Full Circle Ch. 01

K. Nitsua. Copyright 2014 by the author.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Full Circle is the final installment of The Steelman Tales.




One night that summer Kevin had a dream. In it he was standing watching Jon, tall and vigorous as he had been most of his life. His love was dancing by himself, happy and carefree—strange, because Jon had never been much of a dancer. Kevin smiled at the sight, but then he grew sad because he knew, even in his dream, that it couldn't be real--Jon had been gone for more than a year. He began to cry--harsh, painful sobs that tore at him as they welled up from his lungs.

He awoke to the dark solitude of the bedroom and the bed in which he now slept alone. Real tears were running down his cheeks. It was a long time before he fell asleep again.

In the morning he walked out into the back yard and stood gazing at the swimming pool. Leaves were floating on the surface, and the water was a suspicious murky color. It really needed cleaning, but he didn't have the time or the energy. He'd thought of draining and filling it in, but there were too many memories. For the umpteenth time he told himself: get off your butt and hire someone to do it.

In his clinical practice he had counseled more than a few patients through bereavement and loss and done his best to empathize. He had always been aware that he had not lived the same experiences they had. All that had changed over the past few years. Only lately had he emerged from the fog of his own grief enough to wonder, now and then, how losing Jon in such an agonizing way would change him as a professional. As yet, he couldn't be sure.

People had begun to contact him again. That was an unexpected cruelty of losing a life partner--the silence. He knew that friends hadn't called because they didn't know what to say, or thought he wanted to be left alone. In a way they had been right. How could he have spoken about Jon's death to anyone, when even thinking about it had brought him to tears?

Long ago he and Jon had dined together in this house and sat by this pool after their first meal together. Later, they had swum nude and made passionate love in its waters. The memories did not cause him pain now—he felt nothing at all. It was as if he were remembering a scene in a movie, or someone else's life.

Slowly Kevin turned and walked back into the silent house.

It had started so gradually. Afterward Kevin suspected that Jon had been declining for a long while before people started noticing, and had successfully concealed or compensated for his increasing difficulties until they began to overwhelm him.

Brenda, Jon's administrative assistant, had called him one day at work. "I'm very sorry to bother you, Kevin, but I thought you should know if you didn't already. Jon seems to be having trouble using his computer."

"What do you mean?"

Brenda hesitated. "Well, this may sound strange, but for the past few days, he's been asking me every day how to open his e-mail account. I've showed him, of course, and he's thanked me and been fine, but then the next day it's as if he never did it before. And it's not a new system."

At that point Kevin had been merely puzzled, not terrified.

Then there had been the day that Jon had come home, slamming the door, fuming and cursing. This was so unlike his usual self that Kevin had come out of his study when he heard.

"What's the matter?"

"This bunch of assholes who supposedly work for me. Always asking me what I mean. Telling me that they already told me things or sent me e-mails. Why the fuck don't they just tell me what I need to know?"

Quiet inquiries had revealed an increasingly erratic pattern of behavior. Jon missing meetings, being found wandering around campus afterward. Saying he had just needed to get away and think. Jon stopping students on campus, asking them how to get to buildings and classrooms that had been intimately familiar to him for decades.

It had been possible to Kevin to push these incidents to the back of his mind as long as they were only at work. Then things had started happening at home.

"Dr.—uh, sorry, I forgot your name."

The student he had finally hired to clean the pool was standing outside the back door. Although it was only mid-morning in May the Texas sun was already beating down with a steady, blazing strength.

"Kuehlwasser. It's kind of weird, I know. Just call me Kevin." With an effort he remembered the boy's name: Ryan something.

"Well, K—" Ryan stopped, abashed, unable to address him so informally. Kevin smiled to himself, oddly touched. "Anyway, I only skimmed your pool. Didn't drain it, because I couldn't put in any chemicals."

"Wasn't there a canister of stuff in the shed?"

"Well, yeah. But you see the color of the water? It's going to need a lot more than just some more chlorine, man."

"Oh, jeez." Kevin was embarrassed. "I guess it's been longer than I thought since I cleaned it myself." He couldn't remember, was the truth.

