Chapter 7 - Ain’t Misbehavin’

Brian burst through the doors of the White Lion at 5:30 pm.

He’d been frantically waiting all day long, trying to determine when would be an appropriate time to venture back into 1941. He’d been so distracted the whole day he could barely get any work done. Finally, when he couldn’t take it any longer, he simply bolted out of the hotel and headed in the direction of the White Lion pub. To hell with waiting and fuck anyone who told him it was too early in the evening to even hope Justin would be at the drinking hole yet.

Brian rushed up to the bar, elbowed aside a young naval officer and pounded loudly with his knuckles on the bar top. “Daphne! Daphne, I need to find Justin. Where the hell is he? Is he here yet tonight?”

“Well, if it ain’t tall, dark an’ desperate,” Daphne teased, turning around and flashing her brilliantly white smile at the frantic man. “It’s a bit early for Justin to be ‘ere yet, Sweet’art. The only blokes in ‘ere at this time ‘a day is the working stiffs on their way home to the missus. The more . . . interestin’ crowd . . . don't straggle in ‘til about eight o’clock, Darlin’.”

“Fuck!”

“Oi! Watch yer language. Ladies present,” warned the Navy boy still hovering at Brian’s elbow.

Brian mumbled an insincere ‘sorry’ before turning back to Daphne. “I really need to find Justin, Daphne. It’s important. I need to . . .”

Brian paused there, unable to go on. He didn’t know what he was going to say to Justin, to be completely honest. How exactly did you tell someone that they were going to die? And, even if you knew definitively they WERE going to die, would you tell them? Should you tell them? It was an age-old question; was time static or elastic? If you knew something was going to happen in the future, could you do anything to prevent it, or was everyone’s fate already set in stone? Brian had been struggling with that question all night and all day and still hadn’t come up with any real answer. All he knew was that he had to at least find Justin and try to stop the inevitable. Any way he could.

“What ya need to do, Darlin’, is ‘ave a seat, an’ a pint, an’ try an’ relax,” Daphne ordered, pointing to a vacant bar stool a little ways down the counter. “I ‘spect our Sunshine will be along eventually. He comes ‘round most nights. Provided he don’t have no mission to fly that evenin’. But you frettin’ and scratchin’ like a cat in heat ain't gonna get ‘im ‘ere any faster. So, just sit yourself down and I’ll be with you in a tic. All right, Darlin’?”

Brian rolled his eyes at the cheeky wench, but he didn’t really have any grounds to argue with her. So he followed directions, sat his ass on the empty barstool, and waited until the beautiful brown-skinned barmaid brought his warm pint over. That was something he was going to have to get used to. He’d kill for a cold lager, to be honest, but ‘when in Rome’, right?

It took Daphne quite a while before she made her way back over to check on Brian. There seemed to be a flurry of activity in the pub just then. The working class crowd that had been in the bar when Brian entered, seemed to all take the cue to leave about the same time. Daphne was busy bantering with each of them as she settled out their evening’s tabs. In a way, it was the best possible balm to Brian‘s frazzled nerves to watch this conventional scene play out. It was so redolent of ordinary, routine humanity. It reminded him that even here in wartorn 1941 London, life DID go on. The people persevered. They went on with their lives. It wasn’t as bad as Brian had imagined it to be while he was freaking out in the wee hours of the night.

“So, ‘andsome. What’s got your knickers all in a twist this evenin’?” Daphne asked when she finally got a minute to come talk to Brian.

“I just really need to find Justin. I’ve got some information for him about . . .” Brian hesitated again, trying for the hundredth time to think of a way to relay his news to Justin without sounding like a total whack-job or giving away his secret. “I’ve come across some confidential information that I think he needs to know.”

