This is a love story in one part. Only 4,400 words and very little sex.
Memories
The walk from the square to `La Saten' was tiring. Tomas remembered as a young man making this same walk, frequently, and not feeling the strain. But that was a long time ago and the memories brought tears to his eyes. He had been so young, they had been so young. Where had all that exuberant youth gone, how had he thrown it away so easily?
Panting as he would have done after running a marathon, he picked his little corner of the bar and ordered his wine. Paco served him as usual, and asked after his health, as usual, then left him with his memories, as usual. Paco hadn't even been born when he and his love had got uproariously drunk here on numerous occasions, but the best memories were of the nights they hadn't got drunk, but had gone home to make love until dawn.
How had he let it slip away, Fernando was still there as large as life and a million times more beautiful, but only in his mind. The beautiful boy was gone, had been gone for years. Long, lonely years. Why did he stay? Why did he continue to breath? He had been dead in his heart for all those years since he had let his love go.
Outwardly nothing had changed in his life, or his surroundings. Old Spanish villages changed slowly, sometimes they looked as if they had never changed. Rojas was like that, oh yes, a few new buildings, but all like the old ones. La Saten', (The Frying Pan), hadn't changed, Paco had left it as it was. A new coat of paint every spring and that was it. Tomas smiled as he thought of his first drink here, how he had been at his most persuasive convincing the barman that Fernando was old enough to be served alcohol. Of course he wasn't, he was only fifteen, a small Spanish boy, brought up in England where Thomas had first seen him and fallen in love when he was eighteen. It was in this village that he had become Tomas, dropping the h' forever after that first visit.
They had come here on a backpacking holiday with friends. The friends had moved on but Tomas and Fernando had remained and fallen in love with each other and with this village.
"We'll come back here to live when we have finished our education," Thomas had said to Fernando one morning as they lay, lazily stroking each other's naked bodies, in the small house they had rented for the remainder of that first summer.
"But how will we live?" asked the ever practical Fernando.
"Oh, we'll find something to do. We won't need very much money to live in a place like this."
Fernando didn't think it would be that easy, but by then he was so in love he would let his man have his dreams. They could still be in love when reality took over.
The little house was tucked into the hillside just below the village, with wonderful views down to the coast and along the beach. Large old olive trees dotted the gardens, their knarled old trunks making patterns with their shadows on the long grass.
"We'll buy this house and live here happily ever after, we'll build a swimming pool and make love and swim all day and I'll tell you forever how beautiful you are and how much I love you."
Fernando laughed at the absurdity but loved to hear his man tell him how much he was loved. Maybe they would one day buy this little house, but he couldn't imagine it ever being their main home. They would have to work, but he would be happy if they could be together. Thomas was his first love, and he hoped his last.
Tomas had his second glass of wine and looked round at all the other customers, mostly young, all smiling and talking animatedly in a dozen different tongues. His sleepy little village had become part of the `in crowds' summer resting place. They talked about how quaint it was, and wasn't it wonderful that no one had changed it. The wealthier ones had big villas in the valley, madness, the valley was like an oven, but they all had air-conditioning. Tomas thought of his little house, no fans, no air-conditioning. The onshore breeze wafted through the house during the day, keeping it cool for the evenings. He remembered the day they succumbed to the 20th. century and installed electricity. They had needed it for the swimming pool filtration and circulation pumps. Before that they had made do with a gas fridge and oil lamps. Battery driven tape cassettes and radio had been their music source, no television. He still didn't have a television. They didn't need anything or anyone in those days, they had their love. The thoughts made his sadness deeper and the tears ran silently down his face. He paid for his wine and departed quickly before anyone could see those tears.
Perhaps it was time he went back to England, close up the house for a few months. Maybe come back in December when it would still be warm during the day, and a small fire would suffice in the evenings. He would bring another batch of books to read, get in a couple of flagons of the local red wine and hibernate for the winter.
He knew he should shake off this ennui and get on with his life, he was only fifty and apart from the loss of one lung which kept him short of breath, he was still quite fit. Twenty two years he had with his love, and these last ten without him. What wonderful years, until the arguments started, the last two years had been a nightmare, neither of them willing to compromise, stupid, stupid, stupid.
Tomas sat on the back patio with another glass of wine and remembered. They had gone home from that first holiday, he to university, Fernando to do his last year before GCEs, three more years of education for him, and six more for Fernando. He would use those three years to become one of the most daring and successful traders in the City. The money was to buy their little house. He smiled as he remembered all the clandestine meetings they had in England. Homosexual acts were still illegal for Fernando for another three years but somehow they managed to meet often enough to maintain their sanity. Every school and university vacation they came back to their little house in their quaint little village. The owner laughed at their enthusiasm and wild enjoyment of each other, and let them have it for a peppercorn rent when they were there. Who else would want it any way in this modern world? No electricity, water had to be pumped up from the well, basic facilities inside, but Thomas and Fernando loved it.
