Jamie Brodie 02 - Hoarded to Death

end up in court. They wouldn't mind bankrupting her to get their hands on it."
    "Well, we'll just make sure that doesn't happen. Why don't I call Neil?" Neil Anderson was one of my dad’s buddies from his Vietnam days, and he was a lawyer. A very good one.
    Pete nodded. "That's probably a good idea." But he still wasn't happy.
    I was concerned. Pete was the most easy-going guy I'd ever known. He'd never had a reaction like this to anything. I didn't know whether I should pursue it, then I decided to try. If he didn't want to tell me, he'd say so.
    "So what is it with you and the Catholics?"
    He glanced over at me, then turned his attention back to the traffic in front of us. "Wait until we're home."
    So I did. When we got inside, Pete went straight to the refrigerator and pulled out a beer. He drank while I went upstairs and changed into sweats and a t-shirt. I padded back downstairs, barefoot. Pete was just cracking open his second beer. Wow. He never drank this fast. I uncapped my first one and followed him down to the living room. I sat down on the sofa; he sat perpendicular to me on the love seat. He was looking at his feet, his lips pursed. I was starting to be afraid of what I might hear. He took another long drink and started talking.
    "I never told you the reason I went to live with my dad."
    "No, you didn't. I got the impression it had something to do with your being gay."
    "Partly, yeah. Indirectly. But that wasn't the primary reason." He opened his mouth to continue, then stopped and thought for a minute. Then he turned to me. "How old were you when you lost your virginity?"
    Why were we talking about sex again? "You mean, when I first had anal?"
    "Yeah."
    "I was eighteen. With Ethan."
    He nodded. "Do you know how old I was?"
    "I have no idea."
    He looked back at his feet again. "I was fourteen."
    Oh my God . "Fourteen? Anal? "
    "Yeah."
    Pete’s words from last night came back to me. “Once. I didn’t like it.” The picture suddenly came together in my head. Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit . "It was a priest ."
    "Yep." Pete took another long drink and drained his bottle. "Want another one?"
    "Uh...no, not yet."
    "Well, I do." He got up and went upstairs. I was frozen in place, horrified. I remembered the first conversation we’d had about sex when we’d started dating the first time, more than four years ago now. It was our third date. We were at a pizza place in Westwood, just talking and eating and laughing and getting to know each other better. It was getting to the point that we were going to start sleeping together; neither one of us had mentioned it yet, but we both knew it was coming. Pete had leaned across the table, so no one else would hear. “There’s something you need to know about me.”
    “Oh yeah? What’s that?”
    “I don’t bottom. Ever.”
    That was okay with me, at the time. I’d figured that I could eventually change his mind. I’d still been thinking that way last night.
    My chest felt tight. I thought I might have to get my inhaler.
    Pete returned to the love seat, rested his forearms on his thighs and let his beer bottle dangle between his knees. “You know, when you go through a Ph.D. program in psych, you have to go through analysis while you’re doing it. I’ve worked through a lot of this, actually. My therapist says that it’s okay to maintain some anger about what happened, as long as I don’t let it overwhelm my other emotions.” He looked up at me. “I think I’ve been able to do that.”
    I nodded. I fel t like I might faint. “This is why you don’t bottom. Or like to be touched from behind.”
    “ Yeah.” He smiled at me weakly. “Do you want to hear about it?”
    I did and I didn’t. But…“If you want to tell me, yeah.”
    “I need to tell you.” Pete leaned back and took a deep breath. “My dad wasn’t religious; my mom was the one that had been raised Catholic and wanted us to be as well. My brother and I were altar boys, we went through catechism, the whole bit.” He took a drink and paused for a minute. “When I was thirteen, a new priest came to the parish. He was a young guy, energetic, upbeat. And he was very good looking. I developed a major crush on him. I hadn’t really known until then that…that I was attracted to guys. I knew I was different, but I’d never had the words for what I felt. You know what that was like.”
    I did. I remembered being seven years old, sitting at the top of the jungle gym at recess, watching my