‘What happened?’ JC asks, is suddenly curious to know the answer. Wants to understand the complex individual sat quietly beside him on the doorstep of what used to be a home. He hesitates as Chris looks at him, wonders if the blankness that he can see upon his face is genuine, or a mask to deflect the questions. ‘Why did… uh… I mean… you and… AJ…?’

‘What?’ Chris’ voice is gentle; curious. ‘Why did we split?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Because I fucked things up.’

Chris’ blasé response startles JC for a moment, and he feels his mouth gape open a little, hastens to close it, bites down on his lower lip in an effort to determine that it’s no longer hanging open. He narrows his eyes a little, stares at the dark shape beside him. ‘How?’

‘He…’ Chris hesitates, takes an audible breath, rushes back into speech. ‘He was offered another site.’ He explains simply, quietly, turns his gaze to the darkness that envelops them once more. ‘He asked me to go with him. I said “no”…’ A softly bitter laugh escapes his lips. ‘I said that he didn’t know me as well as we’d both presumed. I said that if he thought for one second that I could ever leave here, that I could ever take on another excavation and just abandon this one… then he didn’t know me at all, and I’d rather he were packed and out of my caravan by the time I got back from the ‘pub…’

‘Was he?’

‘Fuck, yeah!’ Chris snorts, the sound oddly amused to JC’s ears. He shrugs his shoulders, pushes and pulls himself up from the ground until he can turn to look back down at JC, regard him from a shadowed face whose expression remains hidden in the night. ‘By the time I crawled back eight hours later, he was on his way to his new site. Like I said -,’ he explains, sounds patient and weary despite the harshness that his voice contains. ‘I fucked up. Royally. Lance has never let me forget it – and if we don’t get back to that bloody tent, JC, he’ll add my name to his list of people whose bollocks he wants to fry for his breakfast on the last day of the season…’

Despite himself, JC can’t help the grin that curves his mouth as he scrambles to his feet, stands beside Chris. ‘Sounds painful.’

‘Oh,’ Chris snickers. ‘I’m not kidding, man – Lance is someone you want to watch when he’s pissy!’

JC thinks back to the calm way in which he’d been approached, the distance to the manner of the site’s Director, the awe that he can see in peoples eyes as they snap to attention each time that Lance speaks, and he purses his lips thoughtfully. ‘Yeah,’ he says, nods his head in consideration. ‘I can see that…’

‘Wish Lance could…’

There is a hint of quiet desperation to Chris’ voice, and JC finds himself wondering at it; silently questioning himself whether it has anything to do with Lance – or is solely because of the relationship between Chris and the mysterious AJ. He opens his mouth to ask, feels his brow draw down over his eyes as he determines to ask, is forestalled by the sound of his companion’s voice:

‘So -,’ Chris seems suddenly buoyed: almost hopeful as he gently knocks JC’s arm with his elbow, disturbing his thoughts. ‘We friends again, then?’

The question startles him, and he laughs, splutters out the sound into the shadows. ‘You even have to ask?’

‘Hey! Considerate New-Age man standing here!’

‘Yeah, yeah!’ JC knocks him again, feels as though an invisible weight has been lifted from him, wonders where this allegedly considerate New Age man was whilst he were blowing him and being called by the wrong set of initials. He grins. ‘Whatever, man!’ he pauses, feels his grin settle into a shy smile. ‘You’re forgiven. I guess.’

‘Well, thank fuck for that -,’ Chris drawls, sounds amused. ‘For a while there, I honestly thought I’d have to return to baiting Wade to get my kicks…’

A moment of silence settles between them: comfortable where, only a couple of hours before it had been tense and awkward, before JC blindly reaches out, pats his hand down upon the darkened curve that he knows to be Chris’ shoulder.

‘You coming back, then?’ he asks.

‘Yep. Can’t have Joe drinking all my booze, now, can I.?’

‘Or Lance after your bollocks.’

‘Well, no -,’ Chris says, his voice distinctive with a grin. ‘Not when they’re such a nice pair, after all…’

The sound of their laughter carries before them, almost lights the gravel spattered path back towards the marquee, blends into the stillness of night with its distant sound of traffic: people carrying on with their lives a million miles removed from that of the campsite, the excavation – and yet, not, JC thinks dimly as he alters the speed and strength of his gait to bump his hip and elbow companionably into Chris’. He still has questions, still wants to know as much as Chris is capable of telling him – but he thinks that it can wait a while.

Perhaps…