Chapter Text
Gravel crunches underneath our feet as Achilles leads the way up the driveway that is probably bigger than my entire back garden. I am momentarily distracted by the two cars parked - an Audi and a Range Rover - but then I look up at the house, and my mouth drops open. It’s a detached three story period house, the kind of house that you might imagine royalty to grow up in. Flowers crawl across the front of the house in bursts of red, pink and white, their leaves swaying slightly in the breeze, as though they are waving us in. I blush when I look at the bouquet that Achilles is holding. It seems suddenly silly, spending £10 on a guy like Achilles. He does not seem like a £10 bunch of flowers kind of guy.
Instead of walking up to the front door, Achilles slips down the side of the house and to a wrought iron staircase that twists up to the very top floor. My head spins slightly as I follow him up. I am beginning to realise how very different the worlds Achilles and I are from are.
“Home sweet home!” he says brightly, pushing the door at the top of the staircase open, “Mind the messy desk. I, uh, work best in a mess.”
I step into the room and lose the power of speech. It’s much bigger than my bedroom with slanted ceilings and a window seat that looks out onto a sprawling garden. In a makeshift alcove made of two bookcases is Achilles’ extremely messy desk; his laptop is precariously balanced on three books, sheets of paper strewn haphazardly around it. Next to the desk is a whiteboard that Achilles seems to use to write whatever comes to his mind on. There’s a half finished to-do list, a reminder to go to the gym, eat and drink, and a number of words written in languages that I don’t recognise. There’s an acoustic guitar leaning against one of the walls, and I choose not to imagine Achilles playing it for my own sanity.
“This is nice,” I say, “like, very nice.”
Achilles smiles at me, but he looks almost embarrassed. He holds up the bouquet and points towards the door.
“I’m gonna go and grab a vase for these, I’ll be right back.”
I slide onto the window seat, my mind racing ahead of itself in the silence that Achilles leaves behind. I look at the latin scrawled onto the whiteboard, the garden behind me, and Achilles’ bed that is three times bigger than mine and facing a television that is probably worth more than what I make in a year. Embarrassment curdles in my gut, and I am suddenly twelve years old again and attending a school that my father can’t afford, but he sends me to because it’s all about our image.
The boys I attended school with had it all. Every Christmas was a skiing holiday, and then it was a summer in the south of France with some famous politician who would open doors for rich kids and leave the poor kids working in a shitty coffee shop.
I look around Achilles’ bedroom, and realise he is probably exactly like the boys I hated in school. Before my mind can delve too deeply into this and become convinced that Achilles is the Devil’s spawn, the door opens and he appears again, a vase held carefully in his hand. It’s painted orange and black, and I wonder if he has any personality outside of doing a classics degree.
“Do you recognise this myth?” Achilles asks, holding the vase up to me.
A smile tugs at the corners of my mouth. Being on the receiving end of a history lecture every five minutes should infuriate me, and yet it doesn’t. No one benefits from pretty privilege quite as much as Achilles does.
“No,” I tell him, “I don’t know anything about myths.”
Achilles smiles as he sets the vase next to his bed. He takes a moment to re-arrange the flowers and then he sits beside me. Our shoulders are pressed together, and I pretend not to notice the electric shock that shot through me and settled in the pit of my stomach.
“It’s Achilles’ death,” he tells me.
I make a face, “ Why would you keep that?”
“My mum gave it to me after I came out to her,” he says, “it’s kinda funny, isn’t it?”
“Is it?” I ask.
He frowns, “ I think it’s funny. My therapist doesn’t.”
I stay silent. Achilles does not seem like the kind of person who goes to therapy. Then again, receiving a vase depicting the death of the person you are named after from your mother seems like a good enough reason as any to be in therapy. Achilles sighs and nudges me.
“Sorry,” he says, “I didn’t mean to - to make it awkward.”
I shake my head. For some reason, I don’t feel awkward. Upset, maybe, at Achilles’ mother, but not awkward.
“It’s okay,” I tell him, “I’m very good with homophobic parents. I mean, if my dad knew I was here...” I trail off, it’s not even worth torturing myself over. I shake my head, “this isn’t really acceptable date talk, is it?”
“No,” Achilles says emphatically. He reaches over me to grab something, and my heart doesn’t almost leap out of my chest when he practically sprawls across my lap. He pulls a cart of booze over to us and gestures to it vaguely, “What do you want?”
I let him choose what to drink, and he settles on brandy mixed with coke. It would not be my first choice, but as the more I drink, the more warmth that spreads through me. Though I suspect it has little to do with the drink and more to do with Achilles.
