In an Unmarked Landscape

Posted on 27 November 200824 July 2021 by Jackie Thomas

After the fire. A sequel to From Far Away

Category: Real Person Fic

Characters: Dave Brown, Julian Barratt, Mike Fielding, Noel Fielding

Pairing: Noel Fielding/Julian Barratt

Genre: AU (Alternate Universe)

Rating: PG-13

Status: Complete

Length: 10-20k words

Notes: A sequel to From Far Away This story takes place in an alternative universe where Noel and Julian do not meet when they are supposed to. It is a sequel to my story From Far Away which ended with them finally getting together after a fire started by a rogue ex of Noel’s destroys everything he owns.
This is a work of fiction with no basis in reality, no offence or disrespect to Julian, Noel and the other Booshies is intended.

In an Unmarked Landscape by Jackie Thomas

In an Unmarked Landscape

Noel stood close enough to the bonfire to feel the heat of it on his face. He dared himself nearer to the spitting crackle of burning leaves and branches, reached out a hand to almost touch it.

The fire burned strongly despite an earlier shower, and the smell of smoke and rain-soaked plants mingled in his parents’ garden. His cousins’ children darted around him. Family and neighbours clustered by the barbeque; their talk and laughter reaching him from a distant galaxy.

The children shouted for everyone to look as flames began to lap at the socked foot of the Guy they had made. It was tied like a martyr to a broken chair and was wearing an old shirt of Noel’s. The garish purple paisley had been abandoned to his mum’s rag box when he first left home and was now awaiting sacrifice. Considering everything, it was a careless choice.

He recognised Julian’s slow footfall on the gravel path, heard his muttered curse.

A familiar hand stroked his hair before resting on his shoulder. Noel turned for a kiss, flavoured with the tang of beer on both their breaths, keeping the connection until Julian broke it.

When the fireworks started, everyone gathered to watch, holding the littlest children at bay and cheering on Noel’s dad and uncle who were in charge of the display. Julian was standing with Mike away from the crowd, head slightly bowed in apparent contemplation of something Mike was saying.

Colours cartwheeled, flowered and flared. Hundreds of dying stars were sent out into the night sky and Noel was filled with an inexplicable feeling of dread.

Julian weaved through the crowd before it ended. “Let’s go,” he whispered, taking Noel’s hand and leading him away.

The air was still smoky and punctured with dozens of small explosions as they walked to the tube. Noel felt like he had survived the Blitz and Julian was quiet, even more so than usual.

“Are you alright, Ju?” Noel asked.

Julian hooked an arm around his shoulder, drawing him in closer but didn’t answer.

For the past few months Noel had been working in a vintage clothes shop near Covent Garden called ‘Sweet Boutique’. He loved the job; it was almost perfect for him, and he spent the days enthusiastically dispensing advice on everything from silk dresses from the forties to psychedelic creations from the sixties.

Also, thanks to his staff discount and first dibs on the weekly deliveries he was gradually repopulating his destroyed wardrobe in a spectacular way. A long, green, leather coat of uncertain derivation was his new favourite. A gift from Julian when autumn set in.

The shop was in a lively area and stayed open most nights until ten o’clock. Tonight, as they locked up and he said goodnight to the girls he worked with, he found Julian waiting for him; cigarette in hand and unruly hair a victim to the slight breeze.

Noel was surprised to see him; Julian’s three-piece jazz band were supposed to be playing tonight in a pub in Islington.

“What happened to your gig?” Noel asked, as he crossed the road to him.

“It was fine,” Julian said, submitting to a public kiss. “We were first on.”

“Yeah, so? I thought I was meeting you there. Did the bar run out of beer or something?”

Julian ignored the question. He had been quiet and preoccupied after last night’s party and the same cloud seemed to be hanging over him now.

“Why don’t you give up your job?” He asked suddenly as they started the walk home. “You should be concentrating on your art.”

“Well I can’t afford to, can I?” Noel replied. “Obviously.”

“They make you work too late,” Julian went on.

“I don’t mind, it means I can sleep in. It’s the earlies that do my head in. What’s this about, anyway?”

“I don’t like you walking home so late.”

It was the most un-Julian thing he’d ever heard. He sounded more like Craig. “Seriously, Ju? Since when?”

Julian looked down at his feet. “Never mind.”

Noel squeezed his hand. “I may look like an old Indian woman, but I can look after myself.”

