Free Beautiful Child by David Menon Page B

hasn’t quite stopped loving your father yet and until she does she won’t be asking you to walk her down the aisle to marry another man, however lovely Malcolm is.’
    ‘Well I love my Mum and I love my Dad and I’m relieved they’ll both be there on the happiest day of my life.’
    Susie kissed him. ‘Me too. Now darling, can I ask you something?’
    ‘Sure,’ he said as he ran his fingers up and down her arm.
    ‘You work with a lot of gay men in the airline business, don’t you.’
    ‘Yeah?’ said Angus, munching on his chicken and bacon tortilla wrap. ‘Where’s this going?’
    ‘ Well have you ever been tempted? I mean, they say that the difference between a straight man and a curious one is six pints of lager.’
    ‘I kissed a guy once, yeah.’
    ‘Kissed him?’ asked a startled Susie. She hadn’t expected him to say yes.
    ‘Well I suppose you could say I snogged him to be honest.’
    ‘Tongues?’
    ‘Oh yeah.’
    ‘Fuck’s sake! Tell me more’
    ‘He was a friend of mine at university’ said Angus. ‘One of my best friends actually. He was gay and I knew he was into me but I just ignored it because we were mates. Anyway, one night it just happened. We were drunk, we’d had a great evening out at the pub and it just happened.’
    ‘But what did happen?’
    ‘We were sitting together on the sofa, we were close and the next thing he kissed me. And I responded.’
    ‘You responded?’
    ‘I wanted to see what it felt like, yeah,’ said Angus. ‘but within seconds I knew that I wasn’t even a little bit gay or even bisexual. I didn’t like it. I didn’t like the feel of stubble against stubble.’
    ‘ Did you get a stiffy?’
    ‘ Semi, yeah’ said Angus. ‘But it went down again once I’d realised it wasn’t what I was into.’
    ‘How did your friend react?’
    ‘He called me a prick tease’ said Angus, ‘we were never the same after that.’
    ‘The poor baby was in love.’
    Angus blushed. ‘Yeah, it seems that way.’
    ‘Where is he now?’
    ‘We graduated the same time and he joined the RAF. He’s flying the Eurofighter now. The last I heard he was part of a squadron that’s seeing action in the Middle East somewhere. I’ve nothing but respect for him and I always wanted to forget about what had happened and stay friends. You know it makes no difference to me if someone is gay. But he felt differently.’
    ‘You broke his heart.’
    Angus blushed even more. ‘Well if you want to put it like that.’
    ‘Well how else could I put it?’
    ‘Yeah, point taken.’
    ‘So all those gay boys at work? There must be tons who fancy you?’
    ‘Yeah, and I flirt and have a laugh but that’s as far as it goes,’ said Angus, ‘but why all these questions about me and man love?’
    ‘I was just thinking about my brother Matt,’ said Susie, ‘he’s good looking, he’s funny, he’s intelligent …’
    ‘…and he can’t find anyone.’
    ‘And he won’t find anyone,’ said Susie, ‘because of Charlie fucking Baxter. God, I loathe that man. My brother is wasting the best years of his life over that user.’
    ‘Are you sure Matt has got a thing for him?’
    ‘Absolutely sure,’ said Susie. ‘You don’t think he has?’
    ‘I agree that all the evidence is there,’ said Angus, ‘but what can we do?’
    ‘I don’t know but I just worry about him ever finding happiness, Angus. I mean in gay years he’s getting old.’
    ‘You make him sound like a dog.’
    ‘You know what I mean.’ said Susie. ‘Gays are so fucking youth orientated. I don’t want him to be lonely, Angus.’
    ‘You can’t help who you fall in love with, Susie.’
    ‘No. But if it remains unrequited then you have to dump it and Matt is doing the opposite of that when it comes to Charlie Baxter.’
    *
    Rita Makin had been a widow for ten years. Her late husband George had worked at the local factory manufacturing shampoo and other personal hygiene items for all their married life but the