"Anyway, we'll need specific chemicals to do this, and a bigger poolvac. I can get the machine, and I'll write down the name of the stuff I think we should use, if you don't mind buying some. We need to do a thorough cleaning, restore the water to the proper ph, then shock it back to health. That's what you call it."

"Sure. How much for today?"

The student shrugged. "Why don't we wait until I finish all the work, then I'll give you an itemized invoice. Less paperwork that way."

"Well, thanks. At least come in and let me get you something to drink."

He pushed open the screen door and let Ryan into the kitchen, still warm since he hadn't turned on the air conditioning. That was a frugal habit Jon had cultivated, avoiding turning on the AC as long as possible even during the broiling hot days of the Texas summer.

"Sorry it's so hot in here."

Ryan shrugged. "Cooler than outside."

"What can I get you?"

"Just some water, thanks."

Kevin gave Ryan a glass and studied him while he drank it. He saw a dark-haired young man around twenty, tall and lean, with angular, chiseled features that were surprisingly intense even in repose. Jon might have looked something like him when he was that age. He blinked away the tears that had suddenly risen to his eyes before Ryan could see.

"You live here by yourself?"

Kevin stammered, thrown by the suddenly personal question. "Uh... yes. I had a partner--spouse. He passed away about a year ago. He was the Provost at Steelman for many years."

He wasn't surprised that the student showed no sign of recognition. Ryan also had no reaction to the information that Kevin had been married to a man. That much had changed in his lifetime, at least.

"Sorry for your loss, man." Ryan drained his glass and rose. "I'll call you about next time. Or you can call or text me once you've gotten the stuff."

Kevin nodded. "Okay."

Ryan approached Kevin and once more took him by surprise, extending a hand and shaking Kevin's, looking into his eyes with a smile that completely transformed his face. "Have a good day."

Kevin watched him as he headed out the back door. Ryan's shoulders were broad in his t-shirt, his hips narrow, his butt compact and shapely. He shook his head. Stop it. As if he'd ever.

Still, he caught himself later that day idly wondering what Ryan looked like naked.

When he got out of his car in the driveway after coming home from work Kevin did not immediately place the sound he heard coming from inside the house. When he did, his body hurtled into motion without conscious thought, his feet running toward the front door.

It was the smoke alarm.

He flung open the door. A bluish cloud drifted out and the acrid odor immediately assailed his nostrils. Indoors the beeping was loud and insistent. Choking and coughing, Kevin ran to the living room. Jon was sitting on the couch dressed in his suit. He raised his head, startled.

"Get out! Get out now!" Kevin shouted.

Jon's expression was vacant. "What? What's the matter?"

"Jon, the house is on fire!"

He ran into the kitchen. It was a pan on the stove. Through the smoke that filled the kitchen Kevin could see that bright flames were shooting to the ceiling. The baking soda box—where the hell was it?! Kevin finally remembered and pulled it out of the refrigerator. He tipped the box into his palm and blindly threw handfuls of white powder at the conflagration until finally the flames began to die down.

He was gagging and hacking from the irritating smoke. Tears were running down his cheeks. Kevin threw open as many windows as he could to try and get it out of the house, turning the vent fan above the stove on full blast. At last the air began to clear and he could see again. It took him a few more moments to find and disable the smoke alarm. The sudden silence was both a shock and a relief.

It was sheer good luck he had come home before the fire started to spread. A large black circle of soot stained the ceiling above the stove. Everything in the kitchen would have to be cleaned.

"Jon!" Where was he? Kevin ran back into the living room. His spouse was still sitting on the couch, in the same position as when Kevin had come running in.

"What the fuck were you doing? Trying to burn the house down? Didn't you see the smoke? What the hell's the matter with you?"

Jon's lip trembled and he looked as if he were about to cry.

"Kevin, please. Don't shout at me like that."

He was not getting through. As he stared at his partner Kevin's anger receded and a creeping chill took its place. Without answering he turned and went back into the kitchen, more slowly now, hoping against hope that he had been mistaken about what he'd suddenly remembered seeing in the refrigerator in his panicked search.

Kevin opened the door and stood staring down, not caring about the cold air rushing out.

