The Shadow Anthology

Tom

Lee was an impeccable father to his children after their mother disappeared. Mere hours after they were born, they had been left to their own devices, accompanied only by doctors. Their father had abandoned them in search of her, but he came back.

Their childhood and adolescent years were mostly unremarkable, despite how they had begun. Their personalities flourished without any major flaws. By the time the pair were twenty years old their father was fifty-five, though he neither looked it nor acted it.

Lee had always been a man of tradition and therefor was greatly opposed to his daughter’s disinterest in all manner of men. She found herself evidently unattractive to women as she had tried to follow this path in her collegiate years. However, her relationships with men could never last longer than a month; they were either purely emotional or physical, and she expected something more. Scarcely was there a mixture of the two, though when one did occur it quickly and mysteriously toxified.

However, this wasn’t the most prominent issue in the Hayes household after Tom began to bring home other men to spend the night. It had never been glaringly obvious to his father as his son had always preferred sporting to singing ever since he could walk. The sudden uproar of shock upon his son telling him he was gay was locked away deep in his mind. The disgusted thoughts slowly festered away in his subconscious until they rage to the forefront of his mind. When he could take no more, he packed up his son’s belongings, took out a thousand or so pound from his savings and left all of it on the front porch, accompanied with a note.

The note read, “Tom, I don’t know if your sexuality is a choice, or if nature has forced you to be like this, but I do know that almost every night for two years you have chosen to bring other men into my house. I confronted you on the matter many times, but you keep shunning me and shutting me up by shouting “bigot" and “prejudice". I will not live with this behaviour in my house when I am doing you a favour by letting you live here. I can’t tell you to change, or even ask you to, because I don’t think I know what’s best for you anymore. I know what is best for myself and my daughter however, which is for you to leave us alone. I know this won’t be easy and I am sorry, but please leave and never come back. Lee.”

Upon reading this, Tom left. He didn’t turn back at any point of his journey, nor did he attempt to contact either Lee or Sophie. He was well educated and so quickly found a job working as a teacher. Some years went by and he moved on again, to a place where he could work in his preferred field. He became quite a well-known rugby player and began to receive petty sponsorship from a variety of brands. Though he was far from making millions he was assuredly well-off.

A couple of years on, Tom Hayes happily met his match. He arrived at his newfound lover in the town of Rowbrey. He was travelling the country at the time and happened upon a man his age called Grayson. They were brought together in a simple public park for the first time. Both men were walking their beautiful long-haired huskies. The dogs went into a frenzy of smelling each other and wrapped the men tightly together.

Five years onward, despite countless unwanted arguments and almost as many necessary ones, the couple moved in with each other and began to prepare for marriage. The ceremony was quiet, as they wished it to be. Tom hadn’t invited his sister as he had no idea how he would get on touch with her, given that he didn’t know her state of living. He also assumed that she had been given numerous opportunities to contact him but hadn’t done so.

Grayson's situation wasn’t too dissimilar from Tom’s as they had both been forced out of their homes at an early age. Grayson was eighteen when his mother expunged him from their home without a penny to his name. He was significantly more flamboyant as a child than his counterpart, though little did that show in his later years. He had no siblings, though both his parents and grandparents were still alive and hate-fuelled. Hence the wedding was sparsely populated.