Love in Every Season Read online

  “Didn’t it just?” Alex seemed in no hurry to move off the floor, the pair of them snuggled together. “Okay, I’ll raise its status from tolerating it to being grudgingly grateful towards the day.”

  “Is that all I’m worth? Grudging gratitude?”

  “You’re worth all the tea in China. All the outstandings in Ofsted.” Alex kissed him, the sort of kiss that made Jamie think they might just have to go up to the bathroom and make use of the shower. They were both in a bit of a state, after all.

  “You’re a devil,” he said, leaning in for another kiss.

  “No. Fallen angel, maybe.”

  “Come on.” Jamie, reluctantly, got to his feet, pulling Alex with him. “Let’s get you upstairs and clean your halo up.”

  “Halo? Is that what you call it? I’d call it—”

  Jamie shut him up with another kiss. He could use all the double entendres he wanted when they were in the shower...

  Summer

  Tumble Turn

  Nomination – July 2005

  It was a Wednesday and I was around Matty White’s house. As usual. I spent a lot of time with Matty in those days, with him being my best friend and everything and such a mass of acne that none of the girls looked twice at him, so he always had time to spare for his pals. The girls never looked twice at me, either, so we pretended it didn’t matter that we were single, because we preferred knocking around together, didn’t we? Just as mates, of course.

  We spent most of our out-of-school hours at his house or mine, watching the sport on television or playing on his X-Box. He was the first boy in our class to have one of those, probably because his mum and dad had split and his old man had given him it out of guilt. Guilt at having run off with someone not even old enough to be Matty’s mum. We didn’t mind—I loved trying out the games, especially the new ones which arrived every Christmas and birthday, although my favourite was always Amped. It was unlikely I’d ever get the chance to snowboard in real life and I knew I’d never be that good at it even if the opportunity came up, so I played on that for hours.

  “Off to play on the B-Box?” It became a running joke with my dad, every time I said I was going down Matty’s, he’d come out with something like, “Don’t you ever get tired of that M-Box?” or whatever he was calling it that week. Once Matty’s mum had a bit of a party for her birthday and we got dad onto the X-Box, playing Project Gotham Racing. He was absolute rubbish and he’s never lived it down.

  That particular Wednesday we weren’t playing computer games; I remember it really well for a number of reasons. It was an INSET day, for one, which meant we didn’t have to go down the Open Prison, otherwise known as Oakmount Specialist Language College. Sounds posh, doesn’t it; dead Harry Potter. It wasn’t. Just the local comprehensive school, one that fancied itself a bit because it made the pupils do two foreign languages. Except if you were a bit thick, then you only did one. Matty and I did German and Spanish, which meant we could swear in two languages, three if you include English. By that you’ll see that neither of us was that dumb.

  It was a warm day, just perfect for July, and we were in the lounge, lazing about on the settee with the French windows open and listening to the radio. We didn’t often have the radio on, not being into pop music, unless it was Radio Five with the sport. Middle of a Wednesday there isn’t usually any sport on, but we were glued to the set like it was the World Cup and England taking part in a penalty shoot-out. Matty’s mum came in from work for her lunch—she’s an assistant at the local primary school—and tried to shoo us out into the garden or down the park. She thought Matty spent too much time indoors as it was and always warned him about getting rickets if he didn’t have some fresh air.

  We had to beg her to be quiet, because things were just reaching a climax, but she didn’t seem to twig. She was halfway through lecturing us about being rude when the announcement came and the next minute Matty and I were bouncing about and hollering, “Yes!” at the top of our voices, punching the air and doing high fives, the works. Matty gave his mum a great big hug and a kiss, so I gave her one as well.

  “What are you two daft beggars doing?”

  “Celebrating of course, Mum.” Matty gave her another smacker. “London got the Olympics, even though old misery guts said that they were bound to give the Games to Paris.”

  “I never did,” I protested. “I just said we weren’t to count our chickens before they were hatched.”

