Giles Pt. 01: Down Among the Dead Men

"Well!" Ralph huffed and dithered for a moment, conscious of all the not so friendly stares. Then he drew himself up and stalked off trying to retain some pride.

When he was out of earshot, Quentin and Billy fell about laughing and some at nearby tables turned to applaud. Matt leaned across to kiss Giles on the cheek.

"That was beautiful!"

Giles sat a little straighter and gave a short nod. The rest of the evening passed very pleasantly indeed.

However, on their return to the flat, Giles turned to Matt. "I had a good evening, Matt but I don't want to go there again."

Matt was taken aback. "What was wrong with it?"

"It's not me, Matt. I don't mix with creatures like Ralphie. I'm a creature of the Home Counties and boarding school."

"What are you trying to say, Giles?"

"That I'm a straight that likes men, Matt. I want to be in that milieu. No high camp, no bitchy queen dramatics."

Matt stared at him. "But that's my crowd!"

Giles nodded. "Yeah, I get that. But if you want to do that then you'll have to do it on your own. Billy and Quentin were great company and I'd happily meet them again somewhere but not anywhere where someone like your ex is likely to crawl out of the woodwork."

"But that's-"

"Don't you dare try and play the homophobia card with me, Matt. Just don't."

Matt's expression was mulish, and Giles frowned. "Do you mean to tell me that there's no non-scene gay culture in London? Seriously? In a city of millions? C'mon!"

***

December

Christmas loomed and Giles fretted. Matt would surely either be returning to his parents for the season or entertaining them. This might be the end of his stay. His shattered self-confidence was only slowly starting to knit itself back together. Even as it did so, Giles started to realise that he was not who he was before. What he was becoming he did not yet know.

His unease manifested itself in little ways and Matt picked up on it immediately.

Giles frowned at him in irritation. "How am I ever going to keep anything secret from you?"

Matt adopted his urbane grin - which was almost as annoying as Giles' older brother Charles' quirked eyebrow - except it made Giles smile.

"What's the problem, darling?"

Giles sighed, "It's Christmas in a fortnight's time, and you haven't said a word about what you plan to do."

"Oh!" Matt said in surprise, "I'll be popping up to Edinburgh to see the folks for Hogmanay. I was rather hoping you would come with me."

"You're Scottish?"

Matt roared with laughter, "Och, dinnae fash yersel, laddie!"

Giles stared at him open mouthed, and then Matt's words came back to him. "Go with you?"

"Sure. Spend a nice cosy Christmas here and then go up for some genuinely pagan rituals in the frozen North. What do you say?"

Giles was silent for so long that Matt's smile died on his face. He turned away and started to get up from the sofa only for Giles to pull him back down and hug him tightly. Matt rested his chin on Giles' head and patted the other gently on the back. He felt like he was holding some wounded creature, and at the same time teetering on the edge of falling very deeply in love.

"I take it that's a 'yes'?"

***

A week or so later, Christmas was ramping up, and Matt was hard at work to try and bridge the hump of the Christmas break. This meant being able to let off steam in one way or another. As he'd not managed to persuade Giles into bed yet and the squash club was closed for the holidays, it was time for the ritual of levering a reluctant Giles out for another night on the town.

He'd come home to find Giles brooding at the tiny kitchen table. This happened on a fairly regular basis. Giles would sink into a funk, and it would take a moderately heroic effort from Matt to bring him out of it. However, he'd had a hard day and was not really in the mood to indulge. He flopped into the other chair.

"What is it now, Giles?"

Giles looked up, almost as if he'd noticed Matt's presence for the first time. His countenance was thunderous, and Matt tensed, wondering if this was a storm about to break. Giles could be unpredictable at times. Then the other man's expression softened, and he covered Matt's hand with his own, patting it gently. Matt did not know quite what to make of this, so he captured Giles' hand and placed it firmly on the table.

"I think you need a diversion."

Giles looked wary. "What do you suggest?"

"Let's go out."

Giles frowned again. "I'm not sure be I'd very good company," he said.

Matt scoffed. "Come along, old man. You can't just retreat inside your shell! Besides I've had a tough week and I need to work off some stress."

***

Ensconced in a cosy little bar they talked current affairs and politics until they were interrupted by a rich melodious voice.

"Matthew Gascoigne! What brings you south of the river? "

She pronounced the word 'south' as 'saaf' and Giles and Matt turned to see a tall slim Black woman.

