Little Squirrels Can Climb Tall Trees (17 page)

“For all the sons and daughters! For all of
your
sons and daughters and sisters and brothers!” Kyle yelled.

And as quickly as it started, there was nothing more for them to say. Dozens of conversations started up around the room. Still riding on the emotion of the moment, Kyle gave the woman a hug and then said to her, “Hi, I’m Kyle.”

“Veronica. Pleased to meet you.”

“You’re good!”

“I wouldn’t have said anything if you hadn’t started it by saying what you did. We made a good tag team. Too bad you’re not a dyke or I’d be in love!”

“No, my boyfriend wouldn’t like it if I was a dyke.” They exchanged contact information and agreed to meet for coffee later in the week. The gathering was breaking up, and Kyle needed to say good night to his mother, not at all sure what her reaction was going to be.

He didn’t have to go searching for her, because she found him. “You spoke good, son. What’s made you start speaking up for the gays like that?”

“It’s not ‘the gays’, Mama. It’s me. I’m gay. I’ve been gay my whole life. I was born gay just like I was born tall. I have a wonderful boyfriend who loves me. We live together, and I plan to live the rest of my life with him. I love him dearly. It hurts me deeply, Mama, that you don’t know me at all. But I want to correct that, so I’m telling you a little about who I really am.”

“Don’t say such things!” she scolded him.

“It’s the truth.”

“It’s that man you had me meet last night, isn’t it? He’s the one who’s filling your head with all these lies! Leading you into sin!”

“You didn’t hear a word I said tonight, did you?”

“I heard every word you said.”

“Well, you go think about what I said.” He leaned over, kissed his mother, and said, “Love you, Mama. Sleep well. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

Kyle was so wound up that when he got outside the hotel, he didn’t get into a cab but simply started walking home. Partway there he broke into a run, even though his dress shoes were absolutely not meant for running and they in fact hurt his feet.

W
HEN
he got to the apartment door, he was still breathing hard, and his face was flushed from the cool air in which he’d run. The sound of the key in the lock brought me up off the couch to greet him and to see how the evening had gone. I was surprised by the look on his face when he came into the apartment.

“You okay?” I asked in concern as I saw Kyle breathing hard.

“I’m better than okay. I am an awesome man!”

I wrapped my arms around him and gave him a big hug. “That’s my man! But I didn’t think you’d be in this mood when you got home tonight. What happened?”

“I came out to my mother.”

“You did? Holy crap!”

“Really.” After he pulled off his tie and toed off his shoes, he turned back to me and said, “You might want to watch out tomorrow for angry women with pitchforks—just to be safe.”

“Oh? Must have been quite a night!”

“Oh, it was great. I wish you’d been there.”

“So your mother could jab me with her pitchfork?”

“No, my new dyke friend would have stood in the way.”

“Oh? You go to a gathering of good Christian women and you come home with a new lesbian friend?”

“She prefers ‘dyke’, not ‘lesbian’. And her name is Veronica. She said if I was a dyke, she’d be in love.”

“Oh! Are you considering swinging to the other side, babe?”

“Hah! Not hardly,” he said, and he kissed me so intensely that I thought my toes were going to curl.

“Wow. You’re all butch and manly and take charge tonight. I like it!”

“You bet your sweet ass I’m all butch and manly and take charge. I just took on a room of good Christian women and one pissed off Bible-thumper preaching about ‘the sin of homosexuality’.”

“You’re kidding me! Really? Holy shit!”

“I couldn’t take it anymore so I got up and told all of them about a horrible gay-bashing case we had today. And I told them that if Jesus were there, he’d hang his head in shame at the hate they were preaching in his name.”

“Holy shit, babe! You’ve got some huge boulders between your legs tonight!”

