Page 428 - Some Dance to Remember

398 Jack Fritscher

That’s why he could never be responsible for anyone’s hap-
piness. That’s what he meant when he said I didn’t know what it
was like to be inside a body like his.
He knew I could do what he could not.
I never meant love to be a contest.
I didn’t mean to win. Not the way he thought I did when he
said he hoped to love Logan the way I loved him. At least with
Logan he tried. But he failed. Logan left him too.
He said he preferred communicative men to competitive
men. In his mind, did he see me as a competitor? Did he feel me
outstrip him in love? Did he think he had lost that competition?
A competition more important than bodybuilding. Is that what
turned him to steroids? Fear of not being big enough for love?
Fear of losing? Fear of losing to other bodybuilders the way he
feared he had lost to me? I didn’t think he was that competitive.
I didn’t think winning meant so much to him. Has he lost his
love of sport? Did he think in love, someone wins...and someone
surrenders?
Love is not a physique contest.

“You’ll never catch on, will you?” Kweenie said.
Ryan drove her to the airport. “Give January my regards,” he said. He
headed back to the City to call Teddy.
“What do you want?” Teddy was suspicious on the phone.
Ryan had spotted Teddy the day before on Castro. He had looked
unhappy. Ryan had heard rumors of fights between Teddy and his leather-
man lover. He decided to invite Teddy over for supper to ask him about
the possibility of reconciliation; but on the phone he was clever enough
not to reveal his motive. Ryan feared sex with strangers; Teddy was not
Kick, but he had been, before Kick, the most Ryan had known of love.
Ryan knew Teddy inside out. Teddy was safe.
Somewhat reluctantly, Teddy agreed to come. He was a sucker for a
free meal.
Ryan carefully prepared the exotic lasagna that had always been
Teddy’s favorite. The kitchen filled with a warmth it had missed for years.
Ryan and Kick had always eaten out. The only kitchen appliances they
had ever used were the refrigerator and the blender. Ryan hoped against
hope that a reconciliation with Teddy might be the best antidote to the
strain of Kick’s absence.
“I’ll tell you one thing,” Solly had said. “When you pushed Kick you

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