11

11

Fen's eyes filled up as he made his way out of the building. Ripley's words were replaying in his head. He'd not even had the chance to tell Ripley his good news about the drug trial. Or give him the penguin book he had in his pocket.

He ended up on the wrong bloody bus and didn't realise for several minutes. Fen kept looking for something he'd missed in the conversation, something to explain why Ripley had said all that. He couldn't come up with anything that didn't fit under the umbrella of not good. Nor any reason why Ripley wanted things to be this way. There was no answer to make Fen feel any better.

That should have been enough for him to say no, keep your fucking money, yet it wasn't, which made him disappointed in himself. But that is a lot of fucking money!

But…

But…

But…

Emotions battered him. It would have been an easy no if the request had been…what? One night for…a thousand pounds? Except would it really have been an easy no? Even a thousand was a lot of money to him. No to five hundred pounds? Also a lot of money. Probably no, but… Whether he liked it or not, he had a price. Didn't every person? Maybe not, but in the end almost everyone could be won over with the right carrot or stick.

However, Fen was weighed down by bitter disappointment. He'd dared to hope and now hope had gone. He was only wanted for six months. Ripley wasn't looking for a future and a future was what Fen longed for, at least as much of a future as he could have.

Ripley telling him he wasn't into commitment didn't make Fen feel any less hurt. His life had been marred by rejection. His father not wanting him had set the pattern for what followed. He was seen as odd because he didn't like what other boys liked. Kids at school hadn't asked him to play. He was the only boy in the modern dance club. The only boy who liked ballet. Being called names was part of his life.

Then none of what had gone on before had mattered, because the one time he'd sort of expected rejection, he'd been accepted. The one major success of his life, the best day ever, better even than getting top scores in his GCSEs and A Levels, was when he'd won a place at the Royal Ballet School with a performance he knew had been the best he'd ever given. Not just that but he'd been offered a scholarship. It made up for everything he'd gone through. All the long hours practising, the injuries… He'd thought the future was his. All he had to do was work hard to be the best he could. He loved ballet. It was his life. It was everything. Then it wasn't.

He turned in on himself. His mum kept pushing him to go out in the evenings, to make new friends. Seth and Morgan were gay like him but they were a pair when he'd met them, and Fen always felt a third wheel. If he'd had someone of his own… It had taken a lot for him to pluck up the courage to ask someone out. The times when he'd been asked and said yes, he should have said no. It hadn't been easy to pick himself up. Nor when job applications went nowhere.

Fen had understood he wasn't much wanted for anything, wasn't much use for anything, and he'd come to terms with it. Life wasn't all bad. He had a mother who loved him, had eventually found a job he quite liked, a place to live and he was still friends with Seth and Morgan. Though he had no ballet friends. He'd let them go because it hurt too much to see them doing what he'd thought he'd be doing too.

Now Ripley had come into his world, saying all those nice things and one awful thing. It was like being caressed by a gentle hand and being stabbed in the heart by another. Ripley might want him, but not for the right reasons. Not because he was infatuated with Fen, or because he couldn't live without Fen's kisses, or because even thinking about Fen made his stomach churn and his heart leap.

Well, maybe those were all true, but wanting to pay him, to set a time limit on their relationship, to keep it transactional, make it a contract, that changed everything, cheapened everything, spoiled everything. How could Fen believe he was wanted if he had a sell-by date on which he'd be discarded?

He changed buses on autopilot, relieved when he managed to get on the right one this time. He pulled on his gloves. He was feeling really cold. But even feeling cold didn't distract him from going over Ripley's words.

Why was that the way Ripley wanted to do things? Apart from do I have a price?—why was the question dominating Fen's thoughts. Why had he offered so much money? Fen would have been his…whatever he wanted to call it…sort of boyfriend, lover, without being paid. But now the offer had been made, it couldn't be ignored. The words, eighty thousand pounds, were still ringing in his head.What could he do with that amount of money? That was the other side of all this.

If he'd asked himself that question before he'd been to the doctor, he might have had a different answer to the one he had now. Without knowing about his starting-to-fail heart, if he'd suddenly won that amount of money, he'd have resigned and set up as a self-employed restorer. He'd have rented a bigger place to live with a workshop attached, or just rented a workshop if he couldn't find somewhere suitable. He'd have gone to car boot sales, and auctions, picked what he wanted to work on. Built up relationships with local dealers and offered to repair stuff for them.

Or maybe he'd have gone to Japan. Found a job teaching English and experienced Japanese culture, studied ceramics… Come back, gone to university here. Ended up teaching… Ended up living longer than he'd expected because doctors would have discovered a way to halt the cardiomyopathy. He'd have found someone who loved him. They'd have set up home together. Happiness would have been real. Now those one-day-my-prince-will-come dreams had been blighted because the prince wasn't who Fen had expected. He might have been, but he wasn't.

