by Nicola Haken
“Uh, sure. Thanks. Um, that’ll be all,” I added, again feeling like an utter douchebag. ‘That’ll be all’… what the fuck was I saying?
“I’ll just run along then shall I?” he teased with a wicked grin that dove straight to my cock.
“Sorry. Long day. Catch you later.”
“Wait…” Jake grabbed my forearm, pulling me back as I tried to retreat into my room. “We should talk about what happened earlier.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. It shouldn’t have happened.”
“We both know that’s not true,” he countered, his voice deepening as his body started closing in on me.
"You need to stop this, Jake. It's not going to happen. I'm not... like you. I'm straight."
"So is spaghetti until it gets hot," he whispered against my neck. Then he nibbled gently along the tender flesh, his coarse stubble grating against my own, and everything I've ever forced myself to believe started disappearing against my will. His presence affected me more than I liked or wanted and I needed to get away from him before I became incapable of coherent thought.
“You need to forget this afternoon,” I said, immediately wanting to punch myself in the balls for allowing my voice to crack. “It will not happen again.”
Then, shoving him away, I stormed back into my room and slammed the door behind me.
Jim knocked on my suite door bang on time. Pulling on a shirt after finishing some push ups, I answered immediately, as usual feeling the need to hurry up and get my time with my mother over with.
“Neil’s downstairs. We’re taking Sayid too, there’re crowds front and back of the building.”
“Press or fans?”
“Both.”
Nodding in understanding, I hooked my jacket onto my finger and threw it over my shoulder. We decided to go through the main hotel entrance seeing as there were crowds at both exits anyway. The sound of camera shutters flooded the air before I’d even fully stepped out of the revolving doors. I’ve learned to tune out the sound over the years, and I also learned quite early on that if you look towards the ground while surrounded by the press, you don’t get blinded by the incessant flashes…but I don’t think it would ever be possible to ignore the screams and chants of excited fans. Not that I’d want to – I wouldn’t be where I am today without their passion and support.
“SAWYER! SAWYER!”
“SAWYER, OVER HERE!” Girls yelled and sang my name, bouncing up and down and trying to reach out to me. I stopped by a couple of them, draping my arms around them while their friends took pictures on their phones.
“OMG I love you! Thank you so much!”
“I love you, too! All of you!” The reaction to my voice never failed to overwhelm me – especially when some girls literally cried.
“Sawyer, is it true you’re dating Elle Wilson?” The waiting journalists and photographers didn’t waste any time calling my name either.
“Are you glad to be back in the UK?”
“Sawyer, do you want to address the rumours about your sexuality?”
“What rumours?” I snapped, going against everything I’ve been trained to do and immediately wanting to punch myself in the head for not ignoring them.
“That’s enough for today, guys,” Jim intercepted, putting one hand on the small of my back and slowly pushing us through the crowd towards the waiting car.
“SAWYER!” they continued to yell. “Have you seen today’s article in The Sun? Want to respond?”
Jim covered my body with his while I slid into the back seat of the car, and the second the door closed next to me, the most welcome silence descended.
“What article?” I barked when Jim climbed in the other side.
“We’re heading round the back where it’s gated off to switch cars. Should make sure we’re not followed.”
“Jim? What fucking article!”
“I dunno, mate,” he said, sighing. “You need to ask Claire.”
“I’m asking you.”
“If Claire kicks my arse for telling you this I’m saying you forced me.”
“Fine by me. Hell, tell her I had you by the throat if you want. She doesn’t scare me, dude.”
“Apparently some guy has sold a story saying you two had a… thing… going on between you in college.”
“What the fuck?”
“Hey, come on, mate… you know the press is full of this shit. If you make a big deal out of it they’ll just assume it’s true. We all know it’s not, so don’t beat yourself up about it.”
“I want to see that paper.”
“Claire, and I think Jake too, have copies. But honestly, it’s not worth it. Those damn papers are filled with all kinds of shit and lies every bloody day. Just shrug it off. It’ll all die down soon enough.”
“You’re right,” I agreed, forcing a look of indifference onto my face. He was right about one thing – I couldn’t afford to get worked up about it. If it’d been a woman I wouldn’t have given a damn, so I needed to act the same right now – especially in front of the guys.
As planned, we quickly swapped cars and waited back for a few minutes until the original car had passed the photographers. As expected, some of them quickly jumped in their own cars to follow, then Jim radioed Pete to come and distract the others by asking them to leave. We knew they wouldn’t of course, but while they were listening to him we had our opportunity to leave unseen.
The familiar balloon of dread inflated in the pit of my stomach when we pulled up onto my mother’s estate. I detest the place. Everything about it reminds me of a time I wish I could forget – the mass of flats all cramped together in tall blocks, the metal railings surrounding the brick walls that are filled with graffiti (and not the artistic kind, more like ‘Kev fucked Kerry 2012’). Not to mention the fact you can smell the stench of stagnant piss coming from the stairwells before you even get out of the car.
The place is a dump – always has been, always will be. I’ve tried to talk my mother into letting me buy her a nice detached house, wherever she wants in the world, over the years, but she refuses to have anything to do with money earned from my ‘sinful’ career filled with vile music and starstruck whores.
