Harry was tall and thin, elegant looking, silver-white hair; an older man, maybe 55 but what did I know? I was 13, maybe 14. It was hard to tell how old adults were. My father’s name was Harry so maybe that was why I felt safe with him. He started talking to me on the subway and I immediately responded, telling him how I wanted to be an actor, how I was coming home from rehearsal. Then it turned out we lived on the same block on the lower east side of Manhattan. Made sense. That’s why we were on the same train.

My father was fat and ugly, a mean man and it showed on his face. He hated me, hated that I was an actor. It was a sign that I was a fairy. An unhappy man and it showed on his body, hanging globs of fat, loose floppy muscles. I would never have leaned forward and talked so easily to him as I did to Harry on the subway.

Harry was interested. Harry listened. He smiled. He was nice. He thought it was wonderful that I was an actor and had a good part in a school production. But I knew there was something else. Even now I know I knew. Back then I didn’t know I knew. But I knew.

I didn’t know what gay meant. I didn’t know that I was. This was in the 1940’s when people didn’t talk about such things. I don’t even remember that we used the term “gay.”

Queer, faggot, fairy; that’s what I knew Harry was. Once walking with my father, he pointed out a mincing man in a bright red wig. “Look, Eddie,” he said, “That’s a fairy.”

The first day I went to a new junior high, one tough kid told me, smirking and scary, that he and the other guys had decided I was the biggest fairy in the class. I didn’t know enough to be insulted. I wouldn’t have fought back if I knew. But I asked Phyllis Finkelman, who came with me from our old grammar school, what a fairy was. She said it “was like a male prostitute.” I didn’t understand at all what that was or why anybody would say that I was. But I knew Harry was.

So, when he invited me up to his apartment as we walked home from the subway, of course, I agreed to go. It seemed inevitable. I was drawn to his door as if by a whisper. I knew I shouldn’t go. I knew I would never be able to tell my mother about this, even though I told her everything. I knew as I was walking beside him, his long, long legs stretching out with each step so I had to shuffle to keep up, I knew this was wrong. This was dangerous. My mother must never know. But I could not resist. I could not turn away.

Days later, my mother’s best friend, Mildred, told her she had seen me walking with Harry and that everybody knew he was a no-goodnick. I shouldn’t be hanging around with him. I told my mother it wasn’t me. Mildred had mistaken somebody else for me. I had never met this nogoodnick Harry. I was a good actor. My mother believed me or, at least, I convinced myself she did. And it started me on a lifetime of lying, which pains me even now.

He had a strange apartment, with hanging drapery and tassels and a miniature statue of David. Harry had money, that was clear. Nobody in my family had an apartment like that. But I settled into an easy chair and kept talking and when I stopped, he started. He got a telephone call and responded with annoyance. He explained after he hung up, that it was from a neighborhood kid who wanted to come over. The kid had just been there, said Harry, and had spent the entire night. He told the kid in no uncertain terms that it was too soon to come again.

By then, I knew for sure. And Harry knew that I knew and we could really get comfortable with each other in a way I had never experienced with a man, in a way that I really liked. I felt I could pour out all my secrets to Harry but I did not know what those secrets were.

He began to describe the rules of his visits with these neighborhood boys. He said the guy took a shower first in the bathroom at the end of the hall. He pointed it out so I could see where it was and picture the adventure, step by step. He said they proceeded down the hall naked, or maybe wrapped in a towel, and I pictured the tough guy in my new junior high like that. Then the guy stretched out on the bed in the darkened room and Harry said he went in and “did his magic.”

So there it was, the invitation I had known was coming but I pretended I didn’t understand and just kept smiling. Harry was very nice. He didn’t go any further. He didn’t pressure me. He made no further offers or explanations. He left his phrase about magic hanging in the air floating among the tassels. I was preparing to leave because my mother would be worried. He said I could come back whenever I wanted. After all, we were neighbors.

Then, the doorbell rang. Harry had forgotten he had an appointment with a neighborhood guy who had a business proposition to discuss. I could have gotten up and left but I didn’t. Harry made no gesture that indicated I had to. He answered the door and I stayed. It was Louie, a guy from the neighborhood. A good-looking Italian with a head full of curly dark locks. Duck’s Ass haircut. Sideburns. He was older, maybe nineteen or twenty. But it seemed he didn’t work. He didn’t go to school. He was always hanging around the playground, kidding with kids my age. What was he doing there? He never played ball. Maybe he wasn’t so smart. But he was handsome and charismatic and funny and always having a good time. He was just Louie, another nice guy from the neighborhood.

As soon as he entered and looked me over with a glance that said that Harry had found a new boy, I knew at once that Louie was one of Harry’s regulars, wrapped in a towel or probably not because I imagined that Louie was not shy, I knew I had to get out of there. Now things were getting dangerous. Now more people knew. So when Louie started talking about this fantastic opportunity he wanted Harry to invest in, I scooted out and never called Harry again.

But I have been dreaming since then about Louie and Harry and the guy from junior high in a towel and I am now 84 years old.

Harry and gorgeous Louie and the guy in my Junior High were all in on the secret. I raced home to my mother for some consolation but, eventually, she told me what

Mildred had told her and, even though I was a good actor and lied like a pro, I knew she didn’t believe me and nothing would ever be the same.

– Edward M. Cohen

Note: This piece originally appeared in the UK anthology Beyond Queer Words.