Kicking Up My Heels...in Heels

by Liam Livings

I arrived home, having thought about all the things I needed to do after talking to Daisy and Ian, and came crashing back to earth with a bang, remembering tomorrow was the day of our appointment at the family planning clinic.

  Chapter Thirteen

  AS I WALKED through the door, I told Mum I had to make a few calls and would help with dinner in a while, if that was all right.

  She turned from where she was kneeling in front of the oven, giving it a good going over with elbow grease and an aerosol of acrid smelling foam, and said, “Good day, love?”

  I paused at the bottom of the stairs. “Very good. Lots to do. Be down in a bit.” In my room I called Bruce’s mobile to thank him for putting me in touch with Daisy and Ian and started blurting out all the great advice they’d given me, reading from my notebook. “They both sent their love and said you’re due round theirs.”

  “I am. I’ve been meaning to see them for ages, never seemed to get round to it.” He paused. “Still, that’s life, sometimes it gets in the way of making other plans, or whatever that Lennon quote is.”

  Exactly like how I hadn’t met Tony’s bastard boyfriend, I thought wistfully. I told him they wanted to see me perform, and the sheer undiluted terror it had struck to my core. And how, now I had the Plan, I had found myself reflecting, thinking about Dad, and how he’d disapproved of all this, and yet for some weird reason I couldn’t work out, I was sad. Hurt that Dad couldn’t see me doing this, making a go of it, doing it like a professional, just like he’d done with his consultancy business too.

  “He’ll always be your dad. Can’t change that.”

  “I know that. But why, after he treated me so badly, am I missing him? Why do I have this image of him like that friendly old man in the Christmas toffees advert, with me sitting on his knee, as he tells me what he’s been up to and asks what I’d like for Christmas? What the fuck is that all about, eh?”

  “You wanting to impress him, to please him is pretty normal. You’ve got two parents, so you’ll want approval and love from them both.”

  “That’s just it, he doesn’t love me. He can’t, or he wouldn’t have buggered off. I don’t know. Why am I trying to impress Daddy Do Nothing, when he’s done nothing to help me, when he’s not seen one part of what I’ve done?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “No, it wasn’t a question to answer; it was me thinking it out loud. I’ve heard nothing from Daddy Do Nothing, and I’m not waiting anymore to hear from him. Because, let’s face it, if he was going to get in touch, he’d have done it by now, through Mum, or something. So, he doesn’t deserve to see all this. He’s not part of it, not like Mum is, and you are, and Daisy and Ian are. Who needs Daddy Do Nothing when I’ve got a whole load of others who’ve helped me so much, I can’t believe it?” I took a breath, wiped a tear that had, for some strange reason appeared in my eye, sat up straight. “I’m not thinking about him; I’m not worrying about him. I’m going to spend time on the people who are here, who have helped. Do you think I should send flowers, or chocolates, or something to Daisy and Ian, or too much, do you think?”

  “I’ve never heard anyone being offended by someone sending them flowers or chocolate as a thank you. I think that’d be nice. You’re a good lad, Kev. Your mum’s done well. I’ll tell her if I ever get to meet her.”

  “I do try when I’m not fucking things up in a fantastically artistic way.” I thought back to the gay Hell’s Angel and his tickly beard and smiled at myself.

  “That’s all we can ever do, love, try our best. Which reminds me, I wanted to talk to you about something. You all right to talk now?”

  “For a bit, yes. Is this about the different group for twenty plus? I’ve lost the flyer you gave me about it; I meant to look at it after we last spoke, but…”

  “Doesn’t matter. It’s related to that, but not that…”

  Chapter Fourteen

  AT THE ALLOTTED time, far too early in the morning as far as I was concerned, I collected Tony from his to take him to the family planning clinic.

  He sat by the door, his face as green as a green sheet, all of his fringe covering his eyes, slowly tearing a piece of toilet roll into tiny pieces.

  I leant down to his eye level. “Look, you need to keep it together all right? Or someone’s going to think something’s up, and we don’t want that yet, do we?”

