“The good thing is that you’ve all admitted to your sins and have been punished for them. You’re pure again and you can commit yourselves to staying so. Now you can put the past behind you and think about your future.”
The group leaders take us out one at a time. I go first out of my group and I’m taken through the forest to the east of the camp. There, in a small clearing, is a sleeping bag that’s been placed under a flysheet which has been lashed at an angle to four trees. There is also a case of bottled water. I set down on the sleeping bag.
“No talking,” said Gareth, “and no sleeping until it’s night.” He drops a plastic bag and a box by me and then walks away.
I look in the bag, inside is a huge bag of trail mix and a toilet roll. In the box are three cans of beans and sausages (which I assume I’ll be eating cold), three tins of tuna, a plastic spoon and fork and a bible.
I hear Jacob being moved into his place, which is about fifty yards to my right and then Noah is moved about the same distance away to my left.
So I start reading the bible again and all it does is reaffirm every notion I have that it is a complete waste of time. I’m half way through Ruth when Gareth comes over and tells me to follow him. I spend the next half hour working on the wood pile. To my surprise, Gareth helps and brings the wood over for me to chop and then picks it up for the second cuts. We even have a chat. He tells me he’s at university studying theology and is only here over the summer to make some money. By the end I’m tired and ready to sleep. He doesn't take me back to my camp, not straight away. He takes me to the main hall where Lee is waiting with a set of mechanical hair clippers.
“Sit down on the chair, we’re going to get rid of that bleached hair of yours.”
I think about complaining but I know what will be waiting for me if I do – either a spanking or time in the shed. So I say nothing and sit down. I keep quiet through the entire thing though with every truss of hair I see fall to the floor I get more and more angry. It’s all I can do to contain myself. It takes less than five minutes for him to give me a crew cut. When he shows me what I look like in the mirror I want to punch something. I have a couple of millimetres of hair all over my head. No more bleach blond, it’s back to the black which has grown out since I attacked it with the peroxide.
There is no shower afterwards either and I don’t think there will be until all of this is over. I’m taken back to my camp and left again. I’m hungry so I eat some of the trail mix. Some of the hair has got down my sweatshirt and itches across my shoulders, so I take it off, turn it inside out and flap around to see if that helps, and brush down my shoulders as best I can. Then I think better of putting it back on the right way and put it back on inside out.
I lie back and think about Noah. He stopped me telling him that I loved him and I know it’s because he only wanted to hear it if I meant it. I do mean it. I could think of nothing better than the two of us running away together. I think about the softness and the heat of his body, his breath against my mouth before he kisses me and his hands on my body and I am hard again. I would try to wank off if I felt like I wasn’t going to be disturbed but I don’t know if or when Lee, Gareth or one of the other leaders might make an appearance.
So I lie down. I’m not allowed to sleep but I close my eyes and give myself a virtual tour around the science museum in my head.
I wake up at twilight and feel guilty for going to sleep. I seem to have gotten away with it but I’m sure it would have meant the punishment shed if I hadn’t. I open up a tin of beans and sausages and eat them cold. It’s horrible but I’m so hungry. Then I have some of the trail mix for dessert and wash it all down with about half a bottle of water. A few minutes after I finish I hear Lee’s car driving away.
I want more than anything to get up and see Noah but it’s too much to risk. I feel so lonely without him and Jacob with me. I wonder what it will be like to have to go home and leave them behind. Unbearable I would think. It’s dark now so I settle down for sleep and imagine Noah lying next to me.
A hand is pressed over my mouth and my legs and arms are being held to the ground. I open my eyes. Gareth is kneeling in front of me and the other three group leaders have me pressed down at the limbs. I struggle and scream and try to get away but it’s no good. Tyson has his hand over my mouth to stop the noise. They have me pinned.
“Calm down.” Gareth speaks in a hushed voice. “Just stay calm. I’m going to hurt you for a few seconds but don’t struggle or it will be much worse.” He reaches up my left leg and grips me under my knee. He pushes his thumb into my leg as hard as he can. My body jolts with the pain, my eyes water and I feel like I can’t draw a breath. It’s like someone has kicked me to the bone. As soon as he releases his hand the pain stops.
“Now we’re going to let you go in a moment. If you shout or call out while we’re here, I’m going to put you in so much pain you’ll wish you were dead. Do you understand?”
I nod. My breathing is so fast and it feels like I can’t get enough oxygen in through my nose.
“And if you mention to anyone what happens here I’m going to do the same and it won’t matter, because Lee won’t believe you. Do you understand?”
I nod.
Tyson takes his hand off my mouth. The four of them let me go and sit there watching me.
“What do you want?” I feel like I’m about to cry.
Gareth leans over and brushes my face with his hand. “You got off lightly yesterday with that story you told Lee. I told everyone else here and we all want to see if it’s true. So don’t move.”
“No, don’t!” I put my hand up to try and stop anything he’s about to do.
Gareth clenches his hand into a fist and draws his arm back. “Do you want me to hurt you? I’ll break a rib.”
“No.” I feel tears falling onto my face.
Gareth pulls up my sweatshirt and rubs my belly with his fingertips. The other group leaders start feeling themselves up. I can see their cocks harden through their joggers.
