Couldn't fucking believe my eyes. I was filled with a mixture of rage and joy as all the repressed resentment toward Grant for abandoning me at the threshold of my most life-changing experience, warred with the familiar feelings of love and contentment that I had always associated with his sweet face. Grant had always, until the moment of his extraordinary failure of character (in my opinion), symbolized stability and safety, and a glimpse of that welcome emotion coursed through me as I gazed into his eyes over the distance. Nonetheless the deep feelings of abandonment that I had experienced at his hand when he chose his ideology above me, now manifested as a deep desire to kick him in the face. That same face held a mixture of astonishment and glee at the position in which he found me, with Jan's impressive piece of meat not an inch from my almost pouting lips.
"Wow, Benjamas, looks like you haven't lost your touch baby!" he quipped, and walked into the bungalow followed by two burly MPs who pretended that seeing a troep with another's boerepiel (Afrikaner cock) on display near his mouth was the most natural thing imaginable. As he made his way towards me the battle between my conflicting emotions escalated and I was torn between throwing myself into his familiar arms and spitting in his cute, grinning face. The latter won out.
"I'm not your fucking baby, you deserter! How dare you make an appearance here? Have you come to gloat that you were right? Have you come to see where my `cowardice' has left me stranded, legless and without prospect for a normal life?"
As he walked towards me I swung my chair away from Jan's now drooping dick (amazing how quickly a man can lose an erection in the face of immanent conflict) and raced at my approaching ex. Instead of slowing down I sped up and crashed into my astonished ex lover's legs and sent him flying onto his back. He was barely able to break his fall, and only because the equally dumbfounded MPs ended up in a tangle behind him, providing a (under different circumstances) comely mattress. I launched myself at him out of my chair and landed on his chest where I sat in a parody of our lovemaking in better days. I used to love squirting on his face and he would ejaculate spectacularly as my spunk painted his upturned chin and nose and eyes.
No cum this time as I vented my rage by shoving at his chest, causing astonished grunts to erupt from him in time to my rough attention. My words and sobs came in concert.
"YOU-CANT-JUST-WALTZ-IN-HERE-AS-IF-E-V'RY-THING-IS-JUST-THE-WAY-IT-WAS!" I banged away at him, eventually growing inarticulate as relief at seeing him overcame my grief at losing him and I fell into his comforting arms, howling my desolation into his understanding embrace.
The confused MPs tried to exert their influence in the face of such over-the-top display of emotion.
"You have one hour. We will be back for you then," the one barked at the still overcome and prostrate Grant.
They may as well have not existed as the now mildly embarrassed platoon tried vainly to pretend that they were invisible, but of course they weren't and they weren't likely to be able to disappear as their disabilities made it hard for them to just simply evaporate into thin air.
Grant was a gregarious type and, pulling himself together, immediately sussed out the situation. He disentangled himself gently from my still sniffling grip and got up to introduce himself to the guys. Typically, he cut straight to the chase and didn't wait for Jan to tuck away his still impressive flaccid cock before sticking his hand out and grasping the flustered private's hand to shake it vigorously.
"Hi, I'm Grant," he said cordially. "If Bennie told you anything about me I guess I won't win any popularity contests here at the moment."
"No fucking kidding," Jan said as he disentangled his hand from Grant's and undid his belt to restore his modesty as if it was quite ordinary for a man to be packing his lunch while meeting a stranger. I guess it just depends which crowds you move in and the guys had been exposed to some novel ways of relating since I had come on the scene.
Grant nodded at the mostly hostile looking group and walked back over to me and helped me back into my chair. Once he had me settled, the gravity of my situation seemed to finally penetrate and he took a moment to just look at me. I saw his face first begin to colour a deep red as what he saw before him finally hit home. His composure crumbled.
"Jesus, Bennie, what did I let you do. Why didn't I fight to keep you out of here? This is all my fault. I'm so sorry baby, I'm so, so sorry..." His last words were wracking sobs as he knelt in front of me and took my hands in his.
"Will you forgive me for abandoning you? Can you bring yourself to let me try and make it up to you by being there for you, as I should've been from the start?"
Weirdly I had regained my composure as he lost his and although tears still streaked my cheeks I felt an eerie calm pervade my being as I looked at the man who had formerly been my star, my beacon. I realised that, while I still loved him, he by no means held that position any longer. Where previously a deep dependence had nestled, chaining me to this man with an inexorable need for proximity and approval, now I had been delivered of my desire to be validated by him. The moon of my existence had escaped the orbit of his planet's attraction. Perhaps I had come to realise that I was no moon after all, but the star of my own existence.
It had taken losing my legs to find my feet.
I waited as his grief played itself out and I wondered whether I thought it was too little, too late. I didn't hate him; I just pitied him because I had seen what a man could do when he loved somebody. Ben Jordaan stood on my horizon, a monument to devotion and while Grant had always done his best to support and love me (we had dubbed it `unconditional positive regard', a phrase which now reeked of the bland vanilla political correctness which it typified) he had shown in the end that his belief system didn't include space for grace and sacrifice. These were not qualities that you could pull from nowhere. They were either born into you or engraved on your heart through suffering and pain.
