Free Come Back by Sky Gilbert Page B

Shakespeare, then why would it matter if one stupid and irrelevant academic were invited to attend the conference and argue in favour of the bungheaded theory? Why, instead, would that make everyone boycott the conference? What are they all afraid of? And how could a man as kind and brilliant as Dr. Braithwaite treat me as if I had just farted in public when I brought up the subject? Is the emperor wearing
any
clothes?
    Okay, I’ll stop. It’s becoming clear to me that there is no place for me in this world. I was driven out of my theatre company. Why? For being too gay, for championing gay, when gay is clearly over. At least, in the way I knew it. And now the only academic subject I want to talk about is verboten, and I am condemned to silence. I feel that when it comes to me, the rest is silence, because what else do I have to say, and what is the point of talking?
    You don’t have to answer. But maybe you will understand why I have been late with my latest draft.
    Thanks for everything,
    Dash
    The
Hamlet
reference is melodramatic but appropriate. Shortly after this, Dash abandoned not only his thesis, but any effort at constructive living. I don’t expect you to like Dash; he is eminently unlikeable, self-obsessed and self-destructive. And I’m not saying I like him, just that I am fascinated by him. Is this just nostalgia? At my age, I think I can be forgiven a little nostalgia. But I don’t think that’s really what it is. Dash’s self-destructiveness is rooted in a direct relationship with a discernable reality; that is, he knows he can destroy himself. (It is so difficult to destroy yourself these days!) But also, his obsession with Shakespeare is not only rooted in a time and place where identity mattered, but where truth mattered. When history seemed like something that could be proved. It is romantic, and I am romantic. And though I don’t want to stop talking, it is late. We have been talking practically all night — it’s so easy now that I am integral. But I suppose this isn’t talking, technically, as you haven’t had a chance to respond. Yet I haven’t needed a cigarette because I have become drunk on you. You can’t imagine what a job it is to haul this carcass — and that is literally what it has become — into bed. But that’s what I am going to do. Sometimes I think the only thing that keeps me alive is believing you’ll listen to me. When we meet again — I am certain it will happen someday — will you buy me dresses? Yes, I would look ridiculous. It would be like putting the Blob in an evening gown, mud glittering with diamonds. But I should like that. And I would especially like you to go on again about how you cannot wear dresses, that you don’t know how to wear them. But I can.
    I can no longer twirl. I can no longer dance. Perhaps that’s why I am playing with words — because they remind me of what it was like to dance for you.

T hough I expect severity, there is something else in your tone. It’s impossible for me to imitate, and I wouldn’t want to. There is a coldness. It suggests I am already dead. It seems only fair to wait to treat me as dead when I am actually dead, and otherwise treat me with the common respect of one human being for another. Surely we are not beyond that? I have made many allowances, yes, for
you
. You are a fragile, special case, and your relationship with your father . . . But we won’t go there. I know I’m not supposed to mention that. I know our relationship will never be equal. I know you require acquiescence, obeisance almost, and it is that stone coldness of you I adore. It reassures me. There is so much love and so much hate in it. I used to receive enough serenity from the severity of your look that I could sleep at night. But there is something missing in the way you treat me now.
    If only I could see you . . . I know it’s impossible. Ironic that