Peter Anghelides - Another Life

Gwen knew better than to protest. She heaved herself out of her chair, and made her way to the exit platform with Toshiko.

‘Doesn’t your boyfriend mind you working this late?’ asked Toshiko.

‘He said he was going out to an all-night Star Wars marathon,’ lied Gwen.

Toshiko looked unconvinced. ‘In this weather?’

‘They’re Star Wars fans,’ explained Gwen. ‘They’d crawl over boiling lava to avoid missing their fifteenth viewing.’

‘Ah,’ said Toshiko, ‘I understand. Otaku .’ She smiled when Gwen frowned. ‘Geek.’

‘ Otaku ,’ repeated Gwen.

The platform began to lift them upward.

‘And gemu otaku is a video games geek,’ Toshiko said.

‘I think that’s pronounced “Owen Harper”.’ Gwen looked up above them and sighed. ‘You realise that we’ve forgotten the umbrellas again.’

The pavement slab opened up overhead, and the cold rain showered in on them.

Jack watched Ianto polish the table where his feet had been propped. Ianto could tell that his boss didn’t really approve, but he thought that Jack would dislike it even more if the place got to be a mess. At the moment, he had other things to worry about though.

‘Gwen tells me you know where Owen is, Ianto.’

Ianto stopped polishing. ‘No. His radiation readings reached normal, and so he decided to go out. On a date, he said.’

‘A date? What about the work I asked him to do?’

Ianto produced a buff folder of printouts. Balanced on the top of it was the radiation sponge. ‘He asked me to give you these. He said that there’s a lot of information about what a brave and resourceful soldier Sergeant Applegate is, fine service record. And she has 450 Nectar points, in case that’s important.’

‘I could kiss you, Ianto.’

‘No you couldn’t, sir.’

Jack flipped open the folder and stood up. ‘I’m gonna take this down to my office.’ They both walked out of the Boardroom and made their way down the spiral staircase to the main Hub.

Ianto noticed how the water in the centre had risen higher, and seemed to be slapping higher against the edge of the basin. The view through the portholes in the wall above them also seemed to be more turbulent, with fragments of weed whirling past in the dark water and fewer fish visible than usual.

Jack walked away towards his office. ‘You can go home now.’

‘Thank you. I have a bit more filing to do. In the basement. I’d like to finish it.’

Jack laughed. ‘You may as well live here, Ianto,’ he shouted before he closed his office door.

I could say the same thing about you, Ianto thought as he set off to the basement to continue his own work.

The sodium glare from the streetlights cast a jaundiced pall across the sodden T-junction. Owen sat listening to the howl of the wind and the battering percussion of rain above the Boxter, and wondering if the roof latch would hold. No wonder he’d got a deal on the car. Too good to be true at 18K, even with 40,000 miles and schlepping all the way out to Colchester for it. He should have bought the Honda S2000, like he’d first thought. But he’d gone for style and speed, so now he found that the windstop on this 1997 model Boxter didn’t hook properly and ended up rattling.

And windstop was what he needed right now. The storm outside buffeted the car, and rain lashed the windscreen until it was awash. Owen flicked on the wipers. They swiped the water aside so that he could peer through the glass at Megan’s place across the road. Her maisonette was the top floor, up an L-shaped flight of steps at the gable-end of the house. Two windows were visible. One was unlit, with opaque glass. The other was much wider, bold red curtains illuminated. He thought he saw a shadow at one point, but through the downpour it was hard to be sure. The window was partly obscured by a large plane tree, that must have been planted by a pessimistic urban planner who’d not expected the houses to still be there once the tree had reached its final size.

He’d sat here for ten minutes already, kidding himself that he was just waiting for the rainstorm to ease off, just rehearsing what he was going to say, devising the best and most logical explanation for Megan. In reality he felt like he was a student again, the first time he’d arranged to meet her. Then, he’d stood outside the Angus halls of residence, uncertain, nervous.

She’d made all the running in the refectory earlier that day, and he’d hardly believed his luck in persuading her to go out that evening. Actually, she’d persuaded him to persuade her, he’d work out afterwards. And thus, his fresher insecurities fuelled, he’d worried about everything from then on — was he wearing the right T-shirt, was he heading for the right room in the hall, would he pronounce her name right, should he rehearse his line or would that sound too rehearsed, had he chosen the right film, was she allergic to Chinese food…

Another wild gust rocked the Porsche. The sallow glow of the streetlight revealed where he’d been tapping his fingertips. He noticed with a mixture of embarrassment and annoyance that it looked like he’d been doodling in the dust on the dashboard. Did that shape look like a heart? Not what he’d intended, at any rate. And what would Megan think if he ended up giving her a lift somewhere later and she saw it? He scuffed over the doodle with his palm. The result was a great smeared patch in the dust that somehow made the dashboard look even grubbier. Owen tugged a cuff up over the heel of his hand, and swiped over it. That looked better, at least. But now he’d got a tidemark of greyish dust over his left sleeve.

He blew an exasperated sigh, leaned back against the head restraint, and looked around the rest of the Porsche. Under his coat, the passenger seat had three old crisp packets on it, one only half-finished. Beside them was a bent plastic teaspoon with an uneaten raspberry yoghurt that he’d grabbed off his desk at the Hub thinking he might finish it on the way out. He slipped off his seat belt to look in the footwell, where he found bits of gravel, three Post-it notes containing grid references, plus a couple of forgotten AA batteries. Probably dead, but he stuffed them in his jacket pocket just in case.

He was experimenting with doing the same with the crisp packets when he thought: that’s just stupid. He’s arranged to see her for the first time in over five years, and he’s bringing her a pocketful of empty crisp packets and a raspberry yoghurt. He should have stopped off to get her flowers. Roses, she liked roses, didn’t she? Or was that too cheesy? A bottle of wine, at least. But he’d never been very good on vintages, always went for the third least expensive bottle in Threshers. Megan used to tease him about it, because she’d been to a wine appreciation group at Uni and could tell her Merlot from her Camembert. He recalled little about it now, except stuff about macerating the must, and how cross Megan got when he joked about ‘length’.

Owen unlocked the glove compartment. The light flicked on, and he could see the dull sheen of the Bekaran tool. That was a better idea. Never mind the wine and roses. The alien device felt cool in his palm as he slipped it into his jacket pocket. He shoved the crisp packets and the plastic spoon into the compartment, and shut it.

He hadn’t changed before leaving the Hub, and was still in his Torchwood standard: black jacket, dark trousers and shirt. Probably ideal for getting knocked down in the dark by a careless driver racing through Whitchurch on his way home to Cyncoed. Owen hadn’t driven home for different clothes either, because that would have delayed him getting to Megan. So it seemed daft to sit here, just peering up at her room. He wasn’t that uncertain undergraduate now, no way. He certainly hadn’t been that awkward kid any more when he and Megan had split up. When he’d left her.