It's Not Too Late

*** A continuation of the Jesse and Will storyline. Jesse struggles to cope with breaking up with Lucy after seeing her in his regular club with one of Will's friends. ***

Other stories with these characters include:

Lad With the Cock in his Mouth [Jesse discovers a taste for cock]

Jesse, it was Really Nothing [Jesse punishes his girlfriend for sleeping with his best mate]

Jesse's Charming Plan [Jesse decides to punish Will for seducing his girlfriend]

I might Share You [Will starts to push Jesse's boundaries]

Six Dead Poets [Will shares Jesse with the members of Oscar's club]

All That's Dark and Bright [Byron tries to seduce Jesse]

For the full experience, put on 'Lover, you should have come over' by Jeff Buckley.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Will pushed me into the lane next to the club and shoved me against grey-painted brick.

"Get it together!"

"Get off me, you prick!" I tried to shove him back, but he pinned me against the wall, his face a snarl.

"Right now, Luce is in the toilets, crying her fucking eyes out. Do you care?"

"Do I care?" I said, enraged. "Do I fucking care? How can you stand in front of me and ask that? I love her, Will!"

I stared at him, full of rage, and couldn't stay still, my fingers spasming against my leg, constantly moving. My gaze flickered past him to the busy street at the end of the lane, my head full of static.

"You need to calm the fuck down," said Will. The hand that hung at his side was curled into a fist, his arm tense. I knew he wanted to punch me, was holding himself back. I knew how hard he could punch. I did my best not to push him.

My eyes came back to his face. "I'm calm. But I need to get the fuck out of here."

I tried to get past him, but he pushed me back against the wall with both hands.

"Stay there."

I couldn't. I had to get out of there. Before I did something stupid and forced him to hurt me.

"Will, just get off me, would you?"

I struggled to get past him again and he shook his head. "Not while you're like this. You'reso fucking lucky—" he broke off.

"What? Lucky you're not kicking the shit out of me right now?"

The rage was rising again.

"I should," said Will. His pale blue eyes were cold. "You put your hands on her or anyone else again and I'll fucking kill you."

No, no, I didn't want to think about what I'd done, didn't want to be here.

I tried again to throw him off, and he grabbed my shirt with both hands, wrestling me against the wall with his full force, pinning me there with his weight.

His short sandy hair was tinted pink by lights from across the street, his pale eyes dangerous.

"No, Jesse, you don't get to walk away after that. You stay here and you sober up, and then you can fucking apologise."

"Get fucked!" I'd had enough of Will deciding shit for me.

I shoved him back with all my strength, but he grabbed a fistful of my shirt and threw me back against the wall, his fist raised.

"Come on!" I shouted. "Come on!

I wanted to get it over with. Maybe the white noise in my ears would stop if he hit me. Maybe the speed would let me drop. Maybe I'd stop feeling like such a giant cunt.

Will swung to punch me, but at the last second slapped his hand flat against the wall beside my head.

"You walk away from this, and you never come near me again. Ever. Do you understand me? You lose my fucking number."

Breathing hard, I eyed him for a long time. I knew he meant it. Will never made an idle threat, never made a promise he didn't plan on keeping. And he knew what his threat meant to me. I'd already lost Luce. He was all I had left.

"What's it going to be?" he asked.

Lucy appeared at the end of the alleyway. "Will? Is he—?" There was a sob in her voice.

"He's sorry," said Will, "Is what he is."

"And what about you, Will?" Lucy said, as she stepped into the lane. "Are you sorry?

Will stepped away from me as she drew closer, and put his hands in his pockets.

Lucy stood in front of me and her eyes dropped to my fingers, twitching, twitching. She brought her gaze back to my face. "I'm sorry, I didn't know you'd be here tonight."

I knew I was close to crying and hoped like hell I wasn't going to do it in front of her, knew it was in my eyes.

She gave Will an angry look and he walked off a short distance and lit a cigarette.

She hugged me and I instinctively put my arms around her, soaking up her heat. She looked up at me, her makeup run, her bright red curls falling loose from their fastening at the back of her head, her blue eyes ringed with darkness, her eyelashes jewelled with tears.

I'd done that.

"I wanted to tell you, I wanted to tell you but it was too late by the time I realised what he was doing."

Over her shoulder, Will smoked and watched us, his face set in concrete.