Julian didn’t speak again during the walk home and they didn’t stop at their local as they might otherwise have done. Living in one small room, they had learnt how not to get under each other’s feet, and Noel tried to keep out of Julian’s way tonight, so he could brood over whatever this was in peace.

Noel usually worked on his art at a small table set up by the window and he sat there now, switching on the desk lamp to look over the drawing he was finishing.

A caricature of Julian was running across an arctic wasteland, his arms windmilling in cartoon panic, his legs seeming to lift him off the ground. A caricature of himself calmly watched, leaning chummily against a polar bear.

It was the latest in a series of pen and ink pictures telling an odd narrative of two mismatched friends. His first drawing had been done as a gift for Julian, but the idea quickly developed into the graphic story they were creating together.

Julian encouraged him to make his character more extreme. He was straight-backed and buttoned up with an expressively anxious moustache. Noel’s version of himself was big nosed and big haired, with a permanent toothy smile.

Before Julian and Noel properly met they had named each other Howard and Vince. They had christened their inky alter egos accordingly, and were putting words into their mouths together. Now Vince was saying something to the polar bear; they hadn’t decided exactly what.

These days he was used to working while Julian strummed a guitar or smoked, or ambled through his domestic routines; an easy presence at the edge of his awareness. Tonight he was like a trapped animal. Music went on and off, the kettle was switched on and forgotten, the keyboard was tortured for five minutes and abandoned. He had thrown himself into the armchair and was tapping the side of a beer can when Noel put down his pen, too aware of the atmosphere to concentrate.

“Blimey Julian, it’s like having a poltergeist.”

Noel climbed clumsily on to Julian’s chair, wedged a knee on either side of his lap and took his face in his hands.

“What’s wrong? Tell me. And if the next word out of your mouth is ‘nothing’, I’m going to bite you.”

Julian unexpectedly wrapped his arms around Noel and pressed his forehead against his chest.

“What is it, sunshine?” Noel asked more gently, his chin coming to rest on top of Julian’s head, his arms loose around his neck. “Why won’t you talk to me?”

“If I ever lost you,” Julian mumbled into his t-shirt.

“Is that what you’re worried about?” Noel asked, astonished. “Why would you lose me? You’ll never get rid of me.”

Julian didn’t reply. In the end Noel climbed off him and took his hand. “Come on, you maniac. Let’s go to bed.”

Julian had already gone out by the time Noel woke up. He had an uncertain recollection of being disturbed by a light going on and another of a kiss goodbye. But he was sure Julian had not told him where he was going.

Noel felt an odd, irrational anxiety. Julian rarely got up before eleven; being part jazz man and part comic he had even less use for mornings than Noel did. If he ever had something to do early in the day everyone knew about it and the complaints started well in advance.

Noel dragged his phone off the bedside table to see if he had slept through a text, but he had no messages. He typed one instead; ‘Where R U?’. He made himself not send it. He knew it was one of the ways the fire had changed him; he never used to worry about people like this.

He realised he would not be able to go back to sleep so he got up; the chill of the unheated room hitting him as he pushed back the duvet. He lit the gas fire and put on one of Julian’s cardigans over yesterday’s jeans and t-shirt. He raked his fingers through morning hair and went to switch on the kettle.

While he waited for it to boil he wandered over to his drawing. He touched it lightly, absently reconnecting with it.

Julian’s coffee cup was on the table. He must have stopped here to chart Howard and Vince’s progress across the tundra before he went out. He had left a note on Noel’s rough plan; ‘Howard has one leg shorter than the other.”

He remembered an idle conversation they once had with the two guys in Julian’s band. They had claimed everyone had one leg slightly shorter than the other and somewhere like the arctic, where there were no landmarks to navigate by, people ended up walking in unintentional circles.

Noel wrote a line for Vince to say to the polar bear about Howard’s short leg. He smiled; it was a good way to bring Howard back to Vince.

He picked up Julian’s cup and poured the remains of his drink into the sink. Julian rarely finished a cup of coffee or tea. He made it too late and ran out of time, got absorbed in something and forgot about it, or lost it in the postage stamp sized room. If either of them were ever moved to do the washing up, a search for Julian’s abandoned mugs was always the first thing initiated.

Noel made his own drink as the kettle clicked off. He, on the other hand, never let his coffee out of his sight. Firstly because if Julian found a stray mug he reasonably assumed it was his and it was never seen again. And secondly because he now held a half-formed, half-conscious belief that things he could not see would permanently disappear. It was another way the fire had messed him up.

