Chapter 2 ; part 1
1935
When Alfred secured a seat at the table, there was no one but Arthur and a maid still at it. The skittish woman went to leave at the site of the Lord, but he shushed her down again.
"Don't mind me." He said.
Arthur gave her a look, looking up from the large French newspaper he was reading, as if to say "he's American, don't bother."
"Arthur, what's so interesting in that paper?" Alfred asked, leaning down onto the finely carved oak table.
"Germany, something to do with that Hitler fellow. He's bad news, I say. I can smell from a mile off."
"You say? A mile off?"
"Absolutely. Anybody who's managed to gain that much support in a country facing so many social economic problems must be."
The maid made fast a piece of material she was repairing, making sure to keep her eyes in one direction. Downwards.
"Hm, well. He could just have good policies. I heard he striked a 10 year peace treaty with Poland?"
"Mm. Treaties mean nothing, Versailles for instance."
"Versailles done fine."
"Versailles has done no such thing."
"Give me an instance."
"Okay- i-let me think."
Alfred huffed and waited. Arthur opened his mouth as all but silent vowels came out, his eyes reached up to his forehead and dropped back down again in a pattern of thought. Five long, decrepit minutes passed.
"He had a reamarment rally- i-I'm sorry. I shouldn't speak." The maids trepid voice was shrill and weak. She spoke to the emptiness infront of her, and Alfred had to take a moment to register what she had said in a volume his ears could understand it.
"No, don't be. Where did you learn this?"
"I listen to the radio when I can, m'lord."
"The radio, you say." Arthur raised his eyebrows.
"I do, sir."
"I didn't know we had a radio, wonderful! How I damn well miss the music from the states- pardon my language." Alfred stood up, in a calm manner.
"Where?"
The maid looked at him a few times, careful to miss his direct gaze.
"Kitchens quarters Lord, I'll have it brung up for you shall I-"
"You'll do no such thing, I wish to listen to it straight away."
Alfred went away humming a jaunty tune, tripping against his own feet in a small dance. Arthur smiled and placed his paper down, ripping a small section from it and tucking it in his pocket, before following that of Alfred. The maid sat, slightly surprised, slightly content, she hadn't seen the Lord so happy in months, let alone let it be her to cause him that. She ought to get a day off, she thought to herself. She might even have the cheek to ask for it, from the Lord himself. "He's nice and American."
She followed.
"There's music. It's wonderful."
"This is private, isn't it?" Arthur was bending round all corners, skittesh of all nooks and crannies, that crack in the door seemed discouraging. The radio sat in it's glory tucked to a corner of the small room, meant for nothing but storage space that had long been neglected. A few cigarette butts were skewed on the dusty top of the machine, but other than that it worked and looked a miracle. Out of place in the damp room.
"Da duh daaaaa, duhhhhh. I haven't even met youuuuuu, except in dreams that are haunting meeeee-"
"Alfred I'm-"
"Stillllll I feeeeeel, youuuuuu are re-aaaaaaaaal!"
"Alfred will you-"
"I know I'm going to get you- no use in hiding away from meeee!" Alfred took Arthur's waist, and pulled it against his own. The music continued, grainy and unpolished, and they both sank into eachother almost. Arthur forgot about what he had wanted to talk about, and Alfred had lost the Rythm of the lyrics ; still they both hummed on, Alfred's hands moving their way up, down and around Arthur's chest and torso, both leaning into eachother, The twenty-six year old Lord resting his chin on the twenty-nine year old's shoulder. Arthur closed his eyes in a sleep that was not sleep but more a blissful trance, where Alfred's hands and sweet voice were the only thing awake to him. The soon-turned-silent embrace satisfied a shared and sexless hunger they both desired. Without music, Alfred continued to rock lightly and hum, the noise coming as a faint spark of electricity as Arthur leant his back into the steady 'brum-brum' of Alfred's heart. They stayed like that for quite a while, as the seconds and minutes ticked by on Alfred's silver pocket watch hanging from his breast pocket.
