“Steve won’t let you in if you don’t look the part.” That’s Bram. His voice sounds... lighter. “Can’t wear the same thing twice. Can’t look boring.”
“Sounds like exclusionary bullshit to me.” Maud again.
“It’s not.” Bram again. “It’s fun. Lily takes other people’s trash and transforms it into alook. That’s magic.”
Maud says, “She spends more time creating your looks than you do wearing them. Seems like a waste of time.”
“But creativity is God’s greatest gift to humanity. It’s never a waste of time.” This must be the woman named Lily.
Bram adds, “Besides, Steve keeps the people who don’t dress the part out to keep us safe. To create a space where freaks like us can feel at home.”
“I feel at home right here,” Maud says.
“But one home isn’t enough, is it?” This is one of the women. I’m not sure which one. “When my family moved here, they were so scared of racist violence that they wouldn’t let me leave our council flat. I went to school and came home. Which made my home feel like a prison. I needed a home away from home, and a home away from my home away from home.”
“It’s true,” Bram says. His voice gets closer. He’s standing by the window. Looking out. Completely unaware that I’m crouched and breathless underneath the windowsill. A spy in his house of love. “But some people don’t even have one home. They’re cursed to wander the world alone.”
I roll my eyes up. I can see him leaning forward. If he were to look down, he would see me. Perhaps he’d be thrilled. Welcome me in. Perhaps he would hate me for eavesdropping. But he doesn’t look down. Instead, he closes the window. Shuts me out. But that’s all right. I know exactly where to continue my exploration of his new life. I’ll observe him until I’ve made a decision.
I play my synthesizer at run-down Tube stations with fancy names. Park Royal. Marylebone. Marble Arch. When the police chase me out of the Queensway station, I run fast enough to evade them, the coins I’ve gathered jangling in my pocket.
On Monday evening, I enter a red telephone box. There’s trash inside. I kick it to the corner of the booth. I get the sense someone slept here last night. Better than sleeping in the rain. I push a button markedA. Place some coins in.
I dial the queer helpline. His voice comes from the other side. The voice I’ve tried to escape for decades. The voice I’ve longed to hear for decades.
“Hello, this is the queer helpline. My name is Bram. How may I help you?”
I freeze, realizing he may recognize my voice, even after all these years. I hide any trace of the Oliver he knew behind a heavy Irish accent. I spent years in Belfast, thinking perhaps I’d feel at home there, in the land of my ancestors. “Hello” is all I say at first.
“I’m gay and I’m here to help if you are too,” he announces calmly.
“Gay as in homosexual?” I ask, confident he can’t identify me with the accent. “Or as in happy?”
“A little of both,” he says. Then, “No, sorry, I’m a hundred percent homosexual. Perhaps fifty percent happy.”
“Better than most.”
“You’re probably right.” He sighs. “I should feel lucky. I do feel lucky.”
“It’s sad, isn’t it?” I ask. “That the vast majority of the world is so deeply unhappy.”
His voice rises a little. “It’s not sad. It’s enraging. We made it this way. Humans. We have all the tools for happiness. We could take care of each other. Provide for each other. Instead, we destroy each other. For what?”
“Greed,” I say. “To have more than others.”
“Yes, greed,” he echoes. “I’ve been guilty of greed.”
“Is that why you’re volunteering for the helpline?” I ask. “To ease the guilt?”
He takes a moment. “I’m supposed to be asking the questions,” he says quietly.
I hear a click. Place another coin in. Outside, an impatient woman taps her foot on the pavement. Rushes me with her urgent blue eyes.
“I wasn’t greedy for money,” he explains, filling the silence. “Just for love. I did something impulsive and terrible because I thought it would bring me the love I craved. The kind that lasts forever.”
I gulp down hard. I feel I’ve taken this far enough, or perhaps too far. And yet, I need to hear this. I must know if he understands what he did. How he might explain it to a stranger. Which is what I am to him from the other end of the line. “So you never found it, then? Love that lasts forever.”
“No,” he mumbles. “And perhaps, yes. Not romantic love. I only experienced that once, and I’m afraid I bungled it forever. But...”
