The Thousand Smiles of Nicholas Goring (6 page)

Dave had an Outback trip planned for late July with a family who wanted to fossick for opals, and another trip later on with a bunch of blokes who were more into pubs and off-roading, but Dave had delegated his other two business bookings to the retired couple who helped him out when needed. At least Robin was keen on the idea of him and Nicholas coming along on the fossicking trip, but otherwise he seemed content to simply hang out.

More to the point, Robin was perfectly happy to keep company with Nicholas. It was obvious Robin was still in love with Nicholas – and when Dave thought back to being eighteen and in love and on his summer holidays, he could perfectly understand Robin's lazy contentment.

One warm afternoon they were all three hanging out in the shade on the back veranda. Dave was stretched out on a recliner with his current Patrick O'Brian novel, while Robin was curled up on the swing chair beside his beloved Nicholas. Robin had been listening to his music, though he'd only had one earbud in, and Nicholas had been browsing through one of his glossier academic journals, but even such pleasing demands as these had been put aside. The backyard stretched before them, looking particularly green and lush, and when the leaves of the banana palms stirred in the occasional breeze they sounded as beautiful as the patter of gentle rain.

There was certainly a sense shared among the three men, Dave thought, of all being very right with the world. So it was no surprise or interruption when Robin softly announced, "I love it here. I really do."

Nicholas smiled broadly, and said, "I'm glad. I love it here, too."

"I can see why you had to come live here."

"It was David," Nicholas said. "David belongs here, and I belong with David." Nicholas exchanged a solemnly happy glance with Dave, before adding to Robin, "I didn't
want
to leave you all behind, you know."

"I know." Robin sighed, and the quiet returned for a while. Until Robin tentatively began again, "I was thinking …"

"Yes?" Nicholas prompted.

"I was thinking that … maybe I should defer my enrolment at Oxford, and spend some time here with you instead."

Nicholas's expression slipped from tranquil to troubled in a moment, though he seemed to be trying to remain calm on the surface. "Were you?" he asked in fairly neutral tones.

"Yes. Lots of people take a gap year before starting uni, you know?"

"They do," Nicholas allowed. "Usually there's some … purpose to it, though."

"Like there's any better purpose for me than being with
you
," Robin returned.

Dave tensed a little, and sensed that Nicholas did, too. That was about as blatant as Robin had ever been – in words anyway. For some reason it all seemed much safer if it remained unspoken, or at most a subject for teasing, no matter how well known.

Eventually Nicholas said, "Well, let's see how you're feeling in a couple of months –"

"Of
course
I'll still feel the same –"

"About the gap year, I mean. Your grandfather is coming over to collect you, remember? If you can convince
him
to leave you here rather than take you back to Oxford, then I won't get in your way. You can tell him you have a home here with us."

"Thank you!" Robin cried, sitting up to look at Nicholas with a bright smile as if it were all already agreed. "Oh,
thank you
, Nicholas!"

Dave snorted. Nicholas's father was a lovely guy, and particularly fond of Nicholas, but Dave had seen him in Formidable Mode. "If you're serious, Robin, you'd better come up with a better reason than just hanging out with us. I don't think Richard's going to be very impressed.
I
wouldn't want to have to argue your case for you."

Robin barely spared Dave a glance.

For some reason, Dave persisted, when really he knew he should be dissuading the young man. "What are you gonna be studying at uni? I know I should know already, but these things tend to go right over my head. Maybe you can do a year's study here that would be – well, relevant."

"I doubt it," said Robin. "I'm doing PPE."

"You're such a frightful snob!" Nicholas told Robin – before he took pity on Dave and explained, "PPE: Philosophy, Politics and Economics." He added wryly, "Robin's going to be prime minister one day."

"Not of Australia, I take it."

"No," and Nicholas intoned, "Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland."

Robin didn't care about being teased. He was sitting sideways on the chair now with his leg folded under him, focussed entirely and intensely on his uncle. "Nicholas," Robin said.

"Yes?"

It seemed that Robin was determined to finally lay all his cards out on the table. "You know I'm in love with you, Nicholas. You've always known, haven't you?"

