Chapter 19

The Land Rover juddered to a stop at the end of a rough track, and Adrian switched off the engine. They’d climbed higher and higher, the land around them turning from rich green fields to heathland and scrub, the barely there track he’d taken not marked on any map. He glanced at Luca, who peered through the windscreen, and suppressed a smile. Luca didn’t have a clue what was waiting for him. To many, the land beyond the vehicle was bleak and harsh. To Adrian, it was untamed and wild, and all the more beautiful for it. He just had to convince Luca of the same.

“It’s, erm…”

Adrian laughed as he jumped out of the car. “Come on, I want to show you something.” Pulling out the cool box he’d hurriedly packed when Luca had agreed to his spontaneous suggestion, he nodded towards the crown of the hill. “This is as far as I can take the Land Rover, so we’re going to have to walk for about twenty minutes.”

Adrian looked down at Luca’s feet. Not hiking boots, but what he was wearing was sturdy enough for where they were going.

The wind was warm, but brisk, and Luca pushed his hair away from his face. “It’s so different up here. It’s like another world.”

“It’s what I like about it. You need to choose your time carefully because the weather can change for the worse with no warning. Very few people come up here and of those that have some haven’t made it back when nature’s turned against them.”

“Thank you for bringing me to a place of danger and death. And there was me thinking I’d be tucking into a ploughman’s in a pretty meadow filled with colourful wild flowers. Your choice of location is, at least, original.”

They didn’t speak much as they made their way up the hill. The ground was mostly dry, but pitted with holes that could catch the unwary and inattentive. Reaching the crown, the wind whipped them both, grasping at shirts, plastering jeans to thighs.

“Oh my god,” Luca breathed.

Adrian said nothing as he studied the man next to him, lost in what lay before them. Luca’s lips were parted slightly, and his chest rose and fell from the short but steep walk. His hair whipped around his face, the sunlight making it shine like gold. Luca turned to him and smiled, his eyes bright with wonder.

Beautiful, so damn beautiful… A weight pressed hard on Adrian’s chest, forcing the air from his lungs, making it hard to breathe as Luca smiled into his eyes.

“Is it real?”

“What?”

Luca nodded to the clearing, looking to Adrian for an answer.

“Yes, it is.” Adrian’s voice scraped his throat, rough and gravelly, but if Luca noticed he gave no indication as he turned his attention back to the clearing.

“Incredible,” Luca whispered, as he gazed in awe at the ring of standing stones taking centre stage in a steep dip in the middle of the crown.

They picked their way over worn ridges in the land; the wind dropped and fell silent as they reached the earthwork enclosed stones.

Twelve standing stones, some with lintels still in place, encircled a pock marked slab mottled with bright patches of lichen. Supported by smaller stones, it was about the size of a large dining table.

“Are you sure this is real?” Luca asked, walking around and inspecting the henge. “It could be a folly.”

“No, it’s real. The stones might have been reset in place at some time, I suppose, but there’s nothing to suggest it. Very few people come here because they’re so out of the way and the land gets heavily water logged, which can be lethal for the unwary. There’s also a lot of dark folklore attached to them. All of it superstitious nonsense, but it’s surprising how strong a grip it has even now.”

“Dark folklore? A place of sacrifice or witchcraft?”

“Something like that. Whatever, it keeps the crowds away, which is just how I like it.”

Luca smiled. “So I’m privileged to be brought here? Thank you.”

They unpacked the food on the slab, an eclectic and tasty mix.

“It’s like an altar. I can imagine it being used for ritual sacrifice.” Luca scooped up hummus onto a piece of bread.

“Hmm, of city boys who were foolhardy enough to wander too far from Zone One on the underground.”

Luca spluttered, grabbing at his apple juice to gulp some down.

“Is that what you think I am? It’s true, I suppose. At least in part. But what about you? Weren’t you at one time that same city boy you mock me for being? I remember you mentioning a corporate job, and you don’t get too many of those in small Devonshire villages.”

“True enough. I studied in London and after university I got my foot on the first rung of the must-have career. It was like I was in a straight jacket and I hated every moment of it. I got up one morning and the weather was so good, it was spring and the world felt like it was full of possibilities which didn’t include being holed up in an office. Then and there, I made the decision to pack in the rat race along with the suits, shirts and ties that felt like they were strangling me. They all went in the bin. Literally.”

“That’s some decision to make. Did you come back here, to the farm? To take time to think about next steps?”

“No.” Adrian instantly regretted the snap in his voice. His lips twisted into something like an apology. “Sorry, didn’t mean to bite your head off, but coming back wasn’t an option. It would have felt too much like failure. Or that’s what I thought at the time. Returning with my tail between my legs. There was no way I was going to have that laid on me. I suppose,” he said, an unexpected shyness creeping over him, “in some ways I ran away. Not that I was going to admit that to myself.”

