will send me money later but I need it tomorrow!"
I did some mental arithmetic. "How much are you short?" I asked.
"Twenty dollars," he said.
"I can lend it to you," I offered. "Put it on my account." The book allowance associated with my scholarship had been untouched until now and there was about twenty-five extra left in there.
"Oh really?" Duncan exhaled in relief. "That is so nice of you!"
We settled our scores at the check-out desk and slung U-bookstore bags over our arms.
"That was so nice of you to lend me the money," Duncan said at least three times on the return trip to the dorm. "I'll pay you as soon as I can!"
We made it barely in time for dinner and again and we sat at the all boy table. As I ate and he chattered I reflected that Duncan had mentioned his father was a noted pediatrician. Why, I wondered was the son of a Doctor so short of funds?
I felt a touch on my shoulder. "Hi Dave, Hi Duncan."
"Hi Ellen." To Duncan, "this is my friend Ellen from across the hall. To Ellen, "this is my roommate, Duncan."
"Hi Duncan," Ellen repeated. "See you Friday!" I'd hoped she'd sit down to tip the gender balance a bit but she had places to go.
"Hey Duncan?"
"Yeah?" Duncan replied his voice indicating he was turned toward the window.
"Do you go out on dates very much?"
"Well I suppose if I find the right person. No, really I have so much studying to do I'd have to say I don't go out very much--now."
"Oh," I said. "I was just wondering. That girl Ellen, invited both of us to a party Friday. I'm supposed to tell her if you'd like to come."
"Where's the party?"
"In her cluster," I told him.
"Oh," he said sounding nonplussed for some reason. "I don't know."
"Well," I said, "she and her girlfriend are both pretty nice." I'd speculated on Janice, really knowing nothing much about her nor for that matter, of Ellen and why hadn't I said roommate?
"Girlfriend?" Duncan inquired.
"Roomie," I corrected.
Again, "Oh, well, maybe some other time."
"Okay." It seems to me that free refreshments probably, and something to do on Friday was worth at least some risk. "I got out seldom enough myself but if you can't party the first week of term, when can you?"
"You know Dave," Duncan said a few minutes later.
"Yeah?"
"I'm gay so all of my relationships are with men."
Chapter Two
I'd been standing next to my bed looking toward Duncan's side of the room as he spoke. Now I felt my knees sag. I sat involuntarily onto my bed. It wasn't as if there hadn't been clues, lots of them in fact but to have it stated so clear-cut like that, still managed to astonish. "I have transvestite tendencies," I told him, for some reason feeling I needed to match his own declaration.
"You dress in womens' clothing?" Duncan asked.
"For a period of time," I said.
"Yes," he responded.
"So" I inquired, "do you have no relationships with females at all?"
"Oh," he replied "I suppose I could be bisexual but I feel I'd just as soon not bother with women."
"Oh."
I'd have to say that women or at least girls had been pretty much paramount in my mind since I'd been thirteen or so.
"Did you ever have a girlfriend?" I asked.
"There was a girl I knew when I was about fifteen," he said. "We'd lay together naked and you know, touch each other and she wanted it to go further but I knew it never could."
By now the shakiness had pretty much gone out of my legs and the subject at hand was drawing me in from a more or less sociological standpoint
A number of things suddenly occurred to me. "With gay men," I began, not quite sure how to talk about this stuff, "is it true that one guy is more feminine and the other's more masculine so they kind of I don't know, complement one another?"
"Sometimes I'm dominant and very masculine," Duncan said "and sometimes I'm very passive and very feminine. It just depends on the situation and a lot on who I'm with." Duncan took a moment to inhale on his cigarette. He smoked more or less constantly. "I've been out in drag before," he continued. "But that's not really the same thing as wanting to be a girl or even feeling female. It's a kick in the balls to all conventional men, even gay men, an attack on their macho trip. You're saying here I am. I'm dressed like a woman. I walk and talk and do everything like a woman but under it all I'm a man and maybe more man than you!"
"I've never heard it put quite that way," I said. "I've been putting on girls' clothes since I was about nine and I think it makes me feel gentler or something but I never saw it as a striking out at anybody, though I know a lot of people would likely be offended by it."
"Well," Duncan said "you're not doing drag you're just cross-dressing. I have a friend, a gay friend who wears items of women's apparel quite often. He says yes, these are things a woman might wear but they belong to me and they're my clothes, just like if a woman wears a pair of jeans or work boots or something. I know a woman who bought herself a tuxedo because she said it's a well-made suit and she likes wearing something that's of such value and a lot sturdier than any female outfit you can find."
"Yeah," I said, "I had a school bus driver when I was in junior high. She was black and rumor had it that she dressed up in a tuxedo to go to dances."
"Sure," Duncan replied, "why not?"
"Do you mind if I ask where you got the clothes to wear when you went out in drag?"
"A friend," Duncan said, "down in Portland. He had all the stuff."
"Huh, I've tried on stuff my sisters had or sometimes my mom, maybe one of my aunts. I've never thought about wearing women's things that belonged to a man."
"It's really just like borrowing a costume from the school drama department," Duncan told me.
"Or renting from a costume shop. It's not what he wears everyday and we were just going for the look, not the way either of us lives all the time." He hesitated then, "It sounds like maybe there's more emotion attached to what you do. Maybe the things are more comfortable for you or they help you express a part of you that you can't bring out wearing mens' clothes?"
"Maybe so," I replied, feeling a bit uncomfortable with any analysis at the moment.
"Well," He said "There's no-one to stop you wearing your womens' clothes and feeling the soft textures and being whatever you want to be. I need to go to the library for a while but I'll
