The Professionals Circuit Archive - Family Ties	Family Ties

 

by Fanny Adams 

  
 *Story #15 in the Emma universe*


 The phone rang early--about five a.m., I think, and as Bodie was face
down in the pillows as usual, I grabbed for it. I managed to drop the
receiver twice on the way to my ear. Please God, I prayed, don't let it be
The Cow.

 "Hello, who is this?"

 "'s Ray. Who's calling?"

 "I'm calling William Bodie. Is he there please?"

 William? I gave Bodie a vicious poke in the ribs and dropped the receiver
on his head. He managed to grunt into the business end of the thing. Then
he tensed and I found myself very awake. Something wrong.

 "When?" he said. He hadn't moved but his whole body looked ready to
explode. "Don't know. I don't want ... Yes I know. I realize that. Look,
if I can get the time..." There was a long silence. "No, I don't really
care much," he said finally. "I'm sorry." He chuckled after a moment.
"Exactly right. Yes, well, it'll be good to see you again at least. I miss
you sometimes." Something caught me--a vise-grip on my vitals. "Love you
too. See you soon." He hung up the phone and rolled over, pulling me into
his arms. "My father's dead," he said bluntly. But as he said it all the
tension drained out of him. "Would you be shocked if I added good
riddance?"

 "Only a little. Who was that on the phone?"

 "Eliza." The name didn't ring any bells and I frowned at him. "My eldest
sister?"

 "Oh yeh, sorry. I forgot."

 "She wants me to come up for the funeral. God, what's the time?" He
reached round, half rolling on top of me, to read the clock.

 "Oof! you weigh a ton, Bodie."

 "You complaining, petal? Five-twenty! Didn't we just go to bed an hour
ago?"

 Instead of pushing him off, I wrapped myself around him. "About three." I
kissed his chin. "We're not due in 'til mid-afternoon," I reminded him.
"Feel like reaffirming life a bit?"

 He grinned down at me. "At least my father is a good excuse for making
love to you."

 "Since when did we need an excuse?" I asked as his hands made straight
for all my most erogenous zones. I guess we both were feeling a touch of
the morning matrimonials. It was going to be fast and furious.

 In fact, the whole exercise took about fifteen minutes, after which Bodie
dropped off immediately, face in my armpit. I lay awake for a while though
trying to put together the rather sketchy picture of his family that he
had drawn over the years. An enormous Edwardian father who was (though
Bodie had never actually said as much) quite mad; a delicately beautiful
mother who died young, and three sisters--Eliza the nun, Vick the
anonymous wife and mother and Caro with a lot of boyfriends. The whole
thing had a mythic taste.

 Time off ... which meant that he'd be talking to The Cow as soon as
possible--today probably. Well, I was going too. He wasn't going to face
his family without me. "Brought your wife, eh?" they'd ask. Never mind. I
stopped apologising for sleeping with Bodie a long time ago and I never
apologized for loving him. Anyway, we'd been living together for seven
months so I expect I was the closest thing to a wife that he'd ever have.
And vice versa. Bodie was becoming nicely domesticated--house-trained he
called it, like a graduate of the Woodhouse school. No bad Mercs.

 He was in the loo when I woke up again and had just lathered up for a
shave, so I got my face all soapy trying to kiss him. Made him laugh too
which is always good for my sense of perspective. "Going up for the
funeral, aren't we?" He didn't reply, but that Satanic eyebrow of his
reached new heights. "I'd like to go."

 "You don't have to." He scraped at his face with great concentration.

 "I *know* that. I'd like to meet your family."

 "No you wouldn't." He finished shaving and rinsed off the lather. Then he
splashed on some after shave--citrus with a hint of lavender, very sexy.

 "Look," I said, trying the I'm-being-rational approach, "if there's a
problem, just say so."

 "Problem?"

 "Like they don't know about us and you don't want them to."

 "I don't give a damn about that," he snarled.

 "Okay, okay, I'm sorry." I washed the soap off my own face and switched
on the electric razor. Noisy bugger it is too, and it drives Bodie mad. "I
probably couldn't get the time off anyway," I yelled over the buzz. He
mumbled somthing I couldn't quite catch. "What?" He left the room without
answering so I switched off and followed him. "What was that?"

 "I said, you win, you sexy little sod." He picked me up and kissed both
cheeks, one stubbly and one clean shaven, and laughed. "How can I resist?"

 I wrapped my legs around his waist and we kissed for a while. "You *want*
me to come along--you're sure?"

 "I want to make love to you in his sodding bed. I want to introduce you
to my family as my lover. Besides," he added, his face going all young and
vulnerable and looking so much like Michael, "I'd miss you like mad. I'm
used to that pretty body beside me at night."

 "You say the sweetest things, William," I said very sarky. "What *do*
they call you?"

 "Will or ... Willie." He made a face and I retched sympathetically.
"Bodie will do. Or Sweetums." I began to giggle. "Or Warm-thighs. Eliza
would love that, wouldn't she?"

 He was getting aggressive and I ordered him to put me down so I could
finish my shave. I looked not just disreputable but rather like a crazed
harlequin. "I won't be long," I promised as I went back to the loo.

 "I won't get dressed."

 Well, The Cow grumbled and groaned at me, but he gave me the same leave
as Bodie. I reckoned he would. He knew a deal more about Bodie's early
life than I did and he wasn't the man to send a lamb like our Bodie into
the bosom of his family without a little protection. In fact, he said to
me as we were leaving (and he was sure that Bodie was out of earshot),
"Take care of him." Then he motioned me out double-quick.