"Can you see what he's done?" She was sobbing herself now, her voice hitching. "He wants you all for himself."

I pushed her back gently. "He didn't make you fall in love with someone else. He didn't make you bring that personhere, to the club where you know I go every fucking weekend."

She sobbed, wiped the tears from her mouth. "He took his time and stole you away piece by piece. While he had you doing God knows what, he sent his friends to wherever I was to 'make sure I was okay'. Had them invite me out. If I turned them down, he sent someone else."

I glanced past her at Will. The look he was giving Luce was chilling.

"I didn't know where you were." Her voice hitched again. "I knew you'd be fuckingsomeone, and whoever they were, there weren't me. And I felt... so hurt, Jesse. You broke my heart."

"I told you I'd stop!" I said. "I told you to tell me what you wanted!"

She shook her head, tears trickling down her face. "It's not about what I want, Jesse. It's about what you want. And that's not me. It's not me."

I shook my head at her. "So you what, you fucked his mates? Whenever he took me somewhere else? And then you just happened to fall in love with Lyle?"

She dropped her head, her eyes squeezed shut. "He's straight, Jess. He just wantsme."

"No one can be happy with just one—"

"No!" Her eyes flew open, blue and enraged. "That's what he wants you to believe! That one person's never enough! Where will that leave you? Look at yourself, Jesse, you can't deal with jealousy. You can'tshare. It's not who you are. And... there can't be one rule for you, and one rule for everyone else."

She clutched her arms across her chest and broke into giant sobs.

"I loved you—so much," she said, and turned her back, bending over the pain inside her.

I put a hand against her back. "So tell Lyle to fuck off. Come home with me."

She turned back to me.

"He loves me, Jesse. Just me. So, no. You do what you need to do. Go find yourself. But be careful of him," she pointed to Will. "Because he's fucking poisonous."

She turned and walked towards the end of the lane, her head down, stumbling over a loose stone in her heels, lost in misery.

Will flicked his cigarette away and walked back to me, his hands up, palms facing me so he could block if I tried to hit him.

"It's not like that."

"Isn't it?" I cocked my head. "How about you go fuck yourself?"

I pushed past him and headed for the end of the lane.

He tried to drag me back and I spun into him and landed a punch to his stomach. He must have been expecting it, he barely winced.

I backed away and he came after me, his lip twisted in a snarl, and slammed me against the wall.

His voice was a growl. "I warned you once before, you don't get fucking physical with me."

"How about you don't fucking ruin my life?"

He shoved me away from him. "Go on. Fuck off then. If I'm the worst thing that's ever happened to you."

I gave him filth and carried on towards the end of the lane.

"And next time you need someone to hold your hand because you can'tdeal with who you are, don't fucking call me!" he called after me. "Lose my fucking number, you ungrateful prick!"

I kept walking.

It took me three hours to work my anger into exhaustion.

The house lay in silence as I pulled myself up the steps to the front door of the flat Luce and I had shared together for nearly a year.

My boots thudded on the stairs as I went straight up to the second floor.

I walked to the door of Luce's room and listened. Knocked softly. Nothing. I pushed the door open. Didn't know what I expected to find.

Her bed was stripped of linen, her things in boxes. Nothing had changed. She hadn't miraculously decided to come back.

I pulled the door shut and put my back to it, resting there with my eyes closed. Took a deep breath in. Let it out again slowly. Made a face and sniffed my armpit. I reeked.

I headed down to the bathroom, hoping a shower would wash away my self loathing. It didn't. I came out just as soiled as when I'd gotten into it. All the shit was inside my soul. There was no way to wash that away.

I towel-dried my hair and went back to my room and switched on the lamp.

Normally, because my hair was long enough to brush my shoulders, I'd do something to make sure it didn't turn into a bird's nest. Tonight, I didn't give a fuck if it went Saiyan.

I pulled on pyjama pants and a t-shirt as defence against the cold, and sat on the side of the bed, staring down at the worn carpet, the noise in my head only just starting to lift from white fog into any kind of coherent thought.

What have I done?

My mind slid away from a snapshot of Luce, her mouth locked to Lyle's, slow dancing against him in the club.

My hand caught in her bright, bright hair, forcing her to face me, her hands held to mine as I gripped her, her eyes wide with pain, and fear. Fear of me. My rage. So much rage.

