An Amicable Split
January 3rd, 2006
I met Jose through my buddy Joe the Invisible Broker back in…1997, I think it was. Joe was having a party at The Panelled Place and either Lenny or his sister Jamie brought Jose over. I was immediately smitten by Jose’s square-shouldered but svelt physique and his lovely golden añejo color–but I was hesitant to approach him, fearing my inexperience with his ilk would be too glaringly obvious, or that my friends would notice my sudden attraction. I resisted his advances at first, hiding behind a masque of forced indifference…but I couldn’t hold out for long, and before I knew it, he was pouring himself down my throat and surrounding my heart with a warm, welcoming glow redolent of the continent’s great southwestern deserts and the evening redness in the west. That night, Jose and I became lovers.
As time went on, we saw one another rarely–almost always at Joe’s place and then, later, at Jamie’s (she, too, was entranced by Jose’s Latino grace and rough, yet cultured, disposition)–but everytime we hooked up the sparks just flew and my entire body was suffused with the elemental heat of our passion. Jose was a classic “bad boy” with a reputation for inspiring men young and old to feats of suicidal machismo or delusions of bravado…but with me, Jose was always as gentle as he was wild. He never did me any wrong. We would meet at friends’ houses, or later at the late, lamented Club Laga and the Upstage, and before long the carousing would begin in earnest. He helped me strip away many of the inhibitions that had overshadowed my life since my sheltered childhood. Jose stripped me naked and taught me to be proud of, and the love, the inner nature that I’d hidden for so many years. Without his encouragement, I never would’ve met my first real girlfriend, or survived the nightmare that our break-up became. Many a bleak night was saved by his delirious embrace. He was always there for me, to resurrect me from corpselike depressions and dance away nights of glorious abandon. And when the inevitable “morning after” came, he was always gone, leaving me to wake in peace without any awkward or headachey goodbyes.
Everyone knew of our love–we were not ashamed of what we had between us; nay, we celebrated it at every opportunity! Occasionally, Jose would introduce me to his relatives, like his distinguished old tio Don Eduardo and even, occasionally, to his hell-raising ne’er-do-well younger cousins with their bouncing low-riders and their savage natures, but always–always–I came back to Jose. I enjoyed a hundred thousand sunrises and sunsets with him over the years. I drank gallons of margaritas with him. In many ways, he was my savior.
But…a few years ago, things began to go bad between us. We began to argue, and though our rows were generally very subdued affairs, they always left me with a terrible burning in the stomach and sometimes stabbing headaches of shame. We began to see less of each other. I supposed this was just a matter of how relationships evolve, and that the blush of our initial passion had faded into a more sedate, but permanent, affair. But I was wrong….We were simply growing apart. My body just didn’t want him like it used to, and no amount of forcing myself to believe we were merely “taking a break” from each other could truly convince myself. The writing was on the wall: we just didn’t need one another anymore like we used to. We’d meet up sometimes when we were out and we’d have a wonderful time, just like in the old days…but the night would often end with a disagreement, or a sad parting–and it was just obvious that the old days were dying and would not be coming back, no matter how hard we tried to preserve them.
I’m a complete mess when it comes to ending relationships–it’s just so hard for me to tell somebody it’s over….Especially Jose. We danced around the issue for most of last year, but finally…finally it came to a head on New Year’s Eve, 2005. A few months earlier, Jose and I had spent a truly wild night together at the Upstage–just like we’d done a thousand times in the past–but we hadn’t spoken for months. He showed up at the Colony for New Year’s Eve and we actually avoided one another for most of the night. I finally had a margarita with him but…I couldn’t even finish it. We’d just grown too far apart.
We snuck off to a quiet corner, and there I tried to tell him: “Jose…I just….”
“It’s okay, hermano,” he said, patting me comfortingly on the shoulder. “I know how it’s been. You don’t have to say anything.”
Tears welled up in my eyes but….I set my half-empty glass aside. “I just can’t do this anymore,” I sighed. “My wild and crazy days are behind me now, and…we’re just more like distant friends now.”
Jose nodded sadly, but then smiled. “I’ll always be here for you,” he said. “Whenever you want to get together. We don’t need to go crazy anymore and tie one on like we used to. We can sit around and enjoy a quiet sunrise every now and again, and remember old times. We’ll always be friends, Pegritz. Even if we only see each other once or twice a year.”
And that was that. We parted and I spent most of the evening sober–the first New Year’s I’ve spent sober in years. The more I think about it, though, the more I realize that our relationship now is much stronger than it was before. I don’t need Jose in my life anymore: I’ve grown into myself, become comfortable with the person that I’ve become over the past few years, and I just don’t require Jose’s companionship like I used to. I see now that what we had in the past was nothing more than a mutual dependence–a rather sick affair, now that I think about it..and it’s amazing that it never did us any harm. We were good together–we’re still good together in some ways–but we’re both stronger now and can survive without each other. In many ways, what we have now is a thousand times stronger than what we ever had in the past. We have a friendship that can now truly stand the test of time.
So here’s to you, Jose. I won’t be seeing you for a few months, most likely, but when we get together again, there’ll be a shot glass waiting for you, mi amigo.
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These are the thoughts I mull in the night, which your memoire of Jose brings fresh to my mind. I am glad for you, for how you handled your parting. You may have distanced yourselves, but you ended well. Like men.
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