The maid from earlier, Hetty, stood by. Silent in speechless gaze. Staring through the gap between the heavy door and the distressed frame. Her mind argueing both ways at her.
Back in the room, Alfred had parted them from eachother with a twirl, much to Arthur's dissapointment.
"You were trying to say something, before I crudely interrupted you." Alfred leant against the wall, as Arthur reassured himself of his bearings.
"Crude is the last thing I'd call it."
"Hm, that doesn't sound like you." Alfred pulled his watch from his chest and dropped it in the pocket on his trousers. The ticking was disturbing the sweetened silence.
"Right I- I-" Arthur tucked his hand away inside his trouser button, clutching the torn piece of paper inside of the pocket tightly.
"I was just going to ask you to change the song, I can't stand that American squabble you call music."
Alfred laughed "ah, but my music has singing atleast, I can't deal with all that fancy orchestra marbo-jarbo you Europeans like. Golly."
Arthur could feel the tips of his nail biting his palm as he scrunched the paper so tightly. Regretting ever taking notice of it.
"Right-o."
"Is everything okay? Truly?"
"Fine-fine really. Just a little lost is all, I was a million miles away as you say."
He could feel Alfred scrutinising his every look and thought, as though piercing into his mind, but not commenting.
"If you say."
They chatted more, the chat sliding to heavily awaited lips to lips and wandering hands, which soon emptied into quick and repressed sex. All while another pair of eyes watched on and waited. Like a tiger to prey.
It was easy for the two to get lost in eachother, the freedom of being able to kiss and touch and say those sweet things into each others ears became a long-awaited allowance on both parts, and when finally free to do so the feeling became so overwhelming and perfect they'd lose track of where they were. Like a gorgeous day dream. It could prove to be dangerous however, and Arthur always tried to improve it upon himself, one wrong move and it was over. Moments like those would cease to exist and he dread to think of the other consequences. He was not a prison type. Not a caged type, sometimes, he liked to be so free of society and etiquette, he wondered to himself if his leanings were all just a side affect of not wanting and not being able to fit in. The doubts would settle after he felt Alfred's warm breath against his neck, which would send a pin prick river of chills down his spine and wash of happiness over his body, however he couldn't deny he didn't feel something when presented with a beautiful woman, something Alfred had told him himself he found hard to do, if at all.
When the two had finished, it felt less of love in the room and more of a heavy sense of shame. Arthur, despite the happiness he still felt anytime when he was with Alfred alone, could bare not to look in his eyes, for it would bring on a feeling so remorseful and contradicting with love that it'd make him feel sick. Alfred, however, tried to forget it was Arthur he was loving and holding all the time, even just when their hands brushed and he would feel that jolt of static joy run up his arm and drop to his stomach, would he try to forget who caused it. But when he didn't, and he would look into Arthur's eyes with such care as that of a newly wed husband, it would vice once again the more primal of their emotional intimacy. Those moments, Arthur thought, he would choose anytime over the rough or usually guilt-ridden sex.
"What's this? Arthur?"
Arthur was carefully buttoning up his shirt as Alfred picked up the crumpled piece of paper by his feet, near Arthur's still neglected trousers.
"What's what?"They weren't facing eachother, Arthur squinted as he tried to make out the different numbers and words printed on the radio, technology had always surpassed him.
Alfred read outloud
"...treatment to cure your perversion- Arthur? This is yours, right? This bit of paper?"
Arthur felt a deep down feeling of dread weal inside of him. He carried on dressing, staying calm.
"Cure? You want to fix yourself from...from this?"
Arthur swallowed an empty mouthful as his tongue felt abnormally large and dry. Turning to pick up his trousers and purposefully missing Alfred's searing gaze.
"I was going to throw it away." He answered nonchalantly.
"Why did you have it if you were going to throw it away?"
"It must of just, ended up there somehow, you know how sneaky the staff are." He laughed, clearing his suddenly sore throat.
"I'm American, not stupid. Things don't just happen upon you, not things like this."
