Chapter 3: The van's suspension creaks as Jan pulls Clara onto her lap, their mouths meeting in a sloppy kiss that tastes of warm cider and chemicals, Marcus's hungry eyes flashing in the orange glow of streetlights.
The van’s engine was a ragged cough against the silence of the drained city. Inside, the air was cold and smelled of old vinyl, stale tobacco, and the ghost of a thousand spliff-ends. Jan slid the side door shut with a heavy clunk, sealing them in a dim, metallic cave. The only light came from the dash, painting their faces in a sickly green glow.
Marcus caught her eye in the rear-view as he pulled out of the alley. “Belt up.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Jan muttered, but her fingers fumbled with the stiff buckle in the back. The high was receding, leaving a brittle, jittery edge in its wake. The world outside the windows was a blur of boarded-up shops and flickering streetlights, a stark comedown from the neon womb of the Hacienda.
Clara sat pressed against the door, her forehead resting on the cool glass. She felt hollowed out, her body a used-up shell. The memory of the booth was a series of vivid, disconnected snapshots—the vibrating speaker, the taste of him, the shocked face in the doorway. It felt like something that had happened to someone else.
The heater whirred to life, pushing out a dusty, lukewarm breath. The van was an icebox.
“Gonna be a bit,” Marcus said, his voice flat with fatigue. He lit another cigarette, the ember flaring in the reflection.
Silence settled, thick and uncomfortable. The energy that had arced between them upstairs had short-circuited, leaving behind a strange, charged awkwardness. They were just three strangers in a van now, riding the bleak tail of the night.
Jan shifted on the hard bench seat. The post-E drips were starting, a cold, creeping unease in her stomach. She needed to move, to feel something warm. She looked at Clara’s profile, pale against the dark window. Her friend seemed miles away.
“You alright, Clark?” Jan asked, using the old nickname.
Clara just nodded, a tiny movement. Her eyes were closed.
Jan reached out, her fingers brushing Clara’s arm. The skin was cold. Without a word, she began to rub it, briskly, trying to generate some friction, some life. Clara’s eyes opened, meeting Jan’s in the gloom. There was a question in them, and a deep, weary gratitude.
The rubbing slowed. Jan’s hand moved to Clara’s shoulder, squeezing the tension there. Then her fingers trailed along the line of Clara’s collarbone, over the damp, thin fabric of her top. It wasn’t about desire, not exactly. It was about connection, about anchoring themselves back in a shared body, fighting off the cold and the creeping emptiness.
Clara sighed, a soft, surrendering sound. She leaned into the touch, turning her face towards Jan. Their eyes locked. The understanding that passed between them needed no words. It was the same understanding that had fuelled a hundred adventures, a thousand secrets. This was just another one.
Jan’s hand slipped lower, under the hem of Clara’s top. Her palm was warm against the cool skin of Clara’s stomach. Clara’s breath hitched, just a little. Her own hand came up, curling around Jan’s wrist, not to stop her, but to feel the pulse point there.
In the front, Marcus drove, his gaze fixed on the empty road heading east towards Salford. But his eyes kept flicking to the rectangle of the rear-view mirror. He saw the shift. Saw Jan’s dark curls brushing Clara’s cheek as she leaned in closer. Saw Clara’s hand tighten on Jan’s wrist.
He took a long, slow drag on his cigarette, the smoke boiling out of his nostrils. His grip on the steering wheel tightened, the leather creaking.
Jan kissed Clara’s neck, a soft, dry press of lips. Clara tilted her head back, offering more. Her hand left Jan’s wrist and slid up into her wild hair, pulling her closer. The kiss that followed was slow, deep, a familiar exploration. It was warmth. It was solace.
Jan’s other hand pushed Clara’s top up, her thumb brushing the underside of Clara’s breast. Clara arched into the touch, a low hum vibrating in her throat. The sound seemed abnormally loud in the silent van.
Marcus watched. He didn’t look away. The tiredness burned off him, replaced by a sharp, voyeuristic intensity. This was a different show. Private, raw, and far more intimate than the staged performance in the booth. He felt like a ghost, an unseen spectator in his own vehicle. It was a power shift, subtle and profound. They had forgotten he was there, or they didn’t care.
