Lust Or No Harm Done Read Free Page A

said, mildly surprised. 'Don't you want to fuck me?'
    Michael said, 'No. I don't.'
    The guard covered his smile with an index finger.
    Tony looked bruised. 'You do,' he insisted.
    Michael began to talk for the benefit of the guard. 'I'm sorry if you got that idea. Look, you're in a bit of a state. My advice is to try to get back home and sort yourself out.'
    The guard suddenly trooped forward, his smile broadening to a leer. 'Bit off a bit more than we can chew, did we, sir?'
    'I think he's on something and he's been following me,' said Michael.
    'Must be your lucky day,' said the guard. He began to hustle Tony back from the barriers. 'Come on, let the Professor be. He probably can't afford you anyway.' The guard had the cheek to turn and grin at Michael like he'd said something funny.
    'He's not well,' said Michael. Gosh, did he dislike that guard. But he needed him. The guard herded Tony back towards the lifts. Michael saw Tony look at him, with a suddenly stricken face. It was that panic that frightened Michael more than anything else. The panic meant that Tony needed Michael. For what? Something was out of whack.
    Michael fled. He turned and walked as quickly as he could, away. He doesn't know where I live, Michael thought, relieved. If I get away, I find another gym, and that's the end of it. Michael's stomach was shuddering as if he had run out of petrol. The tip of his penis was wet.
    It had been raining, and the pavements were glossy like satin. A woman bearing four heavy bags from Tesco was looking at her boots; Michael scurried to make the lights and bashed into the bags, spinning them around in her grasp.
    There was a shout from behind him. 'Oi!'
    Michael spun around, and saw the Cherub sprinting towards him. Michael knew, from the way his athlete's stride suspended him in mid-air, that Tony had jumped the barriers.
    Michael backed away, raising his arms against attack, terror bubbling up like yeast.
    Keep away from me! Get back, go away!
    And the street was empty. Tony was gone.
    Michael blinked and looked around him, up and down the pavement. When he looked back, he saw the guard hobbling towards him, pressing a handkerchief to his face. He'd been hit.
    'Where did he go?' the guard shouted at Michael, strands of spit between his lips. 'Where the fuck did he go?'
    'I don't know!'
    'Bastard!'
    Michael tried to look at the guard's lip.
    The guard ducked away from Michael's tender touch. He demanded, snarling, 'What's his name, where's he from?'
    Michael did not even have to think. 'I've no idea. He just followed me.'
    'Oh yeah. Just followed you, did he? If I press charges, mate, you'll bloody well have to remember.'
    The guard pulled the handkerchief away and looked as if expecting to see something. He blinked. The handkerchief was clean, white and spotless.
    This seemed to mollify him. 'You better watch the kind of person you pick up, mate.'
    Then the guard turned and proudly, plumply, walked away. For all your arrogance, Michael thought, in five years' time you'll be bald and fat-arsed.
    Michael stood in the rain for a few moments, catching his breath. What, he thought, was that all about? Finally he turned and walked up Chenies Street, mostly because he had no place else to go, and he began to cry, from a mix of fear, frustration, boredom. Christ! All he did was go to the sauna. He didn't need this, he really didn't. He looked up at the yellow London sky. There were no stars overhead, just light pollution, a million lamps drowning out signals from alien intelligences.
    Michael lived in what estate agents called a mansion block: an old apartment house. It was covered in scaffolding, being repaired. He looked up at his flat and saw that no lights were on. Phil wasn't there again. So it would be round to Gigs again for a takeaway kebab and an evening alone. Involuntarily, Michael saw Tony's naked thighs, the ridges of muscle.
    He clunked his keys into the front door of his flat. The door was heavy and fireproofed