With Grant sobbing on my lap all I could think of was what my Ben was enduring and wonder if he was ok. I ached for him with a dull throb, similar to the phantom pains I still experienced in my now absent limbs. He represented a fragment of me that had been ripped away prematurely, just as it was beginning to identify as a part of my being, showing the promise of adorning my life with a significance I had never foreseen.
The guys were beginning to get seriously embarrassed and with polite coughs and grunts filed by me to leave me and my weeping ex behind to catch up. Wessels rolled his eyes and shook his head while I gave a bleak smile as he hobbled by.
I waited patiently for Grant to weep out his guilt and remorse and when he finally looked up at me through tear stained eyes all I could muster was a quiet smile. He immediately knew that something was amiss and struggled to his feet to sit on the closest bunk and lean towards me.
"What?" he asked, fear and doubt evident in his voice.
"Grant, a lot has happened since you said goodbye to me at the station. And I don't only mean that I've lost both my legs below the knee."
Grant flinched at the casual mention of my disability. I had always been a live wire, hyperactive even, and to see me sedately parking in one spot with my wheel chair must have seemed strange to him. I carried on.
"I've changed in other ways too. I'm stronger than you remember me."
He nodded and I could see the recognition of that fact dawn in his eyes.
"You are. You were always beautiful, but now you're strong too. Oh God, Benjie, I was such a fool to let you go...! I love you so much...I didn't realise what I was doing when I acted so stupidly...I only want to..."
His words trickled to a halt as he saw the expression on my face. A puzzled frown jostled with fear and then, at last, comprehension. I nodded.
"I've met somebody...another troep. It hasn't been going on for very long, but I have fallen for him completely." I watched tears gather in his eyes again as he slowly shook his head.
"I've gone and fucked us up too, then..." he whispered.
"No Grant. It's not you. It's him. I wish you could meet him and then you would understand."
There was a long, long moment of silence as he searched my eyes for confirmation and I could actually see the moment when he resolved to put my good above his own illuminate his sad face. I was proud of him for taking the leap and in true form, self-sacrifice painted a prettier picture than self-absorption.
"Tell me about him, Benjie," he said softly. What could have been resignation in his voice, was infinitely better interpreted as warmth and love. He had redeemed his ideological folly with one sentence.
I sat, contemplating how to describe Ben Jordaan in ways that wouldn't highlight all of Grant's failings, and realised that it wasn't my responsibility to try and sugar coat the truth and so minimize who my Ben is. Conviction could, I know, arise in Grant, and his heart could accuse him. He had to fight that demon himself; I couldn't minimize the betrayal that I had experienced at his hands, much as I still loved him. I couldn't make Ben smaller to help Grant feel bigger.
"Ben Jordaan is a straight man who has fallen in love with me."
I held up my hand to quell his natural protest at the notion that a man who falls in love with another man could be straight.
"My therapist is an asshole. Well he's also a rapist."
Grant's face drained of all blood as what I was saying penetrated.
"No he didn't succeed in raping me but let me tell you the whole story. Lieutenant Vosloo has had an obsession with me from the start. He was completely bipolar. One minute he would be soft and gentle and the next a complete asshole. It was during one of his Mr. Hyde episodes that Ben showed me some tenderness... He occupied the bunk above me, and one night a few days ago only, he slept in my bunk and one thing led to another."
I felt myself blushing. I was tempted to avoid Grant's eyes, but forced myself to meet his gaze.
"The next day everything was different. Ben was different. Everybody noticed it."
"Did they know the two of you...you know?"
I chuckled.
"It almost turned into a full-on circle jerk. Well everybody was jerking, but in their beds. Yes, everybody knew, and what's more, they had known that Ben had a thing for me before he even knew it. Nobody was surprised when we disappeared after breakfast. When we came back we were a couple."
"But it's so fast Benjie. How can you know this is right if you haven't taken the time to check it out?"
I looked down at my legs.
"How can I know whether I will still be around tomorrow, Grant? After what I've been through, I know life is fragile and that the only moment I have is now! Also, Ben is like nobody I have ever met. He's big on the outside and the inside."
I went on to describe how Ben had given himself for me and was now probably being tortured for me, all to spare me pain and humiliation. A look of horror and then outrage slid across Grant's handsome face.
"You are fucking kidding me! Of course I knew this stuff still goes on here and that was one of the reasons that I was so against you coming here besides the ideological issues I had with it. Damn, Benjie, the moment I walk of this place I'm going to the newspapers and I'm going to kick up a fuss!"
"Grant you can't do that! You'll only make things worse for Ben and probably yourself as well."
"Bennie these people are far too used to getting their own way! When good people say nothing... It's the least I could do. It we don't say anything for fear of retaliation we ensure that another generation of innocent gays has to endure the same victimization. Ben is already deep in trouble and if he is half the man you describe he would welcome the chance to see his sacrifice benefit others."
I had forgotten how persuasive Grant could be. Passion lit his eyes and a terribly attractive glow flushed his excited cheeks. Uncertainty dripped through my veins like a leaden poison. It was not a decision I was prepared to make alone. I had to consult my brothers in arms.