Before we realized it, it was time for our Spring Break. We had been seeing the people who were in town for their Spring Break in Emerald Beach, but we more or less took that in stride without much notice. There had been so much going on that I think ours crept up on us. We had tickets for Washington, D.C., and the four boys--Kyle, Justin, Brian, and I--were looking forward to the trip. As usual, Kyle took charge of planning the trip. He spent three or four nights on the Internet looking for Web sites of places we might like to go. "Okay. Here's a list of places," he said, passing out a printed list of museums and other attractions. "I want everybody to check off the ones they think they would like to go to. I don't think we can go to all of them, so we have to make choices." The list was pretty extensive, and I was sure it didn't include everything there was to see. In fact, I pretty much knew that he had left off the list things that he wasn't interested in. For example, I had been to the National Gallery, and it wasn't on the list. I knew Kyle had no interest in spending time looking at paintings, and I pretty much didn't think any of the rest of us did, either. We had done that in New York, and it had been a bust. He would tally the lists but wouldn't tell anybody what we were going to do. He asked us not to discuss our choices because he wanted the whole thing to be a big surprise. "Kyle, this is just more of your bullshit," Justin had said when Kyle announced the rules. "Do you trust me to put together a good trip?" Kyle asked. "Don't start that trust crap, Kyle. You're always wanting to test me. You know I trust you. I don't have to keep saying it over and over," Jus said. He was a little annoyed. "I guarantee you this trip will be fun for everybody. Just do what I ask you to, okay?" Kyle said. He was a little annoyed, too. He had gone to a lot of trouble to research all those places. "If you don't want to do what I put on the list, you don't have to. You're a grown man. You can get around a city by yourself," Kyle said. "Kyle, you're getting mad, and I don't want you to get mad at me over this. I'm sorry I said anything," Justin said. "That wasn't fair of me, and I'm going to do it exactly like you want us to." "Let's start over," Brian said. "What do you want us to do, Kyle?" "Well, I was just thinking that instead of arguing about what we want to do every day, you all would let me come up with an itinerary. I mean, I got the stuff that looked good to me. I didn't put the National Ballet on the list, but I didn't think y'all would want to see that. I tried to get stuff that boys would like," he said. "Okay. That sounds good to me. And you're right. There's no point in wasting half a day arguing and trying to decide what we want to do," Justin said. "Let's vote." The things on the list were very good, I thought. And it really was all "boy stuff." I noticed he had "Dupont Circle Nightlife (Gay)" on the list. That was a big gay neighborhood, and I'm sure it was chocked full of gay bars, clubs, coffee houses, shops, and restaurants. We really didn't participate in gay culture all that much, but I liked the idea of being in that kind of environment from time to time. We did it in New York and Boston, and we did it some in New Orleans, too. I didn't want a steady diet of that, but two or three times a year were fun. * * * Our flight out of Emerald Beach was at 9:30 AM on Saturday, March 14th, and we would come home on Saturday, March 21st. The flight to Atlanta took the usual hour, and the flight into Reagan National Airport from Atlanta took an hour and a half. Flying into Reagan National was sort of scary because it was right in the city, or it seemed like it was. We got out of there and to our hotel by 3:30. We were staying in one of our "brand" hotels in the Dupont Circle area, and I knew that Kevin, who had made the reservations, had known about that part of town. It was a really nice hotel, though. We had adjoining rooms, with a door connecting the two, but each room only had one bed, a king size. The arrangement the year before in New York, where all four of us stayed in the same room, was fun, and I liked having the extra money. But four guys in one room, with only one bathroom, wasn't fun. Kyle and I shared a bathroom all the time, just like Justin and Brian did, and we had our routines worked out. I was glad each couple was going to have their own room and bathroom, but I liked the idea of the door between them. We didn't unpack or anything when we got into our room. We just put our bags in there and met downstairs. They had a coffee shop in the lobby. We had eaten a hamburger in Atlanta, but we were all hungry. First stop, coffee shop for a snack. After that, we picked up a tour bus. It was about 4:30, and the feature of that tour, besides just driving around seeing places like the Supreme Court, the Library of Congress, the National Archives Building, the Arlington National Cemetery, and other stuff like that, was dinner at a nice restaurant (Italian) and