Sacrilege - Chapter 13

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

After an uncomfortable evening at The Red Admiral, I not only craved some personal space, but as men and women in a crisis have done for centuries and will doubtless continue to do…I went home to mum.

Our goodbyes outside the club were a trifle strained, to say the least. Philip and Ralph Packard took a cab, and I overheard Packard senior instruct the driver to take them to Sawbridgeworth. Jackie and Miles remained on the entrance steps, mixed expressions conveying the kind of pleasure and relief one might expect to find on the faces of genial hosts after a dinner party that has gone only marginally better than expected. 

Ryan, too, grabbed a cab and only shrugged when I refused to share. “I thought you were coming back with me?” was all he said.

“Well, you thought wrong,” I told him huffily, “I’m sleeping at the widow’s house tonight.”

“Suit yourself.”

As I watched the cab vanish into a maze of hazy street lamps and assorted shadows, I felt irrationally miffed that he hadn’t tried to dissuade me. I should have gone with him of course and confronted him with the lie. Starting a new job, indeed, what rubbish!

How many other lies had Ryan told me, I wondered?

I hailed a cab and sank back into the rear seat feeling very much the injured party in a love affair turned sour. I even began to see myself as a lover scorned and ran the gamut of appropriate emotions until reality pulled me up sharp, forcing me to concede that, so far at least, any scorning was entirely on my part. There has to be a good reason why he lied or so I kept telling myself. Nor did I cease to do so even as I paid my fare outside the widow’s house and finally drifted into an uneasy sleep on my pillow what seemed an eternity later.

I caught an early train to Reading the next morning before anyone could ask any questions. The widow would never ask, simply probe delicately. Danny, on the other hand could be relied upon to be direct. There was no way he would swallow the suggestion that I simply felt I should visit Thomas in hospital although that part was true.

“Why now?” Danny would demand to know.  For my part, I’d huff and puff and he would draw such conclusions as I would much prefer he didn’t. Danny had an uncanny knack for landing a bull’s-eye where home truths were concerned, especially mine. .

I had second thoughts and dragged my feet on approaching the house where I was born. My mother, however, seemed pleased to see me and wasted no time laying a full English fry-up in front of me that I devoured with relish. Afterwards, we sat opposite each other at the kitchen table drinking tea and talking family stuff. “Thomas is looking and feeling much better. Mary’s still worried sick, of course. That husband of hers doesn’t help. She’s convinced he’s having an affair, you know. If you ask me, that’s why young Thomas has gone off the rails…”

I nodded or shook my head and made innumerable grunting noises in what I hoped were appropriate places.

My mother, though, was nobody’s fool. “I’m selling the house, by the way and going to live in the South Pole. I found a recipe for seal pie in one of my old cookery books. That’s what gave me the idea. Mind you, I’ve always fancied an igloo of my own.”

I nodded absently before betraying myself with a guilty start.

“Well may you look like a burglar caught in the act, Laurence Fisher, given that you haven’t been listening to a single word I’ve been saying.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

I shook m head. Where would I start?

“Well, I do. I want to know what our Marc thinks he’s playing at. I know this Jackie used to be a man but she isn’t now so why is Marc interested, eh? I thought people like you only liked men?”

“People like me?” I bristled.

“It’s no use you getting up on your high horse either,” my mother snorted, never one to be easily distracted once she had the bit between her teeth. “I want to understand, I really do. But it’s beyond me, it really is. No sooner do I get my head around the fact that he likes men when he’s with a woman, even if she did used to be a man. She doesn’t look like a man, does she? In fact I’d go so far as to say she’s a bit of a stunner. So why has our Marc taken up with her? Does he still think of her as a man...or what? I’m telling you, Laurie, it’s doing my head in. What do I tell the rest of the family when I haven’t a clue myself?”

“I haven’t really thought about it,” I had to confess. It was true. I’d never questioned the whys and wherefores of Marc and Jackie’s relationship. As far as I was concerned, they seemed well suited, end of story. Even so, I had to concede that my mother had a point. “All that matters, surely, is that they want to be with each other?” I put to her. “I think they really love each other. Who knows why we fall in love?” Or out of love, I added miserably, but only to myself.

My mother sighed and got up to make a fresh pot of tea.

