This is a story that involves sex between males. If such a story is offensive to you, or illegal for you to read where you live, then do not continue, go and surf elsewhere.
This is a work of fiction and in no way draws on the lives of any specific person or persons. If there is any similarity to any real persons or events it is entirely coincidental.
This work is copyrighted (c) by the author and may not be reproduced in any form without the specific written permission of the author. It is assigned to the Nifty Archives under the terms of their submission agreement but it may not be copied or archived on any other site without the written permission of the author.
My thanks to John who has read this through for any details that may need explanation for transatlantic, or non UK readers, and made several corrections. Any remaining errors, grammatical, spelling, historical or whatever are entirely my fault.
If you wish to comment on the story then do contact me on Jeffyrks@hotmail.com. I aim to reply to all messages.
This story is dedicated to Ron, who lives in an English village, and whose chance remark while we were chatting gave me the idea for this tale. The story bears absolutely no resemblance to his relationship with J. Neither Ron or J identify in any way with either of the two main characters.
Resume:- Malcolm and Simon are two gay men in their 60s who live in a homophobic English village, called Whitgest. They have met, but they carefully conceal their sexual orientation from each other. Both have been thinking over their own personal sexual stories. In this part Simon is continuing to think over his past, and especially how he came to get married.
A Tale of Two Englishmen Part 4
Simon continued to think back over the past, and especially why he had married and stayed married.
He recalled those few days after Chris had told him that sex together was incompatible with his Catholic faith, and that they must stop doing it. He felt down. There was almost a physical ache of despair and sorrow deep within. There were times when he felt angry. He felt so lonely. For the previous eighteen months he had been able to talk things over with Chris, but now he was the last person he could turn to.
During Holy Week at Our Lady's Catholic Church there was a service each evening. Though in some ways he felt angry with God, and with the Church, he knew that there in the quiet of the service he could think and be quiet. On the Tuesday of Holy Week Simon stayed kneeling in the pew after the service. Slowly the church quietened, as the other worshippers left. The main lights were turned off, and there was only one light focused on the cross on the altar. The rest of the Church was in darkness. He thought that Father Simon and Father Michael must have returned to the Presbytery. He had no idea how long he stayed there. Thoughts chased themselves round in his head. Eventually he stirred, and immediately he heard another movement at the back of the church. He turned, and in the gloom saw that it was Father Michael who had been kneeling in one of the back pews. Before Simon could get on his feet Father Michael walked down the aisle and joined him, sitting next to him.
"What's the matter, Simon? Something's seriously wrong, isn't it?"
Simon leant forward and buried his head in his hands on the pew back in front of him.
"What's wrong, you can tell me," persisted Father Michael.
Simon remained silent.
When he did not answer Father Michael spoke. "Can I hazard a guess? Something has happened between you and Chris. Something serious has upset your relationship."
Simon gave a slight nod.
"May I make another guess. Chris has broken off with you."
"How do you know?" whispered Simon.
"You didn't sit together as you usually do at Sunday Mass. He looks sad, but you look far worse. I reckon he is the one who has taken a step that was hard for him to take, and that has come like an unexpected blow in the belly to you."
Simon gave another slight nod.
"I'm going to keep on guessing. Your relationship with Chris was more than just a friendship. I reckon it was a physical sexual relationship. And that Chris has found someone else up at Birmingham, and has had to give you the push."
"No it's not that. There's no one else involved."
"What then? You can tell me. I am under the seal of the confessional as much as if we were talking in the confessional over there."
"Last Friday evening Chris told me...." He got no further. The floodgates opened and the tears began to flow. His body convulsed with great sobs. Father Michael's hand came and rested on his shoulder.
Simon had to make two or three attempts before he could continue, and when he did it was haltingly, with pauses while he wiped his eyes and blew his nose.
"Last Friday evening he said that it must be the last time because he now believed that what we were doing was totally wrong......You see he has got very involved with CathSoc up at Birmingham....There's this Catholic Chaplain saying that it is terribly sinful what we've been doing. That we're endangering our immortal souls. ....But I love him Father Michael, I love him." There was a fresh flowing of tears.
"Thank you for telling me. I had guessed a long time ago that you were having sex together."
"How?" said Simon beginning to perk up.
"Just intuition. The way you were always together. The way that you looked at each other. The way there were times you obviously wanted to hurry away together. For those with eyes to see and ears to hear, I reckon it was pretty obvious what you were both up to."
"Why didn't you say something, tell us off?"
"There is a time to speak and a time to be silent. Let me say I bided my time. I awaited the opportunity. If I had taken either of you on one side or spoken to you both, I reckon you'd have been very hurt and angry. I would have lost any possibility of helping either of you. Perhaps, with it all happening like this I can help you now."
"Sorry for crying like a baby."
