Gay love among a mental health health crisis...
âMemory is my enemy. It never fails me, although I often wish it did.â
Tony, a gay man struggling with grief and mental health issues centered around his body image, is about to turn 35.
As this âcubicle daydreamerâ takes steps to improve his situation, his life is turned upside down when he is drawn to a younger, flamboyant and free-spirited artist named Antonio.
Will Tony successfully make a meaningful connection with Antonio despite their many differences? And how long can he hide the secret devastating to himself and to their relationship?
Part romance, part drama, part comedy and a raw portrait of disorder, Cloud Cover captures the experience of love and lossâof others and of oneselfâamidst past trauma, modern expectations and resulting inner turmoil.
If you enjoyed the romance of Call Me by Your Name, the honesty of Chelsea Handlerâs Life will Be the Death of Me and the campy humour of RuPaulâs Drag Race, then pick up Cloud Cover today!
Gay love among a mental health health crisis...
âMemory is my enemy. It never fails me, although I often wish it did.â
Tony, a gay man struggling with grief and mental health issues centered around his body image, is about to turn 35.
As this âcubicle daydreamerâ takes steps to improve his situation, his life is turned upside down when he is drawn to a younger, flamboyant and free-spirited artist named Antonio.
Will Tony successfully make a meaningful connection with Antonio despite their many differences? And how long can he hide the secret devastating to himself and to their relationship?
Part romance, part drama, part comedy and a raw portrait of disorder, Cloud Cover captures the experience of love and lossâof others and of oneselfâamidst past trauma, modern expectations and resulting inner turmoil.
If you enjoyed the romance of Call Me by Your Name, the honesty of Chelsea Handlerâs Life will Be the Death of Me and the campy humour of RuPaulâs Drag Race, then pick up Cloud Cover today!
April 2010
My boyfriend, Ken, said he found me attractive because he thought I looked like Bruno Mars. I didnât see it at first. As his songs got more popular, people started to make comments to me about it. Ken joked that if I wore a fedora, sunglasses and chains, and walked everywhere surrounded by big guys that looked like bodyguards, I could pass as him on the street. On top of that, I had that âextra bit ofpudge, just like Bruno,â heâd say.
Except for that last one, I liked the comments. It was nice to see someone famous who wasnât conventionally handsome with a square jaw and pointy nose. Bruno is half Filipino, a quarter Puerto Rican, and a quarter Jewish. Although Iâm full Filipino, I felt we shared a sense of âothernessâ; in a glamorous world of white, blue-eyed, blondhaired Justins (Timberlakes, BiebersâŚ) and Kens (my boyfriend, my very own Ken doll), he stuck out with his round eyes, full cheeks and brown skin, a lot like my own features.
I too stood out in my gay Toronto world. And by stood out, I mean I was invisible. First of all, it was difficult to spot me in a crowd: Iâm five feet and three-quarters-of-an-inch tall. In the dimly loften referred to as âyellowââwould get lost in a sea of chests and armpits. Tall, beautifully sculpted, Caucasian ânon-yellowâ men would elbow my face by accident, and not even know it.
But Bruno Mars gave me the possibility that a yellow Asian could be cute, perhaps attractive. Maybe even, dare I say it⌠sexy?
Everyone always thought of me as âTony, that nice guy,â which was fine. To be admired was nice. But to be desired meant more to me than I liked to admit.
âTony?â a voice said. Fifteen-year-old Abigail caught me day
dreaming at my desk. I looked up to a sea of eyes, all centred on me.
âYes, Abigail?â
âShould I read out what I have now?â
âOf course.â
The assignment was for the kids to write three-to-five sentences answering the question âWho am I?â There were no criteria, guidelines or restrictions. And no judgment. This was a creative writing class, after all.
âMy name is Abigail. I am fifteen years old and in grade 10. I like writing. It makes me feel like an artist. My favourite movie is Legally Blonde. I think I want to be a lawyer, just like Elle Woods. Totally my hero.â
She looked up at me, seeking approval.
