Reconciled - 2. Chapter 2

"You look like you're in a good mood," Mark smiled.

Arran nodded and sat down opposite his best friend. Two coffees where already on the table, tiny whisps of steam wafting the aroma into the air. He looked from the coffee, past Mark, out to the frosty street. Sunlight was glinting off parked cars and reflecting a bright sheen across everything.

"I met up with Tom," he said, picking up his coffee and taking a careful sip of the hot liquid. That gentle touch to his lips of the cup brought back the encounter yesterday afternoon and he smiled to himself.

"So!," Mark leaned forward. "What happened?"

Arran was silent a moment before replying. "We, ah..."

Mark interrupted before he could say any more. "I knew it. I just knew it. You did, didn't you?"

"Ssh!" Arran felt himself blush.

"What was it like?"

"You seem terribly interested in my sex life all of a sudden."

Mark looked at him across the top of his coffee cup. "I told you all about Jennifer."

"Ah, wait a minute. You said you slept together. I think that's all you said."

"Yeah, well, you too, now. You're no longer..." He lowered the cup and leaned even closer, "A virgin," he whispered.

Arran blushed again. "I guess not."

"So who did what?"

"Mark! Can you shut up? I'm not giving you the details."

"Did you..."

"Ah, no! I'm not going there, Mark. No way. Use your imagination."

Mark sat back, giving up his interrogation, but he had to admit to himself he was curious. He wondered why he was so interested, it was a little more than simply wanting to know his best friend was happy. Maybe everyone would want to know who did what to whom?

Arran watched his friend. He could see the cogs turning in his mind, he knew him too well, but no way was he going to give details. That was between him and Tom. Besides, Tom trusted him, and that wasn't something to be taken lightly. It did cross his mind though, he wondered what Mark would think if he knew how he felt. He wondered what anyone would think. There was this lurking concern about what was normal. Was what he thought, felt, what excited him, was it normal?

"Hey, you still here? You look a million miles away."

"I was thinking," Arran replied.

"About what?"

He wasn't about to start discussing his own psychology. "About this guy Tom's got a problem with."

"What guy?"

Arran explained about Achim, the fight, if you would have called it a fight. About Tom getting beaten up and Achim getting collared by the police. How that was probably for dealing drugs. He told Mark, Tom told him he'd seen Achim, but it was impossible to identify someone who was on the ground some distance away from the twelfth floor of a tower block. He told Mark how he thought Tom might have been more affected by the incident than he was saying.

"Maybe," Mark confirmed. "Maybe he's not telling you everything? Either about how he feels, or about this guy, Achim. Or maybe he doesn't know himself. He could just be scared?"

"Yeah, there's all that. It's all possible."

"Talk to him. That's what I would do."

Arran smiled, put down his coffee and stood up. "Thanks," he told Mark.

Mark looked up at him. "You're seeing him again?"

"Yeah, later."

"Well, talk to him," Mark repeated. Then, with a glint in his eye, added, "unless you've got other things on your mind," he winked.

"You're incorrigible! See ya around."

"I'll want a report," Mark called after him as he put his jacket on and left.

Ali had phoned him and Arran had easily agreed to go round and see her, it was like falling back into his old life, but with one big difference, they weren't a couple any longer. The street where Alison lived was only a short distance from Jennifer's and in the same nice, affluent neighbourhood, a stark contrast to the council estate which was home to Tom and his mum. The difference struck him profoundly, even the type of cars that were parked in driveways or in the road reflected that disparity. Previously, he had never paid too much attention other than superficially, but now it seemed to Arran that here, there was a different way of life entirely, no Achim's hanging about selling drugs and hassling people.

It was Samuel who answered the door and let him in. Arran smiled at the boy and could not help notice how he seemed awkward, kind of ill at ease being face to face. This made Arran wonder exactly what Alison might have said about them breaking up. At the same time he couldn't get rid of the idea that Sam might be looking at him differently now.

That odd thought did not last long. Samuel invited him in and shouted up the stairs to his sister. "Come in, it looks freezing out. Ali! Ali! Arran's here."