“You don’t have to tell me any of this, not if you don’t want to. But, I’ve been told I’m a good listener.” Luca reached forward, resting his hand lightly on Adrian’s before withdrawing it. Reassurance and sympathy. Maybe even understanding. Adrian’s heart twisted hard. God, he craved that so much.

But opening up, being honest about what really mattered to him, about how he felt… When had that worked for him, when had that not turned around and kicked him in the teeth? His stomach clenched so hard he winced, and he hesitated, his instinct to back off and tuck everything firmly out of sight and close down. It was safer, it was the wise thing to do. But here, just the two of them with nothing but the breeze, the high wheeling birds, and the ancient stones, something inside him unlocked and loosened.

“I always seemed to be at odds with my mum and dad,” he said quietly. “Always, for as long as I can remember, we were locked in a never-ending battle. The only one I could ever talk to was my gran, and when she died the arguments with my parents only got worse. What they wanted for me, and what I wanted for myself, caused so much friction.

“The Hardys worked the land. It’s how it had been for generations, and it was how it was going to stay. I had other ideas, and I was going to break with tradition whether they liked it or not. Add in stubbornness and a refusal to listen or compromise, on both sides, meant the divide between us only got wider over the years until it became unbridgeable. When I left for university I was determined to never come back. And mostly I didn’t.”

“That was a huge decision for somebody who was still a teenager.”

“Not really. My nan was gone, and I’d never felt much connection with my parents. I was constantly locking horns with them. But the different ideas we had about the life I wanted to live went deeper than not accepting I’d be just another Hardy who worked the land. When I was sixteen, they found out I was gay.”

“Oh.”

Adrian snorted. “Oh. It’s one way of putting it, I suppose.” Adrian slowly shook his head, as the memory of that long ago day burnt bright behind his eyes.

“I’d decided to work up to telling my parents because even though I tried to tell myself I wasn’t shit scared, I was. So I told my brother first.” Adrian swallowed down the bitterness. “It was the worst thing I could have done.”

He stopped, closing his eyes for a moment, centring himself before he inched open the floodgates a little more.

“Richard was a couple of years older than me. We were very different, but close. Or I thought we were. I’d always looked up to him. And I loved him. He was so laid back, just got on with doing what Dad told him to do. Anything for a quiet life, he always said. I honestly thought he’d be okay with it, that I could confide in him and he’d have my back.”

“But he wasn’t and he didn’t.” Luca gave his arm a gentle squeeze. Adrian’s heart clenched, needing the solidarity in Luca’s touch more than he realised.

“He hit the roof.” Adrian swallowed. Richard’s betrayal after so many years was still hot enough to burn and scar. “He’d always been a good brother. He taught me how to ride a bike, he’d take me fishing, and help me with my homework when my parents either wouldn’t or couldn’t. I believed I’d be safe telling him.” He scraped a hand down his face. “But the things he called me, before he went straight to my parents, betraying something that was so important and central to who I was, outing me to them before I was ready.”

“Jesus. What did they say?”

“They were shocked, but I’ve got to give them their due because they didn’t wring their hands and start wailing.” He half snorted, half laughed. “It took the wind out of my brother’s sails. My dad said he’d always suspected, and then went off to milk the cows. My mum put the kettle on. That was the only time we talked about it, if you could call it that. It was like if it wasn’t acknowledged, it didn’t exist.”

“What happened with Richard?”

Adrian blew out a long breath. “His betrayal was something I could neither forget nor forgive. All the trust I put in him, all the belief and hope that he’d stand by me, he chewed it up and spat it in my face. He never explained why he did what he did, or why he felt how he did. I confronted him, but he refused to talk to me about it. It tore me up inside, not knowing why. Whatever reasons he had, he was keeping them to himself. So I kept my distance, or as much as I could. After what he did to me, I could never trust him again. I just kept my head down and plotted my escape.

“When I turned eighteen and got the A Level results I needed, I packed my bags and walked out. I never wanted to see the farm again, and I was determined not to.”

Betrayal. All his trust and belief thrown back in his face. First Richard, the brother he’d loved, but he hadn’t been the last…

“Why did you come back?”

Adrian hesitated as the memory, as bright as the sky above them, surfaced. A phone call from the other side of the world, in the early hours of the morning, when he’d been more asleep than awake, changing the course of his life and exposing the sense of rootlessness that had little by little been gnawing at him for years.

