by Alexis Hall
He tried to sleep, but bits and pieces of memory kept washing back on him like sea wrack. Everybody had teased Fen. Or James, as he’d been. It was what kids did. And, yes, it had occasionally been a bit rough, but that was just the way it was. Same for everybody. They would probably have done it to Alfie if he hadn’t been the biggest and the strongest. The ringleader. And even that wouldn’t have made a difference if they’d known the truth.
If they’d known he was just like Fen.
Faggot. Puff. Sissy. Pansy. Fairy. Fudge-packer. Cocksucker.
His hands tingled suddenly. Remembering Fen across the years. Holding him down. It had all been petty. Small hurts. Humiliations. But relentless. And heedless. A habit.
He was too hot, then too cold. He shoved the sheets aside. Blundered into the bathroom and drank and drank, directly from the tap. The water was so cold and clean, it tasted sharp somehow. Straight from the Kielder reservoir. Not like the mineral-heavy shit they had down south.
He pulled back, gasping, hardly daring to meet his own eyes in the mirror—bully, coward—but he looked exactly the same. He searched his face for a reason. Maybe he’d always fancied Fen, and beating him up, taking the piss, generally harassing him, had been the only safe way to get his attention. Like pulling a girl’s pigtails in the playground. Or maybe it came down to some psychotherapy bullshit: attacking the part of himself he couldn’t accept. But, no. There was nothing. Nothing to redeem or comfort him. Nothing to lend meaning to it. Fen had simply been there, and it was what you did to people who were different, even if you couldn’t exactly work out why they were different, or why it mattered that they were.
Fuck. He was fifteen years too late to be thinking about this stuff.
Which meant he also had fifteen years’ worth of bad to feel about it. And if nothing else, he owed Fen a proper apology. No more excuses or defensiveness. Maybe then he’d realise that Alfie really had changed. That he wasn’t like that anymore.
God . . . Fen had slept with him. Wanting him and hating him at the same time. Alfie had no idea how he was supposed to feel about that. Used? Deceived? Fucked up? But he kept remembering the sweetness. The scent of Fen’s hair, the salt in the crevices of his lips, the roughness of his hands.
He left the bathroom, couldn’t face the bed again, and crossed to the window instead. Pulled back the curtains. Across the bay, the lights from North Shields cast shining shadows over the still, black sea.
Alfie let his head fall forward against the cold glass with a pathetic little thunk. He couldn’t go back to London. Not until he’d sorted this out somehow and made things right with Fen. Maybe it shouldn’t have mattered so much, but it did. It really did. And, yes, it was a bit selfish—not wanting to leave this bad memory of himself in South Shields—but there was more to it than that. Because under Fen’s anger and the pain there’d been something. Something Fen had wanted from him and had given in return, perhaps even without intending it. A sort of . . . understanding. Well, that, and the mind-blowing sex.
Except he had no idea where Fen was now. Where he might have gone. Surely he knew someone who knew Fen? It was a small town. Except he couldn’t think of anyone. Maybe his family would be able to help, but he couldn’t let them know he was interested in someone like Fen. It would confirm all his father’s worst fears about the sort of man his son was on his way to becoming. Could he ask Kev? Kev was bound to know or know how to find out. But how would that go? I ran away in the middle of your wedding to sleep with the kid we used to pick on at school. Any idea how I could get back in touch with him?
That was when he remembered: Fen’s mother owned a flower shop on Prince Edward Road. It was part of a parade of shops locals called the Nook after a pub that had closed down ages ago. When Alfie had been growing up, there’d just been the Cranny on the corner, and the Black Prince, which became the Prince Edward, which was supposed to be the roughest pub in the area. Kev had dared Alfie to have a drink in there once. He had been absolutely shitting himself the whole time, but nothing bad had happened at all. Everyone had just ignored him.
So. There. A plan. That he’d planned. As soon as it was morning, Alfie would drive down to the Nook and, hopefully, the shop would still be there.
