Lost in Manchester - 20. The One that Got Away. March 2000 and March 2010. Thomas.

Ciaran was leaning a tanned arm against the side of the jukebox, carefully avoiding the sticky patches left from spilt bottles of WKD, as Thomas scrolled through the who’s who of homo-pop caged up in the miniaturised menagerie. They were going to need some music to get through an evening with the elders gathered incongruously in this lifeless bar.

Thomas stopped at the senior Minogue, and Ciaran smiled.

“You know what, Confide in Me was an exceptional track, but it’s got to be said, it’s starting to look like that’s going to be our girl’s last big hit”

Thomas tilted his head from one side to the other, ruminantly.

“Life doesn’t end when you hit 30 you know”

Ciaran’s expression turned to clowning scepticism. “That’s not what I’ve heard” he said laughing, and pulled Thomas across to the almost-empty dance-floor.

“Anyway, you’re going to hit it about six months before I do boyo, so you can warn me if I should just kill myself at 29 and three quarters.”

Jenny was watching them from across the room, her left elbow propped up on the bar behind her and a raspberry daiquiri nestling in her right hand. Around her were several clusters of Lib Dem politicians hovering at the sides, looking distinctly uncomfortable at having been pushed into hosting this political rally at a bar in the gay village. Thomas had been increasingly active in the party since leaving University and had pushed for this venue. He knew he was looking certain to get candidacy for a winnable city centre seat in the 2002 elections.

Peter, the deputy leader of the party was standing on his own, on the far side of the room, his black hair speckled increasingly with grey as each day passed. Thomas watched the senior figure as his gaze lingered a little too long on a Nordic looking twenty-something mincing past. Jenny was always telling him Peter was a closet case.

Thomas sidled up next to her at the bar, and shouted across for a beer. He glanced across to see the Nordic guy had stepped in and was making shapes with Ciaran on the dancefloor.

“So what do you think of it?” Thomas asked, looking around.

She smiled wryly. “You’ve definitely pulled them out of their comfort zone”

He glanced across again at Ciaran and the chiselled blond he was dancing with, before flicking his eyes back and catching the mischievous gleam in Jenny’s eye.

“I know. This place is pretty bad though isn’t it? I never realised how horrific a gay bar could look without the party lighting and excessive alcohol consumption”.

“The place is great Thom. This was all about pulling them into the new century, and asserting your voice at the table, and we’ve done both of those things already”

He smiled gratefully. “Thanks Jenny. Just wait til I’m elected. They’re not going to know what’s hit ‘em.”

He glanced across again. Ciaran’s arms were round the guy’s waist and their hips were twisting as one unit. The guy whispered something in Ciaran’s ear, then pulled back and they were both looking into each other’s eyes and laughing. Thomas’ brow furled.

“Thom?”

He glanced back to Jenny.

“You have no idea what I asked do you?”

“Sure, yeah. Ask me again though, just to be sure.”

She shook her head.

“It does look like Ciaran’s bagged himself a stud for the evening”. She seemed to examine Thomas’ face for a reaction.

He glanced across once more and turned his nose up.

“He can do better”.

 

A decade of politics seemed to have aged Thomas more than the years that had passed. He sat in the back room of the Loom Inn, his head buried in his palms, and his fingers clamped across his face like thick curtains keeping out the dark.

Cameron sat on the opposite side of the table, and Jenny at the head. Nowadays the three had over a century of life between them.

“So I take it things didn’t go entirely to plan then?” Cameron asked gently. They had returned minutes earlier from the second of the two election speeches Thomas had given. Thomas felt and no doubt looked weary and defeated, and so Cameron had quickly pulled them through to the back room, leaving young Luke out front to man the fort.

Thomas couldn’t find the words and so relied instead on emitting deep morbid breaths from beneath the hands across his face.

“It honestly wasn’t that bad” Jenny said. “Neither of the speeches were. He’s beating himself up because there was no standing ovation.”

She never knew when to just say nothing.

“So was there a good turnout?” Cameron asked.

“Yeah, good. More than a hundred at both events” Jenny replied. “There was a very positive…”

“We’re all a bunch of fucking idiots, so it makes no difference anyway” Thomas said without moving.

“Ok, not everyone was positive…” Jenny agreed.

