Chapter 76
The bus was slow to come and when it finally arrived it was crowded and overheated. I paid my fare and scanned the rows of passengers for an unoccupied seat but there were none. I clasped the gummy strap above my head and braced myself for the short journey to the park gates.
When I had spun slowly into wakefulness that morning I'd realized how desperately I needed a day to myself, a blank, stolen cascade of hours to reflect on what had happened and what likely lay ahead. After breakfast I threw some books into my bag and headed for Hampstead Heath. Kenwood House had been on my list of must-see destinations for ages and this was as good a chance as any to make a day trip of it. Who knew, maybe an extra dose of neoclassical archictecure was just the balm my sore heart needed.
The walk through the park was bracing, and my first sight of the luminous, perfectly symmetrical house at the top of the hill brought a measure of comfort. I was offered the option of joining a small guided tour when I bought my admission ticket but I declined—I wasn't seeking instruction today but rather solace. And yet as I wandered through the large, bright rooms I began to wonder if I'd made a miscalculation in coming here.
The Adamesque wedding-cake décor, of the type I usually found soothing, rubbed me the wrong way; the library's vapid pink and blue color scheme lacked conviction; the roundels and grotesqueries struck me as flat and uninspired. It was all undeniably beautiful, yes, and I realized that my faint stirrings of rebellion were more a factor of my general unease than an actual antipathy towards the house's aesthetic. But still I wished I were stomping through some stark castle in Wales instead.
When I left the grounds of the estate an hour later I wandered up the steep gray road to a slightly seedy-looking neighborhood pub which, according to the chalkboard out front, was "the oldest gay bar in London," a distinction it seemed to share, in my recollection, with a multitude of establishments across the capital. The predominantly male lunch crowd was more boisterous than I expected, jostling and vaguely celebratory, as though the denizens had just been made aware of a sports victory of which I was—and hoped to remain—blithely ignorant. A rhythmic boom of music shook the place and a scrum of smoke hovered around the Edwardian brass gasoliers above.
When I eventually shouldered my way up to the counter I ordered a pint and a shepherd's pie in a harsh shout, wondering if I would ever find a place to sit. But by the time I was handed my warm beer and a plate of unappetizing food the rush had abated, and soon I was in possession of a small table by the window. I had brought my dog-eared volume of Trollope and sat reading long after my half-full plate had been taken away and my beer had been refilled twice. The place was nearly empty now, with a heavy mid-afternoon hush hanging over its ponderous mahogany fittings and smoky banquettes.
When I put down my book occasionally and let my mind dwell for a moment on Nick's treachery I felt sick and hollow. I was humiliated that Clare, and seemingly everyone else including David Vardanyan, had known I'd been supplanted in Nick's affections before I'd found out myself. And by Trip Ashbrook of all people, a man seemingly devoid of any vestige of moral compass, a rich opportunist willing to do anything to get his way. I remembered the sloppy, unromantic kiss Trip had given me that night at his house in Battersea and tried not to think of Nick and Trip together. The idea made my heart lurch. I had thought Nick was mine, but I had been embarrassingly wrong.
A few early "happy hour" customers had drifted in by now, and as I began packing up my bag to leave a tall, solidly-built youth with a broad, mournful face approached, cocktail in hand. "Like some company?" he asked in a deep though tremulous voice, pointedly placing his glass on the table as if to forestall rejection. It wasn't exactly a smooth strategy but there was something in the fellow's stolid determination that I found just appealing enough to stay seated, at least for the moment.
"Actually I’m on my way out," I countered.
His cheek twitched slightly. "Just one drink," he said, a note of slightly hectic entreaty in his voice. "My treat."
I sighed. "Why not?" I managed a polite but unenthusiastic smile.
His shoulders relaxed a little then and he leaned in for a handshake. "Dan," he said. His hand was warm and moist.
After two drinks we repaired to Dan's place nearby. It was unimaginably squalid. Crumpled magazines and newspapers carpeted the sitting room floor. Smelly pizza boxes and empty beer bottles lurked underneath.
“Who’s your decorator?” I said, trying to steady my nerves.
He didn’t answer. His eyes were skittish and vacant—he seemed drunk or high, or perhaps both. He took my hand and led me across the room towards the kitchen. I couldn’t help admiring the fact that he didn’t apologize for the colossal mess. “How about a drink?” he asked with the composure of a society hostess offering tea. He opened the refrigerator to reveal a liter bottle of cheap gin, a round of moldy cheese and a brown, mushy-looking bunch of celery still in its plastic shroud. He took out the bottle of gin and poured a huge slug into a dirty-looking glass he’d excavated from a sink of piled-up dishes. I took the glass and emptied it in one gulp.
“Aren’t you having any?” I asked, but by then Dan’s arms were around me. I could feel his erection struggling to escape his thick suit pants. We kissed; it was frantic and unnerving. When Dan excused himself to go to the bathroom I poured myself another drink and peered around the dimly lit room, wondering why I was there. Perhaps a misguided attempt at revenge against Nick, which was its own melancholy brand of pathetic.
Dan came back naked. The sheer predictability of the move was disappointing, but even so it was a remarkably beautiful sight: broad, high-set shoulders, hairless chest, almost supernally narrow hips. I felt a stab of desire deeper than I’d experienced in months. For the first time uneasiness gripped me. “You obviously misplaced your clothes,” I said, taking a casual sip of my drink.
He laughed; it was like the bark of an ill-tempered dog. “And you obviously don’t want to be here.”
I stood up and pulled on my jacket. “I think you're probably right." But then he crossed the room and put his arms around me again and it felt wonderful. I took my jacket off.
The sex was surprisingly uninspired. Dan was gentle and considerate, not at all what I had become used to. Perhaps for that reason, perhaps because I found him inadequate on some fundamental level, I made the almost unconscious decision to leave him with something he would always remember. I knew I would never see him again; he was the perfect receptacle for my little story. "What was your childhood like?" I asked leadingly as we lay twisted together on his narrow, dirty bed drinking the last of his bottle of gin.
He propped up on one arm and looked at me. "Seriously?"
"I'm just curious."
He sighed, pulling up the sheet to cover himself, as if this somewhat belated demonstration of modesty were required for such intimate revelations. "My father is a grammar school teacher, my mother works in a factory. I have two sisters. We did okay, but there was never enough money. Pretty typical, I guess." I didn't respond. "And how about you?" he went on dutifully.
This was my prompt. "I was perfectly happy until I was seven. Then I dropped my baby brother in the bathtub. He died."
Dan made a sound as though he'd been struck. "Oh,” he said. We lay in silence for a few moments.
I pushed on relentlessly: I was determined to tell this affable stranger the most shameful secret of my life. "Our mother left us together in the tub while she answered the phone. My little brother, who was a toddler at the time, got restless and started crying. I stepped out of the bath and reached across to take him out but as I hoisted him over the edge I lost my footing on the wet floor. He fell out of my arms and dropped into the tub."
Dan's breathing was labored now; he was looking away from me, out through the dirty window towards the starved-looking garden in the back. "He didn't make a sound," I went on. "His eyes were open and I remember thinking that as long as they stayed open everything would be okay. You couldn’t be dead if your eyes were open, I told myself. But I was wrong."
After a charged pause Dan stood up and began dressing. "How awful," he said perfunctorily. "I'm so sorry."
He may have been sorry, but he clearly wished me gone as quickly as possible. I could hardly blame him; he'd signed on for casual sex, not a horror story. But I wasn't quite done. "To protect me, my mother took the blame. Only my father knew the truth. It completely destroyed our family."
Dan handed me my shirt. "I have to be somewhere," he said, bustling me out with almost indecent haste.