San Francisco
Part 21

I was surprised when Spencer announced that he was going to church with his folks. "MM and his mom usually come with us. You can stay here with Willie if you want. I'll be back in an hour or two."

"Why church?"

"Why not? Besides, the music is always awesome. Organ, brass, timpani, and choir. You wanna come?"

"Uh... thanks, but... well, I'm not really a church guy. What does Marc think about it?"

"My being a confirmed Anglican? He's cool. Just 'cause he's into Judaism doesn't mean we can't be friends, or even lovers for that matter. Anyway, it's a family tradition... his and mine."

"And Willie?"

"He's got the rest of his life to figure out what he wants to believe in," Spencer said as he rose from the table. "I've gotta get dressed."

By the time Spencer had reappeared, Willie and I had done the breakfast dishes.

"Whoa!" was all I could say when I saw the tall windsurfer in a suit. He looked so different! Kinda businesslike and sophisticated.

"You approve?" he smiled.

"Jeez. You look way, way important. I've never seen you in a suit... well, not counting your birthday suit. It's hard to know who you really are... the windsurfer, the musician, the student, the farmer, the guy I slept with last night. How can you be all those things?"

"Just 'cause a brick has six sides doesn't mean it's not a single brick," he grinned, then headed for the door. "Back soon, guys. Behave yourselves."

"Feel like a coffee?" Willie asked once the sound of the Bronco's motor faded as it headed down the road.

"Cool. What do you believe in?"

"Huh?"

I watched Willie fill the electric jug with water, then turn on the power before I spoke again. "Spencer said you had the rest of your life to figure out what you wanna believe in."

"I believe in Spencer."

"I mean God and stuff."

"Spencer is God... at least to me he is. He's everything that's good. You mentioned Marc before. Not long ago, Marc phoned Spencer from Israel and told him that his dad had pulled a few strings and found Bene in jail somewhere on the West Bank. Charged with treason against PA. Spencer freaked when he heard the news, and asked his dad if he could fly to Israel to help. His dad agreed, and said he'd go with him. He'd booked an early flight to Tel Aviv from LA the next day, which meant Spencer and his dad would need to catch the red-eye from SF to LA that morning. I told them I'd stay here and look after Bugsy and the house."

Willie poured the coffees, then took them out to the redwood deck as I followed him. "Anyway," he continued, "after Spencer had calmed down, his dad set up a three-way phone convo between him, Spencer, and Marc's mom. Spencer, meantime, had reasoned that there was nothing he could do about Bene's imprisonment. What was he gonna do in Tel Aviv? Pull a Rambo and break Bene and his buds outa jail? Besides, he wouldn't have been able to see Marc 'cause he was on patrol off Gaza."

"So he didn't go?"

"Spencer's dad knows his son pretty well. He understood that Spencer wanted to help his friends, but he also knew that Spencer's common sense would ultimately prevail, and that Spencer would see the folly of his mission after he'd calmed down and had a chance to think it through."

"Do you think Spencer's dad would've gone with him if he hadn't changed his mind?"

"Who knows? Probably. But Spencer's final exams were right around the corner at the time, so travelling to Tel Aviv would've screwed things up for Spencer as well. Anyway, as we'd already suspected, Bene had taken up the Palestinian cause. He and three buds, all Israeli, were caught in area A -- which is Palestinian territory -- with contraband, which consisted of huge backpacks of food and supplies that they were delivering to families they knew."

"They were there illegally?"

"Yeah, but they were hardly spying or any of that shit. But that's what they would've been charged with. All of them being Arabs made no difference. Anyway, after quite a while in jail, they were allowed to make phone calls. The government figured that the guys would be used as bargaining tools by Arafat's thugs, and negotiations had already begun. Marc or his mom didn't know where Bene and his buds were being held... only that they were being treated well... so that was a relief. Apparently, there were other guys in the same fix as Bene and his "merry band of brigands". That's what Marc's mom calls them."

"Sounds like a lousy fucking war."

"You know of any good ones? Anyway, so now you know why I believe in Spencer. He's generous, loyal, and a whole bunch of things that I admire. My church is right here... at his house."

"You love him big time, huh?"

"Yep. Want another coffee?"

I wasn't sure if I should ask Willie any more stuff about his relationship with Spencer, but I was totally fucking curious. Besides, I figured I might not get the opportunity to be alone with Willie again.

"It's cool that you offered to look after the house and Bugsy," I said as Willie made another two cups of coffee. "Seems you're always helping around here... the deck... fixing things... knocking walls out."

"Keeps me occupied. And I like doing things for him. This is my second home."

"Where's your first?"

"I don't have one... unless you call a crummy residential hotel room with the bath down the hall a first home."

