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Gwen wasn’t sure what number drink she was on. There had been the piña coladas, then there had been the round of Sex on the Beach, which she was sure Owen had only chosen for the pleasure of smirking as he’d named the drink aloud, then there had been sambuca shots, three beers, a bottle of wine, and…
Wait, had the shots been after the wine, or before? There had definitely been Jägerbombs involved somewhere, and tequila shots, but the order was rather warm and fuzzy around the edges. If Gwen was honest, everything was warm and fuzzy around the edges; when she turned her head, it felt as though her brain was buffering to catch up with the change of viewpoint, and the music playing overhead seemed distant and hard to make out, although if she concentrated hard she could tell you that it was ABBA, but the song name escaped her. Was the theme of the night ABBA? There were numerous hen parties and stag dos around them dressed in improbably glittery spandex jumpsuits and platform shoes; she supposed she ought to be grateful that Jack hadn’t insisted on a dress code for the team night out.
Owen caught her staring at a nearby stag party, all of whom were garbed in shirts that were open to the navel, and stacked platform shoes. Cardiff’s fancy dress shops must be facing a chronic shortage of 1970s attire, she thought to herself with a small chuckle, as Owen leaned over with an easy grin and nudged her gently in the side. He was sober as a judge, an unfortunate side effect of his dead-yet-undead state, and she felt a sudden and passionate stab of pity for him, although even in her drunk state she knew better than to voice that thought aloud. She enjoyed being alive, even if he didn’t.
“Fancy Rhys in some of that get-up?” Owen asked, and she giggled at the mere image, her cheeks burning as she thought about her dolled up in a matching outfit, and she wondered about having a themed event for the girls in a couple of weeks. Would it be fun? Or would it be really shit? It was more than likely that she’d get called off to some emergency after ten minutes and she’d have to leave her mates with Rhys, and they might take Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! a bit seriously after a few drinks. “Maybe we should have a team fancy dress party and do plus ones. Not that Tosh and I have them, and Jack and Ianto would just bring each other. But still.”
“I’m not sure Rhys would be a fan.”
“Of us, the seventies, or fancy dress?”
Gwen considered this question for a moment; her husband had made his thoughts on Torchwood perfectly clear. Well. His thoughts on Jack; he’d outright loved Ianto and Tosh, although the jury was still out about Owen. “The first two,” she told him. “He’s dressed up before.”
Owen’s eyebrows shot up, and he snickered; she punched him in the upper arm as she realised what she’d implied, and he held up his hands in a silent gesture of surrender. "Hey!” he protested, still laughing. “You’re the one who said it, not me!”
“Filthy-minded…”
“Why’s Owen being filthy minded?” Jack chipped in, returning to the table with another tray of shots; these ones were acid-green, and Ianto eyed them with considerable distaste. Gwen didn’t blame him. “I mean, this time?”
“Gwen said Rhys dresses up.”
“Does he now?” Jack raised his own eyebrows and smirked at her, and she felt her cheeks flush. “Well, that’s quite the intimate revelation. Please tell me you’ve got a PC Plod routine. Please.”
Owen groaned. “No, please don’t. I’ll never be able to look at her or Rhys the same way ever again. Or Andy.”
Gwen wrinkled her nose, the alcohol blurring the topics together in her mind, and forcing her to think about sex and Andy in the same headspace seemed entirely wrong. She knew Andy had had girlfriends, yes, and the odd boyfriend, but she didn’t ever want to think about him doing… that. It was like thinking about your family members doing it, or… well, she supposed she knew her colleagues did it. She’d caught Ianto and Jack only the previous week, and she was still unsure whether she wanted to shake the image in her mind, or use the incident for blackmail. As for Owen… well, the less she thought about what had happened between them the previous year, the better.
“Yeah, let’s not objectify my husband,” she implored them. “And if we’re doing stereotypes, that means Owen’s into doctor… stuff.”
“I am not into doctor stuff,” he denied at once, handing the shots around to his colleagues in a slightly officious manner that contradicted what he’d just said. “I don’t get off on sticking needles into people, or cutting them open. Who do you think I am, Frankenstein?”
“No, I mean like…” Gwen bit her lip as she took two shot glasses. “You know, doctors and nurses.”
Ianto was still staring at the semi-luminous green alcohol with an expression akin to abject horror, although he too was holding two measures; Gwen elbowed him gently in the side. “It’s apple flavoured,” she told him in an undertone, as Jack grinned at Owen, who probably would have been blushing if he still had the blood for it. That thought alone was rather sobering.
“I feel very victimised by this topic of conversation,” Owen announced, half-chucking the now-empty tray down beside their table. “I’m going to file a complaint with HR about bullying.”
“I am HR,” Jack pointed out, and Owen slumped back in his seat with a look of great defeat, flipping Jack off with both hands as he did so. “Everyone, come on, count down. Three… two… one…”
They necked their shots as one, with Owen watching on with an acute sense of yearning that made Gwen feel somewhat uncomfortable. She wondered how it must feel to be trapped, as he was, between life and death, isolated from the things that had once brought him joy; she considered for half a second reaching over and taking his hand, but that would be an act of overt sympathy, and even in her intoxicated state, she knew how he would react to such gestures. Better to continue riling him; at least that was he could feel slightly alive.
