The past abuses had made them angry, but not…complicit.Watching these current events unfold, it was far more difficult to distinguish betweenthemandus.After all, was it not true that the only thing evil needs to triumph is forgood mento do nothing?What had any of them ever done about the evil they were now shown?Live burials for gay men in Afghanistan; stonings in Algeria; beatings, torture and electroshock treatment in Egypt; young gay teenagers cut in half or thrown off buildings in Iran; Somalia, a teenager buried up to his neck and stoned to death—a more severe punishment than for murder; five thousand children in British schools currently being taught that gay men should be put to death; a British television channel advocating gays should be tortured and murdered; Uganda, gay men forced into tyres, set alight, and rolled down streets; Baghdad, gay men’s rectums glued up as they were force-fed laxatives until they literally exploded—the bodies left in the street for the dogs.And all of this illustrated with photographs and video.
* * *
Ben had experienced the religion of peace up close and personal for most of his working life, so much of this didn’t come as a shock to him.When the doctor began on Russia, however, he was appalled.He’d had no idea.Young men sodomised with bottles and set on fire; gay men hunted by vigilante groups—and all of this with no Stone Age religious bigotry to cause it.It was a political hatred; a belief inspired by a collective imperative to seek an outsider, to say all humans must see the world the same way and those who don’t are abnormal.That such deviance must be rooted out…In one video, Soviet army officers stood around watching a young recruit being beaten to death by other recruits.Ben didn’t follow that one too closely.He didn’t want to see a familiar face amongst those watching.
Tea came and went.A few of the group drank some, but no one wanted the biscuits.After tea, came the movie.Neither Nikolas nor Ben had ever watched a gay movie—other than ones with men who, by and large, hadn’t been cast for their acting ability—and perhaps because of the emotional exhaustion of the day, it surprised and disappointed them the men were separated by death at the end—a conclusion which, the doctor was at pains to point out, was a feature of almost all gay movies.The message was clear, he claimed: for all its liberal pretensions, the film industry was about dollars.Money came from majorities, however vociferous a minority might be.They played with gay love but would never portray it as being a valid alternative to that which paid their salaries.
Then it was supper, and they were allowed to go to their rooms and clean up beforehand—the first time other than necessary bathroom breaks they’d left their classroom.Ben came automatically into Nikolas’s room, and they sat side by side on the bed, contemplating their shoes for a while.Ben eventually asked in Danish, “Have we ever supported a gay organisation with ANGEL?”
Nikolas shrugged.“Not specifically.No one has asked.”
“Would you if they did?”
Nikolas repeated his gesture.It said a lot.He turned then and took Ben’s face in his hands, and for the first time Ben felt a huge surge of anger at the realisation that had he been in another country with different rules, he would be made to feel unclean about the terrible desire he felt for a kiss from this man.
With profound relief he saw a similar thought flicker across Nikolas’s face.Instead of bringing their mouths together, Nikolas continued to cup Ben’s face, staring into his eyes.He stroked his thumb thoughtfully over Ben’s cheekbone.“If I’d met you in Afghanistan and killed you, I’d have been given another medal.If I’d kissed you?Loved you?”Then he dropped his hands and added a little sulkily, “But this doesn’t affect us.We live our lives as we wish and no one can stop us.”
Ben slumped a little alongside him.He didn’t do deep thought about anything, never had, but thatinsularityseemed wrong to him somehow.“That would be like us in our hut in the Philippines, in the green glow of our tropical snow globe…if the tsunami had happened around us and we’d just stayed in the hut, ignoring it.Thereisa tsunami happening around us, and we’re caught in it just as much as we were in that one.Maybe we should help with this one as well.”
Nikolas smiled sadly.“I think you’ve been radicalized.”
“And you?”
Nikolas appeared to think about this for a long time.All he concluded was, “I’d have chosen a different ending for that film.”
“Happy ever after?”
Nikolas laughed ruefully.He pursed his lips.“Imagine what all this would do to a young man like Michael’s nephew.It makes more sense now that he targeted the Islamists at his university.”
“Get them before they got him?”
“Possibly.”
“And he had three weeks more of it.”
“Yes.I think he did.I wonder what criteria they’ll use to separate us tomorrow.Those who stay and those who go?”
Ben frowned.“Won’t they try to persuade everyone to stay?Join their cause?”
“I wouldn’t.Not everyone has violence in them.It doesn’t matter what the provocation, some men wouldn’t retaliate.”
“But we’ll be asked.We’re kinda…ideal?”
Nikolas shrugged again.“I wouldn’t recruit me, no.”
“Huh?”For one moment, a vision of Nikolas in Siberia flickered across Ben’s mind, blood-soaked, feral, grinning.
“I’m not the kind of person they want.I can’t be radicalized.I have no…beliefs.”
Ben frowned deeply.“Bollocks.You’re the most opinionated person I know—you have opinions about everything!”
There was too much truth in this for Nikolas to deny, but he replied calmly, “You’re missing the point.Belief isn’t the same as opinion.I think lots of things, but I believe in nothing.I wouldn’t fight for anything except that which affects me personally.”
Ben stared at him.He was about to contradict this appalling declaration, but the more he thought about it, the more he saw the truth of it.Nikolas had fought many times in the years he’d known him—he’d killed many times as well.But each time it had been to protect something that mattered personally to Nikolas.
Nikolas suddenly nudged him with a smirk.“Besides, I’m not gay, so why would they ask me to join their little rainbow army?”
Ben didn’t smile in return but asked in a low, serious tone, “What about me?You think they’ll ask me?”
