Liberty

The rain falls hard on Times Squares’ neon, battering billboards and shop signs, tapping on windows with wet, tender fingers. Everyone is wrapped up warm. Layers of scarves and jumpers and trench coats; beanies and gloves, rain boots and raincoats, corduroy and denim and fur.

Still, in downtown Manhattan, there are myriads of people who duck in and out of shops and cafés, leaving puddles in doorways for overworked baristas and sales assistants to mop endlessly, yet not unhappily. Although it rains over New York, the city is not subdued, rather it is electric with energy. Something is happening tonight, though the pedestrians and shop keepers and taxi drivers do not know it yet, and may try to forget it afterwards, it will happen anyway, it will happen regardless.

As the streets run like gutters of people and the Statue of Liberty watches over us, rain flowing like tears upon her cheeks.

I am not one of the many that walk New York’s rain drenched sidewalk. Instead, I am here, wrapped comfortably in blankets before the blue flashing television, waiting for Marcus to return.

Three years have passed since it became legal to love, but I am still scared when he is not here. The minutes become snails as I wait, the long hand creeping around the clock, as my mind wanders dangerously. There will be a day when he comes home dressed in liquid crimson, purple nebulas curling around his shattered ribcage. There will be a day when I will receive a call from a tired hospital receptionist, asking me to drop everything and be beside him, which I will do, unquestioningly. There will be a day when no one calls and a policeman comes home in his place, carrying the heaviest of news, and I will look desperately at him with weeping eyes. Searching for the comfort that I will never find in his half-disgusted sneer.

There is no place for us in this world and, as we are so often told, there is no place for us in the next, yet we love regardless. Even in fear, even amongst hatred. Packed like sardines in our tin can apartments, waiting for death in shellshocked silence, we love. Even as our world crumbles into atomic catastrophe and doctors tell of cancers that are spread by our love, as if we are merely plagued rats marauding on a sinking ship. Even in the face of all annihilation. In a place without freedom, without liberty. Where our love is forced to hide in apartments, in bedrooms, in closets, still we love. Desperately, hopelessly, clinging to each other in crushing embrace. There may be no place for us, but we are still here, existing, and praying. Praying to a God that does not love us. Praying to be seen and heard and loved. Praying for a place. Praying for a home. Praying for liberty.

*****

At 6PM Marcus gets home. Neither of us feel like cooking, so we call Janet and agree to meet her and Brenda at this beautiful, little place in Brighton Heights called The Bluebird. On the New York City streets, slipping between its graffiti-stained alleyways, we do not hold hands. Sitting on the subway, as the pitch-black roars outside, Marcus does not put his arm around me or look too intently at me. He holds back and loneliness envelops me amongst the silent commuters.

Out here we are not who we are inside.

We step out of the subway, holding our jackets above our heads, and trudge through Brighton Heights. There is a feeling about New York that we who were raised here can never understand. Marcus had it when he first arrived from Wisconsin. A boyish wonder and an adult hatred fought inside him. I´m not so sure where his heart settled but he never left. I often wonder if he stayed for himself or for me, but it seems- like many of the people who stumble into this city- it is the closest thing to a home he has found.

We walk by a homeless man who says nothing but looks up at us from a shop doorway. All misery seems to live within his mahogany eyes and Marcus drops a couple of coins into his coarse hands.

We arrive early at The Bluebird. Marcus smokes in the lobby as our table is prepared. He is nervous. Without the women we are two men having dinner. Without the women we are Michelangelo’s David, left stark naked in the centre of the restaurant. Eyes seem to drift towards us. Diners nudge each other and laugh. Everyone can see what we are.

Marcus is clumsy in making it clear that we are merely friends, talking loudly of sports that we never watch and the attractiveness of Maud Adams in the newest Bond film. I can see his hand shaking as the waitress guides us to the table. Suddenly, he is very pale.

‘Marcus!’ we hear as we take our seats. ‘Marcus, you’re not going to sit down before the lady, are you?´

‘Of course not, merely being a gentleman,’ he replies, offering Janet his chair.

I offer my own to Brenda, watching Marcus whisper into Janet’s ear. She laughs flirtatiously, but I know he’s giving her an earful about her tardiness. I sit opposite Janet and ignore him as much as possible. Never do we enjoy a meal like lovers, always like this. Across from a woman, living for the odd thrill of eye contact like teenagers on a double date.

