I wasn’t working on Saturday, so I had plenty of time to wonder what the hell I thought I was doing, agreeing to go out with Phil. I cleaned the house a bit, did some food shopping, watched the football on the telly. By six o’clock, the butterflies in my stomach had mutated into flying elephants all flapping around like Dumbo drunk on champagne. It was daft—after all the time I’d spent in Phil’s company over the last couple of weeks. But that had been business—his business, at any rate. This . . . this was dinner, with a chance of sex.
At least, I hoped there was a chance of sex.
Well . . . I thought that was what I hoped. To be honest, I wasn’t entirely sure what the best-case scenario was in this situation. Phil was . . . well, basically I fancied the pants off him, but every time we spent more than half an hour in each other’s company, we ended up yelling at each other. And not in the porno way. It was so bloody frustrating—every time I got a hint he might actually like me, it all seemed to go tits up the next time we met.
I wasn’t even sure what to wear. He’d only seen me in my work clothes—scruffy jeans and dusty shirts. Would he be disappointed if I dressed up? Did he like to see me as his little bit of rough? Then again, if I turned up like that and he was all smart in his posh shoes and his cashmere, wouldn’t it just look like I couldn’t be arsed to make an effort?
It was weird—back in school, he’d been the bit of rough. Maybe he’d had a taste for the good life back then, but his parents certainly hadn’t had the money to indulge it. My dad had made bank manager by the time I was in my teens, so my stuff was always brand-new. God, I hoped this wasn’t just some twisted way of getting his own back on me, of rubbing it in how well he’d climbed the social ladder, while I’d slipped down a rung or two.
In the end, I went for a fairly new pair of jeans and a lambswool sweater Gary always tells me makes my shoulders look bigger. Of course, sod’s law it’d be warm in the restaurant so I’d end up taking it off, and be back to my usual skinny-runt-in-a-T-shirt look, but at least I’d tried. Then I gave the cats an early tea and set off on foot.
Phil’s flat was just up from the old Odyssey on London Road. They’d tarted the outside of the cinema up a bit recently—supposed to be restoring the inside as well. I wasn’t holding my breath, but at least they weren’t just letting the place fall down anymore. I’d even chipped in the odd fiver to the fundraising myself. From the location, I’d expected Phil to be living above a shop, but as it happened, the whole building had been converted into flats. His was on the top floor—in fact, when the house had been built, it would’ve been the attic. I wondered how he was getting on with the sloping ceilings—at his height, I’d have thought they’d have been a bit of a challenge. I grinned to myself. Maybe that was why he was so grumpy all the time—he had a permanent headache from constantly banging his head on the ceiling.
It looked like I wasn’t going to have to wait to find out, as he buzzed me in on the first ring and opened the door to his flat just as I reached the top of the stairs. He smiled when he saw me, which sent the butterflies into overdrive. He looked relaxed, in jeans and a soft blue shirt the colour of his eyes. “Want to come in for a drink before we head out?”
Dutch courage? I was all in favour of that. “Yeah, sounds good.” I stepped inside and looked around. The place had been modernised recently—it was all open-plan, with bright-white decor and pale-coloured wood, making the most of the space. In daylight, it’d probably be bright and airy, but the downside was a faint smell of fresh paint which didn’t seem to sit too well with my empty stomach.
It was also . . . bare. And full of boxes, many of them open at the top and showing signs of frustrated rummaging. “Still not unpacked yet?” I asked, because there’s a rule you have to state the obvious in this sort of situation.
“Not even close.” He grimaced. “Half the trouble is, I’ve got no cupboards or shelves to store stuff when I unpack it—the London flat was furnished, and I’ve been concentrating on buying the essentials. Like a bed.” It was good to know he had one of those. A decent night’s kip is very important. “I’ve got a sofa on order,” he carried on, oblivious to my filthy mind filling in what else his new bed might be good for, “but for now, you’ll have to park your arse on the garden furniture.”
There were a couple of folding chairs and a wobbly-looking table next to a large, square window, all of them covered in either boxes or the contents of boxes. I shifted a few things and pulled up a chair, glad to sit down. “I’m guessing you don’t do a lot of entertaining?”
“Not as such, no. Beer? Or would you rather have wine?”
“Whatever you’re having,” I said, his uncharacteristic politeness obviously having rubbed off on me. “Beer, for preference, but I’m not that fussy,” I added a bit more honestly.
“Beer it is, then.” He grabbed a couple of bottles from the fridge, opened them, and handed me one.
“Cheers,” I said and took a swallow—realising too late the gassy stuff wasn’t really what my stomach was set up for right now. Maybe it was just nerves, but something was definitely making me feel queasy. “Mind if I open a window?”
“Be my guest.”