  Matty nutmegged my head for that; I swear my scalp was sore for days, but I didn’t care. We had the Olympics and I’d already done all the calculations. I’d just have graduated from Uni in summer 2012 so there wouldn’t be anything stopping me watching the Games every chance I got, remote control in hand to flick between the rowing and the modern pentathlon. We won the team gold in that in Montreal, 1976—my dad told me all about it, including the tale of some Russian army officer getting caught for cheating. I used to think he’d made that bit up until I found the story on Wikipedia.

  “What a pair. I suppose you’ll want to go, won’t you?” Mrs. White rolled her eyes. “You’ll have to ask your dad to pay. I can’t afford it.”

  “I don’t want just to sit in the stands, Mrs. White. I want to be taking part.” I high-fived Matty. “I’ll make sure he gets tickets, so he can watch me.”

  “Oh, Ben.” She rolled her eyes again. “I’ll just get you lads a sandwich, you must be starving.” Mrs. White turned on her heels, looking back over her shoulder as she reached the door, to give me her Oh, Ben, you poor lamb look.

  I like Matty’s mum, I like her a lot, and she’d been a real rock to him when he was feeling a bit lost after his dad left, but she likes to put labels on things and stick them away in compartments. Second wives are like cats, only in it for what they can get. Once they spot a better home they’ll up sticks and go there. The second Mrs. White came in for a fair bit of the first Mrs. White’s labelling.

  Matty’s from a broken home, so he can’t ever be expected to do as well as the other boys at school. That was another one of her favourites, closely followed by Ben’s got cerebral palsy, poor lamb. Of course, that means he can’t do what the other boys do.

  I gave up arguing with her. I used to hear her tell Matty to make sure he looked after me when we went to parties, because I had CP—I think she thought Matty managed to wake up each day and forget that—and so I wouldn’t be able to join in any fun that was going on. If she’d seen me on the dance floor giving ABBA some welly I suspect she’d have pretended not to notice as it would have shaken her preconceptions.

  Matty was different. As soon as his mum had left the room that auspicious day, he’d just rolled his eyes, winked and said that if I didn’t get him the best seats in the house to watch me in 2012, then he’d thump me. I punched him a couple of times and we started to laugh, because life’s good when you’re fourteen and you don’t know your limits. Matty always believed in me.

  My parents believed in me, too. When I got home later, they were almost as excited as we’d been. Mum loved the cycling and the rowing—still does—and she was already planning all the events she wanted to watch. Dad’s more the water sports type, so he was putting in his two pennyworth for the ten metre platform diving or something. I went along with the flow, setting out my order for athletics tickets, just on the off chance that my training schedule was going to let me get to see some of the other Olympic events. It was only over dinner, when they’d planned themselves hoarse, that I dropped the bombshell.

  “I’ll be there. Of course.” I can remember the situation as clear as yesterday. I was halfway through one of Mum’s pasta bakes, making sure I didn’t slitter it down my t-shirt while I was eating. I’m only an S9 categorisation, although I didn’t know that back then, I just knew that I had cerebral palsy pretty mild compared to how it could have been. I was at mainstream school and doing pretty well, even though I say so myself.

  See, my parents were the direct opposite of Mrs. White. Their attitude was,
Ben, he’s got cerebral palsy. He can do what the other boys do. He might just need a bit of help. So, I had this really neat apron to wear at mealtimes if I wanted to—butcher’s blue and white stripes—and Dad had a matching one because he slitters worse than I do and he hasn’t even got an excuse.

  “Of course you’ll be there, you daft pudding. We wouldn’t get tickets for us and not you.” Mum wagged her fork at me. “Only not the beach volleyball or whatever it is where the girls just wear dental floss.”

  “Spoilsport.” Dad gave me a wink, before he swerved to avoid the whack Mum was sending his way.

  “Actually, I was hoping I could get you tickets.” I didn’t worry that at this rate I’d soon have promised tickets to the whole street. “I’m going to be one of the competitors.”

  “Really?” It was an enthusiastic “really”, not the sort of sarcastic reply some parents might have given. “Which event?”

