The Free-range boys

‘Just kidding,’ said Granna with a sly smile, and went to the corner cupboard.

‘I couldn’t find those damn albums anywhere, and then I remembered that Hermione must have been cleaning the overflowing shelves at the cottage and storing them in the cupboard here.

‘And I was right.’

Granna grabbed a stack of photo albums and, standing at the door, said, ‘Get dressed, boys. Breakfast is ready, and you’ve got a big job ahead of you.’ She shut the door, and the boys had never put on their trousers so quickly.

Pancakes and strawberry jam were waiting for them in the cottage. Granna had left a note on the table.

“I went to get fresh milk from the neighbour. If I’m not back in 30 minutes, I am dead, or my hip has decided to break the deal. In both cases, you’ll find me lying on the road. I hope you can get the pier done before it starts to rain. I heard the forecast; it might develop into bad weather later in the afternoon.”

The boys emptied the plates, washed the dishes as Granna had instructed, and went out to prepare the pier for summer.

It was easier said than done, and they spent the whole morning pushing and pulling, lifting and levelling the long wooden structure, then sliding it onto the pontoons made of empty steel barrels. Finally, the pier was in place, and the boys were exhausted.

‘Well done! You were so into it that you didn’t even see me coming. Luckily, I’m still alive and kicking despite the hip,’ shouted Granna from the veranda. ‘Lunch will be ready soon. I also heated the sauna. Put some wood into the sauna’s fireplace on your way to lunch.’

The wind started to blow harder and harder, and some naked branches of the nearby birch trees fell onto the grey ice. The sauna was almost hot enough, but Tuomas added a few logs to the furnace.

The boys ran inside and enjoyed a heavenly creamy salmon soup, accompanied by a blueberry pie that was to die for.

‘You smell bad, boys. Physical work does that to you,’ said Granna as she poured tea. ‘I suppose you truly need a proper sauna. I also left some vihta for you there. I put them into the hot water to make them soft for you.’

‘Shit,’ shouted Tuomas, pointing to the lake. ‘Look! Esa, we must run! Both ropes have given in to the wind.’

They ran to the pier, which had come loose and was being swept against the breaking ice. In a few more minutes, they would not be able to retrieve it from the water.

Tuomas leapt onto the landing stage just before it cast off from the shore. He threw the loose rope from the water to Esa, who pulled the pier along with Tuomas against the wind.

Esa managed to tie the rope and was ready to do the same with the second rope when they heard a rumbling, deafening sound from the lake. While tying it, Esa saw how the vast lake shook off its ice cover like some prehistoric monster. The howling of the wind grew louder and louder.

The landing stage was now firmly attached, and Tuomas was jumping up and down on it in ecstasy, shouting at the top of his lungs, ‘Esa, can you see that!’

Esa laughed and jumped onto the pier, and Tuomas hugged him. They were like two shamans performing a rite of spring.

The wind pushed the ice farther away from the shore into the middle of the vast lake. Massive ice plates crashed into each other, and the thunderous noise sang the start of summer. Then it poured, and the boys ran back to the cottage, laughing and pushing each other, almost getting soaked wet.

Granna had been watching them, and her heart was bursting. These boys were free, and they had the power to shatter any ice in their souls and sail through life fearlessly.

‘You’d better go to the sauna. Otherwise, you’ll catch a cold,’ said Granna. ‘It should be ready now.’

The boys sat on the sauna’s upper bench, throwing löyly-water from the bucket onto the hot stones. They were covered in shining sweat.

Outside, the wind roared, but soon the ice was gone, and the majestic lake had waves with foam crowns racing towards the opposite shore.

‘Let’s dive in,’ said Tuomas, and they ran from the sauna to the pier. Without hesitation, they jumped into the lake. It was freezing, but they didn’t care. After a while, almost blue-skinned, they climbed back onto the landing stage and danced like madmen, Tuomas singing the old Finnish anthem of longing and love, Distant Shore:

Amidst the skies so clear and grand, there lies a strand,

Where the soft embrace of joy meets the golden sand,

Where the sun's warm rays in endless dance do hover,

There, the heart finds peace, its troubles to recover.

