Date: Wed, 21 Sep 2005 22:16:51 +0100
From: Mike Arram <marram@wanadoo.co.uk>
Subject: Heart of Oskar Prinz - 16

The following story describes people and places wholly fictional, although
based on some element of reality.  How much is really up to you to decide.
There is a place called Ruthenia, but it is not the Rothenia depicted here.
It won't take long for the alert reader to realise that my Rothenia is
unapologetically borrowed from Anthony Hope's magnificent creation of
Ruritania, although updated for the twenty-first century.
  This is my third attempt at gay erotic fiction.  The earlier ones are
'The Decent Inn' and 'Terry and the Peachers' which can be found in the
Nifty archive under the College section.  Excuse the self-indulgence of the
crossover references, but they did amuse me.
  The story contains graphic depictions of sex between adult males.  If the
reading or possessing of such material as this is illegal in your place of
residence please leave this site immediately and do not proceed further.
If you are under the legal age to read this, please do not do so.





XVI


Terry O'Brien pulled Will into a taxi.  The boy looked fixedly ahead as he
was driven to Terry's hotel, and Terry booked him in.  He joined him later
with a bottle of whisky.
  'It's as well I was following you, my babe, wasn't it?  Give me the
story, I need to know it all, and fast.'
 Will looked dazed at him, then looked down at the glass in his hand.  He
gulped it down and coughed.  He told what he knew, slowly and deliberately,
watching the look of compassion growing on Terry's face.  His head was
pounding, and his eyesight was blurred; the flashing lights of an imminent
major migraine began blocking his vision; he had already lost sensation on
his left side and his speech was beginning to slur before he finished.
  When he had finished, Will sat blankly.  Terry stood up and paced the
room.  It was pointless asking Will what he wanted to do now.  Will was in
deep shock and looked very ill.  He wrapped a blanket round the boy and
poured him another drink.  Will drank it mechanically.  Eventually, as
Terry expected, he slumped into unconsciousness, adrenalin shock and
extreme stress had overwhelmed him.  Terry left him and sat till very late
in his own room, making phone calls and tapping his teeth, as he did
whenever he was thinking deeply.
  Will woke curled on top of his bed in the early morning, where Terry had
put him when he returned to check on him.  His head was beyond splitting,
it had split; it felt like the mother of all migraines.  But it couldn't
be: last night's should have cleared by now.  He lay in great pain.  Terry
came in just as he vomited catastrophically over the side of the bed.  He
took one look at him, checked his pulse and got an ambulance.  Will was
unconscious when the paramedics arrived.
  Will came round late that night, to see Terry still there.  He was hooked
up to a drip and a monitor.
  'What happened?' he croaked.
  'Massive allergic reaction, babe.  Something to do with serious steroid
abuse combined with an unregulated adrenalin gland.  You might have died if
you'd been on your own, but the good people here stabilised you.  Thank God
you had an E111 with you, or I would have had to have paid.'
  'The bastards at Falkefilm nearly got me then.'
  'I don't think they were trying to kill you, but that's what they nearly
did.  Not the best of employers are they?'
  'Oskar?'
  'Gone.  No sign of him or his little dog.  I opened his apartment and got
your stuff.  A very co-operative concierge, happy to do anything you like
for a thousand krona.  Sort of reasonable human being I can deal with.
Then I had a chat with a friend of mine in Peacher Corp Rothenia.  He had a
friend high in the Strelzen Police, and we all called on your friend Rudi,
who is now cooling his heels in a very clean Rothenian prison cell until
Hendrik's lawyers can get him out.  The Rothenian authorities don't like
illegal drugs.
  I went to see the good Mr Wilemmin, your employer, this afternoon.  An
impressive sort of man, and very reasonable too in his way.  To tell the
truth, I rather liked him, the way you might like a handsome tiger, but
wouldn't want to get in the same cage as he was.  The thing about Wilemmin
is that, like any tiger, he has a good nose, and can smell wealth and
power.  He smelled it on me.  It helped.  He wouldn't give up the tapes he
had, although a friend of mine was willing to make it worth his while.'
  'Has Matt that much money?'
  'Matt has quite a lot, but nowhere near as much as this man.'
  'Andy Peacher would have helped me?'
  'He's a very special man, sweet babe.  Awesome really.  He cleared me for
up to half a million dollars.  Anyway, Wilemmin got all arty on me and said
the tapes were sensational, and he'd be a fool not to produce the DVD.  So
I'm afraid you - or rather Jason Williams - are going to be famous.  I've
already booked my copy.'
  'You may not be disappointed.'
  Terry laughed.  'What I did do was get your cash from him, with a huge
extra bonus, and his regrets that you won't be working with him again.  The
bonus was because I had the biggest and scariest local law firm serve
papers on him this morning to sue his arse for what they did to you.  They
had fun with his contract.  In fact it was more like a damage settlement
than a bonus really.  I don't suppose you'll grudge the big cut the lawyers
took out of it.
