Lost in Manchester - 4. The Irishman. September 2009. Thomas

So he got turned down by a twentysomething. It was no big deal. He didn’t even want to date a twentysomething. They were always so needy, so eager to prove themselves, so unnecessarily excitable. He didn’t need dating.

At just 35, he was the founder and owner of Delaney Architects, a local Councillor and a one-time hero of the Gay Village. One-time hero.

Thomas sat at his antique walnut desk, and stared at the 19-year old figure with eyes full of sexual mischief on his laptop screen. He slid his fingers across the keyboard to type, his head static and his eyes forward, like a blind man reading braille.

>IrishBear: I want to see that shirt off

>Cutie3.14: we only just started chatting

He waited patiently for a few seconds. Guys like this were so easy. You just had to tease them a little.

>IrishBear: Do it you sexy maths geek

There was another pause as the guy registered the reference.

>Cutie3.14: you worked out my username

>IrishBear: I did

>Cutie3.14: Cutie Pi!

>IrishBear: Yes

>Cutie3.14: Most people don’t get it

>IrishBear: Well I’m smarter than the average bear. Now, get it off

The boy paused, feigned a shy expression, then gave in.

>Cutie3.14: ok daddy bear

A chill ran down his spine. Bear alone wasn’t great, but he had conceded, at 35 and with his build that was what they called you. Since adopting it in his username it had also been pretty successful. But daddy bear. That was gruesome; a slug slithering into his ear. It sounded like overflowing bellies, bushy beards and the clinging stench of cigar smoke.

Ah, but it was worth it. The student took off his glasses and lifted the skinny black t-shirt up and over his head, leaving a pale, lightly defined chest exposed. Thomas watched the shirtless figure for several minutes, hypnotised by the passionate concentration on his face and the contorting torso as he stroked himself, below the lower boundary of the camera shot. He bucked one last time, then seconds later the window went dark and he was gone.

He might at least have said goodbye. But that one was never going to work out. Daddy bear was a deal breaker.

He clicked back to a screen of 28 miniature camera windows, and mulled over his next move. The digital clock at the bottom right corner of his laptop screen blinked up 20:58.

Thomas opened four new windows and spent a few minutes chatting with each inhabitant. The fourth window contained a mid-twenties male, moulded like an Olympic swimmer. His abdominals protruded down the centre of his chest like he’d swallowed a bumper sized hand grenade. The muscled crescent of his bum was resting back on a blue swivel seat in front of a desk, and the camera was perfectly positioned to show his head and naked body, all the way down to where it got interesting. His face lit up like an electric storm as he smiled and laughed at the things people were typing on his chat feed.

Thomas invited him into a private chat room. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, a guy who looked like this would ignore him, yet some masochistic tendency always made him ask. When the chat screen actually opened, he was caught off guard.

>Adonis24: hey, what u lookin for?

Thomas’ brain shut down. What am I looking for? What’s realistic with this guy? What can I say that isn’t totally inane?

>IrishBear: Well what are you offering?

Ugh. I’m an idiot.

The guy paused and it looked for a second as though he might exit the chat room, but then he started typing.

>Adonis24: I’m into hot bears sometimes. Turn on your cam

Thomas felt anxious. In what universe would this sculpted Olympian, this buck-naked James Dean, ever want to sleep with him?

But maybe?

He switched it on, and waited for the reaction. It was swift.

>Adonis24: fuck man, bye

The screen went black. A notice came up to say the user had blocked him.

Thomas slumped back. He looked down at his shapeless half-naked 35-year old body spread over the chair and felt utterly and irreversibly unattractive.

The clock on the wall ticked past 9:30pm.

Thomas pictured the huge golden clock inside the Town Hall and the tense hushed crowd all about him. That night in 2002 was like yesterday. The returning officer was waiting for the last cheers of celebration to die down so he could read aloud the result of the election for the next ward - Hulme.

Jenny, his campaign manager was standing at his side, holding his hand. She looked like she had placed her life savings on Red 27 and was watching the wheel spin. He had been calm though. He knew exactly where the ball was going to land.

