“Oh for God’s sake. Move over.” Lena shoved him aside and brought up the invoice Brix would never have found on his own. “Two hours, plus consultation time. She’s in for one-eight-five.”
“Ta. Will you take it for me? I gotta do something.”
“Arsehole.” Humour danced in Lena’s eyes. “Go on. Fuck off.”
It wasn’t quite as simple as that. When Taz finally reappeared, Brix still had to wrap her ink before he could let her go, but once she was safely with Lena and on her way out, he left his station and went to Calum’s, searching out the battered box Calum had brought back from London.
Inside he found the vintage tattoo machine—Dottie—Calum had spoken so fondly of, still fragmented in a dozen pieces, waiting for someone to bring her to life. Brix took the box to the office at the back of the studio and laid the parts out on his desk. Even fragmented, the machine was a thing of beauty, though it was going to take all his skills to restore her.
Brix got stuck in, working at a steady clip until he came to the rear spring, a classic place for sparking and overheating in older machines. He loosened the tension in the spring and ran the machine for a few minutes, cursing when it cut out. A weak connector was a ball-ache he could do without if he wanted to fix Dottie up before Calum returned.
With that in mind, he went to the storeroom and searched around in the boxes of mismatched machine parts, searching for the remnants of his own vintage coil gun. Eventually, he found a handful of washers and a clip chord that might do the trick.
He was road-testing his handiwork when Kim stuck his head around the door a little while later, leaning casually on the architrave in a way that would’ve fooled anyone except Brix and Lena. “What’s up, Kim?”
“Up? Nothing, mate. All good in this hood.”
“Yeah?” Brix turned Dottie’s power down, checking her capability at a lower voltage. “Not freaking out over Lena going back to Bristol, then?”
“You’re asking me now? When she’s leaving on Sunday?”
Shit. Brix switched Dottie off. With his own bullshit to drown in, he’d neglected Kim, a friend almost as dear to him as Calum. Almost. “I guess I just figured you were okay with things because you haven’t said otherwise. Sorry, mate. I’m so fucking self-absorbed at the moment.”
Kim grinned. “You don’t know how to be selfish. But I am okay with things. More than okay. I love Lena to death, and that ain’t gonna change.”
Brix nodded slowly. “You deserve to be happy.”
And it was true. Kim had his fair share of demons, but he’d fought them off in a way Brix could only dream of.
Perhaps sensing the oncoming cloud of self-loathing, Kim gripped Brix’s shoulders and shook him slightly. “Take your own advice, bud. You know how awesome Calum is, don’t you?”
“Course I bloody do.”
“And you know he adores you, right?”
Heat flooded Brix’s cheeks. He stepped away from Kim and turned back to Dottie. “Don’t be a dick.”
“I won’t if you won’t. Lee told me Calum’s sticking around for a while. I’m gonna make a wild assumption he’s staying to be with you, which is fucking great. Just don’t balls it up by throwing your best Lusmoore at him.”
“I’m not going to fleece him of his priceless family heirlooms.”
“No, but you might let whatever bullshit got you this far have its day while you and him fall by the wayside. I know you, Brix. You let life consume you, eat you up, while the rest of the world goes on without you.”
“That’s not going to happen with Calum.” Brix didn’t know how true the words were until he said them, but HIV be damned, he wasn’t letting Calum go. “You look after your boy, and I’ll take care of mine, yeah?”
“Suits me. I’m off home. Be lucky, mate.”
And with that Kim was gone, leaving Brix with Dottie and a newfound determination he couldn’t shake. Didn’t want to shake. Or did he? Years of abstinence had almost convinced Brix that he didn’t even like sex. Can’t have done if he’d gone without it for so long. But then Calum had rocked up at Truro station with his gentle eyes and broken heart, and lit a flame in Brix.
I want him.
But was it enough? The science was one thing, but surely Calum deserved better than anything Brix could give?
Or maybe they both did.
Fuck it.
Brix returned to Dottie and tightened the last few remaining parts. Then he took a cloth to her and polished her within an inch of her life. With that done, and Dottie complete, he wrapped her in a softly worn old T-shirt he found on his desk and took her back into the studio.
