“Everything has progressed as expected, and the speakers are almost done.”
I nod. “Okay.”
“We need you on stage, whenever you are ready.”
I glance down at my watch and note the time, the second hand creeping past the half-hour. Already, four days have passed without him. I feel his absence in the house, in the hushed silence of the staff, the lack of life in the air. I stand and smooth the front of my jacket. “I’ll come now.”
* * *
The street is full, brightly colored ropes of cafe lights and flowers stretched between the buildings, the sea of people packed beneath them. Later tonight, there will be a catwalk that stretches halfway down the street, through the thousands of bodies currently packed in the space. I look to the end of the street, where the crowd continues. “The main road is closed?” I ask Mario sharply, spotting the police lines, the horseback officers moving through the crowd.
“Yes. They’ve filled the next block over too. We are speaking to the police now about crowd control and moving further east to try and keep the crowd off the avenue.”
It’s the biggest crowd we’ve ever had, and there is a sharp flare of pain at the fact that Vince can’t see this, the outpouring of love, the visual proof that he lived, he affected, he inspired. I step onto the stage and nod at The Who, shaking each of the band members’ hands. They will kick off the party, playing their hits from the 60’s, before turning over the stage to the Kinks. The Celebration of Life will last over ten hours and will evolve in both its music and decor, spanning the five decades of Vince’s life, the theme changing every two hours.
I glance at my watch, then back at the crowd, their chants subsiding as I approach the microphone.
“We love you, Marco!” From the middle of the street, a woman screams and there is a general chuckle that moves through the crowd.
I smile and work the microphone loose from its stand. Lifting it to my mouth, I speak.
“Four days ago, I lost a man I’ve loved for a decade, a man who many of you also loved. We lost a man who cared for this community in ways that I struggle to explain. You supported his lifestyle. You supported his brand. You supported his passion, and most of all, you supported his fashion.”
A cheer starts at the end of the street and swells, thousands of hands clapping and voices lifted in support. Someone turns on their cell phone’s flashlight and the trend catches on, thousands of lights suddenly lifted and waved in the air, illuminating the dusk with a sea of white specks.
“Tonight is the first annual Vince Horace Memorial event,” I continue, swallowing a bit of emotion that comes at the physical wave of support. “We will spend the next two hours celebrating the 1960’s, and all that it brought to our world and to the fashion industry.” Against the backdrop of the north building, an image flickers to life, a thirty-two story photograph of a baby Vince. “This is the decade that Vince Horace was brought into our world. It was the beginning of the Gay Liberation movement.” At the mention of the movement, the cheers increase, the energy rising. Beside me, a butler extends a glass of champagne, which I take. “Now, we will toast and celebrate the birth of gay liberation and the greatest man I, or fashion, have ever known.” I lift my glass and wait a moment, watching as a sea of tuxedoes move into the crowd. “Vince, we love and miss you dearly.”
There is the synchronized pop of hundreds of champagne bottles, and the band dives into song, the cheers reaching a new crescendo as I tilt back the glass and down a thousand dollars’ worth of champagne.
Funny how, with a crowd of so many, a man can feel so alone.
Chapter 10
AVERY
The closest spot is two blocks away and I shove the SUV into park and fly out of it. Slamming the door shut, I sprint forward, the curb hidden in the dusk and catching my toe. I right myself, take a deep breath and keep running, Andrei’s building bobbing into view as I manage two cross streets without being hit.
The door to his office sticks, and I slam my shoulder into it, my entrance inside more of an uncoordinated tumble, rather than a step.
Marcia looks up at the sound, her greeting cut short when she sees me. “He’s on the phone.”
I straighten, wheezing a little as I move forward and almost collapse on her desk. “Please tell me that my letter didn’t go out.”
“The overnight to New York?” She raises one fuzzy, untamed brow, her Russian accent still thick despite the years. “It picked up. A delicious mailman.”
