Neil was born to tie shoe laces. And so it was I entered work and saw him, hunched over in the hallway, and feeling I had enough momentum to turn on my heel and up the stairs, I sped off without a word. However, the incongruity of a certain detail, surely the unconscious reason for speeding off, had finally rung a bell in my conscious mind. I then yanked myself back in Neil's general direction, checking the purple flyer above his head. It was true. Somone had cut off the reply slip and booked a 1 day course on Sexual Feelings in the Consulting Room. Now who would be doing that? To cover my behaviour I launched a Lovely Day! at Neil, and, in saying the unlovely words, I could feel our toes curling. But who the hell is having sexual feelings in the consulting room? Does Gareth know? Why's he not told everyone? He is paid to be the child of the team. And yet, of course, when it comes to the really important issues, the gossip will always let you down, leaving the last stretch to your own imagination. I entered my room with a huge appetite for nothing in particular so, throwing open the window, I sat on the ledge and lit a quarter pipe.

I glimpsed Thom in the lounge, bent over a joystick, but followed his mother into the kitchen. Without speaking she reached for a cupboard, changed her mind, then filled the kettle instead. On top of the million little details I was processing, I wondered if she were reaching for alcohol in that cupboard and sensed, in the calm of her negation, that she had decided to make me suffer for any pleasure I might find here. To make matters worse, I felt it necessary to maintain my demented persona and only felt able to do that by saying nothing. She turned towards me and I wished myself to hell and back. However, instead of folding her arms she let them fall to her side, relaxed. Clearly, she had no more idea what to do or say than me and, seeing that, I rolled up my sleeves and sat myself at the kitchen table.

Do you remember Versailles?

I asked, as if the unresolved memory of a holiday in France had stopped me moving on with life.

You really do want sex, don't you?

Yes, I only suggest a little historical foreplay...

And felt a certain pity for myself, aware that my unbidden memory of Versailles was important and worthy of discussion and, quite suddenly, it then became a fleeting symbol of our disharmony, containing all the ambiguities within. I was desperate to speak of this as X arched her back as she sat opposite, showing well preserved breasts plus a hollow of shadow to her buttocks. And it was another fleeting symbol, too, that I did not speak of what I wanted, and of X that she would not relax to allow the past in. It was all happening all over again. We would not be having sex. These few minutes had exhausted us both so we sat there, calm and ironic, ready now to talk of Thom, the week ahead, the future. We were good people, done with anger, making the best of it. Sure we were. For ourselves, and him. And so we waited for Thom to come bounding into the kitchen, each second of silence like a pinprick on my palm.

Drunk with David Hockney.

I spent the morning trying to recollect the night I spent drinking with Hockney and remembering the slowly dawning shame at seeing how, as we quaffed our thirty year brandy, the artist, stubborn when sober, yes, perhaps truculent, how quickly he became an incredible bore. I even remember noting a certain retardation in his character. The shame then revisits me now like a pain in my lungs. It was a letter from a Dr. R. L, requesting she read the letters Hockney sent me in the early 1990's, that prompted the memory. I was heartened to observe that the subsequent letters we exchanged has not sweetened the memory of that first meeting and so, my mental health thereby confirmed, I turned to the question of whether to an accept Axel Von Raffenstein's invite to his party after the Erotica exhibition at the Barbican. The exotic creatures he gathers would certainly be a rare tonic to the somewhat homespun, laundry girls I currently desire. I decided to attend and, at the moment of decision, emboldened with a daring, a vanity, a peripheral awareness of my charm as I crossed the lounge, I also decided I really would make a pass at Thom's mother.

Yesterday, my aim was to ascertain if a man had entered her and therefore Thom's life. This afternoon, my intention had warped, or perhaps consolidated into one of sheer prowess. And so I went to see them at four, the idling hour, and arrived with the sense this would only work if my confidence were at the hilt, as hard and tight as mineral. In fact, psychotic. I stood on the doorstep, figured a statement, not a question, was more effective. She opened the door.

I would like to have...

I paused a few seconds, suggestive of unending personal, cultural pursuits, but then, as if veering into a sudden, impulsive understanding of core family values:

Like to have sex with you.

Ok, she said. And then, to cover herself, You'd better come in, I mean. And so, with the hint of mental illness, as if allowing me in were making the community a safer place, I entered the family home for the first time in five years.

Bruckner's 8th.

