The Beginning (Starting Over) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Books by Matthew J. Metzger

  Title Page

  Legal Page

  Book Description

  Trademark Acknowledgements

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

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  About the Author

  Pride Publishing books by Matthew J. Metzger

  Single Books

  Best Behaviour

  Enough

  Starting Over

  The Divorce

  The Other Man

  The Wedding

  The Third Date

  Starting Over

  THE BEGINNING

  MATTHEW J. METZGER

  The Beginning

  ISBN # 978-1-83943-082-4

  ©Copyright Matthew J. Metzger 2020

  Cover Art by Erin Dameron-Hill ©Copyright November 2020

  Interior text design by Claire Siemaszkiewicz

  Pride Publishing

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Pride Publishing.

  Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Pride Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

  The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

  Published in 2020 by Pride Publishing, United Kingdom.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the authors’ rights. Purchase only authorised copies.

  Pride Publishing is an imprint of Totally Entwined Group Limited.

  If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book”.

  Book five in the Starting Over series

  Is this the end of the road, or the start of a whole new journey?

  Aled’s had enough. His family is hundreds of miles away from him, his job is pointless and the feeling that he’s missing out on his own life has grown too big. But how can he call time on Yorkshire when it’s the place that Gabriel calls home?

  Chris doesn’t know what to do. Inheriting property in the childhood village where he felt such a freak growing up wasn’t what he wanted, and he didn’t expect to miss Aled and Gabriel as much as he has since returning to Somerset. He’s out of place yet again, but doesn’t know where to call home.

  When Aled is offered a job in Cornwall, Gabriel senses an opportunity to fix Aled’s misery, shed Chris’ unhappy history and bring their entire relationship under one roof. It will be the biggest gamble Gabriel’s ever taken on them…but this time, it doesn’t feel like taking a risk.

  They’re starting over at the beginning, and there’s nothing left to fear.

  Trademark Acknowledgements

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Airplane!: Paramount Pictures Corporation

  Audi: Audi AG

  B&Q: B&Q PLC

  Coke: The Coca Cola Company

  Ford Focus: Ford Motor Company

  Grindr: Grindr LLC

  Homes Under the Hammer: Lion Television; All3Media

  IKEA: INTER-IKEA SYSTEMS B.V.

  Instagram: Instagram, LLC

  Jacuzzi: Jacuzzi, Inc.

  Pepsi: Pepsico, Inc.

  Range Rover: Jaguar Land Rover Limited

  Sky: Sky Limited

  Skype: Microsoft Corporation

  Sprinter: Daimler AG

  Transit: Ford Motor Company

  Chapter One

  His car was the only one left.

  Aled sighed as he collapsed into the driver’s seat. The rest of the car park was devoid of life, with not even the rats feeling sociable now. A lonely light flickered above the exit. When he turned the key in the ignition, the dull echo bounced off the concrete walls and punched him in the ears.

  Rather than head home, Aled sat back and finally took his personal phone out of his pocket. More than twelve hours after he’d arrived at the office, he finally had a moment to scroll through his messages. A reminder about his dentist appointment next week. One advert from Sky. A voicemail from a withheld number that could definitely wait. And a flurry from his partner, waiting at home, and his best friend, waiting in St Ives.

  Gabriel: Cannelloni for dinner, y/n?

  Suze: GUESS WHAT!

  Tom: Big news pal!!!

  Gabriel: Suze just called. I’ll start packing for you too ;) See you later xxx

  Gabriel: Cannelloni is a no btw, the meat’s gone off :(

  Suze: Call me! Call me call me call me call me!

  Suze: Fine, be busy.

  Suze: Euan’s getting a baby sister!

  Suze: You’re going to be an uncle again!

  Aled closed his eyes as a jolt of pain burst through his chest. He should be thrilled. Should call her at once. Call her bloody mad for getting pregnant again so quickly after having Euan.

  But the only thing that occurred to him was that he’d missed it all.

  He’d spent almost thirteen hours at work today. Eleven of them had been wasted in pointless meetings at which nothing was decided. His lunch break had been sacrificed to firefighting about a major campaign that was in danger of going belly-up. And the final hour had been spent interviewing the last candidate for the senior account manager’s vacancy. Absolutely none of it had been work. Or even worthwhile.

  Meanwhile, his best friend had baby news and his partner had been making dinner and packing their cases for their weekend trip to Cornwall. Life had been moving without him. While he’d been talking campaign management, they’d been living.

  Why?

