Cricket (12 page)

“Who’s next?”

It was, at once, exactly like and having nothing at all in common with Henry’s last experience of working in a bar. The shiny gay bar in the Village served more Cosmos than pints, and the beer came from bottles, not a tap. Here, people were happy to wait for their Guinness to settle and teased him good-naturedly when he had no clue what a “pint of Doom” was.

As the band started up, he learned the names of all the local ales and how to use a pump to serve them (under Ryan’s watchful guidance), and by the time the first song was over, he’d rolled his shirtsleeves to his elbows and had figured out the difference between a five- and a ten-pound note.

The phrase “and one for you, love” seemed to be uttered with every other drink he served, and even while refusing more than he accepted, a line of empty glasses started to be assembled behind him.

Stella didn’t mind him drinking on the job. In fact, she almost encouraged it. Ryan certainly was, and it was to him that Henry most often turned when he needed help with the till or figuring out what the hell someone was asking for.

The space behind the bar was small, only really big enough for a couple of people at a time, and he guessed that when the pub was built no one had taken into account having to squeeze three adults back there. It meant that passing someone became a rather intimate affair, and Henry couldn’t help but wonder if Ryan pressed his hand to his sister’s lower back as he tried to get to the till, or slapped her ass when she bent over to get a Corona out of the fridge.

He hoped not.

When the band finished their first set with a rather raucous number that Henry didn’t recognize, a path to the bar was cleared for them. Not that Stella made them pay for their drinks.

“You must be Henry,” the short redheaded girl said as she hopped right up to sit on the bar.

“Yeah,” he said, looking up at her.

“You’re pretty. Two pints of Stag, two JD and Coke, and a ’Bow and black.”

She said it like a challenge, like she wasn’t expecting Henry to nod sharply and turn away to start pouring the drinks. Someone put a song on the jukebox, and suddenly the pub was filled with music again as Henry lined up the first two pints for the redheaded fiddler.

“Twelve fifty,” he said, echoing the local tone, and earned himself a smile. He took her money, gave her change, and nodded to the next patron to take his order.

B
Y
THE
time Andy arrived, things were starting to settle down, and Henry was beginning to feel the effects of the four (or was it five?) glasses of gin and tonic he’d drunk through the course of the evening.

“I’m just going to the loo,” Stella said as she ducked back under the bar. “And to get a breath of fresh air.”

“No problem,” Henry said.

He swapped the gin for a large glass of ice and water and sipped it contemplatively. The band had done the second part of their set and were just packing away. The lights were still pretty dim, but people didn’t seem to mind.

Both doors—the ones at the front and the one that led to the garden at the rear—were propped open, trying to tempt a breeze through that didn’t seem to exist. It wasn’t hot, not really, but there were enough people in the little pub to make it warm, and the fresh air that did make it through was a blessing.

“You did good tonight,” Ryan said, joining him with a pint of cider. Well, half a pint.

“Thanks,” Henry said and raised his glass. “I enjoyed myself, actually.”

“Don’t let Stella hear you saying that. She’ll get you signed on as staff.”

Henry chuckled. “I don’t know about that.”

When Stella and Andy came back, she shooed them out the door for a much-deserved break. Ryan snagged a couple of bags of peanuts as he passed the basket they were kept in, and they found their way to a picnic table at the back of the garden.

It was colder out here, much quieter too, and Henry pulled in deep lungfuls of crisp, cool air. Ryan sat down on the table part of the picnic table and propped his feet up on the seat. He split the bag of peanuts open and pulled a pouch of tobacco out of his back pocket, rolling a cigarette with deft fingers.

“You smoke?” he said, offering it to Henry.

“I try not to,” Henry said wryly, then accepted it. Ryan handed him a box of matches and went about rolling another. “Matches? Really?”

“Fuck off. I lost my lighter,” Ryan mumbled. “They were all I had left in the kitchen.”