“We’re all a bunch of idiots…”

“This was the view of one of your esteemed audience members?” Cameron asked.

Thomas lifted his head slowly, like a great iron portcullis lifting. He locked eyes with Cameron.

“I talked to them about my vision of a new, practical politics. A politics where we weren’t scared to make unpopular decisions and we weren’t even scared to lose elections if that’s what it came to. A politics where being in opposition matters just as much as being in power, and where all politicians can contribute and can make a difference. I talked about the obsession of politicians to stay in power, even when it came at the cost of sacrificing what they went into politics to achieve”.

“It was powerful.” Jenny interrupted, “People were sitting up in their chairs.”

Thomas eyed her uncertainly, then switched back to Cameron.

“I talked about a new type of politician. I said I want informed debates inside and outside the Town Hall, and I want people to understand the different sides of complex matters and why we reach the conclusions and the decisions we do.

“I said to the businesses tonight that I want politics in Manchester to matter. I said I think it’s depressing how few people in the city can even name their local councillor. That people are deciding which local councillor to vote for, based purely on what they think of the three national party leaders. I said that come election time I want people to know who their candidates are and what they represent – across all parties. I said I want people to make properly informed decisions about how their city is being led. This is the politics I want in our city.”

Cameron nodded. “Yeah…”

“Then this man on the right-hand side, halfway back shouts out they’re all a bunch of idiots anyway, so it makes no difference.”

Cameron shrugged. “It’s just one dickhead isn’t it?”

Thomas breathed out slowly and tossed the question round in his head.

“But it’s what people think, and I don’t know how I can change it. In fact I don’t think there’s any way I can change it”.

“What you can do is keep saying it” Jenny said firmly. “Some of them were listening. Some of them heard it. And the more you say it, the more they’ll hear it”.

Thomas shook his head. He turned to Cameron again.

“I said to them tonight that I wanted to make sure councillors are visible and vocal, explaining the decisions they make on your behalf, clearly and openly. I said they should be intelligent people. And if they’re not, then people should find that out. They should be people who understand the world, and can lead our communities. Can advise; can counsel; can shape a better city for us all.

“The same guy shouts out good luck with that mate”.

Jenny was shaking her head, but he wasn’t done.

“The other day at the Women’s Institute I spoke about diversity, and wanting councillors to properly represent the range of people in our communities. One woman raised her hand in the Q&A afterwards and said to me Look love, politics has always been grey haired men making decisions in locked rooms. We’re not going to change that in our lifetime and neither are you. All we want to know is how much cash you’re going to be pushing our way. She got the biggest cheer of the night”.

“She got one or two cheers Thom, that’s all” Jenny argued.

“I talked about green energy and putting a hold on limitless new airport development, because we need to be thinking about the bigger picture and how our city can lead the world in facing up to climate change. One old lady asked if that would mean they wouldn’t go ahead with the cheap flights to Fuerteventura that she’d been reading about”.

He threw open his hands in despair.

“Thom, they really didn’t go as badly as you’re making out” Jenny said, sounding frustrated.

He slumped his head back down into his hands.

 

The last bars of Shania Twain were fading down, then mixing back up into the latest Britney track and Thomas lifted his head from on top of his folded arms at the wood panelled bar. Across the room he could see Ciaran mouthing born to make you happy to Cam and Jenny, who were battling hard to keep up with his moves. The dance floor beneath their feet was a gaudy patchwork of glowing coloured squares.

It was late in the evening and their veins were all pumping gin. Ciaran tried to beckon him over but Thomas instead rested back on the bar and blew him a kiss.

As the song ended the three of them came across and variously collapsed across the bar, recovering from the exertions of a five-song diva marathon.

Thomas draped an arm round Cameron and Ciaran who stood either side of him.

“Boys” he said seriously, “I fear we’re standing at the edge of an abyss tonight. Here we are at 25, each of us at the height of our sexual prowess. The clock reads 2.30 on a Saturday morning, and as things stand, each one of us is heading home to a cold, sexless bed. Without immediate action comrades, I fear that terrible day when we start our descent to mere mortals could soon be upon us.”

“Well I’m only 24 actually” Ciaran said with a grin. “still on the way up”.

Cameron looked across the bar, caught the eye of a scruffy blond in grey tracksuit bottoms and gave him a wink. The guy smiled back.