Clara’s hands were on Jan’s waist now, pulling her half onto her lap on the narrow seat. The van swayed slightly with the movement. Jan’s skirt rode up high on her thighs. She straddled Clara, their kiss breaking only for a gasp of air before coming back together, hungrier.
“Fuck, you’re cold,” Jan mumbled against Clara’s mouth, her hands sliding around to her back, seeking skin.
“So warm me up,” Clara whispered back, her voice ragged. Her fingers found the zipper at the back of Jan’s dress, tugging it down a few inches.
The green dash light glinted off the sweat on their skin, caught the desperate, earnest look in their eyes. This wasn’t for him. It was a lifeline thrown between them in the sinking hours. Marcus understood that. It made it more captivating.
His knuckles were white on the wheel. He guided the van onto a darker, residential street, driving slower now, the engine a low grumble. He needed to keep watching. He needed to see where this led.
Jan’s dress was open to the small of her back. Clara’s hands were inside it, palms flat against her spine, pulling her tight. They moved together in a slow, grinding rhythm, a silent conversation of need. Jan’s head dropped to Clara’s shoulder, her curls a dark cascade. She was breathing hard.
“Clark…” she murmured.
“I know.”
Marcus flicked the indicator, turning into the car park of a silent, grey block of flats. He killed the engine but left the headlights on, illuminating a cracked concrete wall. The sudden silence was absolute, ringing in their ears after hours of noise. It was broken only by the soft, wet sound of their kissing and their quick, shared breaths.
They froze, blinking in the sudden stillness, remembering where they were. Remembering him.
Slowly, Jan turned her head. She looked over her shoulder, through the gap in the front seats. Her eyes met Marcus’s in the mirror. Her face was flushed, lips swollen. There was no apology in her look, only a bold, defiant challenge. See? it seemed to say. This is us.
Clara followed her gaze, her green eyes wide and dark in the dim light. She didn’t shrink away. Instead, she kept one arm possessively around Jan’s waist, her chin resting on Jan’s shoulder, staring back at his reflection.
For a long moment, no one moved. The headlights poured useless light against the wall. The only sound was the ticking of the cooling engine.
Marcus finally broke the stare. He pulled the key from the ignition, plunging them into near-darkness. He opened his door, the interior light blinking on, harsh and unforgiving.
“Come on then,” he said, his voice rough. He didn’t look back at them as he got out. “Before we get a tug from the Bill.”
The cold night air flooded in, sharp and sobering. Jan and Clara disentangled themselves, shivering instantly in the sudden chill. They fixed their clothes with clumsy, hurried hands, the earlier intimacy replaced by a shaky, post-adrenaline tremor. They climbed out of the van, their legs unsteady on the solid ground.
Marcus was already at a rusted security door, key in the lock. He pushed it open, holding it for them. The doorway was a black maw.
Jan went first, her usual bravado softened by weariness. Clara followed, her fingers briefly finding Jan’s in the darkness, a quick, reassuring squeeze. As Marcus stepped in behind them and the heavy door clanged shut, cutting off the outside world, the only thing left was the echo of their footsteps in the concrete stairwell, climbing upwards into the unknown dark of his flat.
The stairwell smelled of damp concrete and boiled cabbage, the echoes of their footsteps dying as they reached a scuffed blue door on the third landing. Marcus shouldered it open without a word.
The flat was a cave of shadows, lit only by the orange sodium glare bleeding through grimy windows. The front room was a chaos of vinyl stacks, speaker towers, and a sunken sofa buried under coats. The air hung thick with stale smoke and yesterday’s takeaways.
“Home sweet home,” Marcus muttered, dropping his keys onto a pile of flyers.
Jan wandered in, her eyes adjusting. She ran a finger through the dust on a record crate. Clara hovered near the door, her arms wrapped around herself, feeling abruptly sober and out of place.
“You live like a proper animal, you,” Jan said, but there was no bite to it.
“Charming.” Marcus crossed the room to a makeshift kitchenette, a single bulb flickering on. He filled a kettle at a sink stacked with unwashed mugs. “Brew?”
Clara just nodded, drifting towards the sofa. She sank into the soft, cratered cushions, disappearing into the mountain of fabric. She felt the last vibrations of the music still humming in her bones, a phantom energy with nowhere to go now.
