Daniel was stuck. It wasn't the pondering sort of stuck, or the worrisome sort of stuck, but the type of stuck that dug deep into a man's flesh and, if met by the right conditions and applied the right amount of pressure, could turn blood to ice, bone to dust, and mind to a brittle fragment of what it once was. You see, Daniel had a secret. He was beyond the schoolyard tales of who likes who - no, he was far too old for that now - and so his secret was kept with the most discrepancy one could possibly manage. He hid from the world and, when it turned its back, he embraced the invisibility the action granted him. He feared the day when it would not be its back it was turning, but its head.
But Daniel was a free man - at least, for the meantime. He came and went as he pleased, he met with who he wished, he worked where he worked, and he saw who he saw. His life was a done deal; it was fitted and tailored with an abundance of 'don't ask, don't tell' and 'need to know' policies. And it suited him well. It meant that no matter what he himself engaged in, the rest of the world needn't know his secret, nor that he even had one. After all, the fact of the matter was the truth behind the tailored facade would have been so unbearably devastating to hear that surely the skies would have shattered and the earth would have crumbled and fallen if the words were uttered aloud. Daniel, however, did not mind for one second. The mere thought of self-acceptance in the time he lived was an act of tremendous and utterly misplaced bravery, though, at the time, it was more often thought of as cowardice.
The important thing to understand is that Daniel, though living his life exactly as he pleased, lived in fear. He would, of course, deny this. No, Daniel had to be free, he had to be perfect, he had to be the man of the hour! And so he was to a certain extent. But his definition of freedom was very different to mine.
I met Daniel in the summer of '33. He was a student at a cheap college somewhere in Northampton, and I was one of the rich kids on the other side of town - a boy with a degree more valued than any kind of friendship or, heaven forbid, love. We did, however, share one thing in common, and even though that fact alone may surprise you, the reality of the situation was so much worse, so much more despicable, and yet so much more glorious than any one of our imperious friends could ever ascertain.
You see, Daniel and I were lovers.
But he was afraid, and childish, and was living his life the way he wanted to - all except one tiny detail. He never did see, at least not by the time I had made his acquaintance, that the life he was living wasn't his own, but the one that was expected of him. He fought so desperately to be his own man but despite winning a plenitude of insignificant battles, he simply could not win the war.
How we met does not concern anyone but ourselves; it is far too incriminating. But there is one thing I can tell you with absolute certainty: never, not even for the smallest of moments, did I regret meeting him. He became my friend, my confidant, and I'd even go as far as to say the love of my life. Daniel's fear, as I'm sure you can imagine, caused our meetings to be haphazardly irregular - sometimes surprisingly early, and sometimes disappointingly late. But, all in all, we were happy. We had been lovers for a total of two years, spending as many nights as we could in each other's arms, spending each painful day apart until it was time to rejoin once again. He meant the world to me. I swear he did.
But I was stupid. And, before long, it all fell apart.
I don't know how it happened - I wasn't present for proceedings that would lead to the worst day of my life. I wasn't aware of the danger that followed our every footstep, heard our every breath, and stared in on our every waking hour. I wasn't smart.
Whether it was the way I walked, or the way I held my body, or the way I spoke, or the way I laughed, or the infinite amount of other ways that could have sounded an identifiable alarm to those I shared breath with, someone knew. He knew what I was, and how I lived, and he knew that I'd give anything to have it not so. And he locked that away in his mind, to be used when required. I was oblivious for so long. All until he needed a favour.