We are sitting facing each other on the window seat, our ankles hooked together. He doesn’t take his eyes off me once, but I don’t feel uncomfortable underneath his gaze. In fact, I never want him to stop looking.
“I have loads of work to do tomorrow,” he laments, head falling against the window.
“Oh, if you’re - you’re busy, I can go,” I say, hastening to get up, “Sorry, I didn’t realise-”
“No!” Achilles says quickly, “No, sorry, I didn’t mean that you had to go. I’ll get it done. I always do.”
Arrogance shouldn’t be attractive, but my heart feels like a hammer against my ribcage.
My eyes flicker over to the whiteboard, “What work have you got to do?”
Achilles sighs, “I kicked up such a fuss about Achilles and Patroclus being gay that now we’re having a debate about it. I have notes to write up. I even bought another copy of The Illiad so I could highlight all the gay stuff.”
I nudge my ankle against his, “Practice on me. Convince me that they’re gay.”
He pours me another drink and stands to grab his copy of The Iliad. It is clearly well loved; the corner of the cover curls upwards and the spine is cracked to the point the words stamped on it are impossible to read. Multi-coloured tabs peak out from the pages, and I wonder how long we’re going to be here for.
I get comfortable, drawing my knees closer to my chest but not unhooking my ankle from around Achilles’. I watch as he clears his throat and opens the book, flicking through it until he finds the page that he’s looking for.
I don’t know how long he speaks for, but I am mesmerised. My heart leaps whenever he says my name, and I have to remind myself that he’s not talking about me, he’s talking about the other Patroclus.
Truthfully, I don’t understand most of what he is saying to me. In fact, he may as well be speaking Ancient Greek, but I hang on to his every word like it’s my lifeline. He talks of Patroclus - the other Patroclus - with such care and tenderness, that my heart swells like a balloon. I want to reach out and hold him, to sink into his world and stay there forever.
“ Let one single vessel, the golden two-handed urn the lady your mother gave you, hold both our ashes” Achilles reads out loud, “They wanted to be together in death, for eternity. They were in love, I don’t care what anyone says. How is this any different to Orpheus going down to the Underworld for Eurydice? He even says that there will come no second sorrow like this to my heart again whilst I am still one of the living. Achilles loved him, and I don’t know how-”
Sometimes my brain short circuits and does stupid things. Like coming out to my extremely homophobic father, or punching a kid in school, or kissing Achilles’ because apparently reciting The Iliad is something I find extremely attractive.
At first, he doesn’t respond and I consider throwing myself out of the window, but then one hand is on my cheek and the other is on my waist. I’ve never understood the saying ‘sparks fly’ until now. Something sizzles in the air around us, but it isn’t lust or anything even slightly sexual. It’s something more. It’s like the Big Bang that caused the formation of the universe; everything has perfectly aligned for it to happen at the exact right moment. And in that moment, in this moment, something has been created - something incredible, something perfect, something terrible, something I want to protect.
We pull away, but we are still close enough that I feel Achilles’ breath dancing across my lips. I swallow and sit back, my eyes looking everywhere but his face.
“Sorry,” I say, “Sorry, I should have - I should have probably asked or - um, sorry.”
“ Sorry?” Achilles repeats, “Patroclus, you don’t need to - I mean, that was - it, um -” it’s only because he sounds so flustered that I can look down at him. His eyes are shining, face bright red and lips parted ever so slightly. I want to lean forward again but I hold back, “You don’t need to apologise. If I knew you were going to kiss me like that, I probably would have read The Iliad to you months ago.”
That is enough to snap me out of my daze, “ Months? We’ve only-”
“I stared at you just as much as you stared as me,” he says, and his annoying suaveness has returned, “You’re cute when you make drinks, you know.”
“Cute?” I repeat.
Achilles nods, “Yeah, you make this face when you’re concentrating. You’re like-” he furrows his brows and pouts his lips before breaking off with a giggle, “It’s cute, and like half the reason I’m there all the time.”
“What’s the other half?”
“You always make my drinks best,” Achilles says, “Everyone else always leaves something out, but you never do.”
“At least I’m good at one thing,”
“Two things,” Achilles corrects, “You’re also a great kisser.”
I take that as an invitation to kiss him again.
The night stretches on, and I wish it wouldn’t. When the moon has settled in the sky and a few stars are peeking through the darkness, I resign myself to the fact that this date must end. I pull away from Achilles and sigh.
“I should probably go,” I say, “and you have stuff to do tomorrow.”
“Don’t go,” he says quickly, “Stay the night. You’re not in work tomorrow so it’s not like you have to wake up for anything!”