The lights in the Bluebird seem to cast more shadow than they should, the faces of the other patrons are hidden by the dark, drenched in shadow. Anyone could look up from these tables and we would be none the wiser.

I stare into the kitchen as Janet and Marcus talk, I can tell they are flirting by Janet’s laugh. It is always hollow. The door to the kitchen swings back and forth as the wait staff rush in and out. The glimpses inside reveal nothing but chefs in stained aprons, some smoking and blowing it, billowing into the steaks that are frying before them.

‘Are you coming?´

‘Hm?’

‘Smoke,’ Brenda says.

‘Sure.’

I hold Brenda’s jacket for her. She puts each arm in and kisses me afterwards. It feels strange, her lips are extremely dry, and they linger slightly too long upon mine, but I smile and hold her hand as we head for the door.

Outside the rain splashes our cheeks. We turn away from it and peer across the river.

‘I always liked her. Lady Liberty, I mean.’ Brenda says after a few minutes. She stares at her, as I look at Brenda. Her mousy-brown hair rolls like waves around her face, each feature pointed and sharp.

‘Went to see her with my dad as a kid. I was maybe twelve or eleven, I don’t know. We didn’t do much stuff together, but he picked me up from mom’s and drove us down to take the ferry. I spent the ride with a few other girls my age. I was beginning to realise I wasn’t like them. You know what I mean.

They weren’t interested in the statue but as we got closer, I just kept staring. It was beautiful. The most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.’

I look around, it’s just us out here tonight. The city may be sleeping at last.

‘We got there and did all the tourist stuff. Finally, we climbed her, all the way up. We reached the top and I looked out. I wanted to cry, I knew I wasn’t normal, I looked down all the way to Liberty Island. And I remember, I remember looking at my dad and saying do you think she loves us?’

Brenda looks down for a minute, takes a long drag from her cigarette and sends it out into the air. It dissipates, seemingly disappearing altogether, but, of course, it never does, only appears to.

There is a moment of silence between us. I think of nothing in particular, I only look at the statue, trying to recall a memory of my own. Alas, nothing comes, and I am left with cigarette smoke and silence,

Brenda turns and looks at me fully. I remain as I am, leaning against a railing, my eyes fixed on Lady Liberty.

‘Aren’t you tired?’ she asks.

Lady Liberty stands very straight and very still.

‘Yes,’ I say, but I am not sure which question I am trying to answer.

*****

Brenda is inside again. I still stand, the rain beating against my face, my skin like stone from the cold.

Blindly, I wander, stumbling between the nightlife. Lost in the shouts of excited students and traffic nearby. Puddles splashed by tyres and rain dropping steadily into the streets, rhythmic in its continuity.

Brenda’s question, in its blunt honesty, caught me off guard. Truly, now, I feel the exhaustion that years of hiding and lying and running has caused. I feel each worry in the deep creases of my face, each small lie I have been forced to tell pounds a steady drum beat upon my mind, each fear aches in my bones. My heart seems to beat slowly and then quickly, slowly and then quickly. I am disoriented, unsure of my surroundings.

I stumble and fall through a crowd of people, who do not react at all, crashing against a glass window with a thud. With my face pressed up against it, I can feel a dull ache in my shoulder already and my headache is compounded by the bruise swelling on my cheek. My eyes open, and then open further with the shock and horror.

Behind the shop window I lean upon, six television screens sit, they flash with the blue light of my own screen as the images loop. Beside them a sign reads ‘QUICK! GET THE SHARP LINYTRON WHILE STOCKS LAST!’ Upon the screens the headline spins around and around. The image of the mushroom cloud that we had so feared but never believed we would see scars our irises. I push myself back from the glass and stare. Behind me a woman is yammering to herself.

‘They did it, they did it. I can’t believe they did it. I just can’t believe they did it. Oh god, they did it. I just can’t believe they did it.’

The crowd seems to seethe, shock subsiding and being replaced by rage.

‘I KNEW THEY’D DO IT. I KNEW IT!’ A man roars.

‘Commies,’ says another. ‘Why’d they have to go make us do this? Stupid commies.’

I stare at the screens. I think about Marcus. I think about Janet and Brenda. I think about Brenda’s dad and their visit to the statue. I remember sleeping with a boy for the first time in the dead of the night after we’d hidden on Liberty Island. I remember my mother, holding my hand in the hospital, praying for my soul mere hours before she died. I remember the picture of my father that she kept in her purse, even though she always said she hated him. I remember the powerless feeling of being gay. I remember my exhaustion and I remember my elation when Marcus admitted his feelings for me. I remember the feeling that I knew how it would end between us, and I remember deciding I didn’t care. I remember everything and I remember nothing, and I know that I have to get back to him. I have to get back to him.

