Goodmans Hotel

Later we stopped the car near the sea so that Vincent could photograph a couple of men fishing from a pier in defiance of the icy wind. A little further down from where they sat waves crashed violently against the curved arm of the harbour. Vincent took ages finding a viewpoint which would enable him to picture the fishermen with a cascade of surf in the background; he showed Darren the camera's features and let him take half a dozen or more shots, while Lizetta and I watched from the warmth of the car. Despite having children of his own, Vincent was clearly unable to resist Darren's appeal; it was as though he gave off some kind of pheromone that made us all want to play at being a parent to him.

We wandered around the town looking at restaurants and going in and out of various shops. Lizetta bought a tartan scarf for herself and a doll in traditional Scottish dress for a niece, and I bought an attractive glass jar of wrapped sweets that would look nice on the hall table back at the hotel.

We went back to the cottage with our purchases, and in the evening returned to town for dinner in a restaurant where mounted heads of deer stared down at us from the walls. After the meal Lizetta and Vincent drove straight back to the cottage, probably intending to make full use of their double bed, and Darren and I walked around the frozen streets until we found a pub that looked comfortable and not overcrowded. Having brought the van down for the evening I had to restrict myself to soft drinks because of driving back. The other customers were regulars with pints of ale who watched football on the large screen TV and took little notice of us. After an hour we had had enough of the place and went back to the cottage, letting ourselves in quietly so as not to disturb Vincent and Lizetta. For the same reason we were reluctant to turn on the television or listen to music, but we made ourselves coffee and chatted in the kitchen.

'Do you think they're about the same age?' Darren asked.

'I don't know exactly. Lizetta must be nearly forty. He's probably a bit older.'

'Do you think it matters, people being a similar age?'

'Some women seem to be happy with men a lot older than themselves. The same doesn't hold true for most gay men, unfortunately. Youth counts for so much; however well you take care of yourself you slip down the league table as you get older.'