Chapter 25
TWENTY-FIVE
BENJI
NOW
I never want him to let me go, but eventually, he does, although it seems even our skin and our bodies resist it.
We’ve stuck together in places, sweat and bodily fluids holding us in place.
My bag makes a noise as Dion’s stomach pulls away from it.
And I like it. The messiness, the animal nature of it, the symbolism. I like it more than I suspect I should.
“I should deal with this,” I start rolling the condom off my dick once Dion has lifted off me completely.
He points at a door underneath the spiral staircase leading upstairs. “There’s a toilet with a bin in it through there.”
“Thanks,” I say, and suddenly I’m feeling very naked and very awkward. I reach to grab my tracksuit trousers on my way as I stumble in that direction.
Once the condom is disposed of, I pull my trousers on and wash my hands, then check my bag.
I almost expect something to have happened to it or my stoma.
For it to have become dislodged or loose or unexpectedly full while I was having the literal ride of my life, but it looks exactly as it always does when it’s empty.
It wasn’t a problem during sex – I was too far gone for anything to be a problem – but I was aware of it, and a small part of me couldn’t switch off, worrying it was going to get dislodged.
I make a mental note to look into getting a belt as a matter of priority.
Not that I assume another round is on the cards.
It’s just what I desperately, desperately want.
But Dion owes me nothing. Not even the coffee and possible future we talked about earlier.
I nod at myself in the mirror above the sink as if to cement this truth in my mind and then I walk out to find Dion again.
He’s still sitting on the couch and like me, he’s thrown some clothes on, namely his boxers and the T-shirt he was wearing earlier. He’s staring at his phone, a faint frown pinching his eyebrows together.
He looks comfortable. He looks casual. He looks so normal, it kills me. This is what I want. His nights off on the sofa scrolling on our phones in silence. Him choosing music for our evenings together. Lazy cuddles in our underwear. Slow weekends where we stay in pyjamas until the afternoon.
Fuck, I’m running away with myself again.
I guess if the situation were different, now would be when I would make my excuses and save Dion (and myself) from my runaway imagination and leave. But I don’t have that option.
“Dion, I—” I begin, but when he looks up at me, all words fail me. He’s so fucking handsome.
“Are you okay?” he asks and he nods to my bag. “I didn’t cause any damage or pain, did I?”
“No, God, no. Everything’s fine. I actually feel quite relieved I can tick that off my list.” I foolishly act out writing a tick in the air in front of me. “Sex with a colostomy bag, check.”
Dion’s eyes narrow.
“Fuck, not that that’s what that was.” I rush to sit next to him. “Not at all. That was … pretty fucking awesome.”
He smiles and it has almost the exact same visceral reaction in me as when he came in my arms earlier. I light up from the inside out. “Yeah, it was awesome,” he says in a quiet voice, but one that I’ll play on repeat until the next time I see him.
“And you’re cool, about what really happened that night? At the Leavers’ Ball?” I take a seat next to him, close enough to touch or reach for him, but I don’t actually do it.
He nods slowly. “I think so. Of course, I can’t remember word for word what was said but it makes more sense that you were talking to Miles about Raquelle than me. I mean, I’m assuming you didn’t tell Miles that you had a crush on me back then?”
That familiar heat returns to my cheeks. “No,” I admit. “But I wish I had. I wish I’d told everyone. I wish I’d told you.”
“Why didn’t you?” he asks me slowly and carefully, like maybe he’s afraid of the answer.
“Because I knew you didn’t like me, like that. I wasn’t even sure if you liked me in any kind of way. And then I sent you the Valentine’s card and you laughed at me.”
“I didn’t laugh at you. I laughed at what I thought the card was.”
“A French-speaking stalker?” I offer and I can’t help my own chuckles bubbling out of my mouth.
“Exactly!”
We make music by laughing together.
“I can’t believe I got my mum to write it.” I cover my face with my hands, rubbing as if to clean off the embarrassment. But still, we’re both laughing.
“You know,” he says and his unexpectedly serious tone has me dropping my hand and looking at him. “I kept the card.”
