The Devil's Trill Sonata (21 page)

Jayden laughed, the knot easing. Darren was in a good mood—or at least a better one, his tone was still a bit flat—so maybe he wouldn’t be too upset. And Jonathon’s idea was a good one, offering a whole week in exchange.

“So when’re you going?”

“Um,” he said and took a deep breath. “Look, you remember how I said Jonathon’s Dad works for some big company and paid for our train tickets and the hotel in Paris, so it’s a really cheap weekend and I’ve never seen Paris and always wanted to go and…”

Darren paused. Jayden heard the sudden stillness, in the lack of the background rummaging and the way for a moment that even breathing went quiet.
Now you’ve done it
, whispered the little voice in his head.

“It’s my only chance of going before I graduate,” he whispered.

“When?”

“He booked the tickets before inviting me,” Jayden pleaded. “It
had
to be that weekend, Darren, they can’t change the tickets once they’re booked and…”

There was a long pause. Jayden squeezed the phone until the plastic case creaked, and bit down on his lip, listening to the
nothing
on the other end of the line, hearing Jonathon’s cultured voice saying the dates in his other ear like a ghost.

“So you’re not coming,” Darren said eventually, in a voice so quiet and so even, it was almost a whisper, if not for the steely undertone.

“I…I want to, Darren, you know I do, but…”

“You’re going to Paris that weekend instead of coming here.”

“I
want
to come to Southampton, and I’ll come after I’ve been to Paris, and…”

“If you wanted to, you would. You want to go to Paris more.”

Jayden flinched, and drew himself in, dragging his feet up the bed to prop an elbow on his knees. “I have one chance at Paris, Darren,” he said lowly. “I can’t afford to go, not until long after I get a job, and it was really nice of Jonathon to offer, and…”

“And hey, you can see your boyfriend anytime, doesn’t matter,” Darren said coldly, and Jayden’s stomach twisted at the mocking echo of Ella’s very words. “Except when the fuck
am
I going to get to see you, Jayden? I haven’t seen you since Christmas, now I won’t get to see you for my birthday or for Easter, so when? The summer? Next Christmas? Or will the trip to, I don’t know, fucking Milan with fucking Jonathon and
fucking
Ella get in the way?!”

Jayden recoiled physically from the phone for a brief second, the surge of Darren’s anger taking him by surprise. “Don’t
swear
at me!” he protested in startled, stupid disbelief, and Darren snorted.

“I’m fucking pissed off, Jayden, what the fuck do you expect!”

“It’s just a
weekend
, Darren.”

“It’s just the only weekend I could guarantee I’d actually have some of your fucking attention for five minutes, never mind the rest of you!”

“I…Darren, what?” Jayden floundered, too shocked to know what to do. He’d never had Darren angry at him, not really. He’d seen him in every mood imaginable, and he
had
seen him angry, but with other people, not
Jayden
. They’d argued only a few times, and then Darren had been obstinate and stubborn and a jerk, but not
angry
, not like
this
.

Jayden felt
sick
.

“Ever since Christmas—no, fuck it, since before Christmas—you’ve talked to me for all of ten bloody minutes before Ella’s there, or you have work to do, or Jonathon’s invited you out down the river, or
something
. I feel like you’re not even fucking there half the time, and then the one weekend I was going to get you to myself for a change, you’re cancelling to go to fucking Paris with your fucking obnoxious, condescending, so-called
friends
!”

Jayden felt the red in his own veins. “Don’t talk about my friends like that!” he protested.

“Oh, right, I’m not allowed to talk smack about them, but when the fucking banker’s daughter or whatever the hell she is, is ragging on my job and my appearance and the way I fucking dress, that’s cool? Thanks, Jayden, really pointing out where I stand here.”

“
You’re
being obnoxious!”

“You know what?” Darren snapped. “Fuck it. Go to fucking Paris, and have a whale of a fucking time with that poufter who wants to shag you so hard it’s painful being in the same
county
as him, and fucking enjoy it, Jayden, because by the time you get back, you might well be free to go and fuck him!”

“Wha—Darren, for fuck’s…!”