Jan stayed standing, restless. The comedown was a tightness in her jaw, a static in her veins. She watched Marcus move around his own space with a detached familiarity. This was the man from the booth, the silhouette against the strobes, now just a bloke in a damp t-shirt making tea.
He sauntered in from the kitchen area, a large, filthy bong in his hands. He set it on a low table scarred with ring marks and burn scars. From a Tupperware, he pinched a clump of sticky green weed, packing it into the bowl with practised ease.
He flicked a lighter, the flame illuminating his focused, weary face. He applied it, leaned down, and took a monster hit. The water bubbled violently, a deep, liquid gurgle, as the chamber filled with thick, milky smoke. He held it, his eyes closed, before exhaling a vast, sweet-sour cloud that rolled towards the ceiling.
He passed the bong to Jan.
She took it without hesitation, her fingers curling around the warm glass. She met his eyes, a flicker of the old challenge returning. This was a different kind of communion. She bent forward, lit the bowl, and drew.
The smoke hit her lungs, harsh and expansive, a earthy punch that cut through the chemical remnants of the E. She held it, the world softening at the edges, before coughing out a plume.
“Proper gear,” she rasped, handing it toward Clara on the sofa.
Clara stared at the apparatus, then at Jan’s offered hand. The shyness, the part of her that calculated risk, resurfaced. But Jan’s eyes were insistent, a warm anchor in the strange room. Clara took it.
As she bent to the stem, Marcus spoke, his voice a low rumble. “Seen you two, you know. For weeks. Proper little firecrackers, you are.”
Clara inhaled, the comment threading into her with the smoke. It was a confession that made the night make a different, more deliberate sense. She passed the bong back to him, her green eyes wide and watering slightly, seeing him anew.
She passed the bong back to him, her green eyes wide and watering slightly, seeing him anew. The weed spread a slow, woolly warmth through her chest, a different blanket than the E’s sharp sparkle. It softened the room’s hard edges.
Jan watched the exchange, that familiar proprietary spark lighting in her gut. She felt the last tight coil of the come-down finally unwind, replaced by a heavy, insistent thrum. The sight of Clara’s knowing look at Marcus, the intimate pass of the bong, itched at her. She needed to be the centre of this again.
“So you were watchin’ us, then?” Jan said, her voice cutting through the smoky quiet. She leaned a hip against the record crate, the movement deliberate. “From your little throne up there?”
Marcus took another hit, holding the smoke. He nodded slowly, his eyes not leaving hers. He exhaled. “Hard not to. You two burned brighter than the strobes.”
“Just lookin’?” Jan pushed, a sly smile touching her lips. The chemical confidence was gone, but a deeper, more natural audacity rose in its place. She felt a restless heat under her skin, a need to redirect all the energy in this cramped, male room back onto herself.
She straightened up from the crate, pushing her dark curls back over one shoulder. The room felt suddenly smaller, the distance between her and Marcus shortening with her intent. A deliberate, rolling motion settled her posture.
Jan squared her shoulders back, arching her spine just so. The neckline of her dress gaped, revealing the deep, shadowed curve of her cleavage, a pale contrast to the black fabric. The dim light from the street seemed to find the space, to dwell there. It wasn’t an accident. It was a statement.
“Some views are better than others, like,” she said, her tone dropping, becoming conspiratorial and thick. “Bet it looked different from up there. All that energy. All that… movement.”
Clara watched from the sofa, drawing her knees up. She saw the shift in Jan, the performance clicking back into place, but this was for a single, captive audience. A quiet thrill threaded through her fatigue, mixed with a strand of possessive unease.
Marcus’s gaze dipped, just for a heartbeat, taking in the offered view. A faint, appreciative smirk touched his mouth. “It had its moments.”
“Just moments?” Jan took a slow step closer to where he stood by the table. The clutter of his life was at his back; she was the only thing moving in the static room. “From where I was, things got pretty blurry. Hands and lights and that. You must have a better memory for details, DJ.”
She was right in front of him now, close enough for him to smell the sweat and perfume and smoke still clinging to her. Her eyes were dark, challenging. “What was the best bit? For you.”