âGreat!â I said. âThanks, Abigail, good work.â
âThat movie sucks!â a boy at the back of the class said. A few of the other kids laughed. Abigail rolled her eyes.
âHey guys. No judgments in this class, okay?â I said. âWe should feel free to share whatever we want without fear of being judged.â
The class grew silent.
I continued. âAnd just for the record, Legally Blonde is an absolute masterpiece of cinema!â They all laughed. âPut yourself in Elle Woodsâ shoes! Empathize! How great would it feel to stick it to your stupid ex-boyfriend by getting in law school and upstaging him?
Thatâs amazing, right?â
Many of the students giggled and nodded.
âEmpathy, guys. I want you to consider all points of view when you write. Itâll make you a better writer, and a better person.â
Abigail smiled. âTony?â
âYes?â
âWhat about you? Donât you have to tell us who you are?â
I didnât have anything prepared. I scrambled some sentences together in my head:
Iâm Tony, Iâm 29. I wanted to be a writer when I was a kid. Now, I
teach creative writing to teens at this community centre. So, I guess
things didnât turn out exactly as planned. But I have my health. I have
a boyfriend named Kenâa lawyerâwho, when he isnât pinching my
chubby cheeks calling me his âchunky monkey,â is a good guy. Although
we donât yet own multiple properties together, we go on vacations and
occasionally eat at restaurants in Yorkville where the portions look like
pebbles on their giant plates. But the photos look good on my Facebook.
I guess that means my life is close to perfect, no?
But I kept my biography to myself. I looked back at Abigail and deflected the question: âThis class is all about you guys, not me. Iâm just here to help if I can.â
There was a spring in my step when I left class to head home, which was a quaint little house in Little Portugal. Ken and I were celebrating our two-year anniversary. Iâd been thinking about what to wear for this night for months. I wanted to look good for him. He deserved it; he worked his butt off and had recently made partner at his firm. I loved him.
I tried to channel Brunoâs current 50s-doo-wop trend: I wore a dark blue suit with black lapel, shiny black shoes, a white shirt and a black tie. To finish the look, I teased my hair to get it as big and fluffy as possible, with a small curl dangling loosely on my forehead, as if I was carefree and cool.
In the last couple of months, I had been trying to lose some weight by cutting down on carbohydrates. I replaced my rice at meals with salad. Ken would comment every now and then about me âgetting more doughy, but itâs okay because itâs cute.â I was 130 pounds, with a normal (but on the high side of normal) BMI of 24.9. But I took his comments as a cue to trim myself, and I thought the new diet was working. I stood in front of the mirror, as I waited for him. Okay, not bad.
Ken was one of the most punctual people I knew, so it was odd to get an âIâm running lateâ text. He was never late.
We were going to the Toronto Symphony to see Rachmaninoffâs Piano Concerto no. 2, my favourite, next to Vivaldiâs Four Seasons. Ken preferred the less melodic, harsher classical music, like Shostakovich and the newer pieces by modern composers, which to me sounded like cats in a dryer. One of my best friends, Nick, said that we were too pretentious for late-twenty-something gay men, with our love of âold people music,â as he put it. But I didnât like classical music because I liked being fancy; I liked it because it was simply beautiful. And all right, Iâll be honest at the risk of sounding snootyâI thought anything was better than the simple beats and âgrab-my-assâ lyrics of basic pop music.
Ken came in, looking as handsome as ever in a grey suit and gelled-back, dirty blonde hair, his blue eyes sparkling. My Ken doll.
He was holding a bouquet of roses. They were yellow.
Yellow?
Why were they yellow?
âHi babe,â I said, âyou look amazing.â
âThanks. Should we head out?â
âLet me just put the flowers in a vase.â
Ken was uncharacteristically quiet in the car.
âSo, how was your day?â I asked as he drove.
âGood,â he answered.
âYou okay? Youâre a little quiet.â
âIâm fine. Can we just listen to the radio?â
âSure.â
He turned up the volume. Something was wrong. He hadnât even commented on my suit or how I looked at all.
