Chapter Four The Boys #3
I can’t say anything in response to that, but my cheeks begin to flush red in shame and embarrassment. He’s right. I have always been together in the past. I hate that he – and everybody else – had to see me so . . . apart.
‘What happened?’ I ask him, desperate to turn things onto him again.
Leo looks down for a moment and then back up at us. ‘You’re going to laugh.’
Jack blusters. ‘We are most certainly not!’
‘Come on, Leo! We’d never laugh at you!’ I add in agreement.
‘But you will, though,’ Leo counters. ‘Please just remember that this was a lot more frightening than it sounds.’
Jack, sensing Leo’s vulnerability, changes his tone. ‘We will, mate. Just . . . take it slowly.’
Leo grimaces. ‘It’s best I just get it out in the open as fast as possible.’
‘Go on, then,’ I say, my heart beating a little faster. What’s he about to impart? Something grave and horrible, probably. That’s what his face is advertising, of that there is no doubt.
Leo sighs, closes his eyes for a moment and then looks towards the ceiling. ‘Gandalf beat me up,’ he says, in a rather exasperated tone.
Silence.
Dead silence.
A couple of ice ages pass while Jack and I both digest this information.
‘Gandalf beat you up?’ Jack says, in a voice more level than a spirit.
‘Yes. Gandalf,’ Leo confirms.
‘From Lord of the Rings?’ Jack asks.
‘From Lord of the Rings,’ Leo confirms.
‘Did he do it with his staff?’ I interject, causing a small whine to come from the back of Jack’s throat. He is trying ever so hard not to laugh. As am I.
We really do have to pick our way very carefully through this. Leo is clearly in a vulnerable moment, and any poor reaction from us will set him back.
But by Christ, do you have any idea how hard it is not to laugh when one of your best friends looks at you with a forlorn expression on their face and tells you they’ve been beaten up by bloody Gandalf?
‘Why don’t you give us a bit more detail?’ Jack asks, and I can see that his hand is digging into his right knee. It’s a commendable effort.
Leo nods. ‘It was the last time I came out of The Channel. You remember? That nightclub I used to go to on Spring Street?’
‘Yep, we remember, don’t we?’ I say, earning a nod from Jack.
Leo gives us a slightly shy half-smile. ‘I know it was never somewhere you guys wanted to go, but it was an important place for me.’
‘You met Travis there, didn’t you?’ Jack says, receiving a dark look from Leo for his troubles.
‘Yes, I did . . . the little shit,’ he replies.
‘Let’s not get bogged down in all that again,’ I say hastily. Leo can get sidetracked very easily whenever someone brings up his ex. And we have bigger fish to fry here – instead of going over old ground for the millionth time.
‘Agreed,’ Leo says. ‘Less said about him these days, the better.’ He takes a deep breath. ‘Anyway . . . I came out of the club that night, and figured I’d walk back to the flat.’
‘That’s over seven miles,’ I admonish.
He rolls his eyes. ‘It was summer. I was drunk. What can I say?’ He shrugs his shoulders. ‘It was dumb, I know that now. Largely because about ten minutes into my drunken walk home I was set upon by the entire Fellowship of the Ring.’
Jack leans forward. ‘Leo . . . mate. Have you actually gone stark staring bonkers on us?’
Leo gives him a derisory look. ‘No. I haven’t. I was out the same night Fantasticon was in town.’
‘Ah . . .’ Light has begun to dawn on Jack’s face. Puzzle pieces are falling into place.
It’s not the biggest nerd convention in the country. Hell, I doubt it’d even make the top ten. But the civic centre has been home to Fantasticon for six or seven years now, and I’ve always taken something of a semi-professional interest in it, given what I do for a living.
Did for a living, if we’re not very lucky . . .
‘They were part of the cosplay competition,’ I say to Leo, doing my best to ignore my unhelpful internal monologue.
Leo nods. ‘And they were drunk too,’ Leo continues, ‘And I have to admit I was a bit rude to Frodo when he bashed into me as we both tried to negotiate the bus stop on Crammond Drive.’
I wince. ‘Blimey.’
‘We started throwing insults at one another.’ Leo looks horrified. ‘If it had been a group of big, burly lads, I would have just hurried away . . . but I was stupid . . . and very drunk.’ He has a slightly haunted look on his face. ‘Of course, his mates all defended him.’
‘Well, they would,’ I say. ‘He’s the ringbearer.’
Jack whines again.
Leo rolls his eyes. ‘I know it sounds silly. But there were nine of them. Most dressed in armour of some description. A couple even had swords. And they were all absolutely wasted. They ganged up on me. Pinned me against a wall. It was bloody scary.’
‘Blimey,’ I say again.
