The Family of Max Desir by Robert Ferro

Author:Robert Ferro [Ferro, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Gay Men, Murder Mystery, Coming Out, Italian-American Family, New York
Publisher: New York : Dutton
Published: 1983-03-15T04:00:00+00:00

BUT ALL THIS DID NOT OBSCURE THEM to each other. It seemed to reveal in each a few carefully delineated qualities that the other could see and define. Clive was simple, affectionate, generous, superstitious and devoted. Max was moody, frank, independent, volatile and appreciative. These two personality grids seemed to fit over each other easily. It took months for Max to figure out why, and by then he was addicted to the sex, the habit, the convenience, the safety, and ease of it all.

It seemed to fit also that Clive was in love and Max wasn’t. He would have been glad to return some sentiment, or, considering his love for Nick, at least willing; but it never came to him except lightly, in waves of tenderness and affection. These feelings he tried to swell into something more buoyant, something that might lift them both off the ground, if only momentarily. But it never happened. When Clive said, I love you, Max, I want you for my own, Max said, I don’t love you, I already have a lover, you know that. And it would anger him that anything more than sex and simple affection should be expected.

This inequity had a profound effect on them sexually. Max felt as if he had found a wonderful machine of lust, which did not or could not judge, which was constant and would adjust to the moment, the mood and the whim. Clive was in a less comfortable position, the unrequited lover; but access to Max made him feel all the more favored and passionate. He was shy. He had reduced his talk to a set of basic barometric indicators that made conversation circular. This narrowness, which could at times be maddening to Max, was more usually aphrodisiac. There seemed little else to do but make love. He would turn to Clive, filled with demands, needs, quirks, favorite moments to be repeated, and Clive would say, Yes, Max. I’m here for you.

Was there some reason why he should say no to all this? Should he cancel the situation simply because his mind did not go naturally to Clive before he fell asleep at night, lying beside Nick, or because he was not inclined to merge their lives further?

His mother was dying. Two or three times a week he visited her in Hillcrest, arriving in the late afternoon and staying until after dinner when she went to sleep. Her cheeks were swollen, her eyes small and glittery, the glitter of drugs. Each time she had a seizure it lasted longer—a minute, two minutes of repeated explosions in her head.

Max would return to the city and sometimes go directly to Clive’s. He would step into the amber-lit rooms and find the votive candles lighted before the saints and smell the airless perfume, and they would fall on each other and rifle each other’s body like thieves. In the morning Nick was waiting.

Are you all right? he asked. And Max crawled in beside him to be held, thinking of these three separate parts of his life—his dying mother, Nick and Clive.

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