Country Mouse

by Aleksandr Voinov

  Malcolm took two strides over and got his attention. “Get your stuff from the hotel,” he said quietly. “You can cab it to the station.” Owen raised his eyes and smiled.

  “Yeah?” he mouthed, and Malcolm nodded. “Jenny? Look, I’m going to swing by and grab my stuff, and I’ll meet you at the station at—what time? Oh Christ, that’s early. Okay. I’ll be there at eleven a.m.—give us some time to do whatever. Yeah, I will. You have fun too.”

  Owen tapped his phone and then frowned. “I do need my stuff. I’ve got my phone charger there. And clean underwear.” He grinned at Malcolm wickedly, and Malcolm’s stomach flipped over. “Think I’m really gonna need clean underwear.”

  Malcolm swallowed past a suddenly dry throat. “I should certainly hope so,” he said, and then, impulsively, he gave Owen a peck on the cheek before grabbing his wallet off the counter and heading for the door.

  He squelched the pang of bad conscience about work. Normally, he’d go through his trading strategy, work out better ways to make money, but at the end of the day, he was mostly paid to act as a market-maker, and that was by necessity a client-driven business. And in this shitty kind of market where even hard-bitten traders sat on bags of uninvested cash and whimpered softly, whatever proprietary trading went on was mostly flying blind.

  Hell, even Peter “Short the Bitch” Connolly didn’t do much trading right now. When the whole mess had started, he’d announced he’d leave the market for a year or two, sit on a terrace somewhere in Bali, and come back when the market was calming the fuck down. Malcolm figured they all should have done that, really.

  He should probably go to that drinks thing that the commodities research house was hosting tonight, but then, expensive prostitutes and sugar traders were really not who he wanted to spend his Saturday evening with. Taking Owen along occurred to him, but Owen wasn’t really the type to enjoy financial people getting loud and drunk, and there was so much more to London than an admittedly atmospheric cellar bar.

  He jogged down toward the bagel place he remembered, just fifteen minutes away, got one of everything (probably still very limited), then picked up some Italian ham, cheddar, and Cornish brie at the supermarket, and headed back, a thought forming in his head. Okay, not forming. Crystallizing. Taking shape and getting edges, that sort of thing.

  When he opened the door, the breakfast bar was laid and orange juice poured, and Owen was standing in the kitchen as if he belonged there. Ouch. That pang of—something—actually hurt a little.

  “They’re still warm,” Malcolm said, dumping the bag of bagels onto the table. “Cheese here, the local stuff—not London, but British—and yeah, Josh is going to kick my arse for all those carbs, but that’s okay. I’ll go back on lean roast chicken and salad later.” Coffee was made, too, so Owen had learned the Italian coffee machine. Malcolm picked up his mug from the counter just as Owen finished them.

  “I’m thinking, if you need anything more, like, I don’t know, clothes, stuff . . . It wouldn’t be a big deal, you know.”

  Owen frowned and started rooting through the paper bag. “What wouldn’t be a big deal?”

  “Never mind,” Malcolm said, feeling suddenly self-conscious. Here he’d been about to offer something tremendous, and the stupid Yank didn’t even see what he was about.

  “Oh wonderful,” Owen breathed, pulling out a bagel and some cream cheese. He turned around and took the bagels to the counter, then pulled out the little wooden cutting board and started to slice them up. Then he pulled out the tomato and the cheese and sliced that up too.

  “What do you want on yours?” he asked, looking at a bemused Malcolm. Malcolm couldn’t help it. The boy (well, he really was a man, but a young one) was just so . . . natural. Everything he did, from making coffee to fixing their breakfast to . . . (Malcolm swallowed) cleaning him up and tending to him after sex. It was so easy for him. He accepted, which was funny to think, because he hadn’t stopped challenging Malcolm once, but that was really only when . . .

  When Malcolm wasn’t being himself. It was like Owen saw who a person was, and would accept nothing less.

  “I’ll have what you’re having,” Malcolm said, trying to define that thing he wanted again. The least he could do was make an effort to take him somewhere decent. “Look, I’d like to go someplace posh tonight—you got any clothes for that, back at your hotel?”