  He shook his head slowly as two fat tears appeared and rolled down his Kermit-the-frog-green cheeks.

  “You eaten?”

  He shook his head again. Still not pushing his fringe from his eyes.

  “Take a deep breath and keep a lid on it, all right?” I wiped his face with some tissue from his lap, picked him by the arm and led him into my car, slamming the door.

  As I walked round to the driver’s side Tony’s mum appeared at the front door, all green kaftan, feathery necklace and wild hair all over the place. She held her hands up for me as if she wanted a hug and started to walk to Tony, sitting in the car.

  I intercepted her, halfway to her target, gave her a hug, nearly knocked myself out with the smell of lavender and “all-natural so it doesn’t really work” deodorant. “We can’t hang about, I’m afraid we’re on the clock.” I looked at my watch, with a smile back at her.

  “He’s been in and out that lavatory all morning. Hasn’t eaten a thing for the past few days. And have you seen his face? What is wrong with him? You must know. Come on, tell me, I simply must know. I’m his mother. A mother must know.

  Not everything though. “He split up with his boyfriend. It’s really hit him hard. He thought he was—” I paused for dramatic effect, clutching my hands to my chest. “—The One.”

  “He mentioned they’d split up, but really, after a few months? He’s normally over it and under the next man within a matter of moments. Why the big drama this time?”

  “Who knows how someone else’s heart works.” I had no idea where that had come from. I must have been channelling my inner chakra, or standing on some sort of chi line, or something, but was relieved it had made her stop talking.

  She held her hands over her heart, then opened her palms upwards, blowing to Tony, sat in my car, not paying a blind bit of attention to anything. “Where you off to now?”

  “I’ve got a dose of something, itching down below”—I pointed to my groin—“so he’s coming along. Moral support.”

  “You can get the most marvellous creams and ointments nowadays. I always swear by Knux Vom and arnica, the homoeopathic remedies are so marvellous these days.”

  I smiled, walking backwards towards the car. “He’ll be back before you’ve missed him. And I’ll give him a good kick up the backside, tell him to build a bridge and get over the ex. Or something.” I waved, as I got to the car door.

  As we pulled away from Tony’s house, I realised he hadn’t put his seat belt on. I leant across him, buckled him up and asked him what he thought he was playing at.

  “What’s the point? I’m gonna die anyway. If it is…” Another big tear splashed down his cheek. He didn’t wipe it, he kept shredding the tissues with his hands, in small jerky movements all the time.

  I pushed his fringe back, out of his eyes, tucking it as best I could behind his ear. “None of that talk. I told her it was me with a dose. Always base a lie on an element of truth. Good advice that was.”

  Silence. No, who from, that’s an interesting piece of advice? Nothing. His fringe unfolded and gradually covered his eyes again. He didn’t push it back. He sat with the hair covering his eyes.

  “Yes, it was Mum who told me that. I know, I was surprised too, her with the God’s honest truth running through her like a name through a stick of rock—and she’s telling me how to lie. Would you Adam and Eve it?” I rolled my eyes, turning to my left to see if Tony had cracked even a hint of a smile.

  Nothing.

  I squeezed his leg. “It’s gonna be all right. Whatever they say. It’s gonna be all right, and we’ll work it out together. Remember, I am not going a
nywhere.”

  I’d heard stories at Out! of guys whose entire friendship circle had disappeared like a sandcastle when the tide came in, once they told one friend they were HIV positive. Friends they’d known most of their adult life, friends who’d gone to uni with them. Friends some of them had known from primary school. Gay friends, straight friends, men, women, black, yellow, and green people, this prejudice hadn’t seemed to discriminate. It swept through them and left these lads totally alone and having to rebuild a friendship circle while getting used to new medication, regular appointments to a clinic, counselling, never mind telling their family too. The common phrase I’d heard through it all was people deserved what they got, if they’d been stupid, hadn’t looked after themselves.

