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I had been reading Francis “Our Mutual Friend”, which had been the first book to fall into my hands when I’d thrown together only my most essential belongings not even a day earlier.
It was merely by chance that I picked this particular book, and had I chosen more carefully, I certainly wouldn’t have ended up with this one; I’d read it a few years ago, and it wasn’t a favorite, neither when looking at Dickens alone nor when considering the multitude of other books I have consumed over the years.
Yet as I trudged on (remembering the gruesome first chapter, I had opened it at random since Francis, being in the state that he was, didn’t need to hear about the practices of Victorian body snatchers), I remembered how remarkably well the story reflected his situation. He, too, was determined to marry for money to some extent, just like Bella Wilfer, only he did so to keep it, not to obtain it.
While I was describing the exact form and color of Mr. Sloppy’s trousers, I had already begun to think up a strategy for showing Francis the absurdity of his behavior by means of this honorable literary example, but his nurse opened the door before I was able to express any of it to him.
“You’ve got another visitor, Mr. Abernathy,” she said in that chipper tone of hers.
Francis, who, up to this point, had shown no sign of life except for some soft, shallow breathing, groaned and dragged a hand across his face.
“Not again,” he said to me from underneath his fingers. “She only left two hours ago, what could she possibly want now?”
“To bring you another stuffed animal, probably,” I replied, eyeing the teddy bear sitting at the foot of Francis’s bed.
However, the person who hesitantly stepped into the room wasn’t Priscilla.
Instead it was a man, tall and wide-shouldered with blond hair and a boyish face of the Robert Redford sort.
I had never laid eyes on him before in my life.
The way he stood in front of us, awkward, large hands sticking out of his green tweed overcoat, he seemed like a tree planted by some mistake in the middle of a traffic island.
Next to me, Francis inhaled sharply and scrambled upwards.
“Kim,” he said urgently and a little hushed, “what the hell are you doing here? Are you insane? Did anyone see you?”
The man frowned, apparently surprised. “Uh, no, I don’t think so. I mean, they have the reception lady and the nurse who showed me in, but it’s going to be alright, I think. Look, I… I just wanted to see how you were.”
“Just peachy. As I’m sure you’ve noticed,” Francis said and made a weak gesture with one bandaged hand.
So this was the guy Francis had been seeing, the one he had been discovered with.
It was nonsense, of course, but I couldn’t help but blame him for this whole debacle, and I resented him for the way he stood there, upright and in good health, while Francis lay next to me like a corpse on display, his red hair the only thing distinguishing him from the hospital sheets.
“I thought you wanted nothing more to do with me,” Francis was saying now, half mocking, half accusing.
“No, I-” Kim cast a nervous glance in my direction.
Leaving Francis alone with this man who bore an uncanny resemblance to Charles went against my every instinct, but nevertheless, I pushed up from my chair.
“I think I’d better wait outside,” I told Francis quietly but he grabbed my sleeve with a force I wouldn’t have thought he still had.
Please stay, said his eyes, and so I did. The way his fingers, which I’d known to be so elegant and precise, now held onto my cuff, unfocused and shaking from exhaustion, made me sick.
Out loud, Francis said, “Kim, this is my friend from California, Richard Papen. Richard, this is Kim Hegarty.”
Kim nodded. Reluctantly, we shook hands.
Immediately, he turned back to Francis.
“I’m sorry, I wouldn’t have come if I’d known you had company.”
“It baffles me that you’ve come at all,” Francis huffed. “Took you long enough. I’ve been here almost a week.”
“Yeah, well…” Kim hid his hands in his coat pockets and looked out the window, face pinched with nervous discomfort. “I wasn’t sure if they’d let me see you.”
He took a step towards the other side of Francis’s bed, which made us both tense.
I regarded him suspiciously. What Francis had told me about him so far hadn’t exactly endeared him to me, especially the part about his drinking habits, although he seemed sober and quite tame. But certain experiences had made me wary, and Francis wasn’t known to cultivate relationships with people or things that were good for him. (Me neither, for that matter, but ever since I had arrived in Boston and found him a shadow of his already not very substantial self, I felt the need to protect him.)
“It doesn’t matter,” Francis said now. “Everyone has been crawling out of their holes anyway. The wife of Priscilla’s great-uncle came to see me, for Christ’s sake.”
At that we exchanged a quick, scornful glance. Kim, on the other hand, looked rather hurt.
