File Under Dead: A Tom & Scott Mystery

1

I always arrived early at the Oscar Wilde Gay Youth Services Clinic. The faux-pine door at the alley entrance to the tatty old building looked like the next puff of a breeze off Lake Michigan could blast it into oblivion. If Bette Davis were looking for a dump, she would have to look no further than the overgrown Victorian mausoleum that served as the main building of the complex. I’d been the sponsor of the Eponymous Gay Teen Club at my high school, Grover Cleveland. A couple of the kids in the program had begged me to volunteer at the clinic as well. They insisted that I was the only adult they knew who was realistic about their problems. When I told them that I was sure the adults at the clinic were highly qualified, good people, they responded that their elders were mostly concerned with infighting and one-upmanship. Infighting in a gay organization? How could the kids be wrong?

Over time the clinic had expanded from one building with services only for gay teens to half the block on the west side of Monclair near Addison. It was as close to a real gay community center as Chicago had but its main focus was still helping gay teenagers. It was another do-good organization with not enough money.

Two years ago a former student of mine, Lee Weaver, had accepted a job at the clinic. His position at the clinic was his first since he’d gotten his master’s degree in social work. I’d helped Lee come out when he was a senior in high school. He’d been shunned by his parents and picked on unmercifully by the kids in school. I’d intervened as often as he’d permitted.

Between unpatrolled washrooms, bus stop torment, hallway hell, and other random unsupervised moments, bullying teens are able to inflict incalculable amounts of mental and physical damage on their peers. These unpoliced venues incubate teenage misery. Even the adults in the supervised places aren’t always all a gay teen could wish for.

Lee had vowed to spend his life helping gay kids. He had run into tons of problems finding the job he wanted. There weren’t that many openings for helping gay kids exclusively and he had competed against a flood of applicants for every job. He had known that the clinic didn’t have a great reputation as a positive work environment, but it was doing exactly the kind of work he wished to be involved in. After being employed there several months, Lee explained that working at the clinic was like swimming in a vat of molten lava on the way to a living hell. He’d added his voice to those of the kids pleading with me to pitch in.

I was heartily sick of the incessant infighting inside gay groups and Lee had graduated from student to good friend. I thought gay kids needed a break and Lee needed help, so I had volunteered. But I’d refused to go to any staff meetings or to participate in the bureaucracy. By coming in early in the mornings I was most likely to avoid Charley Fitch, the notoriously nasty boss of the clinic. He was known for working late into the night. An amazing number of people volunteered for morning duty. I didn’t know if anyone noticed this or not and I’m not sure I cared.

Whether volunteering or being paid, arriving at a job at seven in the morning every other Saturday was not my idea of a good time. But I’d promised to sub for a couple months for one of the volunteers who had been in a near-fatal car accident. It was the first warm day of spring in early April and I’d rather have been out enjoying the pleasant day. At least I could get a lot done in the quiet hours before the clinic began to fill.

The clutter in the office I used looked worse than normal as I tried to find a spot for my coffee. The space had originally been a storage closet and still partially served that function. Despite being so cramped, it was used almost continuously by people like myself—occasional volunteers and low-level staffers. I’m certainly not a neatnik, but the people I shared the office with were total slobs. I prefer to keep my lack-of-cleaning peccadilloes confined to private spaces in my home. These people had no problem leaving their papers and paraphernalia spewed everywhere.

Someone had stacked a ton of files on the desk I used. I found a spot for my coffee on top of the filing cabinet and transferred enough crap from the top of the desk to the few remaining feet of space on the floor. When done, I had enough room to place an elbow and a pad of paper on the desk.

The buzzer rang for the front door. Usually on Saturdays, no one else arrived until after 9:00 A.M. I thought about ignoring it, but whoever was ringing the bell wasn’t letting up. I turned on lights as I maneuvered through the mess and then hustled through the litter in the hallway to the door. When whoever it was saw the lights go on, the buzzer stopped.

I opened the door.

Max Bakstein, a junior at Grover Cleveland High School, and another kid I didn’t recognize stood in the doorway.

Max said, We gotta talk to you, Mr. Mason.

