Take My Breath Away by Ali Ryecart
Chapter Thirty-Eight
JAMES
Another bottle of champagne arrives. I’m not sure how many that makes because I stopped counting long ago.
A smart, expensive Soho bar, with drinks including the never ending flow of champagne, courtesy of the host. I’ve had more to drink than I normally would. I’m not drunk, exactly, but it’s fair to say the edges have been blunted.
The evening started out sober and restrained, in one of the council chambers at work. Worthy speeches and polite chitchat all served up with warm cheap wine and under-seasoned canapés. A long-standing colleague’s overseas posting has been officially marked and as soon as it was over, a small group of us made a discrete departure to here, to the chic, sleek bar for a private party that’s a lot less sober, in all senses. I hadn’t really wanted to go, but it would have been churlish to say no. I’d intended on staying for a couple of drinks, before heading home to Perry. But that was hours ago, and the champagne keeps on coming.
“Anything take your fancy?” Sam, my soon to be departing colleague, slumps into the seat next to me.
I follow his gaze beyond the roped-off area that’s for our party alone. There’s plenty to take my fancy, or there would have been not so very long ago. Now, I’m only looking. That’s all. The way I was in the pub not so long ago, when Perry dashed off to talk to Alfie. No harm in looking. Just as I thought then, it’s all about whether you let looking turn into more. And that’s not going to happen.
“No, not tonight.”
“Really?” Sam tops up my glass. “That’s not the James I know and love. What’s happened to the man who can fuck his way through half the population of London without putting a hair out of place?” He half snorts and half burps and I shrug. There’s a lot of truth in what he says, but I can’t say I’m thrilled with the description. “Not seen you around the clubs and bars much in recent weeks. It’s been noted, you know.”
I don’t for a moment believe my absence has been deemed noteworthy.
“I’ve been busy with other things.” I don’t say anything more but Sam’s drunken, beady eye is on me.
“Don’t say you’ve met somebody? You? James Campion, who pounces on anything with a pulse?” His eyes widen in almost comic incredulity, but I don’t rise to it.
What and who Perry and I are to each other is for us alone. Other than Elliot, nobody knows about him. I’ve not introduced him to any of my other friends yet, but I will do soon. For now I want Perry all to myself, and if that makes me selfish then so be it. Perry’s not a topic up for discussion and certainly not with Sam, not when he’s pissed and not when he has a loose mouth.
“So, you’re off to the fleshpots of…”
Sam’s plum posting overseas is enough to knock him off the scent, and we spend the next few minutes talking all about that before one of his friends, somebody I don’t know, comes to drag him away.
I’m left alone for barely a minute or two, before I’m joined by a couple of guys, one of whom I know slightly. The other’s a stranger.
The one I don’t know wants to get to know me a lot more, if the press of his thigh against mine and the overt and frankly laughable come-on in the way he licks his lips and runs his gaze up and down my body is anything to go by. Sam’s little barb is wrong. I don’t go after anything with a pulse. I have my standards, and can more than afford to be fussy. And this guy doesn’t meet them, even if I were on the lookout. Which I’m not.
I get up to get away from his clumsy and drunken attempts at seduction. I could tell him straight out I’m not interested, but I don’t want to embarrass him by telling him he doesn’t have a hope in hell’s chance, and decide instead to be kind.
“I’m just heading outside.”
His eyes light up.
Oh, Christ… Of all the things to say. He thinks it’s an invite.
“I’ll join you.” In his haste to get up and follow me out for something he definitely won’t be getting, he stumbles and knocks over his chair.
“No, that’s okay. I’ve got a phone call to make. To my boyfriend,” I add.
A least that got through…. The guy’s face drops just as he slumps back into the chair he’s just uprighted.
I shove my way through the crowd. It might be new and sleek, but it’s a typical Soho gay bar and it’s full. Hips, arses and cocks nudge, and arms snake round waists. Men in twos or threes or even more, slip off to the toilets, sometimes surreptitiously but mostly brazen. It’s hot and sweaty, and excitement and anticipation pulse in the steamy air.
I’ve been to a million and one places like this and I’ve done it all and taken everything that’s been on offer. It’s exciting, the thrill of what the night might bring, it’s impossible to deny and it’s exciting still, even though I’m going to refuse anybody or anything that puts itself in my way. I haven’t been to a place like this for ages, and I’d be lying if I said I’m immune to the thrill that’s running through the air. The issue is whether or not to give into the thrill, and there’s only one answer to that.