  Owen grimaced. “Khakis and a dress shirt. Not really posh, I guess, but then, Jenny doesn’t show me off to her rich friends, so it was all I needed.”

  “Look,” Malcolm said delicately, “I could take you shopping, you know. I’ve got the coin, it’s no big deal.”

  Owen grimaced. “No thanks. Honestly—I want to see the tourist stuff, but if it’s too rich for khakis and a button-down, it’s probably too rich for me.”

  Malcolm took a deep breath through his nose and gritted his teeth. “I was just saying . . .” Owen turned and regarded him levelly, and Malcolm was suddenly overcome by an emotion he rarely, if ever, had any contact with whatsoever.

  Patience.

  If the day went well, maybe Owen would want to see the pricier side of London enough to let Malcolm shop for him after all. And seriously, for what Owen had done for him, he’d have spent at least that much money on a shrink or a rentboy. Or a guy who did both. He chuckled at the thought of Owen as a high-priced escort, and felt an odd churning in his stomach. Jealousy and hunger made an awful combination.

  “Shit, I can smell the starch from here. Let’s eat.” Josh would have his arse. But then, Mr. One-Million-Crunches-at-Lunchtime would have his arse anyway.

  He settled down and started on the orange juice, a rare indulgence. “Those clothes are fine, by the way. You wouldn’t believe what people wear in this place. But then, I remember meeting a Japanese tourist who actually showed up in a pinstripe with a bowler hat. I wasn’t sure if the guy was being ironic or had used a tourist guide from the seventies and thought he’d fit right in.”

  Good; given the way Owen almost snorted his coffee through his nose, the diversion tactic was working. “We’ll start at Trafalgar Square. What about Madame Tussauds? Wax figures? I think they have Hitler and Lady Gaga there now. And the Beckhams, of course. Kylie. We’ll grab a day pass on the Tube, it’s all pretty much within half an hour of each other, and then it depends what kind of food you like. If you’re more for Indian, I’ll take you to Veeraswamy; if it’s more Japanese, we’ll do Nobu.” He’d find a way to pay the bill without Owen working out how much it cost. Maybe that was the way to do it—get the Yank tired enough with sensory overload to exhaust him into financial complacency.

  “Sounds good,” Owen said, seemingly taking a lot of pleasure from that bagel now, and Malcolm reminded himself to eat. Mouthful of carbs, but wow, it was nice.

  “Great. We’ll start at Trafalgar Square, which is just across the road.”

  They set out soon after that, although Owen felt a sudden arrow of vanity as they were leaving and pulled out the knit cap he kept in the pocket of his hoodie. In spite of the fairly mild weather, he put it on as they stepped outside of Malcolm’s building. When Malcolm looked at him in askance, he felt his face heat and looked away.

  “It’s a fashion statement, okay?”

  “And what exactly is it saying?”

  Owen pulled up a corner of his mouth. “It’s saying my hair’s too long to stay neat in the wind, that’s what it’s saying.”

  Malcolm laughed at that, which was good, because it was true. But after that, Owen nearly forgot about the cap and the hair and his embarrassment. London was bigger than all of that put together—and then some. Massive groups of tourists, and they started on Trafalgar Square, which was really impressive. Malcolm pointed out a guy with a huge bird of prey on his arm across the square. “I bet you didn’t know London has an official hawk keeper . . . whatever they’re called, oh yes, falconer. The stupid animal rights people hate him, but he does keep the pigeons under control,” Malcolm said in th
at off-handed kind of way, just before they headed into the National Gallery.

  “That is so. Fucking. Cool.” Owen’s eyes were probably the size of dinner plates, but he didn’t care.

  Malcolm rolled his eyes. “Yanks,” he said, but Owen could see him smiling too.

  The gallery itself was enormous, so they only had time for highlights, like the painting with an optical illusion that, if you looked at it from a certain angle, had one elongated smear across the bottom turn into a three-dimensional skull.

  “Here’s the da Vinci Dan Brown wrote about.” Malcolm’s voice held suppressed excitement—certainly no tour-guide boredom. Owen could listen to him for hours. “For a while, you could barely get into this room. Or, of course, the Templar church. Want to see that? Should be open. Unless there’s a posh wedding going on. But it’s a nice walk along the Thames, anyway, if you’re interested.”