"Jesse, what the fuck? I'm not with you anymore!"

The bouncer pulling me towards the door. Will, coming out of the toilets, seeing Luce's tear-stained face, seeing me being manhandled, thinking I was in trouble, not that Iwas the trouble. His face when the bouncer told him I'd grabbed Luce by her hair and shouted into her face.

Fuck. I wrapped my arms across my chest, all the guilt and anger festering inside me. I could feel it like tar coating my lungs, wrapped around my heart. Turning my blood to sludge.

Her things, piled in boxes. Her mattress bare, waiting for her to come and take it all away. All her warmth. All of it gone.

He loves me, Jesse. Just me

I bent over, my nails digging into my palms, pain gripping my gut. I wanted to throw up.

I loved you so much.

I hadn't expected to see her, not tonight. But there she was, in the club wealways went to, withhim. The prick she'd replaced me with, who was nothing like me. Will's mate, an asshole in a suit, older than us, not another student. Looked like a total merchant banker, and yeah, that was fucking rhyming slang.

I'd pulled her off him, felt the urge to do more than just drag her around to face me. Wanted to hurt her. To hurt her the way she'd hurt me. And the second I saw her fear, wanted to hurt myself. God, what kind of asshole was I?

And with a head full of E that I now knew was full of speed, I couldn't say sorry; couldn't apologise while that cunt of a boyfriend of hers was standing there.

It didn't matter that I'd always known this day would come. It was too soon. I wasn't done loving her. Didn't know what you did when the heat burned out inside you and left dust.

My phone lit up and I saw it was nearly 3 a.m. It was some app alert. Not a text. Not Facebook chat. Not WhatsApp. A fucking software update.

Go fuck yourself Samsung.

I got into bed and left the lamp on, staring up at the ceiling. Felt another punch of agony in my gut as I remembered Luce's terrified eyes.

What the fuck have I done?

I couldn't leave it like this. I had to talk to her, had to fix it, had to make this gut-punched feeling go away.

I picked up my phone and sent her a text.

'Can we talk. Is it too late?'

I stared at my phone, hoping, stupidly hoping, she'd still be awake. Wherever she was.

She's in his bed, Jesse, you stupid fuck.

I could just imagine him holding her, whispering,'You've had a narrow escape. Will told me he's got emotional problems.'

I squeezed my eyes shut and slammed the phone into the bed.

My phone assumed that meant I wanted it to update, and started its work. I gave it the finger and rolled away.

Exhaustion pulled at me, but I knew I couldn't make it through to dawn like this. I wanted one of them to call me.Jesse, are you okay?Hey mate, you alright? Sorry I fucked up your life.

... and remembered Will's voice following me across the road."Lose my fucking number, you ungrateful prick!"

My head throbbed, my skull filled with weight. So tired, but sleep wasn't happening.

I held up my phone. Freshly updated to whatever piss-useless battery-draining version of Android Google had decided to inflict on me.

No messages.

I left the phone on the bed and walked through the house to the bathroom. There was something about this bathroom at night. The moonlight came in through the frosted window and painted everything like some surreal masterpiece, as if the house was stuck in another time. Well, it did when I was drug-fucked.

I caught sight of my face in the bathroom mirror. My eyes were still blacked out, everything soft focus.

My face was lit blue on one side by the light from the window, dropped in shadow on the other. I held a hand out towards the mirror and for a moment I felt reality hitch, as if my fingers might pass through the surface and connect with the stranger I saw in the mirror, with his black eyes and his messed hair, and skin pale enough that he could be a ghost.

Am I still here?

Touch it. Find out.

I held my fingers above the surface of the mirror. Afraid, if I moved my hand any further and the glass wasn't there, then... maybe it was already too late.

I couldn't do it. I brought my fingers back towards my face and touched my own skin. Cool, but not cold. Not dead then yet.

I braved the mirror, forcing myself to face this bizarre, irrational fear, reaching towards it, spreading my fingers wide until the tendons were taut. Half expecting my fingertips to pass through and keep going.

They bumped against the hard surface.

I pressed my fingers to the glass, leaving smudges there, and smiled darkly at my reflection.

Still here.

But why?

I looked around the bathroom. The means was here. The means was everywhere.