“Noooooo.” I groan, sliding down the front of her particle board desk and onto the cheap carpet. “Tell me you’re joking.”
“Nope. Dee-licious. Tight juicy ass. A new one.”
“Not the mailman.” I glare at her, and I liked her better before she mastered the English language. “The package. Tell me you’re joking about the package.”
“It’s gone, apyr.” She pokes at my hand, pushing it off her desk with one sharp jab of her pen. “Now go. I have work to do.”
Gone. Poof. Stuck in the back of some juicy-assed mailman’s truck. Tonight, it’ll be on a plane, flying to New York for a morning delivery. “Can you have it redirected?” I call out.
“With the post office?” She snorts in a manner that inspires little confidence in our nation’s mail service. This is my fault—using Andrei’s cheap ass. Any other attorney would use FedEx, my package instantly found, stopped, and returned to where it belongs—the trash can.
I moan, kicking my feet out and crossing my arms over my chest. I hear footsteps and slide right, peering around the edge of Marcia’s desk and seeing Andrei’s thin build move down the hall. “Andreeeei….” I groan.
“Oh God.” He stops beside me, hands on his hips, and looks down. “Tell me you’ve got some sort of protective layer between yourself and this carpet.”
“Tell me you didn’t mail that letter.”
“We mailed the letter.” He turns to Marcia. “Did it get picked up?”
“I told her. It got picked up.”
He looks down at me. “It got picked up.”
“Thanks,” I snap tartly.
“Having second thoughts?” He crouches down, cupping his hands under my armpits and pulling me off the floor.
I refuse to support myself, keeping my legs limp, my weight heavy on him. “You shouldn’t have sent it. You knew I would regret it.”
“You guys want to move this conversation somewhere else?” Marcia calls loudly. “I got work to do.”
I glare in her direction, then look back to Andrei. “I don’t like her,” I whisper loudly.
“Yes, I know.” He smiles. “You’ve mentioned it several times.”
“She was checking out the mail guy,” I say loudly. “She called his ass juicy.”
“Bitch,” Marcia mutters.
Andrei struggles a little under my dead weight, and I don’t assist him, intentionally lolling to one side, my arms hanging like pendulums. He stumbles to the side and attempts to prop me against the wall. “You know I’m billing you for this.”
“What if I’m wrong?” I lift my head, looking up into his face.
He smiles. “Then we’ll get through it.”
Getting through it isn’t an acceptable plan. I push off his chest and stick my tongue out at his wife.
* * *
I buy the ticket without thinking, the airline app making the process too easy, a thousand dollars gone with a few easy swipes of my index finger. Bam. Done. I’ll beat USPS to New York, snag my envelope before it has a chance to be opened, and retain my sanity—and my reputation.
“You’re crazy,” Marcia remarks, settling into my office chair, the plastic creaking under her weight.
“Probably.” I watch the counters work and glance at the clock, working through my timeline. I am cutting it close. It’s already six. I need to finish packing envelopes, drop them off at all three buildings, head home to pack and be at the airport in time for the ten o’clock flight. “Grab that stack. You stuff, I’ll label.”
> She groans, pushing to her feet and moving with absolutely no sense of urgency. “They not going to give you the envelope. You know that?”
I don’t respond. They’ll give me the envelope. If I have to tackle the delivery driver and wrestle it out of his hands myself, I’ll do it. What’s he going to do, call the cops?
“God, this is boring.” She pushes a stack of twenties into the letter envelope with all the care of a drunk hippo.
“You’re getting fifty dollars an hour to be bored. Think of all the fake Vuitton purses you can buy.”
“Hey.” She points one lacquer covered finger at me. “My shit is real.”
“Hey.” I point back at her. “Stuff that shit faster.”
This is why I don’t use her—she talks more than she works. But she’s trustworthy, was available last-minute, and I am officially desperate. I run my hand down the spreadsheet and turn the page. “Come on. We’ve got about fifty left. Hustle.”