I push my way out, not through the main door, but a smaller one that takes me outside and into a side alley.
The air outside is cold and crisp, and I take a deep breath and lean back against the wall. The alley’s long but narrow, and although Soho’s teeming streets are only footsteps away, the sound of the crowd’s muted.
Plunging my hand into my trouser pocket, I pull out the squashed packet of cigarettes. I rarely smoke anymore, but just sometimes I crave the hit of nicotine. It’s a filthy habit and at odds with keeping fit, but still, here and now it’s what I want. I light up and take a lungful of smoke before letting it go on a long, steady exhale. God, but it tastes good. It’s another thing I haven’t done much of recently.
My phone, which is the whole excuse for me being out here, presses against my chest from my jacket inside pocket. Perhaps I can give Perry a call, just to see how he’s doing… But I decide not to. He’s with his Alfie, who’s now back in London from wherever he’s been shepherding, or reciting poems, or what not. It’s hard to imagine Perry having a friend like that. No, I won’t phone, I won’t disturb him, but just as I decide not to my mobile pings as a text drops in.
Long journey back to Highgate… had a few beers… staying the night….The message ends with a row of kisses and I can’t help but smile. I plug in a quick response telling him I hope he’s having a good time and I’ll see him tomorrow, adding a row of kisses of my own. Putting my mobile away, I take another drag on my cigarette and close my eyes.
I really need to give this up properly, and for good. But not yet.
“Hello stranger.”
My eyes snap open. In front of me just a step away is the last person I expect to see.
Aiden.
He smiles and looks at me through hooded eyes.
Despite the cold, he’s only wearing a T-shirt which hugs itself to his muscled torso. Intricate inked patterns snake their way down both arms. His jeans sit low on his hips revealing a flash of firm abdominal muscles. He looks good, but he’s always looked good. And I smile, returning the one he’s giving me, because I like him. We’ve never been anything to each other beyond filthily glorious sex, but I’ve always liked him.
“You never returned my text messages. I’m hurt James, I thought I meant more to you than that.” He pouts but his eyes glitter in amusement. He’s not hurt, and we both know it, but maybe he’s a little disappointed and it feeds my ego to think that.
“I sent you a text. I told you things have changed.” And then deleted your number…
“Didn’t get it.” He shrugs. “So what’s changed?” His eyes bore into me, as sudden realisation widens them. “Changed. You meanwith that friend of yours, the one who was with you in the café?”
“Maybe.”
I don’t offer any more information and he doesn’t ask. I take another draw on my cigarette and blow the smoke to the side.
“Got a spare?” Aiden asks, and I fish out the packet from my pocket.
He takes the cigarette but before I can offer him the disposable lighter, he plucks mine from my mouth and uses it to light his own. Aiden draws hard to light up, his generous lips tight around the tip. Something tightens deep in my stomach. He keeps my cigarette and gives me back the new one. Raising his eyes to mine, he smiles, as dark and dirty as ever, before he flops against the wall next to me. He’s close although not touching but I can feel his heat and I detect a tang of salt and sweat and cum on him. It’s a heady aroma and almost without realising, I breathe in deep.
“It’s good to see you again, James. Seriously.” There’s a sincerity running through his quietly spoken words, cutting through the heat of his flirting.
“It’s good to see you, too.”
He snorts. “But you’re only saying that because we’ve run into each other by chance.” He stares at me and even under the weak lamplight I see all his cocky artifice stripped away. There’s real hurt this time, in his voice and in his eyes, something I’ve never seen or heard before, and for a moment I have no idea what to say.
“Don’t tell me you’re actually properly with that young guy?” He laughs, and shakes his head. “I thought hell had more chance of freezing over.”
“Like I say, things have changed.” It’s all he needs to know.
“Changed. That word again.” Aiden pushes himself off the wall and steps in front of me. His body brushes mine, enveloping me in the sharp tangy aroma which is now illicit and out of bounds. “Changed? Really?” His lips lift in a lazy smile as he moves in closer.
He’s hard. I clamp my hands to his waist ready to push him off. Through the thin cotton of his T-shirt his skin’s warm and damp, and before I’m even aware of it, I’m breathing him in and digging my fingers into his flesh.
“You’ve not changed, James.” He’s hardly a breath away. His drink and cigarette roughened voice is low and gravelly, and he chuckles as he presses his erection against my hip. Tilting his head back, he moves in to kiss me and I slide my hand around the back of his neck.