My hands drop, and so does my jaw. “You kept it?”
Dion’s cheeks darken, a deep shade of umber. “It’s the only Valentine’s card I’ve ever received.”
I could be wrong but I have an inkling that’s the most vulnerable thing Dion has ever shared with somebody. At least, I imagine, this side of his transition.
“God, I don’t know whether to be mortified or thrilled to tiny fucking pieces that you kept it.”
“Not that I could tell you where it is, but when I was thinking about moving out of my parents’ place last year, I did a big clear out and I found it. I distinctly remember deciding not to throw it away.”
“Maybe you knew,” I venture playfully. “Maybe on some level you knew that I would reappear in your life and get trapped with you in your place of work and force us both down memory lane to face up to the skeletons in our closet.”
Dion’s forehead creases. “What are your skeletons?”
I plonk myself back on the couch next to him and take his hand in mine.
“Miles Richards. Being in the closet at school. Not admitting to you or anyone just how much I liked you back then.” I stare at our laced fingers, too shy to meet his eyes.
“Do you think things would have been different, if I had told you the truth? Or would you have laughed at me like I imagined?”
When I finally look up at Dion, his big brown eyes are soft but still intense on mine.
“I can’t honestly say it would have ended up like this.
” He nods at our state of undress, and I realise this is the longest I’ve ever been topless since my colostomy surgery.
Even when I’m home alone, I don’t like to walk around topless with it — seeing it out of the corner of my eye is jarring — but sitting here like this with Dion, I’ve almost started to forget about it.
Or rather, forget that it’s a big deal. “I wasn’t as …
at peace with who I am back then. I didn’t really do relationships. I still don’t …”
“Oh,” I say, sounding normal even though it feels like all my organs have plummeted through my ass, which is a feeling I’m very familiar with.
“I mean …” Dion jumps in but then trails off again. “I just … I’ve never really wanted to be in a relationship before. It’s just never been a priority until …”
I grab hold of that until with both hands and all my teeth. “Until?”
“Until now. Until you,” he says, and my heart stops dead in my chest. It only starts to pump again when Dion lifts my hand up to his mouth and kisses my knuckles, those globe-like eyes fixed on me.
I shiver. Literally shiver, and have to bite back the moan that’s on the tip of my tongue. As much as I want to sink to my knees for Dion again, I want this conversation much, much more.
“I don’t want to put any pressure on you,” I say. “I meant what I said. I just want coffee.”
“And a possible future?”
“Sure.” I smile. “I’m not even going to try and be cool about it. I really want a future with you but if that’s too much of a big step to think about right now …”
“It is and it isn’t.” Dion drops his gaze.
“My friend Mari, who works here … The one who took the keys. They think I’m on the aro spectrum.
Greyromantic or some shit. And I’ve never really thought about it much.
But now you’re here and I’m feeling things I’ve never felt before.
It’s not that I thought something was missing; quite the opposite.
My life has always felt full and good. But now … ”
“Now?”
“Now, I think something would be missing if I didn’t go for coffee with you.”
“That’s good enough for me,” I say, feeling that truth in every cell of my body.
Dion opens his mouth to say something in response to that, but then his lips close again.
“So you still live at home?” I ask, as much to talk about something as anything else but then I realise how it sounds. Like judgement.
“Yeah,” Dion says with the kind of apprehension I would expect.
“That’s nice,” I say quickly.
“You think? Most people think I’m weird.”
I shake my head. “Not me. I was living at home for the last year or so too. And I wouldn’t give that time up for anything.”
Dion studies me for a moment, allowing the gravity of what I just said to land and sit between us.
“You know, I used to think it was only because I wanted to be close to help with my dad. He can’t walk for more than a few steps.
Now Mum’s pretty much his full-time carer, but she still needs to work too, so I like to give her regular breaks.
But I don’t know if that’s the real reason.
I think part of it is that my home is a safe place.
No matter what was happening out in the real world, I always had that house and my parents to return to. ”
“You mean, being trans?”
