Gordon #2
Gordon’s own downfall makes him cringe. It was gaudy and cinematic, and not in a good way, just in a way that feels clichéd.
Losing his composure at work; coming in on a Monday still stumbling drunk from the weekend.
And where once he’d been one of the lads—Gordy-boy!
—through the haze, he’d sensed himself becoming a pariah.
The climax came just near Junction 8 on the M25, where he overturned a Porsche and his body had to be cut from its crumpled metal with hydraulics.
He remembers someone talking to him, warning him of any loud noises, reassuring him he was going to be okay, and he recalls wanting to die rather than having to bear that person’s unwarranted kindness.
There’s been a surprising relief in losing everything, though. He always aspired to be someone, and now he’s nothing, he finds that somehow feels like more.
“I was thinking about this girl. Lily,” Gordon tells Rob as he levels off a measure of crystallized rabbit-skin granules.
“I—we—were fourteen. I sat next to her in maths. She was—now I look back—one of the few people from school who was really kind to me. For no reason. Just because she felt like it. And I…”
He tells Rob about the night of the party when he’d pinned her against a tree, and later, how he’d turned on her and encouraged the other boys to do the same.
“I didn’t know what it would do to her. How it would pan out.
But it was different after that. When boys passed her in the hallways—even the ones who weren’t in our year—they’d sniff their fingers and make, I don’t know, retching noises or something. ”
As Gordon opens a bottle of deionized water, he glances up to gauge Rob’s reaction.
Rob has one hand splayed across his chin, thumb brushing against two-day-old stubble.
But he looks more thoughtful than judgmental, so Gordon continues, even though he’s wishing he could just put all this away in a box somewhere.
“And the girls, they just sort of drifted away from her. She got this stammer, in class. And I didn’t know what was happening at the time, but now, well, I think she’d started having panic attacks too.
After that school year, she never came back.
I thought she’d moved away or something, but then one of the girls—her mum must have known Lily’s mum—found out she’d totally cracked up.
I remember sitting there laughing with the others, making jokes about the local loony bin—Maudine, it was called; I think it’s gone now—but I was shocked. ”
“And you think the two things were linked? What happened and her breakdown, I mean.”
“Probably. She was just a normal girl before that. Well, not normal. Special. Bright. Really good at English and stuff. And just really kind, like I said.”
Gordon is aware that so much of what he’s said has come out wrongly.
Cracked up. Loony bin. He wishes he was better at choosing the right words.
There was a time—goading his mum to gain his father’s approval; being one of the boys at work—when his words fitted in.
Were expected, even. But now they don’t feel like him, none of this feels like him, or at least not a part of himself he wants to keep.
A few weeks ago, when he’d arrived early for a meeting, Gordon had sat in some nearby gardens, beside a lichen-covered reproduction of David: nose sheared off, a limb hewn away.
And ever since, he hasn’t been able to shake the image of a shattered statue—not just a missing arm, but a literal pile of rubble; disembodied lips and fingers, a jumble of barely distinguishable body parts.
Gordon has the overwhelming feeling that what he’s doing here—at group, with Rob, in every part of his life—is attempting to use those fractured, misshapen pieces to build something new.
And the realization dawning on him is that it’s simply not possible to keep the cracks from showing.
Gordon returns his attention to Rob. “Anyway, I looked her up online the other night. Yeah, I know,” he says, seeing Rob grimace as if to say, That’s never a good idea.
“She’s married. Two kids. Works in law. At first, I was just pleased for her, that everything had turned out okay, you know?
But then I went onto her firm’s website.
” He winces at the memory, the moment of realization.
“And she’s this—this human rights lawyer, specializing in justice for women and girls.
Rape, assault. And I just—I just thought, I did that.
What I did changed the whole course of her life.
And she’s still carrying it with her.” He sighs.
“It’s probably what motivates her, makes her good at her job.
I mean, I’m not trying to take credit for it—more the opposite.
