fic: Big Bang - Man, Rearranged (Part One)

[calliglad]

Title: Man, Rearranged [Part One]
Author: calliglad
Artist: gwentastic
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Please take careful note, warnings will heavily influence the reader's interpretation of events that the author has intentionally left open and can be viewed as major spoilers. Highlight to read: mental disorder, ambiguous character death. End Highlight
Disclaimer: I do not own, nor am I affiliated with Merlin, Colin Morgan, Bradley James or any other subject in this story. This is for entertainment purposes with no wish to offend.
Summary: After 'Merlin', Bradley's career skyrockets. Amidst his growing fame and budding relationship with Colin, he starts having strange dreams and begins to wonder what is real and what isn't.

Masterpost | Part One | Part Two | Art

-

It's the wrap party and Bradley is drunk.

"Chairs," he says, firmly.

"What?" says Colin.

"Chairs," Bradley repeats, less certainly. "I'm not sure I like them."

"What's not to like?" Colin asks, but Bradley's had what's getting on to be too much to drink and he's not sure the subject is quite so interesting as it was nine seconds ago.

"Chairs," he says again, just to reaffirm the point. "I mean, who invented the first chair?"

"God? The Prime Minister?"

"And what the hell were they thinking when they did it? 'Cause, look at that thing!"

Bradley waves his hand and Colin looks over immediately at what actually might be a coffee table.

"Yeah," says Colin, squinting a little. "Crazy."

They carry on in this vein until Anthony sidles over in search of decent conversation, finds none, and says,

"It's a coffee table, boys."

"Oh," says Colin, and bursts out laughing.

Anthony excuses himself as Bradley starts up as well, but Bradley doesn't notice. He's too busy watching Colin laugh and cataloguing the reasons why it's too difficult not to love him.

"Nobody else would put up with you," Colin always says.

Bradley thinks that's just the beginning of it.

Katie elbows her way through a gaggle of make-up artists and attaches herself to his arm. "Bradley! How's things?"

"Pretty good," he says. "You?"

"I'm good, I'm good," she replies, then, "But I'm not good! Bradley, Merlin is over--it's the end of an era."

"That it is."

"What are we going to do? I haven't played anyone other than Morgana for years."

"I dunno," says Bradley. "I've got a meeting with my agent tomorrow."

"Oh, well, best get you prepared, then," Katie says, then pours half of her cocktail into his glass. When he looks doubtfully at the results, she snorts and says, "Man up, Bradders."

He downs it, whereupon his recollection of the evening gets a bit hazy, and turns up at his agent's office the next afternoon, hungover and wishing the train to London hadn't swayed so much.

"Nice of you to join us, Bradley," says Scarlett.

"'Us' being the world of the living?" he replies, slumping into a chair. The world spins a bit, so he focuses on a hideous piece of abstract artwork until things calm down.

"I have some good news or some bad news," she says.

"Good news or bad news?"

"Depending on how you take it."

"Well, put the good spin on it and we'll see how we go." Bradley instantly regrets saying 'spin', because his chair legs suddenly seem to be of continuously varying lengths.

Scarlett doesn't seem to notice. "Good news, Bradley!" she says. "I've got you a job."

"A job? What kind of a job? A lengthy, well-paying kind of job?"

"As long as the network likes the pilot, yes."

"Cool," says Bradley. "Wait--pilot? Network?"

"HBO, to be precise. Just the sort of place you should be aiming for."

"What--America? When did we talk about this?"

"I have had several telephone conversations with you on the subject."

"Those don't count! You just speak and I make the right noises. I don't actually listen."

"Regardless, you have this opportunity, and I think you could do very well."

"Scarlett, I am not Hugh Laurie. I'm sure this can only go badly."

"Look at the script," she says, thrusting it into his hands. "Come back when you've seen sense."

Bradley steadfastly ignores the script until much later that night, when there's nothing on the television except Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand on separate channels. He carefully pulls it out of his bag and hesitates, aware that the script will probably be so wonderful he will love it immediately and be forced to eat his own proverbial hat.

This turns out to be a very accurate assumption because, after an hour of feverishly reading every line, he calls up Scarlett to praise and grovel. She doesn't answer the phone, because it's the early hours of the morning and if she's not tending to her most recent infant, she's probably in bed. Bradley gives up and tries to calm the butterflies of excitement in his stomach, but then he catches sight of how much they're willing to pay him to do this and has another bout of hyperventilation.

He rings Colin.

"Bradley?"

"Hey, did I wake you?"

"No, no, it's fine," Colin reassures, even though he's blatantly lying. "What's up?"

"I've got a job offer."

"Hmm?"

"And I really like it."

"Uh huh."

"And they'll pay some ludicrous amount of money for it."

"So...?"

"It's in America, Col."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

There's a lengthy pause and some kind of rustling on the other end of the line. Bradley rests his head on the coffee table and waits for Colin to say something.

"So, what?" says Colin. "You asking my permission or something? 'Cause you've got it. Go for it."

"Really?"

"Yeah, if it's what you want to do."

"But I don't know if I do, that's the thing."

"Bradley," sighs Colin, sounding tired and exasperated. "Just do it, yeah? You want to, your agent wants you to and I want whatever you want."

"But--" says Bradley, but Colin carries on.

"I'm sure America isn't that bad. You're a posh white boy--they'll love you. You'll be the next Hugh Laurie or something."

"Colin--"

"'Night, Bradley. I'll call you tomorrow, okay? Bye."

Turns out they film most of it in Canada anyway, which makes breaking the news to his mother that much easier.

"Oh, wonderful!" she says. "We can come and visit--I've always wanted to try skiing."

"So, you think I should take the job?"

"You do whatever you want, dear. I'll support you, whatever you choose."

Bradley wishes people would stop saying that, since it's obviously the most absolutely pants answer in the history of the universe.

Scarlett smiles extra wide when he finally caves and says, "Where do I sign?"

Bradley feels a little like he's signing away his soul, but is more upset that it feels like he's signing away Colin.

-

Colin's doing some kind of artsy project and can't get away, so Angel helps Bradley pack the last of his stuff.

"It's a long way away, Bradley," she says, packing saucepans into a box, voicing the very thing he's been ignoring.

"Could be further," he says. "Could be Australia or something."

"Yeah, maybe," she says. "Only-- This isn't some kind of rebellion, is it?"

"Rebellion?"

"Yeah, like maybe you've gotten sick of us all and now you want to get as far away as possible. Or something, I don't know."

"Angel!" he says, shocked. "That's not it. I'm not sick of you. How could I be sick of you? You're my best friends."

"Yeah," she sighs, and sits down on a box. "Colin's upset, you know."

"What?"

"He won't say it, but he is. In that way men can be."

