Chapter Twenty-Three A Guesta Son
Leaving the flat the next morning, Danny experienced an anxiety he hadn’t felt since they first started dating when everything was fragile and new – that he had said or done the wrong thing, that there would be no next time and that he would never see Luis again.
Danny caught the morning train to Exeter where he changed onto a regional bus.
There were some seventy stops to the northern edge of Cornwall, a slow journey through the granite moors where Danny would roam as a teenager, much to the consternation of his parents who wondered why he couldn’t make friends like ordinary children, concerned that he spent too much time on his own, feral in the hills or by the sea.
Passing through Dartmoor National Park, six hours after departing London, Danny finally saw his childhood town of Bude.
His parents were waiting at the bus stop, both in good health from daily coastal walks and a diet of fish broths.
His mum, sixty-nine years old, was wearing a brown jacket buttoned up to the neck with black trousers and sturdy leather boots.
His father, seventy-three, wore a waxed waterproof jacket, grey combat trousers and modern hi-tech hiking shoes.
At some point his mother had stopped dyeing her hair and it was now a magnificent grey.
His father’s silver hair was cropped short.
For a handsome man, he had never shown any interest in style or fashion, not as the absence of vanity but as vanity of another sort, disdain for frivolous concerns.
No one hugged. Perhaps they weren’t sure how.
Danny’s parents owned and managed a guest house overlooking the dunes.
Shortly after they married which, for point of comparison, was two years after their first date, with a wedding at their village church blessed by a priest, they went into business together.
They bought a rundown townhouse and converted it into a guest lodge with nine bedrooms. The rooms ranged from cosy nooks for solo travellers to a grand attic suite with sweeping sea views and a small balcony.
There had been many renovations over the decades with the most recent opting for uncluttered simplicity, pine bedframes and pine cabinets, accompanied with English hospitality necessities such as mini-kettles, tea bags and home-baked Cornish fairings made with ginger, golden syrup and cinnamon.
According to tradition the biscuits were given by a man to his sweetheart during courtship.
Whenever Danny’s mother baked a batch she would give Danny two, one for him and one for any girl he might have his eye on. Alone, he had always eaten both.
Over the years the guest house terrace had become a popular spot for visitors to enjoy homemade ice creams, celebrated for their unusual flavours such as ‘Cornish Tea’ with Earl Grey, chunks of scone, raisins and ripples of strawberry jam.
The bar served eclectic local ales brewed with Styrian Golding hops.
The restaurant made their own pasties and parsley pies.
However, during the rise of cheap package holidays, the business teetered close to bankruptcy.
Danny’s parents had been weeks away from a forced sale with no choice but to re-mortgage their home – an end of terrace, two-bedroom house on a cul-de-sac ten minutes’ walk from the guest house.
Throughout his childhood the family home had remained neglected with faulty electrics, draughty windows, damp walls and a concrete backyard sprouting weeds while his parents diverted their resources into the business.
Growing up Danny would compare the condition of his bedroom to the bedrooms in the hotel, dreaming of one day sleeping in the attic suite, a room he would often clean.
He would watch his parents fret over the happiness of their guests, oblivious to his sadness.
He never told them how, on the daily walk to school, he was called a faggot so frequently that he had started taking a circuitous route to avoid the confrontations, entering his school over a back wall at the last possible moment before classes began.
While his parents wrote handwritten notes to each of their guests wishing them a pleasant stay, Danny returned home with a note stuffed into his schoolbag from fellow students describing the various ways he should kill himself.
Over dinner his parents would discuss which beach toys to buy for the summer while Danny would sit at the table, believing that it would have been better to be their guest than their son.
Arriving at the cul-de-sac Danny took a moment to admire the improvements to their home.
The house was painted pale blue, the colour of diluted sky.
The aluminium windows had been replaced by timber.
The concrete patio was now a coastal garden with pheasant grasses, red valerian and gorse.
He had followed the changes from his mother’s Christmas card updates, a typed summary of the year’s events, but this was the first time he had seen the transformation. He said, ‘Your garden is beautiful.’
They seemed pleased.
Dinner that night was fish soup made with pollack and fresh fennel, served in their newly refurbished kitchen with its oak cabinets and German-made appliances, unrecognizable from the unmodernized kitchen of Danny’s childhood.
His dad opened a bottle of white wine. Danny positioned himself with a view of both of his parents.
‘Mum, Dad – I’m getting married.’
His parents looked at each other. Neither of them had guessed this scenario. His dad asked, ‘To the man you’ve been living with?’
Danny suppressed a sigh.
‘To Luis, yes. Who else?’
His dad shrugged.
‘You might have met someone new.’
Danny shook his head.
‘Luis is the only man I’ve ever loved.’
