"So Kim, how does it feel?" you ask as Kim returns with coffee for you both. He places yours down exactly where you like it, then sits down at his desk.

Kim looks up at you quizzically. "What do you mean?"

"You've made it through two weeks here. Two weeks with this lot, two weeks with me, I don't know which you deserve the biggest medal for."

Kim cracks a smile. "It's no big deal. But," he pauses, "I swear, if one more person says 'Friday night drinks' to me."

"Well, you do know there's only one way to make them stop, right?"

Kim looks at you warily. "Which is?"

"You'll be kicking yourself for not thinking of this."

"Go on."

"To join them for drinks."

Kim sighs. "You know, that is not exactly the magic bullet you built it up to be."

"Just go for a drink with them once and they'll stop asking. Problem solved."

"Without you?"

For a moment you forget about your problem with alcohol and you're touched. Kim's saying he doesn't want to go for a drink with the guys if you're not there. "I never said I wasn't coming."

"Yes, but it's okay for you, you live in Jamrock. You can stumble home, I'd have to leave it here and go wait for who knows how long at the bus stop."

"Then why not stumble home with me? Easy." You point finger guns at him.

"Do you think that's a good idea?"

You're not sure what Kim means by that so you just stare at him. Maybe he just doesn't want to see you drunk. Doesn't want to risk ending up having to carry you home. Or maybe he's afraid he might have to face up to the undeniable chemistry between the two of you. You tug at your collar, feeling hot suddenly.

"Won't there be talk if they know I'm staying with you?"

You shrug. "I guess they're gonna find out sooner or later," you say. "Don't worry about it. Some of these guys live together. Jamrock's expensive."

Kim sighs. "And I suppose the fact that I don't want to go isn't a valid excuse."

"How about we go for one or two? We can leave as soon as you're ready to. I need to not drink too much anyway."

Kim shuts his eyes for a moment. "Don't make me regret this."

"Hey Mullen, I'm surprised they let you back in here after what happened last time!" McLaine says as he slaps you on the back.

"Why, what happened last time?" you ask. As far as you're concerned, this may as well be the first time you're walking into this particular bar.

"You spilled your entire fucking drink over a girl you were chatting up. Correction, trying to chat up," Jean said.

"She looked like something that'd climbed out of the sea!" Torson says, laughing raucously.

"Then you threw up on the carpet, over there," Jean says, pointing to a place on the carpet between people's feet which was still discoloured.

You shake your head. "You're making this up," you say. You turn to Kim as the others make their way to the bar. "I won't drink tonight."

"Mm-hm," he says. "If they'll allow it."

Before you can protest, you find a bottle of beer being pressed into your hand. You look at Kim, he is also holding a beer and looking a little put out by that fact. Jean leads the way to some empty tables and you all find a place to sit. Kim sticks by your side, you notice.

Someone starts a toast to Kim, and Kim does his best to hide his embarrassment. He glances at you and you give him a supportive smile. The other officers take turns asking Kim questions, all of them mundane or stupid, and he deflects them in his usual manner. It gets loud as more officers from the precinct show up.

You keep an eye on Kim as you chip into the conversations happening around you. He is fairly quiet, as he tends to be around large groups of people when he has no particular task to do. He is sipping his beer slowly, to show willing you imagine, while the rest of your colleagues are knocking theirs back. Your own sits on the table in front of you, doing nothing but keeping your hand icy cold. You'll take a drink in a minute, you keep telling yourself. But really you're afraid. Afraid because Kim's here. He's seen you have a drink before, but he's never seen you drunk. You want to keep it that way.

"Hey, what've we got over here? The case of Dick Mullen and the Undrinkable Beer?" Torson yells across the table, as if he read your thoughts. Laughter erupts from the others.

"Don't tell me. You came back from Martinaise with a different drinking problem, right?" Jean says.

More laughter.

You wish you had a witty comeback. Even more, you wish you hadn't come. You're doing this for Kim. You don't want the others to think he's boring, or a killjoy or uptight, all of the things you know he isn't.

You take a drink, and start to formulate a response that involves Jean being impatient, but then you realise the conversation has already moved on. Your guilt makes the beer taste awful. You take another drink. No, you're wrong. It tastes so, so good. You put the bottle down.

A girl with lime green hair leans over the table, and you think she is collecting bottles, but instead she leaves something. A flyer.

You pick it up, to distract yourself from your drink, which you really really want to drink, but also really really don't. There is a group of long haired, androgynous looking people in leather, two of them holding guitars. Sułislaw and the Pseudomorphs it reads, and underneath, The Basement Bar.

"Sułislaw," Kim says, "that name sounds familiar."

"Yeah. I remember Soona the programmer mention someone called Sułislaw, wonder if it's the same guy?"

"Of course! And yes, I remember her saying he had started a band," says Kim as he take the flyer from you to have a closer look.

"Wonder what kinda music they play?"

"I've heard of The Basement Bar, it's where the nastiest, heaviest bands play. It also has the reputation for being the most run-down, badly maintained and dirty venue in Jamrock," Kim says with utmost approval.

"Wanna go see them?" you ask with a grin. "They're playing next weekend."

"Oh, no, it's not exactly my scene," he says, putting down the flyer.

But you know he's lying, you've heard the radio station Kim listens to. It is his scene, or he'd desperately like it to be. You pick up the flyer, fold it in half and slip it into your pocket.

While you were talking to Kim, the conversation the rest of your colleagues are having has turned coarse. They're discussing the women in the bar, their physical attributes and what they'd like to do to them in graphic detail. Judit is rolling her eyes and making an effort to finish her drink quickly. Trant just watches with interest, as if he is observing an unfamiliar species in their natural habitat.

