Charles26

1 Kings 19:11-13 (if you want to be fussy) - the still, small voice of calm. Even the Old Testament has some decent stuff in it, I think, though there is no doubt at all that it also has a great deal that is really unpleasant. I could easily argue, for example, that the taking of Jericho and what followed is a good an example of a war crime as you could hope to find anywhere. However... No crises in this chapter but a fair amount of growth and development. There does seem to be something odd going on between Jimmy and Dan and I'm sure we'll learn more about that in due course. The strengthening bond between Levi and Matt is heart-warming but perhaps what hits me hardest in this chapter is the new information on just how very bleak Levi's life was with his Maternal grandfather (get it right this time!) and his mother. Bacon and eggs for breakfast as his birthday treat?! We don't know how much of it was poverty in the dollars and cents sense and how much it was emotional and spiritual asceticism gone mad but it is just so hard. I don't think anyone in these stories other than Tony Scott has much money but I'm pretty sure that Matt and Luke and Levi's new extended family more generally will make a real effort to ensure that Levi's sixteenth birthday is something special.

Touché !

I couldn't put it any better, so I won't even try! Everything is still pellucidly unclear, transparently nebulous and brilliantly tenebrous; so congratulations @Carl Accolla 🙃

Well written - well done. Encouraging too. It seems that Levi is beginning to find his feet, and that can only be good. Not that I imagine things will go smoothly all the way from here😉. Levi's relationship with Tim and Guy is interesting. It's good, of course, that they too are beginning to feel like family. That may even help with the underlying problem if my guess is right. Levi has accepted Matt and Luke as his parents and I suspect that somewhere in his subconscious that means he has stopped thinking of them as sexual beings. They're just dad and dad-2. Tim and Guy are another matter entirely. They are older than he is, obviously, and I don't suppose he feels any sexual desire for them any more than they do for him. (All cool there.) But they are young enough and fit enough and openly loving enough that they are very clearly two people with an active loving, sexual relationship. And that, I suspect, registers with him in a big way; it's something that he wants for himself very badly but at the same time rejects as contrary to the "moral values" he has been taught. It's not that they are doing anything wrong; it's just that what they do stirs up the conflict in his own emotional and sexual turmoil.

It's true that we don't know much about what motivated Levi's paternal grandfather. It's also true that he did provide at least a home for his errant daughter and her fatherless son, though only from the time when Levi was already five years old. It's not nothing. But we do have some idea of the requirements and restrictions imposed on Levi first by "pop" and then by his mother. I think Levi has done amazingly well to have emerged from that environment as whole and as caring as he is. Obviously he did love his mother - caring for her much have been terrible near the end. But whatever upbringing he had it certainly didn't provide him or his mother with any real friends. Just some people they more-or-less knew at school or at their church. And I can't help feeling that his grandfather set the tone from start to finish.

Yes. Well. Maybe. I feel that Lewis is in a deep hole, struggling to climb out, and I'm sorry for him. Whether that makes him a credible long-term partner for Harry is, of course, another question entirely. In any case, I really can't see James suddenly becoming what Harry so desperately wants and doesn't dare look for. Another thing I love about this story is the weather. We've been in a heatwave here for over five weeks - that's 36°C and over - and the idea of a nice, cold day is unbelievably appealing.

Is there a child? Perhaps I missed it. Whatever hold Catherine has over Lewis (and money seems the obvious possibility), and whatever Catherine wants from Lewis, I definitely get the impression that their marriage is very much on the rocks and that Lewis is a decidedly unhappy man. Almost as much so as Harry... ...who does seem to be clinically depressed. And while he is in that state I am more inclined to feel sorry for him than to criticise. What game James is playing I really don't know.

I'm not sure that I can add anything to the various analyses of James, Lewis and Harry and their inter-meshing relationships, whatever precisely they may actually be. But there surely is a whole lot of pent up desire there, though I'm not really clear whose desire for what. Fascinating. As is my normal approach I think I prefer to watch and wait! But, oh glory - the office party. My idea of hell on those few, tragic occasions I failed to avoid them. Certainly I did have friends in the office but the office party was never the occasion for spending time with them. A brilliant description of pseudo-social misery in action.

