Once More, With Feeling - Part 1/4
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(Colin - Tuesday, March 11th, 2014)
It’s not exactly surprising that he’s being typecast.
Colin knows it and there’s something comforting in that. He can spend the best part of his life exploring the darkness within him and pretend he’s pretending. He signs the contract and waivers with something of a finality he can’t place.
“Thank you, Mr Morgan,” Tracy from HR says, “Enjoy your research.”
Colin glances at her warily, but there is only bland politeness in her eyes. “Thank you,” he tells her with a careful, detached smile, reminding himself she doesn’t know where he’s going. It takes effort to walk out into the street trying not to look like he’s got a big, naughty secret hidden under his trench coat.
Summer Escorts in London is a place you only get into by invitation. Colin doesn’t exactly know who pulled the strings to have them accept his presence as part of his research project, but as soon as he walks into the well-maintained, unobtrusive building, he’s whisked out of the white lobby into a comfortable library. It has everything from leather chairs to a small table with a decanter of coppery liquid and a woman who is clearly waiting for his arrival. Colin isn’t sure what he was expecting, but it isn’t this kind of crisp, well-lit normality. It’s all so perfectly set up, he feels like he should be acting already. If he wasn’t a bit nervous, he might find it amusing.
“Drink?” the woman asks him, lifting a heavy crystal tumbler. She’s immaculately made up. Subtle but perfect, down to the cuticles of her toes. Her skirt is knee-length, but tight, showing off slender ankles. Her blouse is tastefully unbuttoned to display a hint of breasts but no cleavage, exactly. Everything exuding capable professionalism, the kind Colin sees in agents and PR reps.
“It’s a bit early,” Colin says, and she raises an artificially arched eyebrow at him. It’s seven PM so that statement makes no sense at all.
“Ms. Ludgens will be with you in a moment,” she says, “feel free to look around.” As if she knows he’s too wired to sit down. Then, with a turn on her red-soled pumps, she’s gone. Colin moves to the bay window and looks out over the Clapham Common. The house is an old Victorian like there are thirteen in a dozen in London. It’s unremarkable, which is probably why they chose it, and located beside a nursery school, of all things.
He stuffs his hands into his pockets, then thinks better of it, not being in his usual jeans and hoodie. He wants to make a good impression, and isn’t that funny, since he’s basically in an upper-class brothel. He wonders about the rooms above his head, what they’re used for, if there are people there now, men with women, men with men, women with women, forgetting about their lives for a breathless hour. He starts to wonder what drives people to do this, it’s why he’s here after all. The door behind him opens just as he’s about to examine the curiosity he feels.
“Mr Morgan, a pleasure,” the woman says, walking toward him. “I’m Deborah Ludgens.”
“Colin, please,” he says, smiling a little shyly. She’s in her fifties, wearing a grey suit that makes her green eyes sparkle. She’s gorgeous and not at all what he expected. “Nice to meet you.”
“Colin,” she says, softer, taking his hand in hers. “I am pleased to have you here. There are a few rules I’d like to go through with you. Mostly about our privacy policy concerning both our employees, and of course our clients, should you accidentally come across any names. You’ll be able to talk to a few of our employees, both men and women, who volunteered to tell their story once they heard you’d be here. I doubt you’ll be able to talk to any clients, but we can see about that at a later date.”
“That won’t be necessary anyway,” Colin says. “I’ll be playing the role of a prost -- I mean, escort.”
Ms Ludgens smiles as if she finds his slip-up endearing. “Everyone here does what they do because they like it, Colin,” she says, putting a gentle hand on his arm. “You’ll see that for yourself. This isn’t a whore house with trafficked sex slaves. These are students paying for their college bills. These are professionals. These are working ladies and gentlemen who find pleasure in this.”
“I understand,” Colin bluffs, casting his eyes down. He’s blushing a little, and Ms Ludgens laughs.
“Why don’t you step into my office and we’ll go through the paperwork.”
Hours later as his body lulls to the rocking of the train home, his mind teems with it all. It occurs to Colin that this is something he’s never given any thought to--the reasons why people would sell sex of their own volition, not under duress or out of a great need. Staring out of the plexiglass window, he feels the familiar thrill of the unknown mindset, the new skin he’s about to step into.
This he knows; this he understands. There’s a challenge here, and he can already feel himself circling the problem, looking for an in.
All night, Colin’s mind buzzes with the search for the quiet confidence he needs to tap into a role, and in the morning, he can feel it around him, settled over him. He can do this.
It comes as a bit of a surprise then, that the more time he spends at Summer Escorts, the less it’s what he expected.
