Played!

by JL Merrow

  “Let me guess—instant success?”

  “Unmitigated disaster. It was an open-air production, in the Master’s Garden at Clare. And nobody had thought anything of the fact that Trinity had their May Ball the same night. Except that the music from the band entirely drowned out the dialogue for the whole of the first half.” Tristan paused for effect. “And then in the second half, the fireworks started. Oh, the audience applauded politely enough at the end, but it was quite plain none of them had had the first idea what had been going on.” He grinned.

  Con smiled back.

  A curious fluttering sensation arose in Tristan’s breast. “Are you familiar with the play?” he asked quickly.

  “Nah—but Malvolio’s the hero, yeah?”

  “God, no. A thousand times no. He’s a steward with delusions of grandeur who is duped and humiliated in the course of the play.”

  Con frowned, but a half smile still played upon his lips. “And…that’s what made you want to be an actor?”

  “But of course! He’s…” Tristan stalled, neither words nor gestures sufficient to explain, in a few words, the joy of playing a character who excites both ridicule and sympathy. “We’ll find a reputable production, and I’ll take you to see it,” he decided. “We’re only twenty-five miles from London; there must be one that’s easily accessible this summer.”

  “Yeah? That’d be… Yeah. We should do that.”

  Con’s face was aglow as he leaned unconsciously towards Tristan. Now was the time. The iron was hot; the sun, shining. Tristan opened his mouth to say the words that would make Con his.

  “So, rehearsal,” he was appalled to find himself saying. “I thought we’d go back to the scenes with Titania. How’s your singing?”

  Con looked supremely uncomfortable. “Dunno. Never really done any.”

  “Excellent. Just remember, this is supposed to sound bad.” Tristan took a moment to berate himself for his epic failure of nerve, then another to breathe in the character of Nick Bottom. A puffed-up idiot who utterly failed to live up to his own expectations.

  No, that wouldn’t be too far a stretch of his abilities right now. Tristan began singing in a nasal monotone, clapping his hands to the beat.

  “The ousel cock so black of hue,

  With orange-tawny bill,

  The throstle with his note so true,

  The wren with little quill,”

  He broke off for a moment, a thought striking. “You could go for the laughs with cock and little quill, but remember you’ll be in full ass’s regalia then, so any subtle expressions are likely to be lost.” Tristan frowned. He never had had that conversation with Heather over Bottom’s costume. “Do we know yet what you’re going to have in the way of headgear? We should find out sooner rather than later.”

  “Yeah. It’s just gonna be this sort of hood thing—Hev reckoned it’d be funnier. And, well, cheaper, than a full ass’s head.”

  Tristan nodded. “No, that’s good—we could work with either, but it does make a difference. How about a tail?”

  Con blinked. “Dunno. Is that in the play? I thought it was just his head that got changed.”

  “Oh, you mustn’t underestimate the efficacy of a tail. One can do all sorts of things with a tail.” Remembering his goal, Tristan smiled flirtatiously and added a little of a leer for good measure.

  Con, predictably, flushed.

  “Ah, well. Onwards and tupwards, as the saying goes.” Con was frowning, but Tristan ignored it. “You, dear boy, are about to be seduced by a fairy. Are you ready?”

  “Uh…”

  “I’ll be the fairy. Come, sit thee down upon this flowery bed.” Tristan patted the sofa impatiently until Con sat, perching upon the edge like a very large, very nervous bird preparing to take flight. Beaming, Tristan continued with both words and actions. “While I thy amiable cheeks do coy, and stick musk-roses in thy sleek smooth head, and kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy.”

  Con swallowed audibly. “Uh, that was my real ear you just kissed.”

  “Well, of course it was. You’re not wearing any false ones right now.”

  “Yeah, but…shouldn’t you, you know, pretend?”

  “Do remind me which of us is the professional actor here, won’t you? I seem to have forgotten. Actually, I think it would be better if you put your head in my lap instead of just sitting next to me. This isn’t the nineteen thirties; neither of us is required to keep one foot on the floor.”

