Requited Ch. 11

Thank you for reading this, especially those of you who have rated or commented on my work. I read and appreciate every comment and truly value the feedback. Due to the nature of Unrequited/Requited, I've received a lot of DM's from people sharing their own experiences of unrequited love. Every message is unique and yet, the same. Every one of these messages has moved me in some way.

This story is dedicated to those who have felt the sting of love unrequited.

Epilogue

It's hard to believe it, but that day in the den was six years ago. So much has happened, and so much has changed, but still, I look back on that summer with nothing but fond memories. I still think about it often.

I remember the look on Laura Montgomery's face when she arrived at the beach house after her vacation in Europe and realised that Francesca hadn't made up a bedroom for me. Her head whipped back and forth, I could see her thinking, "There must be some mistake."

"Heavens," she said, "Francesca must have thought you were leaving today. I'm sorry West, I'll get her up here right away."

"Mom, it's fine. West and I are, uh, we're sharing a room." Said Andy.

It took her a second. A second or two, but when she realised what he meant, her face broke into a smile the likes of which I'd never seen on her before.

"Stanley," she called down the hall, "could you go down to the cellar? We're going to need bubbles with dinner."

Dinner was a pleasant, if slightly stilted affair. Joss sat there, looking at Andy and then looking at me, grinning like a Cheshire cat. We ate and drank champagne. Mrs Montgomery and Joss told us all about their trip and Mr Montgomery sat there, in a semi-inattentive state, like always.

Just before dessert, he smiled slowly and raised his glass and said, "Andy, West...I've been wondering when you two fools would figure it out."

"Dad!" Exclaimed Joss, "You, you can't say something like that at the table!"

"I apologise." He said evenly, "You're right. I should have waited until we were out on the porch."

Everyone laughed. Even Mrs Montgomery smiled. She smiled and she looked over at him. When she set her glass down, she left her hand on the table, near his. He didn't miss it. I saw him reach over and put his hand so close to hers, they were almost touching. It was the first time I'd ever seen such an interaction between them, but it wasn't the last. I'd always had a feeling that Mr Montgomery had crossed Mrs Montgomery in some way. I suspected he'd been unfaithful, but now I know, he didn't do that. He did something worse. He rejected her son. Mrs Montgomery is many things, but the one thing she's not, is a woman who takes kindly to someone hurting her children. That night was the first step in a long road back for them.

*

A few weeks later, Andy and I were getting ready to head into the city for the day. I had to have a medical check for my new job, and I needed to run a few errands. While I was eating breakfast, I overheard part of a conversation between Andy and his mom. Something about taking me to see two twenty-four.

"What's two twenty-four? I asked him later, on our way into the city.

He looked a little uncomfortable, "It's uh, it's a building I kind of own."

"How do you kind of own a building?"

"Well, my grandfather, my mom's dad, left it in a trust for me. I won't officially own it until next year when I turn twenty-five."

"Oh." I said, "Why was your mom talking about it?"

"She suggested I show it to you."

"Okay, sure, we can swing by."

We ran our errands and then we did go by. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't two twenty-four, that's for sure. From the casual way he described it, I was expecting something small, or at least, smaller.

"Bloody hell." I said, standing across the street, looking up at the expansive red brick warehouse-style building.

"Sorry about all this." He said uncomfortably.

"Why are you sorry?"

"Well, it's just kind of embarrassing, I guess."

I laughed. I'd never dreamt of owning a property like this, but one thing I couldn't imagine being about it, was embarrassed.

"West," said Andy, kicking his foot softly against the sidewalk, "one of the tenants gave their notice a few weeks ago, I, I wanted to show you this place, in case you wanted to talk about living here together."

I'd been planning on living with my aunt and uncle in Bushwick until I could save enough to rent a place. As the summer wore on, it had started to play on my mind. Even though, by my calculation, on my salary, it wouldn't take more than a few of months of heavy saving to be in a position to rent a studio, the thought of not seeing Andy every day had started to make me feel anxious and sick.

"I mean, no pressure, or anything." He added quickly.

I started to laugh, "So, you're saying you own a building, and you just randomly happen to have an apartment for us to live in? God, it must be weird to live in your world."