  Anyway, when we'd got over that social obstacle, Hendrik was an
interesting man to talk to; turned out we had some common acquaintances.
He said you are one of the greatest natural talents he has ever
encountered.  I think he meant it.'
  'Can you get the money to Oskar?'  Terry looked surprised, 'Serious?'
  'Yes serious, that and the money Matt gave me.  It must all get to Oskar,
it's important.'
  'After what he did to you?  Will, you're nuts.  Oh well, thank God you
called me when you did.  I could smell disaster all over this affair, and I
was not wrong.  I shall make a point of delivering it to his Serene
Highness, and I may even restrain myself from beating the crap out of him
when I do it.'
  'Don't mock him, Terry.  He was doing what he thought was right, for his
family's future, if not for mine.  He kept on warning me all along about
the way it was, I just didn't listen to him.  I was high on Strelzen and
romance.  But this place is not safe for the likes of me.  This is a place
of noble ambition and passion, unrestrained lust and sudden violence.  I
belong to Berkshire and a cup of tea with the ten o'clock news before an
early night.'
  Terry gave a long, low laugh, 'Sweet babe, you are one of the best boys.
If it wasn't for Ramon, I don't know what I would do.  We fly out tomorrow
afternoon, anyway.  I've borrowed a plane and it's waiting at the airport.'
  'Wow.'

Will was dressed and sitting on his hospital bed when Terry came for him
the next afternoon.  Terry looked at him, smiled and kissed him
lingeringly.  'I found the boy where you said he was, at Terlenehem.  He
did not seem surprised to see me, and I gave him what you told me to.  He
accepted it, and thanked you.'
  'Did he say anything else.'
  'Not much beyond formalities, he stood throughout the meeting, as did his
sister, a serious sort of babe ain't she?'
  'But nice.'
  'She told me to tell you something in Rothenian, but I couldn't remember
it, and didn't like to write it down.  I think it was meant kindly and she
said that it involved a kiss on the forehead.'
  'Then I know what it was.'
  'Come on then me babe, it's time to leave the Land of Fairy Tale, if you
get my rather complicated meaning.  I'll take your bags.'
  Will looked out of the windows as the familiar streets of Strelzen
retreated past him, and the cathedral towers disappeared behind the car.
So many memories, so much joy and so much pain.  His eyes filled with
tears, and they streamed down both cheeks.  Terry left him alone; the
insensitivity was only an act, as Will knew well.  At the airport, aircrew
in Peacher uniforms were already waiting to take their bags into a large
Peacher Corp jet.  Will was ushered through immigration like a VIP.  The
sleek new plane launched itself effortlessly into the air, and he played
cards with Terry all the way to Heathrow, although his concentration was
poor.  A car was waiting and he was dropped outside a house in Highgate
that he was ashamed to say that he recognised.  Matt White was waiting on
the doorstep, and took his bags.  They said farewell to Terry, who kissed
Will tenderly, like the good man he was, and headed back to the airport to
pick up the Peacher jet again en route for Washington.
  'Well, young William Vincent, what a summer eh?' said that beautiful man,
and took him in his strong arms in the hall.  Will sobbed unashamedly on
his shoulder for a good twenty minutes, as Matt rocked him gently.

Will stayed with Matt in his handsome house on Highgate Hill for all of two
weeks, the butt end of his summer.  It seemed accepted and arranged that he
would do it, although he couldn't remember how and when.  So he occupied
one of the guest bedrooms, put his feet up in the designer lounges and
walked the well-tended walled garden on warm afternoons.
  Matt's generosity was surprising.  He gave up most of his time to Will,
and Will was very grateful, although puzzled.  He knew Matt must have
better things to do.  After two days he made some noises about getting back
to Whithampsted.
  'Do you want to?'  Matt asked.  'Wouldn't you rather be out of things for
a while, lost and anonymous in London?'
  'Well, yeah Matt, but y'know it's very generous of you and I don't want
to distract you from more important things in your life.'
  'Who says you're not the most important thing for me at the moment?'
  'That's flattering, but why?  We've only known each other a month or so
... leaving out the years of fantasising I did over your face and body.'
  Matt smiled the smile, and Will nearly fainted again.  'Will,' he said.
'Let me tell you something about myself.  It's this.  I'm a sad,
obsessional bastard.'
  '... er, I think those words apply to me, really.'
  'Hear me out.  This is what I mean.  I fell for my Andy in my second year
of uni ...  as you probably know, since you seem to have acquired every bit
of available information about me.  We had two months of the most delicious
and extraordinary love that ever could be, I've never felt so exalted, so
alive as I did then.  Never have since.  Never will.  And it ended.
  It ended because he hid from me the most important thing about himself:
who his father was.  Happiness was then replaced with fear of discovery,
and when the world and the tabloids did find out, something far worse than
that followed: horrible libels, persecution and humiliation.  Our happy
little gay love affair was ripped open, exhibited, lied about and sneered
at.  And then the worst thing of all happened.  Andy couldn't cope with it
and ... and he left me, he dumped me and walked away and betrayed me as
completely as Oskar betrayed you.'