I freeze, my palms going clammy. Dating, holding hands and kissing is one thing, but staying over at Achilles’ house is another thing all together. My fathers evil taunts echo around my brain, but before I can make up some silly excuse as to why I can’t stay, Achilles rests his hand on my leg.
“We don’t have to sleep in the same bed if it makes you uncomfortable,” he says, “You take my bed, I’ll take the sofa.”
“Oh, I can’t make you sleep on-”
“It’s fine,” he tells me, “it’s a sofa bed. It’s quite comfortable, actually.”
“Are you sure?” I ask. The thought of not having to go home to the basement fills my heart with indescribable joy, but that feeling does not compare with knowing I’ll get to spend a few more hours with Achilles, “I feel bad if you’re not going to sleep in your own bed because of me .”
Achilles grins at me, “I told you, boundaries are cool.”
He leaves me a t-shirt and a pair of jogging bottoms at the end of his bed, and then leaves to get changed in the bathroom. Something blooms in my heart when I pull the t-shirt over my head and my senses are overwhelmed by Achilles’ scent. He smells of expensive aftershave, old books, and something oddly floral. I imagine a life where I am always wrapped up in his scent, and my heart aches.
I sit on the bed cross-legged, picking at a piece of thread at the ankle. I never even have a sleepover as a child, much less as an adult with someone who I have spent the best part of an hour kissing. I shudder, my brain suddenly clouded with all the horrible things my father would no doubt say if he knew where I am. I imagine he would look as he did when I stupidly came out to him; a vein popping in his forehead, face contorted with anger and hatred, and spit flying as he pelts me with the insults that he knows hurts me the most.
You’re stupid, lazy and you’ll amount to nothing. I can’t begin to explain how disappointed I am in you. You’re not the kind of son that I deserve. You’re barely a real man. I’m glad your mother isn’t alive to see what you’ve become. I’m glad-
“Patroclus?”
I flinch, my neck snapping up with such ferocity that I hear it click. Achilles stands before me, a tiny crease between his eyebrows. He’s wearing a pair of pyjama bottoms with a Taylor Swift t-shirt, and even as my father’s words echo around my brain, I smile.
“Taylor Swift?”
He cracks a smile, and warmth spreads through me.
“She’s a great storyteller, I’ll hear no slander,” he says. His smile drops and it’s like the sun has been extinguished, “Are you okay? You look...troubled.”
“Yeah,” I say, trying for a smile, “Yeah. I’m okay.”
He hesitantly sits next to me, hands folded in his lap and a careful distance between us. I want to close the distance and rest my head on his shoulder, but I can see the tension in his body. His shoulders are hunched and his knuckles are pure white from the grip he has on his hands.
“If you don’t want to stay the night, I won’t be offended,” he says, “I told you, boundaries are cool. I don’t want you to feel forced into it.”
I don’t know what I’ve done in my life to cross paths with someone like Achilles. I have never met someone so arrogant yet gentle, someone so unwaveringly suave yet geeky. He is a walking contradiction.
“I do want to stay the night,” I tell him, trying to inject my voice with the kind of confidence that he does, “I wouldn’t agree if I didn’t want to.”
He looks up at me. His eyes are wide and awash with concern.
“Are you sure? When I came in just then you looked...scared.”
“I promise I want to stay,” I tell him, “I was just overthinking.”
Achilles nods his head slowly, “You know, you can - you can talk to me about stuff. I know we’ve not really known each other that long, but if you need to vent, I’m good at listening.”
“Okay,” I say, my voice barely above a whisper, “Okay. I’ll keep that in mind.”
We stay up for a little while longer, just talking, and then Achilles presses a kiss to my forehead and bids me goodnight. My skin tingles where he kissed me, and I struggle to fall asleep. The night is quiet. I listen to the wind rustling through the trees and Achilles’ sleepy breaths. I turn my head to look at him and my lips are pulled into a smile. He is attractive even when he’s fast asleep.
The faint light of the moon washes over Achilles’ sleeping face, and his skin glows like he is some divine creature. His hair is draped across his face, and as he breathes, one strand of hair flops up and down. I bite back a laugh as I watch and, if I were creepier, I might take a video of it. Although I feel as though just watching him sleep is creepy enough.
My eyes fall to the space in front of him. His arms are stretched out towards me, almost like an invitation. I could easily fit onto the sofa-bed with him. My brain, fogged by the most alcohol I have ever drank in my life, short-circuits again and I slip out of Achilles’ bed. I shuffle the short distance to the sofa-bed and carefully lie in the space beside him. At first, he doesn’t move and I don’t think that he’s realised I’m there, but then one of his arms curls around me.
I watch his face until sleep claims me. I understand why the other Patroclus would want to lie with his Achilles for all of eternity.