 We motored up together the next day. Bodie was cheerful enough when we
set out, but the closer we came to Liverpool the gloomier he became. His
spirits deserted him altogether when we turned the car down a narrow
street that was dominated by a big Victorian house. "That's it," he
announced quietly.

 "Pretty grim," I joked. "Just the place to start a murky career."

 "Why don't we just turn the car around and go home?"

 "Park the car, Bodie."

 He did as I told him and gave me a chaste kiss on the cheek. Very sweet.
"Thanks," he said.

 The woman who opened the door was obviously a charwoman pressed into
service and hating it. She showed us to the kitchen where there was a
crowd around the table all drinking coffee or tea and eating biscuits.
They stared at us with unconcealed hostility. Bodie introduced me as his
partner to Vick who had bluish shadows beneath her eyes rather like the
ones Bodie gets when he's over tired, and to Caro who was smoking a
cigarette and looking bored, and who was a strikingly handsome woman. I
had supposed that the third woman was Eliza, but it turned out that she
was a neighbor come to offer her condolences. She left not long after we
arrived. Vick introduced her husband Tom, who seemed annoyed to see Bodie.

 "Where's 'liza?" Bodie asked as he rummaged around and found a single
bottle of beer which he opened and passed to me. I took a swallow and
passed it back.

 "With the priest. She didn't say anything about you bringing your
partner," Tom observed. Caro snickered.

 "She didn't know, did she?"

 The door swung open and I was sure that this was Eliza at last. "Well,
you've brought Ray, haven't you?" she asked. She was a big woman--almost
six feet tall and husky. Her clothes were ordinary and her salt and pepper
hair was clipped very short. She didn't exactly look like Bodie, in fact,
none of them resembled the others, but there was something that set them
apart as one blood. There was something in the eyes--an expression--and in
the set to the mouth.

 "He asked to come," Bodie explained as he embraced Eliza. Then he pulled
me over to be inspected. "This is my big sister," he told me.

 "That's a pun," she snapped back, deadpan. I felt a silly grin tug the
corners of my mouth. "How nice to finally meet you after all these
years... and all those stories!"

 "Oh really?" I squeaked. "You have the advantage of me, I'm afraid. Bodie
is very close about his family."

 "With good reason," Caro added.

 "Willy, I'd put you in your old room, but I see that won't do. Would you
rather have Mother's or Father's? Tom and Vick are in the guest."

 "What difference does it make?" Tom demanded.

 "Will probably has a preference," Caro told him. "For one room over the
other," she added, with perfect comic timing.

 "That's not what I meant."

 "Oh, I'm terribly sorry."

 I knew what he meant and I couldn't help tensing and thinking, here it
comes!

 "Mother's then," Bodie decided.

 "Why?" Tom demanded again.

 "Isn't it bloody obvious?" Cara snapped. Vick had an odd look on her
face--amusement and pity all muddled together with something fierce and
unexpected

 "It has a double bed," Eliza said very evenly by way of explanation.
"I'll see you're settled," she said to Bodie.

 "Oh Tom, right next to your room!" Caro said gleefully. "How nice for
you." A beautiful bitch that one.

 "Sharrup," Tom growled as we left the kitchen.

 "Tom is very straight-laced," Eliza explained somewhat unnecessarily as
we mounted the stairs. The house had a musty, disused smell. "The idea of
homosexuality is doubly upsetting to him when it strikes this close to
home." She opened the bedroom door and motioned us in.

 "You seem very cool about it," I observed, ignoring a ferocious glare
from Bodie.

 "Well, again, I have the advantage. I've known of the relationship almost
since the first." It was my turn to glare ferociously at Bodie. "And then,
my background rather precludes any value judgements on the subject. I'm a
psychologist, you see. A teaching sister."

 "No, I didn't know," I said pointedly. "Is that why you wear civvies?"

 She laughed. "That and the fact that I look like a very large penguin in
a habit. Quite frankly, I'm just happy that Will is happy at last. More
power to you that you've helped him to reach that stage. You're welcome
here as long as I have anything to say about it." She ruffled my hair in a
Bodie-like gesture and left us alone to unpack.

 "I like her," I told Bodie who was sitting on the edge of the bed, his
head averted and his ears pinkish. "You okay?"

 "Being here is... unimaginable, Ray. The memories..."

 I sat beside him and put my arms around him, struck as I occasionally was
in moments like this with how very young and vulnerable Bodie really was.
"Tell me about your mother--this was her room, wasn't it?"

 He nodded. "I liked this place best when I was small. It always smelled
like her." He pulled away and went to the dresser where he sniffed at each
of the bottles in turn--cut crystal or etched or tinted glass--ornate
things trimmed with silver. "Nothing left after all these years," he said.
"She always smelled of violets and roses and jasmine."

 Then he opened each drawer and surveyed the contents. He was searching
for something, and finally he found it in a tightly sealed box of
potpourri. He opened it and stirred it with his finger, and a smile played
across his face. "This is my mother," he said, holding the box out to me.
Violets and roses and jasmine.

 On all the tables, all the flat surfaces, there were photographs; some
were silver framed, some in wood or cloth or brass.

 "Family?"

 Bodie nodded. "And friends. These are my parents on their wedding day."
She was beautiful--remarkably so--and her young husband was handsome. They
looked happy. The look in his eyes was the very same one I sometimes saw
in Bodie's when he looked at me or the kids. Eerie. "And this is me at
three. Little Lord Fauntleroy, eh?" He passed a photo of a beautiful child
with blacks curly hair and an enormous teddy bear.

 "Rupert?"

