Chapter 2
As Dan walked into the bathroom with a stranger, he saw his sister out of the corner of his eye. She was talking to what appear to be the world’s biggest git. He wanted to scare the little shit away, but Claire never took kindly to his brotherly interventions. She always wanted proof that he cared about her, but she rejected his protectiveness, and any effort to help her along. He never understood what it was she wanted from him.
“She’s fit,” Jones observed, following Dan’s gaze. “The two of you…?”
“She’s my sister.”
Jones looked comically mortified, but laughed.
“She’s not really my type. I was just being nice in case she was your wife or something.”
Dan felt defensive in a slightly different way.
“What do you mean, she’s not your type?” Dan wanted to strangle any man who looked at his sister, but he despised any man who did not appreciate Claire. It was maddening that she sometimes questioned her worth because of dickheads who were afraid of a woman who wasn’t a delicate waif or who didn’t dress like she was ready to wash a car in a music video.
“She’s a bit short for my tastes,” Jones explained, running a hand over Dan’s chest. “And I’m pretty sure she’s a woman.”
Dan left Claire to her own devices; she was better at taking care of herself than Dan. He’d spend a little quality time getting high with a beautiful and confusing boy and some quality cocaine, and the world would seem brighter. Everything seemed easier to handle after a few rails.
Xxx
Jonas climbed on top of the commode, so he could kiss Dan without the taller man’s cooperation. Dan seemed more than interested, but the coke apparently made him jittery and preoccupied. Jonas wasn’t exactly short, but he needed a stepstool to reach Dan. Once their lips touched, Dan seemed to come back to reality. He responded with more heat and passion than Jonas had expected. Dan had been a bit cool. His eyes had roved over Jonas’s body in a way that could only be described as wolfish, but the lust was only in his eyes. The rest of his body radiated indifference, from his apathetic expression to his slumped posture. Dan had the perpetually bored look that was so popular in Shoreditch, but that Jonas could never get a handle on. Jonas was an enthusiastic guy, and he could never really hide it.
“Jones…” Dan murmured as he ran his hand over the zipper of Jonas’s trousers.
“Jonas,” he corrected.
Dan nodded and repeated, “Jones.”
Maybe it was his accent, or maybe it was Jonas’s accent, but it seemed a small thing to argue about. He could be Jones for a bit.
Dan swore as he tore at Jonas’s tight-fitting trousers. Dan did not seem accustomed to undressing another man, but he seemed at ease with what was happening. Jonas had been the guinea pig for the occasional experimenting hetero, and it had never been a pleasant experience (no one needed that baggage), but Dan seemed comfortable enough handling a cock.
“Johnny?” Dan asked.
“It’s Jonas… I mean, yeah. I’ve got something.”
Jonas fumbled through his tiny pockets for the rubbers while Dan watched with excitement in his eyes, but a bored expression on his face. He ended up handing the condom to Dan, not sure who was supposed to be wearing it. Dan wasn’t sending very clear signs in terms of what he was looking for. Jonas was pretty flexible, but he was used to men being more aggressive with him. He often inspired some kind of primal response in men, a need to prove their masculinity as they fucked him, but not Dan. Dan played with Jonas’s hair, and kissed his throat like they were on a date.
Then he took Jonas’s cock in his mouth and started giving the best blow job of his life. Jonas wasn’t sure if Dan had any particular skill or if it was just the shock of seeing that beautiful, eloquent and elegant mouth wrapped around his cock. Dan was definitely the smartest guy he’d ever got off with. Dan wrote for a trashy rag, but he wrote the stories people talked about. He wrote ‘voice of a generation’ type shit. Jonas stroked Dan’s hair, and the larger man sucked his dick with enthusiasm. The bathroom was an elegant affair, with flattering lighting and numerous mirrors allowed Jonas multiples views of Dan going down on him, his cock disappearing between thin but expressive lips.
