Sweet Potato Pie

By Ian McDuff

The conclusion and coda of the ‘Medley’ that began with ‘Sexual Healing’ and continued through ‘Sailing (Somewhere, Beyond the Sea)’ and ‘Stormy Weather.’ The title track, of course, is James Taylor’s.

Miz Diane adored Howie. She loved them all, mind you. She loved Howie especially, though. Not quite as much as she loved James Lance’s Josh, of course: not quite; but James Lance wouldn’t have wanted to bet too heavily on her not being willing to trade him, and an outfielder to be named later, to Hoke and Paula for Sweet Howie D.

Howie, the Bass thought, sure as shootin’ had Momma fooled. ‘Sweet,’ my ass. Simon damn Legree.

It had not been part of Howie’s plan to end up, he and Nick, accompanying the private, hidden-from-the-world, reunited Josh and James to Mississippi on their much-needed break. And everything up to that point: from getting them to sort out their feelings separately after the blow-up caused by the public JC’s interview about his solo project, to getting them back together in LA, to forcing them – when they had thought they were past it all – not to pretend it never happened, but rather to talk it out: everything to that point had been Howie’s subtle doing. But now, he was glad that he and Nick had acceded, despite their doubts, to their friends’s invitation to stay with them.

Sex, they had down to an art-form, obviously. The comment about drugs had been what had enraged James, despite what Josh had clearly been meaning, really, to say: not because James hadn’t already forgiven him for his past screw-ups, not because James didn’t know that Josh was back to them whole and sound now, and had been even when he’d gotten tangled, as per usual, in an interview: but because it had been a huge public-private embarrassment for James – for Lance, even. But it was clear to Howie that his friends, despite their having been together longer than he and Nick had been, despite their having in many ways been his and Nick’s mentors and exemplars, were missing an essential harmony in the music of their relationship.

Nick, in fact, had put it best, in shocked, whispered tones. ‘Howard. They. Jesus, Howie. They don’t seem to, they don’t … they don’t know how to play.’

That was the problem. Howie – sweet Howie, stable Howie, mature Howie, business-oriented Howie, Nick-calming Howie, for God’s sake – had never lost, and had never been embarrassed to indulge, a certain madcap streak. And Nicky, of course, was just a big goofball, a Newfie puppy let loose at a garden party to mingled dismay and hilarity. But Jamesanjosh™? As Nick had gone on to say, in tones of horror, ‘I mean, it’s, it’s like Kev dating, I dunno, Carson or somethin’.’ That image had make Howie shudder right along with his Nicky. There wasn’t timber enough between Jackson and Corinth to provide the sticks that were lodged up those two asses.

Thinking about it, Howie was beginning to come to the conclusion that it wasn’t that Josh and James had never known how to play; it was, rather, that it had been knocked out of them, as it had been with Kevin for so long. James had been too business-like for too long, had felt that he had to be to survive and to secure a place in the scheme of things, with the group, that would prevent them from dismissing him. He had ruthlessly shoved everything else aside in order to make himself indispensable, when in fact, as J and Chris and Joe and especially Josh had said from the start, he’d been indispensable all along. BMG’s suited Huns had a lot to answer for.

And, too, he and Josh both were so very, very closeted: it had to be having an effect on their ability to open up in any fashion at all, much less to be carefree – and thus risk inadvertently coming across as ‘gay.’

As for Josh, well. Even before the group, there had been slavery in the fields of the Mouse. Howie knew full well that scripted ‘fun,’ of the sort Backstreet, like ’N Sync, had long endured, was fatal to real fun; and Josh, like J, had been suffering from the effects of scripted regimentation longer than anyone. Too, the dark Los Angeles days had left him with all sorts of scar tissue.

Something, Howie resolved, had to be done about this.

It was Nick who, all unknowingly, gave him the answer. Nicky and his appetite.

They had driven over and joined the Basses and the Loftons for church, followed by Miz Diane’s best Sunday dinner. James Lance had been obviously trapped between his several worlds: trying to be himself, his down-home, honest self, but knowing that even in Clinton there was a price to fame. His Momma had had no truck with that, whipping his mirrored sunglasses off his face before he got off the porch. From the neck down, he had been his real, home self, in a three-button, tropical-weight wool worsted suit, with a pewter warmth to it in place of the silvery-metallic popstar threads of Hollywood Lance: a Confederate grey suit, wholly apposite, in place and unexceptionable. But he had been unable to make his face match his attire: his eyes were wary and his smile false, a crocodile smile where his true, boyish grin ought by rights have been.

Dinner was better. It was just the eight of them, safely at home, changed out of their Sunday-go-to-meetin’ best but dressed with the special care of even a casual Southern Sunday: Izods, madras, khakis, cool summer cotton for Miz Diane and Miz Stace.

