Shameless (7 page)

“I’m really not sure about this, John,” he said, downing the last of his Budweiser and reaching into his sock for his cigarettes. “I think I might just go home.”

John, who had his eye fixed on a visibly well-endowed skinhead leaning provocatively against the cigarette machine, spoke without turning his head. “But we’ve only just got here. Have another drink. You’ll soon get into the swing of it. You can’t tell me there isn’t a single person here you don’t fancy.”

Martin surveyed the room. John did have a point. There were quite a few sexy-looking men dotted about, more than he had expected to see in fact. He had always imagined places like this to be full of old men with beer bellies exposed and dim-witted wives tucked away somewhere. While it was true that there were some men here who fitted this description, the majority were reasonably good-looking, and there were even a select few who were not only strikingly handsome but had the kinds of bodies that wouldn’t have looked out of place in an ad for a telephone sex line—all bulging biceps, pert pecs and washboard stomachs. He suddenly became very conscious of his own stomach, protruding over the elasticated waistband of his Calvin Kleins. He definitely had to join a gym, regardless of the cost. He breathed in deeply and lit a cigarette.

“Oh, look who it is!” John said, nodding in the direction of a beefy blond standing at the far end of the bar. “I see she’s back on the steroids.”

“I think he looks sort of sexy,” Martin replied, smiling shyly at the blond, who held his gaze for a second or two before turning away.

“Don’t be taken in by that butch exterior,” said John. “She’s a typical muscle Mary that one, a proper legs-up Lucy.”

“Muscle Mary” and “legs-up Lucy” were two of John’s favorite put-downs. If the Mary in question happened to be on the small side, or had legs that were not only free-floating but somewhat shorter than normal, then he was referred to as a “muscle midget.” Like a lot of gym-obsessed gay men at the more effeminate end of the scale, John didn’t regard himself as a muscle Mary, or even remotely camp, and was generally scornful of anyone he thought deserving of either description. Martin had noticed over the years that the more muscular John became, the more inclined he was to camp it up, as if the exaggerated masculinity of his body gave permission for a degree of effeminacy he would never have dared reveal otherwise. Martin had never discussed this with John. Once, he had made the mistake of asking him what it was that distinguished him from the muscle Marys he was always so quick to criticize. John’s answer had been short and delivered with a slightly incredulous tone, as though he were stating the obvious: “Muscle Marys have tattoos!”

“I knew a couple who picked that one up once,” John went on. “Cock the size of a button mushroom, apparently. Not that it mattered. They were barely through the door before she was begging to be spit roasted. Squealed like a pig, or so I was told.”

“Spit roasted?” Martin looked puzzled.

“A cock in either end,” John said impatiently. “Don’t tell me you and Christopher never tried that with someone.”

“No, we didn’t.” Martin frowned as the memory of his one disastrous attempt at a threesome came flooding back.

“Well, there’s no need to look so miserable about it,” John said, misinterpreting the look on Martin’s face as one of regret for what he hadn’t done, rather than remorse for what he had. “I’m sure there’ll be plenty of other opportunities. Anyway, you’re better off single. In my experience, threesomes work best when you’re the fresh meat in someone else’s sandwich. That way you’re sure to get most of the attention. I remember my first threesome, with a couple in Kilburn. They’d been together for years and were obviously bored to death with each other. I didn’t mind, though. I got a great fuck out of it, and they jerked each other off afterward. Anyway, that’s enough talk. I think it’s time for some action. What about that guy over there? He looks like he could show you a good time.”

Martin looked and spotted an enormous muscle queen with a shaved head and tattoos. “Not really my type,” he said. “He looks a bit rough.”

“We all need a bit of rough in our diet,” John replied, rolling his eyes. “I see what you mean, though. He looks like he’d fuck you over the sofa, then wipe his cock on your curtains.”

Martin shuddered. The thought of anyone fucking John over a sofa was not one he cared to entertain. Besides, he was pretty certain there weren’t any curtains in John’s flat. It was all microblinds.

“Good job I shaved my balls this morning,” John said, leering at the tattooed guy, who scowled back in what passed for an alluring manner. “I had a feeling I might get lucky tonight.” Readjusting his crotch, he headed off toward the main area of the club where groups of men were already huddled together under camouflage netting. “See you back here in an hour,” he called over his shoulder. And with that, he disappeared into the darkness.

Martin sucked furiously on his cigarette and felt his stomach twisting itself up in knots. He wished he could just throw himself into things, the way John did. He still felt self-conscious, still felt silly, only now he was vaguely aware that he was beginning to feel horny, too. He ordered a large vodka and knocked it back in one gulp. He had never been in a situation quite like this before. Sure, he’d had casual sex with people he didn’t know, but always in bed, and always one at a time. Now here he was, practically naked in a room full of strangers, poised to throw himself into a writhing mass of bodies where any number of people could touch him, taste him, possibly even tear huge chunks out of him if they wanted to. It was terrifying, and exciting at the same time. God knows what the girls at work would think if they could see him now. Still, he’d come this far. There was no point in backing out now.

