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For a little while Doc had thought Chester just might have a special lady in his life, based on what he’d asked a few months ago during a physical.
“Say Doc, do you know much about people getting sick from, uh, doin stuff together?”
“That’s the main way people get sick. From being around other people, when there’s coughing, and lack of hygiene and so forth. So be mindful of washing your hands and staying out of line of someone’s cough.” He thought he had said this plenty of times before.
“Well I know that! But I was talkin about well, you know...”
“Oh,” Doc said, realizing what he meant. “You’re concerned about venereal diseases?”
“I wouldn’t say concerned exactly," Chester said, looking down nervously, like he regretted asking, "I just overheared people talkin so I wanted to know.”
“Well, knowledge is power. There's a lot of stigma around the subject, but ignorance isn't doing anyone any favors.” Doc might have been cantankerous when not on the job, but when someone was in his office asking personal questions, he had to be approachable so that people could get help for whatever fool situation they’d gotten themselves into. So, he gave Chester a man to man talk, telling him the basics of venereal diseases, trying to be matter-of-fact and calm his nerves. It wasn't his first conversation along that vein.
“Are you having any symptoms, or have you had any in the past?”
“Well, no.”
“Then there's no use worrying. If I were you, I’d be more worried about getting the girl in trouble. A baby is the much more likely result.” Doc tried to advise him on the details of impregnation, as there was plenty of ignorance about that too, but Chester looked restless. “You should be taking this more seriously. Most men don’t give it a second thought, right up until they get someone pregnant out of wedlock.”
“Oh if that happens no problem, we’ll just get into wedlock!” He smiled cheerfully at the idea, as if that would equate to living happily ever after—still not treating it as a likely outcome, it seemed.
“I hope she’s someone you can live with, if that’s the case.”
Doc wasn’t sure whether Chester was asking hypothetically, or if he’d met a woman, but there was no need to pry; if it was an ongoing thing then he'd be seen with her soon enough.
“Any other questions while you got me here?" Doc asked, because it was easier once a person was warmed up; often they’d ask all their questions in one sitting and never speak of it again. "I know people get tongue-tied, but the only stupid questions are the ones you don't ask.”
“Could any two people spread stuff to each other?”
“Any two people?” Doc scratched his head a moment, before he understood the question.“Oh. Right. Yes I believe that's possible. It’s more likely from man to man than from woman to woman, but...” He cleared his throat; just because he was professional didn’t make it any less awkward to talk about such a subject with someone he regularly shared meals with--but then, he had encouraged him to ask. “I’ll leave it at that, unless you want further elaboration.”
“Oh no, no no, it just occurred to me right this minute. ”
Doc didn’t think much of it. Chester was known to ask questions out of the blue, often with a foggy idea of what he was talking about: how did Siamese twins happen? Were there really people who had tumors with teeth on them? Could masturbation really lead to blindness? (Well, that one was probably out of personal concern.) He’d recently related some dubious story where a woman got pregnant by being shot in the belly, by the same bullet that shot a man through the testicles. (Doc had assured him that that was not possible; most likely this woman had gotten pregnant the same way everyone else did, and then come up with a wild yarn to defend her reputation.)
Over the years, Chester had been seen with girls a few times, but it seemed he had rotten luck. After this conversation Doc wondered if he’d see Chester with a girl again, but he didn’t. It was just the usual, Chester and Matt moseying around town, sitting languidly on the porch in the heat of the afternoon, and eventually going to the Long Branch, where they would hang around Kitty.
He did eventually see Chester out and about with Kitty, but that was a few months later, after the time Matt had come back from his trip...
Those three were late to supper that evening. It was unusual for all three to be late at once; they usually filtered in one or two at a time, but Doc was more annoyed than worried at that point.
He waited awhile and then couldn’t justify taking up a table for so long when there were others waiting. He ordered and was halfway through eating his supper when Kitty, Matt and Chester finally graced him with their disheveled presence.
“What’s gotten you three so held up?”
“Sorry about that,” Matt said.