a tour of the major monuments after dark. Washington was a city of lights, and they did the best job of any place I had ever been of lighting up those monuments. We had passed the White House when it was still daylight, and it was fine. Nothing really special, though. I mean, we had been to plantation houses that looked about the same from the street as that place did during the day. At night, though, all lit up, it was spectacular. The highlight for me was the Lincoln Memorial. We got out of the bus at that one, and walking up those steps, with the lights on that colossal statue, really moved me. Standing at the top of the Lincoln Memorial, you could look down the National Mall at the Capitol Building, ablaze with light. Kyle grabbed my hand. "This is magnificent," he said. His voice broke, and I knew he was as filled with emotion as I was. Brian was crying openly, and Justin wiped a tear or two from his eyes. There's a lot bad about America, but there's a whole lot good about it, too. Standing on that spot, my throat contracted and my chest heaved. I was taking AP American History, and I thought about everything those buildings and monuments represented to us and to the world. There in the center of it all was the Washington Monument, under a ton of scaffolding because of the renovation they were doing, and I thought of George Washington and of the republic he and the Founding Fathers envisioned. People all around us were wiping their eyes. "Let's walk down," I said to Kyle. He still had my hand, and we walked down the step of the Lincoln Memorial as a couple in love, out for all the world to see. We walked over to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial on the left. There were a lot of people there looking for names. I thought about Kevin's uncle who had been killed in that war, and I wondered if we could find his name. We didn't know the year he had been killed, so we really didn't try that night. Later in the week, we went back there in the daytime when we knew the year, and we found it. We each made a rubbing of his name to give to Ed the next year at Christmas. After we saw the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, we walked across Constitution Gardens and across West Potomac Gardens to the Korean War Memorial. It was a bunch of statues of soldiers crossing grassy fields. They had planted winter rye grass between the rows of statues, and it looked like the guys were crossing rice paddies or something, as the grass blew in the breeze. To me it was much more stirring than the Vietnam Veterans Memorial was, but that was just the way I felt. It was fabulous. In the last few months, our president had said North Korea was part of the "axis of evil," and the day before I had heard on the radio that 50% of the households in South Korea were wired for broadband Internet, a much higher percentage than our country. I didn't know what to think. After that, we got back on the bus and they drove us to the Jefferson Memorial. We had spent a lot more time in AP American History studying Thomas Jefferson than we had George Washington because the man had made a much greater contribution to the country, intellectually, at least. He was never a soldier, or at least not a famous one. He wrote the Declaration of Independence, and he, along with Benjamin Franklin and some other guys, gave the country its philosophical roots. His monument was fine, too. It was probably as big as the Lincoln one, but it didn't stand in that commanding spot like the Lincoln did. And that was maybe the way it should be. Jefferson was a farmer, after all, and he loved the countryside. He was kind of a man behind the scenes, pumping out the ideas that inspired people like Washington and Lincoln. Maybe he needed to be off to the side. But it was spectacular. We got back to our hotel at nine o'clock, and we went up to our rooms. All four of us were in mine and Kyle's room. "Well, so far, you done very good, Kyle," Justin said. Brian and I laughed, and Kyle just grinned. "I told you it was going to be good, Jus," Kyle said. "You just have to t-r-u-s-t me." Kyle was lying on the bed, and Justin jumped on him when he spelled out that word. They wrestled around for a few minutes, and then we heard the bed groan, like it was going to break or something. "We better stop this shit before me and Tim are sleeping on the floor," Kyle said. We all laughed, but I was glad they stopped it. "So, what's next? Are you guys ready for bed?" Justin asked. "It's only a little after eight, our time." "Hell, no, I ain't ready for bed," Kyle said. "I say we go out. We're right here in the middle of the gay neighborhood. One of them, anyway. Let's go see what our brothers are up to." "That sounds good to me," Justin said. "Wait a minute. Before we go, I've got something for Tim and Brian," Kyle said. "What?" I asked. "Fake ID's, that's what," Kyle said. "Jeff worked on these things for days, and they are perfect. Everybody here is twenty-one, as of right now. I know you two won't be drinking, but a