He didn’t back up. The bong dangled loosely from his fingers. “The bit where you stopped caring who was watching.”
His voice was low, a rough sound in the quiet flat. It wasn’t the answer she expected. It bypassed the tease and went straight to the heart of it, acknowledging the raw, traded power of the booth.
Jan’s smile widened, less a smile and more a baring of teeth. The directness thrilled her. “Might not care now, either.”
Her hand came up, not to touch him, but to pluck the bong from his loose grip. Her fingers brushed his. She turned away, a slow pivot, taking the apparatus with her as she walked the few steps to the sofa. The sway in her hips was pronounced, a rhythm for him to follow.
She dropped down beside Clara, sinking into the cushions, their thighs pressing together. She reloaded the bowl, her movements ritualistic and focused.
“Clara here,” Jan said, not looking up as she worked the weed, “gets all shy after. Thinks too much.” She lit the bowl, took a hit, and passed it directly to Clara, their fingers tangling. “But I’m just getting started, me. That E just… unlocks the box. The come-down’s when you see what’s really inside.” She finally looked over at Marcus, smoke trailing from her lips. “And I’m fucking starving for something.”
The vulgarity hung in the air, a deliberate provocation. Clara took her hit, eyes watering, the warmth in her chest tightening into something anxious and excited. Jan’s boldness was a train and she was locked on the tracks, unable to look away.
Marcus finally moved. He walked over and sat in a battered armchair opposite them, the king returning to his makeshift throne. He rested his elbows on his knees, leaning forward into the space between them. The orange light from the window sliced across his face.
“What’s inside the box, then?” he asked, his eyes flicking from Jan’s defiant gaze to the rapid pulse in Clara’s throat.
Jan leaned back, stretching her arms along the back of the sofa, further accentuating her chest. The fabric of her dress strained. “Right now?” she purred. “Feels like an ache. A proper, empty ache. That music pounds it into you, doesn’t it? Leaves a shape. A hollow.”
She turned her head, her lips close to Clara’s ear, but her voice loud enough to carry. “D’you feel it, Clark? That hollow where the bass was?” Her hand left the sofa back and slid onto Clara’s bare leg, just above the knee. “Needs filling with something proper.”
Clara’s breath caught. Jan’s touch was electric, a claim staked in front of their audience. She managed a tiny nod, her eyes fixed on Marcus, watching him watch them.
Jan’s hand slid higher on Clara’s thigh, a slow, possessive inch. Her attention, however, was all for Marcus. “You dish it out all night,” she said, her voice dropping to a husky murmur. “That sound. That feeling. What do you do with yours? When you come down off all that power?”
The question was a blade, wrapped in velvet. It laid him bare as much as her posture laid her bare. It asked about the man, not the DJ. The silence that followed was thicker than the smoke, charged with a new, dangerous current. Jan had stopped suggesting. She was hunting. And they were all waiting to see what she would catch.
The question hung, sharp as a needle in the haze.
Marcus held her stare, that tired smirk finally returning. He didn’t answer with words. He just stood up, the chair legs scraping harsh on the bare floorboards. He walked to the window, his back to them, and yanked a dirty cord. A heavy blackout curtain fell across the orange street-glow, plunging the room into a deep, velvety dark.
“Power’s just another kind of hollow,” his voice came from the blackness. A lighter flicked, catching the brief outline of his jaw as he lit a candle on a speaker stack. The small flame guttered, then steadied, painting the room in a loose, trembling radius of gold.
Jan’s pulse hammered in her throat. This was it. The acknowledgement. The game had changed boards. She felt Clara tremble beside her.
“Come here,” Marcus said, turning. He wasn’t looking at Jan. He was looking at Clara.
Clara’s green eyes were wide in the candlelight, swallowed by dark pupils. She looked at Jan, a silent plea for guidance. Jan gave a barely perceptible nod, her hand squeezing Clara’s thigh—go on.
Clara rose, unsteady, and took the few steps to him. He didn’t touch her. He just looked down, his gaze tracing the lines of her body as if memorizing a track.
“You kissed her in my booth,” he stated, his voice low. “With my taste still on you.”
Clara swallowed. “Yeah.”
