A week earlier, I served a couple of unexpected customers at my counter at Howard Johnson's. It was Lisa and her friend Kristen.
Lisa had been my "girlfriend" I had dated briefly three years earlier. My main goal was to have a date for my Junior Prom so I decided to flirt with Lisa, a girl in my JA company and asked her out. We first went to her prom at Cumberland High School. John and I double-dated. He took Kristen. Then we went to my prom at Woonsocket High.
I had pretty much "come out" to myself but I was still torn as to what I wanted my "public" life to be. I wasn't thrilled about living openly as a "fag", I was head set on a "normal" life, with a wife and kids and ranch-style house with a picket fence and two car garage. You know...the "American Dream". Or at least the Reagan inspired version of it.
Lisa was a good selection because it was pretty obvious she was hot for me and though, of course, I felt nothing sexually for her, at least she had a nice personality and could hold a good conversation. I even toyed with the idea of what married life would be with her. My desires were purely selfish, of course. In no way did I consider what she really wanted. At this time.
When Lisa showed up with Kristen at HoJo's, I hadn't spoken with her in about three years. No fight or official "breakup" caused our falling out, we just lost touch of each other. Actually, I just lost interest in her once JA and the proms were over so I never called her.
She was surprised to see me. She hadn't known I was working here and it was just coincidence that she and Kristen had popped in for some ice cream sodas.
I actually believed her. How naive I was.
Lisa told me that she had been attending her freshman year at Leslie College, an all-girl school in Cambridge and was staying at her parent's house for the summer. Kristen had also been away at college, but I forget where. I frankly didn't care. I was still jealous of Kristen on a sub-conscious level since John had maintained his relationship with her well into our senior year in high school. The year he basically shut me out for being madly in love with him. He wouldn't even have sex for money with me like he did during the last few months of our junior year.
Something about Lisa struck me while we caught up. Though still "full-figured" she had lost a bit of weight and gained a lot of self-assurance and character. I was intrigued. Would I say I was becoming attracted to her? Well, no. In the three years since I'd last seen her, I had become fully aware of my sexuality and knew I wouldn't even be "faking" a straight life. But I was looking for another friend.
I was still nominally friends with Michael P., but since the day I revealed to him that I had sex with his 16-year-old brother last summer, we weren't going out much anymore.
And Michelle, my other good friend, another HoJo's co-worker friend had been busy with her new boyfriend and didn't have much time for me anymore.
So here we were, on what could be termed a "date" going out to Denny's Pub, a newly-opened sports bar located on the spot of the former Lums family restaurant, which itself had replaced the Bonanza cafeteria-style steak house. We shared a couple carafes of blush zinfandel and after a few minutes, and once the alcohol of the wine started to fortify my courage, I decided to tell Lisa the truth.
"Lisa, I'm gay.", I decided to just declare it flat out, no drama, no ceremony.
She pretended at first to be fully ok with it, but I could see she was heartbroken. I think she had really started to have feelings for me. As I tried to explain to her why I wasn't forthright about it earlier, I could see she was becoming more comfortable with it. I think she sensed there was something there that was preventing our budding relationship from evolving despite her clear signs that she'd be open to it.
As we talked on and on, eventually closing the place down at 1:00, I knew I had done the right thing. I felt we were both more comfortable than ever with each other and knew our friendship would grow deeper over the coming months.
I had been sharing with Lisa my recent experiences frequenting Providence gay bars and she suggested we go to one. So after being shut out in this North Smithfield straight bar, we were headed to the Fife and Drum.
But as I was driving her father's AMC Hornet into downtown Providence on Route 95, I suddenly noticed, in the dark ahead of me, an 18-wheeler, stopped right in the middle of the right hand lane. At 55 miles per hour, and traffic blocking me in the lane to my left, I slammed on the brakes but it was futile. As we were about to smash into the back of the truck, I turned to Lisa as I held out my right arm to protect her from moving forward. I calmly said, "I tried to stop."