I debated inwardly whether to make good my escape or…what? Why had I come? Why did I remain seated at the kitchen table like a child waiting for pudding?

“How’s Philip?” she asked with her back to me as she lifted a steaming kettle from the hob.

I said nothing. I’d have liked to get up and leave, but my legs had other ideas. My mother handed me a fresh mug of tea and sat down to contemplate hers. “Philip and I are going through a rough patch,” I admitted, “like most couples do. He has a very demanding job, after all.”

“And you’re none too happy playing second fiddle, I suppose. Isn’t that about it in a nutshell?” My mother, not unlike Danny or the widow Finn, had precious little time for going round mulberry bushes. Moreover, since my father’s death, she had become far more self-confident and assertive. She might have been a bird in a cage set free. It was the oddest thought and one with which I felt distinctly uncomfortable. .

“No,” I began to protest. “Well, maybe. I don’t know. I didn’t mean for things to work out like this, they just did,” I mumbled.

“Work out like what?” my mother asked as lightly as if we were discussing the weather.

I got angry, raised my voice and told her as much about Ryan Banks as I didn’t mind her knowing.

“There’s no need to shout. I may be getting on a bit but I’m not deaf.”

I took a deep breath and continued. “The trouble is I think Philip knows,” I groaned, “and I didn’t want him to know, at least not until I’d sorted out my feelings.”

“It’s a rare person that can do that,” my mother pointed out unhelpfully. “You just have to follow your instincts and pray they’ll see you right in the end.”

“Follow my head or my heart, do you mean?  How do I do that when they’re at loggerheads with one another all the time?”

“Head and heart always are,” said my mother with irritating conviction. “No, it’s instincts you have to go by. They’ll see you on the right track. The rest is up to you. Do you love this Brian?”

“Ryan,” I corrected her crossly. The conversation wasn’t going as I’d either hoped or expected. My mother was meant to come down hard on one side or the other, not get philosophical. In spite of myself, I couldn’t suppress a grin. I had never thought of my earthy, practical, mother as being much of a philosopher. “I think so, yes,” I told her.

“And Philip, do you still love Philip?”

“Yes.” I nodded, close to tears. “Yes,” I repeated, but unable to tell whether I really meant it or was simply trying to convince myself it was true. “I don’t know what to do, Mum. I don’t know what to do.” I sobbed.

“Well, don’t look at me. I can’t tell you what to do, except that crying never got anybody anywhere fast. So take a tissue and wipe your eyes. That’s better.  You’re a grown man now. You’ll go your own way like you always have, and no, I’m not criticising, merely stating a fact.  Love is a funny old business. One minute it has you up and the next it has you down, and then just when you’re ready to throw in the towel, you’re on the up again. All we can do is make the most of the ups and trust it will be enough to see us through the downs.  Now, about Marc’s transvestite friend…”

“Transsexual,” I corrected her,” even more irritably than before.

“It’s a rum do, if you ask me. Oh, if Marc’s happy, I’m happy, of course I am.  But it’s like Mary and I were discussing last night. Does Marc see this person as a man or a woman? I mean, if Marc thinks of Jackie as a man, while Jackie obviously sees herself as a woman, well…where does that leave the rest of us?”

“Does it really matter? It’s between Marc and Jackie. It doesn’t affect the rest of us so why should we care one way or the other?”

“Of course it affects us. It affects the whole family. That’s just it, don’t you see? We’re a family. As a family, we need to know where we stand with one another. How can we know that with someone like Jackie? Don’t get me wrong, I like Jackie. I think she’s very nice. But…oh, why does life always have to be so complicated?”

“It’s only as complicated as people choose to make it,” I muttered with feeling. “Look, Mum, you don’t seem to have too much of a problem referring to Jackie as ‘she’ or ‘her’ so you must think of her as a woman, right?”

I suppose so, but…”

“No buts. What you see is what you get, just as what Marc sees is what he gets...if you see what I mean.”

“I’m not sure that I do.”

I burst out laughing. My mother looked aggrieved at first, and then her face broke into a smile. It was good to hear her laugh and I felt better for it, even if none the wiser for making a hash of things.

