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"Oskar. You needn’t play formal host to me. You look tired. It’s all right to be tired. Take the time to relax. Change into something more comfortable if you like and put your feet up for a while. I can pour the drinks. The table is set. Unless you consider that a liberty you’re not comfortable giving me."
Max’s voice is soft and light. His words surprise me, in a good way. We’ve been having sex for more than a month now, whenever I’ve invited him to stay. It has always been up to me, he waits to be asked. Polite, some would say to a fault. I haven’t really thought of him as a lover, but as another man I have sex with. I have viewed the relationship this way because with rare exceptions, it’s how my relationships with other men have played out. We feel a physical interest, we have sex. Maybe only once or twice, sometimes for a month or two. When one of us angers or irritates the other or a new interest is found, we drift apart without bad feelings. Max and I are on the longer end of a relationship as far as I’ve known relationships to be, except in my distant past before the world I live in shaped my more recent reality.
No one had asked me if I wasn’t in the mood, cared whether I was or not, or looked at me with an eye to understand, sympathize or comfort, not even Else. He seems to regard me as myself, a person, as if how I’m feeling matters to him. It’s pleasant, but also a little frightening. I could get used to it all too easily, but he could become bored with me next week. Still, it’s nice and I’m more than tempted by the offer and the sentiment. I don’t feel especially well. I might be coming down with a cold. If it had been anyone other than Max, I would have made an excuse and come home alone.
Still, I must be careful. I grunt at him and nod. "A drink would be welcome," I acknowledge as I go into the bedroom. It’s cold, or at least I’m cold in a shivering sort of way, so I turn on the radiator. The bed looks very inviting. I’d like nothing more than to sink into its softness and pull the covers over my head, but instead I only hang up my jacket, take off my tie and loosen my collar, and put on house slippers. It will have to do.
When I walk into the other room, Max is in my kitchen looking for something.
"Do you have any honey, or lemon?" he asks me. In my current state I don’t even wonder why he wants those things, I just tell him where they are. I only want to sit down and eat, talk a little while, and then go to bed. I’m not thinking of sex at all, but I assume Max will be since we are where we are in our relationship.
We sit down to the dinner my neighbour has left me, and he puts a mug of something steaming on the table for me and a glass of wine for himself. I’m a little embarrassed, as I’m no wine expert and what I have on hand would be of poorer quality than what he would usually drink. When I take a sip of my drink it’s whisky, lemon and honey, with an emphasis on the whisky. It’s perfect. It’s what I need, but not something I’d bother to make for myself. Is this the doctor in him, or is it more?
"Thank you. It’s good," I tell him. Truthfully, the drink enables me to eat when I’m really not hungry. It takes the edge off my irritability, but also means my guard is down more than makes me comfortable.
After dinner he encourages me to lie on the sofa, puts a cushion under my head, covers me with a blanket, and puts the food away without saying much. He also brings me another drink of the same and sits in the chair near me sipping wine. I’m saying barely a word, because my energy is seeping away and I can’t seem to regain it. I’m half afraid I’ll fall asleep on the sofa. My eyes burn and my skin feels tight on my body.
We talk a little about the case we’re working on which kept us out in the streets so long. Some good ideas are shared, but I know I’ll forget them by morning. My throat is scratchy in spite of my drink.
"Oskar." Max’s hand is on my shoulder. "You needn’t pretend you’re fine. Why don’t we get you in bed? You don’t need to entertain me, you need looking after."
"You should go," I manage to croak out. "I can’t carry on a conversation or even think. I’m sorry, I didn’t realize I was getting a cold or whatever it is. You don’t want to catch it, and I’m no good to anyone tonight."
Max frowned. "You don’t need to be useful, or whatever you’re thinking you need to be, all of the time?"
I think he doesn’t understand. "Max. I can’t..I’m not in the mood or have the ability to, um, be intimate with you tonight," I tell him bluntly, not knowing what else to do. His face registers surprise and sadness. I think I was right.
"Well, I assumed that. Do you think I only come home with you, spend time with you, for that?"
I don’t know what he’s getting at, so I say ‘yes,’ and he looks even sadder.
"I was drawn to you. I had and do have physical feelings for you, yes. But it’s not the only reason I want to be with you. It’s true I’m naïve about such things, but I wouldn’t have wanted to have sex with you if I didn’t also feel something for you. I hoped you’d feel something too."
