The Sceptic, page 15
“Us? You took Jason, then?”
I jerk. “Of course. Why not?”
“Was he due to go to uni too?”
“No, he failed his A-Levels.” I rub my nose. “He was high when he took his exams, and apparently, the exam boards don’t really mark rambling very well.” He doesn’t laugh, just watches me steadily with a dark look in his eyes.
“So, you took him with you. Did he work while you were at uni?”
“He did, but he never managed to keep a job for long. There would always be something wrong. His employer didn’t understand him. The job was too much work or not enough. Or there were no prospects. He’d come home laughing and swear there was a better job around the corner.”
I shake my head, remembering those times and how I would come home to find him giving me that rueful look of his with his dark hair falling over his face. Irritation would wash over me, and then I’d immediately feel guilty. He’d laugh and tell me that he loved me and charm me out of my mood. We’d shag, and the next day he’d go back to looking for a job. I remember feeling a great weariness around him and then tremendous guilt.
I look at Jem. “I’m giving you a bad impression of him. He wasn’t that bad. He was just sad underneath, and it was my load to carry. Nothing would have happened to him if it hadn’t been for my dad.”
A fact Jason never failed to remind me of. I’d say how sorry I was, but then he’d give his little laugh and say he’d rather be with me than anyone else, and so we’d go on.
“So, how did you eat if he didn’t have a job?”
“I got two bar jobs, and that was more than enough money for us to live on.” I pause. “Or so I thought.”
He cocks his head to one side. “What happened? Because I know you never finished your course.”
I scrub my hands over my eyes and sigh. I jerk as his hand suddenly strokes my hair. “Don’t answer, Will. That’s surely enough for tonight.”
I remove my hands and look into his concerned eyes. His worry seems to fill the part of me that always feels so empty, so I carry on. “It’s okay, Jem. It was a long time ago. The whole downward slide started when I got a cold. I felt awful, and my boss sent me home early.” I shake my head. “It came as a bit of a shock to Jason,” I say wryly.
He tenses. “Oh god, I think I know where this is going.”
“I’m sure you do. He was shagging someone else in our bed.”
“That fucking monstrous weasel dick.”
Incredibly, I laugh, but it’s humourless. “I couldn’t believe it. I was so in love with him. I thought he was the one for me, and while I worked and studied so we could have a life, he was fucking someone else.”
“What happened?”
“I didn’t even shout. Can you believe that?”
“Yes, I can,” he says softly.
“I just stood there like I was in a bubble while Jason and the other man rushed around getting dressed. Fortunately, my bubble isolated me from the massive rant he had going on. Apparently, it was all my fault. I was always too tired for sex, and he needed it.”
“You were too tired because you were keeping down two jobs and studying.”
“Most men wouldn’t stick around for that.”
“Yes, they would,” he says steadily, and I know he would. Loyalty is written all over him. “It’s just that, sadly, you don’t seem to have known many. What happened then?”
“I asked him to leave.” I bite my lip. “It was pretty fucking awful. He was just so astounded that I wanted him to go. He couldn’t believe that I’d ‘throw him away’—those were the words he’d used. I couldn’t, in turn, believe that he thought it wasn’t his fault. So anyway, I chucked him out.”
“Good. Where did he go?”
“With the other bloke.” Jem makes a sound of disgust, and I laugh. “Jason was always practical in his own way. Last I heard, they were still living together.”
“Did you see him again?”
“Once.” This part is even more painful. “I had to, you see. With him not living in the bedsit anymore, he didn’t have time to hide the post, which is how I found out two days later that I owed thousands of pounds on credit cards.”
He sits bolt upright. “What the fuck?”
I groan and laugh. “That was my reaction. While I’d been working, Jason had applied for several credit cards in my name and run up debts. I’m such a twat that I never realised. All the nice things he bought weren’t from the money he’d earned from his job. The presents he’d given me I’d actually bought myself. I showed up at his place ranting and raving. His boyfriend punched me in the face for talking so badly to Jason, and Jason cried. Said he was lonely and how it was all my fault. He shut the door in my face.”
I remember the moment when I’d stood outside his flat, rain pouring, my eye throbbing painfully. The nosy neighbours had drifted away from their windows to make dinner while I stood utterly alone for the first time in my life, clutching a handful of credit card statements and knowing I wouldn’t be able to get out of this one.
“Anyway,” I say, hurrying to get the story over with. “I now have a credit score that only someone in prison for fraud would admire. I came to an arrangement with the credit agencies, but it took all my grant to pay them off. I lost the bedsit because I didn’t have any money for rent, and I lost my university place because I couldn’t afford the fees. I had no choice but to be homeless again and live on the streets. The second time around was even harder.”
Warm arms suddenly surround me, and I gasp as Jem hugs me tightly. His grip is firm, his body warm, and I take a shuddering breath at how nice it feels. I expect him to move away but he never does any of the things I predict. Instead of moving back to his side of the bed, he settles against me, his head on my pillow. His face is sad. “I’m so fucking sorry,” he says fiercely. “He was a cunt. You know that, don’t you?”
“I do now,” I say softly.
“He didn’t deserve you.”