The boys ran back to the sauna with their teeth chattering and lips a dark shade of blue.

It took a long time to warm up. The gentle, humid sauna was like a giant womb. The boys sat glued together and enjoyed their skins.

Tuomas took the vihtas, two bunches of last summer’s birch branches with leaves soft from the hot water, and gave one to Esa. They began to hit themselves and each other with them, and the blood rushed to their red, hot skin.

‘Lie on the bench,’ said Esa, whipping Tuomas’s back, bum, and feet with the vihta. Then it was Tuomas’s turn to return the favour. They threw water on the stones and leaned forward as the hot air rushed over them, prickling their bodies.

It was all hot, humid, hilarious hubris of youth.

‘Wash my hair,’ asked Tuomas when they were too exhausted to whip any more. He sat between Esa’s hairy legs. ‘My father used to do this when I was a small boy. And that’s how I came out to him. So wash my hair, and I’ll come out to you. You have almost as hairy legs as Dad.’

Esa was chuffed, and putting shampoo in Tuomas’s curls and massaging it in deeply was a joy above all joys.

Tuomas stood up and ordered, ‘Now wash my whole body.’ Esa’s hands, filled with soap and tenderness, washed every inch of Tuomas’s body. When he hesitated near Tuomas’s striking red pubic hair, Tuomas whispered, ‘Do it well for the evening.’ And Esa’s shyness was swept aside by the arousal they both felt.

Then Tuomas washed Esa slowly, carefully and with long, loving fingers, finishing the rite by pouring warm water over him. They were clean, calm, and chuffed. They were ready for the night of their lives, but first, they needed to help Granna and have dinner with her.

‘That took a long time,’ said an amused Granna when the boys came into the cottage, bringing with them the clean scent of sauna. ‘I think I’ll skip the sauna today and just shower in my sleepout. You can have another go if you still have energy after an early dinner. It’s not even six yet.’

The low-hanging clouds cast a grey hue over the view, making the evening much darker than it should have been for this time of year. The boys looked at each other often when they thought Granna wouldn’t notice. Having released every last ounce of their hormones into their veins, only a single thought occupied their minds and nothing else.

Granna sensed their nervous energy.

Tuomas was much like his father in a similar situation many years ago. Niilo also thought his mother wouldn’t see through his excuses to sneak out to the sauna’s sleeping chamber, where he had smuggled not-so-innocent girls at far too young an age. Often, she saw how Niilo rowed to the opposite shore where the summer dancing hall was and returned late with lovely company. He had been very lucky with the opposite sex and attractive, which had nothing to do with his lanky appearance. The memories made her smile.

Granna didn’t want to keep the boys on tenterhooks and called it a day.

The long and much-awaited Saturday had gone in a blink.

‘I’m a bit worn out,’ said Granna. ‘The walk to the neighbour took its toll.’ She let Esa and Tuomas do the dishes after the light dinner.

‘Are you all right, Granna?’ asked Tuomas. ‘Does your hip give you heebie-jeebies?’

‘Heebie what? You sometimes speak a language that isn’t even close to Finnish or English. I’m just tired. I’ll read in bed and let you do your things,’ she winked and said goodnight. ‘See you in the morning.’

The boys didn’t waste time.

They wiped the table clean and rushed to the sauna’s sleeping chamber. The yellow light of the kerosene lamp made everything seductive.

Tuomas grabbed his holdall. ‘Ta-daa,’ he sang, jumping on the bed beside Esa and holding a small plastic bag.

There was a small tube of lubricant and a box of condoms.

‘Do you really mean…?’ asked Esa, suddenly very tense. ‘I’ve never done it,’ he continued, embarrassed, fiddling with the condoms in colourful plastic envelopes, looking disgusted. ‘I really don’t know what to do,’ he confessed. ‘What if I do it wrong?’ And he looked like a caged animal.

