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Collins was charging down the field after the ball. Just a good solid kick would’ve put it in the goal, but then an aggressive intervention from the left flank intercepted him, helped by a distraction provided by Blackie, the terrier owned by the grocer’s son, running onto the field and nipping at Collins’s heels.
The twelve-year-old who’d nicked the football off of him soared off to the other end of the playground and hefted it to his mate, a brick-like adolescent who rarely moved far down the field but could kick like a donkey. Before Collins could intervene the teen tanker had belted it into the goal - symbolised by two scruffy jumpers - that was wide open as their goalie had gone home early for tea.
“VICTORY!” screamed the kids, running around and whacking each other on the shoulders in triumph.
“Who let that bleeding dog on the field?”
Collins was rubbing his shins and looking peeved at Farrier, who was ostensibly on his side in the match of RAF Pilots vs Children of Stumpter’s Close, but was folded over, hands on his knees, rendered paralytic with laughter.
The dog was running between the boy’s ankles - “Nice one, Blackie!” “Who’s a good boy then?” - and being showered with ear scratches and petting, while Collins looked between it and Farrier, clearly unsure who he was more furious at.
Farrier never realised that Collins could get so competitive. It was delightful. One third of their team, Smithy, had complained of a stitch in his side and laid down on the grass for a snooze, leaving Farrier to try and assist the striker. Which he hadn’t been very good at, after getting distracted by the younger brother of one of the other team coming onto the pitch to tell him a joke about ponies. It had left Collins’s position wide open to dogs and quick twelve-year-olds but in Farrier’s defence, it had been a good joke.
“3-1! 3-1! We’re better than youuuuuuu!”
They may have been champions but they were rubbish at chants. Collins ruffled their heads and produced a chocolate bar from his coat pocket.
“The spoils of victory - here you go,”
“The whole thing, mister?”
“Yeah, just don’t ruin your suppers. Now clear off, it’s getting dark.”
There was a shower of thanks and Collins was swamped by leg hugs and demands for a rematch. Someone small tugged on Farrier’s arm. He looked down to see two pale blue eyes looking up at him in earnest. “You will come back, won’t you?”
Farrier winked down at the boy, clapping a hand on his shoulder. “‘Course we will. Need to defend our honour, don’t we?”
He got a nervous smile in response, and Farrier reached down to pick him up for a tight hug. A lot of these kids had seen their Dads and brothers leave and not come back already. And this wasn’t even such a big town.
Smithy had taken off already by the time Farrier and Collins began the walk back to base. The daylight was dying behind the trees of the town, glimmers of it dancing on the creek by the path. Farrier bent down to throw a pebble in, just to hear the splash break up the quiet. It was so different being out here, compared to London.
“Kids here are just the same as in the East End, you know.”
“Mmm?” Collins had been watching the arc of the stone in the air, and he turned back to Farrier.
He shrugged. “Not sure if I expected them to be some kind of alien species, or something. Maybe that because they talk different - going to those schools, like yours.”
Collins gave him a friendly nudge. “It’s not the kids that are strange in those schools. Not when they start, at least.”
“You mean when they get out, all clued up about the Corn Laws and Latin verbs, like you?”
“My Latin is terrible, and you know it.”
Farrier pursed his lips. “I try not to hold it against you too much. It is disappointing, of course…”
The next nudge was more savage, and they were laughing, wheeling around the path. It turned to cut through the forest, the houses of the village distant behind them as gardens edged up close to the bounds of the trees.
Farrier left his arm wrapped around Collins’s shoulder as they turned the corner. It was a wild patch of woods, a scrap left over from a huge ancient forest from back when England was wilder and less bound. There was something Farrier had spotted here the other day, and he softly pushed them off the road in its direction.
“Here,” he said under his breath, as if the trees were listening in.
It was a shed, a sizeable one, from a plot that intruded into the edge of the forest, near the riverside. From behind the trees you could just make out the tops of bean poles and a washing line, a fence, and behind it all, tucked under the trees, this lean-to.
Farrier circled around it carefully. It smelled of earth, and old tobacco, and it was easy to imagine the owner retreating here for a quiet smoke and consideration away from the wife and kids.
The door was bolted, and Collins peered into the single window. He shook his head. “Darker than the inside of a cow in there.”