The car rammed into the tail bar of the truck, and since both Lisa and I were wearing seatbelts, we bucked forward but, thankfully didn't get flung through the windshield. As the car came to a halt, I could see the front end crumpled up, steam and smoke billowing up from the crushed engine. I looked over to Lisa and she seemed to be ok but looked like she was in shock. I felt fine and saw that the windshield didn't have a crack in it so I guessed I was ok. I got out of the car to assess the damage as the truck in front of me turned over its engine and started to roll away. There was a lady in tight jean shorts on the small sidewalk on the side of this highway bridge. She was staring at me and as I looked towards her, she pointed to me and started screaming.
I became slowly aware of the strange feeling of warm liquid flowing down from the top of my forehead. Apparently, my head did hit the windshield, but at an angle so the windshield didn't break, but the skin of my forehead did, tearing through an artery. Blood was gushing out of the wound in pulsating squirts.
The screaming lady, who it turns out, was a hooker the truck driver had stopped to solicit finally snapped out of it and used a part of what scanty clothing she had to help me apply a bandage to my head. Lisa was still in the car and seemed to be having trouble breathing. Things were starting to get fuzzy and I was getting dizzy so I had to sit down on the sidewalk with the hooker helping to apply pressure to my gash.
After the paramedics showed up, we were brought to the hospital in separate ambulances. After I was stitched up in ER I found Lisa. She said that she had been feeling chest pains but she was ok. She confided in me she was worried because aside from being epileptic, she also had a known heart defect and when she felt chest pains, she thought the worst. Luckily though, she was ok. I suffered a few days of pain from the wound, and 13 stitches which caused a slight scar which was then just behind the hairline.
Lisa father was super cool about the car. The insurance company questioned me about the accident and both Lisa and I stated that a truck had been stopped illegally on the highway. But no other witnesses reported seeing a truck. Of course the hooker was nowhere to be found.
The day after the accident I stayed in my room nursing my aching head. Around noontime, my father decided he'd check on me and asked me why I was still in bed. I told him that I was in a car accident last night. He said nonchalantly, "Oh, alright.", shut my bedroom door and left me alone. I didn't let myself cry into my pillow.
Lisa had been my "girlfriend" I had dated briefly three years earlier. My main goal was to have a date for my Junior Prom so I decided to flirt with Lisa, a girl in my JA company and asked her out. We first went to her prom at Cumberland High School. John and I double-dated. He took Kristen. Then we went to my prom at Woonsocket High.
I had pretty much "come out" to myself but I was still torn as to what I wanted my "public" life to be. I wasn't thrilled about living openly as a "fag", I was head set on a "normal" life, with a wife and kids and ranch-style house with a picket fence and two car garage. You know...the "American Dream". Or at least the Reagan inspired version of it.
Lisa was a good selection because it was pretty obvious she was hot for me and though, of course, I felt nothing sexually for her, at least she had a nice personality and could hold a good conversation. I even toyed with the idea of what married life would be with her. My desires were purely selfish, of course. In no way did I consider what she really wanted. At this time.
When Lisa showed up with Kristen at HoJo's, I hadn't spoken with her in about three years. No fight or official "breakup" caused our falling out, we just lost touch of each other. Actually, I just lost interest in her once JA and the proms were over so I never called her.
She was surprised to see me. She hadn't known I was working here and it was just coincidence that she and Kristen had popped in for some ice cream sodas.
I actually believed her. How naive I was.
Lisa told me that she had been attending her freshman year at Leslie College, an all-girl school in Cambridge and was staying at her parent's house for the summer. Kristen had also been away at college, but I forget where. I frankly didn't care. I was still jealous of Kristen on a sub-conscious level since John had maintained his relationship with her well into our senior year in high school. The year he basically shut me out for being madly in love with him. He wouldn't even have sex for money with me like he did during the last few months of our junior year.
Something about Lisa struck me while we caught up. Though still "full-figured" she had lost a bit of weight and gained a lot of self-assurance and character. I was intrigued. Would I say I was becoming attracted to her? Well, no. In the three years since I'd last seen her, I had become fully aware of my sexuality and knew I wouldn't even be "faking" a straight life. But I was looking for another friend.
