CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Ollie got a call at five the following morning.
He hadn’t slept much.
He’d been lucky when he’d returned home that everyone else was out. Letty and David were still apparently on their hastily reorganised evening, and Ronnie had left a note saying that Luke and Jonas were taking her out to celebrate the film deal. Luke and Jonas’s names had been suitably underlined and Ollie got the implied recrimination. He didn’t even feel any remorse whatsoever at his lack of interest in what would have once been such a momentous deal. Anything Oliver did tended to play a far bigger role in Ollie’s life than it should. He realised this. But now, all he could think about was a dog on a table and Tom. He gave himself credit that the dog did loom slightly larger in his mind than even Tom. But guilt was a stronger emotion than love, Ollie had discovered. His burning, gut twisting love for Ed Barnes had dissolved very quickly on the shame of thinking he’d killed him. One year ago, almost to the day, and now Ollie couldn’t really work out why he’d fallen for a guy who had never once really given the impression he was anything other than a man paid to care for him, to look after his welfare, and ensure he was safe and reasonably happy.
Tom’s voice sounded tired, but then Ollie assumed his did, too. But at least he’d had a chance to shower, take a couple of painkillers, close his eyes and try to make sense of what had happened between them that night.
“How’s the dog?”
He heard a grunt of amusement from Tom. “Hello, Ollie.”
“Yes, hello. How’s the—?”
“He’s got a broken leg. They’ve pinned him up for now, and they’ll have to see how it sets.”
“Have they found the owner?”
“Looks like he might have been a stray. The police said they’d had reports that some freedom campers had dumped a dog down by the lake. Big and shaggy was the description, so I think he’s going down for the job.”
“Jesus. What’s going to happen to him?”
“James has taken him back to Wanaka for now. I don’t know. How are you?”
“Me? I’m fine. How are you?”
“Better now that I know he’s going to be okay.”
“What are you doing now then? Where are you?”
There was a pause, and then Tom said slightly too casually to be actually casual, “I got the boys to pick me up. Casevac and Sicknote came and got me. I’m up in the huts with them.”
“Oh.” He couldn’t think of anything else to say. Well, he could, of course; his moratorium on speaking had ended once he’d started to feel better at about four o’clock that morning. He just didn’t want to put anything into words. It would be like throwing fragile, delicate china into a maelstrom.
“I’ve told them they can use my house in Dunedin for some R&R at the beach before they fly home.”
“Oh.”
“So, I thought I’d better go with them. I don’t want them to trash the place.”
“No. Of course not.” A huge amount of damage could be done to one roll mat and a kettle, obviously.
Ollie wanted to ask,
“What about me?”
No, actually, he wanted to ask,
“What about us?”
but how brave did someone have to be to put that tiny sibilant pronoun out there all on its own into those ferocious winds? Ollie certainly wasn’t the man for that job.
“Are you sure you’re all right?”
Ollie nodded. A bit redundant on a telephone, he knew, but it was all he could manage.
§§§
Breakfast was always a very moveable feast at his mother’s house. She normally wrote in the mornings, sustained by tea and the occasional cigarette, but she encouraged her guests to make full use of the kitchen. The five of them, left to their own devices, therefore, variously sat around with newspapers and orange juice or black coffee and their phones.
Ollie had told the story of the previous night to Luke first. Then he’d had to retell it to Jonas. When David appeared, Luke owned the event and told it with far more panache and made-up moments of extreme tension than Ollie had managed. David relayed it to Letty when she arrived, and she immediately went up in Ollie’s estimation when she claimed it was all her fault. If she’d not bailed on them, that dog would not have been in front of their car at that exact wrong moment. This was true, obviously, but he reassured her that her leaving at the time she did only ensured they were delayed by the fraction of a moment that had totally saved the dog’s life—that had she still been with them, they’d have probably killed it.
