by JL Merrow
Thinking back to him embracing me in front of her when we first got here, I realised it must have been mine.
Debs had even supplied a plate of biscuits—rather soft digestive biscuits covered in indeterminate dribbly icing designs, presumably by the twins, but it was the thought that counted.
“Is it George H’s party the twins are at?” I asked when conversation didn’t seem to be forthcoming.
“Yeah.” Debs sounded surprised. “Over at the soft play in the sports centre. They’re going for a pizza after.”
I nodded. “Ah, the standard plan of wearing them out with energetic activity, then feeding them junk food until they’re bouncing off the walls again just in time for parent pickup, yes? It was a bit hard to miss him handing out invitations to the whole class. And Charlie was talking about it before half term.” Actually, he’d voiced his concerns that it might be all a bit rough for him. I’d encouraged him to accept the invitation on the basis that what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, and it would at least make George H happy even if diving into ball pits wasn’t precisely the sort of thing Charlie would prefer to spend his time doing.
I hoped none of us were going to regret it.
Debs looked at me. “I can’t work you out, you know?” She laughed to herself. “Sod it. Wills and Harry like you, anyway. And obviously you do,” she added, turning to Sean.
Sean gave me a sardonic look. “He’s all right, I s’pose.”
“Likewise, I’m sure.” I smiled at him, my heart melting at the way his answering smile made his eyes soften and glow in the artificial light.
“So where are you from, then?” Debs asked, breaking the spell.
“I grew up in Surrey, but Mother moved to Wiltshire when she and Peter got married.”
“Yeah? What’s he like, your stepdad? You get on all right?”
“Oh, absolutely. He’s been so good for Mother. And so good to me, too.”
“You got any stepbrothers and sisters?”
“Three, but they’re all rather older than I am. The elder two are in their forties with children of their own. To be honest I don’t really know them very well—they’d all moved out and got homes of their own already when Mother and Peter first got together.”
She nodded. “He’s older, then. You were an only child before that?”
Sean leaned forward, looking uncomfortable. “Debs, I brought him round for a cup of tea, not an interrogation.”
Debs didn’t give an inch. “I’m just showing an interest, all right?”
“It’s perfectly all right,” I assured them. “And yes, Peter’s in his sixties, but he’s very active. And I was indeed an only child.”
“They okay with you going out with blokes?”
“Perfectly,” I said with confidence.
Her tone sharpened. “What about blokes from the council estate?”
Sean shifted in his seat again. “That’s enough. Give the man a break, okay?”
She humphed. “There any tea left in that pot?”
I picked it up. “A little, but it’ll be very stewed.
“Doesn’t matter.” She held out her mug, and I poured out a tannin-thick stream until she said “When.”
“More milk?” I offered.
She shook her head. “Sorry for being a bitch,” she said abruptly, leaning back in her chair with a sigh. “I just get so sick of it all, sometimes, waiting to find out…you know. And that cow next door going on about how it must be a comfort to have Sean so good with the kids. Yeah, right, it’s such a sodding comfort to know I might not see my boys grow up.”
“Debs…” Sean started.
“And it’s not fair on you either, is it?” She cut him off. “Why should you have to look after my kids just because I got knocked up, married a loser and got ill?”
“Because they’re my nephews, and I love ’em, all right? Anyway, you’re gonna get better.” His expression was fierce, and it caused a strange pang inside me.
“And then, then she goes on about how it’s a shame you can’t seem to settle down with a nice girl who could be a mother to them.”
I assumed the she in question was Debs’s bovine nuisance neighbour.
“Yeah? What did you say to that?” Sean asked with a tone of grim amusement.
“I told her to mind her own effing business, of course. What’s it to her if you go out with girls or blokes or the queen of bloody England?”
“Well, she might have a point if she disapproved of the last option,” I said. “After all, that would be adultery, on Her Majesty’s part, at least. And age differences of that extent rarely work out.”
Debs looked at me and laughed shortly. “God help me. I’m starting to work out what he sees in you.”
Chapter Fifteen
We didn’t stay long after that. The twins would be arriving back from the party soon—one of the other parents was giving them a lift—and Debs insisted she wasn’t going to inflict their post-party behaviour on me when I was going to have to deal with them all day tomorrow.
As I strongly suspected she was desperate to have her house back to herself before they arrived, I didn’t put up too much of a protest.
When we got back outside to where the weeds were making a valiant attempt to turn the driveway into crazy paving, I paused for a moment, helmet in hand. “Um, if you don’t mind my asking, do you feel tempted sometimes to only go out with women?”
Sean frowned at me and put his own helmet back on the seat of his motorbike.
“I mean,” I hurried on. “Wouldn’t it be less bother in some ways?”
“What, so I’d fit in and no one would have to know I wasn’t straight? Sod them. It’s none of their business. I go out with whoever I want to.” His eyes narrowed as he looked at me. “You wouldn’t go out with a girl to make other people happy, would you?”
He seemed to have an awful lot of confidence in me. “No… But that’s different, isn’t it? I’m not attracted to women. At all. It just seems, if you actually do have a choice…” I trailed off, intimidated by his hard expression. It looked all wrong on Sean’s face. “I didn’t mean to offend,” I said weakly. “I suppose I’m just finding it hard to imagine myself in your shoes.”