“Oh, I didn’t know I was reduced to the level of Priscilla’s great-aunt already,” he replied, eyes searching for something other than Francis’s crimson head to look at. Finally, he settled on the untouched accumulation of food on the bedside table.
The immediate regret in Francis’s eyes was obvious, and I half expected his usual “Please don’t be mad at me” but nothing came.
“I’m sorry, Kim, really,” he said instead. “But I don’t know what you want from me. Since killing oneself isn’t as easy as I thought, there won’t be a way out this time. I'm getting married, like you’ve heard, and that’s that. Also, I’m sure when the time comes you’ll rather turn your attention elsewhere than spend time as my paramour, won’t you?”
“You’re such an asshole, you know that?” Kim hissed, suddenly agitated. “You couldn’t even be bothered to tell me you were alive, I had to find out through the papers. How do you suppose I felt, sitting alone in my apartment with that fucking two-line note you wrote me? Is it really so bizarre to imagine that I actually care about - about what you do, after everything?”
I thought about the long letter Francis had written me and said nothing. But deep down, I was a little proud, despite everything.
Two red blotches had appeared on Francis’s cheekbones. “Oh yes, you must have been miserable, I’m sure,” he snapped and almost ripped out my cufflink. I hadn’t even noticed that he was still holding onto me.
“You know that's not what I-“ Kim cut himself off and desperately threw up his hands, which made Francis recoil. He looked just about ready to faint, and tiny beads of sweat were rapidly collecting on his upper lip.
With sudden energy that undoubtedly surprised me the most out of the three of us, I clasped the arms of my chair and pushed out of it.
“It might be best if you leave now,” I said to Kim, who seemed stunned by my unexpected display of authority.
I have had enough experience with Francis’s beastliness myself in all the time I’ve known him, and it’s true, he was being beastly. Kim hadn’t been anything but caring (and a little stiff) in the short time he’d been here, but my loyalty lay with Francis, first and foremost, who seemed on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Besides, I still hadn‘t forgotten about the letter he had sent me, a letter that, apparently, he had given more thought and attention to than whatever he had sent to his actual lover. This realization filled me with a strange sort of giddiness.
Kim looked over at Francis, who didn’t contradict me, then cleared his throat.
“Yes, maybe I should. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to barge in like that.”
He rose and brushed down his coat. “And I’m glad you're alive, Francis. I hope you’ll be - happier now.” He shot me an unmistakable look, but before I had the chance to deny anything, Francis held out his hand.
“Well, I don’t know about that,” he said sadly, but with a hint of his usual dryness. “I’m sorry too, believe me. I know you won’t forgive me, and I won’t ask you to, but just… don’t take it personally. And you'd understand if you knew my fiancée, anyway.”
If Kim had wanted to answer that, he swallowed it down. But he did take Francis’s hand, tenderly, in his and held it for a moment.
Then, after another cordial nod in my direction, he strode through the room and vanished into the corridor.
I listened to his footsteps receding on the sleek hospital floor. A door closed somewhere in the distance, and all was quiet again.
I sat down and turned to Francis, incredulously.
“What was that?” I started to ask but saw him slumped over in bed, head buried in his hands.
“You alright?” I said instead.
He shook his head violently and muttered something like “Jesus fucking Christ” into his palms.
“I mean, he seems nice enough.”
Francis lowered his hands and turned towards me, eyes still closed. His hair, which was a lot longer than it had been the last time I’d seen him, hung around his head like a coppery weeping willow.
“I know,” he said, sounding drained. “I’m a swine. He could be awfully sweet, actually. And the drinking wasn’t that bad, truly. Sometimes he brought me coffee in bed, can you believe it?”
I considered this. “Did you love him?”
“I don’t know. Probably not.” With meticulous care, Francis sorted his limbs, leaned back, and brought the covers up to his chest. “I don’t know if I can ever love again, to be honest.”
At that, an inexplicable sensation of fear washed over me, but before I had the chance to ask him what the hell he meant, he continued.
“Or,” he said, “at least not someone who doesn’t - know about me. You know.”
Somehow that addition didn't soothe me at all. I wasn’t sure if there was an implication in his words, and if yes, what exactly it entailed.
In any case, I didn’t like the way my cheeks burned, and I glanced away. For a second I was just as uncomfortable as Kim had certainly been a few minutes ago. Francis simply had that effect on people.
