A short story (jrm_gwm, 2012)

Here's something different from my usual reviews of other people's movies, books and plays, a short story I wrote for my Open University creative writing course. I hope you enjoy it (Click the title).

The Truth is Out There 

‘Is David your boyfriend then?’

As soon as the words left her mouth, Alice regretted them. Keeping her head forward, staring at the road ahead, she tightened her grip on the leather steering wheel. From the corner of her eye she saw her son’s shoulders tense up beneath his t-shirt. It was the black one with the X-Files logo he liked so much.

A mixture of exhilaration and guilt shot up her spine. Her palms moistened on the steering wheel and her heart raced. Adam remained silent and Alice wondered whether she should speak again. Sneaking a glance across the space between the seats, Alice realised she had been holding her breath. Letting it out only released the tiniest glimmer of tension from her body.

Adam was stunned, shocked into silence. They had been discussing university options when his mum dropped her bombshell. He could feel his face reddening as it always did when talk turned personal. Beads of sweat were percolating under his arms despite the cool breath of the air conditioning on his bare limbs.

He was damned if he was going to his mother let her off the hook with an answer straight away. But what should he say?

Adam had fantasised about this sort of moment for years, ever since he had accepted himself as different to his friends. Scenarios bad and good swirled in his mind, fragments of imagined conversations drifted towards his lips and away again. Would the easiest option be to lie? Or to finally admit the truth, out loud?

He had read coming out stories online, and he’d spoken to David about it but nothing had prepared him for this unexpected question. Especially asked here in the mundane surrounding of the Astra. This secret that he had dwelt only within his head for so long... It deserved a more momentous revelation than this, particularly to his mother.

Didn’t it?

Or was it the case that this was real life. There wouldn’t be fanfares, declarations of love or banishments into exile.

Adam’s mind raced. What should he do? Before he had realised what he had done, his lips parted and he heard himself say:

‘Yes’.

So she was right. The new friend who kept coming round and spending hours in her son’s bedroom was actually his boyfriend. Adam had just admitted it.

Now what? She hadn’t thought this far ahead. In the weeks prior to this car ride Alice had become suspicious about David, who had appeared from nowhere. According to Adam he was a friend of Callum’s, a boy he’d known since primary school. There was a nagging instinct that told Alice not to believe her son on this point. Maybe it was the fact he rarely allowed Alice or his father the opportunity to speak to David. Or perhaps it was the fact that Adam had been so much happier of late, full of joy and appearing more relaxed and comfortable in his own skin than before.

Should she push for more information now?

What did she want to know?

How did she feel about this revelation that she had elicited from her first born? Alice decided to go with her initial curiosity and to question Adam. She could see that he was uncomfortable. He was playing with his beautiful blonde locks, twirling them around his fingers, and she could see his right leg bobbing up and down. Her maternal instinct was to stop now and halt the discomfort she was causing her child. But her need to know her son better and to understand him trumped the protective urge.

Alice decided she should seek clarification, to make sure she had actually understood.

‘Adam, are you telling me that you’re gay?’

Oh god, she’d said the word. That one word he could never say out loud. Because that was the ultimate admission. He couldn’t open his mouth and say ‘Yes Mum, I’m gay’ because then the ground would open up and swallow him, right after his head had exploded from the heat of embarrassment.

Swirled in among the confusion and mortification, Adam became aware of a rising anger. How dare his mother confront him like this and ask him such questions. He wasn’t ready. This was his secret to impart, not hers to steal. He wasn’t going to make this easy for her – she certainly wasn’t making it easy for him. A small voice suggested that he should think about how difficult it was for his mum, but this was drowned out beneath the cavalcade of deeper feelings that had been stirred up.

Adam felt like hours of his life had just passed. In reality there couldn’t have been more than five minutes since his world shifted on its axis. He went with his mother to see her parents often and knew the journey well, and he also knew there was at least half an hour of the drive left. Without allowing himself to even consider what would happen when they reached his grandparents’ house, Adam tried to work out would to do next.

He had already stepped on the path to admission and honesty. His arm resting on the car door, his fingers smoothed through his hair in an unconscious soothing manner. Closing his eyes to the world, to his mum, he took in a deep breath.

Adam’s answer pushed forth into the heady atmosphere within the vehicle and hung there as before:

‘Yes.’ 

Alice heard the answer and her body relaxed. Her foot shifted on the accelerator, slowing their speed before a honk from the car behind brought her round.

Alice felt numb. Shocked? Certainly. Relieved? A little. The emotion that Alice felt more overwhelming than any other was hurt, and this was metamorphosing into anger. Why had Adam kept this from her? Who else knew? What would people say?

Questions swirled in her mind but she was controlled enough not to start blurting them out at random. Above everything Alice knew that she must seize this moment to have a meaningful conversation with Adam, while it was just the two of them. She would ask her questions and figure out what to do as she went.

As Adam shared with the most important person in his life the most important part of himself, his shoulders slackened and his mind went quiet. There were no more voices like cartoon angels and devils whispering possible consequences. There was just a void.