He edged his way through the bar and into the dim recess of the club. Pausing until his eyes grew accustomed to the dark, he gradually became aware of a couple of men to his right, one kneeling in front of the other. The man on his knees grabbed Martin’s leg as he pushed by and ran a hand up his thigh. He flinched and moved on. Directly ahead of him was a pool table. As he drew closer, he could make out the shape of a man lying spread-eagled, facedown on the table, while a second man fucked him from behind. A small group of men had gathered around. Some were muttering words of encouragement—“Fuck him harder!” “Give it to him!” “Yeah, fuck him!” Others watched silently as they masturbated. The air was heavy with the stench of poppers.

Martin felt a hand on his crotch and his cock stiffen. As far as he could make out in this light, the two men fucking seemed fairly attractive. If he could just concentrate on them, then it didn’t really matter what the others looked like. He kept telling himself this as he felt a hand tugging at his Calvins and a mouth closing around his cock. Someone pressed themselves against his back. A hand reached over his shoulder and held a bottle of poppers under his nose. He inhaled deeply and felt his head spin and the world disappear. It all slipped away—Christopher, his job, his father. The only thing he was conscious of now was the intense tingling sensation in his groin. That and the hands reaching under his armpits, playing with his nipples. He thrust his hips forward, faster and faster, until the tingling sensation ran all the way up from his balls to the tip of his cock, and he came in short, violent bursts.

Martin stooped to pull up his Calvins and felt a hand on his arse. As he struggled to push it away, the figure kneeling in front of him rose up, and the light from the bar spilled onto his face. Martin couldn’t place him at first. Then it hit him. It was Matthew, John’s date from Friday night.

“Hello again,” he said with a gloopy grin. “Fancy meeting you here.”

Martin turned and fled.

Six

W
hat do you mean,
where was I last Friday night?” Graham was pacing the room in that determined, precise way he always did when he was really angry. Three days had passed since the mysterious Darren had left a message on Graham’s answering machine. For three whole days, Caroline had been biting her tongue, until finally, tonight, she just couldn’t take it anymore.

Watching Graham stalking up and down her living room, still clutching the bottle of red wine he had been about to uncork, she wondered how long it would be before he wore the varnish off the wood veneer flooring, but didn’t dare say anything. There was no point talking to him when he was in this mood. It was best just to leave him until he calmed down, as he invariably did. His temper was like a gasoline fire—ferocious while it lasted, but short-lived. Caroline had a sneaking suspicion that these little outbursts were really just his way of playing for time, a delay tactic designed to ward her off while he struggled to come up with a credible excuse. If she was right, then he was bloody good at it, there was no denying that. Still, she resented him for stealing her thunder. She had every right to question him about his whereabouts on Friday night. There was something funny going on, and she was entitled to know what it was.

His pace was beginning to slow now, which usually meant that he was cooling down. Another minute or two and it would be safe to prod him a little further.

“Well?” she said eventually, trying hard to disguise the impatience in her voice. She didn’t want it to sound like an interrogation. That would only fuel his temper even more.

“Well, what?” Graham wasn’t giving an inch.

“Where were you?”

“Why do you keep asking me that?” He certainly had her there. The problem was, she hadn’t actually mentioned to Graham that she had overheard the answering-machine message. She had gone over it in her head dozens of times, torturing herself with visions of who this Darren character was, and what her boyfriend was doing at a group called C.L.A.G. She was no closer to knowing what this mysterious group was all about, but she was certain of one thing: the
G
stood for “Gay.” It was some kind of gay support group, and her boyfriend had been to one of their meetings, which could only mean one thing. She had been right all along. Graham was secretly gay, and his relationship with her was a total sham. This would explain why he was so set against the idea of them moving in together. He needed the security of his own flat to help conceal his deception.

She should have confronted him with it straight away, she knew that. It was silly to let it go for days like this. She should have simply told him that she had overheard the message and asked him to explain what it was all about. But she hadn’t. She told herself this was because she didn’t want Graham thinking that she was spying on him, but deep down she knew that, had it been a woman’s voice she’d heard, she would have confronted him about it immediately. It was okay to fly off the handle if a strange woman called up and left a message for the man you’d been dating for the past year. In fact, it was expected. But to interrogate your boyfriend over a phone call from a strange man? Well, that was a bit different. Life wasn’t like
The Jerry Spinger Show.
People didn’t just change sex at the drop of a hat or turn gay overnight. Those weren’t the sorts of things that happened in West Hampstead, certainly not to people like her. What was she supposed to say exactly? That she suspected Graham of harboring homosexual tendencies? Somehow, she didn’t think that would go down too well.