“He was mixed up.”
“He was a wanker,” he corrects me. “He had you, and he never tried to help you, never worked alongside you. Just became a noose around your neck.”
“You’re not saying anything Blue hasn’t told me,” I say wryly. “Over and over again.”
“Good for Blue, then.” He looks up at me, his eyes fierce and very bright in the shaft of moonlight coming into the room. “You’re a good man, William,” he says. “A fucking good man.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“I do,” he says, and he kisses me.
For a second, we stay immobile and then I groan and open my mouth, and the kiss becomes warm and heated. His lips are soft, and he tastes of toothpaste, and his body is warm against mine, but still, there’s a kernel of coldness inside me that nothing can reach. Nevertheless, I make a disappointed sound when he pushes me away.
“Where are you going?”
He smiles at me and cups my chin in his long fingers. “You don’t need that now, Will.”
I pout. “Why?”
“Because I don’t think you’re in the mood after laying yourself open like that.” He smiles. “I mean, if I’m wrong, feel very free to correct me.”
I want to protest, but he’s right. I feel flayed open after relating that story. It’s only the third time I’ve ever told anyone. The other times were to Blue and Tom.
It’s a sign of how different Jem is from Jason. Jason would have pushed, asking why I didn’t fancy him, maybe even accused me of being unfaithful until I gave in and shagged him. It was a dance we did a lot, and I now know it was fuelled by his guilt. I feel a sense of profound relief that Jem isn’t like that.
I blink as he gets up and motions to me. “Come on. Get up, Will.”
“Get up where?”
He throws his sleeping bag on the floor, and when I climb out of mine, he tosses it to the floor too. Then he pulls the duvet back. “Get in.”
“That’s someone else’s bed.”
“I know, but it’s clean sheets. Wendy told me she put them on all the beds, and I’ll wash them before we leave. You don’t need to be on your own in a sleeping bag now.”
“What do I need?” I say slowly as I follow him into the bed, subsiding with a sigh into the sheets that smell of lavender.
“A cuddle,” he says, a smile evident in his voice as he draws me into his arms. I remain stiff, and he chuckles. “It’s like hugging a fucking ironing board, William. Get with the relaxing.”
“I am relaxed.”
“You’re about as relaxed as a case of rigor mortis.”
I laugh and inhale the scent of his cologne. His arms are warm, and his smile wide as I slowly relax. I’m too tall, so we fidget about until we end up in a position with me lying by his side, my head on his chest, his arm around me and his hand stroking through my hair. I can hear his heart beating steadily, and I take a deep breath. As I release it, the final bit of tension vanishes, and I settle into him. It’s extraordinarily lovely to lie like this.
“Thank you for talking to me,” he whispers. “It can’t have been easy.”
“It was easier than you think,” I say. I feel split open, but in a good way, as if I’m lying spreadeagled under a vast sky, and the fresh air has washed over me, reaching to all the nooks and crannies and scouring me clean.
He scratches my scalp, and it feels so nice that I wriggle close. When he lifts his hand thinking he’s hurt me, I take it and place it on my head again without thinking. He chuckles. “Like a big old bear,” he whispers.
I snort. “Hardly. Leather has never looked good on me.”
“Liar. Everything looks good on you.” Silence falls for a bit, and I feel tiredness wash over me, and then he stirs. “Can I ask you one thing?”
“You can ask me anything,” I say sleepily.
“Do you still love him?”
The question surprises me, and I’m silent for a second, analysing how I feel. It’s strange but surprisingly painless. Jem obviously thinks he’s upset me and goes to move away. I grab his hand. “No,” I say hoarsely. “I don’t love him anymore. I haven’t loved him for a very long time.”
“Since you found him with the other man?”
I shake my head, and he resumes stroking my hair. “I didn’t stop then. I’m stupidly loyal, I’m afraid, so I just carried on for a while and then one day I woke up, and I realised I was cured.”
“When was that?”
Tonight, I think, but I don’t say anything, and after a few seconds, he hugs me tight, and I drift off to sleep.
I come slowly awake to a strange noise. Jem and I have separated in the night and he now lies at my side, one hand on my wrist as if he’s taking my pulse while asleep. For a few seconds, I lie there trying to work out what the noise is. It’s a loud dragging sound, and I realise it’s coming from outside the bedroom door. No light shines from beneath it, but the noise continues, as if something heavy is being dragged slowly past the door. There’s a loud gasping sound, as if an exhausted person is responsible for the dragging.
I try to sit up, but something heavy is on my chest, holding me down. It’s an unpleasant weight, and my lungs are too constricted to breathe. The heaviness becomes unbearable, and I try to shove away the weight, but my arms won’t work. I call out to Jem, but scream silently, my eyes watering. My mouth won’t open. Something is on my lips, holding them closed.
I twist and turn, wrenching my hand free from whatever invisible force is holding me down. My nails tear, burning and stinging. I frantically raise my hand to my mouth.
Horror washes over me. My mouth is sewn shut. Rough cotton criss-crosses my mouth. The pain is razor-sharp, and I swallow convulsively as a metallic taste floods my mouth. Then my eyes bulge as blood suddenly fills my throat. It’s thick and viscous and I gasp and gurgle, unable to swallow.