In any case, Fen probably didn't have enough of a future to do any of the things he'd thought about. Though eighty thousand pounds would take him to Japan, would let him travel to other places, and would make a big difference to his life. So would forty thousand. Would Ripley agree to three months? Did that make any difference? Oh God. So I do have a price? But it was such a lot of money. Had Ripley deliberately settled on an amount that was hard to turn down?

He almost missed getting off at the right stop. Even though he was distracted, he checked the group of guys weren't around before he unlocked his door. He didn't want to admit he was scared, but the incident had unsettled him. Once he was in his room, he turned up the heating and sat on his bed in his coat. The money wouldn't only help him. He thought about his mother, what he could give her after she'd sacrificed so much to help him with ballet, but she'd want to know where the cash had come from and Fen never lied. Well, only for the right reasons. While he was still alive, he knew she wouldn't take money from him, and if she found out what he'd done, she'd be so disappointed in him.

Why couldn't Ripley have wanted him because Fen made his heart beat fast, because kissing him made his toes curl, because he desperately wanted to wake up and see Fen lying next to him?

How do you know he doesn't?

That was true.

It was of some comfort.

Fen took the book, toothbrush, condoms and lube from his pocket and got ready for bed.

Even when he was curled up under the covers, he cycled repeatedly through say yes and say no.

Sleep didn't happen. Well, not deep sleep. There was no sliding into comforting dreams.

Fen would have said yes if Ripley had asked him to be his boyfriend. So why not be his boyfriend and have a whole lot of money at the end of six months? He'd wanted his life to change and he was being offered the chance to change it for something he'd have been happy doing anyway.

But why six months? Why pay him at all? What was wrong with the guy?

Fen rolled over, then rolled back, turned his pillow, thumped it, turned it back. The same thoughts kept churning in his head. For whatever reason, Ripley needed to control everything. The start and the end. He didn't want to get hurt because he'd been hurt before and was protecting himself. He didn't want to fall in love because love had ended badly for him. Maybe it had something to do with the death of his father. Maybe Ripley couldn't risk falling in love with him because Fen was dying.

Whatever the reason, Ripley didn't want the complexity of a relationship, didn't want the love that might develop. Fen had a choice. Delete those photos, say no and forget he ever met him. Or use the six months to make Ripley see he was wrong. Six months to make Ripley fall in love with him. Except it would be a love that couldn't last.

As Ripley watched Fen walk out of the restaurant, he'd registered the slump of his shoulders, known how much he'd hurt him and found himself grinding his teeth. That had not been one of his finest moments. Considering what he did for a living, it had been a spectacular fail. And it fucking hurt. And he was an idiot because he'd probably fucked up everything and there had been no need.

Ripley took a deep, shaky breath.

Why hadn't he just let things unfold and allowed the six-month deadline to remain in his head? That would have been the sensible thing to do. Deceitful yes, but less painful for Fen.

Although, was that true? Dumping him after six months when he hadn't known it was coming? The theory behind his proposal was Fen would know where he stood from the outset, they'd have fun for six months, and Fen would come out of the arrangement with a substantial sum of money. Ripley thought he'd be doing Fen a favour as well as keeping things honest and open between them. He had the money. Fen didn't. But if Fen thought he felt sorry for him… Fuck. Of course he thought that and he was offended.

Now he needed to put things right, though he wasn't sure how. He paid the bill and left.

Harry was waiting and Ripley slid into the back of the car. "Home, please."

Despite what Fen had said, if he said yes on Friday, every future interaction between them would be marred by what he'd offered. Would Fen be mentally calculating how much he earned each time they fucked? What price Ripley put on a blow job? Would he be worrying whether Ripley would get his money's worth? His head throbbed. He'd let lust and loneliness and a touch of insecurity get the better of him. Something else too, a feeling he couldn't identify. Or maybe didn't want to.

Ripley knew he wasn't relationship material. He had devastating proof of his inadequacy in that regard. Alejandro had complained Ripley was too self-centred, too focussed on his time-consuming job, too unwilling to take a risk, too buttoned up, too… a whole lot of other toos. And he was right. Ripley was well aware of those character flaws, but he was what he was. Nurture and nature had both played their part, as had the death of his father.

Prior to Alejandro, steering clear of any emotional attachment had led Ripley down a dangerous path for a while, experimenting in a dark world he'd eventually walked away from. He'd failed to see BDSM wasn't the unemotional arrangement he'd imagined. It had its attractions, but it was not for him. Pain cured nothing. Not his nor anyone else's.

One-night-stands had avoided the need to expose his failings. He'd thought he was lucky to be gay because women, more than men, were looking for long term. There were plenty of gay men who just wanted to fuck. He avoided those who looked for more. Sex mattered to him. Being friends didn't. It had been easier to fuck someone and move on to the next. Until Alejandro. The person who'd made him see things differently. The person whose actions had destroyed him. Ripley's lungs locked as he remembered. He'd opened his heart and paid a heavy price. Ripley didn't want to be in the position where he'd risk his heart. Not again.