Now he’d started thinking about this stuff, the memories came back far more strongly than he would have expected. Details he hadn’t even noticed at the time, like the sweet-dusty smell of the place, and the way the sunlight fell in thick golden strips over the floor. The hand-painted sign and the spill of bright flowers over the pavement.
His mam used to go there every Saturday for the week’s flowers. Even though it was out of her way. Dragging with her, occasionally, a resentful Alfie.
He remembered Fen’s mother. Her coils and coils of sun-yellow braids. And Fen too, sometimes perched on the edge of the counter, wary-eyed behind his glasses, listening to whatever he listened to on that Sony Walkman he carried everywhere.
The hours dragged by. Alfie slept a little. Thought too much. Watched the grey light creep between the sea and the sky.
He checked out of the hotel at 9 a.m., hair still damp from the shower he’d taken to try and wash away the night. Then he stuffed his case into the boot of his car and made for the Nook.
It was a heavy sort of morning, the kind of morning you only really got up north, so close to the sea. The air was thick with salt and spray, and the cloud-churned sky sagged low like the belly of some monstrous beast. The sea was sullen too, the waves turning over and over each other in clots of dirty white spume. Alfie watched the old lighthouse recede in his rearview mirror, its redness dulled to the shade of an old wine stain against the horizon.
The Prince Edward roundabout had always been terrible for traffic snarls, but it was early enough that Alfie glided straight over, turned into the parallel access road that ran alongside the shop fronts. He managed to find a prime parking space right in front of the Ocean Pearl Chop Suey House, which used to be one of the few Chinese takeaways in South Shields. It looked exactly the same as it always had: dirty yellow sign with blue lettering, two Chinese lanterns hanging in the window. It reminded Alfie that there was a time when kung po and spare ribs had seemed unbelievably exotic to him.
There’d been a handful of changes, here and there. They had a Subway now, though the sea air had dimmed the glowing green paintwork. And a Tesco Express, open every day from six in the morning until eleven at night. He could have gone there for condoms. Alfie wanted to laugh about it. But there was nobody to share the joke.
Most things were pretty much as they’d been before he left. The salon where he’d gone with Kev to get his tan done before a night on the town. The paper shop. The post office. The butcher. The bookies. The dodgy place that promised to buy your gold and cash your cheques. God, even Munchies, the tiny little takeaway sandwich shop were you could buy soft, floury stotties as big as your head.
Alfie hurried along the pavement feeling like he was in that movie about the birds turning evil. Except it was memories pelting him from all sides.
He was starting to think maybe he’d got it wrong, or the shop had closed down, when he saw the familiar florist racks up ahead. They were different. Not like he remembered. He remembered flowers everywhere, jostling for space, practically pushing pedestrians off the pavement, gleaming even on the darkest of winter days. These were fine. But neat. Modest.
The door and the sign had faded to mustard. The painted purple flowers to dusty lilac.
But the letters were still just about readable: Pansies.
How had he forgotten? They’d certainly never let Fen forget. It wasn’t even funny. He couldn’t believe he’d ever thought it was.
He took a deep breath and pushed open the door. The bell jangled. So familiar, ringing across the years, cutting across whatever music was playing. Jazz or something. Some angry women singing about murder.
And there was Fen. Right in the middle of the shop, his back to Alfie, manhandling a big plastic bucket full of w
ater and dead plant bits.
“Can I help—” He turned. Went white. “What the fuck?”
Alfie just stared. This was the last thing he had expected.
“Get out.” Fen’s voice swooped up at least an octave. “Leave me alone.”
“I just wanted to—”
“I don’t care. If . . . if you don’t leave, I’m calling the police.”
“But—” Alfie blinked “—why?”
Fen hefted the bucket into his arms, as if he wanted to put something between them. “You stalked me. And you’re harassing me.”
“I didn’t expect to see you. I was looking for your mam.”
There was something, something Alfie couldn’t read. A pause or a look. A flicker in Fen’s eyes. “Well, she’s not here.”
“Yeah, I can see that. I was hoping she’d tell me how to find you.”