The dragging sounds continue, moving past the bedroom door towards the stairs.
I thrash violently, stars bursting behind my eyelids as I struggle for air. I’m going to choke to death if I don’t get free.
Why hasn’t Jem woken up? I cast a frantic look at him but he’s lying quietly, his expression serene. There’s a heavy bump bump bump on the stairs and then a silence for a second, before something whispers in my ear, “Wake up.”
I draw in a startled breath, and it’s like bursting into the fresh air after being underwater for too long. My eyes open.
“What the fuck?” I gasp. I’m standing in the garden in my underwear under the magnolia tree. The air is cool on my body, the grass wet with the first dew, and dawn is painting a milky wash over the sky.
I raise frantic fingers to my mouth, but the stitches have gone. Was that a dream?
My fingers throb, and when I look down, I see the broken nails and blood seeping out from under them. Not such a dream after all.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
JEM
I’m not sure where I am when I wake. The bed feels different and the sheets don’t smell like my usual washing powder. Then memory returns with a rush, and I sit bolt upright. I look automatically at Will’s side of the bed, but it’s empty. Will’s side of the bed? Get real. It’s only for tonight.
That thought makes me feel sad, as if we’re already back in York and he’s drawing away from me. Because it’s going to happen. For some reason, I understand him, and I know that scares him because it does the same to me. I’ve never felt this level of interest in anyone before. It’s a level that could jeopardise my career because feelings like these come with ties.
I shake my head to clear it and look at my watch. It’s five in the morning. Where is he? I look cautiously at the bathroom. The door is shut. Is he in there? Then I realise there’s a light showing under the door. Even as I look, I see a shadow move in front of the light. So that’s where he is.
I lie back down in the warm muddle of blankets. Already they smell of him, and I inhale the scent of vanilla. It’s a warm sexy smell, and I feel the low buzz of arousal in my groin. Kissing him last night had been wonderful and terrible at the same time. Wonderful because I was touching those soft, full lips with mine but terrible because it had come with the price of knowing his story.
I can still feel the burn of anger inside me at hearing what Jason had done to him. It seems grossly unfair that such a complete wanker is living happily and safely in a house while golden-hearted Will was forced onto the street because of Jason’s actions. While Jason lay in bed with his new lover, Will was fighting to survive in a world that must have been so alien to such a sweet-natured, gentle man. Thank god he had Blue.
It’s funny, because Blue credits Will with standing up for him, but I now know it was a two-way street. The two of them are closer than any other friends I’ve ever seen. They have a shorthand of looks and unspoken words that is palpable.
Will’s been in the bathroom for a while now, and it’s very quiet. I check my watch. I’ve spent fifteen minutes brooding like a teenager.
Is he okay?
I climb out of bed and pace over to the bathroom. I hesitate and then knock gently on the door. “Will, are you okay?” I whisper. Silence. “I’m not being a creeper. I just wanted to check. You’ve been in there for a while.”
I look down at the bottom of the door just in time to see the light go off. When nothing else happens, worry stirs. What is going on? Is he upset with me because I asked too many questions last night? I hadn’t meant to, but it was the first time he’d opened up to me, and maybe I’d pressed too hard.
“Will?” I say again. When there’s no reply, the worry becomes stronger. “Okay, I’m coming in,” I say in a louder voice. I’m probably overstepping so much my feet must have blisters, but I’m still doing it. “I just hope you’re not sitting on the loo because this could be embarrassing for both of us. Like next level of embarrassment right up there with going out with your underwear hanging out of your shoe.” I pause. “Not that that’s ever happened to me.”
I reach down and try the door, fully expecting it to be locked, but it swings open. The bathroom is dark. Breathing echoes in the corner. It’s fast and hurried like an animal in pain.
“Jesus, Will. Are you okay?” My voice quivers.
The breathing loudens, almost panting, and then stops abruptly.
He’s ill.
“I’m switching the light on,” I say firmly, pressing the light switch.
I hiss as bright light sears my eyes. Blinking, I take a sharp breath, chills running down my body.
The bathroom is empty.
I look around dazedly, but it’s a small room, and there’s nowhere for anyone to hide. The towels hang neatly, and everything is as we left it. But I know someone was in here. From the bed, I’d watched a figure move, casting shadows beneath the door. The light had gone out just a moment ago.
So, who had been breathing in the dark?
“Shit. What is going on here?” I whisper.
I need to find Will.
Fear strikes me with the force of a punch. I back slowly out of the bathroom, not wanting to turn my back on it. After grabbing my clothes, I race out of the room. I stop only to pull on my shorts and don’t even attempt to be quiet as I thunder down the stairs.
Downstairs is dark and quiet, the only lights coming from the charging units in the kitchen. I pause in the hallway listening intently, but there’s nothing.
Cool air swirls around my ankles and I follow the source to the open back door.
I pause for a second. Maybe Will went out for a breath of fresh air. The night is hot enough for that. If I follow him, my behaviour could come across as really fucking creepy. The man’s entitled to his privacy, for god’s sake.
