Chapter Text
It sounded like little bells at first, invading his mind in whatever dream he was having. By the time he was conscious, he couldn’t quite remember the places he visited in his slumber, but the sound still continued. Callum sat up, letting the sleep fall away and trying to remember those little details, like what his name was and why he wasn’t passed out on his pillow right now.
Callum recognised that sound, he knew he did. The information suddenly clicked into his brain and he scrabbled around his night stand to get his phone, pressing the button when he saw who the call was coming from.
“Hey, Lo,” his voice crackled out, as his friend appeared on the screen. “What’s the matter? You alright?”
Lola was clearly distressed, her mascara running down her cheeks, and her nose red and blotchy. The camera shook slightly as her hand wavered when holding it. “Callum,” she cried, and that was all she managed to get out before she dissolved into floods of tears.
“What’s wrong? What’s the matter?” he asked, his heart rate speeding up, as he ran a hand through his hair nervously. “Is it Lex? Is everyone okay?”
Suddenly, Lola was shoved over on the screen and Ben appeared rolling his eyes. “You’ve worried him now! I told you this was ridiculous!” he scolded, before turning towards the phone. “Don’t worry, Callum. Everyone is fine. Lola’s just been on the wine for the past three hours. It’s got her all emotional about everything.”
“It’s that bloody film,” Callum heard a voice shout off camera, that he recognised as belonging to Jay. “I told you we shouldn’t have watched it!”
“What film?” Callum asked, feeling relieved that everyone was alright. He turned to reassure Plant, but he was still fast asleep in his basket on the nightstand.
“It’s that Tom Hanks one where he’s with that blonde bird and then his airplane crashes onto a desert island and he’s all alone,” Ben explained, handing Lola a tissue.
“How can you be so emotionless about it?” Lola replied, her words slurring slightly. “He’s all by himself and she’s all he thinks about. That’s all that’s keeping him going, and his only friend is that football!”
“I think it’s a basketball,” Jay called out in the distance.
“It’s a sodding volleyball!” Ben exclaimed with a dramatic sigh. “Ain’t you two every played a sport? Even I know it’s a volleyball!”
“It don’t matter what it is, Ben! Tell him it don’t matter, Callum!” Lola ordered, but continued without giving him a chance to answer. “What matters is that it’s all he’s got! Like you and Robert!”
Once Ben had found out about him and Plant, it wasn’t something he kept to himself. It was lovely in a way; Lexi always drew beautiful, colourful pictures which Ben took a photo of and sent through to him. Callum always showed Plant, but his ego stopped him agreeing it was a good likeness. His leaves seemed to be more alert afterwards though, so clearly he was secretly flattered.
Ben had continued to tease him about it, but it was all good natured. He’d even given Plant his own nickname; Robert. (“Thought you’d like it!” he had protested when Callum scowled over the screen. “You like classic rock!”)
Callum nodded along to Lola, as she continued to tell him about the film between sniffs. “He gets saved, Tom Hanks does, but he loses the football!”
“Basketball,” Jay called.
“Volleyball!” Ben replied with a huff. “I remember you watching it on the last Olympics, Jay. Perhaps pay more attention to what they’re whacking over the net than the scantily glad women doing it.”
“So then he gets back home, and the first thing he wants to do is go find his girlfriend,” Lola continued, not paying any attention to the debate. “But he finds out that she ain’t waited for him, and she’s now shacked up with some boring dentist or something.”
“It’s Mr Big from Sex in the City,” Jay answered assuredly.
“He’s a huge fan!” Ben smirked at the comment. “Binged watched it and everything.”
“Hey, I’m a modern man!” Jay said, appearing behind them on the screen. “It weren’t the whole thing, anyway. I only saw a few episodes!”
Ben raised his eyebrows. “Yeah, well your Netflix history says different!” he bit back before Lola punched him in the arm. “What the fuck was that for?”
Pointing at the screen fiercely, Lola shoved him again. “Tell him!”
“This is ridiculous,” Ben replied, pursing his mouth and sitting back. “I ain’t saying something absurd just because you downed a bottle of prosecco, Lo!”
“Tell him, Ben!” she said, before reaching off screen and bringing back half a glass of wine. “I think it’s really important he hears it.”
