by Anna Martin
“Stan. ”
“Would you move in with me?”
“Okay. Yeah,” Ben said. A slow smile lit up his face. “Yeah, that would be good.”
“Good,” Stan agreed, then kissed him to seal the deal.
Ben rubbed at his tired eyes, then buried his face in the crease between Stan’s shoulder and neck. Stan held him there, gently stroking his hair until Ben gave a big, heaving sigh.
“Come on,” Stan said, climbing off Ben’s lap and not waiting for him to follow.
In the bathroom, Stan turned on the shower and let the water warm up while he twisted his hair up and secured it with a big clip.
“Is this a voyeuristic thing?” Ben asked from the doorway, leaning against the frame with his arms crossed and a smirk playing at his lips. “Or am I supposed to join you?”
“Either works for me,” Stan said.
Ben laughed and started stripping off.
It was a comfort thing, Stan decided as he ushered Ben into the shower, not a sex thing. He wanted Ben to stay the night now that they’d made a decision to live together. He wanted to show Ben how good it could be.
Ben dropped his head and shuffled under the wide spray of water. From there, Stan pulled him close so his chest was pressed against Ben’s back, and with his hands liberally covered in Moroccan oil, he started to knead at Ben’s shoulders.
“Oh, God,” Ben groaned. He huffed a laugh.
“Is that okay?”
“More than okay.”
When he was done, Stan switched to shampoo and worked it into Ben’s hair, massaging it into his scalp.
“Want me to return the favour?” Ben asked, his voice low.
“No, I’m fine. Come on.”
He switched the water off and stepped out of the cubicle, then wrapped himself in a towel and passed one to Ben. It wasn’t late, but Stan was tired and Ben looked exhausted, so they went to Stan’s bedroom—their bedroom—and pulled up a movie to watch on Stan’s laptop.
Barely half an hour into the movie and Ben was asleep, his head on Stan’s lap, snoring softly. Stan ran his fingers through Ben’s still-damp hair and thought maybe, just maybe, this could work.
Even though Ben would have liked to take things slower, time was against them, and his landlord wanted him out of the hazardous house as soon as possible. That meant chucking most of his stuff in black bin bags and whatever boxes he could beg, borrow, or steal from the pub, then hauling it on the Underground over to Stan’s place. Some of the bigger things—okay, just his TV—and anything slightly precious went in the final run in a taxi.
Since Tone was still on strict bed rest at Sherrie’s, Ben ended up going through all of his stuff too, though he got a taxi over to Notting Hill with the whole lot rather than going back and forth again.
“I could have done it,” Tone grumbled as Ben dumped the last duffel bag on the floor in Sherrie’s spare room.
“No,” Ben said, slightly breathless. “You couldn’t. A thank you wouldn’t go amiss, you miserable bastard.”
“Thanks.”
Tone was sitting back on the bed in boxers and a T-shirt, looking fed up and clashing wildly with Sherrie’s décor. The room was decorated in pale colours and roses; Tone was dark and surly.
Feeling sorry for the guy who was admittedly his best mate, Ben reached into his backpack and drew out two bottles of cider.
“Aw, mate,” Tone breathed. “Sherrie won’t let me drink. You’re a legend.”
Ben laughed. “Bottle opener?”
“There’s one on my keys.”
Ben found the keys amongst the other junk on the dresser and popped the lids off both bottles, then sat down on the end of the bed and passed one to Tone.
“How’re you feeling?” Ben asked.
Tone shrugged. “I feel alright, then I try to do something and I feel shit again. And I love Sherrie, don’t get me wrong, but she’s fucking scary when she shouts.” He shuddered. “I tried to make a cup of tea yesterday, and she practically chewed me a new one.”
Ben snorted. That sounded like the Sherrie he knew and loved.
“So what about you and Stan?” Tone asked.
“What about us?”
“You’ve only been seeing him a few weeks.”
“It’s been almost three months, Tone.”
Tone shrugged. “Same diff.”
