You're getting used to this bed. You've slept a few nights in it now since you came home from England, if you could call it coming home; if home was just a place, and not the people who had your heart.

The bed feels different this morning, as you move from sleep into waking. There's a dip in the mattress beside you, someone's weight there, someone's skin warm against your arm. It's not that lad you picked up yesterday, or who picked you up: that lad with a caustic turn of phrase and a particular English accent, and a streak of kindness after you'd had him that took you by surprise. No, not him. You didn't fall asleep with him.

And now you remember, and you feel a prickling of sweat under your arms, a flush of panic not about what you've done, but about what you came close to doing. You could have lost him for ever. But you didn't. You didn't, and you concentrate now on your breathing to calm down, and you remember how he asked you why you were here, and how for once in your life you got it right.

"Cos I love you... Cos I can't live my life without you. I love you, Steven." Your words sounded pale to you, as if they might not make it through the cold air to touch him. But then he answered you, his voice stronger than yours somehow, and somehow sounding like he was surprised, not by what you'd told him but by what he was telling you: "I love you too."

His face was damp with tears and snot, and his lips were cold and the inside of his mouth was warm, and his hands felt sure and possessive as he took hold of your face, and your hotel wasn't far away from that bridge.

The bed was unmade, and you saw him look at it, and you felt a tide of disgust rise in you, and you said to him, "I'm sorry." And he looked puzzled, as if he thought for a second it was, "I'm sorry, this is a bad idea; I'm sorry, you need to go." But then he got it, and shrugged and told you, "It don't matter now, does it?" And all of a sudden you felt weary. The energy that had brought you running back from the bridge with him, had all but left you.

He looked at you, and took off his coat.

When you'd imagined this – when it was never going to happen because God wouldn't let it, and because the boy was married now, and when imagining it was what you did to punish yourself – you'd imagined a frantic ripping off of clothes and a pawing at flesh, a taking of what ought to be yours, a rushing to get everything you could from him. Only when it became real, you didn't do that. What you did last night was, you made love with him.

You sit up slowly, trying not to disturb him; you lean back against the headboard and look at him as he sleeps. The bright Winter sun is pouring through the open curtains and bleaching him of any imperfections – except there aren't any, not a flaw, not a mark. You really must have been gentle with him.

He looks like an angel, all glowing golden skin and softness, the shadows of his eyelashes making them appear even longer. His lips are slightly parted and you hold your breath for a few seconds to listen to his breathing, and watch the rise and fall of his chest, and then you breathe again, slowly in time with him. His face is unlined, untroubled, innocent in sleep. You'd be scared to touch him if you weren't comprehensively aware that his instincts are as carnal as your own. If he's an angel, he's the fallen kind.

Still, you don't touch him except to smooth his hair where it's been mussed up from your fingers raking it and your fist gripping it. He'll be needing his sleep, won't he, after the day he had yesterday. He put everything on the line for you, his whole future, and you feel scared suddenly, just like he said you were, because what if you're not strong enough? What if you're not as brave as him? Because this young man here in your bed, as fragile as he looks, has more courage than anyone you know. He must have, to take on a man like you, to come back to you, to put aside what everyone else will think of him; to sleep with a man like you who could snap him in two, a man who's only ever a step away from the darkness. A man like you doesn't have a long lifespan: there are too many enemies, too many risks. It's only here, in this moment, that you realise how much this didn't matter to you before, because now everything's changed and it does matter. You want a future now because you want one with him, you've got a lot of wasted time to make up. You want to be with him for ever, and for the first time you care that your for ever might not be for long.

And then you remember what you've put on the line for him in return for his faith: your fear and your heart are in his hands, and they're good hands, strong hands, and you've got to believe that this is it now. If this isn't it, for ever, then nothing is.

You're hungry: starving. Maybe that's why you feel shaky. You and Steven had better things to do all night than eat. You climb carefully out of bed, pull on some clothes, take a glance at him, and head out of the hotel to the nearest takeaway. You try to think when you last had a meal. It was when you were with that lad yesterday, wasn't it? You grabbed a bite to eat in the pub. What was his name? McQueen. Jesus, what were the chances? Maybe you've got God all wrong. Maybe He's not the angry one of your childhood, sitting in judgement over you, deciding how soon to send you into the eternal fires of Hell. Maybe He's more the Mount Olympus kind, manipulating the mortals like mice in a lab, watching them squirm just for the craic.

He was alright, the McQueen boy. You liked his accent and you liked his sarcasm, they were enough like Steven's to remind you of him. Not bad in the sack either, once you'd won the tussle over who was going to fuck who. He'd suggested he wanted to top you – what he was used to, you guessed – and you'd laughed and disabused him of the notion. You gave him a good time anyhow, and finished him off with a handjob that had his eyes rolling back in his head. And then when Steven arrived you remembered – like you'd always known ever since the day you first took him to bed with the bruises fading on his healing ribs, and you saw what he had, the trust of a child and the heart of a lion, and he gave them both to you – that sex without love leaves you hollow.

When you get back to your hotel room with coffee and breakfast and condoms, Steven is awake, and you know the conclusion he must have jumped to when he woke up and found you'd gone. You feel ashamed that he'd still think that you'd leave him, but why wouldn't he? You're going to have to prove yourself.

