Tea, page 18
THEY HAD TO go home the next day.
John didn’t even care about the long drive. He was euphoric from their seafront kiss at midnight and the idiotic, almost giggly attempts at warming up in the car not twenty minutes later, stopped only from full-on back-seat sex by the stern look of a policeman as his patrol car trundled by.
So it was their last day—so what? John had woken tangled up around the most amazing person in the universe, knowing he’d get to do it back home too.
Even the drive home was incredible, Chris having finally found a radio station he liked and singing along to rock songs at the top of his lungs the whole way. And it was a long way, as snow had shut down the moors, and the New Year traffic was in full swing. He was a terrible singer, truly awful, yet so damn stunning, caterwauling without a touch of self-consciousness, so bold and bright and bloody brilliant that John enjoyed every second of ear-bleeding noise anyway. Even when they stopped for petrol, he criticised the band playing, and Chris wound the window down and screeched the whole song to him so loudly he was audible from inside the kiosk.
“Good New Year?” the cashier asked with a knowing smirk, and John blushed hard enough to set his hat on fire.
It was perfect. Damn Chris’s opinion: John was in love. Certainly in love enough to shut the singing up for thirty seconds by kissing him, before peeling out of the petrol station and the screeching starting up again.
The only downside to the entire week was the bit where John pulled up in front of Chris’s flat.
“Home sweet home,” he said and put the handbrake on. “I don’t want it to end.”
“You have work tomorrow.”
“Mm.”
“And I have to go and visit my mum.”
“Yeah…”
“And no doubt your sisters are going to want to interrogate you.”
“Christ, yeah.”
“But for what it’s worth, I don’t want it to end either.” Chris leaned across to kiss him sweetly. “Come over tomorrow night when you’re done with work?”
John smiled. “Love to.”
“I could make cannelloni. I’m good at cannelloni.”
“It’s a date.”
Chris grinned and reached for the door.
“Um, hang on.”
“What?”
John took a deep breath. “Um. I made myself a promise.”
“What’s that?”
“That after this week, I would meet your family.”
Chris blinked.
His hand left the door release, and the other groped for John’s and found it, still resting on the handbrake.
“You sure?”
“Yeah.” John took a deep breath. “I—this is going to sound stupid.”
“Try me.”
“I figured if your friends didn’t hate me, and if you spent a whole week alone with me in a place you didn’t know, then—then maybe even if your family thought I was this—I was a—what Daniel said…maybe even they said it, you’d not…believe it.”
Chris sighed and squeezed his wrist.
“‘Course I don’t believe it,” he whispered.
“And maybe they’d not be able to change your mind.”
There was the crux of it. John knew how easy it was to twist a mind. To change it. John knew the truth about what he and Daniel had had, yet Daniel’s persistence in his lies got even John questioning it. Chris might know what he was, but families, loved ones, held enormous power. And they could make him question things, just as Daniel had made John.
Chris chuckled. “See, there definitely speaks a man who hasn’t met them. And still doesn’t know me too well yet. This mind isn’t for the changing.”
John laughed weakly.
“You sure?” Chris prompted.
“Yeah. Bloody terrified, but sure.”
“Going to be totally honest, John. My mum’s probably not going to be too keen,” Chris said. “She’s…protective. My dad’s more…whatever, I’m an adult now. So, do you maybe want to start with Dad?”
“Isn’t he the Marine?”
“Yeah…”
“How is the Marine better than your mum?”
“From what you’ve said about your parents, I don’t see why this is the surprising way around.”
John coughed a laugh. “Good point.”
“Do you want to come over, or go out somewhere neutral, or—”
“Neutral. Um. Dinner out somewhere, maybe?” It would be more formal, but he could dress up a bit, hide the worst of the tattoos, and escape once the meal was over rather than being trapped in their house.
“I’ll sort something out.” Chris’s fingers tightened. “You sound edgy.”
“Yeah, well, I feel it.”
“Don’t. It’ll be fine. Promise.”
“Promise?”
“Absolutely promise. If it goes really wrong, you’ll get to see me explode in a temper, and I’ve got the feeling you might find that sexy.”
John found a smile and darted it Chris’s way. “Really?”
“Oh, yeah. You seem the type.”
“Dunno,” John said. “Might be a bit vanilla for that.”
“The fact you know what vanilla means says you’re not.”
John laughed.
“Anyway, I’m always sexy, so you probably will.”
“That’s true.”
“C’mon. Give me a kiss, then go away. Gina’s coming over this evening to get the tell part of kiss and tell, and I need to clean up before she gets here, or she’ll rearrange all my stuff in her tidying up.”
John laughed for real then and leaned over. The taste of coffee was becoming familiar.
“Thank you,” he said.
“For what?”
“Everything.”
NORA WASN’T HOME, so John found the business card and shut himself in his room with his phone. He would have to meet them. And despite Chris’s assurances, he was bricking it.
Part of him was terrified that, in spite of all Chris’s reassurances and all the perfectly logical, rational reasons why they couldn’t possibly think he was a ra—a thug, he would still freak out and have a panic attack.