  Do you tell a motorcyclist they deserve to be in a crash and have their leg amputated, simply for being on a motorcycle? What about people who smoke all their lives and die of lung cancer—there’s always a lot of head tilting and isn’t it sad, and they battled to the end. No accusations, or folded arms about them deserving it. So why was this different? Bruce, in his almost unending wisdom about this sort of thing, hadn’t been able to answer that question, so what hope did I have?

  But I knew what I could do for Tony, no matter what the result, was to stay with him, to stand next to him, while others would inevitably drift away. And that was my promise to him, and his to me—years ago when we’d first found out about all that, at a youth group, with Bruce explaining about condoms and stuff.

  So now, as I drove him to the family planning clinic, I knew as surely as I’d known anything in my life, I would stick by him, even if he came unravelled and fell apart as he was clearly doing now in front of my eyes. Because that’s what friends do for one another.

  On the walk from the car to the clinic, I asked what he’d told work.

  “Doctors appointment. Said I’d be in later.”

  “We’ll see. When was the last time you were off sick?” I held the door for him, gently pushing him through it, my hand in the small of his back.

  “Never.”

  I gave our names to the receptionist. She showed us to the seating area of plastic school seats arranged in rows. There were teenaged couples of men who’d not yet started shaving and women who only looked just old enough to have breasts never mind be pregnant, some crying quietly, others sat about, while a young man rubbed a young woman’s back as she sat back rubbing her swollen baby belly.

  I sat Tony in a corner as far away from people as possible, then walked to a plastic display of leaflets about sexually transmitted diseases and information about babies. Maybe not. I rifled through a pile of magazines and almost leapt for joy at an old Hello! magazine from a few months ago with the latest celebrity gossip and news. Tony normally enjoyed a bit of a Hello! bitch, so hoped now it would help pass the time. I sat next to him, opened the magazine and said, “Look who’s just had a new nose? Would you believe it? And that one’s remarried again. It’s like a merry-go-round in that house. Out the door with one husband, in the door with a new one.” I turned the page. “And what does she think that dress is doing for her?”

  Tony leant forward, his fringe still covering his eyes.

  I squeezed closer to him, pushed his fringe out of his eyes, gently kissed his cheek, whispering in his ear, “Come on, have a look” and pointed to the person in the magazine again.

  Someone at the other side of the room tutted loudly, I assumed at the two men who were touching one another in public. Didn’t they know this was an emergency? I had to use all my skills and patience to get back to the core of the Tony I knew and loved, and if that meant touching him, then so be it. My flag waving, banner gay came rushing to the surface.

  Another tut and I threw the magazine down, swept over the other side of the room.

  The offended person, a teenaged boy, was reading a magazine. “What you want?”

  “Can I help you?” I put my hands on my hips, instantly regretting not dressing today for all the extra I am Kev hear me roar it would have given me, but there hadn’t been time, what with making sure Tony was ready.

  “Do you have to do that in here?” said the spotty teenaged boy, holding his girlfriend’s hand.

  I blinked, remembered Daisy and Ian’s advice, took my banner gay indignance down a few notches then said, “What exactly do you mean?”

  “Kissing an’ that. Makes me feel sick. She’s pregnant, feels sick anyway.” He nodded at his girlfriend.

  “I kissed him on the cheek. I didn’t suck his face off. My friend isn’t well. He’s not been well for a while. I was trying to make him smile, make him laugh with one of the magazines he normally enjoys. Only, today he’s not himself. So, on a day like this, when everything’s pretty shit, to be honest, is it so bad I try to make him smile? You two are here cos she’s pregnant I suppose.”

  They both nodded.

  “In case you’ve not worked it out, neither of us is pregnant. We’re here for another reason. So if I need to kiss him on the cheek and push his fringe out of his eyes, to make him smile, I do hope that’s all right with you. On this shitty day.” I stared down at them, my hands still on my hips.

  I felt a hand on my arm. Tony led me away. “All right, enough of that for today. Save your energy for later. We’re gonna both need it.” He led me by the arm back to our seats, pushing his fringe out of his eyes that showed the slightest merest suggestion of a smile. Not on his lips, but his eyes.

