May Day: Part 16

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Doyle hummed the theme tune to Dixon of Dock Green as he poured himself another gin. His house was quiet and dark, except for the one lamp on the sideboard. He chuckled to himself, but sobered almost instantly. He wandered back across the shadowy room, taking a pre-emptive gulp of the spirit and picking up his book on the way, he settled back down into his sofa in the peace.

The words weren’t going in. No matter how many times he read a sentence, he couldn’t quite latch on to what it actually meant. He just couldn’t stop thinking about Bodie. He didn’t know what he was feeling: proud, worried, regretful, amused… He never knew how he was feeling anymore. It almost felt like a storm was going on in his head, and he didn’t even want to think about his heart.

It had been a low-down dirty trick, and whatever bit of bobby was left inside of him was wincing. But having Bodie just dump him in the street, like that - when all he’d said was that he didn’t think he had enough coins to stay at the pub too long, especially what with Bodie’s date coming down - had just been the last straw.

His face had done that thing which Doyle hated more than anything; Bodie had had the face without a look on it, and his voice had sounded hollow and strange: “You’d better get some money, then.” And that had been that; Doyle was walking home. Doyle had moved right past guilt, now - if he felt indignant and wounded, then it probably wasn’t his fault anyway.

But it was. And he knew it, which was why he’d reacted so badly to Bodie ditching him. He’d marched round to his nearest contact, and pulled a favour so dirty all the gin in the world wouldn’t make him clean.

Speak of the devil, Doyle thought as his living room was suddenly illuminated by car headlights. Setting his empty glass down, wiping his mouth anxiously with the back of his hand - and some of his arm - Doyle instinctively looked for hiding places. He knew what was coming.

He opened the door before Bodie could boot it down, but his face was met with a fist he didn’t even see coming. Bodie had never, ever hit him before - Doyle had never thought he would. He lay, dazed and winded, staring up at his ceiling for a moment, before the same hand reached down and grabbed his forearm, hauling him upright and towards him. 

"You met Charlie, then?" Doyle muttered, groggy beyond words.

He was having trouble seeing straight - Bodie was a lot harder than even anyone thought and the punch had given Doyle stars in his skull - but he fixed unfocused eyes onto the face that was actually, now he thought about it, a lot closer to his own face than he had first imagined.

“… Bastard,” Bodie had been saying, softly and under his breath, but Doyle thought he only caught the end of it. He leaned in closer, putting his ear to Bodie's lips.

“Beg pardon?”

“No, that’s it,” Bodie said mildly, his face giving nothing away at all as Doyle drew back to look dazedly at him. “ Bastard.” 

"I know," Doyle grinned a balmy, half-witted grin, drunk with danger and a possible concussion.