epilogue
June 2008
Jay stood in front of the full-length mirror, fixing his hair into some sweeping, textured style using some of Seb’s better quality gel whilst reciting lines in his head. Nerves didn’t cut this one. He took a deep breath, his lips drying and focused on trying to tie the cravat into the knot he’d been shown at the store.
He stopped short when Seb entered their room.
“Fuck.” He slapped his hand down, catching Seb’s gaze through the reflection. “You don’t half look good in that.”
Smiling, Seb held out his arms in display. The tailored light-grey morning suit with fitted ivory waistcoat clung to his slender frame and silken sky-blue cravat tied in a perfect ruffled knot brought out the sparkle in his dark eyes. His hair, void of the usual mussed-up spikes, had been brushed to the side with a hint of blue at the tips, just to give him that edge he demanded.
“Not so bad yourself, Cockney boy.” Seb stepped up behind him, dropping his chin onto Jay’s shoulder. “You okay?”
“Nervous.”
Seb chuckled, then stepped back to eye Jay in the mirror. “You need help with that?”
“Better had.”
Draping his arms over Jay’s shoulders, Seb tugged one silk end and wrapped it across the shorter side.
“You learn to do this somewhere?”
“All posh boys have to know how to tie a Windsor knot and wear an Ascot from birth. The ones who don’t get thrown on the scrap heap. AKA, state school.” Seb shuddered.
Jay snorted. Seb’s brash wink through the reflection made him smile and he watched as Seb expertly whipped the silk end across. “What’s an Ascot? I take it you weren’t talkin’ the races?”
Seb focused on threading and looping Jay’s cravat up and over. “A casual cravat. Day wear. Less formal. One you would wear to the races.”
“You ever been?”
Seb tucked the ends into Jay’s buttoned waistcoat and brushed his hands down the front. “Yes. Best way to do business. My father owned a horse for a while too. Stupid thing never won.”
“Yeah?” Jay noted the sudden flicker of melancholy crossing Seb’s features. “You should invite him round.”
Seb peered up, locking onto Jay’s gaze through the reflection. “Are we ready for that?”
“I am if you are.”
“Maybe. But let’s get this done first.” Tapping Jay’s shoulders, Seb kissed his cheek. “Perfect.”
Smiling, Jay twisted in Seb’s arms and went in for a deeper kiss.
“Oi!” Bryan stuck his head in the door, cravat flapping around his neck and huffed. “I’m shitting myself here and you’re getting in a quickie?”
Sliding his hands down the small of Seb’s back, Jay glanced over Seb’s shoulder and noted his brother’s unknotted cravat, undone waistcoat and uncufflinked shirt.
He drifted his lips to Seb’s ear. “You better work your fingers on him, an’ all.”
“I don’t do ménage.” Seb twisted, quirking an eyebrow. “Especially not brothers.”
Bryan grimaced. Chuckling, Seb meandered over to him and worked his upper-middle-class dressing habits on the older Ruttman. He didn’t linger over it, though, not like he had with Jay. All business. With a deep breath, Jay rummaged in his suit trouser pocket and fished out a jewellery box. He handed it to his brother. Bryan widened his eyes as he snapped open the red velvet box to reveal solid gold crossed hammers cufflinks, the West Ham emblem. He smiled. Then held out his arms to Seb, allowing him to fix them on for him.
“I also left the real Tiffany for mum and Cheryl in their hotel rooms.” Jay slipped into his tails.
“Cheers, bro.” Bryan scrubbed a hand through his trimmed stubble and did one last check of himself in the mirror. “Pub?” He slapped Jay’s chest and bolted out of the bedroom.
Stopping at the door, Seb eyed Jay. “You okay?”
“Just realised I ain’t been to a wedding before. Nor am I good at making speeches. Can’t you do it instead?”
Seb laughed. “You’ll be fine. It’ll be much better coming from you.”
Jay tapped the blazer pocket holding the speech he’d scribbled. “You ever been to a wedding before?”
