Lauchlan loathed the thought of returning to work from the moment he had gotten out of bed that morning; the morning after the morning after he had woken up in another man’s bed and had all but signed his dignity away.

The debt he could live with, as long as he didn’t think about it, but the thought that other people might know what he had done terrified him. Cabbies were not known for their respect of anyone else’s private affairs, so much so that sometimes Lauchlan wondered if he worked with a bunch of fishwives instead of grown men. If they knew, he could only imagine what he would be in for when he entered the gates. Hell, he was half expecting to be stoned to death on the spot. But even if they didn’t know about his drunken misadventure, Corbin could return at any time to settle their debt and Lauchlan had no doubt that word would get out to his colleagues when it was settled, if they didn’t witness it firsthand. Lauchlan shuddered at the very thought of the humiliation and prayed that it never came to that, but with his luck, it probably would.

Lauchlan had braced himself for the actual act of copulation. It had been the only thing on his mind ever since he’d made the blasted promise, and he convinced himself that it was something he might be able to tolerate. He had thought of just shutting his eye and imagining Ida in Corbin’s place but he scrapped the idea after only a moment of entertaining it. There was no way on earth that he would be able to keep thoughts of sweet, innocent Ida in his mind while he was anywhere within a ten foot radius of Corbin. The image of Corbin’s battered body splayed out before him drowned out the thoughts even now. Never mind that the physical sensations of actually doing… that with another man would make thinking of anything feminine a nearly impossible task.

Since sodomy had been legalized almost a decade ago, Lauchlan assumed that the act mustn’t be so bad. People did so it voluntarily after all. But legal or not, most people didn’t think too much of those who chose to do it. People had even been murdered for making that choice and Lauchlan really, really liked being alive. Somehow he didn’t think that “I was drunk and I promised,” would be a good enough excuse to get him off the hook, unlike other more conventional drunken mistakes which inevitably ended in marriage. But did it even count if he had almost no recollection of the deed? If anything it added a layer of plausible deniability to the counter argument that he was planning as he arrived at his post after a day and night of fruitless fretting.

His employers were the prestigious Brett and Burke Cab Company, which was one of the most famous and efficient companies in the city and by far the favourite means of transportation for anyone who lacked their own way of getting about. It was rivalled only by the public horse tram service which was hindered only by the mire of bureaucracy. B&B owned more than a thousand horses and more than seven hundred hansom cabs as well as many other miscellaneous vehicles such as luggage transports, armoured wagons and wedding carriages that where hired out for reasonable fees.

It was Lauchlan’s job to care for the horses belonging to the company, not all one thousand though, just sixty of the beasts that were housed in one of B&Bs many stables. The local populace needed the cabs’ services daily, as the housing in the local neighbourhood was far too short on space for families to own their own horses and traps.

The people affectionately called the stable, The Beehive, due to the constant buzz of activity and the to-ing and fro-ing of the cabbies. Lauchlan thought that it was a very apt description for the place, because the throng of activity seldom ever lulled. In fact, it was Lauchlan’s job as stable master to ensure that the activity never lulled unless it was strictly necessary.

The mornings were always the busiest time of the day for Lauchlan and he had to set aside his argument plans in order to focus on what he considered the most important task of the day. He arrived at the beehive at precisely five thirty each morning. By that time, the swarm of stable boys employed by B&B had already started feeding the horses and preparing the many hansom cabs for the day, a much more demanding task than is often assumed. Each cab had be cleaned and checked over for damage before it could set out for the day, each driver was responsible for his own cab and had to pay for repairs out of pocket on top of the loss of wages, despite the fact that the hansoms were owned by B&B.

With a legion of stable boys performing much of the work typically assigned to the stable master, such as the cleaning and feeding it would be simple to assume that Lauchlan would have very little to do, but it was quite the opposite. Lauchlan was responsible not just for the horses but for the stable boys as well, he had to oversee everything that they did, making sure that their work was finished to good standard and on time as well as their hiring, firing and payment, putting stewardship duties on top of all the standard tasks. He also had to decide which horse would be paired with which driver and cab, after more than ten years of working for B&B he had come to know each horse by its name and its nature which was vital in making the right decision at a moment’s notice, otherwise the whole day could be slowed down and that did not please the higher ups.

