by Con Riley
“Five years though? Even with shore leave, that’s a long time for newlyweds to be apart.”
“Yeah.” Now that he’d spent time himself so far from family, he could only marvel at that level of determination. “You know what you said earlier, about us not getting a chance to date?”
“Yeah?”
“They didn’t exactly have much of a chance to spend time together either.”
“No?”
“So they wrote to each other instead. Dad sent Mum postcards from every port his ship called into.” Those postcards had dotted the walls of his parents’ bedrooms his entire childhood, slightly faded reminders that their love conquered the distance. “He told her they’d go back to each country one day, travel when they had all the time in the world to explore. He always said that being apart was hard in the early days, but they were still some of the best years of his life until his contract got cut short.”
“Cut short? Was he injured, or something?” Rob took the photo from Jude’s hands, lifting it close as if looking for why his dad’s stint at sea had ended early.
“No, it was because of this guy.” Jude reached for another photo. In this one, the same smiling man stood with his dad in front of a temple topped with a golden Buddha. Both men shared sunburnt noses, the photographer capturing them laughing together. “If you want to know the reason why I could never come out; why I left as soon as I could and why I wanted to win that contest so badly, this picture is the start of that story.”
Rob asked, “Who is he?”
Jude took a deep breath and told him.
10
“He’s called Trevor Mirren,” Jude started. “He signed up at the same time as Dad. They did pretty much everything together even though their roles were very different.” Jude pointed to another photo, this one of a wedding. “Two years into his contract, Dad and Mum got married and Trevor was Dad’s best man. I never actually knew him.”
“Oh.” Rob’s voice was low. “Did he die?”
“I thought so.” Jude added clarification, the confused furrow in Rob’s brow slowly smoothing. “The whole time I was growing up, Dad would always go quiet if anyone asked about these photos, and Mum would change the subject. He’d actually look in pain, so I knew something really bad must have happened to his friend.” Jude watched Rob slide one of the framed photos into a cardboard box, placing it carefully with some others. “You’d think that Dad keeping these up on his wall meant he remembered Trevor fondly, but I guessed pretty soon that wasn’t the case. Not one bit.”
For someone so nosy, Rob was quiet, leaving Jude to fill the silence. He set the Buddha photo aside. “Tell me, what do you know about being gay in the navy?”
“Not much,” Rob admitted. “I know it isn’t against the rules, these days. I don’t know how well that works in practice. I imagine no one’s too interested, as long as you keep things private.”
“That’s for the Royal Navy. The conduct laws for the armed forces started to change in the 1960s and 70s, but do you know when the law finally changed for merchant seamen?”
Rob shook his head.
“2017.”
“You’re kidding me.”
Jude wished he was. An earlier relaxation of the rules might have meant his dad would have been less uptight. “To be honest, I don’t know how strictly the conduct rules were applied over the last few years, but thirty or forty years ago, even a hint of being gay had consequences.”
“Like…?”
“Like Dad losing his job as well as that big end-of-contract bonus he’d banked on to buy this place.” He reached for another photo. Rob caught his arm before he could grasp it.
“Jude? Are you telling me your dad and this guy had a thing together?”
“No.” He shook his head swiftly. “Jesus, no, I absolutely know Dad wouldn’t have done anything like that. Not ever.” His dad’s silence had said a whole lot about his feelings on that subject. Jude tapped on the glass with the tip of a finger. “Only that didn’t matter when this guy was caught in the act.”
“But not with your dad.”
“No.”
“So what did him getting caught with his pants down have to do with your dad losing his job?”
“I never found out, beyond Dad being a witness in whatever the shipboard version of a court-martial was called. I didn’t even know Trevor’s name for the longest time. Dad never called him by name, even though he kept all these photos. If pushed, he said it was just someone he sailed with, but I found out.” He picked up the Buddha photo again and flipped it over to unclip the backing. Beneath a sheet of mounting paper, the back of the photo was transcribed with faint blue biro.
Trevor and me, Phuket.
Jude resisted the urge to trace the words with his finger, wanting to so badly. And wasn’t that the worst about loving a parent who’d hate you, if they found out the truth? Rejection burned like the bile he’d had to swallow daily. “Then I dug around some more.” Jude tilted his head towards a now-empty bookshelf. “Dad had a ton of old stuff to do with his job, paperwork like manifests. There was a Trevor Mirren on every crew list. No one else had the same first name.”
“Why’d you search for that? For his full name? Did you want to meet him?”
“No! I was twelve-years-old and nosy, that’s all, with no access to the internet that Mum didn’t watch over. I was only looking for more photos of him.”
“Why?”
“Because he was the only other real-life person who I knew for sure was gay.” His head dipped. “If Dad was so friendly with him he can’t have known he was gay until Trevor got caught. That meant that Trevor must have been really good at passing for straight.”
“Jude….”
Jude couldn’t keep in his frustration. “I know. It’s stupid, but I was a kid. You wonder why I don’t talk much? What the hell could I say when Dad always clammed up around openly queer customers?”
“He wouldn’t even serve anyone queer?”
