'Sorry...'

It was the following morning and I had been lying in bed for a good half-hour before I gave up and accepted that despite of extreme tiredness I was unlikely to get back to sleep any time soon.

As I listened to the clanging sound of David's (my flat-mate from hell) searching around in the pan cupboard, no doubt looking for a frying pan for his regulation fried breakfast. I glanced over at the luminous red display of my digital alarm clock.

I decided to head into Bangsar and treat myself to something new and expensive that I didn’t need it. I picked up yesterday clothes that were lying on the floor at the foot of the bed and put them on, shoved my feet into my trainers and went to living room. Fausing to glance in the direction of the kitchen where my flat-mate continued his banging and clanking, I made my way out of the front door and closed it quietly behind me.

I haven’t speak a single word to my flat-mate since the previous evening. Passing each other in the hallway, in the kitchen or outside the bathroom 'our' preferred method of communication appeared to be what was known as ‘glower’ (brow furrowed, eyes narrowed, mouth set in a permanent scowl) which could variously be interpreted as ‘Just stay away from me.’ ‘You have let me down badly.’ Or ‘I am so annoyed that I can barely look at you,’ depending upon who was doing the scowling and the degree of facial manipulation that was occurring (I was damn piss off to see the living room was upside down while they had a 3sum at that late evening when I opened the door from work). This being the case I had opted simply to stay out from my flat-mate’s way (at least for today).

I headed to Bangsar Village II and spent a good hour or so wondering in and out of shops picking up anything that look that I fancy from new jeans and trainers to designer watch.

From there, I made my way to La Bodega but as I passed the bookshop, I found myself going inside. I couldn’t remember the last time I had bought so much as a birthday card so what I were doing in the shop was a mystery but eventually as I browsed the aisles I was drawn to the blank greeting card section. There were cards of every description from arty-looking black and white pictures through to ones adorned with the faces of celebrities but the only type that interested me were reproductions of various artistic pieces. I selected a Rothko print entitled ‘While over Red’, picked up a pack of biros and took them to the till to pay for my purchases.

I changed my mind about La Bodega and doubled back to myself until I reached to Starbuck's where I bought my normal double espresso (together with an impulse purchase of a blueberry muffin) and then sat down at a table towards the rear of the shop. I took out the card from its paper bag, ripped open the cellophane, opened my new pack of pens and contemplated the open page in front of me. I took a bite of blueberry muffin, chewed, then finally committed pen to paper:

‘Sorry’

I tried to imagine what Lawrence might feel when he read it. Would he like the card? Would he like the fact that it contained only a single word? Would he even know what I was sorry about? I wasn’t sure but I needed to do it. Not because I was going to try and win him back (I was pretty sure that Peter was right that it was unlikely he was going to change his mind) but because I felt, for reason I couldn’t quite pinpoint, that it was the right thing to do.

Ten minutes later, having drunk my coffee, consumed my muffin and sealed my card in an envelope, I checked my phone for Lawrence's address, scribbled it on the card and headed in the direction of the nearest post box.

With all that happened in recent weeks. I hadn’t given the ‘gay life’ (more to sex life) a great deal of thought. Now, however, that a young cutie boy was making it clear that he was interested, he decided now was the time to give it a great deal of thought. The main question on me is: my mind was testing whether Peter had been right in his suggestion that I should stick to what I was good at: being a single.

I was indeed good at being a single. Of all the single gay men I knew, I was one of the best. No one (at least no one had complaint about my performance in bed) could out me. I was the James Bond of ‘singledom’ and there were guys in the bar who would have lopped off a limb to be him for a single night. But was that enough? Enough to make a life that wasn’t completely devoid of all meaning? I decided to find out!

Making my way across the Frangipani bar, I engaged the boy, who turned to be French (or possibly Danish, I wasn’t quite sure because I had been too busy looking at his chest and tummy to pay attention to what he was saying) in conversation.

Refocusing my mind from his chest to his lips, I learned he had come to KL to see some of his university friends and this was his last night in town before heading back home, so he was desperate for the night to be as memorable as possible.

Clicking straight into ‘George-the-pull-autopilot’ within fifteen effortless minutes I had my arm round his solid waist, a beer in my hand and a big grin on my face that might as well have been a flashing neon sign announcing: ‘Here I am, a forty-eight-year-old single man with my arm round the kind of boy most mortals could only dream of.’ If there was a heaven for single men, this was it.

This was cool of the shaken but not stirred variety. This really was the best a man could get!

Did you get it my friend?