Note: For those who haven't read Doing It Again/Say It Back, Brendan has recently started a job as manager of a club in the city centre, and Ste is working in (but doesn't own) a restaurant in the village. They're living together in Ste's rented flat.
Two days after I said to him that maybe we should look for a place to live in town, we're viewing apartments. Two days.
I thought he'd be slower to like the idea. He's lived in that same corner of that same village since he was a kid at school, so I thought he'd be nervous of moving; and I thought the idea of giving up the flat where his is the name on the rent book to live in a new one bought with my money, would set him off worrying about his independence. He gets like that sometimes, but not this time – or not yet, anyhow. I guess he sees the sense in living somewhere close to my new job, because with the hours I'm working we've not been seeing enough of each other, and when you've had years of your life taken from you, every hour together counts.
I'm not too fussed about the place we buy. There's a few things on my checklist: it's got to be in walking distance of the club; it's got to have someplace to park my car; it needs two bedrooms so the kids can have one when they come to us at weekends (they're still young enough to share) and it's got to be the kind of place that's always in demand in case we want to sell it or rent it out in a couple of years. That's when my contract managing this club finishes, and when my time on parole runs out so I'll be free to leave the country, and maybe – if we can sort something out with the kids, and if Steven wants it – we'll try our luck starting over in Dublin.
Anyways. One step at a time.
We're looking at this apartment, and it seems okay to me. It's got an L-shape living room on the corner of the building, and it's on split levels with the two bedrooms up a flight of stairs. There's people living in it but they're out and the estate agent is showing us around, and he's got all the jargon and I've stopped listening. We're in the kitchen and Steven's asking about which of the appliances are included in the sale or something, and I'm bored and staring out of the window.
He seems happy with the answers he's getting.
"Bedroom," I say to the agent.
The guy gapes at me for a moment – I don't know what his problem is – and then he recovers and he says, "Yes, of course. Upstairs."
We follow him up. He's got a nice little arse in the seat of his shiny suit, which is a welcome distraction from the crap he's spouting – well-appointed this, sought-after that, all the sales brochure bullshit.
The bedrooms look okay. I think we've seen all we need to see.
"Will they take an offer?" I ask the agent.
"Brendan," Steven says, "We in't decided yet."
"Shall I give you a minute?" the agent asks and he goes back downstairs.
"You don't like it?" I ask Steven, and I can see that his mood has changed since he was happily asking about the cooker and the fridge and whatever. "What's the matter?"
"Kitchen's too small," he says, and he stomps down the stairs and I'm left trailing after him as he says to the guy, "Sorry mate, not what we was after," and goes out of the flat door and down onto the street outside.
"What's got into you?" I ask when I catch up with him.
"Liked the view, did you?"
"What? Yeah, it was okay. Steven?"
"'Okay'? You practically had your tongue hanging out."
"What?"
"I saw you, Brendan!" He's stalking off down the street and I'm keeping pace with him, and people are throwing glances at us. "I saw you staring at his bum, so don't bother saying you never."
"What? His – ? Jesus, Steven, he was walking up the stairs right in front of us, where else was I supposed to look?"
"How d'you think I feel, right, when you're, like, flirting with some bloke right in front of me? 'Bedroom'..."
"I was asking to see the bedroom."
"It was the way you said it, all..."
"All what?" I grab him by the arm to stop him; he shakes my hand off him but he stops all the same, and stands facing me, and I ask, "All what, Steven?"
"All, like, sexy and that."
He's pouting, and the centre of his bottom lip looks dry and flaked, and I remember taking it between my teeth sometime in the early hours of this morning when we both woke up for kisses, and I remember holding his head in my hand so I could keep on kissing him when it got heavy as he fell back to sleep.
"I just wanted to see the bedroom, okay? Come on, d'you think I'm interested in some flashy kid in a nylon suit, with an iPad and a mouth full'a blarney?"
"Wouldn't put it past you," he says, but he's starting to look embarrassed now. "I'm being paranoid, aren't I?"