"It has its moments." He said, rolling his eyes at me, "What do you say? Want to be roommates again?"

"Hell, yes." I said and I kissed him long and hard, right there in the street.

*

The first month was hard. It was heaven, and it was hard. We used all our meagre savings to buy a mattress and a few essentials. Andy's mom loaned us some pots and pans, and my mom sent us the rug from my bedroom at home, as well as a large, metal trunk I'd used to store my toys in as a boy. Though we had no sofa, we put the rug in the living room and used the trunk as a coffee table. At night, we dimmed the lights and sat on the floor and ate, using the trunk as our table. By the end of that first month, we were as tapped out as two guys starting out could possibly be. We ate a lot of ramen. I remember the two of us sitting there, on the floor one night. I'd finished telling him about my day at work and he was telling me about a new painting he was starting. We were sitting close. So close, I didn't care about anything else. We had nothing. And we had everything.

"You know what I'm going to do, when I get paid?" I said.

He shook his head, even though I'd told him my plan several times.

"I'm going to take you to that little Mexican place that you love. I'm going to buy you whatever you want. I'll buy you three meals, if you want. It's going to be the best dinner of your whole life."

Did I mention we'd been eating a lot of ramen? A lot, a lot.

"If you take me for Mexican, you better believe, you're going to be bottoming for the next day or two." He replied.

We both laughed and slurped our ramen. He looked so beautiful then, I can still see it in my mind's eye. I couldn't take my eyes off him. I felt so incredibly content. I felt so sure that I was right where I needed to be. Our lives were just beginning. It was hard starting out, it was hard finding my feet at work and having no money or furniture, but it was also perfect. It was perfect because I was doing it with him. He felt the same. He must have.

"Hey West," he said, leaning his head back a little and looking at me, "do you think this is it? Do you think this is the best day of our lives?"

I smiled at him, and even though part of me suspected that it very well might be, I shook my head and said, "Nah."

"How do you know?"

"It can't be, 'cause tomorrow it's pay day."

*

It was my birthday a couple of months later and we were still pretty broke. Andy was teaching art at a nearby art school a few times per week. The pay was terrible, but it was something. Still, we were in no position to spend money on anything that wasn't essential. Somehow, he still managed to make it the best birthday I'd ever had.

"Happy birthday." He said, serving me my coffee and breakfast in bed and handing me two neatly wrapped gifts.

The first, was a sketch that he'd done of us. Just of our groins. Just us, from the navel to mid-thigh. Standing close. Standing strong. Naked. The detail was astounding. It was seriously impressive.

"Holy, shit!" I laughed, "It's amazing."

"I told you I like your dick so much, someday I'd draw it."

"Actually, I think you said someday you'd paint it."

"Unless you want to explain to guests why there's a painting of you and your dick hanging in our hallway, don't tempt me, okay." He said, giving me a playful swat and handing the next gift to me.

I unwrapped the tissue paper carefully and gasped when I saw what it was...it was his blue t-shirt. The faded blue t-shirt I love. The t-shirt that feels like him.

"Thank you." I whispered, feeling a bit over-come, as I pulled it on. I stroked my hands up and down my chest, feeling the tiny bobbles in the soft, well-worn fabric, "I love it, Andy. I love it."

*

We took our time, furnishing our place. We spent lots of time in thrift shops and at markets. Andy likes to hold things and think about them for a while. He hates shopping on-line. He likes negotiating on prices, haggling and chatting with the owner, before buying something. Everything we bought, we bought together. Even though he's much more into that kind of thing than I am, he wouldn't allow anything into our place, unless we both loved it. For quite a while, we had decent bed linen, but no base for our bed. That's what Andy is like. I love that about him.

We painted the walls in our bedroom a dark blue-grey and hung Always above the bed. We hung the abstract he gave me at the end of first year, in the living room.

"Guess what," he said, as we stepped back and checked to make sure the painting was straight, "I got an offer on Heart today."

"Surely, you're not going to take it?"

"Actually, I think I am."

A wave of emotion flowed through me and settled somewhere near my knees, "Andy, please don't. We don't need the money that badly. We'll be okay."

