The Beast of Bodmin Moor Page 8

  Jake did not deign to respond.

  The only dignity you’ll glean from that, is in defeat, and y’know it. Whatever you’re about to spout now is deluded in the extreme…and thus, doomed to defeat. Amateur.

  “Phin… ” Crap. No matter how he phrased this, it was going to reek of a rebuff—

  Odd that.

  ”I-I…don’t think…” Jake tripped over his treasonous tongue, tried again. “I can’t, it’s not sa—”

  “S’okay! Sorry…I didn’t exp—” Phin broke off in a flurry of unruly limbs, scuffling backwards in an effort to clear the table top before nutting the damn thing when he staggered to his feet. “Agghfck!”

  “Y’okay?” Jake winced, springing up to…stand there uselessly, unsure whether Phin would allow—let alone welcome—touch. The offer of comfort from the one who’d inflicted the hurt.

  Phin was a ‘mishap’ waiting to happen left to his own devices. The last thing he deserved was added insult to injury. The thought of Phin driving was too dreadful to contemplate, so Jake didn’t. Mostly because he had far more immediate horrors to focus on, such as… the fact he’d fucked everything up. Had made Phin feel unwanted—maybe worse—unwantable, having blatantly sensed a brush off on the way. Mortifying in itself. Brutal; after offering far more than he could afford Jake to crave. Or covet with every fibre of their being, furry or otherwise.

  Way to maim him for life, fuckwit. Fix it.

  “Phin, I didn’t mean…please don’t think—”

  “S’okay. You don’t have to do white lies, or say ‘it’s not you, it’s me’. I’m not…slow.” Phin sighed, pressing the heel of his palm to his forehead and kneading, hard. Too hard, after all it had suffered of late. His words had been soft, lilting with acceptance. Aching with self-awareness. The shame that scythed through Jake’s system was scalding.

  “I know you’re not…far from it. I wasn’t trying to fob you off, it’s just, I never expec—I-I can’t risk…” Jake’s pathetic attempt to form an entire sentence stuttered to a pitiful halt. He couldn’t make this right without telling truths so far-fetched it would make matters worse. Even more insulting. Quite a feat after being rejected in the immediate aftermath of blowing someone’s mind. For the first time.

  Jake stood, utterly inept, willing Phin to…even look at him. Those inimitable eyes were staring into the far-off distance, unreachable. Cherub lips upturned in a small smile that shrieked ‘quiet courage’. It was impossible to say how, but something had shifted; shuttered Phin off, as if an inner portcullis had come crashing down. His entire frame, every excessive inch, seemed to have shrunk inwards, warding Jake away. Worse—worst of all—was Phin’s cloaking of unnatural calm. Akin to that eerie stilling of air before a storm breaks.

  “It’s okay…” he repeated, into the ether. “I’ll just…put some clothes on and drive you home.” Phin hadn’t quite crammed his fingers in his ears and started humming, but it was a close run thing.

  Phin wanted Jake gone. And who could blame him? Jake least of all. Home was the last place he wanted to go, but he sure as hell couldn’t stay.

  Inside, wherever the jackal resided, he could feel Jack’s fretful pacing. The frustration seething beneath the surface of Jake’s skin wasn’t his own. Sort of. It felt physical…a force in itself. A restless, clawing sensation that surged alongside his sudden spike in temperature. Boiling the blood in Jake’s veins as his pores wept sweat. He had to leave. Flee. Fast.

  Phin bent to scoop up his scattered clothes, scrunching them into an absent-minded snarl of fabric that belied his unnerving equanimity. Then turned and wandered into the loo without a word, shutting himself inside.

  Now. Thought and deed; done in the blink of an eye. Jake snatched the door open and shot outside, tugging it shut behind him. He stood, scanning the expanse of scrubby grass and granitic rubble, isolated in indifferent majesty. As barren as it was bleak to those oblivious to its beauty. Nowhere to hide. Everywhere to run. There was no trace of human scent as far as Jack could smell or see, aside from the most alluring of them all. The autumnal afternoon was overcast; the sky as grey as the ancient rock at his feet. Ominous clumps of cloud hovered in low clusters, hugging the horizon, heavy with the odour of oncoming rain.

