Chapter Text
When Warren wakes up first thing in the morning, his wife is already awake. They exchange a chaste kiss on the cheek and she hands him his coffee, slightly cold, and he smiles in a quick and forced exchange before she finishes up in the bathroom. She combs something thick through her hair into a slick ponytail, so tight he wonders how she can think.
There is nothing intimate about their relationship.
Warren’s adjusted to it like cold water.
When it’s his turn in the bathroom he closes the door to change and showers briefly, just enough to comb his own hair back and trim his beard- it’s barely there enough to hide the gauntness of his face, but he’d rather keep the thin and scattered hairs than look like a sad teenager.
He buttons up his stiff shirt and tucks it into his slacks, wool socks keeping his feet warm when he steps out into the cold remainder of their flat.
She finishes her breakfast at the table and he starts his own two packets of instant oatmeal in their containers. There’s nothing worse than coming home to dishes when you’re already drained from a long day, and this cuts those corners. He throws them in the trash bin on his way out the door.
“So,” she sighs as they both make their way into the driver and passenger seat, buckling their seatbelts, “what’s up with today? You ever find out what’s up with that, uh, Red Valley Project thing?”
“Oh, um, the seed vault. Yeah, I’ve kind of given up on that. Maybe this Gordon guy has something for me, but I really don’t want to chase down his conspiracy rabbit hole. It’s not worth it, honestly.”
And that’s how he ends up in Gordon’s car, in the middle of the night, leaving his wife to take the bus home. Because he’s just awesome like that.
The rain’s pouring on the windows and Gordon’s talking too fast, too anxious, throwing insults his way like he hasn’t talked to anyone since secondary school and yeah, honestly, Warren wouldn’t put him past it.
“Another tape.”
“Another tape!” He’s got that smarmy smile on his face and it drives Warren crazy.
The only thing he can think to say is “this won’t fit in my dictaphone.”
“No, it won't, Mr. Godby, but luckily you're sitting in a 1998 Vauxhall Astra. What it lacks in air conditioning it makes up for in a top notch cassette player.”
Of course this guy’s car is even shittier and nerdier than he thought it’d be.
He doesn’t like listening to that tape. The more he thinks about it, the worse it gets.
Yeah, he really didn’t like listening to that tape.
He storms out of the car, slamming the door shut behind him, and then suddenly he’s just standing there. In the rain. Getting soaked. Gordon’s running out behind him, shouting “hey, hey!” and his own car door slams back shut. Faintly he can hear the tape still running in the car.
“I don't want to hear any more of this, okay? If this is just some sick joke you people play on the new guy then fuck you, alright? If its real, then fuck you, why would you show that to me? Why come to someone in Accounts with this?” God, he hates his miserable fucking job. Why on earth did Karen think this would be a good fit?
The conversation goes nowhere but yelling until they get progressively more and more wet, and Warren can hardly hear himself think over the rain.
Gordon shoves tapes in his hands and he doesn’t know what to do with them. He really doesn’t want to know what’s on them.
He runs.
Well, not literally.
He gets in his car, in his and Karen’s car, and drives until he doesn’t even realize where he is anymore, just that it’s starting to get more and more familiar looking.
It’s a really, really, really long drive.
It’s a shit cemetery.
Not that Warren has a lot to compare it to. He never made a habit of hanging out in graveyards, no matter how emo he might’ve been as a teenager.
Frankly, it’s too nice of a day for this.
He stares down at the little tree he knows marks his father’s memory and thinks it’s too lively for the man that he was.
Abruptly, his phone rings, interrupting his brooding.
Karen.
Shit.
She’s yelling the second he answers the call.
“Warren!”
“Hey-”
“Where the hell are you?”
“I’m in Norfolk.”
“Norfolk?! When did you- why-” He can hear her pacing on the other side of the phone.
“Karen, it's fine, I'm alright.”
“And what about me? What if I'm not alright? You must have seen my calls, my messages, how dare you just up and go out of nowhere-” She keeps ranting at him and he keeps responding, kind of, but he’s so… despondent, it doesn't even register that he’s talking. He doesn’t feel real. He’s not here, he’s not on the phone with her, he doesn’t feel the wind in his thin, recovering hair and he doesn’t see anyone approaching in the distance.
“Why have you gone there, Warren?” Her voice is a sigh, like she’s disappointed and sympathetic all at the same time. She reminds him of his old school councilor.
“I just needed to go home.”
It’s not his home. It’s never been his home. But what other words does he have?
“Is this because of that guy you were talking to? Graham-”
“Gordon Porlock.”
“He sounds like an herbal remedy.”
The joke doesn’t land, and they both notice.
“It's nothing to do with anyone. It's just me.” He’s the one that’s fucked up and cracks under pressure. Always has been, always will be.
“Where are you right now?”
“...I’m at my dad’s grave!” He says it with an up at the end, almost like it’s a question.
“Jesus, babe.”
He doesn’t want her here, he doesn’t want to take his meds, even though he knows both are unavoidable.
The angry figure in the distance keeps getting closer and he knows, just as he always knew, that it’s his sister. She’s always just had that look about her.
“Babe, I need to go, okay?”
“Is someone there?”
“It’s fine, I’ll… I’ll speak to you soon.”
“Warren! No, this is not-”
He hangs up on her to face his sister, who’s standing with her hip jutted out and arms crossed over her chest, her crazy and unruly hair no better than he remembers it. She’s pissed off, just like everyone in his life always seems to be, either pissed off or crazy. Emily’s always been both.