“We went to meet him after his trip,” Kitty said, with an irrepressible smile.
“Thought you got back several hours ago,” Doc said.
“Sure, but then he was tellin us about it,” Chester said.
“Never knew a business trip was that interesting--”
“Boy I sure am so hungry I could eat a horse!” Chester declared. Doc was used to this kind of thing—being interrupted mid-sentence, changes of subject, and most of all, people not listening to his advice, so he shrugged it off.
The waitress came by right at Chester’s announcement, and the three made their orders, rife with double portions, sides and desserts.
“I think your eyes might be bigger than your bellies,” Doc said, impressed at their appetite. “And your bellies are gonna be bigger than your wallets if you keep this up.”
“They already are!” said Chester.
“It’s a figure of speech, numbskull!” Doc said.
“Well I agree with Chester. I could just about eat a horse,” Matt said.
“You could eat a lot of things,” Chester said.
“Damn right I could!”
Doc looked around at the three of them and the atmosphere between them, where they seemed at the brink of bursting into laughter at any minute, their faces occasionally contorting to hide smiles, and then giving up and smiling. They were acting queerer than usual, that was for sure.
“Have you three been smoking something?”
“Yeah...that's exactly right,” Matt said. “Got a hold of some marijuana while I was out of town.”
“That’s why we were late...lost time after our merry little smoking session,” added Kitty.
“And you know how hungry I get after that,” Chester said, though Doc highly doubted there was a precedent. “Which is... even hungrier than I usually am all the time!” Everyone started giggling at the statement, which shouldn’t be funny, but it was so underwhelming that it was.
It looked like Kitty had hastily put up her hair. Chester was periodically trying to reach in back to fix an unhooked suspender. Matt had buttons out of line, and his shirt untucked.
“And just where did you go for this gay ol' time? You look like you were dragged in here by a wild boar.”
“We was layin out in the grass, smokin grass,” Chester said with a dreamy smile. “Starin up at the purty clouds.”
“Lost track of time, got hungry, came running back,” Matt said. “We were already late or we’d have cleaned up better.”
“You’re liable to attract ticks lying around in the grass,” he said.
Matt looked at him like he was a nag.
Doc shrugged it off. “Your funeral.”
“Guess we’ll have to check each other for those,” Chester said. They avoided the giggles, but they still exchanged glances.
Their food arrived; meanwhile Doc paid his bill.
“Well, as fascinating as it is to watch you all scarf down enough food for an army, it’s been a long day for me, full of house visits and belligerent patients, so I’m going to turn in for the night,” Doc said.
They said good night and he went home to read a book. He was always the odd one out with those three, which suited him just fine. He was fond of them, but he was too old for some of their antics. And on busy days full of dealing with people, he liked some time alone.
He took the encounter at face value. So they’d gone off and smoked some cannabis. He didn’t doubt that. Why would he? Young people seeking altered states of consciousness was nothing new.
He started to see Chester and Kitty out together in the early hours before the Long Branch opened up, usually midweek. Chester was thoroughly gentlemanly about it, walking arm in arm and holding doors for her (more chivalrous than Matt sometimes, Doc thought). It looked like he was just accompanying her when she bought weekly supplies, got beauty treatments, or just wanted a stroll without out-of-towners heckling her.
No one in town was entirely certain if Matt was ‘with’ Kitty, but he clearly wanted to be, and it was at least an ‘if I ever did’ situation for the both of them. And that didn’t mean that Matt had any claim to Kitty, but it probably meant that his right hand man wouldn’t publicly court her without there being a heap of trouble. If Kitty and Chester were walking around like they had nothing to hide, Doc thought it must be innocent enough.
He didn’t pay it much mind, but there was the day he’d stopped in to get some clothing repairs. He was sitting in back and reading a newspaper when Kitty and Chester came in. Doc could have said hello to them, but the moment passed, and they didn’t notice him behind his paper, so he tried to busy himself with the news--but the more his mind tried not to eavesdrop, the more he listened.
Kitty seemed to be trying to give Chester a ‘new look’.
