How can it be harm? Idolatry, I have confessed. Covetousness? I do like to look at him, but I do not covet him. He is not my possession. He is his own self, so very much his own self, it bewilders and bewitches me. Porneia, then? Unlawful desire, selfishness, an act that debases another. It crushes me beyond expression to believe that simply by their existence, my ... what must I call them? ... my preferences are unlawful, unnatural, and degrading. But what nature? What laws?
And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
Has God turned away from me? Or have I turned from Him?
No. I cannot accept this. The sin in porneia is the use of others without care, for the fulfilment of the basest, most self-centred lusts. It is not a particular desire, it is not a particular act—it is simply the perversion of love into something that harms someone else.
I would not harm him, for all the world. I wish I could please him only half as well as he pleases me, but I fear that is beyond my power.
Some days ago, I found him insensible upon the floor, I believe trying to escape the confines of his room. Of course, I promised him liberty, shamed that my care of his body had paid so little heed to his mind. It was no wonder he was bored, restless and stifled. Not long after, I helped him dress. My clothes do not fit him well. He is too thin, too tall, but he holds himself with such pride, and glared at me so fiercely, I could not laugh. My king of shreds and patches.
Such an expedition, from his bedroom, down the stairs, to one of the drawing rooms. He had to rest so often, yet still he insisted. While I admire his will, I fear for him. A broken reed is one who never bends. He thinks he hides them but I see his wounds, ill-knit bones and scar tissue. I wouldprotect him from all the world’s brambles, if only he would let me. I would never see him hurt again.
Finally, we staggered across the threshold. It was not an edifying sight for the culmination of such a journey. His eyes travelled across the faded furnishings, the covered furniture and the heavy curtains. “O brave new world,” he said with magnificent scorn, and fainted.
Oh my heart, my heart. I have never felt such things.
I have had the room aired. We sit there fairly often now. It grows easier every day to get him there. I think his strength returns. He has certainly been calmer since the day I found him on the floor. I am glad for him. The time will come that he may want to leave—I dread it and anticipate it, with almost equal fervour. When he is gone, I will be free. I will no longer fear myself and my sins. I have duties in my parish that require my attention. But it does not feel like liberty. It feels like loss.
“This is a stupid game,” announced Micha, having lost at chess, yet again. He batted over his king with such a dismissive gesture that it toppled most of the other pieces.
Thomas, observing the carnage, covered his mouth with his hand to conceal a smile.
“And stop laughing at me, you smug prick.”
“I’m so terribly sorry.”
“Then, why are you still laughing?”
Taking a deep breath, Thomas just about managed to compose his features into something suitably solemn. He had grown accustomed to Micha’s harsh responses, finding at their heart a strange contradiction, for as much as he complained of Thomas’s mirth, he also seemed to court it. And Thomas was glad, more than glad, to give it. Somehow, they had found an odd equilibrium between Micha’s moods and Thomas’s care. Though Micha was no more inclined to be amiable than he had ever been, Thomas thought he had been calmer lately, not precisely at his ease but softened,as if he felt himself protected in some subtle, private way. Thomas was not self-important enough to attribute it to his own influence; he was simply happy for Micha’s happiness.
And for his own, since he simply enjoyed Micha’s company, difficult though it could be sometimes. He was like no one Thomas had ever met before, so careless of the opinions of others, direct to the point of cruelty, and, to Thomas’s untutored perception, freer, somehow. As for Thomas’s equally untutored heart, he was still sufficiently innocent of the sin in which he believed himself now utterly steeped that he drew as much pleasure from Micha’s simple presence and his growing good health than he did from any more carnal meditations. He accepted Micha’s beauty, and his response to it, as a mere part of something in every way as delightful as it was mysterious.
“You,” he said, “are a terrible loser.”
Micha slumped back in his chair. “Well, who likes losing?”
Thomas began to gather up the scattered chess pieces and arrange them in their little wooden box. The hand-painted scene on the lid had faded long ago. Thomas could just about make out a pale splodge of sun, a few splashes of green. It had been a gift from Edward, when they were all young. There had been one for Thomas and one for George, but whatever their brother had been trying to portray was lost to time. Thomas could not even remember if George had kept his. “You make a good point. But would it be unbearable of me to remind you that this was your idea?”
“What else am I supposed to do? Stare at the ceiling until my eyes bleed?”
“We could play a different game. I am entirely at your disposal.”
Micha looked unimpressed by this prospect, and there was silence for a while. “A friend taught me,” he offered abruptly, looking not at Thomas but at a thread that had come loose at his cuff and at which he was picking distractedly. “A long time ago. I’ve always been terrible at it.”
Thomas suspected this was the mysterious Isidore. Micha spoke of him often, but never directly, and Thomas knew better than to ask questions or Micha would only grow impatient and refuse to say anything at all. “You refuse to consider the broader strategy,” he teased instead. “You just shift the pieces around because you can.”
“As though you’re any better. You agonise over the fate of every pawn.”
“I still won.” Thomas paused meaningfully. “Twice.”
“Only because I let you.”
“By being—to use your own words—terrible?”
Micha tapped the side of his head. “It’s my broader strategy.”
Thomas was laughing again, helplessly. Micha, of course, glared at him, but the more he glared, the harder Thomas laughed. There was something different in the other man’s eyes, a trace of warmth and a hint of pride, as lovely as it was unexpected.
