Johnny Come Home

by Rafael Henry

Chapter 2

John took my advice, based on a few hours of my experience, and came back with a far more accomplished product. He's gone back to the same location but this time has focused on two boys already changed for, presumably, their afternoon athletics session. I'm wondering why he chose these two? There was just the one angle of the boys chatting together, but with one interesting event in between. The fair-haired boy, thinking no one was watching, put a hand out and felt the groin area of his friend. He must be a very good friend as not everyone would allow another hand which is not his own, to fondle the front of his PE shorts in that way for a few seconds, that most fortunate of boys.

'This is far better John.' I said, running the file through to the end.

'Do you think so?'

'Yes, way more interesting. You've almost got a narrative here.'

'Like a story?'

'Exactly that. Something going on. Do you know those boys?'

'He's my brother.'

'Which one?'

'This one.' John says, pointing to the boy on the left, the recipient of the gesture.

'Goodness, What's his name?'

'Richard.'

I'm speechless.

'You know you said you need to know more about me? How do I do that?'

I thought for a very short time.

'Well you seem to be getting better by the second with that camera. Why don't you make a short visual essay at home? That would tell me a lot about you wouldn't it? Where you live and so on. Take it home tonight, shoot a few minutes around the house and bring it in tomorrow. Look at anything you like. Just ordinary stuff. Anything. But be careful with it. Not everyone wants to be filmed. So, just be careful. Do you understand me John? I'm not saying you need to be secretive about it. Not at all, but just be bit discrete.'

I couldn't wait for our next session up here in the library to see what John would bring to the table.

So he arrives bang on time, two minutes early actually, and hands me the camera. I plug it in and find the right place and start the show.

There's a few seconds outside showing me the house, a typical three bed semi, garage on the side, nice little well-kept garden in front. A path up to the green front door. Then he takes us through the ground floor looking into a dining- cum-kitchen space, a lounge as opposed to a drawing room, and then upstairs to his bedroom. We then get shown around the room, two beds, their heads against the right-hand wall and about four feet apart, two small desks and basic wooden chairs for homework doing no doubt, and the open doors of a fitted cupboard at the other end, the shelves loaded with the boys' clothes other than things that need to be on hangers; several pairs of trousers and a couple of jackets. I think mum is well-organized as the various items are arranged in neat piles, the two boys' smalls kept separately, and the sock collection in a jumble in the corner. John, curiously, zooms in on the shelf, our eyes being carried along to those smaller items of boys' attire. This is right up my street and it's got me wondering why he's shown me.

'Is that enough.'

'Yes, well done John.'

'So now will you tell me?'

'Yes I will tell you.' I said, taking a deep breath.

'I wrote this story about three years ago. More of a sequence of real-life events really. Since then I've thought about re-writing it the way I wanted the story to go, even though it didn't in fact happen that way. It all happened at my last school John, not here. You know that sometimes girls have what they call crushes on a teacher?'

He nods, open mouthed, the saliva on his lips shining brightly.

'Well, sometimes boys can have them too?'

No nodding this time.

'Did you know that John?'

'Yes.' He says, his mouth open just a little bit more.

'So this is the thing John. It happened to me. I was your age when it happened, and I certainly wasn't expecting it. The master was quite new and………'

'What Alex? What was he?'

'Nice looking. It's as simple as that. I rather fell for him. His room was open for boys to go there and do extra bits and pieces in the evenings if they wanted to. He seemed to like me and encouraged me to make little models in clay, people mostly, copied from photos. We'd look at books of sculptures. Not just old ones, like Roman figures, but modern ones too. He had lots of drawings of figures that could be turned into clay models which could be fired in a kiln and then glazed so they would become more permanent. I would sit next to him at his desk as we looked through all the books he had. It was hard to concentrate because I was so close to him. Sometimes I managed to touch him by accident, like his hand on mine, or my leg against his. I was sure he liked me, and never moved away if one of those little accidents happened, which they began to do more and more. One evening my hand touched his and neither of us moved. We just stopped everything because of what was going on. His fingers were spread out next to mine and touching. Slowly they began to cover mine. He was holding my hand. Can you believe that John?'

