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Stephen leans back on the chair with a sigh, propping his legs up on the desk in a rare moment of casual comfort. Alex looks over at him, the creases around his eyes and mouth deepening as he smiles, his tawny-gold hair glinting in the warmth of the sunset.
‘I have something to show you, love,’ Alex says, his smile widening, and Stephen arches an eyebrow at him; it’s been a long day, and he really isn’t in the mood for whatever nonsense his husband has decided to bring home.
Alex chuckles, catching the look of irritation in Stephen’s eye, ‘Oh, don’t look at me like that you old miser, I’m sure you’ll get a kick out of it.’
Stephen grunts, unconvinced, ‘Alex it’s far too late in the day for me to get a kick out of anything .’
‘Ah, come on now, I wouldn’t be so sure.’
Stephen sighs, and Alex laughs again as he hops out of his chair and comes to perch on the desk beside Stephen’s feet. He fumbles in his cardigan pocket for a moment, before finding his prize, and pulls it out with a soft ‘ta-da!’ . Stephen blinks, focussing his tired eyes on the small object that Alex is holding between his thumb and forefinger, and snorts.
‘What, exactly, is that ?’
‘It’s my old signet ring!’ Alex proclaims, as if every young man in the mid-80s had a signet ring, and that it isn’t a completely bizarre thing to present at 7:30 on a Tuesday afternoon to your perplexed spouse.
Stephen looks at it, then at Alex, then at it again. It is rather stained (pewter-silver, tarnished with age), and looks far too small for Alex to actually wear , and the seal itself is a rather tasteless skull, embedded in a red gem of some kind.
‘Alex,’ Stephen begins, peering at the ring, ‘I wasn’t aware you were some sort of 19th century duke, with absolutely frightful taste, as a child.’
Alex swats him on the arm, laughing, his eyes twinkling, and turns the ring in his fingers, looking at it quite fondly. ‘The technical term is ‘goth’ , darling, and this was my prized possession; never underestimate the power of several rather gaudy pieces of jewellery to draw in a partner for the evening.’
As always, Alex speaks as if his experiences are universal, as if being some kind of promiscuous goth , with a signet ring (of all things), is something that Stephen could possibly relate to. He had spent his youth preparing for adulthood, and wearing an array of very sensible blazers and brogues, with no jewellery of any kind even entertained as a possibility.
‘Where exactly did you come upon such a treasure , then?’ Stephen drawls, folding his hands across the scant softness of his belly, looking disdainfully at the offending item.
‘You know, I haven’t the foggiest,’ Alex chuckles, settling comfortably on the desk, still gazing lovingly at the ring, ‘I have a very vague memory of an Echo and the Bunnymen concert in Edinburgh, and a really rather lovely young lady with neon yellow hair and two rings in her nose, but any specifics are lost to time, I’m afraid.’
‘It’s your prized possession and you can’t remember where you bought it?’ Stephen snorts again, derisively, and Alex smiles down at him - his hair forming a rather lovely halo around his creased, handsome face, in the low light of the evening.
‘Darling I was absolutely, royally off my face for the majority of the decade and well into the 90s, you can’t expect me to remember every little detail, can you? Hm?’ Alex’s voice is soft, warm as the low sunlight, and Stephen chuckles quietly.
‘I doubt that gem is genuine then?’
‘Or gemuine, one might say?’ Alex smirks, narrowly dodging the flat of Stephen’s palm as he reaches out to slap his leg.
‘Say something like that again and you’ll be sleeping in the shed.’