Behind me a child cries. A woman is screaming.

‘MYSONMYSON! WHEREISMYSON?!’

I leap to my feet and begin to run. Someone picks up a brick and launches it, hurtling through the TV shop window. I pay no mind. I run. I run as fast as I can.

Throngs of people fill the street. Where I can, I slip between them, and where I can’t I push right through. Marcus fills my mind. His stocky body, nude in our living room as he laughs at something small and innocuous that escapes me now. His gentle, loving hand when we are alone. His kisses laid so sweetly upon my lips. I run harder.

The rain grows heavier. I reach the waterfront and make for the Bluebird. The river seems to swell, crashing violently against Liberty’s legs. She sways precariously.

A crowd of people have filled the street to watch her, they scream with each wobble. I try to push between them, but it is impossible. They are one solid mass of humanity.

‘MOVE!’ I scream. ‘LET ME THROUGH. PLEASE!’

No one listens. They stare at the statue.

‘MOVE!’ I scream again.

No one even looks at me, it is as if I am not there. There is nothing to do, nothing but to join them in watching her.

Lady liberty totters, the strength of the wind and waves battering her down. Teetering on the edge of collapse, it seems it would only take one more good hit to do it.

She creaks with the sound of thunder, but she does not fall. Instead, her head turns towards us. The crowd gasp and scream.

Her body turns. She stands very straight, looking down upon us. She appears to cry. Silently she shakes her great head. No one talks, they just watch. They stare at her as she stares back. Disappointment seeming to flood her.

She turns from us and takes a step away, out towards the ocean. Only once does she look back with an almighty creak, before walking steadily away. With each step she sinks, further and further, until at last her torch is the only thing that peers above the waves. The ocean swallows her and she is gone. Lady Liberty lost forever beneath the waves.

*****

I arrive at the Bluebird soon after. There is no-one inside. Marcus’ jacket remains on his chair. I pick it up, put it around my shoulders, it smells so much of him, his dark wooden cologne clinging to the lapel.

I walk outside, climbing over the railing and dangling my feet above the river. The rain has stopped, and the streets are empty of people.

I think about all the fears I held for so long, the way we hid ourselves away. It all seems so silly now, in the wake of this night, but it was not and couldn’t have been changed. I am not foolish, I know the dangers were real, they just seem smaller now. As if I was focused on a word when it was merely the first of a novel.

Liberty Island sits empty, great footsteps marking its face. I think of her, beneath the water, how beautiful she was and how wrong we all were. She was here the entire time and how often did we look upon her? How much time was taken to appreciate her and what she meant, what she should have symbolised?

In the night, I am alone, truly now. Not even the façade of freedom hangs over me, at last there is something genuine and tangible about it. Finally, something uncontrollable about the darkness, something untameable in the night. You could almost reach out and touch it and come alive with it yourself. You could sprint through the empty streets, screaming and laughing and letting them think you mad. You could. You really could.

My eyes sag beneath the weight of the night, tiredness has crept into my body as my mind raced away. I stand up and climb back over the railings. I am hoping Marcus is at home, or maybe I am not. Perhaps I want to go, perhaps I want to see what I missed while I cowered in my apartment. I want to feel the coolness of a wind as it lifts across an autumn evening, to feel mad with passion and desire, to feel the liberation of being without responsibility or restraint. Maybe I want to feel free just once, forced to do nothing and compromise for no one, at last having the true freedom to choose not to love if I so desire.

A soothing wind floats lazily above the river, and I allow it to hold me, pushing my arms beneath Marcus’ jacket to embrace myself tightly. I do not know if I will see my love again, but for now I am content in the knowledge that I am the arbiter of my own destiny, for good or for bad. For truly there are no wrong decisions, only the correct one in the moment. Only the one I make right now, in the fallout of everything.

Our world may crumble but I plan to live in it as long as I may. I have stared into annihilation before, only now am I unflinching as it avoids my glare.

Liberty Island is silent. It seems empty with the memory of what once stood there, the most beautiful lie to ever be told, encapsulated in the form of a stoic angel. The river runs calmly out to sea, its self-contained tranquillity lost in the wildness of the waves. And I am you, gentle river, I am you.