It’s quiet phone calls and boring excel sheets. It’s banking on Fridays, and accounts reconciliations against the escorts’ booking fees. And sometimes, it’s meeting beautiful men and women, all in expensive clothes, and listening to stories of how they started out earning money to get through college. Some do it just because they like it. Some are married and their partners know. He can’t help but be intrigued by the way varied ways in which their lives have led them here, these many different people.
It’s a lull on such a Friday night when Meghan, the receptionist who actually seems like a lot more than that, confides in him.
“It takes a while to build a relationship of trust with the regulars but we’ve never had any issues. They usually accept that we won’t have a list printed in The Sun, you know? It’s as much in our best interest as theirs to be absolutely discreet.”
“Of course,” Colin says, perched on her desk, accepting a piece of the apple she’d peeled and neatly quartered.
“It’s Josh you’re meeting tonight, isn’t it?” Meghan asks, wiping her hands on a napkin before holding up a long finger and tapping the bluetooth device attached to her ear.
“Summer Escorts,” is all she says with a faint, distracted smile at Colin as she listens. “The twenty first. Amanda. Just a moment, please.” She taps her Mac out of sleep mode and opens the calendar. “Amanda is available, yes.” She pauses, nods, types something with a sharp tap of her red nails. “Friday the twenty first, six PM at the Dorchester.”
Colin’s eyes widen fractionally.
“Evening gown, spending the night optional. It’s in her calendar, sir. Your usual payment option? Yes. Yes, perfect. Thank you.” She rings off.
“The Dorchester?” Colin asks, reaching for another piece of apple. Meghan shrugs and then slaps his hand. He grins.
“There’s some business conference on, Nathaniel’s been called in for it already too,” she says and rolls her eyes before offering him the plate. He takes another piece and munches on it.
“Yes,” he says, answering her earlier question. “I’m meeting Josh this evening. Any idea when he’ll be here?”
“Hang on,” she says, flicking through the calendar on the screen again. Colin had peeked at it once, unable to contain his curiosity, but everything’s in some sort of code only Meghan seems to understand. “He’ll be here around eleven I think. He usually spends the night here, after seeing this client. They don’t live far from here and then Josh goes to see his mum in the morning.” The look she gives him is knowing, as Colin tries to imagine sleeping with someone for money and then facing his mum the next day.
Josh walks in at ten past eleven, a breeze of aftershave and easy smiles. “Meghan,” he says, “Looking gorgeous as always.” He kisses her on the cheek. “And you must be Colin Morgan.” He holds out a hand and Colin takes it. Josh’s palm is warm and dry. He hands Meghan a folder while she tells him to check his calendar when he’s done with Colin. “Do you mind if we take this upstairs?” Josh asks Colin without a hint of ambiguity. “I’m beat and I want to change.”
“Sure,” Colin says. “No problem, it shouldn’t take long.”
Josh smiles and shifts his backpack higher up his shoulder. “Come on then. Ta, Meg, see you in the morning.” He takes the stairs two at a time and Colin follows. He’s been up here a dozen times before, and now he knows these rooms are in fact only used for sleeping. Everyone prefers to talk in one of the bedrooms rather than the library or the kitchen downstairs where anyone could walk in.
“Have a seat,” Josh says, pushing open the door and stepping aside so Colin can enter. “I’m just going to go change out of this suit and brush my teeth. I’ll be right back.”
“Take your time,” Colin says, squeezing past him and into the room. He flicks on the light, which casts a dim rainbow of colours through its painted glass cover and he sits down by the window in the only chair. The room is bare of any personal touches, but is comfortable anyway. A queen-size bed and two matching side tables take up most of the space, apart from the small desk and chair he’s occupying. Colin has pulled out his notebook from his own bag and scribbled, Josh -- Friday May, 16th, 2014 in the corner of a new page by the time Josh returns, hair wet.
“I took a shower,” he says, dropping the suit and the bag on the bed. “Sorry to keep you waiting.”
“That’s all right,” Colin says. “We can start right away and get it over with so you can go to sleep.”
“Sure,” Josh says around a yawn, and he sinks down on the bed. “What would you like to know?”
Colin shrugs and smiles. He still feels a little bashful even after all the interviews he’s done so far. “The usual I suppose. How did you end up doing this job?”
“What, being a whore?” Josh laughs at Colin’s mortified face. It’s a rich sound. Easy. “It’s all right, I’m just calling it like it is. I know most people who work here claim high and low that’s not what we are. I shag people for money. That makes me a prostitute.” He shrugs and looks at Colin, waiting.
“It’s more than that though, isn’t it?” Colin asks, leaning forward a little.
“Oh yeah,” Josh says and he stretches out on the bed, leaning back on his elbows. His t-shirt rides up a bit, and Colin notices his jeans are still undone, a pair of Ralph Lauren boxers hugging narrow hips. When Colin looks up again, Josh is grinning, acknowledging Colin’s look for what it is: appreciation. “I do dinners and functions, mainly with women. It’s usually the men who just want sex. They don’t care about conversation and company much.”
