for all that was left when I finished. I’d offered him a drink when we arrived, frightened at how badly I had begun to want one. He’d asked for fruit juice, and I’d told him that just because I wasn’t didn’t mean he couldn’t—astonishing myself, because I couldn’t recall deciding that I wasn’t at all—and he hadn’t made a fuss; just acknowledged this weird new development with a nod and observed that solidarity could help.
He paused by the photograph of me and Joe on Tynemouth Sands, one of my favourites. He’d bought me a surf class for my birthday, and we’d spent an hour crashing off the rented boards into the perishing cold North Sea. We were bruised and bleeding from sand grazes and blazing with happiness. He had his arms round me, his fingers in my hair. It was taken about eighteen months ago, something else I hadn’t thought about. Marnie had just moved to Newcastle to be closer to her job. Joe’s mam had just fallen ill. His presents had been of their usual thoughtfulness and generosity.
I didn’t understand. I went to sit down on the edge of the sofa, nursing my own glass of fucking useless fruit juice, which I now strongly wished to dump into a quart of vodka. Aaron smiled at the photo. People often did. That much joy was infectious. He moved on, now looking at the small framed shot on the bookshelf, glancing to me for a permission I could only give by a nod. He picked it up and turned it to the light, matching faces. Joe and me again, this time on the football field. He had me in a friendly neck-lock. We must have been about ten. After a moment, Aaron looked at me, frowning. He said, “Either this is your brother, or…”
“No. That’s Joe, my ex. We were together for…” I tailed off. We’d hardly been precocious. Hadn’t had sex until we worked out what sex was, well into our midteens, but that had been a technicality. “He lived up the road from me. I can’t remember when we weren’t.”
“Until…?”
“Six months ago. June.”
He set the picture carefully back on the shelf and turned to me in silence. Oh God. That look would finish me. There wasn’t a trace of pity in it. It was searing compassion: hot, wordless, man-to-man. “It’s all right,” I tried, aware that though my voice was steady, huge tears were hitting the knees of my jeans, a flood I hadn’t given permission to start and was completely powerless to stop. “I’ve been filling my time in—you know, drinking, fucking around…”
“Swallowing handfuls of pills. Okay.” He came and sat next to me. He put his arm around me. “Okay, yeah. In the circumstances, all that seems pretty reasonable.”
Did it? This view of things had never occurred to me. I thought I’d just been an arsehole. A coward who had fallen over at his life’s first real adversity and lost control of everything. His arm tightened—gently, not demanding, leaving it up to me whether I leaned in towards him. Whether I surrendered. He raised his other hand and pushed my fringe back, and I reflected, as his mouth brushed warmly at its roots, that he’d found a place on me that even Joe had never kissed, the widow’s peak. The gesture sent shivers through me. My eyes closed. When he leaned back on the sofa, I went with him, turning my face to his shoulder.
Another trouble with breakups—the instant loss of the dozens of daily touches, the background tapestry of comfort, given and received. You can screw your way through half a city’s population and never get that back. I had been starving for it without knowing. I pressed myself to him, feeling his embrace close round me, hard and strong, so tight my ribs popped. Grief went through me, but this time instead of crawling like sickness, it seemed to ring like bells over hard-frosted fields, plangent and clear. It wasn’t spineless, was it—not cowardly, pathetic, any of the other names I’d been calling myself? To weep for Joe, for this kind of loss; even briefly to want to
He paused by the photograph of me and Joe on Tynemouth Sands, one of my favourites. He’d bought me a surf class for my birthday, and we’d spent an hour crashing off the rented boards into the perishing cold North Sea. We were bruised and bleeding from sand grazes and blazing with happiness. He had his arms round me, his fingers in my hair. It was taken about eighteen months ago, something else I hadn’t thought about. Marnie had just moved to Newcastle to be closer to her job. Joe’s mam had just fallen ill. His presents had been of their usual thoughtfulness and generosity.
I didn’t understand. I went to sit down on the edge of the sofa, nursing my own glass of fucking useless fruit juice, which I now strongly wished to dump into a quart of vodka. Aaron smiled at the photo. People often did. That much joy was infectious. He moved on, now looking at the small framed shot on the bookshelf, glancing to me for a permission I could only give by a nod. He picked it up and turned it to the light, matching faces. Joe and me again, this time on the football field. He had me in a friendly neck-lock. We must have been about ten. After a moment, Aaron looked at me, frowning. He said, “Either this is your brother, or…”
“No. That’s Joe, my ex. We were together for…” I tailed off. We’d hardly been precocious. Hadn’t had sex until we worked out what sex was, well into our midteens, but that had been a technicality. “He lived up the road from me. I can’t remember when we weren’t.”
“Until…?”
“Six months ago. June.”
He set the picture carefully back on the shelf and turned to me in silence. Oh God. That look would finish me. There wasn’t a trace of pity in it. It was searing compassion: hot, wordless, man-to-man. “It’s all right,” I tried, aware that though my voice was steady, huge tears were hitting the knees of my jeans, a flood I hadn’t given permission to start and was completely powerless to stop. “I’ve been filling my time in—you know, drinking, fucking around…”
“Swallowing handfuls of pills. Okay.” He came and sat next to me. He put his arm around me. “Okay, yeah. In the circumstances, all that seems pretty reasonable.”
Did it? This view of things had never occurred to me. I thought I’d just been an arsehole. A coward who had fallen over at his life’s first real adversity and lost control of everything. His arm tightened—gently, not demanding, leaving it up to me whether I leaned in towards him. Whether I surrendered. He raised his other hand and pushed my fringe back, and I reflected, as his mouth brushed warmly at its roots, that he’d found a place on me that even Joe had never kissed, the widow’s peak. The gesture sent shivers through me. My eyes closed. When he leaned back on the sofa, I went with him, turning my face to his shoulder.
Another trouble with breakups—the instant loss of the dozens of daily touches, the background tapestry of comfort, given and received. You can screw your way through half a city’s population and never get that back. I had been starving for it without knowing. I pressed myself to him, feeling his embrace close round me, hard and strong, so tight my ribs popped. Grief went through me, but this time instead of crawling like sickness, it seemed to ring like bells over hard-frosted fields, plangent and clear. It wasn’t spineless, was it—not cowardly, pathetic, any of the other names I’d been calling myself? To weep for Joe, for this kind of loss; even briefly to want to
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