The making of jonty bloo.., p.12
The Making of Jonty Bloom, page 12
part #1 of Unfinished Business Series
“My suite’s okay.”
“But the only real wow factor is the view. The two suites had work done on them a couple of years ago. The other rooms are…a bit grim. Designed by Agatha Christie with murder in mind. But the guests don’t seem to care. Most guests. We get the odd one or two who find fault. But the rooms are a reasonable size and they’re not expensive, not considering the views and the proximity to the beach. The restaurant is the big draw. People come from Newcastle to eat at McAllister’s and it’s easier to stay the night, so we have high occupancy rates. The chef is really good. Though I think Marcus only stays with the hotel because his wife’s family is from round here and they have three young kids. Her parents help with them.”
All useful information, though Devan did feel a twinge of guilt. “Is that the guy I heard banging and clattering when I wanted breakfast after service had finished?”
Jonty winced. “That was Wayne, the sous chef. Wayne’s a combination of Gordon Ramsey and Naomi Campbell—good and bad bits. Foul mouthed, bad tempered, touchy, tall, very good-looking. Both great at their job.”
“If you could do whatever you liked to the hotel, what would you do?”
“Update the rooms. Refit the bathrooms. Replace the windows. Paint the outside and get rid of the stains creeping down from the balconies. Find ways to persuade more people to come out of season. Maybe hold wedding fayres or special events. Murder mystery weekends would be fun. Or retreats for writers or even sports weekends. You can climb, ride, swim, surf, kayak, and a whole load more. Or even arrange stays for film lovers. Lots of filming has been done around here. Harry Potter, Transformers, Lady Macbeth.”
“How often does the major come to stay?”
“He lives in the hotel all year round, along with a few other guests. There’s also a couple who split their time between the hotel and cruising.” Jonty glanced at him. “What have you come up here for?”
Had he been too obvious, asking about the hotel? He didn’t want to tell Jonty that truth. Not yet. Maybe he’d never need to if McAllister didn’t want to sell. But another truth to avoid a lie… A more painful one for him at least. Why not?
There were a lot of reasons why not.
“You’ve gone so quiet, I’m worried,” Jonty whispered.
“I came up here to escape.”
Jonty gulped. “Oh God. What’s happening in the south? Have you run out of coffee? Toilet rolls? It can’t be the sea level rising or we’d be underwater. Zombie apocalypse?” He groaned. “Now I feel terrible I’ve trivialised what might be something serious. Like cancer. Sorry.” Jonty grabbed his hand and squeezed hard. “If you have duct tape in your pocket, now might be a good time to use it. Not on me, obviously, on you, so you can’t tell me I’m an idiot.”
Devan chuckled.
Jonty gave a dramatic sigh. “Except you can’t just say you came up here to escape and not tell me why. Are the police after you? Your boss? The Russian mafia? Colombian drug lords? A Mexican cartel? Aliens? I’ll shut up now.”
For some unsettling reason that he didn’t fully understand, Devan wanted to tell him about Ravi and Griff, wanted someone on his side.
“You don’t have to tell me.” Jonty widened his eyes. “Debt collection agency? Your ex? A gang of exes? A casino debt? Sorry. I will give up asking eventually.”
Devan snorted. “Really?”
Jonty looked hurt. “I won’t push. I know you arrived feeling sad. You don’t have to tell me why.”
“Are you going to let me get a word in edgeways?”
Jonty mimed zipping his lips. Devan waited, but Jonty said nothing else.
“Last Sunday, while I was having lunch with my parents, they told me my brother’s planning to get married in December.”
“Right.” Jonty frowned. “Were you supposed to marry first or something, because you’re the eldest son?”
Devan laughed. He couldn’t help it because Jonty had inadvertently almost got it right. “In a way. The person he’s marrying is my ex.”
“Oh. Ah. Eww. Eek. Oops. I’ve run out of short exclamations starting with vowels, but that’s…not good. Is your ex awful? You want to save your brother, but you can’t because he won’t listen? Shit, that sounds like me. The not listening bit.”