“Catch up with you in the morning then boys.”

Thomas watched the smile break widely across Ciaran’s face as Cameron patted the two of them on the back and headed away. His eyes were full of wonder at something he would never have had the balls to do himself. Thomas gazed into those beautiful snow globe eyes as they turned back to him and Jenny. The alcohol had dampened his self-consciousness, and after a few seconds Ciaran glanced away embarrassed, and Thomas realised the look had gone on too long.

Jenny quietly excused herself to visit the facilities.

Ciaran turned back and looked again into Thomas’ eyes, then reached out slowly and took his hand.

“Just the two of us single boys left then. What are we to do?”

Thomas’ heart beat hard in his chest. God, how amazing it would feel for the two of them to collapse into a thick duvet and do nothing but lie and touch and stroke and whisper and doze together, all night and then all of tomorrow. How easy and beautiful and normal that would feel.

But it had consequences, and he wasn’t ready for consequences.

Thomas pulled his eyes away and looked across to the edge of the dancefloor where another two guys stood finishing their drinks, clearly on friendly but not intimate terms.

“How about these?” he said and pulled Ciaran gently by the hand, letting go once they were in motion walking casually across the bar.

Thomas smiled and leaned his forearm on the table by the two guys, revealing his heavily worked bicep.

“Looks like you boys might be needing a couple of dates for the rest of the night, eh?”

Thomas glanced back across as Jenny returned to the empty bar. She gave him a look of mild disapproval then picked up her coat, and disappeared into the night.

 

“I’m serious, I think that, overall, the speeches went well. This was always going to be about the long game”. Jenny wasn’t giving up.

Thomas reared his head up once more. “Did you see the looks on Gordon and Peter’s faces? They’re going to get a restraining order on me if I ever set foot near a microphone again.”

“Maybe they needed to hear it too. Look, there were five journalists across the two talks, and I know at least two of them are going to be saying positive things. The ideas you set out and the passionate delivery, they made an impression.”

“What about the other three?”

She paused. “Well, the other three are more likely to reflect the immediate mood of the audience. But still, it was a start”.

He rolled his eyes. “It was the end.”

“Thom, come on. They were tough audiences.”

“You picked them”. He couldn’t help the resentment, spitting out at her.

Jenny looked injured. She narrowed her eyes.

“Well maybe if you hadn’t cut me out of your life these last four years we might have come up with something a bit more effective. Jesus, Thom, you should have been leader of that group already. You would’ve been if you’d have stuck with me. You chose to throw that away.”

The reservoir of bile in his stomach churned over.

“Well what did you think I’d do after you fucked up my whole life”.

The words burst out like vomit, and he looked away embarrassed at the mess that he should have kept inside.

The room was silent.

Thomas couldn’t lift his eyes to her, but glanced up at Cameron, whose face was as blank as printer paper.

“Well what the hell does that mean?” Jenny demanded.

“Nothing” he muttered.

“So what, you’re telling me that these last four years were no accident? That I’ve been in exile for a crime I don’t even know about? When was my fucking trial?”

She turned to Cameron, who held up his hands, in surrender. Her expression demanded an answer but he wasn’t yielding. “Jenny, this isn’t for me…”

Thomas dropped his head into his palms once more.

“Thom, stop hiding your fucking head away and tell me what terrible thing I did to you four years ago, that apparently undid all our years of friendship”

She wasn’t going to stop without an answer.

“Look, if you can’t even…”

“You fucking set them up” Thomas said, springing suddenly up in the chair like a jack in the box.

“What?”

“Ciaran. You set him up with that fucking Australian.”

“So?” Her voice was quieter and her face still struggled to comprehend.

Thomas rubbed away a tear from one eye.

“Ciaran is happy isn’t he?” she said.

“You set him up and you told him to go.”

“Ciaran is happy” she said again, her voice more brittle. Her confusion was turning to understanding and then back to anger.

“Fuck, is that what this has been? Four years exclusion, because I helped your best friend find happiness? Because I saved him from a lifetime of unrequited love for you? Can’t you be happy for him?”

Thomas sat and shook his head hopelessly, tears starting to roll down his cheeks.

“You took him away from me.”