  Aled dropped the phone on the passenger seat and put the car in gear. He felt—low. Flat. The weekend holiday was overdue already, but he had the glum feeling that he wouldn’t feel any better when he came back on Tuesday.

  What the hell was he doing it all for?

  Aled had never pretended to have a job that performed some greater good. He was a marketing executive. He’d worked for the same firm since he’d left university, almost seventeen years ago. He had a fat salary and a nice company car, and he
did it so he could afford a nice house in a decent area and not have to worry about money. And given that Gabriel barely made more than minimum wage and had only been working part-time since his accident last year, the household finances rested mainly on Aled.

  He couldn’t afford to walk away, yet as he cruised the dark streets, weaving around taxis and early evening revellers, Aled wondered if he could really afford to stay much longer.

  Once upon a time, he’d enjoyed working for the firm. When he’d been a drone with a cubicle, and his best friend Suze had worked in accounting on the next floor down. When he’d been able to go to Christmas parties and leaving dos without being eyed warily from the sidelines and dealing with suck-ups at the bar. He’d gone to work with his best friend and pseudo-sister, and his days had consisted of slagging off incompetence and making bets on when the estates manager would finally snap. They’d bitched over Skype at work, met up for a bitch in person at lunch, then again at the end of the day.

  Then he’d been promoted a few times and Suze had left to get married and start a family down south, and—

  Aled squeezed the steering wheel.

  And he’d started to feel flat.

  He reached out for the stereo system and brought up the speed dial, hitting Gabriel’s number. It was second, preceded only by Suze’s. Gabriel had mockingly told him off for it once, and Aled had retorted that it was usually dangerous to talk to Gabriel and drive at the same time. But sexy games weren’t on his mind. Gabriel was only half an hour away, yet Aled had a fierce need to hear him sooner than that.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey. It’s me. I got out of work at last.”

  “Finally!” Something clanged in the background. “Sorry. I’m packing snacks for the car. Did you get Suze’s news?”

  “Yeah.”

  “She was suggesting we go down tonight so you have all of Saturday to help them celebrate, and I’ve packed for that but you’ve had a long day, so—”

  It would be sensible to wait until the morning, but Aled selfishly wanted as much time as possible. He could check into the hotel at any time. And Gabriel was spending the weekend with one of his other boyfriends near Bristol, who wouldn’t much care when they swung by.

  “You can keep me awake until Bristol,” he said. “If I’m knackered by then, I’ll crash on Chris’ sofa.”

  “Okay,” Gabriel said. “Are you all right? You sound—”

  Aled winced.

  “—kind of flat. Are you sure everything’s okay?”

  “Yeah. Just work. Long day.”

  “Need something to take your mind off it?”

  Aled laughed. “I’ll definitely be too tired to drive if you start that.”

  “I meant a cuddle, you sex-obsessed swine,” Gabriel said loftily.

  It was all bullshit and they both knew it. Gabriel fully admitted to being obsessed with sex. If not for the fact that he could abstain if he really had to, Aled would have thought it was an addiction. Nine times out of ten, when they fucked, it was Gabriel who started it.

  But the haughty tone brought a smile to Aled’s face, metaphorical sun starting to glimmer through the moody clouds in his head. Gabriel’s faux-bitch attitude was funny given his usually placid nature, and it lifted Aled’s spirits. Gabriel in general lifted his spirits. Somehow, he always knew the right thing to say and the right way to be.

  “Are you driving?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Could you stop at the petrol station and get a tin of those fruit sweet things for the drive down?”

  “Sure.” Practicalities helped a little, too. “Need to fill up anyway. I’ll be home in about half an hour.”

  “Okay. You want a special greeting?”

  “Nah. A hug will do fine. See you soon.”

  “Love you!”

  He hung up and cruised into the petrol station in a slightly better mood. Gabriel had a sunny sort of personality. He bounced. He’d been a bit of a mess after his accident, and during the whole Michael fiasco a couple of years ago, but he’d been riding a high since he’d been allowed to ditch the last of the medication. He’d even managed his first bike ride last month, and he’d been ridiculous ever since. And when he was buoyant, he pulled everyone else up to the surface with him, bad day at work or no bad day at work.

