A Fluffy Tale (11 page)

Julian squeezed Leo’s fingers. “He doesn’t
deserve you.”

“Yes, he does. And like him, I have a
weakness for wounded helpless things, even when I'm pretty helpless myself,” he
said with a wry smile.

“Will you be able to still stay with me?
Can you walk okay?”

“I'm fine. They think the symptoms will
disappear almost completely, but they’ve put me on some blood thinning
medication. I just need to take things easy, but I always do.”

“Coming up here three times a day and
buying an apartment isn’t taking it easy.”

“My boy, you’ve been doing most of the
work. But for a little while, I’ll have to ask you to do some more—do you
mind?”

“Of course not! What do you need?”

“I’d like you to take over visiting
Zachary, starting now.”

Julian took a deep breath, trying to stay
calm. “I can’t—he told me to get out. He’ll just call the nurses and make them
throw me out.”

Leo smiled and tightened his fingers a
little in Julian’s grip. “Oh, I think maybe he won’t. Will you try, for me?”

“You’re meddling again.”

“Unashamedly. But for a
good cause. You see an arrogant, self-assured man with the world at his
feet. I see a lonely little orphan, clutching Linis as if he never intended to
let go, and refusing to cry at his parents’ funeral. You scared him today. You
need to fix it.”

“By telling him how sick you were? It’s
true!”

“No, by giving into his bluff, and doing as
he predicted—walking away. Someone needs to introduce him to the concept of a
self-fulfilling prophecy.”

“Yes, they do. Okay, I’ll try, but I can’t
make him see me.”

“I know. Use Pyon. He can’t resist your
little kem any more than I can.” Pyon stuck his fluffy head up in enquiry,
hearing his name. “Yes, you, mischief. Go help Julian mend some fences.”

Pyon chirped and ran up the bed so he could
lick Leo’s chin. Leo laughed and Julian grinned as he lifted his cheeky kem off
the sick man’s chest. “I’ll come back afterwards.”

“Yes, do. It’s boring in here.”

“Brought you some books,” Julian said,
taking them out of the holdall, and placing the other personal items in the
locker. “I didn’t know what you’d like, but there’s a few different ones.”

Leo shook his head in amazement. “Julian,
you’re simply a treasure. Now, off you go.”

He couldn’t face Zachary immediately. He
needed to think, and make sure he could stay calm. He walked outside the
hospital, sat on a brick wall of a flowerbed, stared up at the brilliant summer
sky. The season was almost over. By the time Zachary was well again, it would
be nearly winter.

Leo was staying. Leo was old and had just
had a stroke, and was possibly the best friend Julian had ever had. And he had
a prick of a nephew who needed him too. Needed him so much he was too scared to
let him come close because he was bound to lose him.

Julian’s family were all
alive, even his grandparents. No one had ever died on him. The worst
thing that had ever happened to him was messily breaking up with his boyfriend
at University, and the two of them were sleeping with other people before the
week was out. Zachary and Leo had brought Julian the closest he’d ever come to
losing anyone who meant a damn thing to him. And it hurt.

How much more must it have hurt for
Zachary? Losing his parents, then his grandparents—who knew how many other
people had died or deserted or dumped him? How many people had Zachary driven
away before they got a chance to do it to him?

At least one, Julian thought miserably. And not without reason. Going in with guns blazing to a sick
man’s room and delivering bad news with one hand and a slap across the face
with the other didn’t make him a prince in the slightest.

Pyon howled quietly, twining around his
legs. He’d been off looking for other kems and exploring, and now he’d come
back to the only person he really loved and trusted. Who he believed in the
deepest part of his kemmish heart, would never leave him or hurt him. “I did
hurt you, though,” Julian whispered. For the same reason as
he’d hurt Zachary. Pure and utter thoughtless selfishness.

He sighed and picked Pyon up, nuzzled his
soft fur. “I don’t deserve you, little fella.” Pyon just licked his face.
Deserve, don’t deserve, didn’t come into it with kems. They were stuck with you
until you died. People were different.

He popped Pyon onto his shoulder, and
stroking his kem’s fluffy tail, he walked back inside and went up to the
orthopaedic wing. He was a little surprised to see Zachary in a wheelchair,
wearing a rather nice deep blue bathrobe, with Linis sitting sedately on his
lap. He’d progressed a lot in the couple of weeks since Julian had last visited
with Leo.