All the way through to his second day at his new school and Levi is already entangled in a pretty extensive and sticky web. On the one hand, whatever colour of sheep Casey may be, and Levi has been comprehensively warned about the family (at least), the erotic attraction is there, potent and undeniable. We've been told that Levi has hit full-on puberty late (and his emotional asphyxiation by his "Pop" and his mother may be responsible for the delayed onset) but his new, emotionally healthier environment seems to have turned the process on full blast. Not the easiest context in which to deal with a first object of desire. And of course, while Matt and Luke and the others are not trying to "convert" Levi to homosexuality - a stupid idea promoted by the ignorant and prejudiced - what they are doing is normalising it and showing it as just another, admittedly minority, way for people to live and love. On the other hand there are Jimmy and Dan. Two very decent guys and probably good people to have as friends but since Jimmy has already said that he doesn't really have any other mates at school they are clearly not a pass to general popularity. And they are obviously close - are they a couple? Close enough in any case that Dan is becoming jealous on the first day he meets Levi. Has Levi noticed and has he picked up on the need for care? But yes, the final scene where Levi actually calls Matt "Dad" for the first time, and the resulting hugs - that was lovely.

It's rare that I read something so well written that I really feel for and with the characters; but this is one of those cases. When it came to Harry realising he had rejected Lewis's invitation to his birthday drinks and the shame and regret he felt I just had to stop for a while and come back the next day. So we now know much more about the griefs, shame and regret (again) for past mistakes and bad behaviour - but Harry still comes across as a basically decent lost soul. I really want to see how this develops!

Well written and convincing - no surprise there😉. Well done. I can't predict just how much grief Levi is going to get from the "arseholes". The support of Jimmy, and those like him, will be critical at school; the support of Matt and Luke and their friends at least as important at home. I hope that if there are real problems Levi will feel able to tell Matt and Luke, at least, what is going on and how bad it is. The image of children - especially adolescent males - varies hugely from place to place and time to time. Innocents, harmless until misled? (New Testament: "Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.") Or uncivilised savages needing harsh discipline to civilise them? (Old Testament "Spare the rod and spoil the child".) Or just unformed and dangerous - The Lord of the Flies, anyone? But I think it is fair to say that they can be pretty brutal at school to anyone they see as different or vulnerable. And as Frank Herbert said in Dune, "beginnings are such delicate times." Still, I'm confident that Levi has the inner strength as well as the support he will need to settle in, make a place for himself and be happy. Good luck!

"Elite" is subjective, I think, and the associations it has depend on context. Not many people have a problem with the idea of elite sportspersons, for example 😀. And educated is not really a bad thing to be: it often helps in life! Apart from that... Yes, probably a breakthrough chapter. At the very least Jake and Mannly should understand and know each other better from now on and that should make life better for both of them. Meanwhile, I wonder what progress if any there has been in tracking down the men who attacked Mannly. No doubt we shall discover in due course. We can suppose that they were motivated by homophobia and it was a gay-bashing but we don't even know that for certain. Thanks for another enjoyable chapter.

So true. This is a very dangerous line of thought. A variant on survivor's guilt. Clearly, far from doing anything wrong he seems to have been a marvel; one of those undervalued, unpaid carers who get so little recognition. He needs to be reassured on this, as plainly, as often, as convincingly and with as much love as it takes.

Oh, wonderful! The Promised Land, flowing with milk and honey - and an allure both forbidden and entrancing. Worst, more probably best, of all there's a boy who has caught Levi's attention at first sight. Settling in is clearly going to be a challenge but equally clearly the biggest struggle will be within. I think and hope that in the end Levi will find himself, not oppressed by the ghosts of his grandfather or his grandfather's church but not overcome by a need to conform with his new environment and peer group: truly himself, decent and loving, whatever the details of faith and sexual orientation may prove to be. Thanks for an inspiring chapter!

So far the history and the relationships are getting more tangled, not less, on closer inspection. What is clear is that there is a lot of hurt buried not especially deep in Harry which he can never escape. It's all beautifully portrayed, so job well done. I look forward to discovering more.