Summer of Sherlock Entry 11
Username: fengirl88
Type of work: Fic
Category: Slash
Title: Because The Night
Prompt(s) used: Lestrade; memories of summer as a boy.
Rating: NC-17
Word count: ~4000
Warnings: Explicit sex; sex between minors; character death.
Notes/Acknowledgments: I'm very grateful to kalypso_v for suggesting the song as a basis for this fic, and for her careful reading of the results. Lestrade's memories of summer as a boy were shaped by several conversations with thimpressionist; this fic is for her.
Because The Night
“When did you first know you wanted to be a copper?” DS Smith asks, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
Lestrade suppresses a sigh. They're all in the pub winding down after finally cracking the Parker case, and this isn't the conversation he'd like to be having tonight. But she's a good cop and she deserves an honest answer.
“Summer of 1978, Weston-super-Mare,” he says. “I was fifteen. There was a murder.”
“Oh,” Smith says. She's wondering if it was someone he knew, maybe someone he loved; he knows that's what got her into the Force. But she won't ask.
“You knew the killer.” The sound of Sherlock's voice makes them all jump. Hadn't realized he was even listening. He's been fiddling with his phone, no, John's phone, for the last half hour, while the others were chewing over the case and swapping stories.
Lestrade never knows how Sherlock gets it right almost every time. He's close tonight, but not quite spot on.
“I knew the guy they thought did it, yeah,” he says.
There's an awkward silence. Tyler's the one to break it.
“Didn't know you came from Weston-super-Mud.”
“Yeah, well,” Lestrade says. “Haven't been back there in a long time.”
Not since his mother's funeral. Nothing to go back for.
“Anybody want another?” John says. “My turn.”
Lestrade looks at his glass. One-third full. Better not.
“I'm OK, thanks,” he says.
“So what happened?” Donovan asks. Soul of tact as usual.
“He disappeared,” Lestrade says. “Case was never solved.”
Sherlock is twitching, barely suppressing his irritation. Clearly thinks he'd have solved it in five minutes flat. Quite possibly would have, too.
“What did you want to be before that?” Dimmock asks.
Sherlock glares. Still hasn't forgiven Dimmock for existing. Honestly, he's like a bloody five-year-old sometimes.
“I wanted to join the circus,” Lestrade says.
“That's quite a switch,” Tyler says.
“You're not kidding,” Lestrade says. “Shocked my old Headmaster rigid. Poacher turned gamekeeper, he called me.”
“Bad boy, were you?” Tyler asks, grinning.
“Oh yeah.”
One reason his mum had warned him off having anything to do with Robert Graham. Ironic, really. If it hadn't been for that -
Sherlock gets up abruptly and goes to join Watson at the bar.
“What's got into him?” Smith says.
“Don't ask,” Donovan says. “God knows what goes on in his head half the time.”
Lestrade has a fair idea what's biting Sherlock, but he's not going to share that with them. Any more than he's telling them what happened with him and Robert Graham that summer, the summer that changed his life.
*~*~*~
The great thing about being in a punk band was you didn't have to be able to sing. Or play, come to that. Greg's guitar-playing wasn't up to much, but it was good enough for Hazardous Waste.
“Safety-pins and spitting,” his mother said, disgusted. “Isn't it time you grew up?”
Fifteen years old, he knew he'd got a whole life of being grown-up ahead of him. Smoking, drinking and singing angry songs with piss-awful lyrics and no tune was much more fun.
His mum went up the wall when she found out he'd been bunking off school. Said there'd be no more pocket-money all summer, not that there'd ever been much.
“You can do some bloody work for a change. Chip-shop, shoe-shop, I don't care.”
But jobs were in short supply that summer, even crap part-time jobs. Which is how Greg ended up working for Mr Rush, sweeping up and scrubbing floors in the butcher's shop. He wasn't allowed near the knives. Probably just as well. Ed, who'd worked there since he was a boy, was down to three and a half fingers on his left hand.
Rush had a temper on him, for all he could be charming to his female customers. The shop sign said Rush & Son, but Son had long since buggered off to work with someone else.
“My Chri', they used to fight,” Ed said, savouring the memory. “Just as well he did go. Sometimes I thought the old man would swing for him. Might have done if it hadn't been for Mrs R. She kept the peace as much as anyone could.”
Halfway through the second week, Mrs Rush's nephew arrived. Must take after the Glaswegian side of the family, Greg thought. Robert was small and wiry, dark-eyed and sharp-featured. Looked a bit of a scrapper, for all he was so slight; scar over the right side of his mouth, and his nose had obviously been broken at some point. Stronger than you'd think, too: he made handling the heavy cleaver look easy. Greg could see Rush sizing him up, trying to work out if it'd be worth changing the shop sign to Rush & Nephew.
It took him three days to work out the answer was no, and from then on in it was a war of attrition. Robert did as he was told, but with a distinct fuck-you air - he'd roll his eyes and give that crooked sideways smile, his skinny body insolently shrugging or slouching. He couldn't have made it much clearer he thought his uncle was a wanker if he'd taken out an ad in the local paper.
Greg thought Rush had it coming, and it was fun to watch. He was still a bit wary of Robert, though. Two years is a big age gap when you're fifteen, and Robert made him feel like an ignorant sheep-shagger. Greg didn't need some jumped-up tosser going on about what a provincial shithole this place was, thank you very much; he knew that already. Anyway, if Glasgow was so bloody marvellous why didn't Robert just bugger off back there?