“Confidential, eh? That sounds a bit dodgy. But, then again, Gears did say as he thought you might be in the know,” Daphne said as she surveyed Brian with a critical eye. Then she turned and looked across the bar, finding the person she was looking for sitting on a bench in the back corner. “Oi, Peaches! Can you pop by Sunshine’s place and tell ‘im he’s got a gen’lman caller ‘ere a waitin’ on ‘im, please. And tell ‘im to leg it.” The man she’d been addressing promptly got up and trotted off, no questions asked. “That should get a fire lit under our Sunshine for ya, ‘andsome. I ‘spect he’ll be round right soon. Can I get yer ‘nother pint while you’re waitin’, Love?”

Brian nodded and handed her his empty glass. He could see why Justin had said Daphne was his first friend here. She was a hoot. Brian thought that Daphne and Cynthia would get along like gangbusters if they ever met.

Brian had barely downed half his ale before a winded Justin rushed through the front door, looking like he’d sprinted all the way to the pub. When he saw Brian sitting there waiting for him, he broke out into a huge smile that threatened to split his face in two. Despite how worried Brian had been feeling, he had to laugh at the surreptitious way the younger man tried to wipe the perspiration off his brow and straighten his clothing as he walked over. Justin was so guileless, so unworldly. It was quite a refreshing change for the experienced and slightly jaded Brian.

“Hello, Blue Eyes,” Brian welcomed him by pulling out the stool next to his own.

“Brian. I . . . uh . . . I didn’t expect to hear from you again so soon,” Justin fumbled for something to say as he took up residence on the proffered stool and turned to smile at Brian.

They stared at each other wordlessly for several minutes, acting like lovestruck fools without even realizing it, until Brian woke to the fact he was acting like a lesbian and tore his gaze away. What the hell had gotten into him? Maybe time travel was affecting his brain in some indecipherable way and turning him into a twat? Time to get a grip, Kinney.

“I need to talk to you,” Brian told him quietly. He still didn’t know what he was going to say, hopefully it would just come to him when he started talking.

Unfortunately, they were interrupted by a teasing Daphne before Brian got any further. “That was quick, Sunshine. Run all the way ‘ere, did ya?”

“Yeah, you could say that,” Justin smiled sheepishly at his friend.

“Well then, you must be right thirsty. Can I get ya a drink?”

Justin nodded and reached for his pocket, startling slightly when Brian wrapped his warm hand around Justin’s wrist, squeezing it softly, and stopping him. “I’m buying your drinks tonight, Blue Eyes.”

Daphne smiled at the two of them. “So, what you boys ‘avin?”

Justin watched as Brian downed the last of his drink and handed his glass back to Daphne. “Same again for me please, Daph.  Blue Eyes, what’ll it be?”

“I’ll have the same,” he told his friend behind the bar.

“So, how was your mission the other night,” Brian asked to fill the time while the barmaid was getting their drinks. “Everyone made it back safely, I hope.”

“Just barely,” Justin answered with a grin that belied the gravity of his words. “It was just a defensive run, so we weren’t too far out. Which was good, because we got into a bit of a rumble with a pack of Stuka bombers bringing up the tail end of Gerry’s evening bombing run. We took out four of them in the process, but they shot up a couple of our guys pretty good too. Jeffries had to do a hot landing when his gear malfunctioned and poor Kirk was leaking fuel all the way back to base and barely made it in on the fumes. If we’d been any further away, he would have had to ditch the plane. But at least Gerry will have four less bombers to send out tomorrow night.”

Brian marveled silently at the cavalier way the young man sitting next to him bluntly detailed the fact that he’d been part of killing four Germans. Four human beings. Granted, they had been four humans beings fighting on behalf of the Nazi regime, which basically made them complicit with the monsters in charge of that contemptible administration, but still . . . Seen through the lens of his modernistic understanding, Brian didn’t think he could be so sanguine about such a thing. Especially since he didn’t think the populace of April, 1941 even knew yet about the atrocities the Nazis were already involved in with their Extermination Camps in Eastern Europe.

“That’ll be one bob, one pence,” grinned Daphne as she placed the drinks in front of them, thankfully interrupting Brian’s morbid thoughts.

Brian reached into his pocket and pulled out his handful of change. He should have probably looked at the coins more carefully before he came back.