  Matt's eyes teared up as he lived it again in his head.  He paused and
continued, 'What I felt then was a loss so complete and so horrible I never
recovered from it.  Oh, in the end we drifted back together.  He got in
trouble in the USA and I was able to go over and pull him back from the
brink.  We were a couple again, and a happy couple for most of the time:
but I never lost the blackness of abandonment.  It's taken me years to
recapture the feeling of safety with the poor little guy.  The supreme
happiness of those first days of loving ... that's never coming back, it's
just a memory of a lost Eden, one that you can't recover in this world.
  'What I'm saying is this.  You can't compare Oskar and Andy, but you can
compare what I felt then and you feel now.  We were both betrayed in the
middle of something wonderful and we both have been abandoned.  I took the
wrong way of dealing with it.  I let the blackness get to me, I got
obsessed about it, I blamed Andy and went under the waves of grief.  I
didn't let my friends help, though they tried, and it was only when I
realised that, because of my own selfishness, I was in a fair way to
abandoning another friend who needed me desperately, that I snapped out of
it.
  It doesn't need to be like that for you.  So live here with me and talk
about it.  Get away from it for a while; get perspective, but most
importantly, let your friends help you.  I am your friend, Will, you poor
silly sod.'
  So for whatever reasons of sympathy and shared disaster, they did become
close friends, and they talked as freely as close friends do.  Lying on
Matt's sofa, with Matt holding his head in his lap, playing with his hair
and kissing it, they talked a lot about love and disappointment, and Matt
told him some more stories that helped him.  They walked the North London
parks.  They ate out sometimes, and Will got used to being stared at when
he was with Matt, he even got snapped with his hero by a solitary paparazzo
with nothing better to do.  On good days, they talked also about their love
of history and did some serious work on the Elphberg project, painful
though Will found it to look at Oskar's handwriting.
  Will kept faith with his lost love, and no word of the Rassendyll story
ever escaped his lips, or ever would.  He also remembered Marie at the
Modnehem Gallery, and Matt duly sent a handsome donation towards the
collections.  Will wrote an affectionate letter in Rothenian to accompany
it, and gave her his address if she wanted to reply.  He often played
Rothenian classical radio, which you could get over the internet, and it
comforted his heart to hear again the beautiful language that he had grown
so to love.  He swore to keep it up somehow.
  He woke up on his last day in Highgate to hear a flurry in the hall
below.  His door burst open and Terry bounced on to his bed.
  'Thank God, babe, I knew Matt would do his magic on you: you look vaguely
human.  Oh.  No clothes.  But I love the six pack.  Rudi might have been a
bastard, but he's given you a physique to die for ... oops, you almost
did!'
  'You've been taking those sensitivity lessons then, Terry?'
  'And the sense of humour's back too.  What more could we want?'
  'What are you doing here?'
  'Ah.  The boss is here with me.  Look!  Shoulder holster.  Real gun.
S'OK, I have a permit for it.  And worse, I've brought Jenna, ice maiden of
sudden death.  Come on, get up.  We're having breakfast.'  And he bounced
out again, like Tigger.
  Will showered slowly, reluctant to join a social group, but he couldn't
drag it out for ever, and so he dressed and went down.  They were all
sitting in the big handsome kitchen.  He recognised Andy Peacher at once,
sitting at the kitchen table hand in hand with his Matt.  He was smaller
than he had expected.  Andy got up and shook Will's hand, with almost the
same smiling formality as a Rothenian.  He was introduced to Mark, his PA,
and Jenna, his driver and bodyguard; apparently they were a married couple,
on their way to see her parents in Missenden.
  Will didn't contribute much to the conversation, but they didn't expect
him to.  They were talking about friends he didn't know, and the impending
new semester at John Adams College.  It was suddenly borne in on Will, that
the new term for him at Whithampsted Grammar would begin in only ten days.
  In the end, he found himself alone with Andy, and he found himself
wondering why.  But he said what he had to say, thanking Andy for trying to
help with Falkefilm, even though there was no need.
  'It was worth a try, Will,' Andy replied in a marked American accent. 'If
money could have done some good, you were welcome to it.  The way dad's
coining it at the moment, we may soon control the world economy anyway.
Have you looked at Falkefilm.com?  Jason Williams's model shots are on
there, and I have to say they are something else ... not that I printed
them out of course.  They're advertising the "American in Strelzen" DVD for
September.'
  Will's heart lurched.  But he knew the possible consequences of what he
had done when he had done it, and would take them when and if he had to.
He told this to Andy, who nodded.
  'I just want you to know,' he said, 'that if it goes pear-shaped, I can
get you away from it all pretty damn quick, and I will do if you just ask.
Ring Terry and he'll arrange it instantly.'
  'Thanks, Mr Peacher.'
