Chapter Twenty #2
“Eyes? Road? I don’t mind when you do it, honestly—I find it strange, and wouldn’t want to myself, especially when paired with stubble, but it doesn’t bother me. I told you this the other night! Didn’t I?”
“Me? Wearing fucking dresses?”
“I only wonder where on earth you buy the matching shoes, because you have big…feet…but they always seem to fit quite well. You looked very nice in the frock you wore for the…” What was that expression Samuel had used?
Ah, yes, he knew listening to Samuel so considerately would come in handy one day, “…prettiest girl in the club contest. You won, of course.”
Ben was silent until the next junction. It was a blessed relief, and Nikolas turned the PM back on.
The Russian president had been summoned to Downing Street for a crisis conference.
Nikolas chuckled to himself. He couldn’t imagine the president he’d known in other circumstances being summoned anywhere.
They’d shared an office building once, until their respective careers had led them on other paths.
They’d actually had a brief conversation once in the toilets.
It had been a singularly unpleasant experience for both of them.
“I don’t fucking believe—”
“I have a photograph of you in a dress. It’s yellow.” This was actually true—almost. Ben was about three months old and technically it was a Christening gown, but these things were all semantics.
He got to listen to the whole interview in peace.
* * *
Ben was on even less sure ground when they arrived at the London house.
This, he gathered, was Nikolas’s house and had been since before they’d met.
He didn’t remember much from his very brief visit at the beginning of the week.
Fear, confusion and anger tended to do that.
Nikolas had summoned the team once more, and Ben greeted Squeezy with a subdued nod, muttered hello to Tim equally quietly, and decided to make everyone tea.
The team was decidedly depleted. Kate, of course, was absent. Andrea Gillian wasn’t required—she was coming later to examine Ben—and Jackson hadn’t arrived yet.
Ben had just finished making the tea when this last member of ANGEL strode in.
Ben hadn’t met this man before. Jackson clearly knew him, but he only gave Ben a small salute, sat at the table and refused tea.
He produced a bottle of water and began sipping it, leaning back in his chair, stretched out.
Ben suddenly realised that Nikolas was watching his reaction to Jackson. Ben lowered his gaze, but heard Nikolas rise. He brushed past Ben on the way to the fridge and whispered, “You’re out of luck. He’s not gay.”
There’s rage and then there’s…well, rage.
Ben had been about to respond to the infuriating gay implication (still seething about the image of himself in a yellow dress, being leered at—or laughed at, which was worse—by gay men in a sleazy bar somewhere), when Nikolas told him to take Radulf out for a walk—that he needed to discuss things with the others Ben couldn’t hear.
For some reason, the man called Tim rose swiftly from his place and declared he’d go with him—that he wasn’t really any use either for what was going to be discussed.
Nikolas didn’t object, so Ben found himself walking alongside Tim Watson to the canal.
Tim knew the way…assured Ben they’d gone there together with the dog many, many times.
He even knew a good pub and suggested he treat Ben to lunch.
“Don’t take it to heart—how he speaks to you. He’s sort of got into a habit with it because it infuriates you and he likes annoying you.” Clearly this Tim person knew him well enough to read his body language. Interesting.
“Why does he fucking want to annoy me all the time?”
The man shrugged. “I don’t really know, but if I had to guess, I’d say it was his defence mechanism—but for God’s sake don’t tell him I told you that!
Jesus. Again, if I had to take a guess, I’d say he’s terrified he won’t get you back.
Nikolas doesn’t do fear, so he does aggression instead.
He can’t be aggressive with you, so he’s dialled it down to being annoying. ”
“Bloody hell. But I’m still here! He can’t lose me! I’m not a sodding dog!”
Tim nodded sadly. “Yes, but the Ben he wants back is the one who knows him. That’s the thing. The rest of us only know bits and pieces about him—Kate probably knows the most—but you know it all—or we assume you do. Who he is. What he—and, honestly, I can’t tell you any more.”
“So you’ve had the speaking moratorium put on you as well.”
“I don’t know what happened in Lancashire anyway. Michael won’t tell me. He never tells me anything. Well, about what he does, anyway.”
Lancashire? Michael? Another bloody ANGEL employee? “Ask Squeezy at an opportune moment—oh, like when you’re fucking maybe? He knows.”
Tim glanced over. “Squeezy is Michael. That’s his name. And do you have a problem with me and Michael? Because you were the one who introduced us.”
