Tribute Act

by Joanna Chambers

  “The thing is,” Mack said desperately, “I’m not going to be around for much longer.”

  Rosie smiled big. “Well there you go! That’s all the more reason for us to spend time together while we can.” She added, with youthful callousness, “I can go back to my old teacher once you’ve gone.”

  Mack cleared his throat. “Oh, right.” He paused as though waiting for some last reprieve. When none came, he sighed. “Um, okay then.”

  “Yes!” Rosie clapped her hands together, eyes sparkling. “Could you come to the house after lunch tomorrow?”

  Mack bit his lip, plainly torn—I thought I knew what was bothering him.

  “How about you come to our place, Ro?” I suggested. “I’ll come pick you up and take you back after.” At Mum’s frown, I added, “You can work on something to play for Mum and Derek without them overhearing you practicing.”

  Mum’s frown eased at that and Rosie’s on-the-spot bounce reminded me of when she was little and would get excited. “Great! How about two o’clock?”

  “Make it three,” I said. “That way, the lunch rush will be over before I come and get you.” I glanced at Mack. “Does that sound okay to you?”

  “Sure,” he said, though he still didn’t look entirely happy.

  And that was how Mack started teaching Rosie guitar.

  October

  The next few weeks passed quickly.

  Slowly, gradually, Mack was regaining his strength. Rosie too, though she had a steeper hill to climb.

  Mack continued to play at the café twice a week but as he got better, I could see he was getting bored: bored of spending too many hours alone, either at the flat or wandering round Porthkennack.

  From a domestic point of view, he was an easy flatmate. He did his fair share round the flat, but he wasn’t a neat freak, and we got on well. We had a similar sense of humour, liked the same movies and games. I loved having him around—it was like being part of a couple, only without the sex . . . which was, really, the only source of tension between us. On my part anyway—perhaps Mack wasn’t even aware it was an issue. He certainly gave no sign. But yeah, for me, I was having trouble hiding how attracted I was to him, and I was pretty sure I was regularly slipping up. It felt like he caught me looking at him at least once or twice a day.

  When I masturbated, at night or in the shower, it was Mack I’d think about, and that was new. My wank bank had always comprised outlandish fictional situations—I wasn’t one for fantasising about people I actually knew or things that could, conceivably happen. But now I found myself remembering those few hours we’d spent at Mack’s hotel all those weeks ago. How it had felt to press inside him and feel his body draw me in. How he’d looked beneath me, his long, strong back under my hands as I smoothly fucked him. How it had felt to lay my naked chest down against that milk-white skin and take his shaft in my fist, coaxing his orgasm out of him.

  I replayed it in my mind too many times to count.

  Midway through October, one of our part-timers handed in her notice. Katie had got herself a childcare qualification the year before and had been searching for a job in a nursery for a while, so it wasn’t a massive surprise. I was chuffed to bits for her, but I groaned—inwardly of course—when she told me she needed to start straightaway and couldn’t work any notice.

  “It’s a huge pain,” I grumbled to Mack at home that night. “I’ll need to get someone else quickly because Mum wants to stay at home with Rosie a bit longer.”

  “I’ll do it,” he said casually, eyes on the TV screen, thumbs busy on his console. “I’ve done loads of catering jobs.”

  I eyed him. “I know. I was thinking about asking you, but being on your feet all day isn’t a picnic. It’s not that long since your surgery.”

  He glanced up then, tossing the controller aside. “Come on,” he scoffed. “It’s been nearly eight weeks. I’ll be fine. Plus I’m bored and I want to earn some cash. If you don’t let me do it, I’ll just go and get a job somewhere else.”

  I knew he wasn’t kidding. And the truth was, Katie only did a handful of shifts each week—if I swapped the rota around, I could make sure I was around to do any grunt work when he was working.

  “Okay, fine,” I said. “On the strict understanding that you promise to tell me the moment you start feeling tired and agree to take regular breaks. Proper sit-down ones. Agreed?”

  He rolled his eyes at me, but then nodded and grinned, clearly pleased.

  The next morning, it was my turn to open up the café. When I shuffled into the kitchen straight from the shower, a towel slung round my hips, I found Mack already dressed and making tea.

