Love and Tea Bags

by C F White

  He’d tried calling Bradley several times on the ride over, but alas, no answer. Mark had even left a garbled message on his answerphone that Bradley would no doubt laugh over when and if he ever turned the sodding thing on. What was the point of a mobile of one couldn’t be mobile when answering it? So Mark’s only choice was to attempt to catch the flight to Sydney before it took off and convince the Adonis to stay a while longer. Perhaps have a nice chat over a cup of tea? Gosh, he needed a tea. But he supposed that should wait.

  Stuck behind a family of holidaying Brits in the revolving doors, Mark reined in his need to kick the little kid pulling her monster on wheels. And yes, it was a monster. A pink one with a face. Instead Mark uttered a pardon me and inched past them all into the entrance. He stopped and checked the signs on the screens dotted around the check-in lounge. The Archer Atlantic to Sydney still wasn’t boarding and actually, for the first time in Mark’s life, he’d caught a break by noticing it was slightly delayed. Thank heavens for that good old Brit lack of timekeeping. There must have been snow on the runway or something. Mark was aware it was May, but that hadn’t been unheard of before.

  With renewed hope, he marched over to the Archer check-in desk and the beauty behind loosed a welcoming, and somewhat unnerving, grin his way. “Checking in, sir?”

  “Um, no, not exactly. I just need to get over into the departure lounge, if you would be so kind as to point me in the right direction?”

  “Do you have a ticket?”

  “No. I don’t plan on flying anywhere. This body in hot terrain is not a good look.” He chuckled.

  She didn’t. “Without a boarding pass, you can’t enter into the departure area.”

  “Right.” Mark ruffled his hair. “Are you sure?”

  She looked pretty damn sure and rather annoyed that Mark had the audacity to suggest she wouldn’t know the rules of her profession and that Mark, the infrequent flyer that he’d just admitted to being, would.

  “Sorry, of course, yes.”

  Mark remained stood at the front, deciding what to do next. The family from the doors approached the queue behind him and waited, impatiently, with their suitcases on wheels ready to board the conveyor belt to go to, well, who the hell knew where? Quite possibly not where they were going. Mark offered up an apologetic smile to the father, then turned back to the Archer’s delight. Which, in hindsight, she wasn’t. What with Mark being the real Archer here, having discovered that from his brief read of the horoscopes in the paper left in his Uber.

  “I’ve seen it on many a sitcom slash romantic comedy etcetera. The guy runs to the airport, calls the damsel’s name just as she’s hopping onto the plane and wham bam, Bob’s your uncle.”

  The lady arched a perfectly already arched-in pencil eyebrow.

  “Are you saying that’s all lies?” Mark gasped, hand to his chest. “Are you insinuating that all those films, television programmes—heck, I’m positive there was an advert who used the running to the airport cliché one Christmas—all have gaping plot holes that not one person picked up on and slammed a one-star review on their Amazon profile?”

  “I believe they would have all bought a ticket, gone through the departure gates and got there that way. I’m pretty sure that’s how Ross did it in the final episode of Friends.”

  “Oh!” Mark nodded. “I see! I need to buy a ticket!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Great. I’ll have a one-way then please. Cheaper, right? And I don’t actually have to board the plane, do I?”

  “You can’t buy a ticket from here.”

  “But you just said—”

  “You’d need to buy a ticket from the ticket booth. This is check-in.”

  “Right, of course.” Mark’s head pounded with all this new information. “And would you be so kind as to point me in the direction of the Archer Airways ticket booth?”

  The girl smiled, her red lips coating her white teeth. She pointed the tip of her pen over to a booth the other side of the airport. Mark sighed, tapped the counter surface and swivelled. His hips, not anything else. This whole situation was rather laborious, but it didn’t require the middle finger salute.

  “Sir?”

  “Yes?”

  “You can buy a ticket from any of the airlines.” She waggled the edge of the pen at all the other multicoloured booths ranging from budget to exclusive air travel. “You just need to get to the gate, right?”

