Work Text:
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle.
Everything I do is stitched with its color.
W.S. Merwin, “Separation”
Lies Do Not Become Us
Alfie – Little hand says
it’s time to rock and roll.
Nicholas stares at the newspaper in his hands, mouth hanging open, for long minutes.
“Hunh,” he says.
**
He misses stars most of all. Not most, he amends. The most of anything is the one thing he chooses not to think of at this moment, walking down a still busy street at the turn of nightfall. But looking upward and encountering little more than specks, barely visible for all the light pollution of the city, he understands for once why it is denizens of large cities feel themselves to be the centers of the universe.
He’d never thought of stars much before Sandford. There, though, walking down the whisper quiet streets and looking up, he would experience an almost-vertigo. Layers upon layers of stars, reminding him how unimaginably huge the universe is. One time he’d leaned too far back and might have lost his balance, reeling a bit, except a friendly hand on his shoulder saved him, not to push him back up, but lending him the strength he needed to keep enjoying the wonder of it all.
Damn. Damn it all to hell.
**
The bathroom is covered in blue: sink, tub, tile, walls. It reflects off his skin, shading it an unhealthy hue.
Nicholas stares at his sickly, bruised-looking reflection in the mirror for long minutes before walking to the front room and sitting on the sofa. There is nothing in here for him to stare at, though. No television. No window. Just walls decorated in the same “we don’t give a shit” manner all furnished apartments have. Washed out paintings that could be hounds running through a field, or waves of a muddy sea. In fact, the only thing worth staring at is sitting on the coffee table in front of him. Its bland electronic face glows green and tells him nothing except the time is 1:37 a.m.
He picks it up and does what he’s wanted for the two hours he’s wandered around the tiny flat. It rings seven times before a sleepy voice answers.
“Wha?”
“You were sleeping?” he asks the obvious.
“Nicholas,” Danny hisses. “What the fuck’re you doing?”
“Calling you.”
“You can’t do that, yea?”
“Of course I can. At times. You don’t have to whisper, you know. No one’s listening.”
“How do you know?”
He shakes his head, confused. “Well, unless someone is there…?”
“Why would someone be here?”
“Never mind,” he says, absurdly grateful. “I just wanted to see how you were doing.”
“Oh.” He can almost hear the shrug through the wires. “’m fine. Doc says I can go in starting next week part days, if I do a deskjob.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. But it beats sitting here all day.”
The thought of Danny returning to work without him is almost too much. Nicholas lays his forehead on the coffee table. “Anything going on around there?”
“Are you in a tunnel?”
“What?” He sits up. “No. No. Just—“
“Nothing going on. Building the station. Burying the dead.”
Nicholas fights the urge to lay his head back down.
“Swan’s missing again.”
He raises his eyebrows. “Tenacious bird.”
“Yeah. Tony’s having a bugger of a time catching it.”
“Is he honking at it? He shouldn’t do that.”
The line is quiet for moments. Nicholas admits he enjoys simply listening to Danny breathe, but guilt over waking him takes over.
“I suppose I should go.”
“Oh.” He thinks he hears disappointment, but if it’s there it’s quickly covered by a hearty, “Well then.”
He takes a sharp breath, suddenly not wanting to break the connection. “I’ll try to call in a few days.”
“Keep yourself safe, Nicholas. We’ll talk when we can.” Calm voice on the other end.
He wonders about that. Does he sound upset? It is when he takes another breath that he hears the hitch in it. “I like…I like the messages, Danny.”
“Yeah?”
“I do.”
“Not gonna blow your cover, or anything?”
He resists the urge to laugh, though he doesn’t think it would be misconstrued. Laughing might just break him right now. “No. They’re perfect.”
“I’ll keep doing it, then.”
“Good,” he says, damn hitching breath. “Good.”
**
When the helicopter arrived in Sandford it attracted the same fanfare it did the first time, given the events that occurred the first time. Which meant many people went underground, closed their doors, and locked away their children until given the all clear. Nicholas had just returned from Bristol with Danny and was attempting to not be a mother hen, and failing a bit, when he heard the unmistakable whir of blades.
“Shit,” he said.
“Hunh. What do you think they want?”