When his victory was announced, a cheer erupted around him. Jenny’s face broke into a grin and she thrust her arms into the air and then down and around him. He had felt almost happier for her than for himself. She had put everything into the campaign. She had won it.

The evening that followed was a blur. It had been a well-publicised campaign and the gay village had been right behind him. Thomas was now their implicit representative in the Council Chamber. He was flying the rainbow flag for his people. Each bar they entered that night welcomed them like returning war heroes.

He remembered one moment vividly from the club that night. A second where the world stopped and he took a memory-shot of each of his three friends exactly as they were. Cameron was up on the stage, his shirt long since abandoned and his gym-worked torso shimmering from the sweat of his dancing, a crowd of adoring boys around him. Across at the bar Jenny was lounging on a bar stool engaged in conversation with a tall drag queen in a blood orange wig. With one hand she sipped politely at a lurid green cocktail, and with the other gesticulated every word she spoke, like she was a television signer for the hard of hearing.

And there right in front of him was Ciaran, all bright smile and glistening blue eyes as the nightclub lights flickered across his face. They were dancing alone, two bodies grinding together, laughing, flirting, touching. They had been best friends for a decade, and tonight wouldn’t be the first drunken energetic night they’d shared a bed. Thomas always joked they’d end up together as soon as they became too old to pull a new guy each weekend.

He browsed the webcam site again and after several abortive conversations, opened up a single new chat window. It was a guy in his late twenties or early thirties, light blond hair and blue eyes. Thomas opened his webcam for the guy to see and slid his fingers onto the keyboard.

>IrishBear: you know you have beautiful eyes?

>JoshuaCam: thanks man

>IrishBear: is the rest of you that beautiful?

The guy gave a mischievous look and angled the camera downward. He was completely naked and, apparently, in the mood.

>IrishBear: are you in the city centre?

>JoshuaCam: yeah

>IrishBear: you should come over

The guy made an awkward face.

>JoshuaCam: yeah, my boyfriend might not like that

Thomas heaved a sigh. Always the same story.

>IrishBear: damn boyfriends always getting in the way

>JoshuaCam: I know

Thomas got lost in thought for a second, then looked up to see the expectant face awaiting his next line.

>IrishBear: so what’s he like?

>JoshuaCam: who?

>IrishBear: your man?

>JoshuaCam: you want to talk about my boyfriend?

>IrishBear: No

>Irishbear: I guess not

>JoshuaCam: you want to lower your camera for me?

>IrishBear: does he make you happy though?

>JoshuaCam: what?

>IrishBear: your boyfriend

>JoshuaCam: yeah

>JoshuaCam: but right now I just want to see your cock

>IrishBear: i’ve never actually been in a proper relationship

The guy made a frustrated face.

>JoshuaCam: you’re not horny are you?

>IrishBear: I just think maybe I’ve missed out, you know?

The guy made a final exasperated face.

>JoshuaCam: sorry, I really don’t care man.

The screen turned again to black and Thomas was alone.

He broke away from the laptop to use the bathroom and picked up his phone on the way back to check for messages; there were none. It was coming up to ten thirty, and he hadn’t eaten yet. He would have one final look at who was on camera, then go and put food on. He filled the kettle, switched it on and tossed a teabag into a mug.

There was so much confidence in his voice that night.

“Labour are all very well” he announced, a pint of beer held aloft, as if to alert people to the impending speech. “You can’t knock what they’ve done for us nationally. But we’ve got to keep the pressure on. We’ve got to keep this country liberalising”.

“Hear hear” Cameron had shouted and clinked his glass with Thomas’.

“He still thinks he sounds like Martin Luther King when he talks like that” Jenny told the others.

“I’m going to be like Martin Luther King. We should all be more like Martin Luther King. There’s a world out there that needs to understand what equality means.”

“Quite right” Ciaran added, his soft Welsh lilt caressing the words. “Just don’t go getting yourself bloody shot”

Then leaning in closer to Thomas’ ear, “I love you too much boyo”.

