Burdens & Riding With The Wind

by Black, Fabian

  He and Nina grew especially close. They didn’t always see eye to eye. They were both volatile and impulsive. They had rows and disagreements, but there was never a hint she would ever turn her back on him, even when he fucked up big time, as he often did in those days. He was off the rails more often than on them.

  He would never have met Adam if it hadn’t been for Nina and Avril. He was a close friend of theirs, often spoken about, but not actually met until he returned from a period abroad to work and live in England again. He’d taken up a post in Norway as a means of escaping a painful situation at home. He returned when he realised distance had done nothing to ease the pain.

  The source of Adam’s pain turned out to be similar to Phin’s. Parental rejection. Adam’s father was a vicar. Adam’s revelation about his sexuality had threatened deeply held religious beliefs. He couldn’t cope and had turned his back on Adam.

  Apart from the shared experience of rejection they had nothing in common. Adam was five years older than him and much more conservative in attitude, perhaps the result of being a vicar’s son. He didn’t share his passion for fast bikes and racing. He didn’t approve of what he termed Phin’s reckless infatuation with speed. It was understandable. Adam’s mother and young brother had been killed in a car accident. His mum had been late for an appointment. Her hurry to get there meant they never got there.

  Adam wasn’t shy about expressing disapproval on any subject. During a dinner party conversation Avril let slip that Phin had served a period of probation for twocking offences when he was a teenager. He had grinned, fancying Adam would view him as a young rebel, a bit of an urban hero. He was disappointed, and embarrassed, feeling more like a naughty little boy than an urban rebel. Adam saw no glamour in such activity and said so in plain terms.

  Despite their different natures an attraction developed. Phin thought he’d died and gone to heaven when Adam finally asked him out on a date. It wasn’t a plain sailing romance. They seemed to spend most of their time together disagreeing about things.

  The romance limped along for a few months as they tried to balance physical attraction with their different personalities. Then something happened that seemed certain to end the relationship.

  Nina and Avril were away on holiday. He had arranged to meet Adam for lunch. He didn’t make it. He was stopped for speeding on his motorbike. He tried to laugh the incident off, but Adam saw no humour in the situation. Phin would never forget the look of disappointment on his face. Losing the respect of the man he had come to admire hurt him more than he ever imagined. He went on the defensive.

  He accused Adam of being uptight, prudish and judgemental because of what had happened to his mother and brother. They rowed furiously over it. They parted company with harsh words followed by a day of mobile silence. No calls, no messages.

  Phin was convinced their romance was over. He’d fucked up and lost out. He took his misery to visit an old mate. Andy Blakelock.

  Andy suggested it might be a bit of a laugh to take his motor for a joyride around the local industrial park ‘for old times sake.’ Phin proved, not for the first time, that being a grown up doesn’t always coincide with maturity and wise decision-making. He agreed, and lived to regret it.

  Andy’s motor turned out to belong to someone else. Nina and Avril, happily leaping off mountainsides somewhere in the Italian Alps were in no position to bail him out of the subsequent trouble. Not knowing whom else to turn to he turned to Adam. It was the best move of his life.

  Adam told him he was glad he had turned to him and in the future he always could turn to him. He’d be there and he’d always listen and try to understand, because he loved him.

  Phin was given no time to savour this first declaration of love. It wasn’t followed by kisses or cuddles or sex, though the latter looked to be a certainty when Adam made a grab for him and forcibly took down his jeans and underwear. Uncontrollable lust was not the motivation.

  To Phin’s utter shock and humiliation, Adam had turned him over his knee and given him the longest, hardest spanking of his entire life, in fact at that point the only spanking of his life.

  Phin was truly astounded by how much it hurt to be smacked on the bare bottom. The humiliation factor was soon overridden by the pain factor. Adam was a strong man and he had a hard hand. He didn’t hold back. Phin had howled and bucked and protested, but Adam held him fast across his knee until he was satisfied he had been sufficiently punished for his irresponsible behaviour.