Julian said if Noel wasn’t careful he was going to end up as one of the lost souls who dragged all their possessions around the street with them on a trolley and wore all their clothes at once. He secretly thought this a reasonable response to the general unreliability of objects. So far though, it was a harmless enough compulsion; even after four months, he hardly owned anything, and it just meant he was less likely to litter London with forgotten hats and sketchbooks and mobile phones.

He took his coffee to the armchair by the fireplace, attempting to wake up and warm up. He touched the electric guitar necklace he always wore. It was almost the sole survivor of the fire. The other survivor was the wizard; a painting of his Julian had bought from his little cafe exhibition before the whole thing went up in flames.

The wizard hung above the fireplace, challenging them to believe his rescue was an accident, challenging them to believe any of it was. Even Julian thought the painting was unsettling. It was why he bought it; he said it looked like it had its own agenda. Noel supposed it was alive in its own way; the layers of paint would be drying for years yet, the blues and gold of his robe, the black and russet of his hair. It existed beneath the same cycles of sun and moon as they did, subtly changing, slowly aging. Processing its still, silent alchemy while he and Julian together sketched the noisy circles of their lives.

He looked up at the door opening. “Morning sunshine,” Noel greeted Julian lazily. “Where’ve you been?”

“It doesn’t matter.” Julian muttered.

“Doesn’t it?” Noel asked mildly, unwinding himself from the chair. “You’ve been storming around since the crack of doom.”

Julian did not reply, but walked round and enveloped him in a November-cold hug which sent coffee splashing out of the cup he was still holding. He worked himself free of the bruising hold.

“What’s the matter?” He asked, at the end of his patience. “What’s happened?”

“Nothing. I want you.” Julian said kissing him hard on the mouth. “Can we – you haven’t got to go to work, have you?”

Noel’s ‘not yet’ was lost in another kiss. The coffee was taken out of his hand and he was turned toward the bed.

“Alright, Ju. At least let me get my knickers off.”

His joke did nothing to puncture Julian’s strange intensity but his hold on Noel became gentler. They made love slowly, Julian covering Noel with his body, his every touch an attempt at possession.

Afterwards, he stroked Noel’s hair with a shaking hand. Noel sent his own finger to touch a mark he had not noticed before below Julian’s eye.

“What’s that?” He asked. Julian’s hand folded round his own and drew it away.

“Nothing.” It didn’t look like nothing. It looked more like someone had aimed to gouge out his eye and missed. He brought Julian down to kiss the mark, and Julian rested his head on Noel’s shoulder.

That evening, when it was beginning to get dark, someone threw a brick through the Sweet Boutique shop window. The brick missed Noel by a centimetre and the window shattered, fracturing into pieces.

Anya and Basha, the two sisters he worked with, picked their way through the shards in their spiked heel shoes and tiny leather mini skirts. They did some interesting Polish swearing and set about ushering customers out of the shop and fending off those trying to come in.

Noel found he couldn’t move. He froze, his heart pounding and his stomach tightening. Eventually he was declared ‘useless’ and sent to get a cup of tea. In the cafe he phoned Julian. He just wanted to hear his voice, but when Noel told him what had happened he went quiet and said he had to go.

Noel looked at his hand and saw it was trembling. He was annoyed by his extreme reaction. Stuff like this, and worse, had happened all the time when he worked at Kings Cross and it had never bothered him. It wasn’t fair for this to be hitting him now.

He had been theoretically angry when the Crown Prosecution Service decided they did not have enough evidence to prosecute Craig for starting the fire in his room, but actually he was relieved. He resented the amount of space Craig occupied in his mind, how everything else had to shove over to make room for him. Now at least, he could let him fade in to distant memory.

Apparently though, even after summer had turned to winter he was still present; making his hand shake and adrenalin flood his system over the smallest shock.

He took teas back to the shop for the girls as the emergency boarding up company and the police arrived. They all had to give statements for the insurance and Basha gave him something to do which mostly involved picking bits of glass out of the display mannequins’ hair. It worked, he was feeling better by the time they had sorted everything out and were ready to close up.

As they were leaving, Noel saw Dave hurrying across the road to the shop.

“Alright, Dave!”

“Yeah, I think so,” Dave said, looking at the boarded up front. “What happened here?”

“Brick through the window.”

“Jesus. Was anyone hurt? Are you alright?”