“I mostly wear things til they wear out and I need somethin new, I never buyed new clothes just for fun.”
“It’s up to you,” Kitty said. “But I have an inkling that a new look might make you feel like a new man. Why is it you wear both suspenders, and a belt, anyway? Isn’t that redundant?”
“You know I don’t come from much. I was stuck with hand-me-downs that were too big, and I was pullin 'em up every couple steps. But one time they shimmied down when I was workin in a kitchen and carryin a pot of stew, so I couldn’t pull ‘em up, and the whole kitchen got a good laugh at me, standin there in my draws with my britches around my ankles.”
“I'm sorry Chester, that’s awful!” Kitty said.
“I can laugh about it now, but wasn’t laughin then! I started puttin a rope through the belt loops to keep ‘em tight around me, and suspenders to hold ‘em up...by the time I got myself better fittin clothes I was used to it, and didn’t feel right without it. Now I think if I didn’t wear ‘em people wouldn’t recognize me!”
“So it was to feel secure... and now it's your signature look,” Kitty said, and they both giggled.
Chester got busy looking through the pile of fabric samples they’d both picked out. She gave her honest opinion on how the colors and patterns looked, considering his skin tone and body type.
“I never much thought about all this, I don’t think I’m all that much to look at,” he said.
“You’re slender, you’re lean,” Kitty said. “You don’t give yourself enough credit sometimes.”
“Oh pshaw! Quit bein nice, I’m just a straight-up stringbean.”
“There must be something attractive about you, if you’ve gotten someone’s attention…”
Doc peeked over to see Chester blush; both of them looked and sounded just a little giddy--as if they could be giddier but were trying to keep it contained.
Whoever this someone was, Chester sure was keeping everything behind closed doors.
But apparently it wasn’t Kitty. They were clearly platonic friends. He hadn’t realized how close before; he’d thought their friendship was just incidental because they both hung around with Matt. It was a bit remarkable, because oftentimes a man’s lady-interest and best friend were at odds; either a relationship of animosity or forbidden attraction. (Often some combination.) But they seemed to be on equal footing when it came to him.
“Did you ever feel weird about that time?” Kitty asked him in a hushed voice.
“Maybe just a little the day after, but then we all started actin normal and it felt normal again. I don't regret tryin it out.”
“So it's the kind of thing you only need to do once?”
“I didn’t have anything against it, but I wouldn’t go outta my way neither.”
Doc was trying to concentrate on the paper rather than this conversation. They sure were harping on that smoking session. He’d tried marijuana a few times too, but it mostly made him dizzy, and insatiably hungry. It wasn't that exciting!
It was a slow day for Doc and he was stopping in for a beer. Matt and Kitty said hello to him and then had their own conversation.
“How’d it go this morning?” Matt asked Kitty, standing by the bar. They were leaning against it, close to each other without touching. They glanced at each other and at Chester, who was in their line of vision as he talked to some acquaintance at the next table.
So, Matt knew about it all along. That wasn't surprising; Chester wouldn't dream of doing him wrong.
“I tried...but he’s set in his ways,” Kitty smiled.
“Doesn’t really matter,” Matt said.
“Not at all. This is the Chester we know and love. Just the way he is. Suspenders and belt and all.” Kitty smiled serenely and they gazed at each other, and then looked affectionately over at Chester. Something about the way they did it was uncommon...
“That's right. Oh by the way, I have a feeling it’s gonna be a slow night tonight,” Matt said. “Midweek, hotel is deserted, transients left this morning...”
“Is it now? Well, enjoy your peace and quiet then. You can come over another time this week.”
“I sure will Kitty.”
Now that was odd. Doc understood the need for peace and quiet, but would a young man really choose staying home over a night with an attractive woman? Particularly one whose dress he tried to look down every time he stood near her!
Doc identified the passing of time by his visits. So in the next few weeks he delivered a baby, gave hypochondriacs some ‘fooling pills’, applied a few casts and stitches (mostly younguns that were roughhousing too much) saved some lives--and pronounced a few people dead. Some of old age or disease, some of violence.