  'Andy.  Now I've got to go and look at a Youth Project in Hackney, and
attend a reception at the Prince's Trust.  I think Matt wants you to look
in before you go.'
  They said goodbye.  Later that morning, Will had his bags packed and he
looked in on Matt in his study.  'Did you ever tell Andy what pain he
caused you?' he asked, because he knew there was nothing now that he could
not ask Matt.
  'He knows deep down, I think.  But that's in the past now.  He has grown
up, and grown into a very loving man.  He has no hard side left to him.  He
truly is a man cascading with warmth and affection, and I'm so very proud
of him.  The problem in the end was me not him.  I grew tougher, if not
harder.  Eventually, after two years silent suffering I left him.  But when
I did that, I realised that I was just trying to get back at him in kind,
and I was as wrong as he had been.  And, praise be, it turned out that
there was something unexpected and deeper in both of us beneath all the
hurt and the suppressed anger.  It was a different kind of love: something
patient and calm, not exciting and not exalting, more of a foundation rock
really.  Nobody can get excited over foundations, but you try building
things without them.  And that's what we are doing now.  We may have lost
paradise, but we're building something more human and intimate, more fit
for this world, in hopes of a world to come.'
  'And what will become of me, Matt?'
  'Nothing bad, unless you give into the blackness.  But I don't think you
will.  You have your kids to teach, and they'll not let you moon around
being tragic.  And, when all's said and done, you know you don't hate
Oskar.  Oh ... he was wrong, make no mistake about it.  He used you
... maybe not ruthlessly or without cost to himself, but he did use you.
But there was something noble in him.  He did what he did to help others he
loved in what he saw as a great cause.  When Andy betrayed me, it was
because of his fear and pain.  He betrayed me as a scared child would.
Oskar at least betrayed you looking in your eyes.  He stabbed you in the
heart as a prince might for reasons of state, like King Henry the Lion and
his would-be Bavarian assassin.  So don't hate him for it.  And also there
is always this.  You've loved well once, if not too wisely.  You can love
again.'
  They embraced for a long time and kissed, and Matt made him promise to
let him know if he could help in any way, and told him that the job offer
would always be open.  He told him also that he would miss him a lot; that
he was to think of the house in Highgate as his own, and that they must
meet regularly.  And so Will's oldest daydream came true, although not in
the way that he might have expected.
  A taxi took Will to Paddington and the express got him to Didcot in less
than an hour.  He sat next to a Rothenian family and chatted fluently and
happily all the way to Didcot with them.  They were from near Modnehem.  He
shook their hands formally when he disembarked, they were utterly charmed.
It was only two thirty when he was climbing the steps up to his flat.
  Most of the plants had died, so he had to assume that Harry Baxter had
forgotten his promise.  The place smelled stuffy and so he threw open the
windows. He leaned out the back window, looking across the narrow
backstreet gardens to the church.  He stayed there just breathing in the
air of normality till the church clock struck three.  His eye was caught by
his DVD player and the discretely stacked gay porn.  He shoved the boxes in
a bag, and decided to dump them at the first opportunity.  He was no longer
the man he had been at the beginning of summer.  He began work on the
drifts of unread mail.

Weeks passed by.  Term recommenced and the choir geared up again.  It was
as though his wild summer had never happened, but of course it had.  Yet
Matt White had helped him a lot, and he blessed the man for it: he had
perspective again and the darkness did not overwhelm him.
  Harry was very keen to see him and even keener to resume sexual
relations, but Will was having none of it.  He had chosen the love of his
life, and although he had chosen disastrously, there could be no other,
particularly someone like Harry.  And Oskar still haunted his dreams and
day dreams.  He still had the attar Helge had given him.  He opened it and
sniffed it once.  The reaction was so powerful that his eyes were flooded
with tears and his brain with maddeningly vivid memories.  He put it away.
  So time healed him in its rough way, even though the scars were still
there.  The demands of schoolteaching were as ever enormous, and allowed no
self-indulgence.  Will was soon submerged in his routine of preparation and
marking, and the old delights of the job had not left him.  He found that
the most helpful of all.  He sang next to Harry in the choir on Thursdays
and Sundays, and they remained apparently cheerful with each other.  So the
crash of his world at the end of November was all the more shocking.
  As ever he came into school early, but found the head waiting for him.
'Will, can you give me a moment?'
  'Sure.'  They sat in his study.
  The head passed him a printout.  'I found this pinned to the Year 10
noticeboard when I came in this morning.'  It was the picture of a smiling
and provocative Will from the publicity set, naked and erect, his legs
crossed, leaning back on his arms.  'It says it is an American called Jason
Williams, but it is you isn't it?'
  Will was sombre but ready for this moment. 'It is.'
  'I've just checked the site, it's East European porn, and you are all
over it.  I take it you are gay?'
  'I am.'
  'I don't like to ask these questions, as being gay is neither here nor
there.  But being a porn actor is.'