I held open the door. Max was a tall, scrawny kid with jet black hair. He was on the track team at school. He’d come to one or two Eponymous Gay Teen Club meetings with Felicia Lucinzki, the head of the group. Felicia was a cheerleader and aggressively heterosexual. She was part of a trend I’d noticed in the past few years—straight teens, mostly girls, taking up for gay and lesbian kids. At the time, Max had been introduced in such a way that I’d assumed Felicia was his girlfriend—very possibly a deliberate obfuscation on his part.

We stood in the main room. Outdated machines—answering and fax, computers and printers—poked their heads above the sea of clutter. The plastic desk chairs were any of three unpleasant colors: maroon, pink, or fuchsia. The couch in the waiting area was cracked green vinyl. Someone had painted the tin ceiling with swirls of brown. The place was always unpleasant to look at and noisy to distraction during the work day. The computers had been donated by a company that didn’t want them, which meant the damn things got ornery, froze, or crashed frequently and all the programs on them were outdated. The frustration of downloading more modern items onto them was monumental.

Max indicated his companion. This is Abdel Hakur. He was shorter and scrawnier than Max with skin slightly duskier than Max’s olive complexion. He goes to Grover Cleveland. He’s a junior, too.

What can I do for you guys?

Is there someplace we can go to talk? Max asked.

No one else is here.

But someone could come in.

That was more paranoia than I cared to deal with, but teenagers had their needs. I led them to the back.

How’d you know anyone was here? I asked.

Felicia talks about the work you do, says you can be trusted. We tried a couple times before. Then I heard Felicia say you’re here early on some Saturday mornings.

You could’ve come talk to me at school.

No. Here’s safer, Max said. More paranoia.

Or talked to one of the counselors who was on duty.

No, Max said. We wanted you.

I guess it’s good to feel needed, even if it is by teenagers you barely know.

I pulled two folding chairs in from other offices and placed some of the clutter from the floor onto the piles in the hall. This opened up a few square inches on the floor on which to rest the tips of their chair legs. I sat in the creaking swivel chair behind my desk. On good days the chair had been known to swivel for up to an inch and a half. It creaked more effectively than it swiveled. The two boys leaned toward each other, their knees touching. Max was nearest the door while Abdel was crammed between him and the filing cabinet. Max wore jeans and a letterman’s jacket, which hung open over a white T-shirt. Hakur wore black jeans and a gray sweatshirt with a picture of Grover Cleveland on it.

Max sniffed the air. Kind of stinks back here.

The whole place always stinks, I said. The floors have been musty since they built this place sometime after the invention of dirt. In the summer the basement really reeks. What can I do for you guys?

We’re in trouble, Max said. He spoke in a breathy rush.

How can I help?

They exchanged looks. Max said, You’ve got to promise not to tell. You can’t tell anybody you even saw us together.

Teenage drama queens or the harbingers of teen tragedy? I was sure I would find out soon.

Max said, We’re lovers. They clasped hands.

I nodded. I hoped they weren’t expecting gasps of astonishment.

We’re not sure what to do.

About what?

Well, we’re gay.

I figured I’d hear the litany of the usual problems with being gay in high school.

Max said, It’s a real problem.

Are the kids harassing you at school?

Nobody at school knows. You can’t tell. Nobody knows about us.

What about Felicia?

I guess she suspects, but I haven’t told her for sure.

She knew. A common delusion of gay kids, and many gay adults for that matter, is that the rest of the world doesn’t know. The world has usually figured it out a long time ago and except for some loud, angry exceptions, doesn’t care as much as many think.

What can I help you with?

Can’t you tell?

Sorry.

I’m Jewish. Abdel is Muslim.

I’ve never been really good at doing ethnic. I have enough trouble listening carefully to people without worrying about the proper label. These two just looked like worried kids to me.

Max said, Our parents are strict. Really strict. As nutty as the craziest Baptists about religion. If they knew, they’d kill us.

Good to know being prone to violence wasn’t limited to the fringe elements of only one denomination.

Abdel said, I’d be thrown out of the house. My relatives wouldn’t take me in. He had a soft velvety voice.