Ben shrugged back and took a deep gulp of the cider, then wiped his mouth with his arm. “He offered. I don’t have anywhere better to go—God knows I don’t want to go and stay with my mum—so it sounded like a good idea.”
“What if it doesn’t work out? What if it does?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Ben said with a laugh.
“Guys like Stan….”
“Finish that sentence,” Ben told him, his voice going suddenly dark and demanding.
“Alright, alright, keep your knickers on,” Tone said, holding up his hand—the one not occupied by his cider. “I just meant you shouldn’t lead him on. Don’t move in with him if you’re not serious.”
“How do you know I’m not serious?”
“Fuck’s sake, Ben. I’m not saying you’re not.” Tone stretched out, and his spine popped loudly. “He’s important, then?”
“Yeah,” Ben said. He sipped his beer. “I don’t want to put a label on it yet. But he’s important.”
Tone didn’t push for anything more, and Ben was grateful for that. It wasn’t that he hadn’t considered his relationship with Stan and what it really meant—he had, at length. He was from a family of men who didn’t talk about their emotions, though, and definitely not about their partners. Ben couldn’t remember ever seeing his dad tell his mum he loved her, which possibly had something to do with why they were divorced, come to think of it.
Ben left Tone in Sherrie’s capable hands—much to Tone’s distress, but when Sherrie got scary and demanded him out, Ben got out.
The first few hours were strange, as Ben brought a few battered suitcases of his things through the door and started unpacking his clothes into drawers. Stan fussed. He made tea, didn’t drink it, then went back to watching Ben doing his thing.
“I’ve emptied half of the drawers,” Stan said, hovering nervously at the door to the bedroom. “I can make more space in the wardrobe if you need me to.”
Ben looked up from where he was stuffing underwear into a drawer—not folding any of it. “Then where will your clothes go?” he teased.
“I’ll find somewhere.”
“This is fine. Perfect. Thank you.”
Stan nodded. “Do you want a cup of tea?”
“I’d love one.”
After retreating to the kitchen, Stan fussed with the teapot and the kettle and found the right mugs, then rearranged the cupboard where he kept the mugs and cups until all the handles were facing the right way. Ben came in just as Stan was dumping the teabags into the recycling container.
“Thanks, love.”
“That’s okay. Do you want a biscuit? I bought some for you.”
Ben paused in blowing across the surface of the tea to cool it and smiled without moving the mug from his lips. “No, thank you. This is fine.”
“Okay.”
Ben sipped his tea, set the mug down on the counter, then grabbed Stan’s wrist and drew him close. Knowing he’d feel better after a hug, Stan let himself be folded into Ben’s embrace and laid his cheek on Ben’s chest, sighing heavily.
“If this isn’t cool, then you just have to say,” Ben told him, stroking his hand over Stan’s hair. “We can do this for a trial period, and if it’s not working, I can go live somewhere else. The last thing I want is for this to be the beginning of the end.”
“I don’t want that either. I want you here, Ben. I promise,” Stan said, squeezing Ben tighter around his waist. “I’m just… scared, I suppose.”
“Don’t be scared. We’ll be okay. What happened to promising to make love every night?” Ben teased. He pulled away enough to duck h
is head and press his lips to Stan’s. Stan let himself be kissed, moving his lips slowly and parting them when Ben licked at his tongue.
“We can still do that,” Stan said.
Ben grinned and kissed him again.
The transition from boyfriends to live-in partners came smoothly, more smoothly than Stan had expected. He’d never lived with anyone other than family before; even when he was in Italy, he’d had a small, boxy studio apartment he didn’t have to share with anyone else.
He had a worry in the back of his mind that things would be different for them once Ben moved in, that his possessions would be moved around, and Ben would keep strange foods in the fridge and not do his share of the housework. Or, at the other end of the scale, that Ben would feel like the flat in Bow Quarter wasn’t his own, that he was a guest or a lodger rather than a partner.