lot of places you can't even get in unless you're twenty-one. Well, you can, as of now." He gave me and Brian new driver's licenses that said we were twenty-one. I was sure the Department of Transportation in Florida could have spotted them as fakes, but they looked real good to me. "Kyle, this isn't right," Brian said. "Why not? Are you going to get shit face drunk tonight? Are you going to pull out your dick and piss in the street because you're drunk? Are you going to rape somebody on the dance floor because you're drunk? I just don't see it happening, Brian." Brian laughed hysterically at Kyle, and the rest of us laughed, too. "You ain't going to pull that little thing out. You know that," Justin said. "Fuck you," Brian said. "Oh, listen at him. He's already talking like a big boy," Justin said. Brian dove on him and hugged him and kissed him. They wrestled around a little, and they were so cute. "Let's go before we really break the fucking bed," Kyle said. We all laughed. * * * Dupont Circle itself is a big traffic circle where three major streets come together. Right in the middle of the circle is a big fountain that is a memorial to General Francis Dupont from the Civil War. The circle itself was interesting enough, but the action was down P Street and on 17th Street and other streets around there. "Do you all feel like cutting a rug?" Kyle asked. "Dancing?" Justin asked. "Yeah. Like we did in New Orleans," he said. "Sure," Brian said. He liked to dance a lot. We went into a club that had a huge dance floor, with lights and loud music. There were quite a few people dancing, and a lot of them had their shirts off. Some were holding glow sticks. We found a place to stand along the wall, and a shirtless waiter in real short shorts was there to take our order almost immediately. Kyle and Justin ordered real drinks, and Brian and I ordered cokes. We figured the cokes would cost as much as the liquor drinks, but they turned out to be only $3.00. There wasn't much point in trying to talk, so Kyle and I stepped out to dance. Justin and Brian did, too. Kyle is a very good dancer, and I think he'd gotten even better since he'd been in the play. He put a lot of energy into it, and I noticed guys looking at him. We danced three in a row, and then we took a break. The first thing he did was take off his shirt. He was starting to sweat, and he didn't want to ruin his shirt. In a matter of minutes the waiter was back with a second drink for Kyle. "I didn't order this," Kyle said. "I know, but you took your shirt off. It's on the house for any guy who takes his shirt off. Especially if he looks like you," the waiter said and winked. Justin laughed his ass off at that shameless flirting, but Kyle just grinned and thanked the man. "He thinks you're cute," Justin said. "He is cute," I said. "Take yours off and see if he'll flirt with you." "I don't want to do that. I don't want to give the boy a hard-on," Jus said. Because of the noise in the place, he had to just about shout to be heard. Well, not only was he heard by us, he was heard by all the guys around us. Three or four just to our left heard him and laughed. Kyle and Justin finished their drinks, and Kyle shared his free one with Jus. That was about all we could take of that place, so we left. It was cold enough outside for us to need jackets, so Kyle put his shirt on before we went out. The next place we went had a cover charge, but you got a show and a free drink for it. We went in, and there were as many women in there as there were men. We sat down at a table with six chairs, and we ordered our drinks. In a few minutes, these two women came over to ask if we minded if they sat with us. We didn't mind, but the place wasn't really standing room only. "This is a gay bar, isn't it?" Kyle asked one of the ladies. "It sure is, honey. One hundred percent. Is this where you belong?" "Yeah, we're gay," Kyle said. "You must be a lesbian." Both of the women laughed. "Where are you from, sonny?" she asked. We told them all about ourselves, where we were from, what we were doing there, and so on. They were real nice. "Can I buy you ladies a drink," Kyle, the Southern gentleman, asked. "Why, that would be nice," one of them said. She said to call her Syl, short for Sylvia. The other one said to call her Irene. We chatted on, making small talk. They told us about some places to go and some to stay away from, and they encouraged us to check out the gay bookstores that were here and there. At one point Kyle asked, "Why did you laugh when I asked you if you were lesbians?" "Show him, Syl," Irene said. Syl took Kyle's hand and put it in her lap. He whipped his hand away like her lap was on fire. "Shit! Fuck!" Kyle said loudly. The two women were laughing hysterically. "What the hell's going on?" Justin asked. "This ain't a woman. He's got a dick, and it's hard," Kyle said. That only made Syl and Irene laugh harder, and we all laughed hard at Kyle's reaction. Finally, he saw the humor of the situation, and he laughed, too. "Do you do this