In his excitement, Tuomas didn’t understand why Esa had become so tense. He looked at the condoms like venomous snakes. Tuomas giggled and said, ‘They don’t bite you.’ But that didn’t help – Esa seemed to be developing a proper panic.

‘Relax,’ whispered Tuomas. ‘With me, everything you do is right.’

‘This is the first time for me too,’ comforted Tuomas, stroking Esa’s hair and moving closer. ‘I’ve done my homework. There isn’t a porn movie on the internet I haven’t seen. I studied them all.’

But Esa was even more tense, and when Tuomas leaned back on the bed, holding him close, Esa felt Tuomas’s erection and jumped up as if he’d had an electric shock.

‘What if your Granna comes?’ he cried, standing in front of the window, looking at the stormy waters the darkening night made ominous.

Something is now profoundly wrong, thought Tuomas. He stood up and turned Esa around. He was crying. Big teardrops travelled over Esa’s high cheekbones, making the thin, hardly visible facial hair on his upper lip messy. He shook like a fever, and Tuomas had to use all his strength to hold him.

‘Esa,’ whispered Tuomas. ‘What is it? You can tell me.’

‘I can’t,’ shouted Esa through teary hiccups.

Tuomas took Esa’s hand and led him to the bed. ‘It’s OK. You don’t need to say or do anything. I am here to help you. I want to help you – whatever it is. I love you, Esa, and I’ll do anything you ask – or ask me not to do.’

They sat on the bed for a long time.

With a huge bang, a violent gust hurled a broken branch from the birch against the window, and the boys thought it would shatter into pieces, but it absorbed the blow and remained intact.

Esa pressed himself closer to Tuomas.

‘Do you think I’m disgusting?’ Esa asked, letting the wind almost bury his whisper.

‘You are the most beautiful person I have ever met,’ said Tuomas, relieved that Esa had at least said something. ‘Nothing about you is disgusting – and you cannot do anything disgusting.’

‘Tuomas, are you angry with me because I let you believe we could do it, but I can’t?’

‘If you don’t want it, I’m happy. I care for you, and being with you is enough for me.

‘I’ve never had a friend – not a single one before I met you, let alone a lover. So let’s continue as friends if you don’t want to take it any further.’

And then Esa burst into tears again. Tuomas was at his wits’ end. He could only hug Esa tighter and wait.

‘But I do. I want to. I’ve wanted to since the moment I saw you,’ shouted Esa. ‘And that’s the fucken thing. I am dirty. Disgusting! If you knew, you wouldn’t touch me even with a ten-metre pole.’

‘I don’t know how to make you believe there’s nothing you can say or do to upset me.

‘Or – there is one thing that would upset me: if you don’t trust that I am worthy of your love. Tell me, please, Esa.’

A dog on the nearby farm began barking as if someone had been hitting it. The wind carried its wailing so close it felt as if it were just behind the door.

‘If I tell you, you’ll think I’m just a fucken faggot,’ begged Esa. ‘Please, don’t look at me – I’ll tell you. But don’t look at me.’

Tuomas didn’t need to say anything. He just kept Esa close and stroked his hair gently, listening to Esa’s horror story.

‘It was three years ago.

‘Just when I had my birthday. My father’s pilot pal came to visit. He had left the Air Force and was flying some fucken billionaire’s private jet he parked at the Perkule airport.

‘He said he had a birthday present for me.

‘Mum and Tiina had left for Tiina’s photography summer camp, and I was alone with Dad.’

Esa’s monotone voice became filled with anger word by word.

‘This brick was everything Dad wasn’t: a rich, gorgeous and high-flying piece of shit.

‘Dad had wanted to be like him, but after he hurt his back permanently, he had to give up flying. Instead, he started to drink. Not much, but enough to keep everybody in the family on their toes. He could be nasty when he had a few.