“I really don’t think it’s important that we woke him up past midnight to say it,” Ben remarked, before Lola glared at him again. “Alright! Fine! Callum, the reason that Lola made us call is so I can promise you that I will wait for you until the end of lockdown and not shack up with Mr Big!”
“Oh yeah, real romantic, Ben!” she responded, downing the last of her glass. “That ain’t what you said during the film. Callum, listen. He said that he’d never stop waiting for you. Ain’t that sweet?”
Ben started to blush and look down. “You’re so drunk I could have said anything,” he muttered, his eyes slightly flickering to the screen to check Callum’s reaction.
“Am I Tom Hanks in all of this?” Callum replied, smiling warmly back, knowing how much it took for Ben to say those words.
“Babe, I’m the blonde bird, so you got off lightly!” he said, before returning his eyes fully to the screen and holding Callum’s gaze.
“We should have just watched Toy Story 2!” Jay exclaimed, putting his arm around Lola’s shoulders to comfort her, as she snuffled out more tears. “We’re going to say bye bye to Callum, now Lo, and get you off to bed and let him get back to his. Night, mate!”
Ben blew a kiss at the screen, before Lola managed to fumble a finger to end the call.
“You can’t do that! You know you can’t do that!”
Jay started to shake his head with a huff, shooting scorn from his eyes towards Ben with such intensity that even Callum could feel the annoyance through the screen. They’d propped Ben’s laptop up on a chair, and they were all sat around the coffee table playing Scrabble, drinking and bickering. Callum had his own bottle of beer open, but Ben, Lola and Jay had the spirits and shot glasses out.
“Lola just did exactly the same thing!” Ben argued, downing his shot. “She used one of Callum’s words and just added a letter and got herself a load of points.”
Jay grabbed the bottle of vodka out of Ben’s hand before he could pour another drink. “No! Callum put the word ‘toned’ down, right?” he explained, as Lola gingerly reached for the alcohol and tried to sneak it out of his hand. “Then, Lo added an ‘s’ to the front to make ‘stoned’. As in ‘I stoned him to death when he couldn’t stop cheating at board games’!”
“That’s actually not the meaning I was going for,” Lola muttered to Callum, taking a swig from the bottle.
“I did exactly the same thing!” Ben said with a shrug.
Jay widened his eyes. “No, what you did was take Lo’s word of ‘anchor’ and try to shove a ‘w’ at the front,” he said, throwing the tile back at Ben. “It ain’t even the correct spelling! You’re always lauding your GCSE English over me!”
“Don’t start again,” Ben replied, grabbing the bottle back from Lola and pouring more into his glass. “Just because the only certificate you ever got were your ten metre breast stroke. And you only went for that cause you didn’t know there was swimming involved.”
“Bit hard not to get your GSCE when you’re clinked up in the local Borstal, ain’t it?” Jay said, downing Ben’s drink and then sticking his tongue out at him. “Who was your talk partner in lessons? The Artful Dodger?”
“Do you have any GECSEs, Callum?” Lola slurred out. “I ain’t got any, but I’m gonna make sure Lexi gets hers. I can do ananagrams…anananagrams. I can do those mixed up letter problems really well though!”
“You do the one in the back of Woman’s Weekly every week, Lo,” Ben intercepted. “It’s hardly The Sunday Times crossword.”
“I got English and Maths,” Callum said, answering the question and taking a swig of his beer. “Oh and Food Tech.”
“See!” Ben said pointing to the screen and back at himself. “Proper little bright sparks we are!”
Jay rolled his eyes. “Oh yeah, right little smart arse power couple you are!” he snarked. “You haven’t even figured out how to be in the same room together! You’ve got a couple of high school exams; it’s hardly a doctorate from Oxbridge!”
“They just help with my police application, that’s all,” Callum added in.
“Aww, that’ll be nice when you get in, won’t it?” Jay commented, elbowing Ben. “You can have this one’s mug shot in a fancy photo frame on your desk.”
“Oh shut up, Jay!” Ben remarked, giving him a kick under the coffee table. He leaned closer to the laptop. “I’ve had to listen to cops and robbers jokes all week.”
“He can get your fingerprints from your file engraved onto his handcuffs!” Jay said, snorting out a laugh at his own joke. “It’ll be dead romantic! You can pack him a lunch in one of your old swag bags!”