“God, that’s foul,” Ianto said, shuddering as he leaned towards the table and began arranging the now-empty glasses into two neat stacks in an automatic manner; he barely seemed aware that he was doing it, and Gwen found herself oddly touched by the gesture. It was Ianto all over, taking care of them and thinking of others; he’d been taking their empties back to the bar whenever there was a lull in the conversation, and with any of the others Gwen might have thought that they were merely trying their luck with the barwoman, but not Ianto. Well, and not Jack either, she supposed; the two of them were far too enamoured with each other for that. “What was that?”
“Sourz Apple.”
“Tasted more like battery acid,” Ianto shuddered again. “Disgusting.”
“Drunk a lot of battery acid?” Owen asked. “I mean, I know there’s not much to do in Wales, but…”
“Tosh, you’ve got to keep Owen under control,” Jack implored her; Tosh had remained rather quiet for the last half hour, and Gwen wondered with a pang of guilt if she’d had too much to drink. It was an unpleasant feeling, she knew, to try and suppress your nausea or maintain a façade of relative composure, and she looked across the table to her colleague with concern, only to find her smiling serenely at Jack, unbothered by his teasing.
“I’m not his handler,” Tosh pointed out, sounding surprisingly sober, or perhaps she was just better at holding her drink than Gwen gave her credit for. They didn’t usually drink this much, but it had been One of Those Weeks. “Or his keeper. I’m not using a cattle prod on him, either.”
“Thanks. My arse thanks you too,” Owen quipped, and she laughed at that, and Gwen knew then that she was drunk, because she didn’t blush in the same manner that she usually would’ve at the mere allusion to part of Owen none of them ever saw. “Fried meat. Lovely.”
“Speaking of which,” Ianto chipped in with a faintly haunted expression. “Can we please not go to that bloody awful kebab place after this? I don’t think I’ve recovered from the last trip and-”
“The screaming shits?” Owen finished for him, shaking his head before continuing. “Yeah, nor have I. I’m the poor bastard to had to medicate you all, remember? I think I’ll carry that memory with me forever, which in my case is a long time.”
“No Dave’s Kebabs,” Jack pretended to write the point down on the back of his hand, then mimed underlining it twice. “Duly noted. We could try that new pizza place on the corner of Queen Street though.”
“God, that sounds good,” Gwen let out a longing sigh; the thought of a hot pizza was impossibly appetising right now, as was the prospect of chips. “Can we just go there now and come back? Or we could go over to Ignite once we’ve eaten, have a little dance…”
“I’m not dancing,” Owen said at once, holding up both hands. “I’ll mind the handbags.”
“Boring,” Tosh teased, but she chucked her handbag at him anway; he barely caught it. “But thanks.”
“I didn’t mean yet,” he groused good-naturedly, but he swung the strap over his shoulder with a small, secret smile that Gwen felt guilty for having witnessed.
“So is it Pizza O’Clock?” Jack asked, and Gwen got to her feet, swayed unsteadily, and was saved by Ianto grabbing her arm.
“Yes,” he told Jack, wrapping an arm around Gwen’s waist as she regained her balance. It was strange being this close to him; he was usually one of the least hands-on members of the team, although he made a notable exception for Jack. She’d definitely seen far too much of that last week. Ianto was the polar opposite to Rhys, tall and surprisingly solid to Rhys’s shorter softness and she found herself blushing like a schoolgirl as she caught a whiff of his aftershave, and it took everything in her to not giggle. I’m married, she remined herself, a touch hysterically. And I’m very much not his type. “Alright?”
“Alright,” she acquiesced, deciding she could chance being cheeky. “But maybe hang onto me all the same, it’s not every day I get escorted out of a club by a charming Welshman in a suit.”
“I dunno, you got kicked out of Lava by security last month,” Owen pointed out, and she flipped him off with the hand not clutching Ianto’s arm.
“They didn’t have suits on,” she noted. “And they weren’t charming.”
Jack grinned at the two of them and then met Ianto’s gaze; something unreadable flickered between them and then the five of them began heading for the door.
“This is weird,” Gwen said softly, finally laughing. “You’re that much taller than me.”
“I know. I haven’t left a club with a girl since…” he trailed off. “Well, in a while.”
“Maybe don’t make a habit of it,” Jack said from behind them, and before either of them could stop him he’d leaned into the small gap between them and pressed a kiss to first Ianto’s cheek and then Gwen’s. Dancing away from them and striding ahead, he cuffed Owen gently in the back of the head, and as they reached the street the two men pretended to square up to each other before Owen extended his arm into the road and a cab drew to a halt.
“One nil,” he teased Jack, who was hanging his head in mock defeat. “Better luck next time.”