"Why don't we not focus on-"
"Why did you have it?"
It fell silent, a bad, dreading kind of silence.
"I wasn't for me-"
"Oh, don't give me that horse crap!"
"No! Please, it isn't. I promise you." He stepped forward, Alfred shook his head, a wet anger welling up inside him with every word spoken.
"Who's it for then?"
Arthur's mouth opened and closed like a fish, before he finally took a shallow breath and answered in a low, breathy voice.
"You."
Denial.
"Me...? Why me? I'm not- Arthur I'm not a perversion. I'm not like those men that like other men-"
Arthur glanced at the Lords dishevelled and sweaty appeared, and allowed himself a small pout of laughter.
"No, Arthur no. It's you, I just like you. I'm not perverted." Alfred could feel he was lying. His hands trembled and his eyes shook as he struggled to keep them open and free of salty tears. There was a reason his wife was childless, it was obvious. Painfully obvious he was lying to himself as he thought about how he had to sleep with her in that position she hated so much, just in order to give her the occasional pleasure she asked for. About how he had to kiss her with his eyes closed, in order to lie to himself about who he was kissing so it would not lack passion. About how every time he felt Arthur's hands on him, he felt that deep pitted stomach-type pleasure that he could just not achieve with the soft touch of a female. He risked everything he cared for, along with the murderous feeling of pure guilt he had to endure on the daily, just so he could recieve what he desired so deeply. It was clear, but he still shook his head and said "No, I'm no queer. You're just quite feminine and-"
"I'm a homosexual." The words hung like wet clothes from a straining washing line. It felt heavier to have them said, instead of only known.
"Or atleast have urges leaning that way. I can admit it Alfred. It helps, if you say it."
There was a small, inaudible to both men, gasp from behind the door.
"It's not true for me." Alfred's voice was betraying him word by word, each syllable he found tougher and the sentences seemed to sting in his throat like a lemon rind. "I'm normal."
"And I'm not? Why won't you say it? I know it's hard, I do. But do you know how it makes me feel? You denying you are like me because you think it's wrong?"
"No Arthur-"
"Do you think I'm wrong?"
"No! No. You're, you're perfect. Right in every way-"
"Then why won't you say it, Alfred?"
"Arthur-"
"Why don't you just admit-"
"why the hell does it matter?Huh?!" the rind dropped and his words strung out like a wasp sting. He hadn't realise he was crying. When had that happened? His cheeks were moist with a river of raw self-hatred and guilt. His knees where giving underneath him and he hadn't realised they gave up till he felt himself kneeling on the cold stone floor. Arthur had only a short time to worry about a sudden heart attack or fainting before Alfred rose to his feet again in a slurry and hooked both arms around him, holding him tight as hell and bawling into Arthurs undone navy waistcoat. Arthur stood surprised for a second, before sliding both hands round him and supporting his weight, hugging him just as violently tight to help hold him up.
The Englishman tried to form words, but his head was so shuffled about that all he could manage were a flurry of comforting shushes as Alfred soaked his clothes in tears and crushed his lungs with a bear-like grip. The room was a mixture of must, semen, smoke and a subtle whiff of fresh air (if it decided to be forgiving). Filled to the brim with the ricocheting force of crying and desperate air-filled laughs. It sat like that for some time, but seemed to move by in a matter of seconds.
"Oh... Arthur." Alfred was managing to compose himself, roughly pushing Arthur from him. "What a horrid room to ruin myself in."
"Quite."
"I'm sorry."
"I'm sure."
"No I am, sincerely."
"Quite."
"Arthur..."
The was a moment of thought, before someone decided to speak again.
"I wish I could stop, I wish I could sometimes."
"What do you mean, Arthur?"
"You, I wish I could stop loving you like I do, those weeks I'm away from you are hell. I miss your affection and your touch and just you Alfred. Do you think I wanted to be like this? Do you think I wanted to have to love someone who I can't?" He laughed, mid sentence. Stoic and shrill "I would swap this, what we have Alfred, for anything. But I can't, it doesn't work like that, I love you physically and emotionally and I'm addicted to you like a damn drug. Shit if i can quit that."