Justin could see Brian fumbling around with the money in his hand and pulled his fingers away from where he was pushing the coins around in his palm.

“Here, let me help you,” Justin offered, as he pulled Brian’s hand towards him and quickly selected the two coins. It’s these two,” he showed Brian the coins before handing them over to Daphne. “You’ll get the hang of it eventually. It took me a good month or so to figure out the money when I first got here too.” Justin added with a wink.

“Thanks,” Brian replied, pocketing the rest of the coins. “Britain definitely needs to hurry up and switch over to a decimal based currency system. Who can count by twelve and twenty?”

That got a laugh out of Justin as well as Brian’s neighboring bar mate on the other side. “Ain’t never gonna ‘appen, Mate. We don’t go for none of them new-fangled notions. We like us a good ol’ fashioned British Shillin’. ‘Sides makes yer smarter to ‘ave to figger out real money.”

Brian just shook his head knowingly and turned back to his blond.

“Give me easy to count greenbacks, any day!” Justin offered as he raised his glass to Brian.

“Cheers to that,” Brian echoed, tapping his glass to Justin’s and then taking a nice long sip. “And to COLD beer,” he added in a whisper that he hoped only Justin could hear.

Justin sniggered at Brian’s comment but didn’t add anything, choosing to change the subject instead. “So, how much longer do you think your business will keep you here in London?”

Brian thought he could detect a hint of uncertainty in Justin’s tone, which caused a strange warm feeling to ignite in Brian’s chest. “What? Are you trying to get rid of me already?” Brian teased.

“No, you big dolt. I was just wondering . . . Well . . . How much time we have . . . To . . . To get to know each other,” Justin replied, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial hush and the rosy blush Brian was coming to expect painting the boy's cheeks by the end.

“Lucky for you,” Brian announced, not quite so demurely, “it looks like I’ll be around here for longer than I originally thought. My business is going to take longer to finish up than I’d anticipated. My client wants me to stay on and personally supervise things until the campaign is completely up and running. So, Blue Eyes, you and I should have plenty of time to . . . get acquainted. Well acquainted, I hope.”

Brian said the last bit in his most seductive baritone, moving his hand to rest on the younger man’s thigh under the cover of the bar’s overhanging counter. Justin’s hand covered his and gave a quick squeeze. But then, to Brian’s surprise, the lad intentionally moved Brian’s hand away, off his lap. Brian gave the youth a questioning glance but only got a shrug in response. Which, of course, only made Brian even more curious.

“What? Don’t tell me anybody in here would object to us getting a little more friendly . . .” Brian looked around the pub, and just like the previous time he’d been there, picked up a gay vibe from more than a few of the patrons. He leaned in even closer so he was practically whispering in the perfect little shell of an ear. “I’m pretty sure we're not the only gays . . . I mean queers . . . here, Justin. Or are you just shy? You didn’t seem that timid the other night when we kissed.”

“No. No, it’s not that . .. Well, not exactly . . . It’s just that this isn’t really that kind of place, Brian,” the younger man explained, looking around himself furtively, as his blush darkened. “Daph and her father are pretty open minded, you know? But still . . . I mean, I know there are places, clubs in the city and all, where things like that are okay, but . . . Daphne‘s father could get in trouble with the authorities if word got out that they allowed such improprieties in their pub. The British aren’t quite as puritanical as the Americans are these days, but there are still sodomy laws on the books, you know,” Justin explained with a dismal half grin. “Besides, the gang here sees me as one of the ‘regular guys’. I don’t want them thinking I’m a sissy or anything.”

“A ‘regular guy?” Brian chuckled at that. “What exactly is a ‘regular guy’ as opposed to a ‘sissy’? Aren’t we all sissies? Not that I care. I refuse to let anyone label me.”

