The One: A Gay Fable - Softcover

Alvarez, Alex

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1481740903 ISBN 13: 9781481740906

Publisher: AuthorHouse, 2013

Synopsis

Vincent Miles sat on the low stone seawall feeling wholly restored. To what exactly he had been restored, he couldn't say. He only sensed that he had felt like this before-light and content and nothing more. If he tried to picture something more, then he would surely see a world of sorrow and doubt. There was none of that here, not now. The view was everything and everything was the view. From here he could only move on, to some kind of summit, a climax coming his way . . .

About this title

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The One A Gay Fable

By Alex Alvarez

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2013 Alex Alvarez
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-4817-4090-6

CHAPTER 1

Vincent

I

He had nearly convinced himself that this latest break up wouldn't hurtas much, not like Jeremy or Mike or his first love, Logan. With Orlando,he had time to prepare for the blow, a year at least to trace the sad eclipseof happy possibilities.

What Vincent hadn't expected was how quickly it was all settledonce the decision had been made. Within a week, Orlando was gone,leaving Vincent a bit disoriented if not thoroughly in despair. There weremornings when he woke with the comforting sense of having his boyfriendnext to him—but that Orlando could be a comfort at all after so manymonths of stiffness was a tribute to the overall loss. The evenings were byfar the worst; he would fall into inexhaustible loneliness, reaching out totheir four years of togetherness for some kind of purpose, some substantialground that he could build some meaning on. In the end, the only thingconcrete was the familiar humiliation of another failed relationship. Thiswas his fifth and he was only twenty-seven years old—

And if this time Vincent could burrow deep with the pain, it wassimply because the sting of rejection was so palpable. Not only hadOrlando thoroughly given him up, he hadn't even bothered to show himwhat he had been given him up for. All Vincent had, with any certainty,was that his boyfriend had come back from a "time alone" vacation toPoland even more aloof. And when he wasn't, he was even more irritable.The months that followed consisted of bitter, erratic argument that leftVincent spiritually wasted ... until he was done—everything breached,exposed, and exhumed.

Now he was left to search out where he had failed, where Orlandohad failed, where the world had failed. Round and round, the only endwas that there were no answers, only that he hated Poland, would alwayshate Poland. But he couldn't so irrationally hate without often smilingafterwards at the insanity of simply being human.

Orlando moved out in November and then moved away in January. That,at least, was a blessing. If his ex had stayed in New York City, Vincent wassure he would have run into him by chance, or worse, by convenience.That it all shifted during the holidays was another blessing; the holidaysDemanded attention and therefore could prove a much needed distractionfrom the dangers of his renewed state of aloneness. This is not to say thatVincent was by any means in the Christmas spirit. He was an actor byprofession and passion and could thus just play the spirited Christmas.

The worst of the three holidays, New Year's Eve, might've posed achallenge, but that too he performed expertly: he went out with uncoupledfriends and then went home with the first man who made a convincingmove. He woke up the next day with an exhausted relief that the holidayswere over. It certainly gave him courage to face the new year ... until hecouldn't find his underwear—or a yellow cab out of the Bronx.

When winter established itself, he could truly find no desire in hislife, only the routine of singleness to fiddle with and adjust to—again.January and February were cold, harsh, servile months of self-reprisalsand subtle despondency. That it only showed outwardly in the slack of hisoften generous smile, the thoughtlessness in his words, and the unkemptlength of his dark hair, was proof that Vincent wasn't the type to hold uphis feelings for the world to see. He showed enough, but that quality wasnow measured by the collapse of repetition and a suppression of feeling,patterns of behavior that nevertheless promised nothing overwrought orhysterical, which then added, for the intimate observer, poignancy to hisoverall spiritual derailment.

Fortunately there were several unexpectedly warm days in Marchand you could say that kept him superficially steady until the early springpulled him out from the frozen finality and placed him firmly on newground: new hope and better days. And yes, Vincent came into happinessagain. Well, not so much happiness as a lessening of unhappiness—butthat was a start. Here, he had been before and from here he knew the way.He knew too that he wasn't alone on this road, the result of which wasto find himself on a brilliantly warm afternoon in Central Park, alongwith hundreds of other New Yorkers who were bidding farewell to theexhausted winter. And it was under this sun, on a soft grassy incline of hisyoung life, that Vincent took up again an appreciation of all that could beright and good around him.

It was here too that Vincent, with no need to struggle with questionsof expense or prudence, decided to take a two-week vacation, in the latesummer, to somewhere in Europe, specifically somewhere he had neverseen before. Why not? He had the means, the accumulated time, and thepersonal freedom. And if it seemed as if he was taking a characteristic cuefrom Orlando, then he had recovered enough to cite him as inspiration.Vincent had never been on a trip alone, not even cross-state. There wasnow a curiosity in the thing that his ex had seemed to flourish in. Perhapshe had been missing something; perhaps it lay mostly in introspectionthan the generic sense of change; perhaps the thing he was missing-outon was the thing that ultimately broke them up—

Looking into the fractured light of the sun from behind his dark sunglasses,Vincent could now see how Orlando had perched himself high aboveeverything. Even him. And now he wanted to be perched, to see what allthe fuss was about—to know what he had been given up for. Surely it wasbetter than the nothing Orlando had left him, nothing in the form of analmost offensive platitude: "I don't think we were meant to be."