  'I understand.  The parents will be in arms if and when it gets out.  And
it looks like some pervy Year 10 boy is determined that it will get out.
I'll clear my desk.  My resignation will be with you by tomorrow.'
  'Why did you do it, Will?  Was it for the money?'
  Will smiled sadly and shook his head, 'No sir, it was for love.  I'll be
off now.  I have to find a new life.'
   The head took his hand kindly and held it.  'I'm so sorry Will, you were
the best young teacher to come to this school in years.  We'll all miss
you.  I do wish you well and there will be no trouble about references,
even if you want to carry on teaching some time.'
  Will started packing up his flat, and gave the landlord the month's
notice required.  He sat and thought of what to do next.  There was not
much choice really, and it was not a hard one when it came down to it.  He
rang Matt White's PA and asked for an interview.  Matt was out of the
country, he was told, but he had left instructions that Will was to be
referred to the Marlowe Productions office in Camden, if he took up the
offer, and the house in Highgate was his.

So, on an early December morning, Will shook the dust of Berkshire from his
feet and followed his worldly goods up to London, where Dave Evans, the PA,
had said that Matt was happy for him to stay at the Highgate house again
for as long as he liked till he got sorted, or for good if he preferred.
It was a big and empty house, but Dave was in an office in a converted
garage out the back, and was quietly kind and helpful.
  They regularly had coffee together in the kitchen, and Dave amused Will
very much with his gossip about the Peacher circles in which he moved.
Dave, it seemed, had been in the same year and department as Matt and Andy,
and had seen the great romance unroll and then unravel in front of his
eyes.  Dave filled in a lot of details for him about Matt as a student.
  'He was so ... so beautiful as a boy, you wouldn't believe it,' Dave said
in his soft southern Welsh accent.  'Hang on, I've got some pictures.'  He
reappeared with amateur snaps of himself, Matt and their circle of friends.
One of them was truly sensational.  Somehow the essence of the young Matt
had been caught as he turned towards the camera.  It captured a
nineteen-year-old boy of deep lovability and heart-breaking vulnerability,
as well as a beauty far beyond the ordinary.  'I'm so proud of that one.
That was just after he and Andy got together.  You can see why I was so
jealous of Andy Peacher.  God, that boy Matt had it all.  The whole world
loved him.  But he changed.'
  'How did he change?'
  'It was the breakup.  He became moody and withdrawn, and never got back
to the innocence he once had.  So even though most people would now say his
beauty has matured and grown, and it's maintained and polished by trainers
and consultants, still, they never saw him the way he was when he was
eighteen.  But I did.  It breaks your heart.'
  Will had a telephone chat with Matt, and the first Monday after his
arrival he turned up for his new work as a production assistant, on twice
the salary he had enjoyed as a teacher.  The Marlowe offices were near the
Sainsbury's in Camden in three houses in a shabby nineteenth-century
terrace.  The office was already busy and he knocked on the door marked
'Producer'.  A good-looking older woman looked up at him with a tight
smile.
  'You must be Will.  Matt's told me about you.  To be honest I'm glad
you're here, the Elphberg project's suddenly become a nightmare.  We had a
translator but she's gone back home for Christmas with no promise she'll be
back, and Matt says you're fluent.'
  'I get by.'
  'It's a lifesaver for us, however good you are.  I've put you in the
office with Melanie, you'll work with her on the Elphbergs and the
Grimaldis.  She'll take you through the files.  Staff meeting at three this
afternoon.'
  'Cheers.'  Will wandered off to find Melanie, who turned out to be a
recent Oxford graduate in what seemed to be a semi-permanent tizzy.  His
assigned desk was shabby and stacked with her files.  She helped him move
them on to the floor, and he set up his laptop.  A phone and modem turned
up later and were jacked in.
   Will spent the day getting his bearings.  Media types seemed to work in
a state of chaos and panic, laced with hopeless optimism.  He was bemused,
because order and organisation were what he preferred.  The staff meeting
was at least revealing of the plan behind the chaos.  There were three
teams, all working on two projects, one of which was further advanced than
the other.  The pressure was on him and Melanie to be first to present a
draft screenplay and script, because the Elphbergs were to be the first
episode.  Since neither of them was experienced, the producer was taking a
close supervisory role.
  Will took to the job, although it took a while for him to get used to a
work day that was not divided up into 45 minute chunks, punctuated by
bells.  He imposed his sense of order on Melanie and their joint
environment.  He was soon popular around the office, even more so than he
had been at his school.  He had changed, though he did not know it.  The
tragedy had made him softer, more patient and sympathetic.  His uncertainty
had been burned away now too; he knew exactly what he was, and was his own
man at last.  People warmed to his combination of good looks, level gaze
and half-sensed sadness.  He stopped hiding from a world which was getting
increasingly keen on him.  The change became a bit clearer to him over the
holiday season.
  At Christmas he boarded the train for Plymouth and his parents.  He was
not looking forward to it.  His father and he had a long history of mutual
coldness, and his holiday visits had tended to be short since he had left
home.