“Can I just play my word now, please?” Ben said, trying to put his tile back down. “Rather than be heckled by the salty peanut gallery!”
“No you can’t, because it’s not a bloody word!” he replied. “Don’t go starting to throw a paddy cause you can’t think of another word.”
“Me kick off?” Ben snorted out. “You’re the one that ten minutes ago threw all his tiles in the air because you couldn’t figure out how to spell ‘quinoa’ correctly.”
“It is a tricky word,” Callum added in, downing the last of his beer. “Everyone struggles with it.”
“Yeah, but everyone knows it ain’t got a ‘g’ in it, apart from this donut!” Ben replied, before narrowing his eyes at the screen. “And don’t think I ain’t noticed you just been drinking beer. Go get your vodka out and give Robert a shot of Miracle-Gro or something.”
Callum groaned slightly before running to the cupboard to grab the bottle that Stuart gave him, and a small glass. When he returned, Jay and Ben were still embroiled in their discussion.
“You ain’t missed much, hon,” Lola remarked gesturing her head with annoyance towards the two boys. “Ben just pointed out that Jay wouldn’t know a packet of quinowa if it walked up and introduced itself. Cheers to us, eh? I’m glad you’re my friend.”
Callum quickly twisted the lid off the bottle, pouring himself a glass and raising it. To his friend. That felt good.
“Right, we’re starting again!” Jay exclaimed, collecting up everyone’s tiles and putting them in the bag, before Ben snatched it off him. “And don’t be cheating! I saw you sneak back that ‘q’ last time!”
As Ben was dishing out the tiles, Callum downed the vodka in his glass, spluttering a little as the liquid scraped through his throat and made his eyes water. He emptied the last couple of drops into Plant’s soil, giving him a clap on the back and poured himself another drink. When he looked back at the screen, he could see all the tiles were placed out and they were ready to start.
Squinting slightly, he looked at the square letters he had in his rack on the coffee table.
V. E. Y. L. I. O. U. O.
“I ain’t got the best letters!” he remarked out loud, tilting the screen so Plant could see. He wasn’t the best speller and shrugged his leaves, the alcohol already having a little effect on both of them. “Hold about, Ben. You’ve given me eight tiles, not seven.”
“Oh there we are!” Jay said, shaking his finger again as Lola poked her head around and started staring at Callum’s tiles. “You ain’t happy with cheating for yourself, you now brought your fella into it to!”
“Yeah, you’re right mate,” Ben admitted, scratching the back of his head before hurriedly reaching across to grab them back. “I’ll pick some new ones out for him.”
“Hold on a second,” Lola said knocking his hand away. Suddenly her face changed and her eyes became wide. She gripped on to Callum’s tile holder and tried to hold it up to the screen. “I told you I was good at anagrams. That is the sweetest thing, Ben!”
Before she could reach the laptop, Ben smacked the tiles out her hand, causing them to land all over the board. “Whoops,” he said, glaring at Lola, before picking up all the letters quickly.
“Ben, you’re taking the ‘p’ again,” Jay tutted, as Lola turned to the laptop and winked at Callum with a knowing grin. Unsure of what he missed, he just downed another drink.
The next morning, Callum had woken up bleary eyed and thrown the cover back over his head when his gaze caught the beam of light sneaking through the bedroom curtains.
His head swirled a little as his alarm started beeping at him. Callum wasn’t quite sure why he still kept it on. It wasn’t until later in the day that he did his run now, and it was a few hours until he was doing P.E with Lexi. He felt that perhaps if he turned it off it would be a slippery slope. Having that routine and that structure helped him get through every day.
Today though, he reached an arm out from the blanket and gave the phone a whack. He swore he heard a groan as he did so. “Shit, sorry,” he muttered, hoping he didn’t knock too many of Plant’s leaves off. He was sleeping off his own alcohol escapades from last night. The memory of holding Plant aloft in his arms, as he leaned over the balcony in the rain and sang ‘Circle of Life’ came screaming back to him.
Grumbling at the recollection, and hoping no one had a phone out recording them, he snuggled his head back into the pillow and let his eyes flutter back shut.
When the beeping started again, Callum stretched his head out from the duvet, surprised to see the room encased with light. Scrabbling for the phone, he could see it was close to midday. He must have turned off the snooze button without even knowing. Focusing on the task at hand, he answered the call.