  Con’s head noticeably failed to move lapwards. “Shouldn’t we be talking about this with Linda? She’s the one who’s actually playing Titania. I mean, she might get a bit pissed off with me if we’re rehearsing the scene and all of a sudden I’ve got my face in her crotch.”

  Not having met Linda yet, Tristan couldn’t comment on her in particular, but he could damn well pass judgement on generalities. “You really have no idea of your own allure, do you? Trust me, dear boy, there are very few people around who would object to your face coming into contact with any portion of their anatomy.” Tristan cocked his head. “Well, perhaps my neighbour over there. He seems to get a little hot under the collar about anything gay.”

  “Mr. Onslow at number twenty? He’s always been all right with me.”

  “Well, flamboyant or, for that matter, camp are the last words anyone would use to describe you. Quite possibly he hasn’t noticed your rampant homosexuality.” Tristan leaned towards Con and lowered his voice in both volume and pitch. “Trust me, though; I’ve noticed. Now. Head; lap.”

  Con scowled and resolutely failed to move. “Where’s Peaseblossom?” he ground out with no regard to character while delivering the line.

  Tristan ignored it and smiled brightly. “I can be Peaseblossom, if you like. Just put your head down on that cushion. There, that’s it.” He leaned over, allowing a sultry look to slink into his eyes. “Now, where’s that itch that needs scratching?”

  Con stood up abruptly, his face red. “Look, you gotta stop this, all right?” His voice was hoarse but nevertheless ominously earnest.

  Tristan’s stomach took on a sudden whim to visit his socks. “I thought you were enjoying our little acting classes?”

  “Not the acting. The… The other stuff. All that…you know. Suggestive stuff. You gotta stop it. I told you before, I’m not interested.”

  Tristan forced a laugh. It sounded painfully hollow, as if uttered by a corpse in a cathedral crypt. “Oh, that? Dear boy, you didn’t really think I was serious, did you?”

  Con blinked. “Oh.”

  “I do apologise if I’ve offended your rustic sensibilities. I shall try to be a little more innocent in my amusements in future. Don’t worry, your rough-hewn virtue is entirely safe in my hands.” Ashes. That was the taste in Tristan’s mouth. He laughed again, more lightly this time. There, that was better. Still haunting a cathedral, but at least above ground. “But do recall the Bard’s comedy is supposed to be bawdy.”

  “Oh,” Con said again. “Yeah. Right.” His stance, which a moment ago had been that of a gazelle about to flee from a lion, now took on the aspect of a gazelle that had just realised said lion was, in fact, merely a trick of the light upon a tuffet of grass.

  Tristan smiled—a good smile; a thoroughly convincing one. He’d practised it in the mirror many times so was quite certain of that. “Shall we continue?”

  “Um.” Con swallowed. “Think… Think I’d better go. Gotta job,” he added unconvincingly, the quick rub to the nose merely the perjured icing on the forsworn cake. “I’ll, um. Give you a call.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Strange Bedfellows

  Con barely knew which way he was walking as he left Tristan’s house. Stupid, fucking idiot. Course Tristan wasn’t serious. Why the sodding hell would he be? They’d had that conversation already, hadn’t they, about Tristan fancying him—but
he hadn’t, had he? He’d just been horny, that was all. Con had just been, well, there. Tristan had even admitted it. He’d said Con wasn’t in his league—well, he’d said it politer and posher than that, but it meant the same thing.

  God, Tristan must think Con was just like Nick Bottom—thinking he was God’s gift to men, women and fucking fairies. Why the sodding hell couldn’t Con have kept his stupid, big mouth shut? He could have played along with the flirting, it wouldn’t have killed him. Yeah, so it was awkward and uncomfortable, and made him want stuff he knew he couldn’t have—so what? Con was a big boy. He ought to be able to handle it.

  It was just… Con couldn’t stop thinking about the way Tristan’s face lit up when he talked about stuff he really cared about. The way he waved his hands all over the shop while he talked, and his face was like…like one of those flip books Gran had helped Con make when he was a kid, where you drew a little stick figure on the corner of each page and then flipped it quick so it looked like he was running…

  “Con?”

  Startled, Con looked up, blinking back something in his eye. “Oh—Mr. Onslow. You all right?”

