The Lateness Of The Hour

by Lisbet Adair

After MW3 Price has to return to England, to tie up some loose ends, but it means facing up to the decisions he made years ago that brought everyone else down with him. This is the sequal to The SAS and The Glam That Goes With It, and continues the stories of Price, his wife Sam and Gaz's wife Vivianne.

2. Chapter 2

The Lateness of the Hour: Chapter 2

June 2012

Long before MacTavish's time in the regiment, a tabloid clipping had been pinned to the ancient cork of the general noticeboard: a full-page splash from the siege of Clapham College. The image in question taken during one of the many interminably boring hours prior to the event's self-resolution, as a cache of giggling and flagrantly intoxicated students exchanged flirtatious obscenities from the window of their flat with the men camped out below. The photographer had been between them; shooting beside the soldiers, faces unreadable behind balaclavas, as they watched the raucous display, culminating when one ripped off her shirt, exposing her chest beneath, and hurled it down. The shutter came down as one man reached up, forever freezing the shirt in its fall towards him, just out of his reach, and capturing the girl overbalancing as her friends clung to her.

Gaz had been the first to point it out to him, stopping MacTavish in his tracks as he passed the board, grabbing his arm and spinning him round as he stabbed the yellowed, crackling paper with his finger.

"What do you think, eh?" He asked, his face bright with a sudden, boyish glee.

MacTavish had stammered a non-committal reply. He knew how exposed he was, as the new boy, to becoming the butt of jokes and regarded this situation with deep suspicion. "She's gorgeous! You'd give her one, right?" Gaz punched him, lightly, on his shoulder.

He'd agreed, mostly to be polite, but also because whatever the truth behind the image, she was beautiful. The picture was perfectly balanced, a strange homage to Michelangelo in the cold light of a London afternoon. Her long, dark hair flowed forward in a dark stream, following the motion of her arm, framing her pale face with its expression of exuberant joy. Her wild vivacity tempted him, and he couldn't draw his eyes away. He stared at her until Gaz broke him from his reverie.

"She's my wife!" he'd said, grinning triumphantly.

"Fuck off!" MacTavish had replied, with an incredulous laugh.

"You don't believe me." said Gaz, looking hurt.

He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his tattered wallet, flipping it open to reveal the photograph inside. Sure enough, the same woman stared back: fully clothed, in a delicate yet unmistakable wedding dress, her hair tamed and set with a crown of miniature white roses. Next to her, respondent in his dress uniform, and wearing an expression of bursting pride, was Gaz.

"But..." MacTavish stuttered.

"I cut that out of the paper and stuck it up there in '99 and said "I'm gonna marry that girl and I did." He explained, his tone distinctly smug.

"And you just, left that there with her tits out?" MacTavish had spluttered, disbelieving.

He shrugged "She's not bothered. People do daft things when they're young." He regarded the clipping affectionately. "You have to take it down if I die though. If I catch you perving over my widow, I'll come back and haunt you."

These words echoed painfully in his ears. He could feel the pressure of grief welling again as he stared at the space where the clipping had been a, bright patch where the cork around it had faded and crumbled, a sudden lump in his throat that he couldn't swallow, a pressure in his chest that seemed to squeeze his very heart. To the uninitiated, Gaz and Vivianne were poorly matched, not so much transgressing boundaries of class as storming them, but despite all the judgements and stresses that had crushed other marriages before them, they had endured and prospered through it all until, with a single pull of a trigger, it was over and there was no one to blame but him.

He'd missed the funeral, on account of being indisposed behind the lines of the Russian civil war, but he couldn't claim that there hadn't been time to pay his respects since his return. He'd wasted countless empty hours between meetings and physio, rotting his brain with day-time television and eating crisps until Price dragged him out to trample the countryside and tried to be optimistic about the future.