The answer to that one was simple. Whatever Robert Graham had been getting up to back home, the family obviously didn't want him doing it on their doorstep.
“They sent him away,” Greg's mother said. “Mrs Rush told me. I don't want you hanging around with him after work. That boy's a bad influence if ever I saw one.”
She never did know how to manage him.
“D'you like punk?” Greg asked the next day.
Robert pulled a face. “Most of it's shite. Why?”
“Just wondered,” Greg said.
No point inviting him to come and hear Hazardous Waste, obviously.
“So what sort of music do you like?”
“You trying to get off wi' me or something?” Robert asked, laughing.
Bastard. Greg felt himself going red. “Piss off.”
“That's a no, is it? Shame,” Robert said. He went back into the front shop, leaving Greg feeling he'd just made a total prat of himself.
That, and wondering if Robert really thought that's what he'd been trying to do. Or if Robert wanted to get off with him. Never occurred to him before, but now he couldn't stop thinking about it.
He couldn't sleep that night. Too hot, and his mind kept replaying that exchange with Robert. But this time Greg was all cool and in control, saying “Might be. Why, you interested?” and Robert was saying “I am, aye,” and backing him up against the big freezer and shoving a hand down Greg's jeans and fuck he was hard, hard right now thinking about Robert's thin strong fingers on his cock, rough and quick and sure as he teased him and laughed at him and made him come right there in the back shop with Rush and Ed just the other side of the wall, Christ, yes, like that, ohh -
He buried his face in the pillow to muffle his groans as he came, and fell asleep still haunted by Robert's sly knowing smile. The same smile he gave Greg next morning, like the bastard knew he'd been jerking off thinking about him.
The first time they had sex was two days later, in the flat over the shop.
“The old feller's taking Auntie out tonight,” Robert said. “D'you want to come round?”
“OK,” Greg said, heart pounding, mouth dry with excitement.
“Bring some records,” Robert said. “If you've got any that aren't shite, that is.”
“'Course,” he said, though he wasn't sure what would pass that test.
Ian Dury, Elvis Costello, Squeeze, Graham Parker...
“No' bad,” Robert said, going through the pile. “Not bad at all. Smoke?”
“Haven't got any,” Greg said, embarrassed.
“'s OK, you can have one of mine.”
Roll-ups and rough cider and record after record. Sitting on the floor leaning against Robert's narrow single bed.
“Here,” Robert said, “bought this on Saturday.”
A simple four-note pattern, repeated on the piano, and then it changed, came back to the start and off again. The voice had a rough edge to it, vulnerable and strong at the same time, pulling at his insides:
Take me now, baby, here as I am,
Pull me close, try to understand...
He looked at Robert, uncertain, and Robert looked back. Not teasing now, but not making a move either. Waiting. His eyes were very dark. Greg felt dizzy, wanting, not knowing how to ask.
Because the night belongs to lovers,
Because the night belongs to lust...
Robert took another drag on his cigarette. Greg couldn't look away from those hands, that mouth, wanting them all over him. Bastard was just making fun of him again, tormenting him with that long slow stare that made heat pool in his belly and at the base of his spine. If he made a move, Robert would just laugh and push him away.
Wouldn't he?
Not laughing now, though.
“Oh for fuck's sake,” Robert said, exasperated. “Are you just gonnae sit there all night?”
He grabbed a fistful of Greg's t-shirt, hauled him close and kissed him. Greg gave a small surprised yelp and kissed him right back.
It was like his last kiss - Janie Lewis at the school disco, two years ago, awkward and clumsy - and it was nothing like that. He twisted his fingers in Robert's hair and pulled him closer, bumped heads, apologised and burst out laughing. Robert was laughing too, and then he wasn't, and Greg was flat on his back underneath him, not quite knowing how he'd got there, dizzy from the feel of Robert's erection digging into his hip.
“Stop arsin' about and gi' me a proper kiss,” Robert growled.
That meant tongues, right? Greg swallowed nervously, opened his mouth, closed his eyes and went for it, hoping it wouldn't be too revolting.
Robert tasted of cider and smoke and salt; Greg licked at the taste and felt him shudder. He opened his eyes, worried he'd done something wrong, but Robert's face was too close to see properly. On the other hand -
On the other hand, that tongue pushing between his lips, that body rubbing against his, didn't feel like Robert was going off the idea. And those hands fumbling to pull Greg's t-shirt up and undo his jeans, oh god -
Really embarrassing, making that noise, but he couldn't help it, the touch of Robert's hands on his bare skin was too much. Robert wasn't being quiet either, swearing raggedly in between the kisses and gasps for breath.
He couldn't get Robert's zip undone, making a mess of it now, Robert batting his hands away and saying “Fuckin' let me”. Tugging his jeans down and oh Christ he's not wearing any pants, the thought of Robert like that all day was almost enough to make Greg come there and then. He gritted his teeth and concentrated on thinking of Geography lessons, cabbage, scrubbing the floor of the shop -
Christ. The feel of Robert's cock pressing against his was so good he thought he might pass out from excitement. Robert spat deliberately in his hand and rubbed it on him, on them, wrapping his hand around them both and squeezing, pulling, once, twice, three times -
It was like when he did it to himself, and it was nothing like it at all, the feeling coming right up from the soles of his feet to the top of his head as he cried out and came, like being turned inside out, hollowed out, dumped on wet sand by a great big fucking wave, all the breath knocked out of him.