“I’ve never drinking vodka again,” he remarked sleepily, managing only enough strength to open one eye. “I think my face is broken.”
“You only had half of what we had,” Ben said smiling warmly, and barely even looking tired. “Look at you. Dirty stop out. Well, stop in, I guess. I’ve tried calling you four times this morning. You hangin’ that bad? Poor baby.”
Callum sat up a little, running his fingers through his hair. Yeah, that was too soon. Dropping his head, he leaned back onto the pillows with a groan. “I’m not going to do anything today.”
“Well, it’s a lockdown, that true for all of us every day,” Ben remarked back. Before furrowing his brow. “You sure you’re alright? It’s just the vodka, yeah?”
“Yeah,” Callum said back, trying to smile reassuringly. With the fact he still couldn’t properly open his eyes and his hair was all over the place, he probably looked like a squirrel pulled out of early hibernation. He wasn’t sure it was just the vodka though. Lockdown had reached a point where it was feeling like hitting a brick wall. It was easier to get into a routine at first and telling yourself to just sit tight and it would be over soon enough. Soon had been and gone though, and sometimes it was like it was never going to end. The drink had maybe heightened that feeling, but it still lived there all the time, lingering away.
Then there was Ben and the bitter sweetness of it all. He didn’t know what place he’d be in if he didn’t have that, but there was sometimes that little pessimistic hamster treading the wheel inside that thought it could all come crashing down before it had even started.
“Do you want to meet my mum?” Ben suddenly blurted out, chewing a little at his lip. “Only if you want to of course.”
Callum was taken aback a little. It wasn’t a conversation he was expecting, and he could see that Ben was growing nervous waiting for his response. “Yeah, course,” he replied, nodding his head as much as he could without making it feel as though it had a paper weight bolted on to it. “I want to meet all your family once this ridiculous thing is over.”
“Okay. Good,” Ben replied, nodding his head. “She was thinking more like in half an hour’s time. That do you at all?”
“Half hour?” Callum said, sitting up so abruptly that his stomach swished. “What? God, I think I’m gonna be sick.”
“Well you’ve got twenty nine minutes to chuck up your guts, wake up a bit and get dressed,” Ben remarked with a smile. “Chop, chop.”
Callum opened his mouth to speak, but words didn’t seem to be making their way from his brain to his lips. “What?” he repeated, nothing appearing clear at all at the moment.
“My mum don’t quite believe you’re real,” Ben explained. “So I said we’d call her to prove you actually exist and I ain’t just been lying to her for weeks. Twenty eight minutes to go. Up to you if you want her to see you in your boxers or not.”
“It’s just us and her?” Callum asked, secretly hoping that Jay or Lola would be part of the call so he would have another friendly face.
“Yeah, it’s fine. She don’t bite. Trust me, she’ll adore you,” Ben replied. “Why did you want some of your family on there as well?”
“Oh God no,” Callum replied quickly, before seeing Ben’s face fall quickly. “Nothing to do with you. Really, it’s definitely them not you.”
Callum could imagine it now. The screens filled with Stuart in his face mask, Shirley with a permanent scowl, Tina downing mojitos, Mick on a three second delay, Linda trying to burst into song now she had an audience, and Rainie waving a vibrator around. Meeting Ben’s mum for the first time, even though it wasn’t technically in person, would be scary enough.
Mums usually loved him. At least when he was younger and he dated girls, they did. Not that dating them used to last long. Once or twice at the most but they were always keen to bring him home. It was an opportunity that worked both ways. They used to take him into the living room and introduce him, knowing they could look their mothers in the eye and tell them his intentions were honourable and he wasn’t just another guy that was looking to get into their pants. It would keep the questions away for the next few months when she went out and was getting with guys that would raise eyebrows if she brought them home. Callum knew the score there. And he didn’t mind. Sitting in a front room, with a mother bringing him cups of tea and fussing, wasn’t something he ever had. So even though it was just a few hours, he relished it.