I looked at the boy to see how he reacted to that tiny bit of romance.

'Did you like that John?'

He smiles and nods.

'Was that the end?'

'No. Just the beginning.'

'Can I hear what happened next?'

'Of course you can.'

We played the three minutes of video recording back on the screen while I continued with my tale, quietly spoken in our corner of the library, as my new friend asks……

'What did it feel like when he held your hand Alex?'

'It felt very comforting, the hand of friendship if you like. Especially the first time because you know something has changed for the better. And it was a completely different experience for me, like no other. Have you ever tried it?'

'No. Can we now?'

He's sitting to my left so I left the palm of my hand out for him to see, and he laid his hand on it as I closed my fingers around his.

'How's that now?'

'Nice. Can we stay like this for a bit while you go on with the story?'

'I was modelling a figure in clay, working from a photo of a boy picking fruit from a tree.'

'Did the boy have anything on?'

'No. He was stretching his body up high to reach the apple.'

'Was he nice?'

'Yes, very.'

How old was he?'

'Oh, maybe your brother's age. How old is he?'

'Twelve. Do you like him?'

'He's quite different to you isn't he. A bit broader in the face.'

'Am I too thin then?'

'No! You're just right.'

'Really? Do you mean that?' The boys says, moving his hand inside mine.

'Yes I do. Even though you don't wear proper school uniform. Those trousers are not the right colour but they look good on you.' I said, rather obviously looking down. John looks at that very particular focal point, looks up at me again and smiles. He knows.

His groin area looks very constricted in those very fitted trousers. Quite a few of the boys wear these enhancing garments for that reason I'm sure, shirts not tucked in so there's often a little bit of bare back visible when they reach down for something, not to mention the very top of the boy's underwear. Boys like us notice these things. Like his brother in the playground, Richard.

'Did you finish the model of the boy?'

'Oh yes. It came out well, in other words it didn't blow up in the kiln when we fired it. They often do.'

'Why?'

'Because there was a tiny bit of air left in the clay after it had dried out.'

'Where is it now?'

'I have it, along with a few more.'

'Can I see them?'

'Maybe, sometime. Some of them are of me.'

'How?'

'I was his model for a while. While I was working on things, we would talk, just him and me. He told me all about the room in his house where he made his sculptures, and his garden with lots of them in it. A tiny sculpture garden he called it. I asked him, like you have just now, if I could see it. That's strange isn't it? That you asked the very same question as I did?'

'And he said you could go?'

'Yes, by bike. It was a few miles but I was used to long bike rides. I would disappear for hours and go all over the place, especially in the summer months. Sandals and a tee shirt and a pair of shorts. That's all; and a rucksack on my back with a drink and a bit of food. I'd find a field somewhere and go and lie in it and think about the things I liked to do. I'd dream about meeting someone interesting. Use my imagination a bit. I'd make up little stories about meeting someone and……..well, you know. And then this happened. I'd met someone very unexpectedly who liked me. Who wanted to be with me. Someone who wanted to know me properly, inside and out.

'Inside?'

'Yes, to know what I was really like, as a person who was growing up, and what I might become one day. It was incredibly romantic. I'd fallen in love John. At least I thought it was love.'

'Wasn't it then?'

'A kind of love, all about being needed by someone and wanting them back. I'd started to think about sex John. I was your age and I had entered puberty which can get quite complicated as you may have found out already. Have you?'

'Yes I think so. I make up stories in bed at night like you did. About meeting someone.'

'And do you?'

'Yes.'

'And then you can go to sleep happy?'

'Yes.'

'Afterwards? Sometimes with Richard?'

'Yes. Quite often. We'd pretend.'

'And that was nice? It was very beautiful wasn't it? You love him very much don't you? Like you, he's very beautiful.'

'Yes of course I love him. Massively.'

His hand feels so warm in mine. Love can take so many forms, as it moves through us, this way and that. It can grow from nothing it seems to me, and then, all of a sudden, it's there, in you, and you have this burning desire to say it. I love you.

'Can I borrow your camera again tonight Alex?'

'What? Another idea in your head John?'

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