Chapter Text
‘One day, Thomas Edgar Barrow, I am gonna marry you.’
‘Shut your gob and eat your breakfast.’
‘Oh, come on! Don’t tell me you’ve never thought about it?’
‘I have not.’
It was true. Thomas never thought about it because he never allowed himself to think about fantasies like that when it came to Jimmy. He loved Jimmy with more than his whole heart, so much he felt his love burn him from the inside out every single day, but they were best mates. The very best of mates. He never let himself dive so deeply into the idea of the two of them walking off into the sunset because the dream hurt too much.
Jimmy, he thought, only had an inkling of this at the very most. Spooning the last of the baked beans onto his toast, accompanied by sausages from the butchers down the road, fried eggs, hash browns, and grilled tomatoes dusted with salt, Thomas sighed and considered asking Jimmy to stop talking about it altogether. He picked up his plate and placed it opposite Jimmy’s on the small round table in his kitchen. As he sat down, Jimmy’s chair scraped. Jimmy, in pyjamas and his favourite dusty blue t-shirt, leaned on his elbows over the breakfast Thomas had made him with a keen smile.
Faintly, Thomas thought that the t-shirt Jimmy brought out his eyes.
‘Liar,’ Jimmy announced.
‘Believe whatever you would like to believe, Jimmy, I don’t spend my life thinking about you.’
That part was a blatant lie, but Thomas was reasonably sure Jimmy had no clue.
‘You can’t say things like that to a narcissist like me. I might wilt.’
Despite his annoyance, Thomas snorted. ‘Then wilt.’
‘You’re very mardy this mornin’,’ Jimmy said, sitting back with a thump. Finally, he picked up his knife and fork. ‘It’s the weekend and you get to spend it with me!’
‘I spend every weekend with you,’ Thomas pointed out.
‘All the more reason why we’re gonna get married one day, you’ll see. Might as well when we live like this.’
‘You mean when you steal my clothes, my cigs, my hair wax, my toothpaste, and my patience?’
Jimmy chuckled from low in his body. The husky sound sent delicious goosebumps down Thomas’s spine, and he hoped to god Jimmy couldn’t tell.
‘See! We’re practically married!’ Jimmy enthused.
Thomas rubbed his temple with one hand and picked up his coffee in the other.
‘You are the weirdest little man I’ve ever known,’ Thomas said despairingly.
‘You love me for it.’
‘Less by the second.’
Jimmy kicked him in the shin under the table and smiled smugly when Thomas glared back. If Jimmy were anyone else, he would be a pain in the arse, yet Thomas knew he couldn’t do without Jimmy and his stupidity. The jokes dwindled into hums of satisfaction, to Jimmy leaning back in the chair and sighing happily. Thomas didn’t hesitate in snatching up Jimmy’s last abandoned piece of toast.
‘How was work yesterday?’ Jimmy asked.
‘Ivy says hello.’
‘Christ, don’t,’ Jimmy moaned, grimacing. Just three nights ago, Jimmy had come in with his tail between his legs and told Thomas the sorry story of sticking his tongue down Ivy’s throat. Ivy had then slapped Jimmy around the face and told Thomas all about it the next morning in the office.
‘It’s what you deserve,’ Thomas chided.
‘I know that. I was drunk, to be fair.’
‘Not an excuse, Kent.’
‘Are you really gonna be that hard on me?’ Jimmy whined. Thomas smiled over his coffee at the boyish pout Jimmy had going.
‘Yes.’
Even though he did think Jimmy was an idiot, Thomas got up, cleared their plates away and made them each another beverage to get the day going. After a while, he forgot about Jimmy’s odd non-proposal.
Jimmy wanted to go out and Thomas wanted to stay in. This meant that they went out, but only with the deal that Thomas wouldn’t get dragged through shops for hours on end or pulled into one of the awful, bubbly, neon clubs Jimmy claimed to enjoy. The last time that happened, Thomas ended up being rescued by Jimmy from an awkward chat-up and then rubbing Jimmy’s back when he vomited in the toilets.
Luckily, they did have one thing in common when it came to their ideas of enjoyment. Thomas accepted a sunny walk as the weather permitted, a bright sky and a biting wind chasing their coats, while they sipped hot chocolates. They could walk like this endlessly, fuelled by hot beverages and meandering conversation.
‘Thomas, have you never thought about gettin’ married?’
Just moments ago, they were talking about desserts, and now this. Thomas’s eyebrows rose. He glanced at Jimmy, finding pure curiosity in Jimmy’s face and a soft frown looking back at him.
‘I haven’t come anywhere close to that with anyone yet,’ he answered.
‘Never?’
Thomas shrugged and gestured vaguely with the hand that held his drink. ‘I was with Philip the longest and he weren’t gonna touch marriage with a ten-foot barge pole.’
‘But what about you?’
He sighed as he thought back to the days of Philip. Three years of feeling like he was staring into the sun without blinking. At the time, he had been willing to go along with whatever Philip wanted, going along with his mad schemes, dining out, jetting off so often he almost got the sack from his job, though Philip never claimed any responsibility for the tantrums he threw to convince Thomas to go, because that was Philip. He might have seen the world, but his knowledge of it extended as far and mummy and daddy’s purse strings.
When Thomas suggested they find a nice little flat of their own, weaving a pretty picture of tranquillity, Philip had unabashedly laughed in his face while standing in his stainless steel kitchen at the top of a skyscraper in London. How the charade of a relationship had gone on for another four months, Thomas still did not know, nor did he even want to.
‘I think I knew it’d never happen,’ Thomas said honestly, ‘and I’m glad it never did.’
‘Me too.’
Thomas nudged Jimmy gently with his elbow. Jimmy met Philip in the cinema once a couple of years ago. Thomas had had to walk Jimmy out of the building by the shoulder because Jimmy threatened to burn Philip’s flat down.
‘What about you, then?’ Thomas asked.
He knew the answer before he heard it.
‘Not on your nelly am I doin’ that,’ Jimmy blurted immediately. Thomas chuckled. ‘Unless it were with you, no chance.’
‘Jimmy contra mundi.’
‘Exactly. Unless it’s you.’
‘Why’re you so hung up on marrying… me?’
‘It just makes sense.’
Thomas halted on the cobblestone street down which they walked, while Jimmy walked a few steps ahead before realising and turning around. Framed by the beige brick buildings and blue sky above, Jimmy looked for a second like the subject of a professional photographer. In a deep black coat, a scarf that went all the way up to his chin, and black clothes, he might have been shadow, until the shock of golden hair.
Even when he was being this difficult, he was incredibly beautiful. Thomas bit the inside of his cheek.
‘Are you ever goin’ to give me a straight answer?’ Thomas asked.
‘It’s hardly straight.’
‘Jimmy.’
‘You of all people should get it,’ Jimmy said, squinting with one eye, ‘You’ll see.’