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Reasons

Lewis didn't look like he was dying. Apart from the plastic tube forcing an unnatural grimace at the side of his beautiful mouth Lewis looked much the same. Clare slipped into the chair by the bed and let her breathing slow to the rhythm of the ventilator.

Clunk. Sssss. Clunk. Sssss.

He looked very small under the bedclothes. Clare had always loved Lewis' compact little body. She used to be able to lift him up and swing him round, like a child. Now she put her hand out to touch him but hesitated, wary of disturbing the wires from the electrodes on his chest. There was an arterial line in his wrist, and a catheter tube peeped from the bottom of the bed. People had been messing about with Lewis' body and Clare wasn't sure if she was allowed to touch him any more. So she just sat and watched the stillness of his long eyelashes and listened to his mechanical breath.

Clunk. Sssss. Clunk. Sssss.

"He wouldn't think much of the outfit!"

Lewis' sister was standing at the doorway shaking her head.

"He always hated white - said it reminded him of his sins."

Clare looked at the surgical gown and smiled.

"Come on then, Lorna - let's get him into his leather trousers before the doctors come back. Dare you!"

Lorna came towards her, laughing a little too loudly as she caught Clare in a fierce embrace.

"I'm so glad you're here, Clare. I hate it on my own."

Clare squeezed her.

"Yes - that's what it's like, isn't it? Being on your own - it's like he's not here. Sit down, Lorna - I'll go get another chair."

When she returned Lorna was leaning forwards, elbows on her knees and hands folded under her chin. Clare watched her studying the brother who was so like her. Lorna wore her thick black hair loose, and Lewis always kept his head shaved, but they shared the same fine bones, strong noses and wonderful dark eyes.

"You look so alike." She realised that she had never said it before. Lorna sniffed.

"He got a better deal on the eyelashes," she said, taking Clare's hand. "Mum's coming later. They've asked her about .... about switching off the machine. The doctor said there was nothing more ...." She bit her lip. "Do you think he can hear us, Clare? Do you think he knows we're here?" Not waiting for a reply she sighed. "All the times I cursed him, wished he wasn't my brother."

"Don't," said Clare. "No one's ever happy with their brothers and sisters. That's the whole point of siblings - to teach you about hatred. Don't torture yourself."

"Did you hate your sister?" asked Lorna. "Did you ever want her dead?"

"Of course. I would've traded her in a thousand times. I wanted a brother you see."

"Yes," said Lorna. "I suppose I did too."

They looked at Lewis.

"Do you remember," asked Lorna, "when Princess Anne married Mark Phillips? Lewis was about eleven. You know he spent two whole days afterwards in his bedroom making an exact replica of her wedding dress. You should've seen it - it was perfect. And do you know what I did?"

"Sshh," said Clare. "It doesn't matter now."

"But it does," said Lorna. "It does matter, Clare. You know what I did? I ripped up that bloody beautiful dress. I threw the bits out of the window into the garden, and then I went out and stamped them into the mud. I just couldn't handle it. I just wanted Lewis to be - to be normal."

Clare shrugged. She knew the story.

"And the worst part," continued Lorna, "was that he forgave me. Any other brother would've kicked the shit out of me, but not Lewis. You know what he said? Eleven years old and he says - 'I'm sorry you find me difficult, Lorna.'"

She burst into tears.

After Lorna had left Clare closed the door and tried to remember all the things she wanted to say to Lewis. What had made her laugh out loud on the underground and what had woken her up in the middle of the night. But somehow it was hard to begin. It was hard to know what was important, the way it always was with Lewis. She thought about Lorna destroying his dress and smiled. Of course Lewis hadn't been angry. Even when his creations began to sell for hundreds of pounds Lewis never seemed to understand what all the fuss was about.

"After all, darling, they're only clothes," he used to say.

Clare pulled her chair a little closer to the bed and cleared her throat. Then she stood up and began to pull out the dead daffodils from an arrangement of spring blooms. She picked up the card in the centre and read, 'To dearest Lewis, with love from Adrian, Saul and Gita.' She did not recognise the names, but whoever they were they obviously had no idea about Lewis' taste in flowers. She looked at her own gift, a single bird-of-paradise on the bedside cabinet. Lewis would have liked that. With a shock she realised that she was thinking in the past tense.

