Day Thirty-Five
"Why are you always sending me out with Owen?"
Gwen looks up at me. She's sitting at Jack's desk; I guess it establishes her power. I guess I don't care; it's just a desk.
"It's good experience for you, he's a great field agent."
"That's not the reason."
Gwen purses her lips and her eyes narrow slightly. I clench my clammy fists and for the thousandth time wonder why she intimidates me so much. She takes a while answering, looking up at me, and I'm wishing I'd sat down when I came in so I don't feel like some silly school boy visiting the headmistresses office. "Because you're a man."
That's not the answer I expected.
"He needs that," she says, "Doesn't really trust women and right now I want him as stable as possible."
I've read the files, I know about his mother. I've known about the endless series of one-night stands. I've seen him with Gwen. I saw how he was with Jack. But I never connected it to 'Doesn't trust women'. That's why she's sitting behind this desk and I'm still fetching the coffee.
"Tosh?" I ask.
Gwen glances across to Tosh, head down, tinkering with some new alien artefact, masculine and feminine and from Owen's perspective, safe. "That's different," she looks back at me, "But now's not a good time. I've got to know we can trust him, and we don't need the disruption of a romance, particularly if I decide he needs to go."
I think my mouth must be hanging open a bit; I'd always seen Gwen as an idealist, but here she is manipulating our relationships like a madam in a brothel. And perhaps I do know why Gwen intimidates me, she's a hard-core fighter like Jack, like him she sees things as they are. But she's something more, because she sees further, she sees right inside us.
"Ianto, he's not stable, but he needs us and we need him. And right now the one he needs is you."
"But I don't need him. He…"
"He did, but Jack forgave him, I think we should follow Jack's lead. Please try Ianto, you've got the patience. I know it's hard, I know you're hurting too, but you're the only one."
I bow my head, but manage to mumble, "Okay." I guess from here on in it's just me and the prodigal son.