They'd never known each other that well, but he'd visited Gaz at home a few times, and even run an errand for him, picking up a poster from her shop in the town. He'd been struck by the fact that she was still beautiful, and the effort not to think at all about what lay beneath her paint-stained tunic left him a stammering wreck. Of course, she was married to Gaz, and there were some lines that even he refused to cross, but his eyes had always been drawn to her, even if it sent a bolt of envy into his heart.

Now Gaz was dead, and no matter how he replayed his hazy memories of the events on the bridge, or that officially, the account of his actions was exemplary, the guilt haunted him, possessed him in the darkness before the sedatives kicked. He heard whispering accusations in his head whenever it was quiet: If he'd been stronger, faster, better… then the clipping would still be on the board, there would be one less name on the clocktower, and they'd be spending the hazy afternoon celebrating the end of the first stage of selection in the grounds of the old vicarage that Gaz had the good fortune to call his home.

It had taken every ounce of energy to leave the flat that afternoon. If it had been anyone else who'd asked, he would have said no, but he couldn't duck out of the invitation, even though the thought of attending had almost unmanned him: he owed Price his life after all. Next year, he would reach mandatory retirement, and even though he would still be welcome, MacTavish knew that it wouldn't be the same. He didn't want to go but adding more guilt to his already unbearable burden was unwise at best, so he forced himself to shave, shower and ignore the sweet call of the drinks cupboard.

The summer sun was at its highest, the sky a clear, downturned bowl of blue in every direction and eventually, the warmth of it on his skin, the lush, verdant green of life around him and the thumping trance music he blasted into his ears conspired together to make him feel better, and he was almost ashamed that he had considered bottling out. As pressed the doorbell, he found that he was almost looking forward it, and then she opened the door.

He stared at her, stunned. In retrospect, he should have predicted this, she was best friends with Price's wife, but he had never considered that she would still want anything to do with the regiment.

"Hello. It's... Iain. Isn't it?"

Vivianne had cut her hair into a short crop, and the change was striking, but it didn't distract from the destruction that loss had wreaked on her: the dullness of her skin, the way her collarbones stuck out in a way that they hadn't before and the vivacious joie de vivre that had fled from her usually animated face. Her smile had once shone with radiance, but now it seemed weak, anaemic and robbed of life.

She stared at him, expectantly, and he felt sick.

She had a small girl balanced on her hip and MacTavish recognised her as the daughter Gaz had spoken of. She had bred true to her mother, a small, pale face and with dark brown eyes that regarded him with wary suspicion. He smiled at her, and she hid her face in the fabric of her mother's sleeve.

"Um... yeah." He replied. He struggled to fill the awkward silence. "I brought... stuff." He held up the box of cider, the bottles clinking.

"Fab!" she said. "There's some ice boxes outside. Do you know where you're going? Becca needs the loo." She hefted the girl, who was still hiding.

"Yeah. Thanks."

She left him there, on the front step, in a cloud of faint perfume, ascending to the upper floor of the house with her long black skirt billowing behind her. He watched her go, her daughter peaking out briefly and hiding again when he caught her eye.

He remained on the doorstep, stunned. All his nightmares, his raging inner turmoil had been focussed on dealing with this moment and its fallout and suddenly, it was over. He shook his head, trying to clear it. He had expected a grief that was incandescent, with accusations and screaming. He expected to be asked to account for himself, or at least for his conspicuous absence. He knew that's what he deserved, to be scourged for all his failures that had left her children fatherless, and yet, she had just walked away.

The adrenaline surge that had started as she opened the door stopped as soon as it began, leaving him dizzy and drained. Stumbling on rubbery legs, he crossed the threshold and went inside.

Outside, Price was manning the barbeque, sweating already from the heat of the coals and the baking sun. His wife was beside him, wearing her permanently anxious expression, and he recognised a few faces from other squads. Price was well-liked and respected, for all his gruff mannerisms, and MacTavish knew that he wasn't the only man who was going to miss him. He was glad at least for a good send off.

