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THE BOOK OF SEXUA.L ERRORS By Nicholas T. Boggs Submitted to the Faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences of /\merican Uni V{'rsity in Partial Fulfillment of tht~ Req~irements for the Degree of l\fastcr of Fine An::; ln Crcati vc \V rifr:ig Chair: _ f2:0:~_t_::-_C'::-: ____ _ H-.ichard McCa.rm ~~It_~~ Andrev.r Holleran 6--~----~K ______ _ Dair:: 2008 Vvashmgton, D.C. _'.2!)() ! 6 AMERICAN UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 0\ ~CJ"'\ UMI Number: 1460501 Copyright 2008 by Boggs, Nicholas T. All rights reserved. INFORMATION TO USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleed-through, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. ® UMI UM I M icroform 1460501 Copyright 2009 by ProQuest LLC. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. ProQuest LLC 789 E. Eisenhower Parkway PO Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 ©COPYRIGHT by Nicholas T. Boggs 2008 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED THE BOOK OF SEXUAL ERRORS BY Nicholas T. Boggs ABS"IRAc·1· The Book of,\'exual Errors is an original work of autobiographical fiction that e;'>'.plort.~s the story of a young graduate student at Columbia University, Nick, v\lw mov.;;s into his hom0scxual uncle's rcnt-controlkd apartment in the East V11lagc; of New York City in the summer of! 999. Nick, who has recently come out to his family, is both fascinated and haunkd by the mythic stories he's heard itbout his uncle':; tr:-J.gl~: lilc as a prodigai soli and former habitu6 of New York's legendary nightch~bs. At the center of the :narrative is the history behind the uncle's collection of Royal Dou1ton figurines-- eacb was purchased ·when one of his friends died ofAJDS in the I 980's, and then~ are one hundred and ninety seven of them in his living room·---and Nick's :struggle to com1:· tc krms 1.vi~h what they mean, literally und metaphorically, for his 0 1.vr: future in the apartment and in the world beyond it. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I thank the Creative Writing Program at American University, especially the members of my thesis committee, Richard McCann and Andrew Holleran, both of whom have guided my development as a creative writer as my teachers in the classroom and inspired me through the examples they have set forth in their own writing. I also feel fortunate to have studied with Denise Orenstein, Kermit Moyer, and E.J. Levy during my time as a graduate student at American. I thank the other writers in this program, as well, particularly those who were my classmates in the fiction and non-fiction workshops in which the ideas for this thesis first came into being. I also thank the D.C. Commission on the Arts for the financial support of a 2008 Literature Fellowship, and The Blue Mountain Center, where much of this thesis was written during my residency there in the month of September 2008. My friends and family have supported my writing over the years, and for that I am grateful. And lastly, I thank Paulo Santos, who has always believed in the figurines, and in me. lll TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ............................................................ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................ iii Chapter PROLOGUE: WASHINGTON, D.C., .1988 .............................. 1 I. EAST TENTH STREET, 1999 ....................................... 6 II. THE LIVING ROOM ............................................ 19 III. SAY UNCLE .................................................. 26 IV. THE MUSEUM OF SEXUAL ERRORS ............................ 34 V. PILLS ........................................................ 56 VI. TIME-RELEASE . 62 VII. A FALSE SENSE OF WELL-BEING ..............................70 VIII. IN THE BEDROOM ...........................................76 IX. TWO FOR THE ROAD ......................................... 86 X. THE DRIVE ................................................... 92 XI. BENEATH THE CANOPY ..................................... 127 lV PROLOGUE: WASHINGTON, D.C., 1988 It was ha(fpast five on Christmas Eve when he told his wife he was fairly certain the snowstorm the weathermen had predicted wasn't going to materialize after all. "You never know, "she replied as she leanedforward to dab at the lipstick she 'djustfinished applying to her lips. "Sometimes rain turns to snow. " "The kids will be disappointed, that's for sure, " he added, grasping the back of the chair and bending to kiss the top ofher head. "No white Christmas. Again." And there was every reason to believe that he was right. By a quarter to six, the light rain had turned into a steady downpour. that streamed down the windows and shook the branches of the leafless trees in the backyard. From where he was standing at the bedroom window, he could see that the empty green trashcan had tipped over right next to one ofthe puddles that were already forming on the cement basketball court next to the garage. He'd have to remember to go outside later, once it stopped raining, he thought, and drag it back up to its upright position. A few minutes later, he went downstairs and saw his son standing there before him in the foyer in his black tuxedo, right next to his mother. He wrapped the gray raincoat he'd brought down from the closet upstairs around his son's small thirteen year old frame and told him to break a leg in the concert that night. Then he kissed his w{fe 1 2 on the cheek, put an umbrella in her hand, and sent them out the back door into the cold, rain-soaked air. He watched from the foggy window in the kitchen as the old green Volvo pulled out ofthe garage, cringing for a moment as it narrowly missed hitting the toppled trashcan-from upstairs, he hadn't realized that the wind had blown it directly into their path. But everything was all right. He could see the car's headlights beaming through the rain, his wife in the driver's seat, their son sitting beside her, the windshield wipers flitting back and forth, furiously, like hands waving goodbye. And then they were gone, down the driveway and out onto the rain-slicked streets, and he was home alone, with nothing to do but wait for the downpour to stop so he could go outside and move the trashcan before their return. He was awaiting the return ofhis three daughters, as well, who were out singing Christmas carols with their friends from church. He.found this amusing-teenage girls and boys out singing in the rain on Christmas Eve. He pictured them huddling under umbrellas, trying in vain to keep their candles lit, shivering, singing, families in open doorways trying to smile, the fathers thinking to themselves, as he would have, that it's raining, that it's cold, and anyway, everybody knows that the Twelve Days a/Christmas is an extremely tedious song. Can't we take a rain check and call it a night on the seventh day? Jsn 'ta week of Christmas enough? Church had always been his wife's idea, and the singing, ofcourse, as well. He'd said goodbye to religion in the sixties. No war. No God. No Vietnam. This was what had brought the couple together, years ago, marching through the streets during the day, painting protest posters at night in their basement apartment in Adam's Morgan as they 3 sat together on the soft, weathered rug she'd brought back from the Peace Corps in Colombia, Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell records playing in the background. That was the kind ofsinging that he could get into, but church songs and Christmas carols, and, most ofall, a son singing as high as a girl for the whole world to see, this was something that his son needed to say goodbye to. For his own good. For the good of the family. In the end, it hadn't been that difficult to convince his wife that he was right, even though she was the music teacher, even though she was the one who'd spent hours with their son in the piano room playing the accompaniment for "Amahl and the Night Visitors" and "The Magic Flute" and "La Boheme" and "The Chichester Psalms," and, yes, for "Silent Night, " the solo that he'd sung every Christmas Eve at the Kennedy Center for the last three years, the solo that he would be singing for the last time tonight. No, she hadn't been that hard to convince. Not really. All he'd had to do was talk about his own brother, his son's uncle, about how he was dying alone in New York City. Yes, the father was sparing the son, really, that's what he was doing, saving him .from a life like his brother's, a sickness like his brother's. Wasn't this what a father was supposed to do for his children? Help them find a path in life that would bring them happiness and love, and, above all else, keep them safe from harm? At least these were the things he'd said to his wife in their bedroom on a Sunday afternoon, weeks ago now, before she brushed back her long brown hair, and nodded, closing her deep blue eyes, and then opened them again, shooting him a look ofsilent accusation. Yes, her eyes seemed to be saying to him, though they both did their best to pretend that nothing between them had changed, New York is too far away.