Once I was on the train to Farnham, Tristan phoned to see how my evening was panning out. I told him that I was already on the way home, and he asked me why. After standing to check that the seats around me were empty, I explained my horrific visit to Mo’s flat.
“Bike leathers are hot,” was Tristan’s frivolous response. “You should have gone for it.”
“I don’t think he even has a bike.”
“Who cares?” Tristan said. “You need to let yourself live a little.”
“Only I don’t call putting on a set of motorbike leathers in a grubby flat living a little.”
“I do.”
“Well that’s where we differ. I’m not like you.”
“You might be more like me than you realise, if you let yourself go,” Tristan said, sounding vaguely piqued.
“You know what, Tristan?” I said, my angst unexpectedly morphing into anger. “No matter how much I let myself go, I’m never going to be the guy who puts on bike gear for sex, because I’m never going to be a slut.”
“A slut?” Tristan repeated.
“Yes.”
“Like me, presumably?”
“If the cap fits,” I said, wincing at my own harshness.
“Have a nice trip home, Cliff,” Tristan said. And then the line went dead.
I felt bad. Of course I did. But I was in the middle of a drama of my own, and being pushed by Tristan to “loosen up” simply wasn’t the answer. I would, I decided, phone him the next day; I would apologise.
In fact it was Tristan who phoned me the next morning. “I just wanted to check you’re OK,” he said, which under the circumstances, I thought surprisingly selfless of him.
“I suppose I am,” I replied. “I’m not sure why, but the whole thing yesterday has left me feeling miserable. I actually feel a bit depressed to be honest.”
“When you say the thing yesterday, you mean the conversation with me? Or . . .”
“No, the conversation was my fault. I’m sorry about that. But the date, if you can call it that. The whole thing was sad. There’s just no other word for it. Sad.”
“I’ve had a few of those,” Tristan said. “There are some sad people out there, and sometimes you’re going to meet them.”
“And the whole fetish thing. It’s just all a bit pathetic really.”
“One man’s pathetic is another man’s hot.”
“I know. I get that. Honestly I do. And I really am sorry for what I said, you know.”
“It’s fine,” Tristan said. “You’re right in a way. I am a bit of a slut. But that’s how I like it.”
“You know I’m really not,” I told him. “I’ve been thinking about it, and it’s not because I’m uptight. I mean, I may be uptight, but that’s not the reason. I’m really just not built that way.”
“I know. But you don’t have to be,” Tristan said.
“I’m not sure I’m cut out for this at all.”
“Cut out for what?”
“For the whole gay thing.”
“You don’t have to be slutty to be gay, you know.”
I laughed. “Except that you kind of do. Everyone I meet, everyone I talk to online. They all think more like you than me. They’re all into something.”
“Well that’s just the law of probabilities,” Tristan said. “The slutty ones are all online hunting for fresh meat. They’re all hanging out in the bars waiting to pounce. My single girlfriends have exactly the same problem. The slutty guys are the ones you’re going to stumble upon. But there are plenty of nice guys at home watching TV, dreaming of their perfect partner, believe me.”
“Are there?”
“Sure.”
“So how does one go about meeting those guys?” I asked.
“Ah,” Tristan said. “If I knew the answer to that one, I’d be a happy man, wouldn’t I?”
Tristan went on to say that Grindr wasn’t ever going to work for a “wallflower” like myself, and suggested a different website called OKCupid, and after a brief discussion about it with Jenny at my next session, I took the leap and signed up. It was free, after all.
The men on OKCupid did seem to be, by and large, a more relaxed, less frenetic bunch than the men on Grindr. They appeared to be open to wider-ranging, non-sexual discussions and, for the most part, to be looking for actual, old-fashioned dates.
The setup process required the answering of literally hundreds of random questions about tastes in pop music and favourite colours, but it also allowed me to identify as bisexual, which for the moment, at least, struck me as less daunting than having to assume a one hundred per cent gay pigeonhole.