Max said, My dad’s a strict Orthodox rabbi. He lives and breathes Kosher, and obeys all the Torah regulations, rules, and laws. He’s memorized huge chunks of the Talmud.

Abdel said, Strict interpretation of the Koran is paramount in my house.

Max said, We want to tell everyone. We’re not ashamed. Abdel nodded agreement. Max continued, But we need help. We want to plan ahead. Abdel can’t stay at my house. After I tell, I’ll probably get thrown out.

What about your mothers? I asked.

Mine would freak, Max said.

Abdel said, My mom is not the one I have to worry about.

Why have you decided that it’s important to tell now?

Max said, You’re out. You should understand. We want to be able to live openly and honestly.

I said, You know there will be pressures from the kids at school as well as your parents. Grover Cleveland is in a very conservative area.

Max said, Yeah. We don’t care about the other kids. We can handle that. It’s our parents.

How old are you? I asked.

I was seventeen a couple of weeks ago, Max said.

Abdel said, I’ll be seventeen next month.

Where would you go? I asked.

Maybe we could get a place together, Max said.

Ah, the dreams of teenagers. I didn’t laugh. As a teenager, I’d always assumed I was terribly realistic and pretty smart. Looking back on it, I’d rather not make a list of all the times I was embarrassingly stupid or even worse, out-and-out dreadfully wrong.

You guys have jobs, savings?

We’ve both got college funds, Max said. Other than that, not much.

And if your parents throw you out, do the college funds go away?

They looked at each other.

I hadn’t thought about it, Max said.

Abdel said, I just figured it was mine, but I don’t have any idea how to access it.

Jobs?

Head shakes.

How long have you guys been dating?

Since last summer, Max said.

Nine or ten months, a decent amount of time for a teen relationship, but not near enough to happily-ever-after for comfort. Whether or not the relationship would be permanent, the key was that these two certainly seemed to think it would be. This concept was undoubtedly backed up by as much teenage passion as they could summon. Being teenagers, that could be a great deal of passion indeed.

Abdel said, We met at one of those youth camps where they bring over Palestinian and Israeli kids to try and get them to talk to one another, so they can learn to get along.

Max said, Abdel and I never met or talked to each other at Grover Cleveland. At the youth camp Abdel and I got along better than they thought.

I asked, If your parents are so strict, how come they sent you to such a place?

Max said, I was president of my youth group. My dad got a lot of pressure from all the other Jewish groups to send a delegate. If he heard about the two of us, he’d never send another representative. He’d probably try to wreck the program. I’m sure he’d think somebody tried to recruit me or molest me. Of course, nobody did.

Abdel said, I thought going to the camp would be a way to get my dad to unbend and it definitely gave me a chance to get out of the house. Some of the kids I know thought I was nuts, but I think fighting and wars are crazy. I put a lot of pressure on my dad so he finally let me go.

Max said, We’ve been sneaking around ever since. It’s really tough and getting kind of absurd. Funny sometimes. We make out in any place we can. At Grover Cleveland the last stall in the third floor west boys’ john in the late afternoons has been our most frequent spot. But we’re tired of lying and hiding. He took a deep breath. And we want to go to the prom.

The one the youth group here is having?

No, Max said, the one at school. They looked at each other and smiled.

Some gay youth groups have safe proms for kids in their areas who don’t feel comfortable going as a same-sex couple to the one at their own high school.

I’m a little confused, I said. You want to tell everyone, but you don’t even want to be seen here. If you go to the prom as a couple, you might as well hang a neon sign around your necks. Shooting off fireworks would draw less attention. Are you ready for that kind of spotlight?

Absolutely, Abdel said. Can we take a guy to the prom at Grover Cleveland?

I’m not sure what the reaction would be, but I can help you there.

We want to be in control, Max said. We want people to know when we want them to know. Going to the prom at the youth group here wouldn’t be much of a statement.

I said, You want to take a great risk, but one that has minimal consequences? What they wanted was for the world to be a perfect place, a safe place. I wished I could assure them that it would always be so.

Abdel said, I understand about consequences. I’m ready to take some risks, but I don’t want to end up living in a box under the El tracks.