a lot?" Kyle asked. "Not too often," Syl said. "Just when we see sweet young boys who are still wet behind the ears. I hope you weren't offended." "Hell, no, I wasn't offended. I was too surprised to be offended," he said. That made them laugh some more. It was pretty clear they liked all of us, and I could tell they really liked Kyle. It turned out Syl and Irene were both in the show, and they both could sing really well. We stayed for their act, and Syl dedicated her version of "Way Down Upon the Suwannee River" to "the boys from Florida." That was quite an experience. We walked around holding hands or with our arms around one another. We went into several shops, a couple of galleries that had photographs, as well as paintings and prints, and a bookstore-movie store combination. We bought a couple of books to give Kevin and Rick, and Jeff and Tyler as souvenirs, but we didn't buy any movies. I thought about buying a little pin of the gay flag, but I changed my mind when I saw it cost fifty dollars. We got back to our hotel around 12:30 in the morning, and Kyle and I crashed for the night.
The week we spent in Washington was as much fun as I think I had ever had on a trip. We had been on some wonderful vacations, but, for some reason, the Washington trip was the best to me. We were staying in the Dupont Circle neighborhood at a very nice hotel. Kyle, Justin, and Tim liked the area, but I absolutely loved it. The circle itself was really a small park, and there were people in it day and night. The buildings and houses around there were beautiful, and a bunch of the old mansions had been turned into embassies of countries from around the world. There were a lot of people on the street, and there were sidewalk cafes and interesting shops everywhere. We hadn't been in any neighborhoods in any city yet that was like that one. Even Greenwich Village in New York wasn't that good, at least to me. We did so much that it's hard to remember everything. Fortunately for us, Kyle took a million pictures, so we can look at those and remember all the fun we had. Probably the highlights for me were the National Zoo, the National Aquarium, Explorers Hall at the National Geographic Society, and the National Air and Space Museum. We went to see the musical 1776 at Ford's Theater, the place where President Lincoln was shot, and that was really cool. After the play, we went to a coffee shop for something to eat, and we were discussing everything we had already done. "I loved that play," Kyle said. "You want to be in it, don't you?" Justin said. He and Kyle had a special language they used when they were playing with each other, and Justin used it when he said that. It wasn't really a special language. It was more like a tone of voice, or something. "Yeah. So what if I do?" Kyle asked. "So nothing. Be in it if you want to," Jus said. "Just don't be singing the damn songs around the house all the time." "But Justin, I got to. 'It's hot as hell in Phila-del-phia,'" he sang. "Oh, my God! Here we go," Jus said. "I'm buying that CD," Kyle said. "Just get ready. I don't remember any other words because I had never heard any of those songs before, but I'll be learning them." "Was this your favorite thing we've done so far?" Tim asked him. "Probably my second favorite. My first favorite was the FBI tour. Now that was something," he said. "I have to agree with you, Bubba. That was mighty good. I liked the stuff about the gangsters. The G-Men always get their man, that's for sure. Why do they call them G-Men, anyway? Does that stand for 'gangster men'?" he asked. "It stands for 'government men,' Jus," Tim said. "I read that somewhere on the tour." "I read that, too," I said. "Another place I really liked was where they made the money and the stamps," Justin said. "That was cool, too," Kyle said. "Course, I almost shit my pants when you asked them if they ever made any three dollar bills." All of us had laughed when Justin had asked that question, and we all laughed again when Kyle said that. "I just wanted to see what I was supposed to look like, that's all," Justin said. "I thought the International Spy Museum was mighty good, too. I learned about stuff I never even knew existed. Like the ring gun and the lipstick gun. That place might have been as good as the FBI, in fact." "I know. I loved that one," Jus said. "I never thought I'd say I loved a museum, but we've been seeing some great ones. Kyle, you knew what the hell you were doing when you picked these places out. I have to hand it to you, Bubba. What are we going to do tomorrow?" It was Thursday night, and the next day would be our last day in Washington. Our flight home was Saturday at ten o'clock in the morning. Kyle took a deep breath. "Bubba, you got any smokes on you?" he asked. I hadn't seen Kyle smoke a cigarette in weeks, and he seemed really nervous right then. He took a deep drag before he said anything. "Tomorrow, we're going to the United States Memorial Holocaust Museum. They have a special exhibit going on called 