By the time dessert hit the table, hard on the heels of ham and fried chicken and chicken livers with cream gravy and okra and butterbeans and black-eyed peas and corn on the cob and spinach casserole with hard-boiled eggs atop it and mustard greens and fried green tomatoes and cornbread and dinner rolls and mayhaw jelly and enough ‘ice-tea’ to float the CSS Alabama, it was only his innate mannerliness, and the recognition that ‘if Momma ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy,’ that supported Howie, in his present distended condition, in politely accepting a piece of Miz Diane’s sweet potato pie, when all he truly longed for was a nap. Nick, on the other hand, had two slices, with a glass of milk (Nicky had learnt by experience, from past visits, that he really, really didn’t care for buttermilk at all), plus a ‘sliver-or-so’ of Stace’s black-bottom pecan fudge pie. And cleaned his plate, at that.

But it was when Nicky begged Miz Diane for the recipe – the ‘receipt,’ in good Southern – that Howie, despite his near-coma, Got An Idea.

‘Why, Nick, honey, of course you may. But James Lance knows how to make a sweet potato pie as well as I do: Heaven knows his Grammy and I taught him right, when he was knee-high to a duck. I’ll give you a copy of my card on it, but why don’t you let him show you how to make it, you have any questions.’

The next few days passed quietly, back at Jamesanjosh™’s own pied-à-terre. And Howie was content that it be so: no one except, probably, Nick would yet want even to think about making that pie.

The mid-days were hotter’n a jalapeño, already, even thus early in the year; but the warmth was grateful, not yet chokingly humid. And the Mississippi air was sweet and tender and sky-deep, like the love between Nick and Howie, like the love between Josh and his James. And the nights were calm and pure and filled with soulful love-making; and they were content to step out of time’s mill-race for a time and let the world go by.

It was a time for lazing about, luxuriating in the quiet, watching Josh calm himself and grow still, watching Nick take a wide-eyed interest in everything, tagging along with James as James got himself good and grubby in the garden or coaxed them all into riding. Hired gardeners would take over, of course, sadly but inevitably, where James had planted and dug and weeded, and hired hands would look after the horses most of the year; but, while he could, James threw himself into the rhythm of hoeing and pitching hay, tilling and polishing tack. It was the best therapy for him; and working in, yes, harmony with him, words unneeded, minds at one, Josh was finding himself – and his James – all over again.

Still, it was typical of the Bass that his relaxation was work, in its way; and it was that pattern Howie and Nick were determined to break.

At the last, there came a day of steely skies and rain, not enough to cause despond or to affect any plans that called for baking, but enough that their outdoor plans were curtailed. It was Howie’s moment, and he seized it. Nick did the actual asking: after years of honing his skills on Jane and on Kevin, Nicky could wheedle anyone.

‘All right, all right,’ James had finally said, torn between annoyance and amusement, ‘we’ll bake the damn pie.’

Half an hour later, having burnt his fingers peeling the boiled yams, and already beginning to wonder just how much mashing this was going to take – James wouldn’t let them use a mixer – Nicky was beginning to have second thoughts; but there was still a Mona Lisa smile on Howie’s face, so Nick figured everything was proceeding according to plan, and wherever Howard led, he was determined to follow. Even if it meant KP duty.

Part of Howie’s smile resulted from the subtle signals that told him James had damned near forgotten how to do this, over the years, even with Momma’s ‘receipt’ there on the counter: had forgotten, and, typically, was hell-bent on making sure no one noticed.

But the first crack in the ice came when James Lance frowned at the card and, with an air of decision, grabbed the phone and speed-dialed Miz Diane.

‘Momma?’

‘Why, sugar! I didn’t expect to hear from you until later, dear. Fortunately, you caught me. With the weather what it is, I thought best I should postpone my hair appointment. What is it, hon?’ James had come by his sometimes diva-ish emphasis on Style-and-Refinement honestly, though Miz Diane had always been more steely than merely self-indulgent.

‘Momma, this here sweet potato pie receipt calls for brown sugar. Didn’t Big Momma and Grammy both always use Steen’s cane syrup?’

‘Why, they surely did, honey. So do I, sometimes: it’s a perfectly simple substitution.’

‘Well, but, Momma. We’re bakin’ one now, on account of Nicky kept wantin’ to, and. Which one ought I to use?’

Diane laughed. ‘Don’t make no never-mind, as they say. You go ahead on and use Steen’s this time, honey. It’s sweet and rich and out of Louisiana, and I know you like all sorts of things that way.’