“We’re all fine. What about you? Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be poncing around Shoreditch?”

“No. Well, yes. Julian phoned and asked me to come and meet you. Despite the fact I’m not your boyfriend and he is.”

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding,” Noel exclaimed. “He’s gone well wrong. Did he say why?”

“He’s a man of few words, your Julian. But I suppose he thinks Craig’s going to try something. Did he do this?”

“Craig? What’s he got to do with anything?”

“Oh,” said Dave with the cautious hesitation of someone who has unwittingly broken a confidence. “Mike saw him in Camden.”

“Yeah, so? That’s where he lives. When he’s not on the run.”

“I think we assumed he would stay out of the city.”

“Did we?” Noel took his phone from his pocket. “Was anyone going to mention this to me?”

“It’s not looking that way.”

Julian was now not answering his phone and it switched to voicemail. “You knob head, call me back.”

“He’s probably gone to find Craig,” Dave said.

“He couldn’t be that stupid.” Though piecing everything together he was coming to the same conclusion.

“He’s just trying to look after you, Noel.”

“I know. Look, I’d better go.”

Dave came with him, which was good because Noel had a few things to say as they rushed from Camden tube to Craig’s street.

“Craig was bound to come back to London, I knew he would. He inherited that flat from his Nan; he doesn’t have a mortgage or anything. He’s probably been back for ages.”

“Well, Julian doesn’t know any of that. Don’t you two talk to each other?”

Noel ignored the question. “The thing about Craig is that you leave him alone, don’t get him wound up.” He thought about this and remembered the mark on Julian’s face. “If he bricked that window, it was because Julian was round there picking fights with him this morning. If Craig hasn’t killed him, I’m going to.”

“Craig’s unpredictable,” Dave said. “You were leaving him alone when he set that fire.”

“Okay. So does that mean you go round and poke him with a stick every two months to make sure he never forgets me?”

He tried Julian’s number again, and left a slightly calmer message. “Call me back, sunshine. I need to know you’re alright.”

Craig’s street was a long, busy road, lined with houses, flats and shops. His block was shared with mostly retired, long time residents of Camden. It was one of the pensioners who had intervened when Craig was beating Noel up, and had him sit in her flat until the ambulance arrived. He didn’t want to think about what would have happened if she hadn’t.

At the end of a row of shops was a small pub which Noel had got to know pretty well when he was living with Craig. They found Julian sitting outside it.

It was a cold night and he was alone at one of the tables. He was wrapped up in his overcoat, hunched over a pint, one arm folded across his chest. His other hand, loosely bound in a bloodstained bar-rag, held a cigarette. An angry red blot across his eye was beginning to bruise

Noel sat down next to him and took his hand. He looked under the rag; there was a jagged cut across the palm that had now stopped bleeding. “Oh, Julian.”

“It’s all right, Noel. I’m fine,” Julian said quietly.

Noel reached an arm round his shoulders. “We’ve been looking for you. Why didn’t you answer when I phoned?”

Julian didn’t reply. He took a drag from the cigarette with a shaky hand, coughed and winced.

“You came here this morning, didn’t you? That’s how you got that gash on your face?” Julian was silent. “Fuck Julian, why wouldn’t you tell me?”

“Do you know he tried to kill you today?” Julian snapped back at him. “With a fucking brick.”

“I – no. He tried to scare me, at most.” Noel said carefully. “It’s you he tried to kill, by the look of you.”

“Do you care he knows where you work? He probably knows where you live? Does that register on the radar at all?”

“And now you’re trying to scare me,” Noel replied, trying to understand why Julian was so angry with him.

“What happened, Julian?” Dave asked, breaking the silence. “Where’s Craig now?”

“I don’t know. He’s okay – I didn’t make much of a dent, to be honest.”

“Come on,” Noel said. “Let’s go to A&E.”

“No, I’m fine. I told you.”

“Alright, then let’s go home. Craig could be around here somewhere. Dave, will you get us a cab, mate.”

They said goodbye to Dave, and Julian consented to being helped into the car. But he would not let Noel touch him as they slowly took the short walk from the cab to the house and up the stairs to their room.

When they got inside, Julian took off his coat and sat cautiously down in the armchair. Noel lit the gas fire and poured him a glass of whiskey. He flinched as he reached to take the glass.

“I’ll go downstairs and see if I can borrow some nurofen or something.”

“I don’t need anything, don’t bother.”