"Yeah, it's pretty cold," Arran replied, half looking at Sam and glancing at the stairs, uncertain where to go.

Ali appeared at the top of the stairs. "Come up," she told him, and Arran left her little brother staring curiously at him as he squeezed past and climbed the stairs.

"What did you tell him about us?" He asked her, once inside her bedroom.

She smiled and sat down, arranging herself on the little chair in front of the dressing table. "Oh nothing, why?"

"Just that... oh, never mind it's not important."

"Was he being funny around you?" She looked across at him.

"Kind of. Maybe it's just me. I could be getting paranoid!"

She laughed. "I don't think so. Paranoid, you... Slow on the uptake, but not paranoid."

"What does that mean?" He sat down on her bed.

"Nothing. So, how's things?"

"Piling up. There's Tom, my dad, and Vicky. Have you talked to her?"

Alison repositioned herself, turning away from the mirror and looking directly at him. "I've talked to her, but it didn't do much good. She thinks we, the girls, ought to support her. I don't know how she's become so obsessed, but it's like a crusade. She is right, your dad is wrong. No, actually, its not just that. Right and wrong. It's worse. She won't listen to reason and is determined to make him pay."

"For ending their thing?"

"Yeah, I guess he hurt her. It doesn't make sense. She's just being vindictive. Or, no, maybe she did this thing on the spur of the moment and the longer it goes on, the deeper she is digging herself in."

Arran looked at the cream bedspread and pillows, at the bedroom, all neat and well arranged. "Well, it doesn't matter. The cassette Tom gave me proves she's lying."

"Are you and Tom a number now?" She asked, surprising him.

He looked up, thinking for a moment. "It feels right. At least it does when I'm with him."

She met his eyes. "You're not sure about him?"

Ali had a way of teasing out the truth. She was particularly good at it.

"I never imagined it."

"No." She raised her eyebrows. "Like I said, you're a bit slow on the uptake."

"Are you having a dig at me?"

She smiled, but didn't reply.

"Sammy," Alison was standing in the doorway, Samuel was lying on his bed with his headphones on.

He saw her, and lifted them half off so he could hear. "What?" The music carried on drumming in his right ear.

She stood there staring at him and miming, not saying anything. He paused the music and lifted the headphones off completely. They hung around his neck.

It always worked, one of her ploys. "Can I come in?" She asked.

"What is It?"

He didn't invite her in, but she entered his bedroom anyway, closing the door with a soft click, behind her. She moved across the room and sat on the foot of the bed looking up at him.

"You want to talk to me?"

He frowned. "About what?"

"You could start with Arran." She smiled.

"What about him?"

"I don't know. Maybe you can tell me?"

"Tell you what sis?" He fidgeted, feeling a little uncomfortable about where this conversation was leading.

"Well, perhaps how you feel about him." She raised her eyebrows.

"I don't feel anything about him."

Samuel moved now, swung his legs off the bed and sat up, pulling off the headphones and dropping them on the bedside table.

"You weren't acting funny then?"

"Funny?" He tried to sound casual, but there was an element of alarm in his voice. Something he couldn't quite hide, because he knew what she meant.

Alison looked around the room, she didn't reply, but gazed at the posters stuck on the walls. A typical teenage boy's bedroom, but possibly with a little difference.

"Okay," she broke the uneasy silence. "If you don't want to say. But he thought you treated him differently."

"I didn't. Why? How?"

"Since we split up and he started seeing a boy in his class, Tom."

"Tom? I didn't know he... " Samuel' s voice faded away. "I mean," he started trying to recover.

"Arran is with Tom, do I have to paint a picture?"

Samuel blushed. "Yeah, I know."

"And you like him, don't you?"

"What!"

"Arran, you've always kind of liked him."

Alison was careful about what she was saying. Choosing her words. But now things with Arran were more or less out in the open, at least as far as they were concerned, she wanted to show her little brother that she supported him. That was, to tell him if he liked Arran, if he was... if he had the same feelings. It was fine.