He dropped the cider bottles in an empty ice box and picked up a bottle of beer from the cold, icy swill of another. On the edge of the patio, he found an empty deckchair and flopped into it. He'd talk to Price when there was less of crowd, but right now he needed time to settle, to still the seething, anxious waters of his mind, which was still reeling from his experience at the front door. He clasped his hands in front of him, trying to still the shaking left by the adrenaline leaving his system. He tried to relax, leaning back in the chair and letting the sun warm him, but there was something gnawing at him, a sense of being watched.

He opened his eyes again and looked round. Standing close, just a few metres away at the edge of the slabs, there was a small boy. There was no mistaking who he was, because unlike his sister, he had bred true to his father. He stared at MacTavish, his laurel eyes narrow with anger.

MacTavish stared back, expecting the boy to look away, shyly, like his sister had done, but he didn't.

"You knew my Dad." He blurted out, eventually.

MacTavish was taken aback at his bluntness, but many of his nightmare scenarios had featured Gaz's children, their curious questions piercing him like arrows. At least he felt prepared for this scenario.

"Yeah" he answered. There was no point in lying.

He knew from his own bitter experience how adults treated children in the aftermath of tragedy: the whispers, the hidden looks that passed between them beyond his understanding.

He looked at the boy again, remembering his name: David. His small body strained with a mix of rage, and fear. MacTavish saw it in his clenched fists, his constantly shifting gaze. He knew he wasn't supposed to ask these questions, wasn't supposed to open old wounds, but MacTavish remembered the burning need to know eclipsing the others, driving him to ask and ask and ask.

"He was a good man." MacTavish said eventually, despising the weak platitude even as it left his lips.

"That's what they all say." David's voice was hard, every word accented with compressed rage.

"Doesn't make it any less true." MacTavish replied.

"What happened to him?" the boy said, enunciating each word, every sound loaded with accusation. MacTavish knew how much effort it cost him to ask, to transgress what his mother's orders.

"David?" Vivianne had spotted them, isolated from the main party. She strode towards them over the grass "Don't bother Iain, please." She looked pained.

"I want to know." The boy glared at her, and her expression hardened.

"We talked about this, David." She said, through gritted teeth.

"It's all right." MacTavish interrupted. Vivianne gave him a sharp look. "Look wee man, can you do me a favour?"

David nodded.

"Go ask your Auntie Sam for a cigar for me, would you? I need to talk to your Mum for a minute."

The boy glared at him, the betrayal evident in his expression.

"I'm sorry." Said Vivianne, as he left. She collapsed into the chair beside him, the metal scraping on the slab. "He's been… understandably difficult recently."

"I'm sorry. I should have come by. Paid my respects."

She waved away his concern. "I think we've had plenty of that, but I appreciate the sentiment."

He wanted to scream at her, scream that it was his fault that Gaz was dead.

She shaded her eyes and looked at him, sensing his tension. "You were there, when he died."

MacTavish couldn't answer her.

"He liked you. He always had a sense for a who was going to be a good fit." She sniffed and then shook her head. "Anyway… I'm sorry about David. I keep telling him not to bother people about it."

"What did you tell him… about…" He couldn't say Gaz's name in front of her "What happened?"

She unclasped her hand and gestured emptily in the air. "That his father died fighting for what he believed in. That he was a brave man and noble soldier. Like Gaz believed in anything." She snorted. The strain in her voice was palpable. She had loved him, loved him with a depth and passion that MacTavish couldn't begin to understand. "I can't tell him anymore, he's… he's a child."

"But he's not stupid."

"You think I should tell the truth? That-"

"Look." MacTavish interrupted. "It won't get any better if he doesn't get the choice to find out."

"What makes you an expert in parenting all of a fucking sudden?" Vivianne snapped "I-"

"I know what it's like. I've been that kid."

