“While I was on duty as a detective with the Wahredua PD, and while I was actively engaged in rescuing a local boy who had been kidnapped.Did you find that problematic?”
“No—”
“I almost lost my eye.I still have the scars.”
“I’m talking about certain events—”
“Would you like to talk to his parents?Ask them how problematic I am?”
“I’m not talking about that,” Fields snaps.
Sammy is sitting bolt upright in his chair, his dark eyes fastened on me.
“I’m talking about what happened after that.The review board.”
“Oh, when the review board cleared me?That’s the problem?”
“Of course not.”
“After I tracked down a killer.And might I fucking add, the killer of a boy nobody was even looking for.”
“You know goddamn well what I’m talking about!”
“If you’re talking about when I got roofied, and I was a fuckingvictim, then fuck you, fuck your money, and fuck this fucking game of trying to get me to squirm around because you’ve got a blank check.”
And I disconnect.
Sam’s breathing fast, but he only says, “Are you okay?”
I grunt and toss my phone on the desk.
It starts to vibrate, and it’s Fields again.
I reach for the phone, and Sam puts his hand on my arm.When I start to shake him off, he tightens his grip—not hard, but holding on.He says, “Deep breath.”
I do.And it helps.And I even smile at Sam as I pick up the phone.
“I’m not doing whatever you want me to do,” I say as I answer the call.“You can either help because you know WISP is important and doing good work, or you can take your money somewhere else.”
Fields’s breathing is harsh.A second ticks past.And then another.And then he bites off “Detective Dulac—” But he stops.And then he does this half-laugh, and he says, “What am I doing calling you back to pick another fight?God damn it, I am turning into a cranky old bastard.”
“Self-awareness is a fucking joy.”
He laughs again, a little more strongly this time.“Detective—Gray.I’m sorry.I’m not unaware of what you’ve done for this community.And I’m sorry if how I approached the topic was insensitive.I do like the work you’re doing.But I also feel like my concerns are legitimate.And I don’t think I’m out of line in wanting a little reassurance from you before I hand over a—” His voice turns dry as he parrots my words.“—blank check.”
I open my mouth, and Sam squeezes my arm again.
“All right,” I say.“It would help if I knew what those concerns were.”
He’s quiet for several seconds.When he speaks again, his voice is lower, and he sounds tired more than anything.“It’s a very different world we’re living in now.I don’t think people your age know what it was like.What it used to be like.You have an idea, I’m sure, but you don’t know.”
I wait.
“I’ve worked very hard to be taken seriously,” Mr.Fields says.“For my colleagues to treat me as an equal.Not to be seen as a deviant or a predator or some sort of freak whose father didn’t pay enough attention to him, or who got touched by a priest, or who was some sad, genetically incomplete fairy.I understand things are different.I understand that young people today have different views, and they seem to think pretty much everything is acceptable.But I’ve lived long enough to know that some of that is bullcrap, if you’ll pardon the expression.People are people, Gray.They don’t change all that much.And I’ve spent my whole life trying to show the world that homosexuals are kind, decent, hard-working people who love their families and want to live nice, normal lives.And I don’t want to beat around the bush, so I’m going to tell you that I think a lot of the fags running around out there, shaving their assholes on YouTube and crawling around like dogs in Pride marches, they’re undoing everything I’ve spent my whole life trying to make better.They can’t see that.And maybe you can’t see that.But it’s the truth.It’s their world, understand?And we have to live in it.Everything else is a fantasy.”He stops, and then he says, “So, that’s my concern.Your lifestyle.”
There’s so much I want to say.So much about the heteronormative mindfuck he’s talking.The kink-shaming.The assimilationist bullshit, like if we can all pretend the tops are tradmasc and the bottoms are tradwives, the straights will leave us alone.And a part of me is sorry for Fields—sorry for what he went through, and sorry that it hurt him so badly, and sorry that he can’t be happy now that the world is a different place.
But I’ve worked so hard for WISP.