But Jayden didn’t even get to finish swearing at him; the phone cut out, the shrill silence telling after hearing Darren’s temper and the sounds of him smashing around his flat (
that you haven’t even seen
, the Charley-imitating voice in the back of his head chipped in snottily) in a rage.

“You fucking arsehole!” he shouted at the phone and hit redial. It was immediately cancelled. He tried again, and it was cancelled. On the third attempt, it dropped straight to voicemail. “Real mature, Darren!” he shouted at the Vodafone standard recording and hung up furiously.

Darren didn’t
get it
. He’d been all over the world. He had a picture on his Facebook of him and Scott in South Africa on Darren’s twelfth birthday, for God’s sake. It was just Paris to him, but Jayden had
never
been abroad, not anywhere, not even
Ireland
, and it was huge for him, to be able to leave the country. To
use
his passport! To hear people speaking in another language because they lived there, not because they were immigrants or in the classroom. Darren didn’t understand that, and okay, Jayden was sorry it had to be the same weekend, but Ella was
right
, wasn’t she? He could visit Darren some other weekend.

You’re overreacting
, he texted, but got no reply.

“Jayden?” There was a knock on the door, but Jonathon had more tact than Ella and didn’t open it. “Are you okay? I heard you shouting.”

Jayden opened it and stuffed the phone in his pocket. “I’m fine,” he said shortly. “And I need a drink. You coming?”

Jonathon—
that poufter who wants to shag you
—stared back warily, chewing on his lip, then nodded slowly. “Did you argue with your boyfriend?” he asked delicately.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Jayden said shortly.

He certainly didn’t when, ten minutes later, he received a
???? WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON UP THERE?!
from Paul, when his relationship status switched from
in a relationship
to
it’s complicated
.

Darren woke up and felt a weight on his chest.

He closed his eyes and groped for the alarm. He still had work, weights on his chest or not. He had to focus, somehow.

He switched his phone on while the kettle boiled for coffee. The weight had slid to his stomach and pooled there, a sticky lump of viscous lead. It hardened when the barrage of missed texts assaulted the screen, starting with an accusatory
you’re overreacting
and dissolving through
this is fucking stupid, Darren, answer me!
and
I love you but sometimes I don’t like you very much and this is one of those times!
until Jayden’s anger had started ebbing around eleven o’clock and he’d said,
I’m sorry it fell on our weekend but I can’t help that
.

Darren snorted. Yes, he bloody could help that: he could not go.

The final text had been sent at midnight.
Call me tomorrow? We need to talk. And I’m sorry I upset you and you’re feeling left out. I didn’t mean it.
Left out. Right.

This heaviness in his bones wasn’t left out. He knew this heaviness. It was a special type of molten metal in the marrow: loneliness. The isolation that had dogged his teenage years from the word go. The feeling that he was behind a glass screen and the rest of the world was moving on without him.

That
Jayden
was moving on without him.

Darren put the phone on the side table and dragged himself from the kitchen into the bathroom. A headache pounded in time to his heart behind his eyes: he downed four aspirin and skipped breakfast. He felt so heavy that it was half-tempting to call in sick, but for what? To be crushed to death in bed under the weight of being cut adrift? To wait endlessly for a miracle to happen and Jayden cancel his plans and come here instead?

To wait to come first?

He was pathetic, but he wasn’t that far gone yet. He dressed with sluggish speed, numb fingers struggling with buttons and zips. Rachel was up. He could hear her singing in her kitchenette, but where yesterday Darren had crept in to share breakfast with her before the landlady started banging pots downstairs, today he simply shrugged on his jacket and sank down the stairs, leaving his phone on the side. He couldn’t take more of it today. Not more coming second, third,
last
. Not more…not more
Ella
, speaking out of
Jayden’s
mouth.

It was an icy morning. The cold sank into his hands as he scraped the frost off the windscreen, and he left the heaters off in some vicious attempt to shake the lead from his brain. The cold woke him up, at least physically, but the metal core refused to be shaken, and Darren found himself rhythmically clenching and releasing his hands from the wheel.

