A pair of well-worn sneakers, tied to bars with greasy laces, fingered by the grubby hands of a bad boy, just hanging there. A pair of cheap sneakers blowing in the wind. And yet, I can’t stop looking at them. Worn by a cute deadbeat with dirty feet. It’s a kink, a fetish, a desire to lust after.
It was the last night of our short seaside holiday and Charlie decided that it would be a good idea to stream a movie. He spent well over an hour flicking through Netflix and Prime Video until my patience finally ran out.
“Charlie, we will soon have spent as long looking for a movie than it would to watch one.” He stopped flicking. “Then I shall choose this one, and if you do not like it, I shall not be held responsible,” he said petulantly.
The movie he chose was in black and white and called This Special Friendship. It soon became apparent that it was old (1964), and in French, which delighted Charlie, but the English subtitles would soon annoy him, while I would be annoyed with Charlie for moaning about them.
“It is called Les amitiés particulières, which means ‘special friendships’, but the English cannot translate it correctly,” he told me. “The synopsis is simple. It is set in the rigid atmosphere of a Jesuit boarding school and is a tender relationship between a 14-year-old upperclassman and a 12-year-old boy, who is the object of his desire.” Charlie’s expertise had come after consulting his iPhone.
The movie seemed harmless enough, and because it was made in the 1960s was tame when compared to boy-love movies of today, but after only a few minutes Charlie tutted with disdain. “The character of Georges is supposed to be 14 years old,” he said, “but he looks like he is older than me.” I later found out that the actor, Francis Lacombrade, according to one source, had been 21, but others stated that he had been 17.
Charlie’s derision intensified when the object of his desire appeared for the first time. He was a small cupid-faced boy carrying a lamb which we presumed was meant to be the symbolism of Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God. “Bordel de merde! Please tell me that this boy isn’t going to be his lover.” His fears proved to be correct, and I agreed that the age difference was disturbing.
He was called Alexandre, who turned out to be a bit of a cock-tease for Georges, but the romance mainly involved love letters passed between the two of them. The relationship is destroyed by a priest’s will to protect them from homosexuality. “We know why he did that,” said Charlie knowingly. “That priest wanted his wicked way with the little boy.” That wasn’t the case, but there were no happy endings, because heartbroken Alexandre jumped to his death from a moving train.
“The movie was good,” Charlie said afterwards, “but I found it troubling.” I agreed and began my own internet search to see what people thought about it. I was surprised to find that modern-day audiences seem unperturbed by the subject matter but could see that the Catholic Church had tried unsuccessfully to get it banned on its release.
Charlie disappeared into the kitchen while I fell down a rabbit hole as I dug deeper into the movie’s background. When he returned with two mugs of tea I told him my findings.
“I’ve found things that might upset you even more.”
“What do you mean?”
“The movie is based on a book written by a French author called Roger Peyrefitte and is said to be autobiographical because he had a similar romance, and the younger boy committed suicide.” My pronunciation was poor, and it came out as Pay-ri-fit.
Charlie corrected me. “Pey-ri-fee.” He stretched on the leather sofa and mulled over my new-found knowledge.
“But there is more,” I said, scrolling down the page of a French literary site. “Peyrefitte visited the movie set and fell in love with a 12-year-old boy who played a small part as a choir boy. They had a relationship, and the boy became his personal secretary and was eventually adopted by him.”
“It is Greek love,” Charlie frowned. “Erastes and Eromenos. What happened to them?”
“The boy was called Alain-Philippe Malagnac d’Argens de Villèle.” My English pronunciation left a lot to be desired, but Charlie looked at me as though I had said something significant.
“Alain-Philippe Malagnac?”
“I suppose so.”
“It cannot be the same person,” he cried, “but my father once knew somebody with that name.”
I continued reading.
“Malagnac became proprietor of Le Club Colony in Paris and briefly managed French singer Sylvie Vertan but it almost bankrupted Peyrefitte and forced him to sell artworks and erotic antiques.”
“The Alaine-Philippe Malagnac that my father knew was married to Amanda Leah, who he believes to really be a man, but a gay icon. He died in a fire near the Alpilles Mountains.”
I saved my pièce de résistance until last.
“Malagnac married Amanda Lear in 1979. She was close friends with Salvador Dali, who disapproved of the marriage.”
Charlie smiled triumphantly. “That is incredible. I cannot wait to tell my father, but what shall I say?” He began fiddling inside his shorts, something he tended to do when he mulled things over. At last, he came to a decision. “I will not say anything because he will become worried that I might also be seduced by an older man.”
I smiled. “I think it is most likely to be the other way around.”
Colvey
There are things that people don’t know about you. And if they did, it’s unlikely that they would believe it.
The council house scruffs who think you are fucking cool in your Hoodrich gear. You talk to them like shit, and they are so thick, that even though they are scared, they think it is only a game.
But I know why you treat them so badly and keep them in their place.
I know your dark secret.
It is something that you don’t want them to know, and if they did, you know that you are finished.
Charlie had been watching movies on TV and hadn’t gone to bed until three o’clock in the morning. This was normal, but he wasn’t used to me waking him up six hours later. I reminded him that he was due to meet Leon at ten for his photo shoot. Only the top of his head could be seen from under the covers and his hair stuck up at all angles. He was barely communicative and answered with strange little noises that sounded kind of cute.
Ten minutes later I had to tell him again that he had to get up. “It’s like trying to sleep in the Gare du Nord,” he moaned. There was then a frantic rush to shower and make himself look beautiful, not helped by the fact that in this rented holiday cottage the bathroom was downstairs while his clothes were upstairs.