“Yeah, to outsiders, I guess, we ARE all sissies,” Justin explained, looking at Brian like he must be a little slow not to already understand this stuff. “But in here, we’ve got our own pecking order, so to speak. In here, you’ve got the true ‘Sissies’ - guys like Peaches over there.” Justin inclined his head towards the small, effeminate guy that Daphne had sent to look for Justin earlier. Brian watched as Peaches walked across the bar to seat himself at another table, the way he swiveled his hips as he moved, and Brian had to concede, you couldn’t possibly miss him.

“Then there’s the ‘Elites’ - they’d be sissies except they’ve got enough money or breeding to get away with it. Fancy’s one of our more colorful elites here at the White Lion,” Justin continued, raising his glass to his buddy across the way as he mentioned the man’s name. “Fancy’s father is some big shot up in the midlands somewhere. He got the full deal - Public school education, Oxford, trust fund - and as long as he stays here in London where he can’t embarrass the family - daddy doesn’t care what he does.”

“Then there’s the ‘Aunties’,” Justin smiled at a group of older men at a back table, all of whom were gabbling like a brood of hens just then. “Aunties are what comes of sissies and elites who manage to make it till they get grey hair.”

Justin then turned a bit in his seat so Brian could see past his shoulder to the line of guys propping up the far end of the bar. They all looked like ordinary working stiffs, military men or, a few, older gents that didn’t stand out much at all. “At the top of the pile there’s us ‘Regular Guys’. Guys like me, Gears, Lucky . . . We’re the ones nobody notices. The ones who can get by. The ones who don't get singled out.” Justin looked back at Brian, his eyes intense and focused now. “The ones who get to keep their jobs and positions because nobody knows we’re perverts . . . Sexual monsters who practice ‘unspeakable crimes against nature’ . . . You know, the ones who get to be pilots in the RAF.”

Which shut Brian right up. Because for all his Twenty-First Century, Out-and-Proud Gay Man, rhetoric, Brian had never had to choose between his job and his sexual orientation. Not that he hadn’t suffered the usual discrimination that all gays had to put up with. He’d been ostracized, bullied, called names, even beat up a couple times when he was younger, but he’d never had to worry he’d be put in jail just for being who he was. And he’d never personally been at risk of being fired from his job because of his sexual orientation. Justin, and the rest of the men Brian saw around him, had to think about those things every single day. So, maybe, if they were especially cautious about showing themselves to the world, it was understandable.

Brian sat up straighter, moving back just a little from Justin so there was a tiny bit more space between their bodies.

Justin smiled understandingly at his companion. “It’s not like everyone doesn’t KNOW we’re all the same,” he tried to elucidate further, endeavoring to sound less harsh. “But some of us just don’t like to advertise it, you know?”

“I get it, Justin. I didn’t mean to push. And I don’t want to jam you up with your job. I guess . . . I guess I just come from a different world is all.” Bran huffed a little private laugh at the degree to which that was an understatement. Then, to lighten the mood, he asked, “so, since I don't swish like a ‘Sissy’ and I’m too visible to be one of your ‘Regular Guys’, What does that make me? An ‘Elite’?”

“No. No, guys like you, Mr. Kinney, are in a class all by yourselves.”

“A class all by myself?” Brian chuckled, rather liking that determination.

“Yep. You, Brian, are what we refer to as a ‘Notorious Queer’. You’re the kind of cocksure, rowdy, unapologetic queer that spawns legends. You’re the ‘All-American Queer’. The Yankee version of Oscar Wilde,” Justin proclaimed in a teasing voice. Then he leaned in, an impish grin on his boyish face, and added in a whisper, “and even better, you’re all MINE!”

“How about we get the fuck out of here, Blue Eyes?” Brian suggested, his voice gone all husky.

“I think that’s an excellent idea, Mr. Notorious,” Justin agreed, swallowing the rest of his beer and then clapping his glass down on the bar definitively.

They were outside and already halfway down the street before Brian remembered the treats he had in the briefcase he was carrying. It wasn’t till a cool wind blew past them and he saw Justin, who’d been walking a few steps ahead of him, shiver a little, that he recalled his special present. Stepping over to the building side of the sidewalk, and tugging at the sleeve of Justin‘s uniform jacket to grab his blond’s attention, Brian propped his foot up on a convenient step, and used his knee as a platform to balance the overly full briefcase atop.

