Somewhere They Can't Find Us [Roger/Brian]

Somewhere They Can't Find Us: Part 6

'Mister May? Mister May, are you paying attention?'

Brian hardly looked up from the hands he had folded into his lap, in which he at the moment was finding more interest in than in paying attention to the man in front of him who had just called his name to check if he was still mentally present. He knew it was important to listen to the man his parents had hired to defend him in court, but he simply could not get himself to face him, let alone actually pay attention to him. There was so much running through Brian's mind right now, but the joint attempt of his parents and the lawyer to figure out what to say and do in court, was not part of his current stream of thoughts. There was no room for these three people trying to do what they probably thought was best for him but which Brian considered to be toxic towards his relationship with Roger, the one they were trying to erase to the point where it was going to look like nothing but a mistake, an accident, and incident even that had taken place without either of them ever having meant any of it. And even though Brian realised that playing their love down as much as possible was the only thing that could safe whatever was left to safe, it still felt so wrong and unfair, and he therefore could not feel anything but anger towards the three people sitting around him.

'Brian,' his father grumbled, obviously more than a little displeased with his son's absent-mindedness. 'Listen to mister Green.'

Brian looked up and let his glance on his father's face, which he could read like an open book. The usual anger and disgust was visible on it, this time mixed with impatience and something that seemed like misunderstanding, probably towards the fact that Brian was not grasping this opportunity to talk to this lawyer and come up with a plan to save himself from detention. Brian knew his father probably had be hoping for him to open up to this stranger and let him handle his fate in court, but his dad of course didn't know that Roger and he had already come up with a plan of their own during their secret meeting, and that Brian did not feel like he needed the help of this intruder who had been called into his life by his parents and whose main aim so far seemed to be to make all of them pretend that nothing had ever happened between Roger and him. Brian knew that his father would never understand his aversion towards the man for the reason mentioned above, and that he similarly would never understand why Brian wasn't seizing the chance he had given him. Then again, Brian knew that none of this whole show was actually about him; it was all to save him from blame so that his father's reputation could remain as spotless as it always had been.

Spotless to the outside world while the shirt stained with blood from Roger's bleeding nose was hidden away somewhere at the bottom of the laundry basket, Brian thought bitterly.

'Will you listen, please?' his mother's fragile voice caught his ears, and Brian decided that it was probably better to give some kind of a reply in order not to make her break down and cry right here in the middle of the room. The possibility of this happening within now and five minutes anyway was realistic, but at least for now Brian managed to prevent it.

'I am listening,' Brian mumbled, his fingers fiddling with the tie with world's ugliest print. His father had given it to him and made him wear it to this appointment in order to make him look 'serious and professional'. As if Brian cared about looking serious and professional in a time like this.

'Very well,' mister Green instantly added, probably afraid the family would break out into fighting if he did not take over the lead of the conversation as fast as he could. 'If everyone is with me, I'd suggest that now that we've discussed the testimony Mister May gave in the police station on Friday 11 November 1967, to interrogator Joseph Marks,' - Brian had to oppress the tendency to vomit whenever he heard this name, even though he had already heard it a lot over the course of the last thirty minutes - 'and recording officer Peter McAllen, let's move on to what happened after you returned from the police station.' Mister Green's voice was a business-like tone Brian knew the man was probably used to after God knows how many years of having come across cases like his one, but he still felt like it was completely out of place for the current topic. There were feelings involved in this case, Goddamnit, feelings from both his side and from Roger's side, and he wasn't going to let this random law clerk his parents had pulled out from God-knows-where erase all of those just so he could make money on a hopefully successful defence in court.