“I don’t know that I’m arsed to care.”
Danny gave his giggle-wheeze that reminded Nicholas of a balloon leaking, which reminded him of other wheezes he’d heard too recently, but he knew it was Danny’s nervous sound. Danny’s ‘I don’t know what to say at this moment, or if I should be amused, but I am’ sound. He let it go. He wished he were still in Bristol with Danny, watching him get all red faced and struggling and trying not to mother hen him to irritation, even while failing a bit. Say what you like about the Met, he thought, they are timely bastards.
***
2:10 a.m. and it only takes two rings this time.
“Nicholas?” Whispered.
“Danny, I already told you; you don’t have to whisper.”
“No, it’s a good part, here listen.” At that the phone is held aloft and Nicholas hears tinny gunfire and a voice saying, ‘Arse tit fritter darbs!’ Danny pulls the phone back in time for Nicholas to hear, “Ye-ah, boyee! Did you get that?”
“What about bitter barbs?”
“No, it’s…here I’ll back it up.”
Before he can protest, the phone is held aloft again.
**
He watches people because that’s what he is supposed to do. He loves it, the wonder and confusion of staring down strangers and trying to determine the whys of it all. Why is that woman carrying a dustbin with five umbrellas in it? Why is the boy angry with his mum and stomping ahead of her? Why is the man with the caftan wearing a caftan? Wait, why is the boy stomping ahead of his mum? She isn’t stopping or even calling out to him. He keeps his gaze trained on the boy, who simply enters a sweets shop. The woman follows after.
He turns his attention to a man walking quickly away from the electronics store across the street. His gait is forced, hurried, his face resolutely turned forward. Nicholas narrows his eyes. It only takes the barest movement of someone throwing open the door of the shop and the walker’s quick glance backwards to get Nicholas running. He dashes across the street, vaults over the parked Vauxhall, barely registers the owner’s shouts as he takes off down the sidewalk, dodging pedestrians who refuse to move out of his way.
**
Alfie – Time to dance with
the universe.
**
1:47 a.m. and it barely rings once.
“Who brought me the peachy flowers?”
“Peachy?” he asks.
“You know, peach-colored. Had a limp.”
Nicholas files through the many visitors Danny had while hospital-bound, sorts by gender, age, and physical characteristics. Danny had insisted on introducing him to each person with various descriptors. “Your cousin Paul’s wife’s older sister’s boy?”
“No, that’s George. He limps on his right.”
Right, lefty. “Peach tulips?”
“They were tulips? That’s my mum’s favorite.”
Nicholas files that away as well. “Tulips are lovely flowers,” he says. “Very pert.” He thinks some more. “George O’Neil?”
“Oh! That’s my mum’s cousin, Jilly’s husband’s brother!”
All right, then. “So that was him?”
“Yeah.” He drifts away. Nicholas cannot hear the sounds of dialogue or gunfire from the telly. Wonders if it’s muted or if Danny’s been sitting there for how long trying to remember.
“So, that answered your question, then?”
“I was just wonderin’. Couldn’t remember,” he says, slightly irritated sounding.
“Well you were on several strong painkillers, had tubes coming out of every hole in your body, including a couple of new ones. I think you can be excused for not remembering every person who came to see you.”
“That’s why I have you, yeah?”
**
He hated packing with a passion. His cottage was indeed, as Frank had said, lovely. He could already envision the flowers that would crowd the front, and spotted a climber starting on his front wall. He stood in his well-appointed bedroom methodically refolding his shirts and placing them just so in his suitcase. Danny sat on his bed.
“Got everything, then?”
Nicholas studied his suitcase: clothes, shaving kit, uniform. “Seem to.”
“I mean, snacks for the trip? Some DVDs?”
He looked up and smiled at his friend for the first time since that fucking helicopter had landed, but didn’t answer.
“I mean you just got your new plant and everything. You were gonna show me how to care for it.”
“Well now you can have a trial by fire.”
“Maybe you should take it with you.”
Nicholas shook his head. Taking the plant would be…permanent seeming.
“I don’t want to mess it up, is all.”
“You won’t. And if you do, it doesn’t matter.”