You make a joke of it, "Not getting rid of me that easily, Steven," and you put the coffees down and shrug off your coat and sit down on the bed. Steven reckons he's dreaming, and he doesn't mean about getting breakfast in bed, he means about you.

You've eaten half the breakfast on your way back from the takeaway, and now you start on his half. Well, he's smaller than you, the skinny little bastard, so he doesn't need so much to sustain him.

He gets a text from Leanne, the girl who's minding his kids, and he feels guilty. You want to stay here in Dublin and have him all to yourself for a little longer, but it's a no-brainer. You can't keep a father from his kids, not a father who loves them in the right way, a father whose kids love him back. You tell him you'll sort it, book flights for you both for this afternoon.

"We'll be home in a few hours," you say.

"We?"

"Yes, we."

This is what commitment feels like. It feels good.

You tell him you'll show him the sights in the time you've got left. You climb onto the bed and straddle him, and lean down and kiss him, softly, and the way he's looking at you is kind of shy, kind of filthy; like he's all yours. You offer him anything he wants: "I'm your man... whatever the pleasure..." And you are – you're all his.

"Guinness," he says, and you repeat it back at him just to clarify. Okay then. That's what he wants to try, and you've promised him anything, so...

You sit back on his thighs. His hand comes up, his fingers in the waistband of your black jeans, his knuckles against your skin under your vest.

You get off him and take the lid off his coffee and hand him the paper cup. He looks affronted that you're giving him coffee instead of cock; it makes you smile.

"Drink up before it gets cold."

He sits up and takes it in both hands and sips it. Last time you bought him a coffee, he rejected it. That time, he didn't want anything from you – well, except your eighty grand. That time, he wanted Douglas. You wonder if he's remembering that too, because he's making an effort, he's draining the last dregs from this cup that you've given him.

You're glad you remembered to put in his four sugars. He'll need the energy.

By the time he's finished, your clothes are on the floor and his eyes are on you. You take the empty cup from him and put it back on the table, and you bend down and kiss the sweet coffee from his lips, and then you pull back the covers.

You were wrong about there not being a mark on him. Your teeth have left a sludgy bruise on his hip bone, making the edge of his tattoo indistinct, and when you part his legs to kneel between them there are bite marks on the smooth skin on the insides of his thighs. You trace them with your thumbs and press to test if they're tender: they must be, because he flinches, so you kiss where you hurt him. You've never wanted to kiss anyone as much as you want to kiss him, and you do it now, working your way up his body, lingering at his nipples until he reaches for your face and draws you up to his mouth, impatient. You feel his legs wrap around you, his ankles crossed, his heels behind your arse pulling you onto him. You rub your cock against his, and thrust your tongue deep into his mouth. His hands are in your hair, and you couldn't break this kiss if you wanted to.

You use lots of lube. It'll help soothe where he's sore from last night, and he loves it, the feel of your hand massaging it onto him, slipping over his perineum, your fingers working inside him. His hips rise off the bed, writhing like a cat as you stroke between his legs. Your cock is so ready it hurts, but you give his a bit of attention first with both hands and a slick of lube. You grip his shaft firmly, and with your thumbs you tease the tip until he grips your wrists to stop you, and looks into your eyes and says, "For fucksake Brendan, are you gonna fuck me or what?" And you laugh, and he laughs, and he lifts his legs and you manhandle them onto your shoulders.

He opens for you and you push in a couple of inches before he reflexively tightens around you. You shift a little to find the angle which you know – you remember – will allow the deepest possible penetration; you let him breathe the resistance out, and when you feel him relax you slide in rapidly and jolt against him as you hit home.

You let him set the pace, and at first the only movement is the spasming of the muscles inside him, then you start to rock with him, and you can't tell if your body is taking its rhythm from his cries or if his cries are led by your body's rhythm.

He's saying your name, over and over, panting it out, and he's looking into your eyes like you always had him do; and then he flings his hands onto the pillow either side of his head, and he's biting his lip, and you know what he wants. Your arms are holding your weight but you move them now so that the whole weight of your body is taken by his legs as your chest bears down on them. He's more or less folded in half now from the hips, as flexible as ever, and now that your hands are free you do what he is wanting you to do, you take hold of his wrists and pin them to the bed, and fuck him, and fuck him. He's tougher than he looks, this boy. This man. You can take some of the credit for the toughness, and some of the blame.

Last night you almost asked him what it was like with Douglas, what it was that they did. Almost, but in the end you didn't, because what does it matter? You've both got pasts. What you know for sure is that Steven didn't get this from him, he didn't get to abdicate control, he didn't get to enjoy being shown who was boss, even though you both know it's something of an illusion: it's what Steven wants, and what Steven wants from you, you give him. Who's boss?

You hold him when you're both finished. You're on a high, both of you, and you grin at each other stupidly as you come down.

"Want a bath, Steven? I'll run you one."

You go and have a shower then run him a bath and go back and tell him it's ready. He gets up and stretches, and as he passes you, you stop him with a hand on his chest; you feel the beat of his heart and you tell him, "I love you, okay?"

"I know." He smiles and leans up to kiss you, and you're smiling too, and he says into your mouth, "Love you too."

You watch him walk into the bathroom, and you think to yourself, Am I dreaming?