"Jones!"

Jones jumped as one of his earphones was pulled sharply away from his head. His eyes snapped open and he looked up at Claire while his chest heaved with vague panic. He'd been listening to a mix he'd titled 'Dan's secret shame songs', the ones he'd never own up to liking if asked but that he cherished and listened to when he was alone in the bath or doing the dishes. Jones had put together the mix over a series of years, through stealth and serious listening, and he loved the eclectic mix of electro, emo, pop, old school rock and Alanis Morisette. Dan was a man of many secrets and complex tastes and Jones loved the fact that he knew him so well and yet was still learning new things.

His shoulder spasmed in retaliation to his jump of surprise and he winced as he removed his headphones completely, trying not to glare at Claire who, he was pretty sure, didn't realise what she'd done.

"Alright?" he asked, trying to shift himself on the armchair to be more upright and look more willing to have the conversation Harry seemed to think they needed to have.

"I brought you a cup of tea," Claire told him, holding the cup and saucer out in front of her like it was a venomous spider and Jones took it with a smile of thanks, careful not to knock the biscuits out of the saucer in the process. Biscuits with tea, with proper tea cups, seemed to be an Ashcroft family tradition that Claire and Dan were rediscovering and Jones hadn't been able to avoid having at least three cups a day, which meant six biscuits at least. He was actually worried that his trousers would start getting tight but he didn't want to be rude, and it was only for a few more days so for now he just put up with it. He put one of the biscuits down on the sideboard for later and blew on his tea, waiting to see what Claire would do.

"Did you... want to talk?" he asked once she was sitting comfortably in the armchair that Harry had been occupying earlier that afternoon.

"Not really," she snapped tiredly, bringing her tea cup to her lips to hide how she was feeling, only to let out a hiss as she burnt her tongue.

"Harry said-"

"Yes, well," Claire interrupted and Jones could see how hard she was trying to reign in her anger and decided it was probably best to let her get to things in her own time. "He's right, obviously. I just don't want to."

Jones studied the way her shoulders hunched around her tea cup and the strands of long, brown hair that had escaped her low ponytail. There was static in the air, like a storm was coming jones reckoned, and it was making her hair frizz. Everything about her reminded Jones of the tomcats he'd seen roaming the back alleys of Shoreditch. Some of them were beautiful and they could be friendly and even protective, coming up and rubbing his legs and purring as he tried to get comfortable on a bed made out of cardboard and newspapers, sleeping by his feet and hissing at anyone who came near - though he'd never figured out whether the cats liked him or just his body heat - still, it had made him feel a whole lot safer some nights. But during the day those same cats strutted about like they owned the street and wouldn't accept a pat from anyone. And that was Claire: she cared a lot and felt things really strongly but she wasn't about to let her guard down and show you that she cared. Claire was a prickly tomcat but Jones knew better than to ever tell her so.

He also knew that those same haughty toms had ducked and darted in fear when the men from the pub walked past at closing time, flinching before the boots even came close, because they'd learnt fear and pain and were all too aware of just how vulnerable they actually were. Claire could be like that as well.

"Thanks for the tea," he told her, dunking his biscuit in it until it was almost disintegrating then lobbing it into his mouth, savouring the hot, sweet, soggy mess.

"You're welcome," we replied, nibbling her own biscuit self-consciously. "Mum thinks you drink too much coffee so I thought, tea..."

"She's good your mum."

"Sure," Claire scoffed, then turned her head in embarrassment as Jones stared at her.

They sat in silence, listening to the clock tick, the whir of the dishwasher, the far off sounds of Catherine talking on the phone in her office and the radio murmuring in Roger's study. It was all very suburban, very alien, but it had a quiet rhythm to it that Jones liked, like the pad of trainers on concrete on those strange autumn mornings when the clouds were silver and bright and covered the whole of the sky and everyone and everything seemed distant.

It was nice, pleasant, but he could see why Claire hated it. She wanted to be edgy and forthright and be her own person. She just tried a bit too hard, and didn't seem to really understand the concept of tact. Jones would have given anything for a home like this growing up, two parents, siblings, bedtimes, vegetables. It was funny the things you ended up getting nostalgic about.

"I need to apologise," Claire said to her tea cup, her brows drawing together just like Dan's did when he was facing an uncomfortable reality. "I haven't said sorry about the article or the way I treated you. I haven't said thank you for giving me a place to live."
"It's fine, Claire," he told her. She wasn't the only one who didn't much like these kind of conversations.

"But it's not really," she told him earnestly. "I was doing a film about the homeless and I nearly became homeless myself and you gave me a room in your house and you..."

Claire bit her lip and Jones could feel the words she really wanted to say but was holding back. They were pressing against his skull, like the headache that came at the end of three days with no sleep and too much caffeine. Claire was trying to apologise but she wasn't going to get over things and move on - wasn't going to be properly at ease - until she'd satisfied her curiosity as well.

He looked at her, at the curve of her eyebrows that always made her look a little angry. She wanted a reason to feel sorry for him, Jones realised, because pitying him would make it easier for her to apologise and move on, and Jones didn't know how he felt about that.

