Prologue

Joe could feel the music inside him, like a second heartbeat. He leant against the damp wall of the hallway in the house, feeling the thud of the speakers all the way through him, reverberating up from the wooden floorboards, pulsing against his spine as the beat came up through the walls. If he had been in a normal frame of mind – if he had been sober – he might have spared a thought for the neighbours; how they would be hating the noise and the shouts and the mess that was gradually accumulating. But he was very much not sober. He’d drunk wine, and cider, and vodka – so far – this evening. The only reason he wasn’t staggering was the equal quantities of amphetamines he’d also ingested were acting as some sort of balance. Joe shook his head, blinking. The beat from the speakers in the living room thudded through his head.

He needed some fresh air. The party had reached that bleary stage. Those who had found someone were already occupied, and those who hadn’t were starting to get that look; desperate but not yet desperate enough to leave. There was still hope. Some more drugs, some more booze, and who knew what might happen?

Joe stumbled along the hallway, heading for the kitchen. He’d been to this house just once before, when a boyfriend had invited him along to another party. Memories of that party were what had drawn him back this time, despite that little voice in his head that told him he was too old for this scene anymore. He was too old for the hungry young crowd that flocked here after the nearest gay club closed. Joe caught sight of himself in an uncurtained window as he went past it and flinched. His face, a ghostly grey against the blackness of the night outside the window, looked far older than his forty years. I’m forty, he thought incredulously, as he lurched through the kitchen, too bright after the dimness of the hallway. Forty. How had that happened? He remembered his twenty-year-old self, going up to London, starting at drama school. I was supposed to be famous by now. He fumbled at the handle of the back door. Two men – boys, really, they couldn’t be more than nineteen or so – looked up from the kitchen table where they were industriously hoovering up lines of cocaine. Joe thought briefly for a moment of asking to join them and then thought better of it. He thought he could see a faint flicker of disgust in their faces as they watched him try to get the back door open. He was starting to feel very sick.

Eventually the door yielded and Joe almost fell outside, stumbling down the two brick steps to the patio that made up the majority of the back garden. Whose house was this, anyway? The boyfriend who had invited Joe here once before was long gone by now. He’d only been a flash in the pan, anyway. That was all that Joe seemed to get, nowadays. Nobody wanted him for anything more than a one-nighter. Almost weeping with self-pity, he staggered towards the bushes at the back of the garden and vomited, bending over from the waist and almost falling before putting one hand out to stop himself.

“Steady,” said a voice behind him and then a hand was on his arm, making sure he was stable again.

Joe choked and spat, aware that his legs were trembling beneath him. What am I doing here? What am I hoping for? He kept his head down for a moment, wiping the tears from his face with shaking fingers.

“You all right?” The voice was a man’s – there were no women here – and it was a nice voice, deep and calm.

Joe said nothing for a moment, gathering himself. He felt physically better after vomiting, but inside there was still that awful sense of bleak emptiness, the feeling that life was just slipping on by, leaving him flailing in its wake.

“I’m okay,” he said after a moment, his voice hoarse.

By now he had straightened up and for the first time he saw his companion. A man of about his own age, quite tall and broad-shouldered, but not good-looking. Joe took in the pockmarked skin of the cheeks and the dirty blonde hair with a little twinge of disappointment, but after a moment, he realised the man was smiling at him and that made him a little more attractive.

“Had a bit too much?” asked the man, his tone sympathetic.

Joe nodded, starting to smile himself. Okay, so the guy wasn’t hot, but he wasn’t that bad, either. Perhaps this could be the start of something… Beggars can’t be choosers, he told himself gloomily.

“Always,” he said, trying for the cheeky grin that always used to work.

Perhaps something of it still remained. The other man eyed him for a moment, the sympathy in his gaze ebbing and something more speculative replacing it. “You here on your own?”

“Yeah,” said Joe. “All dressed up and nowhere to go.”

The man smiled. “I’ve got somewhere we can go.”

All right… Joe was conscious of a twinge of excitement as the man led him out of scrubby little garden and through a gap in the fence at the bottom of the courtyard. It was overgrown with brambles and uncut shrubbery and Joe cursed as a thorn caught him on the arm. He was wearing a T-shirt and only then became aware of the chill of the night air as it enclosed him, chilling the sweat on his face.