I quickly got chatting to three nice-enough-sounding guys, but before I could even arrange to meet any of them (the closest, Tom, was on the south coast) a far more exciting romantic possibility dropped, almost literally, from the sky.
I was walking back to my car carrying two work suits, freshly retrieved from the dry cleaners, when it happened. As I crossed Castle Street, I walked past a ladder leaning against a tree, and as I glanced up, a man in a red nylon harness dropped quite speedily to the ground, landing less than two yards from me.
He lifted off his safety helmet and unclipped the rope, and then frowned at me, and because I felt that I knew him from somewhere but couldn’t quite work out where, I stopped walking and frowned bemusedly back. And then it came to me. He was Rob, the tree surgeon I had stood up less than two months earlier.
Rob squinted at me, then smiled lopsidedly before asking, “Do I know you from somewhere? I know you from somewhere, right?”
I nodded. “We, um, talked online. A couple of months ago. Rob, right?”
Rob nodded but continued to look confused.
“I stood you up,” I admitted.
Recognition slipped across his face. “Ah! That was you was it? Fred, isn’t it?”
“It’s Cliff actually. I lied about the name as well.”
“Right,” said Rob, his smile fading.
“I tried to apologise, but the system wouldn’t let me send you a message.”
“I probably blocked you.”
“I guessed that. I don’t blame you really.”
“So where you heading with the suits?” he asked, inclining his head to indicate my dry cleaning.
“My car. It’s parked up there.”
“And after?”
“Just home.”
Rob nodded. “You could buy me a pint then,” he said. “That would be a proper apology.”
I swallowed and steeled myself to be brave. “OK then,” I said. “I’ll just dump these in the car.”
When I returned, Rob had finished loading his equipment into his van. “Over there?” he asked, nodding towards the Nelson’s Arms in the distance.
“Sure. Why not?”
“So what happened?” Rob asked as we started to walk. “Why did you leave me sitting there like a lemon?”
“I chickened out, pure and simple. I’m a bit new to all of this.”
“Me too,” Rob said. “But I still don’t stand people up.”
Though not classically good-looking by any stretch of the imagination, there was something very attractive about Rob. From his bandy-legged walk to his calloused hands to the way he fiddled with his beard while we were waiting for our drinks, he oozed manliness, and that was something I realised I found very attractive. It was the same thing that had initially drawn me to go home with Mo, only with Rob, one sensed that it was not theatre, not make believe, but a genuine ruddiness that came from working outdoors all year round.
We took seats in a corner of the bar and sipped our pints. Rob followed each sip of his Guinness with a wipe of his beard on his sleeve.
“It’s nice of you to give me another chance,” I said to fill the silence as much as anything.
“I’m not,” Rob said, grinning cheekily. “I’m just letting you buy me a pint.”
“All the same.”
He shrugged. “Life’s too short to stay angry,”
he said. “And if you fell out with everyone who ever behaved like an arsehole you’d pretty soon fall out with yourself. We’ve all been there.”
I nodded. “I like the attitude. Where’s the accent from?”
“West Country. Yeovil.”
“It’s a good accent. We used to go down that way a lot for holidays.”
“We?”
“With my family,” I said vaguely.
“So what happened that day?” Rob asked. “Did you just fail to achieve lift off from your sofa?”
I shook my head sadly. “I honestly did chicken out. I came to the pub, but then panicked and walked right past.”
Rob smiled. “I saw you then. I was watching out the front window, and I thought I saw you go past. I thought you were just heading to the hole-in-the-wall or something. I assumed you were coming back.”
“I’m sorry.”
“So you keep saying.”
“Well I am. Honestly. You seem nice.”
“You reckon?”
I nodded.
“Nice to talk to, or nice as in cute?”
I coughed. “Um, both,” I said, feeling embarrassed.
“You’re cute too,” Rob said. “I like the whole banker thing you have going there.”