 "Yeh, Rupert the first. The late lamented Rupert. Dad hacked him up. Said
I was too old for toys." He put the picture back and it was all I could do
not to try to slip it into my pocket. "This is Mum when she was a girl."
She'd been a gawky child, all scabby knees and elbows and a toothless
grin. Her stockings were drooping and she clutched a large cat. "Always
loved animals, she did. We never had any though 'cos Dad was allergic to
everything. Only..." he grinned, "one summer we spent the long vac in
Kent. Mum had people down there. A little goat adopted her, and followed
her everywhere. She cried when she had to leave him." He looked out the
window for a time.

 "Who's this?" I asked, indicating a photo of a good-looking young man.

 Bodie frowned and picked it up. "Don't know. I don't remember this one."
Then he shrugged. "Might have been one of her brothers. She had four and I
think they all died in the war. Don"t know for sure. Maybe there's one
left. I'll ask Eliza." He put the photo back carefully. "Feel like a kip?
I for one am knackered. "

 I wasn't particularly tired but as he looked like he could do with a bit
of a cuddle, I didn't argue. I dropped off eventually and had a nice
little nap as well.

 A knock at the door wakened us, and Caro marched in bold as anything to
announce that supper was being laid early because of the wake. "I'll show
you the lav so you can have a wash before," she offered. "Come on."

 I stumbled out of bed leaving Bodie to mutter something rude and pull the
covers over his head. She led me down the hall, found a flannel and a
towel and hung about in the doorway as if she intended to watch the
ablutions. "I'm fine now. Thanks awfully."

 "You're rather attractive now I look closely at you. Are you exclusively
gay?"

 At which I think I went bright crimson. I stammered "No, of course not."

 "Why 'of course'?"

 "Well, because I'm not, that's all."

 "Then you wouldn't be put off if I made a pass?" she asked. "What about
Will? Does he just like boys or is he democratic as well?"

 "No, yes...I mean..." She was getting a little too close for comfort.

 "Goodness you're a nervous one. I was only asking. I haven't seen him
since he was fourteen and he hadn't started on girls yet, though as I
recall he was very popular with the neighborhood boys--as I was. I was
just wondering is all."

 "Popular with the boys?" I asked, feeling very tense. Bodie had implied
though not ever actually said, that his first sexual experience was on
board ship. Silly thing to worry about, I guess, but it bothered me.

 "Oh yes, very. He was very pretty, you know. Prettier than his sisters."
She laughed. "I was always jealous of his looks. I had a boyfriend who was
more interested in Will than in me. Nothing worse for a girl's ego. He was
very free with himself in those days." She moved very close. "If I tried
something..." Wonderful perfume she wore... and I thought: What the hell?
What can it hurt? I kissed her, putting my all into it, and I felt her
moving in my arms, moving closer, wrapping herself around me wanting more.
But for me there was nothing like that--only a pleasant feeling that I'd
kissed a beautiful woman because she wanted me to. Nice, but once over I
didn't miss it or long for more. Not like with Bodie where each kiss is
like an invitation to another one.

 "That was nice," I told her quite truthfully, "but that's all."

 "We have half an hour ..."

 "No. Sorry. It's not worth it to me, Caro. Thanks anyway." We both looked
up to find Bodie looming in the doorway. "Getting to know your family,
Sunshine," I said brightly.

 "So I see. Sod off, Caro. I want to do a little molesting myself."

 "Selfish bugger," she muttered, but I had the feeling that she wasn't
entirely unsatisfied with the result of the encounter. She threw a
provocative smile at us as she reached the doorway. "If you're ever up for
a threesome, I'm game for just about anything."

 "What a tart. Pretty too, like a female you." I washed myself in tepid
water while Bodie searched through the cabinets and cupboards. "What's odd
is that I'm not more turned on to her. I ought to be, you know,
considering."

 "Considering?" He was obsessively looking through everything as we
talked.

 "Considering that she looks like you, berk. Don't you ever listen to me?"

 "Only in bed. She doesn't, you know. Look like me." He pulled out a towel
and pressed it to his face, inhaling deeply.

 "Good coke, is it?"

 He chuckled. "They had a special smell when I was young. I never knew
why, but all the towels smelled like summertime. When Mum died that smell
disappeared."

 "I love you, twit."

 "Oh thenks awfully, Raymond, old chappie."

 Supper was awkward, but it never, thank heaven, spilled over into grim.
Tom glared at us all through the meal until I finally asked him straight
out what the problem was.

 "Probably one of your false eyelashes coming loose, dear," Bodie quipped
before Tom had a chance to answer. Eliza choked on her salad and Cara
stuffed a napkin into her mouth to stifle her laughter. Even Vick, smiled
that little, secret smile I'd seen before. The change was startling. She
was pretty.

 "Very funny, very funny," Tom snapped.

 "Me? No, not at all. I'm singularly lacking a sense of humour, isn't that
so, Raymond?"

 "Oh yes," I confirmed. "Very dour."

 "You know damn well what I mean!"

 Bodie's response was one of those frozen smiles that never reach the
eyes. The effect is hideous for anyone on the receiving end and Tom very
wisely backed off.

 "Do you suppose that any of Mother's family will come?" Vick asked.

 "Why would they want to?" Caro asked, and Bodie wondered aloud if anyone
would be foolish enough to think that they cared that their father was
dead.

 "I care." Everyone looked at Vick. "I care. He was my father after all."

 "Darling, you must understand, we all have to deal with this in our own
way," Eliza said gently, taking Vick's hand between her own much larger
ones. "And anyway, funerals aren't really for the dead, they're for the
living."