"Well," he says, then he realises she's crying. "Angel--"

"Oh, don't mind me," she hiccoughs. "It's nothing, really, I--"

"Angel," he says, and pulls her up into a hug. She presses her face into his shoulder and says, shakily,

"Don't be a stranger, okay? You'll come back and see us?"

"Of course I will," he says, smoothing her hair.

"It's just--We'll miss you. Things won't--Colin especially."

"I'll miss you too," he whispers. "But it's not forever."

"Better not be," she says, pushing him away with a smile, wiping her eyes. "Look at me. I'll just--"

She goes to the bathroom and Bradley hears her blow her nose loudly.

Later, when Angel is gone and everything is packed, Bradley falls asleep on his bare mattress in a sleeping bag. When he wakes up in the morning, he catches himself wondering why there aren't any crimson bedcurtains, so maybe going somewhere completely new, doing something completely different, isn't such a bad idea after all.

-

When Bradley's settled into his new flat--apartment--and made sure that the essentials are working--electricity, plumbing, internet--there's an email waiting for him.

Bradley-- Hope you're okay, living wherever it is you're living. I don't think I could do what you're doing. Thought I'd email, seeing as long-distance international calls don't really fit in my budget. You are an expensive man, James. Katie got very upset last night, missing you. She insisted we watch your favourite film. I endured for the sake of friendship. Keep me updated, okay? --Colin

Bradley smiles and sends back,

Don't knock Dirty Dancing, it is a classic, you barbarian. Miss you all. P.S. It's Vancouver, Geography-tard. Get an atlas.

He sleeps on the floor under a heap of jackets because he has no furniture, and dreams of vixens' screams and frosty mornings.

-

On his first real day on the job, the first all-cast read-through, Bradley is terrified out of his wits. There are so many actors, familiar and unfamiliar, milling around and talking with their funny, nasal accents, he feels overwhelmed and alienated. It reminds him of when he first met Colin, but at least Colin was only from Ireland, where they have the decency to drink tea without ice in it.

"You're that guy, aren't you?" says someone behind him.

Bradley turns around. "Depends which guy you mean, I suppose."

"You know," she says. She's pretty--well, most of the people in the room are, incongruously so--with absurdly straight teeth. "That guy. Uh, Merlin?"

"No," he corrects. "I was Arthur."

"Oh, right!" she says. "With that guy from Buffy."

"Yeah, that's the one."

"Cool. So, what're you doing here?"

"I'm playing 'Jonathan'," he replies, still feeling bewildered whilst having a niggling sense he should be offended instead.

"The college professor? Really?"

"Yeah, I keep having all these nightmares that the costume department will outsource all of my jumpers from my grandfather or something."

He gives a half-hearted laugh, but she only looks baffled.

"Sweaters," he says, belatedly.

-

"Bradley, slightly more to the left? Yeah, that's good. Hold there."

Bradley fights the urge to wipe his face with the sleeve of his jumper, which does indeed seem uncannily like something his grandfather would wear. It's a toss-up between two evils: baked under the midday sun or eaten by mosquitoes in the shade of the trees. Today's filming involves a lot of running and being slathered with fake blood, being made to heft the largest monkey wrench the prop guys could find. He wishes it would just be over already, so he can go home and collapse in front of Farscape repeats.

"Okay, guys. More yelling this time--lots of anger. Let's keep that energy up! Okay, and...Action."

Bradley suppresses a sigh and charges down the hill, roaring at the top of his lungs, ready to rescue his ex-girlfriend's daughter from her bigamist captors. Or something. He's not really sure.

-

"...and it's very new and very exciting, and I'm extremely happy to be involved in it."

The interviewer smiles in a way that Bradley sympathises with. He doesn't really have any idea what this show he's involved in is about either. Only that it's very exciting, possibly a little too artsy and sophisticated for its own good and he now substitutes sword-fighting for household objects and occasional gunplay. But then, he hasn't seen an entire episode cut together yet, so maybe things will clear up soon.

"That's great," she says, still grinning in that fixed sort of way. "Now, most people watching will know you from the BBC show Merlin. How have you found the transition between the two places, both career and lifestyle-wise?"

"Well," he says, pausing to collect a suitable answer. "In terms of jobs, they are incredibly different. Not just the genre or the characters, but the crew as well. I've gotten soft, working with the Merlin crew all these years, so it's a little disorientating, working with new people and getting used to the way things are done. And I've had to get to grips with the differences between American and British television, which mainly boil down to working hours."

"And how do you find living over here?"

"It's different," he says, then nearly grinds to halt because he can't think of anything else to say. "Er--I miss things, you know. Marmite. Baked beans. Proper beer. Family, friends, all that."

"Do you miss your old cast-mates? Since you worked with them for so long, you must be close to them."

"Colin is my best friend," he says, confident. "Me being here and him being elsewhere doesn't change that. And of course I miss him and everybody else, but it's not like I won't see them again." He grins, probably in the way Colin always describes as 'dopey'. "I'll be back before they can even form nostalgic memories of me."

-

One time, Bradley gets home from a particularly exhausting night shoot and slumps down in his desk chair to find a light blinking at him softly, announcing the arrival of an email from Colin. He sits there for at least a minute, transfixed, with no idea what to do. Then comprehension trickles back into his mind and all the buttons seem to make sense again. He brings up the message:

Bradley--how's things? I hope your new job is going will--I keep having people come up to me and ask me about it, like I know anything.

I'm doing this music project at the moment. I'm sure we're terrible, but you should come see us play.

Missing you. When does filming finish? Are you coming back to the UK after?--Colin

Bradley thinks about writing back, but when he looks down at the keyboard, the letters seem to sway and it makes his head hurt. He resolves to answer in the morning, when he isn't so close to a state of vegetative coma.

He eats a slice of bread to assuage his cramping hunger and washes it down with some drowsy cough medicine, temporarily flummoxed by the childproof cap. He collapses into bed and, for once, sleeps dreamlessly.

-

Towards the end of filming, his American agent calls him up and says she's landed him an audition for a small part in a film.

"Just the kind of break-out role people kill for," she says.

Bradley can't think of a reason why not to do it and, for the first time ever, he goes into an audition and the director takes one look at him and says, in a Chicago accent so broad it's almost comedic,

"Oh, darling, you're perfect. Just perfect. You got it. You got the job, now get out."

He wobbles back out into the corridor and asks the bland, chain-smoking assistant, "Is it always like this?"

"Fuck, no," she snorts.

-

Bradley comes back home the minute filming is over. He hadn't noticed before, but as soon as he's booked the flight, he wants to be back in Britain more strongly than anything.

