Rating: Heavy PG-13.

Disclaimer: The show doesn't belong to me. Although, sometimes, I really wish it did.

Summary: When Maxxie's mother is asked to housesit for their next-door neighbour, he's put in charge of feeding her extremely overweight cat, Horace, morning, noon and night. Of course, as soon as Tony finds out that Maxxie possesses a set of keys to a i very /i empty house for the entire week, he can't resist taking advantage of the situation. An extremely random one shot.

Who Needs Enemies

'Now don't forget to let Horace out for thirty minutes.'

Mrs Longdon's visit had been expected.

'Feed him at seven thirty, on the dot, or he'll get restless.'

Mrs Longdon lived for precision.

'Do remember to get him in again by ten.'

Mrs Longdon was the old lady from number twenty-six, the house with the blue door.

'Horace is afraid of the dark you know, dear.'

Mrs Longdon was the one woman that Maxxie's mother hated.

'The plants will need watering after sundown.'

In fact, you could probably say that she despised her…

'Oh, and the recycling, put that out on Wednesday, won't you?'

…or pitied her, depending on the way you looked at the situation.

'I told Graham to come and collect his money from you.'

Graham was the resident milkman and the man Maxxie was convinced Mrs Longdon had been having an affair with. Milk definitely wasn't the only thing Graham was giving her on a Friday morning. In normal circles, milkmen didn't make a habit of going into people houses while delivering their usual four pint of semi-skimmed. There had to be something going on.

'I think that's all.'

This happened a lot. Once every two months Mrs Longdon went to visit her static caravan in Swansea and left the keys to the house in their capable hands. The problem was that no matter how much she hated doing it; Maxxie's mother didn't have the heart to say no to the delightful lavender scented old lady.

It had become custom to pawn Horace off on Maxxie for the week. In fact, Maxxie had even gone so far as to say he liked the tabby one day to please her. He didn't of course. Mrs Longdon would remain the only one who cared for that flea-bitten, fat, smelly excuse for a cat until the day it passed away to pussy heaven.

On Horace weeks, as they were so affectionately named, Maxxie tried his hardest to stay at college late. He hung around on the green until it got dark and made a point of avoiding his house. There were better things he could be doing with his time. Getting high with his friends for example, or spending an hour in the dance studio working on a new tap routine. Either way, feeding Horace wasn't exactly at the top of his list of priorities.

Anwar and Chris were the only ones who knew about the annual house-sitting. He didn't dare tell anyone else, especially Tony. Things were bad enough with his best mates knowing as it was.

Back at the beginning of the year they'd accompanied him to Mrs Longdon's late one Friday night. He'd been high, Anwar had been drunk and Chris had been a combination of the two. They'd fallen through the front door, smashed three of her decorative plates, broken the coat stand and lost Horace up the oak tree. He'd stayed up there for two hours. Two hours that Chris had spent calling out, 'Here pussy, pussy, pussy, come and join the party!'

Mrs Longdon had a niece named Anne, a five-foot brunette who had graduated from Oxford University in 2006. Dozens of pictures of her littered the fireplace in the living room and Anwar liked to sit and stare at them. Twenty-first celebrations, holiday snaps and family portraits, crammed between porcelain cats and seashell ornaments. Maxxie didn't see the attraction, but then, he wouldn't. When Mrs Longdon had returned from her week away she'd found one of the pictures missing and accused Maxxie of stealing it. For arguments sake he told her it had been him and ever since then she always told him when Anne was coming to visit. She didn't know he was gay, and if she did, she probably wouldn't understand.

Generally Mrs Longdon's holiday went without a hitch, as did the house-sitting, but this week was destined to go wrong from the very beginning.

It all started on Monday afternoon when Tony overheard Maxxie talking to Chris. Word soon got around and by Tuesday lunchtime Tony had called everyone together to discuss throwing a party on Friday night. Maxxie tried to protest, but seeing as Tony was involved, he soon found out that saying no was pretty much impossible.

By the time Friday came he found himself sat on the island in Mrs Longdon's kitchen watching Jal empty out the contents of two Tesco bags and tip crisps into flowery bowls. On the other side of the room, Cassie banged the cupboard doors as she looked around, musing about how pretty things were and how she didn't need to move anything. This news came as a welcome relief for Maxxie; things were bad enough without Cassie rearranging the entire kitchen as well.

Come nine, Maxxie was busy stashing Mrs Longdon's prize plates away in the welsh dresser, his friends running amuck in the living room. Horace had made himself scarce hours ago - probably hiding in the oak tree again. The tabby cat wasn't all that keen on Chris anymore.

Maxxie sighed, he should have said no. He should have stuck to his guns and stood up to Tony for once.

'Jesus Maxxie, you really need to chill out.'

Tony didn't bother toning down his entrance, shouting loud enough for the entire party to hear and then waltzing into the room and jumping up onto the dinning table. He leant back on his hands, sprawled across the surface and swung his legs back and forth.

'Chill out?' Maxxie questioned once he'd slammed the cupboard door shut. 'She's going to fucking kill me!'

Lifting his shoulders in a shrug, Tony's reply was lax, 'Relax, she's never going to find out, Nips and Cass are coming round spring cleaning in the morning. It'll be spotless.'

'That's not the point, Tony.' Dusting his hands off on his jeans, Maxxie got to his feet and walked over. 'My mum trusted me with those keys. She's always been able to trust me with them. Anwar and Chris only knew by accident and Mrs Long-'

'Fucking hell Maxxie, give it a rest, you're worse than Sid.' Tony slid back down off the table, his blue eyes bright in the low lit room as he slung an arm around Maxxie's shoulders. 'It's about time you started having some fun, don't you think?' he added with a grin.

