Recommended song: A Perfect Circle – The Noose (I’m totally in love with that song!)

Chapter 5

The smell of fresh coffee slowly filled the studio’s small kitchen as Christian drummed on the surface of the counter with his fingers, watching the foggy morning through a smaller window. Dave was half-lying on the table, still in his morning coma. As his friend glimpsed at him, a smile appeared on his face.

“Still struggling with all the pain in the world?” he chuckled to himself.

“Fuck off…” came the muffled reply.

“As usual” he chuckled again then put a strong cup of black coffee in front of the singer, who seemed to wake up a little more from the familiar smell. He nearly purred as he took the warm cup into his hands and carefully sipped from it. “By the way, Dave…”

“What?”

“Morning, guys!” a messy blonde head appeared next to them as a happy Martin walked into the studio.

“Morning, mate” Chris shook hands with him with his usual smile, but Dave just grunted.

“… so, I was about to talk to Dave, but it’s good that you’re here too. So after your little ‘private action’, I mean the joking around, we fell behind with two tracks and the deadline is coming up quickly and we’re far from ready with the mixing, so…”

“I can stay late, if needed!” Dave said immediately and Mart started nodding too.

“Yeah, no problem. We can finish it with David.”

“Ahh, okay… That’s great. I won’t have time today to deal with this, so thanks!” he eyed them maybe a bit suspiciously but his smile reappeared soon.

“Sure. Then it’s settled. Can I have some too?” Mart nodded towards the coffee machine next to Chris and while the blonde drummer poured for him too, Mart glimpsed at Dave, who quickly turned back to his cup, pretending as if he wasn’t staring at his workmate.

---

“Fancy some coffee?” Dave asked Mart around 8pm, heading for the kitchen area.

“Yeah. It seems we’ll stay here for a while” he rubbed his eyes and held back a yawn. “You should call your wife, me thinks.”

“Oh, yeah. Good idea” David frowned and turned around, not noticing the strange expression on Martin’s face that just got more visible as he heard the way Dave talked on the phone.

“Don’t wait for me, I’ll be late…. Uh-huh… Whatever. Bye” he hung up and tossed his phone on the counter with a sigh. He felt suddenly cold – but this came from the inside. He didn’t regret talking like this on the phone, because it became quite common lately. The feeling of no one waiting for him at home spread through his heart as he watched the dark liquid pour from the coffee machine. He frowned, shook his head and forced a reckless smile on his face. “Whatever!” As he got back to the other room with two steaming cup in his hands, he quickly realized that his workmate was talking probably with his wife too.

“So how is his hand? Healing well?” Mart asked from Suzanne with worry in his voice then he sighed with relief “So next week the doc will finally remove the cast? That’s good. Give him and the girls my kisses… Yeah, for you too” he added after a hesitant pause. “Listen, I have to go now, we’re still working. Okay. Yeah. Bye.”

“Here” Dave offered a cup and Mart took it with a grateful smile.

“Thanks” he nodded and watched Dave sit down to a table, checking some papers.

“The missus?”

“Yeah” he rolled his eyes.

“Who got injured?”

“My son, Calo. He broke his arm while skateboarding. But he’s better now.”

“How many kids do you have?”

“Three. Viva, Ava and Calo. Viva is the eldest, she’ll finish high school this year, Ava is already a rebelling teenager and Calo is my smallest.”

“So I guess you love them very much” Dave mused watching the proud expression on the blonde man’s face.

“Yes. More than anything. You know, they helped me a lot to survive my failures. I could hold on to them, whatever happened.”

“Oh yeah, I know the feeling. I have two kids too. Jimmy, from Jen’s previous marriage and we have Rosie together. They are fantastic and helped me a lot too. I think our kids don’t even know how much we can thank for them.”

“Absolutely” Mart chuckled. “And how did you meet your wife?” he asked. He became curious now that it seemed David is open to talk about his life a bit.

After a longer pause, while Dave tried to decide how much to tell to the other man, he went on: “I met her after I left Basildon and came to the states. We met at some kind of a party full of musicians, actors, actresses and other people. She plays in serials. She was recently divorced from her first husband with a few years old boy.”

“I guess it wasn’t easy to win his trust.”

“I had to work on that, but now we love each other. Although… lately we drifted apart a bit.”

“I could tell.”

“From what?” Dave looked up at him.

“From the way you talked on the phone.”

“So you caught that, huh?” he sighed and looked down at the papers in front of him, avoiding eye-contact. He didn’t like to talk about his failures. “But I guess it’s just natural that they grew and don’t really give a shit what’s with me, ha-ha!” he forced a laugh, but Martin saw through him. He didn’t say anything, just watched Dave for a while then sat down opposite him.

“Listen, Dave… I understand what you feel.”

“Do you?” he huffed and leant back in his chair.

“I’m going through the same thing right now. You feel sorry about that, right? Cuz I do.”

“Yeah” he whispered, fixing his gaze on the table.

