Dirty Seduction

Peter was still struggling, though, even through the hand holding. He still felt the wrath of people when they ventured out, hating how they were judging her as well as him.

“He still feels it?” I asked.

“Yeah, badly. It’s ok, but I’m hoping it eases up.” She grinned. “I’d love to be hitting the town for meals out, I’d be happy and wouldn’t give a shit. But he’s weird about it. I think he still believes he’s in the wrong.”

That sounded familiar. Being in the wrong.

I wanted me and Julian out of that kind of situation. I wanted to be holding hands in public with him, and out in the city, out with him everywhere.

One day, I hoped that we would be. One day soon.

We were still chatting when lunch came to an end, realising with a jolt that we had to shoot off for our next lessons. Lola had further to go than I did, over to the art block. She virtually dashed out of there with a byeee, her satchel bouncing against her ass as she ran.Contentt bel0ngs to N0ve/lDrâ/ma.O(r)g!

Meeting her was amazing, but it made the contrast with the other assholes out to jeer at me much more pronounced.

I managed to stumble my way through my next lessons in some kind of order, leaving college as quickly as I could, but the guys from block seven were outside the 24-hour garage, smoking and drinking on the bench. I crossed the street, but it didn’t make any difference. They let out a wolf whistle and yelled over as passers-by looked on.

“Didn’t think you were such a cheap little hooker,” Marlow yelled. “Come over here. We’ll give you a better fuck than that old man.”

“Come on!” Dane shouted as I carried on walking. “We’ll make you way more of a slut than he will.”

“Wouldn’t want to be seen out with Grandpa, would you?” Marlow laughed. “Best keep him hidden in the seedy den, eh?”

I’d never stood up to the idiots before, not once, but my levels of rage had taken enough. My legs were trembling but they carried me, fuelled. I crossed the street and walked up to them.

“I’m not embarrassed about being with Julian. You’re the fucking embarrassments. Like anyone will ever give a shit about you. You’re nothing but losers.”

They weren’t expecting it from me. Hardly anyone ever stood up to them, and I felt a weird sense of strength as I saw their discomfort, which said it all. The fear and rumours around them were likely just as bullshit as everything else around here. Maybe they were just little pricks with an inferiority complex and nowhere else to go. Sad.

They scoffed some more, shouting obscenities as I left them behind, but I didn’t care. None of it mattered. All that mattered was my newfound backbone and the man I loved waiting upstairs for me.

He was straight over to the door as soon as I stepped inside, green eyes searching mine for my reaction.

“Are you ok, sweetheart? Did it go ok?”

I nodded, with a surprising smile. “Yeah, it did.”

“I’m putting dinner on,” he told me. “We have fillet steak.”

I took hold of his arm before he turned away, fuelled even more by the urge to rebel against the world outside.

“That’s great, thank you,” I said. “I’m spoiled. But how about we go out first? Even just for a walk?”

His eyebrows pitted. “You want to go out?”

“I want to go out with you. I want to show the world they can fuck off, because I don’t care what they think. They can jeer and spit and ring bells calling us sinners for all I care, and you know what? I’ll be smiling.”

“I’m not so sure about that” he began, but I was. I was deadly sure. I was remembering the strength in Lola. She was proud, determined to stand with Peter through his shame.

“Will you come out with me, hand in hand?” I asked him. “Yes or no?”

He didn’t even pause.

“Well yes, of course I will, if that’s what you want.”

“Do you want to? Do you want to come out with me?”

His smile was beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. He tipped my face up to his and pressed his lips to mine with pure adoration. I could feel it.

“I’d love nothing more than to be at your side. Just so long as you’re ready.”

“You won’t be ashamed to be seen with me?”

He laughed. “There is nothing shameful about you, sweetheart. The wrongdoing is all on me.”

“And I don’t give a single fuck about that. All I care about is being with you, everyone else can get stuffed.”

“And what about your mum? How will you feel about her seeing us together? That could be painful for her, you know?”

I could only imagine how shit Julian had found it to have his whole family cast him aside. The idea of seeing the hurt and disappointment in Mum was enough to make my heart ache, but not enough to back down. The world would have to accept me being with Julian, including Mum and big-mouth Trish, since I wasn’t ever going to let him go.

“I’ll cope,” I told him with a smile.

“You’re sure?”

“Very sure.”

I was so relieved when he took his coat down from the hook.