"I'm sorry." She pressed her hand to her forehead, massaging her fingers into the skin, hard, as if it pained her. "I shouldn't…"

"It's okay" he shrugged. "It wasn't nice… but it was better, in a way because… I can't… I can't put my finger on it, but it was like then… we were all in it together."

She pushed her fingers into her hair, clawing at it. "I can't-"

"No. Jesus! Fuck, no…" He shook his head. "But, he should get the choice. I think."

Vivianne chewed her lip in a gesture that was so unlike the woman he remembered that it deeply unnerved him "He's just… so young. And… I know you… I know you don't want to talk about it."

"Trust me. It's not pleasant, and I don't think it'll make him happy, but if it keeps festering…. It'll just get worse." MacTavish knew that she was right, that he didn't want to talk about it, but owed Gaz and that meant he definitely owed his son. If Price wasn't going to do it, then someone had to and no one, he thought, had more of a debt to repay to Gaz's family than him. He had to start somewhere, had to do something.

They watched David, who had located Sam. She looked up at the direction he pointed in, frowning. MacTavish waved, and she went inside, David following behind.

Vivianne was silent beside him. "I think it might be better if you spoke to him alone" she said eventually.

"All right." He said. "He might want to go home afterwards, I'll come and get you."

She gave him a thin smile, but there was no pleasantness in it. He didn't blame her. He suspected that it was bred into her not to show weakness, regardless of her pursuit of more bohemian ideals, and he didn't like putting her in this position, even if it wasn't really his choice to do so.

She stood up, brushing invisible dust from her dress and turned back to him as if there was something else she felt she should say and they looked at each other awkwardly for a few moments, until she turned away and was swallowed by the crowd.

What the fuck have done? He thought, and part of him wanted just to get up and leave, not to start this.

As if on cue, David reappeared. He thrust the cigar towards him, letting MacTavish pluck it from his hand as he stood up.

"Where'd Mum go?" he asked, looking round.

MacTavish shrugged. "If you're finding this hard, just remember that she is too. Today's not the day to make her reopen old wounds."

"Are you… are you going to tell me about Dad?" he asked, incredulous.

MacTavish clipped the end from the cigar and lit it, clouding his face in with the first puff dark smoke. The fruits of exploiting Sam's ignorance: the prize of a Padron '26, which filled his lungs with intense, earthy smoke. He hoped Price would turn a blind eye: they weren't cheap. For a moment, it was a welcome distraction, the calm before the storm was about to break. He had been in warzones at home and abroad, done many morally questionable things for his country, but nothing had filled him with as much dread as the task that lay ahead of him. He thought about Gaz, alive, for the first time in weeks, and the things they'd talked about in the days before they'd last set off. Gaz had trusted him, and he had failed him. The least he could do was try to keep his family together.

"Come on." He jerked his head, and the boy fell in line behind him.

At the bottom of Price's garden a derelict greenhouse, declared absolutely out of bounds for the party, and screened off by a chicken wire fence, clung to life by only the barest margin. Most of the panes were cracked and smashed, the wrought iron frame rusty and crumbling. Between this and the wall that marked the end of Price territory, a narrow space littered with stacks of terracotta pots and bags of compost existed in shadow. MacTavish overturned one for boy to sit on and after a short hunt, a steel bucket for himself. He put his feet up on another.

"How old are you?" He asked.

"Eight." David replied, sullenly.

MacTavish nodded. "My Dad died when I was about your age."

David looked up sharply "Was he a soldier?" He asked.

"No. He worked on the rigs, out in the North Sea." MacTavish paused, taking a long draw on the cigar. "One night, by mistake, someone make a mistake. Wasn't their fault, they didn't know, and then: boom. The whole fucking rig exploded."

David regarded him with wide eyes, but said nothing.

"Suddenly, my Dad wasn't coming home, and my house was full of people talking in whispers in corners, telling me not to annoy my Mum. Telling me that my Dad was a good, brave man doing a dangerous job." He looked at David, who looked away. "I knew there was more to it than that, because people clammed up when I came over, talked in whispers, spelled out words. Something wasn't right. So I asked, and I asked and no one would tell me anything."

