Pansies

by Alexis Hall

  This was . . . this was bad gay. This was what your parents worried about. What the Daily Mail wrote about. And it was so, so good. Dirty and desperate and sexy as hell. And Alfie was . . . yeah, Alfie was over the edge before he’d even realised there was an edge: a shock of raw pleasure like staring straight at the sun. For a moment after, he thought he might never breathe again.

  “Can’t believe you did that,” he gasped, trying to clear the sparkles from his eyes. “What if someone had come?”

  Fen grinned up at him and licked his lips. “I’m pretty sure someone did.”

  “Wow. You actually went there.” Alfie tugged at his zip. “This was proper reckless, pet.”

  “Fun, though. And a lot less reckless than you taking on three blokes.”

  Catching Fen’s hand, Alfie pulled him to his feet. “I thought you wanted me to stop doing stuff like that.”

  “I do.”

  “But if this is how you respond . . .”

  “It was a one-off.”

  “Oh.” Alfie tried not to sound too disappointed.

  “Not the blowjob, silly. I’ll do that as much as you like—”

  “As much as I like? Cos I liked it a lot.”

  Fen laughed. “Well, I’m happy to commit to an intensive schedule of oral sex in exchange for not having to hear about you on the news.” He tucked himself against Alfie’s side. “Come on, Sandor Clegane, let’s go home.”

  And, this time, when Fen said it . . . it sounded like the most natural thing in the world.

  The van was ready on Friday. Leyla said the quick service was due to a combination of residual guilt, hope of future custom, and also happening to have the part in stock. Once he’d collected it and driven back to Pansies, Alfie spent the afternoon making calls and running financial models, the like of which probably no flower shop in the history of the world had ever needed before. Probably didn’t need now. But he believed in being thorough.

  When he was done, he went to wash buckets with Fen and talked him through it. He would have done a PowerPoint, but he was pretty sure Fen would have laughed in his face.

  “So, you see,” he finished, “if you started off just doing Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays, serving local businesses and events only, even accounting for time and additional expenses, it’s totally worth it.”

  Fen ran a fretful hand through his hair. “I’d have to hire someone though . . .”

  “Couple of hours’ work, three days a week?” Alfie shrugged. “Cash in hand, mate. Under the counter.”

  “Oh my God. You’re an accountant. I’m pretty sure you’re not meant to encourage people to break the law.”

  “Actually, I’m an investment banker. We think of the law more as guidelines, really.”

  “Should I put a sign in the window, then? Wanted: morally ambiguous driver for illegal part-time work?”

  Alfie huffed exasperatedly. “Naw, just ask someone. Everyone needs a few quid now and again.”

  “This is South Shields. I don’t know anyone, and I probably hate them, anyway.”

  “My boyfriend could do it.” Gothshelley sailed majestically into the workroom in a cloud of taffeta. “He’s got his licence.”

  “You have a boyfriend?” asked Alfie, surprised.

  “Oh, what? You think just because I’m fat I’m sexually undesirable? I’ll have you know, some boys like their milkshake extra thick.”

  “I didn’t mean that—” he flailed frantically “—it was more your personality like.”

  She gave him a cold, hard stare. “What do you mean? I’m winning.”

  “Okay,” said Fen, quickly. “Fine. Have him come in tomorrow with you so I can meet him. And Alfie, we’ll need orders in place if we’re going to make this work.”

  All the wes in that sentence turned interior bits of Alfie to mush. He reached into his pocket and produced a list. Handed it over. Earned himself one of Fen’s pointiest looks.

  “For fuck’s sake. What if I’d said no?”

  “I was intending to be incredibly persuasive.” He flicked a glance at Gothshelley. “And, no, it wouldn’t have involved kissing with tongues. Well, mebbe, a bit.”

  She was hunched over her phone. “This isn’t your time, Alfred. I’m texting my boyfriend right now. And, awww, look what he sent me.”

  She turned the screen so he could see. Something awful was on it.

  Alfie flinched. “What the fuck is that?”

