he's staying put. He says
it depresses him, living in the middle of the Castro. So many widowers, he says. But I think it's better he's there.
Especially if he gets sicker. He's got a strong support group of friends.'
'Is whatsisname still around? The kid with the dyed eyelashes?'
'You know his name, Will,' Adrianna said, turning and narrowing her eyes.
'Carlos,' Will said.
'Rafael.'
'Close enough.'
'Yes, he's still around. And he doesn't dye his eyelashes. He's got beautiful eyes. In fact he's a wonderful kid. I
surely wasn't as giving or as loving as he is at nineteen. And I'm damn sure you weren't.'
'I don't remember nineteen,' Will said. 'Or twenty, come to that. I have a very vague recollection of twenty-one-'
He laughed. 'But you get to a place when you're so high you're not high any more.'
'And that was twenty-one?'
'It was a very fine year for acid tabs.'
'Do you regret it?'
'Je ne regrette rien,' Will slurred, sloe-eyed. 'No, that's a lie. I wasted a lot of time in bars being picked up by
men I didn't like. And who probably wouldn't have liked me if they'd taken the time to ask.'
'What wasn't to like?'
'I was too needy. I wanted to be loved. No, I deserved to be loved. That's what I thought, I deserved it. And I
wasn't. So I drank. It hurt less when I drank.' He mused for a moment, staring into middle distance. 'You're right
about Rafael. He's better for Patrick than I ever was.'
'Pat likes having a partner who's there all the time,' Adrianna said. 'But he still calls you the love of his life.'
Will squirmed. 'I hate that.'
'Well you're stuck with it,' Adrianna replied. 'Be grateful. Most people never have that in their lives.'
'Speaking of love and adoration, how's Glenn?'
'Glenn doesn't count. He's in for the kids. I've got wide hips and big tits and he thinks I'll be fertile.'
'So when do you start?'
'I'm not going to do it. The planet's fucked enough without me turning out more hungry mouths.'
'You really feel that?'
'No, but I think it,' Adrianna said. 'I feel very broody, especially when I'm with him. So I keep away when
there's a chance, you know, I might give in.'
'He must love that.'
'It drives him crazy. He'll leave me eventually. He'll find some earthmother who just wants to make babies.'
'Couldn't you adopt? Make you both happy?'
'We talked about it, but Glenn's determined to continue the family line. He says it's his animal instincts.'
'Ah, the natural man.'
'This from a guy who plays in a string quartet for a living.'
'So what are you going to do?'
'Let him go. Get myself a man who doesn't care if he's the last of his line, and still wants to fuck like a tiger on
Saturday night.'
'You know what?'
'I should have been queer. I know. We would have made a lovely couple. Now, are you going to move your
butt? This damn bear's not going to wait forever.'
CHAPTER IV
i
As the afternoon light began to fail, the wind veered, and came out of the northeast across Hudson Bay, rattling
the door and windows of Guthrie's shack, like something lonely and invisible, wanting comfort at the table. The
old man sat in his old leather armchair and savoured the gale's din like a connoisseur. He had long ago given up
on the charms of the human voice. It was more often than not a courier of lies and confusions, or so he had
come to believe; if he never heard another syllable uttered in his life he would not think himself the poorer. All
he needed by way of communication was the sound he was listening to now. The wind's mourn and whine was
wiser than any psalm, prayer or profession of love he'd ever heard.
But tonight the sound failed to soothe him as it usually did. He knew why. The responsibility lay with the visitor
who'd come knocking on his door the night before. He'd disturbed Guthrie's equilibrium, raising the phantoms
of faces he'd tried so hard to put from his mind. Jacob Steep, with his soot-and-gold eyes, and black beard, and
pale poet's hands; and Rosa, glorious