"Just a bit." I take his face in my hands and kiss him, and when I open my eyes I'm vaguely aware of the people passing by leaving space around us like a no go area. "I'm looking at flats with you, yeah? I got no interest in anything else."
"I know," he says.
"Come on. There's another estate agents there."
We cross the road together.
"You did look at his bum though, Bren, to be fair."
"I'm married, mate, I ain't dead."
We look at the details in the estate agent's window. There's a couple of likely-looking flats for the right price, then Steven says, "Look," and he starts reading from one of the screens. "Newly back on market – price reduced, it says."
Reduced or not, it's still twenty-five grand more than the one we've just looked at, and twenty-five grand more than I've reckoned on paying.
"Steven, that's – "
"Two bedroom top floor – that's what we want, innit, two bedrooms – exec... executive apartment in sou... something-after canal-side delve... dev... Is it department?"
"Development."
"Canal-side development. Canal-side, Brendan – I've always wanted to live by a river or something."
I touch his back.
"Come on," I say, and we go inside.
The agent's a girl this time.
She says the owner needs to sell it fast because their buyer pulled out at the last minute, so they're paying two mortgages till they offload this one. They've already moved out, so if we wanted it, we could move in as soon as the legal stuff was sorted.
We go and get my car, and meet the agent down at the property.
It's on the top floor of a three floor building. There's no lift but that's okay, the kids are way beyond the pushchair stage.
"This'd keep you fit," I say to Steven on the way up.
"I am fit. You saying I in't fit?"
"Nope," I say, and I pinch his backside and he says, "Ow!"
The agent looks around and I'm ready to say, You got a problem? but she gives us a smile.
We go into the flat.
"Everything you see is included in the sale," the agent says. "Blinds, light fittings, all the kitchen units and white goods, the designer sofa here, the built-in wardrobes obviously, and there's a bed in the master bedroom."
She walks us from room to room, which is stupid because it's not exactly huge and we can find our own way around; plus I can do without the commentary.
"We don't want no one's second hand beds and sofas and whatever," I say.
"Why not?" Steven says. "They're better than what we've got. My furniture's gonna look crap in here."
"Your furniture's gonna look crap anywhere."
Steven ignores that, and follows the agent into the kitchen.
"Bren, look, it's mint."
The kitchen, like the lounge – the living space, the estate agent calls it – has got a wide window looking out over the canal, but that's not the view I'm looking at. I'm looking at Steven assessing the stove and the fridge and the worktops, and he's half kid in a toyshop, half clear-eyed professional.
"He's a chef," I say to the agent.
"Oh, cool."
We have a look at the small bedroom.
"Not much room for two beds," I say.
"Two? It's more of a single bedroom really," says the agent.
"We got two kids," Steven says. "Only weekends and that, but... They could have bunk beds I s'pose. What d'you reckon, Brendan? The kids'll like that, won't they? Once they stop fighting over who gets the top one."
For a moment I'm back in prison, and I get the bottom bunk for the first few weeks before I'm transferred, and I'm looking up at the mesh of springs bulging under the weight of my cellmate, and I can hear it groaning every time he moves.
"Long as they don't creak," I say.
"What?"
"Nothing."
Steven lays his hand on my shoulder as the girl leads the way to the bathroom.
"There's a corner bath, and a shower unit..." She goes on saying what we're seeing, and when we get to the main bedroom she says, "So this is the bed that's included in the sale."
"We don't want someone's old bed," I say like I said before.
"Look at it though, Brendan. It's massive."
He has a point.
"It's king size," the agent says.
"We've gotta get a new one anyway," Steven says, "Ours is on its last legs, like, it dips down in the middle cos – "
"Alright, Steven." Jesus.
"No, but what's the point in getting rid of this one here and bringing in a new one just the same?"
"It's a good bed," the girl chips in. "The owner only left it because he and his girlfriend are both selling their properties to buy one together, and they don't need both their beds. Same with the sofa."
I'm being ganged up on.
"We ain't even said we're taking the flat yet, never mind the bed."
"Shall I leave you to have another look around and talk it over? I'll go and wait in my car, take your time."