Jonas stroked Dan’s hair and felt a thrill at the intimacy. The cock-sucking was great, but freely touching Dan added another level of excitement. Although he could be a sloppy drunk, Dan had always seemed unreachable to Jonas. He was a member of an elite class of people who defined coolness. Jonas loved the idea of being cool, but lacked discernment. He would always be a big dork at heart, but Dan Ashcroft was fucking Cool.
Without the numbing effects of the coke, Jonas would have come right away, but he was feeling detached from his body and a little confused. Dan was a big man with a big mouth, and Jonas felt like he was being swallowed whole. He could imagine losing himself in Dan, becoming one of his lackies and learning to turn his nose up at things that were two weeks out of style. The idea of surrendering himself to a higher power was both frightening and tempting.
He was confused and disappointed when the wet heat disappeared from his cock, and the feeling only intensified as Dan lifted him off the toilet and placed him so Jonas was gripping the sink in front of a massive, gilded mirror. He was like a rag doll in Dan’s big Northern (why did Leeds suddenly seem so damn sexy?) hands. Dan tugged at both of their clothes until Jonas’s arse was exposed. He felt a twinge of anxiety when Dan’s cock bumped against his bare skin. He was no stranger to bumming, but he wasn’t that experienced. The guy trying to stick it up his arse usually knew his name.
Dan chose that moment to moan “Jones” in a way that made Jonas think his name should be Jones. Maybe Dan was right and Jonas’s parents had been wrong.
Lacking proper lube, Dan kept spitting on his fingers as he stretched Jones. With the distance he usually got from cocaine, Jonas felt like he was filming a porn. All they needed was some music, and if he’d had his cd player, Jonas would have had the perfect mix.
“Ready?” Dan asked, rubbing the head of his cock in the crack of Jonas’s ass.
“Yeah” might not have been the sexiest or coolest answer, but it was what came out of Jonas’s mouth. It was an awkward angle, and Jonas wasn’t really prepared for Dan’s girth. As Dan’s thrusts became rougher and more aggressive, Jonas was banging his thighs off a sharp angle on the vanity, but the little pains and discomforts only made it more exciting. He was being taken by a man’s man in a (tastefully appointed) men’s room. He’d lived there all his life, but Jonas was finally experiencing Shoreditch. He was stroking his own dick when Dan clasped one of his big hands over Jonas’s.
“Show me what you like,” Dan grunted.
What Jonas liked was being fucked by a stranger with a cold demeanor but a gentle hand, and it was a matter of seconds before he was coming on what looked to be a very expensive bathroom sink. Dan chuckled as he began to pound Jonas into the marble. Jonas wondered if there would be bruises left by Dan’s fingers digging into his hips. Those would be sexy bruises, unlike the ones he was definitely going to have on his shins and upper thighs. He watched Dan’s face go from nearly expressionless as they fucked to becoming suddenly intense and focused before contorting into the painful grimace of orgasm. Having had a few minutes to recover from his own climax, Jonas felt like an anthropologist - the Jane Goodall of Shoreditch. He’d seen real feeling from Dan Ashcroft. For some people, it only took one snort of cocaine to be hooked, but Jonas could always walk away. It was like booze: fun at a party, but not something that called to him during the day.
Seeing Dan without his mask of reserve, however, was instantly addictive. Jonas had a feeling he’d spend the rest of his life chasing after Dan, trying to get under his skin so he could leave his mark like a tattoo.
xxx
Dan scrubbed his face, trying to return the feeling. His lips and cheeks were nearly numb. He hated coke, but sometimes it was the only thing that seemed to work. Booze would always be his poison of choice, but there were feelings alcohol couldn't kill. Shame was one of those feelings. In fact, booze could make shame flower and bloom like a goddamned flower. Cocaine made Dan paranoid and anxious, but it also killed all those minor concerns about being a decent human being.