When the plane touches down, it feels so viscerally right that he has to stand still and just breathe for a minute, in case he starts doing a Kevin Costner impression and kisses the ground or something. As he stands gormlessly at the baggage carousel, he thinks he hears a jeering crowd, the beat of drums, but there's a greasy teenager standing next to him and she's probably just listening to her iPod too loudly.

-

The first thing he does is visit his mother, who feeds him so much 'good, British food' that he won't pine for Yorkshire puddings for at least three months.

"You look tired, dear," she keeps saying.

"Jetlag, mum," he tells her. "My internal clock's just wonky."

He hasn't been sleeping well, mostly because his body is still thoroughly convinced that dawn should occur sometime after midday, but when he does sleep, it's fitful and he wakes up distinctly unrested.

He goes back to London to visit Colin, who greets him at Paddington station with a grin that outshines the sun.

"Look at you," he says. "Fatter already."

"What?!" Bradley cries, clutching a hand to his stomach. "No, I'm not! Am I?"

Colin just laughs and carries Bradley's bag across the station, ignoring his running commentary of: "Not fat at all--how could you suggest--I'm not getting fat, am I, Colin? Colin, am I?"

Colin hails a cab, then looks a bit sheepish when Bradley raises an eyebrow.

"Why have a car in the city?" he says. "An oyster card is just as good. And don't forget, you took the train here, so no more raising of eyebrows, thanks."

"Yeah, so I could sleep on the journey. I'm given to understand that's generally frowned upon when driving."

"Jetlagged?"

"Yeah, like death."

"Not up to dinner out, then?"

"Oh, no, by that time I'll be wide-awake. Dinnertime is my internal elevensies."

"Cool. Thai alright? Or we could do steak and kidney pie if you've been pining."

"No, my mother more than made up for that."

"Thai it is, then."

They have dinner with Colin's eclectic, slightly mad mates in some kind of Thai hippy soup-kitchen place. Colin seems extraordinarily happy, laughing loudly and telling Bradley all about the play he's been working on.

"One night only," he says, "Only been rehearsing a couple of weeks. You'll come, right?"

"Of course I will," says Bradley. "Though, why's it showing only one night?"

"Maximise bums on seats," says Colin, promptly.

When Bradley frowns in confusion, a girl in a violet trilby says, "We don't think many people will come."

"But it'll be cool," reassures Colin. "Art and all that. Aiming for critical, rather than public, acclaim."

"That is utter balls, Morgan," someone says.

"Yeah, well," Colin says, blushing a little. "After that, I've made some time for you. We could do something, or just chill, you know. Whatever."

"Anything's cool."

"Come on, you're only here a week before you're jetting back--I swear you should have a longer break than this."

"I'm working on a movie," says Bradley, feeling slightly shamefaced for no good reason.

"Ooh, really? You didn't tell me that! What, Hollywood and all them lot?"

"Well, it's being filmed in Detroit, but--"

"Oh my God, Bradley, that's amazing! You never tell me anything."

"That's not true--"

"Wow," says Colin, leaning back in his chair and affectionately treading on Bradley's foot. "My mate Bradley, big movie star."

"Colin, I have ten lines. I haven't wrested this role from Russell Crowe or anything."

"Oh, well, in that case," says Colin. "We'd better dunk you in the Thames or something. Remind you that you're no better than the rest of us, get you back to your roots."

"But I'm not even from London!"

"At least get you smashed, then. You've been drinking so much of that American crap that you'll probably pass out after a single pint of real beer."

"We'll see," says Bradley, grinning in anticipation.

-

In defiance of expectations, he drinks Colin under the table and since Colin is in no state to remember his address and Bradley has only the vaguest idea, it makes for a very interesting journey home.

They have to randomly disembark the Tube abruptly because Colin feels queasy, but once he's finished heaving dryly into the gutter, he straightens up and says, in a pleasantly surprised tone of voice,

"Oh, look, this is my street."

He takes an age finding his keys and Bradley starts patting himself down just to join in, but then finds the missing keys in his own jacket pocket.

"How did they get there?" says Colin, giggling insensibly. "Silly me."

Bradley deposits him on the sofa and fetches a glass of water for each of them. When he sits down, Colin doesn't take his glass, surprising Bradley instead by saying,

"I've missed you, you know. So much."

"I've missed you too," says Bradley, and it's not some meaningless platitude--he means it. He really means it.

Colin gazes at him balefully and there's a moment where something could happen--where Bradley's sure something would happen, if only both his hands weren't occupied with not spilling both glasses of water over either of them. Instead, it just sort of settles into comfortable silence and Colin takes his water, his fingers dry and warm against Bradley's, which are cold and slippery from condensation.

He sleeps badly on the uncomfortable sofa and wakes up when Colin shuffles into the kitchen and starts rattling mugs and clinking spoons. They sit together at the small kitchen table, hungover and nauseous, and Bradley just stares at Colin, at the stubble on his cheeks, the bags under his eyes, his fingers clasped around his mug, fingernails bitten and ragged.

He can't remember ever seeing anything so beautiful.

-

Colin's play takes Bradley right back to his drama school days; a strange mishmash of humour and drama, slapstick and poignant sadness. At the end of the second act, Colin sweeps onto the stage in long scarlet cloak and Bradley's breath catches in his throat at the sight, all his instincts screaming, wrong, but then the Maharaja treads on the hem and the scene goes to disarray in a cloud of smoke and violet sparks.

When it's all over and he slides backstage, Colin runs up to him and doesn't ask if it was good.

"Did you enjoy it?" he says, instead.

"Yes," says Bradley. "Very much so."

"Including the water-pistols?"

"Including the water-pistols."

"Good," sighs Colin, and Bradley gives him an enthusiastic, back-slapping hug.

"Beer?" he says.

"Beer," agrees Colin.

-

"So, Bradley James," says the Maharaja, still wearing his magnificent turban, after a pint or two, or seven. "You have defected."

The table erupts in noise, either cheering or jeering, it's hard to tell.

"Defected?"

"To America," intones the Maharaja, and the crowd boos theatrically. "So tell us, James. Tell us of your work there."

"Not much to tell," says Bradley.

"Not good enough," someone shouts.

"Spill it!"

"Spill what?"

"The beans," says the Maharaja, who shushes the table and leans forward to whisper, "Do all the actors wear beards?"

"What?!" laughs Bradley, spluttering. "What on earth do you mean? No, no, of course not."

"Well, all Americans are religious, right?"

"No, I'm pretty sure--"

"And is humanity not created in God's own image?"

"Well, some people--"

"And is God not bearded?!"

"That's not--" Bradley says, but gives up as the table erupts in cheers and everybody is suddenly wearing moustaches drawn on with eyeliner and stage make-up.

