Commitment Issues by Ali Ryecart
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Freddie
The slam of car doors and the shouts and screeches of kids dredge me up from sleep, but I don’t want to wake up, I want to stay where it’s cosy, where I can nuzzle up against the warm, hard body next to me.
I prise my eyes open and my heart all but jumps into my mouth, as the night before becomes the morning that is.
Next to me, Elliot’s sprawled out, one leg bent at the knee. The duvet’s slipped during the night, leaving him naked. I stare down at him because it’s impossible not to.
He’s beautiful, but I already know that. His light olive skin looks warm to the touch and my fingers ache to drift over him, over the skin stretched tight across his firm muscles. He’s sleeping, his chest moving up and down in a steady rhythm. My gaze drifts to his flat, taut stomach that’s splattered with the dried-up, crusted cum from when we’d made love.
Made love.
I inhale a sharp breath. No. It’s dangerous to think of what we’d done as that. We had sex, just like we had sex in France. It was the outcome of two men who’d wanted each other, allied with opportunity. A plus B equals C, although as I stare at him, with visions of last night flashing though me, it feels like two and two making a whole lot more than five.
Elliot shifts, and coughs, his spluttering shaking him awake. His eyes open wide and blink a couple of times. He looks vague and fuzzy and disorientated as he turns his head to me and blinks again, looking at me as though he has no idea who I am, and I’m taken aback by how much that hurts.
I never was any good at the morning after the night before, and I force myself to smile and cringe inwardly when I hear the false cheer in my voice.
“Morning. The bathroom’s just across the hall, if you want a shower.”
“What? Er, no. Thanks. It’s probably best if I get dressed and go.”
He must see something in my face, like the drop that feels like it’s a thousand feet and counting, because he stills, half way through pushing himself out of bed.
“I’ve got a conference call later this morning. A follow up from my Oslo trip, and I have some papers to read through first.”
He says the words gently, not taking his eyes from mine. The I’ve got work line. I’d heard it so many times before, a thin excuse to run as fast as they could. It’d been like that with Paul until in the end he hadn’t even bothered to lie.
“Sure.” I nod and look away.
“Freddie!”
My head snaps around, Elliot’s voice is like a sting. His eyes bore into mine and I see the hint of anger glittering in their arctic blue depths.
“You think I’m lying, that I’m feeding you some half-arsed excuse to run off as fast as I can. I can see it in your face, so don’t insult me by saying that’s not what you’re thinking.” His voice is clipped and crisp, because he knows that’s exactly what I am thinking.
“I—”
“Shush.”
He presses a finger to my lips and it takes everything I’ve got not to suck it deep into my mouth. Underneath the cover, my cock twitches.
“Come with me if you don’t believe me.” He’s still staring at me, and his eyes are issuing a challenge. “The call’s at eleven, and then we can have lunch. If you want to.”
His finger slips from my lips, but he still stares at me. The challenge, the daring me to disbelieve him, is gone, replaced with something else, something I can’t put a name to. He’s become serious and closed off and inward looking.
“Come back with me, Freddie. We need to talk.”
“What about?”
“You know what about.”
The sounds of a door banging and a toilet flushing are signs that the house is coming alive. Cosmo’s up and about, and my stomach plummets at the thought he’ll see Elliot walk out of my room. He’ll have questions because he always does, but how will I answer them when I don’t know the answers myself?
I nod, as I look down. Because he’s right. We do have to talk, and try to put a name to whatever it is we are.
“I’ll, erm, jump in the shower. Are you sure you don’t—?”
Elliot shakes his head. “I’ll call a cab for half an hour’s time.”
He leans down and rifles through his clothes to find his phone, and I scramble from the bed, dashing for my dressing gown hanging from the hook on the back of the door, shy at him seeing my nakedness. Christ. The things, wonderful spine-tingling, sweaty, naked things we’d done together, and I’m shy?