"Eventually, my Uncle Charlie caved in. My Dad didn't die in that explosion, not right away. Afterwards, in the fire he couldn't get out, couldn't get to the lifeboats. So, him and all of his mates tried to shelter in the living quarters, hoping that it would hold out until help could get there and put the fire out."

"They lasted an hour, and then the whole rig just came apart. The whole accommodation block just came off and went into the sea. No one got out. They went down with it."

David shifted. He looked scared, but MacTavish went on.

"So, I knew, and that was that." He paused, letting this sink in. He left out the nightmares that had started afterwards, the longstanding fear of boats and the depths, the screams that echoed in his mind at night. "I'll tell you what happened if you want me to, but once you know, you can't… un-know it. You can just leave it, come back in a few years. Never if you want to. No one will think any less of you."

"I want to know." Said David eventually. He clenched and unclenched his small hands. He was shaking.

MacTavish sighed, grinding the cigar between his teeth. He had been half-hoping the boy would bail out, and they could come back to it when he was older, but it was not to be. "There are some things I can't tell you, some details that, we're not allowed to say, because that's the rules of the job and I've got to respect that. That's not my choice. Your Dad lived by the same rules, right?"

The boy nodded.

"Sometimes, you have to do things in secret. Say, one of your pals wants to… win a race at the sports day and if he wins, his Mum and Dad will take him to Alton Towers, and you know he'll get to take a friend. So, you agree to help him, take him out running to practice, let him borrow your good trainers and when he wins, you both get a nice day out. That's what we do. Me, Uncle John, your Dad. We went to help someone, who couldn't do what they wanted to do themselves and if we didn't help them, lots of people, families, kids. They were going to die."

"Did you win?" David asked.

MacTavish just swallowed this gross oversimplification without comment, even if it grated on him. He wanted to say that it was more complicated than that, it wasn't about winning or losing, but today wasn't the day.

"Yes." He sighed "We did. We all did a great job. Especially... especially your Dad."

"So why did he have to die?"

MacTavish closed his eyes. The pressure was starting again in his chest. "We… we did what we had to do, but we had to get out. We were thousands of miles away from here, surrounded by people on the other side, people who wanted us dead." He gestured beyond the garden wall with the butt of the cigar "We made out to the bridge, thought we were going to get away, and then it just exploded."

He heard his voice catch as he remembered, the ringing in his ears, the choking dust and debris filling the air and the awful smell of scorched fuel and flesh. For a moment, he was back there, feeling Grigg's arms pulling him, trying to drag him upright, and then dying in a sudden moment, because of him. He took a few breaths to steady himself, and then he carried on.

"I woke up a few moments later, couldn't see anything for dust and couldn't hear. Someone" He stopped again, and breathed hard, remembering Griggs "Was trying to help me, trying to pull me out, but he was exposed, and he died trying. Your Uncle John was out of it, I was hit… the bad men came." He saw Zakhayev come through the dust, striding forward unstoppable. "Your Dad, he was injured, and trying to get up, but he couldn't. The leader, the one in charge, he came up to your Dad... looked him in the eye, and shot him in the head."

The pressure in his chest was burning now, his throat tight. He finally pulled together enough courage to look round at David, who was staring at the ground in front of him, his mouth a hard line, his jaw clenched tight.

"I'm sorry I couldn't save your Dad." He said. It was barely a weak whisper, a feeble apology that died in the air between them. "He deserved... better."

Beside him, David was silent. Mentally, MacTavish steeled himself, expecting him to lash out, silently relieved to see the tension fall away as his hard expression shattered. He pulled David to him, holding the boy close as his body shuddered with new grief.

The boy clung to him, and he clung back. He tried to bite down on it, but the sorrow welled unstoppable within him, overcoming his frigid pride until it was drowned in a slow rush of silent tears.