“I never want to see you again.” Fen sounded calmer, but his knuckles were bloodless against the bucket.
This wasn’t going well. But Alfie wasn’t ready to give up yet. They’d held each other and talked to each other and shared something that mattered, even if it was nothing more than a moment of unexpected connection across the years that separated them. If only Fen could understand . . . He held out his hands. A peace offering of air. “Look, Fen, mate, I fucked up. I fucked up badly. Before, and last night. I just really want you to know that I meant what I said: I’m not who you think I am. Not anymore.”
“I don’t care. Don’t you get it?” Fen was actually yelling. “I don’t fucking care.”
“Yeah, but you have to know that I’m sor—”
Suddenly Alfie was drenched. In freezing, foul-smelling water, and it was everywhere. Stinging his eyes. Soaking through his clothes. Dripping from his hair. The shock of it hit him first. Hard enough to hurt somehow, like a punch in the face. Followed by the cold and the stench, and the sour taste filling up his mouth and nose. And only then the slow realisation of deep, physical discomfort. The sort that wouldn’t go away until you got in a really hot shower.
He tried to wipe his eyes. The liquid clung to his fingers, slimy with rotting plant matter. The smell made him gag. God, he’d probably swallowed some. He spat on the floor, but that only made it worse. When, finally, he could see and breathe and think again—at least a little bit—the first thing he focused on was Fen. Standing in front of him, trembling with fury, the empty bucket hanging from one hand.
“I said get out.”
So Alfie got out.
Stood for a while by his car, wondering what to do. He knew he could go to his parents’ house for a shower, but on balance, he preferred driving all the way to London in wet, smelly clothes to facing his family. And there was Kev, of course, but the last thing you needed the day after your wedding was your best mate turning up on your doorstep. Especially when your best mate had fucked off in the middle of said wedding.
In the end, he covered up the driver’s seat as best he could, sacrificing his wedding suit to save the interior of his car, and headed for home.
He knew it would be a miserable journey. But he didn’t look back.
4
Dear Mum,
* * *
I’ve done the most messed-up thing.
You remember that boy, Alfie Bell, who used to tease me all the time? Well, I met him again the other night. At the Rattler of all places. I don’t even know what I was doing there. I just had to get out. So I started walking and that was where I ended up.
And he came in and I recognised him straightaway. He hasn’t changed. Well, he has, but only in the sense of being more somehow, more everything, more like himself, as if the boy who used to hurt me all those years ago was just a rough cocoon for the man. The ridiculously beautiful man. If you like them big and dark and rough-hewn, that is, which—God help me—I always have.
He walked right up to me and asked if he could buy me a drink. And, you know, all I thought was that it’s been something like fifteen years, and he was still finding new and special ways to make me feel worthless.
I thought he’d finally worked it out. And come back all the way to South Shields just to taunt me. But it wasn’t some imaginative new torture. Or a cruel joke. He didn’t even recognise me. Which was really its own cruel joke.
But he wanted me. He really wanted me. So I went with him.
I’m such an idiot. I know I shouldn’t have gone. But I did. And I’m so completely ashamed. I was pathetic. I can’t even bear to think of it. Thank God nobody will ever know. Well, except me and him, and when it comes to him, what’s one more humiliation or one more hurt?
I’m writing that, but I don’t believe it. I can’t make myself believe it, no matter how hard I want to. And he’s probably sitting in his fancy car right now, laughing at me. Remembering all the things I did and said and let him do.
It wasn’t like I thought it would be. He was . . . kind to me. Why? He’s not kind. He’s Alfie Bell: an arrogant, thoughtless, bullying, cowardly caveman. But I just needed someone to touch me. Someone to make me feel warm. And it was like he knew. Knew all the terrible, messed-up, shameful things I’ve never admitted.
I never told you. I never told you how bad it was. And how much I dreaded, God, I dreaded everything. Waking up in the morning, knowing he would be waiting for me, him and his friends, and all the rest of them. Old taunts or new ones, it didn’t matter, I never learned to shrug them off. I never learned not to care. I didn’t dare tell you. You would have been so sad. You would have wanted to protect me, but you couldn’t. Nobody could. But at least I got to save you that heartbreak. It’s the one thing I’m proud of. In all this weakness.