For the first few nights, they danced around each other; Ben had his routine, and Stan had his own, and they had to try to figure out how to layer their lives until they were seamlessly feathered together. Ben liked to play his guitar for an hour or two every night, either practicing or writing new stuff, or just messing around. He liked to have music or the TV on in the background when he cooked or worked on his laptop.
Stan was used to the quiet, the only noise in his space being noise he made himself. It turned into a strange sort of comfort. It didn’t matter if he was working at the kitchen counter or in the living room while Ben was in bed, he was aware of there being another person around. It was different… a good different.
Neither of them were particularly competent cooks, though Ben was trying to improve his skills. When their schedules aligned and they were both at home for dinner at the same time, he made dinner, an interesting variety of vegan meals from recipes he found online. Some experiments were more successful than others. His vegan lasagne was becoming Stan’s favourite thing to eat.
“I’ll wash up,” Stan said as he cleared their plates to the sink.
“I can help.”
“You cooked. I’ll wash up,” Stan insisted. Ben squeezed past and patted Stan’s bum lightly on his way to the living room. Stan loved when he did that, though he would never admit it aloud.
He carefully portioned the leftovers into plastic tubs and left them on the side to cool before he put them in the fridge. Sometimes Ben took lunch with him when he went straight from the pub to one of his tutoring jobs, so these extra meals were useful.
The pan took a while to scrub clean; Stan left it to soak as he wiped down the surfaces and dried the plates, then stacked them neatly back in the cupboard.
“Stan?”
“Yes?”
“Come here.”
Stan stuck his head around the door into the living room. “Hmm?”
Ben indicated the space next to him. “Dishes can wait.”.
“Okay. Two minutes.”
“Stan,” he whined.
“Two minutes!”
He used his two minutes to wash his hands and twist his hair back into a loose knot. Ben had some zombie show on the TV. He’d never been particularly interested in television, beyond its use for helping him understand another language. For now, Stan was content to be snuggled.
He took his seat on the sofa, leaned back against Ben’s chest and sighed.
“You okay, love?” Ben asked.
“Yeah. I’m good.”
Ben kissed his head and ran his fingers gently through Stan’s hair, undoing the knot, then started working it into a loose French braid.
“What are you doing?” Stan asked, sounding amused.
“Um. Braiding your hair?”
Stan leaned forward to give Ben more room. “How on earth do you know how to do a French braid?”
“I have a sister, remember?”
“You didn’t tell me you had a sister. Only that they’re triplets.”
“Oh.” Ben continued rhythmically folding strands of Stan’s hair over and over itself. “Well, there’s three of them, obviously. Freddie, Molly, and Sam.”
“You’ve never lived with them, though?”
“No. But I babysit every now and then. It was weird…. I was twenty-three when my mum had them, and I had a girlfriend at the time. I could have had kids myself, you know? So I’ve never been that close to them. Mum showed me how to do Molly’s hair when I stayed with them for a week over Christmas.”
He finished off the braid, twisting it all the way to the finest strands of Stan’s hair to keep it in place, then kissed the side of Stan’s neck. Stan leaned back against Ben’s chest and sighed again.
“Do you want children?”
“I don’t know,” Ben said honestly. “Do you?”
“No,” Stan said, his voice low and a little wistful. “I don’t think I could do that.”
Ben nodded, understanding, and held Stan a little tighter. Their TV show went to an advert break, and Stan got up and took their empty mugs to the kitchen to dump them in the sink. Remembering they were out of soy milk, he wrote it on the shopping list Ben had brought. It was magnetic and stuck to the fridge, so they shouldn’t forget stuff like that anymore.
Stan detoured to the bedroom and grabbed his box of nail polishes, then went back to the living room in time for the second half of the zombie program to start. Ben looked over and grinned.
“Time for a change?”
“Hmm. I think so. I have a new blouse I want to wear tomorrow.”
“You accumulate new clothes like no one else I’ve ever known.”
Stan shot him a cheeky smile. “Thank you.”
“I’ll do yours if you do mine.”
Stan held up a bottle of electric pink and raised an eyebrow.