"That's okay with me." Father Michael again put his hand on Simon's shoulder. "You're suffering a sort of bereavement. Tears are the natural expression of your emotions. It's good that you can weep. It's nothing to be ashamed of."
"I hadn't thought of it like that."
"You feel as though you've lost someone you love."
"But I haven't. He's still alive. He says he still loves me."
"I know. I am not surprised that he still loves you. He is making a costly sacrifice for the sake of the Lord. It is a costly sacrifice for him to stop doing it, you know, Simon."
"I hadn't thought of it like that."
"He's had time to think it all over. No doubt he has discussed it with this University chaplain. But for you it has not been a dawning realisation. He has bluntly told you, 'No more.' That's very hard for you to bear. I expect you feel angry as well. Angry with Chris. Angry with the Church. Angry with God. "
Simon nodded.
"That's all understandable. If you're angry with God, I hope you've told Him."
Simon looked at Father Michael with shock in his eyes. "Angry with God?"
"Yes. Many of the greatest of saints have got angry with God at times. He is quite used to dealing with angry saints."
"But I'm no saint."
"Maybe not, but you are someone loved by God."
That sat for a while in silence.
"Let's go over to the Presbytery, and have another wee dram of that lovely Irish whiskey. I think you deserve it."
They stood up, and Simon followed Father Michael over to the Presbytery.
Over a glass of well watered whiskey Simon told Father Michael a little more of his friendship with Chris. The priest listened carefully, and encouraged Simon to tell him everything.
"Aren't you shocked, Father?"
"A priest hears many things. Many, many far worse things than that. You acted largely out of love, and love covers a multitude of sins."
"Thanks for listening. Do you know I feel a little better now I've told you all about it. Just the telling to someone who cares and listens, it's been a sort of confession, I feel."
"Indeed it has. I think you will need to talk again. Probably several times. I am always here to listen. I shall pray for you. But before you go, I am going to pray for you. I shall reserve formal absolution until you're ready, to make a confession. I don't think you ready yet. If you confess to me, you won't need to confess everything again." Father Michael prayed a short prayer for both Simon and Chris.
"Thanks for including Chris. Having talked to you I reckon that he needs your prayers as much as me."
As they went to the door of the Presbytery Father Michael put his arm round Simon's shoulders and gave him a brief hug.
That was the first of many talks that Simon had with Father Michael over the next five months. There was an interval in them for the summer term at Nottingham. Which was largely taken up with work, exams and cricket.
It was the third week of the term that Simon got a letter from Chris.
Dear Si, I have been thinking long and hard about writing this letter. I know what I want to say but do not know how to say it. I have been missing you a lot, and hurting a great deal inside. I reckon your pain must be infinitely more than mine. I knew what I was doing. To you it all must have come as a great shock. I think of you a great deal, and wonder how you are. Si, I miss you. I miss talking to you, and arguing with you; and yes, I miss what else we did together, though I now believe that to have been very wrong. I still love you, and just wish you were still that special friend. May I make a suggestion. You will probably rule it out of court. Can I come up and meet you for a few hours in Nottingham. Perhaps I am being selfish, but I would love to see you, and hopefully find that you are still that same wonderful Simon. We could then see whether we can still talk together, and put the world to rights as we used to. With love, Yours Chris.
Simon thought it over for about ten days. He then wrote saying yes to Chris's suggestion and offering a number of dates later in the term, after the exams. Chris replied selecting one date, and saying what time he would arrive in Nottingham.
They met at the station ticket barrier. They shook hands, unlike the brief hug at their earlier meeting at the same place. The first half hour was difficult, with long silences between them. Slowly they relaxed with each other and began to talk freely. It was not long before they were into their usual political argument. When the time came for Chris to return to Birmingham they both thought that the time together had been worth while. Their friendship looked as though it would survive the crisis that Chris had imposed upon it.
The talks between Simon and Father Michael varied in length. They frequently covered the same ground, but as Simon thought over this period in his past, he realised how important those conversations had been.
At first they frequently examined the sexual relationship with Chris. It was not that Father Michael had a prurient desire for the details. Father Michael's concern was to try and discover how firmly set was Simon's desire for sex with a male. Was his homosexuality just a passing adolescent phase, as it seemed to be with so many lads? It was true that Simon had never had a girl friend, or any apparent desire for sex with a girl; but nor had quite a number of boys of that era. This was especially true for those boys like Simon, who went to a single sex schools for all but the earliest years of their school education. Father Michael thought the jury was still out on that one.
As time went by they increasingly began to discuss the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church. Here Simon was surprised. Father Michael was sympathetic, gentle and kind when dealing with him personally. But when it came to the teaching of the Church Simon found him as strict and inflexible as he had no doubt was Father Ignatius. There was no give when it came to the official position.
"But Simon, God created men and women to have sex with each other. To increase and multiply. To have sex with sex with a man is to go against the will and purpose of the Almighty. It is a flagrant misuse of what God has made."
