Chapter 157
Beau complied. Once snuggled down with his head on Beau’s chest, he asked the question he had asked earlier. Their eyes were not engaged as Beau said, “I don’t want to make you unhappy or upset, but I want to know you, all of you.”
Jeanne-Marie said, “You want to know what happened—how I got so hideous.”
“You’re not hideous.” Beau snuggled closer, letting his hand trace across Jeanne-Marie’s features. Beau got up on one elbow for a moment to kiss his man lightly on the mouth. He lay back down. “Did someone hurt you?” Beau asked.
He settled back down on the pillow he had fashioned from Jeanne-Marie’s chest and listened, confident that the time had come for Jeanne-Marie to tell his story.
“One of the reasons I was so drawn to helping you was because I could see you were a victim of not only theft, but of a hate crime. Somehow, those hoods pegged you for what you are, and ridiculed and humiliated you for it. The kicking, the blows, those were after you had passed out—there was no need for them if all they had in mind was simple robbery, of relieving you of your valuables. No, they wanted to hurt you—to make you pay for the simple fact of who you were.
“It’s crazy when I put it like that, isn’t it?”
Beau nodded, knowing his simple up and down movement against the flesh of his lover would be perceived as a yes. He traced a finger around one of Jeanne-Marie’s nipples as the man continued.
“But I couldn’t stand to see them hurting you that way. Not only did it outrage my sense of justice and compassion, but it brought back the horror of my own memory.”
Jeanne-Marie stopped speaking then. No words came forth for a long, long time, and somehow Beau knew not to press him to speak. He instinctively realized that Jeanne-Marie was rallying his own internal forces to tell the remainder of his story.
“Once upon a time,” Jeanne-Marie finally went on, “I was a very happy man. I lived in the city I found you in—Seattle—in the neighborhood that is the epicenter of the gay community there—Capitol Hill. I wasn’t anyone special. I was simply a man who was happy with his life, content. Because of an inheritance, I lived independently and the income afforded me the ability to work for a charity organization for people living with AIDS. It was gratifying work and I was glad to do it.
“Through that work, I met my lover, a man named Jerome.” Jeanne-Marie laughed and Beau could tell he was reliving a memory. “Jerome was all I ever thought I wanted—physically, he was my ideal: stocky, muscular with blond hair and blue eyes, the kind of full lips fashioned exclusively for kissing.
“We were happy and went through the phases most couples do—infatuation, fucking like bunnies, limerance, love, and then nesting. When we moved in together, I spouted the same ‘forever’ sentiments as most lovers do when they’re buoyed up by fresh passion and earth-shaking attraction.
“But I really believed we would never—could never—leave the other’s side. We were soul mates. A match made in Heaven. We were each other’s elusive ‘one.’
“Until we weren’t. Until that night, when our fragilely built house of romance came tumbling down because of the same hatred you experienced.”
Jeanne-Marie paused again, his breath coming quicker and Beau wondered if the faster breaths described sobs. But he knew to stay silent.
“I had worked late that night. There was a fund-raiser and I had remained after to help clean up. I remember it was winter and some snow had begun to fall, rare for Seattle. When I finally left, the air was brisk and the flakes coming down muffled the sound around me. It was very late. But, if you know the Hill, you know it’s full of bars, gay ones mostly, and so the neighborhood still had a certain energy as people staggered home, alone or in pairs, from the closing clubs
“I must have looked like one of them. And to those who are out looking for the fun of beating up a faggot, I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, especially when I cut through Volunteer Park as a shortcut back to the place I shared with Jerome.
“In the shadows of trees and shrubbery, they were on me like a pack of wolves, punching, kicking, calling me the same names they called you. Fag. Queer. Pansy. Fudge Packer. One of them proposed raping me.
“But rape was not the ultimate horror they had in store for me.
“Oh no.
“One of them came up with the bright idea to make ‘Pretty boy, pretty no more.’ It happened so fast. I felt something cold splash on my face, what I learned later was a squirt of lighter fluid, then I heard, even among the night sounds, that peculiar friction sound of the wheel of a disposable lighter turning.