Maybe Fen would assume he wasn't willing to take a chance because he'd been hurt in the past. Maybe Fen would even think he could change Ripley's mind and at the end of the six months, they'd stay together, living happily ever after because they were in love. Too many things stood in the way of that ever happening. All of them down to Ripley. Nothing to do with Fen. At least Fen would walk away with a sum of money to help him forget.

Sometimes, having a brain that worked at a hundred miles an hour was a disadvantage. Ripley had good reasons for approaching this in the way he had. He hadn't wanted to hurt Fen, but help him. Except being totally open about his reasons had been a step too far. Ripley couldn't admit to that level of vulnerability, the extent to which he was…emotionally stunted. He could never admit that to anyone. His pride wouldn't let him. Even before his father had been killed, they'd been a family who didn't talk about problems. Never complain, never explain was the family motto.

Who'd have thought the concept of a stiff upper lip still existed? But it had and it did. When he was a child, if someone or something upset him, Ripley was expected to deal with it himself. Definitely not show his feelings or share them. Not with his teachers or his parents or his friends.

Lost your teddy? Then look for it.

Hurt your knee? Clean yourself up and stop crying.

Someone been mean to you? Stand up for yourself.

Don't snitch. Cowards snitch.

Be a man.When he was still a little boy.

Would it kill you to make an effort?

His father was nowhere near as unfeeling as his mother. But he was so late back in the evenings, Ripley really only saw him at the weekend. At the age of seven, Ripley had become a weekly boarder at a school in Richmond. He was collected on Friday afternoon by his father and taken back by him on Sunday night. He used to love those car journeys when he had his father to himself. He remembered how he'd been asked if boarding school was what he wanted and understood he could have said no and he wouldn't have had to go. But Ripley had been happy to board. It meant less time with his cold-hearted mother. Even though he'd not been happy at school, he'd have been a lot less happy at home.

He'd never seemed to develop the ability to make friends. Not at school, university or work. He had friends but not real friendships. There was a barrier he couldn't shift. He'd learned to repress his emotions, to hide how he felt. To be neither seen nor heard by his mother made for an easier life. All he wanted was his father, though even his father's style of parenting wasn't perfect.

After his father had died, Ripley had buttoned himself up, trained himself not to react. But that didn't stop him feeling, and when anger, jealousy, irritation, and feelings of injustice took root, in hiding them, he'd allowed them to fester. They grew like cancers, morphing into feelings totally out of proportion to what had caused them. Sometimes Ripley exploded, but only with his face pressed hard into his pillow, only when he was sure he was alone. No one knew. No one cared. He still screamed, but only in his head because his mask was firmly in place.

If he'd not lost his father… He'd kept Ripley balanced. He was fun where his mother was not. He always made time to talk to him. Then, in a blink, he was gone and Ripley had fractured. His link to normality gone. For a long period, not helped by his mother part-blaming him, he'd felt responsible for his father's death. He'd been a small boy. He knew it wasn't his fault and yet a little part of him still wondered. If he'd not hidden, if he'd stayed at his father's side, then maybe the burglar wouldn't have hurt him. If he'd come downstairs sooner… What if had to be the most unhelpful words in the English language.

His heart had never really healed. The belief had lodged in Ripley's head that if he loved anyone too much, then lost them, he would break a little more. It was better to be alone, self-sufficient, and take what he needed, when he needed it. In the years following the loss of his father, Ripley had come to accept that love, affection, and commitment were risks too big to take. He was balanced. He couldn't let the scales tip. Then he'd met Alejandro. The scales had tipped and Ripley had been happier than he'd thought possible until it all fell apart.

Now he was a few years away from forty, repressed and lonely, and it was his own fault. He'd thought Fen would brighten his world. If there was an end date, then Ripley could keep his heart safe. Six months was manageable. A gift to himself and enough money to change Fen's life.

Yet Ripley wished to hell he'd never asked the question. It had been a stupid thing to do. He thought about calling Fen and apologising, telling him he'd withdraw the offer and they could see how things went. If he explained a little about his messed-up head, then maybe Fen would understand. To be even thinking of doing that showed him something had changed. He could keep the six-month plan in his mind. They could have fun and at least Fen wouldn't know what was coming. Maybe finish with Fen in five months so it didn't look… Oh what the fuck I am doing? I haven't changed at all.

His head was still a mess by the time Harry had delivered him home. Maybe doing some work would stop him thinking about Fen.

Ripley opened his iPad. Had he made his level of attraction clear? No!

Fuck it!

He went to bed tired, but he didn't sleep and for once, it served him right.