Angelo shook his head. “We talked about this at your dad’s place. I’ve slept in your bed, used your shower, and I know where the kettle is. Show me therest.”
Perhaps it was the break in the cycle that Dylan needed. He shook himself slightly and then led Angelo out of the kitchen. “I forget that our relationship is totally abnormal because being with you is like breathing... I can’t imagine not doingit.”
He spoke absently, but the sentiment hit Angelo like a truck all the same. “I can’t really remember not having you in my life, either. I know I fuck up pretty much every day, but I’m as crazy about you now as I was from thestart.”
“We started in the club with my arse in the air.” Dylan opened the door to his living room. “And you’ve been on my mind ever since. Ain’t weromantic?”
“Fuck that shit. Who wants to be romantic?” Angelo stuck his head in the living room. As promised, the couch was the same as the one at Dylan’s father’s house, and the urge to flop down on it was strong, but Dylan wasn’t ready to crash yet, and Angelo would be awake when he was if it killed him. “You don’t spend much time inhere.”
“How can youtell?”
“Because it’stidy.”
“Fair point. And you’re right. Any evening I’m at home, I tend to flit from one room to another. I’m easily distracted, in case you hadn’tnoticed.”
“I hadn’t noticed because I don’t think it’s true. You have much better focus than me?—you must have, to deal with all that bullshit DRO paperwork. I reckon you’re just crap atrelaxing.”
“Says you.” Dylan tugged Angelo away from the living room. “You were working 24/7 at thedeli.”
“Not quite. And look where it got me?—on a geriatric ward with a mask strapped to myface.”
Dylan’s fingers tightened around Angelo’s. “I hate thinking aboutthat.”
“So don’t.” Angelo tapped Dylan’s temple. “Stop thinking at all. What’s inthere?”
Dylan followed Angelo’s gaze to the last door before the bedroom and bathroom. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Yup. It’s empty. Look.” Dylan opened the door to what was indeed an empty room?—abeautifulempty room with the same wood floors as the rest of the flat and an original window from the old Railstore. In daylight, it would’ve bathed the room in natural light. Right now, Angelo could see the stars, and it took him back to the happy-clappy pain clinic he’d spent all afternoonat.
“Have you got alamp?”
“What?”
“A lamp,” Angelorepeated.
“There’s one behind you.Why?”
Dylan broke off with a shiver. Angelo rubbed his arms and kissed his forehead again and then looked around for the lamp. “I want to show you what I did today. Go and put your pyjamason.”
“Mypyjamas?”
“Or sweats.Whatever.”
“You’reweird.”
But Dylan sloped off to the bedroom anyway while Angelo unplugged the lamp and carried it into the empty room. With it plugged in and emitting exactly the glow he’d been after, he searched out the wireless speaker from the kitchen and set that up in the spare roomtoo.
Dylan came back as he was linking his phone to the speaker. “Temple of theDog?”
“Chris Cornell was my jam when I first realised I liked blokes as much as girls. I had a thing for hishair.”
“Bit young for nineties grunge, aren’tyou?”
“Never too young for something you like,mate.”
Dylan sat on the floor beside Angelo and tilted his head to one side. His eyes were still bright with stress, his limbs tight, his hands clenched, but his characteristic shrewdness was back. “You’redifferent.”