I picked up someone's discarded safety razor and held it up at eye level. Tiny pock marks in the metal, dark stubble caught there. A blade you could snap out.

Will's voice floating across the road behind me over the dull thud of club music and the noise of the street.

Next time you need someone to hold your hand because you can't deal with who you are, don't fucking call me!

I dropped the razor into the sink and closed my eyes.

The weariness dragged at me and I walked back to the bedroom, my body filled with lead, and sat on the edge of the bed again.

Picked up my phone again. No messages. Battery level dropping almost five percent for every time I lit up the screen.

I got back into bed and brought up Will's contact. Tapped on his photo to show the whole thing, not just the cropped image of his face. The only photo I had of just the two of us, Will's arm slung around my shoulder, a cigarette hanging from his mouth. I looked fucked.

That's because you're always fucked.

I closed the picture and stared at Will's last text to me.

'It'll be fine, mate, let's have a good night out. I'll keep you company.'

I brought up Lucy's contact. Her hand shielding her eyes on a sunny day, taken at some festival. Will had been there too, somewhere.

I went back to Will's contact.

Had he really engineered mine and Luce's breakup? He hadn't forced me to fuck him. Or anyone else.

Had he really sent his friends to hit on her? Had he really done that?

Could I really just let things end the way they had?

I knew I should leave it. But that gut-punched feeling inside me was too much. I had to make it stop.

My fingers hovered over the screen. I typed a message. Read it back. Read it again. Steeled myself to press 'send'.

'Are we done?'

Sent it.

I had no way of knowing when and if he'd see it. It had to be a text. I knew all his other alerts were set to silent. Texting was for emergencies and data blackouts only.

I dropped the phone beside me and switched off the lamp, lying in the darkness, counting to a hundred, then starting again. Just for something to do.

Time passed. My body stayed heavy, but awake. I picked up my phone and checked the time. 4.49 a.m. No messages.

I rolled onto my side and remembered Luce's warm, scented body in my arms. Her hair always tickling my nose, impossible to escape. The numbness of my arm under her as she slept against me, the softness of her breast in my hand.

Rain, falling outside now. Spatters of it landing on the windowsill, the window open by the bed letting in a current of damp air.

Her mouth on my mouth, her mouth onhis mouth, in the club, my hand in her hair, hurting her, hurting...

The pain ripped through my gut again and I bent around it.

She was with him now. Maybe she was fucking him, her back arched, her head thrown back. Maybe she was just sleeping in his arms, all of her warmth inhis arms.

And Lyle, her new guy, a guy who loved herso much, he'd taken one look at my face and let a bouncer do his job. Gutless prick.

I glanced across at my phone.

No blue light. No messages.

5.13 a.m.

My phone was now at 9%. I didn't have the will to plug it into a charger.

I closed my eyes and drifted to the song that wouldn't stop playing in my head, over and over, until I felt it boring into my brain.

Where are you tonight? You know how much I need you.

There was a tread on the steps, then a sound at his bedroom door as Will pushed it open and stood there.

I sat up in bed as he nudged the bedroom door shut with his foot, and his eyes dropped to the t-shirt I'd worn to bed.

"That mine?"

I swung my legs out of bed and stood.

"Here, have it back." I started to pull it over my head, but Will shook his head, his lip curled in disgust and pulled it back down.

He folded his arms. "You ready to listen to me now?"

I dropped back to sit on the bed. "Was what Luce said true?"

"Do you think it is?"

"That's not fair."

"What's fair, Jess? Are you gay or are you straight? You really think you're bi? Do you love Lucy or do you love me? You risked your relationship with Luce to fuck me. Was that just because you love cock? We both know you loved cock enough to cheat on Lucy without a second thought."

"You took me to that club!"

"Yes, and I shoved all those cocks in your mouth too, didn't I?"

It wasn't fair.

He sighed. "All I've done is show you and Lucy what you were too gutless to admit to each other. You aren't right for each other. She wants a man who's got a career plan, not some gothed-up, androgynous gyppo."

I got to my feet. "Fuck you! You know, when she was bouncing on my cock, she seemed happy enough."

"Yeah," said Will. "Happy to fuck you. Women will always be happy to fuck you. But you'll never be man enough for them."

"Or for you, apparently," I said bitterly.

He stepped up to me and rested his fingers against my neck. I closed my eyes and soaked up his heat, needing that touch right now.