The next morning, sitting at the kitchen table with Colin, hungover--and he's sure he's spent more of these mornings with Colin hungover than not--drinking tea with a reluctant determination, he has a more sensible conversation on the matter.

"It's different," he says.

"Good different or bad different?"

"I'm not sure yet. It'll probably turn out good different--just have to get into the swing of things."

"Tell me about your character," Colin says.

"Not much there yet."

"You've had an entire season on him, Bradley, you must know something about your character."

"Well," says Bradley, spinning his mug idly. "There are so many different writers and so many last-minute changes to the script--and I mean being emailed two scenes the night before a shoot, completely different from the last time you saw them, all the dialogue changed, the set scrapped."

"We've had that before, couple of times."

"Yeah, but--It seems like I never got the time to know my character, because everything's always in motion. With Arthur, I always knew what he would do, exactly how he would react to a situation. But with Jonathan-- I don't --" He sighs. "Jonathan could be a serial killer, for all I know."

"Be exciting, though? Wouldn't it?"

"Yeah, maybe," Bradley laughs. "Don't know how they'd manage to crowbar in more blood past the censors."

"Violent?"

"Hell, yeah. The more bludgeoning, the better. Usually with household items."

"What kind of household items?"

"Guess."

"I don't know," says Colin, looking around the room. "A mug. Have you committed grievous bodily harm with a mug?"

"Think heavier."

"A kettle?"

"An iron."

"An iron? Turned on?"

"Yep. A sizzling club of death."

"Whoa."

"Yeah," says Bradley, laughing at the memory. "After I watched that scene back, I didn't do any ironing for a week. I hid it in a cupboard and when I came into costume in the morning, the girls would laugh because they knew exactly why all my clothes were creased--"

"I love you," says Colin.

A pause.

"What?" says Bradley.

"I love you," says Colin again, more slowly, like he's trying it on for size.

"Oh," says Bradley. "What kind of love are we talking about, here?"

"Well, it depends."

"On what?"

"On the way you feel," says Colin. "See, if you feel one way, then it's the kind of love between best friends who never lose touch, no matter how far apart they are, and are best man at each others' weddings. That kind of love."

"Or?"

"Or, if you feel the other way, like you'd want a relationship and you think it would work, then it's the kind of love that Michael Buble sings about in ballads and--"

"I can't live without you," says Bradley.

"Yeah," says Colin. "That kind of love."

After a moment, Bradley reaches across the table and takes Colin's hand.

"The second one," he says, just to be clear, and Colin's smile is more wonderful than ever, or maybe he's just looking more closely now.

-

The night before Bradley flies back, he dreams.

He dreams he is astride a great horse, looking out over a sunlit vista. It is beautiful. On the edge of the woodland, there are shadows that flit and dance between the trees--deer. He realises there's a spear in his hand and there are men beside him, tense with anticipation.

"Dismount," he says. "From here, we go on foot."

In the morning, when Colin wakes him with a gentle, bristly kiss, he does not remember his dream.

-

Detroit is, again, a totally different world.

Working on the film, he gets to see parts of the city he's pretty sure wouldn't be included in a package holiday. The contrast between the wealth of the centre and the poverty of the outskirts shocks him, but then all cities are like that, to some extent. The people are friendly, always interested in his accent, but there's none of the easiness of Vancouver. He feels like an outsider, a strange urge to jump the river and escape to Ontario.

Filming is a challenge. Bradley's so used to swinging either a sword or a wrench by this point that he's sort of at a loss as to what to do with other long pieces of metal.

"It's a shotgun, Bradley," the director says, rolling his eyes. "Try to act like you know what to do with it. Or at least what end bullets come out of."

He's distracted, he knows he is. If being far away from Colin was hard before, it's unendurable now. His long distance bill is already twice the length it was before and he's having trouble sleeping, which is absurd, since he can count the number of times he's slept in the same bed as Colin on his fingers.

Luckily, most of his scenes consist of him standing behind Tom Hanks, looking threatening. It's not difficult, but it is sort of insulting, being plucked from the upper-echelons of the television industry and being thrown at the lowest rungs of the filmmaking ladder. Bradley gets, on average, a line every four scenes and he tries to put as much depth into them as possible, but sometimes there's such a thing as trying too hard.

So he settles for standing behind Tom Hanks, trying to tread the fine line between threatening, axe-crazy and piss bored.

-

Because he's playing the bodyguard-slash-aide character, he's present in most of Tom Hanks's scenes, packing both a semi-automatic and a ring-binder. Occasionally, he has to hand him a piece of paper or shove him under a desk, shouting, "Stay down!"

This should probably be embarrassing, but Tom somehow makes it not so.

One scene, things are turned on its head a little, when Tom writes something down and hands it to Bradley, a welcome change from the monotony. But every take, the writing on the paper, which is meant to read, 'Mary - 14 Brooke Street', gets steadily dirtier and dirtier and Bradley has a progressively harder time keeping a straight face.

"Cut!" calls the director, getting pissy after the fifth time Bradley's fluffed it. "Bradley--"

"It's not my fault, sir!" snorts Bradley, giggling. "The other boys keep making me laugh."

"You snitch!" says Tom. "Sir, it's not true, nothing James ever says is true, and that's the truth, sir!"

They break for lunch before they can get the scene right. Tom turns out to be a fan of Merlin and they spend half an hour talking about the show and the legend. It's good, but he wishes Colin was there.

-

After his sojourn past the glitzy veneer of Hollywood filmmaking, work starts on the second season of Maintenance One. The producers cheerfully open their first meeting with him by telling him that, over the first half of the season, they'll be working on Jonathan's character development.

"And then, after the winter break, he'll be this season's B-villain," one of them says.

"A serial killer," says the other, with perhaps too much enthusiasm. "So, what do you say?"

"Cool," says Bradley, only half-truthfully, already envisaging the long night-shoots and endless stunt re-sets.

He rings up his American agent and bitches.

"Well, I've been hearing good things about your work on that film. Maybe you won't be in Maintenance much longer," she says.

"Oh, please," begs Bradley. "If anything comes through--and I mean anything, I'll play a paedophile or the elephant man, whatever--just say yes. I'll approve it later."

"That's not necessary," she says. "But if anything suitable comes up, I'll tell you as soon as possible."

"Thanks, Julia," he says. "But, seriously, paedophile."

-

"But I thought you really wanted to do this series," says Colin.

"Well, yeah," says Bradley, shifting the phone to his shoulder as he loads the washing machine. "But it's kind of like a new relationship. The honeymoon period is over now--I'm getting fed up of the producers nicking my socks."

"We don't have a honeymoon period," says Colin. "Do we?"

"Oh, ours was over long ago."

"Oh, yeah? When would that be?"

"I'm talking years here, Col. We had our honeymoon in the first series of Merlin. Don't you remember, we had that really big fight in France? It was about something really petty."