"You live in a hotel room? What about your folks?"

"What folks? We don't get along."

"But why a hotel room? Why not..."

"Here? Spencer's not ready for a full-time lover... which is what would happen if I moved in. Spencer's like you... he's promiscuous... no shortage of buds. That's not quite true. Actually, he's quite shy... but he still manages to pull the guys."

"What about you?"

I've got a few windsurfer buds... but nobody close. Spencer's the best friend I've got. And I'm pretty close to MM and his mom. You wanna go back to the deck?"

"You wanna tell me how you and Spencer met?" I asked as I placed my coffee on the barbecue table, then sat on the bench opposite the tall hunk.

"You'll need more than coffee, Daniel. So will I."

"You don't have to talk about it if you don't wanna."

"It's not the kinda thing I normally talk about... but... Well, Spencer and I have known each other since he was in second grade. I was a year ahead of him, so I guess we weren't really buds back then. We did speak to each other, though. He was afraid of me."

"Why?"

"'Cause I was tough, I guess. I acted sorta weird, and I was having emotional problems, even then. But I was getting good grades, and I played basketball, so I guess I wasn't that weird. I was the tallest kid in school. By eighth grade, I was six foot... and muscular 'cause I worked out, and still do."

"I can tell. You've got a wicked bod, Willie."

"Thanks. Yours ain't too shabby either, bro, lemme tell ya. Anyway, Spencer and I ended up at the same high school, still a year apart. I'd become a bully by then, and was always picking on the younger kids. I never picked on Spencer, though. I left him pretty much alone 'cept for calling him "Sweetie" once in a while."

"Sweetie? You liked him?"

"No, I didn't like him. I thought he was a wuss. He didn't have a clue what I meant by "Sweetie". He was only fourteen then, and completely innocent."

"So you thought he was cute?"

"Yeah... but I hated myself for it. He was the faggot, not me. At least, that's the way I saw it at the time."

"Spencer was gay?"

"He wasn't anything. Probably asexual. But then Marc arrived on the scene at the start of my third year... Spencer's second. Marc was the best looking guy in the school 'cause he was exotic... a Jew... an Israeli who spoke excellent and correct English with an awesome accent, as well as Hebrew and Arabic. And he played soccer and basketball. The chicks went berserk over him, and so did Spencer. Marc must've been the beginning of Spencer's sexual awakening, even though Spencer didn't realize it at the time. They eventually hooked up, and became best buds. They were hardly ever apart, and when they were, Spencer has since told me, it was torture."

"So that's when Spencer found out he was gay?"

"Not really. He and Marc did all the dating stuff with chicks, but they always double dated. And on weekends they would always spend the night at each other's house."

"They slept together?"

"Nope. No sex... not even playing around. At that point they didn't see themselves as faggots, just best buds and confidants."

"You make 'faggot' sound like a cruel word."

"It was a cruel word. Back then I used it to insult people. And now?" he laughed. "Well, now it's just a word and it means fuck all. Anyway, at that stage, Marc and Spencer were getting a kinda underground rep as being gay, but no one came right out and said it. They were both still virgins, and just laughed off the rumors as bullshit. Meantime, I was hanging with a bunch of sleeze buds and still calling Spencer "Sweetie". We were into pot big time... smoking it up whenever we got the chance. God knows how we weren't suspended or expelled from school. Spencer, on the other hand, was a goodie goodie two shoes."

"Did you hate him for that?"

"Loathed him. He was always better than me... so damn superior. I hated that. One morning in the main school hallway, I asked him where his "kike fag boyfriend" was. He went totally ballistic... arms and fists flying in all directions. But all it took was one punch from me and he was on the floor where I kicked the shit outa him."

"You did that to Spencer?"

"Yeah... not good, huh? I went crazy -- more than crazy -- like I was trying to kill him."

"Jeez! I can't believe you did that! Spencer's such a totally cool guy!"

"I know that now, Daniel, but I didn't then. Or didn't want to. Anyway, my buds dragged me off him, and we went our separate ways... me in a police car to detention, and Spencer in an ambulance to the emergency room with two broken ribs, concussion, and bruised kidneys. He told me later that he'd pissed blood for a couple of weeks."

"Fucking hell! You could've killed him!"

"Tell me about it. Not one of my proudest moments, Daniel. That afternoon, I had a complete mental breakdown. They called it a "psychotic episode". I ended up in a juvenile mental facility."

"Fucking hell!

"You want something stronger than coffee?"

"A beer would be cool."

While Willie was in the kitchen getting the drinks, I was still in a state of disbelief. Willie seemed such a cool guy. How the hell could he have done those things to Spencer? And how could he have ended up as Spencer's friend? Whoa! I was getting one helluva lesson about life, that was for sure.

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