He knew what Danny wasn’t saying. It was the same thing he wasn’t saying. It was the always unspoken thing between them. Instead of causing tension, though, it had settled into a comfortable spot, stretched out its legs, and snoozed, ready to be jostled awake whenever they were ready. Which was not this day.
What he didn’t know, or was having trouble discerning was whatever it was Danny wasn’t asking, because he could see the questions in the way Danny’s eyes kept darting to his face and hear them in every helpful packing hint.
“My mum always rolled her clothes, said she could fit more that way.”
“I don’t have much.”
It was so unlike Danny to not ask questions. Nicholas wasn’t quite certain what to do with that.
**
London stinks. Exhaust, garbage, even the concrete has an odor of wet dog. Of course, Nicholas notices the odor particularly at this moment because his nostrils are flared. Danny would say his Spidey-sense was tingling, but he prefers to believe it is simply the effect of observation and awareness. Something doesn’t smell right. He jerks his head to the right just as the figure steps out of the alley and saunters away from him. He walks rapidly to catch up.
**
Alfie – Don’t forget, the correct
term is babes.
**
He shouldn’t call Danny this late. It can’t be helped, the lateness. By the time he finishes his paperwork, eats, showers, midnight is long past. Night after night, he stares at his phone, talks himself out of calling. Some nights he chooses not to listen. Nights when he fears that, after three weeks away, he is already losing something he had only a tenuous hold upon. He picks up the mobile, scrolls until he sees the number he wants. Doesn’t hit send.
**
Nicholas knew as soon as he said the words ‘I have to go back to London’ what Danny’s reaction would be. He hoped he looked as glum as he felt about it. Which is why it seemed strange when Danny barely reacted at all.
“What about your new peace lily?” he’d asked.
It would be best for him to leave Sandford, the Met Chief Inspector had said. There was no telling how vengeance-oriented the suspect was and Sandford was still making news. Best for him to keep a low profile, given recent events, he’d explained. Best not to take chances with his new friends, he’d cautioned. And Nicholas had agreed, because regardless of how Danny chose to spin it, he should be the one limping around Sandford like an eighty year-old.
What he still can’t figure was why for the life of him he told Danny his work was undercover. Though a part of him whispers possibly the urge to impress his friend proved too great. Or maybe it was because they had just watched Deep Cover. Or perhaps it was simply because it would give him the excuse to not call Danny at all hours, inquire after his health, and hear about Sandford in his absence.
**
12:18 a.m. and the phone rings and rings.
**
It started in the hospital in Bristol. Nicholas would pick up that day’s Times from the newsagents in the lobby to read whilst Danny slept. One time, Danny awakened to see him reading the classifieds and joked about him needing company.
“Alfie – come home now. We have your dish and leash ready,” he read.
“They’re writing to their dog?”
Nicholas shrugged. “Perhaps Alfie isn’t a dog.”
“They put their cat on a leash?”
The discussion that followed was made more humorous by the morphine flowing through Danny’s veins, but it started a nightly trend in which Nicholas read out loud the personal messages in that day’s paper. He liked the hope they represented; needed it. It also had the added positive effect of making Danny giggle. Which he also needed.
**
12:45 a.m. and after 15 rings, Nicholas pulls his phone away to hit the Stop button when he hears “Hello? Nicholas?”
“Oh. Hi,” he says.
“Sorry. I had to about run up the stairs to catch it.”
He can hear Danny huffing, curses himself, the gods, and Tom Weaver for it. “Danny, you should have let it go.”
“Didn’t want to miss your call.”
The elegant simplicity of this statement cause all curses to dry up in his throat.
“I’m sorry I haven’t phoned recently.”
“All right?”
“I’ve been busy.”
“Oh.”
Nicholas realizes he’s standing, sits down hard, his heart pounding, though he doesn’t know why. There was never (well, he shouldn’t say never, because he knows as well as Danny that never isn’t the correct term) this awkwardness between them before. This sudden static of an unused line. Something is right before him and he struggles to reach for it.
“How are you?”
A sigh. “Fine.”
“That’s good.”
“Yeah.”
**
If days can ache this way for a long time
I think, I am done, ready to give up.
