Date: Wed, 06 Mar 2002 09:02:32 -0800
From: D S <denis141@hotmail.com>
Subject: ALONE/TOGETHER- Chapter 24 ~ ANNUS MIRABILIS,
     Part Five: When Winter Breaks Up

This is the last part of this arc, and I hope you like it.  When I started
it, my hope was to write a "year-in-the-life" sort of thing and, for better
or worse, that's what (I think) I did.  To be honest, I'm not sure where
I'll go from here.  There are more stories to tell, but I don't want to just
write episodes either.  This also seems like a good place to stop, so that's
a possibility too, because I tried to sum things up here.  For those of you
who really like the story, and want to see it keep going, please send me an
email and let me know.  Also, I'd appreciate your thoughts on things that
you think remain unsaid, or situations you'd like to see Lance and JC in as
they grow together.  Anyway - I'm rambling now, so I'll shut up.  The email
address is: denis141@hotmail.com.  Hearing from you all really does mean a
lot to me, so I hope that you write, especially if you've never written
before, or because you don't want me to call it quits.  I always write back.

DEDICATION:  This chapter is for Cris, who recently wrote some really great
feedback, and for Aaron (again), because his opinion always matters the
most.

DISCLAIMER:  I don't know any member of NSYNC, and this story purely a work
of fiction.  This story also contains male-male sex (albeit mostly implied),
so, if that's not your thing, or if you aren't old enough to read such
things, you should stop reading now.

CHAPTER 24:  ANNUS MIRABILIS ~ Part Five:  When Winter Breaks Up.

	ROOTS and leaves themselves alone are these;
Scents brought to men and women from the wild woods, and from the pond-side,
Breast-sorrel and pinks of love-fingers that wind around tighter than vines,
Gushes from the throats of birds, hid in the foliage of trees, as the sun is
risen;
Breezes of land and love-breezes set from living shores out to you on the
living sea-to you,
O-Sailors!
Frost-mellow'd berries, and Third-month twigs, offer'd fresh to young
persons wandering out in           the fields when the winter breaks up,
Love-buds, put before you and within you, whoever you are,
Buds to be unfolded on the old terms;
If you bring the warmth of the sun to them, they will open, and bring form,
color, perfume, to you;
If you become the aliment and the wet, they will become flowers, fruits,
tall blanches and trees.
   	--Walt Whitman, Roots and Leaves Themselves Alone, Leaves of Grass
(1900).


October 31, 2007

	JC leaned against the hood of Justin's Jaguar, stretching his arms and
lower back, both of which were sore.   Standing up, he wiped the sweat from
the back of his neck and shook his right hand to dry it off.  He had spent
all morning helping Justin unpack and now he was standing outside waiting
for the furniture truck to get there.  It was a half hour late.  Justin's
house in Los Angeles had finally sold, and he had bought this new one in
Coronado Cays just days later.  It was in an exclusive gated community
across the bay from San Diego.  JC assumed that Justin must have paid a lot
of money for it, because it was on the beach, had its own private dock, and
included a membership to the yacht club.

	JC turned and looked up the street as he heard the rumble of the truck
before he saw it.  The truck pulled into sight and JC waved at it.  There
were three men stuffed into the cab of the truck, and all wore grim
expressions and baseball caps.  Watching them climb out, JC walked toward
the truck and smiled and nodded his head.

	"There's a door at the side of the house you can use to bring the furniture
in," JC said, pointing down a long sloping path that seemed to lead around
the house toward the water.  "It'll be easier.  There's no stairs."

	"Okay," one of the men said, nodding but not smiling.

	JC walked back toward the house, climbing the stairs that lead to the front
door.  The house was a modernist construction of limestone-hued stucco,
concrete blocks, and glass.  It seemed triangular as you approached it, as
if it had once been a different shape, an elongated set of stacked boxes;
but the top of it had been sliced off at an angle, leaving the front of the
house low and the back of it peaked skyward.

	Reaching the front door, which was made of rusted metal and set deep in the
wall, JC got the feeling he was about to enter someplace secret.   He pushed
the door open and noticed again how heavy the door felt, as if it resisted
opening, and you needed strength to enter, or the real need to get in.
Stepping inside, and letting go of the door, JC heard it shut behind him
with a slow swooshing thud.

	The foyer was small, and dim, with a dark impastoed wall not more than four
feet in front of you.  You felt trapped at first, as if you had wandered
into the wrong place by mistake, like a closet.  But then you turned to your
left to walk toward a narrow gap in the wall; it was hardly wider than three
feet, and slightly crooked, as if carved out by hand, and there was sunlight
pouring through it, like into a cave.  Walking through the gap, that was the
surprise: you entered a vast open sun-filled space and confronted a glass
wall that seemed to contain the entire sky.  It was as if you had, in trying
to get inside the house, stepped outside instead.

	"It's a neat trick, huh?" Justin said, leaning against stack of three
unopened boxes, and watching JC stand gape-faced and staring at the view.

	"It's just wow," JC said, pressing his lips together and smiling at Justin.
  "I mean, whoever designed this place knew what he was doing."

	"I'd say."

	"Do you know who it was?"

	"Yeah, the realtor said it was some guy named Steven Holl," Justin said.
"He's famous, I guess."

	"You guess?" JC said, laughing.  "He's really famous.  He won the Pritzker
Prize last year. "

	"Da what?"

