Maxwell and Myles: two brothers, yet two entirely different temperaments.
Maxwell, the extrovert; Myles, the introvert.
Maxwell reserved only in appearance, Myles inwardly repressive.
Maxwell is confident where Myles is nervous.
Careless meets diligent.
Dominant faces the submissive.
The imaginative brother beside the one more firmly rooted.
An optimist paired with a pessimist.
Adventurousness set against caution.
All of it the quiet outcome of the genetic lottery: strands of DNA shuffled and recombined into millions of possible arrangements. From the same parents, yet never the same person. And then life intervenes—different encounters, different choices, different small accidents of experience.
What begins as chance becomes character.
What begins as similarity drifts toward contrast.
In the end, perhaps they also choose it—each brother carving out a separate niche, shaping himself in deliberate opposition to the other, until the distance between them feels almost inevitable.
“The self-righteousness of that age was really camouflage to disguise its own hypocrisy, and the people who were loudest in their condemnation of my father were often those whose own lives could least bear investigation.”
– Vyvyan Holland writing in Son of Oscar Wilde. Published by Rupert Hart-Davis (1954)
And I can’t help thinking that the same still applies…
The people who excite me rarely seem interested in me, while those I feel nothing for often are. It’s a familiar paradox. Attraction doesn’t always align; sometimes it’s a mismatch of types, sometimes it’s the pull of emotional unavailability. I keep finding myself drawn to people who can’t—or won’t—choose me.
The sensible answer is obvious: stop chasing. Put that energy back into my own life instead of pursuing people who remain out of reach. Still, it’s irritating to realise that the very traits I possess—traits that don’t necessarily fit my own ideal—might be exactly what someone else has been looking for all along.
Harry Oldham is writing a novel based on his criminal and sordid past. To do so, he has returned to live at Park Hill, where he grew up, and the place that he once left behind. That was then and this is now, in which the old world collides with the new.(Parts 1 to 18 are available to read in the menu)
Perfectly Hard and Glamorous – Part 19
April 1984 When you look back over a life, there’s always a year that stands out. My annus mirabilis was 1984. Not that anything exceptional happened. But things were happy, and I was rolling in money.
It was also the year I turned eighteen.
Now I’m about to turn sixty, and it feels like a distant memory. Almost a life that belonged to someone else.
I remember one April night. The days were getting longer, and when darkness fell the sky above Park Hill was clear and moonlit, the air sharp with a chill. I leaned on the balcony rail and told myself something I had started to believe.
I was a male prostitute.
That didn’t bother me.
I thought about all the names people might have used to describe me. Queer. Faggot. Bender. Nancy boy. Shirt-lifter.
None of them applied.
Because I wasn’t any of those things.
I was straight.
Anyone could see it. I was a good-looking lad who could get any girl he wanted. That was obvious to everyone.
Especially Andy and Jack.
That year I’d become a bit of an enigma to them. I still hung around with them like I always had, but they didn’t know what I was really doing. None of us had jobs—we were living on the dole. Wasters, really. Nothing to do and nowhere to go. Boredom got us into trouble more often than not.
Our parents hated it.
But I didn’t care.
I didn’t need a job.
I always had money.
More than enough.
Andy and Jack couldn’t work it out. They didn’t understand how I could afford to go out most nights. What annoyed them even more was that I never invited them along.
We’d grown up together. We knew everything about each other.
Or at least they thought we did.
Andy took it the worst.
One night he punched me in the face. We were walking down the street when he suddenly turned and landed one on my chin. I charged at him and shoved him over a wall before Jack managed to drag us apart.
Later Andy said he didn’t know why he’d done it.
But I knew.
He could feel there was something about me he didn’t understand anymore.
Something I wasn’t telling him.
And there was Paolo.
I’d kept him away from Andy and Jack for a reason. If they ever met him, it would be game over.
Paolo was my work partner.
And because I kept telling myself I was straight, I hadn’t admitted something else.
He’d also become the person I cared about most.
Things had changed the year before. One side had been taken out… and those of us left were requisitioned by the survivors. Frank Smith had it all planned. Stage one complete. Now on to stage two of his masterplan.
The new world he dragged us into was worse than anything before.
But it paid.
Men didn’t just watch anymore—they wanted us. Big houses. Fancy mansions. Weekends filled with food, drink and sex.
A lot of sex.
And money.
So much bloody money we didn’t know what to do with it.
Sometimes it felt like we’d already sold everything there was to sell. Our innocence. Our dignity. Our bodies.
But every now and then we escaped from it.
One night Paolo curled up beside me in the back of a big Ford Granada and asked if he could stay at my place. His black curly hair brushed against my cheek, and I realised I liked it.
My parents were away visiting relatives in Skegness, and my younger brother Adam was off somewhere up north on a school trip.
There was no reason to say no.
Besides, I wanted him safe.
Photograph: David Sillitoe/Flickr
We got dropped off on Duke Street and walked in silence to my parents’ flat. Paolo had his coat wrapped tightly around him and a scarf pulled up around his neck so that he looked like one of those preppy American boys from the films.