"Feel what?" I grumble, getting a bit cranky about whatever it was I wasn’t picking up and Max wasn’t saying. His face turns pink, and suddenly he’s tongue-tied. He looks away from me, and then back again.
"Oskar - I love you," he whispers.
I’m shocked, yes. This, I didn’t expect. My feelings are a combination of wanting to hug him and wanting to run from such a declaration.
"I’m sorry. I suppose I should go now," he sighs dejectedly.
"I don’t really want you to go. It’s only that you’re hitting me with surprises tonight and I’m slow because of this cold," I tell him.
"But you don’t have feelings for me."
"I haven’t said that," I protest, knowing I’m going to reveal myself more than I want to. Being with Max increasingly has that effect on me.
"Love isn’t something I’ve had much of in my life. I’ve had little reason to expect it. That doesn’t mean I don’t want it, even if I’ve tried to stop feeling it or looking for it. I need time, Max. I need to go slowly. I..have been hurt in the past. But it doesn’t mean I don’t have feelings for you. I just..you could find someone else tomorrow." I wince as I say it, knowing how needy and pity-inducing it sounds.
"I’m not looking for anyone else."
"I’m so much older than you. That doesn’t usually work, whatever you might think." It is my biggest fear.
"I don’t care that you’re older. As long as we’re sharing our feelings, I like that you’re older. I’m rather ignorant as far as my emotions, and caring about someone and making love with them. Having sex and all the pleasure it provides in the moment is wonderful of course. But I want - I need more. I need you, not someone who really doesn’t care about me at all."
He’s giving me hope, and I’m trying to decide if that’s good or bad for my bruised and trampled heart. Of course, what he wants is what I want too if I’m honest, but in all my adult years I’ve been chasing it and never found it. Could it be as simple as Max needing to find me? Fate or God’s will, who knows? The way he is with me when we’re making love, it is making love. I do feel that, in his reactions to me and in the way he caresses me. It’s something I haven’t had for almost my entire life. Too late for me now, or a new beginning? I don’t know, but I do know that it’s still something I want and I need, just as Max does. And here he is, telling me I deserve rest and care, deserve to be looked after and taken care of and he is prepared to do it. I’m tired of struggling with these thoughts. I want to believe.
"I care for you, yes. Being with you, whether it’s physical or emotional, makes me happy. I want the same as you, but I’ve had a lifetime of disappointment. I need to go slow, like I said. No pushing, no demands. We’ll see where it takes us. But don’t think I have no feelings for you because I can’t yet say out loud what you have said. Still, know that it’s precious to me that you have said it." I’m bone weary now, and emotional. "Any more tonight, I can’t. I do want to be in bed," I admit.
His beautiful eyes are wide and serious, but soft. Oh, so soft when he looks at me. I almost can’t bear it, but at the same time it’s cool water when I’ve been slowly dying of thirst for years.
"It will be all right," he tells me softly, helping me up and into the bedroom. My head is swimming a little. I sit like a child while he undresses me down to my underclothes and guides me into bed. I’m groaning with a mixture of achiness, and relief from the soft, cool mattress.
Eventually there is more honey and lemon, without the whisky this time, replaced by strong tea. Also his remedy for most things, aspirin. I admit it does work on simple pains, which is what my body is suffering now. He undresses down to his underclothes as well, gets the day’s newspaper, and slips in beside me.
"You don’t need to do this," I protest half-heartedly. "It’s too early for you to want to go to sleep."
"I don’t mind. I ran around all day with you, remember. I’m fine with an early night."
He has a sweet, reassuring response to everything. I’m an old grump and I know it, yet he takes the time and trouble to be kind. That in itself is soothing to me. I begin to drift into sleep, off and on. A little restless and uncomfortable, yet exhausted. He touches me now and then, rubbing my neck and back or just a light hand that says ‘I’m here if you need me.'
Somewhere in the early hours of the morning I can’t stop myself from wanting his comfort, and I turn into him and allow my head to rest on his shoulder. His arms pull me into a light embrace and I feel his lips, cool on my hot forehead. As much as I want and need him, as much as I might hope we will stay together in the face of what would be ridiculous odds, I’m still afraid to give him my whole heart just yet. I believe it will happen though, when my fear and stubbornness allow it. Really, it’s all over but the surrender.