  “Fine, fine. Glad I caught you, actually.” He frowned. “Have you just been at Mrs. Geary’s?”

  “Uh, yeah.”

  The frown deepened. “Hmm. There’s something very odd about that young man. He’s not at all what I was expecting. I mean to say, I’ve personally got nothing against homosexuals—nothing at all. I believe one of my great uncles was what used to be called a confirmed bachelor, although of course such things were never really talked about—but it does seem a little distasteful the way he seems determined to flaunt it.”

  Con stared. Words weren’t exactly the thing he was good at even at the best of times, and right now the only ones he could think of were the sort Gran would have given him a clip round the ear for saying in public. He wanted to punch the bastard on his ugly, prejudiced nose. Course, Gran wouldn’t have liked him doing that either. “Dunno what you mean,” was all he ended up saying roughly as he pushed past Mr. Onslow and legged it up the road.

  “But I wanted you to…” Con didn’t hear the rest. He was round the corner and jogging past the village hall before he slowed down again, sweating a bit in the hot sun. God, Tristan had been right about that bastard. Not got a problem with homosexuals? No, not at all, just as long as they didn’t dare do anything gay. Why the bloody hell shouldn’t Tristan flaunt who he was?

  If he wasn’t who he was, he wouldn’t be Tristan, would he? Huh. Argue with that, Mr. Nothing-against-gays Onslow.

  Con had calmed down a bit by the time he got back to his flat—he’d kept seeing people he knew on the High Street, so he’d had to at least give them a smile and a wave. Five minutes in his living room, though, had him pretty much climbing the walls again. He needed something to do. Preferably somewhere a bit cooler, but he’d take what he could get. Maybe he should go and see Alf?

  Yeah, right, because spending all your time hanging round some old bloke you’d only just met, simply because he’d once been mates with your grandad, was in no way sad. Trouble was, all Con’s mates would be working.

  He could… He could go and see Patrick in hospital, Con realised. They weren’t really that close mates or anything, but the poor sod would probably be glad of the company. And at least Con wouldn’t get teased about Tristan. Course, Patrick being a Sham-Drammer too, Con probably wouldn’t be able to get away without talking about Tristan at all, but still, it ought to be easy enough to change the subject.

  Con hadn’t thought they made you stay in hospital so long these days just for a broken leg, but Heather reckoned they were doing all kinds of surgery and stuff to the poor bastard. It sounded horrible. She’d been to visit already, taking a big card she’d got all the Sham-Drams to sign. Well, most of ’em anyway. Con was pretty sure she’d faked Roger’s signature so she wouldn’t have to go round to his house and deal with the git.

  Con ought to take him something too. People liked stuff to read in hospital, didn’t they? Con had never stayed in hospital himself, and Gran had never been one for reading even before her eyes got bad, but she’d liked having her old audio books with her, ’specially the last time she’d been in.

  That time she hadn’t come out again.

  But yeah, he could remember other people in the ward having books and magazines and stuff. Trouble was, he didn’t have a bloody clue what Patrick might like to read. Better be something general interest, then. And there was a lot less chance of Con making a really stupid choice if he stuck with the magazines, so he’d do that.

  Nodding to himself, Con toed on his trainers and grabbed his keys.

  God, he hated the disinfectant smell of hospitals. It always reminded him of Gran dying. That, and the weird metallic sounds you got, mixed up with the squeaking noise his trainers made on the floor. And the lighting, too bright like it was all one big kitchen. And the plastic chairs, and the way they always clashed with the green-painted walls with the scuff marks… Actually, come to think of it, Con hated pretty much everything about hospitals.

  Still, it wasn’t like he had to stay here, was it? He’d rung Heather before he set off to find out what ward Patrick was in—and to check he hadn’t actually been allowed to go home already. She’d rattled off the ward and the visiting hours and said good-bye—maybe she wasn’t supposed to take personal calls at work? Then again, it might just be her being focussed on the job. She was like that.

  There were half a dozen beds in Patrick’s ward, and the other five were all occupied by elderly people, so it wasn’t hard to spot the man himself, even though he had his nose stuck in the Daily Mail and was looking a bit different than he usually did.