But when I see you again, I recognize
All the lies I’ve been telling myself as lies
J.L. Kennedy, “Ache”
**
Nicholas remembers holding Danny’s hand while the other man sobbed, heaving on his hospital bed, trying to curl into himself. He’d wiped snot and tears from his friend’s face without thinking twice, reassuring him that no matter what, he would be a police officer again.
He remembers the first time he’d helped Danny to the toilet, a steadying hand on his shoulder while turning his eyes politely away. Danny started giggling. “Nothing you ain’t seen before, Sergeant.”
He remembers walking with Danny through Sandford after his release. The town, and its citizens, somber and dust-covered. The fountain still bore the scars from their gunfight. Buildings would be repaired. Windows replaced. Danny looked around as if his heart were hollow.
**
12:57 a.m. and his head feels as if a piece of church roof is lodged in it, proof that while a birthday party clown may appear harmless, those squeaky shoes can cause some damage. His chest hurts as well, but not for the same reasons.
He cuts Danny off at hello. “Come visit me.”
He hears the television click on, and just as quickly off, but nothing else except breathing.
“Please.”
“Thought I couldn’t. Don’t want to blow your cover.”
“Blast my cover, Danny. There’s…I just…” he stops himself because he’s raised his voice. “…would really like to see you.”
“When?”
“End of the week?”
“Where?”
“What do you mean, ‘where?’”
“Where should we meet?”
“At…the station?”
“We should meet out of town, somewhere away.”
“Or we could meet here in London, where I’m staying, and save us both the trouble and time of traveling a distance.”
“Aw. I thought it would be fun! All cloak and dagger like.”
He almost, almost agrees. But, “I only have a day free.”
“Oh, all right, then.” Cheerfully, “But let’s meet somewhere else, not the station.”
He thinks quickly. “Check the Buford Abbey Gazette day after tomorrow.”
“Ah, the Gazette. Good choice. That way it’ll be harder to trace.”
He rubs his forehead. “Right.”
**
Alfie – Bullet Tooth Tony’s going
for a pint at the real Drowning Trout.
**
He would have gotten the message. He had to have. Hell, the only reason Nicholas even saw that movie was because Danny said it was a-may-zing. He has to admit, he did like the ending.
He tries to look casual. Isn’t quite certain he’s doing it right. But there is a paper in front of him and it is open. He reads papers. But Danny would like it if he were looking casual. He should have thought of a code word.
He sees Danny before he knows it, sunglasses on, only limping slightly. He looks good. Forgetting any talk of cloaks or daggers, he lowers his paper, grin spread hugely on his face.
Danny’s answering grin is equally huge. They look like a pair of sodding idiots and he doesn’t give a fuck. He stands, gives what could be an awkward hug, but it turns out nicely when Danny claps him on the back.
“You look like shit,” Danny says gaily.
“Thanks, partner.”
**
11:45 p.m. and there will be no phone calls tonight.
“This is…”
“I know.”
“I mean, you could have…”
“There’s nothing that can be done.”
“I have to say it, Nicholas, but your flat is uglier than Doris after a night’s bender.”
Nicholas laughs. Waits to break. Doesn’t because Danny is sitting next to him. They are each holding a sweating can of lager, sitting on the couch, and staring at the wavy hound painting.
“I didn’t choose it, you know.”
Danny turns his head, currently resting on the back of the couch, and looks at him. “You should consider getting a house plant.”
“All right,” he laughs again.
“Oxygenates the room, relieves stress…”
Nicholas knows his smile is idiotic and his expression a little too adoring, but his head is swimming nicely and he doesn’t wish to stop watching Danny as he looks around.
“Where do you sleep?”
Nicholas pounds the sofa. “Right here.”
“Oh.” He scowls. “Christ, you really pissed them off that much by not coming back?”
“It’s close to where I need to be.” He stares at the painting; shrugs. “No worse than my room at the Swan.”
“At least you had a real bed there.”
“It opens,” he says as if he’s just discovered that. When was the last time he’d gone to the trouble of pulling off the cushions to sleep? “But it’s not too uncomfortable like this.”
Danny puts his can on the coffee table and rests his forearms on his knees. Their grand excursion through London had worn him out, Nicholas can see. Or possibly he was already tired when he’d arrived.