  Adam had lectured as he spanked, telling Phin he could take understanding and forgiveness for granted, but that didn’t for a moment equate with a lack of consequences. He made it clear he was not going to stand by and watch Phin take himself to hell. He was taking him in hand before he injured himself or someone else.

  Once the fright and pain had subsided and his tears had dried, Phin found to his surprise that he liked the notion of consequences. He liked the thought of being taken in hand, by Adam at least. It offered a kind of security he had never before experienced. It also offered something else, a startling insight into an aspect of his personality hitherto unimagined. He enjoyed being challenged by someone who was strong enough to follow through and dominate him, physically if necessary. It excited him.

  The spanking fully ignited the spark between them. A long discussion followed and so began their relationship proper. With Adam’s support, and sometimes his discipline, Phin began to sort himself out. He began to grow up and even to like who he was a little better.

  Abandoning his blind study of the cell wall Phin turned onto his back, staring up at the grey ceiling. Now Nina was gone and he didn’t like himself anymore, not one bit. He was disgusted, disappointed and frightened to discover he was still an irresponsible idiot with absolutely no impulse control.

  From the adjacent cell the rumpus continued. The irate duty sergeant at the end of his tether finally erupted.

  “I’ve told you a dozen times, Mickey, we haven’t got any doughnuts. It’s a custard cream or nowt. This is a police station not a flaming three star hotel!”

  “My solicitor will be hearing about this. I need sugar at regular intervals I do. I’m borderline hipposeamic. I’ve got my rights!”

  “You mean hypoglycaemic, and somehow I doubt it. You’re full blown greedy more like. It’s a shame you don’t pay such close attention to other folks’ rights as you do to your own. Now do us all a favour and shove that biscuit in your gob. Give us all some PEACE!”

  There was a clang as the observation flap on the door was closed.

  “You all right in there, mate?” The flap on Phin’s cell door dropped down and the duty sergeant’s lean, harassed face hovered in the opening.

  Phin nodded.

  “You’ll be glad to know the old boy doesn’t want to press criminal charges. He recognised you meant no malice towards him. He’s putting it down to a freak accident and he’ll take it through insurance.”

  “It’s decent of him,” said Phin, immensely relieved and grateful for the generosity of a man whose day he had thoroughly ruined.

  “We’re sorting out some paperwork for you to sign and then you can go.”

  “Thank you.”

  “One more thing.” The sergeant’s pale blue eyes crinkled at the corners. “We traced the owner of the car you nicked. It was registered in the name of one Andrew Blakelock, tax defunct. Now I’m not saying you won’t still be called to account by the law. You’ll still likely be obliged to appear at a magistrate’s court, but I somehow doubt he’ll be pressing any personal charges against you. I’d say this was a lucky day for you, all things considered.”

  “Doesn’t feel like it.” Phin was too weary to even find some small pleasurable irony in having pinched and fired Andy’s car, and one that actually belonged to him for a change.

  “Do you want a cup of tea and a biscuit, lad? It’s been a long day for you.”

  Phin gave a faint smile, shaking his head, his eyes stinging with tears at kindness he
didn’t deserve.

  “I’ll have his biscuit if he doesn’t want it. I’m faint with hunger in here!”

  “You’ve had all the biscuits you’re entitled to, so go ahead and faint. It’ll give our lug holes a rest.” The flap on Phin’s door clanged shut, as the sergeant turned his attentions back to his obstreperous neighbour.

  Another quarter hour passed and then the cell door opened. Phin was told he was free to leave. After signing the appropriate forms he put the pen down and concentrated on trying to thread his belt back through the loops of his jeans with fingers that were uncooperative. He irritably wondered why they had insisted on taking the damn thing from him in the first place. What did they think he was going to do with it, flog himself to death? Fortunately his lack of footwear meant he didn’t have to re-lace trainers.

  “I’ll do it.”