“Are you bisexual?” Colin asks, writing down ‘women - functions, men - sex’.
“No, I’m gay.”
Colin looks up from his notebook, eyes wide in surprise. “But you, you have sex with women?”
Josh sits up again, hugging one leg to his chest and shrugs delicately. “I do. It was weird at first but you get used to it.” The roguish smile returns and Colin realises with a jolt that he finds Josh very attractive. “I let it slip once, to one of my female clients. That I’m gay, I mean. She likes to fuck me with a strap-on now.”
Colin swallows, wishing he could reach for his water bottle without sending Josh into a laughing fit.
“Is there anything you don’t do?” he asks instead.
“I’m pretty open minded,” Josh says with another shrug. “But I’m not into pain. I’ll top or bottom, I’ll pee on someone if that rocks their boat but that’s where I draw the line. I don’t do blood play either. Don’t want to ruin this,” he says, running a hand over his freckle-dusted arm as he looks at Colin from beneath his ginger eyelashes. Colin wonders if flirting is just a default setting for him.
“Mostly it’s pretty vanilla though. I fuck, I get fucked.” He leans forward, suddenly serious. “It’s the drunk businessmen you want to watch out for, Colin,” he says, as if he’s instructing Colin instead of just sharing information. “Always keep a packet of lube because they don’t necessarily like to take the time to prepare.” He sits back again. “I can do it myself then, quickly.”
“Do you think you’ll be doing this job for a while?” Colin asks. His voice is hoarse and he’s sure Josh heard it, but he doesn’t let on. Something’s tingling beneath Colin’s skin and he wants to rub his arm like Josh did a moment ago.
“Just until I graduate. Once I’ve got a job as a finance broker, I bet I won’t have time anymore.”
“You’re studying finance?” Colin asks, too fast to hide his shocked surprise. “I mean, aren’t you worried you’ll bump into one of your clients one day?”
Josh laughs loudly, falling back on the bed with mirth. “Colin,” he says, when he’s caught his breath and pushed himself up again, “You still don’t get it do you? We cater to the crème de la crème of Britain here. It’s much more in their interest to keep our acquaintance under wraps than it will ever be in mine.” His eyes twinkle again. “Remember that.”
Colin thinks about this on the tube, once more rocked into a comfortable state of near-meditation by its rhythm. Does Josh really have no fears about being discovered? Does he really feel so comfortable with his choices that he’s not afraid of being criticised for them?
Colin wonders if there would always be dread of being outed, and certainly this is something he understands. As much as he’s always stayed out of the public eye when not on promo tours, Colin knows what it’s like to be judged, what it’s like to hide.
And yet, what Josh says rings true, because there would be no supply without demand, and it’s the punters who’d be judged the harshest for procuring their hour of pleasure. He worries his doubts like a dog gnawing a bone, searching inside for the right motivation to play this bloody role.
So, he returns to the unobtrusive building day after day, still trying to understand.
On the third Saturday Meghan asks him if he really has nowhere else to be.
“I’m sorry,” Colin says, realising for the first time he has been bugging her a lot lately. “I didn’t think. I’m in your way, aren’t I?”
Meghan rolls her eyes and produces a small tupperware container full of neatly cleaned and halved strawberries. She holds it out to him, and Colin takes one. It’s delicious. “Of course not,” she tells him. “I’m glad for the company. My Saturday nights have been quite lonely since I started to work here. But you’re a strapping, young, successful actor. Surely you have things to do on a Saturday.”
Colin shrugs and licks his lips, eyeing the strawberries. “My friends and family know what I’m like when I’m preparing for a role. They leave me alone and I call them when I have time.” He picks out another strawberry and it shows that Meghan is deep in thought because she doesn’t even notice.
“You’re intrigued, aren’t you,” she says, carefully not looking at him. “By all this. You’re fascinated. It isn’t the shady, underhanded cartel you thought it would be.”
There’s a long silence as Colin thinks her words through. Meghan rarely allows a glimpse of her thoughts and never asks him anything about his private life. He wonders if this means they are becoming friends. She’s still tapping away at her computer when he dares to go for a third strawberry and says, “I am fascinated,” very quietly.
“Hm,” Meghan says and then they don’t talk for a while, Meghan answering calls and Colin going through his notes.
Then, he asks, “Have you ever considered, you know, doing it yourself?”
After a pointed glance at the empty strawberry tin, Meghan looks up. “One of the reasons I’m so good at my job is that I have an intimate understanding of all the aspects, Colin.” She smiles until she sees the comprehension dawn on his face. “So yes, actually. I considered it for several years, or basically until I paid off my house.”