That she’s turned my…”—even though Rob is already nodding, Gordon pauses, trying to find the right word this time—“my darkness, into something good. She’s won, in spite of me. ”
Gordon realizes Rob hasn’t said a thing this whole time and suddenly worries he may have crossed a line; he’s not sure he’s meant to lay things like this on his sponsor. “Sorry, was that a bit much?”
Rob shakes his head and his eyes look even more red-rimmed than usual. “I just feel sad for you. And her. But you’re right, she’s made something good out of it.” They stand in silence for a while and eventually Rob says, “But you didn’t have a drink?”
“No, I just felt like shit.”
“Nice,” Rob says, with a look of gentle satisfaction.
“Can I not come with you?” Kate asks, tapping a cigarette into an ashtray on the bedside table. Maia busies herself with looking through her bag for something. “Maia?” Kate repeats, moving to sit up in bed.
“We’ve been through all this,” Maia says. Kate wasn’t even meant to be free today; it’s only because Dr. Shah asked if she’d swap shifts that it’s suddenly an issue.
“That was before the accident. Before you said he seemed like he was morphing into someone you actually liked.”
“It’s still too early.” She pictures Gordon in the psych ward after his accident.
He’d always had such a physical presence.
Solid, well-built. But when she entered the room that first time, he was sitting in a hospital bed, all his focus on getting a slice of overcooked carrot onto his fork, and he’d looked so reduced.
So vulnerable. They never touched—not then—but she’d put her hand to his wrist and sat beside him on the bed.
Neither had spoken, but after a while, giant teardrops sploshed onto his plate.
She’d traced the birthmark on his forearm, circling its edge with her fingertip.
“It’s like a heart,” she said. “I’d never noticed that before.
” He’d pulled away then, not roughly, but so only his inner arm was visible.
“It’s deformed,” he said, his voice raspy.
She strained to catch his words as he added, “I must’ve been bad even before I was born.
” He’d sobbed then, so loudly the ward nurse looked up.
Under her gaze, Maia felt compelled to lean in and comfort him, to let her shoulder grow wet with his pain.
“Too early for who? Him or you?” Kate is saying. “Because after what he’s been through, I don’t think finding out you’re gay is going to be that big a deal to him.”
“That’s never been the big deal. The big deal is him telling our dad.”
“Which I still don’t get. You’re thirty-eight, Maia.”
“Thirty-seven.”
“What? Stop deflecting. I could come along as a friend, your flatmate. You don’t even have to tell him.”
“Don’t do this.”
“Do what?”
“This,” Maia says, as she checks her hair in the mirror and picks off one of Kate’s long red strands, which must have migrated from the brush. “Wheedling. It isn’t you.”
“No, it isn’t. It really isn’t. Except with you, because you give me no choice.
I’ve spent seven years—seven years!—pretending to everyone at work that we’re not in a relationship in case someone tells someone and that someone happens to know your dad, and then happens to actually mention it to him.
Like, Hey, Dr. A, I heard your daughter was gay!
because that’s really the kind of thing people still bother to mention in 2015. ”
“And we’ve spent seven years having the same argument.”
Kate takes a drag on her cigarette and when she speaks again, her voice is calmer.
“All I’m asking is for you to let me meet your brother.
Because I love you. And I want to know your people, even if they’re not perfect.
” She sees Maia’s jaw tense and adds, “I don’t mean your dad.
But Gordon. Your mum, if there’s ever a safe time for that. ”
Maia sits on the edge of the bed, folding and refolding the fabric of her dress. Kate kneels beside her, brushes Maia’s hair to one side, nuzzles the warm skin of her neck.
“How long would it take you to get ready?” Maia says quietly, while outside rain thrums against the window and a just-emptied wheelie bin clatters down the side alley.
“Not long.”
“Okay then,” Maia says, not really sure what she’s agreeing to, but knowing Kate deserves more.
Kate has already started coiling her hair into a bun as she disappears into the bathroom, and while she clatters around getting changed, Maia sits in her coat, waiting.
She feels physically tired by their argument, but when she thinks of walking to the tube station, she’s glad she’ll have Kate with her.
She will deal with the rest—her brother, dinner—as it comes.