“You know smoking is really bad for… oh fuck, that’s good,” Henry finished, exhaling white smoke into the night air. It was picked up by the breeze and carried in swirling patterns before dissipating completely.

Ryan snorted in amusement and took his box of matches back. “You don’t have any idea what you did tonight, do you?” he asked, lighting his cigarette and shaking out the flame on the match.

“I poured some drinks?”

“Well, yeah.” Even in the dark, Henry knew Ryan’s eyes were rolling. “More than that, though. You just integrated yourself into the village. People who had heard of you know who you are now, and you’ve got yourself a big stamp of approval. People around here like Stella, and if she likes you, then they’ll like you too. Doing something nice for Stell, not because she asked you, not because you had to, but because you offered—well, things like that will be noticed.”

“Are you saying I’m one of you now?”

“No,” Ryan said and looked over at him. “But you’re getting there, city boy.”

Henry huffed a laugh and took a final drag on the cigarette, stubbing it out when he exhaled and dumping it in the ashtray on the table.

“Do we need to go back in?”

Ryan shrugged.

“Do you want another drink?”

Ryan drained his pint glass and winced, shook his head, and winced again.

“Do you have to work in the morning?”

“Fuck no.”

“Come on,” Henry said, smiling. “We should probably head home.”

When he checked his watch, it was a little past midnight. He’d been working behind the bar for a little under four hours. Things were still pleasantly fuzzy, the sweetness of the night air laced with the scent of wildflowers and cigarette smoke heady to his gin-soaked sinuses.

“We should—just go—say good-bye to Stella,” Ryan said and was already a few steps away by the time Henry caught up with his meaning.

Good-byes took time, once thanks were given and hugs exchanged, offers of drinks refused and finally, finally, getting to the door without anyone else wanting to exchange greetings. With the night being warm, the walk back to the farmhouse seemed to take no time at all, and with Ryan and Henry now comfortable in each other’s presence, they were content to walk in silence.

Back at the house, neither man felt the need to turn any lights on as they left shoes at the door, locked and bolted it and, by mutual, silent agreement, headed to the kitchen, guided by moonlight, for tea.

“I had fun tonight,” Henry said as they waited for the kettle to boil.

Ryan smiled, slow and easy, a warmth in his eyes fueled by alcohol and the lateness of the hour. Henry let the thought enter his mind, dismissed it, then dismissed his dismissal and decided to act, for once, on stupid impulse.

Henry took two long strides forward, trapped Ryan against the counter with one hand on either side of the other man’s waist, hands gripping the cool marble countertop, and pressed his mouth hard against Ryan’s.

For a moment he resisted, then seemed to melt into the kiss, his hands grabbing Henry’s shoulders and his slick tongue licking at Henry’s full bottom lip.

As quickly as it started, it stopped. With a gasp for breath, Ryan pushed him away and reached up to rub at his mouth, seemingly in shock.

“What the fuck?” they both demanded simultaneously.

They stood in Ryan’s kitchen, an impasse, each wearing murderous expressions.

“How did you know I’m… I’m…,” Ryan demanded, although his sentence lost its power somewhere around halfway through.

“Gay, Ryan,” Henry said, his eyes narrowing. “You can say the word.”

Ryan scowled… waited for a response to the question he’d never finished.

But Henry could play the waiting game too. He raised an eyebrow, waiting to see if the revelation would dawn on the other man first.

“You have Grindr.”

“Oh.” Ryan at least had the decency to look embarrassed. “Yeah. I should probably get rid of that.”

“Why? Is it something to be ashamed of?”

“No!”

“Then why are you acting like it is?”

“Don’t be such a fucking girl!”

“I am not a girl,” Henry shouted. “I’m a fucking man. And I might be a fag, but I’m doing a hell of a better job at being a man than you are right now.”

And even though he knew it was dramatic, and probably proving Ryan’s point, he stormed out of the house and slammed the door behind himself as he left.