“Sorry, sorry, fuck,” he gasped, shaken by the pulses going through and through him.
Robert's hand kept moving, slipping and sliding in the mess he'd made and squeezing till Greg whimpered and Robert cursed and shook and he felt wet heat spurting across his stomach and chest.
“Jesus fuck,” Robert said, and collapsed on top of him.
Greg groaned at the unexpected weight - heavier than he looks, he thought dizzily. His head was spinning and he felt uncomfortably sticky.
“Christ, what a mess,” Robert said after a while.
More like boasting than complaining, Greg thought. He'd got enough focus back to see that Robert was looking even cockier than usual. There's a reason for that, he thought, and snorted with laughter.
“You laughing at me, you cheeky sod?” Robert said, mock-menacing. He poked Greg in the ribs.
“Fuck off,” Greg spluttered, counter-attacking.
“OK, OK, stop!” Robert said, grabbing his wrists and pushing his hands above his head. He kissed Greg again till he was groaning and squirming, wanting more.
“Christ on a bike, look at the time,” Robert said suddenly, scrambling off him. “They'll be back any minute. Get cleaned up and go home, for fuck's sake.”
So what happens now? He didn't feel brave enough to ask, but the question must have shown in his face.
“That wasna' bad for a first time,” Robert said. “Not bad at all. They're out again on Wednesday.”
“So we can do it again?” He was shaking with how much he wanted that.
Robert grinned. “Oh aye,” he said. “I'm countin' on it.”
Wednesday was the slowest day to arrive in the history of the known universe. Wanting to touch Robert all the time when they were in the shop together was such a torment Greg thought he'd go mad with it. But it was worth it when Wednesday finally came.
*~*~*~
Come on now, try and understand
The way I feel when I'm in your hands...
He couldn't listen to Patti Smith for years afterwards. Hard to say which memory was more acute: the almost unbearable pleasure of what their bodies did together, or the pain of how it ended.
*~*~*~
It was Rush's temper that undid them, finally. Shouting at Greg late one afternoon for lazing around doing fuck-all instead of scrubbing the floor.
“Waiting for the water -” Greg began.
“Don't give me your lame bloody excuses, you useless fucking waste of space!” Rush yelled.
He grabbed Greg's wrist and shoved his hand down into the galvanized bucket, then let go, cursing in shock. The old boiler was overheating so much these days that the water came out scalding. As Greg would have told him, if he'd listened.
Rush's shock was so funny that Greg couldn't help laughing, despite the pain of his own scalded hand.
The next minute, he was lying in a heap on the tiled floor, Rush's blow still ringing in his ears, and Rush was shouting “I'll give you something to laugh about, you little shit, I'll bloody marmelize you!”
“Don't you fucking well lay a finger on him!”
Greg hadn't seen Robert pick up the big cleaver. Hadn't even known he was there.
“Don't, Rob,” he said. “I'm OK. Put it down.”
Rush turned on his nephew and went on shouting: “I'll get you put away, the pair of you, see if I don't, I'll have Fred Johnstone on you, send that fucker to Borstal and you to jail, you evil little bugger, so you can get your scrawny Scottish arse fucked by a proper man, you'd like that, wouldn't you, never see your bum-chum here again I swear -”
“You do anything to us, anything at all,” Robert said, suddenly quiet and sure, “and I'll kill you. Now shut your filthy mouth and stick your hand under the cold tap.”
Greg looked up and saw Ed staring, open-mouthed, standing on the threshold of the back shop. How long had he been there?
“Cold water's a good idea,” he said, as calmly as he could, getting to his feet and turning the tap full on in the stone sink. “Sorry, Mr Rush. I did try to warn you about the boiler.”
Rush slammed out of the shop, banging the yard door so hard the place shook. The three of them looked at each other in silence.
“I'll be closing up, then,” Ed said after a pause, shuffling into the front shop.
Robert was shaking. “That bastard. That fucking bastard. Who's this Fred Johnson anyway?”
“Johnstone,” Greg said. “He's the Chief Constable. I think they're both in the Masons.”
“Fuck. Fuck. I will, I'll, I'll kill him. I mean it.”
Greg took his hand out of the cold water and looked at the blisters forming on it. He wouldn't be playing the guitar for a while.
“I should get this seen to,” he said. “Don't do anything stupid. Promise me. Promise me. Robert.”
“OK,” Robert said. “But I'm not stayin' here.”
“No, of course not,” Greg said, surprised. “I'm not staying either. But I'll need to get some things if we're going.”
“A' right,” Robert said. “Don't be long. I'll pack my bags and be ready.”
*~*~*~
“Are you OK?” Smith asks.
Lestrade comes back to himself with a start, to find the Yarders staring at him, Watson looking concerned and Sherlock still doing his best impression of a thundercloud.
“Yeah, sorry,” he says. “I was miles away.”
The song's still playing in his head, take my hand come undercover, they can't hurt you now...
He remembers the scene as if it were yesterday: Rush's body on the floor in the back shop, blood everywhere, the big cleaver lying next to him. And Robert, white-faced and shaking, blood on his hands and his clothes, saying “I was goin' to do it, but it wasn't me, he was there a'ready.”
Knowing Robert's prints would be on the cleaver. Knowing that wiping it wouldn't do any good after what Ed had seen and heard.
The hurried parting, Robert promising he'd write. The postcard, weeks later, postmarked Halifax, Nova Scotia, saying “Lots like me here but no-one like you. R xx”. Then nothing.