“Where we going?” he asked.

“Just through here. You’ll like it.”

The guy’s voice had changed. Before, it had been one of the more attractive things about him, soft and deep. Now, it was thinning, becoming higher. With excitement? Joe, despite all the booze and drugs and general despair, felt a pull in his groin. Who cared what the guy looked like in the dark, after all? An ancient saying came into his mind. In the dark, all cats are grey.

Faint memories came back to him; of being on the heath in Wallington with some guy and they’d just been getting down to it when the police moved in. He’d never been sure, even now, as to whether he’d been set up or not. Surely the police, even back then – how many years ago was it? – weren’t that bothered about busting queers in the parkland? That was how he’d met an old boyfriend of his, actually a copper, one of the ones who’d been kind to him at the station. Joe had gone back in a few days later to thank him and apologise, and something had sparked between them. Joe hadn’t thought of him in years, really. Funny, really, considering how devastated he’d been when they’d broken up. Mark. Wonder what he’s up to now, Joe thought and then forgot him again.

He pushed aside the last branch and stumbled out into open ground. He stopped dead, staring blearily about him. What the hell was this? As if on cue, the moonlight flooded the scene before it, glimmering off the old stones and ragged grass, the shadow shapes of the gravestones mere black and white boxes.

“This a graveyard?” he asked the night air, because for a moment, the guy he’d been following had disappeared. Stupid question. Of course it was a graveyard. Distantly, through the darkness, Joe could see the misty shape of the church, its bell tower faintly outlined against the star-spangled night sky.

He shivered, again conscious of the cold night breeze. A little spark of sobriety seemed to ignite inside him, and he thought to himself, What I am doing here? Why don’t I just go home?

Before he could act on the impulse, he saw the guy up ahead, fumbling with something on the ground that was hidden from view by a gravestone. Unsure of what to do, half wanting to stay, half wanting to go, Joe shifted from foot to foot, watching the other man walk back towards him. He had something in his hand, something like a glass or a cup. Joe blinked.

“Here, drink this.” The voice of the other man was deep again, commanding. Joe obediently reached out a hand, giving up any thought of leaving. He felt oddly dreamlike, as if he were watching himself from afar.

The glass – it was a glass, something more like a goblet – was black, the rim of its bowl encrusted with something that sparkled dully in the moonlight. Jo could hear the faint fizz of the contents and was again aware of the silence that surrounded them. Even the thud of the music from the house seemed muted.

“What is it?” he asked, not much caring. He was beginning to feel the need for another drink, another stimulant. Either that or he was going to sink down here onto the wet grass and go to sleep for the night.

“Champagne.”

That raised Joe’s eyebrows. Not saying anything, he lifted the goblet and drank deeply, swilling the contents down in three large gulps. “Nice,” he gasped. It was a lie; it tasted grim, but it was alcohol.

“Have some more.”

There was the tinkle of a bottle on the edge of the goblet. Joe watched as the man filled it up again from what looked like a hip flask.

“Why don’t you come over here?” suggested his companion, leading him further into the graveyard, deeper into the shadows. The distant bass of the music receded even further. Joe stumbled and fell to his knees, the glass goblet flying from his hand to land, intact, in the damp grass.

“Whoops,” he said, slurring. His mouth was beginning to feel strange, as if it had been coated with a fine layer of anaesthetic gel. It was difficult to form the word. His whole body seemed to be slowing down. Joe, helpless, fell forward, feeling the tickle of wet grass on his face.

He felt so peaceful that he could have lain there quite happily, but he could – just about – feel a pressure on his shoulder and a moment later, his body was rolled over so that he was lying on his back. Joe stared upwards at the night sky. The stars twinkled, remote and beautiful.

Joe was dimly aware of the face of the man moving into his line of sight and of the hungry, intent stare the man was giving him. But he felt too tired, too damn sleepy, to be alarmed, even at the sight of the knife and, a moment later, a flash of pain in his neck and the sense of warmth against the cold skin of his throat. The man’s head disappeared from Joe’s view and, a moment later, he could feel the brush of something at his jawline, a mouth on his neck, perhaps, but he was long past being able to do anything about it. It was too late. Perhaps it had always been too late. All Joe could do was stare up at the darkening sky above him, watching the faint white glimmer of the stars wink out, one by one.