 Vick poured herself another glass of ale. "Soft-headed, that's old Vick."

 "Soft-hearted, more like," Bodie amended. She giggled while her husband
glowered.

 I helped Bodie clear away, the occupation making me feel less of an
outsider. "Lots of bad feeling about him, is there?"

 Bodie rinsed a plate thoughtfully. "Good reason for it, I'd say. He made
our lives hell until we were able to get free of him."

 "Pretty grim, I imagine, but..."

 "What?"

 "I expect it's silly, only, I never knew my father." I dried the dish he
handed me and set it on the table. "I don't even know who or what he
is...and when I look in the mirror I think he must have been something
rather strange. Anyway, well, I guess what it is is that it seems rather a
wonderful thing to have a Dad no matter how awful. There, I told you it
was silly, didn't I?"

 Bodie put his arms around me and hugged me very tight. "I like to think
of you as springing full grown from your Mum's head--bloody heroic,
innit?"

 "You're raving," I laughed into his chest.

 "Thing is, you have got a dad...'course I ought not to tell you this, but
your mum does know who he is."

 "She said not!" I yelled, pushing him away. "Did she tell you who?" It
was absurd how fast my heart was beating.

 "Ray, listen to me. Is it going to change anything? Are you going to be
someone else entirely if you find out his name?"

 "I could meet him," I insisted. Crazy thoughts were tumbling around in my
head.

 "Oh yeh, you could show up on the doorstep one day and say: 'I'm your
son. You don't know me, of course, but you knew my mother rather well.'"

 "Oh stop it, Bodie. I'm not such a prat. Why the hell did she tell you
and not me?"

 "She didn't tell me who he was, only that she knew who he was and that
she felt guilty for never having told you."

 "And you told her not to. Thanks very much." I began to furiously dry a
plate.

 "You think I'd do that?" he asked quietly. Of course he wouldn't.

 "No. I know you better than that." I sat down, my knees like water, and
contemplated the mixture of euphoria and dread that washed over me.

 Bodie knelt down beside my chair. "If you ask her, she'll tell you, Ray."
I wasn't at all sure I really wanted to know anymore.

 "Will? Ray?" It was Eliza at the door. "There are people beginning to
arrive. I think you should be out here."

 "Feel up to facing a mob, lover?"

 "Yeh, let's go get 'em," I said. I was almost dizzy with emotion as Bodie
hauled me to my feet; and we walked arm in arm into the parlour.

 Tom came up behind us and hissed, "Have a little decency for the sake of
the family."

 "Sod off," Bodie whispered, a charming smile on his face.

 I hadn't expected a coffin ... don't know what I did expect, but the
atmosphere had been so light that I'd forgotten that we were there to pay
last respects. It was in the corner of the room, surrounded by a pitiful
offering of flowers. I found I was curious about the man who lay inside
the coffin. I pulled away from Bodie and peered down at the face of his
father.

 It was not what I had expected at all. There was before me a gaunt old
man with a thick shock of coarse white hair. His hands, which were folded
on his chest, were mottled with liver spots and the veins stood out in
sharp relief under the papery flesh. All there was of Bodie was the
mouth--that same vulerable and ironic mouth which even at rest was
eloquent. I allowed myself to think about that, and it was enough. I
wanted to weep. I backed away and fled the room where Bodie and his
sisters were attempting to sound sincere as they accepted condolences.

 I found myself in what must have once been a grand library. Most of the
shelves were empty now. What dominated the room, though, was not the vast
expanse of shelves but rather a portrait of Bodie's mother as she must
have been early in her married life. It was a magnificent portrait--the
sort that wealthy families are mad for. The artist had been more than just
competent... or perhaps the subject matter had been so superb that all he
needed was competence. I was struck again by her beauty and by the
serenity in her eyes. Bodie hadn't got that at all.

 She was wearing white satin which set off her blue-white skin and black
hair. Her eyes, so like Bodie's in their shape and colour, seemed almost
violet in the muted light. I couldn't help but wonder if the artist had
taken liberties with her likeness. It seemed impossible for a woman to be
so exquisite. Had I been the artist I should have fallen completely.

 The door opened quietly. "Ah, you found her." Bodie stood beside me and
gazed up. "I'd forgotten..." he said dreamily. Then: "My God, what
happened to all the books?" He surveyed the shelves as I remained in front
of the portrait, trying to memorize each detail. "Natural history, a
dictionary, a Western ... " He chuckled as he leafed through the last.
"Eclectic tastes had my father." A small cloud of dust rose as he turned
the pages. "You up to going back?" he asked as he replaced the book. "Come
on, you can keep me from spitting on the old bastard." He switched off the
light and led me out. "Remind me to ask Eliza what happened to the books."

 Mercifully the remainder of the evening was easier. Quite a few people
shook my hand and offered sympathy. I guessed that very few of them knew
who I was, or cared much. I didn't see Bodie approach the coffin at any
time.

 The last of the mourners left, or rather, were shown the door a bit after
midnight. The stragglers were a little the worse for drink and nobody knew
who they were.

 "Leave the clearing up for Mrs Hansen. She'll be in before nine. We'll be
leaving for the funeral at ten." Eliza switched off the lights.
"Goodnight," she said, indicating that we were all to retire to our own
rooms. Caro winked at me and twitched up the stairs just ahead of me and
Bedie. For my part, I was looking forward to putting on a bit of a show
for Tom, not to mention the fact that I was itching to get my hands on
Bodie.