Mart just hummed sympathetically and sipped from his coffee. There was silence for a few minutes then the blonde man started speaking again. “So you’re from Basildon? That’s my hometown too, I just moved to London in hope of getting better jobs.”

“Yes, I guessed that you’re from there too, you know, when you barked back at me so arrogantly and broke my soul” he chuckled, trying to lift the mood and maybe to disguise his curiosity.

They both laughed on that memory then Martin gathered some courage and shrugged “Although it was a deadly boring town, there were some great parties at Bridge House. I used to go there a lot – even when it was just a simple gay bar” he added a bit unsure, watching Dave’s reactions.

“Yeah” he nodded and seemed to get lost in his memories. “Let’s go get back to work. We have to finish this tonight” he stood up and left the blonde man there without looking at him.

The other man just followed him silently and picked up his guitar to accompany Dave’s voice during the bridge part. ‘Maybe it was a mistake to bring that up’, he mused.

After a few minutes they took a break and the singer fiddled with the lyrics in his hand. “You know, I used to go there too” he glimpsed up meaningfully at Mart “And I was friends with Doug, the owner…”

Mart opened his eyes wide with surprise, because he knew what the owner was famous for… He kept the young fags in money… Was it possible that Dave was one of them? Or were they really just friends, somehow? Mart felt tons of questions forming in his mind, but he couldn’t open his mouth to ask them.

Dave watched him and saw that he got it. He had to grin to himself as he started asking Mart about his acquaintances from the club and he nodded a few times when it came to those whom he knew as well. They chuckled time after time on old memories while sipping on some beer Dave brought to them. While the blonde man went out into the kitchen for the next round, Dave had the opportunity to size him up ‘that’ way. He found him cute with his curly blonde hair and shorter, thin, but still muscular body. And he had to admit that he liked those big green eyes. While watching him talking to him, a few times his mind wandered off, imagining how those nicely-curved lips could taste, but he always shook his head and concentrated on what Mart was saying to him. Yeah, if he was still his old self, he’d definitely make a move on the pretty curly man. He wasn’t exactly his type, but… He sighed and shook his head again, tearing his eyes off of Mart’s nice butt. ‘The good old times, huh?’

While they returned to work, Mart had the opportunity to think a bit too. He did it again – Dave flashed that evil smile at him again. Was it an unconscious gesture or did he do it willingly to confuse him? First it bothered and embarrassed him, because he didn’t know how to react. But then… he started waiting for such ambiguous gestures. He couldn’t lie to himself anymore: he simply loved that dirty smile and already felt the danger of wanting more. A question started bugging him and finally around 3 am in the morning, during another coffee break, he dared to ask it.

“Did you leave ‘that’ side of yours behind when you left England?”

“Why do you want to know?” he asked back quietly, his tough attitude long gone.

“I’m just curious.”

“Yes. I had to. I wanted people to accept me. I didn’t want them to look at me as if I was a freak – though I think I still am. But they don’t know it and it’s good enough for me. And… I wanted to start a new life, leaving everything behind.”

“And did you manage to leave this side of yours fully behind?” he looked at Dave with doubt in his green eyes.

“As I said, I had to. I buried it deep inside and threw away the key. It got better with time when I had to focus on work and my new family – especially when Rosie was born” he frowned. “Though I was a bit surprised, because it turned out that NYC is quite open in this question, but I didn’t want to get involved in it, cuz I know myself. I wouldn’t have been able to stop if I did” he said with a bitter smile and Mart was quite sure that he heard some sadness in his voice. “Just Chris knows about my past” he looked up at the other man to check his reactions.

Martin just nodded with a knowing expression. “Is he…?”

“No, Chris is straight. He’s just a good friend, who makes things bearable for me during my worst periods.”

“I see” he scratched his chin “I understand.”

“And what about you?” he asked.

Suddenly the blonde man didn’t know what to say and Dave found it sweet that he slightly blushed. “Well, because you were honest with me… My wife is my Mistress, so to say. Usually I’ve been always in the underdog role since my teens. And after I met her and we started a family, I didn’t have the desire to change that. But…”

“… now you start having doubts…”

“How do you…? Well, yes. I’m far away from her now and… somehow I don’t miss her as much as I should. I miss the kids terribly, but not her.”

“She suppressed you too much?”

“I guess so.”

“I could tell. I’ve been watching you.”

“You were?” Mart frowned.

“Yes. It is easy to see that the more time you spent here with us, the more you opened up and dared to speak up for yourself and for your ideas. You have much more inside, Martin. You’re just afraid to discover this side of yours.”

He couldn’t reply. He felt that Dave was right, but he didn’t know he could look into people this well. A tingly little feeling spread deep inside of him. He tried to figure out what it was – maybe the hope that finally someone can understand him? After all David went through similar things. He was like him in a lot of things. And now Mart started to understand why the singer tried to hide behind his cool and reckless attitude. It was just a picture to the outside world to protect his true feelings and self. The self Mart started to like more and more.

Next chapter

Súgó Még nincs hozzászólás.

Új hozzászólás Frissítés