Page 100 of Oleander

“He’s talked about me going to work for him, about how the business was his dad’s and how he wants to keep it in the family and how I’m his son, but I...” I shook my head. “It’s not what I want. It’s not the life I want.”

The life I wanted was something I couldn’t begin to make Luke (or Beth) understand. I wished I could explain to them how I wanted to be a writer, live in London, and spend my weekends tangled up in bed with Caspien before dragging ourselves out of it to visit bookshops and see movies. They didn’t even know I wrote. I’d never told anyone except Caspien because somehow it didn’t feel as silly to say it to him; it even felt like something hemight be impressed by. And he had been, I thought. He’d given me a look he’d never given me before: a slight speculative raise of his eyebrows and a glint of approval in his eye.

I didn’t think Luke and Beth would judge me for wanting to be with a man or stop loving me because of it, but it did seem like the life I wanted was worlds away from the life they wanted me to have. Which was, ostensibly, here on the island helping Luke for the rest of my life like I owed it to them for taking me in.

And who knows, maybe I did. Maybe I was being selfish for wanting something else.

Something I considered then to be better.

“No, no, a smart boy like you wants something more than this island can offer,” Gideon soothed. Then he said, in an almost whisper, “You want to become something you think will make him see you as his equal.”

I almost gasped at the bare, stunning truth of it. I pulled back to look at him, stricken and open-mouthed.

The denial didn’t come.

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of, Jude. Love cultivates within us the most farcical of notions. It’s a dangerous thing, really. And gosh, you are quite desperately in love with him, aren’t you?” He gave me a commiserative look.

I could only stare at him pleadingly. I often think about how I must have looked to him in that moment; vulnerable and defenceless as a kitten in a box. The look, whatever it was, was all the confirmation he needed.

“Oh, Jude. You poor thing. You poor, poor thing.”

I couldn’t understand at the time why his apology sounded so strange and discordant, like an out-of-tune piano. But now I know it was because he was pleased. My misery – the misery he knew would come inevitably – pleased him.

“He’s going to break your heart, you know. And still, you’ll love him. He’ll break it over and over again and you’ll continue to love him.”

“You think he’ll...break my heart?” I asked as though I didn’t fear that very same thing with every single breath I took.

“Oh, he won’t mean to, not entirely, but he doesn’t quite have it in him to love the way you do, the way I used to be able to. In a way, I’ve done quite well with him. I’ve made him far smarter than either of us.”

“I don’t care,” I said naively. I don’t care if he can’t love me the same way I love him. I’m still going to.” Unconditionally, for as long as I could breathe.

Gideon’s eyes glittered. “Yes, I think you will, won’t you?”

He pulled me into a tight hug that smelled of violets and fresh moss.

Twenty-nine

Ididn’t dare tell Caspien about the talk with Gideon. Even at that point, their relationship and the boundaries of it, were far beyond my understanding, and I was terrified about what he might say or do if he knew I’d been discussing him with Gideon at all.

Over the years that followed, my feelings about Gideon have metamorphosed. Though I knew that Caspien thought him a liar and that their relationship was fractious and twisted, he had never been anything more than kind and generous with me. He was eccentric and odd in waysIcouldneverputmyfingeron,buthe’dnever been cruel to me – not overtly, at least. Then, he felt like the only person in the world who knew and understood me fully.

He knew the deep parts of me I’d never shown anyone else. Parts of me that I’d never even admitted existed to myself. In those weeks leading up to summer, I saw him as a confidant and confessed my sins to him like he was my priest.

At first, I’d been worried that Gideon might tell Caspien about our long talks about the nature of love, about Caspien, and about the future I saw for us far from this tiny island. But now I know that he wouldn’t have dared. Because for everything he was, Caspien did not always play the game by Gideon’s rules, and Gideon could not win a game unless he were in complete control of it.

I came to understand that they trusted each other as far as two snakes in a basket might.

Caspien was due home the last week of May, and I’d already decided I would tell him I loved him. I suspected he was already aware of it – I look back now and think that almost everyone around me was aware of it. I wore my heart on the outside of my body, bright as a beacon. It was no wonder it was pierced right through.

My love for Cas was too big to contain then, and I didn’t want to contain it any longer; I wouldn’t. I’d tell him. I’d show him. I didn’t need him to say it back, but I did need him to know that I was here, that I always would be, and that I’d love him unconditionally no matter what.

I wasn’t stupid enough to think that he loved me back, and that wasn’t only because Gideon thought he was incapable. It was because I hadn’t yet shown him that love was something achievable, something thatcouldexist between us. I knew he’d likely meet other more interesting people at Oxford next year, but those sorts of people he’d known and been around all his life, and he’d never loved any of them.

I was unique in this alone. I was happy to be the orphaned boy from his hometown because it was what connected us. This house connected us: the library, the arboretum, and the birdwatcher’s hut. We’d make more memories this summer so that if I couldn’t follow when he left for Oxford, then at least he’d remember how happy I’d made him here. We’d always have this, no matter what happened next.

I’d gotten rid of Blackwell, and I’d do the same with anyone else who thought they could love him better than I could. It was an embarrassingly childish notion, but I believed it in the marrow of my bones.

I’d be his constant. This summer, I’d show him that. I’d be everything and anything he needed me to be.