The thoughts that went through his head, seeing the Johnstones in town. Knowing what people had said about Rush being a ladies' man. Knowing if anyone could cover up a murder, it'd be Fred Johnstone, with his connections. Not that he needed to. Because everyone knew Mrs Rush's nephew was a bad lot, and it was obvious what had happened.
Ed kept him out of it; never said what the row had been about. If he knew. And Greg pretended he had no idea, just said Robert and his uncle were always quarrelling. Which was close to the truth, and no truth at all.
Not the sort of story you want to share with the team, somehow.
“Think I'd better head off,” he says. “Catch up on some sleep.”
He's not really surprised to find Sherlock waiting for him when he gets home. Lestrade's got used to him letting himself in whenever he feels like it. Doesn't even bother changing the locks any more. Though he never quite knows how Sherlock still manages to beat him to it every time. Maybe Mycroft has a secret helipad or something.
“You think you know who really did it,” Sherlock says accusingly.
“Yeah, well. Can't prove anything. He's dead now anyway.”
One too many Masonic dinners, heart attack, served the bastard right.
“The other man,” Sherlock says. “You could still clear his name.”
“He changed his name when he left,” Lestrade says. “Robert Graham doesn't exist any more.”
He's lived with this defeat so long, he should be used to it by now. But it weighs on him just the same.
Sherlock looks at him. It's not the impatient look Lestrade would expect when he's said something manifestly stupid. It's more - puzzled, sort of. Almost troubled, except nothing really troubles Sherlock, he knows that.
“He might like to come back to life, though,” Sherlock says. “Don't you think?”
“I don't know where he is,” Lestrade says.
This time Sherlock does look impatient.
“I doubt he's beyond the reach of all news media,” he says. “Wherever he is, there's a chance he'll hear about it eventually.”
“Still,” Lestrade says. “No proof.”
Sherlock raises an eyebrow.
“Oh right,” Lestrade says. “Three decades later, you're going to find the evidence and hand the local police their arses on a plate.”
“I thought you could do that bit of it,” Sherlock says smugly. “You've got a couple of days leave, haven't you? We could go down there tomorrow.”
Lestrade finds he's feeling a bit choked. Which is just daft. He clears his throat and says “OK. Thanks.”
Sherlock's scowling again, which seems a bit perverse given he's just got his own way. That and the prospect of a case, you'd expect him to be bouncing off the walls like a hyperactive toddler.
“What's the matter?” Lestrade asks. Probably pointless. Sherlock won't tell you unless he feels like it.
Apparently he does.
“Robert Graham,” he says, as if the words taste nasty.
“What about him?”
“He was your first lover, wasn't he?”
“Yes,” Lestrade says.
“Thought so,” Sherlock says gloomily. “It's the way you look when you're thinking about him.”
Oh, for crying out loud.
“Sherlock,” he says, trying not to laugh, “it was 1978. You were two years old. Unless I'd waited to have sex till I was, I dunno, thirty, there's no way you were going to be the first.”
Sherlock is plainly sulking, just the same.
“You know what?” Lestrade says. “I blame the parents,” and then he does start laughing.
Sherlock goes on glaring for a bit but finally joins in.
“Come here, you silly bugger,” Lestrade says. “Let's go to bed.”
He's a bit too tired for a proper shag, but that never stops Sherlock. And once Sherlock gets going Lestrade's not slow to catch fire himself.
Jealousy always makes Sherlock want to top, which isn't their usual way round. Not that Lestrade's complaining. His arse is going to ache tomorrow for sure, but right now this is perfect, one leg hooked over Sherlock's shoulder and the other wrapped round his waist, meeting Sherlock thrust for thrust as they near the finish.
“Fuck, that's it,” Lestrade says, clenching around Sherlock's cock, “right there, yes.”
He comes so hard he feels wrung out, limp and groaning as Sherlock goes on fucking him through the aftershocks.
“Oh, oh god,” Sherlock says. “Fuck,” and he's coming inside Lestrade, spasm after spasm, then pulling out and collapsing across his chest.
“Oof,” Lestrade says. Six feet of consulting detective is quite a weight, more than Robert, shouldn't be thinking about Robert right now but maybe it's not surprising that he is.
He doesn't usually let himself be demonstrative but he can't resist stroking Sherlock's hair, gently pulling and twisting it, scratching his scalp. Sherlock's softening cock gives an unexpected twitch against his thigh, and Lestrade laughs and kisses the top of his head.
“You know, I wouldn't know what to say to him if he did come back,” he says, tracing the line of Sherlock's neck with one finger.
Sherlock wriggles and makes a sort of harrumphing noise. “Not my problem,” he says.
“Never said it was,” Lestrade says mildly.
“Don't start getting ideas about us, Lestrade,” Sherlock warns.
Bloody cheek.
“I'm not the one who keeps turning up in your bed,” Lestrade points out.
“It's just sex,” Sherlock says defensively. “It doesn't mean anything.”
“Obviously,” Lestrade says. “Same here.”
They both know he's lying. Neither of them's quite sure whether Sherlock is too.
Another snatch of the song echoes in his head:
Love is an angel disguised as lust
Here in our bed till the morning comes.
“What are you smirking at?” Sherlock demands suspiciously.
“Nothing,” Lestrade says. “No reason.”
He knows he's grinning like a loon, but he can't help it, looking at Sherlock tousled and flushed and naked in his bed. Again.
Because the night belongs to us, he thinks.