The worst case was a fatal stabbing. He was summoned when he was about to retire for the night, and taken to the side of a building where a man had already bled considerably.
As he pressed into the gushing wound, he overheard the surviving party tell the story to Matt.
“He was my friend. I never meant it to come to this, honest Marshal! He was comin at me with a knife...I shoulda done more to block him and talk him out of it...”
“What was the fight about?”
“We were both sweet on Mary Anne.”
Doc kept trying to stop the bleeding, but unfortunately the patient was bleeding much too heavily and probably would have had a slim chance even if he'd been there when it happened.
“I’m sorry...he’s gone,” Doc said.
The young man was silent, in shock for a moment. "What have I done," he murmured.
“You both had your weapons drawn, so you won’t face prison time,” Matt said. “It looks like your conscience is punishment enough.”
Matthew could be such a prick sometimes with his moralizing!
The man remained in his moral crisis as he walked away from the scene. Who knew if either of them stood a chance with Mary Anne before, but the muse for this murder wanted nothing to do with him now.
"Get away from me," she said, walking away.
"Please, this is the worst day of my life, just sit with me awhile!" he said.
"I never want to see you!"
Accidents and illnesses were one thing. But it was cases like these—violent deaths that could have been prevented with just a few seconds of cooling down and thinking rationally—that he found the most tragic. People being so cavalier with their lives, and wasting them over matters that they would have seen as trivial with a little passing of time. This hadn't been what he'd envisioned when he was in medical school, but here he was, and someone had to do it.
When he wanted a drink he told himself it was sensible for a doctor to stay close to the saloons, where so many fistfights and shootings took place. He’d been right there to apply first aid more than once. He always wondered whose life he'd have been able to save if he was immediately on the scene, but he also didn’t blame himself; he couldn’t be everywhere at once just waiting for someone to do something stupid. Besides, shootings and assaults didn’t confine themselves to any one place. There had even been a few in the church!
Tonight someone was doing his best to pick an argument with Matt.
“Marshal, I seen your deputy stepping out with your girl,” said Roofus.
“What are you talking about? So they run errands sometimes,” Matt said, not even looking at the troublemaker.
“Yeahbut... they go around together most every week, people are beginnin to talk.”
“By people, do you mean you?” Matt gave him a look equivalent to a gun cocking.
“No, I would never! I’m just sayin what I heard.”
“Let ‘em talk. You think they’d be in public if they were doing something they weren’t supposed to?”
“That’s what they want you to think. You know what they say, hiding in plain sight—and either way, there’s talk,” Roofus said. “I’m just lookin out for ya, that’s all.”
“Well I don’t need your meddling and I can do fine for myself without your ‘looking out’,” Matt said curtly.
"Suit yourself." Roofus walked away. “Cuckhold,” he muttered.
Matt got up and stopped in front of him, taking hold of his collar.
“Careful with flapping your jaw. You might end up with it broken,” he said.
Roofus backed up and held his hands up shoulder-height. He tended to talk big until the minute someone challenged him, and he was no match for Matt. “Aw I didn't mean nothin Marshal, I was just joshin.”
All Doc did when Matt sat back down was raise an eyebrow. But he raised it for a pretty long time, and as high as it would go.
“About that...I can explain,” Matt said.
“I don’t wanna know,” Doc replied, but then realized he knew exactly what it was about--and it went far beyond that altercation. A bunch of things he'd shrugged off, only paying nominal attention--but now his brain had put together.
They both sat stubbornly awhile.
“I think I should,” Matt offered.
“No explanation needed. I figured it out already.”
Matt smiled. “Is that so? Then what was I gonna tell you?” He looked like he thought he was so very cryptic and difficult to figure out; he probably thought Doc was going to come to a completely wrong conclusion.
“It’s been clear for awhile that there is some sort of menage-a-trois happening,” Doc said calmly.
“Manage-a-what?”
Doc laughed. “The three of you. You’re involved in some kind of triangular situation. Romantically speaking.”