Kyle pumped his fist into the air and said, “Bring ’em on! I’ll take ’em all on. Veronica and I stood there in front of all those women hand in hand and stopped the guy from preaching hate in the names of all the innocent sons and daughters out there. God,
that felt so fucking good
! We fought back for once!” Kyle chuckled delightedly. “You remember showing me
Independence Day
? I got to use the president’s lines from that movie. I told them that tonight we fight back.”

“Way to go, babe! I’m so fucking proud of you! You are the most awesome man I know!”

Kyle tried to imitate a bodybuilder hulk pose but couldn’t quite pull it off, which made me laugh. “You’re so adorable!”

“What happened to big and butch and manly with boulders between my legs?”

“Get your pants off and we’ll see.”

“I gotta pee. I’ll be out in a minute.”

I stayed in the living room and waited for my boyfriend to finish peeing and to change clothes. About a minute later, I nearly fell off my chair when I looked up to see Kyle walk into the room—stark naked and strutting proudly.

“Take this, world!” he said, pointing at his naked body as he strode confidently into the kitchen. “And now I’m naked in the freaking kitchen! Hah!” He thrust his arms upward above his head in a triumphant cheer.

He walked into the dining room and said, “And now I’m naked in the goddamned dining room!” He walked to the living room window and pulled back the curtains and yelled, “Here, New York! I’m fucking naked! Aren’t I awesome?”

Standing behind him, I was laughing uproariously. “Babe! I love you so much! Get your beautiful naked ass over here now!”

“I’m not done flashing the world yet! Maybe I need to get a boner and jerk off a little for them first.”

“Don’t do that. You’ll give the old lady across the way a heart attack.”

“Oh, but she’d go with a smile on her face. I mean, I am freaking
awesome
!”

Standing behind Kyle, I put my arms around his body and hugged him. I dropped my hands to Kyle’s crotch and grabbed his testicles. “Yep, boulders.”

“Yeah! Who’s the man? I’m the man! I’m the
awesome
man!”

That night when we went to bed, we tried something I had wanted to try for a long time, something that felt so right that night (even though at the same time, it was really scary). With a lot of preparation, I had Kyle lie on his back while I knelt on top of his dick of death and slowly lowered myself onto it. I’d wanted to do this for some time but had been intimidated by the size of the beast Kyle sported between his legs when he was aroused. Sucking the thing was one thing, but getting it into my ass was something entirely different. But that night I wanted it so badly that nothing was going to stand in my way.

It took a while, but eventually I got it all inside my body. I was breathing a little heavy when I finally felt Kyle’s balls against my well-stretched ass, but it felt wonderful. After we both caught our breath, I lifted up and then pushed myself back down, gasping a little at the feeling all over again.

After I got more comfortable and accustomed to the feeling of my boyfriend’s dick in my ass, we rolled over so that I was on my back with my legs raised up on Kyle’s shoulders. As we stared into one another’s eyes, Kyle fucked me with an energy and a passion that were the hallmarks of our relationship. We both loved the moment, the feeling of the other’s body, how we were joined together as one, drawing strength and energy from one another.

Kyle was so aroused that it didn’t take very long for him to go over the edge. He locked his lips onto mine and basked in what he later called the best orgasm of his life. Finally he collapsed on top of me and simply tried to breathe.

“Fucking awesome, babe!” I whispered into his ear. “Fucking awesome.”

When we finally separated, we showered and then crawled back into bed to wrap ourselves around one another before falling asleep. What a day.

T
HE
next morning I was up first and was in the kitchen making some coffee when I heard a loud knock at the door. Who the hell was at the door at six in the morning? I grabbed a pair of boxer shorts to slip on and then opened the door before the person woke up all of the neighbors. Never in my life had I ever expected to find Kyle’s mother standing on the other side of the door. She looked equally startled to find me wearing only boxer shorts, so I guess we were even.

“Um,” I said. “Good morning?”

She nodded briskly.

When she didn’t say anything else, I asked, “Umm, would you like to come in?”

“Yes.” After she came in, I closed the door and took her coat to hang in the closet.

