Page 7 of Dirty Rotten Love

There is a pause of approximately two seconds, and then the table absolutely loses its mind.

I am laughing before I have fully processed what has been said, which is the best kind of laughing, the kind that bypasses your brain entirely. Tam is wheezing. Grigor has stopped singing. Frasier looks like a man who has been handed a gift.

“He needs to get laid,” Whelan repeats, delighted. “That’s your analysis?”

“It’s not analysis, it’s observation,” says Spanner serenely. “I’ve been on this rig three years. I know what I’m looking at.”

“So what’s the solution?” says Dazza, wiping his eyes. “We’re in the middle of the North Sea. Options are limited.”

“Someone should go offer,” says Frasier.

More laughter. Louder this time.

“Take one for the team,” says Tam, raising his beer. “A selfless act of community service.”

“Very noble,” I say. “Very brave. Who’s volunteering?”

Everyone looks at everyone else. There is a lot of pointing. There are several suggestions that are anatomically creative and logistically questionable. Grigor says something in what I think might be Russian that makes Spanner choke on his beer.

“Rory should go,” says Whelan.

I roll my eyes at him. “Absolutely not.”

“You’re the youngest.”

“Irrelevant.”

“You’re the prettiest.”

I attempt to give him my most withering look, but unfortunately it lands somewhere between flattered and offended and I cannot help that, it is simply where it lands.

“Still no.”

“He’s got a point though,” says Dazza thoughtfully, as if they are discussing something entirely reasonable. “You’ve got a very symmetrical face.”

“I’m not going to MacLeod’s door to offer myself as some kind of. I don’t even know what. Absolutely not. You’re all insane.”

“We’re not saying you’d actually do anything,” says Tam reasonably. “Just. You know. Present the option.”

“The option,” I repeat. “Is he even?” I stop. Rephrase. “I mean. Does he. You know.”

Everyone looks at me.

“Is MacLeod gay, is what Rory is trying to ask,” says Tam, with the patience of a man translating for a small child.

“I’m just asking. For context.”

Spanner shrugs again. “Out here, does it matter? It’s not like there’s a wealth of other options.”

This is greeted with the philosophical nodding of men who have thought about this more than they might admit in other contexts. I open my mouth and then close it again.

“I’m not.” I pause. “Just to be clear. I’m not. An option. I mean, I’m not gay. So.”

“Sure,” says Dazza comfortably, in the tone of a man filing information away without judgement and without particular interest, which should be reassuring and somehow isn’t.

“Doesn’t really matter either way,” says Tam. “Nobody’s suggesting anything actually happens. Probably. MacLeod would eat whoever knocked on that door alive.”

“Or Rory could broaden Macleod’s horizons,” winks Frasier