“That’s nice, isn’t it?” says Gareth, “Nice and soft and sexy.”
My insides squirm as he touches me and I feel like I want to be sick.
“Nothing happening,” says Keith.
Gareth pulls down my bottoms.
“Nice,” says Barnabas. “He’s got a big one.”
Gareth laughs. “Uncut, that’s why I like English boys.’ He begins rubbing his hand through my pubes. Then I feel it happening. My cock stiffens against my will. My whole body feels like the epicentre of an earthquake and I hate every one of them but he’s still able to do this too me. Why is he able to do this to me?
“You little liar,” says Gareth. “You’re totally hard.”
Keith pulls down his bottoms and plays with his cock. Then Barnabas and Tyson do the same.
I know I am here but I seem to be moving away from the ground, light and trembling, into the sky away from them as Gareth starts to play with my penis. He pulls the foreskin back, then leans over me and gently licks it. He draws my cock into his mouth and I feel his pike teeth brush my exposed helmet. “You taste sweet. Anyone else want a go?”
I close my eyes and fly further away as they all take turns sucking me. I don’t hear their jeers or their boasts. I see Barnabas rubbing his cock on my belly but I don’t feel any of it. I see Tyson grabbing my arse and pushing his finger around but I can’t feel it.
Keith is still sucking me when Gareth strips off. He stands over my head, a foot either side of me then kneels down, his weight on my chest. His long, circumcised penis looks like some kind of ugly, bald rodent. Right above it is a hideous red blemish. “Open your mouth you little pervert.”
I bite as hard as I can. Nothing is going to get me to do this.
Gareth brushes my cheek with his hand. “Come on, you’ll really enjoy this. I promise.”
I turn my head away from it.
Then he grabs the ridge of my nose between his thumb and finger and presses. It feels l
ike he’s breaking it. So I open my mouth and wish myself away but the best I can do is the dark, the blackness. Something is choking me. I feel myself come, then more dark, more nothing, not even my thoughts.
Then they are off me.
“See,” says Gareth, “that wasn’t so bad. Remember now, not a word.’ He pulls his clothes back on.
I nod.
“Right guys,” says Gareth, “let’s go get laid. See you all back at the fire.”
I hold my sobs in until they have left. I am going to wail. I cover my mouth and curl up into a ball as my diaphragm takes control of me. I can’t stop. Then there is the taste of rancid salt in my mouth. My stomach turns over so I crawl to the toilet area and throw up my beans. Then everything shuts down as barbed pins and poisoned needles run over my arms, legs and back and I feel the chilled air freeze my sweat soaked body. I curl into a ball again. I shake and my body is making me nod forwards and backwards. Everything out of control. I try to search for something in my head and only one thought is there, a warning – Gareth is heading towards Noah.
Chapter Eleven
The first thing I can remember is feeling tired and the pain from the light when I opened my eyes, even in a darkened room. It's only a brief memory, perhaps an amalgamation of many tiny memories, but it's still the first thing I remember.
I don’t remember my parents being at the hospital, though they tell me I remembered them while they were there and forgot them as soon as they left me. My first clear memory with them is of us walking into the new house together.
“We’ve moved away so we can get a fresh start,” said my dad.
And what did I know?
It wasn’t a total memory loss. I left behind places and people, names and even my own history. I didn’t have a history at that point. I didn’t even ask about the friends I might have had and had left behind. It makes sense now that I doubtless would have some, even though I don’t have any at school at the moment. When I think back to it I don’t remember there being get well cards, chocolates or presents from anybody. Maybe I was as weird and un-liked back then. I wouldn’t be surprised.
Everything was fuzzy and it was disconcerting for a while knowing my times tables but not the name of the metal things you use to unlock doors.
I remember being taken to school for my first day and screaming, shaking and fighting to get away, so out of control my parents rushed me back home.
Then, after a month or so I started homeschooling and found that I could read fast, take everything in and remember it. It was as if my mind was being given a chance to catch up on everything I’d lost. I’d go to the library and demolish books. I still do to this day. Even though I’ve learned so much since I still feel the horizon where my old and new life meet. There is a huge black hole, a singularity where my old life exists and I’m not allowed anywhere near it. I wonder if it’s possible to push new memories near this black hole and let gravity suck them it.
I know something has happened to me. I know it is terrible but at the moment I can choose not to remember it. I didn’t see it, not really. I can make it as though this didn’t happen. My body is curled up and sobbing on the floor but my mind is clear. It’s like we’ve split into two separate people. I’m only in control of one now. The other is doing what must be done to for it to survive.
Here with me there is nothing. No emotion – no happiness or sadness there is just this blackness. I feel like my body has become allergic to my mind and now we must live apart for a short while until it stops fighting me. And that’s all this is, an allergic reaction. So I let it have its way, away from me and this dark quiet place.
And then I realise I do know who I am. I am the inside Malachi. I look around in the blackness and I see golden rows of bookcases which float and fly through the air. One stops right in front of me and I pull a tome down and open it.