“Dammit!” Matt put his fist on the table and grimaced. “Do you think that's what Roofus was implying?”
“None of these other yokels are gonna dream that up. They don’t have the imagination. Or enough powers of observation. Even when they're sober, and they're not sober now.”
“How’d you figure it out anyway.”
“Attention to detail.”
It had been a bunch of things he’d noticed, said ‘hmm, that’s odd’ and gone about his day.
The day at the store, he'd gathered that Chester and Kitty weren't lovers, that Chester had a secret someone, and they both seemed a little conspiratorial. After they'd left, Doc had remembered a polygamous family that had passed through town, with two wives who were content to be married to the same man, and who walked around town cheerfully, seemingly the best of friends. Now wasn’t it funny that they reminded him of that?
His mind had also gone to the fabled camaraderie that worldly women often struck up with homosexual men. But Chester wasn't homosexual, was he? He'd had a few lady-interests over the years. Then again...
At the time, Doc hadn't thought much about Chester’s 'any two people' question, among all the questions asked that day and other days, but in hindsight it seemed suggestive: perhaps Chester had asked a broad question so that he could casually ask the specific question. That would explain him being secretive about his 'someone'.
Seeing Matt and Kitty look at Chester, and talk about some mysterious ‘quiet evening’ that would postpone his meeting with Kitty—he'd thought it might be a code word, but he couldn't for the life of him think of anything that Matt would want to do more than be with Kitty. Unless...
A night that Matt and Chester could have to themselves, unlikely to be disturbed, would be rare in this town. It made more sense than Matt just wanting solitude when he could be having his way with Kitty--God knew he ogled her enough.
Doc had told himself he must have misheard them, misunderstood them, or missed some context--there must be a sensible explanation.
And yet, he also entertained just a bit of doubt that anyone had been smoking anything; he didn't recall any red eyes, coughing or smoke smell. Sure people might look a little haphazard when they were intoxicated, but marijuana by itself didn't typically involve misaligned buttons and other hastily done clothing. That day they were all late to supper, perhaps they'd been doing something very different; something Kitty was asking Chester about later because it was the closest intimacy he'd had with a woman.
Then he'd thought he ought to get his mind out of the gutter; none of that was proof they'd just come from some kind of sexual orgy.
But they had been looking cagey when around him lately, and he'd wondered if they were hiding something.
Any one factoid was spurious, but all together it added up: both Kitty and Chester were involved with Matt, both of them knew about the other, and both consented to this arrangement.
“So, you don't have a problem with it?”
Doc scoffed. “Since when do you need my approval?”
Matt leaned in, and Doc knew he was about to make something already obvious even more painfully obvious. “You do know that since it’s us three, that means me and Ch--”
“Yes, I gathered who’s with who, Matthew! If you’re expecting a lecture on morality you’ve come to the wrong man. I’m a doctor, not a clergyman.”
Despite Chester's short-lived courtships (which in retrospect were mostly like his friendship with Kitty), he did gaze at Matt with a certain reverence, ready to obey and willing to serve; it wasn't such a stretch to imagine him being a little in love. As for Matt...it was not quite as easy to imagine, but they did stand awful close.
Over the years Doc had learned to never be too surprised by anything. He'd performed abortions for wealthy debutantes, given syphilis treatments to priests...and heard a few rumors about the toughest of cowboys rolling around together.
“OK then,” Matt said. “How ‘bout we have some whiskey.”
“Yes indeed, I’d like a strong drink right about now. And you’re buying!”
Matt got a bottle. They drank with few words between them. They shared a few shots with someone who lost his booze money in a game, and that was a break from having to talk to each other or sit silently. Doc didn’t know why Matt’s spelling it out made him want to get tipsy; it was probably discovering some personal things about a friend rather than a patient or stranger.
He could also sense Matt’s awkwardness while confiding; it was contagious. This couldn't be easy for him; this was a man who was scant on revealing personal information (so scant that it seemed he didn't have any). Even when he was seeking medical attention. Even when he was in various states of undress as needed for medical care. Doc was accustomed to him being stoic.