Colin laughs and retreats into the kitchen to rinse out Meghan’s tupperware. “It’s nearly eleven,” he says when he comes back. “Are you closing up? Your taxi will be here soon, I’ll walk you out.”
“You’re a real gentleman aren’t you,” Meghan says, shutting down her computer and getting up. “All right, let me just go grab my coat.”
She has one foot in the cab when someone calls, “Meg,” and they both look up.
“Josh?” Meghan says, squinting at the shadowy figure hurrying toward them.
“Can you just let me in?” Josh asks as he crosses the street. He looks harried, shoulders hunched and his hands buried deep in the pockets of wrinkled black trousers. Meghan looks from him, to the front door, to the cabbie.
“I’ll do it,” Colin says, “off you go.”
“You sure?” Meghan asks him, but she’s already sinking into the seat.
“Yeah, leave me your keys. My train’s not for another half hour anyway and I’ll make sure to come a bit earlier tomorrow.”
“Thanks, Colin,” she says, pushing her work keys into his hand. He wonders who she has waiting for her as she pulls the door shut. He turns on his heels, already fishing for the right key, the cab pulling away from the curb behind him.
“Hey Josh,” Colin says when he’s caught up. “We weren’t expect--” The smile slips off his face. “Are you all right?”
“Just a shit night,” Josh says. He smiles but it’s wan and not right on his face at all. “You don’t have to come in.”
“I’m not leaving you alone,” Colin says, mind firing through every single possibility that could’ve made Josh look like that. He thinks for a second his entry’s going to be blocked but Josh sort of deflates a little, says, “Fine,” and turns around without waiting to see if Colin will follow.
“Tell me what happened,” Colin says when they’re upstairs. “Are you hurt?”
“Only my pride,” Josh tells him. He begins to strip. Tie comes off first, pulled through the knot with a soft whoosh until the ends hang loose over his shoulders. He unbuttons his white shirt and just lets it hang open before going for his belt. “You gonna watch, Colin?” he asks. “I’m off the clock here.”
“Josh,” Colin says, feeling only a little hot under the collar. “You look like shit. I’m not going until I know you’re all right.”
“I’m fine,” Josh tells him, his smile a bit more amused this time. He stops to look at Colin with his hand still on his half-undone zip. He’s contemplating something and the decision dances in his eyes before it solidifies. “It’s this client,” he begins, moving his hands from his trousers and shrugging off the shirt and tie. “I know what he wants, I know what he expects so it’s not like I’m traumatised. It just never fails to put me in a shit mood.”
“What does?” Colin asks, his eyes flickering down when Josh drops his trousers and steps out of them.
“Orgasm denial.”
Colin gasps, can’t help it really because the evidence is, well, undeniable. “Fuck,” he breathes.
“Yeah,” Josh says, looking down at himself. “It fucking sucks. It goes down as soon as he takes off the cock ring because it hurts like a bitch, but it always comes back on my way home. I’ve got my mum over for the weekend so I couldn’t go home like this. I was just,” he waves a hand toward the bathroom. His smile is a bit self-deprecating this time.
“Yeah,” Colin says. “I’m sorry, I--“
“It’s fine, Colin,” Josh says, grabbing the clean towel off the bed. “Like I said, I know what I’m in for when I accept this guy and he pays really well.” He’s still wrapping the towel around his waist as he walks past Colin and it’s completely instinctive that Colin’s lips part as his eyes drop down again. He’s immediately aware of the fact that Josh noticed, because Josh stops barely an arm’s length away and Colin starts to blush when he meets his eyes.
It’s not like Josh even has to say anything, he just raises an eyebrow, looking more like himself than he’s done ever since he walked in the door. He laughs gently when Colin looks away and is about to walk past when Colin stops him with a hand on his wrist.
“Have your shower,” Colin says, “and come back.” He can’t meet Josh’s gaze.
Josh makes him by putting a finger under his chin and lifting it. He looks at Colin, long and searching, doesn’t say anything, just presses a closed-mouthed kiss to Colin’s lips, never breaking eye contact. “Okay,” he says, stepping back. “Undress and get on the bed.”
The quiet command makes Colin physically shudder but he does what he’s told. Even though it doesn’t take long at all for Josh to return, it’s long enough for Colin to want to crawl underneath the duvet, for his skin to thrum in anticipation, for him to have second and third and fourth thoughts.
And then Josh is back, crawling up from the end of the bed, stark naked. He’s as beautiful as Colin expected. Skin porcelain-fragile and scattered with pale freckles like a connect the dots canvas. He kisses his way up Colin’s body, just as chaste as before, starting with the bone of Colin’s ankle and higher, as if he’s connecting lines too. And maybe he is because as soon as he’s reached Colin’s mouth, Colin feels fevered, like nothing he’s felt before. Maybe it’s the slight illegitimacy of it all, or maybe it’s just that Colin has wanted this man from the moment he laid eyes on him.
