Mathieu said nothing. He was smiling, probably amused at my sudden attack of nostalgia. He was leaning on his elbows and looking more at the sky than at the city.

The moon had put in its appearance later than expected. We must have waited a good hour and a half before we ­spotted it, somewhere to the right of Place Ville-Marie, a ­little yellow ball like half a lemon, nothing like the flashy, orgiastic full moon that I’d promised When he saw it he shook his head.

“Do you do this often—promise the moon and deliver a lemon?”

I simply told him that the end justified the means, then put my arm around his shoulders. He rested his head against mine. It was our first somewhat intimate contact; I sensed it was fragile, easily broken. One untoward remark, one awkward move could have spoiled it, we both knew that. So we just stood there, lost between our joy at this first furtive caress and our fear of seeing it vanish.

We walked very slowly down towards Parc Avenue. I ­didn’t dare pop the big question and he didn’t dare ask to spend the night. We were both guessing what the other wanted and we found it both funny and touching.

So we passed through the outside gayland of Montreal’s nights, the famous bushes of Mont Royal, celebrated all over North America and very popular, even since the appearance of AIDS which, it had been predicted, would put an end to such sexual manifestations that cause God-fearing souls to blush and bring policemen running through the shadows, from San Francisco to New York and from New Orleans to Quebec City.