  A familiar voice made him start and set his heart thumping. He glanced up to see Adam, looking tired, but calm. It took all his willpower not to fling his arms around his neck and cling to him. He felt so ashamed he couldn’t look at him. He was frightened in case he saw the contempt he felt for himself mirrored in Adam’s eyes. If Adam rejected him there would be nothing worth living for.

  5. Here Speaks A True Vicar’s Son

  Adam concludes the story in his own words

  “Phin, baby, where the hell are you?” I let out a long shaky sigh of relief the moment I heard his voice, my grip tightening on my phone. I’d been worried to death about him. As I listened to his abrupt no frills explanation of how he came to be where he was, it would seem not without good reason.

  “I’m on my way, love.”

  Andy Blakelock. My upper lip curled of its own volition, as I put the phone down. No wonder Phin hadn’t supplied the name of the ‘friend’ he was staying with in the brusque little text message he had left the previous evening. It informed me he’d had too much to drink to be able to drive and was staying over at a pal’s place. The pal wasn’t named.

  Before receiving his message I had called everyone I could think of, our mutual friends and his mates from the track. Calling Andy Blakelock, the devious little maggot, had never entered my head. My lips pressed together. I didn’t even know he was back in the area, or that Phin was associating with him again. His friends of course are his own affair, but still, respect demanded he should at least have told me he had taken up with him again. Forewarned is forearmed, especially in Blakelock’s case. Trouble was never far behind him.

  Grabbing my jacket and car keys I left the house.

  ***

  Phin didn’t notice me walk into the police station. He was engrossed in trying to rethread his belt through the loops of his jeans. His hands were trembling too much to be useful. My stomach twisted at the sight of him. He looked dreadful. His unshaven face beneath smuts of smoky dirt was pale and drawn. I could tell by the rapid blink of his eyes and the sinewy tautness of his jaw that he was fighting tears. He’d been fighting them for too long. He was too damn stubborn to allow himself any kind of emotional release in case it lessened the anger he was determined to hang onto.

  Phin seems like a man who can handle himself. He’s tall and athletic with a confident devil-may-care attitude. It’s a front. From the moment I met him I sensed an innate vulnerability. The more I got to know him the more I realised he was someone who needed to be cared for. He had no real sense of self-worth and therefore no real desire to take care of himself. He threw himself at danger. It provoked a powerful protective response in me. I wanted to be the man who cared for him. I also suspected he had need of a strong hand. I took a gamble early in our relationship by supplying it. Born bossy, as Phin says. The gamble paid off. It saved a relationship that might otherwise have floundered.

  On viewing his struggle with both his belt and his emotions I experienced two powerful impulses. The first was to take him in my arms, to hold and kiss him and tell him I loved him and assure him everything was going to be all right. My second impulse was to avail myself of the nearest chair, turn him over my knee and soundly spank his backside for bailing out on me the way he had the day before.

  Neither were appropriate actions for the reception area of a police station.

  “I’ll do it.” I walked over to him, pushing his hands away from his belt, threading and re-buckling it before straightening his shirt. The latter was a telling document of stains and odours: stale alcohol, fast food grease, oily soot and sweat. “Is the victim pressing assault charges, have you heard yet?”

  He shook his head, keeping his eyes averted from mine. “He’s accepted it as an accident. He’s taking it through insurance.”

  “That’s something anyway.” I suddenly noticed his feet were bare. After staring at them for a moment I brought my eyes to rest on his face. “Well, you coming out without a coat or jacket doesn’t surprise me in the least, but leaving without socks and shoes?”

  “I left in a bit of a hurry.”

  He sounded defensive, as well he might, but his eyes brimmed and for a second I thought they were going to shed the load they carried. They didn’t. He looked away from me.

  I shook my head. “You seem to be making a habit of leaving places abruptly without thinking of the consequences. I’ve been worried sick since you took off yesterday afternoon, and what about poor Avril? Don’t you think she was in enough pain without fretting about you?”

  “I know.” He continued to avoid my gaze. “I’m sorry. I’ll call her later to apologise.”