  The campervan at his back concealed Jake from the road that edged the moor; all before him belonged to it. The borrowed robe was flapping in the wind, still hanging open, so he shrugged it off his shoulders and tossed it onto the bonnet where Phin should spot it before driving off. He daren’t risk the only other option. Threading a window wiper through a belt loop to stop it blowing away was about the best he could do. He might be an utter bastard, but Jake wasn’t about to bugger off with the bathrobe he’d borrowed, t’boot.

  He ran, ran like the wind whispering through his hair, grateful for its cool caress on overheated skin. Bare soles skimming scrubby grass and mossy tufts, feathery underfoot as he picked up speed. Fast…faster still, until he was but a blur in the distance. Then Jake let go.

  A familiar sense of alien rightness flooded every fibre of his being when the silent shimmer thrilled through Jake’s veins. Aflame with a power as primal as the fire trembling down his spine; unfurling from his very core to ripple through his body in a fluent stretch. Twanging every sinew to screaming point when joints popped with a sickening squelch. The gut-wrenching grate of bone grinding bone as tendons tore and muscles strained at sheaths. Those final shudders; rolling down his back to spill through reformed flesh as fur flowed over his subterranean self. Excruciating pain, the euphoria of freedom. An agony and ecstasy that echoed the ache in their heart.

  15. Phin

  Phin tugged his jeans on and ruffled his flattened hair, then stooped to peer at his face in the cloudy mirror. Not that it mattered…Jack had seen more than enough of it already. How he must wish he hadn’t lost his clothes and happened upon Phin in the first place…let alone stuck around ’til his conked out self woke up. When it was way too light for a starkers stroll-about. Typical. It still wasn’t dark enough, so now Jack was stuck with him until Phin drove him home. If only, he hadn’t admitted that he wouldn’t mind Jake ‘in anywhere’. That had been unseemly, extremely. And presumptive.

  “I-I…don’t think…I can’t, it’s not sa—”

  Phin wasn’t sure what any of that meant…but knew it meant nothing he wanted to hear. It was just a clatter of words that screamed: back off, it was just a bloody blow job. Phin had a sneaky suspicion that Jake’s word salad sentence boiled down to: I’m just not that into you. That’s what people really meant when they used a lot of words to dump your ass without suffering uncomfy consequences, wasn’t it?

  Phin had attempted the pretend-it-doesn’t-matter-a-bit thing. That’s how you acted considerate about being dumped: No probs. I’m fine, it’s all fine. Fine, fine fine.

  Fine (adj): Fuck awful.

  Adding a c’est la vie shrug ’n’ smile so people didn’t feel bad for making you feel bad was the icing on the considerate cake. Phin had tried. It was tricky to say how it had turned out when he hadn’t been able to focus past the fact he’d needed Jake to go. Leave Phin alone, so that he could do concentrating on clawing back a bit of comfiness.

  His whole self had felt like a silent shriek. So Phin had shut down, to hold it inside. He hadn’t wanted Jake to see. He’d seen far too much already. Too much too-muchness. But Phin had somehow forgot himself in the face of Jake. All the things that made it extremely important to ward the world away and its dagger-shooting-glare-of-shame with it.

  Jake didn’t respond to the offer of a lift home, which made Phin even more scratchy. He just sort of wavered about instead, as if wondering whether to pat Phin’s head or do fleeing before the fallout. The latter would have been Jake’s best bet. Phin had to hold it all in, until he’d gone. It was doable, he’d done it a trillion times before. It was p’raps akin to being eaten alive by maggots… far preferable to the Glare.

  The bathroom mirror wasn’t about to offer
up any words of wisdom any time soon, so Phin checked that it was sporting the correct-expression-for-the-occasion: his feeling fine face. A last glance at his cuffs assured him that his jumper seams were not on the outside, safely away from Phin’s skin (screaming loon-on-the-loose). That was a daft thing to do, it must be admitted, but he was too scratchy to tell without looking.