I stayed out of the way and flicked through an old antiques magazine that was at least ten years old. Things appeared to be going well because when Charlie was in a good mood he would start singing Jacques Brel songs in French and I could hear the words to La Chanson de Jacky through the floorboards that had wide gaps between them.
“Même si on m’appelle Antonio
Que je brûle mes derniers feux
En échange de quelques cadeaux
Madame, oh madame, je fais ce que je peux.”
Leon had arranged to meet Charlie outside Dolly’s Vintage Tea Room, but I’d been warned to stay away. He reasoned that my presence would cause him embarrassment. My day was going to be spent wandering around this small fishing village while trying not to spend money that I didn’t have.
“This is going to be interesting,” Charlie said as he drank the remains of his tea (white with two sweeteners). “Leon takes photographs of different subjects, but his speciality is taking pictures of dead birds and the occasional dead rat.
He stood next to his girlfriend and I couldn’t help looking at him. Discreetly like. But Matchstick Man had clocked me and looked at me like I’d done something incredibly bad. I wanted to shout, “Fuck you, Matchstick Man, you had your chance!” Instead, I went bright red and looked at my phone where an app nudged a virtual taxi nearer towards me. Sometimes thinking about it is better than doing it.
A twinkle of imagination. A scattering of angel dust. The glow of the pedalo boy, with gorgeous dark legs and dirty underwear, who stared into the sun and saw the shadow of an indecent stranger.
Saturday slaughter. Pumped up courage. Vodka fuelled Valkyries. Vanilla Valentines. Red Hot Chilli Poppers. Up and down. Cock teasers. Blonde bullshitters. Fag filled fags. Sweaty sex toys. Blue Adonis in Disco Cop. Twink paradise. Twink hell . Be damned by Twinkdom. Boys to men. Romeo, Romeo, Where the fuck are you Romeo? Smooth skinned sluts. Spray tan twiglets. Ba lamb babies. If you could read my mind, love. What a tale my thoughts could tell. Just like an old time movie. A movie that plays every Saturday. The boy shouts louder and louder. What’s he gonna look like with a chimney on him? Up and Down. An ecstasy-stained erotic dream. Screaming queens and disco lights. Screaming queens and fist fights. Shy guys and sly guys. Sugar daddies and fairy cakes. I need you. I want you. I can’t have you. No matter how hard I try, you keep pushing me aside, and I can’t break through. Listen to me. I can’t see through the smoke. There’s no talking to you. The Vengabus is coming. And everybody’s jumping. But you’re not coming. Do you believe in life after love? I can feel something inside me say, I really don’t think you’re strong enough. Robin Hood and his band of boyfriend thieves. Cry babies. Jelly babies. Dolly mixtures. Sun up. Slow down. Come down. Vamos a jugar en el sol. Todos los días son días de fiesta. Vamos a jugar en el sol. Todos los días son días de fiesta. Sex in a Ford Fiesta. Sexy, everything about you so sexy.
Respect. That’s what it all comes down to. Respect one another and don’t be a shit about it. That’s what I’ll tell a police officer if I get caught. It isn’t likely to happen, because they know about me, and don’t have the inclination to do anything about it. They respect me, and I respect them. That’s why they look the other way. After all, our ways and means are basically the same, and I do things that they’d like to do, but aren’t able to.
A baseball cap and a touch of peach fuzz on his chin. He sat at the bar and I saw flashes of flesh around his ankles. At that moment, he might have been the sexiest person in the world. But then he started talking to somebody who wasn’t there, and argued with somebody else who wasn’t there either. He didn’t say anything to me and I WAS there, but I was grateful for that.
Charlie didn’t know it, but he turned heads at the beach today. I watched from a bench as he stripped down to his swim shorts and waded into the sea. For a guy who spends more time relaxing on his bed rather than putting in hours at the gym, he looked remarkably toned. His ancestral line is Mediterranean, and despite a Paris upbringing, he had the physique of his Marseilles cousins.
I was a solitary figure and had become the shadow in his life. Inseparable, comfortable, but never lovers in the truest sense. But I was pleased that he was attracting attention from females, and, dare I say it, a few jealous husbands and boyfriends. And yet, strangely, I also felt envious.
He shaded his eyes, scanned the promenade and waved. A few looked to see who had caught his attention and were disappointed that it was only me. I wanted to shout that Charlie was mine, only mine, and that I was proud of him, and that we shared a bed. But all that glitters is not gold.
The North Sea in April is bloody cold, but Charlie went full steam into the surf and threw himself into the water. His head broke the surface, and I could see that his teeth were chattering. I’d tried to tell him that the water would come as a shock, but he knew better, and would never admit to being wrong. He started swimming, long determined strokes, and completed two sweeps of the beach.
I contemplated that hypothermia might set in or that he might be out of his depth, but, after thirty minutes he swam back to shore, and pushing hard through the water, he reached dry land again. By now, I’d smoked several cigarettes and thrown the stone-cold remains of a takeaway coffee into a nearby rubbish bin.
Charlie dried himself on his towel and sat warming himself in the afternoon sun. Only now did he realise that people were looking, and it prompted him to put his tee-shirt on. He rested his arms on his knees and watched the world around him.
He was perhaps thinking about childhood holidays spent on the beach. He once told me that his family had rented a house every summer at Le Touquet-sur-Mer, and that he’d spent hours playing on the sands with his brother. I thought about Thomas, the older brother, and remembered that the tall boy had asked me to visit him in Paris, but not to bring Charlie along. My heart went out to Charlie, alone on the beach, who suspected that his older brother had an agenda, and was frightened that I might buy into it.
Perfectly Hard and Glamorous 