It was also Lauchlan’s job to make sure that the schedule of the day was upheld. The schedule made B&B more efficient than its contemporaries and surprisingly humanitarian as a sort of happy by-product. But it was frustratingly difficult to maintain.

Every four hours or so, a driver would return to the beehive. There he would drop off his horse and Lauchlan would assign him a new horse from the stables while the driver cashed his earnings in the company safe. This way the horse that was previously working would be allowed an hour or so to eat and rest before it had to replace another horse, and the driver would be safer in the case of a robbery. There was one fatal flaw with the schedule, however. There were more cabs and horses working the streets then there were horses resting in reserve, so the cabs had to come and go in small waves. The “just one last trip” mentality of many of the drivers meant that they rarely arrived when they were supposed to. Keeping tabs on which horse had been working for how long and how much rest they had gotten and which drivers were going on which routes and so on and so forth was a royal pain in the neck that was confusing enough and frustrating enough to drive Lauchlan round the bend on more than one occasion. It was lucky that Lauchlan had a good head for numbers, otherwise the cursed schedule would have fallen apart years ago, and with it Lauchlan’s job.

Lauchlan had enough time to inspect the last horse, a surly Clydesdale named Byron, being hitched up to his hansom just before their drivers began pouring into the beehive just before six a.m. ready for work. Lauchlan didn’t know the drivers the same way that he knew their horses. It wasn’t as if he even had the opportunity to know them in quite the same way, they never seemed to want to know him. As a rule, the stable master would choose an apprentice from the stable boys who already worked for B&B, who were a very closely knit group. They usually came from the poorer classes and as such the position was much coveted for its higher pay and respect it garnered. To put it simply, it was a ticket out of the slums for the one boy who was lucky enough to grasp it. But Lauchlan had inadvertently flouted the age old tradition, and denied the boys of their dreams.

He had been sixteen when he had come to the beehive looking for a job, and sixteen was far too old to be a suitable stable boy. B&B always recruited their boys young, as soon as they were old enough to wield a shovel. It was the cheapest form of labour to be had. With the number of boys that the place needed to function, the labour had to be as cheap as possible to make the business worthwhile. At the time, Lauchlan had been so desperate for work that he was ready to try just about anything, even if it meant working for the pittance that was a child’s wage.

The old stable master, Percival, had seemed to understand just how desperate Lauchlan had been, so he had hired him, expecting him to give up and seek greener pastures when he discovered the confusing schedule and the exhausting shifts he would have to work. But Lauchlan did not give up. Within a week, he had a strong grasp on the schedule when even the other boys who had worked there for years didn’t. Percival had been so impressed that he had decided to replace the apprentice boy he had had in mind with Lauchlan after only a few short weeks, an act of generosity for which Lauchlan would forever be thankful for.

It won only spite from his peers, however. In their minds, he was an interloper who had stolen from one of their own, and many of the boys remained hateful and insubordinate towards Lauchlan to this very day. The fact that the boy who Lauchlan had replaced and almost all of his cohorts had moved on from B&B long ago didn’t seem to matter to the new boys at all, and that animosity seemed to have spread to some of the younger cabbies as well. Lauchlan was not a well-liked man, but he had never been very adept at socialization anyway so he did his best to make do and tried not to let the hurtful words and spiteful looks that came from the other employees bother him. It was the only way he could move on with his life.

Lauchlan was mentally ticking off each driver as they arrived and claimed their hansoms, and to his immense relief none of them seemed to pay him any attention, or at least no more than usual. It was a very good sign, and with each driver who passed out of the gates without a comment, a sneer or even an odd look in his direction, Lauchlan’s spirits lifted. For a few minutes, he dared to hope that just maybe his misadventure had gone unnoticed after all.

His spirits dived when Jasper arrived and seemed to be making a beeline towards him with his cab. Lauchlan’s heart started to race as he franticly combed though what little he could remember of the evening before, searching for anything; anything that he could use to explain away what happened, but he couldn’t remember anything from the night spent at the tavern except that it was Jasper who had convinced him to go to the tavern; Jasper who had kept on buying him drinks when he knew that Lauchlan couldn’t hold his liquor half as well as a man his size should have and it had was Jasper who had also assured him that nothing would go wrong, that they would all have a good time.