“Not quite. Five months ago, Ravi should have been marrying me. The…” Devan swallowed hard. It was harder to say than he’d thought, but then this was something he’d never thought he’d tell a stranger.
Jonty held tighter to Devan’s hand. “What is it?”
“The day before the wedding, I found Ravi in bed with my brother.”
“Had they got a good excuse? Hiding from an escaped tarantula or something?”
“No.”
“Oh shit.”
“Obviously the wedding was called off.”
“By who?”
“That’s an interesting question. By both of us.”
“Hmm. So you both lied.”
Devan frowned. “Why would you say that?”
“It was a guess, but I’m assuming you wouldn’t want anyone to know what you’d discovered and if you’d spoken out, what would that have done to your family? Better to make up some story about realising just in time that it wasn’t going to work, not going into too much detail. Though I’m guessing that’s turned out to be a mistake.”
“Last Monday, my brother, Griff, told me he wants me to be his best man when he marries Ravi in December.”
“He what?” Jonty gaped at him. “Is he mad?”
“He’s…not thinking clearly.”
“Does anyone know the real reason why the wedding was called off?”
“My father knows, but I’ve only just told him. Ravi, Griff and I agreed it was better that no one knew the truth. Ravi was at fault, and Griff, but I would have looked a fool. People would have been sympathetic, but that wasn’t what I wanted. I went quiet. I hid in a dark place and thought time would help.”
“An actual dark place or in your head?”
“In my head. I imagined I’d rather be despised than pitied, but I found myself resenting that I appeared to be the guilty party. Ravi was in tears all over Instagram and Facebook. He’s very good at appearing distraught. Now I’ve found out that for the last few months, and most likely from the day I discovered them, my brother and Ravi have had a relationship. I had even more reason to be pissed off with my brother than I’d thought.”
“And you haven’t put people right about what really happened?”
“No. And now I feel I can’t say anything. Not if Griff is marrying him.”
“That is so fucking unfair. Do you and your brother get on? Did you get on?”
“We were close when we were younger.” Almost inseparable. “We work for the same company. I got him the job. I thought he was my best friend. I’d asked him to be my best man along with my other brother. And because my mother doesn’t know the truth about why the wedding was called off, she can’t understand why I don’t want to stand next to my brother when he marries Ravi.”
Devan was amazed how much better he felt telling this to Jonty. “Griff has always been the golden boy. He gets what he wants, but not this time.” He fucking won’t, because I’d rather die.
“I’d buy them something really meaningful as a wedding present. Like an emergency survival kit or towels with the names Satan and Beelzebub embroidered on them, or an experience gift for something neither of them would like to do such as a napkin folding course, or dry-stone walling for beginners, or a day handling venomous snakes.”
Devan chuckled.
“How long had you and Ravi been going out?”
“Two years.”
“Wow.”
“Once I’d seen him with Griff, all I could think about was whether he’d been faithful during that time. Did I know him at all? Why wasn’t I enough for him? What does my brother have that I don’t? Why would he hurt me like that? I feel… angry. So fucking angry. All the fucking time.”
“Ouch.”
Devan let go of Jonty’s hand. “Sorry. The crazy thing is, that as far as Ravi is concerned, it’s not so much the infidelity that got to me, but the look on his face when Griff was fucking him. I thought I knew him and I didn’t know him at all. I honestly believed that I’d get my head straight and move on, that I could tuck it all away, keep how I felt locked up. For five months that was what I did. Wore a mask, because it hurt too much to let it all up to the surface. I stopped feeling angry. I was more upset that Griff had been Ravi’s partner. My own fucking brother. The one who worshipped me. Now I’m angry again. And…I can’t believe I’ve told you any of that.”
Jonty put his hand on Devan’s arm and slid it down to his hand to let their fingers entwine. “It’s not a surprise you’re angry with everyone, including yourself. Angry with the choice you made to keep quiet. Angry with your brother for his insensitivity. Angry with Ravi for cheating. Angry with yourself for not seeing what you think you should have seen. But more than angry, you’re sad because you’ve been hurt.”