John knew what he looked like in a panic attack. Clenched fists. Wide eyes. Scowl. Heavy breathing. Every muscle tense and bulging.
Scared.
Scary.
“Psalter Clinic.”
He swallowed. “Uh, hi. Is this—” Obviously it was the Psalter Clinic, idiot. “—Nadia Simmons?”
“This is their secretary.”
“I’d—I’d like to make an appointment.”
“All right.” A keyboard clattered in the background. “Are you a current client?”
“N-no. No.”
“All right,” she said again. “You’ll have to book an initial consultation. That’s forty-five minutes, at which Mx Simmons will go over what it is you’re seeking help with, and recommend a course of action. That consultation is free, any sessions after that are priced as on the website.”
John nodded, then rolled his eyes at himself.
“Sir?”
“Yeah. Sorry, yeah. Let’s book that.”
Keys clattered away for a long minute.
“The next available appointment is the seventh of February at two o’clock in the afternoon.”
John almost said: Well, it wouldn’t be two o’clock in the morning, would it? But he caught himself just in time. Bloody hell, Chris was catching.
Then—
“The seventh of February?”
“Mx Simmons is very busy.”
No shit. “Okay. Okay, fine. That’s fine.”
“You want me to book that for you?”
“Yeah.”
So much for seeing her before meeting Chris’s parents.
“What’s your name, sir?”
“John. Halliday.”
She rattled through a few other boring details, and then John was finally allowed to hang up. He wrote 7 Feb on the business card and went back into the kitchen to stick it to the fridge.
A month. Five weeks.
Okay. Five weeks was not that bad. He could cope with five weeks. Maybe Chris’s family would be too busy to meet anyway, so soon after New Year.
And if not…
Well, screw it. If not, John would just have to start practising breathing exercises. And not looking homicidal in the middle of a meltdown.
It would be fine.
Chapter Twenty-Three
JOHN’S PLAN WAS to try putting the dinner off until after he could at least have the consultation with Nadia Simmons, and then have it on neutral ground, armed with some coping mechanisms if he had another panic attack, and promising himself a nice evening with Chris after, no matter how it went.
The plan did not happen.
At all.
Work hit hard and heavy—New Year’s and taking down Christmas decorations caused as many electrical nightmares as putting them up in the first place. So John didn’t get to see Chris for a week, being too exhausted to stay over and Chris’s epilepsy putting paid to the weekend. It wasn’t until the following Tuesday before John got a cancellation and was able to lock up the van at four fifteen, free as a bird.
He ought to go and see Mum and tell her about his trip. He ought to pop down the supermarket and refill the fridge. He really needed to get his hair cut, and more antifreeze for the car.
Instead, he called Chris.
“Hello?”
“Hey, ba—beautiful. You free?”
“Uh. Well. Yeah.”
John frowned. “That didn’t sound convinced.”
“I’m free. Not feeling very well.”
“Oh.” John’s frown deepened. “You got a bug, or—?”
“Seizures.”
“Oh, Christ. Had any?”
“One this morning. Not sure if I’m going to have another.”
John bit his lip. After the run of the luck on the week away, part of him wanted to ride it out and not go round. And the other part told himself to man up—that if he wasn’t prepared to handle this part of Chris’s world, then he could sod right off and let Chris find a better man.
John squared his shoulders and his jaw.
“How about I bring some pasta and meatballs from that little Italian place you mentioned in Jordanthorpe, and a bottle of massage oil, and come over armed with food and a foot massage?”
“You sure?” Chris sounded uncertain.
“Sure. I want to see you, and if you’re not feeling well, maybe I can help you feel a little bit better.”
He could almost hear the smile in Chris’s voice. “That’d be nice. Thank you. But no pasta—makes me feel sick if I seize. How about Chinese?”
“No problem. Any favourite dish?”
“Anything with duck. And all the spring rolls, forever.”
“I know a place in Ecclesall that does duck spring rolls.”
“Bring me every single one in the place.”
“Got it. See you in half an hour, yeah? Love you.”
That earned him a spluttered laugh and another thank you, and despite the news, John found himself grinning as he heaved the van into gear and set off. He was in Jordanthorpe already—a quick jaunt into Ecclesall to get the Chinese, and then back up to Parson Cross. No problem.
The Chinese had only just opened, so everything was fresh out of the fryers, and John splashed out for extra portions of all the sides, wondering if, for seizures, bite-sized would be the way to go rather than real meal food. Was Chris sick during seizures? All the first-aid courses warned about it, but Chris had mentioned losing bladder control rather than vomiting, and he hadn’t been sick at the cottage that John knew of.
The sky was threatening more snow as John headed out for Parson Cross, but it held off, barely. It was a bruised brown colour when he finally pulled up, tucking the van carefully between the same Suzuki Jimny as last time, and a Peugeot with a pair of fluffy nipples hanging from the rear-view mirror. He juggled the Chinese cartons and was pondering how to get a hand free for the buzzer when a tall, skinny man with short, dark dreadlocks came out and held the door for him.
“Fuck me, mate,” the man said, grinning manically. “You got a thing, you ’ave.”