Whatever it is, it doesn’t matter because when Josh asks, “You gonna show me a good time?” all Colin can do is nod and open his mouth and let him in.
It’s exactly a week later that Colin hops off the desk and kneels by his bag to stuff his notes into it, when the front door opens. Meghan and Colin both turn toward it, and in steps a memory that feels like a punch to the solar plexus.
“We’re just about to close,” Meghan says with a tight smile. Colin goes to rise but she puts a hand on his shoulder and steps in front of him, effectively hiding him from view. Colin knows a moment of appreciation for her prudence and he uses it to gather his senses. Of course it isn’t Bradley. This guy is too tall. Thinner. His hair is just the wrong side of honey. But the likeness is enough to make Colin dizzy.
“That’s not how we do things here,” he hears Meghan say. “You have to make an appointment and someone will meet you at a place of your choosing. There is paperwork to be filled out, too. I can’t do anything at this short notice.” Her tone has gone softer, more gentle than Colin has heard it with any client. As if she deals with the kind of desperate loneliness that shines from this man’s eyes every day. Colin doesn’t. He has only seen it once.
So when the guy says, “What about him?” with a nod in Colin’s direction, and Meghan starts, “He’s not --”, Colin rises to his feet, puts a hand on her arm and says,
“It’s all right. Can we have a quick chat?” He gives her what he hopes is a pointed look, eyebrows raised in query.
Ever the professional, Meghan takes the ball and runs with it. She indicates the library door, smiling tightly at the guy. “Why don’t you step in here, then, and I’ll be with you shortly.”
She ushers him into the library and closes the door, throwing Colin an unreadable look over her shoulder.
“There is paperwork for him to fill out,” she says, but Colin can tell it’s really a masked, Are you sure about this?
“That won’t be necessary,” Colin says, “Surely--”
“This isn’t how it works,” Meghan interrupts. She takes his arm, pushes him back a few steps, before hissing, “We don’t know anything about this guy. He needs to sign a contract. Normally we require bloodwork from you. You’d have to sign a stack of papers too, thicker than your arm.”
“I know, but I’m clean, and I--” Colin pauses, searching himself for the right words. “I want to do this,” he finally says, knowing it’s true.
“Ms Ludgens will have me fired,” Meghan murmurs, but her eyes are closed and she’s rubbing her forehead.
“She won’t find out,” Colin tells her.
Meghan shakes her head. “I have to tell her, I have no choice.” She hesitates a bit longer, then smiles at him and leans in to whisper in his ear. “There is an emergency button beneath every bedside table in the rooms upstairs. You press that, security will be here within five minutes.” Meghan looks at him for a long time, before turning around again. She opens the library doors and goes inside, armed with a stack of papers, all business. The doors remain open and Colin’s stomach flares with excitement. He stands tall, looking guilelessly at the man within, feeling himself finally stepping into his part.
“What will be your mode of payment, sir?”
“Cash,” the man says. His eyes keep trailing in Colin’s direction.
“And how long will you be visiting?”
“Just,” the man looks down, blushing furiously and this quirks the corners of even Meg’s lips. “Just charge me for the night,” he nearly whispers, looking mortified.
Meghan scribbles something on a piece of paper and beckons him over. “Sign this please, and leave me an address and a phone number at least. I can’t allow this if you don’t. I need to think about Connor’s safety.”
“Of course,” he says. He writes quickly, then tugs his wallet out of his jeans and pulls a wad of cash out. Colin’s eyes widen when he doesn’t even count it. Meghan looks from one to the other, her eyes lingering on Colin’s face and when she sees no trace of second thoughts or doubt, says,
“I’ll leave the change for you to pick up on your way out,” she glances at the paperwork on the table and adds, “Stephen. Connor will show you the way.”
“Don’t worry about it. The change, I mean.” He takes a step in Colin’s direction and then another, and seeing the nervousness in his eyes, Colin suddenly realises his own power. He waits until Stephen’s within reach, brushes his elbow with light fingers in assurance and turns to the stairs, thrilling at the hum of excitement low in his belly when Stephen follows.
All the way up, Colin feels Stephen’s presence acutely, walking right behind. A perpetual current of mixed emotions sparks up his spine with every step, but once he opens the door to a room and steps inside, Colin becomes Connor. He becomes the role he’s preparing for and somehow, it’s as easy as slipping his feet into a favourite pair of shoes.
“Would you like a drink?” he asks, gently closing the door. Stephen stands in the middle of the room, his back to Colin. He jerks slightly when Colin moves his hands over his shoulders and slips his coat off. “I think I can find some wine or something in the kitchen, if you like.”