‘Momma!’ Josh was blushing even as he giggled helplessly, and Nicky and D, listening along with him, were cracking up entirely.

‘Is there anything else, dear?’

‘No – yes. It says “optional” and I cain’t remember: do I like it best with the ginger or without?’

‘Oh, Lance, honey, take a chance for once. It’s a receipt, not a spreadsheet: within certain limits you’re allowed to have some fun with it. Improvise,’ she said crisply, and hung up on him as he stood there slack-jawed.

‘Kind of like life,’ Howie mused, to no one in particular; and looked innocent when James Lance shot him the glare of a man who’s just been subtly lectured.

‘Cinnamon, please,’ James said, arranging things on the counter-top.

Howie handed him the tin. ‘Canela, si, señor.’ Nicky licked his lips, and not because of the pie that was shaping up: any three words in Spanish, in Howard’s voice, always got Nick revved up.

It was, in the end, Nick, too, who finally achieved the breakthrough.

‘Josh, babe, I need me the eggs, now.’

‘Comin’ up, babe.’ And Josh handed James the carton.

Nick sprang back. ‘What the fuck are those? Jesus Christ, if you people use – are those alligator eggs or something, because I’m not eating anything that has those in it, that is, damn, what the hell is that?’

‘Eggs,’ James said, looking at him like Nick had finally become loon-crazy. Howie and Josh were already unable to keep the laughter from seeping past their best attempts at suppression.

‘Bullshit, Bass! Eggs are not brown!’

Josh and Howie lost it, and Nick looked at them, reproachfully.

Five minutes later, after James had carefully explained the facts of ranging hens to the City Boy, Josh and Howie were still laughing, and Nick was in deep pout. It was at that point that, with his real, true grin on his face, James gathered Nicky into a hug, put his forehead against Nick’s, and said, ‘Lordy, Nick, just promise me…. Never change, Nicky. Never change.’

‘Okay, so I’m an idiot,’ Nick grumbled. ‘Yard eggs. Right. I’m a fool.’

‘A holy fool, maybe,’ Josh said, ‘the truth-speaker with the eyes of a child and the guts to ask questions.’

‘Like the kid in the fairy tale,’ Howie added, kissing Nick. ‘The one who pointed out that the Emperor was actually naked.’

‘It’s the children, and them as are like ’em, as gets into the Kingdom of Heaven,’ James added, squeezing Howie and Josh both into the embrace.

‘Yeah, well,’ Nick said, and then proved their point. ‘You two sure been in Hell, not playing, not having fun with each other anymore.’

James and Josh just looked at him, and then at each other. Then James turned to Howie. ‘You are one sneaky sumbitch, Dorough.’

Howie grinned. ‘That, sir, coming from you, is the highest of compliments. Now, we have a pie to finish, I believe?’

‘Can we have Chantilly cream on top?’ Josh asked, softly. His gaze locked with James’s.

‘Um.’ James’s mouth had apparently gone dry, to go with the glazed look in his eyes. ‘We could do that, yeah.’

‘We’ll make extra?’ Josh had a sultry register that almost persuaded Nick and Howie to ease out of the kitchen right then, lest they see something they had no business seeing. For the first time in his life, Howie was seeing, rather than feeling in himself, for Nick, exactly what was meant by the old Southern phrase, ‘love come down.’

James’s laugh had a little crack in it. ‘Well, if that’s what you want. You being a guest, and all.’

‘I ain’t no guest, husband mine,’ Josh growled, and pushed James up against the refrigerator. At that point, Nicky and D did decide that was their cue to leave. Besides, it was rather … inspirational. And their guest room was upstairs, where they could hear the rain on the roof, so….

‘You and your plans to make them spontaneous,’ Nick gasped.

‘You’re complaining?’ Howie didn’t wait for an answer before getting back to what he’d been doing, which precluded his participation in conversation.

‘Nnnnno, God, no … it’s … God, Howie! I … I just sorta wanted pie … oh, Howard!’

An hour or so later, all four of them slightly embarrassed but none the less pleased for that – and all grateful that the house wasn’t within earshot of any neighbors – they met up again in the kitchen.

‘All right,’ James said, blushing. ‘Y’all are still starin’ at us like a tree-full of owls and grinning like an egg-suckin’ dawg. Stop it.’

‘I just wondered,’ Nicky said, innocently. ‘What the fuck is in Chantilly cream sauce?’

‘This afternoon,’ Josh grinned, ‘what was in it was mostly James’s –’

‘JOSH!’

Giggling, Josh took off running, James in hot pursuit, and Nick and Howie heard the bedroom door slam.

‘Looks like it’s going to be PB&Js for us tonight,’ Howie shrugged.

The pie never did get made, that trip.

END