Ben wrinkled his nose and didn’t reply. It was infuriating having someone know your life better than you knew it yourself.
Tim seemed willing to let Ben’s implication slide, given his condition, for he immediately asked, “How is it going, anyway? Have you regained some memory?”
“Bits and pieces. Nothing very important.”
“Isn’t that the way for all of us? We can remember a damn song that was playing but not the name of the person we were dancing with.”
“How did we meet? Were you in the army, too?” His doubtful glance made Tim chuckle.
“No, thank God. You were ordered to fuck me to get into a terrorist cell you thought I headed up. Then you were ordered to kill me.”
Ben chuckled. “Good one.” He glanced over at a small gesture from Tim. “What? Fucking hell!” After a moment he added, “That wasn’t when I was in the army. No way would I’ve—?”
“No, after, when you worked for Nikolas. I don’t really know much about what you guys did before ANGEL. I came on board when you got back from the Philippines. You’ll know more about the department’s work than I do.”
The department? “Yeah, course. So…”
“Ben, I can’t talk to you about this. He’s told us all not to. I’ve probably said more than I should already.”
“Jesus! What is it with you fucking people! What’s he gonna do? Kill you all if you don’t do what he says?”
Tim stopped on the canal path and regarded Ben for a moment. Ben walked on defensively. He assumed the look was because he was behaving badly. He was, and hated himself for it.
Tim caught up to him. “I’ve been doing some reading up on memory loss in some of my old psychology books.”
Ben quirked his lips in apology, recognising a polite way of changing the subject when he heard it. “And?”
“It’s interesting but still a very unknown area.”
“Nik reckoned it wasn’t like fiction—that I wouldn’t have a sort of oh my God moment when I see something that brings it all back.”
“Well, as usual with Nikolas—and this is something you’ll remember one day—he’s wrong.
There have been a number of cases where that exact thing has happened.
One woman lost her autobiographical memory, just like you, played a game of tennis, and when she missed a shot it all came flooding back to her—she’d missed a shot like that in childhood, apparently.
Another man went for an operation, and lying on the operating table brought his memory back. ”
“That’s good then?”
“Most cases of amnesia are fakes, of course.”
“Fake? What do you mean?”
“Well, people—for whatever reason—decide to have a reset in their lives. Some choose a whole new identity and it’s pure luck—bad for them, I suppose—that they get recognised and their old lives intrude.”
They carried on for a while, Ben digesting this information. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course. Anything except pretty much everything, because he’d kill me if I told you.”
“Are you gay?”
Tim laughed. “Okay, being gay I can talk about—we actually already have talked about it. Extensively. Although, on second thoughts, don’t tell Nikolas that either. Yes, in answer to your question, I am.”
“Can you…is it possible…? I mean…Can you have sex with another bloke but not be gay?”
Tim stopped and toed the ground for a moment.
“That didn’t take him long. Two days? That must be a record.
Okay. Well, I think the jury is still out on that one.
Some people would say yes, of course: experimentation.
Some people would say if you have sex with another guy you’re fooling yourself if you think you’re not gay. ”
“What do you think?”
“When we first met, you were entirely amoral about sex. You used it like a weapon to further your aims. Then you fell in love and that switch turned off overnight. So, if you ask me, I’d say there’s more complexity in human sexuality than we’ve got time to chat about over a walk to the pub.
I read a story the other day about a woman, a lesbian, who was in a relationship with another woman, but then had a sex change and became a man, and then left his wife who’d been his lesbian partner and took up with a man—as a man. ”
“Huh?” Ben was struggling. “Why didn’t she—he—she just stay a woman?”
“My point exactly. Who knows the human heart?”
“I guess that explains why I like wearing dresses—What? Why are you laughing?”
* * *
“Where’s Katie?”
“She isn’t coming. What do we know?”
Squeezy and Jackson eyed each other blankly. Without Kate, they were clearly at something of a loss. Nikolas had always suspected their updates to him on most subjects came courtesy of Kate who did all the research and then handed it over to them to present.
“Where is she?”
“She’s left. I’ll be taking on someone new.”
Jackson narrowed his eyes at Nikolas. “She can’t leave. She knows too much about us all.”
Squeezy frowned. “Knows what?”
Jackson amended, looking straight at Nikolas, “She knows too much about you. Can you afford such a loose cannon out there?”