The start of the 'Butt Monkey' series of stories by Robert Furlong
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Considering the impact it was to have on my life, it now seems difficult to believe that it came with no warning. But then, I suppose that's true of almost all of life's most momentous events: they emerge unannounced amidst the most boringly ordinary of our daily routines.
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The day it started must have been in late September. The shops were already selling Halloween lanterns, the nights were starting to draw in and there was a chill to the evenings heralding winter's approach.
I'd packed an overnight bag after work and was putting it in the boot of the car when my son Jake arrived home from college. Having put out a couple of extra bowls of food for our cat while Jake was grabbing a few things from his room, we'd set off in the car to go to Liverpool to watch a match between Manchester United and Everton the following day. On the way out of town, we'd picked up Jake's friend Simon who was coming along with us as well as Simon's dad, Guy.
As I remember it, Guy's inclusion on the trip was rather an after-thought. One minute, Jake and I were making our plans to drive up on Saturday morning to see the match, the next his friend Simon was being mooted as coming along with us, and before I knew it Simon's dad was in the picture and the trip had evolved to include an overnight stay.
That's often the way it works with Jake, though. Something about inches and miles springs to mind.
I wasn't bothered about Simon's dad coming along -- having another adult in the car at least brought with it the prospect of some fresh conversation -- but I didn't know him very well at all. I knew that, like me, he had been divorced for quite a few years and that, like me, he enjoyed watching a football match pretty much regardless of who was playing, but other than that he was just some bloke I occasionally saw and made small-talk with when I was giving Jake a lift home after college.
Guy and I sat in the front of the car on the way to Liverpool, with the lads in the back occupied by Simon's DS which they'd brought along for the journey. We chatted uncomfortably at first, exchanging trite observations about football and pretending to be interested in each other's jobs, before we grew familiar enough with each other to discuss our respective divorces and the limited success we'd both had with internet dating.
Guy was a plumber -- quite a financially successful one given that he only had to work three days a week -- and it turned out that his ex-wife, like mine, had left him for a younger man. In Guy's case the younger man had been a friend of his who had taken advantage while Guy was away working for a stint on an oil-rig. In my case it had been one of Linda's workmates. We discussed our experiences in terms of how angry we'd been, making jokes about our ex-wives' inadequacies and asserting that the other guys were welcome to have them. We kept well away from sharing the feelings of upset, rejection and failure that we must have both gone through in the months and years since we'd split from women we'd both clearly loved.
Guy had enjoyed more success than I had on the dating scene since his divorce, no doubt helped in part by his friendly and attractive face, and what looked like quite a muscular build through his clothes. However, while he obviously found it easier than I did to meet women and get past the first few awkward, fumbling encounters, his relationships seemed to quickly fizzle out and he seemed resigned to remaining single at least for the foreseeable future.
"Some women disappear when they realise they're not just getting into a relationship with one person," he said quietly, making a subtle gesture towards his son in the backseat of the car. "It was worse a few years ago, when he was younger, but it still seems like it's a complication that a lot of women aren't prepared to deal with."
"Maybe that's my problem too," I nodded. "I always make it clear from the start that I'm not on my own."
I glanced into the rear-view mirror and saw that the lads were too involved in trying to top each other's high scores on the DS to notice that they were being talked about.
"Maybe next year it'll be different," he went on. "Once the lads are away at university, we'll be a couple of free agents again!"
He grinned over at me and I smiled back. Unlike Guy, I was in no rush for Jake to leave home, even if it was just during term time and while he was studying. The house had been quiet enough after his mother had left: I dreaded to think what it would be like when I was alone.
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When we got to the hotel, a fairly standard second-rate chain affair at the edge of an industrial estate, I was checking in with reception when Jake asked if he and Simon could bunk up together instead of the two of us sharing as I'd planned.
"Go on, dad. It'll be a laugh."
I shook my head. "I don't want to have to book an extra room."
"You won't have to," he urged. "I'll share with Simon. You can share with his dad. That'll work."
Guy and Simon were bringing their bags in through the entrance.
"I dunno Jake," I said, feeling a little uncomfortable and glancing over at Guy. "Guy might not want to share a room with me."