It looks like she’s waiting for him to speak so he starts with a tentative “hi.”
“Why are you wearing a suit?” She almost snaps at him. “Are you going to court?”
…
“It’s what I wear for work.”
“It doesn’t suit you.”
…
“Okay.”
“Why did you come here, Warren? Did you think it would change anything?” He doesn’t have a good answer for that. “You wanted to make sure he was really dead? Because I guess you wouldn't really know for sure, would you?”
“I don’t wanna fight with you, Emily. Please.”
“It would be a long way to drive to get your arse kicked Warren. I assume you live a long way away. Or maybe you live in Sheringham above the Co-op for all I know. No, you ran far away, didn't you? New clothes, new haircut. You don't even sound like yourself. Who was that on the phone?”
“Karen. …My wife.”
“Your wife?”
“Emily, please-”
“Fuck off, Warren! God, here I was thinking you were- were barely surviving since you left, but you were getting fucking married? How come I didn’t get invited, hm? You thought I sided with Dad just because you forced me to live with him?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know? How can you not- what, you just didn’t think about me? Fuck off, Warren-”
“I mean I don’t know, Emily! I was in a car crash, I hit my head, I’ve had- I’ve had memory loss. I don’t even remember marrying my wife, alright? And she’s pissed enough at me, so, thanks, I've gotten all the yelling I can handle for today. You want me to fuck off? I’ll fuck off.”
Something in her face changes in a split second, and Warren can’t place what it is.
“You don’t remember marrying her?”
“Yeah.”
It’s quiet again. He can hear the birds.
“Look, why don’t you…” she puts her head in her hands and mutters “god, I can’t believe I’m saying this, um.” She clears her throat. “Come back to my place for the night, alright? We can sort this out. Whatever… whatever this is.”
…
“What?”
“I’ll- do you have a car?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. I walked over here.”
“How did you know-”
“Laura from the hotel, that skinny little tramp. We’re friends on Facebook. She messaged me.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah. This town’s like a fucking panoptocon.”
It’s weird to walk next to her. She’s still a fast walker, even though she’s a full head shorter than him, and he’s scrambling to keep up. It’s almost a workout. His body’s still not back to normal.
It’s even still weirder to drive with her in the passenger seat, to remember the route back to his house.
It reminds him of high school, of walking with her to the parking lot and driving around for hours, paying for gas with spare change. Emily had a scam where she’d pretend to be a prostitute a town over, ask for money before she got in the car, and then she’d run back into Warren’s car with a few pounds and they’d pedal away, knowing what were they going to do anyway, call the cops and admit to attempting to solicit sex from a minor?
Nothing bad ever came of it, but maybe it should’ve.
He keeps glancing over at her, and she’s watching him the whole time.
In his pocket, his phone buzzes.
He doesn’t pick it up, pulling up into their parking lot. “I’m not blocking the neighbors in, am I?”
“Hm? Oh, no, they moved out. Years ago. Couldn’t stand to be attached to the family name.” She’s almost joking. “Do you have any… normal clothes?”
He glances down at his suit.
“No, I kind of- it was an impulse trip.”
“Yeah, that’s… that’s fine. I can scrounge something up. I kind of burned all of Dad’s old clothes, but I have some baggy jeans and unisex sweaters or something.”
He snorts. “Of course you did.”
“Yeah, danced in a circle around them and everything.”
She’s smiling now, but when he looks over to her, it fades.
“You really don’t remember anything?”
“Nope. I’m on, like, a cocktail of medication. I think I had some pretty severe brain damage… I don’t know. My wife kind of handles the professional side of our lives. Got me my job and everything.”
“And you don’t remember meeting her?”
She keeps saying it like it’s weird.
And, okay, yeah, it’s pretty weird. Warren did plenty of searching for wedding pictures, for old things of theirs, for proof that she wasn’t some rando who showed up at the hospital claiming to be married to him, but why would she do that? She’s got more money than him, there is a marriage certificate, so…
Emily’s key turns and clicks in the lock and Warren pushes the rest of the thoughts from his mind.
The house is… different.
She kicks off her shoes by the mat and he does the same, leaving his in a slightly more orderly fashion, and hangs his suitjacket on the coathanger. He loosens his tie, trying to feel more at home, but nothing in here could make him feel in place.
It’s got the same old recliner, but a new couch. Fabric, cozy looking. The walls have changed from brown to a light yellow, but there’s still a pile of diet sodas by the chair and the TV’s still always running. Emily leads him into the kitchen, which is the same as it always was, except the fruit bowl actually has food in it. She pulls out a chair at the little table and he sits. There’s still no photographs on the walls.
She stays standing.
“I’ll get you some clothes.”
“Mine are fine, Emily-”
“I just need a fucking minute, Warren, okay?”
“...Okay.”
She pushes in the chair she didn’t sit in and tosses him an apple as she storms up the steep stairs to the attic where they used to share a room. Is she still up there all the time?
Warren can’t imagine never having been able to go anywhere else, but then again, he can’t remember most of the time he spent not here.
He does end up changing into her clothes by the end of the day. Her sweater clings to him awkwardly even though it’s so baggy it barely stays on his shoulders. The couch is a pullout now, and it’s stiff and uncomfortable under his back.
Warren never thought he’d be back here.