I dash from the bedroom, throwing a quick glance over my shoulder, my heart skipping a beat as he orders a cab to take us home.
* * *
“Hey, Jasper.”
I kneel down beside the mutt who looks like he’s smiling and rub him behind his ears. He makes an odd squeaking noise in the back of his throat before it works its way up into a little yelp of a woof, and without thinking I drop a small kiss onto the rough fur on top of his head. A second later, he’s wriggling on his back, presenting his pink tummy for a rub.
“You’ve got a friend for life,” Elliot says.
I look up and find him smiling down at me and the dog, and holding two mugs of tea in his hands. I’d not even realised he’d put the kettle on because I’ve been so wrapped up in Jasper. Something in my chest hitches. The whole scene feels homely and domestic when it’s anything but. I push myself to standing and take one of the proffered mugs. We’re here to talk, and my nerves jangle as my stomach tightens.
Elliot sits down at the kitchen table and I follow him. I stare down at my mug, turning it around and around in my hands, hardly heeding the scalding heat. He wants to talk. He can start, because I’ve not got a clue where to begin.
“About last night — no, not just last night but about France, too. None of it was supposed to happen, but I don’t regret it.”
My heart flips and I look up at him. There’s a hesitancy in his eyes, and I know he has more to say. I wait, hardly daring to breathe.
“The age difference between us—”
“So?” I say.
“Doesn’t it bother you? Honestly?” He looks startled, as though he’s not expected me to be so blunt. “France was one thing, but—”
“No. It didn’t bother me in France, nor last night. I’m an adult, Elliot, not a kid. I made my own choices, both times.”
“I never said you were a kid. I’ve never regarded you like that.” He smiles, just for a moment. “You’re way too smart.”
“That’s what Viking studies does for you.”
He laughs, and shakes his head, his expression lighter, but almost immediately it falls away.
“I like you, Freddie. A lot. I’m not just talking about—well, you know. I like you.” He pushes his fingers through his hair, an almost nervous gesture that gives him away. “I love spending time with you, I want to keep spending time with you, but I need to be straight down the line, because it wouldn’t be fair otherwise. To either of us. I’m not ready to — to be involved again. Not properly. Not yet. I need breathing space.”
Breathing space, to get over Gavin.
“You’re not looking for a relationship. I get it, but you don’t hold the patent on that.” My words sound casual, almost glib, but they’re knives slicing into my throat. The truth is, I’m being ripped in two. I want him as much as I don’t want him, because I know the danger I’m on the edge of toppling into. “What is it you’re saying to me, Elliot?” I know, but I need to hear him say it.
And here we are, at the nub of it. He’s gazing at me, the air around us so charged, it’s as though a storm’s coming. My gut spasms, and my nerve endings burn. I know what he’s going to say, but still I sit and wait.
“I want to see you again. Like last night, but as friends.”
“As friends, because you need breathing space.”
“Yes.”
Friends. I have a choice, a decision to make, and I bite down on the word, sucking and savouring it. Tasting it. I know what he’s asking of me and I know I should leave and not look back.
As… friends.
I don’t do no strings. I don’t do casual. I don’t do friends with benefits. I’m an aberration, I’m out of kilter and out of step. I can’t fuck around with somebody because it’s convenient. Because convenient can be put aside as easily as it can be picked up.
“As friends?” I say again.
He nods.
And I should go. I should kiss him goodbye and leave, taking good memories with me. I should leave, and not look back.
But this is Elliot, and although the voice in my head’s screaming at me to say no, I can’t.
I can’t do it.
“Yes.”
The word shivers through me. We lean into each other, and kiss, because I’ll take whatever he can give me and know I must live with the consequences.
* * *
Alone in the kitchen, I scroll through my phone looking at all the rubbish on my Facebook feed. Jasper’s lying across my feet. He’s only a small dog, but he’s solid and heavy, and my feet are starting to go numb. I try to pull them out from underneath him, but he makes a funny little growling, snorting noise and I reach down and stroke his silky ears and smile as he rewards me with a nuzzle into my palm.
