Author's Note: Another update, just cos I wanted to keep writing! Not sure when the next one will be up. Probably tomorrow, but I'm not making any promises!
Warning: Strong language
Disclaimer: Nothing belongs to me, all to the BBC and Noel and Julian
"Vince? Vince, I'm making a cup of tea, d'you want one?" Howard knocked on the door gently. There was no sound from within. "Vince?" He knocked louder. There was a muffled groan and something that sounded like, "Go 'way." He banged on the door. "Vince, it's ten o clock! Get out of bed, you're supposed to be in the shop! I'll make you a cup of tea." Sighing angrily Howard moved away from his friend's door and started boiling the kettle. He'd been up for three hours, he'd opened the shop, done the stock check, tried to sell his Jazz records to three customers and hoovered the flat. And Vince hadn't even got out of bed yet. He stirred the tea slightly more vigorously than was necessary. He was treated like some sort of servant in this place. Bollo barely acknowledged his existence, Naboo usually ignored him and Vince... Vince, well. He didn't know what to do about him. Just as Howard threw the two used teabags into the bin, he heard Vince's door open. Turning around he saw his best friend cross the flat, shoulders slumped, and drop onto the sofa. He was dressed more conservatively than usual and Howard could see the marks on his neck from the day before. A pang of guilt shot through him, but he squashed it quickly. Vince had had it coming.
"Here's your tea," he said, almost slamming the bright orange mug down onto the coffee table. Vince glanced up at him.
"Thanks," he said sullenly. Howard fidgeted for a bit and then said quickly.
"Look, I'm sorry about yesterday. I shouldn't have done it." Vince said nothing, just reached for his latest Cheekbone magazine and started flicking through it. "Aren't you going to say anything?"
Vince sighed and put the magazine down. "What d'you want me to say, Howard? 'Don't worry, I forgive you, because I deserved it?' Well guess what, I didn't deserve it. You went off on me for no reason."
Howard glared at him. "No reason?"
"It was just a paperclip you freak. And I didn't even take it!"
Howard ran his hands through his hair.
"Vince, it's not just about the paperclip." The younger man shifted slightly on the sofa, and Howard noticed that he actually looked confused.
"It isn't?"
"How can you be so incredibly thick? Honestly, sometimes it's like talking to an absolute moron with you. Haven't you noticed how things are now? With me and you?"
Vince stood up so that he was facing Howard, fluffing a hand through his black hair in an automatic movement.
"Yeah, I've noticed. I've noticed that you barely talk to me anymore, unless it's to shout or call me an idiot. How can I be expected to know what's going on with you unless you tell me? We're supposed to be friends, Howard. You hardly spoke to me yesterday, and then suddenly you burst into my room ranting and raving about some stupid paperclip. What was I supposed to do? Just stand there and take it? Cause I won't do that, Howard."
Howard sneered at him. "No, that's not your style is it? Facing up to your problems. You just run away or go buy a new hat. I did tell you what was wrong, and what did you do? You laughed at me. I told you the day after I came back from Denmark that I was upset about Adam being found so quickly..."
"Oh you're not still going on about that are you?"
"Yes I am, sir. How would you feel if you found out that you were totally replaceable at the drop of a hat..."
Vince looked puzzled. "I dunno how that would feel. Everyone knows I'm not replaceable, I'm unique."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
By this time they were almost nose to nose, voices were raised.
"Well not that unique, really, are you? Lance Dior did quite a good job at being as shallow as you." Vince stepped back slightly, stung. That was a low blow, and Howard knew it. Howard knew how upset Vince had got at the whole business with the Flighty Zeus. Howard ploughed on, unable to stop the venom spewing from his mouth. "In fact, I reckon he could almost have been you. Only he wasn't quite able to get the real bitchiness that you need to be Vince fucking Noir."
Vince shook his head slightly. "Howard, that's not fair. Take that back."
But Howard had gone beyond stopping. "He didn't bully Harold enough did he, really? I bet Lance never let Harold get fired for the sake of a cape."
Vince stepped forward, his eyes blazing.
"Yeah? Well I bet Harold never sold Lance to a rapist for the sake of a map! That takes a special kind of coward, doesn't it? You'd know all about that."
Howard's face paled. "H-how...?"
Vince's eyes were tearing up with a mixture of hurt and anger. "That nutjob told me. Right before Naboo came running in. I'd told him my mate was a real Man of Action, he'd come and sort him out. And then... then he said that you'd said... how, how long would you... how long would you need him for..." Vince's voice cracked and the threatening tears spilled over. He dashed them away with an angry hand.
"Vince, please..."