  Con walked over to his bed. “Hey, mate, how you doing?”

  Patrick looked up from his newspaper, both eyebrows raised, which made Con feel a bit awkward. Maybe they weren’t good enough mates for Con to come and visit after all? Then he smiled, and Con felt a lot better. “Con! Good to see you.”

  He looked pale and a bit tired—there were dark circles under his eyes—and he hadn’t shaved for a few days. And his hair was the worst mess Con had ever seen it. Without any product slicking it back or spiking it up, it looked lighter, sort of straw colour. Right now it looked like someone had dumped a haystack on top of Patrick’s head.

  “Yeah, personal grooming hasn’t been top of the priorities list while I’ve been in here,” Patrick said with a crooked smile, leaving Con feeling like a total bastard for being so bloody obvious about what he’d been thinking.

  “Sorry. How’s the leg?” Con nodded at the lump under the thin white blanket, mercifully hidden from view, as he sat down on the plastic chair by Patrick’s bed.

  “Ah, you know. Still there, at any rate. So how’s it all going with the play? Hev told me you’re in it now, which, seriously, that’s great. Can’t believe they managed to persuade you.”

  Con shrugged. “It’s going okay. Oh—I brought you this,” he said, reaching into the carrier bag he’d dumped on the floor and pulling out a copy of Men’s Health.

  Patrick laughed. “Oi, is that supposed to be a hint to stop lying around on my arse and get back into training? Harsh, mate. Harsh.”

  Shit. He’d still got it wrong, even sticking with the safe option. Con grimaced. “Didn’t mean it like that. Sorry.”

  “Hey, no worries. Just having a laugh. Seriously, thanks, mate. It’s a lot better than what my mum brought. Copy of Alice in Wonderland, can you believe it?” He laughed again at Con’s puzzled frown. “It’s a joke—s’posed to be, anyhow. She fell down a rabbit hole, remember?”

  Con groaned. “That’s terrible. And that’s your mum?”

  “Yeah, that’s her. She’s signed up on a couple of dating sites, and I read her profile. Good sense of humour, she put. I told her no, Mum. No. You have a terrible sense of humour.” He shook his hea
d, a fond smile on his lips. “But she brought me a couple of thrillers too. Tell you something, I never thought I’d say this, but I’m getting so bloody sick of reading now I’ve got bugger all else to do all day.”

  “Oh—sorry.” Con winced and held up the magazine he’d brought. “Want me to take it back with me?”

  “Oi, no you bloody don’t. Don’t have to read it, do I? I can just look at the pictures. That one’s got David Beckham in—he’s well fit, long as he keeps his mouth shut.” As Patrick made a grab for the mag, Con’s expression must have given away his surprise. “What? Seriously, you thought I was straight?”

  “Wasn’t sure.”

  Patrick grinned. “What, ’cos I never tried it on with you? Hev told me you were getting over a bad breakup. Mind you, that must have been a year ago now, mustn’t it? Could be time to get back on the horse, don’t you reckon? Or is it true what Hev said about you and that Tristan geezer?”

  Oh, bloody hell. “There’s nothing going on between me and Tristan,” Con said a bit sharper than he’d meant to.

  Patrick held up both hands. “Oookay. Moving on now. They’re gonna let me out of here in a few days—wanna take a gimp out for a drink?”

  “Uh…” Caught by surprise, Con wasn’t sure what to say. Did he want to go out for a drink with Patrick? As in, on a date, not just a drink with mates? Patrick was a good bloke, and he was definitely good-looking—’specially when he had his face on—but, well, he wasn’t Con’s type, was he?

  Shit. He wasn’t Tristan.

  “Thanks, but, uh, I think I’m gonna be a bit busy for the next few months,” Con said at last, when the silence got too excruciating. “You know, with the play and all. Seeing as you’ve decided to put your feet up,” he added with a weak smile.

  Patrick didn’t look too upset at being turned down, thank God. “Yeah, yeah, you don’t have to rub it in. So how’s it going, anyway? Go on, give us a line or two. You were there for most of my rehearsals, so you must know some of it by now.”