Pansies

by Alexis Hall

  Finally, his dad nodded: “Alreet. I’m gan te get a cuppa. Want one?”

  That was . . . it? Alfie wasn’t sure if he’d broken down a wall or tripped over a pebble. If he was relieved or disappointed or if it even mattered. “No, I’m good. Should be getting back to the shop.”

  Alfred Senior nodded. Looked like he was about to leave. But then he paused, frowning, as if he wanted to say something else. “You’ll let us know if it’s the transmission? Y’know, wi’ the van.”

  “Aye.”

  So that was that.

  Alfie picked up his impromptu toolbox. Followed his dad out of the garage and into the unexpected radiance of the afternoon.

  He stopped in at the shop to drop off the lasagne, plonking the still-warm dish onto the counter.

  Gothshelley stared at it. “What sinister alchemy is this?”

  “Uh . . .”

  “Smells like lasagne. Can I have some?”

  “No, it’s for us. For later. And, besides, it’s not made from fresh blood and the still-beating hearts of virgins.”

  “What the hell is wrong with you? I’m so not into eating the still-beating hearts of virgins.” She paused, lips curled contemptuously. “The limp dicks of people who think they’re funny, however . . .”

  “Well, there’s definitely none of those in there. It’s mainly . . . whatchamacallit . . . aubergine.”

  “Hashtag Eggplant Wednesdays.”

  “You what?”

  She sighed. “It amazes me how you manage to live in anything that small.” Then she half turned towards the workroom and bellowed: “Oh Fenimore, your boyfriend’s here with his aubergine.”

  “I told you,” said Fen, emerging, looking all shiny in the sunlight, “he’s not my boyfriend.”

  “Right, he’s just the bloke who sleeps with you and cooks for you.”

  “You cooked for me?” Fen wiped his hands on his jeans and lifted a corner of the tinfoil to peek underneath. “Wow, you did.”

  Alfie tried not to sound too proud of himself. “It’s a lasagne. A vegetarian lasagne.”

  “I . . . I . . . This . . . I . . .” Fen had gone pink and flustered and adorable.

  “I just didn’t want to live on takeaway, y’know?”

  “I didn’t even know you could cook.”

  “Well, mebbe I can’t. But I guess we’ll find out.”

  “I don’t care if it’s awful. This was really sweet of you.”

  “Are you going to kiss with tongues?” asked Gothshelley.

  “Maybe later.” Fen scowled at her. “When we’re not being scrutinised by a shōnen ai–obsessed teenager.”

  Alfie had pretty much no idea what they were talking about so he ignored it. “I’m going to get back to the van.”

  “What about the food, though? Won’t it get cold?”

  “It’s fine, just reheat it later.”

  Fen gave him big, helpless puppy eyes.

  “It’s easy.” Never mind that Alfie’d had pretty much the exact same conversation with Mam less than an hour ago. “All you have to do is heat the oven to about two hundred degrees—”

  “How do I do that?”

  “There’s a knob. Just turn it like.”

  “There are five or six knobs.”

  “Blummin’ heck, how can you not know how to turn on an oven?”

  “I told you, I don’t do domestic.” Fen gave him a wicked look from beneath his lashes. “I will, however, make it up to you later.”

  “Oh aye? Going to do the washing up, are you?”

  That earned him a yelp of giggling outrage and a poke in the arm.

  Gothshelley gagged. “You two are so adorable I just threw up in my mouth.”

  Which was Alfie’s cue to get back to the van. He got it jacked up and was hard at work poking around in its innards when he heard the clack of major heels on the concrete floor. He rolled out and found Gothshelley standing over him.

  “I made you tea. I didn’t spit in it.”

  “Er, thanks.”

  She plonked a mug down beside him. It was black and was covered in jagged red script which read: And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Watching Alfie turn it in his hands, she gave a toothy, purple grin. “You like it?”

  “This is yours?”

  “Yeah, I stole it from St. Bede’s.”

  Alfie sipped the tea tentatively. It didn’t seem infused with holy wrath. “You stole a mug from a church?”

  “Yeah, I did enter the house of God and therein I did nick His shit.”

