even thinking about it, I hopped off my box and made a beeline after him. The crowd parted, stunned into silence by my sudden action, allowing me to pass.
Mr. Tight Tee was already out on Santa Monica Boulevard when I caught up with him.
“Hey!” I shouted again.
He turned back, surprise on his face.
“Where you going?” I asked.
He seemed flabbergasted that I had followed him. “I’m going home,” he said after finding his voice.
“But it’s early!” I said. “It’s not even midnight!”
His mouth was open, but he didn’t speak. No wonder he was flummoxed. There I was, on the sidewalk, standing in front of him, with dollar bills hanging out of my thong.
“I was hoping,” I told him, “you’d stick around for my break.”
He smiled shyly. “You noticed me from up there?”
“Yeah.” I laughed. “Come on back in with me. I’ll buy you a drink.”
“Really, I can’t,” he said, but I could see that he was flattered. “I have work in the morning. Lesson plans to make out.”
“Lesson plans?”
“I’m a teacher,” he said.
“Hey, Danny!”
I turned. Benny was in the doorway, pissy as usual.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he snarled. “You’ve still got ten minutes on the box! Carlos is still not ready!”
I gave him the eye. “I’ll be right there,” I said, turning back to Mr. Tight Tee—Mr. Tight Tee Teacher, as it turned out. I was impressed. “Not one quick drink?”
He smiled. Man, was he adorable. Green eyes, freckles, sandy brown hair thinning ever so slightly on top. He might be thirty, but he was still adorable. His well-rounded shoulders and defined pectorals were evidence of many hours in the gym. He was only a couple of inches taller than I was. We’d fit well together in bed.
“One quick drink,” I repeated.
He shook his head. “Sorry, but I really have to go. Maybe another time.”
“I dance on Saturday, too. Come back then.”
Suddenly I realized how pathetic I sounded. The absurdity of it all struck me. What was I thinking, running out onto the street, nearly naked, after a man like this? A man so smart and accomplished—a teacher, for God’s sake. A man so far out of my league, he might as well have been another species.
But he just smiled and extended his hand. “I’ll try to come by on Saturday night,” he said.
I brightened, grasping his hand. “Excellent. I’m Danny. What’s your name?”
“Frank,” he said.
“Frank,” I echoed.
But Frank didn’t come on Saturday night. I looked and looked, scanning the crowd all night, but he never showed. It would be some time, in fact, before I would see Frank again.
PALM SPRINGS
I woke early and spent the morning working. Ollie had slipped out sometime during the night, leaving a note, and I felt bad that I hadn’t been able to say good-bye. I figured I’d call him later and thank him for coming down. Just for the heck of it, I lit the candle he had given me and took a photo of it, just as a little wisp of smoke rose upward from the glass. I brought the image up on my computer and changed the color to a bright pink. Then I changed it to yellow. Then I dragged it to the trash.
Randall staggered home then and convinced Frank and me to go out for coffee. It was Saturday morning, after all, and the local java hangout would be packed. On the ride over, I got the scoop on the night before. As it turned out, Randall hadn’t slept with the young blondie Jake Jones. Instead, he’d had a three-way—with the sixtyish Thad Urquhart and his lover, fiftyish Jimmy Carlisle.
“It was far, far better to go with a couple of experienced pros,” Randall told us as we settled into chairs in the courtyard, “who knew what they were doing, who were actually good at it, than go with some eager young tyro who would just lay back and make you do all the work.”
Both Frank and I laughed out loud. All around us, shirtless men with hairy, distended bellies were sunning themselves, their poodles and Welsh terriers sniffing through the grass. A coterie of boys, probably from WeHo, sat under a tree, sipping lattes and laughing in that high-pitched way coteries of young gay boys always did. The sun was high over our heads, the mountains sparkling gold and copper behind us. In another hour it would be too hot to sit out here, the sun beating down with all its late summer power, sending us scurrying inside like desert rats exposed to the light by overturning a rock.
“Admit it, Randall,” Frank said, “this Jake kid just wasn’t going to put out. Otherwise, you would’ve been all over him.”
“I’m tired of kids,” Randall sniffed, aiming the straw of his mocha freeze at his lips. “All week long my practice is full of them. Screaming, bratty kids who don’t want me poking in their mouths. I don’t need that when I date as well.” He paused for emphasis. “I want a man.”
He’d been saying exactly that for as long as I’d known him, and that was a long time. Boys had never served Randall well, starting with me. Ike was thirty-one, and since Randall was ten years older, I supposed he still counted as a boy.
“He was cute, though. I’ll give him that,” Randall said, day-dreamy.
“Jake, you mean,” I clarified.
Randall nodded. “You saw him, Danny. Didn’t you think so?”
Randall seemed to have conveniently forgotten his idea that Jake had been cruising me last night, and I certainly wasn’t going to bring it up now. I just shrugged. “He was all right, I guess. I don’t usually go for blonds.”
Randall nodded. “That’s because you’re blond. We always want what we aren’t. What we don’t have.”
We were silent on that, sipping our iced drinks in the sun, seeming to ruminate on the wisdom of his words, or maybe their absurdity. My eyes wandered over to the boys under the tree. They were goofing around, tickling each other. I couldn’t help but smile.
“I think I know Thad Urquhart,” Frank said after a bit, stroking the bristles on his chin. He hadn’t shaved this morning, and I noticed how very white his whiskers looked in the sunlight. “The name is very familiar.”
“He’s a big real estate guy,” Randall said. “You should see his house. Gorgeous! Right at the foot of the mountain in Las Palmas. He’s on the city council, too. A real mover and shaker in town.”
The Palm Springs City Council was almost entirely gay, and the mayor was gay, too. The latest estimate was that 60 percent of the population was homo. Anecdotal evidence suggested it could even be higher than that. You couldn’t go to a restaurant anywhere in town without seeing several tables full of queens, and sometimes a scattering of dykes. I remembered when Randall and I, all those years ago, had celebrated West Hollywood’s independence. A city all our own, we’d declared. Now it was almost commonplace. Palm Springs was even gayer than WeHo now, it seemed.
“Anyway,” Randall was saying, “Thad and Jimmy are giving a party next weekend, and I want you guys to come with me.”
I raised my eyebrows. “You’re coming back to the desert again next weekend?”
Randall smiled. “If it’s okay with you guys.”
“Of course, Randall,” Frank said. “You know you’re always welcome.”
“I don’t know about that,” I said, smiling over at my husband. “I might be getting a little tired