No, he thought as he headed back to his perch, snatching back his magazine from Tomas on the way and stooping to blow in Tav’s ear and distract him from the game for a moment. He wouldn’t be telling Mamma.
He would deal with Jack Collins, if necessary, on his own.
* * * *
On the twentieth, the last Saturday before Christmas itself, Tav found himself sitting on the fence by Ponds Forge tram stop, waiting for Luca to escape from swimming club, and kicking his heels off the railing. It was cold and windy, but crowded; the trams were packed, and yet the thirty quid Mam had given him burned a hole in Tav’s pocket. He had plans for him and Luca today. The twentieth was their—well…
He was jolted out of his thoughts when an unpleasantly familiar face appeared at the leisure centre doors.
So there went the little shit. Tav hadn’t seen Jack for over a week. He’d been skipping school or off sick or some such shit. Far as he knew, Luca hadn’t seen him either, but Tav hadn’t dared to ask for fear of getting wound up and losing his shit again.
Now, he reckoned, Jack had been off. He was very pale against the dark fabric of his hood. He didn’t seem aware of Tav watching him—not too surprising, given the road between them—and shouldered a sports bag before wandering up the road towards the high street. He moved slowly and stiffly, head down, and Tav knew the look from years of carrying himself.
He narrowed his eyes. Jack was on the offence. He made a grim figure in the hustle and bustle, and Tav watched until he faded from sight entirely.
“Hey!”
Tav jerked his head around, and grinned. Luca jogged across the first lane of traffic, hopped over the railing, then over the rest of the road and up to Tav’s perch. He was flushed, damp curls rippling in the wind like a field of long grass, and he was in high spirits. The way he stretched up on his toes to press a fleeting kiss to Tav’s mouth said that.
“Hey,” Tav said, smiling. “Alright?”
“Uh-huh. Sorry. Coach made us do butterfly relays, and David sucks at butterfly.”
Tav snorted. “Yeah, whatever. Liar. You were making out with Aaron.”
“No, that’s after Christmas,” Luca said loftily, and beamed. “So! You said you had plans?”
“Was Jack there?” Tav asked instead, and Luca blinked.
“Uh, yeah.”
“Just, uh—I just saw him leave. Looked moody.”
“Mm,” Luca said, and shrugged. “I dunno, man, I don’t ask. He’s not been to the last two sessions, and he just scowled at me the whole time on the one before that. I’m trying to ignore him so we don’t have another barney and you don’t get involved and give your mam a heart attack.”
Tav smiled ruefully. “Thanks,” he said, squeezing Luca’s arm and pushing Jack to the back of his mind. “Come on,” he said, hopping down and jerking his head at the approaching tram. “Meadowhall.”
“Urgh, Meadowhell? Are you for real?”
“Shut up,” Tav said. He caught Luca’s hand in his on the platform, and bumped their shoulders. “I need to get something for Becky. Then I figured food court and cinema. Mam gave me ticket money.”
Luca’s reply was lost in the scrum for seats as the tram doors opened, but Tav held onto his hand tight enough to bruise, and dragged them through the melee to a couple of seats by a steamy window. The tram was hot, but Luca—who had ice for blood, Tav thought—kept his coat and hat on. The combination of that grey beanie, hidden curls, and Luca’s large eyes, sharp cheekbones and thin face was lethal, and Tav propped his elbow where the wall met the window, and his chin on his hand.
“So I figure,” he said idly, “we shoot in and out of Sports Direct as fast as possible―”
“What’re you getting her?”
“New shinpads for hockey.”
Luca laughed. “I swear your mam has three sons.”
Tav smirked. “S’why she raises us. Anyway. I say we zip in and out of there fast as we can, then head straight over for food. Ian’s doing some landscaping out in Tinsley today, he says he can pick us up if we leave around four and run us home.”
“That sounds to me like you want a grope in the car park.”
“Well yeah,” Tav said, and tilted his head. “Day’s more for us than actual shopping.”
“Why?”
Tav blinked, then grinned. He leaned forward, squinted at Luca’s blank expression, and laughed. “Seriously?”
“Uh. Yes?”
“Wow.”