And it gets worse.
I don’t know if it was because of or in spite of, but I really thought I was in love with him back then. For all those years. Because he was the only boy who touched me. He was all I had. His hand on the back of my neck, forcing my head down the toilet. Or his body shoved against mine to stop me fighting. His bruises on my skin. His fingers in my hair.
I’d lie awake in bed, terrified of tomorrow, and I’d think about him touching me. I’d dream about him and want him. And imagine how it would feel if he was gentle with me. If he gave me all his strength. If maybe he put his hand on the back of my neck because he wanted to kiss me and his arms around me because he wanted to hold me.
So there. That’s the truth I could never tell. A sickness I would have lived with safely if Alfie Bell hadn’t walked into my life out of nowhere and pulled it right out of me and made me look at it. And now everything’s stirred up again. Bad memories and good memories, and I’m so messed up, feeling things I don’t want to feel.
Except he made me. Or, no, I let him. Truthfully, I begged him. I just didn’t think he could . . . that I could . . . that anything could be so good again. It was too much, sharp and awful like peeling off a scab before it’s ready. So that underneath there’s nothing but a wet wound.
Oh, what’s the matter with me? Alfie Bell is supposed to be my past. But he’s left me bleeding all over again.
* * *
Love always,
Fen
5
Greg had found this bar in Earl’s Court which was disguised as a speakeasy disguised as a detective agency. It was the sort of thing you were supposed to love about London.
Except it was the sort of thing Alfie hated about London.
And he’d only been back a week.
Greg had to make an appointment to discuss their “case,” and they’d spent the first twenty minutes of the evening being semi-interrogated in a detective’s office before they were led through a false bookcase into a basement bar. The sort of place that had been carefully designed to look like shit.
Alfie whispered this to Kitty, and she told him it was chic, not shit, and that Prohibition was very in right now. She wrote for Tatler, so she would know.
Eventually they found their table, which was tucked into a dark corner beneath an overhang of exposed brickwork. Gre
g looked delighted to be on what he was probably thinking of as “an adventure,” but Alfie had worked a long day, in a long week, and all he wanted was a drink. He snagged the menu from a typewriter and held it up to the nearest candle so he could read the damn thing. He remembered from school that one of the effects of Prohibition had been to push up the price of alcohol so, in that respect at least, the place was pretty realistic.
J.D. Jarndyce (formerly Jarndyce & Dance) paid him enough that he didn’t have to care. But it was a matter of principle. He pointedly ordered the cheapest thing he could find, a pint of London pale ale, which he didn’t like anyway, and was—on this occasion—dispensed from a radiator. Kitty’s wine was smuggled over in a brown paper bag. And Greg had a cocktail called a Grapefruit Blossom which was thankfully served quite conventionally. Albeit pinkly. Alfie didn’t trust pink drinks.
“So.” Greg leaned back in his chair and draped one long leg over the other. He had a way about him that made public places feel like they were his living room. “How was t’north?”
Alfie gave him a look of mingled affection and irritation. “I think you mean oop north. T’north would only get you as far as Yorkshire.”
“Yorkshire, Manchester, same difference.” Greg had literally never been further than Barnet. He was proud of it. Alfie had tried to ask him about it once, and all he’d said was, “Darling, you know how much I prefer going down.” It hadn’t been much of an answer, but it had led in a suitably interesting direction, so Alfie hadn’t cared much. At least, not at the time.
“You know,” said Kitty, “there are studies showing that shameless displays of snobbery are thirty percent more likely to get you laid.”
Greg’s head whipped round. “Really?”
“No, of course not. I can’t imagine anything less attractive, can you?”
“You’re right, I’m sorry. It’s just—” Greg sighed dreamily “—I love London. It’s full of places like this. There’s nothing exciting up north. Just hills and sheep.”