During all the time I knew Fred Hughes I only spoke two words to Andy.
I was Fred’s odd teenage ‘friend’.
Andy only once initiated a conversation with me. He asked about gay life in London. When it became obvious I didn’t really know…he looked vaguely perplexed and walked away.
From that moment on we considered each other from afar, suspiciously and never exchanged another word.
8am. I didn’t go get the biopsy. Something is stopping me. I don’t want to know the truth. Just like I didn’t want to know the truth about him. Some truths are just too hard to face.
I am aware of the dull thump in my ball sack and in my lower back. Like somebody is gripping my left testicle.
One of Jake’s friends wrote to me saying, and even though inaccurate, I really liked the quote, “We have all had diamonds thrown in our face.” It was lyrical and charming. He could have added darling to the phrase. It would have worked perfectly.
Anyway, interesting day yesterday after I published the Irene blog. She, of course, is threatening the IRS and an internet fraud investigation. The problem is..I do my taxes, really thoroughly. It’s not worth doing them any other way. I am not feeling so feisty today.
I remain teachable.
Last night something rather remarkable happened. I met a man a year and a half ago who is perhaps a dream of a guy. That dream of that perfect man. Beautiful in every way. When we first met he explained that he was anxious about his sexuality, we had talked it through but nothing happened. I had wondered about him occasionally, mentioned him to Jake even, but had not contacted him.
Yesterday I received a blunt email from him asking if I wanted to explore his curiosity about men.
I thought about it for a nano second and invited him over.
So, last night we had a very steamy session with each other but I wasn’t engaged. I felt distant, absent..and not really ready to have sex with anyone else. I didn’t even want to kiss him. It is odd this morning to wake up with the smell of some other man on your fingers. I knew that it had to happen sooner or later..somebody else but it’s still too early. I tell you, I don’t envy men like Jake who can sport fuck but the healthy alternative is such a lengthy process. We all agree that if I had been a sport fucker I would have been dead a very long time ago.
Why was his coming to see me last night so remarkable? Because I was always warned in AA to be careful what I prayed for. Getting what you want when God wants you to have it rather than when you want it can be very ungratifying.
Peter Doig painting in my bedroom 1982 Boom Boom Boom (The Sublime)
Is getting to know a man before you sleep with them so bizarre? So when the moment happens, one is present and authentic? After all, Jake and I talked for months before we finally fell into each others arms.
Perhaps he can do that with anyone? Perhaps a period of total abstinence is what I need?
I could have let things just stay the way they were, letting him tell me about his conquests but by the time we returned from Europe I just knew that merely having him in my life would be too disruptive.
I did not want that young man to stick around last night. He left and I lay on the red Victorian sofa I have owned for twenty-six years. I began to doze. There was something very comforting about laying there. The over stuffed arms, the familiarity. The constant presence of that sofa in my life. Dione bought it for me in Edinburgh in 1984. It was on the street outside a junk shop and it was desperate to be loved. I covered it in white ticking, the first of 4 times it has been reupholstered. Jake was three when I bought that sofa. Unexpectedly Dione’s daughter wrote to me yesterday. She’s a sweet heart.
Things have given me more pleasure than the men I have loved.
So, the young man left the house at 2am. I don’t think I’ll be seeing him again.
The picture at the top of the page was taken in my Whitstable house, the house that belonged to Peter Cushing. The red sofa wearing it’s blue slip cover.
