It Matters

It had been three days, long enough to convince Matt that something terrible had happened. He activated the tracker that he'd personally added to Mello's mobile 'phone for just this occasion and was reassured, then annoyed by the fact that the signal was still moving around. It took another couple of hours for him to finally pull on his boots and follow it to its source.



The nightclub was heaving with people. Scantily dressed women dripping jewels giggled in the company of the men who could afford them. The beat was loud and the light-show causing as much darkness as it did illumination. The atmosphere was fuelled by cocaine, though only alcohol was in evidence. Matt lit a cigarette and found a shadow to stand in.



It took twenty minutes before he spotted Mello. Hating the way that the sight took his breath away, he nevertheless watched. The tight leather trousers, laced up at the crotch, and the equally skin hugging leather waistcoat; slightly heeled boots, though his lover didn't need the extra height; the blond hair shimmering in the spotlights, falling over his alert, blue eyes. He was so gorgeous. Inconsiderate and irritating, but ridiculously handsome. That catlike gaze lingered for a few seconds on the spot where Matt stood, his cigarette extinguished now, but there was no reaction. Even if he had been seen, Matt wouldn't have expected one, not with the company that Mello was keeping.



They were obviously Mafia. Matt didn't need a horse's head in his bed to know that. Their guns weren't even hidden and they reeked of wealth and violence. It confirmed a lot that he had tried not to consider, but which had crept anyway into his conjecture. He would have just left it at that, maybe had a quiet drink and gone somewhere else. Mello was alive and that was all he needed to know. However, it was at that moment that another man joined the group across the club. He was immaculate in designer clothes and good-looking in a pretty boy, male model way. He was also obviously effeminately camp and had immediately placed his arm around Mello's shoulders.



The sight paralysed Matt for a long minute. He felt his heart breaking silently inside. It had taken years of shared history for Mello to be comfortable with Matt's arm around his shoulders. Even now, such an imposition could be angrily shaken away, with threats heavy in the air if he should try that again. Mello was not brushing away this imposter. He was just standing there. He was laughing at some joke which had galvanised the entire group. In slow-motion, Matt moved out into full view; he didn't catch himself doing it in time to stop. Once out, he forced himself to exhale and to fix a mask of indifference upon his face. Two could play at that game.



Matt found allowed himself to get caught up in the music, moving flirtaciously in the vicinity of a group of beautiful people on the dancefloor. The orange tint of his goggles caused the light to brighten, as if this was a lovely night, with no care in the world. It wasn't long before he attracted the attention of a nubile young thing, who shimmied down the length of his body and up again. He already knew he'd attracted another's attention, by the ferocity of the glare burning into the back of his neck.



Matt didn't turn around. With a fixed smile of enjoyment, he carried on dancing. Yes, he was making it up as he went along, but the immediate plan called for pulling. Anyone, anything, all of them, as long as Mello was getting the message loud and clear. He hadn't had time to dissemble his emotions. He felt the knife twist of hurting and the uncommon need for revenge; there was something of desperation in there too. It was all hidden beneath that studied placidity and the aped goodtime boy. He was any other nineteen year old, dancing on a Saturday night.



He only considered that his judgement might have been a little clouded when the first gunshots rang out. He was already acting on instinct, before he had even consciously registered the need. He pulled his companion behind a pillar, but was soon alone there. Screams rang out around the room, but the music carried on. A strangely calm, second voice inside told Matt that it should have stopped. It always stopped in the movies. People dived for cover or ran in blind panic for the exits, trampling the first casualties in their rush for survival. Chaos ruled too much to fully appraise the situation, but Matt noted one important fact. The gunshots hadn't been Mello aiming for him. The fact that he was still alive confirmed it.



Over almost as soon as it began, the gunmen sinking away behind the stampeding clubbers and becoming lost amongst them. A second wave of violence followed in its wake, as the retaliation began. The music finally stopped and that made it somehow worse. The shouting and the screaming of the injured or scared, blood pooling across the already sticky carpet or flooding where it hit the shiny dancefloor. Just three feet from Matt's position, he could see a dead girl. Her face taken off by a close range shot and unspeakable matter spilling from her blasted skull.



He was deciding whether to vomit first or to wait until he'd taken out his own gun, when a movement caught his eye. The first figure he had seen not running, instead stepping over the corpse with a crack of leather and chocolate. Mello just stood there staring at Matt with a mixture of emotions struggling for the purchase of his expressions. Fury, hatred, love... yes, there was love. Matt had his own gun in his hand. It went without saying that Mello had his. Some habitual automatic response had Matt shrugging nonchalently, then smirking back at his lover. Then he remembered that he had every right to be angry too.



Matt faltered, realising that, for one of the very few times in his life, he had absolutely no idea what to do next. While Mello just held his gun, not pointing it at him, then Matt did too. He tapped it against his thigh, as if still hearing the silenced drumbeat. This was all too strange. Not the fighting, he'd seen enough blood to last a lifetime, but the fact that Mello wasn't shouting or storming over or doing anything against which he could react with all the justification of the wronged party here. He could tell, from long association, that it was taking all of Mello's willpower to just stand there.



Then his partner was suddenly surrounded by people, all animate and all waving guns like amateurs, though they patently were not that. In a flurry of barked orders, Mello turned to leave, striding away in the midst of them. Matt was not having that. He stepped out from the pillar, raising the gun then lowering it again. Mello turned and caught him with his eyes. They blazed a warning. He mouthed,

"Go home."



Hating himself for it, Matt picked his way through the bodies of the fallen and sneaked out the fire escape as the emergency services arrived.