Something in my voice, or perhaps simply mother’s instinct, stopped her mid-monologue. “Yes, love?”
“Do you remember my…my friend Matt Leeson? We’re…um…we’re going back a few years.”
“Of course I do, love.”
Steam rose in wisps behind her as the kettle came to the boil then switched itself off. Ignoring it, she turned to face me, her expression caught between uncertainty and interest. How could they have forgotten him? They’d been worried sick about me during the six months after he’d disappeared. In my peripheral vision, my father stopped rummaging through the pantry. If he was searching for olive oil, he was out of luck.
“Well, he’s here. He’s…he’s the reason I came up to the Midlands for this visit.”
“Oh, that’s…nice.” She shot a nervous glance at my father. “Here, did you say?” With a hand, she gestured towards the ceiling.
“Yes,” I nodded. “Here. In this house. He’s upstairs.”
“Goodness, that name is a blast from the past,” said my dad. “We were only sorting through some of your old school stuff the other day, weren’t we, Liz? Where on earth did you bump into him again after all this time?”
“On the operating table, would you believe. It’s a long story.”
“Well I never. Small world isn’t it?”
“I don’t think I put any fresh sheets on the spare bed, Alex, before we left. I didn’t know you were inviting anyone, otherwise I’d have made it all nice for him.”
Was there a right age to come out to your parents? And was it as soon as you realised you were bisexual, or after you’d squirrelled it away from everyone, including yourself, for the first half of your adult life? Did you wait until you were at an age where they no longer held any authority over you, when you no longer needed their financial support or sought their advice over things like mortgages and career choices and the best wine to drink with sauteed white fish? When you were so old that, on the face of it, whether they minded or not was neither here nor there, but you were so desperately fond of them that receiving their blessing still bloody mattered to you anyhow?
I was on the cusp of finding out when the love of my life silently appeared at my shoulder. If I thought my parents had stolen the elixir of eternal youth, then Matt had pinched it back again from under their noses. His feet were bare, his hair gorgeously mussed, and one of my comfy old sweaters hung down over his jeans. My hand automatically sought his, a movement not missed by either of my parents. Matt was forever praising my ability to face issues head-on, now was the time to put it to the test.
“Matt’s not staying in the guest room.” He squeezed my fingers and I turned to gaze down at him. “He’s staying in mine, with me.”
My folks were awfully good at this parenting malarkey. I’d only come to realise how good once I had my own occasionally tricky teenager. Or maybe this wasn’t the grand revelation I’d thought it was. Maybe they’d known all along how I’d felt about Matt Leeson, especially in the time following his disappearance after Brenner’s death. At any rate, I couldn’t fault them now. Was it the news they’d been wanting to hear? No, probably not. Was my stunned father scrabbling around for the right words to say, something I’d never witnessed before? Absolutely. Did a whole kaleidoscope of emotions, not all of them positive, race across my mother’s face in the time it took for her to step across the kitchen and throw her arms around my neck anyway? God, yes.
Somehow Matt became part of the embrace too, and then my dad joined in, which was hellishly awkward as we all remembered at about the same time that we were British, and this was a very un-British demonstration of affection, but since we’d started, we’d see it through. The conversation about Provence that followed was awkward too, as was the surreal discussion about travel and airports and the price of airport taxis and whether Matt wanted to take some cheese back home with him.
But none of that mattered and we all knew it. Because the hug spoke of acceptance and unconditional love. And that was enough.
We made love again later, more quietly this time, our soft sighs and whispered declarations smothered under the duvet. We spent longer at it too, the days of being trigger-happy teenagers long behind us. Afterwards, we lay in each other’s arms, plotting a future. As Matt promised to colour in the faded outlines of his past, I took his hand in mine and turned it over, pressing my lips to the centre of his palm. Unhurriedly, I kissed my way up his arm, over the woven, finespun blue veins at his narrow wrist, then up higher, lavishing tender attention on every single one of the faded silvery scars criss-crossing his delicate skin.Barcode armsI’d heard some people call them, with a callous disregard for the unhappy history behind each heart-breaking, self-inflicted cut.
“I hate that you have these, Matt.”
On my watch, he’d never need to add to the collection. I lifted my head to plant another kiss on his lips. I’d couldn’t imagine I’d ever tire of kissing this man. Together, we examined his forearm and the damaged skin.
“Cartwright used to come up with all kinds of different ways to understand me. He was as much pop-psychologist as historian. Especially after half a bottle of red wine. He used to say that during my teens I’d taken too many bullets, and that Brenner’s accident finished me off. The final kill shot between the eyes, if you like.”
His forearm disappeared back under the covers. “He hid it at school when he taught, but Cartwright could be a bit of a drama queen—literally. Yet what he said made sense to me when I was young. Not being able to go to uni with everyone else hurt. Added to abuse and neglect at home—although I didn’t know it as neglect at the time. It was my normal, you see. And then there was you. I was in love, and you were so excited to be starting a new adventure. It broke my heart.”
He gave me a sidelong glance. “Wanting boys, not girls, was an added detail, in retrospect, I could have done without.”
I hugged him a little tighter and buried my lips in his nest of silky hair, trying to make up for all the hugs and kisses he’d missed out on growing up. Oh God, but I couldn’t think about the neglect. Teenage Matt’s home life had been a closed book. My one glimpse had appalled and fascinated me in equal measure. I hadn’t the maturity to consider all the ramifications of that squalid little flat, and I’d never had the misfortune to meet his parents.
“I never knew about the neglect you suffered. I mean, I saw your house; I probably should have put two and two together.”
“I hadn’t wanted you to know. Eighteen-year-old Alexander Valentine wouldn’t have understood anyway. He’d have probably gone straight home and told his lovely parents who would have phoned social services. No child needed that sort of crap in their lives.”
He inhaled deeply. “My dad hitting my mum—hitting me—they were Cartwright’s bullets piling up. He’d go on and on about it, but the analogy made sense, you know? It used to make me think of one of those cowboy films, where the guy keeps on shooting back and staggering around, despite his body being riddled with holes. But yeah, the shot that killed me was Brenner.”
My next question felt tricky, but if I couldn’t ask it in a moment of post-coital bliss then I didn’t know if I’d ever gather sufficient nerve.
“Do you want to…I mean, it doesn’t matter to me at all… but do you ever want to try again? To try to get an education and…a…career? It’s never too late. We both know you’re smart enough, Matt.”
I hadn’t offended him, but I knew I’d never raise the subject again.