Prettyboy

26: Embers

Do you really believe that emotional distress can manifest itself into physical symptoms? Because I did not—not until after fleeing Camden's (and Gerard's, one would suppose) little cave hole, and after watching my old home grill like a piece of toast at your next-door-neighbor's yard party.

Just when I needed to be there for Robert and let him yell on top of his lungs at me for once, because he was exhausted, I believe I collapsed. Since I was a little kid, I often had those haphazard symptoms. At least once every month, my temperature would be higher than average and I would faint or get sick out of nowhere. Once I hit puberty, the whole condition went away. But at my age, which was thirty-eight back in '69, reaching a high temperature could be very ominous. So, Robert and Paul took me to the hospital, where I awoke about an eternity later. I think, in my fever, I had studied those blank white walls of the ward and thought I was getting absorbed by their drabness. Not much later, the very first day, I asked the nurse to paint something on them because they were so unbelievably white—never mind her frustration, I talked her into drawing something on the wall opposite me that hardly resembled an elephant. That is all I remember from my days at the hospital.

"Good Lord," was the first thing I heard Paul say when he acknowledged my coming to, "you gave Robbie such a scare. The man thought he'd upset you so much you had a heart attack."

And perhaps a heart attack would not have been so bad, I soon came to realize. I was already aching from the happenings of the day before, so my heart stopping would put a terminal end to my pain. My fists were clenched once I remembered how Gerard was probably going on with his day with someone who was hanging out and horsing around. 

Sometime in '68, you remember, I was spending my time being very artfully lustful. So, naturally, during that time I did not keep a list of the people I slept with. Who would? I never bothered learning names, apart from those that I happened to come across more than twice and those were usually the ones that superficially resembled Gerard. It is pathetic when you think about it. More than pathetic, it was in fact hurtful, because, sometime during 1968, I must have met a blond guy named Camden. I do not recall the bar, though I assume it was the very one next to his apartment. I did recall Camden's face so very vividly, however. I recalled that once we arrived at my place, he admitted to having admired me in the past. The skunk knew me; I did not particularly care about the lack of morality in sleeping with one of your fans or whatever, so, nothing held me back. The thing is, he did not hold himself back at all, and things happened. The sex happened; he was not allowed to play innocent in front of Gerard. That right was taken away from him the moment he slept with me. It was nothing out of the ordinary for me, he was nothing out of the ordinary. Once we were finished—and I did remember this very well because it hardly ever happened when I brought people home—he did not stay the night and he was out the door in a mere few minutes. I might've been a bit cold with one-night things but this caught my attention. 

It is no complex jigsaw to put together. During that time that those events took place, Camden was alleged to be in a relationship—whatever that signified—with Gerard. They could not have been in what you now call an 'open relationship', this is clear—it involved too much for Gerard, and, as he said, he was already hurt by me. So, you cannot blame me for coming to the conclusion that this Camden was a halfwit cheater. I spent my time in the hospital cursing him and absolutely everyone, because, why, in God's name, did it have to be him in all of New York?  Other times, in the hospital, I thanked God because now I had a verdict. Gerard could leave his in-quotation-marks and moron-of-a lover—he had to, didn't he? I mean, look at me, who has been cheated on and has cheated before. I left my cheating wife and my wife left cheating me. It was not like Gerard and Camden were married, so the process of leaving Camden to bask in his shame would be ostensibly easier. This was my thinking. My plan, not completely devised.