The only experience John had with such things was Gary, and how he had gradually come out. ‘I think I might be…’ when asked if he was gay as if it was a crime not to be admitted. The gradual understanding of one’s self and the offered trust of others were a path through the foothills towards a forbidding summit. The slow process of acceptance sometimes needed a helping hand, a leg-up onto a smooth boulder with few fingerholds, and Gary had found it in John. It worked both ways, however, and Gary had been there to belay John as he traversed between letting go of the past and moving on.
Whereas Gary had been uncertain, Serge had been the opposite, and as Casper folded Liam’s damp clothes, John remembered his opening line when they met.
‘Hi, man. I’m Serge. I’m going to summit Everest. I’ve done Annapurna, I’m nineteen, and I’m gay. Are those Grivel G10s?’
It had been a lot to take in, leaping from summitting to crampons via an admission of sexuality, and to a stranger at that, but John had fallen in love with him on the spot.
Thanks to Gary, he was able to smile at the memory, and as he conceded to Casper’s wishes, he made one of his own. That the two boys would find the courage to admit to each other what was causing them so much confusion. Whether it was the end of a friendship, the continuation of one, or the start of something deeper, was their affair. What niggled John was that even these days, men were conditioned not to address their feelings.
These days? How old was he?
‘What are you chuckling at,’ Casper asked, rolling the mats.
‘Sorry.’ John hadn’t realised he’d been laughing. ‘Old age. Right, young man, we’re just about ready. Bring your things outside, I’ll radio in, and we’ll strike camp.’
‘Have they set off yet?’
‘Yes.’
‘What time will they get here?’
‘About an hour.’
‘Can we go up and meet them?’
‘No. For fuck’s sake, Liam. You’re like a puppy what’s been given a home.’
‘Sorry.’
Liam had been on edge since he woke tangled in blankets on the sofa. Gary had tried to calm him, but found it nigh on impossible. He didn’t want to sound off at the guy, he understood why he was worried, but now Liam was recovered, he had more energy than Gary could cope with.
‘They won’t be long now,’ he said. ‘The weather’s reasonable, and John knows what he’s doing.’
The front shutters had been open a while, letting in the uninspiring November light, and the house had chilled. Gary stoked the fire, turned up the thermostat on the central heating and closed the shutters. John had reported that Casper’s condition was fair, and he was able to walk himself off the hill, but they would both welcome a warm house and a decent meal.
‘Want to help in the kitchen?’ Gary asked.
Liam had been sitting on the sofa, clamping his hands beneath his legs as if to restrain himself, and he leapt to his feet at the offer.
‘What do you want me to do?’
Calm down and stop behaving like a child, was what Gary wanted to say, but instead, he suggested Liam peel potatoes while he fried mincemeat.
‘I’m not good at cakes,’ Gary said. ‘Otherwise, I’d make you one for your birthday.’
‘Oh, thanks for the thought, but Cass isn’t too keen on cakes. Says he gets fed too many of them when he visits his Greek family.’
‘It would be for you.’
‘Yeah, whatever. Have you been to Greece?’
‘Mate, John doesn’t let me further than this kitchen.’
‘Really?’
‘No, it was a joke.’
Liam stared blankly.
‘Or maybe it wasn’t.’ Sighing, Gary lit the gas. ‘No, I’ve not been to Greece, but we’re thinking of Italy next year. Maybe Switzerland for some higher peaks. We’ve been to the Lakes, of course, and John’s been everywhere there’s a summit over six thousand meters, or wherever his work takes him. What about you?’
‘I did an eighty-foot wall in Wales,’ Liam replied. ‘But it’s the abseiling that gets me. Casper doesn’t like that much either. In fact, we usually walk down after a high climb.’
Gary wasn’t sure if the guy was trying to impress, or just wanted another excuse to talk about Casper. Probably the latter, he’d done little else since he had been in the house.
‘Abseiling’s a necessary evil,’ Gary said. ‘But as long as you’re properly roped and everything is double-checked, nothing can go wrong.’
‘It’s that moment you go over the edge, though,’ Liam continued unabated. ‘You know, when there’s nothing between you and a fall apart from some nylon and a couple of knots.’
‘When you’ve slipped at four hundred feet and find yourself hanging, you realise how safe you are,’ Gary said, remembering the first time it happened to him. ‘You just have to trust the person at the other end.’
‘Cass fell once when I was belaying,’ Liam enthused. ‘But I held him.’
‘Good for you, mate.’
The talk of Casper was tiring, and Gary had to find a way to shut him up.
‘Have you told him?’ he asked, adding oil to a pan.
‘He knows. He was right there.’
‘Have you told him you’re in love with him?’
That did the trick, and Liam was silent for a whole minute while Gary fried onions in delicious silence.
‘How can I be sure?’
When Gary glanced across, Liam had one eye shut, and his face was crumpled as if he had asked a question to which he didn’t want to hear the answer.
‘Oh, you are,’ Gary said. ‘Believe me.’
The face straightened. ‘Oh, shit. But, yeah… Well… Maybe, but I can’t tell him.’
