Geoff Ryman - Lust Or No Harm Done

And his father walks out of the bedroom. His father has dressed now, and he looks at Michael with hatred and disgust.

'Don't look at me like that!' Michael wails.

His father has come to do something else. He walks into Michael's room. Michael trails after him.

'What is this?' His father holds up a book of Alice in Wonderland, and throws it down.

'What's this? Batman. A guy in leotards. What have you brought in my house? Huh? You fucking fruit! Were you looking at me? Were you looking at me in the showers? Huh. Huh? Were you looking at my men? Did you come every day into the changing room just to watch the men?'

It's going to start again, his father's hand jabbing into him.

'I did it to be with you.'

His father stops. There is almost sympathy in his face. Now the anger has somewhere to go. His gaze lights on the records.

'What is this? Huh? Fuckin' Cinderella. You're the fucking Cinderella. Fucking Cinderella.' And Dad works the album back and forth, cardboard crinkling until the album snaps.

'Dad, don't,' says Michael, but what he means is don't be this angry, don't break us.

'What's this? And this? All this faggot stuff.' He starts flinging books and records to the ground.

'Dad, stop.' Dad has hold of a book and he is tearing its binding down the middle and he's throwing the pages at Michael. He suddenly wipes all the books off the shelf, and he throws the stereo at the wall and it cracks with the sound of plastic breaking. He shoves the TV to the floor. Miraculously, only some knobs are broken off.

'You get all this stuff out of my house! I don't care where. It just goes!'

His father storms out of the room.

Michael goes quiet. Well, Michael. This is what it is. He didn't love you that way and now he doesn't love you at all.

He knows what you are, that's why. He never would have loved you, the second he found out that you're gay. It never would have been any kind of love as soon as he knew who you were.

How… could… you… be… so… dumb?

Michael starts to slap himself. He slaps himself really hard, to wake himself up.

'You stupid fucking little idiot!' Michael growls at himself, and cuffs his ears and temples, and keeps his fist rolled and punches himself in the face.

There was only a week to go. If he'd left it a week, he would have got onto the aeroplane, gotten over whatever held him. He could have come back at eighteen without Dad ever knowing.

Michael stands in the middle of the room and looks at the bare light bulb, and feels the heaviness again. His fingers feel like fishing weights. They feel like they could pull the line all the way out of his reel. It's late, he has no energy, no tears. He might as well finish clearing up.

Michael picks up the broken record. You can buy another. He puts the books back on the shelf, moving as if in a slow-motion study. The book torn in half is a veterinary textbook, one he was reading for UCSD. He might as well leave it torn, leave it here. He won't have any use for it now – he won't be studying at UCSD. The stereo is fucked, but what does that matter? He only uses it when he's here, and he may never come back again. He turns the TV on and it's a late-night Italian Western, claustrophobic voices in studios mismatching lips. He goes back to scrubbing the hall carpet, listlessly, mechanically, continually and to some effect.

Michael begins to be aware of a shower running. There is a noise coming from it, as if there is something terribly wrong with the plumbing. He thinks he'd better see what's wrong. Then he thinks, If I go to the shower and he's naked he'll think I've come for him again. The towel has turned pink. Michael needs to rinse it. He goes to the kitchen instead, rinses the towel and comes back and recognizes the sound. It's someone crying.

'Dad. Dad, is something wrong? Dad?'

The door creaks when it opens like in a horror movie. The shower is running and something dark is on the floor behind the frosted glass, and there is a shredding sound.

'Dad, Dad are you OK? Dad, just say something.'

Michael opens the door and his father is slumped on the floor of the shower and he's fully dressed with water running and he has been eating towels. Big, plush, California towels. The threads of them lie wound all over his black slacks. They coat his mouth and make him look a bit like the Cookie Monster. His accusing eyes look up at him.

'Dad, get up.'

His father grunts and tries to and can't quite get his legs to unfold, and Michael becomes seriously worried, but he can't think of any way of helping that does not involve touching his father. His father's dark eyes warn him: do not touch me. Michael backs away hands raised as if to shield himself, mime helplessness, display his innocence.

Outside the bathroom door, Michael starts to pace. He paces the hallway, and tries to collect his thoughts and can't. They scatter away from him like pearls from a broken necklace rolling away down an escalator. He can't think of anything to do.

He decides to pack. He will have to leave. In the bedroom he takes his shirts out of the closet. He can't remember how to fold shirts so they stay flat. He remembers how his father and he worked together doing the laundry, just that morning, washing, sorting, ironing. 'Hey Mike, I never did this as well by myself. When you move in, we'll have the cleanest laundry ever.'

I guess we won't now, Dad.

I really should go to bed. Michael has just about convinced himself that that is all he can do, since he can't find his socks or his favourite pair of running shoes.

Then abruptly, determined, business-like, his father enters the bedroom. He's changed into dry clothes, a form-fitting T-shirt and slacks. He's still barefoot. He's breathing heavily, through his nose. His lips are pressed shut.

'What time is it in England? What's the number?'

'What do you mean?'

'Whot do you mean?' His father is doing a hate-filled imitation of an English accent. 'I'm going to ring your mother and let her know what a terrific job she did raising you.'

'You're going to tell Mom?'

'No. You are.'

'Me?' Michael sounds like a scared little boy.

'Don't you think she has a right to know? Are you ashamed, Michael? Are you ashamed of what you did?'

'Yes,' says Michael, miserably. 'Please don't tell Mom.'

'You should never do anything you're ashamed of, Michael. It's five hours to New York, say eight to London.' His father counts forwards from 3.00 am. 'It'll be eleven in the morning, right Michael?'

His father backs away into the hallway, and walks towards the phone in the kitchen. Michael follows, wretchedly.

'Please Dad, please don't. Don't do this, Daddy, please.'

His father gets out his tiny, khaki-coloured pocket diary and starts looking up the number.

'Dad please, look, I'll go to a psych, I'll do anything, but please don't tell Mom.'

'You sure as heck will be going to a psychiatrist.' Dad listens to the dial tone.

Michael remembers shoes. He kept outgrowing shoes, and his Mom on her teacher's salary had to find money for shoes. They always bought the specials or nearly out-of-dates in supermarkets. Her boss told her to smarten up how she dressed when she was teaching but she never buys clothes for herself.

'Everything you do has consequences,' his father says. 'It's time to grow up.' His voice changed. 'Hello Mavis, this is Louis. No, he's not fine. If you wanna know, he's just done something pretty godawful. Michael. Tell your mother what you did.'

Michael is sobbing helplessly now, and is shaking his head, no, no. He can't even imagine saying the words.

'You start growing up now, Michael.' His father holds out the phone like a club.

'No.' Michael is wheedling, like he's wet himself in public.