“I’m sorry I ring you so late,” he says softly.
He receives a sweet smile in return and a shrug.
“I’m glad you get to at all.”
“It’s just, my hours…”
“I’m a police officer too, you know.”
It’s the truth, though Sandford hours never quite needed to run to all-night shifts. Of course, that would have interfered with the movements of the NWA. “How are—?“ finds he can’t quite finish.
“Things?”
He meets Danny’s eyes and nods. Danny shrugs again.
“It’s Sandford.”
**
Nicholas insists on opening the sofa bed without help, though he can feel Danny scowling at his back. He chooses not to care. He finds, to his surprise, some pillows in the linen closet. Danny laughs at him as he stands there staring at them, perplexed. They settle in, Nicholas on his back, Danny curled up on his side, both hands under his pillow. Nicholas has an image of a happy round-faced boy, curled up exactly this way, waiting to be kissed goodnight. He turns off the lamp and the room sweeps into complete darkness.
“Hey, Nick?”
“Hmmm?”
“Why’d you come back?”
He flips over to face the Danny-shaped lump, barely visible in the dark. “I had to.”
“Not here, I meant back to Sandford. That night?”
Nicholas shifts against the bed and feels the give and pull of that thing between them. It has conformed beautifully to wedge itself between his sharp edges and Danny’s soft ones. He wants to rip it away.
“I had to.”
There is no answer from the other man and they could simply fall asleep at this moment, wake tomorrow and it would all be the same. He continues to look at Danny until his eyes adjust and he can barely see Danny’s eyes are open looking at him.
“I’m not working undercover, Danny.”
He hears a deep breath being released, feels it as a breeze on his cheek. “I know.”
“You figured it out?” He should have known. It’s not as if Danny isn’t the world’s foremost expert on undercover work. In movies. Which trumps Nicholas’s knowledge, honestly.
“Always knew.”
“That I was lying to you?”
He can make out more of Danny’s expression now, but it isn’t hurt, or even angry. Just resigned. “Yeah.”
“How?”
“You never have before. You’re not very good at it, you know.”
He wants to laugh. Or cry. He wishes he could go in another room and just think about all this, because there is too much in that one statement. Too much truth and too much hurt. But he doesn’t have time to ponder and twist his mind about, finding the middle ground that would make this right.
He finds he’s been staring at Danny while going over this, and Danny is waiting. For what, an explanation, apology, withdrawal, he doesn’t know. But he somehow knows Danny would wait there forever. Would return to Sandford still waiting, if necessary.
“I don’t know why I did it.”
Danny opens his mouth, but says nothing.
“I really don’t,” he says, because he still really doesn’t.
“I thought…” He can hear reluctance on the other man’s part. Can see the hesitancy in his eyes, so he nods encouragingly. “I thought you were making it easier.”
“To do what?”
“Leave.”
“To work here?”
“…me.”
“Danny, no,” he says softly. “No,” more firmly.
“It’s all right, though. I mean, not all right, really, but I get it. It’s a little strange. Don’t you think it’s strange?”
“What?”
For the first time, Danny breaks eye contact. Waves a hand between them. “This?”
Because he’s not very good at lying, “No,” he says. “I don’t think…I ever thought of it that way.”
Danny lets out another breath, and with it, Nicholas can feel several weeks of pent up worry. “You too?” he asks, smiling.
Nicholas nods, and smiles back.
“So…undercover?”
He cannot stop the blush. “I thought it sounded more exciting?”
“You really don’t know why, do you?”
“I really don’t.”
“That’s fucking brilliant.”
“How’s that?”
“It’s like you have one part of your brain that just made this decision and ran with it, and you, Sergeant Nicholas Angel, Sandford PD, were just left to grab hold of your prick and go along with it.”
“That’s one way of thinking about it,” he says, vaguely irritated.
“That’s so sad it’s hilarious.” To prove his point, Danny is laughing.
“Not too hilarious when I’m avoiding calling you because I’m lying to you,” Nicholas protests. “And you went along with it!” Danny laughs. Nicholas lets him.
Eventually the mirth subsides. “You know what?”
“Hm?” he asks, still a bit annoyed.