This would be different though. This wasn’t some nice, middle aged woman who he wouldn’t see again in a few weeks. This was important. Also, he could always look those women in the eye with the knowledge that the last thing he really wanted to do was go to bed with their children. Now he was going to have to smile through a screen at Ben’s mum and hope his hectic brain didn’t suddenly blurt out a confession of all the different ways he’d imagined having her son. If she’s in the middle of a sentence about the good weather they’ve been having and he suddenly pops out that he can’t wait to go bang Ben in the sunshine of the park after lockdown, then he may have to go hide in the freezer. The only thing he had in there was the onion rings he’d restocked, so he might be able to squeeze in.
“Right, so I’ll give you a call in a bit, yeah?” he said, giving a kiss to the screen. “Callum, relax. It’ll be fine.”
Twenty five minutes later, and Callum was sitting in front of his laptop trying to breath through his nose like the mindfulness app on his phone was telling him to do. In the last three minutes, he’d placed Plant behind him and then put him back on the coffee table three times, before deciding to put him over on the counter. Callum didn’t want to have to worry that Plant would make a spectacle of himself when he had concerns about his own behaviour. He gave them both an aspirin and hoped for the best.
When the call started coming through, he twitched a little nervously before accepting. His breath relaxed a little when he saw it was only Ben on the screen.
“Alright? Feeling a bit better?” he asked with a concerned smile. “I’m just gonna ring my mum.”
Soon enough, an older blonde lady appeared in the other part of the screen, holding a large glass of wine. “Ben! Ben! Can you hear me? Is this thing on?” she called out, taking a gulp of her drink.
Callum could see Ben take a deep, sighing breath. “Of course I can hear you, mum,” he replied dryly. “Half your street can probably hear you. This is Callum.”
Giving an awkward half wave, Callum tried to smile, though he wasn’t exactly sure what his face ended up looking like. “It’s nice to meet you Mrs…Ben’s mum,” he replied, kicking himself as the words escaped. He had tried to go over all the questions she may ask him before the call, but there was only so many he and Plant could come up with. Apparently neither thought of what he actually needed to call her. He knew she was divorced from Ben’s dad, but he didn’t know if they had the same name.
“Is this him? Is this Callum?” she said squinting at the screen and waving. “Oh ain’t he lovely looking, Ben. Tell him he can call me Kathy.”
“You can tell him yourself!” Ben exclaimed. “He can hear you!”
“Get him to stand up and spin around a bit,” she asked. “I can only see his face on this thing!”
Ben threw his hands up in the air in frustration. “Mum! He can hear you!” he scolded her. “And he ain’t a sideboard from Argos you’re trying to size up online! You can’t just zoom in and try and get the 360 degree view. Leave him alone!”
“I apologise for my son, Callum,” Kathy replied, finally realising she could talk directly to him. “He likes to make out I’m some doddery old woman who embarrasses him by showing a bit of interest in his love life.”
“That’s alright,” he replied, thinking about how warm her smile was, and how though they bickered, he could tell the maternal bond was strong with her son. “I don’t mind, honest.”
“Yeah, well I do,” Ben snarled back. “Callum wants to become a copper, Mum. He used to be in the army and all. I like man in uniform.”
“Ben!” both he and Kathy cried at the same time.
“Well, you seem like a lovely boy,” she continued, draining the last of wine. “I’ve been waiting for him to settle down, I couldn’t quite believe it when he told me he’d met someone who he-“
The screen went black where Kath’s image once appeared. “Oh, what a shame, she’s been cut off,” Ben said, clearing his throat. “Probably spilled half a bottle of merlot over her keyboard.”
“Is that her trying to ring back?” Callum asked, peering at the screen. “Perhaps she can reconnect now.”
“It’ll be fine,” Ben said, dismissing his concern. “She’s seen you now, and knows you’re as I described you and not some tramp I pulled on a street corner. Oh, hold about, I did pull you on a street corner!”
Callum shook his head then smiled curiously. “What did you describe me as?” he asked, trying not to sound too desperate for the information.
“A crazy man who talks to his plant and runs into lampposts,” Ben replied, with a wink. “Don’t worry, I sang all your praises to high heaven.”
“Do you think she liked me?” Callum wondered. “I mean, I know I ain’t exactly all snazzy with words. I don’t think I’ve ever made a good first impression with anyone.”
“Are you joking?” Ben replied. “You’re like all her dreams come true. The fact that I’ve introduced her to my boyfriend, he’s a good boy and he’s a bit of a sort; she’ll be doing a one woman conga line around the living room, trust me.”