“No reason,” he says again. “Just because.”
Type of work: Fic
Category: Slash
Title: Because The Night
Prompt(s) used: Lestrade; memories of summer as a boy.
Rating: NC-17
Word count: ~4000
Warnings: Explicit sex; sex between minors; character death.
Notes/Acknowledgments: I'm very grateful to kalypso_v for suggesting the song as a basis for this fic, and for her careful reading of the results. Lestrade's memories of summer as a boy were shaped by several conversations with thimpressionist; this fic is for her.
Because The Night
“When did you first know you wanted to be a copper?” DS Smith asks, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
Lestrade suppresses a sigh. They're all in the pub winding down after finally cracking the Parker case, and this isn't the conversation he'd like to be having tonight. But she's a good cop and she deserves an honest answer.
“Summer of 1978, Weston-super-Mare,” he says. “I was fifteen. There was a murder.”
“Oh,” Smith says. She's wondering if it was someone he knew, maybe someone he loved; he knows that's what got her into the Force. But she won't ask.
“You knew the killer.” The sound of Sherlock's voice makes them all jump. Hadn't realized he was even listening. He's been fiddling with his phone, no, John's phone, for the last half hour, while the others were chewing over the case and swapping stories.
Lestrade never knows how Sherlock gets it right almost every time. He's close tonight, but not quite spot on.
“I knew the guy they thought did it, yeah,” he says.
There's an awkward silence. Tyler's the one to break it.
“Didn't know you came from Weston-super-Mud.”
“Yeah, well,” Lestrade says. “Haven't been back there in a long time.”
Not since his mother's funeral. Nothing to go back for.
“Anybody want another?” John says. “My turn.”
Lestrade looks at his glass. One-third full. Better not.
“I'm OK, thanks,” he says.
“So what happened?” Donovan asks. Soul of tact as usual.
“He disappeared,” Lestrade says. “Case was never solved.”
Sherlock is twitching, barely suppressing his irritation. Clearly thinks he'd have solved it in five minutes flat. Quite possibly would have, too.
“What did you want to be before that?” Dimmock asks.
Sherlock glares. Still hasn't forgiven Dimmock for existing. Honestly, he's like a bloody five-year-old sometimes.
“I wanted to join the circus,” Lestrade says.
“That's quite a switch,” Tyler says.
“You're not kidding,” Lestrade says. “Shocked my old Headmaster rigid. Poacher turned gamekeeper, he called me.”
“Bad boy, were you?” Tyler asks, grinning.
“Oh yeah.”
One reason his mum had warned him off having anything to do with Robert Graham. Ironic, really. If it hadn't been for that -
Sherlock gets up abruptly and goes to join Watson at the bar.
“What's got into him?” Smith says.
“Don't ask,” Donovan says. “God knows what goes on in his head half the time.”
Lestrade has a fair idea what's biting Sherlock, but he's not going to share that with them. Any more than he's telling them what happened with him and Robert Graham that summer, the summer that changed his life.
*~*~*~
The great thing about being in a punk band was you didn't have to be able to sing. Or play, come to that. Greg's guitar-playing wasn't up to much, but it was good enough for Hazardous Waste.
“Safety-pins and spitting,” his mother said, disgusted. “Isn't it time you grew up?”
Fifteen years old, he knew he'd got a whole life of being grown-up ahead of him. Smoking, drinking and singing angry songs with piss-awful lyrics and no tune was much more fun.
His mum went up the wall when she found out he'd been bunking off school. Said there'd be no more pocket-money all summer, not that there'd ever been much.
“You can do some bloody work for a change. Chip-shop, shoe-shop, I don't care.”
But jobs were in short supply that summer, even crap part-time jobs. Which is how Greg ended up working for Mr Rush, sweeping up and scrubbing floors in the butcher's shop. He wasn't allowed near the knives. Probably just as well. Ed, who'd worked there since he was a boy, was down to three and a half fingers on his left hand.
Rush had a temper on him, for all he could be charming to his female customers. The shop sign said Rush & Son, but Son had long since buggered off to work with someone else.
“My Chri', they used to fight,” Ed said, savouring the memory. “Just as well he did go. Sometimes I thought the old man would swing for him. Might have done if it hadn't been for Mrs R. She kept the peace as much as anyone could.”
Halfway through the second week, Mrs Rush's nephew arrived. Must take after the Glaswegian side of the family, Greg thought. Robert was small and wiry, dark-eyed and sharp-featured. Looked a bit of a scrapper, for all he was so slight; scar over the right side of his mouth, and his nose had obviously been broken at some point. Stronger than you'd think, too: he made handling the heavy cleaver look easy. Greg could see Rush sizing him up, trying to work out if it'd be worth changing the shop sign to Rush & Nephew.
It took him three days to work out the answer was no, and from then on in it was a war of attrition. Robert did as he was told, but with a distinct fuck-you air - he'd roll his eyes and give that crooked sideways smile, his skinny body insolently shrugging or slouching. He couldn't have made it much clearer he thought his uncle was a wanker if he'd taken out an ad in the local paper.
Greg thought Rush had it coming, and it was fun to watch. He was still a bit wary of Robert, though. Two years is a big age gap when you're fifteen, and Robert made him feel like an ignorant sheep-shagger. Greg didn't need some jumped-up tosser going on about what a provincial shithole this place was, thank you very much; he knew that already. Anyway, if Glasgow was so bloody marvellous why didn't Robert just bugger off back there?
