Charles by Con Riley

26

Googly eyes and glue pots scattered as Hugo was caught in an embrace by a man who Charles had heard of, but somehow hadn’t pictured like this—full of life and very present, enveloping Hugo and squeezing him as if he’d never let go. His hold forced out the kind of laughter from Hugo that Charles lived for—had been the one person to prompt its emergence.

Until now.

Again, Charles felt dislocated from the sounds of the classroom—from the children’s excitement at having this surprise guest, Hugo’s happiness in their reunion so infectious. He also didn’t hear what Hugo said to the man when he finally let go.

All Charles could do was stand back and cover the front of his chest, holding in something so new he hadn’t had the time yet to name it. Something that throbbed at the sight of Hugo pressing the heels of his palms to damp eyes before hauling a man who Charles had only thought about in the abstract into his arms again.

Hugo held Nathan and didn’t let go, his arms tightening, not getting looser.

Charles caught Ruth’s eye and gestured, holding up a hand to indicate he’d be back in two minutes.

The corridor outside was blissfully quiet, full of the oxygen the classroom had somehow been missing. Charles walked away before grinding to a halt and looking backwards. He tried to drag in a deep breath. Found he couldn’t. Pulled out his phone, needing Keir’s voice more than he had ever, but stopped before dialling, a message from his brother waiting.

George: You’ll be home tonight, yes?

That was more a demand than a question, George being his usual bossy. But he read a second message, and reconsidered.

George: You promised, remember?

He had, but having Charles home couldn’t seriously make any difference to George, could it? He started to text that, but his hand shook. Why, he asked himself. What the fuck was up with this weird physical reaction to seeing a joyful moment for someone he….

For someone he should want to be that happy.

He clenched his fist before trying to text again, then tried clenching his jaw too, but that didn’t steady him either.

A flurry of more texts arrived.

George: Live up to that title in front of your name, for once, won’t you?

George: Honourable, Charles, remember?

His heart still thumped, each of his inhales and exhales ragged, but his hearing came back, because he heard one of the doors that he’d just passed open.

“Charles? Are you okay?”

Charles swivelled to face Sol, who came out of his temporary art room.

“Oh, no you’re not, are you? What’s happened? Is it one of the kids? An accident?”

Charles shook his head. “N-no. They’re fine. I just needed—” Behind him, another door clicked open, along with the sound of Hugo talking, a stranger’s voice joining his in laughter.

Hearing must have done something visible to his face because Sol caught his arm. “Come in,” he said, ushering Charles into his thankfully empty classroom. Charles saw the images that had so struck him last time, and headed for them, confronting a truth he couldn’t ignore. Not now he’d seen the reception Hugo gave a man who’d been with him when those wounds had happened.

Seeing Hugo like this, his face raw and eyes hooded, was a stark reminder. Not just of injuries Charles had barely seen the tail end of, but of the fact that beyond the bubble of this time together, Hugo had another life. A whole one, with someone who meant the world to him. A life he’d pick up when he left here.

Of course he will. He told me so.

And I want him to.

“Charles?”

He turned to find Sol watching, his dark gaze wary.

“I’m fine.” He scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Just needed a few minutes.” He shrugged, making light of a moment that weighed heavier than it had any right to. Then he made himself a liar as Hugo and Nathan walked the corridor outside.

Hugo slowed and peered through each window.

Charles ducked behind an easel, not coming out until Hugo and Nathan’s footsteps faded.

“Sure you’re fine,” Sol said. “You absolutely don’t look like someone who’s just been kicked in the nuts at all.”

“My nuts are fine.” Charles blew out a breath. “I’ve just been….” He had no problem locating the right word this time. “Stupid.”

Sol surveyed his face, thoughtful. “I’ve been meaning to catch up with you. Did you suggest to Hugo that he should come and sit for us again?”

Charles nodded. He had during an evening where Hugo had looked like a different person to the man in all of the artworks here, so relaxed and happy.

Sol touched his shoulder, his hold light as if he knew something inside Charles had come loose, steering him in front of a canvas. “I painted him, this time.”

It was the worst thing he could have shown Charles, but somehow it was needed, because here was confirmation of Hugo’s future. One where he’d be as happy as in the classroom every day now, going forwards.

Whole-hearted,Charles thought. With nothing missing.

Charles stood closer. Couldn’t help it. Drawn to touch the contours of a face that he’d kissed so often; that he’d traced with the tip of his finger that morning. Hugo’s painted smile was vivid, and Charles saw why. He held a sheet of that distinctive writing paper that littered their dining table.

A letter from Nathan.

