Read Online Remembering Christmas by Drew Ferguson - Free Book Online Page A

would grow into a rugged masculinity as the soft layer of baby fat around his jaw and chin melted away with age. His voice, even when shouting, had an eager-to-please pitch that was slightly feminine, but his imposing size, six feet two or three, with broad shoulders, kept him from seeming swishy or gay. He winked when he caught James staring at him—nothing lascivious, just a friendly gesture, a secret message to a stranger who’d wandered into his bar that they were kindred spirits, fellow travelers, despite the obvious twenty or twenty-five-year differences in their ages.
    â€œWhat’s your name?” he asked, as he splashed Absolut and cranberry juice into a glass for a tough-looking babe who’d wedged herself into the crush of drinkers, staking her claim with an elbow planted firmly on the bar.
    â€œWhat’s his name, Jason?” she slurred, as she gave James the once-over, her piercing stare made even more unsettling by a lazy left eye.
    â€œJimmy,” he said, surprising himself by using the name he’d been called in his Appalachian boyhood, the name that no one outside of West Virginia but Ernst had ever used.
    â€œWhat did he say, Jason?”
    â€œHe said his name is Jimmy.”
    â€œWhere’s he from?” she asked, as she fumbled with a crumpled pack of cigarettes.
    James, figuring he was safer admitting he was a New Yorker here than he would have been in the tow truck, had an odd, irresistible urge to impress the young bartender. “I live in New York,” he said.
    â€œLa-di-da,” the woman sneered, unimpressed. “You’re too old for Jason, Mr. New York. You hear that, Jason? He’s too old for you.”
    Something across the room caught her attention, and she suddenly lost interest, making a beeline for the jukebox where the dyke in the snowflake sweatshirt and a mullet-coiffed fireplug were looking awfully cozy, singing along to “Merry Christmas, Darling.”
    â€œWho’s she? Your mother?” James joked, pretending to be miffed by the concerned intervention.
    â€œWho? Wendy?” he laughed. “You got to be kidding. No. That’s my mother,” he said, pointing at Miss Snowflake Sweater. “Aunt Wendy’s her girlfriend.”
    James figured he was stone drunk, hearing strange voices, and hallucinating that a lesbian militia had invaded this hillbilly backwater on Christmas Eve. He tossed back another shot—his third, or was it fourth?—and cradled a mug of beer while Jason placated the restless natives demanding another round.
    â€œI love New York,” the boy shouted as he worked the taps. “I’m gonna move there.”
    Sure you are kid, James snickered. Your senior class probably went to Manhattan for a field trip. Times Square was awesome, and Wicked changed your life. You’re going to find a great apartment like Will’s from Will & Grace and land a fabulous job as an assistant to a fashion designer or Broadway producer who will recognize you as a genius. In a year, maybe sooner, you’ll be rich and famous and have an even richer and more famous boyfriend who will always be faithful and, after New York legalizes gay marriage, you’ll have a beautiful wedding and an announcement in the Styles section of the Sunday Times. Christ almighty, he thought, shocked by his cruel cynicism; he was sounding like Felix and his bitter summer housemates. When did little Jimmy Hoffmann of Parkersburg, West Virginia, become such a misanthrope, he wondered?
    â€œRight after I graduate,” Jason declared.
    â€œYou know New York is pretty expensive. Maybe you should get a job first,” James said, feeling oddly protective of this merry, open-faced boy. The booze was making him feel paternal toward this naïve kid and sentimental enough to romanticize the little hick from Parkersburg who spent his entire four years at UVA imagining his wonderful life in the bright lights of the