“Someone’s hideaway.” Farrier rapped the walls in appreciation. “Well-built.”
He walked around the back, brushing a strand of spiderweb away, and wondered if the owner was just inside one of the houses by the river, eating his evening meal while his boy told him about beating the pilots at football. Or if he was over in Europe, in a trench somewhere. Or under the earth, far away from the hidden spot he’d made himself. Hidden from life itself now.
Arms came around him, and a head nestled on his shoulder. “I can think of something else well-built,”
“You - ” Farrier breathed out, banishing the ghost he’d thought up, and turning around into Collins’s hold, “you’re not so bad yourself.”
He pressed Collins up against the wall, able to make out his grin, the brightest spot in the forest gloom.
The night cold was setting in, but their bodies were still warm from the match. Under Farrier’s fingertips he could feel Collins’s heart beating in his chest as he leaned in for a kiss.
He wanted to hold him just like this, shirt peeled open, their hips settled together, Collins warm and pliant in his arms. The sharp elbows and obstinacy of the afternoon’s football player was gone, this was his sunny lad, and the crook of his neck, Farrier checked, still smelled like fresh bread.
Nipping up and down his neck, Farrier nuzzled into the downy hair that curled into the nape above his back. The shed was well-built - he leaned both of their weights into it, and it didn’t so much as creak - and listened to the little pants and bitten-off breaths that Collins made.
A thigh was nestled between his legs, and beginning to rub along his inseam with increasing urgency. Hands at his back, his waist, his arms, pulling him further off-balance and pressing the two of them closer. What Farrier would give for a feather mattress, and an absence of curfews.
Time was not on their side, even if the sturdy shed was, so Farrier made quick work of Collins’s belt buckle and flies. His skin was even hotter here, and Farrier thought of how salty he’d taste. He kissed the sweat on Collins’s brow as he grasped at his cock, already hard and fitting snugly in his grip.
An eager hand was moving inside his pants, doing a bit of catch-up, and Farrier leaned back from those soft lips for a moment to give Collins some purchase. As he felt his prick gripped with strong fingers, he closed his eyes and groaned deep into his chest.
Opening them he saw that smile glimmering, those bright eyes shining, and Farrier held his breath a little too long. Spluttering, he coughed, knocking heads with Collins, who laughed and banged him on the back with the hand that wasn’t dexterously, wonderfully, wanking him off.
Farrier let his own grip loosen, leaning into Collins, letting him guide him through. Lips at his ear hummed encouragement, “C’mon, just c’mon, here, for me, hmmm?”
He could do that, flexing and shaking as Collins wrung pleasure out of him. One hand braced on the wall as he sucked in breath. The other held onto Collins’s hip. Farrier’s fingers pressed into the thick curve of his arse, and he rubbed their faces together. Stubble on stubble, it would leave a light rash on Collins’s fair skin tomorrow. Sporting injury, he could say.
Coming with a gasp, Collins patted his back as the pleasure shot through him. Farrier bent his head down to rest on Collins’s chest. He moved his hand back, keeping Collins weight up against the wall. It was too dark to see but Farrier had the flesh in his palm imprinted in his mind. He kept his strokes long, not as quick as Collins, drew it out a little more. He wanted to bottle up all those noises he made, the gasps, the yelps, the tender blasphemies.
The air between them was still warm. Collins curled over, his hips jutting back into the wall, and he came with a jolt. Farrier couldn’t see his face but he could wrap an arm around him, pull him close. Let him sink down as if his bones had melted, and it was only Farrier who could hold him up.
Farrier could’ve stayed there longer. Curfew be damned. But Collins stood up slowly, sourced a fat handkerchief from somewhere, and cleaned them up. He took his time over Farrier’s fingers, rubbing the cotton over each of them in turn. Farrier opened his mouth to say something smart, but all that came out was “Thanks.”
“Mmm,” Collins touched the buttons on his shirt, re-fastened, tucked in. “We better get back.”
Everything smelled green. If Farrier closed his eyes again, he could believe they were miles away from anywhere, deep in the woods, all alone. Instead he followed Collins back to the slivers of light that marked out the road. A wind picked up, and brushed over them, rattling the tree tops.
Maybe there would be a storm tonight. Farrier would lie in his bed and listen to the rain, thinking about the shed, and how it would feel to be inside it, protected from the elements