That night, I went to Dupont Circle and waited in the dark for something I wanted, something I needed, but had no idea how it would come, or how it would play itself out. Beloit University loomed over my future like a gold-plated carrot, and since any certainty of college died with my father, I wasn’t sure I wasn’t working for my future like Sisyphus tending his rock. I guess I have Beloit to thank for that analogy. 

Beloit was the genesis of nearly everything I did that year, and everything I did that year involved working for the future. It brought me to the widow’s to help him maintain the garden. I once overheard him telling the widow he thought I was “a great help and a really nice kid.” I was busy working to earn money to pay for a future I wasn’t sure I would get the chance to even have-- and maybe that explains why I was unable to live in the present, unable to let him know I knew he wanted to touch me, and unable to let him know I wanted to touch him, too. There were other reasons. We were dancers dancing different dances. We were reluctant students in need of a teacher, and our need to learn eclipsed our ability to teach. 

He did teach me some things though, and I would often find his words rising from memory years later, like a forgotten planted seed suddenly bursting into a sapling. He was older, and had already been to college. In fact, he'd been to several colleges and had achieved a great amount of success after. I did not understand the difference between a Bachelor’s degree and a Master’s degree then, but he discussed both of them, and I was too embarrassed to admit my limited understanding. He shared some of his successes with me, like his impressive White House post nomination, and he shared memories from his past: his family’s grapevine letters, the experience of snow in New England, and the enchantment of sleeping in Ceylon. He was certain education had been the foundation upon which he became everything he was, and he spoke of it like a believer speaks in the protective power of talismans. 

He would joke with me, and I would start laughing. His words tickled my ears and stomach, and the depth of my laughter would increase until it made my body shake and my sides hurt. I would laugh so hard I would bend over, yielding to the convulsive laughter. It was at these moments, when I was so filled with his presence, that I would ache for him to touch me, but I knew he wouldn’t, and I knew I wouldn’t touch him.

Most times, he would get me laughing so hard I would be unable to stand. I would fall to the ground between the rows of plants the widow bought as seeds during visits to Asia and the Vale of Kashmir. Lying there on the ground, surrounded by plants, I would continue laughing, but I would really be waiting for him to join me, to drop his hands to my head, or to press his crotch into my face. Soon I would become no longer giddy with laughter, but inebriated by his voice, and heady with his presence. 

Nothing pleased him more than making me laugh, except possibly when he gave me advice. He was very generous with his knowledge and experience, and he never made me feel less valuable as a price for it, for despite his reserved and well-mannered nature, when he spoke to you, he was genuinely and actively invested in speaking to you. He spoke with a vibrant and electrifying voice, and his eyes amplified the current when they were trained on you. I had never before, and have never since, seen eyes like his, and I imagine his eyes held the same qualities as Saint Christopher’s, for they carried the promise of unburdened travel to a better place beyond . This may be the compensatory memories of a recently made fatherless child, and I cannot rule this out. However, I will never forget and will always attest to the quality of his eyes, for they seemed to hold the promise of love. 

Night after night, I imagined him dropping on top me and rolling with me in the dirt: the weight of his body on mine, his chest wet with the moisture of sweat, his hands caked with dirt, and my lips and hips rising up to meet him. Instead, I would sit alone in bed, picturing this scene as I touched myself. My response to the guys on the swim team had long since shown me I was gay. This, my garden side romance, was not about actualization; it was about communion, so evening after evening, whenever the appropriate chance presented itself in the veiled safety of our garden, I dropped to my knees before him. 

I actually believed then that my efforts could possibly force the connection he wanted but was unable to initiate, for I was not unaware of his feelings for me. How could I be? His responses to me were intense, frequent, and easy to see. They were verbal and nonverbal, and they were obviously deeply felt. I noted them then, but I only came to understand fully over the years that have since passed. 

I was never more aware of his feelings for me than I was the night I found myself standing beneath the trees in the dark of Dupont Circle, for earlier that day, we'd said our goodbyes. As he walked out to the garden, I knew the widow had told him it was my last day because everything was different. His usual composure was replaced with a raw nervousness, and I couldn't help but notice he was shaking more than the leaves on the plants, which were swaying considerably in an unseasonably cool breeze. 