I was hoping that Guy would back me up and insist that we stick to the plan we'd made to both share with our sons. It wasn't that I particularly wanted to bunk up with Jake -- since he'd hit his teens, I'd made it clear he could have his privacy whenever we'd stayed in hotels -- but rather that I wasn't comfortable about sharing with Guy. In spite of what we'd found we had in common on the drive up, I didn't feel I knew him well enough to want to share a room with him for the night. What if I had to get naked in front of him or he caught sight of my morning erection? I'd never been comfortable about showing my body off to another person.
However, Guy just shrugged and said, "I'm easy either way. I guess it makes sense for the lads to share. More fun that having to sleep with their old men."
Jake and Simon were delighted: they probably had visions of playing on the DS all night. Not wanting to look uptight by forcing the issue, I let Jake get his way.
Guy, however, seemed to sense my apprehension and grinned. "Don't worry, mate," he chuckled, slapping my back. "I've seen it all before on when I worked on the rig. And if you fart in your sleep I promise I won't tell anyone."
The lads found this as hilarious as you might expect eighteen-year-olds to and so I smiled to try and hide my discomfort. I wasn't that bothered about farting in my sleep, but what if I did other stuff? What if I kept touching myself or scratching my bum or something...?
We loaded up the rooms -- two twin rooms which were fortunately next door to one another -- and then drove into Liverpool for as decent a meal as we could find for the limited cash that we'd agreed on.
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When we got back to the hotel, it was past ten o'clock and time for us all to turn in.
"I don't want you guys playing on that DS or watching TV all night," I told Jake and Simon as they were taking their shoes off. "You want to be fresh for the game tomorrow."
"Yeah," Guy agreed. "So no wanking after light's out."
The lads found this to be very funny and I smiled to hide my disapproval.
It wasn't that I didn't want Jake to hear about masturbation: on the contrary, I'd been talking with him about it for many years after I'd started finding his pyjama bottoms in the laundry bag on an almost daily basis, always copiously soaked around the fly. At first I'd feared that he was starting to pee the bed again, like he had just after his mum had left us, but then I'd caught a whiff of a strong and familiar odour and had turned the fabric inside out to find it smeared with thick white gobs.
So we'd sat down to have the first of our chats about sex. I'd explained to him that he could avoid making a mess of his pyjamas by rubbing his foreskin up and down his penis each night until a white liquid called semen squirted out of it. At first he'd found this funny and said it sounded stupid. But then he'd asked if I did it, and I'd said that I sometimes did.
I assume he'd taken my advice because the wet pyjama bottoms stopped appearing in the laundry bag and boxes of tissues started disappearing from the bathroom cupboard. And Jake's bedroom door started being firmly closed after bedtime.
Since then, over the many years in between, I'd always talked quite openly about masturbation with Jake and had told him that it was something he should never feel guilty about so long as he was discreet about where and when he did it.
Guy didn't notice my displeasure at his frivolous remarks, and went on, "And it's no use trying to pretend you're not wanking by saying you're just scratching your balls! We've heard it all before!"
Simon laughed, "That goes for you guys too, then!"
Guy grinned. "I dunno... two blokes who haven't had a woman for a while... who knows what could happen..."
His son laughed but made a repulsed face. "Ugh, dad, don't be such a skeeve!"
Jake too found the suggestion disgusting but was clearly amused. "That is so heinous!"
I said, smiling, "I'm not sure I'm happy to share with you on this basis, Mr Leeson. I think I'll sleep on the floor in here..."
Guy chuckled, "You're an attractive guy... I'm only human..."
Again the lads giggled through protests of mock disgust at the prospect of homosexual activity between their dads, while I felt rather pleased that Guy had said I was attractive, even if it had been in jest. A bloke with the luck I've had with women needs all the confidence boosting he can get.
We left them with a promise that they'd turn their light off by half past eleven at the latest.
When we got back to our room, Guy said, taking off his jacket, "Maybe I shouldn't have said that stuff in there. It just seemed to amuse them."
"That's okay," I shrugged. "They could see it was a joke."
He laughed, "I tell you what. Why don't we give it ten minutes, then beat the headboard of the bed against the wall like we really are at it together... they'll wet themselves laughing!"
Again I smiled to hide my displeasure. "I think that'd be going too far."