Expecting difficulty, I put on the very slow 3rd movement, but I surprised myself by taking a quick, almost female, ten second shit and this moment of physical surprise was to play out later in the day, whereupon I also softened the instinct with Bruckner's difficult, overlong masterpiece. The moment occurred as I drove home and, on impulse, swerved back in the direction of Thom and his mother. I hadn't planned or wanted, nor even dreamt this happening. The light was fading. It was the twitching hour. And so, wincing with the delight of self punishment, I put on Bruckner's 3rd movement and sat in my car outside their house, waiting for proof. Of course, aside from the perilous state of my son's soul, I had no evidence of another man. I skipped to the 4th movement, reflecting that all things are only waiting to be proven true, yet this was not nearly proximate to the news in my marrow, or, after Lowell, the sound of each sobbing blood cell. I pictured the new lover as having a large, mis-shapen head, the face of an unsuccessful comedian. But all I saw were the bobbing features of a mother and her son so I soon tired and decided there were other, more sophisticated, perhaps even sexual ways of discovering the truth. I would make a pass at her. I would wind down my window and lean out, leering. It would have to be a punchy, all american, no nonsense offer. All smiles, no regret. Certainly, her response will be noted, but it isn't admissible evidence. Instead I will scrutinise the extent of her pupil dilation, thereby the force of her involuntary desire and, thereupon, I'll have my answer. I'll do it tomorrow, late afternoon, the idling hour. And so it was, I was able to deny the horror of my feelings and drive home a regular, positive, cheerful sort of man.

Thom wants The Heartbreak Kid.

Clearly, he was upset about something but his film was a 15 certificate, so we had no chance of that. The air conditioning was sucking the life from me but a vigorous, if selfish, intercourse with Helen in the afternoon had steadied me for the day, so, unable to make a case for preferring Extinction, I tried to think of ways I could smuggle Thom into The Heartbreak Kid. There were three cashiers and so, choosing the one with least self esteem, we entered the queue. I was concerned about Thom's reticence. His choice of film was a way of expressing his upset, yet I was aware of my own reluctance to hear the cause, for Thom and I share a fear, and I smelt it now, a fear that reaches to the depth of our own, or the other's, soul. What if Mummy's met another man? And so it was we reached the front of the queue and I reached for my wallet, stopping quickly, as if remembering to introduce a figure of high royalty. This is my son, I said, conveying an air of sadness and piety, of growth disease, of long nights toiling over the latest clinical trials. Before giving her time to speak, I held her gaze and silently intoned, from my solar plexus and through my eyes into hers and into the shallows of her self esteem, I intoned this message: You are pretty! Something subterranean had been conveyed, for she blushed, and what is that if not introjected delight? We got our tickets, and no question asked. We saw our film. I may not have eased, or even heard Thom's suffering, but I was still his hero and we tucked into popcorn like kings.

The Tuesday Group.

I am a day behind myself! Yet I feel more present now than ever, particularly since departing from the most distinguished company of Madame X. And lending rhapsody to my present condition, my horologist in London has repaired and returned my watch. So, synchronous with myself and therefore the world!

I left for work with dread in my belly.

Gareth is on heat. His whole body is, generally, an act of physical innuendo. Yet today, as he threw himself into a long forgotten, but necessary tale of the hypnotist, I was diverted by a purple flyer pinned to the noticeboard behind him. Smilingly, I manoeuvred him aside. Sexual Feelings in the Consulting Room: A one day workshop. Of course, the professional in me knew this was precisely the kind of peer support I required. Another part of me simply yawned. I allowed Gareth to witter on until a mild ache crossed my lung. I began to wonder if half a minute with Gareth was going to undo all of Madame X's good work. With two or three large nods of the head, I trod on his foot and went up the stairs. Yet just as Gareth had seemed out of kilter, now even my room was unfamiliar. My desk, my books, my couch. It was as if a geometric alienation had occurred, as if my room were a Klee. While this was not terribly disturbing it did inspire me to have a quick brandy in the pub and then return for the Tuesday Group, warm with alcohol, aware that meaningful presence will always find it's screaming opposite.

Yesterday, as I climbed the basement steps out of Madame X's chamber, it took a few seconds for my mind to return to my body and when it did, standing at the top, casting a long glance hither and thither, I felt as lithe, as heroic, as any of god's creatures. And what of Madame X, a mere stranger to me? Yet my parting kiss was one of the most tender I have ever bestowed, reminding me now of the first time I ever kissed Thom.

This evening, aware of a desire to be naked, to touch my wounds, wishing to return to that fear of abandonment and heal myself, like playing with a brand new toy, I took a moment to call my father. I would visit tomorrow and implement a care plan. I then called Thom, deciding to see a movie thursday night. I then took off my clothes and lay on the bed, relishing myself like someone new. I stretched out my legs, feeling the length of my forty seven years, and that was good.