I laughed. “I’m an accountant. I’m on my way home from work. So it’s just standard uniform.”
“Well this is my uniform too,” Rob said, glancing down at himself. He was wearing green combat trousers and a darker green cable-knit jumper.
“It suits you,” I said. “What’s it like being a tree surgeon?”
Rob shrugged. “Pretty OK really. Except when it rains. Which is most of the time in this bloody country.”
“Yeah. That must be tough.”
“I’m joking. I like it. I’m outdoors and it’s low stress. That suits me. What’s it like being an accountant?”
“Boring,” I admitted. “Well-paid but boring. But I like the order. I like the predictability of numbers, I suppose. At this time of year, of course, it’s pretty stressful.”
“Year-end accounts?”
I nodded.
“I have to do mine soon.”
“You’re self-employed then?”
Rob nodded. He had already reached the end of his pint, and I realised that his thigh was now touching mine – an experience it would be impossible to deny that I was enjoying.
“So, another one here?” Rob asked. “Or are you gonna offer me a theoretical coffee at yours?”
I blinked. “Oh,” I said. “Um, yes. Yes, I guess we could do that. I think I have coffee and stuff.”
Rob grinned. “You don’t need actual coffee for a theoretical coffee,” he said. “That’s the point.”
“Oh. Right,” I sputtered.
“Let’s do that then,” he said, standing. “Come on.”
Rob followed me home in his van, and then as soon as we entered the apartment, pushed the flat door closed behind us, grabbed my arm and boldly pulled me in for a kiss. I’d been waiting so long for something like this but was still feeling horribly nervous, so I was relieved that Rob was making the moves. All I had to do was let it happen.
He slid his arms around me and pulled me tight against his chunky frame, and as his beard met my lips, I thought, Oh my god! This is what I need.
That first kiss lasted about a minute, and then we separated and Rob asked, “Do you have any coffee of the non-theoretical kind? Because I’d kind of like one, to tell the truth. It’s been a long day.”
I nodded and broke free. “I do,” I said as I made my way to the kitchen.
Rob followed me and leaned in the doorway, watching me as I switched on the espresso machine. He had a strange expression on his face, half smile, half leer, as though he was feeling particularly pleased with himself right now, and that felt flattering.
Once the coffee was made, we returned to the lounge. “Nice pad,” Rob said, sitting down on the sofa. “You live alone?”
“Most of the time. I have a son. He’s twelve. He stays every other weekend, and occasionally during the week too. He’s at his mother’s today.”
Rob nodded. “That’s cool.”
“And you?”
Rob smiled and shook his head enigmatically. “You couldn’t actually sit any further from me, could you?” he asked, ignoring my question.
“Just nerves,” I said.
“Come here.” He patted the sofa beside him.
I moved to his side, and we drank our coffees before Rob turned and kissed me again and the taste of Guinness was now replaced by that of sugary coffee. He undid my tie and unfastened the buttons of my shirt.
“Very smooth,” he commented before pulling off his own T-shirt and jumper in a single movement to reveal a mass of brown hair. “I hope you don’t have anything against bears,” he said, looking down at his own chest and running his fingers through the hair.
“I don’t think so,” I said, reaching out towards him. “Can I?”
Rob nodded. “Sure. That’s what it’s for.”
My hand hesitated mere millimetres from his chest, because that reaching out to touch, here, now, in daylight, between consenting adults, felt monumental. Absurdly, at forty, I had no idea how I was going to feel about it. Rob took my hand and squashed it against him. “You’ve got great hands,” he said.
“Have I?” I questioned. I had never really thought about them.
“Yes,” he said, removing his hand. I looked at my own hand nestled there and started to move it gently through the forest, and I shivered, because it felt amazing, it felt right, and once I had started there seemed to be no way, no matter how much we undressed, or how much we pressed our bodies together, that I could find a position that yielded sufficient contact between Rob’s hot body and mine.