"You mislaid my script."

"Like I said, petty. But anyway, I don't like the way the American do things. It's just not my style."

"So what are you going to do?"

"Film, hopefully. I've given Julia specific instruction that I will play anything."

"You may regret that," says Colin, laughing.

"Or not," says Bradley. "But how are things with you? You got anything lined up?"

"Yeah, next week, I'm taking part in this London-wide performance art project that Harriet's organising. I'm in the Tate Modern, doing a performance of Macbeth."

"And what's modern about it?"

"The set and costumes are all designed by nut-jobs. We're still working out whether we can make the whole thing glow-in-the-dark."

"I wish I was there," Bradley sighs.

"I know. I wish you were here, too."

-

Bradley gets another small part for the winter break and is pulled in for various publicity events on the Tom Hanks number, mostly in Europe. It's frustrating, being in the same continent as Colin, but not having the time to go see him. Ferried from appearance to appearance with barely a free five minutes in his schedule, his sleep patterns grow more fragmented, his dreams more vivid.

Often, when he wakes, he has trouble remembering where he is.

He gets a week off at Christmas and spends only two days of it with Colin. When he apologises for their lack of time together, Colin just shakes his head and says,

"You look terrible."

"Just tired," says Bradley, and he is.

-

Just before he has to go back to Maintenance One, Bradley turns up to the premiere of the Tom Hanks thing. If he had a choice, he probably wouldn't go, but Julia and Scarlett unite in some kind of cross-Atlantic special relationship and order him to attend and mingle.

"Talk to people," Julia insists. "Directors, actors, musicians--anybody. Make an impression. We want more work out of this."

Bradley is sure that getting him work is what he pays them to do, but they both remain deaf to his arguments. He goes alone, because there's only one person he'd really like to take and Colin hadn't been able to afford the plane ticket at such short notice.

He steps out of the car, onto the carpet, into a wall of flashing lights and screaming people and, for a moment, he loses track of his surroundings, has no clue what he's doing there, but then he hears a shout.

"James! James, over here!"

He fairly stumbles in that direction and Tom grabs his arm and pulls him in, saying, "And this guy, this guy's great. Bradley James, my sidekick. Gotta love him."

"Sidekick?" says Bradley indignantly, as all the reporters swing their cameras on him. "It is my firmly held belief that you are my sidekick, Hanks."

"Yeah, yeah. That's what they all think," says Tom, turning back to some girl from Vanity Fair or something. Bradley feels a bit out of place and adrift, but then a woman in a demure blue gown shakes his hand and says,

"Rita Wilson."

"Bradley James."

"Tom's wife," she says, smiling. "Pleased to meet you."

"Pleased to meet you," says Bradley. "I'm his co-star."

"You liar, James."

"--his dogsbody," he corrects. "This is my first film."

"Really?" she says. "Well, I'll be watching closely, then. I hope I like what I see."

Bradley weaves unsteadily down the carpet, talking to the occasional journalist, feeling a distinct sense of either trepidation or excitement, he's not sure which. One over-eager woman, brandishing a notepad, asks him who he's wearing.

"I don't quite understand what you're asking," he says. She doesn't appear to have an answer to that, so he moves on.

After the showing of the film, where there is much clapping and congratulating, Bradley has a glass or two of champagne to psyche himself up to mingle with the guests. Thankfully, this is entirely unnecessary because Rita hauls him away almost immediately and deposits him in a knot of very smartly dressed people.

It transpires that Rita is, among other things, a highly respected producer.

"And I liked what I saw," she says.

Bradley leaves the conversation in the secure knowledge that he's made Julia several new friends and that he somehow has to fit in at least three auditions before he begins filming again.

"Oh, I'm so glad," says Julia, when he rings her the next day. Bradley feels disappointed. He had been hoping she'd recognise the opportunity to say, "Well done, my apprentice."

-

He attends the auditions with the usual sort of not-very-expectant hope, going through the scenes with his best likeable idiocy. For one of them, he doesn't utter a single line, just chats with the directors and the producers instead, and it's only when he finds himself sitting across from Jessica Alba that he realises he may have just walked into the role without trying very hard.

After he and Jessica run through the audition scene, a long, sweet dialogue, the casting directors all put their heads together and mutter furiously. He catches something about, "Not the right chemistry," and immediately wants to ask to do it again, because he wasn't on the ball, obviously, because it's Jessica Alba, of course the dynamic isn't down yet, they've only just met--

Jessica leaves quickly, something about an interview or a magazine shoot, and she kisses Bradley goodbye, leaving him slightly dizzy and wanting grandchildren, just so he could tell this story in years to come. The director sends him away, saying they would call him, which he doesn't believe. He completely forgets about it all for a couple days because Angel rings him up and announces she's getting married and that he must make arrangements to be free during the second weekend of September. Immersed in frantic phone calls, trying to wrangle a blood promise from his agent that he can have the time off, he doesn't really notice when he gets called back for another audition.

He feels like fainting when they wheel in Anne Hathaway. He nearly does, half an hour later, when all the executives start nodding at one another and saying things like, "When can we sign the contract?"

-

The producers of Maintenance One don't quite believe it either and it takes a very terse phone call from Julia for them to finally get around to writing him out of the script. Bradley films his climactic death scene six weeks later, attends the wrap party for a slightly stilted hour and a half and gets the next flight to the UK. He takes the Gatwick Express up to Victoria and reflects that, since he's about to appear in a film with Anne Hathaway, he must have garnered enough celebrity points to merit being picked up from the airport by a chauffeur. Or at least a cab.

Colin's waiting at the train station for him and Bradley gives in to the urge to hug him, because if he hasn't got enough celebrity points on his loyalty card to hug his secret-boyfriend in public, then he doesn't really want to be in this scheme anymore.

"You're in the Metro today," says Colin, grinning like the Devil before torture.

"I know," says Bradley, heavily. He'd been handed three different free newspapers on his journey from Gatwick and, in two of them, there'd been a little column announcing that Anne Hathaway was going to star in a romcom next year, accompanied by up-and-comer Bradley James.

Thankfully, there hadn't been a photo.

"But you're not wearing a hat and sunglasses!" says Colin. "People will recognise you. We might get assaulted by paparazzi."

"I highly doubt it," says Bradley, but there's a group of business intern-types just over Colin's shoulder that are looking in his direction, over-casually. "But, just in case, let's go. I don't want to be trapped in Victoria train station by a ravenous horde of journalists."

"Yeah, I think you need to appear in a couple more romcoms before you can advance to zombie flicks."

-

He dreams he is tied up, beaten, bloodied, left dying by a fireside. A large, bearded man spits in his face and grinds it in with the sole of his boot.