  “Why were you even there? You don’t exactly strike me as the religious type.”

  She gave a velvety shrug. “I believe in nothing but the waiting dark. And KitKats. But my parents are totally Catholic.”

  “Must be a bit weird. What with you being, y’know, you.”

  “Not really. I mean, they think I’m going to hell, but they think everyone is going to hell. That’s what being Catholic means.” Her eyes softened. “I used to troll them by pretending to be a Satanist.”

  “And they’re really okay with that?”

  “Well, they’re not okay okay. They’d rather I wasn’t cheerfully imperilling my immortal soul, but they believe you have to choose faith. And I believe faith is dumb. And I also believe in premarital sex, women’s rights, queer rights, contraception, abortion, and that saying a bunch of Latin over some wine and biscuits doesn’t transform them into blood and flesh because what the fuck, that’s gross.” She reached down and yanked the mug out of his hands.

  Alfie whined in protest. “What are you doing? I’m not finished.”

  “Well, you should have thought about that before you tried to talk to me. Sheesh.”

  “I was just being polite.”

  “Polite is bullshit. And I don’t converse. I contemplate the meaninglessness of existence.”

  “If I promise not to do it again, can I have the tea back?”

  “No. You’re being punished now.”

  “Wow.” Alfie gave her a dark look. “You can really tell you were raised by Catholics.”

  He was fully expecting her to fuck off with what was left of his tea, and so ducked back under the van. But, to his surprise, her boots didn’t move. In fact, she was driving one pointy toe restlessly against the concrete floor. He poked his head out. “Is everything alreet?”

  “I just wanted to say that what you’re doing is, well, it’s okay. You can keep doing it.”

  “Fixing the van?”

  She gave him a look of withering concern. “Yeah, twonk-face, fixing the van.”

  “Sorry, you mean—”

  “Yeah, I mean.” She attacked the concrete even more viciously. “He was really sad before you came.”

  “Well, it’s rough losing someone you care about.”

  “Don’t care about people. Problem solved.”

  “Did you know his mam?”

  “A bit. She was—” Gothshelley rolled her eyes “—nice, I guess. Really nice, okay? Just one of those people who make you feel the world is a teeny tiny bit less shitty for them being in it.”

  “Like Fen.”

  “Oh shut up.”

  She stomped out. Left Alfie grinning.

  His dad turned out, as usual, to be right. There was definitely a transmission issue, and it was probably the torque converter. Which meant a mechanic because Alfie had learned his lesson. He wasn’t going to wreck Fen’s van as well at his bathroom out of a messed-up need to prove something that didn’t even matter. Or maybe even exist.

  He headed back into the shop to give Fen the news. Found him half in the freezer, cleaning or something, bum waving prettily in the air.

  It was hard not to get distracted, but Alfie made a valiant attempt. “So, I’ve got her running—”

  “Oh my God, seriously?” Fen sat back on his heels. “That’s amazing.”

  “Er, but only enough to get
her to a garage.”

  Fen slumped. “Shit.”

  “Aye. Look, let’s go together. I mean, what’s he going to do? Refuse to serve us? That’s illegal.”

  “He could do something awful to the van in vengeance.”

  “It’s already bust.”

  “He could charge me a gazillion pounds.”

  “I’m pretty sure he couldn’t.”

  “He could—” Fen glanced up at Alfie and, for a moment, he was just a pale-faced kid again, wild and wary “—be nasty to me.”

  “Well, then I’ll fucking punch him. The bigoted bastard.”

  “Oh, my knight in shining armour. That will definitely help.”

  “There’s no need to be sarcastic.”

  “There’s no need to punch people.”

  Gothshelley stuck her head round the door to the workroom. “Now are you going to kiss with tongues?”

  They both glared at her, and she retreated, cackling.

  Fen slid sinuously to his feet. Tucked his thumbs into his pocket. “Let’s do this.”

  “Kiss with tongues? I mean, I’m game, but shouldn’t—”

  “The van.”

  Alfie grinned.

  “Very funny. But, seriously, don’t get in a fight. And if you pull any closet-y bullshit or suggest I wear a different colour jumper or straight-person jeans . . . I swear to God . . . I’ll . . . I’ll . . .”

