Love Slaves of Helen Hadley Hall by James Magruder

Author:James Magruder
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: gay, gay fiction, gay novel, yale, gay literary, james magruder
Publisher: Chelsea Station Editions

It took a dorm emptied of Americans for Randall Flinn to get a taste of what he had originally envisioned Yale would be like. Over break he spent his afternoons reading and writing in Sterling Library. It felt positively monastic to be tucked inside a carrel in the sixth-floor stacks, the insights of scholars past carved and inked into the sides of his desk and on the little shelf above his head. The mullioned windows cast streaks of wan winter light on his notes; the air smelled of iron and of leather dust; and Randall would pause with pleasure to listen to the creaking cage of the old book elevator, then to the soft hobble of a shelver, bent with age, rolling a full cart of treasures to the end of every row.

He gloried in the Mass of Christmas Vigil at St. Mary’s, sang carols with a full throat and open heart, and ignored as best he could the growing pile of message slips from Debi left for him at the front desk. On New Year’s Eve, after a carillon concert at Woolsey Hall, he and Lakshmi Dawat rang in 1984 on the Hadley roof. They’d brought a bottle of port for fortification, recited Blake, Tennyson, and the Brownings from memory and had made it halfway through “The Eve of St. Agnes” before their teeth began to chatter. Descending the rickety metal ladder behind Lakshmi, Randall, whose rugburns had faded, made his resolution. Second semester he would mount—and stay astride—a higher horse. That would mean breaking with Debi and avoiding any conciliatory gestures from Silas Huth. He would take meals in his room, use the stairs instead of the elevator, and redouble his academic efforts.

Twelfth Night had come and gone, and Randall was hardly the King of Kings, but the day before classes began, he received three visitors bearing gifts.

Debi was first, caroming into his room with a Bendel’s bag. She kissed him and plunged her hands up his shirt for warmth. He yelped from the cold.

“Honey, we have to dye my hair!” she said.

“We do? Why?”

“I got it! I got Irina! I checked the call-board! We start tomorrow!”

The drama school call-board was the barometer of thespian worth. Mighty Merle posted new cast lists every week, and his assignments were scrutinized with the science the court physicians once brought to royal waste at Versailles. Going from Helga Two to Irina, the prettiest Prozorov in The Three Sisters, was solid indication of Merle’s confidence in Debi.

Randall, holding her tight, forgot his resolution in a trice. "Why do we have to dye your hair?” His body had a better idea.

“Irina’s an aristocrat. The dye’s in the bag. It’s a honey blonde.”

Randall couldn’t picture it. Debi had frizzy brown curls, and two weeks in St. Kitts had deepened her complexion. "What about a wig?”

“This is the first-year ‘realism project,’ Chekhov, Ibsen. A wig isn’t realism.”

“Neither is hair dye.”

“I have to kill with this part. My whole career depends on this part.”

“I thought your whole career depended on Helga Two.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.