  Yet it still felt like Aled wasn’t getting to see too much of that cheerfulness lately. He’d said goodbye when Gabriel was still half-asleep in their bed. He’d not been able to so much as text. And yesterday had been the same, and the day before, and the day before…

  He mused as he filled up the car and fetched the requested tin of sweets. The problem was, he couldn’t see a feasible way out of the problem. If he jumped ship to another company, he’d run into the same issue. If he requested part-time, the company would quickly sideline him and coax him into quitting altogether so they could save money and resources for the full-time staff. He knew how it worked because he’d seen it before, and even exploited it to get rid of a couple of grossly incompetent underlings before now. And to top it off, Aled had grown too used to his lifestyle. Scaling it all back for a lesser-paying job would introduce a whole new set of problems. And who was going to hire a thirty-seven-year-old man to start a new career? It was too late for change.

  Christ, was he entering a midlife crisis? He hoped not. He wasn’t planning on thirty-seven being the midpoint of his life, for one.

  Squaring his shoulders as he got back behind the wheel, Aled decided to talk it over with Gabriel, and with Tom and Suze over the weekend. Something had to change, and they’d probably have some good ideas. He was spending too much time at a job he was coming to hate, and he was missing out on his family as a result. To hell with that.

  Home—for the moment—was a tidy little house in Newmillardam, south of Wakefield where Aled had spent most of his life. It had played home to three of them for several months last year, but Gabriel’s other boyfriend had eventually gone back down south once Gabriel had healed from his car accident, and now the house was just theirs again. Aled missed the extra company a little, but not the lack of room. It really wasn’t built for three, after all.

  He pulled up outside and sat back for a minute, just looking at the warm yellow light glowing through the windows. The curtains were drawn, but a shadow moved in the kitchen. Next door’s cat prowled along their front garden wall and vanished in a flurry of fur when Aled stepped out of the car.

  It was home.

  Their home. The first one they’d bought together. The one marked by the pair of them, rather than just him, and Gabriel slotted in around the edges. He knew if he walked in, he’d find Gabriel’s uniform draped over the radiator in the hall, and their walking coats wrestling for room on the same hook. His gym kit would have been put through the wash when Gabriel got home from his half-shift that morning. There’d be something to eat waiting in the microwave for him, even if it wasn’t cannelloni. The dishes would have been washed but left to dry on the rack for Aled to put away when he got back. Every room would be perfectly balanced between pristinely tidy but not clinically clean. Lived-in, but neat. Gabriel had taken over most of the chores when he’d first moved in, back in the old house, as an exchange for working fewer hours and bringing in less money. Aled had let him, and the house was far nicer for it. Tonight, Gabriel was probably packing for the drive south, but usually Aled would find him watching TV or flirting with one of his other boyfriends on his phone. Occasionally he’d already be in bed, but only if he had an early shift in the morning.

  Aled stood on the path, staring at their front door, and wanted nothing more than to walk inside and never come out.

  Then next door’s cat shot past his ankles in pursuit of something with a very short lifespan. Aled rolled his eyes, stuck his key in the lock and let himself in.

  “I’m home!”

  “Kitchen!”

  The sight that greeted him brought a lump to Aled’s throat. Two cases set by the door, ready to go. Gabriel in the kitc
hen, packing digestive biscuits into a tin for the drive down. Two cans of Pepsi were sitting in a cooler bag, waiting to go in the glovebox. Two more were set out on their own for the cupholders. The sat nav was charging on the counter, and the whole kitchen was permeated with the warm smell of baking, the results presumably contained in the second tin sitting on top of the—thankfully off—glass hobs.

  Home.

  It all bubbled over.

  “I don’t think I can do this anymore,” Aled whispered.

  And everything ground to a halt.

  Chapter Two

  “I don’t think I can do this anymore.”

  Gabriel carefully finished emptying the digestives into the tin, then closed the lid and said, “You have twenty seconds to tell me you’re talking about something other than us.”

  Aled groaned. He looked exhausted, but a smile flickered around the edges of his mouth all the same. The half-joke had worked. He slipped off his tie, looped it around Gabriel’s waist and towed him into a hug that smelled like cheap coffee and fusty air conditioning.

  “I mean work.” A stubbly kiss grazed Gabriel’s ear. “This is fine.”

  “Fine?” Gabriel said, keeping up the act. “There goes your blow job on the M5.”

  Aled huffed a weak laugh before letting go. “Not in the mood,” he admitted.

  Gabriel ran his hands down Aled’s arms, considering his options. If Aled wanted to get on the road, he’d rush to get out of the door. But he was plainly miserable, and Gabriel wanted to fix that first. They could always go tomorrow. So he picked at the cufflinks, sliding cotton and silver apart until pale wrists were exposed, then lifted one and sucked on the pulse beating gently beneath the skin. It quickened.

  “Tell me about it,” he murmured, then scraped his teeth along the vein.