A MODERN LOVE STORY.
What follows is a true story, but I am NOT the David in it.
DAVID AND JONATHAN
For me it was a life-changing experience, a biblical epic, the love affair of a lifetime, a Shakespearean drama, and a re-run of a notorious romance, while for David, it was merely an occasional harmless bit of fun.
My name is Jonathan, a single, hard working bus driver in Babbacombe. Although friendly and sociable, I had always been something of a lone wolf, with many acquaintances, few close friends, and no attachments; alone but far from lonely. Although gay, it was not a large part of my life, and I had never experienced love in any form; lust maybe, but no more than that.
When we met, he suggested casual sex.
“Oh no” I said, “I am 54, old enough to be your father.”
“That’s no crime is it? I have been with men much older than you.” he responded, and my heart warmed to this smiling, articulate, highly intelligent guy who managed to find something attractive about me.
David was 21, a first year law student, down from Cambridge for the summer. For me, he became, and always will be, the Golden Boy. He was not gay, and had regular girlfriends, but also, it transpired, enjoyed dabbling on the other side of the fence, with a frequency and abandon much greater than my own. Once home, I disappeared to make coffee, but we never did get around to drinking it. The sex, for a first encounter, was relaxed, uninhibited, unselfish and rather beautiful.
I never expected to see David again, but he returned the next day, the next week, the next month, the next year, for 8 wonderful but agonising years; gradually and inevitably, I fell deeply in love with him. It was more than physical love: I always knew that aspect could not last forever, and was not important, but it became increasingly essential to me that I would continue to know him in some form or other. I just could not bear the thought of losing contact with him. Strange though it may sound, it was more of a fatherly love: I became proud and protective of him; I admired his intellect enormously and knew he was destined for great things. I said, “David, you will tell me when it is all over, won’t you? You just won’t disappear on me will you?” He reassured me, and, to his credit, he did keep his word.
The trouble was his visits were usually unannounced, infrequent and necessarily short, him being at University much of the time. Sometimes he would ring me from the station, and I would pick him up for a couple of wonderful hours, before dropping him off near his parents’ home. Sometimes he would come while I was at work, and just leave a note. Once or twice, visits were arranged, but on one of them, I was called to the deathbed of my closest friend, and missed him. I was totally distraught by both happenings, feeling that I had lost both my one true friend and the only love of my life at a single stroke, but a few months later, he returned.
Every time I waved him away, I thought I was waving Goodbye: it was like an endless bereavement that never faded. I would mourn his loss, as if he had gone forever, only to be transported to delight for an hour or so, then for the pain to return once more, only deeper.
Of course I could not tell him I loved him; he would rightly have run a mile. We were so different in our lifestyles and background. All I could desperately hope for was some continuing thread of a friendship and understanding. I needed him to understand that I was not just a bit of rough on the side, but someone with a good intellect, integrity and code of honour. I started writing to him to show him that I was worth talking to as well as going to bed with, and I was never sure if he did understand. I just prayed that my words would get his attention, I suppose.
After he qualified, he went to work in London, and a couple of times, I told him which hotel I was using on my rare visits there, and rather to my amazement, he turned up both times, and one of those evenings turned out to be the most wonderful of my whole life: I had never felt so close to anyone before.
Over time, my letters became more obsessive and compulsive. The relationship now uncannily paralleled the Oscar Wilde love affair with his ‘Bosie’ exactly one hundred years before, my letters an echo of his “De Profundis”. They were, of course, totally counter-productive, and the more I wrote of my sanity and total trustworthiness, the more I proved exactly the opposite, and I appeared to be increasingly flaky and dubious. It was a vicious downward spiral. I wanted nothing from him but perhaps his respect, and hope of a tenuous permanent if distant friendship, but the more I pleaded, the less likely it became, and I was all too aware of it. There is no fool like an old fool. I recognise, and must accept that there is a quirk in my character: While consciously I seek love and a soul mate like anyone else, my unconscious destroys anything or anyone who comes within firing range.
I became deeply depressed and distraught, which is out of character, as were all my actions at this time, I became irrational and permanently morose. My asthma became much worse, and I took time off work. My closest relative Aunt Jackie, asked me what on earth was wrong with me, and I made the mistake of coming out to her. I suppose I was unburdening myself of an intolerable load, but I should have known better. When I had finished telling her the story, there was the most awful interminable silence, and a look of utter disgust on her face. Foolishly, I had sought sympathy; instead it was the permanent end of my relationship with my family.
Eventually, I had to give up work because of poor health, cut myself off from the world for a couple of years, and grieved in a way I thought impossible. Looking back on those dark days, David did show remarkable patience, maturity and understanding, but eventually tired of my extreme emotional outbursts. One night he went out and got drunk, before sending me an e-mail telling me to get lost. He was entirely right to do so.
This was 4 years ago. I follow his spectacular professional progress on the Internet, and cannot yet resist sending him a very unwelcome birthday card each year. One day, maybe, I shall come to terms with it, but not quite yet.
Oh, Shining Star, ascendant in my evening sky,
beyond my farthest reach, too high, too high.
The brightness of your light bedazzled me,
awakening dreams that could never be.