“No,” Stephen says. His voice is low and hoarse. He glances over his shoulder. There is embarrassment in his eyes; it’s a silken veil over the haunted look that still hasn’t left him. “No alcohol. I wouldn’t mind some water though, if you have it.”
Colin indicates the bedside tables, two bottles of mineral water on each. “Will that do?” he asks. Stephen nods and looks away again, unscrewing one of the bottles and drinking deeply. He puts the bottle down and takes a trembling breath. His head is slightly bowed, the back of his hand pressed to his mouth. Colin wonders what brought him here, what put that look in his eyes, why he suddenly decided to do this, when he has clearly never paid for sex.
Jesus Christ, he thinks, breathing much too fast, I’m about to fuck for money.
And then Stephen turns, looks at him with such open desperation and need that it doesn’t matter. None of it. When Stephen reaches for him, Colin goes.
“Can I kiss you?” Stephen asks, his hands resting lightly on Colin’s upper arms. “I mean, on the mouth? Is that--can I?”
“Tonight,” Colin says, feeling an odd sort of weight drop away from the pit of his stomach as he murmurs the words against Stephen’s neck, “tonight I am yours to do with as you please.”
“I’d like to kiss you,” Stephen says, “and undress you. And then I’d like to fuck you slowly. Is that--is that all right?” A blush, dulled by the multicoloured light spilling across the room, unfurls from beneath his shirt collar and Colin smiles. He wants to reach out and touch it, but some part of him knows Stephen needs to be in control. And he can let go.
Colin can let go.
“Perfect,” Colin says, “that’s perfect.”
Stephen’s mouth is on his, chaste and sweet until it’s not and need heats up the kiss. Colin's mind empties of everything except this.
Stephen’s fingers tremble around the buttons of Colin’s shirt, and twice Colin sees him swallow around something constricting his voice but he keeps still. When they are both shirtless and kissed sore, Stephen presses his forehead to Colin’s and says, “I want. I want--” He pushes his fingertips against Colin’s mouth. “God, I want your mouth on me.”
Without looking away, Colin opens up and lets Stephen’s fingers into his mouth, suckles the tremor from them and then sinks to his knees. He rails his tongue over a dusting of golden hair on his way there while he reaches for the drawer of the bedside table. Best start as he means to go on. He helps Stephen out of his shoes, then his socks, and when his jeans are a pile by the bed, he rolls the condom over Stephen’s already hard cock. “Lovely,” Colin is whispering, not even fully realising he’s doing it. “You’re doing so well, so lovely.”
He licks the banana flavour off the latex and Stephen stills a moan, threading his fingers through Colin’s hair. “There’s no one else here,” Colin says, “you can make noise if you want.” He takes Stephen in his mouth and sucks him down. It’s been awhile, long enough to forget this feeling. Of having his throat filled and someone at his mercy. To be the reason someone’s knees begin to tremble, for their hips to undulate in a gentle but uncontrollable rhythm.
When he looks up, Stephen’s head is thrown back and he’s biting his lip. His hands are on Colin’s face, tracing his cheekbones like he wants to take away the sting in his jaw. Then, without a word, his grip tightens slightly and he pulls out, helps Colin to his feet.
Without hesitation, he strips Colin bare and pushes him toward the bed, on top of the sheets. Stephen maps out every line, pays attention to every quiver his touch brings out in Colin until Colin feels boneless and heavy. Like nothing could move him now. He lets go of all his inhibitions, of every bit of control he has clung to his entire life, and lets his legs fall open when Stephen nudges them up.
Colin shivers when the first wet finger enters him, unsure of when Stephen reached for lube, sighs when the second stretches him further. Stephen is careful with the third, waiting for Colin to adjust to the burn before curling his fingertips into the spot that has Colin moan approval to the ceiling.
“Are you ready?” Stephen asks, and he’s breathless, trembling.
“Yes,” Colin says. He rolls onto his stomach when Stephen pulls his fingers out. Because it’s been a while, and this will make it easier. A few seconds pass and then Stephen pulls him up enough to shove a pillow underneath his hips. Colin is open and exposed but there’s no cling of shame or embarrassment.
He just feels a rush of freedom, a release of exuberance in the knowledge that no one will judge him, that this is exactly what’s expected of him. When the cool, slick head of Stephen’s cock nudges at his hole, Colin gives up the last of his self-possession.
They fuck tenderly, to a soundtrack of soft sighs and little groans. There is no other noise, the world around them quiet and peaceful, as if it recognised a need for silent breakdown. At some point Stephen lifts Colin to his chest, so they kneel chest to back on the bed. Colin’s fingers are in Stephen’s hair, Stephen’s hands hold him tight, cradling him, fingers spread over Colin’s ribs.