'The Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals,' and I think we all need to see it," he said. "Is this going to make us cry?" Tim asked. "Yes," Kyle said. "The Web site for it is unbelievably good, and I cried when I read it. I'm about to cry right now, too." "So let's don't go," Jus said. "No, we have to, Bubba," he said. "I thought about it a long time before I put it on the list, but do you remember what Cherie said when we went to the Civil Rights Museum in Birmingham? She said we have to see stuff like that so we won't let it happen again. Everybody knows the Jews took it hard in the Holocaust. In fact, that's all most people know about it. But thousands and thousands of gay men and boys just like us were savagely killed or worked to death. It's going to make us sad. That's true. But the fact that we're seeing it in the fucking capital of our country says we have the right to keep it from happening here. But we have to know about it to keep it from happening." "Is that going to take all day?" Justin asked. I could tell he wasn't interested in ending the trip on a downer, and, frankly, I wasn't either. "Nope. We end the trip with sports," Kyle said. "Tomorrow night we're going to the MCI Center to see the Washington Wizards play the Orlando Magic. We got great seats, too. Right behind the Wizards' bench, eight rows up. We're going to see Michael Jordan play basketball against Darrell Armstrong. I had to give my right nut to get 'em, too. " "I was wondering what had happened to it," Tim said. "Kyle told me you swallowed it," Justin said. We all laughed. "So how'd you get the tickets, Kyle?" Justin asked. "You don't even want to know," Kyle said. "Goddamn it, we do want to know, Kyle. How'd you get 'em?" Jus demanded. "I got 'em through a friend of my daddy, that's how," Kyle said. "Who's your daddy's friend? George Bush?" Justin asked. "Naw, he was fresh out," Kyle said. "Besides, Jeb is his friend, not George. He doesn't like George all that much. That man will pick his nose right in public and wipe it on his golf club. Any man who will treat a golf club like that cannot be my daddy's friend." People at the tables around us were listening like spies at a secret CIA meeting, only most of them were laughing. I knew that Kyle was carrying on, but I also knew there was probably some truth in what he was saying, too. I knew his parents knew Governor Jeb Bush and his wife, and it wouldn't surprise me one bit if Gene knew the president, too. And their dad, the former president. "So who's your daddy's friend?" Justin asked. "You better answer up, Kyle, because if you don't, I'm taking you outside and kicking your ass. You're making me frustrated, and I mean it." "Do you know who Senator Bob Graham is?" Kyle asked. "No, and neither do you, I bet," Justin said. "Who is he?" "He's the senator from Florida, dumbass," Kyle said. "We only got one?" "No, we have more than one, but he's the main one. He used to be governor a long time ago. He used to come to Emerald Beach from Tallahassee all the time, and that's when he and my dad got to be friends. You know that big-ass suite on the top floor of the Laguna? The one they call the Presidential Suite? My dad set that up for him. I mean, they rent it to other people, too, like to Mr. Jeb and his family, but if Mr. Bob wants it, it's his, no matter what," Kyle said. "Shit!" Justin said. "Excuse me. I couldn't help overhearing your conversation." It was a guy from the table next to us. "I'm sorry. We're talking way too loud," Kyle said. "That's just me. I can't help it. I get too excited, sometimes." "No, you weren't talking too loudly. I just happened to hear you say your father's friend got you tickets to the Wizards-Magic game, and that perked my ears up," he said. "By the way, I'm Scott Everitt, and I'm from Florida, too. Ft. Lauderdale." "Hi, Scott," Kyle said, shaking his hand. He introduced all of us. "Small world, isn't it?" "Smaller than you think, Kyle. I work for Senator Graham, and I'm the one who got those tickets for you," Scott said. I only rarely saw Kyle speechless, but he was speechless at that moment. "Scott, please join us," Tim said. "Oh, no. My partner and I are . . . " "No, please do, man," Kyle said, fully recovered by then. "Ask him over, too. I think I owe you a debt of thanks and a round of coffee." The guy who was still at their table was listening, and he came over without being asked by Scott. He introduced himself as Chad Fulsome, and he was from Michigan. Scott and Chad joined us at our table. We had a great time talking to those guys. Chad worked for the Select Committee on Intelligence, and Senator Graham was chairman of that. He and Scott had been dating for eight months and had lived together for six. We told them our history together, except the ugly parts about how they got Justin and me, and there was a definite feeling of comradeship and brotherhood among us. "So, are we just going to say goodbye and never see each other again?" Kyle asked. Scott and Chad didn't know what to say, and it was kind of awkward. "We like you guys, and I hope y'all like us," Kyle said. "Here's my email, and here's the address to our family Web site. Just type in what I wrote on the napkin, if you want to. If you don't want to, that's okay, too. Anyway, good night, guys. And thanks for getting those tickets for us." They both gave each of us their business cards, and we shook hands warmly all around. Leave it to Kyle to find friends in the middle of a city we had never been to before, at least not as a group. We went home to our hotel, ready for the next day.