  Owen grinned. Why not?

  Getting into the Middle Temple area was a bit of an adventure, as the place was fenced off and housed a fair amount of lawyers and barristers in London. Those old houses, with the cobblestone streets and paths and small gardens in between, looked like something out of Dickens—a village where only law people lived.

  Malcolm led him through the gardens and past fountains, saying, “Apparently this is one of those spots where some famous writer or other liked to hang out,” but he couldn’t remember who exactly.

  Then there was a church that looked worn around the edges; it was clearly ancient. White stone, worn sculptures on the ground inside. Those were actually graves, and kings and Templars and national heroes lay here. Owen had thought they were all in Westminster Abbey, but clearly not.

  “There, those two knights on a horse. Seemed some people thought they were arse-fucking,” Malcolm announced cheerily, pointing at a pillar standing just outside the church.

  A tourist cast a baleful glance at Malcolm and hissed a “tsk.”

  Owen snickered, but Malcolm seemed oblivious. Either that, or he’d just recovered far more of his brashness than was healthy for him. “Not, mind, that there’s anything wrong with arse-fucking. Hey, if it was consensual and all.”

  “I imagine it was,” Owen said suggestively, enjoying Malcolm losing a beat, and then they walked down a busy street on the bank of the Thames.

  “There, Houses of Parliament coming into view. The place Guy Fawkes was trying to blow up?” Malcolm pointed ahead. “And that tower there is Big Ben. Of course, the tower isn’t called that, it’s the name of the bell in the tower.” He grinned, visibly proud of his city. “You know why Parliament is built right next to the water? I mean, there’s nothing between the water and the building, see?”

  Owen nodded, leaning his arms on the stone railing and looking at where the building practically rose out of the water. “Dunno? In case there’s a fire?”

  “Almost. They built it there so in case there’s a riot and people want to hang all these bastards, they can evacuate over the water. Pretty clever, huh? Don’t trust a good British lynch mob, is what I’m saying.” Malcolm grinned.

  “Better system than we have,” Owen muttered. “They keep trying to arrest our mobs back home.”

  Malcolm’s grin widened. “It’s because you people don’t mean it. That’s what I’m saying here—we want to hang a politician, we mean what we say! You just want to talk them to death.”

  Owen shot back a grin. “Well, you know. Sometimes talking’s hot.”

  And just that quickly Malcolm was flustered, and they were back in bed, Owen deep inside him, doing the things Malcolm wouldn’t ask for. “Right. Um, okay. On to the next bit, okay?”

  Owen smiled at him, letting his eyes hood over with lust, and Malcolm shot him an exasperated glare and continued the tour, delightfully huffy.

  He guided him across Parliament Square, Westminster Abbey (which was very impressive, but also closed to tourists), and then down the street toward Victoria (whatever that was), and they detoured into a strange building that looked like it belonged in the Middle East.

  “Strangest Cathedral Ever,” Malcolm said at the red-brick, uh, church with gold mosaics and oddly Byzantine look. “Westminster Cathedral. Smell the incense? This is one of the few real Catholic churches we have. It’s not really old, but quite pretty. Looks more like a mosque, right?”

  It did, but the quietness and the incense swept over him in a sweet, almost familiar feeling of peace. He paused for just a moment, eyes closed, a half-smile on his face. “I like this place very much,” he said after a moment, comfortable with the spirituality. “My mom was . . . well, you’d probably call her a hippie, but she’s not really. She’s got a computer and a job and if you didn’t know her, you’d think she’s totally normal. But she . . .” Owen kept his eyes closed and smiled again. “She would like a place like this. She’d say you could feel the Goddess here—which would probably freak out anyone who heard her because I don’t think that’s the point.” He opened his eyes again and looked around, then caught Malcolm’s entranced look and cleared his throat, suddenly embarrassed.

  “Sorry. Didn’t mean to go on.”

  “No worries. I take it you miss your mum?”

  “Text her every day,” Owen said without apology. This morning she’d warned him not to get too attached to whoever he had in bed. “What’s next?”