The answer to that one was simple. Whatever Robert Graham had been getting up to back home, the family obviously didn't want him doing it on their doorstep.
“They sent him away,” Greg's mother said. “Mrs Rush told me. I don't want you hanging around with him after work. That boy's a bad influence if ever I saw one.”
She never did know how to manage him.
“D'you like punk?” Greg asked the next day.
Robert pulled a face. “Most of it's shite. Why?”
“Just wondered,” Greg said.
No point inviting him to come and hear Hazardous Waste, obviously.
“So what sort of music do you like?”
“You trying to get off wi' me or something?” Robert asked, laughing.
Bastard. Greg felt himself going red. “Piss off.”
“That's a no, is it? Shame,” Robert said. He went back into the front shop, leaving Greg feeling he'd just made a total prat of himself.
That, and wondering if Robert really thought that's what he'd been trying to do. Or if Robert wanted to get off with him. Never occurred to him before, but now he couldn't stop thinking about it.
He couldn't sleep that night. Too hot, and his mind kept replaying that exchange with Robert. But this time Greg was all cool and in control, saying “Might be. Why, you interested?” and Robert was saying “I am, aye,” and backing him up against the big freezer and shoving a hand down Greg's jeans and fuck he was hard, hard right now thinking about Robert's thin strong fingers on his cock, rough and quick and sure as he teased him and laughed at him and made him come right there in the back shop with Rush and Ed just the other side of the wall, Christ, yes, like that, ohh -
He buried his face in the pillow to muffle his groans as he came, and fell asleep still haunted by Robert's sly knowing smile. The same smile he gave Greg next morning, like the bastard knew he'd been jerking off thinking about him.
The first time they had sex was two days later, in the flat over the shop.
“The old feller's taking Auntie out tonight,” Robert said. “D'you want to come round?”
“OK,” Greg said, heart pounding, mouth dry with excitement.
“Bring some records,” Robert said. “If you've got any that aren't shite, that is.”
“'Course,” he said, though he wasn't sure what would pass that test.
Ian Dury, Elvis Costello, Squeeze, Graham Parker...
“No' bad,” Robert said, going through the pile. “Not bad at all. Smoke?”
“Haven't got any,” Greg said, embarrassed.
“'s OK, you can have one of mine.”
Roll-ups and rough cider and record after record. Sitting on the floor leaning against Robert's narrow single bed.
“Here,” Robert said, “bought this on Saturday.”
A simple four-note pattern, repeated on the piano, and then it changed, came back to the start and off again. The voice had a rough edge to it, vulnerable and strong at the same time, pulling at his insides:
Take me now, baby, here as I am,
Pull me close, try to understand...
He looked at Robert, uncertain, and Robert looked back. Not teasing now, but not making a move either. Waiting. His eyes were very dark. Greg felt dizzy, wanting, not knowing how to ask.
Because the night belongs to lovers,
Because the night belongs to lust...
Robert took another drag on his cigarette. Greg couldn't look away from those hands, that mouth, wanting them all over him. Bastard was just making fun of him again, tormenting him with that long slow stare that made heat pool in his belly and at the base of his spine. If he made a move, Robert would just laugh and push him away.
Wouldn't he?
Not laughing now, though.
“Oh for fuck's sake,” Robert said, exasperated. “Are you just gonnae sit there all night?”
He grabbed a fistful of Greg's t-shirt, hauled him close and kissed him. Greg gave a small surprised yelp and kissed him right back.
It was like his last kiss - Janie Lewis at the school disco, two years ago, awkward and clumsy - and it was nothing like that. He twisted his fingers in Robert's hair and pulled him closer, bumped heads, apologised and burst out laughing. Robert was laughing too, and then he wasn't, and Greg was flat on his back underneath him, not quite knowing how he'd got there, dizzy from the feel of Robert's erection digging into his hip.
“Stop arsin' about and gi' me a proper kiss,” Robert growled.
That meant tongues, right? Greg swallowed nervously, opened his mouth, closed his eyes and went for it, hoping it wouldn't be too revolting.
Robert tasted of cider and smoke and salt; Greg licked at the taste and felt him shudder. He opened his eyes, worried he'd done something wrong, but Robert's face was too close to see properly. On the other hand -
On the other hand, that tongue pushing between his lips, that body rubbing against his, didn't feel like Robert was going off the idea. And those hands fumbling to pull Greg's t-shirt up and undo his jeans, oh god -
Really embarrassing, making that noise, but he couldn't help it, the touch of Robert's hands on his bare skin was too much. Robert wasn't being quiet either, swearing raggedly in between the kisses and gasps for breath.
He couldn't get Robert's zip undone, making a mess of it now, Robert batting his hands away and saying “Fuckin' let me”. Tugging his jeans down and oh Christ he's not wearing any pants, the thought of Robert like that all day was almost enough to make Greg come there and then. He gritted his teeth and concentrated on thinking of Geography lessons, cabbage, scrubbing the floor of the shop -
Christ. The feel of Robert's cock pressing against his was so good he thought he might pass out from excitement. Robert spat deliberately in his hand and rubbed it on him, on them, wrapping his hand around them both and squeezing, pulling, once, twice, three times -
It was like when he did it to himself, and it was nothing like it at all, the feeling coming right up from the soles of his feet to the top of his head as he cried out and came, like being turned inside out, hollowed out, dumped on wet sand by a great big fucking wave, all the breath knocked out of him.
“Sorry, sorry, fuck,” he gasped, shaken by the pulses going through and through him.