I didn’t know much about the place where Paolo lived.
But when I opened the door to ours it smelt of burgers, chips and stale cigarettes.
I suddenly felt ashamed.
Paolo grabbed my hand like a frightened kid and let me pull him inside.
The flat was silent.
What we were doing felt wrong—but exciting at the same time. The same thrill I used to feel when the Geisha Boys broke into someone else’s place.
Except this time it was my home.
Paolo stayed close while I switched on the lights, hoping nothing embarrassing would reveal itself.
We were both bruised and exhausted. He asked if he could have a bath.
“I need to wash them off,” he said quietly.
The dirty old men.
I nodded.
He went into the bathroom and turned the hot tap full on. It ran loudly for a while before suddenly stopping.
“Harry?”
His voice echoed down the hall.
“Where are you? Come here.”
The door was unlocked. Paolo was sitting in the bath hugging his knees.
“Are you going to join me?”
I shook my head.
“Harry… I’d really like you to get in with me.”
So I undressed and climbed in.
It felt strange. We both knew every inch of each other’s bodies, but sitting there face to face suddenly felt awkward. I stretched my legs either side of him and he rested his elbow on my knee.
“The first time we met,” he said, “you hit me.”
I remembered.
“I didn’t know you, did I?”
“Would you ever hit me again?”
“No,” I said. “And now I’d hit anyone who hit you.”
Paolo smiled at that.
“I love you, Harry.”
I grimaced.
That was what Geisha Boys were supposed to do.
We slept together in my single bed that night. Nothing happened. He held me all night and I kept my arm around him. When he finally fell asleep, I rested my chin on his thick curly hair.
For a moment I felt something close to peace.
It didn’t last long.
The next day Andy called me a faggot.
He’d seen Paolo go into my flat.
“Who the fuck was that you took home?”
This time I hit him first.
I punched him so hard his nose burst and blood ran down his chin.
“You’re a cunt, Andy. That was my cousin.”
He didn’t believe a word of it.
“You’ve gone fucking weird,” he said.
Later Jack rang.
“Harry, you’ve busted Andy’s nose.”
“He called me a faggot,” I said. “And I ain’t no faggot, am I?”
“Nah,” Jack said. “I told him that. But he’s still pissed off with you.”
I couldn’t tell Jack the truth.
Mostly because I didn’t know it myself.
I wanted to say something else.
Do you remember Mr Johnson who taught us English? Let me tell you something, Jack. Last week he fucked me up the arse. Yeah. Our school teacher rammed me from behind.
But I ain’t no faggot.
But I couldn’t say that.
Could I?
I also remembered something else.
Years earlier we’d all been drunk at a party and ended up piled together on a sofa. We were messing around, laughing.
Then Andy and Jack kissed each other.
Properly.
Tongues and all.
That pissed me off. I stormed out and walked the streets for an hour because I was jealous.
But that didn’t mean anything.
Did it?
“A penny for your thoughts, love.”
I was sitting in June’s kitchen stirring a mug of tea far too many times.
“I’m a bit confused, June.”
“Is it Frank?” she asked.
“He’s the least of my problems.”
She smiled.
“So that means you’re thinking about Paolo.”
I gave her a look.
“Paolo’s a jewel,” she said. “And you, Harry, are a rough diamond. But when you put the two together something beautiful happens.”
“I ain’t queer, June.”
She didn’t argue.
“But you care about him,” she said gently. “And there’s a fine line between caring for someone and loving them.”
“It’s all a mess.”
“Is it?” she said softly. “I don’t see why.”
She leaned forward slightly.
“Paolo is a wonderful person. And I think—for the first time in your life—you’ve met someone who adores you exactly as you are.”
I looked down at my tea.
“Accept that,” she said. “Give him the chance.”
“And what happens then?”
June sighed.
“Harry… I don’t like what Frank’s doing to you both. I’ve told him so. But despite all that…”
She paused.
“I think something unexpected has happened.”
“What?”
“You’ve fallen in love with him.”
I laughed at that.
But June didn’t.
Frumpy old June—with a voice like an angel—had just told me the truth.
The thought had never even occurred to me. I genuinely just assumed he wasn’t interested. That was the simple explanation. I made a move, Oscar politely declined, and I retreated into my own embarrassment like a responsible adult.
But Alfie wouldn’t let it go.
“There’s a lot of energy around you,” he said. “It makes people feel exposed. They don’t always know how to handle it.”
I laughed it off at first. It sounded dramatic. But later I started replaying things.
I had been too focused on not humiliating myself to notice the details. The pause before he answered. The way he clenched his fists. The fact that he held eye contact just a second too long before looking away.
Alfie had noticed.
“There was interest,” he said carefully. “But when he realised it might actually become something real, he pulled back. Did you see him blush?”
I hadn’t. I’d been too busy overthinking my own tone of voice.
“He wasn’t rejecting you,” Alfie continued. “He was protecting himself.”