Coke made it okay to fuck a beautiful stranger in a toilet. Jones's eyes were glazed and his cheeks were pink, and he looked exactly like a guy who'd just had his brains fucked out in a classy bathroom. Dan was torn between wanting to know more about the lovely, androgynous boy and never wanting to see his angular face again. He wasn't bothered by the gay sex - Jones wasn't his first exception to the rule - but he felt uncomfortable with the intensity of the experience. Shagging total strangers was always a bit of a let-down. There was so much excitement in the wooing of a partner, but then it was over and you were left cleaning up bodily fluids and wishing the other person would just disappear instead of asking stupid questions, like it was all the beginning of a relationship.
Jones wasn't asking stupid questions, but he was following Dan like they were going somewhere together. It was upsetting.
Yet Dan wasn't ready to send Jones away. There had been something to their encounter that made Dan want a repeat performance. It wasn't just that Jones was sexy and exciting - though he was both - but there had also been an ease and a connection that was foreign to Dan. Either Jones was just really good at fucking strangers, or there was some kind of special chemistry between them. Dan did not believe in love, fate, karma, or fidelity - he was not a child - but he believed in friendship. He wondered if he and Jones could be friends. Being friends would have been easier if Dan hadn't just shoved his cock up Jones's arse, but it didn't seem an impossibility.
The sentimentality of wanting to know the person with whom he'd just had mind-blowing sex made Dan uneasy. He wanted to talk to Claire and have her yell some sense into him. Claire never confused her boyfriends and one-night stands. She enjoyed a random shagging, but any man who tried to seduce her by pretending there was more than sex to their relationship learned the hard way that Claire could not be manipulated (and that she could be kind of a bitch). Claire kept Dan grounded, in a way. She believed in love and forever, but that those were things that had to be worked at. She believed the things that mattered came hard, and that was a good thing. Dan needed her mix of hard-bitten cynicism and hopeful romanticism. She was the antithesis of the shallow nonsense that surrounded him, where dating and sex were all about advancing careers and social standing.
Jones was very attractive. His face was pointy and odd, but the strange angles were appealing. His eyes were bright and a beautiful, changing blue. When they'd had sex, Jones had been completely uninhibited, making ridiculous faces and groaning with no effort to be sexy or smooth. He had been in the moment, and it was perfect. Dan wanted to fuck him again. Maybe even in a bed.
The thought scared Dan. He needed more booze. The cocaine was making things too real.
"Dan?"
He felt Jones’s hand on his arm and stopped. He never heard what Jones said, because at that moment, someone screamed.
Jones and Dan followed the crowd, not wanting to be left out of what seemed to be an "important event." Dan didn't especially care about much of anything, but he was a journalist, and if there was a mildly interesting event occurring, he had the obligation to glance in its direction.
Dan heard bits and pieces of conversation and gathered that a car had jumped a curb and hit a girl. Depending on how close they were to the incident and their level of intoxication, people were either eagerly excited about a possible gruesome death at a hot party or terrified of having witnessed something that would elicit a genuine feeling. Dan was indifferent. He did not want anyone to die, but he didn't especially care about the wellbeing of people he didn't know.
He scanned the crowd for Claire, who would surely sincerely care about the wellbeing of those involved, but the crowd was too dense. He did see the familiar face of Jonatton "Yeah?" When Jonatton pointed at him, Dan felt sick to his stomach. It was a combination of an expression on Jonatton's face that was not dripping with irony and the way that people seemed to care where Jonatton was pointing that told Dan things had gone Wrong.
The crowd allowed Dan to push his way through, and with every step, he felt the numbness of his face spread through his entire body. He was only waiting for confirmation of what he already knew to be true.
Claire was dead, and Dan's life as he knew it was over.
Xxx
Jonas hitched a ride to the hospital with some silly git named Nathan. Apparently, Nathan had been standing next to Claire when the car had jumped the curb and hit her. Jonas was a little concerned that Nathan was not in a good headspace. His eyes were looking strange, and he was shaking pretty badly. He kept whispering to himself.