  “Oh—uh, morning,” I said, jerking to a halt in the doorway, self-conscious about my slight spare tyre. Somehow, for these last few weeks, I’d managed to never be unclothed in front of Mack. Even during our one-night stand, we hadn’t exactly been scrutinising one another’s bodies, so it felt weird to suddenly have my naked chest on show in the far-too-bright morning light.

  Mack looked up from the mugs he was dowsing with milk, clocked my state of undress, and blinked in surprise. For a long, awkward moment, I stared at him, and he stared at my chest.

  At last, he managed to drag his gaze upward again. “Um—I was thinking. If it’s okay with you, I’d like to open up with you this morning.”

  “You don’t have to do that,” I said stupidly, accepting the cup of tea he held out to me. “You’re not meant to start till ten.”

  “Well, I’d like to—you don’t have to pay me for it. I’d just like to scope the place out. See how things work before I get started, you know?”

  “Oh, I’ll pay you,” I said hurriedly, horrified at the implication I was being cheap. “It’s only that I hadn’t planned to start you off with opening up. But sure, if you want to do that, that’s fine.”

  He chuckled. “Hey, I’m just glad to escape another morning of daytime TV.”

  It was typical of him to wave off the money issue—one of the nicest things about Mack was how easygoing he was. If that’d been me, I’d probably have made a big point of principle about how I wouldn’t accept payment for those unsolicited hours and the whole conversation would’ve become awkward. Not Mack, though.

  I took my tea back to the bedroom and quickly dressed in jeans and a polo, examining my belly in the mirror for a bit longer than usual, smoothing my hands down over my torso. When I’d lived in London, I’d been in pretty decent shape thanks to my early morning gym visits and healthy, if expensive, eating habits. I still did some free weights at home, so I had reasonable muscle tone—good pecs and arms—but my gut! Jesus, I had to do some cardio and cut out all the carbs and sugar I was eating. If only I was like Mack. God, that man had so much self-control . . . I thought of his long lean torso and swallowed, hard.

  I wished it was mere envy I felt when I thought of Mack’s body. That had to be better than the unrequited lust that had been riding me since he’d moved in.

  With a sigh, I turned away from the mirror.

  Mornings were always busy at Dilly’s. We opened at eight thirty on weekdays and our first sit-in customers usually rolled in just after nine—mostly parents who’d dropped off kids at school. Midmorning brought the pensioners and parents with younger children, followed by the lunchtime rush, so there was quite a bit of early prep needed.

  That morning, Mack and I got to the café at seven thirty. I showed him round the service counter, coffee machines, and till area, explaining our system for orders and payment, then took him into the kitchen and showed him where everything was stored. He picked up the details quickly, his easy grasp of the essentials testament to the many catering jobs he’d had before.

  Together, we unloaded stock from the fridge and larder and brought it into the main body of the café, loading up the refrigerated part of the service counter with cling-film-wrapped tubs of sandwich fillings, and stocking up the baskets on top of the counter with bread, rolls, and pastries.

  While
Mack filled the coffee grinders with beans, I rolled out some ready-to-bake scone dough Derek had left in the fridge, cut out a couple of dozen rounds, and rattled them into the oven. I’d bake another couple of dozen in an hour or so, and probably a third batch just before lunch—the fresher the better with scones. Derek’s scones were soft, crumbly, and utterly delicious. One of our best sellers was the “Dilly’s special ice cream afternoon tea”—a warm scone served with clotted cream ice cream and strawberry jam sauce, all homemade.

  “We don’t make any of our other cakes and pastries,” I told Mack. “Not yet anyway. That’s where I want to get to though. Ideally, everything we sell should be homemade.”

  “Dilly’s everything?” Mack teased.

  I grinned at him. “Why not? Once we’ve established the brand, the sky’s the limit. I’m looking into getting some of our ice creams into the shops.”

  Mack raised his eyebrows. “Impressive.”

  By 8:15, the scones were out of the oven and the café was ready for opening. Mack practiced his barista skills, making us both large coffees, a latte for me and an Americano for him. I hesitated when he passed me the latte—I needed to give up the big milky drinks—but in the end, I caved. It looked too good to pass up, the creamy foam just the right consistency with a fancy little coffee pattern worked into it.