“Uh-huh,” John said, but the man decided not to hang about, and headed off. Apparently, he was the Suzuki driver. It screeched out of its space, barely avoiding taking John’s wing mirror with it, and set off down the hill. “All right, then,” John muttered to himself and headed up the stairs.
He kicked Chris’s door rather than knocked on it, and a couple of minutes later, it cracked open. The security chain was still on, Chris frowning around the edge of the wooden frame, and John rustled the bags.
“I bring food.”
“Oh,” Chris said and smiled. “Thanks, leave it there, and I’ll pick it up.”
“Charming.”
The chain fell free, and the door opened wider. “There’s an entry fee.”
“Oh yeah?”
“One kiss per food carton.”
“Oh, Christ. Right. Stretch up, then.”
Chris rose on his toes, precise as a ballet dancer, and John leaned down to pepper cheeks, lips, jaw, and chin with little kisses. When he was done, Chris laughed.
“How much did you bring?”
“A lot.”
Chris finally let him in and took the bags to let John take his shoes off. In socks and coat-free, John locked the door again and turned to squint at Chris a moment.
He looked tired. Stiff. He was moving slowly and almost delicately, and John frowned.
“In pain?”
“Little bit. Back aches.”
“Had another one?”
“Not since you called.”
“Going to have one?”
Chris sighed and braced his arms on the counter. Dropped his head. Lowered his voice.
“Yeah. Think so.”
“Okay. You wanna go sit down and let me—”
“No, I bloody don’t!”
The snap was sudden and vicious, and John flinched back. But just as sudden as the anger had sparked, it died again, and Chris ground a hand into his face with a groan.
“I’m sorry. Sorry. I—I just—it gets to me. People go into this awful mother-hen mode, and if I sat and let everyone do everything for me every time I thought I might have a seizure, I’d never stand up again.”
John licked his lips.
“You said you have tonic-clonic seizures.”
“Yeah.”
“So…the go stiff and fall over kind?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t want you cracking your head on the tiles,” John said. “I’ll sort food. You sort something on the telly.”
The angry line of Chris’s shoulders eased a little. “All right. What do you want to watch?”
“Nothing I have to have seen the first eight seasons of.” John deftly took over plates and forks and opening cartons. Chris’s kitchenette was so small it didn’t take much searching for anything, and soon he’d cleared off the coffee table and began to decorate it with cartons.
“Duck spring rolls,” Chris commanded, holding out a hand. John deposited the plate of them there, and two immediately vanished.
“Holy hell.”
Chris swallowed with an unholy wrenching sound. “Hey, I like them.”
“No kidding.”
Two more disappeared before Chris put the plate aside to pick a DVD case up from the TV stand. “Do you mind audio descriptive?” he asked as he fitted the disc into the player.
“No.”
“Good. You’ve probably seen it anyway.”
The first Hobbit film. He hadn’t. And he made the mistake of saying so.
“Excuse me?”
“What! I haven’t!”
“You’re a sick, sick man, Mr Halliday.”
John laughed, settling at the other end of the sofa and drawing Chris’s bare feet into his lap. He started up a gentle, dry foot massage as they ate. The audio descriptive was a little odd, but he got used to it quickly enough. After a few false starts—where John commented on the appearance of the actors, then flushed deeply and stammered apologies—Chris started to demand more of the hilarious descriptions.
They’d reached a part where a lot of short, fat men with beards were dancing and throwing blatantly plastic crockery around—despite Martin Freeman’s insistence it was his mother’s best china—when the first twitch happened.
John let go and eyed Chris warily.
“Chris?”
“Sorry.” Chris’s voice was a little vague. “Think—think I’m gonna go.”
John hastily removed the plate balanced on Chris’s stomach. “That’s all right.” He carefully extracted himself from under Chris’s feet. “If you have to go, just go. It’s fine.”
His heart was beating a tattoo in his throat. This was it. This was it.
Only—it wasn’t.
At least, for a little while. Chris was ignoring the film. When John tentatively uttered a few more absurd descriptions—especially about the homeless-looking gay wizard—they earned very vague smiles, and when he touched Chris’s hand, the fingers squeezed back.
And then Chris said, “Oh.”
It slipped out maybe eight or nine minutes after that heavy twitch. He made that single sound, and then his eyes rolled up in his head.
And he froze.
It wasn’t quite a stiffening, at such, though the way his feet jerked and his neck tensed, he would certainly have fallen over if he’d even been sitting up. For maybe twenty seconds, he stayed perfectly still like that, even his ribcage still. John stared. Counted. Held his breath alongside him.
And then the chest relaxed. The whole body relaxed. And—
Jerked.
The first shudder was powerful, seemed to almost rock the sofa, and a series of smaller twitches followed, radiating outwards from his spine. A hand caught the edge of the coffee table before John could block it, and he carefully shifted the table farther away. Chris’s feet scraped and scuffed against the arm of the sofa; his head rocked at the other, his long frame barely fitting. Thank Christ it was a three-seater. His mouth foamed; his throat made a horrible choking sound, and John tensed up in a panic. But the vomit never came. There was no pink tinge to the spit. And his chest rose and fell—in jerky, harsh breaths, yes, but it did anyway.