I turn away from her and call my heavies, telling them to be here in a half hour. Crossing to the computer, I pull up my email and print out my boarding passes. I glance at the clock. Four hours. If Detroit behaves, we can do it.
* * *
I make the flight, thanks to a brisk jog through the Detroit airport with my backpack. My last-minute ticket puts me in the middle seat, squashed between a chubby man and a kid barely old enough to be out of diapers. I crawl into place, kick my bag underneath the seat in front of me, and pull out my phone. There are a few minutes before takeoff, and I ignore the safety presentation and scroll through recent news stories on Vince Horace. No surprise children popping up. Maybe I’m the only one stupid enough to take that leap.
There is a recent video of his boyfriend, and I click on the image and plug in my earbuds.
“Vince, we love and miss you dearly.”
I watch as Vince’s boyfriend lifts his glass of champagne, the gorgeous movements of that mouth. When he tilts back his head, the glass meeting those lips, my body involuntarily twitches in a pull of need. I shift in my seat. I shouldn’t be looking at his lips. Talk about being weird and creepy. I switch tabs and find another article, one that shows Vince’s house, a huge structure in Manhattan. I glance down at the caption, the address plain as day, available for any tourist or stalker to jot down and visit. I take a screenshot.
The stewardess walks by, pins me with a look of warning, and I stuff my phone in my jacket pocket and pull my seatbelt across my lap. My watch catches my attention and I look down at it. His name shines out from the oyster dial, and I remember the store I bought it in, the haughty salesman and the high price tag. I had liked its funky attitude, the luxurious mix of tiny spikes and fine accents.
It’s funny how life works. It’s a watch I don’t wear often, my absent-minded selection a tipped domino that had started this entire disaster. What if the bartender hadn’t noticed it and pointed out the news story? I probably should have given her a bigger tip. I drop my hand into my lap and think of the man from the video, Vince Horace’s boyfriend. Those lips. That throat.
The guy next to starts to sneeze and I slide lower in the seat and rest my head back.
He probably isn’t my dad, just a guy who looks like him. In all of America, there has to be a thousand guys who resemble thirty-year-old faded photos.
The plane rolls forward, picking up speed, I think about the letter, and everything it asks for. Financials. Medical records. A Paternity test. Andrei was right. We could find out the truth, know the answer for sure.
I tighten my hands on the seat belt and tug at it, checking its secureness as the plane begins to tilt, the engines loud, our takeoff in progress.
It’s too late now. Whether I should be or not, I’m heading to New York. In the morning, sometime before the delivery, I can figure out what I’m doing there.
* * *
Midnight and the taxi line at JFK is as crowded as a theme park in July. It takes twenty minutes and a painfully dull conversation with a German couple about goats to get to the front of the line. I wave goodbye to them, slide into the back of a filthy yellow cab, and read off Vince Horace’s address. Sometime between takeoff and landing, I’d caught blog posts and news articles about his Celebration of Life—a party that seems to be still going on. Assuming I’m not too late, I’m hoping to catch some of it.
A grunt sounds from the driver and is accompanied by a violent shake of the head.
“What’s the problem?”
“Too crazy.” The man waves his hand.
“Too crazy? What do you mean?”
“Too many people. I can’t get there.” He pushes the piece of paper back toward me.
“Just get me as close as you can.” I shut the door and move to the middle of the seat, unwilling to accept a scenario where I get back in that line. After a moment, with an overly loud and annoyed sigh, he pulls forward.
Fifty minutes later, we inch forward in traffic. I look out the window and looking for a cross street, try to see anything through the crowds of people on the curb, sidewalk and street. “Are we close?”
“Too many people.” He slams on his brakes and leans forward, cursing at the crowd and waving at them to get out of his way. They ignore us, a scrawny man in a tutu blowing me a kiss, and the driver reaches forward, flipping the switch on the meter. “Get out here.”
Soooo friendly. Bet this guy has Employee of the Month certificates wallpapering his house.
“This is it?” I look out through the front window and pull out my wallet.