Sean’s lips tightened, then he nodded. “Yeah. I know what you mean. It seems weird to me sometimes, how everyone’s not bi. I mean, fit’s fit, innit?” He grinned suddenly. “So seriously, if you went upstairs one night and found Scarlett Johansson and that girl who played Clara on Doctor Who naked in your bed, you’d kick ’em both out on their cute little arses?”
“Well, of course not. That would be rude. I’d just go back down and sleep on the sofa.”
Sean laughed, shaking his head. “Should have known you’d be the perfect gentleman.”
“So… Scarlett and Clara are, as you put it, fit?”
“Too right.”
“Why? I mean, neither of them has got particularly large breasts, as I recall.”
Sean’s laugh this time was so loud that an elderly couple on the other side of the street stopped to stare.
I frowned, hurt. “Did I say something amusing?”
“Sorry. It’s just, there’s a bit more to it than that, yeah? I mean, don’t get me wrong, boobs are good.”
Damn it, Rose was right. My shoulders slumped.
Sean stopped laughing and pulled me to him. The elderly couple, I noticed out of the corner of my eye, walked away hurriedly. “Hey. Other bits are good too, yeah? I just mean, that’s not what it’s all about. See, you like someone, there’s bits of them that turn you on particularly, right, but they wouldn’t work without the rest of them. It’s the whole package.” He stroked my hair and smiled. “Any bits of me that really turn you on?”
I was so rattled by all the public affection, I blurted out the truth. “Your hair. And your eyes.”
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“Yeah? Seriously? You got a thing for gingers? Hey, I’m not judging. But think about it. If I dyed my hair and got some blue contact lenses, you’d wouldn’t go off me totally, would you?”
I stared at him. When he put it like that, it all seemed so absurdly simple.
Sean coughed. “You’re supposed to say no. In case you were wondering.”
“No!” I yelped. “I mean, to both. I just… I never really thought about it like that. It actually sort of makes sense.”
“Well, there’s got to be a first time for everyone,” Sean said with an easy smile.
I blinked, my mind rushing headlong into visions of first times with Sean. But that couldn’t have been what he was referring to—could it? “Pardon?”
“Making sense.”
“Oh!” Of course.
Sean’s smile broadened. “Why? What were you thinking of?”
“Nothing.” For such a cold day, my face was feeling quite extraordinarily hot.
He leaned close to whisper in my ear, so close his stubble rasped against my cheek. “Mr. Emeny, you’ve got a filthy mind.”
Oh God. He wasn’t wrong.
The ride back to the Old Hatter’s Cottage was some kind of torture, with my arms snug around Sean’s waist, my chest pressed to his leather-clad back, our thighs touching and a powerful engine throbbing between them. There was no possible way Sean could be unaware of what he was doing to me.
Clambering off the bike once we’d pulled up in mi entrada was somewhat awkward. I pulled off my helmet with clumsy hands and waited while Sean removed his with rather more practiced ease. It was getting dark now, thankfully, so at least any passersby were unlikely to notice and be offended by my no doubt flushed and definitely excited state. “Would you like to—”
“Yeah,” he said, not waiting for me to finish. He swung his leg over the motorbike, and I was certain it wasn’t my imagination that painted the shadowy outline of a hard ridge at the front of his jeans.
Oh God. We were going to… I gazed at Sean, drinking in the sight of him, the way the weakly glowing streetlamp outlined his form.
“You wanna…” His voice gruff, Sean gestured towards the door.
“Right. Yes.” I fumbled in my pocket for my keys. Pulled them out. Dropped them. Picked them up again, swallowing as my rising gaze tracked the line of Sean’s denim-clad legs.
We needed to get in the house. Right now. On the third try, I fitted the key into the lock and turned it.
And nearly wept when Hanne’s voice rang out.
“Robert! This is good timing. I was just about to make some deer antlers. Come in, come in. And your friend too.” She was leaning out of her own front door with a big smile on her face.
“I, er…” I looked at Sean, who seemed as completely thrown as I was by this sudden turn of events. “We wouldn’t want to—”
“Nonsense!” she said briskly. “It’s no trouble at all. I couldn’t possibly eat a whole batch myself, and you need to eat more, so it’s perfect. You modern young men—so skinny, both of you. Come on in.”
I made a helpless face at Sean. He seemed to be trying not to laugh.
“Come!” Hanne said again, and clearly her practice mastering Milly and Lily had stood her in good stead, as before I quite knew what I was doing, I was inside her house and Sean, behind me, was closing the door.
Some time later, we were sitting in Hanne’s quirkily Scandinavianised living room, drinking hot chocolate and eating freshly cooked deer antlers. I had been relieved to find these were, in fact, just oddly shaped doughnut-like things, and very tasty. Cooking them had been rather fun in the end, although not at all what I’d envisaged doing earlier.
Milly and Lily had flopped down in front of the hearth, between them taking up about three quarters of the available floor space. Hanne was showing us pictures of her sons, a couple of strapping, bearded Thor look-alikes.
