When Love Comes to Town

For my friends. —Tom Lennon

FOREWORD

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Irish Slang and Other Terms

Ireland in the 1990s

Meet Neil Byrne—Dubliner, rugby star, soon-to-be graduate.

He’s weeks away from his eighteenth birthday. Many of his friends have joined up in romantic pairs (the “rhyming couplets” he regards with jealous cynicism), but Neil remains single. He’s got, in his own words, “a problem that won’t go away.” He’s gay. And for Neil, being gay is both a secret and a burden.

After all, consider the year: 1992. Neil connects with friends using a telephone booth instead of a cell phone. He listens to music recorded on cassettes and played on a Sony Walkman. Neil and his peers may legally (if not always responsibly) drink beer in pubs, where the music of U2 and Sinead O’Connor play over stereo speakers.

Much has changed in the two decades since an Irish educator calling himself “Tom Lennon” published this groundbreaking book. (To protect his Catholic school teaching career, the author never revealed his identity.)

The novel reminds us how isolated many gay people felt in the pre-Internet age, before connecting with others was as easy as a click. That isolation was only increased by the near-invisibility of role models: no out actors or musicians, no out politicians or sports heroes—in fact, not many out and proud ordinary people either. In the novel’s first chapter, the only visible gay person Neil sees is a shadowy stranger who propositions him in a public bathroom. Not a super inspiring vision of a young person’s future, is it?

We may be tempted to judge Neil for his at-times bleak outlook, but think of his situation: no gay-straight alliances in schools, no Ellen Degeneres on TV, no uplifting talk in the media about how “it gets better.” And imagine the risk of telling his parents, when “always in the family, nothing was ever said when it should have been.” Neil’s parents have no more resources than he does, because they’re stuck living in the pre-Internet, pre-PFLAG world too.

For most young people now, it’s not that way anymore, but it sure felt that way then. When I was a closeted gay teen in the late 80s, I felt the same intense isolation that Neil feels, along with the same ugly, internalized homophobia. My fear controlled my life. I remember this endless, confusing flirtation with a cute guy I’d see in my college library. Sitting at separate tables, we’d steal glances across the room. He’d catch me looking at him, I’d catch him looking at me, back and forth, on and on…for two years! We never spoke. I never even knew his name. The behavior seems crazy to me now. (By the end of the 90s, the first time I laid eyes on Mike, my partner, I walked straight up to him, introduced myself, and said, “Let’s get coffee sometime.”)

I don’t mean that it’s easy for young people to come out now; it may never be easy. But with the Internet, more role models, more resources in schools, more protection under the law, and a greater ability to simply talk about sexual identity and diversity, the process has improved for many people.

This funny, suspenseful, and heartbreaking book is a welcome reminder of how far we’ve come since 1992. We read it now to be entertained by the story, to feel moved by Neil’s difficult circumstances, and to be grateful that things have gotten so much better for all of us.

Plus, when you’re young, it’s always fun to ask that timeless question: When will love come to my town?

N
eil rested his elbows on the window ledge, sank his chin into his hands, and stared out across the neighborhood gardens. Clothes flapped on clotheslines, birds squawked, small kids played soccer in the garden that backed onto theirs, and a couple of semi-naked diehards lay sprawled on deck chairs soaking up the watery rays of early May sunshine. At the end of his own garden, a rope with a car tire attached to the end of it dangled from the tree house that his father had built years before. Everything in the garden was in bloom. But even the fresh flowery scents couldn’t change Neil’s mood; Sunday afternoons were always a low point in his week.

Certain that no one was looking, he leaned out the open window and tossed the soggy, sperm-filled tissue into the next-door neighbor’s bushes. Third of the afternoon.
God knows what sort of flowers will sprout from that bush
, he thought, lighting up a cigarette and slipping on the headphones of his Walkman. Sinead O’Connor’s haunting vocals brought tears to his eyes.