  I glanced around the police station. I thought such places were behind him. I never imagined I’d have to pick him up from one again. “Honestly, Phin. What were you thinking, or more to the point not thinking? Nina...” I broke off, biting at my lip as a sudden swell of emotion overcame me. Nina had been one of my closest friends. I would miss her. I had loved her just as much as Phin had loved her, perhaps for different reasons and in a different way, but no matter. Love has many faces.

  “Nina would be disappointed. I know, Adam. I know how disappointed you are too. I’m a selfish scumbag and a waste of fucking space. You don’t have to tell me.”

  After completing my unfinished sentence in a way detrimental to himself he strode towards the exit, casting words over his shoulder.

  “I didn’t want, or intend for this to happen. I’m more sorry than I can ever say.”

  I followed him outside, seeing him shiver as the air wrapped itself around him. The mellow warmth of the day before had vanished. It was a reminder that as well as being a cousin of summer, autumn is also a cousin of winter. There was a definite hint of the latter’s kinship on its breath along with a threat of rain.

  Shedding my jacket I draped it around his shoulders. “What I was going to say before you rudely interrupted me was that Nina was of the opinion you were always more loyal to Andy than he ever was to you. It’s your undoing where he’s concerned. She detested him.” I moistened my lips. It probably wasn’t the best time to say it, but I felt the need to say it anyway. “I detest him too. He’s a viper. I would have preferred some honesty about you socialising with him again.”

  He spoke in a rush. “No, Adam. It isn’t what you think. I haven’t been seeing him behind your back. I promise. Until I bumped into him yesterday I hadn’t seen him for over eighteen months. It was a fluke. He was coming out of The Golden Lion as I was going in. We got talking. He could see I was upset and offered me a drink at his place. Like the dickhead I am I thought it was because he cared about me as a friend, not because he saw me as a source of easy cash. Christ Jesus!” He ran his hands through his already untidy hair. “I need my head examining. If I hadn’t been such a simpleton, thinking he was at last going to show I meant something to him, none of this would have happened today. I never learn. I never get it right where he’s concerned. What is it going to take before I finally get the message?”

  “Stop it, Phineas.” I spoke sharply, recognising the mood he was working up. “Stop the self-abuse. It serves no purpose. We all make mistakes.
It doesn’t make us failures or fools it just makes us human. Andy is the loser. He has no notion of loyalty or true friendship. He’s only ever served himself.” I reached for his hand. “Come on, love. You look exhausted. Let’s go home. We’ll talk properly then, after you’ve had a hot shower and something to eat.

  “No.” He shrugged me off along with my jacket, letting it drop to the ground.

  Thrusting his hands into his pockets he gave me one of the obstinate glares that made me want to shake him.

  “You go home. I’ve got to see a man about a dog first, or rather a bastard about a bike.”

  With that he launched himself purposefully across the car park, as if he had a plan and a way of carrying it out, only to crash and burn as his bare foot came into contact with something sharp. He let out a bellow of pain, followed by a tirade of shocking bad language while hopping up and down on the spot. He’d end up getting re-arrested for public obscenity if he didn’t tone it down.

  Hurrying over to him I halted his war dance taking hold of his arm. “Shut up, Phin, now, before you get into even more trouble. Do you want to do jail time? Sit down.”

  He did as he was bidden, sitting down on the ground with a bump. Kneeling beside him I took his right foot, cradling it on my lap to examine it. A tide of thick blood soaked into my jeans. I cringed. There was a long, amber shaded sliver of glass protruding from the wound. I extracted it as gently as I could. “Looks like a piece of car headlamp. You’d expect to see less of this kind of thing in a police station car park.”

  “I don’t know why,” he snapped. “Everyone knows the fucking police are the shittest drivers around. Only they get away with it. The rest of us have to abide by the law while they piss all over it.”

  I ignored the comment. It was pure spleen. “The cut looks deep, Phin. It needs hospital treatment. There might still be glass in it. Stay there a minute, don’t dare move.” I got up, running quickly to my car, rummaging around in the glove compartment for the first aid kit.