“I only asked,” she said finally. “There’s no need to get so uptight about it. Honestly, anybody would think you had something to hide.”

If this struck a nerve, he didn’t let it show. “If I’m upset, it’s probably because I don’t like being cross-examined about my whereabouts all the time,” he said, disappearing into the kitchen and returning with a corkscrew. “Now can we just leave it, please?” He opened the bottle and poured two glasses. “C’mon, babes,” he said softly, handing her a glass and gently squeezing her shoulder. “Don’t you think you’re being just a little bit silly about this? I don’t demand to know where you are every minute of the day.”

That’s because I’m not the one receiving messages from strange men, Caroline thought, but she knew there was no point in pursuing this any further—not unless she wanted Graham to storm off again, which she didn’t. Heated arguments always left her feeling horny, and he had just opened a bottle of wine. It would be a shame to waste it.

“You’re right,” she said, raising her glass and smiling sweetly. “Just forget I said anything.” She genuinely hoped that he would forget. At least then she might stand a better chance of finding him out.

It was Thursday evening when John finally phoned. Martin didn’t know whether he was relieved to hear his voice or not. John had every right to be angry with him. His behavior at the underwear night had been pretty bad. He’d left the club without even telling John that he was going, which was a terrible thing to do to a friend in those circumstances. He could picture John hanging around at the end of the night, anxiously waiting for him to reappear and cursing his name as the lights came up and the taxi queue grew and grew. Of course Martin had no choice but to leave after what had happened, but John probably wouldn’t see it that way. Matthew was John’s latest catch after all. There was no telling how he would react to the news that his new boyfriend had given his best friend a blow job while he was in the room, but it seemed reasonable to assume that he might not be too thrilled about it. The chances were John had bumped into Matthew himself after Martin had left, heard all about their little encounter, and had spent the past few days plotting his revenge.

“So what happened to you the other night?” John said. He didn’t sound like someone hell bent on revenge. In fact, he sounded strangely cheery.

“Nothing,” Martin lied. “I just went home, that’s all. I looked around for you before I left, but I couldn’t really see very much in there. And I didn’t want to just wade in and find that you were in the middle of something.”

“Good job you didn’t.” John laughed. “I met this really amazing guy. Fabulous body. Great sex. Of course everyone else tried to join in. You know what some of those older queens are like—hands everywhere. And don’t tell me I’m being ageist. I don’t see them chasing after men their own age, so they’re just as bad. There was this one old git, a proper scary Mary, she was. It was like being groped by a waxwork. And it isn’t easy fending them off in your underwear. I ended up stubbing a cigarette out on her arm. . . .”

“So what about this guy?” Martin interrupted.

“What?” John said. “Oh, right. Well, he’s called Fernando, and guess what? He’s Brazilian! He works in a bar in Soho, but that’s just pocket money. He’s really a drug dealer. Coke, Ecstasy, K—you name it! I couldn’t believe my luck. And to top it all, he’s a great fuck, too. I can almost picture myself settling down.”

“But what about the guy you were with on Friday?” Martin couldn’t help asking. “Matthew, wasn’t it?”

John groaned. “That was last week! You don’t have to move in with every man you have sex with, you know. God, you’re such a lesbian sometimes.”

Martin bristled. Given John’s attitude to women in general, and to lesbians in particular, this clearly wasn’t intended as a compliment. Personally, Martin couldn’t see anything wrong with lesbians. So what if they were known for falling in love and setting up home together quicker than you could say “cat flap”? Was that really so bad? At least they weren’t afraid of commitment, which was more than could be said for certain gay men. It was just like that joke that did the rounds a few years ago—“What do lesbians take on a second date? A moving van. What do gay men take on a second date? What second date?” There were far worse things to be compared to than lesbians. All things considered, he would rather be mistaken for a lesbian than for a gay man like John.

“Anyway, listen,” John said. “The reason I’m calling is about Saturday. Gay Pride. You are still planning on going?”

An image of his father squeezed between two drag queens flashed before Martin’s eyes. “I suppose so,” he said, halfheartedly. “Well, actually I’m not sure. The thing is, it’s a bit awkward. I don’t know if I mentioned it, but my dad is coming to stay this weekend and, well, he says he wants to come along.”

“Oh, I see,” John faltered for a moment. “Christ, he isn’t about to announce that he’s queer or something, is he?”

“Of course not!”

“Well, I hope you’re right, ’cos that would be too gross. Can you imagine? Your own dad, a queen! And at his age, too! It would be so embarrassing! Not as bad as finding out that he likes to dress up in women’s clothes and call himself Brenda, I suppose, but even so. . . .”

“Okay, John,” Martin snapped. “Can we change the subject now, please?”