Nothing can stop these lonely tears from falling

Neil made sure to blow the smoke out the window; he didn’t fancy facing another of his mum’s investigations. He looked at the books spread out across his desk and closed his eyes in a grimace. There was so much he had to review before the exams, but he just couldn’t concentrate today. Then he glanced in the mirror, pouted, and made a face at his reflection.

Nothing compares

Nothing compares to you

Narrowing his moist eyes into slits, he focused on a flock of gulls gliding past distant telephone lines.
Lucky things
, he reflected. What he wouldn’t give to be able to just fly away with them. Flecks of dandruff cloud speckled the horizon sky. It was definitely a day for the beach. But the thought of being the spare prick yet again had made him use the study excuse when Gary and Trish had called.

“Jesus, you can’t study all day,” Gary insisted.

“The break’ll do you good, Neil,” Trish added, touching his arm gently.

“Plenty of time for catching rays over the summer,” Neil replied with a grin. Neil always grinned, that was what they liked about him. All the fun of the fair when Neil was around. Gary and Trish, Tom and Andrea, Joe and Mary, Paddy and Niamh …Tweedledum, Tweedledee, all the rhyming couplets were off to the beach—with Neil. “We’ll have to find you a girlfriend, Neil,” one of the girls would say, and Neil would lie back on the sand, cup his hands under his head, and make some smart-aleck comment like, “Only one?” And, of course, everyone would laugh. And Neil would laugh with them. But inside he felt the clawing emptiness. Sometimes he felt like he wanted to break down and tell them all about the real Neil. End all the pretense. Scream it out at the top of his voice for all the world to hear.

The bedroom door burst open and his young niece stood in the doorway, her bottle in her hand. Neil removed his headphones, switched off the Walkman, and stubbed out his cigarette quickly.

“How’re you, Anniepoo?” he said, holding his arms out.

“No, Anniepoo. Nee’s shoe, Nee’s shoe.” The sturdy two-year-old was pointing at his runners.

“Neil’s cool Reeboks,” Neil said, lifting his beaming niece up onto his knee. He could hear the commotion downstairs. His oldest sister Kate and her husband, Dan, along with their two kids, had arrived for their Sunday afternoon visit. His mum was showing Kate the new curtains in the dining room, his dad was chatting with Dan in the living room, while Danny, his three-year-old nephew, was running from room to room, shooting bad guys with his noisy machine gun.

“You crying?” Annie was pointing at his eyes.

Neil nodded. “I crying.”

This was a signal for his niece to lean forward and place a sloppy kiss on his nose.

“I better now,” Neil assured the little girl.

“Teddy, teddy,” Annie said, pointing to the small teddy bear sitting on top of the chest of drawers. Neil had been given Ted by Santa Claus when he was a baby, and at his mum’s insistence, it had remained in his bedroom ever since. He knew it was because he was the youngest in the family; it was her way of clinging on to the memory of happier times.

“Ted is watching you,” he said, gently pressing his finger into the child’s button nose.

“Nee’s books, Nee’s books,” she said, now pointing at the desk.

“Neil’s books,” Neil nodded, as he stood up and hoisted the delighted child onto his shoulders.

“My bot-bot, my bot-bot,” Annie squealed. Neil picked her bottle off the table and went downstairs with Annie bouncing up and down on his shoulders.

He stood outside the living room door and listened. His dad was holding court.

“You’ve met Chris, haven’t you, Catherine?” his dad asked.

“I think so,” his mum replied absently. “Doesn’t he work in the advertising department?”

“The very one,” his dad agreed.

“You always find them in advertising,” Dan, Neil’s brother-in-law, said with a guffaw.

“I mean, he doesn’t hide the fact that he’s one of them,” his dad added, and again Dan guffawed.

Outside the door, Neil was struggling to fight back a blush.

“But, you know, a better listener you’ll never find,” his dad continued.