His truth was out there. It couldn’t be taken back. On this unremarkabl, grey June day, Adam’s years-long internal struggle had reached a turning point. Now all he could do was to go with it, to see where the revelation would lead. The blinding confusion and debilitating discomfort had been muted by an unusual calm. Stilling his restless leg, he took his hand from his head and held it with the other in his lap.

With less reluctance than he expected, Adam gave himself up his mother’s questions.

‘I’m not sure what to say, Adam. This isn’t something I had planned to talk to you about. I didn’t mean to surprise you like this. But listen to me, I’m the one who should be surprised! I – I mean you... how long have you been like this?’

‘Been like what?’

‘Gay, Adam. How long have you felt this way?’

‘I don’t feel like it, Mum. I am it.’

‘Well I’m confused. Last year you had posters of half naked women on your bedroom walls. I didn’t like them but I figured that’s what teenage boys like so I didn’t say anything. What was all that about?’

‘It’s not easy you know. I thought that’s what I was supposed to like too. I didn’t want anyone knowing I was different. It was easier to act like nothing was wrong.’

‘So you’ve been lying to me and your father for ages?’

‘Yeah. I had to. I didn’t know what to say, how to say it. It was easiest just to do what was expected. I hated it.’

‘So this David, where has he come from? He doesn’t even know Callum does he? Oh my god, I don’t know you, do I?’

‘David’s great. I met him on the internet – no don’t get excited about it, I didn’t do anything stupid, he’s not a paedo or anything. You don’t know... You don’t know how lonely it is. Living with this secret that you can’t share with anyone, because if you do... There’s no clue how you might react. I’ve thought about telling you and I’ve tried to do it but it’s been too hard. David’s been one of the few people I’ve been able to talk – ‘

‘The few people? Who else knows? Who else knew before me?’

‘Aw mum, I haven’t deliberately not told you. Well I have I suppose, but only because I’ve been afraid. It’s easier to talk to other people. Callum knows, and of course David and a couple of other friends. I had to speak to someone about it.’

‘I’m sorry you find it so hard to talk to me, Adam. I thought we got on well, we talk about a lot of things.’

‘I know Mum, but we talk about trivial things. Not real life, heartfelt emotional stuff. This isn’t an episode of Hollyoaks or maths homework. This is me. It’s who I am. And I’ve had to hide it. Do you get how difficult that is?’

‘Adam, please forgive me. I’m trying to take a lot in here. As you say, you’ve had to live with this for ages, while I’m just learning about it. I don’t know if it took you a while to accept, but allow me the courtesy of time to get my head around it.’

‘Mum, I – you’ve missed the turn off!’

‘What, oh shit. It’s ok we can go the longer way round. We’re nearly there anyway.’

‘What are you going to tell Nan and Grandpa? Please don’t tell them, I don’t think I can deal with that today.’

‘Don’t worry love, I won’t say anything to anyone until I know how to deal with it myself.’

‘What do you mean ‘deal with it’, you can’t change me or hide me away. I just want to be able to be who I am, and I want you to keep treating me the same. Please don’t push me away, Mum, I couldn’t cope with that.’

‘Oh Adam I’m not going to push you away. I need time to think about things. Adam... I don’t know how to ask you this –’

‘Look, just ask me, I’m so fed up about keeping quiet, I want you to know who I am, to like me how I am.’

‘Are you and David... are you careful?’

‘Oh god, Mum! Why do you have to ask me that? For your information, we haven’t done it. But if we had, please credit me with the intelligence to know I’d be careful. ‘

‘Normally I would, but I’m having to question a lot of things I thought I knew about you, Adam. I don’t mean to be cruel it’s just that I don’t know how I’m supposed to react. I know it’s the twenty-first century and I should be cool. I’ve seen gay people on TV, and I’ve even worked with a couple at the office, but when it’s so close to home... It’s difficult to take in, to process.’

‘Mum, I’d really like you to meet David properly. I know you’d really get on and it would mean more to me than anything if you two would –‘

‘Adam, I’d like to meet David, especially if he’s the reason you’ve been so happy lately –‘

‘He is.’

‘– I should be grateful to him for that. But right now I want to meet Adam. I mean the Adam that I thought I knew. You need to help me know him.’

‘Mum, I – Please, don’t cry, I don’t want to hurt you.’

‘I’m ok Adam, I’m not hurt. Maybe I was... I was angry. But you’re my little boy. I’m just pleased that you’re happy, whatever that looks like. Anyway, we’re here now. Let’s agree not to discuss this in front of your grandparents. Can we talk more on the drive home?’

‘Yes, I’d like that, I’d like that a lot.’

‘Fine, we’ll do that. And Adam?’

‘Yes?’

‘I’m proud of you.’

‘I’m proud of you too, Mum.’

As she turned the Astra down Chapman Street, Alice dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. The heightened emotions of the conversation had burst forth she could stop them. It seemed churlish to be embarrassed at a few tears, considering how her son had just opened his heart to her. It made her swell with pride to realise that he was still her boy, her Adam. And he was happy. She could see it in the relaxed slump of his body in the seat, the steady rise and fall of his chest and the smile that had formed beneath his closed eyes.

Rolling the car to a stop outside the bungalow, Alice allowed herself a moment of composure. Leaning across the gear shift she grabbed Adam in her arms and squeezed his young body, releasing any tension that remained between them with a hug.