Alfred had never heard Arthur swear before, in the many years he had known him, this had been the rawrest of conversations they'd ever had. And it felt so liberating, to spew everything out and leave it naked and bare to look at.
For half an hour, they both sat there, Arthur asking himself questions he'd rather not answer, and Alfred trying to blockade the doubts of himself from his mind. Failing.
Unknown to the two, a prescence form behind the door left. Having heard and seen all she could.
Alfred trickled out stutters uncomfotably, before forming a sentence.
"My Uncle - Uncle Harrison - he was...he was like you." Alfred broke the soft silence with a quiet, shaky voice.
Arthur noted his slouched stoop, and led him to a wall of the room were he could lean. They both ended up sittin on the floor one way or another, Alfred with his back against the cold wall and Arthur set hugging his knees and resting his chin, facing eachother.
"He'd married my aunt. I love her to pieces, she's someone who I can still trust to this day. As for uncle Harrison? Well... she'd all but given up on him after a year of 'marriage' and go off and do her own thing when he'd go out. They'd all but separate if it weren't for the sticky piece of paper binding them together. The family thought he had a drinking problem, and he did go to the public house on his trips out, but it wasn't alcohol he was craving after. Inside there they have these men-"
"Mm, I've heard the stories." Arthur swallowed. Neglecting to say he'd been to see some of the fellows himself.
"Mhm, so you know. One night, oh I think it must have been about...let's say fifteen years ago. I know I was around ten something along that. Anyway, he'd gone out as he usually would and talked up a boy as he usually would, paying as you do-" Alfred took a moment, remembering the newspaper article.
"The boy was workin' with the coppers however. Took him round the back, waited for him to drop to his knees and reach to unbuckle 'is pants before he pushed him to the ground and arrested him. Right there, right then. He got death penalty, but marginally escaped through connections. He's in prison to this day I believe. My aunt was distraught, I think she knew. I remember when the newspaper came, the maid brought it up to us and the family was summoned, I remember thinkin' to myself 'how discustin', how damn well disgusting to waste your life tryna fuck twisted boys when you have a fine wife-" Alfred's speech was turning to have a slight Texan twang to it, returning to his roots - wife turning into waf-.
"And now what am I doin'? Doing the exact same thing. But I understand it now, understand he wasn't all fine and dandy with it all. When he used to tell me "Alfred, don't you dare go betrayin' no one you love" - he used to talk like that- when he used to tell me that I'd heed it as general advice from adult to child. Not until later years I put two and two together and realised that was the silent cry for help. Anyway, dumb story. But why I'm telling you this, is this thang-" he held up the newspaper clipping in a shaking hand, holding it far out like it had the plague.
"We found out later from his own mouth that he'd tried that. something like it almost and guess what, it didn't do a damn thang to him, just made him sought after those boys touchin' and lovin' more and more." He was into a full texan drawl now, the pull of that American accented etiquette all but gone. "Ultimately got him where he is now."
Arthur chewed on an invisible cigarette, feeling the compelling need for one.
"Alfred, you aren't disgusting. But technology has advanced and these are drugs. It says here they've changed three people out of four, two men one woman." He took the paper from his hand carefully, treating as though it's had a life as paper thin as itself. He found the passage of green letters with a gargle of French, talking about the lives changed and how it offered total discretion. Ignoring Alfred's newly admitted issues.
"Here, see? I don't want to try it out right now - truth is I'm scared if I do end up changing - but I thought I'd give you the option..."
Alfred's breath was shallow, the memory of his past and the stress of his present and the ever dimming hope of his future were weighing their worth down onto his shoulders.
"Ofcourse, if you were to be helped, I'd hate it. More than words could describe. But I'd know you'd have a better life and I could live in the knowledge you can be fully happy now- and that's most what I need from you."
"No." Came the immediate answer.