Jim and Neil accompanied me to my mother’s door while Sayid waited in the car with the driver, whose name I still hadn’t leaned. Opening the door, she greeted me with the same surprised gasp followed by a look of disappointment as she always does when she sees me.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, ushering me inside before anyone saw me. “Can’t they go somewhere else?” she whispered, referring to my security team.
“No, Mum. They can’t.”
“So why are you here? You never come home. Is everything alright?”
She was right. I never come home because I hate the damn place. Usually, I arrange for her to be picked up and brought to wherever I’m staying.
“It’s been, what… ten, eleven months since we saw each other? I just wanted to see you.”
After an awkward, one-armed hug, I headed into the tiny living room while my mum made up a pot of tea in the kitchen. The flat hadn’t changed at all since I was a little boy. An involuntarily look of disgust crept across my face as I weighed up the peeling floral wallpaper, the stained brown carpet and the electric fire with metal bars across the front.
“So,” Mum began, joining me in the living room with a tray holding a pot of tea and two cups and saucers. “What do I owe the pleasure?”
“We’ll be heading to Manchester after tomorrow’s show. Just wanted to check in before I left.”
“Well it’s always good to see you, darling.” She said it with such disinterest I knew it was a lie. “How have you been?”
“Busy,” I replied robotically. Conversation between my mum and I has always been a little formal.
“I don’t suppose you’ve thought about finding a nice young woman and settling down yet have you? I see Elle around here quite often,” she said with a raised eyebrow. Mum was
elated when I started hanging around with Elle. I think in her head she had me calmed down and married off to her within a few months of us becoming friends.
“Elle is my friend, Mum. You know that.”
“A mother can still hope,” she said, sounding a little dejected. “She’s a lovely girl. The things she has to put up with from that mother of hers is despicable.”
Yeah, Elle’s mum is a bitch of the highest order – you won’t find me disagreeing with that one. She spent Elle’s childhood drunk most of the time, offering them a new stepdad every two weeks and leaving Elle to practically raise her much younger sister, Kylie, by herself. She’s sponged money off Elle ever since she got her first job as a Saturday girl in a salon. Now, the more money she earns, the more her mother takes. She won’t refuse her because Kylie is only fifteen and still living at home. That’s the excuse she uses anyway – I still think she’d keep bailing her out even if Kylie were out of the equation. She’s her mother, and Elle feels some bizarre sense of loyalty towards her based purely on the fact she gave birth to her.
Then again, who I am to talk? I never leave my mother without passing her quite a hefty cheque.
“You look different,” my mum continued, eyeing me up curiously.
“I have a few new tattoos since you last saw me,” I said, shrugging. Possibly the skulls and roses added to my left arm a few months ago.
“It’s not that,” she dismissed, shaking her head. “You’ve met someone haven’t you? A mother can tell these things.”
I hesitated for a moment before deciding to be honest. Hell knew I needed advice from somewhere because all I was succeeding in doing was driving myself fucking insane.
“Yeah. Yeah I have.”
“And what’s she like?”
“I can’t stop thinking about her.” Okay, so when I said I was going to be honest, that wasn’t entirely true. “I mean, all the time. She never leaves my head, and everywhere I go she seems to be there.”
“That’s great!” she beamed, her eyes full of hope. “So why are you unsure? Does she not feel the same?”
“Yes. At least she says she does. I’m just worried about people’s reaction I guess.”
“Oh my… What’s wrong with her? Does she have tattoos?” She said the word tattoos like it was a terminal illness.
Judgemental as ever I see, Mother.
“No, Mum, she doesn’t have tattoos.” I sighed, exasperated. But wait, does Jake have tattoos? I haven’t seen him naked in over ten years, Hell, I haven’t even seen the flesh of his forearms since he’s been back in my life. “It’s complicated. She works with us. She’s part of our team. I don’t think it would go down very well.”
“Hmm.” Her face wrinkled a little like she was slightly repulsed – no doubt about the fact I’d fallen for someone in the industry. She wants me to settle down with a nice girl from the countryside who never fails to attend Sunday mass at the local church. “You can’t live your life by what others might think, darling. You’re the only one who has to walk in your shoes, no one else.” Whoa… was that my mum being… human? I almost choked on my tea. “Besides, you haven’t put others thoughts first in the past now, have you?” Ah, there we go – a dig at how I ignored her pleas for me not to live this life full of sin. Everything was right with the world after all.
“Maybe you’re right.” Turned out, being ‘honest’ was pointless, seeing as I was actually spinning her a web of bullshit. Truth be told, this wouldn’t be an issue if Jake were a woman. My mum was right… I’ve never put anyone’s thoughts before my own, and if the only issue were that Jake worked for me, I wouldn’t even have to think about it. “So how are you? I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch much lately.”
My mum and I exchanged formal and polite chitchat for twenty minutes or so. As usual, she told me about the latest church gossip and I told her jack shit. She said she had no idea I was even back in the country at one point, but I knew she was talking crap. My face has been plastered over every magazine over here for weeks now, talking about the upcoming tour. Fair enough, she wouldn’t read any of those ‘trashy’ magazines, but you can’t walk through a damn supermarket without seeing it on the shelf.
