Tests
by Allie
Bodie always knew Doyle was a wizard when it came to memory.
He could remember license plates and badge numbers with nothing more than a glance. Remembered them for at least a month afterwards, too, as Bodie had found out the time he asked Ray to look up the plates of that red convertible again, the one a terrorist from Greece had driven.
Doyle had rattled off the numbers, and Bodie stared at him. "You can't have known I was going to ask that. Why'd you look it up?"
"Didn't, did I?" Doyle tapped his skull. "It's all up here, mate." And he'd walked jauntily down the hall, leaving Bodie trying not to gape.
Yes, when it came to numbers, Doyle had an excellent memory.
Bodie had been bored, recently, however, and he wanted to test just how far Doyle's memory went. He had a key to his partner's place, and it was no trouble to sneak in one day and set a few things in slightly different patterns. He moved the picture of the person riding a zebra three inches to the left, getting a hammer and adding another nail in the wall to hang it.
He re-arranged the toy soldiers just slightly, bringing one in the back to stand in the front, and moving the lines of the others, as if they were in a different formation, ready to move out.
He looked around for what else he could move. Hm….
#
When Doyle went home that day, Bodie found an excuse to invite himself in, and bounded up the steps, waiting at the door for Doyle to open it. Maybe he'd forget about the key.
"Open it yourself," said Doyle. "And don't expect to drink all my coffee."
"Temper, temper," said Bodie, and got inside barely before Doyle swatted at him. "You're in a foul mood, mate," he observed as he moved about the kitchen, setting up the coffee maker, and getting some bread out for toast and jam.
"And you're nosy. What else is new?"
Doyle had been in a low mood all day today, and Bodie's efforts to get him out of it had so far failed. They'd ended up snapping at each other, then enduring long silences in the car, before Bodie would try to extend the olive branch again.
Still, even when he grasped that branch gratefully, Doyle seemed depressed.
"Need to talk?" Bodie asked brightly, glancing at Doyle swiftly, wondering if he'd noticed any changes yet.
"Not to you, mate." Doyle wandered into the next room, and adjusted a pillow distractedly. Nope, not one of the things Bodie had moved.
"What, to Ross maybe?" said Bodie.
"Maybe," bristled Doyle. Then he sagged to a seat on the couch, all the irritation draining out of him to leave a weary, Doyle-shaped shell. Bodie wished Doyle could just snap out of it, but he knew that was a fruitless wish. He'd have to let Doyle handle things in his own time.
It still might help to hang around a bit, even if he had to give up the memory game.
"Telly?" asked Bodie, carrying in a plate piled high with bread and jam. Doyle regarded it with a mix of amusement, disgust, and resignation. He accepted one of the pieces, though, and began to nibble at it.
Bodie sat on the sofa beside him. "Ah." He turned on the telly, grabbed a piece of bread, laden heavily with current jam, and began to eat. When the coffee maker gurgled and the flat was filled with the smell of pungent brew, he jumped up and fetched mugs.
He fixed Doyle's the way he liked it, made his own quite sweet and milky, and returned carrying them carefully. Doyle had changed channels. Bodie nudged him till he reached out and accepted his coffee. "Ta." He blew on it distractedly and went back to staring at the screen.
"Come on sunshine, what's the matter?" asked Bodie, reaching a hand out to ruffle his curls. He knew it might earn him a dark look if Doyle was in a really bad mood, but he risked it anyway.
Doyle's eyes stayed riveted on the cathode ray tube. "Got a postcard. It's no big deal, all right?"
"Post card?" asked Bodie blankly. He hadn't seen it when he rummaged the flat a few hours earlier. Where had Doyle...?
Sighing, Doyle drew out a postcard from his inside pocket. It had been folded in half. On the back was a picture of the Statue of Liberty.
Bodie knew who it was from even before Doyle reluctantly handed it over.
The postcard looked as if it had been creased a number of times. Doyle must have looked at it, and re-looked at it, every time he was alone for a moment today. Suddenly Bodie felt bad for leaving him alone at all.
He opened the postcard and read, "Ray, thinking of you. Enjoying my job. Do you still have the same one? Ann"
Bald, that. "She wants to get back together."
Doyle took a slurp of coffee and swallowed, nodding. "Yeah. Reading between the lines. As long as I quit my job." He raised a hand and sighed.
"Don't," said Bodie, too quickly, too firmly.
Doyle gave him a slow look. "Wasn't going to. Just—brings it all back, y'know?"
"I know," said Bodie, his mouth tight. "Maybe it's time to move, mate. Don't give her the new address."
Doyle laughed, a reluctant, world-weary laugh, but an amused one nonetheless. "I hardly need to hide from her, do I?"
"If a postcard upsets you." Bodie refolded it, running the crease tightly between his fingernails, squeezing it hard, marring the picture a bit. He wished Doyle would just forget about Ann already.
But then, Doyle had always been a wizard with memory.
Bodie put the postcard on the couch between them, hoping it would fall down the middle and be forgotten. He drank his coffee in silence and finished the rest of the jam bread.
The programme ended and the next one started. Doyle made no move to get up. He held out his coffee mug to Bodie. Bodie tilted an eyebrow at him. "Oh, you'd like more, would you?"
"Go on, be a mate."
He could see Doyle was, oddly enough, trying to cheer him up, a faint smile quirking at the edges of his mouth as he tried to wind Bodie up.
Feeling something lighten inside him, Bodie rose and accepted the mug and went to get more coffee for both of them.
He'd have to stay on top of things, keep Doyle from brooding for the next couple of days, till the whole Ann thing blew over. It would. Of course it would, because Doyle wasn't going to leave CI5 and move to America for a redheaded woman who read manuscripts for a living.
He handed Doyle his mug, and met a warm green gaze. Doyle had a look about him like he was smiling ruefully at himself, and also trying to show his gratitude to Bodie. "Ta," he said.
Not just for the coffee, Bodie thought, strangely cheered.
Somehow, it must've helped Doyle just to know Bodie felt upset for him. Or maybe just to get the words out. Either way—good. He was starting to seem more like himself. Maybe tomorrow he'd be fine again. Maybe.
Doyle finished his coffee, stretched, and rose. "By the way," he said calmly. "I noticed the picture right away."
"What pic—"
"Forget already?" asked Doyle ironically. "You moved it." He pointed to the zebra picture, then the soldiers. "And them."
He sauntered off to the bathroom with a jaunty walk, a grin in his voice, while Bodie gaped after him.
"Yeah? Well wait till you see your bookshelf, mate!" Bodie yelled after him, grinning hard.