We spent Friday morning taking it easy, kind of walking around and shopping in the neighborhood. We were going to the Holocaust Museum that afternoon and then straight to the basketball game from the museum. We had already seen so many things that we were starting to get a little museum weary. "What have you liked best?" I asked Tim. "All of it has been great, but I guess the Museum of Natural History and the Museum of American History have been my two favorites," he said. "Yeah, those were something else. Those dinosaurs and all those precious stones and minerals in Natural History were spectacular. Seeing that flag that lady made for George Washington was pretty neat, too. What was her name again?" "Betsy Ross," Tim said. "Yeah. In fact, I had no idea there had been so many different American flags in history. Had you?" "Yeah. There's a page in my history textbook that has pictures of all the different ones," Tim said. "But it was very interesting seeing the real things. The thing about all those museums that are part of the Smithsonian is you could spend weeks, probably, in each one of them. I read in a brochure that some of them have two or three times as much stuff in storage as they have on display." "I was surprised you didn't have to pay to get in. Who you reckon pays for all that stuff?" I asked. "The taxpayers of the country do," Tim said. "For real?" "Yeah, for real. Who'd you think pays for it?" he asked. "I thought that Smith guy did," I said. "Well, he did get it started. His name was Smithson, though, not Smith," he said. "How the hell did you get so smart?" I asked. "Damn it, Kyle. You did it again. You suckered me in. You knew who paid for it, didn't you?" I laughed. He looked so cute when he was annoyed at me that I just couldn't help it. It made him laugh, too. I bought a bunch of Christmas ornaments as souvenirs. Those were for people like Kevin and Rick, Jeff and Ty, Father Jerry, and some others. Tim and I got his parents and my parents beautiful ceramic bowls, but we had those shipped. We bought Denny a couple of gay novels and Ron a baseball cap and jersey, but I got each of them something special. We were in a gay store, and some dildos caught my eye. We had had fun with the ones we had bought in New Orleans, and I figured those guys might like to experiment. I bought them each one and each a little book about how to use them. I'd give 'em those in private, of course.
Kyle wasn't wrong when he said he'd put together a great trip for us. I loved everything we did, of course, but that Holocaust Museum just about blew my ass away. Before I went to that place, I didn't have a real clear idea of who Adolph Hitler or the Nazis were. I had heard of them, of course, but I didn't have a good time frame for when they were in power, and I had not really connected them with World War II. I mean, we had been to the D-Day Museum in New Orleans, and that was about World War II. It didn't have anything about the Nazis, though, at least not that I remembered. This place in Washington was all about the Nazis, though, and what they had done in the Holocaust. We went through the permanent exhibit, and it was awful. None of us got the taped tour because it was too long, but we spent a lot of time in there. I read a bunch of those stories they had posted, and more than once I choked up. Brian wanted to hold my hand some of the time, which was something we never did in a situation like that, but I knew my boy needed to feel close to me. "Phew! This is getting to me, Kyle," I said. "I know. Let's go get some coffee," Kyle said. We got cups of coffee and went out to this open-air place where you could smoke. Nobody was talking. I lit up a cigarette and handed my pack to Kyle. He took one. "Was it a mistake coming here?" Kyle asked. "It would have been a mistake not to come here, Kyle," Brian said. "I agree," Tim said. "Me, too," I said. "This has been an eye-opener for me, that's for sure. More people need to know about this place." "I think a lot know about it, Buddy," Brian said. "But you're right. A lot more people need to come here to see this." "That movie at the start of it really put it all into view, didn't it?" I said. "I didn't know shit about this stuff before I saw that movie." "Yeah, you don't ever want to go to a museum and not watch the movies," Kyle said. "We must have seen two dozen or more on this trip." "Yeah, and I've learned a hell of a lot, too," I said. "Y'all got to remember that compared to you all, I'm