  After doing a deep breath, which was supposed to help somehow—it did not—Phin pushed the loo door open. The utter silence that greeted him should have been blissful. It was not. The empty van was a void into which Phin’s stupid, hopeful heart did plummeting. Jake had gone. Phin had never felt so alone, which was weird, when that should have been a wonderful thing. ‘Alone’ wasn’t like this, though. Alone was pottering about, as cosy as can be, but this…coshed Phin with an emotion so strange, he wasn’t sure what it was. Only ‘loss’ seemed similar, but that was a different sort of sadness. This sort was sucking the air out of his lungs. Suffocating him.

  Phin shoved the loo door shut with his back and slumped against it, scrunching his eyes tight shut. Then slid downwards, until he was curled as small as he could make himself and pressed his forehead to his bent knees. He never knew how long he stayed put, listening to what loneliness felt like. Long enough that his bum went numb.

  How Phin wished his mind would follow suit, but not even his bedtime tablets could perform that miracle. Maybe take those and try to go to sleep? He’d forgotten about them last night, so it wouldn’t count as snaffling an extra dose. Phin wasn’t tired, but he rarely was. Hence the need for the knockout drops, because staying awake for a week was ‘bad for him’. Going to bed was the bane of his life. Boring beyond belief (that might be a catchy turn of phrase but Phin sure as strewth-I’m-bloody-bored, believed it). He hated being still and doing nothing to dispel the scratchy. But this nothingness was much worse; he’d rather claw his own skin off than feel it.

  Phin knew he was being daft. He hadn’t lost Jack, who hadn’t been his to lose. Not even a friend, let alone a…lover? Boyfriend? Jake couldn’t even be classed as a one night stand; that would be an upgrade in the ranks of brief encounters. Theirs had been thong sized. Aptly enough, when it was as vividly scored into Phin’s memory as cheese-wire through Cheddar.

  It had been too good to be true. Full stop. Dreams never had a real-life-Phin to sabotage them. The sudden slash of self-loathing that did scything through Phin blitzed his brain with scarlet bile. Sosooostupid. Their teacups sat, as serene as can be, on the countertop, mocking him. A surge to his feet and swift sweep of an arm sent them crashing to the floor in a spatter of tea spray like dirty rain. Every bit as grubby—not good enough—as he’d always known. Wired all wrong, for all to see; as if Not Like You was tattooed on Phin’s forehead in fancy font. The gnawing need to smash everything in sight was scalding; a scorch so intense that a spot of spontaneous combustion should’ve saved Phin the satisfaction.

  All the hopes Phin should never have permitted shelf space, shattered. For the briefest, brightest of moments, there they’d glistened, unfathomably within reach. Destroyed in one hapless instant, as surely as the porcelain shards scattered underfoot. A glint of light glanced off a fragment shaped like a shark’s tooth, ensnaring his gaze. He bent to do plucking it off the floor, a jagged remnant of its former self. Phin knew he would keep it; a single treasure salvaged from the day his foxy friend came to stay, for a while, at least. ‘A while’ worth all the teacups in China.

  Phin closed his hand around it and held tight, lest he lose it, then slid back down the door. It wasn’t till he unfurled his fingers to examine his prize that Phin felt the icy burn. His fingers had been too numb to take any notice of the spiteful pain that scorched up his arm. He still couldn’t feel them, just the searing sting scored across all four, where their ‘bend here’ line used to be.

  Bummer, the ivory tooth was smeared scarlet, too. Phin’s palm felt squelchy with stickiness. It was tingling a shouty shade of tomato now, but nowhere else hurt. He didn’t even feel scratchy. His head was a bit whizzy, which felt preferable to having a hatchet buried in it. The burn itself felt…cleansing, which made sense in the funeral pyre scheme of things. Phin watched the blood do dripping down his forearm, decorating it with ruby trickles like candle wax melting down a wine bottle. The screeching soreness was wearing off a smidge, which was a bit rubbish, as he wouldn’t have that single pulse of pain to do focusing on.

  The scratchy was coming back too, clawing Phin’s arms and legs. A fire-ants-scurrying-under-the-skin sensation so intense he should be able to see them. It was driving him demented. One swift slash across his inner forearm, where the creepy-crawling was worst, might expunge a few infantries. Oops, that’s a tad wider than expected. The shark’s tooth was a smidge thicker than a blade. Ah well. Its scorch seemed to do warming Phin through as it radiated from the gash, gathering force, rather than subsiding. His brain felt as numb as his bum and fingers now, which was a plus, but he felt a bit squiffy, which was not. Phin hadn’t had a jot to drink. He definitely didn’t want to wake up two days running with a hangover after nary a hot toddy to make it worthwhile. P’raps he should take his tablets, then go and have a lie down. He was a bit dizzy, as if he’d been spinning on the spot to make the world go whizzy.