“Let’s do it, then. Let’s face the wall of hate head on.”

His hand was so strong in mine as we set off. Despite the nerves, and the fears, and the shadow of knowing that at some point Mum would see us, I was smiling.

I didn’t feel sick, I felt strong and proud. I wanted the world to know I was on Julian’s arm for real, as a partner, not just a casual fuck. There was something else in me, too. A slight hope of something else under the surface. The hope that he too would find some pride in being beside me. Of showing the world that he wasn’t just a guy who used girls in private for filthy games, because that wasn’t who he was, no matter what he might think of himself. He may have been thrown out by his family because they couldn’t live with his sex life, but this was different to that. I was different. Or I hoped so.

Cliched but true.

If only the rest of Worcester would see it that way…

I got a lurch of oh fuck as the garage came into view, with the idiots still sitting outside. I was ready to give them another round of retaliation and tell them to fuck off again, but I didn’t need to. Julian was already prepared. He gripped my hand tighter as he saw them looking in our direction, and his shoulders were tall and proud. He was giving them one hell of a stare through every step, and I saw the cold, hard strength in his eyes. It gave me a crazy whirl of flutters in my stomach as I stared up at him and not at them, and I got a taste of how he must have looked at Scottie when he ordered him to leave.

I wanted to turn around on the spot and head straight back to the apartment again, desperate for another round of his strength in the bedroom. He was absolutely fucking gorgeous, with the hint of steel that I’d seen in the old photos of him online. Next to his wife.

But now he was next to me…

I felt so free as we passed the guys on the bench with no stupid bullshit from them that I got a rush of confidence of my own. I turned my head back to them when we had walked on by and gave them a smirk of fuck you.

Julian must have read me, though. We were around the corner when he leant down close and whispered in my ear.

“Don’t judge it too early. I don’t want to piss on our lovely parade, but they are just a bunch of loud-mouthed idiots who have no backbone when it comes to it. There will be plenty of more dramatic challenges ahead, I’m sure.”

He wasn’t joking on that score, because typically, as they usually do, a synchronicity rose up to give me the middle finger for being so blase. Trisha was walking towards us on the same side of the street with Ramsay in his pushchair, and there was Martha beside her. I saw them before they saw us, and every scrap of my confidence seemed to fizzle up in a flash.

They practically stopped in their tracks as their eyes locked on ours, and Trisha’s mouth dropped open. I stopped too, but Julian kept on walking, coaxing me along with a gentle tug. He wasn’t afraid.

It felt like a game of chicken, both pairs of us getting closer. Trisha’s face was like thunder and Martha looked like she hated the sight of us, and it gave me trembles at the thought that one day this would be my mum facing up to us, not them.

Julian squeezed my hand again for support, holding tight, and I made sure my feet kept moving alongside him. Who was going to make way for each other? Us or them? Closer… closer…

Trisha’s face was beetroot red, her eyes were full of hate, all for him. Martha looked at him like he was some kind of criminal to be wary of, and that was kind of worse, seeing her afraid of him for no reason at all.

Still, we moved closer.

Still, we all stayed on the same side.

And there was nothing for it, we’d reach each other, face on, up close, and I wasn’t sure I could face it. I wasn’t sure I could do it. I wasn’t sure I could be so brave and face them off this quickly… maybe I’d been stupid. Maybe I’d been totally naive. Maybe taking inspiration from Lola was way too much, way too soon.

As it turns out, I didn’t have to. We won the game of chicken.

Trisha angled the pushchair across the road, getting ready to cross the street with Martha at her side. Wow. They’d be the ones to clear out of our way, not the other way around. But Julian’s strides were too fast and too strong. There was too much traffic for Trisha to cross the road in time.

It was him who spoke, not them. My saviour was the one to close the gap in communication, tipping his head at them with a gentlemanly smile.

“Good afternoon, ladies,” he said, and I gave a hi like a stupid little kid at the side of him.

That was too much for Trisha. We’d passed her by when I heard her trumpet voice shout out, but it was loud enough for the whole damn estate to hear.

“Fuck off! Rosie’s just a sweet little kid, you filthy cunt! You should be locked up and shot dead for this!”

Julian didn’t stop walking, and he didn’t look back. He kept my hand gripped tight, and his head held high, as though her words meant nothing.

Just a shame I knew it was an illusion. I saw just the slightest hint of pain in his eyes, and I knew the truth.

Under the surface, he believed every single word they said.