“What? Oh, right. Well, I suppose we’ll just have to work around him. We could always pair him off with some sad git from one of those gay parents’ groups. He’ll be fine. They can compare notes and we can get on with the serious business of having a good time. Talking of which, Fernando says he can sort us out with whatever we want. I just have to call him tomorrow with a shopping list and he’ll have it all ready on the day. I thought we could get a couple of E’s for the march, maybe some coke to tide us over the afternoon, then a few more E’s for later, and maybe a bit of K for the club later. Oh, and guess what? We were talking about which club to go to, and Fernando said he can put our names on the guest list wherever we fancy. He knows all the club promoters, DJs, everyone. We won’t even have to queue.”

Martin’s heart sank at the prospect of a whole day playing goose with John and his latest catch. He wasn’t sure which was going to be worse—having his father tag along at Gay Pride or watching John falling in love again for the second time in a week.

“Yeah, great,” he said. “I’m not sure about taking E, though. Isn’t it a bit dangerous?”

John laughed. “I can’t believe you’ve never had an E. Where have you been? You’ll be telling me you haven’t tried Viagra next.”

“I haven’t,” Martin said crossly. “I may not be twenty-one anymore, but I’m hardly at the age where I’m having trouble getting it up.”

“Try telling me that after your first E,” John sniggered. “Anyway, you shouldn’t believe everything you read in the papers. More people die every year from alcohol than from E. And alcohol makes you fat, as I’m sure you know. All those horror stories you hear about E, that’s just the crap they sell to kids in the clubs. This is the good stuff. I popped one with Fernando the other night and it was fabulous. We were as high as kites and as horny as hell. And that was just at the club. By the time we got back to his place, we were tearing each other’s clothes off. So, I’ll order you two, okay? Trust me, you’ll have the time of your life.”

Martin doubted this very much, but he couldn’t see any point in putting up a fight. “Okay,” he said. “See you Saturday.”

The first thing Caroline did when she got home from work on Friday evening was call Graham. His answering machine came on after the second ring. She hesitated before hanging up, and then debated whether or not to try him on his cell. She didn’t want him to think that she was checking up on him, though of course this was precisely what she was doing. After all, Graham had told her that he was going out with some of the lads from the office tonight. He probably wouldn’t be too pleased to have her calling up to confirm his whereabouts in front of his work colleagues. Come to think of it, she didn’t really want them jumping to the conclusion that she was some mad, possessive bunny boiler. Then again, this was assuming that he was actually out with his work colleagues, and not simply using them as an alibi. For all she knew, he could just as easily be in bed with some ex-girlfriend he’d bumped into on the tube, or even worse, some man called Darren he’d met at a gay support group a week ago. That was the trouble with cell phones. They were so bloody mobile. Great if you were stuck in traffic and needed to let an important client know that you were going to be late for a meeting. Even better for tracking down a coke dealer on a Saturday night. But when it came to confirming whether the man you were dating really was where he said he was, with the people he said he was with, they were no use at all. Which, presumably, was part of the reason men liked them so much.

She could always pretend that she was calling to confirm details of the dinner party they had been invited to tomorrow night, though she knew perfectly well that Graham’s old school friend Jeremy and his wife, Pip, were expecting them at 7:30
P.M.
sharp. Caroline felt nauseous at the mere thought of it. Jeremy and Pip were two of the most irritating, smug, middle-class twits she had ever met. The prospect of spending an entire evening facing them over the dinner table made her stomach churn. No doubt they’d be sampling some exotic new recipe Pip had picked up at one of her evening classes. What was it last time? Braised pheasant with pancetta? Followed by grilled peaches with a raspberry and red wine sorbet? Designer food, her mother would have called it. For once, Caroline was forced to concede that she had a point.

What was Pip doing learning all these fancy new recipes anyway? It wasn’t as if she actually ate anything. Caroline could picture her now—moving her food around her plate, rearranging it in a series of ever more decorative displays, before finally whisking the plate away and tipping the whole lot into the bin. Pip was one of those annoying stick insect women who took absolutely no pleasure in food. Cooking was just another means of drawing attention to her superior breeding and impeccable good taste.

Caroline resented women like Pip, and berated herself for feeling so intimidated by them. She wondered if it was worth skipping dinner tonight and maybe having a few lines of coke instead. It wasn’t as if she made a habit of it. How much harm could come from missing the odd meal here and there? And how much weight could she expect to lose in a day? Half a pound perhaps? Not a lot, but just enough to give herself that extra boost of confidence. And maybe she should wear that slinky black dress, the one that drew attention to her cleavage. Pip may have been blessed with narrow hips and the appetite of a bird, but she was obviously at the back of the queue when other assets were given out. As for Jeremy, Caroline had yet to meet a married man whose eyes didn’t wander when there was a decent pair of breasts on show.