Elliot’s in his home office, somewhere upstairs, and he told me to make myself at home before he went off to take his conference call. I’ve only been here once before, and the kitchen’s just about the only room I’ve been in. I’m curious to know more about the house and what it might reveal about the man who lives here. But I don’t want to wander around, looking in this room and that, as though I’m poking into his life when I’m clearly only to remain on the edges of it. But he did say…
“Hey Jasper, you want to give me the guided tour?”
The dog looks up at me and cocks his head, his long, pink tongue lolling from the side of his mouth. He staggers up, as if he understands my words.
With Jasper padding alongside me, I make my way down the hallway to where I guess the living room is. I can’t help smiling as I stand on the threshold, and I breathe in deep. The air holds a hint of Elliot’s tangy cologne, and I know already he spends a lot of time in this room. Stepping inside, I take it all in.
Like the kitchen, it’s a mishmash of styles. A huge fireplace, unlit at this time of the year, with a big vase of dried flowers in the grate. Facing it are a couple of big squishy and comfortable-looking sofas, strewn with cushions. Even though it’s a large room there’s something cosy about it.
The walls are cream painted but there’s not much wall on show, because much of it’s covered in colourful framed prints. One whole wall is a huge bookcase, and if I didn’t already like him a lot, I like him way more now. There’s something that’s conspicuous by its absence — no TV or any kind of home cinema, just a small docking station for an iPod and tiny speakers in each corner of the room. But what there is, is a record player, and vinyl. Shelf after shelf, stuffed with vinyl.
“Should I have a look, Jasper? What d’ya think? He did say make myself at home but will he think I’m just being nosy?”
Jasper looks up at me with his big brown eyes and makes some sort of strangled noise in the back of his throat that I take to be a yes.
I pull out some of the vinyl, or albums as my mum and dad insist on calling them. Nothing seems to be in order. Jazz rubs shoulders with opera, which nudges up against ’80s New Romantic and ’90s indie bands. And classical, lots of classical. It’s the same with the bookshelves, the contents eclectic and jumbled. There’s a lot of financial and economic tomes along with political and business leader biographies, but there’s also social history and fiction. The fiction, especially, looks well read and loved, the spines broken and tattered. I smile as I spot a familiar title and pull out the battered paperback. Winnie the Pooh.
Happy birthday, Elliot. Lots of love from Grannie.
I wonder how much of Gavin there is in this room but I already know the answer. This room is Elliot and I suspect it was both his refuge and sanctuary when they lived together.
Putting the book back, I sweep down and bundle Jasper up in my arms, rubbing my face in his rough coat.
“I like this room, Jasper, I like it very much.”
“I’m glad you do because it’s my favourite room in the house, or maybe I should say it takes joint first place with the kitchen.”
Elliot, standing in the doorway. He’s showered, and his James Bond suit’s been cast aside in favour of loose jeans and a plain, lightweight navy jumper, but he still manages to look like he could be on the cover of a men’s style magazine, the casual issue.
“I, erm, hope you don’t mind? You did say—”
“To make yourself at home. If I didn’t mean it, I wouldn’t have said it. I’ve finished my call, so would you like some lunch?”
I nod. “I would, although I think you need to do some shopping. I made myself some more tea when you were working,” I explain. “There’s not much in your fridge.”
“No… Perry, my assistant, he usually arranges my grocery delivery, but with me being away recently, and now he’s off for a couple of weeks…”
He looks embarrassed, and no wonder. “Your assistant arranges your shopping for you?”
Elliot shrugs and gives me a sheepish grin. “He’s so much better at it than me. Last time I tried to put in an online order, I ended up with a box of mangoes and a tin of cat food. We can go out for lunch, if you like?”
“There’s not much but there’s enough to make something to eat. And afterwards, I’ll put the order in for you.”