"Thank you," says Steven, then when she's gone he says to me, "Don't you like it?"
"You like it?"
"I love it."
"Better buy it then, hadn't we."
He grins and throws his arms around my neck and we kiss. He's got a weatherproof jacket on and my arms are inside it, pulling him against me. I give his arse a squeeze, and kiss the side of his neck above his collar.
"Can you afford it though, Brendan? That posh bird says it's a bargain but it's, like – "
"Reckon we can afford it, yeah."
"You gonna get a mortgage then?"
"Probably get them to knock off a few grand for cash." I don't point out that no legit bank is going to give a loan to someone who's fresh from a two and a half year stretch for manslaughter. "Come on, come and flutter your eyelashes at the posh bird, see if you can get her to do a deal with the owner for us."
He glances back at the bed as we leave.
"That's like what we had on our wedding night," he says.
"Okay, Steven, we'll keep the bed if it'll shut you up."
"I know we will." He gives me a kiss on the cheek as we walk down the stairs, and we tell the agent we want to make an offer.
:::::::
He's got a shift to do at that restaurant, and I've got to get to work too. He says he'll get the bus to save me driving him to the village, so I pull up just after the bus stop and we wait in the car: no point him standing around getting cold. It's almost April, but there's not been much sign of spring so far – I don't think we've taken the kids to the park once without them putting on their wellingtons, and the heating's been on every day.
"Leah and Lucas are gonna be made up," Steven says, "Living right on top of the canal."
"We ain't got the place yet, we don't know if the guy's gonna accept our offer, so."
"Yeah, but if we do, they're gonna love it. And we're gonna love that king size bed."
"I dunno, Steven, the smaller the bed, the greater the proximity."
"The..? I don't know what that means."
"Closeness."
"Aww," he says, and he's laughing at me, "We can still be close in a big bed. Just means I won't have to lie in me wet patch, will I, cos we can just shift over."
"Very romantic."
"I'm just being practical, aren't I."
"That what you call it?" I catch sight of his bus in the rear view mirror. "Bus is coming. See you tonight, okay?"
"See you tonight." He kisses me quickly. "Love you."
"Love you. You better run."
I watch in the mirror as he joins the back of the queue and jumps on, then as the bus passes me he looks down from the window and gives me a thumbs-up.
:::::::
The flat is quiet when I get home from work. The light is on in the hallway, but Steven must have gone to bed.
I go into the kitchen and pour a glass of water from the tap. There's a note on the side: Tea in micro. Eat The Salad xx
He's set the timer so I press start, and next to the microwave there's a small plate of salad covered in cling wrap so I start eating it while I'm waiting. I watch the seconds counting down, and stop it just before time's up so it won't beep, because at this time of night noises always sound twice as loud.
It's a bowl of pasta in sauce, loads of Parmesan, and I eat it standing in the kitchen. I'm starving, and it's good.
I leave the plates with the rest of the dirty dishes in the sink, and I go to the bathroom. Showering can wait until morning – the walls in this place are so thin, the sound of the water in the pipes would wake him if he's sleeping – so I just brush my teeth and whatever, and then I go quietly into the bedroom. I sit on the bed and take off my shoes and socks.
"Hiya." His voice is slurred with sleep. "You only just got in?"
"Few minutes." I twist around and look at him in the faint light that's coming from the hallway through the crack in the door. "I wake you?"
"Couldn't hardly sleep anyway, thinking about that flat. Did you see I brought you some dinner home from work? It's in the microwave."
"Just had it. You make it?"
"Course."
"Thank you." I shift to sit nearer the head of the bed. "Fuck all to eat at the club. Just peanuts and, I dunno, olives and whatever."
"Cocktail cherries." His teeth gleam in the dark when he smiles. "You should do proper food, people always wanna eat, don't they."
"It's a nightclub."
"I know, but the upstairs bit, people were all sitting around, weren't they, when I came to see you, not just dancing and that."
I reach and stroke my fingers through his hair. It's shower-soft, and mussed up from the pillow.
He hauls himself up the bed a bit so his shoulders rest against the wall.