They leave him, suddenly, and he is grateful. Maybe he will die in peace. Then,

"Get the girl. He's useless dead."

Some scuffling, terse words, then a girl in a ragged dress is kneeling at his side, wrists marked by recent bonds, her arm curiously tattooed.

"I have been told," she says, "to heal your wounds, but leave you crippled."

He tries to suck in a breath, but his ribs hurt too much. Instead, his throat burns and his eyes sting. The world seems to darken.

"So you must act it," she whispers, laying a cool hand on his brow, and her touch is like the sun breaking through cloud.

-

"Busking," says Bradley, disbelieving. "Really, Colin?"

"A man's got to eat," Colin replies breezily. "And for a man to eat, he's got to have money. Or depend on soup kitchens."

"But you could just get a job," says Bradley, slightly afraid that Colin has indeed been relying on soup kitchens and the YMCA in his absence. "Honestly, you're a recognised BBC actor--you could do far better than busking easily."

"Yeah, but it wouldn't be half as much fun, would it?" says Colin, grinning.

Bradley is afraid Colin's finally done it. Gone irrevocably snooker-loopy.

"But I just don't see why you would choose--"

"--Look, Bradley, just drop it, will you?"

He could go on, but he doesn't want to fight, not when they have so little time to spend together. "I just want to make sure you're happy."

"I am happy," says Colin, seriously. "That's the point."

An awkward silence follows. Bradley hates arguing with Colin. It doesn't happen very often, so when it does, it comes as more of a shock. He tries to laugh it off, makes a funny face and says,

"There's a moral here, isn't there?"

"Yes, Bradley," says Colin, smiling, "there's a moral here. But don't go blowing any fuses trying to figure it out. We're still cool."

"Cool," says Bradley, and it is cool. Several of Colin's eccentrically dressed mates turn up, producing a variety of instruments. Bradley mostly just stands around watching while they set up, until one girl hands him some egg shakers. When he looks a bit sceptical, she just says,

"Move it and groove it to the rhythm, baby."

He's still dubious about the prospect of 'moving and grooving' on a busy London street and he's just about to ask Colin for some reassurance, but then somebody yells, "Get your bodhran out, Morgan!" which is somehow the funniest thing he's heard all day.

Colin indeed get his bodhran out--

"No euphemism intended, this is a family performance,"

--and Bradley feels at a bit of a loss, at first, standing around on the street, shaking along to the beat as they make their music. The public swarms by, mostly ignoring them. After a while, some of them start throwing funny looks, maybe wondering why on earth Bradley James is standing on the street, making music with some unshaven, homeless-looking artsy types, but he pays no attention. There is no reason why he shouldn't be here instead of back in LA, rubbing elbows with whoever's 'in' right now. He's not high and he's not mighty.

In fact, when he looks at Colin's radiant, smiling face, he feels pretty lowly in comparison.

-

The day before Bradley flies to New York, Colin gets a phone call.

"Oh my God--" he says, hand over his mouth. "What happened? Is she--?"

A worried pause.

"Uh huh," he says, sitting down on the sofa abruptly. Bradley excuses himself to the kitchen and comes back just as the conversation ends. He wraps Colin's fingers around a mug of tea and sits beside him.

"Is everything okay?"

Colin sighs and stares into his tea. After a minute, he says, "It's my mother. She's sick."

But Bradley hears somebody else say those words, has such a profound sense of deja vu that he can see it. Sitting in front of a blazing fire, the gleam of a helmet in the corner, the deep blue of a neckerchief.

"I have to go see her," says Merlin.

"I'll go with you," says Bradley, already mentally packing a saddlebag.

But then Colin says, "What? No, don't be ridiculous, you start filming on Tuesday," and things melt back into place again.

"What?"

"Well, what would you say to them? 'Sorry, but I can't make it to set this week because my secret boyfriend's mother is a bit poorly'? I'll go by myself, it's fine."

"But--"

"Seriously, it's fine, Bradley. I'm a big boy, I can go by myself."

Bradley's so wigged out by his little hallucination that he can't formulate an argument and ends up booking the soonest, cheapest plane ticket to Belfast he can find while Colin frantically packs.

Colin leaves in the early hours of next morning. Bradley's still mostly asleep for his goodbye-kiss and wakes up cold and bereft sometime around midday, seriously considering telling the producers to go fuck themselves. Then he imagines the disappointment on Anne Hathaway's face, feels a deep sense of paralysing guilt at the idea of standing up a beautiful woman and can't get up the balls any more.

-

"Call me 'Annie'," she says.

"Sorry?" Bradley replies.

"Call me 'Annie'," she repeats, smiling that lovely, lovely smile. "All of my friends do."

"Oh," he says, reeling slightly with the implication that he, Bradley James, is Anne Hathaway's friend.

"It'd be weird otherwise," she continues. "With us working together and everything. It'd be like filming with my great-aunt or something."

Bradley laughs, but can't think of anything to say after that, so there's a pause that, to her, is probably a little awkward, but to him is a crevasse filled with churning humiliation. Anne Hathaway--Annie--fills it for him, to his great relief.

"So what about you?"

"What about me?"

"What do you call yourself, Bradley James?"

"Oh, just--" he says. "Just Bradley. Not really had any nicknames." Or at least, none suitable for ladies' ears.

"Just Bradley?" she says, grinning. "Nobody ever call you 'Brad'?"

"No," says Bradley, firmly. "No, I am definitely not a 'Brad'."

"Really? I think you could be," she says, and he desperately hopes she's joking. "Maybe I'll call you that from now on."

"No, no, please, please don't!"

"Why not? It's a perfectly good name. If Brad Pitt can do it, so can you. Or are you not half the man Brad Pitt is, Bradley James?"

"I haven't had half the career Brad Pitt has," he says, on the verge of getting on his knees and begging. "Please, Annie, I'll never live it down."

"What will you give me in return for not calling you it?" she says, smiling like the Cheshire Cat, but Bradley is thankfully spared from promising her his first born--who is, in any case, unlikely to appear--by the director coming back from his coffee break with loads of new ideas to shout about. Bradley hurries to his mark and privately thinks that, if he weren't as bent as under-sink piping, he would already be hopelessly in love with Annie.

-

The Met Office forecasts thundery showers for Angel's wedding, but they never arrive. The weather stays stubbornly sunny all day, lighting up her radiant smile. Bradley reckons that, if there were a God, this would be His work, because Angel would have been beautiful whatever the weather, but now she is even more so.

He sits with Colin and Katie in the row behind her family. Katie cries throughout the ceremony, daintily, into a handkerchief that matches her hat. Colin sniffs a couple of times and Bradley takes his hand. The smile he gets back is a little wobbly.

