In the Heart of Darkness

by Reinke, Sara

  “I…I’m sorry,” Julien whispered. “Forgive me, Mason, please, I…I’m so sorry…”

  He might have said more, but his voice dissolved, ragged and pained, and Mason kissed him, his shoulders and neck, his ear, his hair. “Please don’t cry,” he begged again, closing his eyes against the fresh sting of his own tears and holding Julien fiercely, as if to shield him from the entire world. “Please, you’ll break me, Julien. You…you’re breaking my heart.”

  * * *

  In the morning, Mason stirred at a soft, rustling sound near the bed. The sun was up, streaming through the window, and as he opened his eyes, he squinted against the bright glare. He saw Julien kneeling next to the bed, a small knapsack open in front of him. The rustling sound had been him as he sifted through the bag’s meager contents; as Mason watched, he pulled out a worn, leather-bound book and set it on the nightstand beside the bed.

  “Waverley,” he murmured, reading the title from the faded gold lettering on the spine.

  Julien blinked at him in surprise, then smiled. “Hullo. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

  “Nothing for it.” Mason propped himself up on his elbow, then pushed his dark hair back from his face. He reached for the novel, curious.

  “The first few chapters are kind of boring,” Julien said. “But then it gets rather good. It’s about an English soldier who’s sent to Scotland. It’s during a revolution that happened there in the 1740s. And he…” His voice faltered, and he looked down at the knapsack, seeming uncharacteristically shy on the matter. “Anyway. I liked it.”

  Mason opened the book to a place about midway through; it had been marked with a slip of paper as a placeholder. “You’ve read it?”

  Julien shrugged without looking up. “A few times.” He pushed the knapsack aside and stood. “You can borrow it sometime, if you’d like.”

  “I’d like that, sure,” Mason said. As he sat up, he passed the book back to Julien, then watched as he picked up another bag from the floor—a small, messenger-sort that was worn across the chest and over the shoulder—and tucked it inside. He also noted that Julien was already dressed in fresh breeches and a shirt, with a waistcoat but not jacket buttoned over top. He’d pulled on his stockings, but as of yet, not his shoes—presumably, Mason suspected, to move about the room more quietly and not disturb him. “I thought you said you didn’t have to work today.”

  “I don’t. But I have an appointment this morning.” Through the open window, they heard the sudden chiming of church bells from nearby. Even before they tolled out the hour, Julien was in motion, ducking his head to sling the bag over his chest. “In fact, I’m late.” With a broad smile, he leaned over, clasping his hand to Mason’s face as he kissed him. “Please stay. I’ll be back by noon.”

  “No, I should go, too.” Mason swung his legs out from beneath the quilts. “I need to try and see the chancellor today, beg my way back into Harvard’s good graces.” He caught Julien’s hand. “But I want to see you again,” he said, adding with a widening smile, “And more besides.”

  Julien laughed as he pulled him down, kissing him again. “Tonight, then? Six o’clock? We could meet back at The Crow’s Nest.” He tried to draw away, but laughed again as Mason caught him by the back of the head, keeping him near. “Stop…now,” he murmured between kisses. “I’m late.”

  Mason chuckled, releasing him. “Where are you off to in such a hurry?”

  “To see Aaron. I try to get over there every morning.”

  “Aaron?” Mason blinked in surprise. “You mean he’s here in Boston, too?”

  Julien nodded, already at the door. “He’s staying in Charlestown. He…” He paused, then glanced over his shoulder at Mason. “It’s a long story. I’ll explain tonight, okay?” He smiled, then grabbed his overcoat off a peg and opened the door. “See you then. I love you.”

  * * *

  The next week passed like some sort of wondrous dream for Mason. He and Julien spent as much time together as they could, and for Mason, it was as if they’d never been apart. Although social norms dictated they could act as no more than friends in public, for the first time in their entire relationship, they enjoyed even a modicum of freedom. And for the first time, they started thinking about the future—their future—together.

  “I think we should move in together,” Mason told him one night as they lay together in bed. “We could find a nice enough two-room flat in Cambridge to share. Then I could wake up next to you every morning…” With a smile, he started to nuzzle Julien’s neck. “…and come home to you every night. How marvelous would that be?”