She gave him a grateful smile, made him some tea, brought over his shortbread, and sat alongside him. He felt a huge surge of gratitude and affection toward her, and suddenly didn’t care whether she was a fraud or not. It had occurred to him, of course, that her care and ministrations were only filling a void that Tom’s absence had suddenly created. Ollie had never realised before how much Tom Collins had dominated his life recently until he wasn’t there. At the very moment when Ollie needed him the most…
The more he thought about the kiss—kisses—the more confused he became about them. Not the intent behind them—he was fucked up, an emotional mess, probably emotionally retarded when it came to love, but those kisses had been nothing less than passion. A great wellspring of need had surged between them beside that dark lake; that Ollie was certain of. No, what puzzled him was the why and the wherefore. Clearly, Tom
wasn’t
straight, or, at least, he had a few minor bends somewhere along the impressive lines of his rigidity. Ollie had occasionally suspected this, of course. He could cite a number of incidents when Tom’s heterosexual credentials could be called into question. The sunscreen spreading stood out in Ollie’s mind. At the time, he’d tried to reason it away with fronts and backs and rules and allowances, but he’d known the truth. Straight guys didn’t smear lotion over each other, dipping hands down to the concave warmth at the base of their mate’s spine. The azaleas were another clue. Ollie didn’t know what went on in the army, obviously, but he found it very hard to believe guys gave each other hand jobs. Fumbled each other’s cocks. It wasn’t
boarding school
. Or perhaps they did and it was. But that incident, Ollie was sure, would not have happened between two entirely straight guys. Or one straight and one still fetchingly undecided—undercover gay. Emotionally retarded. Scared to death of love and the chaos and death it seemed to bring.
So what had those kisses alongside the lake meant? Was it supposed to mean anything? Could you give someone a kiss like that—unasked for—and then simply carry on being nothing more than friends?
And why was he thinking of himself like some kind of receptive doormat? Why did Tom have to be the one who decided what the kiss meant? Ollie hadn’t asked for it (well not at that moment; he’d been wishing it would happen since he’d met the damn man), but he had returned it. More than returned it. He’d flared with a need so deep, a lust for Tom Collins so intense, that he was surprised his lips hadn’t burnt the man’s face. They were slightly swollen and sore this morning from Tom’s stubble, one of the most delightful inconveniences Ollie had ever suffered. He wanted to keep looking at his reflection, wondering if anyone else could see crush-of-Tom upon him.
By midmorning, Ollie had come to the conclusion that Tom might, in fact, be testing him. That the kiss had been another
assessment
.
After all, this wasn’t unreasonable. Ollie might, in very harsh hands, be termed a bit of a flake. He hadn’t proved himself entirely reliable since he’d met Tom over shit, and parted over vomit. Of course, Tom hadn’t seen him at his best. He’d run from killing Ed Barnes as far as he could and then sat in a kind of shell-shocked, self-pitying vortex of self-destruction, pretending to write a novel, which he’d not even been able to think of a title for. Everyone humoured him because he was who he was. He was Oliver Fitzroy—the real Oliver Fitzroy. The little king.
So, if this was a test, it was fairly obvious what he was being tested on. Tom didn’t do examinations in medieval literalism in art. He did them in shorts. Or at least, he did them about real, tangible things like commitment and courage and being the best you could be. Ollie didn’t have much experience at being the best at anything. He’d spent his life keeping his head down, his beauty to himself, and his thoughts on anything extremely private.
Perhaps this was the time for him to lift his head above his metaphorical parapet and take a leap of faith.
He went to find his mother to tell her he was leaving.
Of course, being the kind of coward he really was, he told her he was going into town to settle the bill at the vet. Once he was safely on the road back to Dunedin, he’d call her and tell her the truth.
Ronnie was clacking on her typewriter, a sound Ollie had grown up with. It was oddly soothing and familiar. He sat on her bed, watching her fingers create their words until she’d finished her sentence, read it back to herself, and then looked up with a smile. “You look like the cat that got the cream.”
Ollie nodded. Cream poisoned cats. It was a salutary thought. But it was best if he didn’t think about dead cats. He’d washed his hair three times when he’d got home, furious that he was washing Tom’s lips off, but obsessed about the ginger pillow.
“I’m popping into town. Do you want anything?”
“David told me about the accident. Were you going to tell me?”