  Oh crap. That was the point I realised that such minor matters as which event hadn’t even crossed my mind. “Um, I haven’t exactly decided.” I’ve always had the habit of blushing spectacularly; at that point I must have been as red as a beetroot.

  “You daft ha’pporth.” Mum tapped my knuckles with her fork. “You better make your mind up pretty sharp.”

  Dad seemed to have made my mind up for me. “What about swimming? You’re good at that.”

  “I suppose I am, but I’m no Ian Thorpe.” My mad Olympic dream appeared to be lying in tatters at my feet. I could imagine the orgy of I-told-you-so-ing Mrs. White was going to enjoy at my expense.

  “You don’t have to be Ian Thorpe. You want to be like that lad from Wales. What’s his name? The one who won the Paralympic gold in Sydney last year.” I never worked out, in years to come, whether Dad meant Dave Roberts or Sascha Kindred and I’m not sure he could have told you himself. It didn’t matter, the die was cast. It was such a blooming obvious solution, although I’ve spent so long trying not to think of myself as disabled that, naturally, I thought of the mainstream games first. But they were just a pipedream, and I’d have had no realistic chance. The Paralympics? That was a whole different kettle of fish.

  Dedication

  I’ll spare you the details of the next few weeks—finding a swimming club, proving I had potential—and the next few months—showing I could put that potential into decent times and attracting the eye of people involved with the regional and then the national squad set-up. I’ll pass over a lot of what went on the next few years, as well. It seemed to be a blur of training, schoolwork, more training, revising, more training, exams…you get the picture.

  I still hung out with Matty whenever I could, but he’d made new friends. Stands to reason he couldn’t just wait around for me to have time to come and play X-Box again. And he grew out of his zits, the spotty duckling turning into a cracking looking swan, which meant that girls reared their peroxide blonde heads and even X-Box didn’t seem so inviting any more.

  He still came along and watched me compete, even dragging along his mum so she could eat her words, and we still met up for a drink, when lemonades after school had turned into pints of beer after a meet. But there wasn’t the same closeness and perhaps that’s as well. Another one of Mrs. White’s great truisms was that, Gay men are all great dancers, but you wouldn’t want them to be friendly with your son. She didn’t know enough to add on the tag, Ben’s gay, so I don’t want him hanging around my Matty. Not even Matty knew where I stood and if he had his suspicions he kept them to himself.

  I’d made new friends in the sport, anyway, and although at seventeen I passed through a phase of wanting to meet the elusive Mr. Right, I reckoned I had plenty of time. A levels and swimming had to take priority. Frankly, I was too knackered most nights to have been able to do anything even if I had managed to get myself a bloke in tow.

  Once A levels turned into freshers’ year at University and freshers’ year turned into second year, I was starting to get frustrated. Not with the racing; that was going—excuse the pun—swimmingly and I’d had my first placing at the Paralympic World Cup. Okay, one or two of the big names in my main event, the S9 one hundred metres freestyle, had been out injured but the time I posted meant I was right on track to qualify for the games, and to have a shot at a medal or two. I’d got the chance of making the relay team, as well.

  Perhaps I should explain the S ratings. They’re easy; the worse your disability, the lower your number and the higher the times the top swimmers make. Some of the S10 guys (or women) are just about on the cusp of non-disability sport and some have crossed it. Not me, though. I didn’t ever want to compete mainstream, because that would mean I’d have had no chance of pulling on the vest—okay, that should be pulling on the swimsuit—and wearing the badge. I was still determined to be at London 2012, even if there was no handsome partner to come and cheer me on and the only victory kiss I’d be getting was from Mum.

  She knew I was gay, of course, probably before I did. When I did the big speech, post A levels, she just gave me a hug and said I must be daft thinking I’d pulled the wool over her eyes for all that time. Dad just took me in a corner for a man-to-man talk that seemed to consist of a big hug, followed by telling me to make sure I didn’t catch anything and asking if Matty was my boyfriend. We ended up cracking open some beers and then weeping into them; I guess I’d always been half in love with my X-Box buddy and I’d never have had the guts to tell him. Sod all use it would have been anyway, Matty being as straight as they come. Nice to get it all out into the open with Dad, though. It left me feeling a lot more ready to face leaving home, because I was on the brink of going off to Welsh Wales (actually, not that Welsh—Cardiff) and study Psychology.