Even though it was fully dark and had been for an hour or two, Phil hadn’t drawn the curtains. I supposed that this high up, he wasn’t worried about people looking in. I leaned on the windowsill and drew in deep breaths of fresh, cold air, but the nausea didn’t go away.
“Are you all right?” Phil asked, looming over me, which didn’t help me feel any better.
“Yeah . . . uh, well, I’m feeling a bit off. Maybe I’m coming down with something.” I turned from the window and paced through the room. Was this just nerves? As I tried to walk it off—whatever it was—I trailed my fingers along a stack of boxes against the wall. “Maybe dinner’s not such a great— Bloody hell!”
I snatched my hand away from the boxes. It felt like I’d had an electric shock, one that sent greasy jolts right into my heart.
“Tom? What the hell happened?”
“I don’t know. I think . . .” Almost without meaning to, I let down my barriers and listened. The pulse of guilt and shame that slammed into me brought me to my knees, my stomach turning and a white hot ache in my head.
“Tom!” Phil was by my side, was helping me up. “Christ, what is it?”
“Something . . . something in one of those boxes,” I managed. “Bloody hell, Phil, have you got a dismembered corpse in there?” I was joking. It wasn’t that kind of feeling at all.
“You’re . . . reacting to some of my stuff?” His bewilderment seemed genuine, but the greasy darkness from the boxes was calling him a liar.
“Yeah.” I tried to smile. “Badly.”
“I can bloody well see that. Come on, come and sit down.” He parked me in the one free chair, then marched over to the boxes I’d touched. “Which one was it?”
“The one on the top—third stack along. But you don’t have to show me. It’s not like I go round telling you all my dirty little secrets.”
“That what you think this is?” Phil’s fist clenched, and for a moment, I thought the offending box was about to be pummelled within an inch of its cardboard life. At least, I hoped it’d be the box. “I’m not having you thinking I’ve got kiddie porn in there.”
Actually, I’d been thinking more along the lines of BDSM and/or amputee fetishes, but yeah, kiddie porn could have accounted for the way it’d hit me.
Possibly.
I’d never reacted to anything this badly before. I didn’t say anything more, because despite what I’d said, I was bloody desperate to see just what it was.
Phil turfed through the contents of the box, laying them out on the boxes to either side. There were ancient packets of photos, what looked like school books—why the hell would anyone keep those?—and then an envelope. A bog-standard brown manila envelope that nearly made me throw up at the sight of it.
“That’s it,” I rasped.
He was looking at the envelope like he’d never seen it before—and I saw the exact moment when he realised what it was. His eyes widened—then narrowed dramatically. “Okay. I know what this is. It’s not porn. Can I put it away?”
“It’s your stuff. You can do what you want.” My voice was strained.
He gave me a sharp look. “It’s still bothering you?”
“Yeah. Still hidden, see?” I nodded at the envelope and nearly fell off my chair.
Phil stared at me for a long, long moment. “Fucking hell.” His tone was resigned as he opened up the unsealed flap of the envelope and drew out a few bits of paper. He handed them to me, and the relief was so great it felt like euphoria. I couldn’t even focus for a moment.
“Oh God, that’s so much better,” I breathed.
“Well, take a look at them; you might as well.” Phil turned abruptly away and strode over to the window I’d opened, staring out into the darkness.
I looked. Then I looked again. There wasn’t much there. The first was a clipping, yellow with age, from a newspaper: Local boy in serious car accident. I read on automatically. Thomas Paretski, 17, was seriously injured when he was hit by a car . . . I put it down. I didn’t need to relive that story. The next was a grainy photo. Of me. Or rather, of my teenaged self, badly cut hair, less-than-perfect skin and all. The last was a picture of the school under-eighteen football team. I’d played in defence. We were all grinning madly and gurning for the camera—looked like we’d just won a match.
I didn’t even remember the occasion. But Phil had kept these mementos.
“Why?” I asked, my tone overloud and harsh in the tingling silence.
“You mean, why did I keep those?” Phil was talking to the window, his tired voice making a circle of condensation on the glass. “What do you think?”
“You felt . . . guilty about the accident? Really guilty?” I couldn’t believe that was all it was.
Phil turned, his face dark. “Oh, for— Yes, I felt guilty. But I fancied you, all right? Back in school.”
“But . . . I thought you hated me!”
It was like lighting a firework. In your living room. Phil exploded, and it wasn’t pretty. “I did fucking hate you, okay? I hated the things you made me feel, made me want . . . Christ, don’t you realise I didn’t have a bloody clue I was gay until I noticed you drooling over me after games? I wanted to fucking kill you for making me feel that way.”
He was breathing hard, his fists clenching and unclenching. I got slowly to my feet, then wondered if that just made me a bigger target. “Um, I think I’d better go,” I said uncertainly. I realised I was still holding the photos and stuff, so I put them down on the chair. This was just too weird.