Fernando finished his A Levels and took a gap year while Thomas took a year off. They bought the little house and started to turn it into a love nest. Trips out to nearby towns and villages in their little Citroën saw them gathering the makings of their home. Locally made rugs for the stone floors, the paintings of local artists for the walls, pottery for ornaments and more practical use, wonderful Moroccan plates and baking dishes that seemed to enhance the taste of the food. Suddenly the year was gone and it was time for Fernando to go to university and Thomas to go back to make more money so that they could fulfil his dream of living in this little village and doing very little except make love.
Thomas had been hugely successful and made his millions while Fernando finished his degree. Then the need for compromise, Thomas was ready to complete the dream.
"I have enough money for us to never work again. We can go out to Rojas forever."
"No Tom, the dream was wonderful and I'll never grow tired of our little love nest, but I need to use my education for my own satisfaction. The money doesn't matter, but I want to work, I want to achieve something in my life besides loving you."
Thomas had looked at him and realised how determined he was.
"Alright my love. How long do you want for that?"
"At least five years Tom, then let's look at it again. We can still go out to the house whenever we have holidays."
The five years were, for Thomas wasted years, yes, he made more millions that they would never need, but he itched to be in their love nest. Why waste years with their noses to the grindstone when they could be in their own little piece of Paradise. He wanted to be making love and lazing around, years when he could have his lover by his side all the time, not just in the evenings when he would be too tired for loving, or at the weekends when there would be things to do people to see.
Fernando didn't see it that way, carving out his own little place in society was exciting, yes he worked hard, but it was work he enjoyed. The people he worked with were young and exciting, vibrant and full of life. Of course he loved Thomas, he was sure there would never be anyone else to love in his life, but he couldn't just do nothing, that was bizarre.
At the end of the five years he wanted another five, he would still only be 32, they could still have decades in their love nest, and perhaps he would be ready for it by then.
The ten years was up and Fernando still wasn't ready.
"Tom, I need more time, but I don't have to be here all the time either. We can go to Rojas for most of the year, well a good part of the year. I can work with my computer and only go back to the office for about one week, or ten days a month. You can come and go as you please. Stay here, and every time I come back will be like a new beginning, wonderful nights of love making, renewing our love for one another."
Once again Thomas acquiesced, how could he not, he still loved this boy who he couldn't see as a man. Fernando would always be the wonderful zestful fifteen year old. The reality was that he still looked like a boy, at thirty-two, people would still put his age at eighteen or nineteen.
It worked for Fernando, and Thomas bit his tongue rather than make waves. They carried on like that for another two years until Thomas had the accident that cost him a lung. Now he felt like an invalid and wasn't prepared to compromise. He perceived that his life would be shorter now so wasting weeks being away from his love, or being in England with him, but not having him all the time was unacceptable and the arguments started.
"I'm not like you Tom, I can't sit around and do nothing, I have to work for my sanity. I love you, I'll always love you, but I can't laze around here and do nothing, it would drive me insane."
"Oh, so my company isn't enough for you anymore?"
"It never was Tom, I have to have something other than you in my life, not someone, but something. I love my job, I'm good at my job, it fulfils a part of me that you can't. You fulfil the part my job can't. You give the balance to my life and that is part of why I love you so much."
They argued round and round until Fernando couldn't take any more. He packed his bags, watched by a resentful Thomas.
With tears streaming down his face he stood in the doorway of their little piece of Paradise that had become a little piece of hell and said, "I'm sorry Tom, I'm not coming back. I'll need a few weeks in the London house until I can get accommodation sorted."
Forty years old and Thomas was lost. Thirty-seven years old and Fernando was lost. Neither of them could even remember what it was like not to have each other.
For a few weeks there was some minimal communication until Fernando moved out of their London home, and then nothing. Thomas went home after a few months and walked into the empty house. For all the warmth there was in those four walls it might as well have been empty. Fernando should have taken everything. All the furniture, all the carpets and curtains, it would have been easier to bear, but he had taken nothing except his clothes and his personal stuff. Everything they had bought together was there. He went round touching things, smiling when he remembered the funny place they might have found this trinket, or that figurine. He remembered haggling with shop owners in Cairo for some of the things on display, the framed photograph of them with the little Thai boy who had been their guide on a trip to Bangkok. He sniggered, remembering how hard the boy had tried to sleep with them, and how amazed he was when they convinced him they only ever made love to each other.
