Doctor Who_ Beyond the Sun - Matthew Jones [54]
‘It’s not mine, it’s just bits of scrappy metal.’
‘Take it! Please!’
‘OK,’ Scott said and did so, before sauntering over to the window. He grinned and then gently tossed the chain out into the night.
‘Hey! You didn’t have to do that just to make your stupid point! I would have kept it if you didn’t want it.’
‘It was worth it just to see your face. I’ve never seen anyone so worried about things,’ Scott laughed. He closed the shutters over the window and then, without warning, stepped out of his boxer shorts, and threw them casually over the back of the chair where earlier Emile had neatly folded his uniform.
Emile glimpsed the curve of Scott’s backside, before he forced himself to turn away, his cheeks burning hotly. Scott turned the light off and Emile felt rather than saw Scott climb into bed next to him.
Next to him!
Next to him, when there was an empty bed on the other side of the room. What did he intend?
Emile panicked, caught between desire for something to happen and a blind terror that it actually might. He sat bolt upright. ‘Scott, what do you think you are doing?’
‘What do you mean?’ Scott’s voice sounded confused in the darkness. ‘Going to bed.’
‘What? Here?’
‘Where else would I?’
‘Scott!’ Emile pulled the sheet up to his neck, covering himself even in the dark. ‘Well in your own bed, of course! Don’t you know what the word “privacy” means?’
‘Umm . . . I think so.’
Privacy turned out to be yet another of those basic concepts that Scott seemed to struggle with.
‘It means to disconnect from others, doesn’t it?’ Scott said. ‘Ursulans sleep where we fall.
Together. Why would I sleep over there alone and cold, when I could sleep next to you and keep warm?’
‘Because . . . because . . .’ Emile didn’t actually have an answer for this. Not an honest one anyway. As the feelings of acute embarrassment and fear receded, he was suddenly aware of an enormous incongruence between what he was asking for and what he really wanted. A faint but urgent voice in his head was whispering that it would be the most fantastic thing for Scott to slip his arm around him and keep him warm through the night.
Words tumbled out in an effort to drown out that little voice.
‘I just want to sleep on my own. In my own bed,’ Emile lied, ‘and if that makes me a profiteer or a bloody Sunless or something then I don’t care, all right?’
Scott was silent for a moment, and then said, ‘You can do whatever you want, Emile. If you really want to sleep alone – fine. Go sleep over there. I’m comfortable where I am. And anyway . . .’
‘What?’
‘I thought you might want to have sex with me.’
‘Scott!’ Emile squeaked. ‘Are you crazy? I mean what gave you that idea?’
Emile felt Scott shift his weight on the mattress as he lifted himself up on to one slender elbow.
‘Just something Leon said.’
‘What did he say?’ Emile immediately regretted the question: he wasn’t sure that he wanted to hear this. He stared into the darkness, feeling desperately sick. The world was careering wildly out of control.
Scott laughed, gently. ‘Just that you can’t keep your hungry little eyes off me.’
‘Oh yeah, sure. I mean, what does Leon know? Tameka’s right: he’s got scales for brains.’
Silence.
Emile immediately regretted saying what he had said. What had he gone and insulted Leon for?
He liked Leon and he’d probably offended Scott now. The words had just tumbled out of him as if he had no control over his mouth.
‘OK, OK,’ Scott said, gently. ‘I guess Leon must have got it wrong. And I guess that I must have too.’
Emile was shocked when Scott leant over and kissed him lightly on the forehead.
‘Sleep well, Emile,’ Scott whispered and then turned over. A few minutes later he had fallen asleep.
Emile lay in the darkness, wide awake, listening to the sound of Scott’s regular breathing. The panic he felt subsided and he felt relieved that he was no longer exposed by Scott’s dangerous words. But beneath that feeling of relief was something else.
He spent the night lying motionless, his head dizzy with questions and accusations. It was a relief when