real ignorant," I said. "Well, maybe not compared to Kyle." They all laughed, even Kyle. Kyle checked his watch. "We need to get back in and check out the gay exhibit. We only have a couple of hours before we need to get going, if we're going to eat before the game," he said. I had forgotten all about the basketball game. We were going to need that game after that museum, and later on I was going to need me some serious loving on my baby, too. * * * I thought the permanent exhibit where they showed what all they had done to the Jews and some other people was terrible. I mean, the exhibit wasn't terrible. The exhibit was wonderful. What the Nazis had done was terrible. But still, I wasn't a Jew, and I didn't even know any Jews, at least that I knew of. What they had done to the gays, though, they had done to me, to Brian, to Kyle, to Tim, and to many of our friends. Sure, you heard stories about gay guys who were picked on, and I lived with some, including the boy I loved more than my own breath, who had gotten it bad. But what those Nazis did to those gay boys in Germany was unbelievable. There were short movies about individual guys and about couples, and how they were treated. There were hundreds of pictures of guys and couples, and those guys were beautiful. Some of the pictures showed the guys together, and you could tell just from looking at them that they were in love. They said they were deviants and a threat to the German race. Hell, those boys were about as much of a threat to the German race as the four of us were to the American race. There were a lot of people in that exhibit area. And it wasn't all gay people, either. We saw two boys around fourteen, with those little Jewish caps on their heads, crying, and there were two older guys--maybe mid-twenties, maybe a little older--who also had those Jewish caps, trying to comfort them. "Let's go talk to those guys," Kyle said. "Come on, Brian," I said. The four of us went over to them. "Hi," Kyle said. One of the older guys looked up at us. I could tell he had that "what do you want" look on his face. "Unless I'm wrong, the eight of us are brothers," Kyle said. "They tried to kill us all, didn't they?" The older guy smiled slightly and nodded. "Are you guys boyfriends," Brian asked. "Yes," one of the kids said. "So what?" "We are, too. That's so what," Bri said. "We need to move on, but we just wanted you to know you guys aren't alone. There are gay teenagers everywhere. And always. Even back then." "Thank you," the older guy said. He smiled. It wasn't a happy smile. It was a smile that said thanks. We moved on to the rest of the exhibit, and I hoped we had touched those guys in some way. I know they had touched me. "That was pretty intense," Kyle said, after we were out of that museum. "I can't imagine what it must have felt like for those two Jewish gay boys we talked to," Tim said. "Bri, thank you for talking to them, Bubba." "We have three hours before the game starts," Kyle said. "Let's go eat."
The basketball game that night was a major highlight for me, and I think for all of us, after the Holocaust Museum. Michael Jordan was in his second year with the Wizards, and that was the first of his last six games with them. Darrell Armstrong was, like, the NBA hero of Florida, and we were unbelievably lucky to see those two guys play against one another. They both knew they were good, but it also seemed like they were good friends who knew each other very, very well. There was a great deal of respect between those two, also, and you could feel it in the stands. But there was a great deal of competition, too. We couldn't hear what they were saying on the Wizards' bench, but we could see their reactions to what they said to one another. I watched the bench almost as much as I watched the court, and I had a great time. "Darrell's doing really good," Justin said, after Darrell laid in a dunk. "Yeah. But so is Michael," I said. We talked about them like we knew them personally. That was the only the second time I had ever been to an NBA game. I had been to several NFL, NHL, American League, and National League games. You name it. I had been to the Gator Bowl, the Orange Bowl, and the Outback Bowl. I had even been to the Olympics in Atlanta. The only other NBA game I had been to was the Hornets in New Orleans. But I was seeing two of the best go against each other that night. The Magic won by three at the last second, and that was damn exciting. "Kyle, tonight was the perfect finish of today, and the perfect finish of the trip," Brian said. "Thank you." We were in a taxi going back to our hotel. "Kyle, I know I gave you shit about the trip before we left, but you done good, Bubba," Justin said. When he said that, it really made me feel good. I knew Tim and Brian would follow me into the bowels of hell, if that's where I wanted to lead them, but Justin was older than me and a real man. I loved Justin as much as I loved my brother Clay, and I really cared about what he thought. Hearing him say that made me very happy. |