  “That’s our kitty, the Marquess of Mitternact, Lady of Shadows, Bringer of Sorrows, Singer of the Ceaseless Requiem. Except he’s put a Day of the Dead filter on her face. Isn’t she adorbs?”

  Fen was studying the list. It was mainly old clients of his mam who had been only too happy to hear from Alfie. And it could have been a lot longer, except he hadn’t wanted to overwhelm their resources.

  “Okay,” Fen said finally, and there was, somehow, this lightness in his voice that Alfie hadn’t heard before, “we can definitely do this.”

  Gothshelley raised a hand. “I bagsy any funerals.”

  “It won’t be sustainable in the long term,” Alfie admitted. “But it could be. With better suppliers and a bit more staffing.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Gothshelley trained a death glare on him.

  “I mean, it doesn’t make sense for your highly trained workers to do stuff someone, um, less skilled could do.”

  The death glare diminished a shade. “Actually, that does make sense. Fen, can we have a minion?”

  “I think they’re called trainees,” said Fen. “And no.”

  “I promise to look after it. Feed it and water it and clip its little claws.”

  “One thing at a time, maybe?”

  “If you say so.” She sighed. “I’m so exploited.”

  Then trudged out again.

  Fen was very still and very quiet, still holding the paper.

  “Um,” Alfie asked, “did I overdo it?”

  An odd little smile. “Maybe? I’m not sure. I suppose I’d kind of settled into not trying. Just waiting for Pansies to quietly die. And now that it might not . . .”

  “It’s still your choice. You can let go. Or keep going. It’s always been up to you.”

  “Yes. But this is the first time I’ve really wanted to stay.”

  Alfie reached for Fen’s hand. “We could—”

  “No, no,” came Gothshelley’s outside voice, “you keep soul-searching and snogging in there. I’ll keep serving all the customers all by myself.”

  “Hold that thought.”

  Fen darted away. Leaving Alfie cringing a little. Because it hadn’t exactly been the sort of thought you could hold. He did sort of hope they could talk about it later, but as it turned out, there wasn’t really an opportunity. They’d just finished closing up and he was helping Fen pull down the grille when—

  “With one star awake, as the swan in the evening, moved over the lake.”

  “I think,” Alfie said warily, “your pocket’s singing.”

  “Oh shit.” Fen wriggled his phone out of his jeans and swiped at it to answer. “Hi, Dad . . . Oh God . . . Yes. Sorry . . . I’m on my way right now . . . Um . . . Yeah . . . Stuck at the shop . . . Okay. Bye.” He hung up. Hooked his thumbs over his pockets the way he always did when he was self-conscious. “Um. That was my dad.”

  “Yeah, I got that when you said ‘Hi, Dad.’”

  “Sorry.”

  “I’m teasing, pet. What’s up?”

  “I . . . I’m such an idiot. I usually see him every Friday. I can’t believe I forgot. Even though my head is full of the fact it’s Friday.”

  “It’s okay.” Alfie caught his hands, kissed them lightly, and calmed their fretting. “Of course you should go be with your da. Want me to drive you over?”

  Fen nodded. “Or—” he stared at the ground “—you could come. If you wanted. If it wouldn’t be weird.”

  “Would he think it was weird? If I just turned up?”

  “Hones
tly, Alfie? There’s not much my dad thinks is weird. He’s got me for a son.”

  Truthfully, Alfie wasn’t entirely sure what he thought about meeting Fen’s dad. Obviously he didn’t want to miss out on an evening with Fen, not when they only had two left, but parents were scary. He was sure it should have made a difference that he was a grown-up in his own right. That he had a job and a car and a penthouse. But he still felt as nervy as a teenager. And as supplicant as he ever had turning up on some girl’s doorstep, promising he’d have her back by midnight. Please let me date your son. And please don’t remember I bullied him for years and hate me.

  “Great,” he said aloud. “Let’s do it. Do we need to bring anything?”

  “Just flowers.” Fen hurried into the workroom, and emerged a few minutes later with a paper-wrapped bundle, in shades of rusty orange and sunshine yellow and deep dark pink. “Some of Mum’s favourites.”