“So Marjory is taking over the organ until we find Helen’s replacement,” my mum continued. I switched off for a little while, but thought I’d better make the effort for the last few minutes before I left.
“Helen Davison?” I asked, feigning interest. If it was the Helen I remembered from being a kid, she’s a toffee-nosed bigot with an ass the size of London.
“Yes. Did you know her son decided to become a homosexual?” I swear, she actually shuddered at the word. “And then she seriously thought she could keep her hand in at the church after that? She thinks she can mock God by strolling into his house as if nothing was wrong!”
“Well… it’s hardly Helen’s fault,” I tried to reason, but really I just wanted to get the fuck out of there.
“But she is standing by him! She is supporting him even though she knows he’s going against God’s will – against our faith, against everything we believe in. It’s unnatural and the whole situation disgusts me. She won’t be welcome at my door again, that’s one thing I’m certain of.”
I’d been brought up hearing things like that throughout my childhood. It used to affect me, because I used to believe in God and I would’ve been too scared to go against him. Then I grew up and realised religion is all political bullshit. But that doesn’t stop me fearing people. Rightly or wrongly, being judged does bother me. I don’t want people to be disgusted by me, and they would. My mother is not the only person who thinks that way.
“I have to go, Mum. We’ve got sound checks to get through ready for tomorrow.” I was lying of course. Final sound checks go ahead on the day of the show, not before.
We said our goodbyes as formally as we said our hellos. Suddenly feeling a little sick to my stomach, I hesitantly wrapped one arm around her and gave her a peck on the cheek before giving her a cheque, which she took without hesitation, and heading outside. Jim and Neil were waiting outside for me, each guarding one side of the door. With a simple nod as my only form of communication, I walked briskly down the concrete steps, flooded with piss and grime, and practically pole-vaulted into the back of the car.
Yeah, that visit was a complete waste of my fucking time.
I don’t know how I was expecting to feel after visiting my mother, but it sure as shit wasn’t to feel worse. Since the band went global, I’ve spent the years wading through my life without much thought. I’ve never taken anything too seriously, too busy being swept along by the glamour and the power. People have always hung off my every word. I’m the frontman – the decision maker. I’ve always had complete control over everything in my life.
Until now.
I don’t quite know what led me to do what happened next. Maybe it was because I couldn’t get pissed and risk a hangover from hell the night before a show. Maybe it was because I couldn’t call Elle because she was working at some fashion event in the city. Or maybe… it was because I just needed to see him.
Chapter Six
“Sawyer?” I answered the door to my room wearing only a pair of grey jogging pants.
“Can I come in?”
Wordlessly, I stepped aside. Sawyer walked past me and took himself over to the white leather couch. He sat down, making himself comfortable, and then after locking the door, slipping into my shirt on from the back of the chair, I joined him, sitting just inches away. As usual he looked perfect. His hair was damp, freshly showered I assumed. He had on a short sleeved t-shirt that exposed the impeccable curves of muscle along his arms, decorated with some of the finest Japanese artwork I’ve ever seen. Then I looked into those rich, caramel eyes, and they were heavy with burden.
“What are you doing here, Sawyer?” My tone was laced with confusion, maybe even suspicion.
“I don’t know,” he answered. “Can we just… talk?”
“Talk?”
“Yeah. Like we used to, you know. Just share random shit. Get to know each other again.”
“I’d like that,” I said honestly. I’d missed more than just his body. I’d missed him… His mind, his sense of humour, his passion for music… “I’ll get us some drinks.”
Conversation flowed slowly, awkwardly even, for a while. Directing the conversation away from himself, Sawyer probed me about my time in Australia. Talking about my family soon led us into a comfortable conversation, and before long, with the help of a couple of glasses of my favourite bourbon, it was just like old times.
“I can’t believe Lily is fifteen!” Sawyer said, shaking his head in bewilderment. Lily is my baby sister. There’s quite a big age gap between us – twelve years. She’s a stubborn thing with a masters degree in sarcasm… but I love her, and I am insanely protective of her. “She must’ve been, what… five when I last saw her?”
“Yeah. She’s gutted she doesn’t really remember you. In fact, I’m pretty sure she thinks I’m bullshitting about knowing you. She said she’ll believe me when she sees my picture in a magazine.”
“That won’t take long.”
“No doubt,” I agreed. “She’d love to meet you when the tour hits Sydney.”
“Yeah?”
“Hell yes! Actually, she’d never forgive me if I didn’t introduce you… and the rest of the guys too or course. No offense to you, but I think she prefers Isaac.”
“None taken,” he said, exhaling a soft laugh. “I’d love to see her again,” he added with what appeared to be a genuine smile. Sawyer has a smile I could get lost in – so wide and bright, it illuminates his whole face. “Your parents too. They were pretty cool back in the day.”
“They still are.”
“Even though you’re…never mind.”
“Are you asking me if my parent’s are okay with the fact I’m gay?”
“No, it doesn’t matter. Forget I said anything,” Sawyer stuttered before draining his glass of bourbon.