While Nathan seemed to be having a nervous breakdown, he also had a car at the ready. As they drove, Nathan prattled on about how he was going to sell his car for a bike and bikes were cooler anyway and they didn't kill people before you ever had a chance with them. Jonas tried to keep Nathan focused on the road and wished he'd learned how to drive.
He couldn't stop thinking about Dan's face as he’d climbed in the back of the ambulance. Claire was still alive, and Jonas had watched Dan take her hand before the ambulance doors had closed. Jonas knew very little about Claire, other than that she was Dan's sister. She was beautiful and had a reputation for partying as hard as Dan. Sometimes that meant people talked about her in harsh terms, because the world had different standards for women than men, but Jonas had always assumed she was cool. She'd always seemed nice enough, reserving her razor-sharp wit for those who deserved it. Occasionally, Jonas was in her vicinity and witnessed her putting someone in his or her place, but he had neither been on the receiving end of her harshness or her kindness. He had only viewed her in action, like she was a character on a television show.
Jonas was surprised by the tears swimming in his eyes for a woman he'd never actually met. She was maybe a year or two younger than Jonas, barely in her twenties. At twenty-three, Jonas felt like his life hadn’t quite started yet. He was killing time, waiting for something that felt like a real life to begin. It might have been the coke and the booze, but Jonas found the idea of someone dying before they had a chance to worry about getting crow’s feet to be unbearably sad.
“Do you think she’ll make it?” Jonas asked, wanting reassurance, no matter how empty.
Nathan, trembling and pale, shook his head far longer than necessary to convey his answer. Jonas felt sorry for the guy. Jonas had never witnessed a tragedy, but had always imagined it to be a bit romantic and exciting. Looking at Nathan Barley, Jonas rethought his position. He didn’t believe in any kind of god, so Jonas made a vague plea to the universe for a happy ending.
Xxx
Dan was smoking outside the hospital when Jonas and Nathan arrived. He said Claire had been taken straight into surgery. Nathan stumbled towards the waiting room, while Jonas stayed with Dan. He was keenly aware he had no business at Dan’s side during such a personal moment, but he couldn’t imagine leaving Dan alone. The Northerner was only a few years older than Jonas, but he was miles ahead of Jonas in terms of life experience. Watching Dan mindlessly smoking and looking so lost and alone, Jonas saw that having a career and a flat did not equal having life figured out. He wanted to hold Dan and promise that everything would be all right, but he was pretty sure things were not going to be all right for Dan Ashcroft anytime soon. Instead, he held Dan’s hand and tried to will him some strength. When Dan led him by the hand and into a men’s room, it wasn’t quite the comfort Jonas had had in mind, but he was glad to be doing something.
The hospital bathroom wasn’t elegant or tasteful; it was ugly and blinding white, and the overhead light was blinking in a way that immediately gave Jonas a mild headache. For the second time that night, he was bent over a sink and fucked by Dan Ashcroft. Jonas gritted his teeth and tried to relax his muscles, unwilling to ask anything of Dan in that moment. The initial pain receded into discomfort, and Jonas again watched Dan in the mirror. Dan’s face was a mask, but there were tears on his cheeks. Jonas desperately wanted to say something, but no words came. Dan caught his gaze in their shared reflection and covered Jonas’s hands with his own so they were both clinging to the sink. It felt good to have Dan against his back. It felt warm and intimate and gave an illusion of safety that Jonas didn’t know he’d been craving. Jonas felt a strange connection to Dan, but he was certain he’d never see him again. The tender connection would slip from Dan’s mind long before he forgave himself for a seedy encounter in a men’s room while his sister was possibly dying. What Jonas understood about being brooding, he’d learned from songs and Dan Ashcroft articles. Dan would reduce their encounter to something meaningless and animalistic, but after they both came, he held Jonas and stroked his hair. For a time, they were just two lonely people who needed to be held. Then Dan went back to the waiting room, where his parents and friends had arrived and were waiting for him. Dan went back to his real life and his real pain and left Jonas to clean up the mess in the bathroom.