In our past meetings, I was the one on the ground, but this night, I thought he would find himself there, as he stood before me, unable to steady his legs. His voice was oddly monotone and cold; it lacked its usual electric energy. He was unable to look at me as he said goodbye; however, he expressed enough to wish me well with my future. Then, he simply, but awkwardly, turned and walked away. 

I was unable to watch him walk away, for he was no longer the man I had come to adore; he had become someone-- something-- else, and I did not know who. It seemed we had already parted before we even said goodbye, and the sad thing is, to this day, I cannot remember what our actual last words were. Absence is too often felt only after someone has already gone. 

I knew I would never see him in the garden again, but I was completely aware of his nearby presence as he entered his bedroom, for rage-filled sounds erupted from his window. Something hard was kicked, and I heard the crash followed by sounds of slamming drawers, and curses. In the midst of his cursing, I heard him indict a witch for passing a wand over his bed as he lay sleeping. The angry sounds poured out from his bedroom window and rained over the greenery of the garden as I worked on the azalea bushes.

Eventually, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him through the window. I'm sure he thought I was focused on the liquid poison I sprayed over the azaleas, but I wasn’t. I saw him watching me, just as I had watched him from this very same spot many nights before. If he leaned just right, I could often catch glimpses of him as he sat at his window-facing desk. 

That night in his window, he looked cadaverous. I shivered as this unfamiliar being gazed absently over the garden. I think he must have resembled the pale and sickly Edward the Sixth, who was propped up and displayed at a castle window to convince the crown constituents of the well-being of their king. Tonight even God could not save the king, and Mr. Malone no longer looked liked the man I knelt longingly before so many times in the past. 

I'm certain he heard me say, "goodbye" to the widow and watched as I left through the front gate following me with his eyes as I walked home through the field for as long as he could see me. I am certain, too, that as he walked under the cover of green trees and dropped to his knees, he had no idea it was me he was kneeling before. His lips were cold as they slid over my cock, and this may explain my fetish for ice cubes in bed. In fact, despite it being the warm season, the air around us was cold, and I worried the widow’s flowers would burn in a late frost. 

There he knelt with khaki-covered knees and a maroon polo shirt over his torso, but with the exception of the color of his clothing, he was colorless. His blonde hair looked faded, almost ashen, and the ashen hue of his hair matched his unnaturally pale face. His eyes still stood out. They glimmered like two gray diamonds, glistened coolly, like distant stars, but no longer reflected the object of their attention as they once did. The moment I looked into his eyes it hit me; he honestly had no idea it was my cock he held in his mouth. Malone had withdrawn from the relations of the living, and only a god of the underground could reach him now. 

Cool saliva ran down my shaft as he worked my head with his chilly lips. Unable to bring myself to touch him, I placed my hands on my hips and pulled my pants and boxers further down, allowing my balls to hang freely. They shrank back into the warmth of my body, as he cupped them in his cold hands and continued to work my erection with his mouth. Eventually, the chill of his lips passing over the tip of my cock triggered an orgasm. I came copiously, and as the warmth of my come cooled on his face and lips, a slight wisp of vapor passed between us, obscuring my view of his face. 

He stood as quickly as he'd knelt immediately after I came. He walked away without a word, and for the second time, I only noticed he was gone after he'd already left. I only had a moment to catch a final sight of him as he passed from the cover of trees and disappeared into the city streets. 

I saw him one more time after this. Years later, as I rode the ferry to Sayville, I stood watching the play of moonlight over the water, when I thought I glimpsed his face in a white cap. I trained my eyes harder on the wave to no avail, for it had already folded into obscurity, and there was no night swimmer in sight. However, to this day, I swear that wave carried his face in its white-lipped kiss. 

Copyright © 2002-2003 Decker. All Rights Reserved. May not be re-printed in any form without express written consent of the author. Do not copy or post.