“Do it now.”
The command was soft, absolute. Clara turned her head back towards the sofa, towards Jan. Jan was already moving, rising from the cushions like a shadow given form. She crossed the space, her eyes locked on Clara’s, the ache she’d spoken of now a visible, hungry tension in her limbs.
Their mouths met not with passion, but with a profound, searching familiarity. Jan’s hands came up to cradle Clara’s face, thumbs stroking her cheekbones. It was slow, deep, a communion. A reclaiming.
Marcus watched, his breath coming slower. He moved behind Jan, his own hunger a separate, patient beast. His hands settled on her hips, over the black fabric of her dress. He pressed his body against the curve of her arse, letting her feel the hard line of his erection through his jeans.
Jan broke the kiss with a gasping inhale, her head falling back against Marcus’s shoulder. Her eyes found Clara’s, glinting with dark fire. “See?” she whispered, the word ragged. “Told you. Hollow.”
Marcus’s fingers found the zip at the back of her dress. He tugged it down in one long, rasping tear, the sound obscenely loud. The dress pooled at her waist, then fell to the floor around her ankles. She stood in just her boots, the candlelight licking over the sweat-sheened slopes of her back, the generous swell of her hips.
“Turn her around,” Marcus murmured into Jan’s ear, his voice gravel.
Jan’s hands, still on Clara’s face, guided her. She turned Clara to face the sofa, bending her forward gently until Clara’s hands were braced on the dirty cushions. Jan followed her down, bending over Clara’s back, their bodies pressed together from shoulder to thigh. She found Clara’s mouth again, the kiss renewed, a desperate anchor.
Marcus dropped his jeans. He spat roughly into his palm, the sound crude and practical. He rubbed himself, his eyes fixed on the junction of Jan’s body folded over Clara’s. He didn’t ask. He just positioned the blunt head of his cock and pushed forward, a slow, inexorable invasion.
Jan cried out into Clara’s mouth, a muffled, broken sound. Her body stiffened, then yielded, forced open. The fullness was a shock, a brutal answer to the metaphysical emptiness she’d described. It was profoundly, vulgar real.
He began to move. Short, testing thrusts that rocked Jan forward, pressing her harder into Clara’s back. Each motion forced a grunt from Jan’s throat, each one swallowed by Clara’s searching tongue. Clara’s own moans vibrated against Jan’s lips, a feedback loop of sensation.
Jan’s world narrowed to two points: the hot, stretching slam of Marcus behind her, and the soft, wet pull of Clara’s mouth on hers. The candlelight swam. Her curls stuck to her and Clara’s sweaty temples. She could smell Clara’s perfume, Marcus’s sweat, the sour tang of sex and dirty carpet.
Marcus found a rhythm, deep and punishing. His hands gripped the sides of her waist, his fingers digging into the soft flesh. The slap of skin on skin, the ragged harmony of their breathing, filled the dark flat. It was nothing like the synth-driven pulse of the Hacienda. This was an organic, filthy drumming.
“That’s it,” Marcus grunted, his control slipping. “Take it.”
Jan could only obey, her body a conduit between them. She rocked back against him, meeting his thrusts, each one sending a jolt through her that translated into a harder kiss for Clara. Clara’s hands clawed at the sofa fabric, her back arching, pressed between the weight of Jan and the force of Marcus driving into them both.
The hollow was gone. Obliterated. Jan was filled to bursting, overflowing, a vessel for this crude, brilliant energy. She was the connection, the live wire between his predatory focus and Clara’s surrendered bliss. It was a power greater than any she’d felt on the dancefloor.
Marcus’s pace became frantic, erratic. A final, deep plunge and he held there, shuddering, a raw groan tearing from his chest as he spilled into her. The heat of it, the shocking intimacy, broke Jan’s last tether. A sharp, silent climax ripped through her, her body clamping around him in rhythmic pulses, her cry lost against Clara’s lips.
He pulled out, leaving her feeling cavernous and wet. Jan slumped fully onto Clara, their combined weight driving Clara deeper into the sofa. The three of them were a heap of tangled limbs and spent breath, the only sound the crackle of the candlewick and the ragged saw of their lungs.
The momentum of the night had finally, utterly, bled out.