Sean Kennedy - Tigers on the Way

Table of Contents

By Sean Kennedy

Sequel to Tigers on the Run

Documentary producer Simon and ex-footballer Declan are taking some big steps toward a lasting life together. Theyve bought a house, and theyll need it for the family they plan to start. Their friend Nyssa has offered to be their surrogate, and Declan couldnt be more excited about being a dad.

For Simon, fatherhood is a huge, daunting commitment. But he sees how much Dec wants it, and hes sure that together they can succeed in anythingdespite his nagging worries.

Just as their new life begins to take shape, a health scare disrupts their plans at the worst possible moment. With time running short, Simon and Dec will have to bare their fears and doubts to each other so they can face them before their world changes forever.

It might mean a literal leap of faith.

This is for Sarah. Our friendship has survived for almost thirty years despite her hatred of The Grapes of Wrath and total disregard of the oeuvre of David Lynchespecially Twin Peaks although we do have Jane Austen together.

Rest assured there will be at least thirty years more!

ALTHOUGH AUSTRALIA has recently, and finally , seen fit to give our community the right to marry, this volume of mine and Declans ongoing adventures is set during the dark times before this, until, I dont know, some Hobbits threw a ring into the fires of Mordor and banished all evil from this land, or something like it.

But evil never entirely goes away, and there is still much of the good fight left to fight. So unfortunately you wont be seeing our wedding in this storylet me assure you, it was fabulous but you will another time.

Good things come to those who waitand those who are denied something and have to wait and fight, wait and fight, fight and fight and fight. But still the Orcs keep coming. The war isnt over, but this battle is well and truly done. Stick a fork in it done!

Love,

Simon Murray

ALBANY, WESTERN Australia, may not seem like the first choice to make a life-changing decision, but in retrospect it was metaphorically apt. Albany is a place of renewal, of Mother Nature fighting back against the odds and producing something beautiful. It was one of the premier ports for whaling throughout Australia, and the whole town lived and died on the success of the industry that grew around it. Of course, that resulted in the wholesale slaughter and near extinction of many whale families. The station that skinned the carcases and extracted the oil emitted a foul odour that hung over the town like a Dementor waiting to strike. As Dec and I toured the old whaling station, we were told that if the temperature was high enough and the sun was out, the warm planks of the jetty would give off a remnant of that smell, and you could only imagine what the full stench would have been like when the station was still operating. It was town legend that the first group of antiwhaling protestors turned away of their own accord because they couldnt stomach it. I dont blame them.

But its a totally different town today. The station is now a museum, and Albany still makes its money off the whalesbut through tourism and not death. The whales have returned in huge numbers, sometimes even swimming right up to the bay where their dead ancestors were hauled up, their blood attracting sharks and floating downstream to an early shore whose sands were stained red, still named Misery Beach. If you stand upon it today, you wont see any remnant of its bloody history. Mother Nature has reclaimed its own.

You may wonder why Im blathering on about a remote town you may never get to see yourself, but like I said, it was where Dec and I made the most momentous decision of our lives. We had been strangely quiet the first couple of days after arriving in Albany, but I had been mulling over the whales and how Mother Nature finds a way to continue on, and while sitting on a flat rock overlooking the Natural Bridge, I turned to Dec.

He was already expecting me to say something. Maybe he had arrived at the same thought at the same time. But I know thats not true. He had been ready since the day Nyssa first suggested this crazy idea of surrogacy to us, not long after we had arrived home from our engagement party.

Lets do it, I said. The water, crashing against the rocks so far below us, still managed to fly upwards and coat us in its spray.

What? He looked so hopeful, yet I could see the reserve in him. He didnt want to be disappointed.

Lets cook up some babies.

He groaned. Simon, please dont say it like that.

Like what? Im only preparing us for what the right-wing homophobes are going to say, probably even some of your buddies from The Footy Show

Theyre not my buddies.

They never were, especially after he came out. Declan Tyler was an anomaly to their blokey, outdated comedy that wanted to remain stuck in the 1970s. Maybe even in the 1850s, when the white men stole Marn Grook from the First Australians and claimed it as their own. Some of the guys on The Footy Show would have fit right in back then.

I just liked to tease him about some of his colleagues. Anyway, all Im saying is, we have to be prepared. So I use humour, so what? I mean, arent bad jokes meant to be a prerequisite for being a

The word seemed so strange, practically impossible, to say.

For being a dad? Dec suggested gently.

A dad, I repeated.

Then Dec was kissing me.

I know youre scared, but youre going to be a great dad.

I was scared, and I doubted I would be. But I had no doubts whatsoever about Dec being a fantastic father. It was a role he was born to play. As well as God of Football (TM).

He was always a good multitasker.

ONCE THE whole kid issue had been sorted, I decided to play my own hand.

I think we need to get a bigger place, I announced over breakfast one morning.

Dec froze, his coffee halfway to his lips. His hair was still wet from the pool that belonged to the residents of our building, but he had since changed into dry clothing. He normally preferred to go and drive to the nearest beach, but he had slept through his alarmI hadntand lazily resisted my attempts to wake him up. It wasnt very often he did that. What?

You heard me. I was nonchalant as all fuck. I had actually been planning this for a while. I knew it was a good idea, and Dec would see the logic in it. I just wasnt sure if he would approve of my choice .

I felt a tiny bit bad about my Machiavellian strategies creating the hopeful expression on his face. Is there a reason why?

I shrugged. We need more space.

Once again, for?

The no-kill animal shelter I want to run in our house.

Funny. He sipped at his coffee before it went cold.

I stopped teasing him. If were going to have, you know.

A small smirk played upon his lips. You still cant say it.

Im saying it without saying it, I told him.

That clears that up.

Come on, you know what I mean.

He set his cup down again. No, I dont know. You could be talking about anything. You usually talk about the thing I least expect you to. For all I know, you could be planning to build a recording studio.

Theres an idea. And my brain was already ticking over. Coby and I had recently decided to start up our own production house. The only problem was that all spaces anywhere close to the city had stratospheric rents, even if I did have my own sugar daddy looking out for me.

No, Sugar Daddy said firmly. Work and home separate, remember?

I snorted. When has that ever happened? This apartment has been filming location, runaway teen shelter, boardroom.