He would have jerked back if Sol hadn’t still had his arm around him, because this was confirmation of what he’d witnessed.

That’s what real love looks like on him.

Charles didn’t know where he found the strength to move.

Didn’t know how to put one foot in front of the other, but he made his way back to the door.

“I told Ruth I’d be right back. Thank you for….” For what? For giving him somewhere to hide? Or for showing him a truth he’d somehow missed?

Had he?

“Just thanks, Sol.”

Charles left, leaning against the closed art room door for a long moment, steeling himself to go back to his own classroom, but he saw Luke at the far end of the hallway, heading in the same direction, and a fragment of a conversation surfaced that he’d all but forgotten.

Charles repeated what Luke had told him. “Hugo had someone he was close to at uni who he was still involved with.”

Had involved meant more than Charles had assumed at the time, going beyond a shared repatriation mission? That would explain why Luke had moved out of their shared flat at uni because—

“Three was a crowd,” Charles said under his breath, deflating.

He couldn’t have been talking about the actual space in their flat, but about Luke not wanting to be a third wheel in a relationship that, with every step Charles took back to the classroom, he saw evidence of being far from over.

All those early morning phone calls.

And all those late-night letter-writing sessions.

Every quiet prayer Hugo whispered before sleeping.

They had all focussed on one person.

And, Charles remembered, as he got to the classroom door, Hugo had said he wasn’t a virgin because of lack of offers. He’d been at uni when he’d agreed to wait for someone special.

Charles couldn’t blame dyslexia for missing that subtext.

“Fuck me, but I’m so much more than stupid.”

“Charles?”

He blinked to find Luke was much closer. His gaze fell to the tight hold Charles had on the door handle.

“Are you going in?”

Yes. He’d have to. Have to pull himself together, and go in right now, if only he could make his hand work.

“Wait,” Luke ordered. “Charles, are you okay?” he asked in a repeat of Sol’s question.

“Me?” Charles said. “Of course I am.” He plastered a smile on his face. “Never been better.” His phone vibrated in his pocket. “Give me a moment?” He read two final texts from George that pulled no punches.

George: You made a promise.

George: An honourable man would keep it.

But Charles had made a promise here at Glynn Harber as well. One that meant staying until Hugo was happy.

He opened the door to find that Hugo must have circled the building. Now he was visible through the wide glass doors to the outdoor classroom, his arm slung around Nathan’s shoulder, his face animated.

God, he looks just like Sol’s drawing.

That really is what love looks like on him.

“Had a hell of a job keeping this secret from him,” Luke muttered from beside him.

Charles glanced sideways, catching a note of coolness. “You’re happy to have Nathan back though?”

“Of course,” Luke said in that same cool tone, but it warmed slightly as he added, “Those two belong together.”

Charles swallowed around a lump in his throat that showed no sign of shifting. “They do?”

Luke said what Charles couldn’t avoid any longer. “Nathan always made him happiest.”

I should want that for him.

An honourable man would.

But wanting that for him was hard when it came at a cost Charles hadn’t anticipated. There was no way to ignore Hugo’s pleasure, and seeing it shouldn’t have hurt, he told himself. He shouldn’t have minded or cared that Hugo pulled Nathan closer, both of them laughing at something that he could only guess at.

It was bad timing, that was all, he told himself, that he saw Nathan catch Hugo’s face to claim all of his focus, a move Hugo had made so often with Charles—touching his chin until their eyes met.

It twisted a blade inside him.

Luke couldn’t have noticed that pain or he wouldn’t have told Charles, “Hugo will be even happier to hear that Nathan’s planning to stay for the rest of the school year. It’ll be just like old times for them to bunk together again.”

At the stables, where there were only two bedrooms.

A last straw landed that Charles hadn’t known would break him. “Yes,” he said, gritty. “Hugo’s happy, so at least that’s one chore off my plate going forwards.”

Luke frowned. “What do you mean?”

“What I said.” Charles was too bleak to do anything but speak plainly. He curled his hand around his phone in his pocket, for once taking strength from George’s reminder. And not only to come home, but also to act with honour.

“I promised to stay until he was happy. I’ll move out over half-term break.” Withdraw, without causing a scene, no-one the wiser that he’d been a fool who’d mistaken practice for real emotion.

It was the right thing to do.

Even Luke nodded as if he agreed.

So why did it feel so wrong?

Hugo saw him then. He pulled away from Nathan, but reached back for his hand, pulling him into the classroom with him. “Charles. We looked for you. Come and meet—”

“Nathan.” Charles held out his hand, shaking Nathan’s briefly, taking in a smile rivalling Hugo’s for width, and hair that fell to his collar.