Callum looked towards Plant to check he heard the same thing. Unfortunately, he was having his afternoon nap. Damn, there was no one else to check his mind wasn’t playing tricks on him.
“Is that what we are then?” he asked tentatively. It could have been just a slip of the tongue and now he was bubbling down into a black hole he would want to swallow him up if he was wrong.
“You heard what I said,” Ben said, smirking. There was a shyness there that only barely blushed on his cheeks. “Unless of course you’ve had a better offer.”
“Umm, can I get back to you?” Callum grinned back, laughing when Ben started glaring at him. “Might just see if anyone else chucks their hat in the game.”
Ben scoffed at that. “Yeah, well in interest of full disclosure I think they have to watch you stand on your balcony at three in the morning with Robert propped up on the barrier in front of you, as you sing ‘My Heart Will Go On’ before shouting ‘I’m the King of the World’ at the top of your voice,” he suggested.
“That didn’t happen!” Callum scoffed back. Crap, that did happen. “Well then I guess you’re stuck with me then aren’t you.”
“Yeah. I guess I am.”
“Morning,” Callum said with a yawn, as he answered the phone one day. “God, I slept so well last night.”
Ben was staring back at him with disbelief. “Callum, have you looked at the news this morning?” he asked, the incredulity clear in his voice.
Stretching his arms and back a little as he sat up, he shook his head. “Nah, I’ve been trying to not watch as much. It’s just so depressing,” he replied. “I mean, I know loads of people have it worse than I do. It’s all just a lot to take though, ain’t it?”
“Get your laptop out!” Ben ordered, pointing at the screen. “Come on, quickly!”
Callum tutted and then reached over for where his laptop was sitting on the table. “You ain’t sent me porn links again, have you?” he sighed, powering up the machine. “I am capable of using a search engine.”
“I’m just curating the content for you, babe,” he explained with a shrug. “That ain’t it, anyway.”
Starting to type in his password, he waited for it to sign in. “Where am I going anyway?”
“Why do you have a password on your computer?” Ben asked curiously. “You afraid Robert’s going to get on and start drooling sap over the keyboard as he looks at photos of rose bushes? Just go to a news site. Any one.”
Callum clicked into the BBC news site and scrolled down, before rolling his eyes at what he was reading. “Why they got a vote for Britain’s greatest ever football manager?” he commented shaking his head. “They ain’t never gonna get a right result because loads of people always forget the old managers. You can’t even compare the classic game with the modern leagues really.”
Ben stared at him open mouthed. “Yeah, Callum. That’s why I called you at this time,” he replied, more than a hint of sarcasm in his voice. “I wanted to draw your attention to a meaningless poll for a sport I don’t watch. Scroll up, will you!”
Callum went further up the website before stopping again. “Are the Americans really using Tom Hanks’ blood to try and get a vaccine?” he queried, looking at the headline. “I assume they’ve got his permission. They ain’t just lingering over him like Dracula in the middle of the night.”
“For fucks sake, would you please just go to the main story at the top of the page!” Ben shouted out impatiently. “This ain’t the Radio 4 newspaper review! Hurry up!”
Sensing Ben’s urgency, he went to the main headline, clicked on the link and started reading. “It says you can visit a close friend or family member, as long as they’ve been isolated for fourteen days, and so have you, and you ain’t shown any symptoms in that time,” he repeated out, squinting at the screen. “Oh well, that’s good ain’t it? You can pop round and see your mum.”
Ben started shaking his head, raising his hands in frustration before banging them down on the table in front of him. “No, Callum!”
He furrowed his brow in confusion. “What? Why not?” he asked, concerned. “She ain’t been ill has she? She’s alright?”
“That thing that’s sailing past your ear right now, Callum? That would be what’s known as the point,” Ben said with a sigh. “You haven’t been sick, have you?”
Callum shook his head. “No, you know I ain’t,” he replied.
“And you’ve only been out your flat to go for a run, yeah? Just to do your training?” Ben prompted, waving his hand to emphasise his words. Callum nodded. “Right, and neither have I, so I’m just gonna wait for you to catch up.”
Callum thought about what was being said and looked at the expectant face Ben was showing him. He couldn’t mean what he thought he did. Could he? “Do you mean meet?” he replied quietly.