“Humiliated.”
“But you said people don’t know the truth.”
“I have no idea what people know anymore, but when your brother is going to marry your ex, I think people might guess what happened.”
“Hurt still fits better than humiliated.”
“Mike told me you’d been hurt too.”
Jonty gave a short laugh. “Was he warning you off?”
“He told me not to hurt you. That’s the last thing I want to do. That’s the reason we shouldn’t…”
Jonty stepped in front of him and Devan stopped walking. Jonty wrapped his arms around him and hugged him. He didn’t say a word, just pressed his head against Devan’s shoulder and held him. Devan lifted his arms and wrapped them around Jonty. They stood motionless for what seemed a long time, until the world around them faded and all he could see, feel and smell was Jonty, and gradually he calmed. His anger faded, his heart rate slowed, his chest stopped hurting.
He’d opened his heart to a stranger. Was this some watershed moment? Could he finally put it all behind him?
“All better now,” Jonty said. “I don’t have any Thomas the Tank Engine plasters or I’d give you one.”
Jonty took hold of his hand again and tugged him on. “Right. The world according to Jonty Bloom. This is the life you’ve been given. You have to keep going. That’s the biggest lesson. There’s no choice. Giving up is not an option. Sometimes life is shit. You get hurt, but you carry on. You don’t let something awful that happened to you wreck your life because that way you’ve lost. If you let hurt keep hold of you, you’ve allowed the person who hurt you to win. You need to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Keep moving. Don’t fall. Because if I don’t eat soon, I’m going to have to snack on some juicy bit of you.”
Devan smiled. “That doesn’t sound too bad.”
“You didn’t see how I bit that Flake? My teeth are razor sharp. I’m always biting my tongue. Though not with you. You bring out the sarcastic side of me.”
“There’s another side?”
“Oh yeah.” Jonty winked at him. “It starts with s too. Guess which of these it is. Smooth, sulky, sweet, sensible, sexy.”
“S—”
“I’ve not finished. Splendiferous, stupendous, soothing, spellbinding, seductive, sultry. I’m glad I don’t need to guess, because I’m thinking I’m all those.”
“What happens if I don’t get it right?”
“I will have failed as a gay man.”
Devan thought about it. “You’re sunny.”
Jonty smiled. “Ahh. You win.”
THEY ATE FISH AND CHIPS in the outdoor area of a restaurant in Bamburgh with a fantastic view of the castle. Devan felt as if he’d somehow moved into another world. Telling Jonty about Griff and Ravi had been so out of character that he was still having trouble believing he’d done it. It showed weakness, something Devan avoided.
Though did it show weakness? There was something about Jonty that made him feel… What the fuck does he make me feel? Less anxious? Settled? Stronger? Happier? Was that it? Less alone?
With only a little prompting, Jonty talked more about the hotel, the staff, and about some of the financial issues Hamish had been having. Apparently, the guy had built a house in Newcastle that had cost him a fortune, only for his wife to die, and he’d paid for his sons to be members of some swanky golf club. Devan felt guilty that he filed it all away. He might have come up here because of Ravi and Griff, but he was also working. He couldn’t get away from that.
“Why did you want to speak to Hamish?”
Devan gave a short laugh. “You didn’t mention s for spy.”
“I overheard accidentally. I thought you were going to complain about me. I don’t want to lose my job.”
Oh shit. A reminder of another reason he needed to leave Jonty alone. “The company I work for is looking to invest up here. I wanted to pick Hamish’s brain. I have nothing to complain about as far as you’re concerned.”
Jonty grinned. “Not even my mouth?”
“Especially not your mouth.”
The more Jonty talked, the more Devan liked him. He was bright and funny. Devan couldn’t understand why he wasn’t with anyone, yet glad that he wasn’t. This friend of his called Tay didn’t appear to be that sort of friend. But underlying the attraction Devan felt, he was aware that Jonty was not going to be happy when he knew why he’d come up to Northumberland.