I switch on the bedside lamp. I want to see his face for this: that's why I didn't phone him to tell him.
"The estate agent called this afternoon," I say. "The fella selling the flat, he's accepted our offer."
He looks blank for a moment, and then he says, "Does that mean – ?"
"You better call your landlord tomorrow, give in your notice."
"We got it?"
"We got it, Steven."
He scrabbles towards me and kisses me.
"That's brilliant! I knew we would, I just had a feeling, me."
"I gotta go see a solicitor tomorrow, get things moving. Sort out the money too."
I don't tell him that the first call I had from the agent was to say our offer had been turned down, and I had to make a higher offer – higher than I wanted to go – and sweated for an hour until the next call came to say we had a deal. Steven doesn't need to worry about that.
He rests back against the wall again.
"How long till we can move in?"
"Dunno. I'll see what the solicitor reckons. Few weeks I guess."
"I wanna start decorating."
I put my hands under the bottom of his T-shirt and push it up, and he leans forward so I can pull it off over his head.
"It don't need decorating. Looked alright to me."
"It's boring though, all white walls," he says.
"We ain't having fucking flowery wallpaper like this place." I stroke down his chest and stomach.
"Shut up, I don't want flowery wallpaper, Brendan. We at least gotta do the kids' room though."
"Okay." I stand up, start unbuttoning my shirt. "You gonna turn over?"
He shuffles down the bed a little and rolls onto his belly. I drop my shirt on the floor, then pull the cover off him and watch him wriggle his boxers down; I pull them off his ankles for him.
"Know how much notice I'm meant to give me landlord?" he asks.
"Dunno. Coupl'a months? On your knees, yeah? On all fours."
He raises himself onto his knees and elbows.
"But we don't have to stay here, do we, if it's like two months?"
"No, we can move to the new place soon as it's ours." I kneel beside him and stroke my hand over his naked back and the flesh of his rump and down the back of his thigh, and back again. "We'll just pay off the landlord if we have to, is all."
I kiss the nape of his neck, then I move around behind him.
"D'you wanna get the..?" He nods towards the lube on the bedside cabinet.
"Ain't fucking you yet, am I." I nudge my crotch against his bare arse to remind him my trousers are still on.
I lean over him and kiss him between his shoulder blades. He smells of the shower gel we nicked from our honeymoon hotel. It's not that same bottle, obviously – that one's long since run out but I've bought one to replace it. Had to pick my jaw up off the floor when they told me the price, but seeing as I'm getting him the apartment he wants and the king size bed he wants and the designer fucking sofa he wants, thirty quid on a bottle of shower gel is neither here nor there.
I kiss the small of his back then I kiss where his tail bone curls into the cleft in his backside. He shivers, and says, "It tickles," by way of explanation.
The skin on his flanks feels like velvet. My fingers count his ribs.
I grip his hips and spread his cheeks with my thumbs and pass my tongue over his tight little hole. It feels impenetrable, a ring of gristly muscle that I lick in circles till it eventually lets me in, and then I tease him, turn my head and bite his flesh. He calls me out so I give in and lick his rim again, and this time I don't have to work for it, there's no resistance when my tongue slips in. He makes a noise like whimpering when I lick around inside him. It's cute, so.
I could make him come, just doing what I'm doing. If I put in a finger where my tongue was he'd be a helpless mess in seconds flat. But then I'd be playing catch-up.
I sit back on my heels and pull him up against my chest, and I say into his ear, "I'm gonna fuck you now. Want me to fuck you?"
"Yeah."
"I'm gonna fuck you."
I leave him, stand up and take off my trousers and boxers. He settles on his back, one hand behind his head, the other holding his dick.
"Hurry up," he says.
I pump out some lube into my palm. It's cold at first on my cock but I warm it with my hand.
"Let's see, then," I say to him, and he languidly draws his knees up to his chest and splays his buttocks with his hands. "Dirty little tart."
I walk to the end of the bed to get a better view. His hole is open, a perfect elongated o with the shine of my spit around it.
"You wannit, lover?" he says.