Luca pulled off his hat and ran a hand through his curls. Luca’s hair was tightly curly—it always looked oddly neat for curls, like a tight perm, and it resettled contentedly as his hand fell free again. “Fine, don’t explain yourself.”
Tav narrowed his eyes. “You do know the day, right?”
“Twentieth, twenty-first?”
“Twentieth.”
“Right,” Luca said, and paused. “I don’t get it.”
Tav rolled his eyes. No shit, Sherlock. That much was obvious. “You’ve forgotten, haven’t you? The twentieth of December? Three years, we were fourteen? You kissed me and then ran off to Italy to visit your grandma for Christmas and avoided me for two weeks like the coward you totally are?”
Luca was groaning before Tav had even finished speaking, a dull flush creeping up his neck. “Oh my God. I’m sorry. Really sorry, this time—I just…fuck, I―”
Tav smiled. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not,” Luca insisted, sliding his foot between Tav’s. “Not if you remembered. Shit, I’m sorry. I’ll make it up to you. Cinema tickets on me?”
“Rather have food on you.”
The dull flush brightened, but that wicked little smirk Tav liked spread across Luca’s face. It was a fucking lickable smirk, that. Made Luca look almost sinister, and weirdly intense when it was turned on you.
“In the food court? Dunno about that.”
“You can make it up to me by getting lunch with me, sitting in the back row of the cinema with me, and coming back to my house this evening,” Tav said quietly. Three years, he knew just how to fluster Luca. Stare. Speak slowly and stare, maintain absolute eye contact, and only smile with one side of the mouth.
Sure enough, Luca grinned and looked out of the window, the flush heading rapidly for purple.
“Bit warm?” Tav teased.
“Shut up,” Luca grumbled, and pulled a face.
Tav just grinned—and when a crowd of elderly ladies bustled on at the next stop, and Luca switched seats to sit next to Tav and offer up the other two to an old couple, somehow one of his hands ended up in one of Tav’s.
“Anyway,” Tav said quietly. “Mam gave me money for the tickets. So definitely food on you.”
“You’re a bastard,” Luca hissed.
“Am not,” Tav said, and grinned. “Is that a no?”
Luca was still bright red. “No, it’s not a bloody no,” he sniped, and butted his head against Tav’s shoulder. Tav laughed and looked out of the window at the steel-grey sky, threatening snow, and nothing else mattered.
Chapter 10: “I have no right to be annoyed about it.”
“Fuck yeah!” Jan cheered when the clock ticked over to half past three and the bell shrieked.
“Daniel, don’t make me dock you points on the January exams for lack of imagination,” Miss Corey said, smirking over the top of her glasses at them as they noisily packed up. “Have a good Christmas, everyone, and don’t forget amongst your presents to read the final chapters! There will be a test, and it will not be themed on the new year!”
“Fuck tests,” Jan said, clapping Tav on the shoulders. “Let’s blow this joint. Got Christmas plans?”
“Not really,” Tav said, shoving his English supplies haphazardly into his bag and deliberately not looking up. Miss Corey always got a pained expression if they crumpled their books, and Tav didn’t have the best of luck with books in the first place. “You?”
“Granddad’s,” Jan said, and snorted. “‘Don’t you complain, it’s probabl
y Pops’ last Christmas with us!’ Thank God.”
Tav chuckled, and lifted an arm to wave at the figures of Luca and Aaron lounging by the lockers.
“Alright, I get the hint. Go mack with your boyfriend,” Jan said, wrinkling his nose and sticking his tongue out in a grotesque face. “Think of me when you’re having fun and I’m stuck in Old Farts Town.”
“Think of you when I’m fucking Luca? How about no?”
“Ew, yeah, no, that’s weird.”
“Too right. See you, Jan. Hey,” Tav added, leaning against the locker beside Luca’s as they drew level and Jan peeled off towards the bike sheds and rear gate. “Plans?”
“Aaron wants to do a run-through of this play,” Luca said. “He’s got snogging stage fright.”
Aaron grinned and shrugged. Tav laughed. “What?” Aaron objected. “It’s not like I go around kissing blokes for fun. I might be shit at it.”
“If you’re shit at it, I’m out.”
“Traitor,” Aaron said, punching Luca in the arm. “C’mon. We only have the community centre until six.”