Nicholas took a long moment with that, and then looked up at Robin with a troubled grimace. Eventually he began, "Maybe you are in love, my dear –"

"
Don't
patronise me!"

"– but being in love passes."

"It
won't
pass."

"I'm just trying to say – don't go making any life-changing decisions, all right, Robin? Let's wait and see how you feel when Father –"

"Oh,
wait and see
," Robin grumbled. "You're not so old, are you, that you can't remember being fed up to the back teeth with being told to
wait and see
?"

That won a reluctant quirk of a smile from Nicholas, but he didn't give an inch. "In any case, Robin," he steadily continued, "I'm with David, and always will be, and that's all there is to say about that."

"But that doesn't matter," Robin earnestly continued, glancing again at Dave –

"I assure you it matters very much indeed!" Nicholas retorted.

"No, I mean – David,
you
don't mind, do you? Me being in love with Nicholas? It's not like anything's ever gonna happen."

Dave slowly swung around to put his feet on the ground and sat up to face the others more directly. He wasn't entirely confident about what to say for the best, but then he took another breath and gave it a shot. "It's not that I
mind
, but I think you'd be a lot happier if you loved someone who could love you back –"

"But he does."

"– in the same way." Dave sighed. "You know what I'm trying to say, Robin."

"But he does love me, and he lets me cuddle him, and he smiles at me, and I don't need anything more than that."

"Well," said Dave, "it's not that I don't understand about the smiles."

"So, you don't mind sharing, right?" Robin persisted. "Because, you know, he still loves you and cuddles you and smiles at you. It's not like I'm taking anything away from what you want."

Dave frowned, and looked to Nicholas for a way forward. "I'm stumped," he said.

Nicholas seemed more troubled than ever. "That's not all there is to love, Robin –"

"It's all I want."

"– and you'll forgive us for wanting you to have someone in your life who'll return your love in kind."

"I don't want to have sex with you!" Robin blurted. Into the silence, he continued in somewhat more reasonable tones, "I don't want to have sex with anyone."

Nicholas rubbed at his forehead in a way that caused Dave deep misgivings. "
What
?" Nicholas asked sharply.

"I'm – I'm –"

Oh God
, thought Dave.
He's coming out. Just not the way we expected.

"I'm asexual, you see." Robin looked from one to the other of them, pale and right on the edge. "I'm just not into all that."

"But," Nicholas gritted out, "you said you're in love with me."

"You can be into love and not into sex."

Nicholas scowled, and started massaging his own scalp, digging his fingers in as if desperate to relieve the tension.

"Nicholas –" Dave said.

"I'm all right," he replied, before turning back to Robin. "How do you know? Have you tried?"

Robin scowled right back. "Did you have to ‘try' before you knew you were gay?"

"No, but you're – forgive me for saying so, but you're very
young
, Robin, and –"

"I'm eighteen! How old were you? You said you've always known. Well, I've always known, too. Even if I didn't have a word for it."

"No," said Nicholas. "Just – no."

Robin stared at him, somehow going paler still. The kid was terrified. "
Please
, Nicholas …"

"What?" Nicholas looked as if he were under siege. "What is it you want?"

"Just to
understand
–"

"You want me to understand? I don't even think
you
understand!"

"I do. I do. I know who I am, just like you did."

Nicholas groaned and shook his head, his gaze darting about as if desperate for inspiration. He looked at Dave, and looked away – and then realised. "You know what, Robin? David didn't know. When he was eighteen, he thought he was entirely straight. I just think you should allow for the fact that you might be … mistaken."

Robin turned to consider Dave with an anxious grimace, as if both needing and dreading to hear more.

Oh God.
"Well …" Dave began, slowly and carefully. "Nicholas is right, as far as that goes. I was with Denise when I was your age. And I loved her, I really did. I thought I'd always be … with Denise. But looking back … When she admired other men, I always had an opinion. I thought it was like appreciating a beautiful sunset, you know? I thought I was just open-minded. I think we both … had a bit of a thing for Pete Murray. It was only later I realised that … straight guys don't think like that. Not even about Pete. Even when I met Nicholas, it took me ages to realise I'm actually bisexual. I guess I was a bit …" What Aussie man would ever want to admit this? "I was a bit innocent, you know? Even a bit naïve, maybe."