Esa wiped his eyes and paused for a long moment, remembering the silent terror his dad could evoke in him.

‘So, this Rolex-and-silk-suit dude asked if I wanted to see his jet the next day. I hated the whole thing – he was slimy.

‘Dad slurred, drunk, “Of course, Esa wants to see what real luxury is.”

‘Dad always spoke on my behalf as if I didn’t have brains or a voice.

‘I wanted to escape. I was afraid. I didn’t know what to do. But seeing a private plane from the inside didn’t seem too bad. Dad insisted I go. He wanted to lick the arse of that “friend”. I was like a token or a fucken trophy.

‘So, when my dad went to work the next day, this bloke took me in his jet.

‘It was hot, and I only had on a T-shirt and shorts. Inside the plane, this guy started to touch me, kiss me, and say that he immediately knew what kind of boy I was and what I wanted. He was all over me. And I was like paralysed; I let him do whatever. I couldn’t stop him.’

Esa bit his lip and leaned against Tuomas to regain strength and continue his story.

‘He turned me around. Suddenly, he took my T-shirt off and pulled my shorts down. His hands were everywhere. He squeezed my dick, and because I was already quite tall and had pubic hair, it seemed to get him madly horny.

‘I can still feel his breathing in my ear, “You will love this, little faggot.”

‘I couldn’t do anything. He was so strong, and I was so afraid and ashamed of everything. I felt like it was happening to somebody else, and I was just watching from above. It was disgusting.

‘He stroked my dick, and I had a hard-on, and I hated it, but it happened, and he got even crazier.

‘He made me lean forward on a desk, spreading my legs, and then he did it to me, and I wanted to scream, but no voice came from my mouth.

‘It hurt like hell. He was pushing and pushing and pushing, deeper and deeper, so that I felt I would split. And I don’t know how long it lasted.

‘Then he stopped and threw the used condom and its plastic wrapper on the desk and tapped my bum.’

It was as if the wind had been listening and was so shocked that it fell silent. Tuomas could hear his heart pounding.

Esa continued with a flat voice, ‘And he did all this three times before he took me back home. I could hardly sit. It hurt so much.

‘I never said a word to him, and he thanked me, telling me how good I was and, hopefully, that I’d enjoyed the ride on a jet.

‘I never told this to anybody.

‘I was thirteen and so dirty that I took ten showers a day for weeks. I wanted to kill myself. I even stole some heavy-duty sleeping pills from my grandma, but I didn’t have the guts. I was exactly what my dad thought I was.’

The full moon emerged behind the clouds in perfect silence. The two boys sitting on the bed were like statues of angels in a graveyard. Tuomas sensed that something had died inside Esa and wanted to help him be reborn.

Esa turned to look at Tuomas, whose tears shone in the moonlight.

‘When I saw those condom wrappings and the lubricant tube, it all came back like it was yesterday. It was worse than yesterday, because I knew that you would hate me for what I let this guy do to me. I was weak. I was useless, like my dad once told me when I let bullies get to me. A top gun’s boy was a wimp, and I could always see how disappointed he was.’

‘I don’t hate you, Esa. I love you. You are the bravest guy I have ever met. How did you manage to cope with all that?’

‘It was easy. There was no one to tell, because no one would have believed me. I was just a disposable, like a condom.’

‘I believe you.’

‘I’m tired. Could you hold me tight?’

The boys took off their clothes and, in their underpants, slid under the duvet. Esa fell asleep almost immediately, but Tuomas gazed at the moon, feeling Esa’s breath on his shoulder and couldn’t help but feel overwhelming anger on Esa’s behalf, along with a deeper love and care for him than he could put into words.

The moon pulled some odd-looking clouds to mask its bare glow, and soon Tuomas also felt his eyelids closing. The last thought that entered his mind was a prayer that Esa would not do anything to harm himself. And then Tuomas drifted into a restless slumber.