Jon's book and cell phone were on the top rack.

He closed his eyes. Something had to be done.

After Ryan left Kevin made a brief call, then got in the car and went to the Steelman campus. It was only a few blocks away and Jon had walked to work almost every day. He needed the car today, though. He was going to do a task that he had been putting off for months and couldn't postpone any longer.

Marcia Hannon, Jon's successor as Provost, had called a few days previously about picking up Jon's remaining things. She was always gentle and respectful, but this last time the message had been clear.

"Kevin, I don't want to upset you, but we're a bit short on space here. Surely there's something you might want, and if you don't want any of Jon's things, we'd rather it be you who makes the decision than us."

"Okay, I'll be there," he had said. It was now two days after when he'd said he'd come, but at least he was actually doing it.

It felt odd walking into the Steelman main administration building, familiar and strange at the same time. He realized how long it had been since he had been here. The wooden boards creaked under his feet in the hallway leading to the Provost's office as they always had. He had thought that going back might be difficult, but he felt nothing as he approached what had been Jon's abode.

He didn't recognize the woman at the front desk—Brenda, Jon's former assistant, must have retired. "Hello," Kevin said. "I'm here to see Marcia."

She nodded. "She's expecting you. Go right on in."

Marcia stood and came from behind her desk as soon as Kevin entered the office. "My, it's good to see you," she said as she hugged him. "How are you doing?"

He shrugged. "Good days and bad. You know. How about you?"

She glanced downward. He could see she was mulling over her next words.

"It's an honor to have this job, but it's not one that I ever went after," Marcia said. "Jon is a hard act to follow, Kevin. You know I'm not just saying that."

"Thank you, Marcia."

She continued, with a forced briskness. "There's really not that much you need to look at. We've taken most of his official papers and put them into University storage, or scanned them and added them to the electronic archive. But the personal things—we thought you'd like to have them, or at least go through the things and decide."

"I'm sorry it's taken so long for me to get here."

Her look was sympathetic. "I entirely understand. Please let me know if there's anything I can do to help."

There actually wasn't very much stuff, just one largish cardboard box loosely packed with memorabilia and framed photos. Jon with Dr. Hale, then President of Steelman University. Jon making a speech at some university function. Diplomas from his alma maters. Kevin set the box down on the table in the conference room where Marcia had left him and began to separate objects into piles, grouping them loosely by subject.

He didn't find the snapshot of him and Jon until he had almost emptied the box. It took him a second to remember where it had been taken—one of the large ballrooms in the student union, during a class reunion. His twentieth, actually.

It had not been so long ago, but so much had happened since then it seemed part of the distant past.

Jon had just been appointed Acting Provost. It had been one of the first major university functions where they had appeared together as a couple, and the evening had been stressful. Yet he remembered it fondly, due to a totally unexpected encounter with a friend he hadn't seen since they both graduated.

Lucas Boatright. Luke.

He wasn't in this photograph, but Kevin nevertheless could see him clearly in his mind's eye. Sweet, vulnerable Lucas with his shock of dark hair, which he had retained even past forty years of age. Kevin had saved him one night when they were both students from what he always thought had been a suicide attempt. They had gone back to his dorm room and hooked up, in today's lingo, the one and only time.

Why hadn't it gone farther than that? Afterward he'd listened to Lucas' tale of woe, rejected by someone who had used then discarded him, claiming to be straight, a familiar story. At the time Kevin hadn't wanted to take advantage of someone so obviously shattered. Besides, he had still been carrying a torch for his handsome former English instructor, Jonathan Evans.

Twenty years later at that Steelman reunion he had still felt the same chemistry between them. But by then he and Jon had been together for two decades, through good times and bad. Lucas for his part had been hell bent on confronting Will, the athlete who had seduced and abandoned him. Kevin and Lucas had embraced as friends, parted, and not seen each other since. They had e-mailed for a while and talked about getting together again, but something always came up.

The crucible of the past few years—Jon's unexpected, rapid and hopeless descent into Alzheimer's—had left Kevin with no time or energy to maintain most of the friendships they had, let along think about reconnecting with anyone. With Lucas, it wouldn't have been easy in any case. He had written Kevin some years after the reunion to say that Will had joined him in California, abandoned by his family and most of his former friends, his health increasingly precarious. Then, silence.