Kim glances at you as the others compete over who has the best skills in the bedroom. It's not as if he hasn't heard this sort of talk in the actual precinct, but now everyone is out and has had a few drinks, it's worse. You wonder idly if Kim could be impressed with such skills. The two of you are still on your first drink, while looking at the number of bottles on the table, the others seem to be on their second or third by now. But if you were to get drunk...

You imagine stumbling out of the bar with your arm slung around his neck, laughing and joking and looking at each other hungrily. It's too far to your place, neither of you can wait that long. You lead him down an alley and push him up against the wall, and he kisses you like he's been waiting for you to do this forever. You want him, he wants you. You're both totally up for fucking in this alley. But you want your first time to be better than this, you take his hand and you hurry home. When you get there, you're not sure what you're going to do exactly, but what you are sure of is that it will totally blow his mind and he's fall madly, deeply in love with you.

"Mullen!"

You're broken out of your fantasy by both Torson and McLaine yelling at you.

"Earth to Dick Mullen," Jean says, waving a hand in your face. "One drink too much for you now?"

You feel too hot. And your trousers feel way too tight. You really wish you weren't here.

"Just tired," you mumble. You glance at Kim, and the guilt of how you imagined him hits you.

"So am I," Judit says, getting up and putting on her coat. "And my family will be wondering where I am."

"I should go too," Trant says.

"No you shouldn't," Jean says, putting a hand on his shoulder to stop him getting up.

There's a clatter and McLaine is crying out. He's knocked his beer bottle over and its contents are now all over the table, and dripping over the edge.

Torson slides his own bottle over to his partner, who immediately cheers up, not caring about the beer dripping off the table onto his pants. McLaine throws his arms around Torson and they hug. It can't last more than three seconds, but you feel intensely envious of that casual hug.

You wonder if you should knock over Kim's drink. Would he hug you like that if you gave him yours? No, no he wouldn't. You can hear his voice in your head, Detective, I think it's time for you to go home.

You finish your drink in the hope that it might give you the courage to just ask Kim for a hug. But it doesn't. Probably just as well. If Kim hugged you, you're not sure you'd ever let him go.

You turn to Kim and try to put the way you imagined him out of your mind. "It's been a long day," you say.

"It has," Kim says. "Time to go?"

"Yes," you say, failing to keep all of the eagerness out of your voice.

"And where are you two going?" Jean asks as you both stand up.

"It's been a long day," you say again.

"It's been the same length for all of us," Jean says, shaking his head in disgust.

"I'm not in the mood for drinking today," you say.

Jean looks genuinely shocked. On the other side of the table, Torson and McLaine are making comments about you going home together, accompanied by sniggering and vaguely rude hand gestures.

"I should be going too," Trant says.

"To the bar? For more drinks? Why thank you Trant, how kind of you," Jean says.

"Oh. Okay, what would everyone like?"

You put both of your middle fingers up at McLaine and Torson, who are still making rude gestures at you, then you turn and walk out of the bar with Kim.

"I got the impression you weren't enjoying yourself," Kim says as you cross the street and start to walk home.

"I don't want to be that guy any more. I don't want to be the drunken fool that they can all make fun of. I might not remember the things I did, but I do remember how they made me feel. Like I'm... nothing. Worse than nothing."

Kim regards you for a few moments and you walk along in silence. "I sure am glad to have had the opportunity to get to know our new colleagues better," he quips.

"I don't think they mean to be cruel," you say, furiously back-pedalling. "They just think it's funny, and that I'm having fun too." You feel emotions start to well up in you and your voice shakes. "But I don't drink to have fun. It might start off that way, but…"

"I know, Harry."

You shake your head, trying to pull yourself together. "Did you have fun?" you ask, already knowing the answer.

"It was an obligation that is now out of the way."

"At least you don't need to drive home."

"Yes. I am so tired even your bed seems enticing."

You're so distracted by the thought of Kim being enticed into your bed that it takes you a few moments to realise it wasn't a compliment. "What's wrong with my bed?"

"The mattress has seen better days. And the pillows, I'm surprised they don't disintegrate when you take them out of the pillowcases."

"Fair point. I think I'm just used to it. I'll replace them. When I have money. Someday."

You walk along in silence for a while. You pass a couple who are furiously making out against a wall, their clothes already falling off. A group of shoeless girls stumble past you, and you hear one of them vomit behind you. It's a typical Friday night in Jamrock.

The couple made you think of your Kim fantasy again. You really need to stop thinking about that. You don't even have the guts to ask him for a hug.

Wait, do you? Maybe you do now.

No. You don't.

You search for an acceptable conversation topic, to stop yourself dwelling on that thought all the way home. "Hey Kim, for someone who doesn't want to go to The Basement Bar, you sure seem to know a lot about it."

"It's purely a professional interest. As I'm sure I don't need to tell you, it's a hotspot for crime."

"As all the best venues are, right?"

"No."

But you know he agrees with you really. It'd be nice to do something that Kim enjoys for a change. You know he'd enjoy it, he just needs a bit of gentle prodding. You're too tired to come up with a good argument right now, you'll convince him later.

Shortly after arriving home, you both crawl into bed. Friday night drinks might not have been as fun as you imagine they used to be, but it's worth it because you get an extra night with Kim, and an extra morning with him. It might not be quite in the same way you imagined at the bar, but all the same it's nice to have him close to you, feel his warmth, hear the soft sound of him breathing. As you feel yourself dropping off to sleep you realise how much easier it is to fall asleep when he's here with you. You wish he could be with you every night.