On My Knees (4 page)

Alex shifted from one buttock to the other while I told him about my meeting with Attila the night before. His lip curled when I gave him all the details of the events that followed. When I’d finished, he shook his head and got to his feet.

“You’re out of your mind, Mark,” he said, rubbing the stubble on his chin. “Since when were you interested in men?”

“I know how it must sound—”

“You’ve only known this chap a few hours and you’re talking of throwing everything away. And where does this come from?”

I shrugged. I knew I’d delivered a bolt out of the blue and didn’t even truly understand it myself. “It just feels right, Alex. I know it’s right. All this time I’ve been living a lie. I want this.”

“Did you tell Diana?”

“No, not yet. I’m going to tell her tonight. She thinks I’m seeing another woman. I was going to tell her, but she was in no mood this morning.”

“She’ll be in some bloody mood when you do tell her!” Alex shook his head again and paced back and forth. “Christ, man. Stop and think.”

“I don’t need to. I mean, I have thought about it, on and off, for years. I’ve always dismissed it. Maybe it’s the Prozac making me see clearly?”

“And what does this chap feel about you?” Alex looked at me, searching for answers.

I looked at my shoes. “Well, he needs a bit of time, that’s all.”

“He needs a bit of time?” I thought Alex would explode. “What the hell does that mean? Have you told him what you’re planning to do?”

A speck of dried dirt marred the toe of my shoe and I bent to rub it off.

“You haven’t told him, have you?” He swung round to face the wall and banged his fists against the plasterwork. “Jesus, Mark!”

Neither of us spoke. Alex leaned against the wall huffing and puffing, and I wondered if this would break our friendship. Of course, I knew what he was saying was all true when looked at logically, but I had to ask myself, when was love ever logical? When Attila had cast me aside and said that he couldn’t get involved with a married man, I knew what he really meant to say. He meant that he would want me if only I weren’t married.

Alex turned back towards me. He glanced at his watch. “Look, it’s just about opening time. Shall we—”

“Absolutely.” I switched on the answering machine and flicked the sign on the door to ‘closed’.

“Wine bar?”

“Wine bar it is.” I locked the door behind me and fell into step.

I didn’t so much walk from the office as float. I passed along the Embankment without even noticing the river. Reality hit me only when Alex pressed a glass into my hand and led me to a seat by the window.

There is something about wine before noon that loosens the tongue and dissolves inhibitions. My head was light before the first bottle was done. Alex’s cheeks were flushed, but then again, that was usual for the time of day as the effects of the evening had still to wear off. He ran his fingers through his rumpled hair and turned his glass.

“It makes no difference to me, you do understand that, don’t you?” he said.

“What makes no difference?”

“Well, you know if you are gay. It doesn’t change anything. Not between us.”

“Thanks, Alex. I do appreciate that. For a moment I thought…but I would have been a bit surprised if it did.”

“I’m still in shock. How can you change overnight? I mean, have you ever tried it?”

I knew this would be the big issue, not just for Alex, but for everyone I knew. Including me.

“No. Never. I’ve wondered, but I always convinced myself that I was just weird. I’ve lived with the feeling that I don’t really belong in the world around me for so long. But now, I know. I really do know, and I feel like a huge weight has been lifted off me.”

Alex peered into his wine as if he’d found a goldfish. “Don’t you think you should…erm…” He looked up at me. “Don’t you think you ought to try it out before you throw your lot in with this chap? And that’s if he even wants you, which sounds far from settled to me.” He drained his glass and went to the bar, leaving me to contemplate his wisdom.

Deep down, I knew he was right, but I hadn’t a clue how to go about it. In any case, wouldn’t it all just kind of happen now with Attila? Maybe I should leave Diana and set up a bachelor pad, let things take their course rather than rushing. But that didn’t seem right. I hadn’t rushed out to find Attila; I hadn’t actually gone in search of anyone. Attila had just jogged into my life. That was how the best things in life happened, wasn’t it?