“That way.” He points forward, gesturing in the general direction, with no indication of whether I need to go a half block or six. “You’ll have to walk.”
I pull out eighty bucks and pass it forward, cracking the door open and pushing at it with my foot, grabbing my backpack. I step out of the car and stand, the night cool, the sounds of the city dominated by a song, the music coming from ahead, where the crowd gets even worse. Hitching the bag higher on my back, I jog forward, moving down a broken sidewalk and around people, the area lively, the energy high. It’s a refreshing change from Detroit and I smile at a passing group, veering around two men kissing and lift up on my toes, trying to see what is past the crowd.
Chapter 11
MARCO
There is love in the air. I watch as Madonna waves her arms on stage, and watch two men kiss, my gaze moving over a body-painted couple, writhing together near the stage. By the edge of the party, a Chinese tourist with a selfie stick gets kissed on the cheek by a topless girl with silver hair, wearing angel wings. I look up to the sky, the stars hidden by the city lights, and try to feel Vince’s presence in the crowd.
“Enjoy the show,” I say quietly. “Wish you were here.” He had loved the energy of a crowd. Loved music. Loved anything that made a person feel. It was what he tried to evoke with his fashion and what he’d never found in love.
The song ends and the lights change, the spotlights swinging across the crowd and focusing on the catwalk. A bass beat starts, something strong enough to shake the ground, the soles of my feet vibrating against the balcony. I straighten, crossing my arms, and watch the first woman sweep down the wide stage, dressed in an early 2000s design, the first of a series of outfits selected by Vince.
The model is a pro, one we’ve used before. I watch her spin on five-inch heels and delicately stomp her way to the end of the catwalk, which begins to rise, smoke expelled as the platform spins upward. She stays in place, her hand on her hips, and peers down at the crowd. She spies me on the balcony and blows me a kiss. I nod in return, allowing my eyes to move over her body. She’s too skinny for me. All of the models are—our industry prefers a gazelle-like structure that never did anything for me. Personally, I always liked a woman with curves. A body that didn’t break when I fucked it like I wanted to.
I force my eyes away from the model before my thoughts go too far. But God, I need to fuck. The last time was eighteen months ago in Bermuda. Vince fell asleep in a private cabana ove
rlooking the Pacific, and I went down to the bar. I bought a drink for a forty-year-old divorcee and was in her suite fifteen minutes later. She rode my cock like a champ, sucked my dick like a whore, and never asked my name. It was forty-five minutes of perfection, and I wanted it again less than an hour later.
Except that an hour later, Vince was awake, and we were dressing for dinner and then on the jet and heading back to New York.
Now he’s gone, and I’m fighting to stay in this life, in this role that no longer has a purpose.
The crowd starts to chant, Vince’s name a heartbeat, one that beats, faster and faster, in my chest.
My sentence isn’t over yet.
I push off the railing and turn, stepping inside the house and meeting the eyes of Edward, who waits, as always, to assist. “Get the car ready.”
Chapter 12
AVERY
I have vastly underestimated my possible father.
I realize that the moment I duck under the barricade and enter the Celebration of Life, which is not only still going on, but in full force. It is a street party of outlandish proportions, and it takes forty-five minutes to claw through the crowd, a chant starting, a “Vince, Vince, Vince, Vince,” mantra that doesn’t seem to have an ending point. I’d lived thirty-one years without knowing his face, and these people, all these people seem to worship him. Maybe it’s a gay thing, much of this crowd men, rainbow flags and clothing everywhere I look. I lift my chin, my gaze moving over the opposite building, balcony doors open, strangers visible and chanting along with the crowd, everyone oblivious to the late hour. How is this allowed? Aren’t there sound ordinances and rules to follow? Don’t these people have jobs and kids and obligations? I push through the crowd, needing some space, some freedom from the noise, and find my way to the other side of the street. I stop in the first empty square of sidewalk and take a moment to catch my breath and recover.