"It isn't just that. It's different now. When I look at it now, I feel different. I know it was real and I know it's an important piece. It's just that for me, it feels like the past. We're in a different place now."

"But," I started, "but..."

"I'm ready, West. I'm ready to let it go."

I swallowed quickly and nodded. I knew he was right. I was ready too. Almost.

"Just let me do one thing, okay?"

I sat down and started to write. I only meant to write a short note, but once I started, I couldn't stop. I wrote and I wrote. I wrote our whole story. When I was done, I folded the pages and sealed them in an envelope and handed it to Andy.

"If you sell Heart, when you hand it over, please give this to the buyer. I want them to know our story. I want them to know that I'm in the painting with you. That I'm hidden behind you. I want them to know that we worked our shit out. But mostly, mostly, I want them to know that this thing between us was always requited."

*

He did sell Heart, and even though it hurt letting it go, I found it didn't matter as much as I thought it would. Over the years, Andy has done well. He's done amazingly well. I knew he would, but it was hard starting out. In the early years, he painted like a fiend. He peddled his wares tirelessly. Despite all the rejections, he never gave up. In the end, his big break came from an arrangement he made with the owner of a coffee shop, called Sanctum. He asked if he could hang his work in the coffee shop as part of the décor, in the hope of selling a painting now and again. It worked better than he could have hoped. A gallerist named, Paul Gossman, saw his work and got in touch. It wasn't long before Andy had his first solo exhibition.

That exhibition went well and so did the next one. At this point, Andy is well on his way to being a big deal in the art world. He still makes me wait until he's finished his paintings completely, before showing me his work. When a painting is done, he calls me into his studio and watches me, waiting, until I find it. He always hides something for me. In all the time we've been together, he's never done a painting without adding a little piece of me. Sometimes, it's big and obvious but most times, it's tiny. Most times, it's well hidden, but it's always there: a compass rose. It's there, painted on a locket, an earring, or a button. Tiny letters denoting north, south, east, west. The compass needle's never point up, as one might expect. They point to the left. They point the west.

The needles he paints only ever point west.

*

"You ready?" He said, as we waited for my mom to open the door.

"I think so."

"No matter what happens, it doesn't change who you are. You know that, don't you?"

"Yeah," I said softly, "I know."

And, I did know, but I still felt nervous. I felt nervous, but I knew it was time. Dinner was great. It's always great being with my mom. Even though I haven't lived with her for years, being with her still gives me a happy, warm feeling. I waited until after dinner. Until after dessert. Andy must have sensed that I was building up to it, as he had his hand on my knee, holding me gently.

"Mom," I said finally, "I need to know. I-I need to know who my father is. It's something I...whoever he is, whatever happened, I just need to know."

Her eyes flicked quickly to me and then to Andy. She lifted her glass to her mouth and took two very long, large sips. She started to set her glass down, but lifted it back for one more big gulp.

Andy moved his hand to my shoulder and squeezed reassuringly.

"Alright," she said, taking a deep breath, "alright. It was 1990 and I was in London. I'd been backpacking around Europe. I'd just been to Amsterdam." She said, as if that explained a lot.

I nodded in encouragement.

"I went to a show in the West End. I saw Cats. What a lot of crap that was."

"Mom..."

"Sorry, I'll try stick to the point. So, I'd seen the show and I was feeling very London-y, so I decided to go to a pub for a pint. Which I did. God, it was a sausage fest in there."

"Mom! Please don't ever let me hear you saying, "sausage fest" again!"

She eyed me sympathetically, "Oh, honey, are you sure you want me to go on?"

I looked over at Andy. He nodded sagely.

"Please go on. I just need to know."

"Okay, so, long story short, I met a very, very nice group of men at that pub and landed up back at one of their houses. I think, I think, that one's name was John. Or Jack. Could it have been Jack?" She said, as if she was talking to herself.

Andy squeezed my shoulder again. Harder that time. I'd feared this conversation for years. For most of my life, I'd feared it. Something about the way my mother was acting was altering the fear I'd held inside me. It was changing. Right then, the fear was changing to something else. It was turning to a totally different type of dread.

