Human Remains

the house in Lenton Lane.
     
Obituary: page 46.
     

Noel
     
    The first time I saw him, I knew he was the one. Knew it the way they always said I would, even though I’d never believed in true love. I laughed at the people who did.
    He was singing tenor in the choir and I was the last-minute replacement brought in when some old dear cried off. I played my little heart out that night, I can tell you. Looking at him when I dared to, which wasn’t often, and drinking him in like wine, letting him spread through my veins like the first taste of alcohol. I wasn’t brave enough to speak to him after the concert but luckily for me he’d noticed me looking at him and came strolling over to ask me to show him where the best place for a nightcap was.
    I took him to the Black Bull, because I knew none of the others would be in there – I didn’t want to share him. I wanted him just for myself. If he was surprised by the pub – it was a bit grim, if I’m honest – he didn’t let on. He bought us a bottle of plonk to share and when we’d finished it they let us have another even though it was almost last orders. We had our heads together, gossiping and putting the world to rights as though we’d known each other our whole lives and not just for that one evening. By the time he walked me home, I was starting to panic that I’d misread the situation, that it was just another fling, another encounter that was going to be about the physical side of it and nothing else. Or maybe not even that. He was older than me, handsome, clever, and I didn’t think I could possibly be that lucky.
    But I was wrong. I was the luckiest boy in the world.
    After that we were together all the time. Every day. Every job we got, we either did together or else the other one would turn down any other performances to be in the audience. We simply couldn’t bear to be apart, not for more than a few hours. His voice electrified me; hearing him sing was sustenance enough for me to live on. And he would sit listening to me play, hour after hour; even when I’d practised enough he would make me carry on, sitting in the armchair behind me, his eyes half-closed, losing himself in the music.
    I don’t think anyone really understood how deep it went. We both had friends, of course, family – his more loving, more supportive than mine – but what we had together was like solid rock compared to the shifting sands of all the other relationships, people who came and went in and out of our lives, passing us by.
    I found him on the floor. He’d been there for some time, even though I’d only slipped out of the house to the shops to get something nice for dinner.
    I called the ambulance and while I was waiting for them to arrive I tried everything I could for him, pounding his chest, my warm mouth trying to breathe life into his cold one. I already knew it was no use. He’d gone. The light had gone from his eyes.
    Three months passed after he left me but I have no recollection of them. The time after had no meaning, no purpose. I couldn’t play; I didn’t even try. I couldn’t listen to music, couldn’t look at the sky, couldn’t walk in the fresh air without him because there was no reason to do it. All I could do was wait.

Annabel
     
     
    I went with Kate to the tactical meeting on Wednesday, even though it was her turn to do it. She usually managed to find some way of getting out of it, but on this occasion she was surprisingly enthusiastic. She was setting up the presentation on the computer, her back to me, the set of her shoulders and the half-smile telling me in no uncertain terms that she thought I was about to make a colossal fool of myself, and she was going to enjoy the show.
    DI Andrew Frost, two years away from retirement, one of my favourite people in the job, was last through the door. ‘Morning, Annabel. Morning, Kate. We get two analysts for the price of one today, do we?’
    ‘Sir,’ I said. I felt an instant wash of relief that it was Frosty chairing the meeting today. A couple of the other DIs had a tendency to ask questions, lots of them, even ones which didn’t make any sense. It felt as if they were trying to catch us out all the time, trying to make themselves look clever at our expense.
    Around the table they all sat, uniforms on one side, civilians on the other. DI at the head of the table; DC Ellen Traynor, DC Amanda Spitz and DC Brian Jones, also known as ‘Shaggy’. I had once asked Trigger how he’d got