Because fuck, Benito made him feel amazing, even when he was asleep, stretched out beside Mickey with his lovely face half hidden by a pillow, his arm flung over Mickey’s belly.
He’s cute. A reach for a self-confessed ex-gangster, but it fit.
Ex-gangster? Mickey frowned at his phone and pushed the creeping suspicion away. He’d wasted enough time on paranoid thoughts lately. Right now, he wanted to walk in the sun with a hot dude and discover things about him that didn’t make his dark eyes flash with pain. I want to know the other stuff. Because whatever Benito said about himself, he was still the kind of man who left groceries on the doorstep of the mother he could barely stand and brought his little sister breakfast every morning before school.
He’s good. I know he is.
“Is that porn?”
Mickey jumped. Benito stood in front of him, bundled up in a North Face jacket and squinting into the winter sun. “You think I’d look at porn outside a museum?”
Benito shrugged. “I’ve never thought about you outside a museum.”
“You don’t think I’m the type?”
“To wank at a museum?”
A grin warmed Mickey from the inside out. “Yeah, that’s exactly what I meant.”
Benito smiled too and rubbed his hands together, blowing on them. “Wanker or not, it’s fucking cold.”
“Don’t like the great outdoors?”
“I like it well enough. Just figured we’d be spending the day inside.”
“I have you for the whole day?”
“If you like.”
Mickey rose from the bench. “Works for me.”
They set off at a slow amble, meandering past the clusters of buildings that housed various displays of the enigma codebreakers. Benito thrust his hands in his pockets and stared at the ground. “There’s something I should probably tell you.”
Cold dread threatened the easy warmth Benito’s appearance had gifted Mickey. He shot Benito major side eye. “Is it bad?”
“Depends on your definition of bad.”
Mickey smirked. “You know my definition of bad. It’s good, right? Always fucking good.”
Benito’s lips twitched. He licked them, as if it helped simmer down whatever image Mickey had planted in his head. Then he shook his head. “I’m not talking about that.”
“Then what?”
“This place.” Benito raised his head and glanced around. “I came here on every school trip since it opened, so I’ve been here a hundred times.”
Relief so acute Mickey could taste it spread through him. He laughed. “That’s it? I thought you were going to tell me you’d killed my cat.”
“You have a cat?”
“Metaphorical cat.”
“You don’t have a cat? You can have my sister’s. Fucking thing is a vandalistic shit bag.”
“Vandalistic?” Mickey laughed again. “Okay, man. So, you don’t like cats?”
“I don’t like that cat,” Benito corrected. “He fucks with me on purpose.”
“Cute motherfucker, though.”
“You know him?”
“If it’s the same massive beast your mum had last year, then yeah, I think so. He sat on my laptop bag and wouldn’t get off.”
“That’s the prick.” Benito swivelled his own side-stare at Mickey. “I keep forgetting you’ve been around all this time and it’s me that hasn’t.”
Mickey’s humour settled into a soft smile. He didn’t know what to say to that. Before Benito, despite a work ethic that left him little time for himself, he’d never had any trouble separating his job from his personal life. Now it felt so entwined he couldn’t fathom what was the past, the present, or yet to come. What are we doing?
God, he had no idea.
Benito led the way around the park. Mickey followed, amused by his word-perfect descriptions of every exhibit.
“You really have been here a thousand times.”
“Yup. I wouldn’t lie about that.”
What would you lie about?
Stop it.
They were by the actual enigma machine. Mickey gazed at it and pushed the noisy demon off his shoulder. “You know, I don’t even like history that much. I just wanted to be somewhere I didn’t want to jump on you the whole time. Just to see what it’s like.”
Benito crouched on the floor, reading a low displayed plaque as if it was the first time he’d ever seen it, not the thousandth. “And?”
“I still want to jump you, but I like the fact you’re a closet nerd.”
“I’m not in the closet,” Benito retorted. “Everyone I’ve ever cared about knows this about me.”
“That’s not many people.”
Benito sighed. “I guess not. You’re on the list, though. In case you were wondering.”
Mickey couldn’t deny it. He grinned a little and offered Benito his hand to help him up.
Benito took it, and for the six seconds their hands were clasped, all felt right with the world.
Mickey missed the sensation when Benito let go. “We should eat soon,” he said. “You want to go for a walk first?”
“Okay.”
They left the exhibition buildings behind and began a slow walk around the park. Despite the sun, it really was cold, but Mickey’s northern blood didn’t mind. He turned his face into the wind and took deep, bracing breaths while Benito hid behind his coat. “We can go somewhere warmer if you want.”
“Nah.” Benito drifted closer, so their elbows bumped. “This is nice.”
“You’re not bored?”
“With you?”
“I meant in general, but okay.”
Benito snorted out a laugh. “Trust me, mate. Nothing about you is boring, but even if it was, I think I’d still love it. I think I need boring in my life right now.”
Mickey tried not to overanalyse Benito’s words. He kept his gaze on the landscape around them and nodded. “I’ve felt that before. Don’t go too far the other way, though. Too much quiet . . . it’s as destructive as chaos.”
Benito shot him another sideways glance. “Is that what’s going on with you? Too much quiet?”
“Maybe. My bosses keep asking me to go to London and have dinner with them near the office or to their big houses in this posh village they live in, but I never go.”
“Why not?”
Mickey frowned. “They’re too happy, I suppose, with their boyfriends and husbands, and I just don’t know what to do with it. Sometimes I think I only function properly when everything is a fucking struggle.”
“You don’t think it’s because you don’t know any different yet?”
“Yet?”
Benito fixed his dark stare on the horizon. “Is this so hard for you?”
“What?”
“Being here. Me and you.”
Mickey thought about his answer for less than a second. “No. This is, like, utopia for me. Like we’re in another world being regular people doing regular shit.”
Benito shrugged. “Maybe we are.”
Benito fought for breath, sweat beading his skin and running down his spine. He squeezed his eyes shut and bunched his screaming muscles. Just one more.