Giles blinked. She belonged on the cover of a magazine. High cheekbones, almond shaped eyes, immaculate hair, and perfect white teeth.

"Sasha Tyler!" said Matt in pleased surprise. "Sasha, this is my good friend Giles Stanforth."

She smiled and extended her hand. Some impulse made him stand and bow over it in the old fashioned way. Then again, he had been to the same boarding school as his brothers.

"My, he's a keeper!" she laughed.

"I do hope so," murmured Matt, and she looked at him quizzically.

"Are you two an item then?"

He looked sideways at Giles who coloured, and mumbled, "No, not really."

Matt placed his hand confidentially on her arm. "I'm working on it."

They took their drinks and went to sit in a booth, where Matt explained, "Sasha is an executive PA, which is a bit like saying that the Space Shuttle is a passenger plane."

"Flatterer!" she hooted.

"I don't think Peter would be able to find his feet in the morning if you weren't there to guide him."

"Peter?" Giles asked.

"Chief exec at Guilders. Something that operates in the interstices, I believe - whatever they are."

"Don't you be rude about my company!" Sasha said, in mock offence.

"See! There's the Freudian slip, darling."

She flapped a hand at him and turned to Giles. "Enough of poking fun at me, what do you do, Giles?"

He sighed and she raised an eyebrow. "I am... between engagements."

"You're an actor?"

Matt laughed. "No, he's been disinherited and kicked out on his ear. I rescued him from the gutter!"

"Matt!" Giles exclaimed, outraged.

"That's better, darling. Time for some bulldog spirit! And you're rather good on the ivories."

Sasha put her hand on Giles' arm, her eyes sparkling. He shivered at her touch and her eyebrows drew down, knowingly. "Do tell!"

Giles recounted his by now well polished story of how the Bitch had pulled the rug from under him, and how he was currently reliant on Matt's goodwill.

"Oh my!" she exclaimed. "Rosemary Ogilvie? It's a wonder you're still alive."

"Everyone says that," he muttered, leaning back against the plush.

"They say she's married again." Sasha observed, sipping her martini.

"Mmm," murmured Matt, "It's a little more complicated than that," and proceeded to explain the Piper's menage a quatre. Giles realised with a bit of a shock that his new friend had not been idle.

"Do the others work, or do they all live on Rosemary's money?" Sasha asked, idly curious.

"No, the husband is an analyst at Cross with Giles' brother. His other wife-" Matt paused and smiled wryly, "the terminology gets tricky at times, is independently wealthy. However, the key linkage is that her sister-in-law is Charles' wife."

Sasha threw her head back and laughed, a wonderful rich sound and Giles felt himself come out in goosebumps.

"You were completely outmanoeuvred!"

He nodded with chagrin. "I didn't start to work it out until after Mother had already given Dearborn to my sister."

The memory of the debacle at the wedding made him flush.

Matt patted his arm consolingly. "You were asleep at the wheel, darling."

"Two ways," murmured Sasha, "gradually, then suddenly."

Giles turned to her in query.

"Ernest Hemingway. 'The Sun Also Rises.' It's how things happen."

"Not sure I understand."

"In the story, it's a man going bankrupt. He's been living beyond his means while putting on an appearance of normality. It works right up until his resources are exhausted then he abruptly loses everything."

"You'd been burning through everyone's goodwill and then one day the opportunity came to put you aside and you had no friends left," Matt observed.

"Anna," Giles said. "It all started to change when Charles brought her to Dearborn."

He stared into his drink. The fact that he would never again breathe the air of his home had started to sink in, and with it a sort of black miasma settled over him.

Matt and Sasha exchanged glances.

"I wouldn't give up hope quite yet," Matt said gently.

Giles was silent.

"Right then, let's have dinner and talk nonsense until you smile!" Matt said cheerfully.

At that Giles snorted and discovered Sasha favouring the other man with an affectionate look.

Matt was unfailingly upbeat. The two of them smiled kindly at him and his eyes pricked. He covered up by fishing for a handkerchief and blowing his nose.

***

Some while later they were propping up the bar in a cocktail lounge as Matt and Sasha swapped scandalous stories about people that Giles had never heard of. Even as he laughed, some part of him observed that his life had been very narrow.

Sasha's hand touched his thigh rather more often than could be explained by chance and a little heat started to gather in his loins.

"Let's go back to my place," Sasha proposed. "I only live round the corner."

Matt raised an eyebrow. "See, darling? A PA who lives in Belgravia!"