  Alfie dragged Fen into a hug. “I won’t. I promise. I’m never going to do that again.”

  “Good. Because I can punch people too. I mean, I haven’t ever. But I’m sure I could figure it out.”

  “It’s not rocket science.” He took Fen’s hand and gently curled it into a fist. “Keep your thumb on the outside and out of the way.” Traced his fingers lightly over Fen’s. “Use your knuckles, not the flats. And aim somewhere squishy—not the face like, cos you’ll probably just break your hand on their jaw.”

  “Thank you, Alfie Bell,” said Fen dryly, “for the sexy lesson in violence.”

  Alfie brought Fen’s still-clenched hand to his lips and kissed it. “Shall we go?”

  After a moment, Fen nodded, and leaving the shop in what Alfie hoped were Gothshelley’s capable hands, they made their way to the garage.

  “What are straight-person jeans?” asked Alfie, as he unlocked the van.

  “Oh my God, are you kidding me?”

  “I’m new at this, remember.”

  “Just, haven’t you ever noticed?”

  Now he thought about it, while Greg and Fen didn’t have much in common in some regards, in others they were quite similar. Especially when it came to showcasing . . . their assets. Alfie was actually pretty pleased to learn that, at the age of thirty, he had finally discovered his type. And that it was men with great arses. Which was when something else occurred to him. “What about me?”

  “No, you’re fine. You’re pretty good, actually.”

  “Really? Cos skinny jeans really aren’t my thing.”

  “Alfie, you look like a Levi advert.”

  “Not the one from the eighties?”

  “No, the recent one. Where his jeans fit really well and he’s implausibly sleeping with a woman. Now stop fishing for compliments.”

  The drive was a little bit hairy—the van was lurchy and growly, and Fen grew very quiet, picking at the dry skin around his fingernails. But still, Alfie got them to the garage in one piece. Except for a new coat of paint and some fresh signage, Brown’s Auto Repair was pretty much exactly like he remembered from when he used to hang out there after school with Kev and Pete. The same squat building, its wide, rolled-open doors giving it a sort of surprised look. He parked on the forecourt and jumped down, assailed by the familiar smells of oil and metal. Made his way inside with a confidence he was far from actually feeling.

  He was barely over the threshold when a cry rang out: “Shit me stupid. Alfie. Alfie Bell.” And the next thing he knew he was being hugged and backslapped. Responding was instinctive. As was reciprocal backslapping. Though, for the first time in his life, it felt ridiculous. Why couldn’t men just . . . hug each other? Without this pantomime of masculinity.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, it’s me. And I’m gay.”

  “You wha?”

  “I’m gay.”

  Pete did a balletic leap away from Alfie’s contaminating body.

  “And I’m kind of with him.”

  Alfie gestured. Fen was standing in the doorway, highlighted like a Click Me button by a shaft of dusty sunlight. And he looked . . . completely fucking delicious, all lean legs and sinewy arms, those long-lashed pretty-as-a-girl eyes of his, accentuated rather than obscured by his glasses. Alfie wanted to throw him to the floor and bite mine into every gorgeous inch of him.

  Fen lifted his hand and waggled his fingers in the campest imaginable way.

  “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” Pete had gone a grey-greenish colour as he stared between them. He took another step back, tripped over a jack stand, and landed arse-first on the concrete.

  It was hard to know whether to laugh or cry. So Alfie just blinked. “Calm doon, man.”

  After a second or two of scrabbling, Pete managed to find his feet again. He wheeled round, pelted all the way to the back of the garage, and vanished into the office, slamming the door behind him.

  “Wow.” Fen looked as bewildered as Alfie. “I’ve never seen anyone succumb to homo panic quite so literally.”

  “What do we do now?”

  “I have no idea.” Fen slipped his hand into Alfie’s. “Shall we go back?”

  “Not sure the van’s up to it, to be honest.”

  At that moment, the office door opened. A new figure emerged and started coming towards them. It—or rather she—turned out to be a tiny woman, in a boilersuit and a . . . whatsit . . . a hijab?

