Page 161 - Some Dance to Remember

Some Dance to Remember 131

and the first to leave.”
“The doc,” Thom said, “told me and mom that he could go on like
this for an hour or a year.”
“We all know that,” Kweenie said. “Every episode he’s had has been
like that.”
“I have a wife and kids,” Thom said. “I have to live my life.”
“So do I,” Kweenie said, “but I don’t make up excuses to cover my
selfishness. You’ve always hated it here. You’ve always hated us. You even
hate yourself.”
There was no stopping Thom. He said good-bye to Charley-Pop and
kissed Annie Laurie and headed for the airport.
Ryan was pleased. With Thom gone, he had their old room with the
big bed to himself. In the darkness of the Midwest night he sprawled
across his faded Roy Rogers bedspread with his cock in his hand and
visions of Kick in his head. Masturbation seemed unholy with his father
unconscious and his mother asleep down the hall in her room. But cum-
ing felt like being alive.
He wrote November 1, 1979, in his Journal:

Some Halloween yesterday in this horror show of a hospital.
I’m a pervert, not because I’m sexual, but because I’m a writer. I
want to be here when he dies, not only because I am his son, but
because I want to watch his face, his breathing, the twisting of
his body. I want to remember the look on his face and the look
on my mother’s face. I don’t want him to die, but if he has to die,
I want to watch. I want to know the sights, sounds, and smell
of his Death. A father’s Death is always a sneak preview of the
son’s. I want to comfort him. I want to know what I will feel in
those last moments watching the man whose seed I am slip away
forever. I make no apology. I am what I am. I got that from Walt
Whitman, not Popeye or Harvey Fierstein.

Ryan waited another four days. Charley-Pop remained unconscious
but stable.
“It’s for you,” Kweenie said. She handed him the phone.
“Kick!” Ryan was surprised. “Of course, I can come.”
Kweenie looked astonished. Kick couldn’t possibly be pressuring
Ryan into returning to San Francisco.
“I need you, coach,” Kick said. “You don’t have to do this, but I’m
asking you this. I’ll never ask you for anything again.”

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