‘OK,’ said Ianto, slowly. ‘Firstly, why are you asking me out, please?’
Patrick wiped his big hands down on his apron. ‘Oh come on, Ianto. When you walked in here it wasn’t to watch me batter a sausage.’ He laid a hand on Ianto’s shoulder and drew close. ‘Or was it…?’
‘Well,’ began Ianto, ‘actually, it was to save your life.’
Patrick took it as a joke and leaned in closer. He was wearing quite a nice scent, Ianto decided. ‘Really? You’re my saviour, are you?’
‘Oh yes,’ said Ianto, suddenly noticing how warm a fish and chip shop was. ‘Uh, yes. Seriously. I didn’t knock on your door by accident today. I was looking out for you.’
‘My guardian angel?’
‘Sort of,’ said Ianto. ‘I’m slightly psychic, see, and I saw you out the other night, and I had a premonition.’ He rolled the last word like a preacher.
Patrick laughed heartily, and clapped his giant hands on Ianto’s shoulders, drawing him into a big, easy hug. ‘Oh you are precious and funny.’
He pecked the side of Ianto’s cheek and then drew back. ‘So, gorgeous, you want to be around me and watch over me? Is that it?’ He grinned a big grin and then kissed Ianto again, this time on the lips. Ianto discovered two entirely new things about being a woman.
Patrick leaned back, and smiled at Ianto. ‘OK then. If I survive till the end of the week, we’ll go to Abalone’s. How about that, angel?’
Ianto was quite distracted for a second, but eventually replied. ‘Yes. Right then. So long as I’m just saving your life. If that’s all right?’
Patrick laughed. ‘It’s quite all right. You know, you aren’t like the other WAGs we get in here. You’re very shy. It’s rather sweet.’
He was about to kiss Ianto again, but they were interrupted by Bren bustling loudly down the corridor. ‘Pat, luv, there are customers who need to tuck into a good mutton pie. I can’t have you out here all night handling the fish.’ Bren gave Ianto the briefest of glances.
‘Yes, Nan,’ said Patrick, cowed just a bit, but also smirking. ‘Come on,’ he said to Ianto, leading him back to the counter and holding it up like a wedding arch. ‘See you Saturday, unless you feel the sudden need to save my life first.’
His hand brushed against Ianto’s skirt and then he went over to heat up some pies, giving Ianto an enormous wink.
Ianto watched Patrick’s back as he worked and realised that, for the first time, he was actually enjoying being a woman. Suddenly hungry, he turned to Bren. ‘Can I have some chips after all?’
Without looking up Bren got to work. ‘Small chips, is it?’ she said. ‘1.20 thanks, love.’
As Ianto walked out, he was oblivious to the two flour handprints over the back of his skirt.
Back out in the rain, he took three steps, trying to eat the chips and shield them from the weather. Steam rose from them, wafting around in the downpour. They didn’t taste of much, other than hot, but somehow they comforted him. A crowd of blokes edged past, their eyes all over him. Someone grabbed his arse, and he flinched and forced himself to move on. If only you bloody knew, he thought.
Later, he’d ask Gwen how she coped with an evening of constant ogling. She’d grin and say, ‘Well, most of the time, I was all padded up in my lovely copper’s outfit. That tends to soften the curves a bit. You still get a bit of chat, mind, but it’s all “awright luv?” banter. Honestly, if I’m lucky, someone’ll tell me that they’ll come quietly. You know. Clever. But not so bad.’
Yeah, Ianto would say, but what about when she was out… properly? And Gwen would shrug and grin. ‘I gave as good as I got.’ And Ianto didn’t doubt it for a second.
But for the moment there was just the chips and the rain. Ianto pressed on, past the bright lights of the last shop open selling cigarettes in Cardiff. One foot in front of the other.
These bloody, bloody shoes. I am never doing this again. And definitely never sober.
The chips were cold and damp. The rain was in everything.
I am completely soaked and sodden. I will never be warm and dry. I absolutely hate being a woman.
Ianto saw something in the street ahead, a figure standing in the shadows by the scaffolding. Something really quite-
Oh is that a cab?
Ianto rushed towards the flickering amber light sluicing down the road. He knew that around him a mini- stampede of drunk boys and desperate girls were all lurching towards the cab. But Ianto knew that he needed it more than anyone else. Screw the shoes, he was going to get it.
He got his hand on the door and was met by the baleful, seen-it-all gaze of the cabbie. ‘You going to be sick?’ asked the voice.
‘Stone-cold sober,’ promised Ianto. The door clicked open and he climbed gratefully in.
‘There’s a charge for sick, you know. And I hate having to scrub the back out. Why they can’t do it in a bag, I dunno. Bloody animals.’
And the cab puttered away, taking Ianto home through the storm. He sat there, hands scrunched round his bag of damp chips, thinking back to what he’d seen on the street just before he’d noticed the cab, with all its amber promise of home and central heating and towels. Because, as he’d been waving his hands at the cab, there’d been a man standing just ahead of him in the street. The man had been standing in the shadows of some scaffolding by the market. He’d just been standing there, looking at Ianto. It hadn’t been a look of lust, desire or even disgust. The look had been one of shock, or fear. Like he’d seen a ghost.
Ianto unwrapped the dead bag of chips and stared at them. Am I a ghost?
Standing there in the rain, watching the taxi drive off, Ross Kielty couldn’t believe what he’d just seen.
Everyone in Cardiff slept badly that night.
GWEN IS AWAKE FIRST
Gwen lay in bed, killing time before the alarm by staring at the back of Rhys’s head.
‘I know what you’re doing, you know,’ mumbled Rhys without moving. ‘Stop it.’
‘Stop what?’ Gwen was all innocence.
‘You are staring at the back of my head. I can tell.’
‘How?’
‘Burning sensation. Will you be happy if I get a bald spot? I don’t think so.’
‘Oh, no worries about that. Fine head of hair. Few bits of grey, though. Quite a few.’
‘No way. We Williamses don’t go grey.’
‘Awwww, Rhys. It’s fine – get used to going grey. There’s no harm in a bit of grey. It’s… distinguished.’
‘I. Am. Not. Grey.’
‘Of course you’re not, love. Now, hurry up and storm off and make us some tea.’
‘Not until you admit that I’ve not got grey hair.’
There was a click, and then Gwen leaned over him holding up her camera phone jubilantly.
‘Yes. I think it’s called salt-and-pepper. See?’
‘That’s just bad light.’
Rhys pulled the covers over his head.
‘Just go and make the tea.’
IANTO IS STAYING IN BED
Ianto Jones had a difficult second day as a woman. It started with waking up from dreams of dark, cold water and then with a shock, as though he’d fallen, spread out in his bed. And he’d forgotten, for the first few seconds, stretching out to touch the radio alarm, seeing his long, slender arm – seeing it but not noticing it.