The news about the Easter exams had been enough of a blow. Darren didn’t like his birthday, but the last few years with Jayden had begun to turn that around a little. Last year, they’d gone on a day trip to Brighton in the middle of their exams with Paul and Ethan. It had been bloody cold, actually, because the Channel didn’t know the meaning of summer, but it had been a pretty good day. Darren had been hoping to do it again this year, and then Jayden become so busy, and that was great that he was being challenged, it
was
, but…

But it felt like Jayden was being dragged away. Or even just walking. Because first came Christmas and having to cut the visit short because of his essays. Then had been the birthday and with it the Easter break. This weekend, the one weekend Darren had been looking forward to because it meant actually getting his boyfriend back…

He was losing Jayden and had maybe even already lost him.

The turn in the road swept up sharply, and for a split second, Darren’s hands didn’t move. For a split second, he kept going straight, eyes on the barriers and the ditch under the tree. For a split second, he
hesitated
.

Then he turned, kept the car on the road, and continued on to work.

* * * *

Paris was…glitzy. Paris was a heady stench of heat, Europe, and wine mixed with glittery lights and boiled in a long and bloody history. It was a haphazard, crammed-together sort of city, rude French locals mixing with equally rude tourists from every country imaginable, and all the food, as far as Jayden could tell, was English, but less burned and with ‘ette’ on the end, ‘a la’ on the front, or occasionally both.

Jayden…Jayden
liked
it, certainly. It was so markedly different to holidays in England with his parents as a kid. Even the view from the train had been different. French countryside instead of English; French villages in French styles instead of the familiar houses dotting the fields along the English train lines. Jayden had always been jealous of Darren and his family, who found such sights
familiar,
and he had stared at the new strangeness raptly.

So yes, he
liked
Paris. He loved the ancient churches and the Notre Dame, and the museums that Jonathon insisted on visiting. The Louvre was okay, he supposed, though he’d never really
got
art, but the Eiffel Tower had more than made up for that morning, with spectacular views and a fresh wind tugging enticingly at his hair. The little back streets and crooked alleys between ancient buildings, with hidden treasures in the form of tiny cafes and specialist shops, those had been a maze of dreams that they’d spent the whole first day exploring. Ella, to Jayden’s surprise, loved those little crannies just as much as he did, even if it was mostly fixated on finding bargain designer handbags.

Paris was nothing like London. London was squashed and shot through with glass, and it bulged with loud chavs, its monuments too scattered to be able to enjoy without coming across them. Paris was different. Paris was compact, rippling out from the beautiful centre without confusion, and they stuck to that centre, soaking up the culture and the history and the beauty of the place. The river, sliding slowly by under rows of bridges, and the twisted runs of ancient streets, and the bubbling rhythm of French (and Chinese, from the hordes of Chinese tourists at the Tower) had a
magic
to it, a real
magic
…

But…

He felt guilty too. He felt guilty for the date and the bail-out and Darren’s obvious upset at the entire fiasco, even though Jayden had promised to go to Southampton as soon as he could shift his workload after his. Darren had always been a fairly easy-going boyfriend, really, he’d never been the type to just explode or get dramatic, but even he’d been pissed off at being bailed on like that, and on
that
weekend, and he was showing it, refusing to reply to most of Jayden’s texts, not picking up the phone when Jayden had called him from the station before boarding the train, and if Jayden
demanded
a response, it was terse at best.

And…okay, maybe Jayden shouldn’t have bailed, but…
Paris
. Paris! He’d never been. Darren didn’t know how exciting this was—he’d probably been to Paris before he could walk. He’d probably gone on weekend shopping trips with his mother (well, okay, probably not, when Jayden thought about that one just a little harder) but
still
. Paris. Ella had said it: he could visit Darren whenever, really, long as uni wasn’t too demanding. But
Paris
. When was the next time he’d be able to go to Paris so cheap? Or when he’d be able to afford to go himself, without Jonathon’s parents paying for the train tickets and the rooms? Years and years and years, probably, especially as even if he and Darren stayed together, neither of them would be earning loads for those years and years and years. So Darren didn’t like the people he was going with, well, since when did Darren get to dictate who he did and didn’t hang out with? Since never, that’s since when. Jayden didn’t get in his face about
Darren’s
friends.