Inside the apartment, Giles remarked that it was very similar to his brother's place. Floor to ceiling windows and Juliet balconies. Matt had already thrown himself on a sofa and lay back with his eyes closed.

Sasha emerged from the tiny kitchen with a bottle of champagne and three glasses. When the slightest snore emerged from Matt's mouth, she looked down at him and then back at Giles.

She walked very slowly towards him with the most amazing sashay to her hips, the glasses trailing from her long fingers.

"It would be a shame to wake him," she murmured from deep inside his personal space.

Sasha smelled of spice and a dark perfume, animalistic and deeply feminine, and it made Giles faintly dizzy. Her eyes were enormous, and her lip-glossed mouth an intensely sensual set of curves. He felt his cock stir and he realised it had been semi-erect most of the evening.

She leaned forward and kissed the side of his neck and he shuddered, putting one hand on the sensational curve of her hip. Another half step forward and she started a gentle swaying motion that rubbed the swell of her mound across the increasing bulge of his erection.

Her breasts pushed into his chest, and he brought up a hand to caress the underside of one orb with the tips of his fingers. Her breathing got heavier.

"I think we need to go somewhere more private."

In the bedroom Sasha expertly opened the champagne to 'the maiden's sigh' and poured a couple of glasses.

As she turned, she casually slipped one shoulder of her dress off to expose a perfectly shaped breast.

In a daze, he walked over and bent his head to her ebony skin, running his tongue up the underside of her breast and on to the nipple, swirling it with his tongue.

"That's a skilful tongue you have," she crooned. "Does it work anywhere else?"

In answer, he sank to his knees and raised the hem of her dress to find that it was the only thing she was wearing.

He chuckled and there was a lazy sort of questioning noise from above.

"I'm glad I didn't know how underdressed you were when we were in the cocktail lounge. I'd've had blue balls by now!"

There was an answering chuckle and then her hand was on the back of his head, pressing his face to the junction of her thighs.

"Oh, fuck yeah!"

He wasn't sure which one of them had said it.

The musky smell of her arousal flooded his senses, and he slipped his tongue into her cleft. He felt her shudder. Caressing the backs of her thighs, he urged her legs wider, and she sat on the edge of the bed. Slipping two fingers into her entrance he stroked her clit with the flat of his tongue, then sucked her fleshy lips into his mouth, palpating them gently as they slipped out again. His fingers started to make wet noises as they eased in and out, Sasha's breath getting rougher as he worked at her.

Suddenly he was aware of another, and he looked up to find Matt standing beside him. He glanced at Sasha to find her studying Matt with heavy lidded eyes. Her hand reached out to rub the bulge in Matt's trousers. Giles was taken aback; he'd thought Matt exclusively gay.

"Mmm," Sasha murmured, "one in my mouth and one in my cunt. The perfect end to an evening."

She got to her feet, skinned off her dress and climbed on to the bed. Her arse was a divine curve in the dim light of the bedroom. Matt and Giles exchanged glances.

"You can have the lower end, darling, that's not really my thing, but I'll take a good blow job if it's on offer!"

Sasha giggled and reached out to free Matt's cock and take it between her lips. Giles suffered a brief and startling pang of jealousy as he watched her minister to Matt's desire.

Sasha left off fellating Matt to look at Giles. "What part of 'cock in my cunt' did you not understand?"

Giles automatically started to stutter an apology which made Sasha hoot with laughter. "Cock. Cunt. Now. " she ordered and returned to her task.

She was very wet and accommodated his shaft easily. He took hold of her hips and was suddenly struck by the thought of Matt in much the same position. God, but she was good, oscillating her hips very gently to vary the pressure on his cock and suddenly he had to concentrate very hard not to come too soon. There were wet sounds coming from both places and Matt's eyes were closed in dreamy ecstasy as Sasha's head bobbed.

"I hope you'll allow me to lick Giles' delicious cum out of you when he's done." Matt murmured and Sasha paused her efforts long enough to gasp, "I'm counting on it!"

"I'm hoping for a fuck as well," Matt said, looking Giles in the eye.

"I'll get him hard for you," she promised.

His head was spinning with the images in his eyes and his head, the liquid sounds, the sweat. Then Sasha was shuddering in the grip of her climax and Giles could hold back no longer. The veins standing out on his neck, he emptied himself into Sasha who groaned even as she tried to maintain the rhythm for Matt.

