The Stranger

Lamb ♣ 07 | LGBTQ+ Serial Fiction

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♣ ♣ ♣ 07 ♣ ♣ ♣

For the first few years I knew him, Lamb always went to his mom’s house for Thanksgiving in Houston, and for Christmas, to his dad and new stepmom’s house in Bronxville, New York, just down the street from some Kennedy cousin or other apparently. Swank. 

His stepmom, Renée, was quite a bit younger than his dad, so you can imagine there was some tension all around—Lamb’s own mother called her “that JAP” (“Renée doesn’t look Japanese,” I said, baffled—“Jewish American Princess,” he explained)—but at least at first, Lamb really tried to get along with her. When she got pregnant our freshman year in college, he was super excited about having a baby brother.

Something happened over Christmas sophomore year. He went back East to spend the holidays, and then I got a letter saying he had cut it short and flown back to Berkeley on Christmas day. He was vague about why, and he never went back as far as I know—from then on, he only saw his dad at his grandparents’ house in The Hague, or they would sometimes meet up in Aspen for a ski trip, or dinner in San Francisco.

In Lamb’s journals, I found a brief entry from “12/26/88 - Caffè Med”—he always made a note of where he was when he wrote in his journal. Caffè Mediterraneum was his favorite on Telegraph Avenue all through college—supposedly the birthplace of the latte, definitely the place in The Graduate where Benjamin is sitting when Elaine walks out of Moe’s Books across the street and he chases after her in the bus.

Lamb wrote:

“I would never hurt him, I don’t know why she acted so crazy. I thought we were bonding. I guess not. I was just trying to have a quiet minute with him, so he would know me—I’m not going to have that many chances to hang out with him, just Christmas mostly, maybe summer break, but I guess that’s all ruined now.

I think I might never see him again.”

Around the same time, Lamb wrote the following story in his journal—in French—I had to translate it with Google. I guess I’m calling it a story, not a poem, but it is strange. A prose poem? Yes.

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L'étranger

By

Lamb.

1. A door shuts, she walks upstairs to make sure. Into the nursery, back down to her book, fallen to the floor.
   “Safe,” she says, reads on a page or two.
   New mother—no gladness upon her lips, no light in her heart. The King away, back for Christmas.
   Out in the garden, a candle bursts into flame, stills to an ember, throbs, throbs. She sets her book aside, draws the curtain. Safe, she thinks. Out of sight, out of mind.
   She guards the palace; guards the new prince. Safe.
   

2. The old prince, strange and queer, looks on.
   The wind-whipped trees bend, sway; moonbeams dance across the glass, frosted by the pulse of ghostly breath. A wrinkled apple falls, rolls and knocks into another, brown cheek, pink cheek. The parkway roars and groans, a river of lights sweeping away.
   He shivers in his cloak.
   

3. Slowly, gently, shut the door, up the backstairs. Searching for it still, not in the garden, not in the spare. The carpet wrong, the bed too short.
   The silver lamp casts about.
   What is it? The treasure promised.
   Where is it? Not in the closet, not in the drawer.
   

4. In the nursery. The gurgle of steam—mobile, moon, stars—a nightlight.
   “Quiet,” he whispers, or he will wake.
   “Look at you,” he murmurs—the little prince coos, eyes bright.

   Long he looks; long years to come—summers and winters; sun and snow. A curled fist reaches, a dimple, a laugh. He rolls the bundle up in his arms.
   Whispers, “Safe, safe, safe—” and “Long life—” and “Blessed—”
   “Brother—”
   

5. He hears no step behind him, then fright, her fury:

   “Why are you here?”
   “The treasure—”
   “Smoke and ash…”
   “We—”
   “Damn you…”
   He flees South, flees West. Stars wheel in a strange sky.

♣ ♣ ♣

Episode 8: No Man’s Land

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Esteemed Readers:

LGBTQ+ fiction and writers remain a marginalized population in the world at large, and even here on Substack there is a relative paucity of queer content.

If you have a queer bestie, coworker, frenemy, nemesissy, softball team, gym buddy, book group, favorite guncle, Aunt Butch, or adored florist-caterer-handyperson-bartender—please help extend my reach to the wider community by sharing this post directly with someone who will appreciate a queer story.

Thank you!

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THREAD: “What we talk about when we talk about ‘Song of Myself’”

SoM, v. 4 | “These come to me days and nights and go from me again, But they are not the Me myself.” | AUDIO