escort

0.8

Troye dreams about Jacob again that night, about kissing him until he wakes up gasping for breath, his hands fisted in the sheets. He's trembling so much that he can't go back to sleep, so, just before 4 a.m., he gives in and fishes the magazine out of the bin in the kitchen and lies on his back in the middle of his studio and finishes reading the article. He can't bear to read the bit about how they met again, or about the flowers, and skips over the part about how Jacob proposed because he can't bear that, either. He doesn't want to know the details, where they were and how she cried, and when she starts gushing about the plans for the wedding, Troye almost throws the magazine across the room, so he doesn't know why he reads on, but he does and his hearts stops.

I know it's soon, but I've always wanted a Christmas wedding.

Troye sits up so suddenly his head spins, his fingers fumbling as he snatches his phone off the coffee table and fires off a text to his friend, Matt. I need a favour, he types, heart in his mouth now because he can't remember the last time he felt that.

Since he wanted to fight for something.

For someone.

+++

If he broke about seventeen rules going to Jacob's house the night they met, then Troye dreads to think how many he's breaking now. Charlotte will kill him in his sleep when she finds out, but he's so past caring that when he leaves his flat and tries to hail a cab, he doesn't notice the guy about ten feet ahead of him trying to hail one as well. So when a cab pulls up between them, Troye doesn't think, just strides towards it. They get to it at the same time and when Troye realises what's happening, he steps back, startled.

'Sorry, mate,' he says, holding his hand up. 'I didn't see you.'

The guy obviously doesn't believe him, the skin between his greying eyebrows pinched as he looks Troye up and down. Troye does the same because the pair of them look so out of place on the scruffy, graffiti bruised street - him in a navy blue suit and Troye in a black one - that Troye can't help but wonder what he's doing there. It's not that the Falcon Road is particularly rough, it's just that, apart from the people who live in the various estates, it tends to attract young professionals about his age who've got their first real job and can just afford a studio near Clapham Junction station, not guys like that, guys in their forties in nice suits. Then Troye sees his tie, the one he almost bought in Liberty last week, the navy blue one with tiny skulls on it, and smiles.

''S'alright,' the guy says, his forehead smoothing when he realises that Troye isn't trying to nick his cab. 'What way you going? Maybe we can share.'

'Stamford Bridge.'

'The Chelsea and Bayern Munich game?'

Troye nods. He wouldn't usually be so keen to get in a cab with a stranger, but he spent so long trying to talk himself out of going that he's missed kick off. He still isn't sure it's a good idea, but when he got a text from Peter - his Wednesday night at nine - to say that his train from Manchester was cancelled and he's getting a later one, Troye took it as a sign and charged out the door. He could wait for another cab, of course, but the traffic is awful, so maybe he's being more impatient than usual. Besides, what's the worse that can happen? The guy's wearing an Alexander McQueen tie.

Serial killers don't wear Alexander McQueen ties.

'Sorry, mate. I'm going the other way.' The guy nods up the road. 'Balham.'

'No worries,' Troye says with a smile, stepping back. 'Have a good night, yeah?'

Luckily, he doesn't have to wait long for another cab, although the traffic makes the crawl towards Battersea Bridge excruciating. He should have got on the tube, but he's wearing a £2,000 Lanvin suit and doesn't fancy sitting in chewing gum.