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“How about we plan something nice for next weekend? We could ask…um…maybe we could ask that new colleague of yours and his girlfriend if they’d like to join us for dinner somewhere?”
Our social life—yet another minefield to tiptoe through. One by one, Sam’s friends had started reproducing, farting out babies left, right and centre. My sister and her kids were a no-go area too—I’d taken to visiting them on my own, always with a ready excuse as to why Sam couldn’t make it. Over the past year, our group of friends had steadily diminished to single figures and box sets.
“Yeah, maybe.”
God, I needed a drink. Grabbing my wallet, I left my room and headed for the pub next door. Some decent grub and a couple of pints, to help me sleep. Mid-week and out of season, the bar was pretty quiet—its only patrons people like me, passing through.
A few tables had been commandeered by a rowdy gaggle of young men and women in business suits. A group of casually dressed, middle-aged blokes, maybe on a golfing trip, judging from their clothing, gathered around another. Staying overnight in hotels alone wasn’t something I did very often, and, self-conscious about sitting at a table on my own, I selected a stool at the bar.
The first pint of bitter slipped down a treat, as did the second. My shoulders dropped from around my ears and my jaw unclenched. I made short work of a third too, to wash down a greasy burger and chips, then, feeling bloated, I switched from gassy beer to red wine. I hated the cliché that men didn’t understand women, but Christ, I didn’t understand my wife.
“Do you mind if I sit here, mate? The match is starting.”
I shook my head and smiled politely as a man, maybe a year or two older than me, took the adjacent bar stool. Wallowing in my own misery, I hadn’t noticed I’d selected a seat with a prime view of the widescreen television. I recalled from the radio on the drive down that Chelsea had a home match. I preferred rugby, myself, but there were worse ways of whiling away a couple of hours than in front of the football.
“No, go ahead. Which team do you support?”
The man dropped his voice conspiratorially, glancing up at the barman sporting the blue of Chelsea. Draped over the optics was a matching scarf. “Manchester City. But don’t tell anyone in here. I’ll get lynched.”
His amused, soft northern tones were comforting. “That accent’s a giveaway.” I signalled to the barman for another glass of red. My companion chuckled and nodded for one too.
“Shall we split a bottle?” he suggested. “If you’re staying for the game. Cheaper for both of us.”
Feeling mellow, I readily agreed before ordering one bottle of Shiraz and a couple of bags of crisps. God, I deserved this, didn’t I? A break for a few hours, perched anonymously on a bar stool, quietly getting pissed and talking about nothing? A hiatus from eggs and temperature monitoring, from wives and careers? My new companion poured two generous glasses and we clinked them together.
“Cheers.”
It wasn’t until halftime, as Chelsea trailed two-one, that I realised my new pal, Gerard-from-Liverpool, was flirting with me. Even more shocking, came the realisation I welcomed the attention and mildly flirted back. After Matt, I’d made an effort to parcel away that side of my nature; the more attractive of my male friends and colleagues would be gobsmacked if they had an inkling of how much they brightened my day.
None of them were a patch on Matt Leeson though. Gerard didn’t come close either, even though a rumpled grey suit and white shirt, with the top button undone, was a good look on him. Carefully cultivated black stubble disguised a soft jaw line, but he made up for it with a cheeky grin and a bucketload of Liverpudlian charm. Being short and dark-haired helped, because I’d worked out long ago that when it came to men, I had a very specific type. Even if I’d never done anything about it.
A second bottle of peppery, fruity Shiraz meant I didn’t pull away when Gerard’s knee and shoulder nudged mine. On the contrary, I let his knee linger, the warmth of his lean thigh titillating through the overlying fabric. A fuzzy image of Samantha asleep in our marital bed, at home and alone, floated into my head, then out again just as fast. It was her bloody fault I was getting hammered in the first place, instead of snoring peacefully next to her.
Gerard stood, excusing himself to visit the gents. Drunken me didn’t equate him briefly placing his palm on the small of my back as a step too far for a married man. When he returned, drunken me didn’t push his hand away when it settled on my thigh, not budging even when Man City scored the decisive winner in the closing minutes. Drunken me struggled to focus on the game.
“I think it’s time to leave, don’t you?” Gerard suggested, draining the last of the wine.
Sober me, bravely clinging on to my pissed soul suggested I should have left an hour ago. Sober me wished I’d ordered room service and plumped for an early night.
“Yeah,” I slurred as I rose unsteadily to my feet. Christ, what the hell was happening? The room started to spin. “I’ve got a bloody job interview at nine o’clock in the morning. Need my beauty sleep. Can’t…can’t drink anymore. Need to…need to…get the job. Make wife happy.”
“I bet you make your wife very happy.”
Gerard’s insinuation purred in my ear, so close I could smell cheese and onion crisps on his breath. A bolt of nausea shot through me. Bloody hell, I couldn’t recall being this pissed ever. I was a two pints of lager and a packet of crisps kind of man. Especially since we’d been trying for a baby. No wonder I was so drunk. Alcohol had been added to a long list of forbidden pleasures over a year ago, alongside pleasure itself. Whereas the stranger now holding me upright, a little more intimately than strictly necessary, was offering no-strings pleasure on a plate.
Soft, dark scruff lay just inches from my face and I so badly wanted rub my nose in it. If I tilted my head down the tiniest fraction, I’d be able to taste it, too. Taste him. One of Gerard’s narrow hips, so damned fine with a skinny grey suit stretched across it, bumped mine as we tottered out of the bar. My fingers itched to grab it, circle my big hand around that jutting hipbone and drag it closer. To rub my hard dick up and down it. To slot my groin against his. Gerard’s fingers, that promised so much as we watched the match, ghosted across my arse. I shivered.
God, I could do this. No one would ever know. Samantha would never find out. I would invite Gerard back to my room. For one night, my hazy, pissed brain could make believe that this short, dark stranger and my Matt were one and the same. If I closed my eyes, if I concentrated, I could have my beautiful boy back once more, if only for a few hours. I could tell him what I’d wanted to tell him all those years ago and never had the chance. How much I loved him, and even though I’d tried so hard, I’d never loved anyone as much since. That I never would. That I didn’t think I ever could. That I was sorry I hadn’t been old enough to understand he was broken. That I hadn’t been old enough to fix him.
Back then, my confused, adolescent mind hadn’t the maturity to process my inherent attraction for both sexes. Bisexuality—Christ, I hadn’t even known the term existed. But I’d understood need and want, and what I had with Matt Leeson, for those few precious months, had felt more right than anything since. My heart ached, my balls ached, my soul ached, for just one more kiss. One more touch, one more mischievous smile, one solemn promise never to run away from me again.
As I stumbled outside with Gerard, a blast of icy onshore wind slapped me across the face, stealing the breath from my lungs as smartly as a rugby tackle to my solar plexus.
And with that sharp, urgent jolt, sober me rallied, reminding drunken me I wasn’t that sort of husband. The cheating sort. The sort who picked up strangers in bars, of any gender, when I had a wife back at home. In horror, I recoiled, staggering away from my companion, roughly knocking him backwards against the unforgiving brick wall of the pub.
“Ow! What the fuck?”
“Oh God, oh God. I’m so sorry.” The words flew out of my mouth in a garbled rush. This wasn’t me; this wasn’t me. I had a wife, I was married. I was a good husband. I didn’t cheat. Beer, wine, and fatty food swirled in my guts as I buried my face in my hands, desperately trying to suck in huge gulps of the frigid night air.