Lauchlan didn’t know about Jasper, but unless screwing a man till he bled and then becoming sexually indentured to that same man was considered “a good time” then no, Lauchlan certainly hadn’t had a good time at all. Despite Jasper’s assurances that he would keep an eye on him (statement followed by a nudge to his ribs and the supposedly ‘funny’ remark that he needed the extra one) he had still managed to get himself so drunk that he had ended up in Coalford and in another man’s bed to boot. In fact, now that he thought about it, it was entirely likely that Jasper had a hand in the whole affair.

Lauchlan could remember Jasper insisting that he loosen up and have a bit of fun, all while shoving drinks into his hands, or at least he thought it was Jasper. His memories were hazy at best. Only Jasper knew how easily he was intoxicated and Lauchlan didn’t know anyone else he would be willing to drink with. Except for that man at the bar who Jasper and his friends had insisted he try to outdrink, a challenge he could recall failing miserably. Lauchlan felt his stomach churn nervously as Jasper sidled up beside him with that smug smirk on his face, the same smirk that he wore out to poker games. Lauchlan began to sweat profusely under his coat. Jasper was always too sharp for his own good so there was little doubt in Lauchlan’s mind that his friend had something to do with his misadventure, the only question being what he intended to do with that knowledge.

“Lauchlan! That was one good night out huh? I wish that the boss would decide to get married more often, then we could have every weekend off!” said Jasper, his voice chipper and a smile splitting his freckled face.

“I wouldn’t remember,” mumbled Lauchlan, casting his eye to the ground as he desperately tried to flesh out his half-composed defences.

“Wow, I knew you were drunk but really?”

Lauchlan felt a rush of déjà vu and his affronted frown was more than enough of an answer

“Jeeze sorry, heh, I guess you drank a bit more than either of us thought,” Jasper chuckled and slapped his arm playfully.

Lauchlan scowled, there was nothing funny about memory loss that he could see, so the only reason that he was laughing had to be that there was something else funny here. Lauchlan’s heart sank to hide in his stomach.

“You promised me that you wouldn’t let me do anything I would regret!” Lauchlan snapped.

“Yeah and nothing happened did it?”

Lauchlan’s whole body went slack with relief, but he frowned as he studied Jasper’s face. It didn’t look like he was lying, but he had the best poker face in town and he had used it to separate all the cabbies from their money on more than one occasion.

“Oh, wait you’re kidding?” exclaimed Jasper as he misinterpreted Lauchlan’s frown. “I kept an eye on you all night, nothing could have happened!”

Lauchlan’s expression quirked into hopeful disbelief as Jasper fumbled to comb his memory of the night at the bar. Had he really not seen anything? The thought was too good to be true, but that didn’t stop Lauchlan from desperately hoping.

Jasper frowned, and comprehension eventually dawned on his face

“Wait, I remember! I was talking to that woman, now what was her name? Gabriel? Gazelle? Grace? I don’t know it had a G and you… you were at the bar! I think,” said Jasper, tapping a finger against his chin, as was his habit when he was thinking. “You weren’t the only one there but the barkeep was busy trying to deal with a drunk who had no money, so I didn’t think anything would go wrong. It was pretty late by then and you were so out of it that you looked ready to fall asleep on the bar stool. I guess I must have gotten carried away taking to G and forgotten to check up on you again. Wait! I never saw you go home did I? I’m sorry about that,” he said as he rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. Lauchlan felt like jumping for joy.

“So, what happened anyway?” asked Jasper his brow pinched with curiosity, and Lauchlan gulped.

“I told you I can’t remember!” said Lauchlan as he desperately searched for a better story. He was not going to talk about what really happened, not even to Jasper, especially not with Jasper.

“Well did you get home alright at least?” asked Jasper innocently, but the friendly question was the last thing that Lauchlan wanted to hear. He scrambled for an excuse, any excuse to get Jasper off his back as quickly as possible.

“We don’t have time to talk about this now, you have to get going!” said Lauchlan, the words tripping over themselves as he spat out the hastily formed sentence. He could tell by the moment he said it that Jasper didn’t buy it, but Lauchlan was saved by the clanging of the local church tower announcing that it was now six o’ clock; the time that Jasper was supposed to be gone.