He quickly opened the bag and pulled out the package he’d stowed in there before he left 2016. Brian had asked the hotel staff to specially wrap all his little gifts up in a plain brown wrapping with string around it, so as to fit in more with the times. This also made it simple to pull the entire package out in one piece. Justin seemed surprised by the rather large bundle that Brian subsequently thrust into his arms. Brian rather enjoyed that look of surprise as well as the happy little grin that came with it.

“What’s this?” Brian’s Blue Eyes asked.

"Just some stuff I saw when I was shopping yesterday that I thought you might find useful,” Brian answered evasively while Justin turned the package over, examining it from all sides. “Stop ogling the damned thing and open it already, Twat.”

With another of those fucking adorable grins that Brian seemed to have become addicted to, Justin pulled the bow on the string holding the package closed. The paper split open right away, revealing a large bag of perfectly roasted Columbian coffee grounds, three packages of Brian‘s favorite chocolate biscuits (McVities Digestives - a guilty pleasure that he could only find when he came to London and which he secretly loved to the point of bingeing on them whenever he visited), all nestled atop a bundle of wool fabric.

“Coffee? Where in the world did you manage to get coffee these days, Brian? I’ve been trying to get coffee at the market here for the last six weeks!” Justin raved as he smelled the package, his eyes almost rolling back into his head with the pleasure of the earthy aroma.

“And biscuits to go with it, of course. Because you can’t have a proper English coffee break without biscuits. Although, I suppose to be proper, you’d need to drink tea instead of coffee. But what the hell; we’re American, right? We don’t have to do proper,” Brian insisted.

“Don’t tell my mates at the White Lion,” Justin said in a hushed aside, adding in a delightful giggle that went right to Brian’s dick, “but I actually prefer coffee over tea. I know, that’s blasphemy here in London, but it’s the truth. Mmm, you just can't beat the smell of freshly ground coffee in the mornings.”

“I promise not to tell ANY of your secrets, Blue Eyes,” Brian promised. “There is more to the gift though. Don’t you want to see the rest?” Brian pointed to the cloth the other items had been nestled in.

“Don’t rush me,” the boy joked, as he fondled the coffee and biscuit packages one more time, just to aggravate Brian a little.

Brian growled a little fake annoyance at the boy, took hold of the food treats, and yanked them imperiously out of Justin‘s hands. Justin laughed again, but took the cue and began to unfurl the piles of cloth, which turned out to be the beautiful peacoat jacket that Brian had purchased in the resale shop the day before. Justin seemed completely stunned by this development. He stood there, holding the jacket out in front of him, looking completely caught off guard for a good minute and a half.

“It’s beautiful, Brian,” he breathed and then lifted the soft wool to his cheek so he could feel it, adding a surreptitious sniff. “So soft. And I love the smell of wool. It had to have been very expensive, though. I . . . I can’t take this, Brian”

Justin tried to shove the coat back into Brian‘s arms. Brian wasn’t going to have any of that, though. He turned away, his arms still full of coffee and biscuit packages, and with his back towards Justin simply refused to take the coat.

“Nonsense! I bought it for you; it’s yours. And since it doesn’t fit me, and I can’t take it back, you have to keep it.”

“But . . . It’s too expensive . . . I just can’t . . .” Justin insisted.

“Listen to me, Justin. Are you listening?” Brian paused, waiting for his blond to nod in acknowledgment. “I bought this for you. I want you to have it. I . . . OK, confession time. I’ve never done this before. I’ve never tried to ‘woo’ someone before. Where I come from, we don’t do that. Or, at least, I don’t do that . . . What I mean to say is . . . Fuck it! Just take the fucking coat, Justin.”