It’s languid where Colin always imagined sex for money would be frantic, a little dirty and contemptible, maybe. It’s loving where he thought there’d be no room for emotion. He kisses more than he ever has during sex, over his shoulder, their lips not parting, not until the end when finally the breakdown becomes a build-up, and they are more gasping in each other’s mouths. Stephen husks, “I need, I need--” against the dip of Colin’s throat and Colin murmurs, “Yes, now. Let go now.”
Stephen puts his hand around Colin’s cock and just holds it there, as he steadies Colin with a splayed palm over his chest and begins to thrust faster, shorter, to a ragged rhythm. He cries out, the rolling of his hips coming to a stuttering end, even as Colin fits his hand around Stephen’s and fucks into it, his own release only a long held breath away.
Still kneeling, bearing each others’ weight, they kiss the shuddering aftershocks into a lazy calm again.
Later, when Stephen’s embrace has slackened and long fallen away behind him, Colin listens to the night sounds. He looks out the window as a man who he’ll probably never see again sleeps in the same bed, under the same covers.
It’s odd, he thinks, that having made what felt like a profound connection, the distance between them is already that of polite strangers. It’s comforting to know that neither of them has to sneak out, has to make excuses, apologies, declarations. It feels close to perfect.
Very close.
Even so, he’s glad Stephen’s eyes are hazel.
(Bradley - Saturday, May 2nd, 2015)
Bradley wonders if there are people who do this all the time, whether they ever lose their sense of shame, or if they always feel this choking desperation like their stomach is crawling up into their throat. He wonders if there are people who find this easy.
There’s a sudden impulse to end the call and pretend he’d never made it in the first place, but if he does that, he’ll never have the courage to try again. Absently, he rubs his fingers over an unidentified stain on the calf of his suit trousers, courtesy of last night’s cab ride to the hotel.
“Thank you, Mr Smith,” says the woman on the phone after Bradley gives her his details, using his least expressive voice, the one he breaks out for consultants and bankers. He pinches the bridge of his nose and feels heat creeping over his face, but the woman’s voice doesn’t resonate with even the hint of a smile at the obvious alias. “You may pay cash, but we will still need your credit card details. It won't be charged unless there is a problem with the initial payment, sir."
Bradley nearly drops the phone and his mind goes blank, so it takes a second before he registers the mild change in her tone. They won't charge the card if he pays cash, so the bank won't be notified of the discrepancy between the name he just gave, and his credit card number.
“Uh. Cash, then,” he mumbles. “Please.”
“Any preferences?”
“Pardon?” It’s too hot in the room and Bradley’s starting to sweat under his collar. He stares with unseeing eyes at the wallpaper of his hotel room. Anxiety and excitement boil away inside him in equal measures, scalding his cheeks and pebbling his skin into goosebumps. He swallows down dread, thinking about the lengths he’d always gone to in order to protect himself from the tabloids, and how huge a risk he’s taking tonight.
“Do you have any preferences?” the woman on the phone repeats. “Hair colour, eye colour, build and such,” she explains with the patience of a seasoned veteran.
“Oh,” he says, more a breath than a sound. “Um.” Shit. Shit. He teeters on the fence dividing this is a mistake and the scary but tempting option of may as well go all the way, but when he opens his mouth, the words are already there.
“Tall,” he says hoarsely, screwing his eyes shut. Not that he needs to, the image is engraved on the back of his eyelids. Sketched over with layers of shaded guilt and erased yearning. “Blue eyes, dark hair, if you --” he clears his throat, blushing fiercely even though she can’t see him through the hotel phone. “If that’s possible, I mean. It doesn’t really --”
“No problem,” she says, “I’ve booked Connor, he’ll be with you at eight.”
Bradley bites his lips on an exhale. It is done. The room suddenly looks too bright, too clean, too everything. “I’m faxing you a copy of our contract,” she continues, the machine above the mini-bar whirring into life. “It has all the rules and regulations, for your protection and privacy as well as Connor’s. If you could read and sign it, fill in your credit card details and fax it back to me by five o’clock today, that would be lovely.”
“Of course,” Bradley says weakly, feeling like a bottle at the mercy of the sea. “No problem.”
“Have a nice day, Mr Smith,” she says. Bradley’s shoulders sag with relief.
“And you,” he manages to croak out before the line goes dead. Bradley stares at the contract hanging from his fax machine for fifteen minutes before he trusts his legs enough to get up and fetch it.
He curls a fake signature underneath a long, long list of diseases he doesn’t have, waivers he doesn’t know the meaning of and don’ts which make him question his sanity for seeking this out. He coasts through it all in an autopilot daze, and when his phone trills loudly from the bed where he’d dropped it along with his wallet, he nearly ruins the thin fax paper with a startled stab of his pen.