Julian did not answer when Noel asked him if he was sure, just lit a cigarette and stared morosely into the fireplace. Noel got a cloth and some warm water to clean his hand.

“Is there anything else I can do?” he asked, when he had wrapped the hand in a bandage. Again he got no response.

Noel reluctantly got up from where he had been kneeling by the armchair. He wanted to take Julian to bed, lie close with his arms around him, fall asleep with him, soothed by car lights travelling across the ceiling, and the house sounding out its familiar night time rhythms.

But Julian obviously did not want him around. Noel did not ask him why; he could not face an argument after everything that had happened today.

“You should have told me what was going on,” he said gently. “But thanks for sticking up for me.”

For the first time since he had woken up here on the morning after the fire he did not feel at home in the little room. The unquestioning sense of belonging he had with Julian had suddenly vanished.

Not knowing what to do with himself, he went to the desk and turned to a blank page in his sketchbook. He drew a border, and started a new picture.

It was the scene where Howard’s one shorter leg would bring him back to Vince and the polar bear. Howard would be outraged at the suggestion there was anything wrong with his fine Northern pins.

He started with Howard; sketching him skidding to a halt, looking both astonished and terrified at where he found himself. He worked for about an hour and finished Howard’s outline and features, his eyes wide with horror and his hair surprised into defying gravity.

Noel had kept an eye on Julian while he worked. He hadn’t keeled over or anything, but remained unmoving in the armchair, occasionally sipping his drink and giving off waves off hostility. Noel thought the picture might cheer him up, so he brought it over.

“What do you think of this?”

“I think you should move out,” Julian said. He spoke so quietly, Noel thought he had misheard.

“I should what?”

“I think you should move out.”

Noel looked down at frantic Howard in his picture, and wondered stupidly if it was an attempt at scripting.

“Are you breaking up with me?” He finally asked.

“Yes,” Julian said.

“Look at me then.”

Julian didn’t turn, he was staring into the orange glow of the gas fire bars.

“What happened today? What happened with Craig?” Noel demanded.

“Nothing.”

“Then, why?”

“Because it’s too much.” Julian finally turned and met his gaze, but only for a moment. “This thing that happened to you. I can’t keep carrying it around with me.”

“I didn’t know you were. I don’t even know what that means.”

“I just can’t go on feeling like you’re in danger all the time.”

“That’s not fair, Julian. You found me and took me home, you saved me. I’ll never forget that, as long as I live. But I never said I couldn’t walk home on my own. I never asked for your protection, I never asked you to get into fights for me. This is all you.”

“I never said it wasn’t.”

Julian sank back into silence.

“And that’s it, then? We’re not even going to try?” He got no answer. “Then fuck you, Julian.”

Noel dragged his boots on and flung on his coat. “I’ll get my stuff tomorrow.”

Noel trekked the half hour to Dave’s flat and collapsed at his kitchen table.

“It sounds like it’s all got a bit much for poor old Julian,” Dave said after he had heard the story. He was deliberating over a bottle of brandy and a mug of tea, and eventually decided to pour one into the other.

“But I don’t get it,” Noel said, warming his hands around the mug Dave put in front of him. “I’ve never gone on about what happened. I’ve never made a big thing about it. I’ve really tried not to dump it on him.”

“Julian is a bit more complex than you, mate.”

“Wow, really? Thanks, Dave.”

“No listen, someone chucked a brick at you. What did you do? Had a cup of tea and got on with your life. He started World War Three with Craig. That didn’t come from nowhere. Do you know what, Noel? For once this isn’t all about you.”

Noel cautiously sniffed at his drink before swallowing a burning mouthful. “I’m sorry, that’s just not possible.”

“What happened to you is obviously on Julian’s mind more than he lets on and he can’t cope with the fact that half the time, you don’t seem bothered.”

Noel huffed. “Only Julian could break up with someone for not being neurotic enough. All right, oh wise monkey. What do I do?”

“I don’t know. Let him calm down, I suppose. I can’t believe he really wants to break up with you.”

“Well it’s not unprecedented, Dave. He’d just be the latest in a long line of people who wanted to break up with me.”

He looked at his fingernails, darkened with varnish. Julian was the only one who never minded what he wore; who despite dressing like a destitute librarian himself, seemed to enjoy each new look.

And not only that, he seemed to know how Noel’s brain ticked over, because his went off in the same way. There had never been anyone remotely like that. There never would be either.

