Barbara Vine - The Chimney Sweeper's Boy

There was no urgency. There was all the time in the world. The head, the shoulders, leaned back against the side of his body, rested there. John did open his eyes then, turning his neck languorously, and saw the back of a dark head, the hair all wet and matted but silky-soft, beautiful shoulders like honey-colored marble. His eyes closed again. He preferred it that way now that he knew his companion was young and fine to look at.

He wanted to touch that hair, stroke it, but he was afraid. Best to accept his own passive receptiveness, wait, let the other make the running. A hand touched the calf of his leg. He held his breath. What must he do to offer himself, to make things plain?

It was as if a voice told him, but there was no voice. He reached for the towel that covered him and took it off, dropped it onto the level below. My lover, he thought, this man will be my lover. They were close now; another body would join with his. He felt its slippery-soft hardness. A mouth closed on him, warm and strong, but tender as a flower.

The heat was wonderful and terrible. Almost unbearable. John had no thoughts, his intellect was gone, he was only flesh and dream and sensation. And something he had never felt before but which he thought might be passion, a kind of painful joy that swelled and opened and unfolded and spilled happiness. He kissed, too, giving back what he had received, receiving again, exchanging liquid pleasure, while the hot fog, which was both wet as water and dry as sunshine, pressed thick and caressing on his skin.

My lover, he thought. For a moment, he was one person with his lover, his own identity was lost, and the other’s, too, merged with his. Then a deep peace descended. His lover kissed his cheek, a gentle, sweet kiss. John waited a moment before opening his eyes. His lover had turned away, had his back to him and had begun to descend the levels. And now, as the ordinary usages of life began to return, John was afraid of losing him, that he would go down there into the mist and out of the door and disappear.

That must be prevented. This was someone he had to see again. A warm, passionate joy rose in him. He had never seen the man’s face, but he was in love. He followed him, down through the mist, ignoring the old men, the hand that reached. John knew so much more now, was already so much more experienced. Close behind his lover now, he laid one hand on the golden marble shoulder, an intimate gesture, almost proprietorial. He followed him out through the door, out of the heat and the fog and the obscuring whiteness, and there in the next room, where the tables were and more old men and the tea lady, he lowered the towel and looked, and his lover turned to face him.

It was Desmond, his brother.

John gave a low cry of terror. He ran through the room, sliding on the slippery floor. He didn’t stay to shower, but dressed, gasping, sobbing, fumbling with his clothes the way one does in dreams. He ran out of the building into the warm, still evening, the change he had taken from his shoe still jingling in his hand. Another wave of heat broke over and released another gush of sweat. For a moment, he had stopped, but now he began to run again. He ran and ran.

Joseph’s voice came to him, saying, “God bless you.” It rang in his ears. Memories of the past hour unreeled themselves on the screen of his mind. After that, he could never go back home, never see any of them again, not after that, the ultimate sin. Alone, he had broken the family, as if smashing with his fist a room full of glass. Outside was an empty, distant, foreign world and he was heading for it. People turned to stare at this running man, who cried as he ran, stared and turned away, embarrassed.

He had died back there in the mist. But hours were to pass, a night and half a day of agony and disbelief, before he recognized that life as he had known it was over and he must undergo a rebirth.

There will be no sleep for me tonight, thought Robert. But he went to bed and lay there with his eyes closed until the pictures which took shape in the darkness became too disturbing. At the window, watching the dawn come, he began to consider ways of telling Sarah Candless and Titus Romney what he had discovered.