  “Yes! Oh, gosh, yes! Thank you.” He physically phewed. He’d had a hunch that his overdraft would never have stretched to a ticket to Sydney and now thanked his lucky stars that he could venture on over to the Aero Flop or whatever and just spend thirty quid on a flight to Edinburgh and still get through the gate.

  “Good luck, sir. She’s a lucky woman.”

  “Oh, no, it’s not a woman. A man, actually. A hunky fine Adonis specimen of all male. And a stripper, nonetheless!”

  “Lucky you.” The lady flushed a little. So did Mark.

  “I know.” He grinned. “Can’t quite believe it myself.” The fluttering in his chest went on overdrive and he paused to take in the memory of Bradley. Naked.

  “Sir?”

  “Hmm?”

  “You might need to hurry then.” She nodded at the screens.

  Mark snapped to and glanced up to the signs detailing that the Sydney flight had landed and was on a quick turnaround, boarding in ten minutes.

  “Bugger!” Mark rammed through the family behind him, sending the little toddler perched on her pink trunk falling to the floor and wailing. Mark figured that would be a usual start to a family’s twenty-four-hour flight with a toddler anyway and so bolted across the check-in toward the nearest ticket booth.

  He possibly should have checked who was working the booth before approaching, as he found he only had a way with certain types of people. The man behind the desk at Budget Airways didn’t come into this category. Big, hairy, beefy and most certainly heterosexual. All the things Mark had come to despise of in customer services. He couldn’t flirt or find some solidarity with this one.

  “Hello.” He thought he’d best start properly. “I would like a ticket please. To anywhere, not really bothered. Just need out, y’know.” He tapped the desk for good measure.

  The man smiled. Or, Mark assumed he did. His beard overtook his lips, so it was hard to tell through the strands of movement.

  “When would you like to travel?”

  “Now. Right now. No time like the present. The world is my oyster. Don’t want to be stuck in old Blighty forever, eh?” He now understood why he got on most people’s nerves. Not Bradley’s though. Dear Bradley. Mark phased out again.

  “Sir?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I’ve got a ten p.m. flight to Reykjavik, you want it?”

  Mark slammed the counter. “Yes, I do!”

  The man nodded, scratching his beard and set to tapping about on his computer. Mark drummed his fingernails on the desk surface, urging the man to have some speed. He glanced up to the screen monitors that indicated he had five minutes before boarding commenced. Mark’s heart beat faster than the clicks on the bear’s mouse. He then marvelled further, regarding the never before used analogy of animals of an airport worker and his electrical equipment. God, I need a tea.

  “I’m in a hurry, could we…” Mark snapped his fingers. He instantly regretted it as the man stopped his idle tapping on the computer to stare vacantly at him.

  “The flight is at ten. You got six hours.”

  “But I have to get home and pack, my dear boy. I can’t very well go to one of the coldest climates in just this leather jacket, now can I?”

  The man shrugged. “It’s a nice jacket.”

  “That it may be, but it’s impractical for Iceland.”

  “You would have thought you’d have brought a suitcase with you, what with wanting to hurry to get out of the country?” The man raised his bushy brown eyebrows. “Running from something, sir?”

  Mark
chuckled, then leaned across the counter covering his mouth with the back of his hand. “The CIA, but that’s between me and you.”

  “What they after you for?”

  “Tax evasion.”

  The man snorted. “All right, if you say so.” He turned back to his screen. “That’ll be two hundred and fifty-eight pounds.”

  Mark nearly threw up. But he didn’t and fished out his wallet from his back pocket. Worst-case scenario, he could use the credit card then call up the bank to say it had been stolen. Mark handed over the well-used and, thankfully, in date Visa.

  “Passport?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Passport? You need your passport to buy a ticket and travel. You’ve got a passport, right?”

  “Of course I have!” Mark exploded. “What are you insinuating here? That I am an illegal immigrant. Like one of those blasted Australians!” Oh, the beautiful Australians!

  “No, just you need a passport to travel. Even pre-Brexit.”