Seb’s dashing smile faded and he scraped his polished dress shoes along the fibres of the carpet. “Yes.”
Jay nodded. “Stephen.”
“It was awfully tedius.” Seb shook his head. Not so much in denial but more to rid it of the thoughts, Jay suspected. “I got drunk on the free Champagne, made a scene by telling Lisbeth there was an exact replica of her dress for sale in Debenhams window and then threw up on my father’s date’s lap before entrees were served.” He gave a twisted smile. “Good times.”
“I’m surprised you went.”
Seb shrugged. “Did you not hear? Free bar.” He angled his head toward the exit. “Speaking of which…”
Whilst not technically free, considering Jay and Seb had contributed a hefty amount to the behind-the-bar tab, Bryan’s wedding to Cheryl was still going to be a pretty decent affair. The ceremony and the reception were all in one place—a remote manor house-slash-hotel just off the A13 and into the leafier county of Essex where Cheryl was from. Bryan, Jay and Seb arrived in style, parked up Jay’s BMW on the gravel front and headed into the venue that was awash with milling guests.
Everyone took their seats in the smaller function room that was decorated in pink and light blue sashes. Seb had to squeeze onto the second row behind the groom’s family, and managed to mask any uncomfortable feeling he might have had at not really knowing anyone. Jay had to leave him to it, as he was needed up front to stand beside his twitching brother.
As the tinkling music started, Bryan faced the incoming and heaved in a deep breath. Cheryl looked radiant, as of course she would, in a beautiful, sparkling diamante-ridden strapless dress and her platinum blonde hair twirled into plaits and curls, topped off with a tiara. Bryan choked, holding a fist to his mouth to no doubt prevent anyone thinking he might be crying. Jay knew better though. That view of the bride elegantly walking down the aisle, one hand looped into her father’s and the other clutching the hand of her daughter, who was in an exact replica of Cheryl’s dress, was enough to make the lump in Jay’s throat difficult to hide.
Jay roamed his gaze over the sea of guests and landed on the second row. Seb smiled, winked, and Jay’s stomach fluttered as he zoned out the goings on beside him. Would it ever be like this for them? Would they be able to do the traditional set-up amongst family and friends? And what would that even look like? He couldn’t imagine the Saunders settling in alongside the Ruttmans. Would Seb even want them there? He might be talking to both Sylvia and Will now, but it wasn’t happy families. Not yet. Jay hung his head. It wasn’t like they had a choice anyway.
Bryan nudged his arm, jolting him to the present. “Rings, mate.”
Shit. First job failure. Handing over the two solid platinum bands from his trouser pocket, Jay mouthed his apology.
The rest of the service went off in tradition and Bryan and Cheryl emerged from the hall husband and wife. The formal stuff ensued, with posed photos in the grounds and the marquee swarmed with guests getting their fill of the free Champagne and beer. Off-season meant Jay grabbed for a bubbly which made the pleasantries of meeting Cheryl’s horde of bridesmaids that much more bearable.
Through the crowd, Jay caught Seb’s eye. He clutched a glass of Champagne, appearing as awkward as hell as Barbara introduced him to a load of extended family that Jay didn’t even recognise. She stroked down his hair, and Jay chuckled into his glass as Seb ran his fingers through it to sort it out.
With their gazes finding each other across a crowded room, Jay was thrust back into those memories of three years ago when their eyes had met across a busy Underground bar, then again, a year later over the heads in a VIP lounge of the Red Bull arena. But this time, Jay read something else in those dark eyes that focused in on him. Something struck him. A realisation, perhaps? Seb had that very same look that Bryan had worn when Cheryl had walked down that aisle, their daughter clopping behind.
Sucking in a breath that curdled with the fluttering in his chest, Jay, mid-conversation with the Matron of honour, held up a finger from around his glass.
“Sorry. I gotta chip.”
He snaked through the throng of bodies, stopping a couple of times to shake hands or kiss the cheeks of people he didn’t know if they were bride or groom side, and made his way to Seb. It was as if he was being pulled there by some invisible thread and Seb’s eyes watched him all the while, urging him ever closer, like they always had. They probably always will.