Michael knocked on the door very gently, which irritated Clare, as did the cautious quiet with which he crept up to the bed.

"How is he?" he whispered.

"Oh, on top of the world!"

She didn't mean to snap, and the hurt in Michael's pale eyes made her feel like a prize bitch.

"I'm sorry," she said, "it's just ...."

"I know - stupid question."

"How are you?"

"Okay - well, I'd be a lot better if my best friend wasn't lying there unconscious, but you know how it is. And you?"

"Yes," said Clare slowly. "Yes - your best friend. It's funny - I kind of always thought of Lewis as being my best friend too. I told him everything you know. He knew - he knows - more about me than anyone in the world. That's what a best friend is, isn't it - someone you tell everything to?"

"Best friend," mused Michael, sitting next to her. "He would hate that term, wouldn't he?"

"Mmm."

Clare watched Michael watching Lewis.

"It's strange," she said. "Often I find myself thinking Lewis would like this, Lewis wouldn't like that. And most of the time I realise I really haven't got a clue. I just want him to wake up so I can ask him. So I can ask him if he's got a best friend, and what his favourite flower is, and who the hell are Adrian, Saul and Gita."

"Who?"

"They sent those flowers." Clare pointed out their gift amongst the array of bouqets. "Do you know them?"

Michael shook his head.

"Lewis knows a lot of people. He has a lot of friends - a lot of best friends." He hesitated. "Did he - did he have a lover? Do you know?"

Clare saw that he was embarassed.

"I think there was someone."

Michael gave a small smile.

"We never talked about it - after he told me, you know. We just never discussed his relationships. He always said his love life was a disaster."

"'There are two types of men in the world,'" quoted Clare. "'Those who I fancy - and those who fancy me.'"

Michael laughed.

"Yes, that's it."

"He was too fond of cliches," said Clare. "I said that to him once and he said, 'Clare, darling, I don't use cliches - I am a cliche.'"

Michael smiled.

"I was shocked, you know, when he first told me. We were only about sixteen and at that age it's more important to be the same as everyone else. But then Lewis always made a point of being different. He was the first boy in our year at school to have his ear pierced - and then, being Lewis, he had seven rings put in and nearly got expelled for the stud in his nose."

"They never saw his nipples?"

Michael grinned, shaking his head.

"He always had lots of girls round him, but he just never seemed interested. In their bodies I mean. He was interested in their minds. He'd stay up all night with them chatting - as you said, people always tell him everything. But that was as far as it went. And the irony of it was all the rest of us were just trying our hardest to get these girls into bed - and all the girls wanted was Lewis."

"Women love him."

"I love him too, Clare."

"I know."

Alone again with Lewis Clare wondered how much Michael really knew. Lewis told different stories to different friends. She had always told him to be careful. It was the only thing she ever told Lewis to do, even knowing that it was the most useless bit of advice to give him. For when he saw the sign in the road saying 'Slow', Lewis just always had to hit the accelerator. Going for a drive with Lewis was the best way Clare knew of cheering herself up - afterwards it always seemed such a miracle that she was still alive. Lewis mixed the strongest Margaritas, rolled the most stupefying joints, handed you a line of coke that would keep you just about touching the ceiling until the next morning. And he smoked Players untipped, constantly, reverently. He used to say smoking was the most elegant form of suicide. So it was pointless, after all, telling Lewis to be careful. Clare felt a little sob slip out, just as Lewis' lover walked into the room.

He wasn't what she'd expected, but then they never were. It was just she'd never quite given up the idea of seeing Lewis settle into the acceptable face of homosexual monogamy, coupled with a similar bright and articulate young man with a sensitive disposition and artistic leanings. The reality of Lewis' sexual life, therefore, was bound to be a disappointment. Lewis' men were brutes. She was even a little surprised that he was here at all, this huge, leather-clad monstrosity with the blank eyes.