Not for the first time, a whimsical notion struck me. If the world’s kitchen tables could only talk, they would surely give its political parties, cultural voices and religious leaders a run for their money. The kitchen table, when it comes to manipulating us mere mortals into chasing our own shadows, has no equal.  Where world politics, cultures and religions come up with various answers to much the same questions, bringing confusion to the masses and enlightenment to the few, the humble kitchen table provides sufficient food for thought to sustain us all.

I gave my mother a big hug and left for the hospital to visit Thomas with a spring in my step.

My nephew was sitting in a chair beside the bed, busy sending text messages to all and sundry. His face lit up when he saw me. We got on well, Thomas and I. One of the things I regretted most about the long estrangement with my family was that I’d missed watching him grow up. But my father hadn’t been willing to entertain the idea of my living with another man, and it had always been a case of take my father’s side or good riddance.  Since his death and Marc’s ‘coming out’ an openly gay man, the family were marginally more reconciled to the state of play regarding our sexuality, but we had our mother and sister to thank for that.  Among the rest of the family, old tensions remained if left to simmer below a surface of civility rather than erupt as they were inclined when my father was alive. My mother’s support in recent years never ceased to amaze me. Mary took after her in more ways than I could have imagined during my father’s lifetime.

Even as Thomas greeted me with a wide grin, I was aware of being more than a little envious of him for having a mother like Mary and could but wish my own mother had been less under my father’s thumb when I was his age, leaving me to wrestle with being gay on my own.

“How are you?”

“I’m okay thanks. Everyone keeps telling me to rest. But it’s so boring, this resting lark. I just want to go home.”

“You body has taken a nasty shock. Plenty of rest sounds about right to me.”

“One minute they’re telling me how resilient the body is and the next how lucky I am to be alive. I hate this place. I want to go home. Ouch!” He winced in obvious pain. “I know, I know,” he muttered with a look that was part grimace, part grin, “Lie back and rest!” I plumped his pillows and he lay back with a shy, grateful smile. “Thanks. Uncle Laurie.”

“Less of the uncle,” I grumbled affectionately. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“There isn’t much to tell really,” he said frowning. “I know Mum has got it into her head’s it’s something to do with gang warfare, but you can take it from me that’s a load of rubbish. It’s not even anything to do with the hassle at school. I was walking along minding my own business and suddenly this guy gets out of his car and sticks a knife in me. How’s that for unbelievable?” I nodded. “I was listening to the Arctic Monkeys and didn’t even take it all in at first. The police asked me if I’d know him again, but to be honest, I haven’t a clue. It all happened so fast. One minute he was there, the next he was gone. Then I felt this awful pain in my chest and saw I was bleeding. I think I realised I’d been stabbed although the truth is I don’t even remember seeing a knife. Somehow, I managed to get into the house and the rest is a complete blank till I woke up in here.”

“You were lucky you weren’t…” But tears welled in my eyes and I couldn’t say the word.

“I’m as tough as old boots, me.” Thomas tried to laugh but winced again and had to lie quietly for a few minutes to catch his breath.

I waited patiently, still close to tears as I watched him wrestle for control of mind over matter. “Thanks for the card, by the way,” he said after a while. He managed a weak grin as my puzzled gave the came away. “It’s the funny one there.”

He pointed to a card at the forefront of several arranged on a bedside table.  I picked it up, opened it and read, Get well soon. Love from Laurie & Philip. My heart skipped a beat as the very feelings of confusion and guilt I’d come to Reading to escape returned to haunt me.

“I’m not sure who the big card’s from. It arrived this morning.” He sat up, leaned over and handed me a large card with a landscape view on the front. “It’s the weirdest thing. I only know one person it could be. He’s in the same class as me at school. But that’s all, we’re not mates. So it beats me why he should bother to send a card, especially one that must have cost a packet. He’s a tall, slim lad too, in the school basketball team, so the description doesn’t fit either…”

But I wasn’t listening as I read, Sorry to hear you got hurt. Get well soon, Fat Georgie.

“You know who he is, don’t you, Uncle Laurie?”

I met my nephew’s long, earnest gaze with a bright smile. “I haven’t a clue,” I said and could tell by his expression that he knew I was lying. “Not a clue,” I repeated and replaced the card.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

I shook my head.

“I won’t tell anyone.”