"I know what you're saying," Samuel felt his face was hot. He took a deep breath. "You think I'm gay?"

"I don't know," she smiled softly. "I only want you to know you can talk to me. If you've got a crush..."

"Wait! Hold on," he interrupted. "You're saying I fancy Arran?"

"I'm not saying that. But if you did it's okay. And if you don't that's fine too."

She stood up, deciding she had said enough. She didn't want to back him into a corner.

"Yeah," he said, as she opened the door.

Turning back a moment, she smiled again. "Well, that's fine, Sammy." She stepped out into the hall.

Samuel sat on his bed thinking about what had just happened. If his sister knew how he felt, what about Arran?

Jennifer's house stood proud across the lawn, behind that big old broad leaved tree. Frost sparkled on the branches, tiny crystals of ice that glistened in the fading sunlight. Alison walked slowly up the path towards the front door, she wondered whether her friend had heard from Vicky. Since the summer both of them had lost contact with Vicky, just until the moment it was revealed she had been in a relationship with a much older man. That man turned out to be Arran's father and when they broke up and she accused him of rape, everything went to hell.

Mark was there with Jennifer, which was no surprise, the couple had grown closer, and these days were virtually inseparable. It was only a matter time she thought, before the pair got engaged officially, and then... marriage. Alison was very conscious of how everything had changed this summer. Arran and her had split up, they had never consummated their relationship, which only reinforced the probability that he was gay. Now he was seeing Tom, it would be too easy to label them the odd couple, she refused to do that, despite their art project and that painting, a self-portrait by Tom.

"It's as if we're all starting a new epoch," she told them.

Jennifer smiled as she glanced at her boyfriend. "We've turned a page," she said.

"Have you seen Arran?" Mark asked.

"Yeah, and he told me about the cassette."

Jennifer turned to Alison. "My dad said that taped conversation might not hold up in court."

"You spoke to your father about all this?" Alison asked her.

"Well, about the cassette. He knew what had happened. Arran's dad getting arrested."

"I think everybody knows. It was in the local paper," Mark said. "Arran's pretty worried about it."

"Yes," Alison said, "he is. Plus he's dealing with Tom. I mean their relationship."

"Do you think it's serious?" Jennifer asked.

"I don't know. Really, I've no idea."

"He hasn't told his dad," Mark told them.

"That he's gay?" Jennifer added as she stood up. "Can I get you a drink? Mark?"

"Why don't we share that bottle of wine?" Mark grinned.

"Ali? That good for you?"

"Yes, sounds... lovely," she smiled, rather distracted by the whole gay thing.

Jennifer went to fetch the bottle and Mark the glasses.

"I see you're quite at home here," Alison said, and Mark grinned again.

They sat down and Jennifer let Mark open the bottle and fill their glasses. She lifted her glass, "To us, I guess."

They clinked glasses.

"Did Arran tell you about this Achim guy?" Mark asked.

"No, who's he? He never said much, just about Vicky and I asked him about Tom."

Mark put his glass down. "Achim is some low life who has been bullying Tom on the estate where he lives. It was Achim and his gang who attacked Tom."

Alison looked shocked. "He never said anything about that."

"No, he only shared that with Mark," Jennifer told her.

"Is it because he's gay? I mean, the attack."

"Probably, I don't know what else it would be." Mark told her. "But it's not like Tom is... you know, I mean he's not obviously gay."

"Except the painting," Alison said.

"The painting is Tom dressed in a tartan mini-skirt. Maybe he's trans?" Mark sipped his wine.

"I never imagined anything like this."

"Nope, neither did I," Jennifer added. "And I never imagined our best friend sleeping with Arran's dad.

Alison was tempted to talk about her brother, but thought better of it. No point in throwing more personal stuff into the mix. She wasn't a hundred percent sure anyway, and if he was gay it was no big thing.

They had finished off the bottle of wine between them, before Alison made her excuses to leave the two of them alone. She didn't want to spoil things by being the third wheel.