  Mark slapped the desk. “Bugger!” His voice echoed around the check-in and many gazes darted his way. He twisted, back to the passport-holding tourists and into the eyes of beef-man. “Okay, look, I’m on the run. Can’t you just give me the ticket and say I threatened you?”

  The man looked down at Mark’s scrawny frame and arched an eyebrow. Mark flapped his hands.

  “Fine, fine!” He huffed and glanced up to the screen. Now boarding for Sydney. “There is someone getting on that flight to Sydney right now that I need to speak to. Can you call someone?”

  “Well, that all depends.”

  “On what?” Mark was losing the little patience he had left.

  “Why you need to call this person back.”

  Mark hung his head. He could not tell this man he was chasing after a stripper who he’d fucked in his best friend’s tea shop with the aid of a butter replacement product. He possibly could have got away with it over at the Archer check-in, but here, the man looked like he wouldn’t appreciate the information, nor the visual imagery. So, he thought of Damian. Never a good thing. But, what would Damian do right now? He’d lie.

  “There’s been a terrible tragedy.”

  “Mmm, hmm.”

  “Yes, my friend’s cat has died. Suddenly. Prolonged cancer. Went on for years.”

  “Died suddenly after years of suffering?”

  “Yes. It’s an oxymoron.”

  “What type of cat is that?”

  Mark furrowed his brow. “A tabby one? Anyway, I really must tell my friend. He will want to say his last goodbyes before departing to pastures new. So if you could just put a Tannoy out to call here? Maybe? Would that work?”

  Silence. Mark drummed his fingernails harder on the surface. Then he recalled what he had in his arsenal. His doe eyes. He widened them, emulating the imaginary cat. The man huffed and picked up a phone. He held it to his ear and dialled a few numbers.

  “What’s the name?”

  “Oh, erm…” Mark looked around the departure lounge for a sign of inspiration. “Suitcase.”

  “Suitcase?”

  “That’s right. Frequent flyer. Airmiles the lot. Cat got around more than most. Perfect name for the little critter. Was a shame he couldn’t fly out to Sydney with his owner.”

  The man gawked at him, but Mark remained poised.

  “I meant the passenger’s name.”

  Mark would have palm slapped his forehead, if he hadn’t made an absolute tit out of himself already. “Bradley Summers,” he mumbled. “Getting on the Archer Airways flight to Sydney.”

  After a brief contemplation, the man dialled the last number and turned his back to speak to whoever was on the phone. Mark could hear him detailing the most ridiculous tosh of lies he’d just made up, but there was no giggling or men in white coats heading his way, so he assumed he was getting somewhere. Beard put the phone down.

  “They’ve put a call out in Departures. If Bradley wants to come talk to his dear Suitcase, he’ll be told to call here.”

  “Possibly could have given the cat’s nickname then.”

  “Which is?”

  “Mark.”

  The man nodded, handing back the Visa card. “Here you go, Mark.”

  Mark took the card and decided to slip it away as if nothing abnormal had happened. He just waited. Tapping his fingers against his sides and eyes fixed on the screen. Twenty minutes passed and the Sydney flight flicked up to declare it had departed then disappeared from the screen.

  No calls were taken.

  “I’m sorry, sir. Perhaps just send him a photo?”

  Mark snorted. “Of the cat?”

  “No. Of you, and those doe eyes. He might board the first flight home.”

  Mark narrowed his eyes. The man grinned. Mark could tell as he saw teeth that time. Well, well, well, turns out one never can tell these days.

  * * * *

  Three hours later, Mark slumped through into his house with a resigned feeling of dejection. It wasn’t the first time, and that stung infinitely more. He’d spectacularly lost everything. And in the process made himself look even more of a dick than was usual. He’d lost his job and the chance at love in one fell swoop. Not to mention all the crap that had been stored in his loft for a rainy day—the man with a van who can proved that he, indeed, could, as the skip outside was empty. He had, however, gotten the beard man’s number. Found out his name was Glen. Recently heartbroken too. Trouble was, he lived in Surrey which was a fair way from Marsby. Not as far as Australia, mind, but still a damn trek.

  Plus, he was no Bradley.