Only a handful of people have this number and he doesn’t feel like making nice with any of them. He stares at his phone as it rings and rings, glad he can’t see the screen from here, knowing he’d feel compelled to pick it up if it says Steph or Mum or even Agent Orange -- his new representative with the unfortunate tanning problem. When his phone finally stops ringing, the room feels extraordinarily empty, and he looks around at the typical hotel furniture, trying not to feel judged in the heavy quiet.
On his way to the bathroom, Bradley sheds more clothes, toeing off his socks and dropping his shirt on the bed alongside the suit jacket he’d discarded at four in the morning.
Tired to the bone and painfully sober, he had stretched himself out on the bed, looking around at yet another hotel room. When had his life become a mindless traipse through slightly used beige rooms with boring striped couches, he’d wondered. Perhaps it was actually the same room, its door a portal to whichever city he’s in at any given time.
Face down on the bed with all his clothes still on, he’d fallen asleep, not waking up until midday with suspect taxi stains on his crumpled, slept-in suit.
A thought elbows itself forward like a weekend punter at a crowded pub, a memory of times he’d woken up to warmth of smiles and arms in his bed, though he doesn't chase the idea, doesn't snatch it out of the air. If he touches that loss, he won't be able to close the lid on it. Bradley can’t stop the wistful pang though, the wish he’d had the courage to stop that warmth slipping from between the sheets as much as it all slipped through his fingers, ebbing along the trail of disappointment between his bed and the room next door. Sand had been sprinkled in his eyes, but it never brought him his dreams.
Bradley plans to remedy the lack of hangover now, grabbing three tiny bottles from the mini bar as the obscenely large bathtub fills with a comforting rush, tinted by a blob of something-or-other from a fancy vial on the vanity. He downs the first nip without checking what it is, pulling a face as the gin burns on the way down. The second and third bottle look even less appealing and he picks up the hotel phone, pressing zero as he unbuttons his trousers one-handed.
“Mr Smith,” says the concierge. “How can I assist you?”
“I’d like to order two, no make that three bottles of whatever red wine you have in your bar.” He pauses, pulls his vest free from his trousers. “With two glasses please. To be delivered to my room by half seven.”
“Yes, sir,” the man says, sounding fast and capable. Bradley hears a quiet rustling, and then, “We have a nice 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon on our wine list, would that be to your satisfaction?”
“It would,” Bradley says. They could send him three bottles of Pinot Pisswater and he wouldn’t know the difference.
“Anything else, sir? A selection of appetisers, perhaps?”
He supposes he should eat something, though swallowing seems impossible past the anxious lump swelling in his throat. “Yes, why not. Thank you.”
“No problem, sir. Will that be all?”
Bradley’s about to hang up, his trousers hanging rumpled and loose around him. He looks down. “Oh,” he says quickly. “Could you send someone upstairs to fetch my suit and have it dry cleaned? I will need it back by seven this evening. They can just come in and collect it. I’ll leave it on the couch.”
“Of course, sir,” the concierge says, “Right away,” and hangs up.
Bradley shimmies out of the rest of his clothes, wondering what the cleaners will make of the taxi stains, then realizes he has something better to be embarrassed about, having just procured a prostitute. He plans to make absolutely certain that after tonight, he never shows his face here again. Unless, of course, he’s right about the portal, in which case he’s doomed to forever look at his own face in this bathroom mirror, thinking Bloody hell, Bradley, one is the loneliest number, but an escort? Really?
He slowly lowers himself into a scalding hot bath, every inch of his skin protesting in outrage. He sighs over the sound of bubbles bursting like tiny orange scented poppers in his nose, wishing he’d grabbed his phone from the bed, so he could drown out his thoughts with music from a time less complicated. Instead his mind fills with all the things he’s been trying to avoid, and maybe it’s for the best. Maybe if he can let go, even just a little, he might actually enjoy his evening.
He dares to imagine Connor, tall, blue eyes and dark hair, and anxiety turns into a tickling curl of dark excitement, like when he was eleven and poaching fruit from old Mr Wentworth’s garden next door.
This will work, he tells himself, it will be fine, all fine.
And so it is as he potters through the afternoon in a bit of a daze, until he answers his door later that night to what at first seems like a huge practical joke, like the ones they used to pull all the time.
It’s a near thing, but Bradley stops himself from looking down at his doorknob to check there isn’t a sign spelling, ‘Je suis Loser’. There’s a ghost of Angel’s or Katie’s laughter ringing in his ears, hiding around the corner like there aren’t years and countries separating them. And fuck, like any of that matters now.
Forget portals closing distances, this is a door straight to the past.
Forward to Part 2/4 >