She was getting under his skin, and she knew it. A tide of beatitude had swept over her face. 'Why are you so defensive?' she said.

Will threw up his hands. 'Anything I say now, you're going to use against me-'

'It's not against anyone,' she replied. Patrick had finally snapped out of his saccharine fugue and tried to interject, but Bethlynn ignored him. Moving a little closer to Will, as if to lend him the comfort of her proximity, she said:

'You're going to do yourself some harm if you don't learn to forgive.' She had laid her hand on his arm. 'Who are you so angry at?'

'I'll tell you,' he said. She smiled in expectation of his unburdening. 'There's this fox-'

'Fox?' she said.

'He's driving me crazy. I know I should kiss his fleabitten ass and tell him I forgive his trespasses.' She gave a darting glance to Patrick, which he took as a signal to engineer her departure. 'But it's not easy with foxes.' Will went on. 'Because I hate the fucking things. I hate 'em.' Bethlynn was retreating now. 'Hate 'em, hate 'em, hate 'em-'And she was gone, escorted away into the crowd.

'Nice going,' Adrianna remarked. 'Subtle, understated. Nice.'

'I need a drink,' Will said.

'I'm going to find Glenn. If he's still sick I'll take him home, so i: don't see you later, enjoy the rest of the party.'

'What the hell did you say to her?' Jack wanted to know, when he caught up with Will and the whisky bottle.

'It's all a blur.'

'I just loved that look on her face.'

'You were watching?'

'Everybody was watching.'

'I should apologize.'

'Too late. She just left.'

'Not to her, to Patrick.'

He found Pat in the room at the back of the apartment they had together dubbed the conservatory; a space occupied by out-of-season decorations, old furniture and several burgeoning marijuana plants. He was smoking a fat reefer in their midst, staring at the wall.

'That was stupid,' Will said. 'I fucked up and I'm really sorry.'

'No, you're not,' Patrick said. 'You think she's a big of fake and you wanted to show her how you felt.' His voice was gravelly. There was no anger in it, not even resentment; only fatigue. 'You want some of this?' he said, glancing back at Will briefly as he proffered the joint. His eyes were red.

'Oh Jesus, Pat-' Will said, wanting to weep himself at the sight of Patrick's unhappiness.

'Do you want some or not?' Patrick sniffed. Will took the joint, and inhaled a solid lungful. 'I need Bethlynn right now,' Pat went on. 'I can guess what you think about her, and I'd probably be thinking the same thing if I was standing where you are. But I'm not. I'm here. You're there. It's fucking miles, Will.' He drew a short, almost panicked breath. 'I'm dying. And I don't like it. I'm not at peace, I'm not reconciled-' He turned to claim the joint back from Will. 'I'm not ... finished with being here. Not. Remotely. Finished.' He took another hit off the joint, then handed it back to Will, who burned it to the nub. They looked at each other, both holding lungfuls of smoke, effortlessly meeting one another's gaze. Then expelling the smoke as he talked, Patrick said: 'I've never been that interested in what goes on outside these four walls. I've been quite happy with a little pot and a great view. You'd come back with your pictures and I'd think: well, fuck it, I don't want to see the world if it's like that. I don't want to know about fucking extinction. It's depressing. Everybody agrees: death's depressing. I'll just shut it out. But I couldn't. It was here all the time. Right here. In me. I didn't lock it out, I locked it in.'

Will stepped towards him, until their faces were no more than a foot apart.

'I want to apologize to Bethlynn,' he said. 'Whatever I think about her, I still acted like a prick.'

'Agreed.'

'Will she see me if I grovel sufficiently?'

'Probably not. But you could maybe call at her house,' he smiled. 'It would make me very happy.'

'That's what's important.'

'You mean that?'

'You know I mean it.'

'So, while you're in a generous mood, can I ask you to do something else for me? You don't have to do it right now. It's more something for the future.'

'Tell me.'

Patrick gave him the cock-eyed look that he always got when he was high, and reaching between them, caught hold of Will's fingers. 'I want you to be here with me,' he said, 'when it's time for me to ... leave. Permanently, I mean. Rafael's wonderful, and so's Jack and so's Adrianna. But they're not you. Nobody's ever come close to you, Will.' His eyes shone with sorrow. 'Will you promise me?'

'I promise,' Will replied, letting his own tears fall.

'I love you, Will.'

'I love you, too. That's not going to change. Ever. You know that.'

'Yeah. But I like hearing it anyway.' He made a valiant attempt to smile. 'I think we should go distribute joints amongst the needy.' He picked up the tin cookie jar on the table. 'I rolled about twenty. You think that'll be enough?'

'Man, you've got it all planned out,' Will said.

'I'm a natural celebrant,' Patrick said as he headed out to distribute this bounty. 'Hadn't you heard?'

Just about everyone got high, except for Jack, who had become self-righteously sober the year before (after two decades of chemical excess) and Casper, who was forbidden to smoke the weed because Jack couldn't. Drew became democratically flirtatious under the influence, then, realizing where his best hopes of gratification lay, followed Will into the kitchen and offered up a graphic description of what he wanted to do when they got back to Sanchez Street.As it turned out, by the time the party broke up, Drew was so much the worse for weed and beer he said he needed to go home and sleep it off. Will invited him back to the house, but he declined. He didn't want anyone, especially Will, watching him throw up in the toilet, he said: it was a private ritual. Will drove him home, made sure he got to his apartment safely, and then went home himself. Drew's verbal foreplay had left him feeling horny, however, and he contemplated a late-night cruise down to The Penitent to find some action, But the thought of getting geared up for the hunt at such a late hour dissuaded him. He needed sleep more than a stranger's hand. And Drew would be sober tomorrow.

Again, he seemed to wake, disturbed by sirens on Market, or a shout from the street. Seemed to wake, and seemed to sit up and study the shadowy room, just as he had two nights before. This time, however, he was wise to the trick his sleeping mind was playing. Resisting the urge to sleepwalk to the bathroom, he stayed in bed, waiting for the illusion of wakefulness to pass.But after what seemed to be minutes, he grew bored. There was a ritual here, he realized, that his subconscious demanded he enact, and until he played it out he wouldn't be allowed to dream something more restful. Resigned to the game, he got up and wandered out onto the landing. There was no shadow on the wall this time to coax him down the stairs, but he went anyway, following the same route as he had when he'd last come into the company of Lord Fox: along the hallway and into the file-room. Tonight, however, there were no lights spilling from the photographs on the ground. Apparently the animal wanted to conduct the dream debate in darkness.

'Can we get this over with as quickly as possible?' Will said, stepping into the murk. 'There's got to be a better dream than-'

He stopped. The air around him shifted, displaced by a motion in the room. Something was moving towards him, and it was a lot larger than a fox. He started to retreat; heard a hiss; saw a vast, grey bulk rise up in front of him, the slab of its head gaping, letting on to a darkness that made the murk seem bright