  I’d plumped for Cardiff not just because it’s one of the best places for Psychology (advert over) but because it was pretty well slap bang next door to the High Performance Centre at Swansea, and within easy reach of places like Bath where some of the training’s been known to take place. Thinking ahead, see?

  Mum and Dad kept wondering why I never came home from Uni with a bloke in tow, and I fobbed them off with stories of spending too much time in the pool, or with my nose in a book, to meet anyone nice enough to bring home. They at least pretended they believed it was the truth. The reality? I had too much of my mind focussed on being at 2012 and passing my degree (in that order) to be able to waste any energy on an emotional entanglement. Big words—remember what subject I was reading?—but they just about sum up where my mind was at. A quick snog and a grope at the gay bar, or back to someone’s digs for a bit of how’s your father was fine.

  There was more to it, of course; there always is. I wasn’t just worried about emotional entanglement, it was the physical side of things that scared the pants off me, too. When you’re gay there’s ways and means of things—I guess there’s varieties of doing it when you’re straight as well, although that’s outside my range of specialised knowledge. I don’t mean to be indelicate but read this next bit with your eyes shut if you’re easily shocked. There’s a world of difference, for me, between mutual hand jobs and full-scale penetration and I don’t just refer to the risk of catching something you really didn’t want to catch.

  When I eventually gave myself up and went the whole hog, I wanted it to be with somebody who really meant something to me. If that sounds stupidly old-fashioned, I don’t care. I’m an old-fashioned boy and I wanted to be in love. If I was in love then as a result I’d find a way of overcoming my panic—and blimey, did I panic at the thought of inserting tab A into slot B—but I didn’t want to risk falling in love before London 2012.

  So, there were never any second dates. Second dates might have meant no chance at Paralympic glory.

  Distraction

  “Where’s my bloody tickets?”

  I hadn’t heard that voice in best part of a year, but I knew it straight away, even though it had gone down a couple of notes. Matty must have kept growing, even into his twenties. Now he looked like a rugby lock forw
ard and a gorgeous one, to boot.

  I couldn’t find my voice.

  “You promised me tickets, so I could watch you. Don’t pretend you’ve forgotten.”

  I hadn’t. I didn’t. “I remembered all right, I thought you’d forgotten, you miserable sod.” I got him in a bear hug—well, you have to take your chances when you can—after which I whacked him a bit. “I know you were supposed to be travelling all last summer, but where were you at Christmas? I went round your house but your mum wouldn’t say.”

  “I’m surprised she didn’t take the chance to slag me off.” Matty wriggled out of the clinch. “I committed the crime of choosing to spend the holidays with Dad, so I was persona non grata for a while. I hardly recognised you just now. You’ve put on a lot of muscle.”

  I resisted saying he didn’t recognise me because he’d not kept in touch, so he hadn’t seen me fill out and blossom. “You here for the Games?” Stupid bloody question, of course, seeing as we were both standing outside the Aquatics Centre.

  “Silly bugger, of course I am. Had to get my tickets through the proper channels since you’d let me down.” His grin told me he was just winding me up. “I hope the British manage to get some medals tonight.”

  “So do I.” I’d got a ticket for the swimming—able-bodied—from a friend of a friend and I couldn’t wait to get up the stairs and into my space. I think I had more butterflies in my stomach than when I’m competing. Of course, I knew a couple of the lads who’d be out there competing and I’d be cheering them on, although it’s sometimes frustrating because you almost want to be in the pool swimming the race for them. Not that I’d be a lot of use in a mainstream race, but you take my point.

  “You here on your own?” It sounded like I was chatting Matty up and maybe I was. I knew I had two chances of winning him over to my lane—fat and slim—but a boy’s got to do what a boy’s got to do.