The Make

grandkids, she is gonna flip, you do realize that?’

George sat back in the chair. He hadn’t thought of that. But he knew Harry was right.

‘I’m going to have to tell her,’ said George. ‘Get it out in the open. Sooner the better.’

Harry tilted his head and looked at George. ‘You think it’s serious then, you and Alf? Not just a fling?’

‘I love him to bits, Harry. I really do.’

‘Oh shit,’ said Harry with a wry smile. ‘Not you too.’

George’s attention sharpened. ‘What, you mean you’ve got someone?’

Harry shook his head. ‘I haven’t got her. Not at all. But I’m in love with her, that’s for sure.’

‘She feel the same?’

‘She hates my guts. I slept with her mother. The cougar.’

‘And she found out.’ George stared at Harry’s face in concern. He had never seen his younger brother looking so downcast, and he felt bad for him.

‘Got it in one,’ said Harry, trying to smile but not succeeding.

‘That would be sort of hard to take.’

‘I know. But since the thing with Em . . . well, I don’t think I care whether I boff another woman as long as I live right now.’

‘Hey, boy, boffing’s what you do,’ said George, trying to inject a little lightness.

Harry had to smile at that. ‘Well, sensei, I am just gonna have to do something else, okay? Something different.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said George, meaning it, his eyes on Harry’s miserable face. ‘I’m really sorry it didn’t work out for you. What will you do, then?’

‘Get a proper job?’

‘That could be on the cards.’ Harry stood up. A proper job doing what? He had no qualifications. He’d never cared about that before, but he did now. He looked down at George and his face was very serious. ‘I’m going out,’ he said. ‘Got a booking at lunchtime, I’ll go straight on to that. But it’s the last one, okay George? The very last.’

Alfie came back in, bringing a gust of cold winter air and a litre plastic bottle of semi-skimmed. Harry was already at the door, shrugging on his jacket. Alfie beamed at him. Harry nodded, straight-faced, and passed on by.

Alfie came to the table where George was sitting, looking morose. Alfie put the milk down. ‘You told him? Already?’ he asked.

George looked up. ‘Didn’t have to. He came into my room to talk during the night. Saw us.’

‘Ah.’ Alfie sat down and looked across at George. There was a brief silence. ‘So . . . how’d he take it?’

George blew out his cheeks and sat back. ‘Pretty good, really. Harry’s a diamond.’

‘It must have been a shock for him.’

‘Yeah. But it’ll be cool. And anyway, Harry’s got troubles of his own without worrying about mine.’

Alfie didn’t ask what Harry’s troubles were. He was aware that they were all treading on new and dangerous ground; he didn’t want to upset anyone by intruding where he shouldn’t.

‘So . . . what’s happening today?’ he asked George. He felt anxious now. Maybe George had decided last night was a mistake, who knew?

George looked at Alf. He said as gently as he could: ‘Look, Alfie, give me a break, will you? All this . . . it’s a lot to take in. A hell of a lot.’

‘No it isn’t,’ said Alfie, feeling a spasm of fear. George was regretting last night. ‘I love you, you love me . . .’

‘Alf!’ snapped George, standing up. ‘For fuck’s sake, can’t you see? This is huge for me. I need some space, okay?’

And he snatched up his coat and followed Harry out the door. The silence of the flat settled around Alfie. He stared at the closed door and hoped that everything was going to work out. Right now, he doubted it.

George went round to see Suze later in the day. He often popped in on her – being careful to avoid the times when he knew that creep Claude was going to be there – and today he had something really important to tell her, and he also really wanted to get out of the flat, give himself a little space in which to think.

He’d spent the night with Alfie.

The night just gone kept replaying in his mind. He still couldn’t quite believe it. But it had been the most thrillingly exquisite night of his entire life. Waking up to see Alfie’s corn-gold head lying beside his on the pillow had seemed entirely natural and right.

And wasn’t that ironic? He had gone into the escort biz as a wide boy on the make, determined to screw a good wedge out of a legion of grateful women – and had stumbled across Alfie, who meant more to him than any woman ever had.

He thought about Harry, who was planning to move out. George didn’t want that. He didn’t want Harry made to feel awkward – it was his home, after all. And Suze was going to go ballistic. Harry was dead right about that.

London buzzed all around him as the dark afternoon faded into black night. Lights twinkled on and he ambled along the Embankment; the river police had divers down under London Bridge. They were hoisting something big – it looked like a cab – out of the water with a crane.

He was in love. It wasn’t a cause for concern, a reason to be fucking miserable. It was the best thing that had ever happened to him. It was going to be the best Christmas ever. When at last he reached Suze’s gate, someone called his name. It was the last thing he remembered.

Two hours later, Suze came to put out the bins in the dark and saw something on the pavement outside the gate. Probably a wino. She stepped a little closer, not really wanting to get involved, and found that the wino looked sort of bulky and . . . oh shit, there was George sprawled face-down on the pavement and people – the fuckers! – were stepping around him, thinking he was just a drunk, just a waster.

‘George!’ she shrieked, and that brought Claude haring out of the half-open front door to stare down at Suze’s eldest son, her beloved boy, lying there on the cold ground with the side of his head a bloody mess. It was Claude who called for the ambulance.

Once Harry was out in the street he walked and walked, trying to take in all that was happening before his date with Rosie May, his latest – and his last – client.

She’d only booked this morning, it was a bit of a rush job, but Harry was okay with that. Sick as he was of the escorting now, he wasn’t about to let the poor woman down. He took the tube over to Soho where she had asked that they meet, at a club there. She’d said she’d meet him at the bar inside, and that she had long dark curly hair and olive skin. She’d know him straight away, anyway, she’d said in her email, from the gorgeous pics on the website, it wasn’t a problem.

Harry was a bit surprised to find himself pitching up outside the door of a fetish club. All right, live and let live, but she hadn’t said in her emails that it was one of those. She was celebrating the opening of her new Soho sex shop and she wanted a nice-looking escort to show off to her staff and her friends, earn herself a bit of kudos.

What the hell, he thought, and went in. The bouncers on the door frisked him, and then he walked on in to the club where the volume of the sound system nearly peeled the skin from inside his ears. It was hot in here, and there were even lunchtime punters in the place, jigging around on the dance floor.

Harry crossed to the long spotlit bar area and looked around. Jeez, the freak show in here. Plastic everywhere – chains, whips, thongs . . . and there was a pretty woman sitting alone at the bar, a woman with dark curly hair and cafe-au-lait skin. He made his way over to her.

‘Rosie May?’ He glanced at his watch. He wasn’t early, so where were her staff, her friends?

She smiled, but it had an edge of unease to it. Well, that was the norm. Lots of ladies felt apprehensive when they’d hired an escort. He smiled too, held out a hand.

‘Hi, I’m Harry Doyle,’ he said. ‘Can I get you a drink?’ He noted she didn’t have one in front of her.

Rosie shook her head and jumped down off her stool. Her movements were quick, lithe, nervous. ‘No thanks.