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The clocks around the Diogenes Club were chiming six, in unison and unobtrusively, when Mycroft heard the first heavy step on the stairs leading down to his bunker. Their pace was easy, unhurried, and gave him time to secure his files and turn off his computer before Lestrade filled the doorway and greeted Mycroft with a weary smile. “Fancy a Chinese?” he asked. No preamble at this point in the week. “There’s a new place opened in Soho, supposed to be pretty good.”
“A glowing endorsement.” Mycroft managed to return the smile, and found it easier than the week before, which had in turn been easier than the week before. “Sounds delightful. Shall we?”
“If you’re ready. I don’t want to interrupt if you’re working.” That was a lie, but one Mycroft appreciated. Lestrade had always been good at allowing him to save face.
They emerged from the dim, cool interior of the club onto a sun-drenched London evening with the city bathed in gold and its usually frenetic pace dulled to a lazy drift. Tourists buzzed around the gardens, and a crowd thronged around an ice cream stall set up on a street corner. Mycroft and Lestrade passed through them, almost unnoticed. Just two more professional men in a population of millions, although he noticed the occasional glances sent Lestrade’s way. Most were curious, with that ‘I know I’ve seen you somewhere’ look that came from press conferences people didn’t really listen to, but there were others. Appraising looks, the search for a wedding ring, then the glance at him to work out where he fit in.
He wished they’d tell him, once they worked it out, because he honestly hadn’t the faintest idea himself.
Soho was busier, as it always was, so they got take-away and doubled back to the churchyard at St Anne’s, where pools of tranquillity had formed in the shade of the ancient trees. Their shoulders bumped together casually as they ate dumplings out of their boxes, and Mycroft found he no longer needed to try to smile.
“Thank you,” he said, and to his eternal credit, Lestrade didn’t try to pretend he didn’t know why.
“You’re welcome. Always.” He bumped Mycroft again, but this time deliberately. “You okay?”
He thought about that one, experimenting with different definitions of and parameters for ‘okay’ and found, to his surprise, that most of them fit. “Do you know, I think I am.”
Lestrade didn’t laugh. He smiled back, eyes crinkling with genuine happiness and, Mycroft fancied, a touch of relief. “Good. I was worried about you.”
“For how long?”
“Oh, only about thirteen years.” He bumped Mycroft’s shoulder again. “You spent too long running around after Sherlock. It’s about time you started living for you.”
He chuckled. “Says the man still dragging me out for dinner every Friday night.” Lestrade looked at him again, his expression wryly amused and faintly disbelieving, and Mycroft’s stomach clenched suddenly. “Oh.”
Lestrade chuckled and looked back at his dumplings. “Was that a good ‘oh’, or an ‘oh shit’?”
Mycroft was no longer a teenager experiencing his first dormitory crush, so he didn’t panic, blush or make a fool of himself. He wanted to, but he refrained. “Mild embarrassment, but not… displeasure.”
“You’re going to have to help me out here. Was that code for ‘shut up and kiss me’ or just ‘shut up’? I can’t always tell.”
Mycroft clarified. Greg’s lips were soft and still smiling, and he stretched an arm across the back of the bench behind Mycroft, resting his fingers on his arm gently. For one glorious hour, nothing outside the churchyard mattered, and when they emerged at last it was as different men, into a different world.