  “I would love it,” Julien said, and there was something wistful and almost melancholy in his voice.

  Mason propped himself on his elbow, rolling the younger man onto his back to make him look up at him. “Then let’s do it. Tomorrow. We’ll hire a carriage and…”

  “I can’t afford a carriage,” Julien said. With a weak laugh, he added, “Hell, I can’t even afford the rent on this shit hole, never mind something nice in Cambridge.”

  Mason wanted to offer to pay the rent on his own, or at least out of the stipend Michel provided for his living expenses while in school. He had come to realize that money—or a lack of it, more precisely—was a very real and pressing problem for Julien. His admittance had only confirmed what Mason had come to realize all on his own.

  Julien’s clothes were his first clues; from a distance, they still appeared presentable, but upon closer examination, the threadbare places and faded colors were apparent. They’d obviously been worn to the point where even a good mending from a skilled tailor likely couldn’t salvage them. His shoes were another—the buckles tarnished, the leather worn, the soles cracked and pocked with holes.

  That he was in debt was another clear sign of Julien’s money woes. That morning, when Julien had left, Mason had overheard the landlady who owned the boarding house talking to him from the entryway downstairs. Or more specifically, scolding him for being more than three weeks in arrears on his rent.

  “I’ll have it for you tomorrow,” Julien had promised, his voice floating up the stairwell to Mason’s ear. Mason had been about to follow him downstairs, but had frozen at the threshold, listening.

  He knew if Julien hadn’t entered the damn boxing contest, he could have paid his outstanding bill, and felt guilty for not having tried harder to dissuade him. He also suspected that a large portion of Julien’s income was going to support Aaron, even though Julien hadn’t admitted as much. In fact, despite his promise, he’d never explained to Mason why Aaron was in Boston, too, or why he was staying in the more affluent area of Charlestown instead of living with Julien. He suspected Aaron was enrolled in college, or serving an apprenticeship of some sort to learn a trade, while Julien shouldered the bulk of his expenses. It wasn’t fair—not at all—but Mason knew Julien wouldn’t have had it any other way. He loved his younger brother; like Lisette, he’d always doted on Aaron. That Julien would live by such meager means—that he would go without so that his brother could enjoy a better life—didn’t surprise him in the least.

  “I don’t want you to worry about money anymore,” Mason said, stroking the cuff of his fingers along Julien’s cheek.

  “I’m not worried about it.” The familiar, aggravated crease between Julien’s brows appeared again. “I’m fine.”

  “I paid the rent for you,” Mason said carefully and when Julien blinked at him in obvious surprise, he added, “I couldn’t help but overhear this morning…your landlady…”

  “Jesus.” Julien’s frown deepened, and his blue eyes flashed angrily. “I wish you hadn’t done that.”

  “I wanted to,” Mason said. Cocking his head, he smiled, trying to coax one in return. “I don’t mind for it, Julien.”

  “But I do.” Julien rolled onto his side, trying to turn his back sullenly to Mason. “I would’ve had it covered by tomorrow. I’m a little behind on some things because of that damn fisticuffs contest, and I haven’t b
een working as much as I should, but…” He sighed, as if exasperated. “I would’ve had it covered.”

  Mason still didn’t know what exactly it was that Julien did for work. Julien hadn’t exactly been forthcoming on the matter, and Mason could tell that whatever it was, he was embarrassed by it, ashamed to tell Mason. He wanted to reassure the younger man that there was no shame in honest work, but held his tongue.

  “I only wanted to help.” Leaning over, he kissed Julien’s shoulder.

  “If I need help, I’ll ask for it.” Julien rolled over again and looked up at him solemnly. “I’m paying you back the rent money.”

  Again trying to lighten his mood, Mason cracked another smile. “You’re damn right you are. I plan on taking every last red cent out of your hide.” With this, he leaned over and kissed Julien. “And your mouth,” he murmured, letting his lips trail lightly along Julien’s jawline. “And your ear,” he breathed, his mouth dancing against the very body part in question. Then, as he worked his way lower from there: “And your throat…and your chest…”

  “No anatomy quiz tonight?” Julien asked, at least yielding to Mason’s persistence, if not his charms, and managing a thin smile. As Mason shifted his position in the bed, sliding down between his legs—nearing this same destination with his mouth—his voice grew low and somewhat hoarse. “No gluteus maximus or what have you?”