The whole experience was so warm and sensuous and good-humoured, I really couldn’t have hoped for a better first date. There were no requests to dress up in strange uniforms, and no requirements to do anything that I might have felt to be challenging physically. It didn’t feel slutty; it felt romantic. We just cuddled and kissed, and stroked each other’s bodies until, one after the other, we came.
Once it was done and we had shared a shower, Rob returned to the sofa and beckoned me over once again, whereupon he wrapped his animal-furred arms around me and pulled me down into a horizontal position beside him. “You don’t mind, do you?” he asked.
“Not at all.”
“If I separate too quickly, I end up feeling horrible. You have to give yourself time to come down, I reckon. You have to be gentle with your soul.”
And as he started to doze and then, gently, to snore, it felt so good, so wholesome, that I swear I had to blink back tears.
At seven, Rob awoke with jarring rapidity and declared, “Shit, it’s gone seven. I need to get going.”
I sat up. “Sure,” I said. “Will I see you again?”
“Yes,” Rob said, dressing quickly. “Definitely.”
I found a business card and handed it to him. “My number and my e-mail are on there.”
“Cheers,” he said, stuffing the card into a pocket in his combats.
“Can I have yours?”
Rob smiled. “I’ll call you. Don’t worry,” he said, which I took to be a polite “no”.
He glanced at the clock again, swiped his coat from a chair, and crossed the room to the door. Once he had opened it though, he paused and glanced back at me. “I’m glad we finally met, Cliff,” he said.
“Me too.”
Then the door closed and I didn’t know whether to feel happy that he existed, or sad that he was gone.
I couldn’t stop thinking about Rob after that. Why hadn’t he wanted to give me his number? Did he already have a partner? Would he ever call me again?
I checked my phone and e-mail frenetically, I glanced at trees in case I might catch him hanging in them – I felt nervous and excited and expectant all at once. And I felt vaguely ridiculous because of it, because, surely
, a father, in his forties, should be emotionally more mature than his son.
After a few days, the precise image of Rob I had in my mind’s eye started to fade a little. Though I remembered that I had liked him, though I could still recall the memory of his body pressed against mine, like a blurred, shifting Identikit image, I could no longer picture him. After a week, I stopped thinking about him constantly, and after two, my sense of excitement had been replaced with a kind of grey disappointment that tainted everything around me. Everything felt pointless. I even stopped checking my messages on OKCupid.
And then, one Saturday, I was eating a late breakfast when my phone rang with a hidden number, and, unusually for a weekend, I answered.
“Hey Cliff, it’s Rob,” he said. “How’s tricks?”
“Hang on one tick,” I said, moving to the kitchen – the farthest room from Luke’s bedroom – before I continued the conversation. “Right, that’s better.”
“So how’s things?” Rob asked again.
“Fine. Good. I didn’t think you were ever going to call to be honest.”
“Really? Even though I said I would?”
“It was over three weeks ago.”
“Yes. Sorry about that. I was away. On holiday.”
“Oh. Right. Anywhere nice?”
“Lanzarote.”
“Good?”
“Sunny. That’s all I wanted, so, yeah.”
I wanted to admonish him for not telling me he was going away, for not warning me to expect such a long wait, but I restrained myself, because above all, at the sound of his voice, I simply wanted to see him again.
“So are you free this afternoon?” Rob asked.
“My son’s here,” I said, glancing out through the kitchen doorway in case Luke had unexpectedly surfaced – which at nine a.m. was unlikely to say the least.
“Oh. OK.”
“His mate’s coming round later, so I could probably get away for an hour or so. I could come to yours.”
“Nah, that’s not gonna work for me,” Rob replied.
“I could meet you outside somewhere. A pub. A park . . .”
“Not really what I had in mind.”
“I know,” I said despondently.
Rob sighed. I heard his breath hit the mouthpiece. “But I guess a walk in the park never did anyone any harm.”
Other Halves Page 17