  His sister met him at the station in his mother's car. 'Will!  Wow!
You've been working out, man, and what have you done to yourself?  You're
like ... a god!'  He smiled and kissed her.  She had grown up.  He heard
all about the recent boyfriends and the progress of her studies in
Electronic Engineering.
  He entered the house and to his own surprise took and shook his startled
father's hand.  'How are you, sir?' he said coolly and confidently, and his
father was even more astonished.  Rothenian formality had made deep inroads
into Will's soul.  After that, his father was cautious about this new,
polite and deferential but still assertive Will, keen to talk and be talked
to.  Also he was plainly glad that Will had given up teaching, so much so
that he never asked why he had done it.  His mother glowed at him.  He
stayed the whole week.  He wished his sister would have blessed him when he
left and kissed his forehead, but such things did not happen in England.
  Matt returned to London in the new year and was seen round the office a
lot.  Will took care to claim no special friendship with him, and he could
tell that Matt approved of his cheerful presence in the office.  In the
first week of January, he had moved out of Highgate into a small flat that
Dave Evans had found him in Kentish Town, expensive but quite near the
tube.  He and Dave, and sometimes Dave's partner Steve, when he was not on
shifts, began drinking on quiet evenings in the gay pubs of North London.
Matt never did, for obvious reasons.  But it was not long before Will also
found a reason not to.
  They were in a pub near Camden Lock rather later than usual one night.
It was live music night and very busy.  Steve and him were enjoying a pint
and a good laugh in a corner, when Steve looked startled.  Three grinning
and drunken teenage boys had settled on the other side of the table.  The
cheekiest of them, an Asian lad, said to Will, 'Hey mate!  We think you're
fit, we do.  We think you're that Jason Williams, innya!'
  'You what?'
  One of them said, 'Nah!  He's English.  Listen to 'im.'
  The first looked unconvinced, 'Look at 'im.  Iss 'im all right.  I got
the DVD.  Iss fuckin' fantastic mate, even on a pirate copy.  You can 'ave
my arse anytime you want.  Hey!  Can you get me into porno?  I reckon I'd
be great.'
  'Nah,' said another, 'Iss foreign where they make 'em.  Innit mate.
Russia or somewhere like that.'
  Steve, a vast and intimidating man, leaned across the table, 'Why don't
you baby queers just fuck off, so I can finish my drink.'
  The mouthiest of them seemed to fancy his chances of facing down Steve,
but his friends took one look at him, and dragged their mate away.  But
they stayed within eyeshot, making comments and staring.
  'OK,' said Steve, 'are you going to tell me what that was all about?  It
suddenly occurs to me that half the bar is looking at you, Will.'
  Will blushed.  There were indeed a few sidelong glances from others in
the pub too.  He sighed.  So this was what it was like being Oskar in Club
Liberation in summer, only here in London it would be all year round.  'Er,
well, Steve ... have you ever heard of Falkefilm?'
  The explanation took a good half pint to make, and when he had finished,
Steve whistled.  'So you're a famous gay porn star.  Funny, you look such
an innocent guy.  Well ... it's a pleasure to meet you Mr Williams.'  As he
laughed, Steve mentally made a note to check the web tomorrow.
  So Steve, Dave and Will started drinking in straight pubs, where they got
mercifully no attention.  Although Steve said with a smile that he had
enjoyed the notoriety of drinking with the famous Jason Williams.
  It was less straightforward in the gym.  Will had achieved his physique
at an appalling personal cost, and he decided that it would be idiotic to
let it go, so he exercised, toned up and consulted respectable trainers.
He got the eye sometimes, though, in that peculiarly British way where
people both looked and didn't look at you at one and the same time.  Once a
cheery and genuine-looking younger man on a running machine tipped him a
wink and called out, 'Hey, Jason!'
  'Hey back you!' Will said, in his Bostonian drawl.  They grinned
conspiratorially at each other.  They even had a chat over an isotonic
drink later, and Will checked him out.  Well why not?  He thought it might
be a distraction and there was no one for him to be faithful to any more.
He began coming on to the guy, whose name was Tony, he said.  Will was
astonished to find that he could come on to a man, and at what an exotic
flirt he had become.  Tony was desperately interested and invited him back
to his flat, only a few streets away.
  Will found himself in the unusual position so far in his life of making
all the running.  Tony was clearly extremely nervous, although he seemed to
be not just out, but experienced.  He had all the right equipment.  OK
then, thought Will, let's be the hot porn star here.  He pulled Tony to his
feet, locked lips and began undressing him slowly, using all the little
tricks Oskar and Felip had taught him.  He had got them naked and had just
begun serious work on Tony's straining dick when he caught a faceful of
premature ejaculation.
  'Oh God!  I'm so sorry, Jason!  Oh, I didn't want it to be like this.'
  Will smiled up at him through the face trail.  'Just lick it up, Tony.
It happens.  I'll take it as a compliment.'