"Anyway, it was a four-way. I mean, I-I...look, there's a chance it was a five-way, but I think, I think it was just a four-way." She said, sheepishly, "You know what it's like, honey, at a certain point, orgies always get a bit vague and you just..."

"Mom, stop!" I said loudly, cutting her off, "Please stop! And thank you. Thank you sincerely for not telling me this any sooner."

She smiled sheepishly again and shrugged as if to say, "It was the least I could do."

Later that night, once we got home, I was sitting on the sofa, numb. Andy poured me a very large glass of wine and sat down beside me. We were quiet for a while and I was thinking about how much, much more lovely my life had been before I'd heard my mother use words like, "four-way" and "orgy."

"You okay?" He said.

I gave him a weak thumbs-up, and took another sip of my wine.

He patted my thigh supportively a few times. We sat in silence for a while and then he said, "Do you think that's why she named you West? I mean, do you think she called you West, because you're West from the West End?"

"Well, fuck," I wailed, "I do now."

He pressed his lips together tightly as his chest started to heave. He omitted a very small snort, which made his chest heave more. Another snort left him followed shortly by a helpless giggle.

"Sorry." He said, his eyes watering with the effort it was requiring not to laugh.

Seeing him like that, with his watery eyes and his face going redder and redder, made me start laughing too. A deep laugh. A big laugh. He threw his head back and laughed too. We laughed and laughed. Every time we looked at each other, we laughed harder. We were gasping and spluttering and doubled over. By the time it finally died down, he had his arms around me and I'd collapsed against his chest.

"It's perfect." He said, after we'd quietened down, "It's perfect. Of course you were made in an orgy, West. Of course, you were. No-one as awesome as you could ever, ever have been made by two straight people having vanilla sex. There's just no way."

I inhaled deeply, and pressed my face into his neck, "D'you know, I think that might be the best thing you've ever said to me? In fact, I think that might be the best thing anyone's ever said to me."

He stroked my back lightly, "I'm sorry you'll never get to know your father."

I blinked and nodded silently. He tilted my chin, so I was facing him.

"It will be different for our kids."

"Our kids? Our kids? We're having kids?"

"Yeah," he chuckled softly, "I think we'll have two."

I leant in to kiss him, but he stopped me and said, "It will be different for our kids, okay? It will be different for them. Our kids will never know one single day, where they don't know that you are their father."

I did kiss him them. I kissed him for a long time and when I finally pulled away, he held my face in his hands. He held me steady.

"Oh God," he said, closing his eyes for a second and then looking at me. Into me, "Please let our babies have eyes just like yours."

*

Over the years, we've talked about getting married on and off. We have. We talked about it quite a lot after Tyler and Guy got married. In fairness, mostly, we talked about what Andy didn't want, after their wedding.

"I think the flamingos were a bit much." He said as we drove home the day after the wedding.

"Yes." I agreed.

"It's not that I have a problem with flamingos in general, it's just that I think that given that there were peacocks roaming around too, it was a bit much."

"Yes," I agreed, again, "you're right. One type of exotic bird is really all that's required for a gay wedding."

"The speeches were a bit much too."

I nodded. He didn't need to elaborate on that.

"Did you see Guy's sister and Ty's mom having a tiff?"

I did see it. Sarah had to move bloody quickly to neutralise it.

"I get it." I smiled, "Say no more."

And I did.

Even though I've always loved the thought of being married to him, I understand. Andy isn't crazy about the idea of institutionalised love. Even though things with his dad are so much better, I know that that still plays a part in it. I think he'd hate to put his dad in a position where he'd need to make a speech or anything like that. And as great as Laura Montgomery is, and she really is. She couldn't be more supportive of us, but she is a handful. Andy has to be very, very careful in the way he handles any type of celebration, because if she gets so much as a whiff of it, she runs with it. She runs with it in a very big way. A caterers-and-marque-tent kind of way. Andy can't bear it.

So, I understand. Even more than I understand how Andy feels about the logistics of a big wedding, I understand that for both of us, something changed years ago. It changed that day in the den. The day he showed me the painting of us. The day we said, "Always."

For both of us, that was a commitment. Neither of us have ever wavered. Neither of us have ever let go. Not for a second.