 I was between the sheets in two ticks, my toes wriggling in anticipation.
Bodie wanted to have a shower, but I grumbled about that, so we
compromised on a quick wash now and a shower, together, in the morning.
Quick! He was gone for almost half an hour. In the end I got out of bed
and went to look for him. I was halfway to the loo when I saw him coming
up the stairs. "Wondered where you'd been. Thought you went down the
plughole."

 He looked up and I noticed how tired he looked, the shadows beneath his
eyes making them look bruised. "Just saying good-bye," he said quietly.
"Let's go to bed."

 I really expected him to be all grim and serious about our lovemaking,
but he was in far better spirits than I had imagined. In fact, he was
rather rambunctious and playful, making me laugh so hard that I couldn't
get it up for the longest time. Nights like that he's so sweet when we
finally do get round to the mechanics of it all that I almost prefer them
to the really hot, intense bouts of passion we have sometimes... well,
more times than anyone would imagine for a pair that's been together as
long as we have. I like him silly and sweet. It's why I married him, isn't
it? Or would have done if that sort of thing was possible. It's just as
good, what we have.

 Anyway, we both made a deal of noise that night. I hoped that Tom was
listening because I gave it my best shot--what Bodie calls my
'cat-in-heat' impersonation, and I half expected them to start rapping on
the walls any minute. I couldn't resist putting a bit of icing on either,
so whenever I woke up during the night (fairly often in a strange bed) I
spent a few minutes bouncing up and down on the mattress, making the
springs squeak. Poor Bodie, I wonder what he thought.

 It paid off too, over breakfast. Tom looked more sullen than ever and
Bodie's sisters were wide-eyed with surprise and/or admiration.

 "Bloody waste if you ask me," Caro said, biting the corner of her toast
with real feeling.

 "I think it's amazing," Vick announced. "Are you two always like that?"
she asked, ignoring Tom's scandalized exclamations.

 "I'm not going to venture an opinion," Eliza said, closing the subject
very firmly.

 The funeral was, as funerals generally are, very quiet. Bodie looked
relieved as if something that had plagued him for years was finally over.
I caught hold of his hand surreptitiously and gave it a squeeze, relishing
the pressure of his fingers in return.

 When we returned to the house, Bodie made we've-got-to-be-going noises
almost immediately, but Eliza settled matters by insisting that we stay
until the will was read that night. Actually, she about ordered us to
stay. Didn't bother me, but Bodie stomped off looking stormy. "Need a
kip," he said as he headed upstairs.

 "Not surprised," Tom muttered--his only allusion to the show we'd put on
the previous night. "We'll be back tonight."

 "Come for supper," Eliza told them.

 "Ta." He kissed her cheek and Vick did the same. Caro went upstairs as
well, saying she needed to make a phone call.

 "Ray, would you like to join me for a sandwich?" Eliza asked, and I
accepted eagerly, wanting a chance to get to know this second most
interesting of the Bodie children.

 She set me to slicing the bread while she emptied the refrigerator and
set everything on the table between us. "Family gatherings always give me
an appetite," she admitted, putting the water on for coffee. We both began
constructing very large sandwiches. "Isn't it fortunate that they don't
happen more often or I'd weigh a ton. Tell me about yourself, Ray."

 Fighting the urge to utter the classic 'not much to tell, really,' I
shrugged and asked her what it was she wanted to know.

 "I was rather wondering--do have some mustard--wondering why it came
about--the relationship I mean."

 I scraped the spicy brown mustard across the bread, purposely frugal as I
wasn't sure just how hot it really was. "It's not easy for me to talk
about these things with you. What I have to say isn't the sort of subject
matter I'd raise with a nun."

 "What about a sister-in-law?" She laughed. "I'm a lot less shockable than
you might think, Ray." She sliced a large ham and cheese sandwich in half
with one deft stroke, reminding me of my mother. "You met... went to bed
together, then found out you liked each other. Am I right?"

 "Essentially. Fairly mundane, really, except for the feelings. What I
felt the first moment I saw him still makes me blush."

 "I'm not immune either, Ray. Few people are." We ate in silence for a few
minutes. "I gather the relationship hasn't been easy."

 "Bodie tell you that?" I asked, a little embarassed at all the things he
could have told her.

 "Not directly no, but I know my brother rather well."

 "My turn now. Why doesn't he ever talk about his past--any of it? He
won't even talk about the good things."

 She put the sandwich down, wiped her lips and folded her hands. "I can
only guess, but I'd say that in order to bury the bad things deeply
enough, he had to sacrifice the good things as well. I don't know how much
you know about our lives..."

 "I know that he loved your mother and she died before he was twelve. How
did she die?"

 "In childbirth. Mother wanted a large family. She was advised against
having any more after Will, but she was determined. She lost two. The
third killed her." She picked at a withered bit of lettuce as she talked.
"After her death, I guess we expected our father to become a substitute
for her. You must understand that while he'd never shown us anything
warmer than detachment, he'd never given us worse than indifference. We
assumed, as children will, that it meant he loved us in a gruff,
undemonstrative way, rather like those salty old characters in old
Hollywood films."

 "But he didn't."

 "Oh, dear me no, not at all." She smiled a little sadly. "The week after
mother died I heard him on the phone begging one of his sisters to take
all of us off his hands. She wasn't having it, of course, and told him so,
so he said, 'take the girls and I'll drown the brat.' I think Will heard
it too because I found him later curled up in his closet clutching Rupert.
He wouldn't say why he was there though. You see," she said with a wry
smile, "he was always a quiet child. Even then he kept things to himself."

 "Bodie told me that your father used to chase you around the house with a
hammer."