“Fair enough. But I want details when work’s over, alright?” said Jasper. He slapped Lauchlan’s shoulder in his customary farewell before heading back to his waiting hansom.

Lauchlan watched tensely as Jasper ordered his horse into a walk, and steered it out of the gate, forcing himself to act naturally as he answered Jasper’s mock salute with a small wave as he headed out the front gates. That had been too close. He sighed as he wiped the nervous sweat from his brow with the back of his gloved hand. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Jasper, hell, the man was the best friend he had now that his mentor Percival was gone, but that only added to the need for secrecy. Lauchlan still couldn’t imagine that many people found the idea of a man doing the things that he had done to Corbin acceptable and if he ended up taking rap for his actions then it would be just like Jasper to get himself caught in the proverbial crossfire. Lauchlan didn’t think would be able to stand having that on his conscience on top of what he had done to Corbin.

Lauchlan spurred himself back into his work. By the time the day was over, Lauchlan was mentally and physically drained. The anxiety of knowing that Corbin would literally turn up whenever he felt like it had Lauchlan jumping at shadows before he would berate himself and throw himself back into work. The constant need to refocus and redouble his efforts to make up for lost time was taxing and he was falling asleep on his feet by the time Jasper returned for his ‘details’ giving Lauchlan the perfect excuse to escape the conversation.

Jasper made him promise to tell him what had made him so upset in the next morning. But he didn’t talk to Jasper the next day, or the day after. Every time Jasper started to ask questions about that night, Lauchlan managed to worm his way out of conversation and plummet back into his work, using it like a shield, but Jasper clued in and each time he became more demanding, asked more questions and looked right through Lauchlan’s excuses and stories almost as if they were made from glass, but he never did pry the truth out of him. Instead he would just give Lauchlan this concerned little frown, look him in the eye and ask,

“Are you sure that’s right?”

Of course Lauchlan would lie through his teeth and say yes, making Jasper’s frown deepen so much that he was sure that he would end up giving the young man wrinkles. Lauchlan felt horrible for treating his friend that way but he couldn’t risk telling him, not when Corbin could turn up at any minute to claim his dues and out his shameful indiscretion to all their colleagues, and especially not when what was promising to be a long harsh winter was sitting on their doorsteps. Lauchlan consoled himself with the promise that he would tell Jasper about it after he and Corbin had settled their ‘debt’, providing that Lauchlan managed to survive the whole ordeal undiscovered. It was a cold comfort, but it was all that he had.

Thankfully, his work consumed even more of his time than it usually did with the preparations for the coming winter season under his supervision. Making busy drove off his anxiety as much as it drove him to exhaustion. As weeks past with no sign of Corbin showing his face at work or at home Lauchlan was becoming increasingly convinced that he wouldn’t come at all. It was entirely possible that he had just been playing with him or better still, that he didn’t know how to contact him, despite his claims.

As autumn gave way to winter, he was almost inclined to believe it.

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GAH! It’s been so long! Did you miss me? I sure missed you AFF! So I’m back at long last I can’t say how sorry I am to have abandoned you as well as my poor little story for all these long months. Basically the HSC, a series of strenuous exams which make up half of your higher school certificate mark and decide your ATAR, ate up a few months of my life and once I had recovered from that I found that my beta had cut and run. I got one email saying that he would have this chapter ready before Christmas and then fwoosh, he was gone. Thankfully a kind person stepped up to beta for me instead, though they asked not to be credited. I have no idea why they would want that, they’re awesome. You know who you are, you awesome person you.

So yeah this is the first instalment of a massive 30000 word backlog of writing that was done over the Christmas break and I’ll be posting it as soon as it’s edited. This chapter is a bit gimpy compared to the rest but not without good reason. It was originally part of a 10 000 word chapter which has been giving me no end of trouble for the past few months. I just think of this as chapter 2A, and chapter 2B is when things start getting interesting so stick around, 2B should be ready in a matter of weeks instead of months this time.

For all you forum goers out there, I have created a review reply thread here and a promotion thread here. I’ll be using the reply thread to respond to and thank all of my reviewers and I’ll be using the promotion thread to announce the release of new chapters. Please feel free to check them out and thank you so much for reading!