It's like no book I have ever read. The pages turn by themselves and on each one is written my thoughts and ideas, interspersed by extracts of all the books and poetry I’ve read, all the conversations I’ve had with other people, not arranged in their own order but by theme. I take another book which is arranged in the same way and here, though the text is different, there is repetition of connected ideas and themes. When I look at an individual passage, silver trails form that link to other books on other shelves.
Can I stay here? Do I have to back?
I hear the roaring of flames and look behind me. Right there are thousands more shelves encircled by a wall of flame. I run through the fire and touch the books.
I feel two hands on me and hear Jacob’s voice but I am not there and do not want to go back yet. A light slap of my face and I am breathless, sweating, back in my body. I am on my feet. I don’t remember getting up.
“Malachi, what the hell have they done to you?” Jacob shakes my shoulders. His hair has been shaved now and he looks younger and yet meaner. He pulls my track suit bottoms up but looks down there as he does it and pauses.
“Mal! Mal! Who did it?” Jacob’s eyes are wide and wild.
“Gareth. All of them.” I fall on him and he throws his arms around me.
There is boy standing behind him, about ten years old, black haired and wearing only a white hospital gown. He seems familiar in a strange way, irritating some part of my memory I don’t have access to. I know he’s not there. I know he’s an illusion – a figment of my imagination but he has a real quality, like imagination 2.0, or a dream made solid in real life. He walks towards Noah’s pitch and beckons me to follow him.
I push Jacob away and go after the boy.
Jacob follows me. “Where are you going?”
“Quiet.” I follow the boy. We sneak together through the trees. He leads me right by Noah's pitch, and then disappears.
I can hear Gareth a short distance away. “Here, have a chocolate.”
I hear the sweet being unwrapped.
“This place won’t be so bad,” says Gareth. “I can look after you.”
There is a sharp intake of breath. “I don’t like it when you touch me,” says Noah.
Whatever place I was in I have now returned. I look at Jacob and he looks angry. “What should we do?” I whisper.
“Did you like the whipping Lee gave you?” asks Gareth, “because I can make sure you get one every day or I can make sure it never happens again.”
There is a long silence between Noah and Gareth.
“I don’t know,” whispers Jacob. “I don’t know what to do.”
“There, that’s not so bad is it?” Gareth’s words make me feel ill and can only hear him but in my mind I can see what he's doing to Noah. “I fancied you since I first saw you. Why don’t you take your top off. You don’t need it on.”
I hear the sound of clothing being removed.
“Now open your legs a little.” Gareth’s voice is calm and reassuring. “There – you like that don’t you?”
I move off, quietly and make a beeline for the centre of the camp. I understand now – this is going on all over the camp. Each of the group leaders has picked out their boy for the night and are pressing them into sex. It will be the ones that scare easiest and will be forced into silence. the wimps, the useless ones – like me.
Jacob follows me and when we get to the edge of the trees he puts a hand on my shoulder and holds me back. I start to cry again. I’m trying to hold in what happened to me for now but I don’t know if I can.
“What did they do to you?” He moves to hug me but I shake my finger at him.
“Don’t touch me.”
He looks terrified.
“We have to do something.” As I speak, every word has the edge of the wail I am I trying to keep inside. “Gareth is going to rape Noah. We can’t let him do it.”’
“What can we do?”
’’Fire,” I say, “something with fire.”
There is no one near the buildings or around the fire. I see the punishment shed and that’s all it takes. “Keep watch!”
/> I run to the fire and pull out a log that has been left trailing over the side. Not hot where I’m holding it but aflame at the other side. I place it by the door of the wooden shed and run back into hiding, waiting for the shed to catch but nothing happens, it only smoulders.
“This is gonna take hours to catch,” says Jacob, “and Noah don’t have that much time.”
I look around for any kind of help. Then I see it by the four chairs which have been assembled round the fire, sticking out of one of the leader’s bags – a glass alcohol bottle. I run over and grab it.
“Quickly,” says Jacob.
I run back over to the shed and pull the log away, still alight, then pour some of the whiskey down the door. I put the log back then replace the bottle in the bag and by the time I am back with Jacob the shed is ablaze.
“We have to get out of here.” I grab Jacob.
“Well come on,” Jacob turns, “let’s get back to our pitches.”
“No, I mean away from the camp.”
“If we go now,’ says Jacob they’ll know it was us.” He starts to drag me away but I don’t need that much convincing. We run back to our pitches.
“Trust me,” says Jacob, “I’ll get us out of here. Just sit tight.” He runs into the night.
By the time I am back I can see the flames through the trees. Only a few moments later the shout of fire comes from the buildings. Less than a minute after that I hear Gareth running towards it.
I lie flat on my sleeping bag and pretend I am asleep.
I’m hoping we’ve been able to save Noah. I’m wondering about the boy I saw. The boy I imagined. Every time I think of him I think of the hospital. I think about anything and everything but what those men did to me and then, of course, I think about that too.
I wake up with the taste the sick in my mouth. I rinse out with water and try eating some of the trail mix but I can’t manage very much. When Lee’s car arrives I take the chance that the leaders will have to deal with the fallout from the burned punishment shed and rush over to see Noah.
The Crucifixion and Resurrection of Malachi the Queer Page 11