Nine

T
HE
only problem was, he had nowhere to go. He could storm around the village, for sure, but there were still people who would be on their way home from the pub, and he didn’t particularly want to explain why he was out on the streets in the early hours of the morning without Ryan, whom he’d supposedly gone home with.

He could go down to the house, but that didn’t particularly appeal to him either. It was big and imposing enough in daylight, downright scary in the dark.

So Henry stormed once around the yard, then went round to the back of the house to go up to his room via the fire-route stairs. In hindsight, he probably should have expected Ryan to be sitting there, waiting for him.

He stared up at the hunched figure, dark against the night sky, almost hidden were it not for the glow of his phone lighting up his face.

In his pocket, Henry’s own phone buzzed.

He pulled it out and opened up the familiar yellow and black app.

Hey, hot stuff. You interested in some fun?

He looked up to where Ryan was still sitting several feet above him, wearing a slightly sheepish expression.

“Is this all a joke to you?”

“It’s easier to make it a joke than accept it as reality.”

There was so much vulnerability in that statement. This poor closeted guy. It was way too easy to forget that he himself had been out and proud for over ten years. There were still guys who were thirty or older and hiding their sexuality under a veneer of heteronormativity.

Henry reached out a hand and waited. He felt as much as saw Ryan taking a deep breath, steeling himself before rising and descending the few steps to slip his hand into Henry’s.

“I’m not going to out you, you know,” Henry said quietly, dropping Ryan’s hand. That was enough of a show of confidence for one night.

“I don’t… that’s not… I don’t even know if I’m gay,” Ryan said desperately.

“Okay. I’m not going to force you into defining yourself either. Just don’t—please don’t try to lie to me. It’s insulting.”

“I didn’t mean to insult you.”

“And I didn’t mean to kiss you—not if it was going to get that reaction.”

Ryan reached up to rub his lips again, the gesture both unconscious and disturbingly erotic. “I didn’t mind that much,” he admitted.

When Henry’s stomach flip-flopped, he pressed his hand against it, suddenly aware that he was out in the middle of the night wearing nothing but a thin shirt. And it was fairly cool here in the breeze. As that thought formed, his arms broke out in goose bumps, and he shivered.

“Ryan… I’m going to bed.”

Ryan’s eyebrows shot into his hairline.

“Alone,” Henry qualified, more than slightly amused. “I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah?”

“Yeah, okay,” Ryan said. “’Night.”

“Good night.”

Henry had to pass him on the stairs, and it was
interesting
, that slow push of one body against another. He jogged lightly up the rest of the stairs, determinedly not looking back down, not even after he’d unlocked the door, let himself in, and pulled the drapes closed.

A shower was completely necessary to wash the smell of sweat and cigarette smoke from his skin, and his arms were slightly sticky from the accumulation of spilled drinks that had run down his forearms.

Water sluiced down his skin from the deliciously powerful shower, and Henry didn’t even try to stop memories from the night playing on a loop in his mind. Ryan smoking, Ryan angry, the look in Ryan’s eyes when he kissed him, apologetic Ryan sending him messages through a gay cruising app.

The poor closeted, probably bisexual man, who was a paradox wrapped up in an enigma smothered in contradiction, who didn’t know himself yet portrayed this calm, easygoing nature to the rest of the world. There was no way anything between them could progress at anything more than snail’s pace, and even then there was no guarantee it would ever get anywhere in the end.

Was it even worth it?

Henry pressed his hand to his crotch, where one part of his body certainly thought so. The images in his head changed their theme. Ryan’s desperately blue eyes, his strong, muscled arms, the fuzz on his chin that was starting to turn into a beard, the streaks of blond in his hair, the way the tops of his ears were permanently red. The way the guy always wore his comfy jeans too loose, so they slipped down on the curve of his ass. How he didn’t have any sense of shame regarding his little beer belly and would happily push his T-shirt up to scratch it.