That was when the tears came, they had never slept around, he had never for a moment doubted that when Fernando was away from him that he was celibate. He sobbed his way through self-recrimination, he swore he would contact Fernando and beg him to come back. He would compromise, he would swallow his longing to be in their love nest all year.
The next morning he rang Fernando's office and was answered by a strange voice.
"I'm sorry Sir, Mr. Sanchez has taken up a new post with a sister company in Australia."
"No Sir, I have no idea how long he will be gone. The initial contract is for five years, but I understand it is renewable."
Thomas fainted, when he recovered consciousness he sat and worked through his options.
"I'll go out to Australia, I'll beg him to take me back, I'll become his houseboy and go anywhere in the world he wants to work."
Thomas knew he was kidding himself. Fernando had gone to the other side of the world to get away from him. The last two years had eroded all the wonderful loving years. The pot of love was empty, the pot of resentment and unhappiness had been overflowing.
He got hold of a firm that would mothball the house and its contents for him. He couldn't imagine selling it and he couldn't imagine ever living in it again. One week later he went back to Spain. One year later he realised he had become a total slob, pride in appearance had gone pride in anything had gone. He pulled himself together, installed a small gym in the cottage, and got himself fit again. He tried share dealing from the house using computers and made more money that he didn't need. He made no friends just being on nodding terms with the villagers that remembered the two young Englishmen that were so in love the world around them was always bright and sunny. They wanted to ask where his friend had gone, but the lines of grief kept them from doing so.
Life became a living death for Thomas. There was never a day that he didn't think of Fernando. The years past and nothing changed. Then at forty-eight he had some kind of attack that was made worse by his one lung and he became a semi invalid. His exercise now was a walk up to the village to La Saten for a glass of wine most days. He made regular trips to London to see his specialist in Harley Street but they said there was nothing more they could do now, he would have to live with his infirmity. The truth was that Thomas was dying of a broken heart. He knew it and was pleased that he would not have to grieve his lost love for much longer.
A flurry of activity followed that last trip to the bar and the little house was closed up after Thomas had spring-cleaned, leaving it as it had been in happy times. His will was with his solicitors here and in London. It was very simple. Everything he owned he left to Fernando. Neither of them had living relatives. That had been one of the draws to their relationship. They had only ever had each other. In London he very quickly sold the little flat he had bought to live in when he was here, then he opened up the big house. The mothballing had worked well. Cleaners had only taken a couple of days to open it up to air, and clean everything.
He made the last appointment to see his specialist and get a reasonable idea of how much longer he had.
"I'm sorry Thomas, there is nothing wrong with you apart from your one lung. But if you don't have the will to live there is nothing medical science can do to make you. Why don't you go and find the boy, at least you will know for certain."
Thomas laughed.
"Henry, I think ten years is long enough for me to know."
With that he had left and walked slowly down Harley Street making his way into the West End. He walked with a stick now looking more like seventy than fifty, but determined to have one last drink in the Admiral Duncan. Then he would go home, ordering a limo to take him. `My last big expense', he thought, I'm sure Fernando won't begrudge me that out of the fortune I have left him'.
He looked round the bar and thought how young all these happy gay men were. How far they had travelled since he and Fernando had started their love affair. No furtive meetings now, these young men could walk down the road hand in hand and kiss openly, how lucky they were.
He heard a bunch of Australian accents and immediately thought of Fernando, `is he still there, has he come back to England, where is he, what is he doing, has he found a new love?' Thomas looked round to see and his eyes locked immediately onto the soft-spoken Englishman that was in their midst. Only he wasn't an Englishman, he was a Spaniard. It couldn't be, he looked so young, he looked so beautiful. Thomas didn't remember anything else until he woke up in a hospital bed.
He looked round slowly until his eyes rested on the sleeping form in a chair alongside his bed. It was him, it was the most beautiful, the most loved creature in the whole world. This apparition couldn't be forty-seven years old, it wasn't possible, he looked to still be in his twenties.
Thomas shifted his position so that he could look more easily at this lover from happier times. The movement disturbed Fernando who opened his eyes and looked.
"I think you have been a very naughty boy. You haven't been looking after yourself."
Thomas blushed, his first words from his love in ten years and they were chastising him. He nodded and the tears came, nothing in the world could have stopped them. Before him was ten wasted years. Fernando eased himself out of the chair and sitting on the bed pulled Thomas into his arms. He didn't say any more, he just stroked the man that he had loved for twenty two years and remembered all the good time, trying to blot out the last years of hell. The extra ten years didn't count, they were the years of living in limbo, just going through the motions. Only Derek had understood, only Derek who would have given his life for one night in bed with his idle, understood.