I had made reservations at Sotto Sotto in Yorkville. According to Toronto Life magazine, it was one of âthe places to eat.â I tried to keep initiating conversation over dinner but couldnât get Ken to seem interested.
âItâs going to be a great term,â I said, trying to sound chipper. âThe kids today were awesome. They loved the selection of poems I gave for homework. One of them told me that âMorning Songâ by Sylvia Plath reminded her of her relationship with her mother, because both her mother and the mother in the poem werenât even sure they wanted children. She interpreted that on her own.Sometimes the kids just really just amaze me.â
Ken was looking down at the floor. âI gotta go to the bathroom,â he said, as he scurried from the table.
He came back ten minutes later, his eyes watering and cheeks red. His face was puffy.
âKen, are you okay? You look like you just threw up,â I said, concerned.
âI did,â he replied.
âWhat, are you sick? Should we leave?â
âNo, itâs okay.â He lowered his voice. âI need to talk to you.â
âOkay. Whatâs bothering you? You havenât been yourself all night.â
âI need to tell you something.â
âYeah?â
âIâve been thinking a lot lately. About us.â
It was that line that you hear in movies and automatically know whatâs about to happen. But this wasnât the movies.
Suddenly I realized. The roses. They were yellow.
âKen, why were the roses yellow?â
He shifted his eyes to the window. âThey were bi-coloured. Did you not see they were yellow with specks of red on them?â
âWhat are you saying?â
His eyes met mine, and he said, âI realized something. I realized⌠that I love you, but only as a friend. Thatâs why the roses were yellow, for friendship, but blended with red, for love.â
I had no words. Maybe that was why I never made it as a writer.
I didnât want to believe it. This shouldnât be happening to me, I thought. Iâm a good person. Iâm nice and I care about people. I didnât deserve this.
But it all made sense. Over time, our conversations had become nothing but cold, dry one-liners. We were both getting busier at work. We hadnât had sex in months.
Then a question popped into my head. âIs there someone else?â I was afraid of the answer.
The response was worse than a âyes.â
âNo, thereâs nobody else. Itâs you. Donât get me wrong. Youâre an amazing guy, Tony. You work hard. The kids at the centre love you. I just donât feel that way about you. But someone will snatch you up in no time.â
Was it sadder that he broke up with me, not for someone else, but because of me? That he only loved me as a friend (who also apparently made him vomit?). Is that like quitting your job, not because you found a better one but because you didnât care for it enough that not having a job was a better option?
We sat in silence for a few minutes.
âAre you okay?â he asked.
âNo. You better go.â
He got up and slowly exited the restaurant.
Other diners were stealing looks at me and then looking to their partners to probably discuss why I was suddenly alone at the table. The entrees had come just as Ken got up to leave. I picked up the fork and quickly shoveled my pasta into my face until the plate was clean. I even ate half of Kenâs plate. It was too much for my stomach and I felt sick, but I kept stuffing the food in. Anything to numb what I was feeling. Anything to change the memory of this evening. I paid the bill and went to the symphony alone to try and fill my ears with anything other than his words. âItâs you⌠I just donât feel that way about you.â
Rachmaninoffâs Piano Concerto no. 2 became the soundtrack for all the images in my head, all the dreams I had had of my life with Ken that now would never come to be: a condo on Lakeshore facing south; vacations to Gay Par-ee; grand dinner parties with friends where we would eat rack of lamb and discuss what films we hated at TIFF; running to tell him that I had finally got my writing published, and him picking me off the ground and spinning me in circles until I felt dizzy with hope and happiness and love. The montage of hazy dreams faded away into a single image of yellow roses, which would eventually wilt and die too.
Reading Cloud Cover, one of the things I noticed instantly was the voice of the narrator. Jeffrey Sotto manages to create a unique and powerful voice that works for the novel really well because so much of the story focuses on the narrator's internal struggle. I found Tony an extremely relatable and sympathetic character and was rooting for him.
I did, however, find this novel had a lot of triggering material. The narrator has an eating disorder and talks very graphically about things like purging and specific numerical weights. Therefore I would warn anyone looking to read it who has had any similar issues that it may not be the book for them.