Last day of school before Christmas always resembled a mass evacuation—the school was empty by the time they passed through the main gate, and the icy pavements nearly cleared of kids. They made an idle progress, Tav’s arm slung across Luca’s shoulders and lazy conversation drifting back and forth through cold air and the encroaching darkness, even though it wasn’t four o’clock yet. Quietly, Tav resented this play already. School was over. By all rights, Luca was all Tav’s until after the new year—except for sodding Aaron and his sodding snogging stage fright!
The community centre was a short, fat building squatting on the hillside in a sort of precarious way—or as precarious as concrete blocks could be—and its door boomed hollowly behind them as Aaron let them in. It was a large, single area that served as a theatre, blood donation centre, crèche, meeting hall and general room-for-hire most of the year round. It did have a proper stage and curtains, but the lighting was limited and the chairs set out for an audience plastic and stackable. A cluster of women were sitting in a circle in one corner and waved to Aaron over their sewing.
“Costumes?” Tav guessed.
“Uh-huh,” Aaron said, hauling himself up on the stage. The others followed, and then Aaron swept the heavy blackout curtain around the boards—presumably, Tav thought, to keep his snogging stage fright out of sight of the sewing circle.
“I’m gonna get started on Miss Corey’s reading,” Tav decided, setting himself up against the wall with his bag and books. “You’ve got an hour.”
“Why an hour?” Luca asked, dumping his bag and coat by Tav’s feet.
“‘Cause Ian’s taking Mam out for a Christmas date, and the girls are staying at their auntie’s,” Tav said, and grinned. “House to ourselves from five thirty-ish.”
“Which is an hour and a half.”
“Alright, alright. Hair-splitter.”
“Not even a proper insult,” Luca said loftily, then grinned. “So hour and a half of snogging Aaron, then plenty more hours snogging you?”
“Yeah,” Tav said and grinned, snagging the front of Luca’s shirt. “First one’s for me anyway.”
Luca smirked against his mouth, the kiss hard and unyielding, and then he was wriggling free with a wicked grin and pulling Tav’s fingers out of the cotton shirt. “Later, you dirty bastard. Aaron gets some loving first.”
“I said kissing, not loving,” Aaron protested. “Not into whatever weird loving you guys get up to.”
“It’s very good loving,” Tav said mildly as Luca attempted to lynch Aaron with his own tie. Tav ignored them and rummaged for his book. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin. It was boring—Tav was good at English, but wasn’t a huge fan. It was an easy A—and he’d never remember to do it if he didn’t start now. The bits about the war were okay, but he had a horrible feeling the final chapters were all about the mushy love story, and some moral about peace.
Soon, however, he was lost, making notes in the margins to the background noise of the sewing circle beyond the curtain, and Aaron and Luca murmuring lines and falling quiet in periodic rhythm. It was peaceful back here. He should come to rehearsals more often if Luca was going to be in them. Maybe he ought to join Aaron’s drive to get Luca into doing more dramatics.
Thing is, this was Tav’s thing. Quiet. He wasn’t a social butterfly like Luca. Tav liked his space, and he liked things to be all in order and calm. He didn’t do manic chaos. He liked watching manic chaos, it was fun—especially watching Luca at the eye of the storm—but Tav liked to sit on the sidelines and watch the insanity play out. Like watching EastEnders or something. Which made Luca kind of perfect: Luca unleashed the madness, and Tav watched it happen. And then when Luca was done being crazy, he’d come into Tav’s corners and be all relaxed with him for a bit.
And maybe it was girly to admit it, but—as much as Tav was looking forward to the empty house and all its promises later—he was in need of a bit of Luca coming into the corner to relax with him.
Which was why the minute the alarm on his phone went off at five thirty, Tav was tucking the corner of a page over and closing the book. “Luc,” he raised his voice, burying the book back in his bag. “We have to―”
The world stopped dead.
How was it that Tav knew it was happening, but was still shocked by it?
The sight of Luca and Aaron locked in a kiss was…jarring. Tav froze in place, staring. Luca was cupping Aaron’s face in both hands, and they both had their eyes closed. Aaron seemed to be frozen in fake surprise, but even as Tav watched, Aaron’s hands curled into the crooks of Luca’s elbows and his shoulders sagged. And okay, it was a chaste kiss, but it was a hard, solid, let’s-go-for-it kiss, too. It wasn’t soft or gentle. It wasn’t hesitant.
