Page 91 of Like a Love Story
Reza massages the knots in my shoulders as Stephen strokes my hair. And I keep saying the words.
I want love to be enough. I’ll keep saying it until it is.
When Reza and I leave the hospital, he clutches my hand, which means so much. Usually, it’s me clutching his hand, especially in public. “When Stephen dies...”
“Art, don’t talk like that,” he says. “He might be okay.”
“It would be a miracle,” I say, forcing myself to accept it.
“Miracles happen all the time,” he says, looking to the sky, as if someone up there might be listening.
“When he dies,” I say again, saying each word deliberately, “I don’t think I can stay in this city. It’s just going to feel like a ghost town to me.”
“He’s not dead, Art,” Reza says. “He’s not a ghost.”
“If I go, will you come with me?” I ask desperately. “To San Francisco like we talked about? We could start a whole new life. Our life. No ghosts.”
“Art, we weren’t talking about leavingnow.” Reza looks away from me, like he’s trying to escape this conversation.
“Not right now,” I say, annoyed. “After he dies.”
“You can’t just escape your past, Art,” he says.
“You did,” I say, pushing him. “You escaped your dad. Wouldn’t it be harder if you were in Iran, in the place where all your memories of him reside?”
“It probably would,” he says. “But I didn’tchooseto escape. My mom moved our family.”
“All the more reason to choose your own fate,” I say. “Don’t you want to create your own life?”
And then he says something that stops me cold. “Would I be creating my own life by followingyousomewhereyouwant to go? I didn’t even apply to any schools on the West Coast.”
Shit. He’s so right. Here I am asking him if he’d followme, without even considering what he wants, or what he’s planned.
“I’m sorry,” I say, my voice laced with regret. “I guess all I want to know is that whatever happens, we’ll be together.”
He looks at me with certainty and says, “I’m not going anywhere if you’re not.”
Judy
We move in with him. We are “his” girls. He uses the possessive to claim ownership of us, and for a few days, he truly does possess us. He possesses our time, our energy, our tears, and our thoughts. We do everything we can to make him eat. We sit on either side of him and watch old movies until he falls asleep. Morbidly, he chooses movies about illness. He says it makes him feel less alone to see glamorous women dying onscreen. We watchDark Victorythree times. Suffering is so beautiful in that film, each moment of disease romantic, deserving of a sweeping score and those epic Bette Davis close-ups, her eyes misty and searching. But nothing about Stephen’s suffering is beautiful. He smells. He sweats. The diarrhea is so bad that he can’t control it anymore. My mom cleans everything: the clothes, the soiled sheets, the toilet. She tends to him like he’s her child, and not herbig brother. And I get the strange experience of seeing how doting my mom must have been when I was a baby, to see how great of a mother she is. Sometimes he doesn’t make sense. He calls me José, or Art, or Bonnie. And sometimes he makes so much sense. He looks me in the eyes, his eyes being the only part of his body that still has any remnant of glow, and he says something so simple and so true. “Judy, when I’m gone, I want you to love yourself as much as I love you.”
Often, he’s angry. This is a side of him I have rarely seen. He screams at my mom, at me, but mostly at himself. He hates what’s happening to him. He’s not ready. He wants to die. He doesn’t want to die. He hates Ronald Reagan. He hates the FDA. He hates that Marilyn died before she could prove herself. He’s furious that his mother won’t come see him. He wants to hurt every bully from his high school. He wants to forgive the bullies, too. He works on a playlist of songs that he wants played at his memorial. “After You’ve Gone,” by Judy Garland. “Don’t Leave Me This Way,” by the Communards. “Friends,” by Bette Midler. “Once upon a Time,” by Donna Summer. Songs that are at once sad and celebratory. He explains to us that the best dance songs are full of longing. They’re about the desire to celebrate desire, because a dance floor is a place to morph your sorrow into grace. We listen to his song choices. Sometimes, for a few seconds, he has the strength to dance, so we dance. We belt out “The Way We Were,” by Barbra Streisand,like we’re auditioning for a girl group. The three of us. I barely sleep. My mom lets me skip school, and she doesn’t go to work. We will be there when he goes. We’ve promised that to him, to each other, to ourselves. But being there requires vigilance, little sleep. Existence is hazy. Jimmy, Art, and Reza are with us often. Activists come and go. A lawyer from the immigration firm stops in to check Stephen’s will. Drag queens sit by his bedside and sing. Only one person is missing. His own mother. My grandmother. My mom calls her twice a day, begs her to come, tells her she will forever regret not making peace with her son before he goes. But she never comes. I only talk to her once. I think maybe there will be a different result if the message comes from her granddaughter. So I take the receiver, and I say the word “Grandma,” and then I break down in tears and can’t say another word. I don’t even know if it’s exhaustion or anger or disinterest, but I realize I can’t speak to her. I don’t have the energy for her, for anyone but Stephen. I thank the heavens that he has my mom, and me, and that he created a family for himself, his queer family.
“Hey, where’s that bottle of wine?” he asks, his voice clearer and stronger than it’s been in days. In the hospital, with those tubes pulled in and out of his throat, he could barely speak. Now, his body is weak, but he can get a sentence out without gasping or clearing his throat.
My mom is roasting a chicken, hoping she can get him to eat some simple food. And I’m her sous chef, learningso much from her. How to give, how to care, how to be patient.
“Stephen,” she says, “I’ll pour you some more Gatorade.”
“Give me the wine,” he demands. “I’m done with fluorescent liquids.”
My mom stops cold. She turns to me, her eyes welling, and asks, “Judy, can you get the wine?”
I don’t understand her reaction, but I go ahead and search the kitchen for that special bottle of wine that Art’s parents gave my parents, a bottle that my mom once said probably cost more than all the wine she’s had in her life. It’s a red bottle from France, and it’s older than Stephen. I stare at the date on the bottle and I resent it. Why does this wine get to stick around longer than he does? I find a wine opener, and I realize I have no idea how to use it. I fumble with it for a few moments, frustrated. My mom approaches with a tender hand on my shoulder. She doesn’t take the bottle from me, though. Instead, she guides me. And then she pours three glasses, though mine is more like a quarter glass.
We sit by his side and raise our glasses. “To my girls,” Stephen says, and we all take a sip. The wine tastes rich and deep, almost like you can feel how old it is.
“To you, Stephen,” my mom says, with so much love in her voice, “who always lived with so much courage.”