He's taking the piss but, Jesus, he's sexy as fuck. Even that backstreet Manchester accent, it's just...
I get onto the bed and onto him, and his legs circle my back, and I edge my cock into him just maybe an inch or so, so I can feel his ring tight around the head. He looks shameless, dissolute.
"Dirty whore."
"Fuck off."
I kiss him but he doesn't like the bitter taste of himself on my tongue, does he, so he turns his head away. I swallow the taste, and he comes around, and soon as he kisses me I slide right into him. His insides are warm and slippery like his mouth, and muscular, dragging me deep. His cock rubs stiffly against my stomach as I move. I lift my head and look at him. As his head thrashes from side to side on the pillow, the glow from the bedside lamp throws highlights and shadows on the structure of his face – his cheekbones, his jaw.
"You're gorgeous, boy."
He opens his eyes, and when I kiss him again the kiss I get back is unfocused and I know he's going to come. His finger nails score my shoulders, his body jerks like a fit and his lips vibrate with his trapped cries. His cum spurts and oozes between us. His legs unhook from around me and collapse to the sides and I think his arms are going to do the same but he re-engages and strokes down my back, and then he grasps my arse and says, "Brendan."
There's fire in my head when I come, burning bright.
I slip out of him and pull the cover up over us, and he tucks himself under my arm.
"I'm knackered," I say.
"You're getting old."
"Fuck off. Just been a long day."
"It's gonna be better when we live near your work." He's quiet for a minute then he says, "I'm gonna see if I can get a job in town an' all. Not gonna be worth still working where I'm working now, by the time I've paid the bus fare."
"Good."
Again he's silent for a while, and I start drifting off.
"Brendan?"
"Mm?"
"Have you really got that much money just, like, knocking around, enough to buy that flat?"
"Yeah. Think so anyway."
"How come?"
"It ain't drug money, if that's what you're asking."
"What is it, then?"
He's stroking the wrist of my arm that's around him, like he thinks he'll need to keep me calm.
"Had properties to sell, didn't I. Offloaded everything when I went inside." Almost everything.
"Like Chez Chez."
"Chez Chez. Places like... in Dublin – "
"You had a place in Dublin? How come you stayed in a hotel then?"
"Ain't the kinda place you'd wanna stay. It was just a shop I rented out and a coupl'a rooms above it I used for... Just for a business address, you know? Jesus, Steven, it's gone now, okay? The money I've got, it's clean."
"I don't get why you had to sell everything anyway."
"Didn't know I'd be coming out, did I, at first – I thought I'd be getting life." I feel Steven pressing closer against me. "Wanted to see my kids were alright, put money in trust for them, and the rest of it I just put away for when... for when someone needed it. Nathan helped me out – did he tell you that? – with dealing with the solicitor and the bank, made sure they didn't take advantage."
"Nate?"
"Yeah. Did me a favour."
"He should an' all."
"Hm?"
"Dun't matter." He cranes his neck and kisses me, his hand in my hair. "I wanna pay my way, Brendan. I know it's gonna be your flat, right, but I'm gonna pay for bills and that."
"It's not gonna be my flat. It's gonna be ours, Steven, you know? Both our names on the deeds, yours and mine." I can't believe he didn't realise that.
"But you're buying it, though, so how can – ?"
"I got more money behind me than you, yeah, but that's just how it is, okay? It's just money. Didn't I tell you I'm gonna give you the future you deserve?"
"I remember."
"I meant it. Just taking me longer than I wanted, that's all."
:::::::
It's gone ten in the morning when he appears from the bedroom in his dressing gown, hair standing on end, bleary-eyed, beautiful.
"Thought it was me that was knackered, you lazy bastard," I say to him.
"You must'a wore me out." He comes over to where I'm sitting at the table and leans down and kisses me on the cheek, his arms folded to stop his robe from gaping open. "What you doing? Thought I heard you shouting."
"Just looking at this." I indicate the paperwork laid out in front of me.
"What is it?"