Something burned dangerously in the middle of Tav’s chest, and he had to unclench his fingers from the strap of his bag. He hadn’t even realised he’d closed them. He was stuck staring, his chest on fire, and his jaw muscles slowly and surely tightening.
Tav took a deep breath, and forced back the rage.
On second thoughts, he didn’t like the idea of this play. At all.
* * * *
As he usually did once they were on their own, Luca slid his hand into Tav’s elbow the moment Aaron waved goodbye and turned off towards Psalter Lane. The hill down towards where Tav and Luca lived was slippery, and Luca always used the pretence of support. Usually Tav smirked at him and started teasing, but…
“You’re quiet.”
Tav shrugged, and Luca tilted his head.
“Tav?”
Tav shrugged again, and kicked a stone. Luca knew the face—the shut-up-I’m-thinking one—but not the reason why. Tav often went quiet while he turned things over in his head. He was scary. He was never the fastest car on the racetrack, but when he did come out with answers to complex shit, they were freaky good answers. Everything from maths to emotions.
Tav had taken weeks to work out why he liked being with Luca so much, he’d said so when they started dating. And then he’d gone from ‘I like Luca’ to ‘let’s date’ in about half a second. So Luca knew the face—he just didn’t know what the problem was that Tav was picking at.
And given that these picking-at-problems phases could be made-up stupid problems, or stuff that made Tav angry, or anything under the sun, Luca’s masochistic side got some air and prodded the issue.
“Ta-av. You in there?”
“Huh?”
“You gonna share what’s in your head?”
When no explosion came, no snapping, Luca figured it was safe to try it, and slid his hand down to slip his fingers between Tav’s gloved ones. He got his knuckles squeezed for his efforts, and Tav’s sigh was loud and weary.
“I dunno.”
“It’s your head, how do you not know what’s in it?”
“I mean, it’s something that shouldn’t be.”
“Why? You imagining Aaron naked?”<
br />
Tav snorted.
“Or Miss Corey?”
“Ew, Luca!”
“Or is it―”
“Shut up,” Tav said, and Luca laughed. “It’s a stupid something. Like…I have no right to be annoyed about it.”
Luca tilted his head and eyed Tav’s profile in the orange-lit evening. His hair burned yellow under the streetlights, and his eyes were shadowed in the changing glare of passing cars on the road. He looked ethereally breathtaking for a moment, and Luca missed his chance to speak.
“I just can’t figure out why it’s pissed me off.”
“Right,” Luca said. “Uh. Why what’s pissed you off?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Tav said as they turned off Ecclesall Road and the housing estate swallowed them whole.
“You’re quiet enough it does,” Luca prompted. He swung their joined hands lightly. “C’mon, Tav, don’t make me resort to torture. Sharing is caring.”
Tav snorted.
“A problem shared is a problem halved.”
“Oh shut up.”
“If you cross ‘share’ with ‘talk’ then you get ‘stalk.’ Oh, wait, you already do that.”
“I do not.”
“Breaking into my room at night―”
“You broke into my house the other week!”
“―waiting for me outside swimming―”
“We agreed to that.”
“―following me to rehearsal…” Tav’s fingers twitched. “Ah. The rehearsal’s got your back up?”
Tav breathed out heavily again; a cloud of vapour rose into the cold evening.
“What’s up?” Luca persisted. They had come to a halt in the road between their houses, his own brightly lit and Tav’s in darkness.
“I don’t know yet.”
“Is it a bad something, or a good something, or somewhere in between?”
“A bad something,” Tav admitted and Luca hummed, tugging until Tav turned to face him properly. When he did, Luca slid his hands around Tav’s waist—or what he could find of it through the thick coat—and leaned forward to press a kiss to an icy cheek.
“Well,” Luca said, “I figure we have the night to ourselves in your nicely empty house, and frankly I’m freezing my nuts off so we could go inside and ramp the heating up and get hot again, and leave the bad something out here, right?”
The Italian Word for Kisses Page 9