Page 35 of Pansies

“People aren’t patchwork quilts.” There was that emptiness in Fen’s voice again. Sharp words blunted against the rocks of some deeper sorrow. “Pieces of pain that can be stitched together into the shape of something human.”

“No, but…”

“But what?”

“I don’t know,” Alfie admitted, and felt shit and useless all over again.

Not that it mattered. Fen clearly didn’t care or need reassurance from Alfie. Well, Alfie’s attempts at reassurance, anyway. He uncoiled, straightened, tipped his head up challengingly. Which would have been a little bit adorable—he looked so pointy like that, all chin and nose and cheekbones—if there’d been any warmth in his gaze. “So what now, Alfie Bell?”

“That’s sort of up to you.” Alfie shrugged. “I’ll leave you alone if that’s what you really want. But what’s the harm in dinner or summin?”

“You’ve heard my terms.”

“Your terms?”

A short, sharp nod.

The conversation—and Fen himself—had wavered about so much that it took Alfie a moment to catch up. “You want to shove my head down the netty? And afterwards you’ll come to dinner with me?”

“Well”—the faintest ghost of mischief curled the corners of Fen’s lips upwards—“maybe notimmediatelyafterwards.”

Alfie might have laughed if he hadn’t been otherwise preoccupied. “I wasn’t… That was… Give over, mate, you know I was kidding.”

“Fine.”

“You can’t be bloody serious.”

Fen adjusted his glasses—a swift, neat little flick with his fingertips—and said nothing.

“You’re being unreasonable.”

“Am I?” Fen’s voice rose abruptly. “Then tell me, Alfie Bell, why the fuck should I be reasonable? Why do I owe you that?”

Alfie had been on his way to annoyed, but it didn’t last. How could it, when Fen was right? He groaned. “You don’t. Of course, you don’t. You don’t owe me anything.”

“We finally agree on something.” Fen had the meanest eyebrows. Especially when they went twitchy and sardonic. He’d folded his arms again as well, so Alfie could see the twist of sinew over the bones of his forearms and the deep groove of muscle between. The faint gleam of gold at the tips of the lightly curling hair.

He stifled a sigh. “All right. If this is really what you need, let’s do it.”

“What… You”—Fen’s lashes fluttered, almost like they did in pleasure, pale suggestions of moving light—“you…you’re going to let me…”

“Well, not if there’s an alternative. But if I have to, I have to.”

Except now Fen seemed to be hesitating. And while this would probably have been a really good time for Alfie to make a strong case fornothaving his head shoved down a toilet, instead he found himself getting reckless and belligerent. He wasn’t exactly keen on the toilet-head-shoving thing, but on a solely abstract level, there was something almost appealing about the parity of it all. Checks and balances. Punishment and redemption. What went around coming around.

He’d felt the same way as a kid when—or, at least, after—his dad had taken a belt to him. Which wasn’t something that had happened all that often. It was hard to explain to southerners, though, who went straight from “hit occasionally” to “horribly abused,” which Alfie thought was kind of weird considering a lot of his London friends barely knew their parents.8 Greg actually called hismaterandpater, which might have been a joke of some kind, and spoke of his nanny with a great deal more warmth. At first, Alfie had assumed he meant his grandmother, but it turned out he meant the trained professional who had been hired to raise him. Before he’d been sent off to school to learn breadmaking or whatever. Apparently this had done Greg no harm. Which was what Alfie was inclined to think about his own upbringing.

Because he knew the difference between cruelty and consequences. And while he was pretty sure he had no intention of raising his hand to his own kids, he tended to imagine they’d somehow be like Greg. Sweetly middle-class and respectful and easy to manage. Not a set of too-tall, testosterone-fuelled, riot-running hooligans who needed whatever discipline they could get. Neither he nor his brother had ever meant any harm, but they’d often inadvertently caused it, and Alfie wasn’t resentful of being called to account.

He hadn’t even been resentful at the time. He hadn’t liked being on the wrong side of his dad’s belt, any more than he’d liked being grounded or shouted at, but there was something very direct and immediate about it. It was a clear line. And, on the other side, everything was okay again, so Alfie didn’t have to feel bad or guilty or ashamed of himself. All that mattered was that he’d done wrong and taken his punishment as a man should.9

Which was exactly what he was going to do now.

“We doing this, then?” he asked, when Fen showed no sign of speaking. “Or do you want to drop it and get dinner?”

Fen stared at him for a long moment, and Alfie had absolutely no idea what he was thinking. Then he nodded. “Okay…yes.” He sounded a bit dazed. “We’re doing this.”

He stepped past Alfie to the door and flicked the latch down. It landed in its cradle with a clatter. Then he turned the key in the lock and flipped the sign over.

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