Free Maybe the Moon by Armistead Maupin Page A

he stay for the night?”
    “Oh, yeah.”
    “Did you read to him?”
    “No,” he said flatly, “and fuck you.”
    “Yes you did. You made that poor child listen to the next chapter.” I could see the whole thing: Jeff propped against the headboard, yellow legal pad in hand; the tangle-haired kid snuggled cozily, postcoitally, against his side. I could even hear Jeff laughing at his own jokes, sighing extravagantly at his own poignant prose.
    He doled out his words slowly, ominously. “So help me…I am…never…ever…”
    “Oh, lighten up. Are you gonna see him again?”
    “I doubt it.”
    “Why not?”
    He shrugged. “I gave him my number, but he wouldn’t give me his.”
    “Where does he live, then?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “What was his name?”
    “Bob, he said. But who knows?”
    “Is that the whole story?”
    “Not exactly. He took off this morning, early, while I was still asleep. He left a note on my dresser that said ‘Thanks, take care’ and just slipped out. I haven’t tricked like that for about a hundred years, and I felt so…I dunno…abandoned suddenly, dumb as that sounds. I thought we might go to a movie today or something. At least have breakfast.”
    “Sure.”
    “But…he was gone, so I made some coffee and worked on the book for a while and then walked down here to return a few videos that were overdue, and when I walked into the store, they had this big display for Mr. Woods . Have you seen that thing yet, by the way?”
    I told him I’d heard about it.
    “Well, it moves, you know, and it’s got a big picture of Mr. Woods and…the little boy. I couldn’t remember his name.”
    “Callum Duff.”
    “In the movie, I mean.”
    “Oh…Jeremy.”
    “Right. Of course.”
    He seemed lost in thought for a moment, so I said: “And?”
    “And…I just stood there, glued to the spot, having the weirdest feeling all of a sudden, because I realized it was him.”
    “Realized who was him?”
    “Bob, the guy I slept with last night.”
    “Was who?”
    “Was Callum Duff.”
    I squinched up my face at him. I could grasp the concept, wiggly as it was; I just couldn’t pin it to the cardboard. “You mean he looked like him?”
    “I think it was him, Cadence. He was just what the grownup would look like.”
    “C’mon.”
    “Well…”
    “Callum lives in Maine,” I said.
    “He does?”
    “Yeah. For years.”
    “Oh.” He looked terribly deflated.
    “His parents took him home after we wrapped. Mr. Woods was the only movie he ever made. He came back for the Oscars, and that was it.”
    I remembered that long-ago night of nights. Callum onstage with Sigourney Weaver, copresenting some boring technical award, the childish “damn” that tumbled from his lips when he flubbed a big word on the TelePrompTer. The whole world was captivated by the only moment of true spontaneity to arise from an otherwise packaged event. Callum left the stage to thunderous applause, those freckles converging in a blush you could see even on black-and-white TV. The town was his on a platter, but all he wanted was to go back home to Rockport, to see his friends again, to study hard and be a lawyer like his dad. Or so he told the press at the time.
    Jeff just wouldn’t let it go. “Maybe he came back.”
    “I think I would’ve heard,” I said gently.
    “You still know him, you mean?”
    “Well, no. Not anymore. But Leonard would’ve told me if he were back.”
    “Who’s Leonard?”
    “My agent. Leonard Lord.”
    “Oh, yeah.”
    “He’s Callum’s agent too. Or was. That’s how I got him. During Mr. Woods . I know I must’ve told you this.”
    Jeff nodded listlessly, drained of his dream.
    “The likeness was that strong, huh?”
    “Maybe not,” he said.
    “He sounds nice, though. The note was really sweet.”
    “Yeah.”
    I couldn’t help feeling sorry for him. This was the first guy he’d even told me about since Ned’s death. “It makes a great story,” I said feebly.