The comment sounded more rebuke than romantic. They belatedly wished him congratulations. After clinking their glasses, his dad asked, ‘Isn’t it called something else?’
This question – the difference between a civil partnership and marriage – had been asked of Danny numerous times. Trying not to sound peevish he patiently explained, ‘It’s called a civil partnership. We’re not allowed to call it a marriage. But we’re calling it a marriage. You can choose.’
His dad said they would call it a marriage. His mum agreed.
The three of them lapsed into silence. Danny had told them about the wedding but not yet invited them. Out of nowhere, his mum began nervously telling a story.
‘When I was a little girl and feeling blue my mother would suggest that we go see the bride. If there was a local wedding we would watch, even if we didn’t know the couple. We would sit on the back pew, admiring the bride and discussing her dress. And it would always cheer us up.’
Danny had never heard this story before and was about to ask about it when his dad asked, ‘Why didn’t Luis come down with you?’
Danny replied, ‘I wanted to try and fix things between us first. We’re not part of each other’s lives and—’
His dad interrupted, ‘But, Dan, that’s down to you.
We’re here. We’re always here. You could have visited us at any time.
You could have invited us to London. You cut us out of your life.
You wanted nothing more to do with us. And sure, there were some difficult times.
We said some stupid things. Everyone says stupid things.
We were about to lose the hotel. We had a lot on our minds. ’
Danny turned cold.
‘I know you had a lot on your minds. Do you know how I know? Because after I told you I was gay you said – that’s all we need right now. You lumped it together with losing the hotel. You were skint and your son’s a fag. What else could go wrong? And let’s be honest, that’s how you felt.’
His dad admitted it.
‘Yes, that’s how I felt. And I’m sorry. If that’s what you want, an apology, but you could’ve had it years ago. You didn’t want it. You didn’t want us. You wanted nothing more to do with us. You turned us into villains when we were nothing of the kind. If anyone is owed an apology, we are.’
Danny pushed his glass of wine away.
‘Maybe I would’ve come down sooner if you had mentioned my relationship in one of your round-robin Christmas cards.
You mention everything else. Who moved house, who bought a dog, who went on holiday.
Not once did you write – Danny, our son, is living with a guy called Luis.
And he’s happy. That’s what I was waiting for.
That would’ve been my sign. So don’t tell me I wanted nothing to do with you when you’ve never said a word about me. ’
His mother answered, ‘We weren’t sure if it was our business to write about your personal life.’
Danny said, ‘Maybe that’s why I’m getting married so that I can finally get a mention in your Christmas card.’
A familiar kind of sadness filled Danny’s heart. If this was a test, they had, as a family, failed. He left the table, retrieving the green envelope from his bag, handing it to his mum and dad.
‘I came here to invite you to the wedding.’
His mother read it and passed it to his dad who put on his glasses.
‘We would love to come to your wedding.’
Danny asked, unsure of his own question, ‘But will you be happy for me? For real? When Luis and I kiss? Are you going to wince? Glance at each other? Just saying you’re going to come isn’t enough. “Yes” isn’t enough.’
The wine had made Danny tired. Noticing, his mum said, ‘It’s late. We thought you might prefer to sleep in the hotel. We’ve reserved the attic suite with the sea view.’
The three of them made the short walk over to the guest house.
It was in the best condition Danny had ever seen it with handsome hand-painted signs and an extensive array of potted plants.
His parents were now free of the crushing financial pressures that had shaped his childhood.
They were able to enjoy their creation, so many years after they had bought it.
A brisk woman from Potsdam was managing the hotel full-time.
She welcomed Danny as though it were his first time here.
At the bedroom door his dad said, ‘I know there were tough times growing up. But there were great times too. We can choose which ones we concentrate on.’
Danny wasn’t convinced.
‘Maybe we can’t.’
He dad looked down.
‘What a shame that would be.’
Once his parents left Danny helped himself to one of the biscuits, wrapping the other in a napkin to bring back to Luis.
Looking around the room, he remembered how lonely he had been as a kid here, scrubbing the sink and toilet bowl, making sure no trace of any red-stickered guest remained.
He took out his phone and called Luis to make sure that he had not merely imagined the life they had created together.
Danny said, ‘Coming here was a mistake. Nothing has changed. I’m catching the first train back tomorrow.
I can’t stay. I feel the way I used to feel.
And I never want to feel that way again. ’
Luis said, ‘Talk me through what happened.’
After listening to Luis’s measured interpretation that it seemed like his parents were trying their best, Danny showered, enjoying the sea-salt scrub his parents had spent many hours testing and selecting for their guests.
Sitting on his bed he found the card his parents had written welcoming him to the guest house, as if they too had always known that he would rather have been a guest than their son.