"Is there something else you want to say, Claire?" he asked quietly, reaching for his second biscuit.

"Yeah, kind of."

"Well?"

"Jones..."

He wasn't going to make it easy for her. Part of him wanted to storm out, kick a chair and scream at the wall. Another part of him wanted to make her sweat, because she could be so damned annoying sometimes and she'd been filming 'the homeless' for months and she didn't get that it was hard to talk about.

"Jones, I... Harry told me that you lived with him for a while, slept on his sofa." Claire had her hands clasped in front of her and was talking in a formal voice that reminded Jones of Catherine, which Claire probably wouldn't be too happy about. He felt as though he was being interviewed which, he supposed, he was.

"Yeah, for a bit."

"Yeah, well... he mentioned that... you lived on the streets for a while. And I know it's none of my business but..."

"You're right, Claire," he told her. "It's none of your business."

"You're dating my brother."

"Dating?" Jones blinked. "Claire, me and Dan aren't dating. We've been living together since I was seventeen. We're a bit further on than dating. And Dan never tried it on," Claire rolled her eyes but he shook his head at her skepticism. "It's true. I kissed him. After I turned eighteen. But that's not even the important bit, Claire. You don't get it."

He could feel the tears starting to prickle in the corners of his eyes and tightness in his throat that made it difficult to keep talking calmly and reasonably. He wanted to get this over, to tell her what she needed to know, rather than what she wanted. And to do that he needed to not cry.

"What do I not get?" she asked him, her voice back to being calm and steady while her hands fluttered in her lap like frustrated moths.

"Your brother," Jones whispered, his throat too tight to allow any more noise than that. "He saved me, Claire. I know he can be a bit... sarcastic and grumpy sometimes but... he saw me sitting out the front of my house, crying my eyes out, and he stopped to help me. My mum'd just died and I was on my own and..."

It was a hard memory to return to, let alone in the company of someone who didn't understand, and Jones felt a slight tremble go through him as he remembered his mother's house.

"But if you met Dan when you were living at home," Claire said in a voice that she probably thought was reasonable but was verging on patronising. "When were you homeless? Why were you homeless?"

"I... why do you think people end up homeless, Claire?" Jones asked her, taking a deep breath to calm the ache building in his chest.

"Well, a lot of them are junkies," she told him, her voice still overly sincere. "They couldn't cope with their addiction, got into debt, ended up on the streets. Were you-"

"I don't do drugs!" Jones snapped. "I've already told you that. My mum was the junkie, Claire! Most kids on the streets aren't there cos of anything they did, we get there 'cos our parents are shit! They throw us out, or try and tell us that if we want to stay in their house we should consider being more accommodating to their 'clients' when they're round at the house. Like being fondled by some greasy-fingered old geezer with breath like canal water is something I should be happy to put up with. They beat us and tell us we're worthless and we either run or get kicked out. That's the truth of it, Claire. It's not some tale of vice and how I clawed my way back up. And it's not some tragedy about a boy who lost his beloved mummy. And I ain't perfect neither, it ain't some happy ending telemovie. I'm not some hero or martyr or activist or example. I don't want to be held up as the popular face of why straight people should care about queers, or why happy families should keep thanking God at their dinner table cos it's me and not them. I don't want to have to talk about it or think about it. It's bad enough that I dream about it. And maybe I didn't tell you cos I don't want to advertise it, and because I don't want to be in your documentary, letting people use me as emotional porn."

He took a deep shuddering breath, trying to clear the high pitched ringing in his ears that was lacerating the careful silence of the Ashcroft residence. He closed his eyes tight, willing the tears to back off but they wouldn't budge. He heard the rustle of Claire's trousers as she stood up and crossed the room, and the shift in the air in front of him as she knelt down next to his chair. He still jumped though, when her hand came to rest lightly on his knee and the sharp ringing was still distorting his hearing when she whispered,

"I'm so sorry, Jones."

He leant forward as she hugged him awkwardly and felt her fingers edging around the light, stick-on bandage he still wore on his shoulder and knew that the apology was for more than just the things they had talked about directly just now. And even if they'd got to it in a less than comfortable way Jones could at least feel that she did mean it. He hadn't actually needed to hear it, but reckoned that Claire might've needed to say it.

"Thank you, Claire," he told her soberly. "I forgive you."

He didn't feel like crying anymore but Claire was, he could feel her tears making the shoulder of his t-shirt damp as she took heaving, sobby breaths. He patted her back and rubbed his hand along her spine like Dan sometimes did for him when he was scared or upset and it seemed to calm her down.

He kept it up until she started to get self-conscious, then slowly moved his hands to allow her to move out the hug with as little awkwardness as possible. Claire sat back on her haunches and narrowed her eyes as she looked him up and down and Jones couldn't help but laugh.

"What?"

He shook his head but she asked again so he told her:

"You look like Dan when you do that. Making shifty crab eyes at people."

"I do not," she retorted but smiled at him and Jones took a moment to appreciate that she really was quite pretty when she wasn't trying to act so serious.

He was about to tell her so but then he heard the metallic scrape of the key in the front door lock and sat up straighter. Dan was back.