Thomas got drawn into a website of a thousand sex videos. He scrolled down the detailed index from amateur to xxx, and perused the videos that had been carefully sorted by the number of guys involved, their ethnicities and the user rating, like a pornographic Argos catalogue. He edged himself slowly and steadily towards his own climax, watching video after video, building it up, relaxing and tensing, over and over. None was quite enough to push him over the edge, but his head gradually disappeared into a cloud of fantasy. Eventually one hit the spot and they probably heard the groan two floors up.

The five second honeymoon after the dizzy hazy height of climax triggered a sudden thudding fall back to reality. He was back in the cold study, next to the dying Yucca plant and the three bags of books that he should have taken to the charity shop months ago. He shut down the internet window and saw the background screenshot of the yellow bird emblem of the Liberal Democrats.

He glanced up to the clock on the wall and saw that it read 11:45pm. He had been online almost three hours. It wasn’t the first time this had happened. Thomas wandered through the thick punishing silence of his flat, into the kitchen. The dry teabag still sat hopefully in the mug by the kettle.

The last seven and a half years since being elected to Council had not been all he had dreamed. Being a Liberal Democrat in this city, meant always being on the outside. Manchester was tied to the Labour party like billionaires were to the Conservatives. It was a city of workers rebellions, suffragettes and communist meetings. Yet, things had started well for him. He built up good relationships with the local media and made the most of being in opposition and having a license to speak out on issues.

After re-election in 2006 he had been invited onto the Liberal Democrats policy committee. It was the forum where the local party power lay, and had seemed a great reward for the political promise he was showing. It meant him getting to influence how the party spoke out as a whole on issues, even if it came at the cost of having to be less vocal on his personal views. They needed to be strategic and united, and to choose their battles.

Joining that committee was the worst choice he could have made though. It had been a straitjacket. He had sacrificed his voice in the city and gained little real influence on the committee. You couldn’t help but think that the party had seen him as a threat and brought him onto the group in order to neuter him.

It was almost midnight and clearly long past dinner. He looked into the fridge in search of a quick meal, but the row of condiment jars, bottled beers and withering vegetables offered little promise. He walked aimlessly towards the balcony, and picked up a photo resting on the side table.

Ciaran’s smile was shining out, next to his own. He remembered the night well. He had taken it just before he got the news. It was a nothing Tuesday evening in one of the bars along Canal Street and Ciaran had brought along an Australian guy he had been seeing, Lucas. He always dated guys for a few months at a time, but they never lasted.

“So Lucas and me were talking about going out to Australia. Maybe doing some travelling” Ciaran told him as they all sat down together with a beer.

Thomas’ face showed a little consternation.

“As a holiday?”

“Sure. Well, an extended holiday. He wants to spend a bit of time over there. And, you know, I’ve always wanted to explore the world, so why not?”

“Is it not a bit soon for something like that?”

Thomas didn’t care whether this was an awkward question to ask with Lucas sitting right there. He had always treated Ciaran’s boyfriends with a healthy degree of disdain.

Lucas laughed. “We’ve been dating six months!”

“Really?”

“We have” Ciaran said softly.

“Well what about your job?”

Ciaran’s face lit up. “Oh, I packed it in. I told Geoffrey to stuff it.”

Thomas laughed in spite of himself.

“I told him, Geoffrey, this boy was made for something more glamorous than the world of Perkins dry cleaning!”

“You could come and work for me?”

Ciaran’s bright blue eyes shone as Thomas stared into them.

“This is going to be good for me”.

Thomas continued to stare a few seconds longer before reluctantly nodding. “So you’ll be back in a few months?”

“Yeah. Probably”. He looked apologetic. “I don’t know boyo. We’re going to see what happens I guess”.

That had been nearly five years ago and there were no signs of him coming back.

The last of Thomas’ old friends to visit the flat had been Cameron. When he thought about it, that was probably more than a year ago now. Since then, numerous other men had been here. Most of them complete strangers, others that he saw now and then when he felt the urge. There were some visitors whose name he never even asked.

He desperately needed to sleep well, and wake up refreshed. He needed to be enthusiastic about work and to get on with life again. To remember what it was like to even have a life again. It just all felt too difficult.

He looked across to the laptop, summoning him back. It was useless. He took a beer from the fridge, returned to the desk and double clicked the internet icon.