  Tony looked at him earnestly, 'God, you're just too hot.  It's like
living a total fantasy.  No one is going to believe I was in bed with you,
no one.'
  Will suddenly remembered his first night with Oskar, 'At least you didn't
faint, Tony.  But I'm a real person, believe it or not.  Forget the
fantasy.  Now let's get into some mouth action, we'll have you up and ready
again in no time at all. '  Will found himself having to take Tony in a
number of positions, and didn't get the penetration he so liked, but the
evening was still an important milestone for him.  His sex life was not
over, even if it had taught him that men from now on were going to have
unreasonable expectations of him.  He found himself answering the same
questions from Tony as they lay in bed that he had asked Oskar.  He didn't
stay the night.  He never told him his real name and although he took his
mobile number he didn't continue the relationship.  He hoped he wasn't
getting like Harry.
  There were odd times like that when being Jason Williams didn't bother
him much.  But he made no attempt to buy the DVD or check on the web about
the state of his celebrity.  But sometimes it was forced on him.  He bought
Gay Universe, and Falkefilm took ads in it.  For months he could not avoid
the ad for 'An American in Strelzen' with a cover picture of Oskar and him
naked and grinning at the camera.  There were some highly coloured reviews
down the sides.  The next month too he found Jason Williams had been
elected 'Most Promising Newcomer' in a porn magazine called BoyMan.  One of
his audition shots was made into the magazine's front cover.  He wondered
wistfully and stupidly if there was any money involved.  His modelling set
was all over the next Gay Universe.  This was fame, of a sort.

  Money or not, there was definitely fame.  He found himself walking Old
Compton Street on another Saturday afternoon in February.  Now he was a
Londoner, and he had an Oyster Card to prove it.  He did not walk
sheepishly past the gay bar this time, but strode directly into it.  He
perched at the bar and ordered a gin and tonic, catching the double take of
the barman with a smile.  There were sidelong glances everywhere he looked,
whether because he was recognised or because he was just confident and hot,
he couldn't tell.  He suddenly realised that, had he been a different man,
he could have screwed half the men in this place without too much effort.
The drink arrived and he gave the barman the change, 'Cheers, Jason,' he
said with a conspiratorial grin.
  Will turned round and rejoiced perversely in the attention, Jason
Williams was at home here.  One table of young men, who must obviously have
a good collection of wanking material between them, was particularly
gobsmacked, and, as often is the way in London, Will recognised one of
them.  He got up, smiled sunnily down at the group and asked if he could
join them.  They smiled, shuffled and mumbled, and he took a chair.  They
may have been worried as to what he was after: and perhaps they should be,
said Dangerous Jason in Will's head.
  They were first-year students from Imperial College, as it turned out.
The boldest of them said, 'We thought you were American, Jason.'
  'I'll take that as a compliment to my acting abilities, but no, I'm from
the West Country.'
  'What took you to Rothenia?' another asked.
  'A holiday, originally, and then I just couldn't get away.'
  'So are you and any of those other guys you have it off with boyfriends.'
  'No.  I'm unattached.  There was a guy ...'
  'Yeah, that Marc Bennett, it was pretty obvious, though Max Wolf seemed
dead keen on you too.  Did Marc cheat on you or something?  Sorry, you
don't have to answer that.  I was being nosy.' These were nice boys, and
Will suddenly liked them a lot.
  Will said, 'It just didn't work out, but it was the best while it was
happening.'
  'We could tell.  Are you going to do any more films?'
  'Nope, I've had enough of fame.  I'm keeping my head down in London for
the time being.  It's a good place just to disappear.'
  They talked about being gay students and coming out.  Two of the boys
were only gay in London.  He sympathised.  After half an hour or so he
finished his drink and said goodbye, but he caught the eye of the quietest
of them, winked and indicated with a slight nod.  He had only been outside
a few moments when he was joined by the boy, very attractive and coy, as
complete a turn-on as when Will had last seen him.
  He smiled with a mixture of shyness and impishness, 'Hello sir.'
  'Robert Franks.  So you came out in London.'
  'Sir.'
  'Just call me Will.  You don't even have to call me Jason.'
  The Whithampsted boy laughed, 'It doesn't seem right ... Will.  I
couldn't believe it when I saw you in that DVD that the lads bought.  But
then my mates still in the sixth said you'd been forced to resign 'cos of
you being caught out doing gay porn films, so there was no doubt after
that.  It's weird seeing one of your teachers being so incredibly hot and
sexual, almost like watching your dad doing it'
  'Totally gross, Robert.  I'm only four years older than you.'
  'I'm Robby now.'
  'Nice.  Does Robby have a boyfriend?'
  'Well sorta, but not really.  I went boldly to GaySoc as soon as I
arrived, and this second year guy picked me up.  He was nice to me, but he
was high on being my gay mentor.  He wanted to mould me and educate me.  I
just wanted a good fucking.'
  'Robby!  What would they say at St Mary's?'