 She looked blank for a moment. "Well, that was after I'd left, but I
understand from Caro that it was almost a weekly occurrence at the end. I
often blame myself for what happened here after I left. I was the only one
with any control over him, and I ignored my responsibility to the younger
children. When I think of the things that man was capable of doing ...
when I think of the things that Caro's told me, the very few things that
she's told me of the two years after I left, I think I can never forgive
myself." She scrubbed a hand over her eyes and sighed heavily.

 "Vick left them too. It's not your sole respon..."

 "You mustn't be too quick to judge Vick," she snapped. "Perhaps she was
the one who suffered the most. She was most like Mother and the one among
us who really loved Father." She looked far away. "Vick was never able to
deny his will in anything until she married Tom out of desperation. She
left because she could not stay. I left because I was weak."

 "What makes it different for you?" I demanded, hating to see her hating
herself.

 "Because," she said evenly and with very little emotion evident, "when he
put his hands on me in the wrong way, I bashed him. She couldn't."

 In the silence that fell between us I felt very sorry for her, for them
all. I suddenly understood a deal more than I ever wanted to. All I could
say after that was, "I'm sorry."

 "It's an old story, isn't it, and it never gets any more pleasant with
the retelling. Our father ended his life mad as a hatter. It's the only
thing that allows me to have any pity for him. Christian charity,
appearances to the contrary, was never my strong suit. Let me clear up
now. Ray. I'd like to be alone for a bit."

 I went upstairs and found Bodie fast asleep in the centre of the bed.
He'd kicked off his shoes and pulled the coverlet over himself, and he
looked very young. I lay down close to him and studied him carefully--so
familiar yet so much a stranger in many ways. I understood his reticence a
bit better now. He began to wake as I smoothed the dark curls back.

 "H'lo. You look like hell."

 "Want to go exploring?" I asked, kissing his nose. "Not that sort," I
added as his fingers--all ten thousand of them--insinuated themselves into
my clothing.

 "Tiresome. What sort then?"

 "I'd like to see your old bedroom." His smile was lewd and I bashed him
gently. "Cheeky devil."

 "Now you mention it, I'd like to pay a little visit as well. There's
something I'd like to get." He rolled out of bed and took my hand, leading
me out and up the hall past Caro's room. I heard her talking on the phone.
She sounded like a little girl. "Here it is," he said, pushing open the
door and switching on the light.

 It was oddly Spartan with whitewashed walls and a wood trim. The little
bed had a plain brown coverlet on it, and what little furniture there was
looked expensive but strictly functional. I looked over the case full of
books while Bodie disappeared into the closet. Adventure, travel, poetry
(the type that children would prefer), all the Waverly novels and
Hornblower series, and a good selection of Kipling and R.L.S.

 "I came back for one thing," Bodie confessed over the sound of things
being shifted. There was a wonderful old collection of circus figures on
the desk that drew my attention. I'd never seen such wonderful toys.

 Bodie emerged from the closet holding a silver picture frame and a
cylindrical object. He turned the cylinder upside down, then right side
up, and a low guttural growl drifted through the room. "Rupert!"

 "No, Rupert's growler. I told you he got hacked up." He flipped the
cylinder again and the plaintive growl escaped. "I rescued his voice...
and this." He handed me the picture and ducked back into the closet to
re-emerge with a small tin box. "I hid this under the floorboards because
no one ever went in my closet. I knew it'd be safe there unless the house
fell down."

 The photo was of his mother, himself and his three sisters. Eliza and
Vick flanked their mother and Caro sat at her feet, and she held Bodie on
her lap. Mother and son shared a smile that excluded the rest of the
world.

 "I took that out of her bedroom the day she died and hid it with all my
other special things." He opened the box. It contained some picture
postcards, a sea shell, a watch and a rosary. "My mother's," he explained.
"Anyway, these are my legacy. It's all I want."

 "We could go now if you really want to. He's not likely to have left you
anything."

 "He was capable of anything. No," he said, closing the box. "Eliza asked
me to stay until the will is read. We can leave tomorrow morning." My eyes
were drawn back to the circus as he gathered up his possessions. He
noticed. "You want them? Have them. My gift to you for being such a brick
this week." Knows all my little secret weaknesses, does Bodie. I snatched
up the figures greedily and made him carry the enormous carousel.

 He tinkered with it as he walked. "Used to play a tune," he explained.
"Circus music ... ahhh." A few shaky notes spilled out of the thing and he
grinned. "Still does, I see."

 I sat down on the floor and began setting up the circus, examining each
figure. Bodie lay down on the bed. I was disappointed. I thought he'd be
interested in an old toy. "Bodie, the lion's mouth opens!" I exclaimed as
I discovered the lever that made the jaws snap.

 He sat up and peered down at me. "That's so the lion tamer can put his
head in the lion's mouth." He squatted beside me and picked up one of the
figures. "This is one of the Flying Macaronis," he told me, holding out a
trapeze artist with bent knees.

 "Why's he kneeling?"

 "Berk!" He held out his index finger with the figure hanging upside down
from the centre joint.

 "Feel a right fool, don't I? Why Macaroni?"

 "Sounded Italian when I was small." He sat down and began to fiddle with
the carousel as I set up the figures. There must have been fifty or sixty
of them. "Granny brought these back from her last trip to Germany in
'fifty-two. She was from Dusseldorf originally."

 "I thought your granny was all Irish."

 "That's Granny Bodie. Granny Slaughter was German." He grunted with
satisfaction as the carousel began to turn and to play a jaunty, if
off-key, tune. It was wonderful. The horses moved up and down just as they
would on a real carousel.