I don’t think I’d have felt any different, to be honest. A large group of threatening people surrounding you on a street at 2 a.m. isn’t something I’d ever want to happen to me, regardless of what silly costumes they may have been dressed in.
‘I tried to tough it out like a twat,’ Leo adds. ‘And that’s when Gandalf punched me on the nose.’
‘Bloody hell!’ Jack growls, in a complete change of mood, his fists clenching. ‘If I’d have been there, Gandalf would have been wearing that staff up his magical arse.’
Leo gives Jack a thankful look. ‘It bloody hurt,’ he continues. ‘May have even broken it. I don’t know. I was too embarrassed about the whole thing to go to a doctor.’
Ignore that. It’s nothing like your situation.
‘The bruise ended up being enormous,’ Leo confides, one hand absently poking at his nose as he recalls the damage done. Leo then rolls his eyes again and looks a bit dejected. ‘If you both want to laugh now, you can do.’
Jack shakes his head. ‘Nah . . . It all sounds very nasty, truth be told. The bastards!’
I nod my head vigorously in agreement. ‘Yeah. No laughing matter, even if it was Gandalf.’
‘It was horrible,’ Leo says. ‘And I was terrified. They were loud, obnoxious, incredibly drunk and didn’t give a shit. Samwise was screaming right in my face, and Legolas even started nocking an arrow.’
‘Christ on a bike,’ I say, in shocked response.
The Fellowship are supposed to be the good guys.
‘They were feral,’ Leo says. ‘Super loud, and super nasty. Called me all the names under the sun. I only managed to get away because there was a wall at the edge of the pavement I managed to clamber over. Twisted my bloody ankle coming down on the other side, but they didn’t follow.
’ He thinks for a moment. ‘Probably the costumes. Too heavy.’
‘Did you call the police?’
‘I did. They did pretty much nothing other than take a statement from me. The copper managed not to laugh when I told him what had happened.’
‘Typical,’ Jack snorts.
‘Obviously nothing came from that,’ Leo says. ‘Not that I was expecting anything different.’ He shifts uncomfortably. ‘It stayed with me, though. Haven’t been able to watch that bloody movie since . . .’
He trails off for a moment, lost in deep thought.
‘Bloody hell,’ Jack says. He then looks up at Leo with a somewhat uncertain smile on his face. ‘I guess it could have been worse, though, yeah? At least it wasn’t anyone dressed as characters from Warhammer. That lot are all absolute nutcases.’
Leo actually nods at this. Sometimes when Jack tries to make you feel better, it’s best to just nod along, and hope he doesn’t try again any time soon.
‘I haven’t . . . haven’t wanted much to do with people since it happened – and that was eighteen months ago,’ Leo continues.
‘People . . . I don’t know . . . scare me more than they used to, I guess?
’ He looks up at me. ‘You remember when I told you I had the flu, and couldn’t come to the beerfest?
Yeah, well . . . that was a lie. I just didn’t want you to see me banged up.
You’d have asked questions about my nose. Questions I didn’t want to answer.’
‘You should have said something!’ I counter. ‘There was no need for you to be embarrassed!’
He gives me a pointed look. ‘What? Like you shouldn’t be embarrassed about what happened to you at the bowling alley?’
I make a face. ‘That’s different.’
‘No, it isn’t,’ Leo says firmly, and deep down I know he’s right. On the surface, though, I want to keep protesting.
‘You see?’ Jack says, getting up from the couch. ‘The both of us know what you’re going through. You’re not alone, and you’re not helping yourself by pretending that you are, or that there’s nothing much wrong with you.’
I stare at him for a moment, trying desperately to think of something that separates my experience from what’s happened to the both of them. I’m self-aware enough to acknowledge that there very probably isn’t, though.
I can’t sleep, Jack doesn’t want to go anywhere in the big wide open, and Leo is now terrified of people. Especially wizards.
‘So, what do we do?’ I ask them both.
In response I get a couple of extremely blank expressions.
‘Do?’ Jack says.
‘What do you mean . . . do?’ Leo adds.
I hold up my hands. ‘About what’s going on? About how we all feel about these things?’
Jack shrugs. ‘There’s nothing to do,’ he says. ‘You just . . . just have to get on with stuff, and hope you feel better as time goes by.’
I give him a flat look. ‘The Grampians were four years ago, Jack. You said it yourself.’
‘Yes . . . But I put up with it. It doesn’t ruin my life or anything. And I don’t feel quite as bad these days. I’m . . . you know . . . fine.’
Leo nods in agreement. ‘I didn’t tell you what happened to me because there’s anything that can be done, Charlie.
I told you the police weren’t interested.
I just wanted you to know you’re not the only one going through some stuff.
I wanted to make you feel better about it.
A trouble shared is a trouble halved, and all that. ’