  “Not pansies?”

  “Oh, she loved pansies best of all, but not in bouquets. She said they were freedom flowers. We sell them mainly in pots and window boxes during the spring and summer. And we used to have lots in the garden, but they’re probably all dead now.”

  Alfie took the . . . he had no idea what they were, gerberas and carnations maybe . . . as Fen turned off the lights and locked up the shop, and they made their way to the car. “You don’t really see pansies much down south, do you? But they get everywhere up here. All over the parks and in the fields come spring. Wild as weeds.”

  Fen gasped. “Don’t say that. Mum always said there’s no such thing as a weed.”

  “Um, what are weeds, then?”

  “Flowers where you don’t expect them.”

  Fen’s dad lived on Laburnum Grove, which, despite the fancy name, turned out to be a housing estate. Without any laburnums. Or groves. It wasn’t awful, but it had been a long time since such places were an everyday part of Alfie’s life. Inside, the house was cleanish and incredibly cluttered, as if the occupant was still working out how to live in it. Not at all like his mam’s pristine home.

  Fen greeted his dad with a hug. And for some reason that weirded Alfie out. His mam was cuddly, but his own dad was kind of unassailable. If men touched each other—and Alfie and Billy had always wanted to be treated as men—it rarely went further than a clasp of the shoulder. Which Alfie’s body still remembered sometimes: a ghost of warmth, his father’s hand. And, as he stood there in an unfamiliar hallway, clutching a bunch of flowers in slightly sweaty hands, watching two men embrace like it was completely normal, completely easy, he was freshly shocked by how deeply so much of childhood he had taken for granted. As if its truths were universal.

  “Oh, and Dadaí—” At last, Fen stepped away. “This is my, um, friend Alfie. I hope you don’t mind that I brought him?”

  “Of course not.” Alfie’s ability to gauge age was basically restricted to his own current bracket, but Aidan O’Donaghue was probably in his early sixties, lean and vigorous, a little bit taller than his son. His hair was mostly grey but for a few deep-buried coppery-gold streaks, and his eyes were very bright, though Alfie couldn’t have said exactly what colour they were. Right now they were narrowed at Alfie like they could see every shitty thing he’d ever done in his entire life. “You’re very welcome, Alfie.”

  They shook hands, and Alfie chanted, I’m a grown-up, I’m a grown-up, I’m a grown-up, in his head, hoping it would help.

  It didn’t.

  He might as well have been standing there in his school uniform, waiting for Aidan to tell him he wasn’t good enough for his son.

  “Well,” said Aidan finally. “Let’s get ourselves comfortable.”

  Alfie trailed after them into the living room, which was higgledy-piggledy with books and DVDs and, slightly surprisingly, PlayStation games. Fen went straight to a vase of withered flowers, and whisked it into the kitchen.

  “Uh.” Abandoned and trying not to panic, Alfie picked up the nearest game box, which was a much-loved copy of Bloodborne. “I always wanted to play this. Is it good?”

  “Oh God.” Fen’s voice. “Don’t get him started.”

  Aidan’s eyes were still kind of wary, but he smiled at this. “I like it.”

  “Dad secretly thinks he’s a medieval warrior.”

  “That’s not true.” Aidan smiled suddenly. And, now, he really did look like Fen, all sharp and toothy and fascinating. With such capacity for joy. “Sometimes I secretly think I’m a starship captain. Or a cowboy. Or some other sort of gun-toting ne’er-do-well.”

  Fen came back into the room and plonked the vase, now full of flowers again, back into what was clearly its usual spot. Then he tidied up a stack of newspapers. And when he was done with that, he began stuffing books back onto a shelf.

  “Stop fussing me, Fenimore,” said his father. “You’re my son, not my wife.”

  He’d spoken gently, but when Fen turned round, his eyes were far too shiny. Unthinking, Alfie held out his hand and was actually a bit shocked when Fen reached back to him and took it.

  Alfie tugged him a little closer. “I thought you didn’t do domestic.”

  “Someone has to,” whispered Fen, curling against his side.

