be turned on. This is what I’ve been waiting for my entire life.
And it didn’t feel unnatural, or strange, or wrong. It felt like he had come home. It felt like the most wonderful, thrilling, incredible night of his life.
In the morning they could barely look at each other, and when they did Daniel found himself announcing he wasn’t gay, and Steve agreed. They said it wouldn’t happen again.
Daniel noticed Bee later that day. A woman. Safety. Bee meant not having to travel down a path Daniel wasn’t ready to travel down. Bee meant security. She meant not having to think about his night with Steve, what it really meant, not having to shock his parents, tell his friends, live a life that Daniel didn’t want.
Because he didn’t want to be gay, and he thought if he didn’t want to enough, then he wouldn’t be.
For years it was easy to keep running. At night he would replay that one night with Steve, and the temptation to find it again was sometimes overwhelming. On an overnight trip in Boston to inspect a building the company was thinking of buying, he walked past a gay bar with a few men standing outside, eyeing him up and down, giving him that look that he doesn’t know, but he knows . . . oh how he knows.
In many ways it would be so easy to go inside, he thought, to be led into a back room, to have a nameless, faceless encounter that might put some of these fantasies to rest, might allow him to put it behind him. No one would know, no one would be hurt. But he’s married now, he has his beautiful girls, and if he started down that path there is a part of him that knows there would be no going back.
Secrets become harder to keep the older you get. The things you think you can suppress, those idiosyncrasies and fantasies you hope no one will ever discover, become harder and harder to hide as the years advance.
Partly it is maturity—the fear of discovery grows smaller, less significant, for you learn that none of us is perfect, that human nature is flawed, that life twists and turns in all sorts of unexpected ways and it is okay to end up in a different place to where you expected.
In Daniel’s case the secret is like a tumor, growing larger and firmer deep inside him, refusing to go away by itself, refusing to lie dormant, metastasizing last month when he got a phone call from Steve. Steve, whom he hasn’t seen since his wedding day. Steve, whom he has tried very hard to forget.
“I’m in your neck of the woods.” Steve’s voice was so familiar, but different. “It’s been so long but I thought I’d look you up.”
“It has been years.” Daniel laughed. “How great to hear from you. How’ve you been?”
“Life’s been good,” Steve said. “So how about it? Drinks? Dinner? I’d love to see Bee and I hear you’ve got two beautiful girls.”
Steve came for dinner. Bee made loin of pork stuffed with apricots and prosciutto, and Steve brought two bottles of Pinot Noir.
As soon as he walked in, Daniel knew. Steve hadn’t run with fear from the life that had been calling him for years, Steve hadn’t pretended to be someone he wasn’t. Steve had struggled with it, and then had given in.
“These are our dogs—” he passed photos around as they sat at the table, the girls having gone off to bed—“Mimi and Bobo.” Small Westies sat on the doorstep of a beautiful colonial house. “And this is Richard.” An older, bearded man, smiling on the deck of a boat. “My partner,” he added, although he didn’t need to.
“Not husband?” Bee rescued Daniel from his crippling awkwardness, his heart pounding fast, color rising to his cheeks.
“Not legal in our state, sadly,” Steve said. “But one day we will. We’ve been together almost ten years. The love of my life.” And he looked up and caught Daniel’s eye, and this time Daniel felt shame for a different reason. He felt shame for not being brave enough to do what Steve had done, and envy—oh God, so much envy for Steve having the life that all of a sudden Daniel realized he had always wanted.
They went out after dinner for a drink at the bar at Tavern on Main. Daniel recalled seeing Brokeback Mountain, looking longingly at the characters played by Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger embracing furiously