Robert's hand kept moving, slipping and sliding in the mess he'd made and squeezing till Greg whimpered and Robert cursed and shook and he felt wet heat spurting across his stomach and chest.
“Jesus fuck,” Robert said, and collapsed on top of him.
Greg groaned at the unexpected weight - heavier than he looks, he thought dizzily. His head was spinning and he felt uncomfortably sticky.
“Christ, what a mess,” Robert said after a while.
More like boasting than complaining, Greg thought. He'd got enough focus back to see that Robert was looking even cockier than usual. There's a reason for that, he thought, and snorted with laughter.
“You laughing at me, you cheeky sod?” Robert said, mock-menacing. He poked Greg in the ribs.
“Fuck off,” Greg spluttered, counter-attacking.
“OK, OK, stop!” Robert said, grabbing his wrists and pushing his hands above his head. He kissed Greg again till he was groaning and squirming, wanting more.
“Christ on a bike, look at the time,” Robert said suddenly, scrambling off him. “They'll be back any minute. Get cleaned up and go home, for fuck's sake.”
So what happens now? He didn't feel brave enough to ask, but the question must have shown in his face.
“That wasna' bad for a first time,” Robert said. “Not bad at all. They're out again on Wednesday.”
“So we can do it again?” He was shaking with how much he wanted that.
Robert grinned. “Oh aye,” he said. “I'm countin' on it.”
Wednesday was the slowest day to arrive in the history of the known universe. Wanting to touch Robert all the time when they were in the shop together was such a torment Greg thought he'd go mad with it. But it was worth it when Wednesday finally came.
*~*~*~
Come on now, try and understand
The way I feel when I'm in your hands...
He couldn't listen to Patti Smith for years afterwards. Hard to say which memory was more acute: the almost unbearable pleasure of what their bodies did together, or the pain of how it ended.
*~*~*~
It was Rush's temper that undid them, finally. Shouting at Greg late one afternoon for lazing around doing fuck-all instead of scrubbing the floor.
“Waiting for the water -” Greg began.
“Don't give me your lame bloody excuses, you useless fucking waste of space!” Rush yelled.
He grabbed Greg's wrist and shoved his hand down into the galvanized bucket, then let go, cursing in shock. The old boiler was overheating so much these days that the water came out scalding. As Greg would have told him, if he'd listened.
Rush's shock was so funny that Greg couldn't help laughing, despite the pain of his own scalded hand.
The next minute, he was lying in a heap on the tiled floor, Rush's blow still ringing in his ears, and Rush was shouting “I'll give you something to laugh about, you little shit, I'll bloody marmelize you!”
“Don't you fucking well lay a finger on him!”
Greg hadn't seen Robert pick up the big cleaver. Hadn't even known he was there.
“Don't, Rob,” he said. “I'm OK. Put it down.”
Rush turned on his nephew and went on shouting: “I'll get you put away, the pair of you, see if I don't, I'll have Fred Johnstone on you, send that fucker to Borstal and you to jail, you evil little bugger, so you can get your scrawny Scottish arse fucked by a proper man, you'd like that, wouldn't you, never see your bum-chum here again I swear -”
“You do anything to us, anything at all,” Robert said, suddenly quiet and sure, “and I'll kill you. Now shut your filthy mouth and stick your hand under the cold tap.”
Greg looked up and saw Ed staring, open-mouthed, standing on the threshold of the back shop. How long had he been there?
“Cold water's a good idea,” he said, as calmly as he could, getting to his feet and turning the tap full on in the stone sink. “Sorry, Mr Rush. I did try to warn you about the boiler.”
Rush slammed out of the shop, banging the yard door so hard the place shook. The three of them looked at each other in silence.
“I'll be closing up, then,” Ed said after a pause, shuffling into the front shop.
Robert was shaking. “That bastard. That fucking bastard. Who's this Fred Johnson anyway?”
“Johnstone,” Greg said. “He's the Chief Constable. I think they're both in the Masons.”
“Fuck. Fuck. I will, I'll, I'll kill him. I mean it.”
Greg took his hand out of the cold water and looked at the blisters forming on it. He wouldn't be playing the guitar for a while.
“I should get this seen to,” he said. “Don't do anything stupid. Promise me. Promise me. Robert.”
“OK,” Robert said. “But I'm not stayin' here.”
“No, of course not,” Greg said, surprised. “I'm not staying either. But I'll need to get some things if we're going.”
“A' right,” Robert said. “Don't be long. I'll pack my bags and be ready.”
*~*~*~
“Are you OK?” Smith asks.
Lestrade comes back to himself with a start, to find the Yarders staring at him, Watson looking concerned and Sherlock still doing his best impression of a thundercloud.
“Yeah, sorry,” he says. “I was miles away.”
The song's still playing in his head, take my hand come undercover, they can't hurt you now...
He remembers the scene as if it were yesterday: Rush's body on the floor in the back shop, blood everywhere, the big cleaver lying next to him. And Robert, white-faced and shaking, blood on his hands and his clothes, saying “I was goin' to do it, but it wasn't me, he was there a'ready.”
Knowing Robert's prints would be on the cleaver. Knowing that wiping it wouldn't do any good after what Ed had seen and heard.
The hurried parting, Robert promising he'd write. The postcard, weeks later, postmarked Halifax, Nova Scotia, saying “Lots like me here but no-one like you. R xx”. Then nothing.
