So there was no real need for them to come out to each other. “I was too chicken to go,” Ronny said, which was true.

“Well, I was scared to death, but I wasn’t going to miss it.”

“What was it like?”

“I don’t know. All right. Everybody was cruising each other mostly, that’s what I remember. There was some good stuff. They talked about pride and all. But it was mostly cruising.” He had lowered his voice and moved closer so the other customer, who was browsing the cookbooks, could not hear. “But don’t think gay people are going to be the cure for your problem. A lot of them are jerks, just like everybody else.”

“Is that what happened with your parents?”

“Sort of. They found out. About me. That was before the conference, though.” Sighing as if he were adrift, an involuntary sound, as if he could not escape the response. “I dropped out of school this semester. I don’t think I can go back.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. I’m all right. I like being on my own. I like my job.” He shook his hair out of his eyes and brightened a bit. “If you’re in town this summer come by and talk whenever.”

“Sure thing.”

He paid for the Forster novel and Hoagie looked down on him from the height of the cashier perch and smiled. How odd it felt; there was no question of attraction between them, but there was a kind of relief. Ronny felt it and was sure Hoagie did, too.

He wandered farther along Franklin Street, wondering. Was he afraid to be gay, officially—wary of attending that conference, for instance, out of fear of facing himself? Or of facing the fact that he was like his own father, something that had been on his mind since the first night with Ben? Or was he afraid of being publicly known, even to the small degree of attending a meeting? He was never shy when talking to Mac at the adult bookstore about what kinds of gay magazines to buy, or when he pored through every new edition of After Dark as soon as he could find it. Would any of that change now, because of Ben?

There was a pay phone in front of Fowler’s grocery store, but a man with a homemade sign that read “Jesus repent your sins hellfire and damnation await thou” was waiting to use it. Besides, Ronny could hardly picture himself standing there, feeling all the things he felt when he talked to Ben while traffic passed and grocery store customers rolled their shopping carts to their cars, wheels creaking and kids shrieking.

When the time came he used a phone in the student union. The place was empty except for him and some people in the student government offices. He sat at the bank of pay phones, dialed the number, and shoved in leftover quarters from the coin-op laundry. Ben answered on the first ring. “You’re two fucking minutes late, boy. Explain yourself.”