So fun he did have, right up until he went wheeling into the coffee table and almost smashed a vase of silk flowers at least. After that things became hazy. There were pills involved somewhere along the way. A bottle of vodka found its way into his hand and he spent an hour grinding blindly with two others to old 80's disco music, Chris' hat shoved haphazardly onto his head.

He wasn't entirely sure when it happened, but at some point during all of this, someone's hand had found its way to his crotch and the owner was contentedly having a good old grope. Maxxie clicked his eyes open, finally getting a look at who he'd been dancing with and found himself sandwiched between Chris and Tony. The stray hand belonged to Tony (which wasn't exactly a surprise), who was smiling away and acting as though nothing untoward was going on.

It didn't matter and Maxxie didn't really care so he continued to dance, swigging from the bottle in his hand and leaning back against Chris, running his fingers through his sandy hair.

Things ultimately became complicated when he shoved Tony into the empty kitchen and kissed him against the refrigerator. Hands fumbling with buttons in the darkness, features picked out with silver, he soon found himself in a position he hadn't thought about for a long while. He had no complaints. Sex came hand in hand with their parties. First you got drunk, then you got high and then you shagged someone random, or someone not so random depending on how the night panned out, it didn't matter.

The bowl of fruit that had been sat happily in the middle of the island hit the floor with a crash, apples and oranges rolling across the slate tiles and, for a minute, the two boys forgot where they were and the company they were keeping. It didn't matter that they were surrounded by friends and kittens painted onto ceramic mugs. What mattered was contact - touching each other. In fact, it wouldn't have mattered who they were, as long as they got that release.

Maxxie was on his knees and had Tony's jeans round his ankles when the party came to a grinding halt. A cry came from the hallway and the music stopped dead. A shame really, they'd just reached the good bit in an old Donna Summer record. He decided to ignore the panic in the other room and slid his hands across Tony's stomach.

'Maxxie, your mum's coming!'

The kitchen door was flung open without warning and Anwar and Chris fell through it, knocking the ironing board over with a clatter.

'Holy shit!'

No one moved and everything that followed seemed to happen in slow motion. Like one of those fight scenes in a Jackie Chan movie. Then, somewhere along the way, Maxxie found himself shoved back out into the hall with the kitchen door slammed behind him.

Twenty seconds later his mother and Mrs Longdon came through the front door, an entourage of floral cases behind them. Mrs Longdon looked rather flustered, her hair bedraggled and her make-up smudged, and it didn't help matters when she noticed the mess in the living room. She sighed and then collapsed onto the couch, her head in hers hands.

'I think you better start explaining yourself, Max,' his mother said eventually, she sounded uneasy and placed a hand on Mrs Longdon's shoulder.

Maxxie didn't get a chance to make up any wild excuses; Mrs Longdon was out of her seat before a word left his lips. 'Where's Horace? Where's my baby?' she asked looking around.

Was this the part where he told her he'd lost her precious Horace several hours ago? Damn that stupid cat. He'd kill Chris when he saw him again. In fact, he'd kill the whole lot of them for abandoning him when this hadn't been his idea. Shit, why did he have to be high? How the hell could he explain himself now?!

'I… I don't know,' stammered Maxxie as he stared down at his feet. 'He ran off, I think Chris scared him.'

'Chris is here?'

Maxxie snapped his mouth shut. If he said anything else his mother was sure to go off like a bottle of pop. Instead he shoved his hands into his pockets and scuffed the toe of his shoe against the flowery carpet. He decided to offer her a feeble nod.

She was back out into the hall like lightening and a loud bang followed as she slammed the door straight into his friends. They must have been huddled behind it listening in.

Mrs Longdon looked ready to kill, but her voice remained void of emotion. 'Do you know what happened to me this evening, Maxxie?' she questioned softly.

Shaking his head, he didn't grace her with eye contact. He couldn't yet.

'Someone let their car roll into the back of my caravan,' she told him. 'I popped out to buy some tea and somebody let their car roll into the back of my caravan. Can you believe that? They forgot to put the handbrake on and I now have a hole in my bedroom wall. In built air-conditioning. I was looking forward to that holiday as well.'

He glanced up, swallowing down hard. Mrs Longdon may have been a tyrant, but she was a nice old lady really. Plus, she made a killer Victoria sponge.

Maxxie had been sure she was going to say something else, however they were interrupted by his mother trooping back in with Chris, Tony and Jal in tow.

'I found your cat,' said Chris, holding his arms out, his eyes wide as the tabby cat struggled in his grasp. Horace didn't look happy and for good reason too, Chris later revealed that someone had stuffed him in the airing cupboard to keep him out of the way.

Tony had been the one to save the day in the end. He was good like that, making up excuses and getting round Mrs Longdon seemed to be second nature to him. Of course, it helped that Horace had been found. Apparently that was all that mattered. As soon as the cat had been back in her arms, it had been hugs and kisses and flapjacks for all.

At least, Maxxie thought Tony had saved the day anyway…

Three days later, on his way home from college, she collared him in the front garden while she was planting a tray of pink and purple petunias. She had mud on her face and a plaid scarf tied around her wiry hair.

'Your friend said you'd help me with my odd jobs,' Mrs Longdon told him and he stared dumbfounded. She shook her head and then brushed her dirty hands off on her trouser legs. 'To pay for the breakages,' she added.

Maxxie blanched. Wonderful, exactly what he needed when he had a stack of homework to do. Trust Tony. He couldn't argue though, so he nodded his head weakly and smiled at her.

Mrs Longdon held out a trowel toward him. 'How are your gardening skills?' she questioned with a hopeful grin.

Sinking down onto his knees beside her, he stared at the flowerbed before him and then took the tool she'd offered, beginning to dig.

Who needed enemies when he had friends like his?