“Coffee?”

“Yes. That would be nice.”

I showed her into the room before I dashed into the bedroom to pull on some pants and a shirt and to shake the living hell out of my boyfriend to wake him up. “Your mother is in the goddamned living room!” I shouted in a whisper. “Get your ass out of bed and come help me!”

“Did you frisk her for pitchforks?” Kyle asked, only half-awake.

“No! Put on some clothes and get out here now!” I yelled in a low voice that wouldn’t carry outside the room.

When I returned to the living room, I saw our guest seated at the dining room table with a cup in front of her. “I helped myself. I hope you don’t mind. I assume you were waking up my son.”

“Yes. He should be out any second now. Sorry I wasn’t dressed when I opened the door. I wasn’t expecting anyone.”

Kyle came into the room with the worst case of bedhead that I had seen in a while. I reached up to smooth down the man’s hair and then went into the kitchen to make his morning tea. Without a word I handed the cup to Kyle, who sat down at the table across from his mother.

“I’m surprised to see you this early,” he said in the understatement of the year.

“I needed to talk to you. I didn’t sleep very much last night.”

“Really? Sorry to hear that. I slept like a baby.” Not judgmental. Just a factual statement.

“Good thing one of us did.”

They each sipped their own form of caffeine quietly for a moment.

“How’d you find the address?”

“Your hospital. Most places will tell mothers anything if you push hard enough.”

He nodded. “Are we okay?” he asked, cutting right to the heart of the matter.

“I don’t understand any of this! How can we be okay when everything I thought I knew is turned upside-down and stood on its head?”

“You needed to know,” he said simply.

“Well, there we agree.”

“We do? You do?” Kyle asked, surprised by her statement.

“Yes.” She paused, clearly anguishing over her words. “I’m so torn I feel like I’m gonna fall apart. Part of me believes that you’ve just told me you’re gonna burn in hell for all eternity. But another part of me heard the words you said last night.” She stopped and noticed me in the kitchen. “Stop eavesdropping in there and just get in here!” she yelled. When I walked into the room and slowly came toward the table, she asked, “What am I supposed to call you?”

I shrugged, smiled, and said, “Cute?”

And somehow the tension at the table broke for at least a moment, and we all shared a refreshing laugh.

“No, I meant, what are you to one another? How do you think of one another? Friends? Boyfriends? Help an old woman out here.”

“Boyfriends works. Soul mate works. Love of my life works,” I answered. Kyle reached across and put his hand on mine for a moment, then squeezed in acknowledgement and love. “And who’s old?”

“
Me!
I’m a dinosaur from another age.”

“No, Mama. You’re not. A dinosaur wouldn’t be sitting at our table at six in the morning in New York City having this conversation.”

“Damn, boy, but you always were good,” she said in admiration.

“Are we okay?”

“You already asked me that. And I said no… but we will be.” She sipped her coffee for a moment. “After dinner last night, some of the women in the group were whispering about you as the spawn of Satan. Wicked old crones! That’s why all their husbands are off getting a little on the side.”

Kyle had just taken a sip of his tea when his mother spoke the last sentence. He was so startled he swallowed wrong and started coughing.

“Others came up to me and spoke of how proud I must be to have raised such a great kid. And I had to tell them that you’d done it all on your own, and while I was proud of you, you were your own man. A pretty good one too.”

Kyle looked at his mother. “I can hardly believe what I’m hearing. Never in my wildest dreams had I ever imagined that (1) I’d come out to my mother; (2) said coming out would happen in such a public forum; (3) after said coming out, that we’d still be speaking; and (4) after said coming out, that you and I would be sitting in my dining room with my boyfriend having coffee and having
this
conversation.”

Kyle paused, having already revealed a lot of information to his mother. “Until recently,” he explained, “I didn’t see myself in a very good light. But then I met Joseph, and he taught me many things, most important that I’m a good man.”