When we left LA (on the run from Kendrick and CAN), we went to… Sedona. It was winter and cold and I’m thinking he’s not going to be able to handle the cold. But the hikes there were wonderful. And Angelo just basically turned off his “thing.” Usually, when he went out, he was pumped up and staring people down to see who he could influence. But there, he even said, “I’m staying hidden here. I’m holding it all in.” so we just did a routine. We ate, we worked out, we exercised, we took hikes, we meditated. He would go up to the phone in his room to deal with the drama going on back in LA so luckily I didn’t have to listen. That was such a relief. I was the first time I didn’t have to hear everything because in L.A. the phone was in the living room. I think he was on the phone with Xena, planning his next moves. The point was supposed to be that we were cleaning up his life… his citizenship, his hypnotherapy license… we were trying to take care of everything that the IRS, or CAN or Kendrick could come after him for. That was basically our mission while we were gone… to clean his life up.
From Sedona, we went to… maybe Colorado to take care of something with immigration. And then we went to San Francisco -- to get him sworn in as a citizen (we had been teaching him all his citizenship stuff on the road). And then we went back to Sedona, I think. Just a lot of packing up and moving to the next thing. It was horrible. We couldn’t call anybody. No one could know where we were. It was life or death. It was living in survival mode. He had it up to such a fever pitch. Everybody was out to get him. No one could know our names. No one could use our credit cards because they’ll trace us. You can’t call your parents or tell anyone where we are. Everybody was anxiety-ridden. And people kept feeding his head with more “what ifs.” And that was the dangerous part too. Everybody knew he was scared and what he was focussed on, so they were playing their own game with him. “What will make him think I am helping him?” and then tell him, “Did you think about this yet? Did you think about that yet?” And doing that with a paranoid guy is like throwing gasoline on a fire. But everyone that is finally getting his ear is just making it worse. Escalating it more and more until he was a raving lunatic. Everybody was just a mess.
By the time we make it to Austin, I’m ready to kill someone. Really. I mean, we made it to Austin and that’s fine. But we’re only here about a month and Xena says there’s stuff going on and we have to leave again. I was ready to kill someone. Whoever. Whoever was saying that. So, we’re preparing to leave again and two days before we go, my mom calls and tells me my brother had just talked to her from San Diego and that he’s been sick for two years and he’s dying of AIDS. She didn’t know he was gay. She didn’t know I was gay. My dad is on the phone too. Both hysterically crying. Both asking if I was gay. Yes. Getting off the phone with them, knowing in two days I have to leave and I can’t tell them where I’m going or if I can ever get back in contact with them. And they’re saying they’re going to San Diego. Sobbing. And then I’m off to Mexico. To the beach and the sand. I had no options. I had no car. I had no money. I didn’t even have the mindset to jump ship. The ONE time it crossed my mind had been in San Franciso. After I realized I had lost Pépé Leputois. (I had had to abandon him for Angelo so many times before, and then taking off for a year? That was it for him. He finally couldn’t take it.) And for me, the thought that I’d be able to be with him again had kept me going. That was gone now. It was then that I tried to find my college roommate in the phone book. But I couldn’t. He has a very common name. After that, it just seemed hopeless. I thought I was doomed. I had lived on the road without a name for a year. I was so “off the grid” as far as living as a human being. If I left, where would I go? And to what? You know? I had abandoned my family. I had no friends. I had nothing. But it wasn’t like I was thinking about it so logically… I just didn’t even think. Probably because I didn’t have any other options. It didn’t occur to me to leave before because I didn’t think it was possible. And really.. .who would pick up the slack? Fratello couldn’t get him from A to B. No one else could really do what I was doing for him on the road. And so off to Mexico we went. I was conditioned. I was trained. I was brainwashed. I was a mess.