"No. I'm not doing that. For you, for me. It's all garbage. If God wanted me to be this way, then who am I to say he was wrong? He chose me an' you and put us in a world together where we'd love eachother and others wouldn't like it because of what we are and God made us tough for that didn't he? Arthur- Arthur I can't make your decisions for you, but this right here ain't gonna help ya. Might as well go start killing yourself now because that's all the good this'll do you."
Arthur nodded "okay Alfred." He smiled, "Okay."
In truth, the thought of being attracted to women -with their curves, breasts and petite necks, slender fingers and lack of in total masculine features made Alfred feel slightly ill. He couldn't imagine a world where that could be changed and he'd be okay with it. Okay with not feeling enjoyment from a man. It made him want the normalness of it all less and less.
"...fuck- i- I'm going to go, we been in here too long. Are you free later?"
Arthur nodded.
"Come to my chamber upstairs, tell them I asked for you because i wanted some more French lessons and they'll send you right up."
They left eachother at that. No epiphany , no agreement. Just a sick promise of what Arthur was sure was just more lustful and shameful actions.
Hetty was sat at a table, reserved specially for that of the female staff. She was calm, gathered and all but a little bit happy. The hardened, more evil light inside of her awakened.
"Everybody knows about lil' Lui from Bologne," she said to her friend, another less experienced maid that came to sit with her when she could, with oversize bespectacled brown eyes and an airbrushed face of naïveté, small rose lips always puckered in concentration. All in all a pretty and kind girl, quite the opposite of Hetty.
"Tough young man that owned a farm, living with 'is younger farm 'and. Two said they were just friends, best friends, but rumours always 'ave some truth to them. Beaten black and blue were lil' Tom, said 'e broke 6 different bones and even lost an eye. He wouldn't say what'd 'appened, but when farm boy went missin' the next few days, it were obvious."
The younger maid gasped slightly.
"He was...?"
"Yeah, through 'n through."
"Blimey...Het you sure know a lot these stories, don't ya?"
"Yeah, hundreds, Jo. Got a new one actually." Her face darkened faintly, she leant close to Jo as soon as the words left her mouth, looking around in mock suspicion.
"You wannu 'ear?"
Jo nodded, fast. Her wide eyes were bright with curiosity.
"This one takes place in this castle an' all."
Jo choked slightly.
"Here?"
"Just now, Jo. Lord."
"No! Crim Het, No. Lord Jones? Really? No."
"Why's it so 'ard to believe? We all know he's not one for lady companions." She shrugged, like this should of been common knowledge, remembering how the Lord would knock off other girls advances. Generally taking up a job at a guards chateau would almost condemn you from ever seeing the Family that owned it, but the Lord of this family tended to visit this place atleast twice a week in the time Hetty had been working there, she'd heard his visitations increased around three years ago, when the mass employment and transfer of staff happened also. She'd not tried with the Lord herself, generally out of shyness and an inner morale that told her she shouldn't mess with married men, though seeing how these girls went Un-prosecuted and were fine to carry on flirting did spark her curiosity and attention from time to time.
The young girls spark voice brought Hetty back out of her own mind.
"Really- with 'oo? One-a the staff?"
Hetty rolled her eyes, now that would just be too predictable.
"Nah, Sir Kirkland."
Jo looked as though she could've leant back right there and then and fainted, but her tight grip on the table kept her upright.
"But you's gonna 'elp me, Jo."
"'Elp you with what, Het?"
"Tell me," Hetty sat back again, resuming that ever dawdling piece of sewing.
"You ever 'earda blackmail for this sorta thing?"
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The Song featured in this chapter is called "Come Out" from 1933. I've forgotten who sings it and I haven't listened to it in months, but if you like music from that sort of era, I'd reccomend a listen!
A best friend of mine proof read this, I'm not entirely sure how to credit her since she doesn't own an account, but her social media of choice would be " www. Quotev Monochromedivine " just take out the spaces.
Thank you for reading this! I hope you continue to!