Rick

No matter how far away I get there is always a little light burning in the back of my mind that I can't shut off. About him. About Rick. The first - the one they say you never get over. How cliche to be part of that club, but it's true.

I once heard Billie Holiday sing a song and the lyric goes, "He's not much to look at, he's nothing to see I'm glad that I'm living and lucky to be. I've got a man crazy for me. He's funny that way."

He wasn't really physically attractive. I found a picture of him years after, and I thought, who is this guy with this bad skin and smug expression? Can't be the man - boy - I fell in love with - back in college for Christ's sake - two hundred years ago? Back when I was young and gay. And now I'm just...(don't say it, you bitches).

The thing about Rick was that he radiated the whole "golden American Dream boy" thing. Bad skin not withstanding (which wasn't that bad - I just never saw a flaw in him back then) he radiated truth, justice, and the American way. Far from having the Lavender Gene, he was captain of the soccer club, straight A's, he knew everything from how a tape recorder worked (beyond me) to the latest news from Nicaragua. I wanted to be near him, to bask in that and have it rub off onto me by osmosis.

For some unknown reason him wanted to be near me. Maybe it was my singing (I was the best at James Caldwell Junior High), my acting (star of every play) or -- could it be -- just me?

Couldn't be that.

But somehow I ended up coming to his house for toast and coffee after his parents went to work. His father was a salesman and his mother - well -- I think she used to zoom around town with her flying monkeys.

But there I was, at his piano singing something - some torch song I'm sure - and I suddenly felt him come up and put his arms around me from behind. His face got very close to my cheek and he said, "You're amazing."

More to come. Off to work now.