“She’s fit,” Jones observed, following Dan’s gaze. “The two of you…?”
“She’s my sister.”
Jones looked comically mortified, but laughed.
“She’s not really my type. I was just being nice in case she was your wife or something.”
Dan felt defensive in a slightly different way.
“What do you mean, she’s not your type?” Dan wanted to strangle any man who looked at his sister, but he despised any man who did not appreciate Claire. It was maddening that she sometimes questioned her worth because of dickheads who were afraid of a woman who wasn’t a delicate waif or who didn’t dress like she was ready to wash a car in a music video.
“She’s a bit short for my tastes,” Jones explained, running a hand over Dan’s chest. “And I’m pretty sure she’s a woman.”
Dan left Claire to her own devices; she was better at taking care of herself than Dan. He’d spend a little quality time getting high with a beautiful and confusing boy and some quality cocaine, and the world would seem brighter. Everything seemed easier to handle after a few rails.
Xxx
Jonas climbed on top of the commode, so he could kiss Dan without the taller man’s cooperation. Dan seemed more than interested, but the coke apparently made him jittery and preoccupied. Jonas wasn’t exactly short, but he needed a stepstool to reach Dan. Once their lips touched, Dan seemed to come back to reality. He responded with more heat and passion than Jonas had expected. Dan had been a bit cool. His eyes had roved over Jonas’s body in a way that could only be described as wolfish, but the lust was only in his eyes. The rest of his body radiated indifference, from his apathetic expression to his slumped posture. Dan had the perpetually bored look that was so popular in Shoreditch, but that Jonas could never get a handle on. Jonas was an enthusiastic guy, and he could never really hide it.
“Jones…” Dan murmured as he ran his hand over the zipper of Jonas’s trousers.
“Jonas,” he corrected.
Dan nodded and repeated, “Jones.”
Maybe it was his accent, or maybe it was Jonas’s accent, but it seemed a small thing to argue about. He could be Jones for a bit.
Dan swore as he tore at Jonas’s tight-fitting trousers. Dan did not seem accustomed to undressing another man, but he seemed at ease with what was happening. Jonas had been the guinea pig for the occasional experimenting hetero, and it had never been a pleasant experience (no one needed that baggage), but Dan seemed comfortable enough handling a cock.
“Johnny?” Dan asked.
“It’s Jonas… I mean, yeah. I’ve got something.”
Jonas fumbled through his tiny pockets for the rubbers while Dan watched with excitement in his eyes, but a bored expression on his face. He ended up handing the condom to Dan, not sure who was supposed to be wearing it. Dan wasn’t sending very clear signs in terms of what he was looking for. Jonas was pretty flexible, but he was used to men being more aggressive with him. He often inspired some kind of primal response in men, a need to prove their masculinity as they fucked him, but not Dan. Dan played with Jonas’s hair, and kissed his throat like they were on a date.
Then he took Jonas’s cock in his mouth and started giving the best blow job of his life. Jonas wasn’t sure if Dan had any particular skill or if it was just the shock of seeing that beautiful, eloquent and elegant mouth wrapped around his cock. Dan was definitely the smartest guy he’d ever got off with. Dan wrote for a trashy rag, but he wrote the stories people talked about. He wrote ‘voice of a generation’ type shit. Jonas stroked Dan’s hair, and the larger man sucked his dick with enthusiasm. The bathroom was an elegant affair, with flattering lighting and numerous mirrors allowed Jonas multiples views of Dan going down on him, his cock disappearing between thin but expressive lips.
Jonas stroked Dan’s hair and felt a thrill at the intimacy. The cock-sucking was great, but freely touching Dan added another level of excitement. Although he could be a sloppy drunk, Dan had always seemed unreachable to Jonas. He was a member of an elite class of people who defined coolness. Jonas loved the idea of being cool, but lacked discernment. He would always be a big dork at heart, but Dan Ashcroft was fucking Cool.