I don’t know. Maybe that’s giving him too much credit. Maybe it’s just a way of coping. But when I think about it now — the way he looked at me before he looked away — it didn’t feel cold. It felt cautious.
“He finds you intimidating,” Alfie added. “Magnetic. But intimidating.”
I have a feeling that something bad might happen. It makes me nervous. Like when you want to have a shit but you’re worried because the drains keep backing up.
The apples were nearly ripe. Red where the sun had kissed them too hard, green in the hollows of shade. Some were freckled, some split open already, pale flesh browning, bees drunk on the sugar. The smell hung low and thick.
He didn’t decide to dance. It happened the way shivering happens. One bare foot scraped the ground, testing it. His shoulders rolled, stiff and then looser, like he was shrugging off something heavy. His arms lifted, awkward, elbows bent too sharply, wrists slack. He laughed under his breath at how stupid he must look, alone in a field with no one to see.
When you look at boys, do you really look – do you look in detail? People see Bradley and assume that beauty must imply intelligence. It doesn’t. The truth is, he’s a bit of a himbo. There’s a Yorkshire saying for people like that: “thick as pig shit.” And Bradley, I suppose, fits it perfectly. He smiles – handsome, devilish – with a guileless sense of wonder. But how long can I keep swallowing my frustration? Physical attraction fades quickly, and I realise the only role he can play is arm candy: a beautiful body, empty-headed, ornamental.
“Video Angelus internehilium et imortalis Even as we speak our hearts entwine. Senex et angelus video venestus caelum. Equiden lavare in meus vita empeteus Ah eeh ah eeh ah.”
*****
The boy who likes the excitement of fear.
“I worry about being thrown off the carousel in later life.”
A skinny body and dirty pants.
*****
“He’s got it. Yeah, baby, he’s got it. I’m your Penis, I’m your fire. At your desire. Well, I’m your Penis, I’m your fire. At your desire.”
*****
Be careful who you choose because it can go wrong.
Hormonal Surge: Increased testosterone, fuelling restlessness and the need to discharge energy, sometimes through risky or boisterous play, mock fighting, and testing boundaries.
I wake and can hear music playing in the other room. It is an eighties song – Calling All the Heroes – and it is perfect. My first waking moments are defined by a song made before I was born. It will become a favourite. Whenever I hear it, I will recall the dream.
“I’m eighteen. Like I always am. There are twenty boys of a similar age. We don’t know each other, but we have bonded; something connects us, though I don’t know what it is. And now we are friends. Brothers who drink too much, laugh, and joke. We move from bar to bar until the group becomes fragmented, but still we keep bumping into one another — in different bars, on street corners, in dark streets – and each time we greet each other with high fives. I keep losing my coat that contains my mobile phone, but somebody in the group always finds it and saves it for me.”
What am I dreaming about?
Eighteen. Delayed or suspended adolescence. The moment just before categorisation -before ‘out’ or ‘not out’, before relationships are legible, before desire is policed or explained. A moment of pure potential, when attraction, friendship, and self-recognition have not yet been sorted into boxes. A group of boys I don’t know, where intimacy doesn’t have to announce itself as erotic to be real. Touch exists: high fives, a coded language, bodies moving together through night-time space, alcohol loosening edges, and the bond is felt rather than named.
These boys don’t posture. They don’t test me. They don’t ask who I was. They simply accept me. A world that perhaps never fully existed, but felt briefly possible.
The group breaks apart, but there is no need to cling because the bond reasserts itself naturally. “I still know you. You still know me.” I repeatedly lose my coat and my phone – yet I am never punished. I am held by others even when I am careless, distracted, or drifting. I don’t have to hold myself together perfectly. I’m not abandoned for losing my way. A fantasy of uncomplicated male belonging – one where youth, desire, friendship, and identity coexist without fracture or explanation.
The next part of the dream is important.
“There are ten of us staying in a hotel room. It is the only one available. We snack on almonds and slices of apple covered in salted caramel and maple sugar. Two double beds and a single mattress on the floor. When it comes to sleep, we must find space in one of the beds. I choose a double bed where four of us will squeeze together. I’m thrilled that the most handsome boy will sleep next to me. But at the last moment, he is taken. Another boy wants him to share the mattress on the floor, and I am devastated. The dream is never consummated.”
The hotel room matters. It is temporary, improvised, and not designed for this many bodies. I share a bed with four boys. The choice is telling. I don’t choose privacy, pairing, or exclusivity. I choose crowded intimacy – warmth, bodies, breath, limbs overlapping. Proximity without the exposure of being singled out. I am about to be close to the handsome boy without declaring him an object of desire, but he isn’t a person yet – he is a figure onto which desire might safely attach itself.
The handsome boy doesn’t reject me; he is summoned – pulled away by another boy. Desire is displaced, not denied. My devastation isn’t only about losing him. It is about losing the fantasy of being quietly chosen within the group. But the group has ruptured because somebody else’s desire has rearranged the night. My loss is intimate, quiet, internal – no one else even notices it happening – and so I do not follow. I do not compete. I do not protest. I absorb the loss silently.
Perfectly Hard and Glamorous 