Free Dead Ringer by Ken Douglas Page B

drink,” Maggie said.
    “ Yeah, well I usually don’t during business hours.”
    “ So, there you go,” she said. “Now tell me, who’s Harvey Milk?”
    “ He got elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors,” Jonas said.
    “ He was a cut above the rest of us.” Gordon stared up at the photo. Harvey Milk smiled back. He was a handsome man, dark hair, smile so wide his eyes were squinting. He was sitting, one leg over the other, by the side of a brick building, wearing Levi’s, work boots and a plaid shirt, kind of like the one Jonas was wearing. His arms were folded over his knee, newspaper dangling from his hands. He looked like he needed mothering. He looked fragile.
    He was in another photo with a young black woman. Milk’s white skin contrasting sharply with her dark face. Her Afro wild, her smile serene. Maybe Maggie didn’t know who Harvey Milk was, but she knew all about Gaylen Geer. An in your face black feminist who raged against everything. Maggie was surprised she hadn’t noticed the photo before, but then the walls were covered with black and white shots of the ’60s and the ’70s.
    Milk was in a third photo, sitting on the top of a car, legs dangling through the sun roof, right hand raised in a fist, in his left he was holding up a sign. “I’m from Woodmere, N.Y.” it said. He was wearing a white T-shirt, a garland of flowers hung from his neck. His mouth was open wide, he was yelling something. A crowd of people were marching behind the car. He looked like he was about to be swept up by a hurricane.
    “ Gay pride parade, he wanted folks to know gays come from everywhere. My sign said I came from Stockholm.” Jonas took another pull from his beer.
    “ Mine said I was from Thief River Falls, Minnesota,” Gordon said.
    “ Was he the first gay elected to the board of supervisors?” Maggie said.
    “ He was the first openly gay man elected to anything on the planet,” Jonas said. “He brought us into the human race.”
    “ You should know that,” Gordon said.
    “ When was he killed?”
    “ Nineteen seventy-eight.”
    “ I was a baby.”
    “ You know about those other guys.” Gordon pointed to the photos of John, Bobby and Martin. “You weren’t even born when they were killed.”
    “ I know about George Washington and Abe Lincoln, too. Come on, guys, it’s not the same.”
    “ It is,” Jonas said.
    “ If it isn’t, it should be,” Gordon said.
    Maggie wanted to protest further, but she saw they were serious, so she bit back her words.
    “ Harvey Milk faced death every day. Back then gays weren’t just discriminated against, they were persecuted. We were beaten, defiled and jailed. Sure, Martin Luther King was hated by a lot of stupid people, but it wasn’t against the law to be black.”
    “ Harvey said in his will, ‘If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door,”’ Gordon said. “He knew it was going to happen, but he kept on anyway, stayed in front of the public and the cameras, showing the whole world it was possible to be gay and do your job.”
    “ He told me he expected it to happen one day,” Jonas said, “but he didn’t dwell on it.”
    “ He was my friend and I miss him,” Gordon said.
    “ Me too,” Jonas said.
    “ So, you two guys go way back?” Somehow Maggie didn’t have a hard time picturing Jonas and Gordon together.
    “ We do,” Jonas said and Maggie wondered if they’d been a couple in the past or would be in the future. She knew Jonas lived alone, though she didn’t know why. She grinned. They might be good for each other.
    “ What?” Gordon said.
    “ Nothing. I think I’ll go.”
    “ Go where?” Gordon’s arms were crossed, eyes scolding now. He was acting like a parent.
    “ Home, where else?”
    “ Not alone you’re not.”
    “ I’m a big girl, Gordon. Besides, you’ve got a game to finish.”
    “ I’ll drive her,” Jonas said. “I need a break anyway.”
    “ No you