  He kicked off his shoes, slipped free from his jacket and banged his head against the wall for a while. Knock some sense into me, perhaps? And it did. He settled on a new plan. First things first, he needed to sell this house. For many reasons. One being that he couldn’t live here anymore. Two being he would do as his father and Macy suggested and go see the world like he had always wanted. And three because he’d need the money to buy a flight to Sydney. It might take months, but he would bloody well do it. At least he could get Bradley’s Australian number from Macy in the morning and try at another call.

  Actually, that all had to come second. First, he needed tea.

  He trudged into the kitchen and stopped short when the light switched on and a cup of the good stuff was held out to him by a muscular arm.

  “It’s probably cold. You took your time.”

  “Bradley!” Mark swooned.

  “Brad.” Bradley winked.

  “I’ve said before, Bradley suits you—” Mark was cut off when Bradley swooped an arm around his waist, tugged him forward and kissed him.

  And Mark wasn’t surprised that his first thought as his tongue raged inside Bradley’s hot mouth was, how the hell had the man even got into his house? Had he scaled the walls in his thongs? Had he used next door’s dubious stepladder and broken in through the open bathroom window? Had Mark even locked the damn house in the first place?

  He decided, though, having obviously knocked quite a bit of sense into himself through his head banging, that he wouldn’t ask Bradley the question just yet.

  That could wait until morning at least.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Best Laid Plans

  Mark opened his eyes to what was certainly a splendid sight to wake up to any day of the year and a ridiculous grin spread across his features as he brushed his nose to the bare shoulder beside him. Bradley peeped open one eye, his lips curving into a smile rivalling Mark’s.

  “G’day, Mark.”

  “It is indeed.” Normally Mark’s reserved nature would have wrapped the duvet around his skinny, pasty body at this point and offered the man a brew. But it seemed a continental drift was in occurrence, and instead he edged closer to slap a kiss on the Aussie’s luscious full lips.

  Bradley hummed, groped Mark’s backside and dragged him on top of him. “And it’s looking up.” He arched that one, now seemingly enticing, eyebrow, wriggling against Mark’s gr
owing hardness between his legs.

  “It’s been a while since I woke up to this.” Mark kissed him, because it seemed like a good response at the time. And because he wanted to. A lot.

  “You could have done. Several times.” Bradley swiped his nose down Mark’s. “If you hadn’t been so bloody…British!”

  Mark chuckled. “That, I’m afraid, is inevitable.”

  “Maybe you need a bit of Aussie in you?” Bradley wriggled his hips, slapping his wide hands across Mark’s buttocks.

  Rather startled at the slap and grope, Mark pulled away and furrowed his brow. “Who’s on top here?”

  Bradley bit his lip, his suggestive smirk once again needing to be kissed away. So Mark did, because he’d had enough of pretending that he didn’t want to.

  “C’mon, Mark, you can’t tell me you’ve not switched it up in your extensive lifetime.”

  “Extensive?” Mark slid off and propped himself up on his elbow, staring down at the beautiful specimen beside him, hardly believing his eyes. Should he have gone to Specsavers?

  Inhaling a deep breath, Bradley grappled for Mark and hefted him back on top. Mark’s cock twitched, poking up between them as if annoyed it had been forgotten about. Mark could almost hear it huff.

  Bradley, at that point, clearly decided it would be better to address the more persistent of the two of them. And that was Mark’s dick. He wrapped his meaty fingers around it and slid up and down, swiping his thumb along the head. It seeped, ensuring Mark that this was real and not a wet dream. Just his wet dream, underneath him.

  “This dick must have had quite a bit of action in its lifetime. If only it could talk.” Bradley pumped a little more vigorously, and Mark’s dick whimpered. Perhaps it wasn’t so much his dick as his throat, but Mark liked to claim that he had full capacity over most of his body’s reactions. His penis, however, had always had a mind of its own. And it seemed, right then, that it was leaning more toward hearing what Bradley might have to offer him. Traitor.

  “Luckily, I only have one mouth that runs away with itself.” Mark grunted as Bradley increased the pressure, firming his hand around the tight flesh.