Bill, a young gay man living in California, returns to Boston in the summer of 1987 to visit his old college roommate and briefly lover, David. He, David, and their buddy Lou drive to Provincetown for a week's gay vacation, where the old ties of friendship among them deepen. But their good time is threatened by increasingly volatile personalities and a growin AIDS epidemic encircling them in an ever tighter grasp.<br><br>Their emotions explode one evening with the unexpected arrival of George, whose added presence brings to a head the simmering anxieties, fears, and resentments these friends have long harbored but have not openly shared. Will their friendships fall apart? Or will they discover a deeper love that binds them together?

Maid Service

By five, which is when Lou told everyone, including several good-looking strangers he’d waylaid at the liquor store, to come, nothing had been provisioned. Cocktails were going to be just cocktails.


Lou waved his hand over the motley collection of glasses lined up on the living room table. “Fat ones, skinny ones, short ones, tall ones. Like real life. Empty. Waiting. Like us. I think this one used to be a Skippy Peanut Butter jar.


“Girls, I don’t know about you, but Tante can’t abide seeing these desperate faggots lined up before her without something to fill them. Fill me, I mean.” Lou picked up the large glass with the faded map of Cape Cod printed on it and poured himself some gin.


“Ice?” David offered, standing by the refrigerator.


By five-thirty, Lou was on his second tumbler full of liquor, Bill on his first, and David was combing his vanishing hair when the first guests arrived.


Chapter 13