I was still nominally friends with Michael P., but since the day I revealed to him that I had sex with his 16-year-old brother last summer, we weren't going out much anymore.
And Michelle, my other good friend, another HoJo's co-worker friend had been busy with her new boyfriend and didn't have much time for me anymore.
So here we were, on what could be termed a "date" going out to Denny's Pub, a newly-opened sports bar located on the spot of the former Lums family restaurant, which itself had replaced the Bonanza cafeteria-style steak house. We shared a couple carafes of blush zinfandel and after a few minutes, and once the alcohol of the wine started to fortify my courage, I decided to tell Lisa the truth.
"Lisa, I'm gay.", I decided to just declare it flat out, no drama, no ceremony.
She pretended at first to be fully ok with it, but I could see she was heartbroken. I think she had really started to have feelings for me. As I tried to explain to her why I wasn't forthright about it earlier, I could see she was becoming more comfortable with it. I think she sensed there was something there that was preventing our budding relationship from evolving despite her clear signs that she'd be open to it.
As we talked on and on, eventually closing the place down at 1:00, I knew I had done the right thing. I felt we were both more comfortable than ever with each other and knew our friendship would grow deeper over the coming months.
I had been sharing with Lisa my recent experiences frequenting Providence gay bars and she suggested we go to one. So after being shut out in this North Smithfield straight bar, we were headed to the Fife and Drum.
But as I was driving her father's AMC Hornet into downtown Providence on Route 95, I suddenly noticed, in the dark ahead of me, an 18-wheeler, stopped right in the middle of the right hand lane. At 55 miles per hour, and traffic blocking me in the lane to my left, I slammed on the brakes but it was futile. As we were about to smash into the back of the truck, I turned to Lisa as I held out my right arm to protect her from moving forward. I calmly said, "I tried to stop."
The car rammed into the tail bar of the truck, and since both Lisa and I were wearing seatbelts, we bucked forward but, thankfully didn't get flung through the windshield. As the car came to a halt, I could see the front end crumpled up, steam and smoke billowing up from the crushed engine. I looked over to Lisa and she seemed to be ok but looked like she was in shock. I felt fine and saw that the windshield didn't have a crack in it so I guessed I was ok. I got out of the car to assess the damage as the truck in front of me turned over its engine and started to roll away. There was a lady in tight jean shorts on the small sidewalk on the side of this highway bridge. She was staring at me and as I looked towards her, she pointed to me and started screaming.
I became slowly aware of the strange feeling of warm liquid flowing down from the top of my forehead. Apparently, my head did hit the windshield, but at an angle so the windshield didn't break, but the skin of my forehead did, tearing through an artery. Blood was gushing out of the wound in pulsating squirts.
The screaming lady, who it turns out, was a hooker the truck driver had stopped to solicit finally snapped out of it and used a part of what scanty clothing she had to help me apply a bandage to my head. Lisa was still in the car and seemed to be having trouble breathing. Things were starting to get fuzzy and I was getting dizzy so I had to sit down on the sidewalk with the hooker helping to apply pressure to my gash.
After the paramedics showed up, we were brought to the hospital in separate ambulances. After I was stitched up in ER I found Lisa. She said that she had been feeling chest pains but she was ok. She confided in me she was worried because aside from being epileptic, she also had a known heart defect and when she felt chest pains, she thought the worst. Luckily though, she was ok. I suffered a few days of pain from the wound, and 13 stitches which caused a slight scar which was then just behind the hairline.
Lisa father was super cool about the car. The insurance company questioned me about the accident and both Lisa and I stated that a truck had been stopped illegally on the highway. But no other witnesses reported seeing a truck. Of course the hooker was nowhere to be found.
The day after the accident I stayed in my room nursing my aching head. Around noontime, my father decided he'd check on me and asked me why I was still in bed. I told him that I was in a car accident last night. He said nonchalantly, "Oh, alright.", shut my bedroom door and left me alone. I didn't let myself cry into my pillow.