Phil had fancied me—by the sound of it, as much as I’d fancied him. Maybe more, even. And he’d kept the photos, the clipping, for a dozen years, even through a move.
But he’d still hated me.
Halfway to the door, I turned. “Why did you keep them?”
“Because I never wanted to forget the way I felt when that car hit you.”
I swallowed. “That wasn’t— I’m hoping that wasn’t because it was such a good feeling?”
“No. It wasn’t.” He gave a tired smile. “You’re right. This was a crap idea. I’m sorry. I’ll see you, Tom.”
Now, of course, I wasn’t sure I wanted to go. I was pretty certain Phil didn’t want me to stay, though, so I nodded and closed the door behind me.
I called up Gary on my way back into town and begged him to meet me up the Dyke. For one thing, I was starving, and if I tried cooking with all this on my mind, I’d probably end up burning the house down. For another, I couldn’t face going home alone, where I’d just sit on the sofa and obsess about the god-awful bloody failure of my date with Phil. I needed distracting, and Gary was nothing if not that.
Of course, I hadn’t realised that these days, Gary was a buy-one-get-one-free offer. When I got to the Dyke, an ache starting in my head to match the one in my hip, he was curled up in a corner seat gazing at a certain market trader like the sun shone out of his proverbial. I got myself a pint, gave Flossie a pat in passing, and joined them, trying not to let my smile curdle on my lips. “All right, Gary? Darren?”
Gary was his usual effusive self, bless him. “Tommy! Sit down and tell Uncle Gary all about it. What did the nasty man do to you?”
“Did he rest his pint glass on the top of your head, that sort of thing?” Darren asked. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to be sympathetic or just taking the piss. Although my money was on him taking the piss.
“Sorry, Gary, I’m not sure I really want to talk about it,” I began, with a glance in Darren’s direction.
Gary tsked. “Darling, don’t be silly! Darren and I have no secrets from one another, so you might as well tell us both.”
Right now I wasn’t sure I wanted to spill the beans to either of them, but they had come out specially to cheer me up. “It just got a bit weird, that’s all. You know that accident I had when I was seventeen, right?” I found I was rubbing my hip, and picked up my pint instead.
Annoyingly, they both nodded.
“Well, it sort of happened when I was running away from Phil and his gang—we didn’t exactly get on, back then. Turns out he’s been feeling bad about it all these years. Guilty. And he, you know, kept newspaper clippings and photos of me and stuff.”
“Oh. My. God.” Gary looked like he was worried his face was going to fall off, and he was trying to hold it on with both hands. “Tommy! You’ve got your very own stalker!”
“No, I haven’t! Come off it, Phil’s not like that.” I took a gulp of beer to steady myself.
“Oh? After all these years, he comes in search of you—”
“He came in search of Melanie Porter, actually.”
“—finds he can’t stay away from you—”
“He asked me to help him out a couple of times, that’s all.”
“—finally, he entices you into his secluded lair—”
“It’s a bloody loft conversion on London Road!”
“—and confesses his obsession.”
“He didn’t confess, I . . .” I glanced at Darren. He stared back, poker-faced. “I found the stuff he’d kept, that’s all.” Except that wasn’t all, was it? I put my pint down. “He said he hated me.”
“He didn’t!” Gary cried.
“Yes, he bloody did. He said he hated me, back when we were at school, because I made him fancy me.” God, I was going soft. I’d started to wish they hadn’t left Julian at home, so he could put his head on my knee, soak me in slobber, and make me feel better.
Instead of a wobbly pair of jowls, a small but meaty hand landed on my leg. Darren’s hand. “Course he hated you. Always bleedin’ do, don’t they? Sodding closet cases. Don’t like the message, shoot the fucking messenger. You’re better off without that tosspot, ain’t he, Pumpkin?”
Pumpkin?
Gary nodded and didn’t even blush. Then again, I’m not sure he even knows how. “Absolutely, Sweetie Pie.”
Not the least bit embarrassed either, Darren leaned forward. “Tell you what, I’ve got a mate out Hemel way—well, ex-colleague, if you know what I mean. Him and his partner are looking for a third. Say the word and I’ll give ’em your number.”
“Um, thanks,” I managed. “I’ll let you know. Want another drink?” I was only halfway through my pint, but I was pretty sure I’d be needing another.
I left Pumpkin and Sweetie Pie cooing over one another and escaped to the bar, where Harry herself was serving. I’d have preferred one of the harem—they’re a bit less intimidating, as a rule. She raised a bushy eyebrow at me.
“Two pints of best and a dry martini, please,” I asked politely.
“Stirred, not shaken?” Harry queried in that gravelly voice that always makes me fancy a cigarette, even though I gave up smoking a dozen years ago, which was around two weeks after I’d started.