“No. It was fine. No one was hurt. The dog was, but he’s going to be okay.”
“Tom was driving?”
“It wasn’t his fault. It was
mine
.”
His mother regarded him for a long time, so long that Ollie began to fidget.
“You do know that Edward’s death wasn’t your fault either, Oliver.”
He felt his throat seize up, and he tried to take deep breaths.
“He was three times over the limit. He was driving you—my son—his charge—Ollie—my precious, wonderful, beautiful son, while he was three times over the limit!”
“
No
, I’ve told you, we had an argument. I told him—”
“It doesn’t matter what the circumstances were. He was there to protect you, and he failed you, Oliver.”
Ollie got up from the bed, the euphoria from the kiss, and thinking about going to Dunedin to revisit it, peeling off under his mother’s continual denial of his part in the death of Edward Barnes. “Well, I’ll see you later.”
His mother nodded, rereading something on the page now. “Drive carefully. And Ollie?”
Ollie hesitated by the door. “Tell the chaps at the vet to spare no expense. The dog should have the best of everything. David told me he’d been dumped alongside the road by some campers, and that he’d chased after his owner’s car for miles as they drove away.”
Ollie frowned, about to remonstrate with this highly exaggerated version of the story, but then he remembered the paw he’d held in his hand, the frantic beat of the pulse he’d felt but not registered at the time, and the roughness and heat of the pads. He swallowed. “I’ll tell them.”
§§§
By the time he got to the vast lake above Clyde, Ollie was feeling steadier, more sure that he was doing the right thing. Although it was cold, he had the roof down and the heated seats on high, and the air was so intoxicating he felt like singing along to the radio. He turned it off to avoid the temptation, and took a bend a little too fast. There was nothing on the winding road. There never was. The lake was very dark and deep and went on for miles, entirely devoid of human activity or life. No leisure boats, no little tourist pull-ins, no buildings, shops or ice cream vans, no swimmers or skiers—simply no people. This was a world after man, a post-apocalyptic landscape of towering, bleak, schist-screed slopes. Ollie suddenly hated the country with a passion he’d not felt before. He’d come here to punish himself. After all, what could be better for someone who was a mystery to himself than to also be a stranger in a strange land? He was an unrecognisable person who’d realised that he actually
was
a character in a book—that he was Oliver Fitzroy and that he was, despite trying so hard not to be, gay.
As he dipped down alongside the vast dam that held the water back from the shanty town beneath it, Ollie realised that he wanted nothing more than to return to the lush, densely occupied land of his fathers, where he fit like a tiny piston in a well-oiled and regulated engine. His life had been one of ancient stones warmed on their southern faces, where winds from the north were cold and brought a tang of salt air and echoes of old languages. He was homesick. He wanted to go home.
By the time he’d reached Alexandra, he’d realised he was in love.
He wanted Tom Collins to come home with him.
He wanted Tom Collins to
be
his home.
How much could you read into one kiss? Ollie had spent his formative years reading a great deal into a single word and a well-placed comma. But perhaps he’d read more into those authors’ choice of words than they had intended.
Perhaps
Tom had not proposed more from that kiss than…than what? How could that intense sharing and swell of need be anything other than what it purported to be?
By the time he got to Milton, Ollie’s confidence was at an all-time low.
What would Tom think about him just turning up like this?
Why had he run away? For that was now what Ollie thought Tom’s midnight flit with his old army buddies in all probability was. Tom had panicked and he’d fled. But Ollie didn’t think it was the kiss that had scared him—it was his confession about Ed Barnes. Why had he done it? Why had he blurted out that awful truth then? When Tom was kissing him? It wasn’t the time or the place to admit to such grievous sins. Ollie should have told him one day when they were out running. What could not be explained away and purified by mountain air? No, he’d spewed it forth like his earlier vomit, on the alcohol and self-pity of the accident with the dog. As Tom had so recently pointed out—everyone had tragic stories. Once again, Ollie had shown that he was focused only on himself. The
me, me, me
of the horrible little schoolboy Oliver Fitzroy he’d been running from all his life.