“And there it is!” Ben exclaimed. “It’s a good job you’re pretty.”
“Oi! Thanks for that!” Callum said with a laugh.
Ben gave him a smile, the sweet one that he’d only ever seen aimed at him. It always made his heart feel better, like it was healing a few of the scars that rested there. “I’m joking! You’ve got to have a lot of brains in your head to join the force and track down all those hot criminals,” he said, before his smile dropped a little. “So, do you want to? Meet, I mean. It ain’t against the rules now, Officer.”
“It says just a close friend or family member,” Callum replied, reading through the article again. “We ain’t never met before.”
Ben leaned his head back in frustration again. “I don’t think it’s means ‘close’ as in physically!” he huffed out, before looking straight towards him. “You’re special to me.”
If Callum’s heart was patched over before, now it felt electric, like he could power half the street with the current pounding through it. There was still that doubt though. That pesky pessimist of a hamster trolling its way relentlessly on the wheel. “I just don’t want to put you or Lex or anyone in danger,” he admitted. “I’d hate to do that.”
“Callum, shut up,” he ordered. “Either you agree to come over here tomorrow, or I’m walking over there right now and sitting down outside, on the pavement. And that’s gonna end with the old bill dragging me away. That ain’t gonna look good on your application is it? Will you come over to ours tomorrow?”
Biting his lip, he could feel his eyes almost start to water. It was overwhelming. “Yeah,” he replied simply. That was all he needed to say.
Ben cleared his throat before scratching the back of his head. “You can stay over if you want,” he added hesitantly. “Only if you want though. Don’t want you walking home late on those mean streets.”
“Alright then,” he added, knowing that conformation was all Ben needed.
“You can bring your magic box of sex tricks if you like as well,” he said with a smirk, now he had a little confidence back.
“Ben!”
“Alright, alright!” he conceded, grinning. “We’ll save it for another time. I’ll see you tomorrow then. On our road?”
Callum nodded. One more day. That was it. One day more.
Callum wouldn’t say he was panicking, but he’d made himself a cup of tea, poured himself a glass of lemonade and opened up a beer in the last five minutes. It had been two hours since he has got off the phone with Ben and agreed to meet with him tomorrow. Where he had agreed to stay over at his house. It was everything he had wanted in these last weeks. It had been frustrating and heart-breaking to get to know someone but never be in the same room as them; to not be allowed the privilege of touching them. It has been a nightmare.
Now, that would be finally over. He would be allowed to do all those things he had imagined. And the thought terrified him.
It wouldn’t just be a quick visit, Ben told him to bring things to stay. He wasn’t sure what to take. It was like being little and being invited over to a mate’s house to sleep over. Only that never happened for Callum. He was asked a few times, but he was so terrified that they’d expect the same invitation back, that he always said no. There was no way he could have a friend stay in his house.
He pulled out an old rucksack from the back of his wardrobe and opened it up. What was he supposed to bring? Callum looked around the room, sighing when he received a dirty look.
“You won’t fit in the bag! Your soil will go everywhere!” he told Plant. He fluttered one of his stems in protest. “Well, yeah, I suppose I could put you in a carrier bag but I can’t just bring you along when you weren’t invited!”
Plant didn’t move, and Callum knew he accepted the decision, he just didn’t like it. “I’ll tell you what, if it goes well, I’ll ask them if I can bring you next time, alright?”
He made a mental note to leave Plant some of his favourite snacks when he went to Ben’s and left him alone. Perhaps he’d even leave the radio on; he enjoyed listening to talk radio the most and it would be a bit of company.
It was no good, he couldn’t focus on anything. Callum just felt a buzz zooming through his body and it left him unable to concentrate on a task. There was no way he could spend the rest of the afternoon and evening just relaxing on the sofa. There was too much nervous energy in him. He had to go out for a run.
Once he was changed, he turned the oven on to heat up, grabbing the onion rings out the freezer and shaking a few onto a baking tray. Callum put the tray in the oven and looked over to Plant. “I’ll be fifteen minutes,” he told him. “Don’t let the flat burn down.”
Jogging down the stairs, he made his way to the exit of his building. Callum shut the door, and out the corner of his eye saw a figure at the end of the path. He was just about to do the awkward dance of throwing himself onto the grass to keep his social distance requirement when he realised they weren’t moving. Turning his head, he stopped still when he saw their face. Ben.