Zachary’s expression became stony as he saw
Julian come in. He pressed the control on the wheelchair
which turned it, motored over to the window, but said nothing.

Julian cleared his throat. “I, uh…saw Leo. He looks okay.” Nothing. He walked into the
room a little way. “Zachary, I'm sorry. Those things I said, they were
revolting.”

“You meant them, though. Every
word of them. You’re only sorry because Leo didn’t approve. He did
though. Agreed with you that I'm disgustingly selfish and cruel.”

“He never said that. He’d never say that,
and he doesn’t think it. I don’t…I really don’t think that. Selfish
yes, not disgustingly selfish. And you don’t mean to be cruel, you
just…are, sometimes, because you want the best and you don’t seem to realise
we’re all just human.”

“Believe me, I'm very aware of that. I
thought I told you to go away.”

“Yes, you did. But if I go away, I can’t
apologise or talk to you, or see how you are, and ask if you’re still worried
about him, or if your leg hurts, can I?”

Zachary turned the wheelchair around. As he
did, Linis leapt off and came over to Julian. Pyon hopped down and the two kems
began to lick and groom each other, eyes half-closed in pleasure. A sight which once had delighted Zachary, now made his lips
thin with anger.

“You subvert my uncle, you subvert Linis,
you insinuate yourself into my home and my life, and now you want to be my
friend? Why? So you can teach me a lesson? Take away everything that’s mine and
show me how I'm supposed to live? What do you want, Julian? Gratitude?” He spat
the last word out at Julian, his eyes stormy.

“You make it sound like this is some kind
of evil plan! I never expected any of this! You think I wanted you to have an
accident?”

“I think you’re exploiting an opportunity.
I’ve known people like you.”

“No, you just think you have. I'm not the
ones who hurt you, lied to you, cheated you. I'm
just…ordinary. Someone who thought you were a prick and got caught up in this
situation, and got to know your uncle, and you, and Linis, and this is hurting
me too. You think I don’t know how afraid you are that Leo might die? Do you
know what we went through when we thought
you
would? I cried with relief, you bastard! So did he.”

A nurse put his head around the door.
“Zachary? Is there a problem? Mr Godwin, you’re being very loud.”

“I'm sorry,” Julian mumbled, staring at the
ground. Could this day get any worse?

“There’s no problem, thank you,” Zachary
said coldly. “We’re just discussing…family matters.”

“All right.” The man gave Julian a slightly
reproving look and then went away.

Julian walked over to the chair and sat
down. “I'm not exploiting anyone. I know you don’t believe me, but I just…fell
into this. Like everything else in my life. Like the job. I never wanted to be a legal assistant, but a
history degree didn’t give me many options.”

“Do something else then.”

“Like what? I'm not made of money like you.
Another degree would be expensive, and I’ve got loans and things to repay. I
want to travel, not that it’ll ever happen. That’s about the only plan I’ve
ever made. You were an accident. So was Leo.”

“How can you live so chaotically?”

Julian shrugged. “It’s worked okay to now.”

“Leo’s relying on you, and yet you don’t
plan, you don’t think, you say things which hurt and then pretend you didn’t
mean them—“

“And you don’t?”

“No. I always mean them. I sometimes…don’t
realise how hurtful they are.”

“You know well enough telling someone to go
away, they’re not family, hurts. You know pulling the status thing is a bitchy
thing to do and you keep doing it.”

“If you’ve come here again to tell me my
shortcomings, Julian, let me assure you I am in no way under any illusion that
people think of me as charming. Now, you’ve satisfied honour and Uncle Leo’s
request, so you can leave. And this time, don’t come back.”

Julian folded his arms. “Uh uh. I’ll leave
when Linis tells me to, and he’s happy. You? You have no idea what you want so
I'm not listening to you. Someone who’s afraid of being alone and who drives
away anyone who wants to be friends, is crazy. Your kem has good sense, though.
I’ll listen to him.”

“I’ll have you removed.”

“No, you won’t. You could have done that
earlier—twice you could have done it, but you didn’t. You know what I think? If
you wanted me to leave, Linis would tell me. You said yourself, they know your
heart.” He looked pointedly down at the two happy kems, lost in a grooming and
cuddling ecstasy. “If you want me to leave, ask Linis to tell me.”

