James Goss - Almost Perfect

He held up the device in its shiny plastic bag.

‘Don’t!’ shouted out both Jack and Brendan.

‘Ianto!’ continued Jack. ‘Don’t touch it – it knows you’re shutting down its power source. It will do anything it can to make you obey it. I don’t care what it’s offered you – it’s lying, trying to get its way.’

‘He’s right!’ barked Jon. ‘It’s the Lord of Lies. Why didn’t we see it?’

‘Because you were too busy looking in the mirror,’ snapped Jack.

‘Please,’ said Brendan. ‘Give us back the machine. Let us reset it. We can put everything right.’

Ianto shook his head. ‘Nope, sorry. Made a deal. It told me how much power it needed. And that it had to come from somewhere. And I’m looking at you.’

Brendan went to stand by Jon’s side. ‘You are kidding me.’

‘It giveth, and now, it tells me, it’s ready to taketh away.’

‘Wait!’ snapped Brendan.

‘Sorry,’ said Ianto, and pushed the button.

And the world went white and changed a little.

‘Would you like something to drink?’

Emma snapped to and flashed the waiter an apologetic look. She’d been daydreaming again, or something. The last few days were a bit of a blur. Like she’d just been asleep or taken something. Or something. She couldn’t quite…

‘Sparkling water, please.’

There. The waiter was gone. She had a couple more minutes to… it was like a memory that itched and itched and itched, but she just couldn’t find it to scratch it. Wonder what it is. Wonder. She traced her hands over the tablecloth, watching the pattern.

Oddly, she couldn’t even remember how she’d got to the restaurant, or why she was here. Maybe she’d just been born, just now, right here, and this was it. The first day of the rest of her life.

Only, she could clearly remember something really funny happening at work. She could remember Kate coming in, looking all fat, with her breast implants leaking during the management meeting. She’d cried and Emma had handed her a tissue. That had been funny. But she couldn’t remember anything else about work. Perhaps she should get a different job. Yeah. Something fun.

Talking of fun, she was in a restaurant, she must be hungry. Mind you, better watch the figure. Only, actually, looking pretty damn good, Miss Webster. I think starter and a pudding. She looked at the menu. Good, she appeared to be in a fish restaurant. She ran her fingers down the starters and lingered over the squid. Something tickled her leg. She looked down, and there was a cat, making its slow way round the tables, greeting the diners. She stroked it, and it nuzzled her back, giving her a look. She laughed and, as she laughed, she caught sight of the man standing by her table. Woah. Epic boy totty.

‘Hi, is it Emma?’ he said.

She stood up without falling over and said, ‘Yes’.

But she wasn’t quite sure in what order. Hum. He had a really great face. You know, the kind of face that, if it didn’t belong to someone actually famous in Heat , definitely belonged to their boyfriend. It was a face that said confident, fun, shopping in New York, snowboarding and beach huts. He also looked pretty good in a suit. Really, just standing there staring now. Say something.

‘And you are?’ That was lame.

He gave her a bit of an embarrassed grin. ‘I’m Patrick. Patrick Matthews.’ Suddenly he scratched the back of his head and frowned. ‘Sorry, like you care, too much detail. Just Patrick.’ He deepened the frown. ‘Never Pat.’

‘Never,’ she vowed. ‘And?’

He looked a bit blank. ‘I’m, uh, well… My friend Ianto, she set this up. I’m your blind date.’

‘You are?’ What? ‘I mean, you are?’

He looked around, sheepish and slightly angry. ‘Er, yeah. Complex story. Why, is something wrong?’

Emma giggled and suddenly felt really, really good. ‘No, absolutely nothing. Sit down, and let’s order a bottle of wine.’

He relaxed and suddenly looked even prettier. ‘This is nice. Really nice.’

‘Yes, yes it is.’ Emma got distracted by the menu again. And a sudden thought. Who the hell is Ianto? And since when was that a girl’s name?

He peeped over her menu, grinning at her. ‘Red or white? Or shall we just get a bottle of pink fizz?’

‘Oh,’ she said, truly happy. ‘That’ll be perfect.’

At a table in the corner, Gwen relaxed and turned to Rhys. ‘I think they’ll be fine,’ she said. ‘You remember the drill?’

Rhys nodded solemnly. ‘At the first sign of him turning into a skeleton, I’m to let you know.’

Gwen smiled approvingly. ‘Good boy. Now what happened to my bread roll?’

Rhys brushed some crumbs off his jacket and shrugged. ‘I thought you were leaving it. Sorry.’

Gwen decided she didn’t actually care. It was a nice, warm night, and it looked like she was going to get through an entire meal out with Rhys without explosions, deaths or Weevils. She even risked slipping off her heels and letting her feet breathe. ‘You know what?’ she said. ‘This place isn’t actually that bad.’

‘No,’ agreed Rhys, polishing off the last of her roll.

And across town, Tombola’s was as empty as usual. Until, suddenly, twelve customers materialised out of thin air. And they were all as mad as hell.

Jack looked round the nightclub, a little sadly.

For a Saturday night, it was early, but still rather quiet. The bar staff sulked in a corner, polishing some glasses, texting, and generally ignoring him.

He turned to Ianto. ‘It’s a bit sad, in a way, you know.’

Ianto nodded gently. He had been working through a clipboard, ticking things off happily. He was now watching a Welsh digital channel on the flat-screen. ‘It’s true what they say, you know. You can never have enough about hill farming.’

Jack finally got served, and he carried their drinks over to a table that was sticky with spilt pints.

Ianto sipped his wine and grimaced. ‘This is vile.’ He ticked a box on the clipboard.

‘I did warn you to stick to spirits,’ said Jack. ‘The worst they can do is water them down.’ He sighed again, looking round the room. ‘Could you not have left it a little fabulous?’

Ianto shook his head. ‘Sorry. No. Look, it was a fairly major operation getting the machine to untangle all those body parts and make everyone normal. Even so, there’s some poor kid in Barry who’s missing a finger.’

Jack shrugged. ‘Not our worst day. Memories?’

Ianto nodded happily. ‘Completely wiped. Never had less trouble getting people to take Retcon. I just told them all it was E.’

‘You are going to hell, Ianto Jones.’

‘Yes, Jack. But I’ll still make a very pretty corpse.’

‘That you will. Although there’s some stubble showing.’

Ianto nodded, beaming. ‘Oh yes. Last night as a woman according to the machine. Yay.’

They clinked their glasses.

‘Gwen’s already arranged to pop round tomorrow and steal all my clothes.’

‘Good old Gwen.’

‘So what about them?’ Ianto gestured to a couple sitting quietly in a corner.

They were old, almost impossibly so, shrivelled in their clothes, which hung raggedly off them, far too young and fashionable for them. Each was clutching a glass of water and looking at nothing in particular. One had the wispy remains of fine blond hair. The other sported a random thatch of dark hair. You could somehow tell they’d once been devastatingly attractive.

Jack raised his glass to them, and they looked away.

‘Sad,’ he sighed. ‘Not everyone gets a happy ending.’