  “Oh, I’ll be meting out remittance from there, too,” Mason assured him, and Julien groaned, arching his back slightly as he wrapped his fingers around the shaft of his hardening arousal. “But first…I think I’ll start right here.”

  * * *

  They’d made arrangements to meet at a pub at six o’clock, but Mason caught a carriage shortly after three o’clock and headed out for Beacon Hill from his own rented room near Harvard. He’d prepared a rather eloquent letter—at least in his opinion—to John Thornton Kirkland, Harvard’s president, expressing not only his desire to continue his education at the college, but his complete and humble deference to the school’s rules and authority. Having submitted this letter in person to Kirkland, he’d also had the chance that afternoon to express these same sentiments aloud and in person. By the end of the meeting, it had been official—he was reaccepted into the college, and would resume his classes with the start of the upcoming term. Hell, he’d even shaken Kirkland’s hand—a gesture he suspected would appropriately horrify his friend David Gorham.

  He couldn’t wait to tell Julien the good news. Not that he didn’t already know what the younger man’s reaction would be. He’d been reassuring Mason all along that he’d be let back in (“They’d be bloody mad to keep you out,” was how he’d put it on more than one occasion), and even though Mason himself had tried to seem like he’d shared in this confidence, in truth, he hadn’t. He’d been worried sick—not just about getting permanently expelled, but of disappointing Michel should he learn of it.

  Thus when he reached Julien’s boarding house, he’d paid the driver, then bounded inside, taking the stairs up to Julien’s room two and three risers at a time. It didn’t even occur to him to knock; Julien kept the door unlocked as a general rule because most of his pockets had holes in them, and he was afraid of losing his key. Mason threw the door open wide as he rushed across the threshold, a huge grin on his face.

  And then froze there, his hand still on the doorknob, the smile faltering as his eyes grew wide.

  Julien crouched on the bed before him, on his hands and knees, holding onto the iron footboard rails. He was naked from the waist down, his shirt tails shoved up from his hips toward his shoulders. There was a man behind him, likewise stripped, and it took Mason a bewildered moment to recognize the outward swell of his paunch, his greasy bald pate, his overgrown mustache—John, the man from The Crow’s Nest.

  He was fucking Julien—there was no more gentle or less crass way to put it. He had his fingers hooked into the meat of Julien’s hips, and was in the process of driving himself furiously into the younger man’s ass. The headboard banged into the wall with every pounding stroke; the entire bed shimmied, the frame squeaking loudly as he moved.

  As Mason burst into the room, he looked up, his eyes widening, his belly bouncing, his face flushed, his breath wheezing from him laboriously. Julien looked up, too, and his eyes flew wide with horrified aghast, his face abruptly going ashen.

  “Mason…!” he gasped, already on the move, already stumbling away from John and off of the bed. “Mason, oh, my God…holy Christ…wait!”

  But Mason was already on the move, too, shrinking back in the doorway. He couldn’t think; he couldn’t breathe. It felt for all the world as if someone had just shoved the business end of a butchering knife into his gut, then given it a swift, hard twist for good measure. He felt his stomach give a lurch, and he turned in a clumsy circle, heading back to the stairs.

  He made it halfway down before he heard the rapid-fire patter of Julien’s bare feet behind him, felt him grab him by the sleeve, his fingers closing with desperate urgency.

  “Mason, please,” he said. “Please, please…oh, shit…please let me explain.”

  Mason turned to look at him. “Is…is he…?” Movement out of the corner of his eye from the second floor drew his gaze, and he glanced in that direction. The fat man, John, stood in Julien’s doorway, watching them, the corner of his mouth hooked in a nasty little sneer, the remnants of his arousal still protruding obviously from beneath his shirt like a short, fat grub raising its head toward the sun. He looked back at Julien in shock and dismay. “Are you in love with him?” he whispered.