"How can you live in this Paradise, surrounded by gorgeous men who would die to be able to make love to you, I would die happy if I could make love to you just once, and you remain celibate. How many years are you going to grieve for this lost love and do nothing about it?"
Derek was angry that, as he saw it, Fernando was throwing his life away on a dream.
"Because what we had could never be repeated, there is no other man on this planet that I could love even half as much as I loved Tom. We can't live together and I'm not living now that we are apart. Just leave me alone Derek."
"No, if I can't have you, then I want you to go home and find this wonder man that can hold you in your mind forever. Ten years Fernando, go and find him, go and live with him in your little love nest. You are crazy to remain here."
At last Fernando realised Derek was right. Ten years he had grieved the loss of Tom, ten years he had refused to bend and do what Tom wanted. Now he would, he would start at the London house and then the house in Rojas. Some of his Australian colleagues were going to England for courses. He would resign but go home with them and start his quest.
His mind returned to the present as the gentle tears of his love had become hard, gut wrenching sobs and Fernando knew that this man was sucking on the last ounces of his stamina.
"Shhh, my love, no more tears, I'm going to look after you."
Thomas couldn't believe what he had just heard. He pulled away from Fernando and looked in his eyes.
"Do you mean that?"
"Yes, I mean that. I came home to find you. I can't live without your love any longer. Pure force of will has allowed me to continue these last ten years, now, I can't deny my love for you any longer. Say you'll allow me back into your life?"
Thomas tried to reply but ended up with another blackout. The brain overload was just too much. This one induced a stroke and the doctors were more than a little concerned.
"He is so weak, Mr. Sanchez. We have talked to his doctors, Mr. Bedford lost the will to live according to his specialist and had virtually wished himself into an early grave. I don't know what more we can do, he will want to live very much to survive this, but I doubt he has the physical strength left."
Fernando didn't leave Thomas's side. The days past and at last Fernando's iron resolve crumbled and he cried.
"Please don't die my love, I need you so much. We need to go back to Rojas for me to show you how much I love you."
The crying was tearing him apart. How could he have left Thomas for so long. He knew a strange man had tried to contact him a few months after he had left and he was sure it must have been Thomas, but he had done nothing. How could he have been so stupid. Despite all the arguments, despite the total loss of loving feelings, as soon as he was back in England, Fernando knew that this man would never be out of his life.
Thomas didn't die, but it was nearly a year before he was well enough to slide out from under the care of his doctors.
"We'll go home as soon as you like Tom. I presume the house is still ours?"
Thomas didn't understand for a little while, and then he realised Fernando meant the little house in Rojas.
"Oh yes my love, I could never have sold it. It was always going to be yours."
Fernando blanched at that comment, knowing that his Tom had almost willed himself to die in despair of ever seeing his love again.
Something else that dawned slowly on Thomas was that Fernando didn't go to work anymore. That whole year he had hardly left his side.
"What about your work, shouldn't you be doing something?"
Fernando smiled.
"No my love, you are my work now, and forever. It has taken me so much longer than our original five years, but now I'm ready to live and love in our little corner of Paradise."
The tears came again and Thomas whispered, "So many wasted years, so much loving lost to us."
"But we have the rest of our lives now. I'll make it up to you, I'll love you like you've never known before."
Thomas laughed then through his tears.
"You only have to love me a little and I'll be happy, and if you stay with me I'll be even happier."
Practicality took over then.
"Let's sell this pile and buy a serviced flat for when we want to come to London. We won't spend much time here so what's the point. We'll make the dream happen. Our little house will be our main home, but please my love, let's modernise it a little, I'm not a teenager any more, I need a few home comforts other than a bed for you to make love to me."
Thomas started to feel young again, the enthusiasm for life sprung new shoots. The years appeared to fly by now, but these were happy years. Once again, the villagers saw the two young men they had known all those years ago, maybe not so young now, but so obviously in love, as they had been before.
The years fell away from Tomas, and after only a couple of years back in Rojas he walked with a spring in his step and looked years younger than he had when he left.
The little house became a frequent party home for the young jet setting gay crowd. They loved to sit and hear the story of these two men, spanning nearly four decades. How could these two men love each other so much and for so long, neither of them ever having sex with another being. That was awesome, and they were still so much in love.
That first winter they curled up most evenings and read to each other in the soft glow of the fire and lamps. They read romantic novels, what else? They laughed and they loved, they tried to make up for all those wasted years and their happiness was complete at last.
THE END
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