To add insult to injury, he was on an early shift at work the next day, which meant crawling off Dave’s couch in the cold, still, Julian-free darkness after barely sleeping.

The boarded up window kept customers away and he spent the day in a slow daze, wandering around the racks, sorting and arranging the clothes; mixing up the styles and colours and decades in a mournful matchmaking ritual.

He finished at six and began the walk home to Kings Cross dragging Dave’s rucksack with him. He texted Julian to tell him he was on his way, but he didn’t get a reply.

He found their room in darkness, and his first thought was Julian had found some pub to sit in to avoid a confrontation.

But when he switched on the light he saw Julian was in bed, or rather on the bed. He was lying on the covers, in the same clothes he had been wearing the evening before. He turned as Noel came in and the pain the movement caused was enough to make him gasp.

“Fuck, Julian,” Noel said, approaching the bed. “What’s the matter?”

“My effing ribs,” came the growled response.

“Let’s have a look.” He carefully unbuttoned his shirt. There was a bruise over his left side about the size of boot print. He’d had one to match not long ago, so he had a fair idea of how much pain Julian was in.

“Why didn’t you phone me, you knob? We’re going to Casualty. No arguments.”

“I’m not arguing,” Julian said.

He allowed Noel to help him up, and leaned against him as they made their way downstairs. One of the neighbours had a car, and she drove them to A&E.

As it turned out, Julian had broken ribs, but nothing more serious. He was told nothing could be done, but he was given an injection to quickly stop the pain and a prescription to cover the next couple of weeks.

By the time they got home, a smudge of colour had begun to work its way back to Julian’s face. He headed for the bed.

“Don’t go to sleep,” Noel said. “You’ve got to have soup. I bet you’ve not eaten anything today.”

“Always with the soup,” Julian muttered. He lay down with difficulty, propped up on pillows Noel placed for him.

Noel prepared the food and sat next to Julian on the bed to hold the bowl steady while he ate.

“Noel,” Julian said, as he finished and laid back against the pillows.

“Yes, dear?”

“I’m sorry about the way I treated you yesterday.”

“You should be, you tit.” He saw that Julian’s eyes were closing. “Oh no you don’t. You’re not sleeping in those ratty clothes again.”

“Mind your own business.”

Noel rooted around in the chest of drawers and came out with some never worn pyjamas; a gift from some sensible northern relatives. Julian allowed him to unbutton his shirt and carefully take it off him.

“It’s alright, Noel,” Julian said, because the sight of each bruise made tears start in his eyes.

He wiped his eyes and helped Julian out of his jeans and into the pyjamas. When he was settled in bed with a mug of tea, Noel began to gather his clothes together and pack them into Dave’s rucksack.

“You don’t have to do that now,” Julian said.

“I’d better get on.”

Julian spoke after watching him in silence for a while. “That was the first time I’ve seen you cry since the fire.”

“Yeah, sorry.” He suddenly ran out of energy and sat down on the bed, arms around a pile of t-shirts.

“You’re a mystery to me,” Julian said, breaking the silence again. “You lost everything, but you go along as if all’s well with the world, like nothing can touch you.”

“Is that why you’re freaking out?”

“I’m not freaking – yes.”

“I’m not the same person as I was before the fire. And sometimes it hits me; you know it does. But I do what I always do. I chuck paint at a canvas, or put the Clash on full blast, and then I feel better. I don’t want to keep going on about my problems all the time.”

“I’m not saying you should.”

“And I have to go out, don’t I? I know that bastard’s out there, but I can’t barricade myself in with a rifle. I’ve got to get on with my life.”

“I can’t think that way.” Julian said. “I just keep thinking it’s going to come back on you, that something’s going to happen. Sometimes I can’t think of anything else. It terrifies me.”

“Oh Ju, why didn’t you tell me? I never wanted you dragged into that mess.”

“Noel, don’t go.”

“I have to. Don’t I?”

“Just stay,” Julian said urgently, starting to get out of bed. “Please.”

“Alright, Julian. Alright.” Noel dropped the t-shirts and moved to the top of the bed. He took Julian’s hand, kissing him lightly near his now black eye. “Go to sleep now, it’s alright.”

Julian fell asleep while Noel sat with him: exhaustion and medication finally defeating his determination to stay awake. Noel settled him more comfortably, tugging the duvet over his shoulders, putting an extra blanket on the bed and leaving only the dim bedside lamp on.