Justin broke out laughing so loudly that several other people passing by in the street stopped and looked over at the pair. Justin immediately lifted the jacket up and hid his face in the cloth so as to stifle his guffaws. It took him at least a minute to fight back his laughter, before he was able to remove the jacket from his face. Brian stood there the whole time, scowling down at the boy who seemed to be overcome with amusement at his expense.

“I’m sorry, Brian, but I can’t help it. You're just so cute,” Justin confessed, causing Brian to glower even more ferociously. “And I’ve never been ‘wooed’ before, either, so I’m not really sure how this works myself. But, I love the jacket, and I will gratefully accept this wonderful gift. Thank you, Brian.” That helped Brian to feel a little less angry, his frown slipping from his face. “Will you help me put it on, please?”

Brian quickly dumped the biscuits and coffee back into his briefcase and then grabbed the jacket, holding it out for Justin to slip over his shoulders. As he’d thought, it fit perfectly. The color was a perfect match for Justin‘s eyes, as well. And the beaming, bright, smile on the younger man’s face as he smoothed the lapels down, made it all worthwhile for Brian.

“Good. Now, where am I walking you to, Mr. Taylor,” Brian asked, picking up his briefcase and resting one arm casually against the small of Justin’s back to guide him into the flow of foot traffic again.

“Well, since I unfortunately have another mission tonight, I think I better have you come with me back to my room. We can . . . Chat . . . While I get ready. Unless, that’s being too forward of me?” Justin proposed, looking bashfully over at Brian with a shy little smile.

“I think that’s an excellent idea, Mr. Taylor. Plus, that’ll solve the problem of me not knowing how to find you, other than to show up at the White Lion and have Peaches run and get you for me,” Brian stated unequivocally. “Speaking of which, how DO I get a hold of you if I need to? You don’t, by any chance, have a telephone in that boarding house of yours, do you?”

“I’m afraid not. Mrs. McCready refuses to have one in the house. She says they’re ‘evil contraptions’.” Justin laughed again and Brian wanted to take him in his arms so badly he had to clench his fists against the impulse - that laugh was going to be the undoing of him.

“Damn! Well, I guess I could always just whistle for you. Do you think that would work?” Brian asked with a suggestive leer as they rounded the corner of one street and Justin began to head them over to a row of townhouses built on the east side of the street. “And you could whistle for me, if you needed me, too.”

“Unfortunately, I can’t actually whistle,” Justin admitted with another infuriating little giggle. “I can sing, I can dance, I can fly a plane, but for some reason I just can’t whistle. I never learned how.”

“Really? There’s something you can’t do?,” Brian teased and then took advantage of a little out-of-the-way nook beside the building that Justin had been leading him towards, pulling the younger man into the space and out of the line of everyone else’s vision. “Whistling isn’t hard, Blue Eyes,” Brian purred, slipping into his best Bacall imitation. “You know how to whistle, don’t you? You just put your lips together and . . . Blow.”

Brian punctuated his suggestive sentence by demonstrating the technique for his perky little pilot. Justin seemed a fast learner. He was already puckered up and ready for Brian‘s advance. Only, instead of blowing, there seemed to be quite a lot of sucking . . . face. Not that Brian was objecting at all.

“Mmmmm. If that’s how you learn to whistle, then I’m all for practicing some more,” Justin murmured as soon as they paused for some air.

Brian was all in favor of more practicing himself. He understood the danger to his Blue Eyes of open displays of affection in this time period, and he really had been trying to restrain himself. But there was something about the juxtaposition of innocence and strength that Justin represented which simply drove Brian wild. And judging by the way that Justin’s body seemed to melt against his own as they huddled together in their private little corner, the way the pliant, warm lips sucked at his own, the way his strong hands sought out and twined with Brian’s under the warmth of the lapel on Justin’s new coat, not to mention the way the younger man’s hips ground against the solid pressure of Brian’s thigh, it seemed the boy was just as wild for him. Maybe, Brian thought, the need to act clandestinely was just making it worse.

“I’m going to kiss you again, Blue Eyes. Prepare yourself,” Brian warned before diving back in for yet another taste of the taboo.