"It's from the folder Nathan gave me when I got out, all the business he handled for me. Should'a looked at it before, shouldn't I." I rub my hands over my face and lean back in the chair.
"Why? There a problem, Brendan?"
"Yeah. No. Kind of, yeah."
Steven sits down opposite.
"You not got enough money, then?"
"No, there's enough. It's just, I can't get at it. Not all of it anyhow, not yet."
"How d'you mean?"
"Most of it I can, it's in accounts I can just get it out of, but there's some that's in these five year bonds."
"What does that mean?"
"It means I can't touch it for another two years. Ain't Nathan's fault, he didn't know I wasn't gonna get life, any more than I did."
"It's your money though, how can you not be allowed to touch it?"
"That's exactly what I said to the bank."
"Was that what the shouting was, was you shouting at the bank down the phone?"
"Yeah." I smile at him. "Didn't do no good. They said the only way they give your money back sooner is if you die."
"Not even if you need it for something? That's not fair."
"If there's special circumstances they might, like if I had a terminal illness or something. But wanting it for something else ain't a good enough reason."
"So, does that mean..?"
"Means I'm thirty grand short, Steven."
"And you can't get a mortgage, can you. I thought about it after: you can't get a mortgage because of prison. Maybe I could see if – "
"No." He's on the minimum wage and he doesn't even get regular shifts; no one but a shark's going to give him a loan. "It's okay. I just gotta sell something else, so."
"What? I thought you already sold everything."
"Not everything. I didn't sell... I was gonna sell it, but then I didn't, because... because I..."
"Brendan?"
"My... It's my nana's holiday house." I clear my throat, take a swig from my mug of tea, then I carry on rapidly. "Worth a lot, so Nathan said. Not the house – that's gotta be rebuilt, got a lotta damage – but the land it's on. If we pay the deposit on the flat, then by the time the rest of the money's due we can auction nana's house. Sold the club that way, didn't I. It's quick, should be quick enough and we'll have the thirty grand we need and a whole lot more. It's gonna be okay, Steven."
"That's the house that got blown up?"
"That's the one, yeah."
"How come it belongs to you now?"
"Left it to me, didn't she."
"Just you?" He's piecing this together. "Not you and Cheryl?"
"Just me." I'm staring at the papers on the table, but all the words and figures are an out-of-focus jumble.
"Was that where..?"
"Yeah. First time, yeah, that was where."
"I would'a thought you would'a sold it before." His eyes are so full of concern when I glance at them that I have to look away again. "I would'a thought you would'a wanted to get rid of it."
"I just... Doesn't matter."
"Yeah it does. It matters to me."
"I just wanted... I just wanted it to rot away. Okay? Just... just let the sea take it, or something." It sounds stupid when I put it into words; it sounds weak. "I just... I dunno. I dunno."
"Right, well." He swallows, and I look at him and he's wiping his eyes on the sleeves of his dressing gown. "We don't have to move, Brendan, right? We can stay here, or... or we can find somewhere in town to rent instead of buying, yeah? Or we can look for somewhere cheaper to buy, can't we? I mean, there must be cheaper flats than that one, right, we can get a one-bedroom one, and the kids can – "
"Steven – "
"I mean it, Brendan, I don't care if – "
"I do, though. I care. This is... it's our future, yeah? That place, you know, it's been here." I press my finger tips against my forehead. "Long as I can remember, it's been here, and there's no good that's ever come of it, so..."
"So it's about time."
I nod, but it scares me. That house was in my head long before my nana left it to me, and I'm scared that by selling it – by thinking about it again – I'm raising its ghosts, not banishing them.
Steven leans forward and touches my forehead like he knows what I'm thinking and wants to take it on. He rests his hand back down on the table with the other, and I look at them: there's little marks you can hardly see where the skin is textureless and a shade lighter than the rest, where he's burnt himself cooking over the years and it's healed. On his knuckles there's a hairline scar, where he's maybe split them punching someone when he's had a scrap. His nails are short but unbitten. They're good hands, practical. They're strong hands. They're more real – he's more real – than any ghost.
"Yeah," I say, as much to myself as to him, "It's about time."