"I hope you know you can still approach me about anything, medically speaking," Doc said, thinking of Chester's last visit.
Matt nodded. "Thanks. Everything's good."
How on Earth had they gotten into such an abnormal situation? Doc had lots of questions, for whose answers he probably didn't want to know. If he asked, he might be told things that made him picture scenes he didn't want to picture--and his mind was doing that enough already.
It was morning, and for the first time in at least a decade, Doc was feeling hungover.
“I should have known better,” he said, sitting at breakfast with Those Three, looking down a stack of toast and copious amounts of black coffee.
“What made you drink so much?” Kitty asked.
“Matt was buying,” Doc said. “It appears I can’t hold my liquor like I used to.”
"Why'd he buy ya so much booze?" Chester asked.
There was another of their exchanges of glances; Kitty looking questioningly at Matt, and Chester noticing the exchange halfway into it.
“We had a talk about it,” Matt said.
“It, huh?” Kitty smiled.
“Yes. ‘It,’” Doc responded.
“And you’re not going to give us a talking-to?” Kitty asked.
“Are you serious? I’m not even all that against it,” Doc said. “Who else would put up with any of you?”
“High praise from Doc. I’ll take it,” Kitty said.
“Tolja Doc would figure it out in five minutes,” Chester said.
“That took more than five minutes,” Matt said.
“No, it probably was about five nonconsecutive hours,” Doc said. “Now. Can we please talk about anything else on God’s green earth, while we're eating?”
“Anything?” Kitty asked.
"Yes, anything," said Doc. "You have something to ask me?"
"Well, you did say 'anything', so...have you ever dealt with anyone getting things stuck in places they shouldn’t be?”
He was a little surprised she would ask, but he still preferred this subject to the previous.
Doc scratched his chin. “Oh yes, it happens. Just last year there was a little girl who had gotten a pussy-willow stuck in her ear. Her mother was mortified, but I thought she must have liked the fuzzy little things, maybe was holding one to her face, and one thing led to another. Seemed understandable enough when I thought from a child’s point of view. It just took a magnifying glass and tweezers; no harm done.”
It wasn’t what Kitty was expecting, but everyone smiled at his wholesome story.
“And, since I know that wasn’t the kind of story you were asking about, yes, as a doctor I've had one or two patients who have told me some variation of ‘accidentally’ sitting directly onto a bottle, or a broom handle that broke, and needing it extracted.”
“I knew it!” Kitty said.
“What did you do?” Matt said, looking mildly disgusted.
“Whataya think? I did my job. I’d rather see someone get help than let things get worse because they’re too embarrassed to get help. No matter what kind of predicament they got themselves into. That’s why I’m here,” Doc said. “Although I might not want to talk about it at the breakfast table.”
“Fair enough,” Kitty said. “I always did want to ask you that. I’ve, uh, heard stories.”
Doc sipped some coffee as everyone was quiet a moment. The cagey look was gone now that they weren't hiding anything from him.
“Were you two planning to run errands this morning?” Matt asked the other two. “Looks a little rainy.”
“I don’t like the looks of those dark grey clouds. We can hold off til tomorrow,” Kitty said.
“Suits me. I just might go get a lil more shuteye,” Chester yawned. "Grey days always make me sleepy."
Doc was glad for the change of subject. Thinking back to the stabbing he’d dealt with the other week, he more appreciated the harmonious interaction he was witnessing now. Rather than fighting and competing, they had become even better friends because of their common involvement...and in a certain light, he could appreciate that.
Kitty looked over at Doc.
“What?”
“Just the look on your face.”
“You know Kitty, I do smile more than I get credit for.” Then everyone was looking at him.
“Would love to know whats going through your mind,” Matt said.
“If you must know, I was just thinking it’s nice. It’s refreshing to see people cooperating and getting along--instead of resorting to violence. Frankly I’d like to see more of it, although I don't think your solution would be feasible for most...”
He realized he was going from being ‘not against’ their unusual arrangement, to being actively for it.
Even if he didn't want to think about the details.