  'That was what I was escaping, Will.  Did you ever find out who had
informed on you?'
  'No.  Not that it mattered.  It was a disaster just waiting to happen.'
  'It was Simon Baxter.  He was suspended for it, and now everyone thinks
he's gay, but he isn't, take it from me.'
  'Simon Baxter!  What, Rupert Baxter's son, the nephew of Harry Baxter,
the solicitor?'
  'That's him.'
  'Jesus wept,' Will said, 'then it does matter.'  It did.  There could be
no doubt then that Harry Baxter had not been as cool about Rothenia and
losing Will as he had pretended.  Maybe also he was envious at Will's seedy
triumphs in Strelzen, from which he had been excluded.  He must have found
out all about "An American in Zelden", being such a devotee of hardcore
porn, and it would have been quite in character for Harry to get peeved at
him and decide to take a petty revenge using his own nephew as his dupe.
But in the light of what Harry had known about Will's devotion to his
career, the revenge had been anything but petty really.  It was truly
vicious.  Will felt both chilled and appalled at that sort of callousness,
too appalled even to be angry.  Never mind what Andy had done to Matt, or
Oskar to him, what Harry had done was the real depth of betrayal, mean and
deliberate with no morality behind it.
  He and Robby found a Starbucks and he spent a while filling in him in
detail on what had happened.  The kid was shocked and really sweet, he was
almost on the verge of tears as Will sketched in for him the consequences
of his big mistake.  They talked and talked, and Will felt a real
connection beginning.  They moved on to a pub near Seven Dials, and, well
before ten, Will knew how it was going to end.  They took the Northern Line
to Kentish Town and fell into his flat trying to suck each other's tongue
out by its root.  They began undressing in his living room.
  'This is so totally cool, Will.  I'm going to have Jason Williams's cock
up my arse.'
  'Actually, I'd just as much have Robby Franks's cock up mine.'
  Robby dropped his pants and looked comically down at himself, 'It's not
so big, and you're used to such well-equipped guys; that Max Wolf, mmm!
What's he like really?'
 'Do you know, it's odd you should ask.  I didn't get to know him that well
...'
  '... apart from his fucking the crap out of you.'
  'Well, there was that, it's true.  But he was an odd bloke.  I thought he
hated me when we first met, but then he did some really quite sweet things.
He even tried to help me I think.'
  'Did he love you?'
  Will thought about it, 'No.  I think he loved Marc Bennett.  Who knows?
Anyway, now that we're both naked, and now we've got the necessary, and I
see that you have a penis of some sort there, let's get busy.'
  It was a really enjoyable night with an eager and pretty, if
inexperienced, boy.  They took turns and Will was delighted to wake up next
morning with a skinny boy, naked with tousled hair, in his kitchen making
himself breakfast and singing Coldplay songs.  They never left the bed all
that Sunday and ended up spinning a coin as to who went on top.  They met
up for sex several times throughout February, and it was always good.  For
a while it seemed as though Will might have found a regular partner, if not
love, but somehow, neither of them wanted to take that step, and the affair
petered out at the end of the month.  Will didn't resent it, Robby was out
to learn about life in a better and more courageous way than he had chosen
to do, and he wished him well.
  He had Matt and the others to talk things over with, and that helped.
Matt was often in the States with his Andy, but when he was back in London
he had a select and small social circle, into which Will was drafted
because, unlike Dave and Steve, he was interested in music and art.  It
included close women friends, which should not have surprised Will as much
as it did.  So one night he found himself at a Covent Garden first night in
evening dress with Matt, Rhiannon and Katy.
  It was like being out on a conventional date, as Matt naturally
gravitated to the smaller Katy, his cousin and a high flying criminal
barrister, while Will, being six foot tall, matched nicely with the svelt
and taller Rhiannon, a young university lecturer.
  'Yikes!' Will exclaimed, as a volley of cameras went off in his face.
  'That's the trouble with Matt and premieres,' said Rhiannon with
resignation, 'the paps.  You get used to the reflected glory.  The trouble
is that when you get in the supplements and celeb mags people see it and
make unwarranted assumptions.  My students are impressed, even though my
husband's a bit quirky about it.  But as long as I'm only on the town with
gays he can't complain.'
  A breathless phone call the next week from Will's mother confirmed this.
Who was that very beautiful woman she saw him with in Hello magazine?  Why
didn't he tell her he was seeing someone?  Why didn't he mention he had
famous friends, even if they were homosexuals?
  Will pondered telling her the truth at that point, but decided it could
wait a month or two.  He wondered if she might like to know about his own
modelling career, but sternly suppressed the thought.
  As it was, Gay Universe ran a few pictures of him and Matt under a half
column gossip feature: 'Is it the end for Andy and Matt?'  There was a
rebuttal from Matt's office saying that the mysterious date was no more
than Matt's work colleague and friend, Mr William Vincent.  Fortunately
nobody connected Will with Jason Williams, or things could have got very
hairy.