Free Do They Wear High Heels in Heaven? by Erica Orloff Page A

both going to have to come up with some new lines.”
    “I know. My credibility is lagging.”
    I grew silent.
    “What?” he asked.
    “Nothing. I was just thinking I wish we didn’t have to spout lines like ‘whoever said life was fair’ and all that.”
    “Yes. I would like to not have to come up with all the answers. It’s difficult being brilliant, you realize.”
    “And so modest.”
    “Certainly. And so fucking good-looking.”
    “Thanks for telling him. He idolizes you, though Lord knows you don’t need anyone else worshipping you. Is that woman from the gym still calling you?”
    “Yes. Seems like ever since she found out I was gay, she’s determined to bed me and change me. Why can’t she think ‘what a waste of gorgeous manhood’ like the rest of them?”
    “You are impossible. Anyway, thanks for telling him. I just…I feel like I’m on my last raw nerve right now. And thanks for keeping him overnight.”
    “Anytime, Lily. Has Spawn called by any chance?”
    “No. I got a card today. He sent me an extra hundred dollars in his child support check and told me to buy them each something they wanted for their birthdays.”
    “Does he realize he missed Tara’s by three months?”
    “I’m sure Child Bride didn’t want him sending anything extra at all. Have I told you lately how much I hate them?”
    “It’s their loss, Lily.”
    “I know. Funny thing is the kids just don’t seem to care anymore.”
    “Well, they have you.”
    “For now.”
    “Stop talking like that. You’re going to beat it.”
    “I can’t even picture losing my hair. I’ll never complain about a bad hair day again.”
    “We’ll take it day by day.”
    “Oh…I meant to tell you thanks for the flowers today. They were a great pick-me-up. You’re perfect in every way but one, darling.”
    “I know. You’d marry me in a heartbeat if I wasn’t gay.”
    “No. I was thinking about your obsession with the Yankees. It’s a sickness.”
    “You know, I just cannot stand it when you emotionally batter me this way. Next thing you know you’re going to tell me Don Mattingly shouldn’t be on the greatest team ever.”
    Michael has this little game he plays for every sport. He compiles a list of the “greatest team ever”—thus Mattingly could play with Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Mickey Mantle, despite the fact that they were not contemporaries.
    “He can be on your greatest team ever, but I find your whole greatest-team-ever thing a tad high schoolish.”
    “Well, you know my emotional maturity level….”
    “Yes, I do. My very own Peter Pan.”
    “I better get going, Lil. I need to finish grading these horrible term papers. What are they teaching them in high school? Certainly not how to write in complete sentences.”
    “’Night, Michael.”
    “Love you.”
    “Love you, too.”
    I hung up the telephone. Now my secret was less of a secret. Tara and Noah knew…and little by little, I’d have to tell other people. My parents were no longer living—and I was an only child—so my friends were my family. Crabby Joe was my family. I had to tell other people soon, though. I felt my hair. My soon-to-be-bald head was going to be like an announcement to the world. I have the c-word.

14
    Michael
    L ily is not a pretty picture when she is throwing up. I suppose no one is, but she is especially hideous, and I know she won’t mind me saying so.
    I held a pot under her head and pulled back her hair because she couldn’t make it into the bathroom. Vomit came out her nose. So much for the antiemetics.
    “I can’t do this,” she moaned. “I cannot do another six months of this. It’s fucking hell.”
    “I can tell you holding this pot isn’t thrilling me either, Sugarcakes.”
    “Fuck you.”
    In truth, I wanted her mad at me. Angry people don’t give up. Depressed people, pessimistic people, the people who always see the damn glass as half-empty—they give up. Angry people fight. They do not go quietly into