‘Because he’s straight?’
‘And it would put him off me.’
‘But at least you would have said it. You’d feel better.’
‘I wouldn’t. People would find out.’
‘Fuck what other people think. Casper would find out if he doesn’t know already, and maybe he would be flattered.’
‘Don’t think so.’
Gary was fighting a losing battle. ‘Okay. Whatever you say.’ The subject still needed killing, and he pointed his spatula to the potatoes. ‘Cut them small so they cook quicker.’
‘Okay. When did you tell John you loved him?’
The subject refused to die, and Gary gave in.
‘I knew long before I said the words aloud,’ he admitted. ‘Like you, it was new to me. I was a couple of years older than you, but no way as good with words. I knew I was gay from when I was about fifteen, but that’s not the kind of thing you talk about in Inglestone. When I met John, and he invited me to live up here, it was easier, being away from people, feeling safer…’
Liam was watching him, waiting for an answer, and hoping for a quick fix, as if Gary was an instruction manual.
‘There’s no easy way to say it,’ Gary continued. ‘No matter what you feel inside, the first time you admit to another guy that you fancy him, let alone love him, it’s… Well, it’s like you and your abseiling. You’re putting yourself over the edge of a cliff with only a nylon rope to hold you. But, if you’re well anchored, and the rope is properly tied, you’ve got nowt to worry about.’ It was the only analogy Gary could think of, and being rather pleased with it, he expanded the idea. ‘The rope is your friendship with Casper, right? But the fixings are your self-confidence.’ That sounded like a step too far, and he asked himself what crass film he had lifted it from.
Liam, on the other hand, beamed open-eyed at the image. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘That makes sense, but what if the rope breaks?’
‘Unlikely,’ Gary said, attending to the saucepan. ‘The rope, your friendship, will al
ways exist like anything made of nylon will always exist. If your admission breaks the friendship, you’ll still have the pieces to work with. The important thing is to make sure your knots are solid, and you’re sure you can cope with the descent. Whether the rope holds or breaks, your knots must stay secure. Got it?’
‘I think so.’
Gary wasn’t so sure he understood it himself. It sounded like John talking, but that was good enough for him. ‘To answer your question,’ he said, stabbing at the block of mince. ‘I told John the night we first made love, which was a couple of days after he saved my life and, coincidentally, on my twentieth birthday. Now, drop those potatoes in the pot, and bung the peel in the bin. Quietly.’
John was relieved to find the gully passable, and there was no need to veer from his intended path or attempt the boulder traverse. By the time they arrived there, neither would have worried him. Once they were free of the tent and Casper was outside, he had become a different person. The afternoon air invigorated him, and he showed no signs of fatigue as they rock-hopped the water channel and followed the path to the zigzags. Home now less than an hour away, the weather was holding, and the rescue had become a pleasant, wintery walk.
Casper’s comfortable conversation had a lot to do with that.
‘Tell me more,’ John said as they walked the winding path side by side.
‘There’s a minimum nine months in the army,’ Casper replied. ‘It’s twelve for the navy, but I’m not interested in a career, so I intend to get in and get out as fast as possible. The basic training’s followed by some specialisation, I think, but I’ll just do whatever gets thrown at me and get it over with.
‘And after?’
‘Probably go to Rhodes, stay with the family, find a job, do the Greek thing.’
‘University?’
‘If I can. But there’s not a lot of work at the end of it, and most young Greeks end up living abroad.’
‘But you could come back? You’ve got dual citizenship, right?’
‘I have, but my mother would need me to be close, and she wants to return to Greece. There’s nothing for her here.’
‘She never remarried?’
‘No. The family didn’t approve of my dad. A Greek woman marrying a Brit she met while he was on holiday isn’t the done thing in our village, nor in many places. It’s usually the other way ‘round, and even then, marriages tend to fail.’
‘Holiday romances and all that?’
‘Exactly.’
They walked on, the subject matter changing with the terrain, until, almost before John realised, they had crossed four of the six streams. Casper was forthcoming and spoke openly on any matter John put forward. Keeping a conversation going while they made the descent was a technical way of assessing his fitness, but the more they walked, the more John found himself interested in what Casper had to say rather than how he coped with the exertion. The lad was intelligent and made pleasant conversation that suggested he was older than his eighteen years. John had stopped thinking of him as a lad in need of rescue and saw him as a young man whose company he enjoyed.
‘You mentioned a husband,’ Casper said, taking John by surprise.
‘I did. Gary. You’ll meet him soon. How’s your rucksack?’
John wasn’t trying to change the subject. He was keen to turn the conversation to the Liam and Casper saga, but they were approaching a ditch which required a ramble, and he needed to check the weight was evenly distributed.
‘Fine,’ Casper said. ‘Can hardly feel it.’
Taking a moment to check so Casper wasn’t caught off balance and finding everything in order, John led the way through the gully, arriving on flatter ground a few minutes later. The sky had cleared, leaving behind air as brittle as thin ice and just as cold. Casper’s nose was red-tipped, but his hat was over the tops of his ears, and his lips weren’t chapped.
