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I then told Herm Hoyt a long and involved story about a fellow runner I'd met in Central Park. The guy was about my age, I told the coach, and by his cauliflower ears--and a certain stiffness in his shoulders and neck, as he ran--I deduced that he was a wrestler, and when I mentioned wrestling, he thought that I was a wrestler, too.
"Oh, no--I just have a halfway-decent duck-under," I told him. "I'm no wrestler."
But Arthur--the wrestler's name was Arthur--misunderstood me. He thought I meant that I used to wrestle, and I was just being modest or self-deprecating.
Arthur had gone on and on (the way wrestlers will) about how I should still be wrestling. "You should be picking up some other moves to go with that duck-under--it's not too late!" he'd told me. Arthur wrestled at a club on Central Park South, where he said there were a lot of guys "our age" who were still wrestling. Arthur was confident that I could find an appropriate workout partner in my weight-class.
Arthur was unstoppably enthusiastic about my not "quitting" wrestling, simply because I was in my thirties and no longer competing on a school or college team.
"But I was never on a team!" I tried to tell him.
"Look--I know a lot of guys our age who were never starters," Arthur had told me. "And they're still wrestling!"
Finally, as I told Herm Hoyt, I just became so exasperated with Arthur's insistence that I come to wrestling practice at his frigging club, I told him the truth.
"Exactly what did you tell the fella, Billy?" Coach Hoyt asked me.
That I was gay--or, more accurately, bisexual.
"Jeez . . ." Herm started to say.
That a former wrestler, who'd briefly been my lover, had tried to teach me a little wrestling--strictly for my own self-defense. That the former wrestling coach of this same ex-wrestler had also given me some tips.
"You mean that duck-under you mentioned--that's it?" Arthur had asked.
"That's it. Just the duck-under," I'd admitted.
"Jeez, Billy . . ." old Coach Hoyt was saying, shaking his head.
"Well, that's the story," I said to Herm. "I haven't been practicing the duck-under."
"There's only one wrestlin' club I know on Central Park South, Billy," Herm Hoyt told me. "It's a pretty good one."
"When Arthur understood what my history with the duck-under was, he didn't seem interested in pursuing the matter of my coming to wrestling practice," I explained to Coach Hoyt.
"It might not be the best idea," Herm said. "I don't know the fellas at that club--not anymore."
"They probably don't get many gay guys wrestling there--you know, for self-defense--is that your guess, Herm?" I asked the old coach.
"Has this Arthur fella read your writin', Billy?" Herm Hoyt asked me.
"Have you?" I asked Herm, surprised.
"Jeez--sure, I have. Just don't ask me what it's about, Billy!" the old wrestling coach said.
"How about Miss Frost?" I suddenly asked him. "Has she read my writing?"
"Persistent, isn't he?" Uncle Bob asked Herm.
"She knows you're a writer, Billy--everybody who knows you knows that," the wrestling coach said.
"Don't ask me what you write about, either, Billy," Uncle Bob said. He dropped the empty bottle and I kicked it under Grandpa Harry's couch. The woman with the dyed-red hair brought another beer for the Racquet Man. I realized why she'd seemed familiar; all the caterers were from the Favorite River Academy dining service--they were kitchen workers, from the academy dining halls. That woman who kept bringing Bob another beer had been in her forties when I'd last seen her; she came from the past, which would always be with me.
"The wrestlin' club is the New York Athletic Club--they have other sports there, for sure, but they weren't bad at wrestlin', Billy. You could probably do some practicin' of your duck-under there," Herm was saying. "Maybe ask that Arthur fella about it, Billy--after all these years, I'll bet you could use some practicin'."
"Herm, what if the wrestlers beat the shit out of me?" I asked him. "Wouldn't that kind of defeat the purpose of Miss Frost and you showing me a duck-under in the first place?"
"Bob's asleep, and he's pissed all over himself," the old coach abruptly observed.