Max said, All I heard about the prom here was that the adults were fighting about it. I don’t want to be part of some adult hassle.

The Prom Committee at the Clinic had indeed fought over everything, with the bureaucratic rule applying: The more minor the issue, the greater the fight.

Reactions to you coming out aren’t in your control, I said. From what you say, at the least, you’ll have parental problems when you announce you’re going to the prom. Once people know, events can get out of hand.

No, Max said. We want to be the ones to do what we want.

I tried the gentlest lecture I could on the ways of the world but it didn’t make any difference. They were sure they could control the whole thing.

Finally I said, You need to keep in mind what all the consequences might be and plan your reaction.

Are you telling us not to tell? Max’s tone began to get a hint of teenage hostility.

I added a bit of a tone of adult sternness in my reply. No. I’m saying that the things we do don’t happen in a vacuum. Do you think they do?

No.

I’m giving the best advice I can. In general I think living a life of secrets is a bad policy. I think there are circumstances in this situation which militate against that being a blind policy. You’ve got to think about where you would live. You should talk to the legal people here about that. You know if your parents throw you out, you are not old enough to live on your own.

We could manage, Max said.

The state may not allow you to manage. In Illinois you are considered underage.

What would happen to us?

The courts are unlikely to do anything that would remotely resemble looking positively on a young gay teen couple. You would most likely be sent to different foster homes, where they might or might not be amenable to you seeing each other.

We won’t put up with that.

Which part, the fact that you’re underage, being involved in the court system, or the possible hostility from foster home personnel?

Max glowered.

Abdel said, Aren’t there gay couples who have foster kids?

On television. I’m not sure about around here.

Abdel said, Maybe we’ll have to run away. I’ve got enough money to start us out.

How much?

Four hundred bucks.

I said, I’m afraid that wouldn’t last long.

Are you going to help us or not? Max asked.

You came to me. I’m not going to say things simply to please you. I cannot change the reality you’re going to have to deal with. There are a multitude of things to consider and not just for today and next week. You’ve got to think about college and beyond.

Max looked at Abdel. I don’t care what happens to me as long as I’m with Abdel. Their arms went around each other and they hugged.

Abdel said, I’ll never leave you.

Max murmured, I love you.

No question in my mind, they were in love in that teenage way that is so passionately intense. I’d been there. Heady stuff when not a little nauseating. I doubted if they were ready to listen to anything but their own passion. Emma Bovary, move over.

At least neither of them indicated any thoughts of suicide, a problem endemic to gay teens. A problem we saw too often at the clinic.

We talked for nearly an hour. At the end they decided to do some more thinking, and after several more pleas for my complete silence, I walked them to the door. In the clinic they had their arms around each other. At the door they un-clinched, thanked me, and left.

I thought their fears of their families’ reactions were likely very well founded. Both sets of parents could look at their age, combine that with fears for their future, add fundamentalist blindness about gay people, and come up with a lot of pain and agony for their kids and themselves.

Those considerations left aside the normal strains in any teen relationship. Straight or gay, how often did such bonds last beyond high school? I didn’t have a lot of hope for their future as a couple. Still, I would help them as best I could.

I returned to my office. Max was right. The reek was stronger than usual today. The window had enough coats of paint around the edge to keep it from opening with anything less than a nuclear device. I propped open the back door to get the warm breeze in the hall and left the office door ajar to catch any chance whiffs of freshness from the corridor.

I decided to try wading through the blizzard of papers and do some filing. I reached for a stack. Shuffling through them, I realized they were case histories from several years ago. I thought I had put these away myself the last time I was in. I fumed about people who used files but didn’t put them back while I carried them back over to the file cabinet.

I opened the top drawer. A severed head grinned horribly up at me.

2

I slammed the drawer shut and backed away. I stumbled over several heaps of useless junk as I staggered into the hall. I’d been in the Marines and seen a lot of grim things. But a decapitated head where you don’t expect one, no matter how hardened you are, would give anyone pause. I paused.

I spent some time breathing deeply. For a few seconds I thought maybe it was just a mask and some special effects, a sick joke done by somebody who knew I came in early. There were several theater majors who volunteered in the