  Aidan, however, wasn’t having any of it. “No, they don’t. And Nora was even worse. I don’t think there’s a tidy gene in your body, a leanbh.”

  He didn’t seem too worried that his son was practically in the arms of a guy who’d just turned up. Which Alfie should have been relieved about, but he kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. And despite the fact Aidan had been nothing but friendly, he was already half-convinced the man didn’t like him. Could see right through him.

  “So you might as well accept it,” Aidan was saying, “and settle down. Now can I get anybody a drink? Would you like a beer, Alfie?”

  It actually took Alfie a moment to remember he was allowed. “Oh, yeah. Please.”

  Once Aidan had brought him a nicely fridge-chilled bottle of Newky Brown, Alfie squooged himself into a corner of the sofa, and tried to relax. Without relaxing too much. Or drinking too fast. Or generally doing anything wrong or making a bad impression.

  Aidan clearly had “his” chair—a big, slightly shabby wingback—and Fen perched on the arm, one foot swinging idly. And Alfie tried not to get weirded out again. When Alfie was with his parents, he was this special version of himself he’d sort of semi-unconsciously put together to reflect what he thought they wanted to see. Even knowing they probably preferred not to see a gay bloke.

  But Fen was just Fen. Just like always.

  At one point when they were talking, he even said “fuck.” Alfie would never have dreamed of saying “fuck” in front of his parents. Well, not casually anyway, like you did with your mates.

  Or holding another man’s hand.

  It was kind of strange, watching them together. Listening to them. Alfie loved his parents, he really did. But this was different. It was like Fen and Aidan were . . . sort of . . . friends almost. Like they actually knew each other.

  “Huh?” Belatedly, he realised Aidan was talking to him.

  “You’re Alfie Bell, aren’t you? Alfred’s son, William’s brother?”

  It took him far too long to work out that “William” was Billy. Which made it look like he didn’t know who his own family were. “Oh, yeah. Yeah, I am.”

  “Hmm.”

  Alfie felt vaguely alarmed. But he had no idea why.

  “What are you doing these days?”

  “I’m, well, I guess I’m in banking. Equity capital markets.”

  “Is there much call for that in South Shields?”

  “Uh. No.” He laughed nervously. “I live and work in London.”

  “He’s just visiting, Dadaí,” added Fen.

  And, to Alfie’s relief, the conversation moved on. He couldn’t entirely keep up, but that was fine. It was way better than having to try to explain himself to Aidan. They did talk about the shop a bit, though, and Fen got all excited and
hand-wavey as he explained some of Alfie’s ideas. Aidan nodded and mmm-ed in all the right places, but he didn’t seem exactly thrilled. Not that Fen noticed. Or perhaps Alfie was worrying about nothing.

  They had omelettes for dinner, which Fen said—not entirely joking—was the only thing his dad could cook. But they were good omelettes, fluffy and gooey with cheese. And when they were done eating, genetics or not, Fen insisted on doing the washing up. Alfie tried to help, but he was forbidden on account of being a guest.

  Which left him, once again, alone with Aidan. He turned slightly apprehensively back to his host and crashed straight into a frown.

  So. That sense he’d got that Aidan didn’t like him? Not paranoia after all.

  Though, when Aidan finally spoke to him, his voice was low and pretty calm. Maybe because all his anger was held in his eyes, turning them icy. “What are you doing with my boy, Alfie Bell?”

  Sleeping with him? Wanting to be with him? Falling in love with him? “Uh . . . doing?”

  “Do you think I don’t remember? Don’t know how you treated him?”

  Oh shitting fucking shit fuck. “I didn’t . . . I’m not . . . I never . . .” He stopped. Gave up. Tried something else. “Then why didn’t you put a stop to it?”

  “Because he never told me.” Aidan stood and moved across the room, restless the same way Fen was restless. Except there was no one to soothe him. “If someone hates you, they can hurt you in so many ways. But that’s nothing compared to what someone who loves you can do. Fenimore has his pride. When he has nothing else, he has that. I won’t ever be the one to take it from him.”