"Hello, I'm Clare." She held out her hand. He took it briefly, reluctantly. There was no flicker of recognition at her name. Of course Lewis would not have talked of her, even mentioned her. As his large, cold hand dropped hers she noticed that his fingernails were filthy, and she covered her distaste with a smile.

"I'm a friend," she said.

The grunt of acknowledgement seemed like quite a favour.

"Are you - Sam?"

"Tony."

She knew it had been an optimistic guess. Sam had been last month.

"Well - " She rubbed her hands together. "I was just popping out for a cigarette - I'll leave you alone for a while."

Tony looked at her. For a moment she wondered exactly how much he had hurt Lewis.

Walking down the long hospital corridor Clare could almost hear Lewis' voice.

"I'm waiting to fall in love. All my life I've been waiting to fall in love. But I'm not half enjoying the dress rehearsals!"

They had been having a picnic in Hyde Park, watching a group of young men playing football.

"Don't fancy yours much," Lewis told her, indicating the fat youth in goal.

"Mine's the Adonis in the lycra shorts."

The Adonis in lycra accidentally kicked the ball at Lewis, who promptly sat on it until he came running up. He stopped several feet away, eyeing the ice bucket with suspicion.

"Gisit mate."

"Of course," said Lewis. "But first let me invite you to join my friend and I in a glass of Chablis and perhaps a little snack. We have some rather tasty lobster claws here and - "

"Nah fanks," said the young man amiably. "Can't stand fish."

"Just a little aperitif then?"

"What?"

"A drink?"

"Don't drink wine, mate. Can I have me ball now?"

Lewis sighed, threw the ball and watched the long brown legs running off.

"Another great love affair aborted," he moaned.

Clare snorted.

"Oh come on! He was a bit young - and a bit short on brain cells."

"Brain cells! What use have I for brain cells?" cried Lewis. "I was hardly envisaging a discussion of Schopenhauer."

"Well, what did you have in mind?"

"Ah, you know." Lewis stretched out on his back and put on his Ray-Bans. "Swinging from a chandelier, naked, my legs wrapped around his waist - that sort of thing."

As Clare walked into the tiny hospital garden she had a sudden vision of Tony's bulk swinging naked from a chandelier, and she burst out laughing. There was a man sitting on the only bench, smoking, and she tried to avoid his eyes as she slipped onto the end of the seat and pulled out her Silk Cut. Keeping her eyes downwards she noticed he was wearing white socks. Lewis hated white socks. He always said they were the one thing that would drive him to homicide. The thought made Clare begin to giggle again.

"Something's tickled you hasn't it?"

She looked up, irritated, hoping she could quash any attempt at companionship with a glare. She wanted to smoke in silence and think about Lewis.

"Share the joke?"

His face was young, eager, like a friendly puppy, and he wore a red ribbon pinned to his lapel. Clare felt like a bull about to charge.

"It's not his fault," she told herself. She took a deep breath, smiled apologetically, and stood up.

"Sorry, did I say something wrong?"

Not trusting herself to speak Clare headed back indoors, aware of his bemused expression. She checked the Ladies' for smoke detectors and then locked herself in a cubicle, sat on the lid of the toilet, and lit up.

It was kind of funny, she thought, meeting the rest of Lewis' life. It had been a long time since Lewis had let people visit him at home, and so his family and friends rarely met. He'd told her she was the last one to see inside his flat, and she felt this to be quite an honour. She remembered the last time she went there, pushing through the waist-high mountains of newspapers, discarded designs, mouldy expresso cups and take-away cartons, and, by a series of complicated manoeuveres and jumps, had reached the only vacant space in the large apartment. Here they lay, surrounded by the sea of debris, marooned on Lewis' bed all afternoon drinking malt whisky. Around the bed a dozen more bottles stood, filled with a similarly coloured liquid. Lewis had explained that it was getting too difficult to navigate his way to the toilet in the night. After that, whenever she asked him about the flat he told her it was even worse.

"If you thought it was bad then ...."