The reception is an embarrassing affair, being hauled off to dance with Angel's miniature cousins, and it's much later in the evening when Bradley finally gets a dance out of the bride. They sway along to Spandau Ballet on a mostly empty dancefloor, all the parents with young children long since left.

"I can't believe you're married," he says.

"I assure you, it happened," she says, laughing brightly. "I saw it with my own eyes. I'm certain you were present."

"Yeah, but still. It's weird."

"Weird how?"

"I don't know, like you're a proper adult now."

"Bradley, I have been a 'proper adult' for many years now! So have you, if you hadn't noticed."

"Yeah, but I don't count. I'm not married. I don't have children."

"I don't have children yet either!"

"But you'll probably have them soon!"

"Bradley," she says, and she punctuates it by treading on his foot. "I indeed may have children in the future, but that is none of your concern. What are you worrying about? This isn't some kind of anti-mid-life crisis, is it?"

"No, no, I've just been feeling a bit...funny, lately."

"You shouldn't. You've got a career going, at least. Anne Hathaway on your arm, I hear."

"That's not true, you know that--"

"I'm only teasing," she says. "I know you and Colin are very happy."

That startles him, makes him misstep. "How did you--"

"Colin told me," she says. "It wasn't a secret, was it?"

"Not really," he replies. "I just didn't know you knew, that's all."

"Well, don't worry, I haven't shouted it from the rooftops. I know how private a person Colin is."

"Thanks, Angel."

She looks at him, and Bradley feels an overwhelming surge of love for her. "You make him so happy, you know."

Her words seem to echo as Bradley glances at Colin over her shoulder, sitting at the edge of the dancefloor, watching. When he looks back at Angel, she's wearing a different dress. Her hair is more elaborately styled and she seems younger, but more tired.

He loves her, desperately, but not the way she deserves. His love for her boils sour in his gut as the people cheer and clap around them, but she does not love him that way either. There is another. His lingering anger at her infidelity dampens, though, when he thinks of his own. He spots Merlin's face across the room, listening to a lady, but not really listening. His eyes burn with jealousy and Bradley burns with guilt.

He stumbles, trips over his own feet and just barely keeps his balance as the world spins and he can't tell what he's really seeing, stained glass or lasers. Angel guides him to the edge of the dancefloor, where Katie is sitting a little lopsidedly, muttering something about drunkards and their place at weddings.

That night, he is afraid to sleep, afraid to dream. He stays awake for as long as possible, watching Colin sleep, wondering what he dreams of. In the morning, the shadows chased away, he feels silly and embarrassed.

-

"Are you sure about this?" Julia asks him, watching him carefully from across her desk, worrying at the lid of a pen.

"What's there to be sure about?" says Bradley. "Of course I want to do it. You know how much I admire the director."

"It's just very different from all your previous work, that's all."

"That's a good thing, isn't it? I don't want to get type-cast as the dick with a heart of gold. I want to try something new."

"You know," she says, looking slightly alarmed, "when you said you'd play a paedophile, I did assume that you were kidding."

"This is not the same thing," he insists. "I was desperate for work then and I wouldn't say that a paedophile is my dream role, but can't you understand the scope of a character like that? That's why I want this job."

"That's why you want to be known as a man who helped oppress an entire people?"

"Look, it's a moral film. The people in question kill me at the end. I talked it over with Annie and she reckons it'll be great."

"But you're missing such an opportunity with the Austen project--"

"Julia, there will always be films of Austen. I may never get tipped for a role like this again. Please get me an audition, Julia."

"All right," she says, finally. "An audition. We'll see how it goes, then review whether you want the part still."

"Cool," says Bradley. He aces the audition and feels a little guilty when he next sees Julia and she realises that her dream of him playing a Mr Darcy lookalike is unlikely to bear fruit just yet.

Scheduling is tight, so he only has a week between filming The Clock Is Ticking with Annie and flying to New Zealand to start preparing for his next project. He and Colin don't see each other, because Colin's tied up in Belfast with some theatre, but it's okay. They'll see each other, somehow. Bradley has faith that his rapidly expanding bank account will make bending space and time that much easier.

-

When he finally makes it to New Zealand, he sleeps for fifteen hours straight and wakes up, bright-eyed and refreshed, at one in the morning. With nothing else better to do and sleep unforthcoming, he rings Colin.

"So what is this film actually about?" Colin asks.

"I'm playing one of New Zealand's British settlers."

"So it's a historical piece?"

"Yeah, the film's about how the settlers take advantage of and oppress the indigenous Maori population."

"Cheerful."

"Well, it's also about the two cultures trying to understand and respect one another. "

"Oh, that's all right, then."

"But I die at the end."

"Jesus, spoil me already."

"Col, if I don't drag you to the premiere, you won't even see it in the cinema. You'll just wait until the DVD comes out and rent it from the video shop, whereupon the sales assistant will make conversation with you about the fact that your best friend and co-star of Merlin was 'really quite good in it, shame he had to die at the end'."

"It won't go exactly like that," says Colin, with a slightly sulky tone.

"No, hopefully they'll say that I was 'really quite excellent' instead."

Colin changes the subject with the subtlety of a rhinoceros. "What time is it, over there?"

"The early hours. Jet lag sucks."

"I'm having lunch. Steak pie."

"Lucky bastard."

"That I am. Listen, try and sleep, yeah? Or your body-clock won't adjust."

"Easy for you to say."

"Well, swing by the hotel pool and tire yourself out or something. Go for a run."

Bradley does just that and, aided by a drowsy anti-histamine, manages to scrape in another four hours of forced, restless sleep. The next afternoon, he attends a cast meeting with several other jet-lagged British actors and their bleary-eyed, worn out presence makes him feel something close to the norm for the first time in months.

-

In his dreams, he watches a woman burn. The acrid smell of her flesh makes his throat close, makes him wish he could do as the court ladies do and clutch a handkerchief to his mouth and nose. Morgana isn't present. She will be punished for it, later, for hiding from the sight and the smell and the screams.

She won't stop screaming.

It haunts his dreams later, dreams within a dream. He wakes in cold sweat twice; once in a stone room draped with red and gold, once in a beige hotel room, the wail of sirens outside. He dozes fitfully until morning and spends the day exhausted, starting at sudden noises.

-

Katie's in Australia, for reasons she never really makes clear, so she rings him up one day and says,

"James, I'm coming over. Make ready for my arrival,"

and turns up on set twenty-four hours later. Bradley is uneasy at the thought of seeing her, maybe even afraid that he'll look at her and see something else.

But it's only Katie, wearing large sunglasses and wellingtons.

"An assistant lent them to me," she says, waving some red stilettos at him. "Ruin these, otherwise. So muddy, this film business."

