“Goodbye,” Aaron said quietly, and the soft finality of that stayed with Joel as he stamped furiously away, cursing himself, and men who didn’t know what they wanted, and whatever was squatting on Aaron’s shoulders, and himself again. Mooning like this over a man he’d fucked once: ridiculous. It would make a funny story in a few weeks’ time.

He marched up Gray’s Inn Road. The south end was lawyer territory; as you went further north towards King’s Cross the area became dangerous in different ways. He kept an eye out as he walked, alert for lone men doing nothing much, or the occasional flare of light that was huddled smokers, waiting in doorways for whatever it was they waited for. Victims, companions, the morning, or maybe just an end to the persistent, pervasive winter drizzle. In their dreams.

Joel’s footsteps echoed flatly on the wet pavements. Gray’s Inn Road could feel very long on a rainy night. Cold, too. His hand was bare because getting a glove on one-handed involved holding it with his teeth and he hadn’t wanted to do that in front of Aaron. He couldn’t be bothered to stop and go through the palaver now, but he wished he had done it earlier because his fingers were icy. Good thing he didn’t have two hands, or he’d be freezing.

His stump hurt too. It still ached now and then; probably it always would. He didn’t get phantom hand sensations any more, thank God, just firing nerves and a dull pain in the cold, but there was plenty to resent, all the same.

He passed the Royal Free Hospital with the glower he always gave hospitals on principle. Nearly there now, which was good because he was itching to be home, even if his bedsit scarcely deserved the name. He wanted to be inside, away from the cold and damp and dark and the sense of people watching him.

He wasn’t quite sure where that last thought came from. It came, though, and he felt himself straighten as his muscles tensed in response.

He didn’t ignore it, because his instincts paid his bills and had carried him safely through three years of war, before he got careless. He sped up a little, heart thumping, eyes darting. Couldn’t see anyone. There were feet behind him, but well behind. Might be nothing. Lots of people would be walking to the railway station, even at this hour.

He turned down Acton Street, ears straining for feet behind him, and crossed over Percy Circus, and now he was pretty sure he wasn’t being followed at all. What a drama out of nothing. He’d laugh at himself as soon as he was inside.