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Jonny’s deciding whether to order Chinese or Indian when his phone rings. It’s Jude, insisting on taking him out for dinner. Two hours later they’re in a French chain restaurant in Covent Garden and Jonny is trying to convince himself that this is not a date. Even if he wants it to be one. In between the starter and the main course, Jude apologises for being a shit since he found out about Jonny and Ewan. He says sorry for using him and that he’s going to be less of a wanker.Jonny can’t believe this is happening and mostly just stares into his glass of affordably priced wine until his meal comes. As the dessert menu arrives he plays footsie under the table until Jude gets the hint and calls for the bill.It’s not that he doesn’t like the things that Jude is saying, it’s that this transition from having quiet dirty angry sex to going out for dinner and talking about feelings has come about a little fast. He’s used to Jude steering things back to sex to avoid uncomfortable situations.When they get back to Jonny’s place, though, he tells Jude to put his money where his mouth is. If he wants to treat him better, then no more dirty little secrets. Ewan has to know. It’s been a nightmare, visiting the pair of them and not knowing what to do when McGregor offers him the casual little intimacies, the hand on the small of his back, the questioning quirk of the lips when Jonny heads back to his own place at 1am in a cab instead of taking up his offer to crash in his bed.When Jonny mentions Ewan’s name, Jude always grimaces.“He thinks I was with Melissa the other night. And right now, in fact”.Melissa. The girl who had dumped him the day after he first slept with Jonny. She’d found a hand-shaped bruise on the back of his thigh. Jude had a quiet belief that she thought it was from Ewan. The break-up, and Ewan's 3am dressing-down had put some things in perspective for Jude. He hadn’t told his best friend that they had split. He felt it would take too long to explain what had happened (that is, to lie), then it became that she was a convenient smokescreen for seeing Jonny.Either way, he’s been lying to Ewan too much lately. Even if telling him that he’s sleeping with Jonny seems a bit too formal, and like a sign of commitment, he ought to come clean. Even if this isn’t really a relationship, Jonny is right that it would be better to get things out in the open. It’s the natural next step in treating Jonny like an actual person, and it’s the key to getting things back to normal with Ewan.He can’t remember the last time they actually had a conversation that wasn’t just a quick exchange about the washing-up, or buying milk. He’s got so distant from his best friend that he doesn’t even know if he’s got any parts lined up lately. Since all this started, Jude has basically trashed everything around him. Now he’s got to sort this mess out. But he’ll outsource the job, if he can.It only takes a few minutes of careful words and gentle kisses to persuade Jonny to make the announcement for him. He appeals to Jonny’s history with Ewan, the connection they forged on set, the fact that, as Ewan’s ex...something, he ought to be the one to tell him what’s going on. It’s too easy, really. Jonny’s so wrapped up in Jude, so eager to please, that he could ask him for anything right now. They make a deal that Jonny will go over for the football on Saturday and somehow slip into the conversation naturally, while Jude finds somewhere else to be for a few hours.He doesn’t feel like giving up on cowardice just yet.Jonny’s attempts to inform Ewan that he has been sleeping with his best mate are somewhat hampered by the fact that, as Jonny reaches for the bag of Doritos, halfway through his third beer, Ewan decides it would be a good idea to pull him onto his lap and tell him how much he’s been missed.Jonny knows that this is so not what he came here to do, but it’s awfully hard to think when Mr McGregor is rubbing circles around your belly-button with his thumb, and craning up to kiss you at the same time. In the end, though, his body does the job for him.As Ewan unbuttons his shirt and nuzzles his throat, he reaches the tender spot where neck meets shoulder, and Jude made Jonny bleed. Somehow, a few days of healing time has actually made things look worse – the scabs are thick and black, and the bruises are now a motley selection of yellow, purple and green.Jonny curses himself for forgetting them, and tries to shrug his shirt back on, but with one hand tangled in the fabric and a concerned tone to his voice, Ewan isn’t letting him.“What the fuck - I mean, I know you like it rough, and it’s good to see you’ve been busy, but this is a bit... you forget the safety-word or something?”Jonny’s heavy breathing is now less from the fact that he’s straddling Ewan’s crotch than that this situation has gone so horribly wrong. His babbled explanation that he’s not been up to S&M hijinks, that a new playmate had just got out of hand, does nothing to assuage the anxiety in those green eyes, and he can practically see Ewan’s mind racing to conclusions that have Jonny helpless and violated in a stranger’s bed.This is so very far from the casual “by the way, I’ve been banging Jude like a drum, is that okay with you?” “Sure, fancy a curry?” exchange that he’d prayed this could be that he feels physically sick.Now Ewan is holding him by the shoulders and saying “did this prick force you, Jonny?” and nausea is quickly replaced by anger. The assumption that because Jonny bottoms and has been known to ask Ewan for a bit of pain, he is automatically some kind of victim, never mind the fact that he’s taller than Ewan and has saved his skin more than once in a fight, pisses him off.He even feels momentarily smug when he blurts out the words “it was Jude, I’ve been fucking Jude”, and gets a dramatic response.Previous concern forgotten, Ewan is angrily shoving him off his lap, and it takes a clumsy sideways lurch (that cracks open his scabs) to stop his head connecting with the coffee table. He ends up wedged between the sofa and the table in a very awkward position, waiting for Ewan to finish his outburst and punch him.Luckily Ewan manages to see the ridiculousness of the situation, and helps him up. Then he sees the blood blooming through the fabric of his shirt, and twenty minutes later Jonny is perched on one of kitchen stools while Ewan fusses about with plasters and antiseptic in a well-meaning but useless manner.“Does he think he’s a bloody lion, or something?”“Looks like it...You’re not – you’re not pissed off, are you, mate?”Ewan hesitates. “No, just...a bit surprised. I didn’t even know Jude liked men.”“To tell the truth, I don’t think he did, either. So,” he says, catching Ewan’s hands in his, “we’re okay, you and me?”Of course, Ewan says yes, but they both momentarily forget that there’s another factor in the equation.