* * *

—

This was where I was supposed to fit in, the gay community. But the wealthy white population of Dupont Circle, with their straight white teeth and gym tans, Abercrombie & Fitch T-shirts and J.Crew flip-flops, their therapy appointments and brunch dates, their Rehoboth vacations and weekends in New York, were so fucking happy and well-adjusted it made my skin crawl to be around them. Happy well-adjusted people don’t join the military. They don’t have to. Goes without saying that happy well-adjusted kids weren’t common in the cult either. But both cultures—the religious cult and the white-teeth gays—share a rule about smiling. Both believe in the power of positive thinking to keep things like homelessness at bay. This way, when you fall, you have only yourself to blame. There has to be a reason because no one wants to think it could happen to them.

I used to get in trouble for not smiling. I have this weird tic that means my face generally expresses the emotion I’m feeling. “Be so happy!” is a Family order as common in communes as “positive energy” is out here.

   The single stupidest thing I got in trouble for was, unsurprisingly, about the worst trouble I got into. I was ten. We lived in Osaka in this tiny apartment with two other families—one family per room, and a single person called a single in the living room. Osaka and D.C. have similar climates—brutally cold winters and swampy summers. We convinced a fan-store owner to donate a few fans to the nice Christian missionaries. But mobile hot air isn’t much of an improvement.

I’d lie there on the futon I had to share with my brother and try not to scratch the heat rash on my back and belly. We couldn’t shut the window to drown out the nightly fireworks in the park without suffocating in the heat. I couldn’t fucking sleep.

One morning I was folding laundry for the home, and I said, “I need some coffee.” A rational person might respond with “You’re ten.” I was not raised by rational people. After the worst beating of my life and two days of intensive prayer to figure out why I’d been walking around in the dumps (I was tired), why I hadn’t smiled two days before when I’d specifically been told to smile (I was tired), and why I, a ten-year-old, didn’t say “I need Jesus” or “I need the Holy Spirit” or “I need to pray more,” all very normal things to say when one is tired, they figured out it had been their fault all along. I’d never received the Holy Spirit.

They laughed like they’d just found the remote control in the fridge after a thorough search of the couch cushions. It was a silly mistake. Easily rectified.

   They prayed and I prayed and accepted the Holy Spirit. We waited, kneeling on the tatami-mat floor with our faces cupped in our hands, sweating. Nothing happened. So I did what anyone would do: I started speaking in tongues. I thought for sure I’d be found out. They’d know I was faking it. But the home shepherd, the big honcho of our little apartment, ordained by God, started translating my tongues into King James English. I kept my eyes shut in fear they’d see the incredulous look on my face, the Holy shit, you guys have been faking this whole time. Then they changed my name to Merry.

I wasn’t any less tired, and I sure as fuck wasn’t any happier. But I was careful to be upbeat, to make my voice sound positive, to walk around with a smile on my face like a lunatic named Merry.

* * *

—

One night in some Dupont bar, I had a couple too many free beers from a guy who thought Jay’s accent was “just delicious,” and someone told me to smile. I was being a drag. I told him I was tired, I’d been sleeping in my car. He said, “You’re never going to fix your situation if you don’t put out some positive vibes.”

People like that are why I felt better walking around at night. I couldn’t sleep anyway. My little Ford Aspire, the car my mom bought me to replace my toasted Acura, forced me to sleep sitting up or in some origami-inspired knot in the back seat. It was too hot to sleep with the windows up, but the mosquitoes found a cracked window as fast as they’d find a vein. I’d spend hours just walking around the city, waiting until the air was cool enough and I was exhausted enough to sleep.

   Some nights, I’d wander down to the National Mall. I liked the Mall at night. Too dark to see the dead grass and the trash. No sweating, corn-syrup-fed tourists dragging their sunburnt kids to another monument. No delusional activists convinced if they just had a few more protesters or maybe if the corporate media would just cover the march, man. No happy couples holding hands or groups of friends throwing a Frisbee around.

The Mall at night looks like West Texas, dark and lonely, but instead of a grain elevator glowing in the distance, it’s granite monuments. And homeless veterans. One of them had a dog who was licking hotdog remains off the marble steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

I told the old vet it was strange, that this is where people in movies eat ice cream during their clandestine rendezvous. I didn’t mean to tell him. I’d started talking to myself. I’d think something, often just a word, and realize I’d said it aloud and look around for witnesses like I’d tripped on the sidewalk. And to me, it was strange to sit on the steps looking out at the reflecting pool like a movie character. It looks different in the movies. It looks bigger. It looks real.

He said, “The ice cream vendors charge too much.” He was sitting on the steps and asked if I had a spare cigarette. I dug my pack out of my pocket, trying to pull out just the pack and not the few dollars I had folded there. I asked if I could pet his dog and he nodded and said, “Sure thing. That’s Sergeant.” Then he added, “She’s a girl, though.”