"Innocent," Nicholas said with a nod, fastening onto this word. "You need to live more of your life, Robin, before you go deciding on labels like – Well. Deciding on fundamental things like that."

Robin had turned back to gape at Nicholas. "I thought
you
would understand, Nicholas. Even if no one else does, I thought you'd be the one who'd let me be who I am."

Nicholas scoffed a little. "Into love and not into sex? How does that even work?"

It had been a difficult enough situation as it was. Now Dave felt a cold stir of foreboding. "Nicholas –"

"I know
you're
into sex, Uncle Nicholas."

"Yes, I am," he returned in tones that Dave felt were a bit too defiant for such a sensitive conversation with young Robin.

"That doesn't mean everyone else has to be."

"Nicholas," said Dave. "Maybe you should give Robin the benefit of the doubt. At least for now. He's obviously put a lot of thought into this –"

Nicholas stared hard at Dave – and then dropped his head into his hands, and dug his fingers into his temples. He obviously had a headache. Dave's cold sense of foreboding deepened.

"Uncle Nicholas –" Robin began.

Dave was on his feet even before Nicholas was –

But in the event, Nicholas just walked past him, holding out a hand to indicate Dave needn't follow. "It's all right," he said. Dave had learned to trust him when he said that. "I'm all right." He was heading inside.

"Uncle Nicholas –"

"Sorry. I can't handle this right now." And Nicholas was through the French windows into the relative darkness of the house, sliding the screen-door closed behind him until it shut with a quiet
snick
.

Robin sat back down again.

So did Dave. They both stared at the wooden decking of the veranda, and then exchanged a cautious glance as if each checking the other was okay. Dave would rather be with Nicholas, taking care of him, but he couldn't abandon Robin. Not when Robin had just been rejected by the man he was in love with. "Are you all right?" Dave eventually asked.

Robin looked at him, pale yet steady. "All right enough. Is Nicholas – ?"

"He'll be fine. He'll drink his water-and-lime, and take a couple of pills for his headache. Maybe he'll read or have a nap. He'll be fine."

A solemn nod acknowledged all this. Then Robin sighed, settled back in the swing chair, and stared off into the abundant greenery of the yard. He snubbed a toe against the decking and pushed the chair back, and then let it swing in a gentle arc to and fro, to and fro.

Dave watched him. Robin had always seemed relatively young to him. It didn't help that whenever Nicholas was around, Robin turned as giddy as a bandicoot, but even so. Dave could have sworn he himself had been far more grown-up at eighteen, even if he had been an innocent in some ways. After all, at eighteen Dave had been working full-time with his dad, and Denise had moved into this house with them as Dave's partner. Dave had thought he'd known everything about how his life would be.

Well, Dave had been wrong about a lot of that – but looking at Robin now, Dave could see a maturity behind the youthful face, and a core of … certainty. A calm confidence at the heart of him. An underlying self-possession. And
that
reminded Dave of Nicholas. If only the two of them could avoid falling out over this, perhaps Nicholas would come to see that, too.

"What are you thinking, Uncle David?"

"I was thinking that … everything's going to be just fine."

"Good," said Robin. "That's good."

In the darkness that night, Dave surfaced from vague dreams as Nicholas's embrace tightened, as his hold on Dave became a grasp. "All right?" Dave muttered. "Nicholas?"

"Yes," Nicholas reassured him, though his breath was harsh in his throat as if he'd been running
hard
. His hands became demanding, and he grappled Dave under him, though he said, "Please –"

"Course," Dave said, already welcoming him with arms and thighs. It was so dark, Dave hardly even knew whether his eyes were open or not, but they definitely closed as Nicholas pressed his face into Dave's throat, as he bit at him and gnawed, and rumbled a growl that shuddered through Dave. Nicholas's cock hadn't caught up with the rest of him yet, but as he rubbed himself against Dave's cock and balls, he soon hardened.