“Is that right?” Dan said in his kiss-arse voice.

“People queue up outside his office for advice on their marital problems.”

“Don’t exaggerate, Dad,” Kate said.

“I’m telling you, they do,” his dad insisted. “The man’s a born therapist.”

“So long as he sticks to therapy,” Dan quipped, and he and Neil’s dad laughed.

Neil took a deep breath and walked into the living room. Dan immediately came over to Neil and slapped his back in his rugby-club manner. “Couple of weeks now and we’ll be able to go for a pint together,” he said, winking to the others.

Neil grinned, trying to conceal his horror at the thought of being stuck in a pub alone with his brother-in-law.

“Our little Neiley Nook’s going to be eighteen!” Kate exclaimed histrionically, clapping her hands to her face. “Oh my God, I feel ancient!”

“I must say, I’m looking forward to discovering what pubs look like from the inside,” Neil said in a deadpan voice, bringing a burst of laughter from the others, especially Brendan, his dad.

“Don’t mind that white lie,” said Catherine, his mum, smiling uncertainly.

“The most worrying thing is that this fellow and all his pals are going to be able to vote,” his dad said, and another friendly peal of laughter circled the room.

Then Neil’s little nephew charged into the living room, spraying the place with imaginary bullets from his clacking machine gun.

“You’re dead! You’re dead!” Danny shouted.

Everyone had to moan and pretend that they were hit before the noisy gun fell silent. Then the little fellow’s eyes lit up. He had spotted Neil. He dropped his gun, hurtled straight for his uncle, and wrapped his arms around his legs.

“Hulk Hogan!” Danny roared, attempting to lift Neil up off the ground.

“And the Warriors of Doom,” Neil said, keeping his head bowed, afraid that his dilated pupils would betray his squalid bedroom activities.

“They love their Uncle Neil,” Kate said.

“Mind the baby, Neil!” his mum warned, watching anxiously as Annie jigged up and down on his shoulders.

“So, how’s the studying going?” Dan asked.

“Fine,” Neil replied, adopting his best fake smile. Since Christmas, his brother-in-law had asked him the same question every time they met. He usually singled Neil out for a friendly chat, but Neil always felt awkward. Except for rugby, they had absolutely nothing in common.

“Danny, stop that!” Dan caught hold of his son who had begun to grab figurines off the mantelpiece and toss them across the room as imaginary grenades.

“Danny!” Kate shrieked.

“You’re a bold boy!” Dan said to his brazen-faced son.

“It’s all right,” Catherine said, stooping down to pick up her precious figurines

Brendan chuckled heartily as he rubbed his grandson’s

hair. “No damage done.” “Don’t encourage him, Dad,” said Kate. “You’d need eyes in the back of your head,” Dan said. “Did he break them?” Kate asked. “No, no, they’re fine,” Catherine said. Neil saw his

mum slip a broken china elephant into her pocket. Her brother, Frank, the missionary priest in Africa, had given it to her. Neil knew that he’d hear the complaints about Kate’s children later. But as always in the family, nothing was ever said when it should have been.

“I’ve got a bit of news.” Kate held her hands up theatrically, “Dan’s getting a new company car next week.” “Really?” Neil’s mum pretended to sound delighted. “What type?” his dad asked, his eyes lighting up. Kate turned to Dan. “What type was it again, pet?” “Well, it was a choice between a Volvo and a BMW,” Dan said. Neil could see that Dan was bursting with pride, though doing his utmost to appear modest. “We’re taking the Volvo because we think it’ll be safer for the children,” Kate told them. Brendan nudged Dan. “You let her choose, did you?” “You know yourself, Bren,” Dan laughed. “Don’t mind him,” said Kate. “Well, I think this calls for a celebratory drink,” Brendan announced, taking a bottle of his homemade wine from the liquor cabinet. “And we’ll even allow the young fellow a taste of things to come,” he added, nodding toward Neil.