“That’s the one. Kitchen still open?” I asked, suddenly catching sight of a packet of pork scratchings and remembering I was starving.
She nodded. “Pie’s good tonight.”
“Ah, but isn’t it always?” I smiled. “All right, you’ve sold me on it. Pie and chips, please, and whatever veg is going. Got to keep up my vitamins.”
She nodded, bellowed my food order to Marnie in the kitchen and got busy pulling pints.
I handed over twenty quid, thinking I really needed to make time for a bit more actual paid work in the near future. And maybe take up running, to burn off all this beer and pub grub. Harry gave me a tray to take the drinks over—it’s easy enough carrying three pint glasses in your hands, but you try it with two pints and one of Gary’s dinky little cocktail glasses. He’d have been well pissed off if I’d dropped his olive.
“Lovely, sweetie,” Gary said when I plonked them on the table. He and Darren had fallen silent when I’d got back.
“Talking about me, were you?” I asked, sitting down.
Gary shrugged. “There’s nothing wrong with being the centre of attention, I’ve always thought. Anyway, you can get your revenge by talking about me now while I pop to the little girls’ room.”
Once Gary was out of earshot, Darren leaned over the table, fixing me with what’s usually described as a gimlet stare, although I wasn’t too sure what it had in common with Philip Marlowe’s cocktail of choice. “He talks a lot about you, my Gary does.” There was a definite emphasis on the my. “I hope this bust-up with the closet case don’t mean you’re going to start looking nearer to home. You ever lay a finger on my Gary, I’ll nut you in the nadgers.” He cocked his head to one side, giving me a speculative look. “Actually, in your case, I reckon I could knee you in the nadgers.”
“Whoa!” I threw up my hands. “Gary and me are just mates. Cross my heart and hope to . . . get kneed in the nadgers. Anyway, haven’t you noticed he’s about this far from getting your name tattooed on his arm?” I gave Darren my own hard stare, one I’d copied off Harry from that time she caught someone making homophobic jokes in her bar. “So make sure you treat him right.”
“Or what?” he taunted, in a you-and-whose-army sort of voice, but he was smiling.
“Or I’ll come round in the night and fix it so your sewer backs up in your kitchen sink.”
Darren burst into hearty cackles. “You’re all right, aintcha?” He took a long swig of his beer. “Did Gary tell you I used to be in films?”
I toasted him with my pint. “What do you reckon? Think Gary would keep quiet about something like that?”
“Bless ’im. Have you seen any of them?”
“Well, none that I remember . . . But then again, I probably wouldn’t have been looking at your face.” It seemed a bit more tactful than just saying Sorry, mate, I don’t watch dwarf porn. “What was your stage name?”
“Ever see the Man from U.N.C.L.E.?”
I nodded, wondering where this was going.
“You’re looking at the one and only Napoleon So Low.” He leered as he said it, and I spluttered into my pint.
“So have you given Gary a private showing?” I asked.
“Depends what you’re talking about, don’t it?” Darren put down his pint, just as Gary returned.
“Ooh, what have I missed? I hope you two haven’t been talking about me.” He was lying through his teeth. Gary loves people talking about him.
“Would we?” I said, just as Darren chipped in with, “Only the good stuff.” Then his face softened. “Course, that’s all there is, innit?”
“Aw, bless him!” Gary cooed, looking worryingly moist around the eyes. “Isn’t he adorable?”
“Darren was just telling me about his career in films,” I went on quickly, before any of us could drown in the slushy stuff. I turned to the man in question. “So how come you gave it all up? The acting, I mean,” I clarified before he could come up with some ripe innuendo on the subject of giving it up.
He made a face. “Had to, din’t I? Industrial accident.” He shook his head sadly, and Gary joined in.
Call me a coward, but I really didn’t dare ask. Good thing my pie turned up at that point.
The food was lovely, bless Marnie’s nimble fingers, although I had to edge around the table a bit to protect the chicken filling from Flossie’s hungry gaze. She stayed on the alert for a moment longer, ears pricked and nose twitching in my direction, then settled back down on her well with a reproachful air. I didn’t feel guilty. I knew for a fact Harry fed her two square meals a day, plus all the rowdy drunks she could chew on.
I’d no sooner set my fork down for the last time than Sweetie Pie and Pumpkin were making their excuses.
“Sorry, Tommy.” Gary pouted. “Darren and I need to get an early night. I need to be up bright and early tomorrow morning to ring in the faithful.”
Darren leered and nudged me painfully in the ribs. “And after that, he’ll be coming home and ringing my bell.”
Gary shrieked with laughter and pretended to slap Darren. “Sweetie Pie! You are terrible!”
As far as I could see, the only good thing about that evening was getting home to find a chatty, friendly email from Patricia Treadgood, attaching both her shortbread recipe and one for gingersnaps.