  They had a walk around the many small side altars and looked at the mosaics, but it was also really quite full and Owen was getting hungry. Malcolm ended up taking him to a quick Japanese restaurant down a side street.

  “It’s just a chain, but the food is okay. Mango Tree’s not far away in Grosvenor Gardens, but it’s maybe a touch formal . . .” Malcolm looked so worried over it that Owen had no choice but to grin and tell him he would really just like to eat something, anything, that didn’t involve much waiting. When he suggested McDonald’s, Malcolm acted like it was some sort of crime, and instead dragged him to the Japanese place, where they actually managed to score a pile of food in under ten minutes. They also did a ginger and white chocolate cheesecake, which, Malcolm insisted, was the best thing on their menu. Even though he hadn’t tasted the other seventy or so items, Owen agreed readily. It seemed he was ready to trust Malcolm on a lot of things, something that probably would have surprised almost anyone else. But Owen had been raised to trust his instincts—to close his eyes in a holy place and allow himself to be guided. So far, this man didn’t seem to be steering him wrong.

  “Okay,” Malcolm said after some internal deliberation that Owen figured involved scales and an abacus, since it dragged on so long. “That’s a solid half day’s work in terms of tourism. Buckingham Palace is just down the road, too. If you ask me, it’s an ugly old box and inside it’s as tasteless as any place I’ve ever been, but we can do it.”

  “I didn’t ask you,” Owen said, and then leaned over and kissed Malcolm soundly on the cheek, in spite of the people flowing around them at the restaurant. “And thank you for taking me anyway.”

  When they came to the front of the palace, the wall opened to a large wrought-iron fence, and policemen in dark blue were guarding the single entrance. Lots of tourists were taking pictures in front of the fence, and Malcolm pulled out his phone and shot a couple of Owen.

  “I’ll email them to you, no problem.”

  Was that Malcolm’s “really clever” way to score his email address? Sounded like it, right? Excellent.

  “Here,” Owen said, giving Malcolm his phone. “Put in your digits, and I’ll put in mine.”

  Malcolm nodded and they sat down at the monument in front of the palace for a minute, entering in phone numbers and email addresses and such, and then Owen said, “Here. Let me take one of you. That way your picture will flash up when you call me.”

  “I’m going to be calling you a lot?” Malcolm’s voice was funny, like he couldn’t decide if he was being sarcastic or begging.

  “Well you’ll have to,” Owen said gently. This was a commitment of sorts, was
n’t it? In a no-strings-attached one-night stand? “You’ll return my calls, right?”

  Malcolm nodded eagerly. “Absolutely.”

  “Then you’ll be calling me a lot.”

  The smile Malcolm gave was almost winsome, and very brilliant. Owen looked at it and swallowed. How much was that going to suck, seeing that face pop up on his phone and knowing its owner was half a world away?

  Something about his silence must have reached Malcolm, because he said, “Here, let me look. That’s not a bad picture.”

  “Did you doubt it?” Owen laughed, but his voice was still a little off and he knew it.

  Malcolm shrugged, but he looked pleased. “You had enough of the tourist gig, then? Ready to go collect your clothes and make some plans for the night?”

  Owen looked around and realized the shadows were lengthening and the sun had escaped the veil of low clouds to reach, chill and orange, across the horizon. It was time to start thinking about the night. “Why not?” he asked, determined to have an amazing night with the man who had made him smile and taken time out of what was, apparently, a hellaciously busy life to play tour guide. “What did you have in mind?”

  “Could have a really nice dinner—you wouldn’t be allowed to look at the prices, though, okay? Or go clubbing, or grab some takeaway and go back to mine. Have plenty of great sex, you know, the usual.” Malcolm delivered the last part with a completely straight face, which meant he was being either sarcastic or ironic—or protecting his feelings.

  “You really want to take me out to dinner, don’t you?”

  Malcolm hesitated. “I want to dress you up and take you out to dinner, yes,” he said, not looking Owen in the eyes, and Owen had to admit the silk and wool of Malcolm’s work clothes the night before had felt fine under his palms, and Malcolm had looked outstanding in it. Anywhere this man wanted to take him would probably have a dress code—or at least a way of making Owen feeling really gauche if he wore the wrinkled khakis and button-down in his duffel bag.