"I should see it now?"

"I'm afraid not. Not even you, Clare, could tolerate the squalor in which I stagnate."

"Why?" she often asked him.

"Who knows?" he always replied.

It was, perhaps, odd that everyone accepted it. It just became common knowledge that Lewis did not receive visitors. That he lived in somewhat eccentric circumstances. As you might expect of a genius. And Lewis loved to take people out, to spoil them. He never answered the phone, but if you left a message on his machine you would invariably, a few days later, receive one of his little pink cards with an invitation to lunch at The Savoy, or cocktails at The Hilton. Lewis never seemed to realise that people just wanted to talk to him.

"Is someone smoking in there?"

Clare dropped her cigarette into the toilet and flushed the chain. There was a loud banging on the door.

"Hello in there. Are you smoking? Smoking is not permitted in any part of the hospital."

The banging continued.

"Hello in there. Can you hear me?"

Clare opened the door. She wondered what Lewis would have said to this buxom, moustachioed nurse. She would have loved him. He would have had her giggling like a teenager in minutes. Clare felt the tears coming.

"Leave me alone," she said, pushing past the nurse as she ran out of the toilets.

She did not want to face Tony again so she went back to the garden. But the man with the white socks was still sitting there. He looked at her peering through the glass door and tried another, cautious smile, but Clare could see that he now plainly thought she was mad. She decided to go back to Lewis. And talk to Tony. On the way back down the corridor she imagined Tony softening, sharing a joke, a reminiscence, catching her roughly in an embarassed embrace. But when she got back Tony had gone. Lewis' mother was sitting by the bed.

"Clare."

"She smelt of something undoubtedly expensive but which reminded Clare of a poodle parlour as she kissed the proffered cheek, wondering which of them was wincing the most. She knew Lewis' mother had never liked her. Lewis said himself that Raine held all his friends responsible for the moral downfall of her only son and Clare, being an artist, was high in the league of the dangerously unconventional. There was a naivety to Raine's disappointment that was quite touching, her belief that if only Lewis had found decent friends, fallen in with the right crowd, then things would have been different. And perhaps now he would be married, and not famous for a risque collection of unwearable clothes, and not lying in hospital bed on a life support machine at the age of thirty.

"The doctor asked me ...."

Raine opened her crocodile skin handbag and pulled out a white handkerchief.

"They need my permission to - to stop - "

She drew the handkerchief over her nose and mouth, and closed her eyes. Clare sat down next to her and took the other hand. It was dry and scaly with the eczema which covered most of her body. Clare resisted the urge to stroke her handbag, for comparison.

"I don't know what to do."

Clare gripped the hand. Eventually Raine opened her eyes and removed the handkerchief. She sniffed and looked at Clare. Clare wondered whether or not to let go of her hand. She imagined Lewis looking at them in astonishment, delighted with the drama, and gently dropped it.

"So."

Raine had a way of cultivating guilt with the smallest word.

"Do you know, Clare, if he had it? The disease. Do you know?"

Clare concentrated on her breathing.

"I don't know," she said, "and anyway, would it make any difference? Would it make it any easier?"

"Easier?"

"You know - reasons."

She didn't add, as she wanted to, "Gay men die of other things too."

"Yes," said Raine. "Reasons."

And suddenly Clare realised that was what she wanted to ask Lewis most of all. He'd left no note, and they said, by the amount of barbiturates and alcohol in his bloodstream when they hauled him out of the Thames, that he must have been serious. He was already, by that time, in an irreversible coma.

"Why didn't you tell me?" asked Raine. "I'm his mother. You could have told me."

Clare looked at her.

"Told you what?" she thought. "Told you that your own son was always unhappy?"

Silently she took Raine's little scaly hand in her own. This was the woman who had given Lewis the gift of life, and he hadn't liked it. He had spat it back in her face. Clare slowed her breathing once more in rhythm with the ventilator.

Clunk. Sssss. Clunk. Sssss.

He was not quite dead. That was Raine's decision now, and in the meantime the two women sat together, waiting for Lewis to wake up.

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