Page 39 of Putting Down Roots

“I do. I need you to know this, whatever it costs me.” His hand falters slightly on my back, then continues its slow, soothing rhythm.

“One day . . .” My mouth goes dry, and I swallow. “One day, my father came. Aunt Frances was out, so I tried to hide in the cellar. I remember him yelling at me, and he hit me, causing my lip to bleed. I heard him shout, ‘This is what it’s like to be a fucking fairy.’ He dragged my hands behind my back and pushed me over a table. Then he . . .”

I hesitate, trying to keep the wobble from my voice. Jackson presses a kiss into my hair and I take a deep breath.

“Then he forced his way into me. Shouting all the time, ‘This is what being gay is.’ I screamed and begged him to stop, but he didn’t. Eventually, he stood up and threw me on the floor. He spat on me, saying, ‘You’re a fucking worthless little shit, just like your mother.’ A taunt he’d been saying my whole life.

“Then I heard my Aunt. ‘You will leave now Cliff. You will never see your son again. You will sign his guardianship over to me. If you do not, I will tell everyone what you have done.’ When I looked up, I could see she was pointing her shotgun at my father. I never saw him again. About six months later, my aunt told me that he’d died—he’d shot himself.” The sobs break through.

“But not before he’d shot my mother.”

I feel Jackson’s arms round me as he pulls me to his chest. He shifts back on the bed slightly and leans against the wall. He places one leg round the other side of me and draws me closer. I turn sideways and curl up in his arms, wedged between his legs.

He doesn’t say anything for a long while, just holds me tight. Eventually, when I raise my head to look at him, I see tears falling down his face. He gently kisses my forehead, each eyelid, then the briefest of kisses on my mouth.

“I’m so sorry you’ve been through that. I had no idea.”

I put my head on his shoulder and snuggle closer. Despite it being a warm evening, I shiver slightly and he pulls me closer. I can feel his breath on my hair.

We don’t move for a while and I become aware of his hand rubbing up and down my arm. It’s soothing, but also, his fingers are lightly touching my scars. Part of me wants him to stop. I want to hide them. But another part of me feels seen, and I want to tell him more.

“Those are from a few years later,” I say into the darkness. His hand stills for the briefest of moments—I think he’s surprised I spoke—then he continues the pattern up and down my arm.

“Do you want to tell me about it?” he murmurs into my hair.

“I want to try.” His response is a kiss on my forehead. So I take a deep breath.

“The thing about being told you’re worthless enough times, is you eventually believe it yourself. At school, there’s always a hierarchy, especially in an all-boys boarding school. All I wanted to do was keep my head down, fit in, not be noticed, but it doesn’t really work like that. I was always small for my age and Iwas bullied a lot. Then I was offered protection from the bullying by a group of boys who were higher up in the hierarchy. The price of their protection . . .”

I pause, swallowing, hardly able to get the next words out.

“Was myself.”

I feel a ragged breath from Jackson across my brow and a very faint, “Fuck.”

“To me, it was better than the beatings from my father, and I cared very little about what happened to me. But I also hated myself. I started cutting my arms with anything I could find—scissors, razor blades, knives.”

Jackson lifts each of my hands and plants a row of kisses along my scars. I want to pull my arms back but he won’t let me—in the end I submit. I know that it’s his way of saying he accepts this part of me.

“Did your aunt know?” he asks eventually.

“She found out when I came home that summer. I didn’t return to that school, she found me another one. But schools are all the same, and the problem wasn’t them, it was me. Then the panic attacks started. I had one year remaining of school, so in the end I went to one locally, but often I just couldn’t go. I couldn’t get myself out of bed, or if I could, I’d have an attack. The only thing I cared about was my art, and luckily, I managed to get a place at an art college. Those were a good couple of years. I focussed on my art and there was no one there to bully me like at school.

“I had a bit of interest in my art early on, but not much. I was struggling to get galleries to exhibit my work. Then one night, when I was nineteen, I met Claude at a party. He promised to getme an exhibition—he promised to make me famous. If I became his lover. I was with him on and off for the last six years.”

“So that’s pretty much it. My career is a joke. And it all went wrong when Claude brought someone else to my latest exhibition—a new lover he was making into the latest star.”

I can hear the bitterness in my voice, even though I’m done with Claude.

“I had an argument with Claude. He wrote a scathing review and caused a scandal. The exhibition was a disaster, and many galleries dropped my work.”

I stop talking. I don’t know what else to say. I’ve told Jackson everything. That for most of my life, I’ve sold myself in one way or another. I’m worthless. But I’ve never met anyone like Jackson before. I don’t think I have anything to offer him to make him stay. I want to let him know that, so he can leave before he finds it out by himself.

“I’m sorry—” I begin.

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” he whispers, his deep voice so close to my ear that I get goosebumps.

“I am sorry. I have nothing to offer you.”

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