"I didn't believe 'im. I never believed you'd do that. Until I asked Naboo 'bout it a coupla weeks ago. I asked 'im how you'd got that map that showed where the yetis were. 'E didn't answer at first, but I got it out of 'im. You had a guilty conscience and confessed all to 'im didn't yer? Confessed 'ow you'd sold your best mate to a rapist..." Vince's voice went completely and he clattered off down the stairs. The door to the shop slammed shut a minute later. Howard stood motionless, all the blood drained from his face.
Sixteen Hours Later
The atmosphere in the living room of the flat above the Nabootique was tense to say the least. Naboo and Bollo sat silently in their chairs throwing nervous looks at each other. Howard was pacing, a glass of red wine clutched in his hand so tightly his knuckles were going white. Naboo frowned.
"Howard, you're gonna break that glass in a minute. Just relax will ya?" Howard shot him a dirty look but didn't say anything. Naboo had come back that afternoon to find the shop deserted, Howard sitting upstairs staring blankly into space and no sign of Vince. Well, that wasn't all that unusual, he usually dashed off to Topshop several times in the space of one day, just in case he missed something he hadn't seen before. But now it was two o clock in the morning, and he still wasn't back. Naboo didn't need to be a Shaman to know that Vince and Howard had had the mother of all fights.
Howard glanced at his watch again, for the third time in the last minute. "Where is he?" he muttered to himself. Another fifteen minutes passed. Howard gave up pacing and collapsed onto the sofa. Suddenly there was the sound of a key turning in the lock below. Howard sat up ramrod straight, as though he'd been slapped.
There was the sound of footsteps climbing slowly up the stairs. From this alone Howard knew that Vince wasn't drunk. When he came back drunk he made one hell of a noise and usually knocked half the items in the shop over. But if he wasn't drunk, then where the hell had he been?
Vince appeared at the top of the stairs, sopping wet, his dark hair plastered to his head, strands dangling over his pale face, drops of water trickling down onto the carpet. Howard leapt up.
"Vince! What on earth happened? You're soaked!"
Vince stared at him vacantly. "It's rainin'."
"I don't mean that! I mean what happened to you? It's gone two in the morning! I've been worried sick!"
Vince gave him a look which said plainer than words that he didn't believe that and muttered, "I went for a walk."
"For sixteen hours?" Howard's voice was little more than a screech.
"I 'ad a lot to think about." Howard's gut twisted a little. Vince's voice was dull and flat. He'd hardly ever seen him like this before, he never normally stopped talking. And besides Howard had a horrible feeling what Vince meant by 'a lot to think about'.
"Look, Vince, I know we, well, we had words this morning..." At this point Bollo and Naboo both edged up from their chairs and shuffled tactfully out of the room. "... but the least you could have done was to let me know you were okay! Just a text or something. I could have been doing things today, instead I was worrying about you."
"What things, Howard?"
Howard gaped. "What d'you mean?"
"What things could you have been doing?"
Howard floundered slightly. "Well, lots of things. I have that new poetry I was telling you about, a new movement in poetic form, sir, and..."
"Oh give over, Howard. You know that bollocks is never going to get published. You spend hours doing that, organising stationary village, insisting you're a multi-instrumentalist, going to jazzercise, and what have you actually done with it all? Ay?"
Howard flinched back, then rounded on Vince. "I could have done lots with it, sir! I could have been somebody, a leading musician in the Jazz field! Instead, I have to stay here with you, an idiot who's constantly getting into some kind of bother and expects me to dig him out of it."
Vince's eyes widened. "You dig me out of trouble? I think you'll find it's the other way round, sir. I know what you do, you cling onto me cause you think that some of my popularity and success will rub off on you, get you out of your own dreary existence."
"How dare you? You're the one holding me back, we both know it." By this time both men were shaking with rage. The air was spitting with the hatred flowing between them.
"I wish I'd never even met you! You're a selfish little bitch who thinks of nothing but himself and his hair all day long. You treat me like absolute shit, and then expect me to forgive you at the drop of a hat. Who d'you think's left to pick up the pieces of the messes you get us both into? Me! God, sometimes I wish the Head Shaman had cut off your head, then at least I'd be rid of your idiocy!"
Vince had been about to retort when Howard's last sentence left his lips.
Vince blinked.
Silence.
Absolute silence.
Howard looked horrified at what he'd said, but still half defiant. Vince nodded his head slowly.
"Awright, Howard."
He turned away and walked into his bedroom, closing the door softly behind him. Howard was left in the dark living room, shaking with anger still, looking at the closed door.
Argh! I'm so mean, I know. Let me know what you think, please! xxx