“Oh, he’d serve them, but in silence. I ended up thinking it would have been easier if he’d been vocally homophobic. At least you can answer back to that. But I saw him freeze so often if he realised. He couldn’t even make himself meet their eyes, ever.” Witnessing that over and over left a scar that still hurt. “He’d make an excuse and leave someone else to serve them, if he could, like he couldn’t stand to be around them.” The small sound of sympathy Rob let out encouraged Jude to be honest for the first time under this roof. “It messed me up when I first figured out that he’d act that way with me too if he knew.”
“Mate. That would mess anyone up. But…” Rob hesitated. “You have to know that he would have got over it. Lou told me you two were thick as thieves, always going off sailing together. She said he was always taking you two to swimming regattas as well, or getting you both involved in projects at the boatshed. I was lucky if I saw my dad for ten minutes before dinner service, after Mum died.” He pressed his lips together as if damming a lot more he could have added. Then he said more softly, “From everything Lou told me, your dad was so proud of you for blazing a trail to London, and for entering the contest. I’m sure he would have come round. My dad did right away when I told him,” he added with a note of surprise like he’d only just realised that wasn’t always the case.
“All I know for sure is that instead of Dad completing his Merchant Navy contract and coming home with enough cash to put down on this place, he lost everything because of Trevor.”
“Everything? But they did buy this place.”
“Only years later than they planned, and for much more money. He got lower-paid factory work, and Mum worked nights as a nurse. That’s why they didn’t have us until quite a bit later, and it’s the main reason the Anchor is still mortgaged.”
Rob still had hold of his arm, his hand sliding down to meet Jude’s. “I’m guessing that growing up with all that…” he struggled for the right word “…history must have made it hard for you.”
; Jude nodded.
Rob’s fingers wove with his. “So you coming out…?”
This time, Jude shook his head, his voice gritty. “It would have killed him.” He shook his head. “No, that sounds over-dramatic. It would have killed us having any kind of relationship like I grew up having with him.”
“You really were close?”
Jude nodded, managing to say, “He was a good dad.” He pressed his lips together again, afraid that they would tremble. “The best. Apart from this one aspect. It seemed like a small thing to keep to myself, at the start. But every year it got worse.” He tapped directly above the knot inside his chest. “In here.” Then he tapped his temple. “And in here too.” His swallow was a dry click. “I’m not painting a nice picture of him. I love him. Loved him. But growing up here was like asking for daily paper cuts when you already have a thousand. So I stopped wanting to spend time with him in the boatshed, or sail away for weekends with him as we used to when I was younger. Lou went instead of me, for a while, until seasickness stopped her, but her doing that only postponed me wanting to leave for good. I couldn’t see a way to stay here and be me, not without it hurting my family. It would never change. He wouldn’t. So I applied for college in London and cooked my fucking heart out so I wouldn’t ever have to come back.”
“That’s why you entered the contest? You needed the start-up capital for your own place nowhere near here?”
Jude nodded. “Having my own business would lend more weight to me staying in London. Dad could understand that given how important this place was to him and Mum. If I was just an employee instead of a business owner, I might as well do that here instead.”
“But you love it here, Jude. You said it was the best place on the planet.”
“It is.” And he’d seen enough of the world now to stand by that statement. “But I’d have to be someone else here; keep up an act forever.”
“What about your mum?”
That was a final twist of guilt Jude tried to box up, like the rest of the photos he packed in silence.
“Jude.”
He could manage to shake his head, but only slightly. Tears that came from nowhere would fall if he shook his head any harder.
“Hey, come here.”
Rob’s embrace almost loosed a sob that Jude tried hard to swallow, triggered into panic every time he imagined his mum facing a typhoon that she had no skill to sail through.
Rob held him steady. “Jude. I’m so sorry.” His lips brushed Jude’s cheek as he said, “I’ve got to stop saying the wrong thing to you,” in an attempt for lightness while holding Jude securely. “Come on. Sit with me for a minute.” He pulled Jude down as he sat on the desk chair, waiting for Jude to settle on his lap before embracing again, both arms firmly around him. “It might be better if you tell me about whatever it is that just upset you.”
It was hard to know where to start while sitting in a room his dad had saturated with such powerful, unvoiced judgement. If he was alive to see Jude being held like this while on Rob’s lap, he’d…. There was no end to that sentence. Now he’d never get to find out. “Let me up.” He tried to stand, but Rob’s grip on him tightened.
“You’re fine exactly where you are.” He rubbed Jude’s back with one hand, then reached across for the window blind cord with his other. Once the blind dropped, the room took on a private air, and with the rest of the world shut out, sharing was a touch easier.
“It’s my fault,” Jude finally got out.
“What is?” Rob murmured.
Jude drew in a breath so shallow his ribcage barely expanded. “That she’s probably dead.”
“Your mother? Of course it isn’t,” Rob offered reassurance. Jude spoke before he could continue.
“I mentioned that Lou got seasick, didn’t I?”
Rob nodded, silent now.
“Mum wasn’t a good sailor, either. She didn’t get as sick as Lou does, but it was a close thing. Neither of them enjoyed being on the water like me.”
