Read Online Sensing Light by Mark A. Jacobson - Free Book Online Page B

of tomorrow. I’ll have the data one day sooner for those obsessive-compulsive Science editors holding my paper hostage.”
    After two years of coddling and massaging embryonic mouse cells, Marco needed results from just one more experiment to parry a final reviewer’s objection to publishing his paper in a prestigious journal.
    â€œReally? You’re not disappointed?”
    â€œKevin, I think you’re confusing me with someone else’s long-suffering, submissive wife. I’m happy to go to work. I’ll page you when the blots are developed. You can pick me up at the BART station, and we’ll go out to celebrate.”
    â€œNo, no. I’ll drive back as soon as I’m done. Then you won’t have to wait. I don’t mind hanging out here until you’re finished.”
    â€œSo now you’re going to do penance?”
    Kevin looked away, and Marco sighed. They had been through this script before. Feeling guilty, Kevin would shut down. Marco, annoyed that he wasn’t responding, would criticize him for not breaking free of his psychic chains. Catholic bondage Marco called it. If particularly irritated, Marco would raise Kevin’s refusal to tell his family about his live-in lover as a prime example, and Kevin would retreat further.
    Marco had looked up the common noun “catholic” in an English dictionary and informed him the meaning was “of liberal scope, inclusive of all humanity.” Kevin believed class difference was the underlying issue. He had mentioned that possibility once, and Marco gave him the silent treatment for a week.
    It’s all right for Marco to rail about the prejudice, homophobia, and narrow mindedness of South Boston, Kevin had brooded, but not for me to point out how the privilege of growing up in a luxurious Mexican villa and attending an elite Jesuit boarding school in Europe has given him the freedom to become whomever he wants to be.
    Time to lighten up, thought Kevin.
    He smirked and said, “What kind of penance did you have in mind?”
    Marco’s stern disapproval dissolved.
    â€œTouché,” he chuckled. “Penance later. Now that I’m here, I’m going to run the gels. But first…”
    Marco sat on a bench and opened his arms. Kevin sat on his lap, and Marco massaged Kevin’s neck.
    â€œThat’s an impressive talent you have,” Marco murmured, “Making things funny when they get too heavy. I’ve never been with someone who could do that.”
    Paralyzed by the compliment, Kevin didn’t reply.
    â€œDon’t give up on teaching me, querido .”
    â€œYou sure?”
    Marco dangled his car keys and said, “Go my son. Your sins have been forgiven.”
    Kevin kissed him on the cheek and took the keys.
    â€œ Qué injusticia ,” Marco grumbled as he watched Kevin drive away. To keep from dwelling on the benighted souls who had raised and still haunted his lover, Marco recalled the night they met.
    A crowd of fifteen thousand had filled Castro Street for the 1980 annual Halloween bacchanalia. Half were in costume while the rest gawked at them. Alcohol was the drug of choice here, and lines of riot police filled the neighborhood to prevent a repeat of the previous year’s melee when gangs of fag-bashers from nearby blue collar suburbs had attacked gay men. Marco had come with Robert, a fellow grad student. Both were dressed as lab rats in white coats. Lengths of rope served for tails and pieces of broom straw taped to their cheeks for whiskers. As they crossed Castro Street, a skinny teenager sliced off Robert’s tail with a switchblade. He ran away whooping, swinging the trophy over his head. Robert cursed the boy who returned to confront him and jabbed the knife at his testicles. He missed low by an inch, slicing through the femoral artery. Robert collapsed in a pool of blood which expanded at an alarming rate.
    A hefty, six foot pirate appeared,