  “God, those scones smell amazing,” Mack said.

  “Wait till you taste them.” I opened one up and spread it thickly with butter before handing it to him.

  He took a bite. “Oh my god,” he moaned through a mouthful of pastry.

  “I know,” I said. “Derek makes them.”

  Mack swallowed. “Yeah?” He lifted his coffee and took a swig. “By the way, what beans do you use? This is a gorgeous flavour. So nutty.”

  I told him about our beans—an Italian roast—and for a couple of minutes, we chatted about coffee and the pros and cons of introducing a “coffee of the month,” an alternative flavour for the aficionados amongst our customers. It wasn’t till later, when I cleared some packaging away, that I saw he’d chucked the rest of his scone in the bin.

  That first morning with Mack went pretty well. He was competent, quiet, and hardworking—too hardworking actually—I had to nag at him to take the regular sit-down breaks we’d agreed on. The last thing I wanted was Mack opening up his surgery wound and bleeding out on the floor.

  “I’m fine!” he protested as I pushed him into a chair after the lunchtime rush and slid a ham-salad baguette in front of him.

  “Eat,” I growled, setting a mango and orange smoothie in front of him too. He didn’t eat nearly enough fruit or veg, and I’d been devising strategies to get more into him over the last few weeks, pulsing up roast veggy pasta sauces and wholesome soups like an overeager parent.

  He sighed, but he tucked in, and I couldn’t help but smile to see him polish off the lot. He was so lean and spare. I loved how he looked, but he could stand to put a little weight on after the rigours of the surgery. And honestly? I supposed I liked taking care of him.

  A little while later, the back door to the kitchen opened and a voice called out, “Nathan? Can you give me a hand with this lot, son?”

  Derek.

  I was making up an order for some customers who’d just sat down. Mack, who’d finished eating, rose from his chair, lifted his dishes, and walked back round the counter. “I can help him,” he said.

  I shook my head. “No way. No lifting for you. You take over here. A white coffee, a flapjack, and a Dilly’s ice cream tea.” Without giving him a chance to argue, I headed for the kitchen.

  Derek did a couple of ice cream deliveries each week from a small unit in the local industrial estate where he made and stored the ice cream for Dilly’s.

  “Hi,” he said when he saw me. “I’ve got everything on your order but the mango ripple. The last batch of that didn’t set right.” He put down the box he was carrying on the worktop.

  “All righty,” I said. “Let’s get this lot in.”

  I followed him out the back door to the van he’d parked in the lane. We quickly emptied out the ice cream and carried it into the kitchen, where I transferred most of it into the chest freezer, leaving out a few of the big ten-litre tubs to replenish the shop freezer: a vanilla, a chocolate chip, and a strawberry cheesecake.

  “Have you had lunch yet?” I asked hoisting up the tubs and heading for the counter.

  “Yeah,” he said following me, “but I could murder a coffee if you— Oh!” He stopped dead when he saw Mack standing at the till. “Dylan. Hi. I wasn’t expecting to see you.”

  Dylan eyed him coolly. “Didn’t Nathan mention I was going to be helping out?” He frowned slightly, and my cheeks warmed. Which was ridiculous—I had nothing to feel embarrassed about.

  “I mentioned it to Mum,” I told Derek defensively.

  He cleared his throat. “Oh, right. She didn’t say. Anyway, it’s, um, fine—not a problem.”

  Well, it hadn’t been, but now it felt like it was. Mack’s face reddened.

  I turned to Derek and said firmly, “Mack—I mean, Dylan—agreed to help us out when Katie left. No one’s responded to the job advert yet, so he’s doing us a big favour.”

  “Oh. I see.” Derek looked hunted. He glanced at Mack and said awkwardly, “Nathan and Lorraine sort out the café shifts. I just do the food.”

  Mack’s expression was unfriendly. “Sure.”

  Christ.

  The door chimed then, and a couple of little old ladies came in, twittering. As Mack busied himself greeting them, I said wearily to Derek. “Go and sit down. I’ll get you that coffee.”

