[Most of the characters in this story have appeared in my previous stories, but you do not need to have read them. This is my first story written in the third person. It tells of two gay couples and an Italian boy who is in search of love and adventure in the English university city of Camford. As usual with my stories, some places and institutions are real, others are fictitious.]
Chapter One: Sandro arrives in Camford
On a beautiful summer afternoon in July, 20—, Alessandro Mascagnoli got off the train in Camford station. Sandro was 19 years of age and had successfully made the journey on his own from the small town where he lived in northern Italy to London-Gatwick airport via Valerio-Catullo-Villafranca airport. From Gatwick he had taken the train to Camford, a trip involving a confusing train journey through the centre of London. It was less than a year since he had last been in Camford, but then he had been brought by his parents for his grandparents' fortieth wedding anniversary, and his cousin Luca's civil partnership ceremony.
Sandro had grown up very close to both his parents. As a teenager he had never felt rebellious, and his discovery at the age of about 16 that the man whom he had always regarded as his father, Massimo Mascagnoli, was not his biological father, instead of creating a barrier between them, actually drew him closer, as he was old enough to recognize the kindness and nobility of a man who could marry a pregnant woman and bring up her child at his own. Surprisingly too, this revelation did not alienate him from his mother Dorotea, but drew him closer to her as he felt full of sympathy for a woman who had been so deceived. However, he nourished a lingering deep-seated venomous contempt for the man who had twice seduced her. The unexpected visit to the family of his hitherto unknown English brother, Luca, whom he had always thought was his cousin, had precipitated his mother's revelation of his parenthood. Meeting Luca and his relatives may have made Sandro wonder more about the world outside his home-town.
At school, he had had friendships with boys and girls of his own age but nothing really close. His closest friends had all been boys, but this did not stop him from looking with interest and excitement at some of the girls in his class at school, many of whom were very pretty. So it was with a sense of adventure and uncertainty about himself and particularly about his sexuality, that he had set out in great excitement, having surmounted the rather considerable barrier of gaining admission to a foreign university, the University of Camford. Apart from his family, there was no-one whom he really regretted leaving.
Sandro's intention was to matriculate in October at Saint Boniface's College to read engineering, but in the meantime he had been enrolled by his uncle on a so-called intensive course of English language at one of the numerous private language schools with which Camford is well endowed. It was not that he did not know English: he had been brought up as bilingual, as his mother was English and his father Italian. However, his pronunciation left a lot to be desired and his knowledge of English grammar was rather fuzzy. Moreover the College had insisted that he sit the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and get the maximum grade.
His biological uncle David Singleton-Scarborough, Luca's adoptive father, however, would not be there in Camford. He had recently started spending the summer months in the Dutch town of Heemstede, near Haarlem, where he was teaching singing and and having recording sessions for Philips. Accordingly, David's partner, Luca's cofather, Jonathan Singleton-Scarborough, would be keeping house for Sandro in their flat in Fountain Street until the Martinmas term began. It was a testimony to Jonathan's deep love for David that he had separated himself from his partner for two months in order to oblige the needs of David's extended family.
The bag that Sandro was carrying, together with a large backpack, comprised only part of his luggage. The remainder would be sent by an international road delivery service at some unspecified date in the future. Jonathan met him at the station and they loaded the two pieces of luggage into the back of the 4x4. Jon then drove them to Fountain Street. He never ceased to marvel at the resemblance between Sandro and his own adopted son, Luke, or Luca he was called by his Italian relations. This was scarcely surprising, as they were biological brothers. Both boys had long, very black wavy hair, both were tall and thin, and both were very brown-skinned.
Sandro had been assigned the small bedroom formerly occupied by David and Jon's daughter Cathy. Cathy, who still had another year of study at Oxbridge University, had insisted on being upgraded to the other spare bedroom as soon as her brother and Tom had moved out, mainly because she wanted the en-suite bathroom. However, she was currently staying with one of her friends in Scotland. By the time unpacking was complete, it was turned six o'clock, and Jon and Sandro went out to eat at the Sparrowhawk, a pub close by the flat in Fountain Street.
On the way to the pub, Jonathan said to him, "Non parlamo Italiano! From now on, I will no longer speak Italian to you. Everything you say must be in English. If you don't know the words, think of a different way to say the same thing in words that you do know. If that's impossible, then ask me in English what the word you need is, and I will tell you. But the only way for you to get really good at speaking English is never to use your native language. I will try, when we are together, to try and improve your pronunciation. You know most of the words, but you don't always say them in the right way. English is much harder to pronounce than Italian, because there are very few rules, and words are often not spoken the way they are spelt. Every evening before you go to bed, I will allow you to talk to me in Italian for not more than half an hour, just so that you can relax before you go to sleep."
It was unfortunate for Sandro that his brother Luca, whom everyone who did not know the secret of the two boys' parenthood thought was his cousin, was not around to welcome him. Luca had just gone to live in Italy with his partner Tom Appleton, where they had recently got jobs in the city of Trabizona. Sandro did not know his uncle David's partner very well, they had only met about twice, but he felt that he was going to get on well with this elderly man whom his uncle loved so much. The guy, even though he was approaching sixty, seemed to understand the feelings of teenagers.
This feeling of Sandro's was strengthened when they reached the pub. "As you're 19," said Jon "it's quite legal for you to drink alcohol, so I am going to buy you some English beer. I don't know whether you drank beer at home, but it is essential in this town to be able to drink and to enjoy beer. Most people don't like beer the first time that they taste it, or even the second or third time! But if you persevere, you realize that it is one of the most enjoyable and refreshing drinks there is. A lot of women don't like beer, but that's because they are not prepared to make the effort to learn, whereas men think that it is manly to drink beer, so they do make the effort. It's not true of course, but it makes men happy to think so! Language skills are just the same. You have to persevere and work hard to learn to speak a language well." He presented Sandro with a half pint of Camford's local brew, West London Bitter. Sandro tasted it and pulled a face.
"It's very bitter," he said. "What does 'persevere' mean?"