"Why then, leaving myself out of it for a moment, why then does he create some men wanting only to have sex with other men, and not wanting it at all with a woman?"
"To want sex with another man is a disordered condition. God gives us freedom. When a man has sex with another man he is using the freedom God has given him in a wrong way. I am free to give you a black eye. God won't stop me. But if I give you a black eye that is misusing my freedom. It is not God's fault at all. I don't think God created some men with the desire for sex with men."
"Why do some men only want sex with men then?"
"It is a wilful perversion, Simon. It is taking what God has purposed and twisting it, warping it to our own sinful desires."
" Where does that desire come from?"
"Good question, Simon. I don't think we know. Whether it is because of original sin from our birth, or because of something that has happened to us in our early life, I just don't know. It is the putting into action, the actual deed that is so terribly wrong. I think it was Martin Luther who said that we can't stop birds flying over our heads, but we can stop them making nests in our hair. You may not be able to stop the desires coming into your heart and mind, but you can stop them making a nest there,
a nest that can lead you into actual sin."
"I didn't know you could quote Martin Luther, Father!"
"He was a good Catholic monk before he went astray, and a little of the good must've remained in him."
They laughed.
"But Father, the deed is done. And I enjoyed it. Does that put me on full course to the eternal fire?"
"Not if you repent. God's love is boundless. He forgives all who are penitent. As the beloved Apostle wrote, If we confess our sin God is faithful and just and will forgive us all our sin, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And there is no footnote Simon, saying with the exception of Simon, or with the exception of the sin of sex with another man. But Simon, forgiveness is an offer from God you must take up. You need to confess to obtain forgiveness. If you don't repent and confess then you are in danger of eternal hell fire."
On another occasion they were discussing the sinfulness of male with male sex.
"So you say then, Father, that if sex is not to be sinful it must to be procreative.."
"Must be open to the possibility of procreation."
"Okay then, if all non sinful sex needs to be open to the possibility of procreation, does that mean that there is a sort of hierarchy of sexual sins? That some are more sinful than others?"
Father Michael thought for a moment, "Yes, I suppose some are indeed more sinful than others. Simon."
"Sex within marriage is okay then."
"Yea, that's fine, Simon."
"Well, what about when the woman is too old to have children."
"That's alright, because it is within the marriage. And Sarah bore Abraham when she was well passed the age of childbearing. You could just say that there is a possibility of procreation."
"What about sex between a man and a woman who are not married."
"That's outside marriage."
"But there could be a distinct possibility of procreation, Father," said Simon with a grin. "Is sex between an unmarried couple, more or less serious than rape?"
"Rape is more serious. It is a violation against the will of the woman. That is very wrong. But both are wrong."
"But rape is more wrong than the other."
"I suppose so." said Father Michael.
"So we are getting a hierarchy of sexual sins. Innocent when within marriage, slightly sinful when between two unmarried people of the opposite sex, and more serious when it is rape."
"I suppose so."
"Where does sex between two men who love each other come?"
"That is very serious. There is no possibility of procreation. It is against nature."
"But Father, for many men who only want sex with another man, to have sex with a woman is against their nature. Is it not?"
"It is a thoroughly disordered condition, Simon. You know that. I have said it many times before, as you well know."
"And where does masturbation come in our list? No procreation, no love for another. Is that the most serious sin of all?"
"The danger in masturbation is that it usually involves lustful thought after another. That is condemned by our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount."
"And what about when...."
"And you, Simon, my friend, are just winding me up, trying to get me tangled up. I am not a moral theologian. You should argue it out with a real expert."
Simon thought he might have got the better in that discussion.
Once towards the end of the summer vac when Simon was having one of his talks he asked him outright.
"Father Michael, may I ask you a personal question?" "You may ask, I reserve the right not to answer." "Chris and I often wondered about you?" "In what way?" replied the priest, with a rather apprehensive look on his face.
"Well, we wondered if you were actually like us. If given half a chance, or if you had not been ordained, you would have gone with men rather than girls."
"That's a cheeky question, Simon. I'm sure you'd love to know." He thought carefully for a moment. "I think you may be right. But I've never had any sexual experience either with a man or a woman."
"Not even a mutual toss off behind the cycle sheds at school?"
"Not even behind the cycle sheds at school. Does that satisfy your enquiring mind?"
"Thanks for answering, Father. Seal of the confessional and all that!"
But there was something else that Father Michael said in nearly all their talks together. "God has a purpose for us all, Simon. Especially that it true for a good Catholic boy like you. It may be that he wants you to be a priest or a religious."
That always brought a strong denial from Simon. "No way, Father. I 'm sure God is not calling me to that!"