Without the numbing effects of the coke, Jonas would have come right away, but he was feeling detached from his body and a little confused. Dan was a big man with a big mouth, and Jonas felt like he was being swallowed whole. He could imagine losing himself in Dan, becoming one of his lackies and learning to turn his nose up at things that were two weeks out of style. The idea of surrendering himself to a higher power was both frightening and tempting.
He was confused and disappointed when the wet heat disappeared from his cock, and the feeling only intensified as Dan lifted him off the toilet and placed him so Jonas was gripping the sink in front of a massive, gilded mirror. He was like a rag doll in Dan’s big Northern (why did Leeds suddenly seem so damn sexy?) hands. Dan tugged at both of their clothes until Jonas’s arse was exposed. He felt a twinge of anxiety when Dan’s cock bumped against his bare skin. He was no stranger to bumming, but he wasn’t that experienced. The guy trying to stick it up his arse usually knew his name.
Dan chose that moment to moan “Jones” in a way that made Jonas think his name should be Jones. Maybe Dan was right and Jonas’s parents had been wrong.
Lacking proper lube, Dan kept spitting on his fingers as he stretched Jones. With the distance he usually got from cocaine, Jonas felt like he was filming a porn. All they needed was some music, and if he’d had his cd player, Jonas would have had the perfect mix.
“Ready?” Dan asked, rubbing the head of his cock in the crack of Jonas’s ass.
“Yeah” might not have been the sexiest or coolest answer, but it was what came out of Jonas’s mouth. It was an awkward angle, and Jonas wasn’t really prepared for Dan’s girth. As Dan’s thrusts became rougher and more aggressive, Jonas was banging his thighs off a sharp angle on the vanity, but the little pains and discomforts only made it more exciting. He was being taken by a man’s man in a (tastefully appointed) men’s room. He’d lived there all his life, but Jonas was finally experiencing Shoreditch. He was stroking his own dick when Dan clasped one of his big hands over Jonas’s.
“Show me what you like,” Dan grunted.
What Jonas liked was being fucked by a stranger with a cold demeanor but a gentle hand, and it was a matter of seconds before he was coming on what looked to be a very expensive bathroom sink. Dan chuckled as he began to pound Jonas into the marble. Jonas wondered if there would be bruises left by Dan’s fingers digging into his hips. Those would be sexy bruises, unlike the ones he was definitely going to have on his shins and upper thighs. He watched Dan’s face go from nearly expressionless as they fucked to becoming suddenly intense and focused before contorting into the painful grimace of orgasm. Having had a few minutes to recover from his own climax, Jonas felt like an anthropologist - the Jane Goodall of Shoreditch. He’d seen real feeling from Dan Ashcroft. For some people, it only took one snort of cocaine to be hooked, but Jonas could always walk away. It was like booze: fun at a party, but not something that called to him during the day.
Seeing Dan without his mask of reserve, however, was instantly addictive. Jonas had a feeling he’d spend the rest of his life chasing after Dan, trying to get under his skin so he could leave his mark like a tattoo.
xxx
Dan scrubbed his face, trying to return the feeling. His lips and cheeks were nearly numb. He hated coke, but sometimes it was the only thing that seemed to work. Booze would always be his poison of choice, but there were feelings alcohol couldn't kill. Shame was one of those feelings. In fact, booze could make shame flower and bloom like a goddamned flower. Cocaine made Dan paranoid and anxious, but it also killed all those minor concerns about being a decent human being.