  “Hi,” she said. “I’m Leyla Brown. Can I help?”

  “Um, yeah, is there another mechanic around? Got a busted van out front.”

  There was a really long silence. It was weirdly uncomfortable.

  “I mean, if there’s not, it’s cool. We can wait or go somewhere—”

  “Alfie, sweetheart. Shut up.” That was Fen. “What my socially challenged partner means is: there’s something wrong with the van. Can you help?”

  “Probably. What’s the problem?”

  “Um, it won’t start? I’m sorry, that’s kind of the extent of my expertise in this area.”

  She smiled. “It’s more than enough. We’ll bring her in, have a look at her, see what’s going on, get back to you with a quote and the cost of any parts in a day or two. We can also give her a full service and tune-up because, no offence, she looks like she needs it.”

  Well. Alfie was an idiot. He wanted to crawl under a car and never come out. “I dunno how to say this now,” he mumbled, “but I think it might be the transmission. Except, y’know, you’re the mechanic. So ignore me.”

  “No, that’s helpful. So, she’s turning over?”

  “Yeah, but she judders out.”

  “Okay.” She nodded. Turned back to Fen. “Just need you to sign a couple of things and we can get started.”

  “I’ll go ring a taxi,” said Alfie. “Get us back hyem when you’re ready.”

  Home. He’d spoken without thinking, and the word clanged like he’d dropped it. But then Fen’s fingers tighten around his, and Alfie decided maybe it was okay after all. That it had been exactly what he’d meant to say.

  They got back to Pansies a little after closing time only to find everything put away and the shop already locked. Gothshelley had left them a note in the front window—which appeared to be an upraised middle finger daubed in purple lipstick on a piece of flower wrap.

  Laughing, they left it there, pulled down the grille, and headed up to the flat. But something shifted between them, without Alfie really knowing quite why or how, and they didn’t even get halfway up the stairs before they were mouth-to-mouth, tangled in each other’s arm
s, fumbling at belts and buttons. It was so awkward, full of edges and angles, Alfie’s T-shirt sticking to his back, his jeans digging into his hips, and the wall flaking plaster as they rubbed up against it. But somehow, that just made it better. It gave this weird clarity to Fen straining against his palm, and Fen’s hand rough on his cock, to their bodies shoved together and their kiss full of what Alfie realised too late was the salt of Fen’s weeping.

  When he came, it was quick and harsh and out of nowhere, a magnesium flare of pleasure that Fen wrenched out of him like a sob. Afterwards, they sat on the stairs, shoulder to shoulder, their unsteady breaths oddly synchronised in the narrow hallway. And Alfie reached out to catch Fen’s tears.

  “What’s wrong, pet?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know.” Fen took off his glasses and cleaned them on the edge of his shirt. His eyes were reddish, his lashes glinting in the uncertain light and spiky-tipped with moisture. “I can’t tell if I’m happy or sad. I think I’m both. Or maybe being happy feels like being sad now or the other way round.”

  Alfie reached for Fen’s hands and held them tight. “It’s okay, y’know.”

  “What’s okay?”

  “To be happy.”

  One of Fen’s eyebrows arched sardonically. “I think I’ve lost the habit.”

  “Don’t be like that. I know you just feel guilty and confused cos you think you’re letting your mam down if you’re not miserable all the time.”

  “Wow, Alfie. Tell it to me straight, why don’t you?”

  “You saying I’m wrong?”

  “N-no.” Fen swallowed. And, for a moment, Alfie thought he might say something more. But he just sighed. “I can’t believe it’s Wednesday. How can it be Wednesday?”

  “We can figure this out.”

  Fen shook his head. “I don’t want to have to think about it.”

  “Yeah but . . .” Alfie wasn’t sure how to say it gently, so he just blundered on “. . .we’re going to have to before Monday, right? I mean, cos it’s something. Whatever we’re doing. I know you feel it too.”

  “Yes,” said Fen, very softly. “I do.”

  “And I’m not just going to walk away. Or let you convince me—or yourself—that it doesn’t matter.”

  Fen gave a wobbly laugh. “Okay, okay. No need to get all Alpha Bell about it.”