Chapter 21 #2
Gerald snorts, and the hand on the gearstick slides over to my knee.
My semi inflates to three-fifths. I must be the only man alive who can be wracked with anxiety and maintain an erection.
Gerald’s thumb begins its usual soothing repetitive stroking—not helping one bit with the trouser situation, but at least it knocks my fretfulness down a notch.
That is until he murmurs an approving good boy while negotiating a double set of traffic lights.
Good boy? Now I have daddy issues to worry about, too.
“Stage fright is a real thing, G.” I don’t think he’s properly grasped the enormity of what he’s planning and how, especially working with animals, anything could go wrong. “What if Elsa makes a complete hash of it?”
Gerald shrugs. “Then I’ll lose. And we’ll drive home.”
God, he’s unnaturally calm. When he’s like this, I swear he’s not even human. “Okay.” My knee tries to jiggle; Gerald’s hand stills it. “Just promise me you’ll both visit the toilet before it’s your turn to go on.”
The sports hall is a glorious, anarchic melee of fur and barking and slippery squares of artificial turf, set to a backdrop of flashing lights and bursts of microphone feedback.
Flood lighting has been switched for disco balls, monkey bars for water bowls.
The unmistakable aroma of doggie excitement mingles with the earthy funk of rubbery gym mats and damp socks.
Me, Gerald, and Elsa take a moment to breathe it all in.
The dog agility heats have been and gone, and the best of breed qualifiers are underway right this minute in the marquee next door.
The handlers prep their pampered pedigree pooches here in the sports hall, in amongst all the dog dancers with their ordinary retrievers and border collies.
Fabrizios zip from task to task, laden with designer labelled bags of chicken treats and bowls of water.
A tense-faced woman frantically blow-dries a bichon frisé.
Meanwhile, her other dog, a yappy chihuahua with silk ribbons plaited in its fur, makes a bid for freedom.
Not giving a shit about any of it, a miserable-looking French bulldog steadily chomps his way through a plastic hairbrush.
As excitement and anticipation surge through my veins, Gerald and I exchange a grin.
Can’t lie—the whole thing is a fucking gay wet dream.
From the expression on his usually serious face, even Gerald’s not immune.
His wide brown eyes dart everywhere, soaking up the atmosphere, drinking it in, yet he’s still so super calm.
He’d give the grumpy bulldog a run for nervelessness.
More importantly, the new shirt is shirting hard.
One of the fabulous Fabrizios fluffing up what Gerald reliably informs me is a Finnish spitz has already glanced over twice.
Naturally, he’s oblivious to the gay and not so gay attention he’s attracting. “My mother would have loved this,” he observes after we’ve registered. “My dad too.”
He’s scheduled to dance ninth out of fifteen entrants in total, all picked from shortlisted videos submitted earlier in the year. “She loved entering the kids into auditions; it didn’t matter what level of ability. Some auditions were for West End shows, some for a village panto.”
“Yeah?” Pride leaks from his pores; it’s the first time he’s volunteered anything personal about her. He sounds like he wishes his dad could be here to see it, too. By now, I know better than to prod. “Did you audition for any?”
Remembering, he smiles. “Yeah, plenty. I was the prototype! I did a few productions; the musical, Annie, was one, Oliver another. I did that one at the Theatre Royal, playing the Artful Dodger for a summer six months, rotated with another couple of boys. It was great fun.”
“You’re kidding me! That’s hardly the odd bit of musical theatre!
No wonder you’re not shitting bricks.” Honestly, the more I think I know this man, the more there is to uncover.
How the hell does he slip wild stuff like that into a conversation, then pet Elsa as if he’d once played fifth shepherd from the left in a school nativity?
I’d be begging please sir I want some more from the rooftops and tapdancing to ‘Consider Yourself’ along the hospital corridors.
“It wasn’t that special. I think they just needed some adolescent lads who were tall and skinny.” He’s blushing. Idiot. Does he really have no idea how bright he shines? I tut at him.
“We all know that’s a lie. Stefan was a tall, skinny teenager with the whole underfed thing going. He couldn’t dance and sing his way out of conga line.”
Nor out of moody Marcus’s clutches.
“Whatever. Mum used to tell us that auditioning isn’t about beating the other kids.
It’s about finding out what we’re capable of when we’re giving something our all.
About discovering the courage to overcome the fear of making fools of ourselves.
To stretch ourselves to the limit. And as long as you do that, she always said you should go home happy, whether you got the part or not. ”
“So you’re not nervous one iota.” My own belly has been somersaulting on Gerald’s behalf since we got in the car. “Wow.”
“I am a bit,” he admits. “It would be abnormal not to be. But I’m trying to channel it into good vibes. Panicking productively. Like Elsa here.”
Elsa, thank fuck, is serenely grooming her front paws as if she’s settling in for a night by the fire.
When Gerald beams down at her like a proud parent, I’m overcome by an insane urge to kiss him, right there.
But that’s something a boyfriend would do, right?
Someone Gerald believes special enough to break his high-falutin’, heartfelt resolutions with.
Not his jittery, annoying tenant he’s allowing along for the ride only to keep him quiet.
So I make do with kissing Elsa instead.