“Yeah, and Black and queer and covered in ink and just … Just different.”
“I don’t think it’s a bad thing, you having that safe place. That haven. That comfort,” I say, thinking about how so much of my grief is rooted in the fact I don’t really have that anymore.
“I don’t either, but …” Dion pauses and I wait.
“My brother and sister both left. Lyla’s down in London now.
Working for some big investment bank in the city and making more money than you can imagine.
I’ve thought about disowning her but she buys the best Christmas presents now.
” Dion’s soft laughter is an invitation for me to join him.
“And Devon is just up the road in Bristol. He runs a barber shop and comes home every month to give Dad and me a trim. He’s always there when we need him, if we need anything.
What I’m trying to say is, maybe I should think about moving out again. ”
“Maybe you should,” I say when other words are climbing up my throat. Words like “Move in with me!” and “My house has plenty of room!”.
“What’s it like teaching at our old school?” Dion asks, and I wonder if he’s doing exactly the same thing I wanted to a moment ago. To just keep talking.
“Weird. But I think I like being a teacher there more than being a student.”
“It’s not like you did badly there. You got good A-Levels and went to your first-choice uni. How was it? University?”
“Good, mostly. I spent a lot of the first and second year still getting to grips with Crohn’s. I had to stop playing football for a while.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“It’s okay. I was already too old to make it big. Now, I play for enjoyment. There’s no pressure anymore. I like it better.”
“Maybe I could watch you play, one day,” Dion says quietly, but he may as well have megaphoned the words directly into my ear.
“I’d love that.” I beam at him.
Silence falls, but it’s not awkward. In fact, it’s the opposite, like a deep exhale after holding your breath for too long.
Both of us are moving our thumbs, and Dion’s skin is so soft and warm.
We listen to Daft Punk and I close my eyes, feeling like I’m time travelling.
No, not time travelling but time straddling.
Going back in time at the very same moment when I want to fast forward to the future.
It’s a perfect moment, which is why my stomach decides to growl loudly.
“I should find us some food,” Dion says.
“And we should think about making some kind of bed for us,” I add.
Over the next hour or so, that’s exactly what happens.
Dion makes us almond butter and jam sandwiches and we eat them standing up in the staff room, smiling at each other as we chew.
We tidy up, drink some water and then move around the studio collecting cushions and blankets wherever we find them.
When we locate a large, weighted blanket in Dion’s boss’ room, I know we’re going to sleep just fine.
Or I will, at least. If I’m tucked under the same covers as Dion, I know I’ll not be wanting for anything.
As it happens, our makeshift bed is surprisingly warm and cosy.
With sofa cushions spread out on the floor, blankets wrapped around them to keep them somewhat in place, I sink into the bed with great relief.
My arm is starting to hurt a little now and it’s like Dion knows this as he inspects his artwork before he turns the light off after a satisfied little grunt.
In the dark, he slips under the weighted blanket and lies next to me.
I itch to reach for him but he lies still, and in the dull light coming through from the street light filtering into the front room, I can see him staring straight up at the ceiling.
“Are you going to be okay with your bag?” Dion asks. “Did you bring any spares?”
“No, but I changed it just before I left my house. That’s why I was late. I normally don’t need to change it more than once a day. I’m assuming we’ll be out of here some time tomorrow?”
“I hope so,” Dion says, but then he turns his head quickly to catch my eye. “Not that I want to not be here with you. I just … I just would like the option to leave. And have a shower, you know?”
“I understand,” I say and I snuggle a little closer to him, wrapping my arm around his soft, full stomach. “Is this okay?”
He holds onto my arm, keeping me in place, and he moves his arm so it tucks under my head, bringing me onto his chest. “This is okay.”
This is okay. This is okay. This is okay. I repeat his words as I feel sleep creep closer and closer.
Understatement of the decade, I think, and I’m about to say it but Dion leans down, kisses my forehead with a sigh, and it doesn’t need to be said. I believe he knows it too.
There was always something about him. And now, hopefully, there’s something about us.