The thoughts that went through his head, seeing the Johnstones in town. Knowing what people had said about Rush being a ladies' man. Knowing if anyone could cover up a murder, it'd be Fred Johnstone, with his connections. Not that he needed to. Because everyone knew Mrs Rush's nephew was a bad lot, and it was obvious what had happened.
Ed kept him out of it; never said what the row had been about. If he knew. And Greg pretended he had no idea, just said Robert and his uncle were always quarrelling. Which was close to the truth, and no truth at all.
Not the sort of story you want to share with the team, somehow.
“Think I'd better head off,” he says. “Catch up on some sleep.”
He's not really surprised to find Sherlock waiting for him when he gets home. Lestrade's got used to him letting himself in whenever he feels like it. Doesn't even bother changing the locks any more. Though he never quite knows how Sherlock still manages to beat him to it every time. Maybe Mycroft has a secret helipad or something.
“You think you know who really did it,” Sherlock says accusingly.
“Yeah, well. Can't prove anything. He's dead now anyway.”
One too many Masonic dinners, heart attack, served the bastard right.
“The other man,” Sherlock says. “You could still clear his name.”
“He changed his name when he left,” Lestrade says. “Robert Graham doesn't exist any more.”
He's lived with this defeat so long, he should be used to it by now. But it weighs on him just the same.
Sherlock looks at him. It's not the impatient look Lestrade would expect when he's said something manifestly stupid. It's more - puzzled, sort of. Almost troubled, except nothing really troubles Sherlock, he knows that.
“He might like to come back to life, though,” Sherlock says. “Don't you think?”
“I don't know where he is,” Lestrade says.
This time Sherlock does look impatient.
“I doubt he's beyond the reach of all news media,” he says. “Wherever he is, there's a chance he'll hear about it eventually.”
“Still,” Lestrade says. “No proof.”
Sherlock raises an eyebrow.
“Oh right,” Lestrade says. “Three decades later, you're going to find the evidence and hand the local police their arses on a plate.”
“I thought you could do that bit of it,” Sherlock says smugly. “You've got a couple of days leave, haven't you? We could go down there tomorrow.”
Lestrade finds he's feeling a bit choked. Which is just daft. He clears his throat and says “OK. Thanks.”
Sherlock's scowling again, which seems a bit perverse given he's just got his own way. That and the prospect of a case, you'd expect him to be bouncing off the walls like a hyperactive toddler.
“What's the matter?” Lestrade asks. Probably pointless. Sherlock won't tell you unless he feels like it.
Apparently he does.
“Robert Graham,” he says, as if the words taste nasty.
“What about him?”
“He was your first lover, wasn't he?”
“Yes,” Lestrade says.
“Thought so,” Sherlock says gloomily. “It's the way you look when you're thinking about him.”
Oh, for crying out loud.
“Sherlock,” he says, trying not to laugh, “it was 1978. You were two years old. Unless I'd waited to have sex till I was, I dunno, thirty, there's no way you were going to be the first.”
Sherlock is plainly sulking, just the same.
“You know what?” Lestrade says. “I blame the parents,” and then he does start laughing.
Sherlock goes on glaring for a bit but finally joins in.
“Come here, you silly bugger,” Lestrade says. “Let's go to bed.”
He's a bit too tired for a proper shag, but that never stops Sherlock. And once Sherlock gets going Lestrade's not slow to catch fire himself.
Jealousy always makes Sherlock want to top, which isn't their usual way round. Not that Lestrade's complaining. His arse is going to ache tomorrow for sure, but right now this is perfect, one leg hooked over Sherlock's shoulder and the other wrapped round his waist, meeting Sherlock thrust for thrust as they near the finish.
“Fuck, that's it,” Lestrade says, clenching around Sherlock's cock, “right there, yes.”
He comes so hard he feels wrung out, limp and groaning as Sherlock goes on fucking him through the aftershocks.
“Oh, oh god,” Sherlock says. “Fuck,” and he's coming inside Lestrade, spasm after spasm, then pulling out and collapsing across his chest.
“Oof,” Lestrade says. Six feet of consulting detective is quite a weight, more than Robert, shouldn't be thinking about Robert right now but maybe it's not surprising that he is.
He doesn't usually let himself be demonstrative but he can't resist stroking Sherlock's hair, gently pulling and twisting it, scratching his scalp. Sherlock's softening cock gives an unexpected twitch against his thigh, and Lestrade laughs and kisses the top of his head.
“You know, I wouldn't know what to say to him if he did come back,” he says, tracing the line of Sherlock's neck with one finger.
Sherlock wriggles and makes a sort of harrumphing noise. “Not my problem,” he says.
“Never said it was,” Lestrade says mildly.
“Don't start getting ideas about us, Lestrade,” Sherlock warns.
Bloody cheek.
“I'm not the one who keeps turning up in your bed,” Lestrade points out.
“It's just sex,” Sherlock says defensively. “It doesn't mean anything.”
“Obviously,” Lestrade says. “Same here.”
They both know he's lying. Neither of them's quite sure whether Sherlock is too.
Another snatch of the song echoes in his head:
Love is an angel disguised as lust
Here in our bed till the morning comes.
“What are you smirking at?” Sherlock demands suspiciously.
“Nothing,” Lestrade says. “No reason.”
He knows he's grinning like a loon, but he can't help it, looking at Sherlock tousled and flushed and naked in his bed. Again.
Because the night belongs to us, he thinks.
“No reason,” he says again. “Just because.”