* * *

When I finally got home, the kitchen looked like a set from an apocalyptic movie—cupboards open, spewing their contents onto the floor. Discarded matches floated in the puddles of spilled milk and oil on the cooker top, and every square inch of counter was covered with pans, packets, unopened mail, and long-opened make-up. It was a scene that I had grown used to, living with Diana.

I moved a pile of old papers from one of the dining chairs and sat down. The clock on the cooker said 17.31. That gave me about thirty minutes before she would be home. I decided to pack the things I would need if she threw me straight out onto the street, and went upstairs to the bedroom. Naturally, the bed was unmade and the floor awash with clothes, shoes, and various accessories. I scraped a path clear with my foot and balanced our biggest suitcase on the scrunched up duvet. I became despondent as my eyes searched the room for my things. Where would I start?

My best suits were easy, hanging in my wardrobe. She’d only commandeered part of the hanging space in there. Locating underwear and socks was more problematic. No drawer or cupboard was ever reserved for my things alone, there was always something of Diana’s stuffed or wedged into any available space.

What is it they say about liars? They have to be really good or eventually they give themselves away? Well, I think the same goes for the untidy. If you’re neat and tidy, it’s quite easy to keep track of things, but if you live in a mess, you may forget where you have put something.

My arm ventured deep into the cavernous drawer on Diana’s side of the bed, looking for an elusive box of cufflinks. The cufflinks weren’t there, of course, but I pulled out a card from under the tangle of bras and tights. It was a Valentine’s card. I meant to tear it into pieces, and I don’t know what stopped me—a twinge of guilt, perhaps—but I opened it up to read the message that one of us must have written in happier times.

To D from C. Can’t wait till the next time. Even our naughty bits love each other.

I had to read it twice before it dawned on me. ‘D’ was obvious, but who the hell was ‘C’?

I sat on the bed and smiled. Well, well, well. So she was having an affair. That in itself was enough of a godsend, but it would be interesting to know who ‘C’ was. The only ‘C’ I could think of was Charles, her boss. I cringed. Charles was over sixty years old and looked like he’d borrowed his face from a Gothic cathedral.

I was turning the card over in my hands, lost in my thoughts and counting my blessings, when I heard the door bang downstairs. I jumped to my feet and slid the card under my clothes at the bottom of the suitcase, then shut the case and moved it into the spare bedroom. As the stairs creaked, I began to palpitate. If she had a knife, I was cornered.

“And what are you doing?” Her tone was confrontational, but then again, when she talked in her sleep it sounded like she was about to rip someone’s throat open.

“I was about to get changed.”

“Well don’t. You’re coming with me to the supermarket. I don’t see why I should do it on my own.” She pushed by to get into the bedroom where she threw her shoes off and put on another pair. “Come on, don’t dither.”

I followed her downstairs, all the way out of the flat and to the car. Why was I doing this? If I was going to get thrown out it would be better before I fetched and carried.

“You drive,” she said, throwing her car keys at me. “And don’t go up the hill, turn round first.”

Being in the car with Diana at my side made me wish for a motorcycle and sidecar. I could feel the hate radiating from her, and this was before I’d broken my news. Anyway, why should I worry now? She’d be free to go off with ‘C’ and rub naughty bits together.

“Diana,” I said. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

“Just pull over here.” She grabbed the steering wheel with one hand and jerked it to the left.

“Don’t do that!” I avoided the cyclist coming down on my inside. “One day you’ll kill someone.”

“With you at the wheel? Who’d believe you?”

I shook my head and brought the car to rest at the side of the road.

“I’ll be two minutes,” she said, getting out of the car. Then she turned back, bobbed her head down to peer at me and said, “Do
no
t move.”

I watched her little legs scurry towards the pharmacy. She moved like a beetle who’d sensed the sole of the boot overhead. I considered doing a runner there and then. I probably would have, had it not been for my mobile phone ringing in my pocket. It was Alex.

“Got a pen and paper?” he asked.

“Hang on.” I burrowed through the junk in the armrest and glove compartment.

“I spoke to my friend Adam. He suggests you give this place a try. Ready?”

