Slightly Settled by Wendy Markham Page B

Myron, and Jack gets beautiful handmade sweaters for all of his sisters.
    In the late afternoon, it starts pouring suddenly, so we duck into a little diner off Washington Square. We have coffee and onion rings dipped in mustard, and somehow they go together perfectly.
    We sit there talking about deep-fried foods and Billy Joel songs and state capitals, and I’m shocked when I glance at the rain-spattered window to see that it’s dark in the street.
    “How long have we been sitting here?” I ask Jack.
    “Too long,” he says, glancing at his watch. “Unfortunately, I’ve got to get going.”
    “Oh…I should get going, too,” I say, as though I’ve got someplace to be.
    I don’t, but something tells me he does.
    He insists on paying the check—Will and I always split it—and we carry our packages out the door. We stand under the overhang and zip our coats, and I try not to be obsessed about his plans for tonight.
    Does he have a date?
    After all, it’s a Saturday night.
    I don’t want him to have a date. I want him to come home with me. But I don’t dare ask him to.
    “I’ve got to go west to get the F train. But let me get you a cab home first,” he says, glancing around.
    There are dozens of cabs, all of them occupied.
    “No, that’s okay, Jack. I’ll take the subway. It’s only one stop.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “Positive.” Too bad I have to walk east to get my train. Otherwise, I could walk with him and try to get more information out of him.
    But east is east and west is west, and I guess this is where we part ways.
    It was good while it lasted.
    “I’ll call you,” Jack says, giving me one last kiss.
    “Okay.”
    We splash off in opposite directions, Transition Boy and me, and I wonder if he really will call.
    I don’t know what I’ll do if he doesn’t.
    Then again, I don’t know what I’ll do if he does.

8
    O n Sunday morning, I wake up to a ringing alarm, thinking it’s Monday. Until I remember why I set it.
    Oh. Church.
    It’s so tempting to roll over and go back to sleep. But I drag myself through a cold downpour to mass at St. Fabian’s near Washington Square, just as I promised I would. My inner Catholic schoolgirl can be a real pain in the ass.
    But when I get to church, I’m glad to be there.
    The altar is decorated with poinsettias and greens and twinkly white lights, and the priest gives an uplifting homily about loving our fellow man.
    I have to remind myself that he doesn’t mean it literally—at least, not in the biblical sense. That, in fact, the whole reason I’m here in the first place is because I’m guilty of loving my fellow man—er, men.
    I take communion out of habit, wondering only after I’veswallowed the host whether I should have gone to confession first.
    Is sex before marriage—okay, sex with zero prospect of marriage—technically a sin?
    Hard to tell, given the archaic language Moses used in the Ten Commandments. I mean, Jack isn’t my neighbor’s wife. And we didn’t have sex on the Sabbath Day or anything….
    Still, when in doubt, cleanse the soul—that’s what I always say.
    Well, not always.
    In fact, I’ve never said it until now, but then, my soul—if that’s what you want to call it—has never been this, um, for lack of a better word, dirty .
    So on the way out, I dutifully pick up a bulletin and check to see when the priest hears confessions. I make a note to make a note in my day planner to go on Tuesday night.
    There.
    I’m almost feeling like my old chaste self again.
    Sunday afternoon, Buckley and I go to see the new Julianne Moore movie. It’s still pouring out, and the trains are messed up and I can’t get a cab, so I’m late meeting him at Loews.
    I spend the whole movie thinking about Jack. Buckley and I don’t have a chance to talk until we’re on our way across the street for a beer.
    Naturally, I light up the minute we leave the theater.
    “Do you have to smoke?” Buckley asks, holding an umbrella over me and