II

"Scusi, is this where you get the ferry to Dubrovnik?"

Vincent certainly could've pieced together the question in Italian, buthe was tired and just didn't have the patience for translation. The fleshymiddle-aged native hardly moved from his low canvass chair; he might'veeven resented having to turn away from the shifting afternoon on theAdriatic: "Yes, that come from Dubrovnik," he lazily pointed to nothingparticular, "another to Dubrovnik in eight tonight, eight tomorrow, noproblem."

Vincent turned to the harbor, to the direction the weary Italian hadreturned to. "Grazie," he brushed him off with ease, "just wanted to besure." He then walked to the edge of the harbor for a moment's absorption.It was still insistently humid but the clear green-hued water refreshed hisconsciousness so that you could say there was a hint of satisfaction in hisexpression—

Indeed everything was going well. He had flown into Rome andstayed a night, just enough time to retrieve a past connection: a birthdaysurprise, his two best friends, Dave Matthews Band at the then newlyerected Gran Teatro Roma. That had been a good trip, but he couldn'tcount on nostalgia to keep him in Rome for more than a day. Vincentwanted novelty; he wanted an experience all his own. The old port cityof Bari was all his.

And he had had a good day in Bari, a day encased in summer andshade, not dust and ruins. So to linger at the harbor, in the dwindlingafternoon, showed that Vincent was going to do as he pleased and whatpleased him was to absorb what was in front of him—

But he couldn't take it all in without an irritating sense of Orlandoestablishing a fine mise en scène for him. In fact, his ex-boyfriend hadforced his way in, here and there: in the taxi on his way to the airport, alittle in Rome, more during the five-hour train ride across Italy, and nowin Bari. It was always, at those moments, as if he were seeing through hiseyes—establishing his impression in a voice that deepened and expandedsimultaneously.

Then again, Vincent had only himself to blame if his ex-boyfriendestablished connections. Hadn't he given him the destination, theinitiative retrieved from an account Orlando had given him, very early intheir relationship, of a trip to Yugoslavia, to Dubrovnik and Belgrade andthe Vojvodina province of Serbia?

At the time Vincent was left with a great deal of impressions,impressions that transmuted and dispersed with time, but the thingthat lingered was the sound of Orlando's voice when he pronouncedVojvodina. He had asked him to spell the exotic sound that night, and itthen gave him a feeling of exclusivity to know that the j was pronouncedlike a y—the exclusivity all between them, which was the thing thatcharacterized their relationship the most.

Vincent turned away from the harbor and slowly walked back to thehotel. There was no time for a nap; he needed a two-hour window forthat. Instead, he sat in the hotel bar, alternating his seemingly passiveglance from the wonderful sunset to the wonderfully beautiful Italianwaiters—and the admiration was returned.

Our hero could be sorted as the ambiguously white (and pleaseexcuse my racial generality) American. The soft angularity of face anddark features were appreciated as handsome. But Vincent wasn't just apretty face. There was an edgy masculinity in his face that reinforcedsome kind of conscious work. Then again, the skilled actor could alwaysproduce an impression. It was certainly helped by a literal "mark," aseasoned scar taking up a good part of his chin, creating a visual referencepoint in which all else had to contend with. So that on closer inspectionthere was no mistaking the intent in his black brown eyes; the intent allin what he saw at a deeper vantage point—

It was in this posture that he lingered before his next jump. But itwould be dark and cool and he would have a sweet alcohol buzz by thetime he boarded the ferry. The crossing to Dubrovnik would take eighthours. He had splurged on a private cabin and there could be no sweeteranticipation than to be cradled by the Adriatic and then to be awakenedto a splendid new world.

III

The sun was without confines, extending beyond the horizon withan oppressiveness that was surely aggravated by the crowd that ringedthe galleries in anticipation of the arrival. This wasn't exactly howVincent had envisioned his arrival. Nevertheless, at the first faint sightof the fortress city, he felt a pull, a tug toward possibilities ... the sharpcontrasting colors of the water and sky, the red clay roofs and glaringwhite stone, all might've produced an aesthetic rapture if not for thefour giddy Japanese girls crushing beside him to photograph and recordthe landing.

To his surprise, the ferry docked at the harbor some distance fromthe high bleached walls. Vincent then had to move among the othertourists in tight procession toward the old city, pushed and paused bysome unseen guide. He expected to escape the throng once through themain gate but even here there was a crowd, and once inside there waslittle to detach him from the clashing variation of voices that dimmedand doused the restored city with an artificiality of a stage show still inrehearsals. But Vincent moved on, seemingly thrust without direction,through tight alleys, high arches, no pausing to soak in the history or thearchitecture because there was simply no inviting space—

"This sucks," he thought aloud.