“I’m going to kiss you now.”
Before Nicholas can respond, Danny’s lips are pressing against his, soft and sweet, undemanding. He closes his eyes, but feels the other man pull away. He remains there with his eyes closed for another moment, willing his terrified heart to beat again. He touches his own lips with his fingertips and looks at Danny, who seems equal parts worried and proud of himself. As he should be, Nicholas thinks.
“Do that again,” he says.
This time, he is ready, lips parted, sliding his tongue in where it is welcomed with a moan that reverberates straight to his toes. He wraps one hand around the back of Danny’s neck, stroking his thumb along the soft skin just below his ear. His other hand, trapped mostly between them, grasps at Danny’s undershirt. He feels a hand rubbing on his chest, thumb circling his nipple, before Danny breaks away to bury his head in Nicholas’s neck, licking at the sensitive skin there. He swallows a gasp at the feel of teeth grazing at the bend between his neck and shoulder.
“Yes,” he says, and when Danny bites down, he hardens helplessly. He frees his other hand to grab Danny’s head with both and bring his lips back. He is careful to keep his lower body from mindlessly pushing forward. Danny tries to move closer, but Nicholas groans and shifts back. Danny makes a noise of protest and moves his hand to his lower back, pulling him in. Nicholas breaks away.
“Danny, wait.”
“Gettin’ shy on me?”
Nicholas places a palm on Danny’s chest and looks at him. Though he is honestly feeling a bit shy, he meets Danny’s eyes and wonders if his look nearly as dark and wild. Danny seems to read his worry and tries to pull away, annoyed look on his face, but Nicholas holds fast with the hand still around his neck.
“You’re not gonna hurt me.”
“I could,” he says.
Danny grabs his hand and places it on his stomach over his shirt. Nicholas can feel heat there and the raised angry ridges of healing scar tissue. “It hurts all the time. When I walk, sleep, take a pee…laugh. You want me to stop laughing?”
“Never,” Nicholas says, though he can’t stop staring at his hand. “I’m still learning all of yours.”
“You are a sad sap, you know.”
“I am figuring that out, yes,” he says. He keeps his hand on Danny’s stomach and leans in.
**
It’s been long enough since Nicholas has been here, tangled in sheets, spit-slick and sweat-soaked, that he feels adolescently bashful in the aftermath. Danny, still catching his breath, lets his fingers idly trace nonsense patterns on Nicholas’s stomach. He endures it as long as he can before grabbing hold of the fingers.
“Tickles,” he murmurs.
“Heh,” he hears in response and instantly regrets admitting that. But Danny’s fingers still and rest easily on his skin, as if he cannot keep his hands off, and Nicholas’s chest makes this funny twisty clench at the thought he may not be the only sap in the room.
“I’m sorry I lied to you.”
Danny turns to face him. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not.”
“I lied to you too, didn’t I?”
Realization hits him. “You did.” He narrows his eyes at the other man.
Danny simply grins in response. “Thought it would be fun. Keep you thinking of me.”
“I thought of you every day, Danny. All the time.”
“Even when you were working?”
“Well, no. Of course then I had to focus on the task at hand. I am patrolling one of the highest crime areas,” but of course Danny is giggling. At him. He finds he doesn’t mind so much.
“Why are you here, then?”
“A very dangerous man was released from prison and made it known he wished to do me a great deal of harm.”
“Why you?”
“Kalashnikov crackhead?”
“Yeah?”
“His brother.”
“Ah.”
“Exactly. I couldn’t chance he’d come to Sandford.”
“We’ve handled worse. Recently, in fact.”
Nicholas rolls onto his back, remembering everything that had gone into making the choice to leave. “Right--and we’re still dealing with the aftermath. Doris is barely out of her cast, the Andys are just getting the hang of police procedure, and you…”
“Useless.”
“Not useless. But…it seemed the best decision.”
“To come back here and do what?”
“This is the neighborhood where most of his known associates—also dangerous types--operate. I’m arresting as many as I can to catch his attention.”
“You mean you’re…bait? Nicholas, that is wicked!”
“You think so?” He turns back to face Danny, who indeed looks impressed.
“You’re like Deke DaSilva. That’s brilliant! It’s….”
