The symphony had reached that point where it suggests wild dancing, with several false stops, when a soft pop! in the air made me look up. Another Don. I had long since gotten used to various versions of myself materializing and disappearing at random. But I sat up anyway.
He looked troubled. And tired.
“Which one of you is Dan?” he said. He looked at me. “You are, aren’t you?”
I nodded.
Don, beside me, raised up on one elbow, sending ripples through the bed, but his gaze was veiled. Don II looked at him but stepped toward me. He was holding a sheaf of papers — I recognized it as my, no, his — diary; that is, his version of my diary.
“I want to excise something,” he said.
“What?”
“That is, I think I want to excise it. I’m not sure—”
He looked at me. He sat down on the bed, and for a moment I thought he was close to tears. He was trembling. “Look, I don’t know if this — this thing is good or bad or what. Maybe the terms are meaningless. I just don’t know. I’m not sure if I should tell you to avoid this or whether I should let you make your own decision.” He looked at both of us. “I can’t talk about it. I mean, I can’t talk about it to you because you wouldn’t understand. Not yet. That’s why I have to do it this way. Here’s my diary. Read it, Dan. Then you decide for yourself if — if that’s what you want. I mean, it’s the only way. You shouldn’t stumble into this. You should either go into it with your eyes open and be aware of what you’re doing, or you should reject it because you’re aware of its possibility. Either way, it’s going to change your — our — life.”
He was very upset, and that made me very concerned. I reached out and touched his arm. He flinched and pulled away. “Tell me what it is—” I said.
He shook his head adamantly. “Just read the diary.”
“I will,” I promised. “But stay here until I do, so you can talk to me about it.”
“No, I can’t. I tried that once and we ended up doing exactly what I came back to stop. I mean, I mustn’t be here if you’re to make your own choice.” And he popped out of existence. Back to his own future — my future perhaps? I won’t know till I get there.
I picked up the papers and paged through them.
The early parts were identical to mine, even up to the point where Don and I were listening to Beethoven, stretched out on the water bed—
What I’m trying to get at is that it started almost accidently.
Don rubbed himself abstractedly and then stretched and rolled over on his stomach. He reached over and grabbed a pillow above my head. “You want one?” I nodded. He fluffed it and shoved it under my head, then grabbed another one for himself. He didn’t roll away; instead, he sighed and let his arm fall across my chest.
Absentmindedly I reached up and stroked his arm. In response, he gave me a casual hug.
And then he was looking at me and our eyes were locked in another of those glances. He was mysterious. I was curious. His smile was bottomless. “What is it?” I asked.
In answer, he slid himself upward and kissed me.
Just a kiss. Quick, affectionate — and loaded with desire.
He pulled back and looked at me, still smiling, watching my reaction.
I was confused. Because I had accepted it. I had let him kiss me as if it were a totally natural thing for him to do. I hadn’t questioned it at all. His eyes were shining, and I studied them carefully. He lowered his face to mine again…
This time the kiss was longer. Much longer.
And he didn’t just kiss me. He slid his arms around me and pulled me to him.
And I helped.
We stretched out side by side, facing each other on the water bed. We put our arms around each other. And we kissed.
I realized I liked it.
I liked it.
“Don,” I managed to gasp, “We shouldn’t—”
He studied me. “But you want to, don’t you?”
And I knew he was right.
“Yes, but—” His face was so open, his eyes were so deep. “But it’s wrong—”
“Is it? Why is it?”
“Because it’s not right—”
“Is it any worse than masturbation? You masturbated yesterday, Danny, I know. Because I did too. You were alone in the house, but you’re never alone from yourself.”
“I — I — but masturbation isn’t — I mean, that’s—”
“Danny—” He silenced me with a finger across my lips. “I want to give you pleasure, I want to give you me, You have your arms around me. You have your hands on me. You like what you feel, I know you do.”
And he was right. I did like it. I did enjoy it.
He was so sure of himself.
“Just relax, Danny,” he whispered. “Just relax.” He kissed me again and I kissed him back.
I’ve done it twice now. I’ve been seduced and I’ve seduced myself. Or maybe I should say, after Don seduced me, I seduced Danny.
I’m filled with the joy of discovery. A sense of sharing. My relations with Don — with Dan — have taken on a new intensity. There is a lot more touching, a lot more laughter, a lot more… intimacy.
I look forward to tonight — and yet, I also hold myself back. The anticipation is delightful. Tonight, tonight… (I begin to understand emotion. Now I know why there are love songs. I touch the button on my belt. I fly to meet myself.)
So this is love.
The giving. The taking.
The abandonment of roles. The opening of the self.
And the resultant sensuality of it all. The delight. The laughing joy.
Were I to describe in clinical detail for some unknown reader those things that we have actually done, the intensity and pleasure would not come through. The joy would be filtered out. The written paragraphs would be grotesque. Perverse.
Because love cannot be discussed objectively.
It is a subjective thing. You must be immersed in it to understand it. The things that Danny and I (Don and I) have done, we’ve done them out of curiosity and delight and sharing. Not compulsion. Delight.
And joyous sexuality. We are discovering our bodies. We are discovering each other. We are children with a magnificent new toy. Yes, sex is a toy for grownups.
To describe the things we have been doing would deprive them of their special intimacy and magic. We do them because they feel good. We do them because in this way we make each other feel good. We do it out of love.
Is this love?
It must be. Why didn’t I do this sooner?
And yet, I wonder what I am doing.
A vague sense of wrongness pervades my life. I find myself looking over my shoulder a lot — Who’s watching me? Who’s judging my days?
Is it wrong?
I don’t know.
There is no one I can talk to about it, not even myself. Every Don I know — every Dan — is caught up in the same whirlpool. None of us is any closer to the truth. We are all confused.
I’m alone for the first time in days.
It makes no difference. I’m still talking to myself.
I wish some Don from the future would come back to advise me — but even that’s a useless wish. Any Don who did come back would only be trying to shape me toward his goals, regardless of mine.