“Thom, he wanted you so much, but you were never going to take him. You led him on. You always did. I lost count of the number of times I thought it was going to happen, but it never did. You wanted to sleep with every guy on Canal Street before him”

“I was in my twenties.” Thomas said with a hollow laugh. “Of course I was going to sleep around. But I was always going to settle down.”

“You were in your thirties when he left. Tell me Thom, when exactly were you going to settle down?”

He shook his head and wiped his eyes again with the back of his sleeve.

“I don’t regret setting him up Thom, and I don’t regret telling him to go out there and get on with his life. You were never going to take him.

He looked across at her with emptiness in his eyes and when he spoke his voice was suddenly quiet and cracked, like he was talking on his deathbed.

“I was always going to take him”.

He wiped away more tears, but it was becoming futile.

“Every single version of my life that I ever contemplated was always going to end up with him and me. It was maybe the one thing that was sure in my life”.

“Thom…” she said, her voice caring but unbelieving.

“You’re right. I wanted to sleep with every man on Canal Street before him. Because then when it was me and him, that would be it. It would be us”.

Jenny looked silently at him. It was impossible to tell what she was thinking.

Thomas stood up. The tears wouldn’t stop and his mind was a storm again.

“I need some air”. He wiped his eyes and headed out of the door without looking back.

 

Minutes later he was paying entry at the bottom of the dark staircase below the neon sauna light, and then disappearing into the steam.

He derobed and wrapped a white towel around his waist. The sauna was quiet this evening, and he took refuge on a leather sofa in an empty room, letting his heavy eyelids drop.

 

It turned out that the two guys that night were flatmates and Thomas and Ciaran went back to their place after the bar. They drank some more and each fooled around with their respective partner. Ciaran and his guy disappeared off to one of the bedrooms leaving Thomas and his to the lounge. They were so drunk and tired that the affair didn’t amount to much, but both were satisfied, and crashed out on the sofas in the lounge.

At about four in the morning, Thomas was sleeping badly, so he was easily woken by movement at the edge of the room. Ciaran had crept out and was making his way to the free bed in the other room.

Thomas hesitated for a few seconds before getting up from the sofa as quietly as he could, and stepping thief-like through the flat after Ciaran into the second bedroom. The flat was in full darkness apart from a dim glow of moonlight shining in through skylights in the roof. A clock ticked persistently in the hallway, and outside a car revved up as it passed by on the street below.

Ciaran seeing the shadow at the door, and realising who it was, folded back the duvet with a flashlight smile shining across his face.

They didn’t say a word out loud, just laid side by side, their half-naked bodies rising and falling with earthly breaths. Ciaran touched Thomas’ arm and as their eyes met, he indicated to the skylight above them. They stared up at the twinkling magic of the dark, starry sky, and Thomas could feel his heart rate slowing and finding peace. Ciaran gently placed his hand into Thomas’ and they fell asleep that night together.

 

A man in a leather harness walked into the room, stirring Thomas from his thoughts. Behind him followed another guy, crawling on all fours.

The walking man sat on a sofa opposite Thomas and his friend continued and rested on the floor by his feet.

“Good puppy. You done well tonight boy.”

The man smiled across at Thomas who returned the acknowledgement.

“Sometimes I wish I could give it all up and do that” Thomas said, indicating to the submissive pup. “Stop thinking about everything you know. Let somebody else do the worrying”.

The guy raised his eyebrows. “Always got space for another mate”

Thomas smiled. “I think this old dog is beyond taming.”

The man’s expression indicated he thought otherwise.

“I’ve got a bit of a reputation for teaching an old dog new tricks.”

Thomas looked at the guy on the floor. He could only be in his early twenties. The man followed his gaze.

“Not this one of course. He’s new in training. But I’ve leashed plenty your age. And beyond”.

Thomas nodded, an amused look still across his face.

“I think knowing too many tricks has always been my problem, if you follow my meaning.”

The man nodded, amused. “Ah well. I know all about that sort of trouble. It can all lose its magic once you know every trick in the book, eh?”

“You know, I think I’ve reached a point where I’ve had my fill of tricks and I’m ready for a treat.”

“Maybe I can give you a hand with that at least then” the man said. “Pup, why don’t you go help out our friend over there, eh”.

Thomas began to raise a hand to refuse, but then somehow it felt easier to let it happen. He sat back, closed his eyes and felt the rush of air hit his legs as the towel fell away.