 "Slaughter was your mother's maiden name then?"

 "Yeh." He lay back to look at the circus which was all set up now on the
carpet at the side of the bed. "Alicia Jane Slaughter. I always thought it
was pretty."

 "You favour her," I remarked as I snapped the lion's jaws shut on the
head of the lion-tamer. To my surprise, the lion-tamer's head fell off.
Bodie shook with laughter. "Oh, very funny. Why didn't you tell me about
this?"

 "Wanted to see your face. I fixed it to do that when I was ten."

 "Fiend!"

 "Oh yes, entirely." I fitted the head back on while he talked. "Gran
brought dolls for the girls, I remember. Vick had a baby doll in a long
white christening gown and a lacy cap, and 'liza had a Victorian one in
green velvet. I don't remember Caro's doll since she broke it a week
later. Dad walloped her for that. God she brought wonderful pressies," he
said dreamily. I gave the trapeze a push and the Great Macaroni fell to
his death. "Granny Bodie couldn't because she didn't have any money. When
she came to live with us she'd tell me stories about the fair folk. Very
superstitious, she was, and I believed her. I think I loved her better
than Granny Slaughter. Dad was happy when she died. I think he'd have been
happy to see us all go." I made a non-committal noise. "I remember when
Mum died," he continued, "I found him sitting in the library, staring up
at her picture, and there were tears pouring down his face. He was just
sitting there crying without making a sound. It was terribly sad. I tried
to hug him and tell him that we loved him and would take care of him." His
voice trailed away. He rolled over and gave the ball perched on the end of
the seal's nose a spin. "Of course he bashed me good and told me not to be
such an ass--that he didn't want my sympathy." He picked up the bareback
rider and studied the horse's belly. "This one used to rear up on its hind
legs until I broke the key off." I wanted to hug him. "Ray, it's terrible
to love someone the way he loved her--obsessively, you know? And I'm
afraid that I'm capable of doing it to you or Michael or Danny or ..."
There was an agonized appeal in his eyes.

 I cradled his face. "If I ever feel smothered, I'll bash you good and
we'll go on from there, all right?"

 "Promise?"

 "On my honour as a girl guide."

 He snickered. "How'd you pass the physical?"

 I rolled my eyes at him and he laughed harder. Then I kissed his nose and
eyelids and mouth. "You're a silly git which is why I let you hang about."

 He showed me how the elephant could balance on its trunk and how the lion
was just the right height to bite the ringmaster's knees. It's part of his
charm, that kid inside the tough man. I wonder sometimes how he managed to
preserve that part of him what with all he'd been through. Me, I buried my
child deep very early and I hardly ever see him anymore. Bodie brings him
out sometimes though. The Ray Doyle that was is an elusive little bugger.

 We were very relaxed and loving that evening when we went down for
supper. We even held hands under the table. Silly and romantic I suppose,
but satisfying.

 Over soup, Bodie cleared his throat drawing everyone's attention. "Did
Ray and I show you pictures of our family?" he asked, knowing full well
that we hadn't.

 "What family?" Vick asked.

 Bodie produced one of those photo cases and pulled snaps out to pass
around the table. "This is Emma. She's Ray's daughter. You can see the
resemblance." It was a photo of me and Em taken just before she married
Alec.

 "Ray, how old are you?" Caro asked.

 "Same as you," Bodie told her. "This is her husband Alec with the
kids--Danny and Michael, Justine and little Georgie."

 "Will, this one, Michael is it?" Sharp lady.

 "Ah well, yeh, he's mine. So's Danny, but he favours his Mum." *That* was
lovely coming from Bodie.

 "And how does Alec feel about this?" Caro asked with a smirk.

 "Any of them legitimate?" Tom asked nastily. Everyone ignored him.

 Bodie passed around the rest of the photos explaining who they were and
where they were taken. Pretty boring really except to both of us. I had to
keep myself from laughing at the expression on Tom's face whenever he
looked at a photo of Danny or Michael. We had coffee in the library, and
the family solicitor, a Mr Hickson, arrived around eight. He offered
condolences to everyone, though he seemed a little confused when he came
to me. "Bodie's partner," I explained.

 "Your father changed his will once a year," Hickson said, "and many of
the alterations were... bizarre." He coughed and shuffled a stack of
papers that he'd taken from his case. "Still, in the end I believe we
managed to draw up a fair and legally sound document. Shall we begin?"
Everyone nodded and he started to read. The 'sound mind and body' line
drew snorts of laughter but when the bequests were read nobody laughed. To
Eliza, who had given up all claim to worldly possessions, he left all of
his considerable liquid assets. To Caro, whose taste ran to very different
sorts of furnishings, all the household goods. And to Bodie, who hated
this house and its memories, the house. To Vick and Tom, who could have
happily made use of any of the aforementioned, nothing at all. Of course.
What better revenge?

 Tom was red-faced and furiously insisting that he would contest while
Hickson invited him to try, observing that such an attempt seemed unlikely
to succeed. Bodie chuckled bitterly. "Just what I need--a bloody great
empty house in Liverpool."

 "You poor bastard. My heart bleeds," Tom spat. "You'd find a use, I'm
sure. You could move your boyfriend in and flaunt him in front of the
neighborhood the way you've done in front of us. Don't give a damn about
decency, do you?"

 "Tom, stop it!" Vick said, rising from her chair.

 "Tom Cleary, you behave yourself," Eliza ordered.

 Caro just laughed. "Let him show his class."

 "You lot are so bloody fine, aren't you? With your fine names and airs
and your Da's money."