Coke made it okay to fuck a beautiful stranger in a toilet. Jones's eyes were glazed and his cheeks were pink, and he looked exactly like a guy who'd just had his brains fucked out in a classy bathroom. Dan was torn between wanting to know more about the lovely, androgynous boy and never wanting to see his angular face again. He wasn't bothered by the gay sex - Jones wasn't his first exception to the rule - but he felt uncomfortable with the intensity of the experience. Shagging total strangers was always a bit of a let-down. There was so much excitement in the wooing of a partner, but then it was over and you were left cleaning up bodily fluids and wishing the other person would just disappear instead of asking stupid questions, like it was all the beginning of a relationship.
Jones wasn't asking stupid questions, but he was following Dan like they were going somewhere together. It was upsetting.
Yet Dan wasn't ready to send Jones away. There had been something to their encounter that made Dan want a repeat performance. It wasn't just that Jones was sexy and exciting - though he was both - but there had also been an ease and a connection that was foreign to Dan. Either Jones was just really good at fucking strangers, or there was some kind of special chemistry between them. Dan did not believe in love, fate, karma, or fidelity - he was not a child - but he believed in friendship. He wondered if he and Jones could be friends. Being friends would have been easier if Dan hadn't just shoved his cock up Jones's arse, but it didn't seem an impossibility.
The sentimentality of wanting to know the person with whom he'd just had mind-blowing sex made Dan uneasy. He wanted to talk to Claire and have her yell some sense into him. Claire never confused her boyfriends and one-night stands. She enjoyed a random shagging, but any man who tried to seduce her by pretending there was more than sex to their relationship learned the hard way that Claire could not be manipulated (and that she could be kind of a bitch). Claire kept Dan grounded, in a way. She believed in love and forever, but that those were things that had to be worked at. She believed the things that mattered came hard, and that was a good thing. Dan needed her mix of hard-bitten cynicism and hopeful romanticism. She was the antithesis of the shallow nonsense that surrounded him, where dating and sex were all about advancing careers and social standing.
Jones was very attractive. His face was pointy and odd, but the strange angles were appealing. His eyes were bright and a beautiful, changing blue. When they'd had sex, Jones had been completely uninhibited, making ridiculous faces and groaning with no effort to be sexy or smooth. He had been in the moment, and it was perfect. Dan wanted to fuck him again. Maybe even in a bed.
The thought scared Dan. He needed more booze. The cocaine was making things too real.
"Dan?"
He felt Jones’s hand on his arm and stopped. He never heard what Jones said, because at that moment, someone screamed.
Jones and Dan followed the crowd, not wanting to be left out of what seemed to be an "important event." Dan didn't especially care about much of anything, but he was a journalist, and if there was a mildly interesting event occurring, he had the obligation to glance in its direction.
Dan heard bits and pieces of conversation and gathered that a car had jumped a curb and hit a girl. Depending on how close they were to the incident and their level of intoxication, people were either eagerly excited about a possible gruesome death at a hot party or terrified of having witnessed something that would elicit a genuine feeling. Dan was indifferent. He did not want anyone to die, but he didn't especially care about the wellbeing of people he didn't know.
He scanned the crowd for Claire, who would surely sincerely care about the wellbeing of those involved, but the crowd was too dense. He did see the familiar face of Jonatton "Yeah?" When Jonatton pointed at him, Dan felt sick to his stomach. It was a combination of an expression on Jonatton's face that was not dripping with irony and the way that people seemed to care where Jonatton was pointing that told Dan things had gone Wrong.
The crowd allowed Dan to push his way through, and with every step, he felt the numbness of his face spread through his entire body. He was only waiting for confirmation of what he already knew to be true.
Claire was dead, and Dan's life as he knew it was over.
Xxx
Jonas hitched a ride to the hospital with some silly git named Nathan. Apparently, Nathan had been standing next to Claire when the car had jumped the curb and hit her. Jonas was a little concerned that Nathan was not in a good headspace. His eyes were looking strange, and he was shaking pretty badly. He kept whispering to himself.