For fuck sake, he even looks like Jesus.

“Charles is… He’s…” Hugo seemed to hit a verbal brick wall.

“A bit of an angel, from what this one’s told me,” Nathan suggested. “You’d have to be to share living quarters with him. Does he ever take his nose out of a book? I’d always have to work hard to get his attention.”

That couldn’t be true, not with the way Hugo looked at him now, bright and warm and open.

Charles could hardly bear the way Hugo’s expression shifted as his gaze swung from Nathan to him, that openness seeming to condense and darken. He couldn’t make himself listen as Hugo tried again to describe him.

“Charles is my—”

“Soon-to-be ex housemate,” Charles blurted. “I’ll be out of your hair for half-term.” And afterwards too. Charles sent up a prayer of thanks that Keir would be home soon, so he could stay with him until the school year ended. “I’m going home once today’s over, so you’ll have the stables to yourself tonight.”

Hugo’s grin wavered. “You are? But I thought you were staying here instead of going home? You said you’d come on the High Tor training with me tomorrow.”

“Can’t.” Charles caught a glimpse of himself in the full-length mirror in the dressing-up corner, amazed he was whole instead of fractured. He patted the pocket holding his phone. “Urgent summons from home. I’ll be off as soon as school’s over, so you two can reconnect without me playing gooseberry.”

“Gooseberry?” Hugo said, his smile slipping.

Charles ignored his question, casting what he hoped passed for a smile Nathan’s way instead. “It sounds like you’re a man of action. Taking my place on the moor for the practice camp won’t be a problem, will it? It would mean Ruth’s husband could get away if she needs him.”

“Share a tent with Hugo?” Nathan looped an arm around Hugo’s neck, and ruffled hair that Charles had stroked back from his forehead in bed that morning. “Won’t be the first time. We’ve shared a lot of tight spots over the years, haven’t we? We’ll just pick up from where we left off.”

Charles didn’t wait around to hear Hugo confirm that. Couldn’t. “If you’ll excuse me. Got a lot of glitter to sweep up.”

He busied himself, aware of eyes on him for a few minutes, but saved by the three men leaving, only Ruth there to witness him let out a breath that felt endless.

“Charles? Are you—?” she started to say.

“Please don’t ask me if I’m okay,” Charles said, glad when she listened to him, because he didn’t have an answer.

* * *

Nathan and Hugoweren’t at the stables when Charles finished work, the last splinters of his stupid emotions swept up with the glitter, but a stranger’s jacket was draped across the sofa as sign that they’d been back there.

Charles dug his case out of the wardrobe in his bedroom and started to fill it, piling clothes in without thinking, his thoughts stuck in a sick loop.

I’m not running away.

I’m giving them space.

I’m not running away.

I’m doing exactly what I promised.

Now, if only feelings he’d never asked for, and hadn’t known he harboured, would catch on and hear that message, he might make himself move faster. Get out of there before they got back. But like the paint he’d mixed for Hugo, his clear thoughts soon turned muddied.

This shouldn’t feel weird, he told himself as he scooped up the last of his clothing. Shouldn’t feel wrong. He grabbed his wash bag and moved to the bathroom, about to add his toiletries, but the sight of the condoms his bag held stopped him.

It was sex, that’s all.

Sex.

So why did he feel as though he was bleeding?

It wasn’t as if shrapnel had struck him.

But it hurts.

Hurts like I stood too close to a bomb without knowing.

I had no idea there were explosives in what we were doing.

The strength of that was breathtaking.Charles stood in the stable’s bathroom with his head bowed, and had never felt weaker.

He wished he wasn’t alone then.

Wished so hard for Keir, when he knew that was pointless. Then he thought of his family, picturing his brother with his jaw clenched like he couldn’t make himself do right now. Those texts from George spurred him.

Honourable, Charles, remember?

Going home was the right thing to do. For him and for Hugo.

Wasn’t it?

He left the bathroom, but paused by Hugo’s open bedroom door where the sight of a stranger’s rucksack on his bed stopped him dead in his tracks.

That’s Nathan’s bag, not a stranger’s.

Books spilled from it that matched the ones on the bedside table. Books that might as well have been written in Latin for all the sense they would have made to him.

Charles went back to his room—a room he’d started to think of as theirs—and slammed the lid of his case down. He wheeled it to the front door, opening it to find Hugo about to slide his key into the lock.

“Hugo.”

“You’re leaving now?” His gaze was as bruised as the first time Charles had seen him. “Why so fast?”

Charles didn’t have it in him to lie. “You don’t need me.” That sounded weak. He firmed his chin. “George does.”

