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Chapter 24
My first instinct is to laugh. He’s got to be joking, right? But one look at his anguished face tells me that he’s deadly serious. I’m completely confused; nothing makes sense here.
“But Toby, you’re gay!”
“What? What on earth made you think that?”
“You. You know, the way you are!” I feel like I’m lost in fog, with no landmarks to help me get my bearings. “For example, the very emphatic way you said, right back when I first met you, that I had nothing to fear from you.”
“I was being a gentleman!” Toby exclaims, almost shouting.
“But you’ve never shown any interest in me! Even when I’ve been naked around you, you’ve just buried yourself in your laptop, or whatever.”
“Would you have preferred it if I’d stared at you, maybe wolf-whistled a few times? For God’s sake! Tell me, what else about me makes you so certain I’m homosexual?”
I stand there like a goldfish. My mouth opens and closes but nothing comes out. I can’t believe I’ve got this so completely wrong. I was so certain he was gay.
“Well, this has been a fucking car crash,” he says, when it’s clear I have no answer for him.
“I’m really sorry, Toby. If I’d have known…”
“Yes, well, evidently you didn’t. I feel like a total idiot.”
“You’re not an idiot, Toby. It’s just that this has come so totally out of the blue, I don’t know what to make of it.”
“I think the fact that you’re not dancing for joy tells me everything I need to know, don’t you?”
He looks angry and hurt, and I still don’t know what to say to him. I want to make this better, but it’s as if some invisible barrier has come down between us.
“Look,” he says, after an uncomfortable pause, “I think I need some time, a bit of space. I’m sure you understand.”
“Of course I do,” I say quickly, “I’ll drop you off at your studio and we’ll talk after Christmas, when I’ve had a chance to digest all of this.”
“Actually, I think I’ll get a taxi. I don’t think I can be around you right now. I’ll call you when I’m ready.”
He turns and strides away. I want to call out to him, but the words won’t come. I watch his retreating back, willing him to turn, but he doesn’t even glance back. For some reason I have a horrible feeling I might never see him again. My mind is stuck on just one question: What the fuck just happened?
I don’t know how long I stand there, immobile, looking in the direction that Toby took. I’m not even sure what I’m expecting to happen. Is he going to come back, smiling, and tell me that this was all a joke, a prank he dreamed up?
“Are you all right, dear?”
I turn to see an elderly lady looking at me with concern on her face.
“I’m sorry?” I ask her.
“I wondered if you were all right. I don’t mean to pry, but I was waiting for my bus over there, and I saw you and your young man walk past, and then you seemed to have a bit of an argument and he stormed off, and you’ve just been standing there for nearly five minutes without moving.”
Shit. I need to pull myself together. I’m starting to worry innocent passers-by.
“I’m fine,” I tell her. “I’ve just had a bit of a shock, but I’m fine now. Thank you.” I give her what I hope is a warm smile and set off towards home. When I get back to the flat, everything looks the same. How can it look the same when, within the space of a couple of hours, everything has changed, and everything I thought I knew has been turned on its head? My headache, soothed by the breakfast, has decided to reappear. I walk into my bedroom; there’s a dent in the duvet where Toby sat down to do up his shoes. I hastily smooth it over, before ripping off all the bedclothes and shoving them in the washing machine. I don’t want any trace of him in here. How dare he drop a bombshell like that and just disappear? How am I supposed to make sense of this? This is the reason why I’ve never allowed anyone to stay over; the atmosphere in my flat, my sanctuary, feels polluted and foul. My head throbs as I yank the hoover out of its cupboard and hurl it angrily over all the floors. As I feverishly wipe down every surface, I realise I’m muttering obscenities like a madwoman.
By midday there’s nothing left to clean. I’ve been over the entire flat and it’s spotless. I’ve put new sheets on the bed, and I just need to wait for the tumble dryer to finish before I leave for Oxfordshire. I’ve packed my bag and loaded it, along with the presents for my parents, into the car. I opened all the windows earlier to refresh the place with clean air, so it’s now freezing in here and I’m sitting huddled in my coat. After what feels like an age, the tumble dryer bleeps to let me know that it has finished. I remove the sheets, fold them and stack them in the airing cupboard, before doing my customary pre-departure tour, making sure that all the windows are closed and locked, and everything is turned off. My rage has subsided now and the fresh air, aided by another dose of paracetamol, has taken the edge off my headache.
The Christmas Eve traffic is typically awful and the drive to Oxfordshire takes nearly four hours. I use the time to continue to try to make sense of what happened this morning. How could I have been so wrong about Toby? I was so absolutely convinced he was gay. And how on earth do we come back from this? I try to work out how I feel about him. I meant what I said when I told him I loved him, but I’d never even contemplated that we could be anything more than friends. I try to picture us as a couple, but my mind just isn’t able to make that shift. Maybe he’s right. Maybe we both need space to come to terms with his revelations, and then we can talk about it after Christmas like the grown-ups that we both are, and figure out what to do.
It’s dark when I arrive at my parents’ house, but I’m illuminated by the blaze from the security lights as I pull up behind my Mom’s BMW. The dog has obviously noticed that the lights have been triggered and I hear him barking inside. I retrieve my case and the presents from the boot and lug them across the gravel driveway to the front door, where I let myself in with my key.
“Hi, Mom!” I call, as the dog bounds up to me, wagging his tail furiously. I set my case down and fuss over him while he wriggles in absolute delight.