He texted the guys in Julian’s band and asked them to look in on him.

He took off his electric guitar necklace and closed Julian’s uninjured hand around it.

Then he went back to his packing. This time he didn’t bother to try and stop his tears.

He kissed Julian softly on the lips and, before he left, stopped to lightly brush his fingers across the oil paint face of his wizard, one last time.

On Sunday Noel had a day off and he slept into the afternoon. When he woke up, he realised how exhausted he had been since coming back here to Dave a few days ago, completely incapable of not crying.

His head was clearer now, but he had not lost the feeling that he had woken up on an alien planet. He did not know how to breathe the strange air, or walk when gravity had no hold on him.

Dave was working at his computer in the corner of the room.

“Are you awake, Noel?” he asked.

“Yeah, why?”

“Because you haven’t moved in an hour and it’s freaking me out.”

“It’s my day off, I don’t have to move.”

“You don’t have to go into a persistent vegetative state either.”

“Is there something you want, Dave?”

“A cuppa, that’d be lovely.”

Noel gave a theatrical sigh and heaved himself off the sofa. “I’m nothing but a skivvy round here.”

On the way to the kitchen, he stopped to pick up an envelope that dropped through the letter box. Dave worked freelance, and he often got deliveries by hand, at odd hours. Noel was half way to giving it to him when he saw his own name on the envelope, written in Julian’s unmistakeable freeform handwriting.

“It’s for me.”

Inside, he found one of his own sketches. It was of Howard; the one he had been working on just before Julian had his meltdown. The picture was half-finished, as he had left it, and unaltered but for one detail. Howard now wore a little electric guitar pinned to his coat.

“Oh, Ju.”

Julian had written the word, “Vince?” in a jagged speech bubble from Howard’s mouth. There was no other message. For Julian, it was a romantic declaration. It was an especially frantic version of Howard, looking even more wild eyed and distressed than usual, and Julian had identified the reason for the distress as the lack of Vince.

Dave peered over his shoulder. “Who’s Vince?”

“I am.”

“I won’t ask.” They stared at the image. “He wants you back. Told you.”

“Yeah,” Noel said. He pushed the picture back into the envelope. “That’s not the point though, is it?” He turned and went into the kitchen. Dave followed him in.

“It’s not like you to bear a grudge, Noel. At least go and talk to him.”

Noel filled the kettle and switched it on. “It’s not a grudge. It’s just–” He pulled a couple of teabags from the box and waved them at Dave. “It’s just, if he’s been freaked out by what happened to me. So much so he’s obsessing about it, and picking fights with psychopaths. What’s changed? Nothing. I can’t guarantee Craig’s not going to turn up one day and do god knows what. I can live with that, but it seems like he can’t.”

“He said that stuff when he’d just got three of his ribs broken. He’s had a chance to think about it now.”

“I know, but you’re the one who said, all that didn’t come out of the blue.”

“What do I know?”

“The truth is, Dave,” he said quietly, looking down at the teabags in his hand. “If that’s what’s been going on with him, he’s better off without me. I don’t want to do that to someone.”

He looked up as Dave ruffled his hair. He smiled at him. “Thanks mate, you always have to pick up the pieces. Are you sure you’re not gay? I’d make a lovely Mrs Dave.”

“Thanks for the offer, but it’s pretty obvious you and Julian should be together.”

The next day at work was horrible. Noel was distracted by the customers, and suffocated by the stock. For once he was glad of his early start and early finish. As he got ready to leave, he laid the picture Julian had sent him on the counter. He knew he had to reply.

There was a blank space in the frame where Vince and the polar bear should have gone, and he began to draw there in black biro. He drew Vince in his own green leather coat, his arms wrapped around himself to keep out the arctic chill. His head hung low and his woolly snow hat pulled down, covering his eyes. Finally, he wrote the word ‘goodbye’ in a thought bubble drifting from the frame.

It wasn’t right, Howard and Vince would always be together, but it made the message clear.

He put the picture in an envelope and wrote Julian’s name on it. He had time to deliver it before he was due to meet Mike, and he took the familiar walk to Kings Cross, to his old house.

The light was on in their window, Julian was home. He thought of him there in the one armchair, all broken but starting to heal. He wanted to be with him; sitting at his feet, head against his leg, sharing the heat of the gas fire, a familiar hand through his hair.

He posted the envelope and walked away. Julian had put up with more than enough, he deserved better.