“I’m prepared,” Justin teased back, smiling up at Brian with his slightly bee-stung pink lips that simply begged for another nibble.

“Damn it, Blue Eyes, you’re just too fucking tempting . . . you know that, right? I want to just . . .”

Brian didn’t get a chance to elaborate on just what he wanted to do to the tempting blond, however, because right at that moment another man came barreling around the corner of the building, striding purposefully towards the house they were huddling against. Brian only got a glimpse of a blue uniform out of the corner of his eye before Justin was pushing him away and frantically trying to escape from the corner into which he’d been backed. Brian took a second to wipe his mouth and then turned around to face whatever was coming.

“Is that you, Taylor?” the newcomer drawled, a hint of suspicion in his tone.

“Hobbs,” Justin replied. “I was just about to head inside to get ready for tonight’s mission. What are you doing back so early?”

“Jacobsen’s come down with the same thing MacCarthy got, so I got called in on the rotation too,” the tall, dirty blond man explained distractedly, still busy eyeing Brian while he spoke. “Who’s this?”

“Just another American I met down at the pub. He hasn’t learned how to deal with the British currency yet, so I took pity on him. And since he was headed to the Tube station next, I offered to show him the way after I grabbed my flight gear,” Justin explained, impressing Brian with his hastily contrived cover story, which would almost work too if it weren’t for the fact that Justin looked like a man who’d just been thoroughly kissed to within an inch of ejaculation. Justin plowed on, though, all fake confidence as he offered introductions. “Brian Kinney, this is Pilot Officer Christopher Hobbs. Hobbs just got billeted here with me this morning as his prior residence was damaged in last night’s raid.”

Hobbs looked Brian over critically and, most notably, did NOT offer his hand in greeting. “Kinney. What brings YOU to The Big Smoke?” he asked suspiciously.

Thinking this was as good a time as any to trot out his freshly forged credentials, Brian responded, “I’m a correspondent with the US War Department - here covering the Blitz and all. I was just asking Officer Taylor here if I could interview him for a story I’m thinking of doing on US Expatriates in the RAF.” Out of the corner of his eye, Brian could see Justin looking at him with surprise. “Perhaps you’d be willing to give me a statement as well sometime?”

“Uh, yeah, sure, I guess,” Hobbs replied, flustered now and maybe even a little flattered to be asked for an interview by a reporter.

“Well, I’ll be going then. I’m sure I can find the Tube from here, Officer Taylor. Thanks for showing me around.” Brian turned his back to Hobbs so he could look in Justin’s eyes and make sure his boy was okay. Justin’s nod and grim smile were only partially reassuring. “I’m staying at The Strand Palace, so if you want to leave me a note there at the desk and let me know when we can meet again for that interview, I’ll be sure and make time,” he suggested with a wink. “Oh, and don’t forget your purchases.” Brian excavated the coffee and biscuits out of his briefcase for Justin and then reluctantly stepped away. “Good luck on your mission tonight, gentlemen.”

With a nod of his head and a tap to the brim of his new hat, Brian made his exit. He fervently hoped that Justin was going to be okay. He didn’t think that Hobbs had actually seen anything, but the way they’d been standing - so close together and touching - was suspicious enough. If he’d thought that his sticking around would have helped Justin any, Brian would have stayed, but he figured his presence would only make things worse, so he’d best make tracks as quickly as possible. It was killing him, though, not to know what was going to befall his Blue Eyes after he’d left. Fuck this stupid, homophobic, time period, anyway.

Well, there was nothing he could do about the situation now. All Brian could do was wait and see and hope for the best. And he would also go officially check into The Strand so that his perky pilot could leave him that message. It didn’t escape him that a convenient hotel room might be the best solution to their problem of where they could kiss without getting interrupted.

Now, if only Brian could come up with a way to deal with his other problem - how to make sure Mr. Justin Taylor, First Officer, Second Eagle Squadron, didn’t end up a missing blip in the annals of World War II . . .