  My heart leapt for joy at this microscopic improvement in Tony’s behaviour as we sat in our seats, his hand still clutching mine, squeezing it every now and again. The tissues were no longer in his lap.

  A WHILE LATER a black female nurse with a shaved head and smiley eyes shouted Tony’s name.

  I stood, lifting Tony by the arm at the same time.

  “Are you two together?” she asked, checking her clipboard.

  “Not together-together. But we’re going in together-together, now.”

  She smiled, said that was fine with her and led us to the consulting room where, once she’d shut the door, she asked Tony about why he wanted the test.

  After giving her some personal details, and she reassured him it wouldn’t go anywhere near his family doctor, or his parents, or anyone else, Tony explained what had happened with his ex-boyfriend.

  She wrote some things on her papers where she’d put his personal details. “Do you know how many other sexual partners your boyfriend had while you were in a relationship with him?”

  “Ex-boyfriend,” Tony said, spitting the ex out like a piece of gristle from a steak.

  “Sorry, ex-boyfriend.”

  “More than one, but less than twenty…” Tony pulled a frayed tissue from his pocket, scattering pieces all over the floor and wiped his eyes.

  She handed him a box of tissues. “I know it’s difficult, but it is helpful if we go through this. It’s about the likely risk factors.” She paused. “All right to continue?”

  Tony cried when he told her how long he’d been with the ex before they had stopped using condoms. Saying a few weeks, now, in the cold light of the consulting room, sounded pretty short. “He said he loved me. He said it would be all right, once we were tested.”

  She clarified he’d had a test before, but when he explained he’d used a false name, she gave up trying to find that record.

  Then she took a blood sample from Tony. She first put a strap round his arm, found a vein, then using a needle and plastic cone-shaped device, bled him into a test tube.

  I thought I was going to pass out. But Tony seemed OK. Well, he wasn’t saying anything and wasn’t looking, but he didn’t look as green as he’d done earlier that morning.

  She went through the same questions with me, and I explained I was single at the moment and had always been careful, with a smile.

  Tony said, “Except that time…”

  “Ssshhh.” I swatted Tony away and smiled back at the nurse. “That’s me, single old Kev. I’m off men. I’m listenin
g to my karma. It’s sending me terrible boyfriends, so I’m not taking any more.”

  The nurse looked up from her notes. “Is there something else I should know?”

  “It’s nothing. I’m really here for him. I’m just along for the ride. But Bruce said…”

  “Bruce, who runs the LGBT youth group?”

  “Yes, him. He said it’s good to get tested every year, like you take your car in for an MOT and service. So here I am, have a look under my bonnet and I’ll be good for another year.”

  “He’s right.” She rolled the pen through her hands. “Nothing else to tell me?”

  I shook my head, lips pursed together. I couldn’t tell her, because if I did, then it would have made it real, what I’d done all that time ago, when I could have gone somewhere but instead, I’d ignored it, left it unchecked. So, telling her now, I couldn’t bear it. Besides, if anything was wrong, I’d have had a cold or felt fluey or sick, wouldn’t I?

  “I’ll put no known risks.” She ticked a box, and we moved on.

  After she’d filled our test tubes, she explained how the test worked, that it’d test for the HIV antibodies and we’d get the results in a week or so as it had to be sent off to another lab as they couldn’t do that test there yet. Someone would call us and ask us to come in or tell us over the phone, depending on the results. She handed us a leaflet about HIV and explained there were services we could access to support us, if needed—counselling, a clinic for regular blood tests to check our T-cell count, collect and change our medication, all sorts.

  It sounded marvellous, if only it weren’t about what it was about. “T-cells? What’s that?”

  “It’s the cells your body has to fight diseases. The more, the better. I can explain if you want, but you both seem a bit done in. It can seem like information overload, so it’s probably best if you read it in the leaflet. If you need to.”

  “So now we wait,” I said, keen to draw this to a close.

  “That’s it.” She led us to the door with a smile. The harsh strip lighting in the consulting room shone off her shiny head.