I wrote the address on a scrap of paper retrieved from the ashtray and put it in my pocket as Diana wrenched open the passenger door.

Diana agreed that I could take the car, but only so that I could transport my belongings in one go.

“I don’t want you ever to set foot in here again,” she said when I finally managed to get a word in and tell her my news. “How could you?”

Her face was red and she shook with rage, but I wondered how much of it was connected with the fact that I was involved with a man and not another woman. I’d read somewhere that women whose husbands left them for men reacted quite differently to those who lost out to another woman. Logically, she had no reason to be mad that I was going. She had her lover waiting in the wings.

I drove to Belsize Park and found a parking space among the Porsches and BMWs. Attila’s numbers were already in my phone. The working day was long over and I tried his home number first. There was no reply, but he answered straight away when I called his cell. When I invited him for a drink, I detected a faint annoyance.

“I’m at my mother’s. I may not be back tonight,” he said.

“Why? Does she live far away?” I regretted the question before it had travelled across the airwaves.

“Listen.” The background noises had changed and I guessed he’d stepped outside. “I told you last night, I can’t get involved. I like you, but this is too complicated for me.”

I felt like I’d been unplugged, all my strength draining away in one gush.

“I’m fresh out of a relationship. To be honest, I’m kind of enjoying my freedom. I’m not ready to fall into another right now.”

“I just wanted to see you.” My voice barely had the strength to crawl down the phone.

“I guess you’ve had a row?”

“Of course.”

“I’m sorry.”

They say that at the moment of death all your life flashes before your eyes. Well, something like that happened to me, sitting there in my - her - car in Belsize Park. A day before I’d been miserable, but I had a home and the empty trappings of a married life. Now I’d lost everything, and my worldly goods were packed in the trunk behind me. Even this man whom I had just met and felt such a strong attraction to, had rejected me, refusing even to see me.

“I’ll call you. OK? If I go back home tonight, I’ll call you.”

“OK.” I sniffed back the tightness in my throat and tried to smile. “On the cell phone. I’ll be here.”

* * *

Attila’s rejection had left me so numb that I hadn’t even noticed the rain that the night dragged in. We’d had an unusually dry spell, and as I churned through the traffic, I realized that I couldn’t see through the windscreen. It wasn’t my eyes, red and swollen from the crying, but tree sap smeared on the glass. I switched on the wipers, and the red taillights in front blurred into crimson wraiths. For once, the washer bottle wasn’t empty and I soon had a clear line of sight. But to where? I had nowhere to go.

It was then that I remembered the slip of paper in my pocket. I drove with one hand on the wheel and one eye on the traffic, and studied the address under the reading light. I checked the map and set off towards Westminster Bridge. I didn’t need to go there, of course, but Alex’s advice was usually sound. And I was curious. In any event, I could always leave once I’d seen what it was all about. What else was I going to do while I waited for Attila’s call?

Once south of the Thames I had to stop and check my route. The South Bank was not my territory, all railways and fly-overs and bridges it seemed to me. Even in daylight I saw it as dark but now, after nightfall and in the drizzle, the blackness seemed pervasive. I found the street and a parking space not far away. The pavement was slimy as the rain loosened days of grime, and I picked my way through the debris of the earlier street market with care.

As I neared my destination, I recognized the scent of Olbas oil in the air. A torrent of steam billowed into the night sky, the steel vent sharp against the green moss on the old engineering bricks. Next to the vent I could see the railway arch, now filled in with a rudimentary façade of lavender-painted timber illuminated by overhead lamps. The obscure glass windows were covered with iron grilles, softened by the dirt of the city. I took a few steps forward then waited while a guy in a hoodie rang the bell at the side of the door. I could hear the buzzing of the entry system and he pushed the door and stepped inside.

My heart pounded against my ribcage and my head throbbed as I started again towards the door. I knew this was the place; the limp rainbow flag over the doorway was a giveaway, yet I still worried. What if it wasn’t the place? What if I stepped inside and it was someone’s workshop?

