A domestic animal

Dick Thompson is a successful middle-aged novelist living in a seaside university town, socially he is has many women friends, but he is in fact gay. Then through one of his female friends, Penny, he acquires a lodger, Antonio, Italian, a handsome and charming young philosopher and one time professional footballer who is visiting England to work at the university for research. He has left his wife and two children at home in Florence. Despite an outward appearance of strength and confidence, he is thoroughly undomesticated, certainly not "a domestic animal", he is untidy and dependant on others for physical care and emotional support. Dick is more than willing to provide for Antonio's needs. Inevitable Dick falls in love with the charismatic Antonio, but the strongly heterosexual Antonio is unable to reciprocate the feeling, yet nonetheless regards Dick as good friend. Dick relates the events of the year that Antonio stayed; his troubled and anxious feelings, the knowledge of the futility but inevitability of those feelings, feelings that may be so familiar to anyone who has been in a similar plight, with intelligence, insight, understanding, and occasional humour. This is a very perceptive and interesting story that has more than a ring of truth about it.