Seb smiled as Jay approached. “Hello, there, handsome.”
Pressing his lips to Seb’s ear, Jay planted a soft kiss. He then opened his mouth to make way for words this time, not actions.
“Oh, Jay, love, there you are!” Barbara grabbed his arm and yanked him away. “You must remember the Barratts, don’t ya? Used to live down our way til they moved out to Essex. They only bloody well know Cheryl!”
The couple looked to be in their sixties. Older than Jay’s folks, anyhow. Floral dress for the lady and a dark-brown pinstriped suit for the balding guy. Jay did the polite thing and shook their hands, although he had no recollection of what his mother had said he should have.
“This is the younger one,” Barbara prattled on, taking a sip of the Prosecco and winking. “The footballer.”
“So this one’ll be next, will he, Babs?” Mrs. Barratt asked the inevitable question that always falls from the lips of those already hitched at a wedding to those who, obviously, aren’t.
“Oh, you never know, Vera.” Barbara smiled. “They may well make it legal yet.”
“Legal?” Mr. Bartlett’s brow wrinkled.
“Gay marriage.” Barbara pointed to Seb. “Seb, I introduced you earlier, is his partner. Other half.” She flicked her gaze to each gaping-open mouth. “Boyfriend?”
“Oh, yes, I see, of course!” Clearly, Mr. Barratt didn’t see.
Barbara opened her mouth, but whatever she was planning to say was cut off by the boom from the master of ceremonies. “You may now all take your seats for the wedding breakfast.”
Sighing, Jay leaned back to Seb’s ear. “I—”
“Come on, love!” Barbara yanked him away yet again. “Plenty of time for that later.” Someone was obviously excited about this part of the day, as Barbara dragged Jay toward the head table and Jay had to watch Seb bundle off to one of the far round tables.
Tucked in his seat, Seb flicked out the swan-shaped napkin and draped it over his lap. He rested his elbows on the table surface, fingers tapping against his lips, and peered over to the front-facing rectangle table decorated with white lilies and green foliage. Jay sat at the end, chatting to the bride’s parents, laughing, blue eyes shining, and looking every bit as gorgeous as he ever did. Seb didn’t think his heart could swell any more for the blond Cockney lad, but something about being here, at a wedding, made his heart leap from his chest for him to wear it on his sleeve, nestled alongside the number nine tattooed on his wrist. Soppy fucking git.
“If the wind changes, you’ll stay like that.”
The chair beside him scraped out and Ann, light blue wraparound dress hugging her fuller frame and the developing baby bump, plonked herself down and nudged her shoulder against his.
“Stay like what?” Seb asked.
“With that sappy grin on your face. It’s nauseating.”
Seb breathed out a laugh. “How’s things with you?”
“Good. Giving up drink when you’re with a bloke in a band is pretty hard going, though. But he’s quit the fags, so I gotta show willing, right?”
“Absolutely.” Seb held up his glass and tapped it to Ann’s water, keeping his lips tight not to mention that, on occasion, Noah sneaked outside during rehearsals and came back reeking of nicotine. Which was a good thing as Noah pulled out the chair beside her, sat, and gave Seb a glare of warning.
Ann shifted in the seat. “Bloody hell.”
“What’s up, babe?” Noah plonked his pint on the table and shifted to run a hand up Ann’s back.
“Kicking again.”
“He’s not kicking. He’s playing the drums.” Noah smiled and held a hand over Ann’s protruding belly. “Rocking out in there, little guy?”
“You know it’s a boy?” Seb asked, eyes focused on the movement bubbling along Ann’s tight chiffon.
“No.” Ann tutted. “He just thinks it is.”
Seb smiled, but couldn’t shift his gaze from the bump.
“You want to feel?”