“There’s nothing to tell,” I muttered and looked away.

“Okay,” was all he said and I could but reflect, yet again, that whatever problems he may have at school, my sister wasn’t doing a bad job of raising Thomas.

We made small talk for a brief while longer then I left. Once outside the building, I had to make a sudden dash for a grass verge where I proceeded to be violently sick.

Back at the house, I promised my mother and sister I’d visit again very soon. Mary came with me to the front door.

“Are you okay?” I asked, “I don’t mean just about Thomas either. Mum told me you and Ian are having problems.”

“How he’s shacking up with a dolly bird young enough to be his daughter, do you mean?” I nodded, not knowing what to say. She shrugged. “I dare say I’ll cope. He may have forgotten we have three children but I haven’t. Someone has to pick up the pieces.”

“Do the kids know?”

“They know something’s up, of course. I suggested to Ian that we tell them together and he agrees. As for when he’ll have the guts to do it, that’s another matter entirely. But you know how kids pick up on things. I dare say I’ll have to tell them myself and he’ll cry ‘foul’ and accuse me of getting my side of the story in first.” She read my expression as she invariably did. “Oh, yes, there are two sides, four if you include his mistress and my bloke too. Don’t look so shocked, Laurie. I’m sorry if I’ve fallen off the pedestal you like to put me on, but I’m only human. Now, run along and take good care of yourself.” She kissed me on the cheek and I realized she had no intention of spilling any more beans. “Oh, and give my love to Philip. You’ve got a good one there, Laurie. Be sure you hang on to him.”

Those last words rang in my ears all the way back to London.

Nothing Philip had said or done at The Red Admiral would have given anyone but me cause to suspect that his feelings towards Ryan were anything but amicable. But I prided myself that no one knew Philip better than I did and was only too well aware of tensions that, for me at any rate, had turned what was always going to be a difficult evening into a nightmare. The Packards may well have swallowed my friendship with Ryan as a bonding of two people plucked from the jaws of death. But they weren’t being asked to swallow anything in the first place and probably could not have cared less anyway.

Philip, I knew intuitively, was no more convinced than Danny or Jackie that my relationship with Ryan was purely platonic. I groaned. How could I expect otherwise? It was, after all, a barefaced lie.

On the subject of lies, what was I supposed to make of Ryan’s string of porky pies?  The non-existent interview in particular made my blood boil. It was so pointless and made me look such a fool. I was hardly going to be surprised at his wearing a suit once I knew he was an accountant, was I, for heaven’s sake? Accountants and suits went together like a hammer and nails or, in Ryan’s care, strawberries and cream.

Ryan’s naked body presented itself to my inner eye, and in spite everything, my lips flickered into an appreciative smile. Did I really care why he’d lied, I wondered? Haven’t I forgiven him already? If so, did that mean I loved him even more than I thought?

So where, oh where, did that leave Philip and me?

“Damn, damn, damn!” I swore aloud, causing several of my fellow passengers to glance over their various newspapers, magazines and a laptop at me with stern, if perplexed expressions.

I couldn’t face returning to the widow’s house. Instead, I surrendered to an impulse to visit a pub in Soho I’d once frequented with Harry, my first love and long-time partner until he committed suicide. Guiltily, I realized I hadn’t given Harry a thought in ages.

The bar was busy, packed with gay men standing around like waxworks in a museum waiting for someone to sidle up to them and magic some life into them. I felt like a fish out of water. Worse, I began to feel old even though I had yet to hit fifty. “Not long to go though,” I muttered into my beer glass, drained it and ordered another.

Foolishly, I’d hoped coming here would make me feel close to Harry. I was wrong. If anything, his memory became more distant than ever. It was like peering through a mist, able to make out a hazy figure but no detail.  It could have been anyone. Harry, Nick, Philip, Ryan…they might have been one and the same person …moving farther and farther away from me until only the mist remained, clinging to my hair and clothes like the smell of a lover’s antiperspirant.

“A penny for them…?”  A familiar voice made me jump and I nearly sent my glass flying, “What are you doing here?”

“The same as you, I imagine, replied Philip.” if the look on your face is anything to go by. I thought I’d left places like this behind me years ago.”

“Ditto,” I said and took a long swig of beer. “But here we are.”

