The mid-40s are that time in a gay man's life when his major paradigm shifts from sexy to Sansabelts. But when Barry Grooms's partner of twenty years is killed on Barry's forty-fifth birthday, his world doesn't so much evolve as it does explode.<br><br>After navigating through the surreal conveyor belt of friends and family, he can't eat another casserole or swallow much more advice on what constitutes grief. Still numb, he leaves his homestore and design business in the care of others as he escapes to Key West, then New York. There he gets a thankless new job working for a crazy lady in a poncho, then has too many drinks with a narcissistic Broadway actor. Next it's a nude exercise class that redefines flop sweat, and from there he's on to a relationship with a man twenty years his junior.<br><br>Yet no matter how great the retreat from the man he used to be, life's gravity spins Barry back to the small town where he grew up for one more ironic twist that teaches him how to say goodbye with grace.

The Cool Part of His Pillow

That felt good, leaving her in a combination of aggravation and fascination. I opt for an ATM within the Marriott Marquis, but I’m distracted by the sounds of law enforcement: four cars, a handful of officers. Times Square arrests are as common as twofers, so I don’t acknowledge it, not until the resistance becomes profane and the scuffling explosive.


I rush through a small crowd to see the police loading the newsstand worker into the back of a car, handcuffed, kicking.


Another officer has just finished dusting the newsstand ledge for fingerprints. Another officer brings down the metal door. The worker rages, most of it indecipherable except for “No one will never see her again!”


Holding his hand is the little newsstand girl.


Chapter 82