Mukhankin was there. He’d called the gallery and pretended to be from Out Loud—why not?—and asked the woman who answered if there was an artist named Novak whose work would be featured. “I don’t see that,” she’d said. And Yale had leaned his head all the way back, left his chin and Adam’s apple pointed at the ceiling until his neck ached.
At least Nora had died believing she’d given Ranko his show, but whatever part of Yale believed in an afterlife (he was trying to believe, at least, lately) felt he’d let her down enormously. She’d trusted him, had left Ranko’s legacy in his hands alone, and he’d failed. And it had been her own work, too, even if she hadn’t seen it that way. Yale had wanted, more than anything, to see Nora’s portrait of Ranko on the gallery wall, next to Ranko’s portrait of her—a secret triumph only a couple of people would ever understand. And now it was all relegated to some storage closet. When he thought about it, his throat constricted. He hadn’t told Fiona the news yet; telling her would feel like telling Nora.
Yale and Fiona sat by the Dubuffet another half hour, but then they could hear everyone coming down Clark, and then they were there with their wind-battered signs, sweaty and hoarse. George Bush, you can’t hide! We charge you with genocide! There were news crews now, running backward in front of the mass. He spotted Asher right near the front, and Teddy too. Teddy was doing a postdoc at UC Davis, but he was back for this, and he’d caught up with Yale at the vigil. He was tan and happy, and he’d gained a few pounds, in a good way.
Yale and Fiona joined the chant: Health! Care! Is a right! Health care is a right! Whatever momentum he’d lost from their detour to the hotel, he easily picked back up again.
When was the last time he’d yelled? He’d yelled at Cubs games. He’d yelled at Charlie when they were breaking up. But he hadn’t yelled about AIDS. He hadn’t yelled at the government. He hadn’t yelled at the forces that had denied Katsu Tatami health insurance, at the county hospital system that had made Katsu wait two weeks for a bed when he couldn’t breathe and then let him die on a ward that smelled like piss. He hadn’t yelled yet at this new mayor and his lip service. He hadn’t yelled at the universe.
Fiona took his hand and led him into the fray, and they wove their way toward Asher. Asher was busy yelling into his megaphone, but he winked at them, and when he lowered it he said, “You okay?”
Yale said, “You know what this feels like? It’s like coming out all over again. I’m in the middle of downtown, shouting about being gay. I’m shouting about AIDS. And it’s amazing.”
“Stay with me, okay? You want these?” Asher reached into his pocket, pulled out a roll of Silence = Death stickers. “Put them everywhere. My friend stuck one right on a horse!”
Teddy bounded up, told them that back at the corner—Yale couldn’t see that far, but he heard the roar from that direction, the whistles and shouting—women had thrown fifteen mattresses into the street to represent the beds that lay vacant from understaffing. They were lying on them, making an impromptu women’s ward.
But then Fiona pointed up, and then everyone started pointing up: Five guys were climbing out a window and onto a ledge of the County Building. They quickly affixed their banner below the state flag: “WE DEMAND EQUAL HEALTH CARE NOW!” Asher started jumping up and down, shouting their names. He said to Yale, “They were in straight drag! They had on button-downs!” Now they wore ACT UP shirts.
It must have been a full minute before the police appeared behind the men and dragged two of them away. The three that remained pumped their fists to the chanting. The whole world is watching! The whole world is watching! And although Yale couldn’t imagine it was true—would this really earn more than a thirty-second spot on the news?—it felt good to shout it. When the cops came back, those last three clung to the very edge, the flagpole, the banner itself. They looked ready to scale the entire building like Spider-Man. Fiona buried her face in Yale’s shirt. Yale wanted to look away too, but he made himself watch as the police dragged them in by the legs.