Shaking his head, Seb sipped from his glass. “No. No, it’s okay.” He’d had many a conversation with Cheryl about how her body became everyone else’s property when she was pregnant and so Seb had avoided putting his hands on Ann since the bump had emerged. Even if he wanted nothing more than to feel the growing baby. What the hell had happened to him? And Noah, if the look on his sappy face was anything to go by.
Ann grabbed his hand and settled it on her stomach when a tiny kick tickled his palm. He couldn’t stop his eyes from welling. “Kid’s got rhythm.”
“Like it couldn’t, right?” Ann tsked. “You want kids, Seb?”
Rubbing along her bump, Seb wanted to feel every kick. Now she’d given him permission, he wanted to lap up as much of it as he could. “Sure.” That fell from his mouth before he’d even allowed the concept to develop in his mind. “I’d have a ton of little Jay’s chasing their footballs if I could.”
Noah snorted into his beer.
Ann nudged his leg. “Well, this is all yours after, if you want it.”
Seb snatched his hand away. “I’m not taking your baby!”
“Damn right! That’s mine.” Noah picked up his pint and took a gulp, narrowing his eyes at Seb.
“No, idiots.” Ann reshuffled in the seat. “I mean the womb. I was reading up on surrogacy.”
Seb flinched. “You what now?”
“Hang on.” Noah plonked the pint back down. “I’m not sure what I think about you banging either of those two, regardless of what sexuality they claim to be.”
“Christ, Noah, sometimes I wonder about you. Let’s hope this baby gets my looks and brain and your…”
“Musical ability?” Noah suggested.
“Erm.” Seb screwed up his face, then placed a hand on Ann’s knee. “I’ll give it lessons.”
Ann smiled. “FYI, they artificially inseminate their mushed-up semen into me.”
A bowl of noodle soup was placed elegantly down in front of them all by the roaming waitress. Noah grimaced, staring into the contents.
Shaking out her napkin, Ann leaned over to whisper in Seb’s ear. “Think about it.”
Well, he certainly wouldn’t be thinking about anything else for a good long while.
The dinner was simple, elegantly so. Food to please the masses. And after the plates were scraped clean, the speeches ensued. From the gushing father-of-the-bride, to the rolling around on the floor laughing unofficial best man, Mitchell’s speech, to Bryan’s simple, “ain’t she stunning? Now she’s proper mine, let’s get pissed.” Then it was Jay’s turn.
Seb settled back in his chair, watching his boyfriend flush with nerves, unfolding the paper in his shaking hands. Amazing how that guy could fight off a bunch of men tackling him at goal, but ask him to stand and say a few words to a crowd and his confidence all but diminished. Licking his lips, Jay peered up to the crowd. Seb willed some of his own brash self-assurance to seep over to Jay, but osmosis didn’t work when it came to personality traits.
Jay wasn’t going for the laughs. He’d known there’d be no point. Bryan did enough of that himself. And Mitchell had had that covered. Jay had wanted the opportunity to show the room, mainly Cheryl, who she had really married. And Seb couldn’t wait for the reaction.
“I was about seventeen when Bryan came home one night to brag he’d met the bird of his dreams. Middle of the night, we shared a room and he woke me up to tell me this Cheryl he’d just met was a stunner. The most beautiful girl in the world, he’d said, which, back then, meant the Moon and Stars boozer down Ford Lane.”
A ripple of laughter followed, and Seb’s smile magnified with pride.
“He’d said she was the one. When I asked how he could know that, they’d only just met, that he didn’t exactly have a track record for keeping girlfriends, his reply was one I’ll never forget. As a seventeen-year-old lad who’d recently become single”—Jay’s gaze flickered over his sheet of paper and found Ann’s—“and struggling to come to terms with who I was, I couldn’t really see how one person could make you feel like that. But Bryan replied with, ‘When you know, you know, dun’t ya? When you don’t know, you muck about.’”
Jay folded the paper and let it rain onto the table. “Now, I know we ain’t no Shakespeare in our family, but that’s a pretty accurate statement of what love is. Bryan didn’t muck about. Six years later, he has a gorgeous daughter, and now a beautiful wife and I’ve never known him to be so happy. So, thank you, Cheryl. For taking him out of my bedroom, and into yours. I needed the space for a start.”
