If you could save someone's life, would you? Anyone's? Ali's older brother has a swastika tattooed on his knuckles, a prison ID number for nearly beating an immigrant to death, and spent his teenage years ruthlessly persecuting Ali for being gay. Blood may be thicker than water, but Ali has spent most of his life desperate to prove he is nothing like Tony. A committed vegetarian, charity-supporter, and blood donor, Ali would do anything for anyone. Ali may share parentage with Tony, but he’s determined not to share anything else if he can help it. So when Tony contracts leukaemia, and Ali is the only match for the urgently-needed bone marrow transplant, Ali is caught between two equally awful choices: to refuse and condemn a man to death, or to donate. And in donating, save the life of the man who nearly murdered Ali's Iraqi boyfriend?

Thicker Than Bone

“I’ll call them tomorrow and make you an appointment,” Ali whispered against his ear, and then wriggled and decidedly hooked his chin over the top of Yazid’s head. “You going to sleep?”


Ali chuckled. “Mind if I watch the telly you’ve abandoned?”


“Go f’it…” Yazid mumbled, and yawned. Ali was worrying about nothing. He was just worn out—Christmas was the crazy season in the catering industry, and he was still learning. Lots of pots to wash, basically—he wasn’t trusted with people’s meals quite yet. He was just crashing after that, and his iron was probably low. He got a lot less meat now, living with this beatnik vegetarian. It’d be nothing, but—eh. If Ali wanted him to go to the doctor, then he’d go. Better safe than sorry, eh?


“Nothing,” Ali whispered, laying an arm around Yazid’s shoulders and resting a cheek against his hair.


Chapter 90