“Yes, here we are.”

We regarded each other like strangers struggling to make conversation, not sure where it might lead us or whether we wanted to go in the same direction anyway. The other waxworks in the museum, if they noticed us at all, would doubtless assume we were going through the same ritual of testing the water that potential lovers, gay or straight, have practised for centuries.

“Can I get you another?” I shook my head. “The same again for both of us please,” he called out to the tallest of three bar staff. The barman raised a hand and winked to signal he had heard.

“I didn’t want another,” I protested.

“You could have fooled me. Come to think of it, you seem to getting rather good at that, fooling me. Well, trying to. The trouble with you, Laurence, is you’re too nice and nice people are too transparent by half.”

“Oh, and what’s that supposed to mean?” If I had meant to sound indignant and offended, my conscience was having none of it. I felt the tell-tale rush of colour to my face.

“Suppose you tell me?” Philip suggested and looked away to pay the barman, leaving me frantically dog-paddling a sense of temporary reprieve.

“Are you any closer to getting your man?” I asked clutching at straws in a desperate ploy to steer the conversation along other lines.

“I think so,” he said but gave me a warning look that I resented. To anyone who might be ear wigging, it would have seemed perfectly innocuous question. “How about you, are you getting any closer to yours?”

My heart sank and I took refuge in another swig. “I assume you mean Ryan?” I ventured, alcohol fuelling Dutch courage.

Philip nodded. I waited for him to say something and felt both unnerved and undermined when he didn’t. His expression, hurt and probing, cut me to the quick. At the same time, I started to get angry at being put on the defensive in this way. “Ryan and I are…”

“Don’t tell me. You’re just good friends, right?”

His sarcasm scored a direct hit. I drained my glass and slammed it down on the bar.  “Think what you bloody well like,” I told him straight and stormed out of the pub, painfully aware that I had not only managed the situation badly but also made a complete idiot of myself. I almost turned back. Only stubborn pride prevented me from doing so, that and an unwillingness to give Philip the slightest cause to suspect that my relationship with Ryan was in almost as poor shape as our own.

I decided to confront Ryan and took the District Line to Bow Road. 

On the way to Embankment station, I had to pass Trafalgar Square. I paused, as I always did, to contemplate Nelson’s column, suddenly envious of the seafaring hero for being well out of the cut and thrust of daily angst. I glanced at the imposing façade of the National Gallery on whose steps I had waited in vain for Philip.

My mobile rang and I nearly jumped out of my skin as that particular train of thought led me directly to my stalker.

I needn’t have panicked as it was only Danny calling to let me know he had a new phone and I should save the number in my phone directory. “Where are you?” But the phone had already gone dead. 

“He’s up to something,” I muttered aloud, continuing to fret as I hurried on.

It was a clear, bright, summer afternoon. Yet I felt like a man groping his way in a fog that was closing in fast. I was anxious to see Ryan, worried about Danny and close to tears over Philip. Worse, try as it might, the damn fog refused to swallow up my worst fears about Fat Georgie. Too late, I realized I should have confided them to Philip.

Why does life have to get so bloody complicated? I demanded of a passing pigeon and tried, in vain, to ignore its disdainful cry.  Conscious of the fact that my mother had only recently asked the same question, I was even more conscious of my glib reply.

At the Underground station, a barely distinguishable voice over a crackling tannoy announced severe delays so I retreated to a nearby pub, continued to feel oppressed and hard done by… and completely lost track of time.  I did call Ryan several times on my mobile, but he wasn’t picking up and I began to lose patience. “Oh, go to hell!” I shouted at the tiny screen, switching the damn phone off before pocketing it.

I decided to return to the widow’s. Ryan would have to wait. Meanwhile, I would have just one more beer…

Later, I forgot my intention to return to the widow’s and headed for Bow instead, but fell asleep and did not realize my error until I woke up Plaistow. Desperate to go to the loo, I emerged into a maze of streets with which I was not familiar and trusted my nose to lead me to the nearest pub. My nose, however, had other ideas. I found myself walking down a dimly lit street, spotted an alleyway and rushed to relieve myself. I was zipping up my fly and continuing to lament my lot in life when I heard someone cry, “Help!” 