 "I didn't expect anything from my father and I warned you not to either,"
Vick told him. "If you're disappointed it's your own fault."

 "You'd side with them against your own husband wouldn't you? Because
you're a Bodie!" He spat the name out as if it tasted foul. "You don't
seem to care that he's been given what should have come to you and our
children!"

 "Easy mate," I warned. He was agitated enough to do something foolish.

 "I'm not your mate!" he shouted. Then he turned on Bodie again. "Your
father would have loved this, wouldn't he?"

 "I don't much care what he would have liked or disliked."

 "You know what he did to Vick for marrying beneath her, but then it seems
that you all have a taste for the gutter, don't you?"

 Before he knew what hit him, he was on his back across the desk with
Bodie's arm planted firmly across his windpipe. "I could fix it so Vick
wouldn't have to worry about getting pregnant again, couldn't I?" Bodie
whispered as he pressed his knee upwards. Tom gave a little choked cry.
"Or I could snap your neck for you, but I don't think you're worth it. You
listen to what I'm saying. I don't much care what you think of me, but if
you ever insult one of my sisters or my lover--that's Ray, by the way--if
I ever hear you do that, Tommy-boy, I'll do you. Understand?" Tom nodded
and Bodie released him, and straightened his tie. "I have no intention of
accepting the bequest, Mr Hickson. You'll have to find someone else to
lumber." He gave my hair a tug. "Coming to bed, Sunshine?"

 "You surprised them," I told him as we undressed for bed.

 "They think I push a pencil. Civil servant and all. Y'know, there's a
certain perverse pleasure in that." He insinuated himself between the lacy
white sheets and I joined him eagerly. "I apologize for what he said,
Ray."

 "That prat? Cummere you butch thing." He pressed himself against me and
we kissed with surprising intensity. "I thought you wanted to fuck me in
your Da's bed," I reminded him as he licked my ears.

 "I don't care about that any more. He was just a sad old man." He nibbled
down the front of me and rested his head on my belly. "I can't even hate
him anymore. Last night when I went downstairs, I wanted to say or do
something so horrible that even a dead man would have been hurt and
humiliated, but he looked so old and sad....like the day in the library
when he cried for my mother. He was all alone in that box. Ray, we're all
the same in the end. I can't hate him any more. I even wish I could have
loved him. Christ, what a way to live!" There was pity and sorrow in those
expressive eyes.

 He began to stroke my cock very softly, as he might stroke a kitten, in a
dreamy offhand sort of way, and I responded in the same way, all the while
petting him and telling him how much I cared about him, how much I loved
him. I noticed his hair was getting longish--something only a long-time
lover would notice at a moment like this.

 He took me in his mouth very gently and later, after a sweet, slow
climax, I did the same for him. Maybe it couldn't ever be official or even
acceptable to the world at large, but he and I were married in a way as
binding as Vick and Tom's marriage or Eliza's union with her god. After
all the questionable choices I'd made in the past, it seemed that I'd
finally made the right one. It's not often that a couple can say after
fifteen years that it's better now than it was in the beginning, but we
damn well could.

 I thought about asking Bodie to change his mind about the house. It would
have been a nice place to grow old together. In fact, for all the pain it
had seen, it was a friendly sort of place. I could almost imagine the kids
playing on the lawn, perhaps the way Bodie and his sisters had played. But
I knew that he'd refuse and I hardly blamed him. Memories both good and
bad have a way of overpowering the present. Bodie could never be
completely happy here.

 When I woke up the next morning, Bodie was not beside me. The clock read
seven-twenty. He couldn't be up and about yet, I thought, but I dozed for
a while and when I woke again it had gone eight and still no Bodie. I
threw on a robe and went to find him.

 He was in the kitchen with his sisters. They were all nursing cups of
tea. "Didn't mean to intrude," I said, hovering in the doorway.

 "Come and sit down, Ray," Vick said. "You're welcome here."

 I helped myself to a cup of coffee and sat between Bodie and Caro. They
were talking about the estate, and had apparently decided to divide
everything in a civilized manner. "Which means leaving Tom at home," Vick
quipped. "I apologize for last night, Ray. You see, he's always felt
inferior to my family. It's a shame really because he's worth ten of
Father. He's a good man but bitter on my account. He simply will not
realize that all I cared about losing was something I never really had.
The rest..." she made a vague gesture encompassing the house and its
contents, "means very little to me now that the kids are all nearly grown.
He should never have married me," she said sadly. "I've brought him a lot
of grief."

 The others protested, trying to comfort her. "Nothing to apologize for,"
I told her. "I'm not sorry I love Bodie. Nobody can make me feel that
way."

 In the end they decided to each take a few of the household things, sell
the house and the rest of the furnishings and divide the proceeds and the
liquid assets into quarters, Eliza's being held in trust for her nieces
and nephews (including, she said, Emma's adorable children). Each would
pay a quarter of the death duties from their share.

 When it fell to Bodie to choose what he wanted from the house, it was no
surprise to hear him ask for the books and the portrait of their mother.
"Which reminds me," he said as Eliza wrote down his request, "what
happened to the library?"

 "Dad burned the others in the fireplace."

 Bodie just shook his head sadly. "Nothing like a good book on a cold
night, eh?"

 We left after breakfast. Eliza and Vick promised to see to the packing
and shipping of the books and picture, but I took the circus with me. Each
of his sisters kissed me goodbye, and Caro whispered, "Just you wait, Ray
Doyle."

 "Stay in touch," Eliza ordered as we climbed into the Capri. Then we
drove away, leaving the three women watching from the veranda.

 -- THE END --

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