  Phin swallowed his pills with a slurp of water from the tap, then held his upturned arm under the flow. Drying blood felt as if your skin was shrinking, which was never a fun thought to trigger. Particularly before bed…which was where Phin should comport himself, before his nook took on the look of a rook’s nest. Or was it a crow’s? The lookout bucket at the very top of a ship’s mast to scan the horizon for scurvy dogs. That would do—it didn’t rhyme though—so the rook would just have to claim squatter’s rights. Like a cuckoo. Oops…Phin had an aviary already.

  His head was getting a bit out of hand. Flopping down before he fell over would be a cunning plan indeed, he decided. Phin felt almost euphoric with relief when he snuggled under the duvet and did dragging it over his head. He loved the dark—far more than any particular season—night was his favourite time of day. It made Phin feel safe. Even the bittersweet tang of tears felt comforting in his cosy cave under the covers…

  ∞∞∞

  Urgh… When Phin peered above the duvet, he really wished he hadn’t. Ouch. His head hurt…and his eyes were sore. And his arm. Fingers. His toes seemed okay, which was not to be sniffed at when they tended to bear the brunt of most mishaps. Phin needed a pee something chronic, so he’d have to do dragging his arse out of bed. Dammit. He also needed to buy loo roll, he remembered—which Phin had not—yesterday. That meant people. Double dammit. He didn’t want to see anyone at all. Too beset by a stroppy ‘if I can’t see Jack, I don’t want to see anyone ever again, so there’, sort of mood.

  Phin did squinting at the angry slash on his arm, which was a bit puffy ‘n’ purple. It wasn’t bleeding any more, but the duvet looked as if it had been tie-dyed in rusty water. After blowing out a huge huff, Phin threw back the covers and scrambled around to do lowering himself to the floor. Pee ’n’ tea. Then what? Quite why he asked himself this, when he knew damn well that he’d be off to the moors later, Phin knew not. It wasn’t as if he had the luxury of choice.

  Believing otherwise was fruitloop delusion more excessive than conjuring up furry friends with eyes that blazed azure…

  16. Ja/ck

  It was with utmost gratitude that Jake grabbed his jacket off its hook. His shift had seemed endless. He’d twitched his way through it, antsy and distracted by an internal pacing too relentless to ignore. The slivers of patience Jake could lay claim to had been whittled away to naught and his now nerves were frazzled to fuck.

  After fleeing from the campervan Jake had let Jack have his head—literally—it had been a relief to hand the reins over. Take a back seat, become a mere passenger to his instincts. Let Jack indulge in pure and simple pleasures, guilt-free and glad to be alive. Gone was the gut-wrenching grief of what-might-have-been, the gnawin
g knowledge that Jake had hurt the least-deserving lover he’d never had.

  Flinging himself into the wind, Jack flew with the fur ruffling breeze, without a care in the world. Except for catching a whiff of rabbit before the heavens opened. Nevertheless, Jake was glad when it started hammering down a few hours later, which lessened their chances of being spotted on the way home. The winding lanes were either flanked by trees or bordered by high hedgerows, safe from streetlights and random passers-by. His cottage backed onto woods, which made the risk of being observed minimal. There was a spare door key secreted in the rockery, and Jake kept an emergency stash of clothes in the shed, for such unforeseen incidents. One naked stroll was quite enough for the foreseeable.

  Jake had not spent the time before his shift sulking. No, not at all. He’d been practicing his guitar, having a shower and tidying up. Useful things. Keeping himself busy until he went to work.

  He had managed four hours without biting anyone’s head off, just about, and now…freedom beckoned. It was nearing half-eleven and the moon was high in the sky, casting its ghostly glow over their labyrinth lanes home. The night was young, and the jackal was eager to be unleashed upon it. Much to the mutt’s chagrin, Jake had laid down the law. No midnight excursions, we can’t risk heading to the moors. Not tonight.