Just before I rang the bell, the door jolted open and a middle-aged man slipped out, his eyes cast down at the pavement as he passed me, pulling up his collar, and hurried down the street. I put my hand out to stop the door closing, took a deep breath, and went inside.

I found myself in a lobby that two people would have overcrowded. To my left was a counter topped by a glass screen, from behind which I was being scrutinized by a tall, muscular guy. He wore a red gym vest and the overhead light reflected off his shaved head.

“Hi,” he said, leaning on the counter. His bulging arms were tattooed from his shoulders down to his wrists. I thought of gorgonzola. “You been before?”

I shook my head as I tried to find the words. “No.”

“OK,” he said, placing a towel and a key in front of him. “Can I just be sure that you know this is a gay sauna?”

“Yes.” This was what Alex’s friend had come up with so that I could
try it out
?

He rattled the computer keyboard. “Can I have your first name?”

My name? No, certainly not. “John,” I said, sure he’d disbelieve me.

“That’s twelve pounds, please…John,” he said with a smile as he typed in the name.

I pushed the money through the gap at the bottom of the screen and he squeezed the towel through to me.

“Locker 26,” he said. “You’ll find your way about. Just go through that door.”

“Thanks.” I took the key from him. I heard the latch buzz and snatched the door open, as eager to escape the outside world as I was to enter this new one. The door slammed shut behind me, and all heads turned momentarily in my direction. I was paralyzed.

The air was stifling - hot and wet. Faithless throbbed out of the overhead speakers. Everywhere I looked were men. Men in suits, men in jeans, men in towels, and men in nothing at all. Old men, young men, and men about my age.

Locker 26 was at the far end of the room, and I wound my way through the throng, tripping over discarded towels and sucking in my stomach to get round locker doors that hung open. I felt terribly overdressed in my raincoat and all but ripped off my clothes, threw them in the locker, and wrapped the towel around my waist.

Men were coming and going through an arched opening between the last banks of lockers. I fastened the key band around my wrist and went with the flow. The gloom concealed a row of showers, laid out along one wall that had been clad with sheet metal. In fact, the whole place had an industrial look, from the metal flooring to the bare brick walls and the exposed service pipes that ran like arteries overhead. Beyond the showers I could see a wood cabin, the door of which opened and banged shut with regularity. Past this structure I could make out a long passageway leading to some area that cast an insipid light. There was clearly plenty to explore.

I nipped under a vacant showerhead and rubbed myself with the gel provided. It was green and smelled cheap. As I rinsed away the reluctant lather, I felt something on my right buttock. Without turning, I craned my neck to see what it was. A man of about sixty-five stood next me, his hand touching me. I edged away.

“Sexy,” he said. He smiled at me and winked, beckoning me to follow him.

I fought back the urge to vomit, finished showering, grabbed my towel, and went in the opposite direction. I found myself at the foot of a staircase and climbed. At the top, a room lay directly under the viaduct, surrounded by small cabins big enough for two or three people and illuminated by a single red bulb. In the middle, a few larger cubicles could take maybe eight or ten. Mats covered the floors, rather like the ones at the gym, and each compartment came equipped with a waste bin and a box of tissues.

I joined the promenade around the perimeter. It reminded me of some sort of market, everyone eyeing everyone else, walking this way then that. It seemed that nothing was really happening. Then, as I rounded the corner at the far end, a group of guys gathered around one of the central cubicles. I drew up behind them and stood on tiptoe to see in. I couldn’t count the number taking part in the orgy, but there were seven or eight for sure. The red light, blocked by those standing, failed to reach the back of the space. White towels draped over shoulders hinted at frantic movement. A flash of an eye and an arm caught in a rare reflection betrayed a cluster of kneeling figures in the far corner. I could feel the pressure against my towel.

The guys in front of me blocked the way, so eager to watch that they blended into one immovable mass. I pushed and elbowed my way forward, determined to break through. I was cursed at as I crushed someone’s toe, but it didn’t stop me. The beat of the music drove me on. My heart raced and my head reeled. One last push and my skin slipped between sweaty flesh, and I fell into the cabin. Immediately, a hand wrapped around my cock.