He hugs her and she kisses the air next to his cheek, careful not to smear him with lipstick. "It's good to see you, Katie."

"And you. Doing well for yourself, aren't you? Though that is the most ridiculous hat I have ever seen you wear, congratulations."

"And what is this?" he replies, pulling her sunhat askew. "You could shade an entire East-African country under there."

"I burn easily," she says, haughtily. "Come on, then, introduce me to your co-stars. I hear this Thomas bloke is quite the dish."

He does as she asks, introducing her around, chaperoning her blatant flirtation with everyone she meets. He's on edge for the duration of her stay, sneaking sidelong glances at her, wondering if--when--she'll turn around and he'll see another face, when he'll feel that unbearable clash between love and fear.

It doesn't happen. Katie stays her own, strikingly beautiful, self and Bradley is torn between relief and anxiety, waiting for the other penny to drop.

-

Soon after filming ends on The Sky Weeps, Bradley gets invited to the premiere of The Clock Is Ticking. He takes Colin as his plus-one and, in a giddy moment after payday, buys him a first-class plane ticket. Colin steps off the flight with an amusingly stunned expression that's totally worth the extra cost.

"My baggage was first out of the carousel," he says, in a wondering tone. "First."

"I know," says Bradley, taking said baggage. "It's awful, isn't it?"

"Will it start raining fire next?" says Colin. "A plague of miscellaneous amphibians?"

"Worse. Julia has insisted I go to some ludicrously expensive place to be fitted for my suit and you're coming with me."

Colin protests loudly but, ultimately, fruitlessly. Bradley lures him, jet-lagged and complaining, to this fancy shop with the promise of sleep and a long, slow blowjob afterwards and it's a particularly unique form of torture, watching Colin be fitted for a suit. Bradley has to sit on his hands to avoid causing a public scandal.

"Have you got anything else lined up?" Colin asks, over the head of a measuring-tape-wielding assistant.

"Not yet. Got something of a break, actually."

"Coming back home?"

Bradley, who genuinely hadn't given the issue much thought until now, blinks and says, "Er, yeah. Yeah, that'd be cool."

"Cool," says Colin, grinning.

-

When he steps onto the red carpet, Bradley only just stops himself from reaching back into the car to offer Colin a hand. He solves the problem by stuffing his hands in his pockets, but Colin elbows him less than gently and scolds him for it.

Blessedly, the next person to arrive is Annie, looking even more stunning than usual.

"Hey, Brad!" she says. "Small world."

"Isn't it just?" says Bradley. "Annie, this is Colin. Colin, Annie."

"Pleased to meet you," Colin says, shaking her hand.

"No, no, it's my pleasure," she says, shooting a truly wicked look at Bradley. "I've heard so much about you."

"Really?" says Colin, in a self-satisfied tone of voice, but Bradley tugs him down the red carpet before Annie can dig her claws in any further.

She gives them a benevolent wave and says, "We'll talk later, darling," before turning to a ravenous-looking journalist.

"Did she just call you 'Brad'?" says Colin, with vindictive glee.

"Absolutely not," says Bradley. "I am not a 'Brad', nor will I ever be."

"Really? Because I'm sure she said--"

"You must have misheard."

Bradley thinks that maybe, if he denies it enough, Colin will forget about it, or at least take a hint, but after the viewing of the film, Annie sweeps over and introduces him to every casting director she knows as 'Brad'. Bradley seethes quietly and Colin snorts in a ungentlemanly way.

-

The UK is a soothing middle-ground after the hectic intensity of Los Angeles and the cool, laid-back atmosphere of New Zealand. He visits family first, brings Colin--

"You weren't here for Christmas!" his mother cries.

"Yeah, well, you know," says Bradley, helping himself to another scone. "Work and stuff. I got a couple of days off, but the flights were just too long for a trip back home to be worth it."

--and his mother dotes, as she always does. She complains that Colin is too thin and that Bradley's getting thinner and her solution seems to be the judicious application of clotted cream to every meal.

He buys a flat in London and finagles Colin's name onto the deed through the combination of a starry-eyed real estate agent and some secretive phone calls that he pretends are to Scarlett.

"Bradley," begins Colin.

"Yes, yes, you are not my kept woman," says Bradley. "But you can't carry on living in that hovel of yours. If the council had their way, they would condemn the building. Or convert it into a school. Or a prison."

Colin purses his lips and it takes twenty more minutes of cajoling before he says, "Kensington?" in a speculative way and hesitantly signs his name.

Their first night in the new flat, Bradley dreams about fields of wheat and long riding trips, the pounding of hooves, but he doesn't wake in damp terror and, in the morning, remembers it only vaguely and forgets about it completely after he gets out of bed. He thinks maybe that the dreams are calming down, going away, and hopes desperately that he is right.

-

Those weeks in spring are heady, filled with trips to see plays, museums, walks in Hyde Park. Bradley does not dream in four consecutive nights, then five, then nine, and walks around in a consistently good mood, satisfied that this episode is over.

Until one day, in Homebase of all places, Colin turns away from a display of gloss paint and says,

"Would you run back and get another light bulb? One of the energy saving ones."

Only Bradley also hears him say, "Don't forget to pick up your sword from the armoury on your way out. I had it re-sharpened," over the top, like double vision, but in audio.

"Yes," he says and stops himself from saying anything further because he's not sure which name he should be tagging onto the end of that answer, Merlin or Colin. He moves through the aisles slowly, because he really has got double vision now, stone corridors overlaying metal shelves, and it's making his head spin.

As he skirts a display of wallpaper or a suit of armour, a sales assistant or a serving girl says, "Excuse me, sirsire, would you like some help?"

"No," he says. "No, thank you."

One of the girls looks accepting, the other surprised. He moves on to the next aisle and suddenly finds himself in the armoury, no light bulbs to be seen. He scans the racks and there's his sword, on the corner stand. He picks it up and tests the edge--very sharp. There's a single nick in the blade that the blacksmith must have missed, high up by the hilt. He weighs up commanding it be redone and just not bothering, but Merlin calls from the doorway,

"Hurry up! The guard has assembled and the King is on his way, you're going to be late,"

and he's standing in Homebase again, holding a light bulb in his hand, and Colin is saying, "Yes, that one. Honestly, how long does it take you to choose a light bulb?"

"Sorry," says Bradley, dropping it into the basket. "In my own little world."

That night, he thinks about seeing a specialist, but that's a little too close to admitting the truth. He decides to wait and see if he dreams, and he does dream, but it's a surreal affair involving driving a Reliant Robin down a rollercoaster while singing excerpts from Les Miserables, which doesn't involve swords or castles or people calling him 'sire', so he classes Homebase as some kind of blip in the radar and doesn't go see anybody.

-

Part Two