‘Warm enough?’ John asked.
‘Yes, thanks. How are you coping?’
‘Cheeky.’
Casper smiled a broad, tooth-loaded grin. ‘Sorry. Yeah, I’m enjoying this.’
‘Feet?’
‘Still no toes, but nothing’s swelling. Apart from that, my circulation is working normally, cognitive function fine, I’m not tired…’ Pulling back his glove, he pinched his skin and showed his wrist. ‘No changes in skin colour. All good, thanks.’
‘Now you really are taking the piss.’
‘O-Level biology,’ Casper said. ‘And Mr Mazur’s first aid classes before the Welsh trip. But I wanted to know more about your husband.’
‘The idea of two guys being married doesn’t upset your Orthodox sensibilities?’ John asked, probing Casper as much as he would any man his own age.
‘Christ, I hate church,’ Casper sighed. ‘It’s so hypocritical. All smells, bells and high-heeled shoes. My mum dresses for it like she’s going to the theatre, which, I suppose, is what it is as that’s where religion came from, but for me? Not into it.’
‘And Liam being gay…?’
Casper shrugged and concentrated on his footfall. ‘I think I’ve always known,’ he said.
‘So what’s the problem?’
‘Problem?’
‘Tell me if I’m going too far—and watch where you tread here, this stream’s always the worst—but Gary told me that your reaction to Liam coming out wasn’t exactly supportive.’
‘It was… confusing,’ Casper said, slipping on a loose rock, but remaining upright.
‘If you already suspected, what was the problem?’
Casper sighed and threw John a glance. Whatever he was about to say, he changed his mind and watched his feet.
‘You can trust me,’ John said. ‘If there’s something you want to know, now’s the time to ask. Before we get home to our men.’
Another glance from Casper told John the youth had been steered along a path he was reluctant to take.
‘Our men?’
‘It was just a guess. Was I wrong?’
They had crossed the stream and climbed to higher ground where they stood, resting and taking in the view. The landscape was laid out like a winter postcard with the grey smudge of Inglestone in the distance, the moor sloping up gracefully to greet them, and overhead, a silent sky of faint blue pierced by an impotent sun. In the middle distance, smoke rose from Barrenmoor Cottage, and between it and where they stood was one more stream and an easy path.
‘Your resilience is impressive,’ John said when Casper didn’t reply.
‘Hm,’ the younger guy grunted. ‘I can’t help thinking you are referring to my lack of communication.’
John was, but he said nothing.
Casper let out a sigh as long and frustrated as a man who knew when he was beaten, and his breath clouded ahead before evaporating.
‘No,’ he said, not daring to look at John. ‘You were not wrong. What I need to say to Lee goes beyond what I can express verbally. I wrote it down, intending to hand it to him on his birthday. A coward’s move, but the best I could do.’
‘It’s his birthday today, isn’t it?’
‘It is, but the letter is in my rucksack.’
‘Ah. And, as it’s unlikely we’ll get that back today if at all, you are left with two options. Tell him to his face, or not tell him at all.’
‘I know.’
‘I won’t ask what was in it,’ John said, suspecting it was bad news for Liam. ‘But you are not a coward, Casper, and to not tell him would be letting yourself down.’
‘I know that too,’ Casper sighed, this time with an air of finality. ‘We have an expression in Greek, Kano mavra matia. Making black eyes.’
When he said no more, John asked him to explain.
‘Kano mavra matia.’ Casper hoisted his rucksack to a mor
e comfortable position, ready to continue the walk. ‘You say it when you’re missing someone really badly.’ Looking at John, his eyes weren’t black, but they were sad and helpless. ‘I’ve been making black eyes since yesterday. How am I going to cope when I’m in the army, let alone after?’
John understood. ‘And this is why you haven’t told him? Because what’s the point of starting something if you’re only going to move abroad?’
Casper nodded.
‘But it’s only for a few months. You can come back.’
‘No. I’m expected to stay there.’
‘Ha!’ John said and set off. ‘I was once expected to be part of an Everest summit team.’
‘Really? Wow. And?’
‘Turned them down. Keep up. Not far now.’
‘Turned it down?’ Casper trotted up beside him and fell in step. Assuming the difficult conversation was over, his mood lightened. ‘Why?’
‘Because Gary asked me to marry him. Upset my old team a bit, but they got over it and summited the next season without me. Life goes on. Here we are, one more stream and it’s the home straight.’
‘So you think I should tell him, even though I’ll be going next summer?’
‘At least you’ll have those few months,’ John said. ‘Time is one thing no-one should waste. Just think about what’s right for you.’ Expecting at least a thank you, he suddenly realised he was alone, and turning back, found Casper on his hands and knees, his mouth open and his face white.
The radio clicked into life just as Gary had finished putting the cottage pie together, and Liam was washing the utensils. Unclipping the receiver from his belt, he raised his eyebrows to Liam with a smile and leant casually on the worktop.
The Students of Barrenmoor Ridge Page 19