“What’s that got to do with you blaming yourself?”
It wasn’t blame. It was a responsibility he’d accepted the moment he got the news that they were missing.
“I was meant to be the one who went with him to retrace his last voyage as a merchant seaman. He knew those seas were tricky, so he decided to take me instead of Mum to all of the places in those photos. Then he planned to come back for a sedate cruise with her somewhere calmer. All those maps Lou stored in the boatshed? The ones in their bedroom as well?” He waited until Rob nodded. “I grew up with him plotting a course on them that I had no intention of ever sailing. It was bad enough living under the same roof with someone who would never accept me, so I knew that sharing a single cabin for months couldn’t happen.”
“So he took your mum, instead.”
“Because I entered the contest.” The words came out in a rush. “The dates clashed perfectly. I thought it was a godsend, not thinking for a single minute that he’d take her in my place.” His breath hitched, no room under his ribs for air, drowning right there on dry land instead of in the Indian Ocean. “I thought he’d postpone the trip, and I’d have time to think of another reason to stall. He wasn’t ever meant to take her.”
“Hey.” Rob’s hold on him tightened once more. It didn’t do much to soothe Jude; he’d been so complicit.
Somehow, Rob read that thought. “No, Jude. No.” His kiss to Jude’s brow offered forgiveness that wasn’t his to promise. “I’m sure she wouldn’t blame you.”
“I blame myself.”
“I can see that.” Rob’s sigh was so soft, his next kiss catching Jude’s lips chastely until Jude kissed him back; better that than letting out a sob that felt so close to the surface. He closed his eyes, Rob’s hands on his face as their mouths moved against each other, sweet and slow instead of frenzied; soothing until he could breathe again without choking. Rob kissed him one more time before asking, “Does Lou know?”
“About what? That I left home in the first place because I’m gay and couldn’t bear for Dad to find out? Or about me making sure Mum had no choice but to take my place on the One for Luck, despite knowing that she hated sailing?”
“Either?”
Jude shook his head. “I wanted to tell her, only…”
“You should have,” Rob said, gentle.
A voice came from behind them. “Yes.” Louise stood in the doorway, clutching some spare bedding so hard her knuckles were as white as the linen. “Yes, you really should have.”
11
“Lou—” Jude was off Rob’s lap in an instant, but Lou had gone already. By the time he got to the door, there was no sign of her in the hallway. He turned to Rob and shot out a hand, close to losing his balance. Rob was up and across the room in a blink to brace Jude, stopping just before making contact, as if them touching again might worsen the situation.
Jude clutched the door frame instead. What Louise must have seen and heard was bad enough, but what was worse—so much worse—was seeing the same frozen look on her face as he’d seen from his dad. It replayed as his heart at first sank and then pounded before sinking even deeper. The front door slamming broke that cycle, and Jude took off, steps thumping along the landing, thundering down the stairs, sure his grip could take the heavy front door off its hinges rather than let it stop him from getting to her.
Louise was all he had left.
The last survivor of a family lost because of his actions.
He didn’t deserve her.
He stopped, palms spread on the inside of the front door, his forehead landing with a despairing bump against it.
“Don’t come out here, Jude.” Louise’s voice was muffled.
“Lou—”
“I said, don’t.” This time he heard her sob. “Don’t open the door, and don’t say a word.” Her voice hitched. “I heard enough already.”
“Please, Lou—”
“No. I… I can’t talk to you right now.”
Jude cou
ldn’t speak either. There were no words in the world to explain, other than the ones she’d overheard without him knowing. They were his entire truth, and each syllable must have damned him.
Rob was quieter, behind him. “Let her go, Jude.”
Jude’s grip tightened on the new lock that Louise had replaced without him here to help her.
“I mean it,” Rob said. “Let her go.” He raised his voice. “Will you go to Marc’s, Lou?”
“I don’t know.” God, she sounded as lost as Jude felt. “Y-yes,” she decided. “Only he won’t know I’m coming.”
“I’ll ring him for you,” Rob called out. “Let him know you’re on your way and need to stay for the night. Go to his place, and sit tight. We love you,” he added.
Jude heard her whimper, a small sound that slayed him.
“We do,” Rob promised. “Both of us. I should have told you that ages ago. Not about me and Jude; that wasn’t my news to share, but I’ve been honest with you about everything else. We really do both care so much about you.” Rob somehow managed to insert a glimmer of humour into a bleak situation. “I’m going to keep it real, Lou. I fancy the pants off Jude, have done since the first time I saw him, but based on past performance, you’re more likely to stick around for longer.” He paused while there was silence. “You and me, Lou… what we’ve been through together, turning this place inside out to make something new here. I wouldn’t have missed it, even if I’d never met Jude. I wouldn’t have missed it because it meant I got to know you.”
The sound of a choked sob made its way through the door.
“Go and sleep on it, sweetheart.” Rob gripped Jude’s shoulder, hold tightening even as his voice softened. “Sleep on it, and we’ll come and find you tomorrow.” He sounded certain. “That’s when we’ll all start over.”
Jude prayed that Lou would let him.
