Free The Swede by Robert Karjel Page B

surprised by his own relief when he called the number on the business card, and Ben suggested that they meet early afternoon at the Whitney Museum café. Just meet the way most people do.
    They sat beside the huge plate-glass windows, just that, a couple of relaxed hours, parted, and from there everything swept forward. That week Grip’s daily rhythm returned to something like normal—he even woke up alone and at home, and ate breakfast beforethe construction workers’ jackhammers had stopped for lunch across the street. He ate dinner out with Ben every night, accompanied him to parties a few times. They hung out with Ben’s circle. But no night together, not even close.
    Finally one evening, Ben asked: “Are you ready?”
    Grip understood perfectly. There had been no contract between them. Even after his daily rhythm had been restored, and Benjamin Hayden became Ben, Grip had still desired other men. Lust was lust. As Ben himself said of him, “With that accent and those bulging arms.” It wasn’t complicated, firefighting that had nothing to do with Ben.
    Are you ready?
    To swear an oath, even if the fine print hadn’t yet dried. There and then, at the kind of crossroads in life where at most you get a second to think. Yet he lived for the spirit of that, for the few moments in life when everything hangs in the balance. Grip nodded.
    “Say it,” said Ben.
    Perhaps the realization came just then. “Now I am,” said Grip. It sounded defiant, even if he didn’t mean it that way. Something trembled in Ben. It disappeared. He laughed briefly and said, “You think you are, but warn me beforehand. For God’s sake, warn me.”
    But Grip would never have to do that. Because Ben wasn’t the type to need constant reassurance—when Ben touched him, he did it in a most natural and obvious way. Grip had never experienced that before. Someone whose presence made him feel calm. Nothing more, just that. It changed everything, and a different kind of life began.
    White shirts and a tan can hide a lot. Age was one thing—Ben turned out to be almost ten years older. The other was the virus. That Ben’s fragility could be contagious, Grip wasn’t at allconcerned about; instead Ben was the one careful about certain details. He was, after all, the person busy keeping death at bay. His bathroom cabinet was filled with pill bottles, and too often he clung to articles about new findings, and to rumors. There was a certain vanity in it, given that his prognosis was hopeless. Being forced to use condoms, and not kissing, those were trivial, under the circumstances.
    For several years Ben had been the manager of a gallery on the outskirts of the Flatiron District. The owner had made a fortune in industrial properties in Jersey, and his third wife convinced him to open their own gallery. But his wife soon lost interest, and the owner wasn’t around, so it was Ben who ran the place. He had pretty much lost interest too, but it kept him afloat. The gallery survived mostly on its annual show by a Jewish artist from Massachusetts. He was best known for his unsavory insects made from parts of real bugs, for his huge ball made from thousands of pieces of chewed gum, and for once having carved a bust of himself in an aspirin tablet. Some noted collectors had invested, and then David Bowie bought a piece; after that prices had only gone up. The artist himself was said to spend his money on high-stakes poker; for the gallery and Ben, it meant they kept going, no better.
    “Security police,” said Ben, thoughtfully rubbing his beard-stubble when Grip told him about himself. By then, Grip had moved in with him in Chelsea, and there were only two weeks left before he had to leave New York.
    “Security police—I thought only Bulgaria and banana republics had them. Security police, that’s what they say on the news when some human rights activist has been beaten or people have disappeared, that the security police have been on the move.”