While I was still trying to get my tongue to say something (it felt like a wrung-out sponge in my mouth), I suddenly noticed Francis’s hand on my arm. When I looked at him, he smiled, just barely, sarcastic and fond at the same time.
“Yes, yes, Richard,” he said, “don’t hurt yourself. Why don’t you read me some more? But not that miserable Dickens again, I beg you.”
“Um, it’s the only book I brought,” I said. “I didn’t exactly have time to-”
I was interrupted by an extensive eye roll. “You’re pursuing a PhD in English Literature,” he said. “You must have something memorized, surely.”
I had, as a matter of fact, but for some reason, the only thing that came to mind was Oberon’s monologue from the first scene of the second act:
That very time I saw, but thou couldst not,
Flying between the cold moon and the earth,
Cupid all arm’d. A certain aim he took
At a fair vestal, thronèd by the west,
And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his bow
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts.
This seemed unfitting, so I told Francis I couldn’t think of anything.
“All right,” he said easily, even though I had the distinct impression that he knew every word I’d been thinking of and could read it in the way my eyes flickered from his chin to his collarbone to the crook of his elbow and back.
“If you do happen to think of something, tell me.”
With that he pulled his hand from my arm and tucked it under his head instead. He shifted around a little while I racked my brain for something, anything that would satisfy him and not embarrass me in the process, but before I had finished my musings, he had fallen asleep, his breathing finally deep and steady.
He looked older, but at the same time not at all. Certainly he seemed more himself than he had back in Hampden, although I wasn’t entirely sure why or what that meant. I had only ever known that other version of him, after all. But here, in that hospital bed, hair fanned out on the pillow and that ridiculous pince-nez nowhere in sight, he was stripped of all pretenses.
I couldn’t deny that my vision of him as a “student prince” had vaporized; it had already been cracking and crumbling when he’d begun to call me about all of his little ailments during that ill-fated spring, but now I found that I didn’t mourn that other Francis, the one who had never been real in the first place. If anything, I cherished this version of him a lot more because, for the first time in the presence of any member of the Greek class, I felt like I didn’t have to apologize for who I was.
Well, at least as long as he was asleep. Awake, he could still grind me into the dust just by raising an eyebrow, but even that didn’t faze me, not when I knew that he was still here to do it.
And I kept thinking about that letter. As dreadful as its contents were, I couldn’t help but marvel at the fact that Francis had put more thought into his letter to me than into whatever he had sent the man he’d apparently spent a considerable amount of time with in the last few months (and might have had feelings for as well).
I’m not entirely stupid, and over the years I’ve come to understand that the others didn’t cared for me quite as much as I cared for them, something that should have been immediately obvious when no one in that hotel room even spared me a glance after Charles had shot me. Honestly, I still haven’t come to terms with it, and even though Francis apologized when I met him in New York that summer after everything went down, he said it like an afterthought, like it was something that needn’t even be vocalized. Camilla had never said anything at all.
Maybe that enigmatic sentence forgive me, for all the things I did but mostly for the ones that I did not from Francis’s letter was meant as some sort of apology? But what were the other things he hadn’t done? Not turning himself in? Extremely unlikely. Being such a coward that he’d rather kill himself than call off his stupid engagement and get a decent job?
I didn’t know and at that moment didn’t care; all that mattered now was that he was alive and as well as he could be, considering the circumstances. I could sort everything else out when he’d been discharged.
What a turnout, I thought, that it was us two in the end.
Back in Hampden, during that single decadent, heavenly September, I could have imagined myself coming to Camilla’s rescue, or Henry’s, or maybe even Charles’s, but Francis used to be a side character to me then, a necessary addition to that fascinating group of self-proclaimed outcasts that I had fallen in love with at first glance. His appearance was striking, yes, but I never felt at ease in his presence, probably because the threat of his sexuality loomed in the background every time we spoke. I still remember panic consuming me when he, in what appeared to be an accidental gesture, touched my cheek that day on the lake.
How ridiculous and hysterical my reaction felt to me now. I’d let him caress my face a thousand times if only it meant that he would give up on these idiotic plans of marriage and suicide.
Was that a strange thought to have? I don’t know. What I do know is that as my eyes inevitably began to droop, one of the last things that occurred to me was how sad he looked, even in sleep, and how much I would like to make him laugh, or else be sad with him.
Before long I fell asleep too, just as the sun stuck its nose timidly through the clouds and made the raindrops on the window sparkle.