“What are you talking about?”
“I go for them like this: three dates, three times in bed, and never more than three weeks.That’s the deal.”
“You know you have a problem, yeah?”
“I didn’t have one until I met the wrong person.”
“Just so we’re clear, we’re talking about the Doctor, are we?”
I let out a frustrated sigh.
“He didn’t like your rules,” Ian says.
“He doesn’t like to play.”
“I thought as much.”
“But I wanted to play anyway.”
“It wasn’t him who lost, was it?”
“Wow.You’re some lad.”
“What hurts you more?The defeat, or the fact he doesn’t want a rematch?”
That’s a fair question, Ian.I always knew you were sharp, but I didn’t realise you were this intuitive.
“Both, I get it.Can I ask you something?”
“That minute’s gone.”
“If you knew he wasn’t right, why did you go ahead with it?”
How am I supposed to explain the way my sick mind works?How do I tell you about this thing I have for the Doctor — this obsession I’ve tried to ignore, only for it to dig in deeper the harder I push it away?How do I tell you he’s everything I never had, and that it scares the life out of me?How do I tell you that Jamie Kennedy died years ago, and I helped put him in the ground?How do I tell you that, for most of my life, I’ve believed in nothing and never dared to hope for a thing?How do I tell you that what I have isn’t really a life at all, just getting by?How do I tell you that the Doctor makes me feel like that small, helpless kid again, with no way to defend himself?
“I think he’s a really decent man.I know we take the piss out of him, but that’s Ryan’s doing.And the Doctor’s so put-together and serious — how would you not slag him?”
“He is.A decent man, yeah.”
“I’d say he’s the kind of man you could trust, Jamie.”
I close my eyes and pull in a long breath.
“The sort you could actually let in, let him look right through you.I’d say he’d see you, and he’d like what he sees.”
“That’s the problem.”
Ian lets out a long sigh.“Do you know how you tell if someone’s the one?”
I don’t answer.I don’t move.So he keeps going.
“It’s when you’re half scared out of your mind that who you are can’t possibly make their life better — only worse.When you’re sure that keeping them at arm’s length is the only way to keep them safe.And do you know how you realise you were wrong?”
I shake my head.
“It’s when, after you’ve hurt them, disappointed them, shoved them away every which way, they still come back.They sit down beside you and help you pick up the pieces with their own hands, one by one, until there’s nothing left on the floor.”
“I wish I could believe that.”