He felt stunned for a moment, until his brain made sense of the sight. It was something unusual and felt strange to see him here. Like seeing a bluebell appear through the snow. Callum met his eyes, and it took him back to those first few days of meeting Ben, when something seemed to click that he’d never known before and thought only existed in the deep hopes of his mind.
“Hi,” he said, and the lack of coherent sentences certainly took him back to when they met.
Ben gave him a smile, his hands shoved in his pockets, like he was nervous. He was. Callum knew him so well by now, he could tell the little signs. “Hi,” he said back, and his voice was soft, and unsure.
Callum wasn’t someone who took charge in his life. At work, sure. He could take control of a kitchen when he was in the army, he could handle a busy shift and a stag party at the pub, but in his personal life he just sat and waited and hoped, and let others take the lead. That was why he hadn’t gone on dates, or called back numbers or returned smiles over the bar. Callum had spent his whole life just letting others deciding what to do for him, and just going along with it.
Without second guessing it, he marched forward along the path, his legs feeling so shaky that he was surprised he stayed upright and didn’t just sway over into the pot of geraniums. As he got closer and closer to Ben, his heart rate built, his confidence grew and he never felt so sure about anything in his life.
When he reached him, Ben looked like he was opening his lips up to speak, his eyes wide at the determined action of the man before him. Callum took Ben’s face in his hands, leaned down and kissed him.
He couldn’t say he hadn’t thought about this moment. Over and over again, he’d played it repeatedly in his head, every night when he was in bed, every time he was in the shower, on every run he took and during every meal he made. The thought had dominated his life with a relentless persistence, with a million different scenarios. In all of them though, it was Ben who kissed him first.
Callum had spent so long waiting for his Mystery Man to save him, to take control, to guide him and tell him what to do. Because that’s what he had done all his life and he didn’t think he had it in him to be any other way. Now though, he realised he could be the superhero, he could be the Disney Prince or the romcom lead if he wanted to be, as much of a childlike dream that sounded. He wasn’t about to whack on a lycra jumpsuit, or start talking with words that sounded like the poetry they used to make them read at school. That wasn’t him. But he could finally show the world what he wanted.
It was a soft kiss at first, despite Callum’s newfound confidence. Just the wild and gentle feel of their lips touching, the connection feeling like letting out a breath you never knew you were holding. It was sweet and sacred, and like nothing he had ever felt before. When he drew back, he looked into Ben’s eyes, closer than he had ever been able to before and noticed the colour; bright and fierce like river rapids. The true colour, not lit or changed by whatever screen specifications and settings he had on that day. They weren’t rejecting him, or humouring him, or any other of the insecurities that Callum worried about. They were saying only one thing. Go on.
The second time Callum leaned in it, was with more force, more hurry, as if Ben was going to be taken away any second, or if this was all just a dream and in a minute his alarm would go off just at the wrong time, waking him up and leaving him with frustrated regret. This was visceral though, touch pouring into feeling. Breath pouring into breath and his head felt dizzy with the sensation, like this was a drug he craved.
Eventually, Callum pulled back, just a little, smiling at Ben. “It ain’t tomorrow yet,” he said, his voice coming out rough and gentle.
“I couldn’t wait,” Ben replied with a whisper, before leaning up to peck Callum on the chin before pulling at his shirt to lower him a little. He rested their foreheads together. “Can I come in?”
“Yeah,” he said back, his voice not much more than a whisper of air by the time it landed on Ben’s lips. A thought struck him. “Do you like onion rings?”
Ben leaned back and let out a loud laugh. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go in before we get reported for public indecency.”
“It was just a kiss,” Callum replied, the smile not being able to stay off his face. He leaned in and pecked Ben briefly on the lips, partly to prove a point and partly just because he could.
“Well give me another few seconds and it won’t just be a kiss,” Ben grinned back with a wink. He held out his hand to Callum. “Let’s go.”
Looking at Ben’s outstretched fingers, he wasn’t sure he even believed it yet. This moment that he had always dreamt of, offering itself up to him so openly.
Callum wasn’t about to let his old self take over and second guess anything. Determinedly, he reached out and linked their fingers together. And when they touched, that feeling of happiness, of confidence and hope built inside.
They walked into the building.
Together.