Tales of the City 06 - Sure of You

good around new grownups,” said Mary Ann.
    “She was fine,” said Burke. “Really.”
    Brian looked faintly apologetic. “Sometimes it takes her a while,” he told Burke.
    “No problem,” said Burke. “Really.”
    Michael and Thack communicated briefly with their eyes. Had Shawna been antisocial? Had she thrown a tantrum and been banished to her room?
    When the maid appeared with a tray of mint-wrapped fish, Mary Ann jumped at the chance to change the subject. “Nguyet,” she said, beaming up at the girl, “those spring rolls were absolutely your best ever.”
    Burke murmured in agreement, his mouth still full of the food under discussion.
    The maid giggled. “You like?”
    “Very much,” said Thack, joining in the praise. “Absolutely delicious.”
    Nguyet ducked her eyes, then set down the tray and fled the room.
    “She’s shy,” said Mary Ann.
    “But sweet,” said Burke.
    “Isn’t she?” Mary Ann waited until the girl was out of earshot. “Her family had a horrible time getting out of Saigon.”
    “She was a baby. She doesn’t even remember that,” said Brian.
    “Well, I know, but…you can’t help but feel for her.”
    Burke nodded, eyes fixed on the door to the kitchen.
    “They live in some awful tenement in the Tenderloin, but they’re the nicest, most industrious people.” Mary Ann handed the tray of fish to Burke. “They’re also incredibly clean. They’re much cleaner than…almost anybody.”
    Than who? thought Michael. Cleaner than who? Across the table he saw a homicidal glint come into Thack’s eyes. Please, he telegraphed, just leave it alone.
    There was one of those moments of total silence—a “mind fart,” as Mona used to say—before Thack turned to Burke and announced: “I just realized something.”
    “What’s that?”
    “I saw you on CNN last month.”
    “Oh, yeah?”
    “It was some sort of panel discussion about television.”
    “Oh, right.”
    “You’re producing something, aren’t you? Some new show?”
    “Well…” Burke looked vaguely uncomfortable. Or maybe it was modesty. “There’s a new project in the works, but it’s not very far along yet.”
    Mary Ann jumped in. “Burke did that special on Martin Luther King last year.”
    “I saw that,” said Michael. “It was wonderful.”
    “Thanks,” said Burke.
    “I actually went to Selma,” said Brian. “I mean, I participated.”
    “Really?” Burke’s response seemed a little patronizing, though he undoubtedly hadn’t intended it that way. Michael found it touching that Brian had offered up this ancient credential for his guest’s approval.
    “What’s this new show about?” asked Thack.
    “Oh…just a general magazine format.” Looking distracted, Burke turned back to Brian. “You were part of the civil disobedience and all that?”
    “Oh, yeah.”
    “That’s when he was a lawyer,” said Mary Ann.
    “No,” said Brian. “That was earlier. I didn’t pass the bar until 1969.”
    “Right,” said Mary Ann. “Of course.”
    “I wish I’d been there,” said Burke.
    “You were too young,” said Mary Ann.
    Burke shrugged. “Not by much, really. Anyway, it was a great time. Things happened. People cared enough to make them happen. I mean, look at the seventies. What a great big blank that was.”
    Michael saw the cloud pass over his lover’s face and realized with certainty what was about to happen. “I don’t know about that,” Thack said.
    Burke offered him a sporting smile. “O.K. What happened?”
    “Well,” said Thack, “gay liberation for one thing.”
    “How so?”
    “What do you mean—how so?”
    “In what form? Discos and bathhouses?”
    “Yeah,” answered Thack, clearly beginning to bristle. “Among other things.”
    Burke, thankfully, was still smiling. “For instance?”
    “For instance…marches and political action, a new literature, marching bands, choruses…a whole new culture. You guys didn’t cover it, of course, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”
    “We guys?”
    “The press,” said Thack. “The people who decided that black pride was heroic but gay pride was just hedonism.”
    “Hey, sport,” said Brian. “I don’t think he said that.”
    “He means the press in general,” said Michael.
    “Well, then don’t blame me for…”
    “I’m not,” said Thack, more pleasantly than before. “I just think you should know that something happened in the seventies. It may not have been part of your experience,