“My dad died in a farming accident, which is more common than you’d think. I was abroad, and I came back for the funeral. Or funerals as it turned out, because my mum died just days after. She’d had a dodgy heart for years, and we reckoned the shock of losing Dad killed her. Richard and I had nothing much to say to each other, and I left again as soon as I could, determined not to return. But I did, just a few months later. Richard was killed in a car accident. Hit and run. He wasn’t married, had no kids, so I ended up inheriting a farm I didn’t want.”

Luca tilted his head. “I remember you saying something. That you didn’t choose farming, farming chose you.”

“It wasn’t the life I wanted, I’d made a career of telling myself that. I was determined to sell up. After all the years I spent running from the place, I thought I could just let it go. But I couldn’t. Returning, in some twisted, bizarre way I couldn’t even begin to explain, I felt I’d come home. But I wasn’t on my own when I came back.” He met Luca’s steady gaze.

“Ah.”

“It didn’t work out. Obviously,” Adrian said, his voice rough and strained. “Not everybody’s cut out for the realities of rural living, as I soon found out. It can be a shock. What you take for granted in a town or city isn’t so easily come by in more remote areas. His name was Sam.” A man he’d believed in, trusted and loved. A man who’d lied, deceived and betrayed. “His romantic view of country living was soon knocked out of him. He couldn’t settle here. There were endless arguments. He packed up and left a couple of years ago, and when he did he didn’t leave on his own.”

Adrian looked away, Luca’s steady gaze a torch that was shining too bright for him stare into.

“I’m so sorry. For all of it. It’s hell, isn’t it, when a relationship you believed in goes to shit?”

Luca’s voice was quiet, and not quite steady. Adrian turned to him. There was sympathy in Luca’s eyes, but pain too.

Protected by the dip, the wind had been nothing more than the faintest, occasional featherlight waft. Now it had died away altogether, as though it were waiting for answers to unasked questions.

“Why are you here, Luca? You said you were — were passing through.” Adrian stumbled to a stop, the words catching him like an unexpected punch to his gut. If Luca registered his trip, he didn’t show it as he gazed into the middle distance, seeing something only visible to him. Luca sighed, and the tension in his shoulders only became clear when they slumped.

“I was with somebody. In London. If we’re trading names, his was Bruno.”

Luca pulled his knees up and hugged them to his chest. It made him appear younger, more vulnerable and Adrian fought the urge to sweep the picnic aside and let it crash to the ground, and wrap Luca up in his arms. He clenched his fists, forcing himself to sit still, and wait.

“He worked in banking and got offered a job in Bermuda. The bank wanted him out there as soon as, so everything was being done to expedite the move. He assumed I’d give up my life in London and go with him. If I wanted to work, he said, I could find something to do in one of the local hotels.” Luca huffed, his lips tightening as he shook his head.

“He’d never taken my job seriously; he thought I floated around all day making sure everything looked pretty. Needless to say, that always rankled with me. He never, ever appreciated how hard I’d worked to get where I was. I had a very good job and when I said I couldn’t just up and leave, I was given an ultimatum. Go with him, or it was finished between us. I—I was shocked at how brutal he was about it. It was a side to him I suspected existed but had never encountered head on. Or not until it really mattered.”

“Did you make the right decision?” Adrian watched him, studied him, looking for any sign Luca believed he’d taken the wrong path.

“I didn’t know. Not at first. And that was what was freaking me out. Not being sure, when sure was something I’d always been. About the path my life was on. The career that meant and means so much to me. Whether I’d let Bruno and the life we could have had go too easily.”

Luca’s fingers picked at the bread on his plate, shredding it into tiny crumbs.

“Now, I know the decision was the right one for me. But when he left, I felt kind of anchorless. I’d been used to being part of a couple, and suddenly I was free, with no accountability to anybody. Thing was, it didn’t feel much like freedom.

“I needed a change of scenery, to get out of London — ironic, when you think about it. I negotiated my way out of my contract of employment, and that was when Alex persuaded me to come to The New House. It felt like a lifeline, and I grabbed it with both hands. It’s been almost a year since everything fell apart, which I know should be long enough to move on, but in some ways it still feels like last week.” Luca shook his head as he stared into the distance. “A year,” he whispered. “Jesus.” He turned back to Adrian. “We were talking about you. Sorry. I didn’t mean to steal the limelight.”

“Limelight is definitely what I don’t want. And I asked you the question. It’s all too easy to spend time licking old wounds, and thinking about what might have been.” Christ, what a fucking waste of life. The realisation pressed down on him, as hard and heavy as the standing stones. A nudge on his arm dragged him out of the morass of his thoughts. Luca held out a refilled glass of apple juice.

“You’re right. One thing I’ve learnt is that dwelling on what went wrong in the past isn’t the best way to face the future. Here’s to leaving all the crap behind and looking forward to new and better. For both of us. Cheers.”