“You must miss them,” I said.
“Oh, so much. But I’m only here for a year, and I’ll see them at Christmas. I’m going to stay with Andreas, my youngest, and his girlfriend in Bergen, and Christian and his family will visit us there. It’s beautiful there, so colourful, and the fish market is very good. You must visit sometime.” She smiled. “Will you see your girlfriend tonight? You could take some of the antlers for her.”
Ah. “I, er, like I said before, Rose isn’t my girlfriend.” I glanced at Sean, but his expression was unreadable. Did he want me to say…? His hand gripped my knee. Right, then. I took a deep breath. “I, actually, well, Sean’s my boyfriend.” I forced a smile and grasped his hand, holding it up to show her.
Hanne’s hands flew to her mouth. “No!”
My stomach, weighed down by a whole herd of deer antlers, plummeted.
“Your boyfriend?” she went on. “And you let me drag you in here and give you cooking lessons? Oh, my goodness. I’m so embarrassed. You must think I’m terrible. Go, you must go now. I’m sure you have better things to do with your time together than stay here with me.” We all stood, and she made shooing motions with her hands, her face a little pink.
“Nah, it was great, wasn’t it, Rob?” Sean said, smiling down at her.
“Absolutely,” I agreed with perhaps a little more enthusiasm than was warranted. “And the antlers were delicious. Really. I couldn’t think of a better way to spend a Sunday teatime.”
“You’re much too polite. And I’m so sorry I took your time together.”
“Not at all. It was fun.” I hesitated, then stepped forward to give her a hug. “Thank you.”
“Don’t be silly. Now go. Go enjoy your boyfriend.” Once again, her deceptively commanding tones had us outside the door before we knew what we were doing.
Sean turned to me, a soft smile on his face. “She’s nice. And you’ve only known her a couple of months?”
“Yes—since I moved here. Why?”
He shook his head, still smiling. “No reason. Look, I probably ought to get going. Promised Debs I’d be back in time to help her get the boys off to bed, and I don’t want to leave her in the lurch when she’s having a bad day.”
“No, no, of course not,” I said, trying not to let my disappointment show. “Um. Just come in for a minute, though? Just…to say good-bye?”
“Okay. But just for a minute, yeah?”
We stepped into the Old Hatter’s Cottage, and I closed the door behind us. Sean’s arms slid around me even as I turned, and we pulled each other close. The heat from earlier was gone, replaced by a gentle warmth that was even more intoxicating. We kissed, softly but deeply. Sean’s lips were sugary, and his mouth tasted of the hot chocolate we’d shared. Our bodies fitted together perfectly.
When I felt things beginning to stir below the waist, I pulled back. I wanted him, yes—but I didn’t want him feeling rushed and guilty. “Good-bye,” I said.
Sean rested his forehead against mine. “Yeah. See you around.”
And then he was gone.
I wandered into the lounge and threw myself onto the sofa, still smiling dreamily—but as the warmth from his touch seeped away, so did some of my good mood. When I was with Sean, everything seemed absurdly simple, but without him to crowd them out of my thoughts, my misgivings about starting a relationship slunk back into the forefront of my mind.
Things seemed to be going so well with Sean—but they’d seemed to be going well with Crispin too, until the storm had broken, and then suddenly, they hadn’t. All it would take would be for Sean to find out the real reason I’d left my last job. About Oliver.
Oh God. Was I just setting myself up for another fall? My heart clenched.
I had the horrible feeling I might not survive this time.
Chapter Sixteen
Bonfire Night being imminent, class 2E and I spent most of the first week back after the half-term holiday dr
awing riotously colourful pictures to display at school assembly, and firmly going over the firework code. Thankfully, most of the class seemed to be planning to go to organised displays at the weekend, rather than having fireworks in their own back gardens. I could still remember the horror I’d felt at thirteen, when we’d been called into a special assembly on November the sixth to be told in sombre tones about a boy in the fifth form who’d lost an eye through larking about with fireworks. While I doubted any of class 2E’s parents would be idiotic enough to let their little darlings get their hands on rockets and suchlike, there were plenty of people who seemed to think nothing of giving sparklers to toddlers.
There was even a little time left over to teach those who didn’t know it already the “Gunpowder, Treason and Plot” rhyme, and explain who Guy Fawkes actually was. It really was a quite extraordinary legacy, for a man to still be burned in effigy every year more than four hundred years after an attempted act of terrorism that hadn’t even succeeded. I wondered if he’d be proud or mortified, if he knew. Class 2E reacted with predictable glee to the more gruesome parts of the story—the attempt to blow up King James I and his parliament, and Fawkes’s subsequent capture, torture and execution—but were disappointed to hear he hadn’t, in fact, been burned at the stake.
Charlie came up to me at the end of Friday. “Does it hurt, getting torch-ured?”
“I’m afraid that’s rather the point of it, young Charlie. But don’t worry, no one’s allowed to do it these days,” I reassured him, mentally crossing my fingers behind my back.
Charlie looked thoughtful. “Oh. Good,” he said and went back to tidying up someone else’s pencils.