Zachary hissed and turned the wheelchair
around to face the window. Linis looked up—and then went back to licking Pyon
as if his life depended on it.

Julian decided he could be a stubborn arse
too, if he wanted to be. “We’ve finished your bathroom—the plumber found a leak
in the pipe work, could have cost you thousands to fix if he hadn’t dealt with
it. The hoist arrived yesterday, looks like a lot of fun. I'm getting used to
parking the damn car, but I hope Leo doesn’t want to keep it because it’s really
ugly, and people stare at you when you reverse into a spot. I—”

“What do I have to do to make you go away?”

Julian took a deep breath. “Really want it,
Zachary. And really, really mean it. Really want me never to come back, never
to see Pyon, never to help Leo again, out of your life and your hair and your
apartment. You turn around, face me, make me believe
it. And make me believe it’s not just fear, getting your retaliation in first.
That’s all you have to do, and I’ll go.”

Nothing. The silence dragged on and on.
Zachary’s head was bowed, but not a sound emerged. Linis suddenly stopped
grooming Pyon and with a sad little squeak, ran over to Zachary and jumped up
onto his lap. Pyon trotted over and joined him.

Two
kems, eh? You’re really worrying them.

He walked over and stood so he could see
Zachary’s face—or would if the man looked up. “Zachary? Do you want me to go?
Really?”

Zachary stared at Pyon and Linis on his
lap. “You’ll leave anyway. Leo will die. You’ll die. How can I…only Linis will
stay,” he whispered. “Only him. People leave.”

Julian crouched down and put his hand over
Zachary’s, resting on Linis’s fur. Now he could see the man’s face, the red
eyes and the tears glistening on his lashes. “Everyone dies. It’s a fact of
life. I can do everything I can to live at least as long as Leo, longer, but in
the end… But you know, I think you’re wrong about kems. I think they live on.”

Zachary wiped his nose with his sleeve.
“Why?”

“Well, they don’t have sex, don’t
reproduce, but they all seem to know each other, like each other. Where do they
come from? I think they must…pass on, somehow.”

“Doesn’t matter. I still won’t have
him…God, I…if Leo died…I was…it…”

His face screwed up against the fresh
tears, and Julian just couldn’t stand it anymore. He put his arms around
Zachary’s waist as best he could. “You were scared?”

“Like…it was like…when Grandfather came in
to tell me that Mama and Papa…I felt so helpless. I just…I don’t want to feel
that way. It hurts, and I can’t bear it.”

Julian stood but only so he could hug
Zachary a little better, the man’s head resting on his stomach. He stroked the
thick, dark hair. “I don’t know what it’s like but I can guess. I really,
really shouldn’t have told you that way. I'm sorry. Really sorry.”

“C-Can you let go of me, please?”

Julian obeyed and stepped back. Zachary’s
face was now red as well as wet. “Sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“No…I…I appreciate…I just…don’t like being
touched.”

Julian blinked. This guy was even more
screwed up than he’d imagined. What had his grandparents done, beaten him with
sticks every day or something? “I just—“

“I know, I…” He looked up, his expression
devastated. “I’ve never said any of that to anyone. I'm so ashamed.”

“If you think I'm going to look down on
you, you’re wrong.”

Linis sat up and began to delicately lick
the tears from Zachary’s chin. Zachary tried very hard not to look at him or
Julian or anything, his embarrassment painful to see. If he
really hadn’t told anyone any of that…that was a pretty scary thought in itself.

“Hey, do they let you go outside in that
thing?”

Zachary wiped his nose again. “Uh…I have no
idea. Why?”

“Well, maybe we could go out to the garden,
have some fruit juice or something, let Linis get some fresh air, and then we
could swing by Leo’s bed and see how he’s doing.”

“I don’t—”

“We never did get that walk in the country
park together. Come on—it’s a gorgeous day outside. Did they feed you? Would
you like lunch?”

He chivvied and persuaded,
obtained the nurses’ permission so Zachary couldn’t use that as an excuse, and
finally managed to manoeuvre Zachary, his chair and their kems down a lift and
outside into a little garden not far from the canteen. He found a spot that
offered a little shade, since it was hot as well as sunny, and then rushed off
to find juice for them both, a sandwich for himself
since they’d already fed Zachary.