Sacrament

'Oh God ...' Will murmured.

'He feels nothing, if that's any comfort,' the fox said.

'I don't believe you.'

'So look away.'

'I can't. It's in my head now.' He advanced on the animal, suddenly enraged. 'What the fuck have I done to deserve this?'

'That's the mother of all questions, isn't it?' he said, unperturbed by Will's rage.

'And?'

The animal shrugged. 'God wants you to see. Don't ask me why. That's between you and God. I'm just the go-between.' Flummoxed by this, Will glanced back down at the picture of Patrick. The body had disappeared, dissolved in the rain. 'Sometimes it's too much for people,' the fox went on, in its matter-of-fact fashion. 'God says: take a look at this, and people just lose their sanity. I hope it doesn't happen to you, but there are no guarantees.'

'I don't want to lose him ...' Will murmured.

'I can't help you there,' the animal replied. 'I'm just the messenger.'

'Well you tell God from me-' Will started to say.

'Will?'

There was another voice behind him. He glanced over his shoulder, and there was Drew standing in the doorway, with a sheet wrapped around his middle.

'Who are you talking to?' he said.

Will looked back into the room, and for a moment - though he was now awake - he thought he glimpsed the animal's silhouette against the glass. Then the vision was gone, and he was standing naked in the cold, with Drew coming to drape the sheet over his shoulders.

'You're clammy,' Drew said.

He was: running with a sickly sweat. Drew put his arms around Will's chest, locking his hands against his breastbone and laying his head against Will's neck. 'Do you often go walkabout in your sleep?' 'Once in a while,' Will replied, staring at the littered floor, still half-thinking he might catch a glittering light in one of the pictures. But there was nothing.

'Shall we go back to bed then?' Drew said.

'No, actually I'd prefer to stay up for a while,' Will said. He'd had enough dreams for one night. 'You go back up. I'm going to make myself some tea.'

'I can stay with you, if you want.'

'I'm okay,' Will told him. 'I'll be up in a while.'

Drew bequeathed the sheet to Will and headed on upstairs, leaving Will to go brew himself a pot of Earl Grey. He didn't particularly want to revisit the images that had just come to find him, but as he sat sipping his tea he couldn't help but picture the uncanny life his littered photographs had taken on as he dreamt them. It was as though they contained some freight of meaning he'd neglected to see or understand, and had chosen to communicate it to him in his sleep. But what? That death was terrible? He knew that better than most. That Patrick was going to die, and there was nothing Will could do about it? He knew that too. He chewed it over and over, but he couldn't make much sense of the experience. Perhaps he was looking for significance where there was none. How much credence should he be giving a dream that showcased a talking fox claiming to be God's messenger? Probably very little.

And yet, hadn't there been a hair-breadth moment at the end, after Drew had called his name, and he'd woken, when the fox had lingered, as though it were testing the limits of its jurisdiction, ready to trespass where it had no business being?

He returned to bed at last. The rain storm had passed over the city and the only sound in the room was Drew's peaceful breath. Will slipped between the sheets as delicately as possible so as not to wake him, but somewhere in his slumber, Drew knew his bedmate had come back, because he turned to face Will, his eyes still closed, his breathing even, and found a place against Will's body where they fitted together comfortably. Will was certain he wouldn't sleep, but he did; and deeply. There were no further visits. God and his messenger left him undisturbed for the rest of the night, and when he woke it was to sunlight and kisses.

CHAPTER VI

Patrick was as good as his threat: the centrepiece of the buff at the party was a large cake in the shape of a rather portl bear, complete with a fine set of fangs and a lascivious pink I It inevitably invited questions; and Patrick directed all enquiries ~ who was then obliged to tell the story of the attack a dozen time pressing it with every repetition until it was honed to the impr~ casuaclass="underline" Sure, I got chewed up by a bear.

'Why didn't you tell me?' Drew said, when the information ha( its way around the room to him. 'I thought you'd got the scars in s But Jesus, a bear!' He couldn't resist smiling. 'That's really some

Will claimed the slice of chicken and artichoke pizza Dre devouring and finished it up.

'Are you trying to tell me something?' Drew said. 'Like stop eat?'

'No.'

'You think I'm too fat, don't you? Admit it.'

'I think you're just fine,' Will said patiently. 'You have my pen to eat every slice of pizza you can get your sticky fingers on.'

'You're a god,' Drew said, and returned to the buffet table.

'Are you two picking up where you left off ?'

Will looked up around and there was Jack Fisher, elegant as eve a brooding white boy in tow. There were the usual hugs and h. before Jack got round to introducing his friend. 'This is Casper. He believe I know you.'

Casper pumped Will's hand, stumbling over some words of adm 'You were one of my idols when I was a kid,' he said. 'I mean, sh; stuff's so real, you know? I mean, it's the way things are, isn't fucked up?'

'Casper's a painter,' Jack explained. 'I bought a little erection He only paints dicks. Don't you, Casper?' The boy looked a lit comfited. 'It's a small market,' Jack said, 'but it's devoted.'

'I'd love to ... maybe show you some of my work some time,' said.

'Why don't you go get us a drink?' Jack said. Casper frown clearly didn't want to play the waiter. 'And I'll persuade Will to painting.' Reluctantly, Casper departed. 'They're pretty good, ac

Jack said. 'And he means what he says, about you being an idol of his. Sweet, isn't he? I'm seriously thinking of taking him off to Louisiana and settling down with him.'

'You'll never do it,' Will said.

'Well, I'm certainly over this fucking town,' Jack said wearily. He lowered his voice a little. 'The truth is, I'm sick of sick people. I know how that sounds, but you know me, I call it the way I see it. And I've got more scratched-out addresses in my little book than I care to count.'

'How olds Casper?' Will said, watching the fellow weave back towards them with two glasses of scotch.

'Twenty. But he knows all he needs to know.' Fisher grinned conspiratorially, but Will looked away. He didn't want to leer over this kid who for all Jack's domestic talk would be out on his ass, fucked and forgotten, within a month.

'You must drop in at the studio,' Jack said, picking up the hype now that Casper was back within earshot. 'He's doing a whole series of sperm pieces next-' He stopped in mid-sentence. 'Uh-oh,' he murmured, his gaze going to the door, where a striking woman in her fifties, dressed in flowing grey, had just made an entrance. She surveyed the thirty or so guests somewhat imperiously, then, spotting Patrick, headed directly over to him. He left off his conversation with Lewis, who was using the event to circulate a very slim volume of his poems, and went to greet her. She lost her regal manner as Patrick hugged her, kissing his cheek and laughing raucously at something he said.

'Is that Bethlynn?' Will said.

'Yep,' said Jack. 'And I'm not in the mood, so you're on your own. Just don't let her have the ruby slippers.' With that, and a sly smile, he made himself scarce, Casper in tow.

Will was fascinated, watching Bethlynn chat with Patrick. He was hanging on her every syllable, no doubt of that; his body language suggesting an uncharacteristic meekness on his part. He nodded now and again, but had his eyes downcast a lot of the time as he listened intently to her wisdom.