Seb drifted his champagne glass to his twitching lips, glancing around the room at the muffled chuckles.
“And thank you, Bryan. For always being there for me. For being a big brother I could look up to and learn from. Kinda. ’Cause I ain’t mucking about, either.”
Seb’s heart pummelled against his rib cage, bursting to be set free. That bit had been an impromptu add that Seb hadn’t been aware of. And he realised right then, for all the buffoonery of Bryan Ruttman, that he’d been the consistency in Jay’s life. The one to help him admit to who he really was. And Seb was now ever grateful to the man.
“I ain’t one for big speeches,” Jay continued, snapping Seb from his thoughts. “So I’ll just leave that there. And end with asking everyone to raise their glasses for the happy couple, Mr and Mrs Ruttman. I couldn’t be more proud of you, bruv.”
Everyone stood, repeated the line and drank. Sniffing, Bryan wrapped his arms around Jay and held him, his shoulders shaking. Seb watched, being the last to sit back down and waited to hold his glass up to Jay’s across the room, that sappy grin no doubt now a permanent fixture on his face.
The day then merged into the evening affair. Seb and Noah made their apologies to the table and scurried out to the main hall where Martin awaited them, single-handedly managing set-up. Like old times. Settling into their accustomed three-piece set-up, the band started the instrumental intro as the guests milled through from the dining area and the new evening-only invites headed in via the main entrance. Seb had decided on a few covers to ease in the unfamiliar-with-their-music crowd gently.
Jay meandered to the bar and perched on the stool. The dance floor cleared out with the guests creating a circle around the black tiles. Ending the interlude, Seb wrapped a hand around the microphone.
“Can we have the newlyweds to the centre for their first dance, please?”
Taking Cheryl’s hand, Bryan led her to the centre of the dance floor. He looked nervous, blowing out a puff of air, but as he settled his hands on Cheryl’s hips and she rested her forehead against his, he seemed to ease off any care that he was on display for all to watch. Seb drifted his fingertips along the A chord, strumming the sweet melody that he had composed for this moment and softened the impact of his voice for the words that followed.
As Seb sang the lyrics he’d written for Bryan and Cheryl, he couldn’t help seeking out Jay through the crowd. He found himself singing to him instead, phasing out all the others in the room until they became a blur and all he could see was Jay. The song was a pretty decent fit for him too, their relationship, and he wanted Jay to know it. To feel it. The way Seb did. Gradually, other couples joined the newlyweds on the dance floor—parents, grandparents, and friends of friends. Jay remained seated at the back, those piercing baby-blues shimmering and not faltering from gazing up at Seb on stage. Adoringly. Like he always would.
Suddenly, for what could possibly be the first time in his life, Seb didn’t want to be on the stage. He didn’t want to be on full show. He wanted to be among the crowd, fused with the other couples, and to serenade Jay across the floor. Martin nudged Seb, and pressed on the backing track. Smiling, eyes focused ahead, Seb slipped off his guitar and allowed the pre-recorded track to continue into the next song, with Martin and Noah offering the live version over the top. Martin could sing, not as well as Seb, but he could hold a tune enough for Seb to have allowed the moment.
He waded through the crowd toward Jay. After seizing the glass clutched in Jay’s hand, he settled it on the bar and entwined Jay’s fingers with his. “Dance with me.” It wasn’t a question. It was a demand. And Jay reacted the way Seb knew that he would. He allowed himself to be led, by Seb, to the dancefloor. This time not to somewhere private, not away in the shadows, but among the other couples. Where they belonged.
Slipping his arms around Jay’s neck, Seb rested his forehead to Jay’s. Jay curled his arms around Seb’s back and swayed gently. Seb wasn’t going full out tango on this one. This one, he just wanted them to flow as one. And he smiled all the way through it.
“I love you, Jay. Forever and always.”
“Back at ya, babe.”
The End