When he had thought of his friend at all after that, Kevin had mentally pictured Lucas as the patient caregiver to his flighty, undeserving love, and pitied him his situation. Little had he known.

Did he even have a working e-mail for Lucas anymore? Or a photo? Suddenly Kevin longed to see him, to find out what had happened, to catch up, to hear the end of the story.

The photo of him and Jon at the reunion and Jon's diplomas were the only things Kevin took with him when he left the office.

He was in the office of the director of the care center, sitting in front of her desk. Kevin liked the woman. She was professional and composed, but genuine in her concern.

"I can assure you, Mr. Kuehlwasser, your husband will be well taken care of here. This is a state of the art facility precisely for patients like Professor Evans."

"And will I be able to take him out, bring him home every so often?"

"As long as he is able to understand instructions and you or someone else is willing to supervise him. Be aware that a time may come when this may not be possible. As the disease advances patients become disoriented very easily, and may wander off when you're not looking. We've never lost a patient even when they've done so, thank heavens—but you never know."

"I understand. I love Jon." Kevin paused to compose himself. "I'm willing to do whatever it takes to keep him as happy and comfortable as possible, for as long as possible."

The director's gaze was sympathetic. "I won't sugar-coat things, Mr. Kuehlwasser. It's a heavy burden of care for one person, even if the patient is institutionalized. Does Mr. Evans have no other close friends or relatives?"

Kevin shook his head. "Jon's family cut off contact with him when he came out. His parents are dead. He has a younger sister, but he hasn't spoken to her for years."

"There are resources available for caregivers. I can put you in touch with people who can help you."

She had pressed a brochure into his hand as he left. He'd never called the number.

He had finally gotten it together enough to go to the local home improvement megastore and purchase the necessary supplies to clean the pool. Ryan answered at once when he called and they agreed on a day for him to come back.

"Glad to hear from you," he said. "I was starting to wonder."

On Thursday, when Ryan came to finish the job, Kevin had gone in to his practice. He allowed himself the luxury of leaving early one day a week, so by two in the afternoon he was pulling into the driveway. The student's battered pickup truck was parked in front of the house. Kevin went in and looked out the back window from the kitchen. He was vaguely disappointed that Ryan had on clothes similar to the last time. He watched him working, steady and industrious, for a few minutes, then went into the bedroom to change out of his work clothes.

It was a hot September afternoon and he flipped on the air conditioning. The window shades were down in the bedroom, though, and it had stayed cool. It felt good to unknot his tie and strip off his long-sleeved dress shirt. Impulsively he stripped naked and rummaged around in one of the drawers of the dresser for something he hadn't worn in ages.

The dark blue square-cut trunks still fit him. He gazed at himself critically in the full-length mirror on the bathroom door, wishing his stomach were flatter. Carrying a towel, a pair of sunglasses, and a bottle of sunscreen (he'd really had to rummage around for that in the medicine cabinet), he walked through the house and out the back door to the pool deck.

Ryan looked up as Kevin settled himself into a lounge chair. "Oh, hey."

"Thought I'd catch a few rays on my afternoon off. Okay with you if I'm out here?"

The student shrugged. "Sure. It's your house, man."

"How's it going?"

"Good. Should be finished before too long. Glad about that, 'cause it is hot out here."

Ryan turned back to his work as Kevin leaned back on the chair, towel underneath him. He squeezed sunscreen out of the bottle into his hand and began to apply it.

"Want some help with that?"

Ryan had suddenly appeared by his chair. Kevin, startled, looked up. "What?"

"I can put some on your back if you want."

"Oh, sure." Kevin turned over on his stomach. Ryan's touch was strong and felt good. The boy was thorough, starting with his neck and working all the way down to the waist of his swimwear, taking his time. Kevin found himself wishing his trunks were lower-cut. He felt a swelling underneath himself.

"Nice suit."

"Huh—oh, thanks." God, he was blushing. Kevin's heart was pounding. Ryan was playing along, at least not repulsed by him. He took the opening, speaking with studied casualness.