His cock slipped out of Sasha and Giles recovered himself enough to think that Matt might need some encouragement. He walked round the bed, letting his hips sway, his cock still semi-hard and shiny with their combined juices. Matt's eyes were drawn to Giles' crotch, and he panted, one hand on the back of Sasha's head.

Standing close, Giles picked up some white liquid on the tip of his finger and offered it to his partner. Matt took it into his mouth with a moan and then Giles took his head in his hands and kissed him hard, tongue spearing into the other man's mouth. It proved too much for Matt, gasping into Giles' mouth.

Sasha swallowed his offering and then rolled on to her back and looked up at him.

"I need some cleaning up done. You promised. Leave Giles to me."

Matt tore himself from Giles' embrace to kneel between her legs and obscene noises came from the junction of her thighs. Giles groaned as Sasha gently fondled his balls with the tips of her fingernails. Her tongue darted out to run round his crown and he started to stiffen immediately.

Matt's was almost delirious with sensation as he sent his tongue into the slick folds searching for the thick white liquid. The anticipation of Giles' newly restored erection tightened his chest and suddenly he couldn't wait any longer. He rose and came to stand next to Giles, panting with need.

Sasha rose to kneel on the bed next to them. "Mm, some boy-on-boy action," she purred. "I'll get the lube."

Moments later she stood next to them slathering the slippery stuff on to their nether regions. Then she retreated to a chair to tease herself with a ribbed glass dildo.

Giles pushed Matt on to his back. The other man hooked his arms behind his knees and pulled his legs up and wide to expose himself to his partner. Giles leaned forward and Matt directed his cock to where he needed it. Sasha let out a lust-filled groan at the sight of Giles' shaft penetrating Matt's sphincter.

It being his second of the night, Giles had much greater staying power this time and shortly Matt was throwing his head from side to side, hair stuck to his forehead with sweat, babbling, "Fuck, fuck, fuck, oh God, fuck me Giles, fuck me!"

Giles obliged and when, with a shriek, Matt came, semen flying in great silvery arcs, he did not let up. Sasha watched with wide eyes as Giles brought Matt to another shuddering, arching orgasm after which he went quite limp.

"You are one sexual tyrannosaur, Mister! Is he dead?"

Giles snorted, "Just fainted, I think. Good job this is your flat."

Sasha let out a giggle then uncurled herself from the chair. "I'm going to shower. Why don't you fix us some coffee?"

By the time he came back from the kitchen, Matt had his arm over his face.

"Coffee?"

"As long as there's brandy in it," Matt murmured. "Actually, forget the coffee."

Sasha emerged from the bathroom wrapped in a bathrobe with a towel on her head. She leaned against the door jamb and sipped her coffee.

"That was a most memorable evening, gentlemen. Let me know if you ever want a repeat performance."

"I don't think I'd survive," said Matt, arm still over his face. It was not the last time they convened to explore what two men and one woman could achieve. However, Matt's heart rang with satisfaction. However obliquely, he'd got Giles into bed at last.

***

When Matt and Giles returned to Matt's apartment, things were different. Their relationship had eased into a comfortable new phase. They'd share a walk in the park, or a meal out, or a cosy night in, or any of the myriad things that a couple might do. And from time to time they'd share a bed.

Nothing was said out loud of course, men don't do that as a rule, but Giles could feel himself dipping his toe in the waters of emotional intimacy. For his part, Matt dared to hope that he might possibly have found a proud arrogant handsome difficult charismatic talented closed magnificent son of a bitch to share a life with.

***

... nearly January

The plane curled in over the coast. Giles looked down at the Scottish capital as the plane manoeuvred for its final approach. He turned to Matt, who had his head in some legal argument.

"You're not going to paint yourself with woad, are you?"

Matt looked sideways at him. "Only if you beg." Then he considered Giles properly.

"Nervous?"

"Isn't everyone?"

Matt narrowed his eyes. "It's meeting my parents, isn't it?"

Giles wiped the palms of his hands on his trousers and admitted, "A little."

Matt had told him that his parents were quite comfortable with his sexuality, but Giles was mostly concerned with them finding out his chequered past.

***

Roger and Ellen Gascoigne were not at all what Giles was expecting. Roger Gascoigne was a tall, kindly looking man with horn-rimmed spectacles and mild blue eyes. His wife was a, dare he say it, statuesque and very well preserved blonde with cool grey eyes. Giles looked from them to Matt and back again. Try as he might, he couldn't see any family resemblance. Matt's father twinkled at him and advanced his hand.