“Off the fucking chain?”
“Sure.”
“Not quite the same when I say it, is it?”
“You’re trying, at least. Hey, do you get to wear a wig?”
“He’s supposed to come after me, not think I’m someone else.”
“Ah, right.”
“And while my suspect is dangerous, he’s no international terrorist holding the city hostage.”
“Pity, that.”
“It’s not working.” Nicholas sighs. “Perhaps I’ve lost my edge without my partner.”
Danny snorts. “Sap,” he says, but he reaches out to tangle his fingers with Nicholas’s. He looks thoughtful for a moment. “So…not such a badass motherfucker with a grudge, then?”
“For a violent criminal who wishes me harm, he’s very reticent.”
“Why don’t you just come home?”
Nicholas raises his eyebrows. “And leave my duty undone?”
“What if he was just winding everyone up before he took off to Amsterdam, or some such?”
“It’s possible, but my superiors took it seriously enough.”
“These would be the same superiors who sent you to Sandford?”
“Well…”
“And then wanted you back because their numbers went ‘squiffy’ while you were gone?”
“…yes.”
“Can I stay? Help you?”
He looks so excited; Nicholas truly wishes he could say yes. “No.”
“Aw, come on. I could help.”
“Of that I have no doubt, but there are jurisdictional considerations—“
Danny’s brows draw together. “Which meant nothing when they’re tossing you about as it pleased them!”
He nods, at a loss as to why Danny is suddenly angry. “True.”
“Just tell me you’re not sayin’ no because of this.” He gestures to his wound.
Nicholas looks down surprised. “It hadn’t occurred to me.” He runs his finger over the scar. Still had a bit of a go before healing fully, but it looked a sight better than it had the last time he’d seen it. He meets Danny’s less angry-looking eyes. “Honestly.”
For the first time since he’d arrived, Nicholas can see the true strain of the trip on the other man, no matter that it was now close to three in the morning and his shift starts in less than twelve hours. He tries not to panic at the thought of Danny leaving, but his face gives something away and the next thing he knows, he is being pulled into Danny.
He revels in the feel of Danny’s hands on his bare back and his lips seek skin, needing as much contact as he can get. Danny can rest when he gets home, he thinks. It’s selfish, he knows, but he senses it in Danny as well, the need to not waste what time they have, now that they have granted themselves this freedom to touch.
**
“Can I come back?” Danny asks; slurry-voiced from near sleep.
“Sure, but there’s not much time,” Nicholas says. His voice sounds funny. Possibly his tongue needs sleep as well. “The assignment was for six weeks.”
“Oh.” Danny curls into him, threading together any parts that will mesh. Nicholas feels too lax to even wonder at it and rests into a tangle of limbs. So when Danny suddenly lifts his head, it startles him.
“Wait, six weeks?”
Nicholas struggles to shrug. “The Chief Inspector said they’d consider it a non-issue after that.”
“Then you’d come home?”
“Yeah?”
Danny is kissing him again. Hard. Hungry. Nicholas finds himself responding despite feeling utterly drained. When Danny pulls away, his expression is something Nicholas, with all his years of trained human observation, cannot define.
“You couldn’t wait one more week to see me?” he demands hoarsely.
Nicholas knows now what that expression is. What it has been all along, lurking beneath all the other expressions used to qualify it.
“No. I couldn’t,” he answers.
**
Danny won’t let him come any farther than this point. Nicholas stands with his hands in his pockets, ignoring the bustle of people rushing to meet their trains.
“I’m glad you came,” he says. It is the truest thing he can think of at the moment.
Danny, who looks so knackered he’ll have to be awakened to meet his connect, gives him a radiant smile. An ‘I think you’re amazing’ smile, all teeth and gums and shining eyes. Nicholas forces himself to not look away, breathless, humbled. “Thanks for asking,” is all he says. He turns and is gone into a sea of travelers.
**
Nicholas watches the street, the people, the shops, and life in the city flows around him.