“This is bloody good pizza,” Ianto sighed blissfully, sinking back into the sofa in his flat. There had been some discussion in the pizza parlour about whether or not to go to a second pub or maybe even a club, before Ianto had argued successfully that his place had cold beer, snacks, and you could hear yourself think, if you so chose. Failing that, there was a sleek, state of the art sound system, which was currently playing what Gwen mentally categorised as ‘lift music’, but was probably actually deeply prestigious. Maybe she’d ask about it later. The team were ensconced around the open-plan living area; Gwen was tucked up on the sofa beside Ianto, who looked oddly naked now he’d shed his suit jacket, while Owen and Tosh were making some kind of concoction in the kitchen and Jack was staring out of the window, a beer in his hand as he looked over the city.
“It is,” she concurred, shovelling another slice into her mouth as Owen and Tosh headed over to them with a tray of whiskey tumblers, each of which contained a bright red liquid adorned. “What is that?”
“Owen made it,” Tosh beamed at him with pride, and continued in a singsong voice: “It’s a surprise.”
“Is the surprise that it contains your blood?” Ianto asked, wrinkling his nose. “It looks really… weird. I don’t think I have any alcohol that’s that colour.”
“I don’t exactly have blood to spare,” Owen reasoned. “So, you’re safe.”
Ianto still looked unconvinced, and he took a glass with a mistrustful expression, sniffing it experimentally. “Looks weird,” he reiterated, setting it down on the arm of the sofa next to him; Gwen felt a flash of concern at the bright liquid and the cream fabric, but she supposed it was his flat and his risk to take.
Jack turned back to them, tilting his head to the side and surveying the strange-looking cocktails with an entirely unruffled expression. “Wow,” he said brightly. “Last time I drank anything that colour, it was chilli flavour. I was sweating for weeks.”
“That’s reassuring,” Ianto told him. “Thanks. It’s not Owen’s blood, but it might make me sweat. Brilliant.”
“It’s got grenadine in, you dick,” Owen rolled his eyes. “No chilli, no blood, no bloody… what’s that beetle stuff? Cochineal? Yeah, none of that. Shut up and drink your cocktail.”
“Are we cheersing?” Jack asked, taking a glass and holding it up. “Fuck it, we are. Cheers.”
“Cheers,” the team echoed, and took a sip as one.
Whatever had been in the cocktails Owen had crafted, it was certainly potent; Gwen was sat on one side of the breakfast bar with Ianto on the opposite side, the two of them playing a rather sluggish game of Snap with a packet of cards that Jack had produced from a pocket of his coat, and both of them nursing tumblers of whiskey.
“Snap!” Gwen half-shouted, slamming her hand down on the pile and sliding it towards Ianto, who blinked dazedly at her, as though struggling to process what had just happened. “OK?”
He didn’t respond, merely took another sip of his whiskey and then lit up.
“OK?” she asked again, a little concerned with how he was now staring at her; he looked as though he’d just had a startling revelation.
“We’re all soup,” he said with complete confidence, and Gwen blinked at him in absolute bafflement. Had they had that much to drink that it’d scrambled his brain?
“I’ll take that as a no, and that you’ve had too much to drink. Explain.”
“We’re about 60% water,” he began, sounding surprisingly certain of himself. Was that a good sign or a bad sign?
“OK,” she frowned, struggling to see where he was going, or even where this idea had come from. Then again, the last time she’d had too much Prosecco she’d ended up debating the ethics of keeping pets with Tosh, so she wasn’t entirely surprised. “That doesn’t make us soup.”
“Yeah, but we consistently have meat and or vegetables in us, broken down by stomach acids.”
“OK…” Gwen shot a sly look over at Jack, and she couldn’t stop herself from smirking as she teased: “Maybe don’t break too much of him down.”
Ianto ignored the subtle dig, which was definitely a bad sign. “And it’s about 37 degrees in there, which could slowly cook anything in us.”
“You’re starting to sound like Owen,” she raised her eyebrows at him, and considered confiscating his drunk. “But OK… yeah, technically, I guess.”
“And soup is made up of vegetables or meat, slowly boiled in water…”
“Oh my god,” Gwen’s eyes widened as she finally cottoned on, and she felt a deep and profound sense of horror creep over her. “And our skin is the bowl.”
“We’re all soup.”
“Right,” Owen said loudly, striding over to them and whisking away both their glasses, which he handed to Jack, who promptly downed both without so much as a second’s hesitation. “I think you two have had quite enough to drink, so I’m going to attempt to use Ianto’s very expensive coffee maker and sober you up.”
“No you’re not,” Ianto protested, getting to his feet and immediately toppling forward into Owen’s arms; Owen lowered him gently to the floor and patted him on the head like a small child.
“Steady on, my Welsh chum. I’ve read the manual.”
“Have you?” Ianto asked weakly.
“No, of course I haven’t,” Owen rolled his eyes. “I’m a bloke. But you can tell me what to do, alright? I’m not listening to you and Gwen tell me that I’m technically gazpacho.”