“I am so full.” Jonty put his knife and fork down. “I’ve not eaten as much as that for ages. Don’t let me go into the water on the way back or I’ll sink like the hippo I am.”
“Do you want a dessert?”
“Ugh. If you’d told me I could have pudding too, I wouldn’t have eaten all those chips. Now I’m too full.”
Devan paid the bill, refusing to let Jonty pay half, and they left the restaurant, heading back towards the beach.
“My mother told me about Griff getting married, moments before she served pudding. My favourite. Apple crumble. And I couldn’t eat it because my throat had closed up. She was bloody annoyed because she’d made it especially.”
“She thought making your favourite pudding would be enough for you to cope with being told your brother and your ex were marrying? I don’t like her very much. Sorry.”
“Nor do I at the moment. She has a blind spot as far as my brother’s concerned. Griff has a mild form of cerebral palsy and she’s always been protective. So was I. When did you lose touch with your parents?”
“Depends which parent you mean. My mother when I was eight. My father when I was fifteen.”
“What happened?”
“It’s a long and sad story. Sure you want to know?”
“Yes. If you want to tell me.”
“You told me yours, so…” Jonty sighed. “We relocated to Northumberland from Surrey because of my dad’s job. I don’t think my mum wanted to move. I didn’t. I had friends at school and moving somewhere new meant I had to start all over again. But dad always got what he wanted by one means or another. If persuasion didn’t work, a thump did.”
Shit! “He hit your mother?”
Jonty nodded. “He didn’t hit me until she left. Then I became his punch bag.”
“Your mother left you with him? Why?”
Jonty kicked at the sand as he walked. “She’d tried to run away with me and my sister a couple of times. Packed a suitcase. Packed my stuff and my sister’s stuff. Somehow, he always found out. I think he had cameras in the house. She was scared of him. He drank too much.
“Anyway, we moved up here and for a while, things were better. He wasn’t crazy jealous and constantly asking her where she was going, who she was seeing, but… It didn’t last. One night, she put me and Denny in the car and told me to stay there. While my mother went into the house to get the bags, my dad came home. I was frightened he’d do something really bad to my mum, so I took Denny out of her seat and carried her back into the house so I could protect my mother.”
Devan swallowed hard. He almost wished he’d not asked the question.
“Dad had hit her. Her face was bleeding. He said he’d let her go, but only with one of us. If she chose, he wouldn’t follow her. I think he thought she’d refuse, that she wouldn’t leave one of her kids.”
Jonty stopped walking and stared out to sea. “And I thought…she won’t choose. She’ll wait until she can run with both of us. But she didn’t. She picked Denny. She was crying, but she picked Denny. I was eight. Denny was two. I…sort of understood, as much as a little kid can. She couldn’t trust my father to take care of my sister. Denny was still in nappies, didn’t sleep through the night and a real little madam. I was a good boy who did as he was told. She thought I’d be okay, I guess. She hugged me and whispered in my ear that she’d come back for me. I believed her. I really believed her. But she never came back.”
“Jesus, Jonty.” Devan was horrified.
“When my dad finally accepted that she’d gone for good, he destroyed everything of hers and of Denny’s that she’d left. Books, toys, clothes. Photos. I hid under the bed in my room and I could hear him yelling as he went round the house. When he finally went quiet, I went down and found him passed out on the couch. He’d thrown up on the carpet. I cleaned up his vomit, made a sandwich, and went back to bed. I still believed she’d come back because she’d promised.
“For years after she’d left, I used to imagine she’d turn up at parents’ evening, or she’d be there when I ran on school sports’ day, or she’d come to listen to me sing a solo in the end of year shows. I tried my best, just in case.
“I convinced myself that she was dead, that my father had killed her, but then he showed me the divorce papers and told me she was going to get married. She had a new life. One without me. But I still hoped she’d remember what she’d said to me. It’s part of the reason I’ve never left Alnwick. The thought that she’d come back, even after all these years.”
