Rhysâs. He was into King Arthur and Guinevere and bold Sir Lancelot, particularly the latter. Marriage is no deterrent to love; jealousy is essential to love; two men may love one woman â that kind of thing. One minute they were in a good place, the next at one anotherâs throats. A candle went flying. It left a scorch mark up the wallpaper, nearly to the ceiling.
Elise remembers a snarl and a rush and the sound of my fatherâs head being slammed against the wall.
Then the electricity came on again: the sobering bathos of artificial light. Jack wasnât moving. Rhys was sobbing over him, saying what have I done?
Elise told him to go and not come back. Ever.
Through his tears Rhys said, softly and quite slyly, âI did it for you. If you knew what he is, you wouldnât stay with him another minute, Elise darling.â
Then apparently I came downstairs, grumbling and rubbing my eyes. Iâd got a chest infection and conjunctivitis and there was a crust over my left eye, which wouldnât open. Elise got a neighbour in to babysit me while she drove Jack to Casualty; he had concussion and stayed in overnight.
âDo you remember any of that, Sebastian?â she asked.
âNo. I donât think so.â
âReally? Perhaps you blanked it out?â
âI wouldnât know.â
âQuite. Well, a couple of days later,â says Elise, âI heard Jack on the phone to â yes, you guessed it. Perhaps they needed the violence. Fed off it. When Jack went missing, I wondered. How could I not wonder?â
âDo you still wonder?â
âFrankly Iâm past caring.â
Rhys would have desired any woman Jack had. And so it turned out, she says. Think of it this way: they didnât so much want each other as want to be each other. Oh, it was nothing to do with me: donât think I was flattered, I was just the muddle in the middle. Be straight with people, Elise tells me. Bring Jesse to meet me. Before itâs too late.
4
âYeki-bood, yeki-nabood.â Thatâs how all Iranian stories, at least in the oral tradition, have begun, since as long as anyone remembers. âThere was one, there wasnât one,â as in âThere was a person (once upon a time); but on the other hand, no, there was no one.â
Hooman Majd 4
The nearer the train approaches to Jesse, the more I realise, not just that I can share all this with him, but that I need to. Itâs my only hope. At last, let Jesse in. Weâve been sharing bed and board in my flat now for many months and yet Jesse has been in some cruel and wanton way locked out.
Whyever does he put up with me? What has he done to deserve me? Jesse practises the decencies, I the indecencies. My truant night walks, how foul they seem today. My mouth fills with queasy sweetness. All this slipperiness can be amended. Jesse is my family, nothing less. I knew that when I asked him for a civil partnership. It flashed upon me that he and I might adopt a child. This thought had sprung, it seemed, from nowhere: Iâd never been aware of the least desire for children or been particularly comfortable in their company.
So I asked Jesse. Will you? Dearest, will you? Shall we?
Half an hour after Iâd asked and heâd accepted â reluctantly, because he clearly comprehends me better than I understand myself â Iâd done an unpardonable about-turn. The night walker had taken my place; the true-hearted lover had melted away.
The thought echoes back: âDonât be like your father, Sebastian.â
What happened to you, Dad? I need to know.
Jack Messenger was shot or had his throat slit on the Turkish border with the Zagros Mountains, frozen into that desolation until the spring thaw revealed his corpse and he began to decompose in the sun. Predators cleaned up the evidence, scattering his remains until a new winter arrested his decay: over and over again. Like so many others he had
Elise remembers a snarl and a rush and the sound of my fatherâs head being slammed against the wall.
Then the electricity came on again: the sobering bathos of artificial light. Jack wasnât moving. Rhys was sobbing over him, saying what have I done?
Elise told him to go and not come back. Ever.
Through his tears Rhys said, softly and quite slyly, âI did it for you. If you knew what he is, you wouldnât stay with him another minute, Elise darling.â
Then apparently I came downstairs, grumbling and rubbing my eyes. Iâd got a chest infection and conjunctivitis and there was a crust over my left eye, which wouldnât open. Elise got a neighbour in to babysit me while she drove Jack to Casualty; he had concussion and stayed in overnight.
âDo you remember any of that, Sebastian?â she asked.
âNo. I donât think so.â
âReally? Perhaps you blanked it out?â
âI wouldnât know.â
âQuite. Well, a couple of days later,â says Elise, âI heard Jack on the phone to â yes, you guessed it. Perhaps they needed the violence. Fed off it. When Jack went missing, I wondered. How could I not wonder?â
âDo you still wonder?â
âFrankly Iâm past caring.â
Rhys would have desired any woman Jack had. And so it turned out, she says. Think of it this way: they didnât so much want each other as want to be each other. Oh, it was nothing to do with me: donât think I was flattered, I was just the muddle in the middle. Be straight with people, Elise tells me. Bring Jesse to meet me. Before itâs too late.
4
âYeki-bood, yeki-nabood.â Thatâs how all Iranian stories, at least in the oral tradition, have begun, since as long as anyone remembers. âThere was one, there wasnât one,â as in âThere was a person (once upon a time); but on the other hand, no, there was no one.â
Hooman Majd 4
The nearer the train approaches to Jesse, the more I realise, not just that I can share all this with him, but that I need to. Itâs my only hope. At last, let Jesse in. Weâve been sharing bed and board in my flat now for many months and yet Jesse has been in some cruel and wanton way locked out.
Whyever does he put up with me? What has he done to deserve me? Jesse practises the decencies, I the indecencies. My truant night walks, how foul they seem today. My mouth fills with queasy sweetness. All this slipperiness can be amended. Jesse is my family, nothing less. I knew that when I asked him for a civil partnership. It flashed upon me that he and I might adopt a child. This thought had sprung, it seemed, from nowhere: Iâd never been aware of the least desire for children or been particularly comfortable in their company.
So I asked Jesse. Will you? Dearest, will you? Shall we?
Half an hour after Iâd asked and heâd accepted â reluctantly, because he clearly comprehends me better than I understand myself â Iâd done an unpardonable about-turn. The night walker had taken my place; the true-hearted lover had melted away.
The thought echoes back: âDonât be like your father, Sebastian.â
What happened to you, Dad? I need to know.
Jack Messenger was shot or had his throat slit on the Turkish border with the Zagros Mountains, frozen into that desolation until the spring thaw revealed his corpse and he began to decompose in the sun. Predators cleaned up the evidence, scattering his remains until a new winter arrested his decay: over and over again. Like so many others he had