“Oh no,” Aiden murmurs, “men like you, men like me, we never change. If you’re telling yourself that, you’re lying to yourself and that sweet thing—”
I whip my hand from him. It’s as if I’ve been burnt, and shove him away with all the force I can muster. He stumbles back, keeping his footing but only just.
“Fuck, no,” I rasp. “I’m sorry Aiden, I shouldn’t…” I squeeze my eyes shut and rub my hands down my face. I feel off centre, disorientated and sick to my stomach.
Jesus, but I’d nearly…
I pull my hands away from my face and open my eyes. Aiden’s staring at me, studying me, assessing me under the weak lamplight. His mouth lifts into a slow smile, but like the shine in his eyes it’s hard and cold.
“No, James, you’ve not changed. Haven’t you just proved that? It really didn’t take very much to tempt you from your newfound straight and narrow, did it? Men like you don’t change; they never do. Don’t fool yourself you’re any different.”
A moment later he’s gone. I scratch at my skin, feeling dirtier, filthier than I ever have before, wanting to scrub it all away until I bleed.
The champagne, the cigarette, and what I almost did, burn a hole in my stomach. I double up and vomit it all out on the pavement, emptying myself of everything except his words which clamour in my head with a dark and undeniable truth.
* * *
I don’t go back into the bar, but I don’t go straight home either. I walk around the busy, winding, twisting Soho streets, my footsteps getting faster as Aiden’s words seem to chase me down.
Clearer headed, but not by much, I tell myself I should bat what he said aside, that he’s wrong, that I have changed, but it doesn’t stop his words burrowing under my skin like a stinking parasite.
I can’t go home, not yet, because I’m ashamed. Ashamed of what I nearly let happen. It would have been easy, so, so bloody easy. A filthy kiss, a fumble for the belt and the zip, and then…
The sickness rises up in me again, but there’s nothing left to leave splattered on the pavement. Temptation, easy temptation I could never resist, grabbing it and gorging like a greedy child. This time I did resist, but what about the next time, or the time after that? I should go home, shower, clean my teeth and wash it all away, all the grubbiness I know is more than skin deep.
Lifting my hands to my face I sniff. I can smell Aiden on me, I’m sure of it. Cigarettes, sweat, and cum, the stench of clubs and bars and temptation. It makes me gag, and I stop for a moment, in a shop doorway, taking deep breaths to steady myself.
I’ve been walking the streets blindly with no idea where I’ve been going, but up ahead is a comforting neon sign, known and familiar. Café Alberto, where I found a drunk and dejected Perry all those weeks ago. His clumsy flirting, almost boyish, it made me laugh but even then it struck a match inside me lighting up a dark little corner of my heart. A chance encounter. I took him not just into my home, but into my heart, and everything changed.
But men like me don’t change. I don’t change.
I barge in and seek out the table in the shadows where I found Perry. It’s occupied, by lovers smiling and kissing half hidden in the gloom, and instead I stumble into a seat up against the large plate glass window overlooking the busy street. I order a coffee but barely taste it as I stare out at the life tumbling around outside.
A couple of young guys come in, laughing aloud in between whispering and giggling all over each other. Mid-twenties, Perry’s age or thereabouts. They flop down at one of the tables, kissing and whispering and kissing again, totally wrapped up in one another.
This is what Perry should be doing, with a guy his own age. He shouldn’t be with me, he shouldn’t be having anything to do with a man like me.
Don’t screw this up, is what Elliot said to me. My friend knows me so, so well. It’s exactly what I’m doing. The guy in the pub, the men in the bar tonight. And Aiden, let’s not forget Aiden, but there’s another man I should never forget.
Alex, the man I betrayed over and over, to my everlasting shame. The man I didn’t love enough. I ditched my slutty ways for him, that’s what I told myself, all those years ago. And I did, for a little while, until temptation crooked its finger and I didn’t think twice about following. I broke his heart and I vowed I’d never do that to another man.
I won’t do that to Perry.
As one, the two guys turn and look at me because I’ve been staring. One of them throws the other a questioning glance before he smiles at me. I stagger up, almost knocking over my seat, wanting to get out to escape their sudden sharp scrutiny, and the light in their eyes that tells me they know the kind of man I am.
I’ve made choices tonight, and they’ve been the right ones, but will I be able to make the right choices next week, or next month, or next year? Will I be able to shake my head and turn away from future temptation when I’ve never done so in the past? I don’t know, and that’s what frightens me. But there’s one thing I do know, and that it’s men like me don’t change.