  I made our drinks, popping a Danish pastry on the tray in case Derek changed his mind about being hungry, and took everything over to his table, settling myself in the chair opposite. He was watching Mack, chatting to the old dears as he took their order.

  “He really hates my guts,” Derek said hoarsely.

  I studied my stepdad. I’d known Derek since I was kid, and he’d always been the big man in the room, the loudest, the funniest. I’d never seen him so . . . diminished.

  “You need to talk to him,” I said, keeping my voice low. “You two clearly have stuff you need to discuss but you avoid him like the plague! What the fuck is that about, Derek? He just donated half his liver to Rosie, and you can’t even say hello properly?”

  Derek slouched over the table, not meeting my eyes. “He doesn’t want to talk to me. He couldn’t have made that more obvious. I’m respecting his wishes.”

  “Bullshit,” I muttered. “You’re being a coward.”

  “Yeah,” he admitted. “I am. But you don’t understand, Nathan. Too much damage has been done—there’s no coming back from some things.”

  “What things?”

  Derek didn’t answer that. Instead he said, “You know, sometimes I feel like I was given a second chance, getting you as a stepson. I fucked things up with Dylan, but everything was so much easier with you. Probably because of Lorraine.”

  I stilled. I didn’t like the thought that I’d been benefitting from Derek’s efforts when his own son had been going without. Worse, that him being so good with me might have been a reaction to his guilt over his mistakes with Mack.

  “Do you remember when you first told us you were gay?” Derek asked.

  I cleared my throat. “Yeah. You said it didn’t matter whether I fancied lads or lasses, you and Mum would always love me.”

  Derek gave a lopsided smile. “You were petrified.” His smile faded and suddenly he looked really sad.

  “When did you find out Mack was gay?” I asked.

  “When he was fifteen.”

  Fifteen? That must have been on that last visit to Scotland. A bad feeling started in my gut.

  I set my mug down. Carefully, I said, “Was that when you went up for his mum’s funeral?”

  Derek stared down at the uneaten Danish pastry I’d put in front of him, as though fascinated. After a long pause he s
aid, “I got up to Scotland the night before the funeral—he just came out with it. I hadn’t seen it coming. I . . . reacted badly.” He looked up at me then, and his expression was grim. “I felt sure he was far too young to know his own mind about something like that. It came into my head that maybe some older guy had got to him—turned him somehow.”

  Jesus. “That’s what you said to him?”

  “Yeah.” Derek put his elbows on the table and dropped his head into his hands.

  I was silent, unsure how to react. I couldn’t help contrasting the way Derek had received the exact same news from me—only a year later by the sound of it. He’d been so great. I’d thought it was because he’d been in the music industry or something.

  “We argued badly that night,” Derek said. “I told him I wanted him to come back to Cornwall with me, and of course he refused. Then, the next day, we had another fight . . . at the funeral. Dylan pretty much gave me what for. I was angry and humiliated—this was all in front of Tammy’s family, who all hated me already. In the end, I walked out. Then I got in my car and started driving home.” He swallowed. “And I never went back.”

  I remembered what Mack had told me about that argument. “I told him I hated him, said I never wanted to see him again.”

  I glanced over at Mack behind the counter on the other side of the café. More customers had come in since Derek and I had started talking, and Mack was busy serving them, not even looking our way. There was no way he could pick up our murmured conversation, but I still felt oddly guilty discussing him when he was right there.

  I turned my attention back to Derek. “Was that it, then?” I asked, trying not to show how appalled I was by what he’d disclosed so far. “Did you just stop contacting him?”

  “Not right away. I called him a few times over the next few weeks, but he wouldn’t speak to me, so I started sending letters instead—he never replied. Mary, Tammy’s mother, suggested I back off and give him some time to come around. I suppose if I’m honest, I was glad.” Derek gaze was turned downwards, his expression pure self-loathing. “At that point, I let it all slide—the calls, the letters. It was easy to do. I was busy here, and Dylan was being taken care of by Mary and Tom. I always meant to get in touch again, but as time went on, it began to feel . . . impossible.”