After Jack had left Ianto pulled on a pair of grey flannel bottoms and set about cleaning up his flat. He started with the front door that Jack had ploughed through: he righted the wood and pushed it back straight, managing to manipulate it enough for it to sit steady against the frame. He'd be telling Jack that he needed to replace that because he sure as hell wasn't. He then moved onto the bottles in the kitchen; cleaning them out before putting them in his recycling bin. His head still ached something awful and his body refused to cooperate from being manhandled, so he moved from the kitchen back to his bedroom, flopping down on the bed and staring at the ceiling, thinking about the living nightmare he had to experience.
Ianto could remember everything so vividly. Right down to the smells of the metal in the blood that filled the room which harboured his secret. He moved so he was resting on his elbows, gagging at the way his memory assaulted him with the smells of the room; the iron of the blood and the metal so strong he could almost taste it. He pulled himself up and rested his back against the headboard, his knees pulled against his chest as he closed his eyes tightly, wishing the images would just stop. After a while Ianto sighed and rubbed his hand down his face, he could remember the look of shock on all their faces. Shock that the quiet, proper, Welsh teaboy had infiltrated their base. He laughed a sigh, when would someone suspect the person they least expect? Feeling tired, weak, ill and useless, Ianto curled up into a ball, holding himself tight, and closed his eyes. He last thought was a plea for a dreamless sleep, oh god, please.
---
Ianto woke when a car back fired in the street outside. His eyes opened instantly, his mind throwing him back to the basement of the hub and Lisa. Although he had pleaded for a dreamless sleep, his eyes had moved quickly beneath the lids, images of a half converted Lisa taking over the Hub and converting the team filling his unconscious mind. Ianto gulped; desperate to slow his breathing down.
He slowly got his breathing to a normal pace when he let out a harsh, hard sob. His mind, still full of the blurry nightmare, was telling him to go.
So, that's what he did. He threw on an old pair of jeans, worn trainers and a ragged t shirt, before picking up his diary, wallet, keys and phone – knowing full well that Jack would call him at some point and not knowing how long he'd be out for.
He ran out the door and down the street, the diary clutched in his hand. The sun was just setting in the sky, making the backdrop of the city landscape a wash of colour; purples and pinks mixing with the blue of the evening. Ianto ran. He didn't look at his surroundings, didn't stop to think of where he was going, he simply ran.
It took him just over fifty minutes to want to stop, when he reached Bute Park; where he and Jack had first met. He was breathing heavily, sweating profusely, aching all over and clutching the diary as tight as he could as he leant against a tree and slid down to sit at the trunk. Once he had regained his breath, and his side no longer felt like it was going to rip apart, Ianto opened his diary. As he flicked through the pages of the worn brown leather book, a photo dropped out, tumbling gracefully to the woody floor. Gingerly he picked it up, looking at the back with sadness. In a tight, curvy, cursive scrawl, the words "Ianto and I, picnic '06" were written across the back. He turned it over in his hand and smiled sadly at the faces smiling so brightly back at him. He remembered the day the picture had been taken like it was yesterday. They'd been together for three months to the day and, in celebration, Ianto had arranged a picnic. He asked edited the work rota for Lisa, ensuring that she had the afternoon off, and took a day out of his holiday time before taking Lisa to a quiet park in between their flats. While there they asked a lovely elderly couple to take a couple of pictures, before Lisa offered them some of the cake that would have proved too much for them to eat alone. She was like that, Ianto thought, really kind and selfless. He should have noticed a change in her really, he did know her best, perhaps he was too scared to admit it?
Ianto sighed heavily and blinked back tears, his heart wedged in his throat. It took so long for him to ask her out, and not because he was shy. No. When it came to women Ianto was hardly shy. Instead it was to do with the fact that he wanted more than just sex with Lisa, he wanted a relationship. So, he tried to win her affections by becoming her friend first. Offering a shoulder to cry on when he could, promise of coffee or pizza when she wanted to talk about nothing and everything. They had known each other a year before Ianto asked her out, and he was surprised when Lisa answered with "fucking finally" and kissed him with all the passion she could muster.
Ianto tucked the photo back into the diary, closing it and placing it under his leg as he leaned back on the tree, looking up through the canopy of foliage to the night sky. Lisa loved dusk. She liked to take walks on her own just as the sun was setting, taking out her camera and taking numerous shots of the sky. Ianto watched as the sky darkened slightly and the stars began to blink and shine.