"Stranger things than that have happened. Some who have denied and resisted the call, have turned out to be some of God's most faithful servants, saints even. But even if God is not calling you to that, as a Catholic man you are definitely called to marry and have children, and bring them up as good Catholics. It is the call to increase and multiply."
Simon often just looked at him and smiled.
For Simon there was no one else after Chris. He did not seek someone else, he did not even go out seeking a casual encounter. To begin with it was Chris or no one. Yes, he found relief by himself, with his own hand, like the overwhelming majority of boys of his age. Slowly he began to be affected by all that Father Michael was saying to him. Perhaps his relationship with Chris had just been an adolescent fling. Perhaps he was growing out of it. After all so many boys did.
It was in the middle of the summer vac that Patricia appeared with a friend at the Youth Club. She had just moved into the area and started coming to the Church. She had been recruited into the Youth Club by Father Michael. She and her friend were keen on tennis. So she made the suggestion that they played some mixed tennis on some nearby courts. Now in those days tennis was never a boy's school sport. None of the boys had ever played other than the knock around with the odd ancient racket in the back garden or street. Patricia was an organiser, and very persuasive. She soon got a group of three or four boys to join a similar number of girls. Simon was one of the group involved. With a lot of clowning around and laughter, the boys began to get the hang of the game.
Towards the end of the Summer Vac there was a regular group of young people meeting to play tennis. Very soon a certain amount of pairing up began to take place.
It was during the Christmas Vac after Church on the Fourth Sunday of Advent that Chris took Simon to one side.
"There's something I want to tell you, Si."
"Yea, what?"
"I've got a girl friend, I'm in love."
"Oh."
"Aren't you pleased?"
"If you pleased, then I suppose I'm pleased for you. But I can't help remembering what we said to each other in Epping Forest."
"But we were just boys then. We're men now."
"I suppose so."
Nigel held another of his parties that Christmas. Chris did not go because he thought it sinful. Simon did not go because he knew that it would bring back too many painful memories. Nigel tried several times to get off with Simon, but Simon was just not interested.
It was during the Summer Vac that Chris told Simon that he was engaged to be married.
"Congratulations. I hope you will both be very happy." said Simon. He could now be more enthusiastic, as there was the slightest of stirrings of interest in Patricia.
"I do hope you will be my best man when I get married, Si."
"Thanks Chris. I will do that for you, if that's what you really want."
"Yes, it is what I really want. By the way, have you met any other guys? You know what I mean?"
"You're asking if I've been having sex with men since we stopped? The answer is , 'No'."
"I'm glad to hear it, Si. Perhaps you will find some nice Catholic girl, and fall in love, and raise a cricket team of strapping Catholic sons."
"Perhaps!"
Simon's remaining time at university saw him engaging in no sexual activity with another, either male or female. The relationship with Patricia progressed very slowly. Over a period of months it became a friendship. Then what can be described as a period of courtship. They got engaged, and were eventually married in the Church of our Lady, on Saturday 14th September 1963.
Father Michael was exceedingly pleased with the way things worked out.
"I told you it might be just a passing phase. Many boys got through it, especially if they go to an all boys school, like you did. Now we can look forward to a good Catholic family, and some good Catholic children."
If either Patricia or Simon had been asked about their sex life, they would probably both answered 'satisfactory.' They enjoyed it, but neither of them found it totally fulfilling. Patricia saw it much as her duty. Simon did not find it as fulfilling or exciting as he had hoped. Whenever he dared to look back, he knew that it was nowhere near as good as things had been with Chris. But he rarely looked back, that was an area of his past that he did not like investigating. He was too afraid of what he might learn. This was especially true after the publication of the Wolfenden Report, and the slowly mounting debate about gay rights. That part of his past was better dead, buried, and forgotten.
He was also very busy. He was one of the large number of people who made their way morning by morning by tube up to the City. Respectably dressed in his dark suit, and in the early days often with a neatly rolled umbrella, he was a typical city gent. Promotion steadily came his way.
When they married they bought a house in Finchley. They did not have a cricket team of strapping sons, but just two daughters. Patricia found pregnancy unpleasant and labour difficult and wanted no more children. They decided to go against the teaching of their Church and use birth control. This aroused a feeling of guilt in Patricia, and became a contributory reason for the decreasing frequency of sex between them.
The friendship started on the tennis court proved a good one. Patricia and Simon got on well together. There were many things they had in common. Their home, family, Church, tennis all helped. They also talked together about everything under the sun, and frequently argued much in the way hat Simon had done with Chris. But perhaps one of the biggest bonuses was that their shared a similar sense of humour. Shared laughter helped them. So the marriage progressed.
That is the reason why Simon got married, and the reason why he stayed married.
Of the others involved, Chris got married as soon as he finished at University in 1959. Simon was his best man. He moved away, and soon the relationship was one of 'Christmas card only'.
Jeffyrks@hotmail.com