While Nathan seemed to be having a nervous breakdown, he also had a car at the ready. As they drove, Nathan prattled on about how he was going to sell his car for a bike and bikes were cooler anyway and they didn't kill people before you ever had a chance with them. Jonas tried to keep Nathan focused on the road and wished he'd learned how to drive.
He couldn't stop thinking about Dan's face as he’d climbed in the back of the ambulance. Claire was still alive, and Jonas had watched Dan take her hand before the ambulance doors had closed. Jonas knew very little about Claire, other than that she was Dan's sister. She was beautiful and had a reputation for partying as hard as Dan. Sometimes that meant people talked about her in harsh terms, because the world had different standards for women than men, but Jonas had always assumed she was cool. She'd always seemed nice enough, reserving her razor-sharp wit for those who deserved it. Occasionally, Jonas was in her vicinity and witnessed her putting someone in his or her place, but he had neither been on the receiving end of her harshness or her kindness. He had only viewed her in action, like she was a character on a television show.
Jonas was surprised by the tears swimming in his eyes for a woman he'd never actually met. She was maybe a year or two younger than Jonas, barely in her twenties. At twenty-three, Jonas felt like his life hadn’t quite started yet. He was killing time, waiting for something that felt like a real life to begin. It might have been the coke and the booze, but Jonas found the idea of someone dying before they had a chance to worry about getting crow’s feet to be unbearably sad.
“Do you think she’ll make it?” Jonas asked, wanting reassurance, no matter how empty.
Nathan, trembling and pale, shook his head far longer than necessary to convey his answer. Jonas felt sorry for the guy. Jonas had never witnessed a tragedy, but had always imagined it to be a bit romantic and exciting. Looking at Nathan Barley, Jonas rethought his position. He didn’t believe in any kind of god, so Jonas made a vague plea to the universe for a happy ending.
Xxx
Dan was smoking outside the hospital when Jonas and Nathan arrived. He said Claire had been taken straight into surgery. Nathan stumbled towards the waiting room, while Jonas stayed with Dan. He was keenly aware he had no business at Dan’s side during such a personal moment, but he couldn’t imagine leaving Dan alone. The Northerner was only a few years older than Jonas, but he was miles ahead of Jonas in terms of life experience. Watching Dan mindlessly smoking and looking so lost and alone, Jonas saw that having a career and a flat did not equal having life figured out. He wanted to hold Dan and promise that everything would be all right, but he was pretty sure things were not going to be all right for Dan Ashcroft anytime soon. Instead, he held Dan’s hand and tried to will him some strength. When Dan led him by the hand and into a men’s room, it wasn’t quite the comfort Jonas had had in mind, but he was glad to be doing something.
The hospital bathroom wasn’t elegant or tasteful; it was ugly and blinding white, and the overhead light was blinking in a way that immediately gave Jonas a mild headache. For the second time that night, he was bent over a sink and fucked by Dan Ashcroft. Jonas gritted his teeth and tried to relax his muscles, unwilling to ask anything of Dan in that moment. The initial pain receded into discomfort, and Jonas again watched Dan in the mirror. Dan’s face was a mask, but there were tears on his cheeks. Jonas desperately wanted to say something, but no words came. Dan caught his gaze in their shared reflection and covered Jonas’s hands with his own so they were both clinging to the sink. It felt good to have Dan against his back. It felt warm and intimate and gave an illusion of safety that Jonas didn’t know he’d been craving. Jonas felt a strange connection to Dan, but he was certain he’d never see him again. The tender connection would slip from Dan’s mind long before he forgave himself for a seedy encounter in a men’s room while his sister was possibly dying. What Jonas understood about being brooding, he’d learned from songs and Dan Ashcroft articles. Dan would reduce their encounter to something meaningless and animalistic, but after they both came, he held Jonas and stroked his hair. For a time, they were just two lonely people who needed to be held. Then Dan went back to the waiting room, where his parents and friends had arrived and were waiting for him. Dan went back to his real life and his real pain and left Jonas to clean up the mess in the bathroom.