  Julien’s blue eyes flew all the wider. “No,” he gasped. “No, no, God, no, Mason! It’s not like that. He’s just…he’s nothing to me.” He shook his head, frantic, pleading. “He’s nothing—he gives me money for it. That’s all.”

  Mason’s mind refused to process this at first; it was as if all of the gears in his head had grown rusty and sluggish. Then, as realization set in, he drew back, giving his arm a forceful jerk to pull free from Julien’s grasp. “You mean you…” He blinked up at John again, then glared at Julien in disbelief. “You’re a…a goddamn rent boy? That’s your job? That’s what you’ve been keeping from me all this week?”

  Julien’s eyes were glassy and enormous. He bobbed his head up and down in a miserable nod. “Yes.” And when he reached again for Mason, but Mason recoiled, he uttered a soft, hurt sound. “I didn’t know…” he pleaded. “I didn’t know how to tell you. I wanted to, Mason—please. I swear to Christ, I wanted to, but I just…I couldn’t…!”

  “How long?” Mason asked, and when Julien didn’t answer at first, only hanging his head, he shouted it, his voice reverberating in the stairwell. “How long have you been doing this?”

  “Almost three years,” Julien whispered. He’d flinched at Mason’s shout, hunching his shoulders as if he expected to be struck.

  Almost three years. Mason tried to let this sink in, but again, it felt beyond his comprehension. “Is it only him?” he asked, cutting a murderous glance up the stairs at John. He knew it wasn’t; knew it couldn’t possibly be, but when Julien shook his head, it still felt like another sharp twist of that goddamn knife. “How many then?”

  “Mason, please.” Julien looked up at him, a single tear slipping past the edge of his lashes to trail down his cheek. “Please don’t.”

  “How many?” Mason snapped, making him jerk again.

  “I…I don’t know.”

  “Bullshit! How many? Five? Ten?”

  “More than that,” Julien admitted softly, pained. “Too many to count.”

  Mason stared at him wordlessly, stricken and dismayed.

  “I thought you were dead,” Julien exclaimed. “I told you before—I didn’t care what happened to me after that. I just…” He looked up at Mason, helpless and pleading. “I needed money.”

  “Why? For Aaron?” Mason demanded.

  “Yes, goddamn it,” Julien snapped back. “He’s my brother, Mason—I had to
do it. I had to help him anyway I could.”

  “Bullshit. Don’t tell me it was the only work you could find. What about the smithy apprenticeship you used to talk about? Or hell, even working on the docks. Or—”

  “Or how about I shovel shit out of the sewers every night for bloody goddamn coppers?” Julien cut in. “I don’t need pocket change, Mason—I need money to help Az. I’m not smart like you. I can’t be a surgeon, or a teacher, or some kind of goddamn industrialist banker. I did what I had to do to survive—to make sure Aaron survived.”

  “Aaron’s a grown man now,” Mason snapped, his brows furrowed. “He’s not a goddamn kid hanging off your coat tails anymore. He can take care of himself! Look what you’ve done for him—because of him.” With a miserable, humorless laugh, Mason swept his hand up, pointing to the now empty door to Julien’s room; John had retreated inside once more. “Just look at yourself, Julien.”

  With that, he turned on his heel and stomped down the stairs, so filled with heartbroken, outrage, he couldn’t unclench his fists.

  “Mason, no.” Julien hurried after him, grabbing him again. “Mason, no, please. Don’t go. Please.”

  “Why?” Again, Mason shrugged himself free. “So I can keep the spare side of your bed warm until the next customer?” He spat on the floor of the entryway. “Forget it.”

  “Please don’t do this,” Julien begged as he turned around again. “I’m sorry. I’ll do anything—please! Please don’t go. I love you!”

  His voice broke, a low, anguished cry, and God, it nearly shattered Mason completely. He had to steel himself against the sound of it, of Julien’s pain—because that wrenching cry could have just as well been his own, the one he’d been biting back ever since he’d opened that goddamn door. He had to steel himself against Julien’s pleas, against Julien himself, and the sudden, agonizing need to go to him, to take him in his arms and hold him, comfort him…comfort them both.