Hugo didn’t say anything for a long moment, so Charles pulled his case over the threshold, but Hugo didn’t back up to let him go any farther, blocking his way to the Defender. “Were you going to see me before going?”

“I….” Charles looked back into the stables, a building he’d first walked into when he’d been a different person. One who didn’t bleed his feelings, blood pooling inside where no one could see it.

“You really weren’t going to say goodbye to me?” Hugo asked again. He stepped closer. “Charles, are you—?”

Charles didn’t have it in him to hear one more person ask if he was okay.

He kissed Hugo to stop him.

Make it last.

Charles did, suitcase abandoned, arms looping around Hugo’s neck, pulling him down into a kiss he hoped didn’t feel as desperate to receive as it felt to give.

Hugo’s lips parted, their tongues meeting in that way that set off the usual tingles, the fizz of those bubbles rising, but each one popped now that Charles had seen Hugo truly happy.

That’s what you wanted.

It was true, but it didn’t make letting go any easier.

It’s the right thing to do though.

Had to be. For once, he’d followed instructions to the letter. Seen a job through from start to finish. At least George would see the honour in it.

He shrugged his way out of Hugo’s hold, who seemed reluctant to let go until Charles said, “It’s been fun.”

“Fun?” Hugo dropped his arms, taking a step back, which was all Charles needed to grab his case and trundle past him, walking fast while fishing for keys that he fumbled, dropping them at the driver’s side door.

Hugo followed and crouched, grabbing the keys and looking up from his kneeling position, no sign of the pain that had been there when Charles had started his role here to make Hugo happy. Now a different version etched it.

“What do you mean by that, Charles? What was fun?”

Charles repeated what Luke had listed weeks ago. “Doing the job that Luke gave me. Cheering you up. Taking your mind off your set back. Making you happier.”

“Happier? Luke…? You…?” Hugo got up, and maybe his knee twinged because he staggered slightly. He glanced back at the stables. “That was only fun?”

No.

Charles got into the Defender, wishing it would live up to its name too, and shield him from what crossed Hugo’s face after he turned back.

His heart wouldn’t let him ignore it.

He rolled the window down. “Hugo—” He didn’t know what to say. Hadn’t been in this spot before, not even once in his whole lifetime. Didn’t know how to convey that he’d have given anything to be the man who made Hugo as happy as he’d just witnessed. Not only in his bed, but out of it too, sharing his faith and interests. Able to match him long-term in the ways Hugo must find fundamental.

Important.

Vital.

But Charles couldn’t.

He was only glue and glitter. Nathan was Latin and Greek.

“So you’re definitely not coming on the challenge?” Hugo asked.

Charles started the engine. “I’d only get lost again.”

“I wouldn’t let you.”

“Nathan will go—”

“That’s not what I asked,” Hugo shouted, rocking back as though the noise surprised him, pigeons on the roof scattering, winging their way skywards like Charles wished he could too at that moment. “You can still come,” Hugo insisted.

Another voice called out—Nathan’s from the school’s back door.

“Hugo. There you are! Why did you leave me with Luke? And how come he’s even more uptight than ever?” He sauntered across the courtyard, and pulled a face Charles might have found comical if another person had worn it. Might have laughed at, or empathised with at the start of his stay here. But all he saw was red.

“Luke isn’t uptight,” he said stoutly, defending him coming easily now Charles knew more about him. “He’s got a hell of a lot on his plate.” And on his shoulders too, if the school was in trouble.

Nathan either didn’t hear him or ignored him. He reached the side of the Defender and slung an arm around Hugo’s shoulders. “For God’s sake, don’t leave me alone with him.” He did what Charles had witnessed one time too many already, touching Hugo’s face to turn it his way. “Come on. I need you.”

And Hugo had needed Nathan too, Charles knew. Needed him enough to bookend his days with Nathan. Every single morning and evening since he’d got here.

That didn’t make Nathan tugging, and Hugo following, easier to see.

The steering wheel creaked.

Charles had to work hard to unpeel his fingers from it.

“Give me a minute, Nathan,” Hugo said.

Nathan let go of him, but he didn’t back off. He grinned and said, “Okay, but hurry up. We’ve got a lot of lost time to make up.”

“This won’t take long,” Hugo promised.

Then he turned to Charles, and his face shuttered—still instead of mobile. “I thought you said that wild horses couldn’t make you go back home?”

Charles didn’t have an answer.

“Do you know where we’ll be if you change your mind?” Hugo asked.

Charles nodded, unable to speak, his throat thick.

Maybe Hugo’s was too because he didn’t say goodbye either.

Charles drove away, glancing back in the rear-view mirror, but Hugo had gone already.