“I have no objection to pink,” Ben said. “Was kinda hoping you had some black, though.”
“I do,” Stan laughed. He found the bottle and shook it out, then grabbed Ben’s hand and inspected his nails. “You bite these.”
“Yeah. Sorry.”
“It’s not hygienic.”
“I know. Those file things freak me out, though.” He shuddered. “The noise goes straight through me.”
“I won’t file them,” Stan promised. “The pink is for my toenails.”
“Oh.” Ben sounded relieved. “I can do that.”
“You first,” Stan said, running his thumbs over his partner’s horrendous cuticles. When he had more time, he was going to give Ben a proper manicure. For now, the black polish would cover up the worst of it.
“Okay,” Ben said and leaned forward to steal a kiss from Stan’s lips.
Chapter Nine
Stan let himself in the front door, toed off his Louboutins, and admired his shiny, pink toenails. Some kind of amazing smell was coming from the kitchen, so that seemed like a good place to go first.
“Good evening,” Ben drawled. He was stirring something on the stove that smelled deliciously of onions, garlic, and tomato.
“What’s that?” Stan asked and wrapped his arms around Ben’s waist from behind.
“Um… it’s a caponata. Italian aubergine stew stuff. And I’m making giant couscous salad to go with it.”
“It smells amazing.”
“Thank you.”
Ben turned the burner off under the pan and moved it to one side, then turned in Stan’s arms and placed a slow, precise kiss on his mouth. His lips tasted of tomato and garlic too, and Stan smiled into the kiss.
“Missed you today,” Stan admitted when they broke apart with a sigh. “It was one of those slow days—we’re in-between projects, and I just know it’s going to go crazy in a few days’ time, so I’m trying to get all my other stuff done before that kicks off.”
“I hate those days,” Ben said and kissed his forehead. “Do you want to get changed before dinner?”
“No, I’m fine for a minute.”
Stan grabbed placemats from the drawer and quickly set the table while Ben dished up the food, and they hooked their ankles together under the table as soon as they sat down.
“This is good,” Stan said after his first mouthful. “I like it.”
Ben nodded. “Thanks. There’s some leftover, if you want to take it for your lunch tomorrow. You can eat the caponata cold anyway.”
“Okay,” Stan said slowly, thinking over the idea. “Okay, I will. Thank you.”
“No worries. You remember I’ve got work tonight?”
Stan pulled a face. He’d forgotten and had been thinking about a night on the sofa, then early to bed—not to sleep, of course. “What time?”
“I start at seven.”
“I’ll come with you.”
Ben laughed. “You don’t need to do that, baby.”
“Am I not allowed out for a drink?”
“Of course you are. Of course. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I know,” Stan said and brushed his foot over Ben’s ankle under the table. “I don’t want to be cooped up on my own tonight.”
“Come with me, then.”
They cleaned up the kitchen together, and Stan ducked into the shower to wash his workday from his skin while Ben got changed into a different pair of black jeans and a long, soft, textured T-shirt.
“This is nice,” Stan said, standing in front of Ben, wrapped in a towel and gently undoing the buttons on the front of the maroon T-shirt. “It’s not black.”
“No,” Ben said with a laugh. “Sometimes I wear things that aren’t black.”
“Well, it looks good on you. You should wear non-black-coloured shirts more often.”
“Maybe I will,” Ben said, and kissed Stan on the nose. “Come on, or I’ll be late.”
Ben went back into the living room, and after a moment, Stan heard the sound of the Xbox starting up. He quickly found a pair of skinny jeans and pulled them on, with a pair of flat boots, because his feet were still aching from his day walking around in killer heels, which looked fabulous but were hell on his arches. He had a loose tank top that was only from Topshop but was nice enough for an evening at the pub, so he pulled that on and tied his hair back in a knot at the nape of his neck.
With time ticking, and aware he didn’t want to make Ben late, Stan swept loose powder over his face, slicked on lip gloss, and used clear mascara on his lashes and eyebrows.