I Should Be Laughing: Another Piece of Harry

“I think you left these in the dryer.”

Harry turned to the voice, to the man who held a pair of underwear, his underwear, a pair of gray boxer briefs, in his hand. Closing his eyes, out of embarrassment and shyness, Harry nodded at the man and reached for the briefs. At least he’d found a clean pair, Harry thought, shuddering at the alternative.

“Thanks…yeah, thanks, “ he muttered, narrowly, taking the offending pair in his hands. A swift second later and the missing underwear had rejoined the others in the blue Rubbermaid basket. Pretending to fold his laundry, Harry snaked his eyes to the side for a quick peek at the man, a cursory raising of the eye, and another nod of thanks as he realized the man was staring back. Then he went back to the folding table and his clothes.

“I’ve seen you around before, I think,” the man said, coming closer. “Do you live in the neighborhood?”

Please, Harry thought to himself, his hands clenched around a bath towel, leave me alone. I’m just doing laundry. I didn’t come in here to…. I’m not looking for…. But, to be polite, and Harry was nothing if not courteous, for shyness breeds manners, he offered the man another smile, albeit without bothering to look up. His head stayed down, a curtain of brown hair falling over his eyes, and he continued to fold the jeans and shirts, towels and sheets; underwear.

“Thought so.” The man refused to go away. He stepped between Harry and the soda machine, pressing his body into the narrow space, and Harry couldn’t help but notice that his jeans were faded, and tight. His shirt, too. “Uh, where…do you live?”

“C-Collinwood.” Harry stuttered. “Up on Collinwood.”

“Yeah?” the man said, running his hand on the rim of Harry’s laundry basket.  “I thought so. I just moved into a building on Nineteenth, by the playground, and I thought I’d seen you. Have you lived in the Castro long?”

“No,” Harry said firmly, wanting the conversation to be over; wanting the man to leave him alone; wanting the man…. At last, he eyed the stranger, taking in, once again, the form-fitting shirt and pants, the hair too blond to be true; and that smile. Harry wondered what that smile wanted from him, uncertain of what he wanted from the smile. He began putting his clothes in the basket, the clean, folded ones, unfolded sheets in a wad, the still dirty dishtowels and socks. He needed to get away from the laundromat, and away from that man and his smile, before…before something happened.

The unwieldy basket resting on his hip, Harry practically ran to the front door and kicked it open. He was out on the street in a flash, walking uphill in front of the laundry. He took a quick peek inside, through the words—‘Free Dry With Every Wash’—painted on the window and saw the man, still standing there, smiling, and shrugging as Harry rushed past, looking inside, then looking away. Not bad looking, Harry thought, if you liked that type.

Trouble was, Harry didn’t know what type was his type. Only recently had he accepted the fact that he was…well, that he was the type of guy who wondered about other guys. Harry had only just realized that he was…say it…gay. Or queer or homosexual or whatever it was you called yourself these days.

And he had yet to…he never…. He was shy, that way. There hadn’t been guys like Harry back home, except maybe Sean who, he heard, moved to St. Louis after graduation. Besides, the two of them hadn’t spoken much once reaching to high school. The best of friends at one time, they had gone their separate ways, become polite strangers, and Harry couldn’t remember why.

Harry was gay. He was finally able to admit it, only to himself, one day as he studied his reflection in the mirror while shaving. “I’m gay,” he would say, trying to smile, hoping it wouldn’t sound forced if he said it to someone else. Gay. That word was okay; it sounded happy, and he should be happy, he had every right. But he never liked the word queer; as a boy, Harry always believed he was…queer…he was odd. Different. Grotesque. Yet, since coming to San Francisco, he recognized that he wasn’t different or odd…or queer. Simply, he was gay.

At age twelve, shy and quiet, alone and lonely, Harry found himself trapped in the locker room with Tim Holt. Tim usually called Harry names as they passed in the hall, or shoved him when they stood in line for lunch, but that day, wearing a sly grin, he sauntered right up, pressed Harry back to a locker, and asked if he was gay, and Harry didn’t know how to answer. He faltered, the combination lock driven into the small of his back, steam spilling from the empty showers. And then, just as he was about to respond, to say it aloud for the first time, to get it over with once and for all, so all the questions and taunts and shoves would end, as he was ready to admit it, Tim Holt pushed him harder into the locker and… kissed him. Right on the mouth. By the time Harry realized he had been kissed, and not punched, Tim Holt was gone. He never spoke to, or bothered, Harry again.

That day in the locker room, Harry had been ready to admit it, but the kiss sent him deeper into the closet because he didn’t know what to do. Should he approach Tim and ask him why he’d done it? Or should he simply stay hidden and quiet and gay. Gay; he would never call himself faggot no matter how ‘in’ that word had become. He understood what people meant about taking the word back, but he could never use it to define himself or anyone because it reminded him too much, and too painfully, of Beal’s Landing, of locker rooms, of home. Of the looks his mother gave him. That one word the reason Harry left home; why he worked so hard for two summers to leave The Landing and not look back.

Strangely enough, Harry always knew he would end up in San Francisco; and not merely because it was a ‘gay’ capital. As a boy, infatuated with the city, whenever his father suggested a trip down the coast, for whatever reason, Harry leapt at the chance. Whether they were going to the zoo or the DeYoung Museum, Golden Gate Park or The Legion Of Honor, Harry would plead to sit in the front seat between his mother and father, on those rare occasions when mother came with, to be the first to spot San Francisco.

Crawling out of the Caldecott Tunnel, he would scan the horizon for the Coit Tower or the Pyramid building. Rounding a curve, and catching sight of the Golden Gate Bridge, he would invariably sigh. It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. The way the cables sliced through the fog, how, sometimes, you couldn’t see the top of the bridge for all the mist and clouds. Pea soup, his father called it. “Fog’s as thick as pea soup, Harry. I’m not sure the city’s even there today.”

Nevertheless, it was always there, waiting for Harry to come back, though he never knew when, or why, he would return, Harry knew he would come back to stay. The bells on the cable cars chugging up the hill from the Buena Vista called his name; the smell of saltwater and steamed crabs on Fisherman’s Wharf were like perfume. Even as a child, Harry felt it was home; he could breathe, and let go of…the pains…Beal’s Landing.