I ran further into the alley and, rounding a bend, spotted figures engaged in a fierce struggle. If I hadn’t been drinking, I would probably have stayed put and called the police. As it was, I ran forward shouting, “Hey, what’s going on?”

One figure promptly ran off.  The other, panting heavily, turned to me just as the moon reappeared from behind a piecemeal of fluffy cloud. “Thanks mate, I owe you one.”

I gasped in disbelief.  “Ryan!”

“Why, Laurence!” He was no less incredulous than I.

We fell into a hug.

“Are you okay?” I asked anxiously.

“Just about, thanks to you, there’s no telling what the bastard would have done if you hadn’t come along with you did. You never know with muggers these days. They’re as likely to kick your head in as take your valuables. What are you doing in Plaistow anyway?”

“I was on my way to see you.”  I explained how I had fallen asleep and missed the station.

“Lucky for me, you did.”

I peered closer. “You look terrible and…oh my God, you’re covered in blood!”

“It looks worse than it is and the blood isn’t all mine so don’t look so worried.  I’ll be fine. My car’s parked nearby. Let’s go home, ok?” 

Blood was oozing from his nose. As he pulled a handkerchief from a pocket to stem the flow, I glimpsed something drop to the ground. Instinctively, I bent to pick it up.  It was only a five pence piece. But it was not the tiny coin that made my flesh crawl. Next to it, on a short stem and undamaged by the fracas that had taken place, was a pink carnation.

“Shit!” was all I managed say.

“What is it? What’s the matter?”

Ignoring the coin, I picked up the flower and showed him. “That was no mugger. It was the serial killer. Oh, God, Ryan, you might have been killed!”

We fell into another hug.

“I don’t understand.” He pushed me away. “What makes you think he’s the serial killer?”

I explained about the carnation.

“So who told you and how would they know?”

The lie came surprisingly easily. “I don’t know. I must have read it somewhere or maybe I heard it on the radio or TV.  I can’t remember. Apparently, the killer always leaves a pink carnation in his victim’s mouth.”

“So if you hadn’t come along when you did…bloody hell!”

We fell into another hug, one that lasted some time. As we clung to each other, I could feel his heart pounding away at my chest. Nor did I turn away when he kissed me and I tasted blood.  His lies paled into insignificance against the enormity of what had happened, could have happened, so nearly did happen. “I nearly lost you!” I sobbed.

“Well, you know what they say,” he joked in a voice taut with tension, “Nearly doesn’t count.” We kissed again. His nose was still bleeding and a cut on his lower lip.  We were covered in blood. Neither of us cared.

“I love you,” I told him.

“I know,” he said and kissed me again with a passion I returned, measure for measure. 

“We should go to the police,” I said later as we were driving back to Bow which, thankfully, wasn’t far.

“And tell them what, that some yob wearing a mask tried to mug me in a dark alley? They won’t thank me for wasting police time and I’m in no hurry to let them waste mine. And don’t give me any more of that nonsense about the serial killer either. You’ve been reading to many crime novels. The idea that anyone would stick a pink carnation in somebody’s mouth after they’ve killed them is bloody ridiculous.”

“I didn’t read it in a crime novel,” I protested, “if you must know, a copper told me who’s on the case.”

“Oh?”

”It was someone I bumped into in a pub. We got talking about the serial killer and   it turned out he was a copper.  We’d had a few drinks and that’s when he mentioned about the carnation,” I mumbled, appalled that I had come so close to telling Ryan about Philip. If the Packards got the slightest whiff of a copper in the nest, it would mean curtains for Philip without any shadow of a doubt. 

I tried to call up a picture of Ryan’s attacker in my mind’s eye. Could the fleeing figure have been Miles Packard, I wondered?  If so, wouldn’t Ryan have known? Possibly not, I conceded, since he must have been terrified and the man was wearing a mask. Besides, why should Miles target Ryan of all people and run the risk of being identified? Certainly, it was an argument that blew a gaping hole in my theory that Miles Packard might be the serial killer. At the same time, I debated earnestly with my alter ego along the lines that if I loved and trusted Ryan why shouldn’t I tell him about Philip?

I sighed, weary and confused. I did love Ryan, I was sure of that now. But could I trust him?

To be continued on Friday