He does not think about the sharp broken sounds Danny made the night before as his cock slid over Nicholas’s tongue. He doesn’t think about Danny sucking on that spot where the tender skin of his stomach stretches over his hipbone, or of the mark he left, not distracted at all by the way his belt rubs at his skin and makes him definitely not think about Danny’s tongue and teeth, which at times seemed to be everywhere at once. He refuses to remember the focused intensity of Danny’s attention, the several times he swears he heard Danny whisper, “Mine,” and how much harder that made him.
But the most difficult thing to not think about is earlier that day, a few hours after sleep had finally overtaken his self-indulgence, becoming aware of the city outside his walls. Intrusive, cacophonous noises that once used to comfort him unwelcome now. For those few seconds before he opened his eyes all memory was lost except that of crushing resignation. And then, “How do you sleep through that fucking racket?”
This will not do at all. He schools his face in an attentive, pensive mask and allows his gaze to travel the busy street.
**
It turns out he does catch his not so badass motherfucker with a grudge three days later during a hold-up, after which Nicholas swears if he ever sees another knife again, he is simply going to baton the suspect in the face, guidelines be damned.
The giddiness sets in while he is at A and E getting his thigh stitched. Then narcotics, combined with five weeks three days of insomnia, knock him out for twelve hours.
**
It isn’t until he notices a familiar conciliatory friendliness on the Met Sergeant’s face that he becomes suspicious.
“Sgt. Angel, through your work alone, crime has dropped seventeen percent in your patrol area. Very nicely done.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“I can see your little jaunt to the country hasn’t softened you one bit.”
“Well, my little ‘jaunt to the country’ had me quite busy. Sir.”
“Yes. A fine piece of work there as well.”
Nicholas is tired of the game. He fast-forwards. “When may I return?”
“Ah, yes.” He opens a folder and scans the contents while Nicholas can feel his teeth grinding together of their own volition. “There…is…a bit of a problem with that, I’m afraid.”
He’ll quit, he thinks. Apply to Bristol Police Service, anywhere to not play these games again. “Problem?”
“It seems your friend, PC Butterman, is to be promoted to Sergeant when he returns to full duty.”
Nicholas smiles in spite of his growing unease. “That is excellent news, sir. No one deserves such a promotion more than Constable Butterman.”
“Yes, it’s very nice, Nicholas, but therein lies your problem.” He folds his hands and leans forward. “If you were to return to Sandford, the total count of Sergeants in that one district alone would number six. In a district with an active CID, that is a bit high.”
Biting back the retort about the activities of Sandford’s CID, Nicholas readies to tender his resignation. There is no other choice. He had found his one thing. Perhaps after leaving here, he would call Janine and tell her he had finally found it. Maybe they could share a drink and ponder old times and be sad and happy for each other. He had meant to check in on her, but—
“Sergeant Angel!”
Nicholas snaps to attention automatically. “Sir!”
“I’d like you to consider an alternative.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but I’m not staying in London. I’d like to return to Sandford. If there will be too many Sergeants then demote me to PC again, I don’t care.”
“Demotion?”
“I…like it there, sir.”
“So I can see. Yes, well that’s good. But it’s not another PC Sandford needs, Nicholas.”
“Sir?”
“What Sandford needs is an Inspector.”
“…sir?”
**
It is another full day before he can leave, though his skin is itching to from the moment his dazed legs carry him from the Sergeant’s office, hand still tingling from the hearty, slightly smarmy, handshake he received from the Chief Inspector (“Call me Kenneth now, Nicholas! I’m certain we’ll be fast friends.”). Paperwork, more paperwork, an excess, if he may say, of paperwork obliterates all connection he has to the Metropolitan Police Service and assigns him a spiffy new cap.
It takes him fifteen minutes to pack, clean, and leave the fuck-ugliest flat he has ever seen. Another fifteen gets him to the station. He could fly, but there is a sentimental symbolism in taking the train, knowing he will arrive well after dark. He gleefully watches the signal bars on his mobile drop one by one.
He hasn’t called Danny. Has had little chance to talk to him since he’d left, except for the one time Danny called him to let him know he had arrived safely back. He wants no more phone conversations for a while. The next time he hears Danny’s voice, it will be in person. Hopefully not long before finding someplace private.
He looks at the newspaper in his lap. Besides, he is expected.
Nicholas – Come home now.
–Danny
End.