It took a great deal of direction (he was too indignant to purchasea map) to find his way back to the main gate. He wasn't sure of his nextmove but he wanted to be close to an exit—

Frustrated and overheated, he paused in the slim shade producedby a domed fountain that gave him the impression of a bombasticmausoleum.

He finished the bottled water he had reluctantly paid seven euros forand retrieved his Let's Go Balkans from his backpack. Even in the coolingshade of the sprouting water behind him, he couldn't shake the burdenof disappointment.

"Don't you wish you could jump in?"

Vincent turned to the voice that struck him with a familiarity thatwas impossible not to welcome even in its suddenness—

"Well, like everything else," he said without hesitation, "there's notmuch room for even that. "I'd prefer the middle of the Adriatic rightabout now."

"Yeah, it's really crowded," his compatriot said not very convincingly."Where you from?"

"Originally from Tucson, but I live in New York City now."

The young man, unquestionably college age, smiled but then he hadbeensmilingallalong—allteeth,straightandwhiteandbright,theiconicAmerican smile that Vincent made a quick connection to Jay Gatsby—orwas it Robert Redford?

"I've never been to New York," the young man said with enthusiasmthat Vincent thought out of context. "But I'm definitely going theresomeday. Just waiting for the moment to come."

Vincent took his own moment to take in his companion's fairness,his confidence, the muscular calves that only genetics could produce.His frame was also wide but not necessarily attributed to the gym. Hewore a dark blue t-shirt with IOWA in rust yellow. This detail instigatedVincent's next question: "And where are you from?"

The young man slapped the letters on his chest. "Iowa—the beautifulland!"

Vincent laughed but it wasn't disrespectful. "Can't say I've ever beento Iowa."

"Yeah, not many people can say that. I'm sure people think it's allfarmland, which most of it is, but Iowa City is a university town. I'velived there all my life, went to the University of Iowa. I just graduated.This trip is a present to me."

"That's awesome, congrats."

His new friend looked up seemingly for some direction and then cameback to him: "Thanks. It's my first trip out of the country by myself. Myparents weren't happy about it for about five minutes, but they supportthings that they see as enriching. They're both teachers so you know howthat goes."

Vincent didn't. "That's great."

"I've already hit twenty-three of the fifty States. Now I'm making myway through Europe. I definitely wanna hit as many countries as I can inthirty days. I know it sounds cliché but I don't care. I'm having a greattime."

Vincent couldn't help being carried away by the young man'scandidness—and so much of it. It reminded him of home; it made himtake a step closer: "I remember the first time I came to Europe I justwanted to see everything fast. I was with my boyfriend at the time and hekept me from jumping ship whenever I got an itch."

The young man slackened his smile. "So are you traveling by yourselftoo?"

"I sure am."

"Cool—how long you in Dubrovnik?"

Vincent sighed. "Not for long I hope. I'm sorry—yes, this city isamazing but it's just too freakin' touristy. I think I've seen enough."

The young graduate rose to make a point: "Yeah, it's a tourist trap. Itdoesn't bother me though, I'm a tourist too!"

"You sure are," Vincent came in with his own candidness.

His companion didn't take offense, instead, regenerated his smile."So where you heading to?"

"Belgrade."

"I just got back from Beograd. It's pretty intense, very foreign. It'sdefinitely one of those places where you need to know someone or evensomeone to go with. Supposedly the best night life in Europe, but therewas no one to show me the way. I did meet these guys from Ireland on mylast night so that was fun."

"Cool."

"No regrets though," he seemed to want to end on a light note, "I justgot back from Herceg Novi in Montenegro. Now, that was awesome. Youshould go there if you want something that is totally not touristy."

For a moment Vincent let the young graduate hang a bit and heresponded by looking past him in a moment of reflection: "I think it's myfavorite place in the world so far."

"Really? In the world? Then maybe I should make a pit stop. I havetime."

"You should. I'm going to Slovenia from here. The legal age ofconsent is seventeen."

Vincent laughed. "Oh, okay—so you like them young."

At this point he should've gone further and asked if he liked girls orboys, his gaydar clearly left back in New York. Instead Vincent smiledwith a tinge of suggestion.

"No, no—it's just a bit of trivia. I'm Ethan, by the way." He extendedhis hand with the first sign of timidity.

"Vincent."

"I have a cousin named Vincent. My uncle is obsessed with Vincentvan Gogh."

"I was named after my grandfather—the Italian side."

"What's the other?"

"Scottish, English."

"You look more Italian."

"Yeah, I look like my mother—so what did you get your degree in?"

Ethan leaned against the fountain. "Accounting. Numbers are mysoul." And he placed his hand on his chest and tilted his face up to thesky.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from The One A Gay Fable by Alex Alvarez. Copyright © 2013 Alex Alvarez. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Edition details

• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1481740903
• ISBN 13: 9781481740906
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 222