	"The Pritzker," JC said.  "It's like the Nobel prize for architects."

	"That's pimp," Justin said, looking around at his new house and smiling.
"No wonder it cost so much."

	"Don't even tell me."

	"Anyways," Justin said, shrugging his shoulders and grinning at JC.  "You
wanna grab a beer and go out on the deck while the furniture gets all
unloaded?"

	"Yeah," JC said, following Justin across the main room of the house and
into the open-air kitchen that filled the far corner of it. "That sounds
good."

	The doors leading to the deck were at least fifteen feet tall and were made
of glass and pale-blue enameled steel.  Justin leaned against the left one
and the door seemed to open almost of its own accord.  JC felt the ocean air
immediately on his face and could taste the salt in it.  San Diego's modest
skyline stood in the near distance, less than a mile across the bay, which
was dotted with boats and water-skiers.  The deck was painted deep blue and
it jutted out from the house at an angle, like the bow of a large boat.
There was no place to sit down so Justin and JC leaned against the red metal
railing that surrounded the deck.  It felt cold against JC's bare arms, like
the bottle of beer he now held.

	"You think you're going to be happy here?" JC asked, turning away from the
rail to look at him.

	"As much as I ever was," Justin said.  "But I like the fact that it feels
like starting I'm over, and doing something new - you know, like different
than before."

	"Yeah, I can see that," JC said.  "When Lance and I first moved here it
felt good, not so much because it was different, but because we were finally
getting a place of our own, someplace to escape to, for us to be alone
together, and just be us."

	"I was always sort of jealous of that," Justin said, taking a short sip of
beer. "How we'd finish a tour or something, and then the two of you'd just
disappear."

	"You were always welcome to visit," JC said.  "And it's not like I was
running off to get away.  I was just going home, you know?"

	"Yeah.  I know," Justin said, taking a long drink of beer.  "I always
thought about coming down here to hang out.  But I was still with her, you
know."

	"And she hated me."

	"Oh... yeah," Justin said, shaking his head up and down.  "She had you
pegged as gay from day-one, and she was convinced you were going to convert
me."

	"That's just weird."

	"Uh-huh.  But what was I?  Like 22 or 23?"

	"If that."

	"I know, because I didn't even feel that old.  It was like I was still the
kid that joined the group at 14, and being a grown up was just another role
to play.  I mean, fuck, Jayce, it was like I'd been grown in a test-tube and
raised to perform. It's all I knew."

	"Lance used to call you the '4-H calf'," JC said.

	"He did not!"

	"It's true," JC said, laughing.  "He said you'd been bottle-fed and raised
to win a blue ribbon at the county fair."

	"Fucker!"

	"He meant it nicely though."

	"Oh, yeah," Justin said, laughing sarcastically. "Like me calling him a
'bull dyke' was meant all nice-like."

	"Remember that time you told him he'd joined the wrong band by mistake, and
that the Indigo Girls had called and wanted him to come back."

	Justin burst out laughing, spraying beer all over JC's bare legs.  JC was
bent over and laughing hard too, holding on to the deck-railing with one
hand, and resting his beer bottle on his knee. He barely noticed the beer
dripping down his legs.

	"Stop it!" Justin said, laughing and starting to choke on his beer at the
same time.  "You're killing me here."

	"You?" JC said, choking too on half-swallowed beer.  "What about me?"

	"Just shut up," Justin said, sitting his beer bottle on the deck and
punching JC in the shoulder.  "Shut up!"

	"Yeah - well," JC said.  "Only if you promise not to tell Lance I always
laughed when you called him a 'dyke'."

	"Deal."

	JC looked at his watch and then at Justin, who was staring into the
distance now, or maybe just looking at his new sailboat as it shifted slowly
back and forth in the water near the end of his dock, the mast wagging like
a finger pointed at the sky.  Looking at the boat now too, JC noticed that
it had no name painted on it yet, and he wondered what Justin would decide
to call it.  JC thought to ask, but he decided to wait.

	"Hey, so I should get going," JC said.

	"Yeah?"

	"Yeah," JC said, reaching out and squeezing Justin's left shoulder, and
taking one last look at the boat.  "We've got a dozen kids coming to our
house for a Halloween party, and Lance should be freaking out just about now
wondering where I am."

	"Nice to be needed, huh?" Justin said.

	"Sometimes," JC said.

	Justin watched JC walk back toward the house and then stop and turn back
around, as if he'd forgotten something.

	"Wassup?" Justin asked.

	"If you want to come over later," JC said.  "Feel free."

	"Thanks," Justin said.  "But I think I'll get some more boxes unpacked.
And I got plans for dinner later on anyway."

	"With anyone I know?" JC asked.

	"What do you think?"

	"Okay," JC said.  "I'll see you then."

	"Yeah, I'll ring you up tomorrow," Justin called after JC, watching him
pull open the door and walk into the house.

*	*	*	*	*

	JC lay propped up against two pillows he'd leaned against the padded
headboard of the bed.  He was reading the last few pages of a novel,
Foucault's Pendulum, and was trying to finish it before Lance got out of the
shower.  Lance's next movie was based on this book, and having nearly read
the whole thing, JC was puzzled how it could be made into a film.  It was a
great story though, full of surprises and weirdness. He wondered what part
Lance would play, probably Causaubon.

	Looking up from reading, JC saw Lance walk out of the bathroom.  He was
naked except for the towel that covered his head as he dried his hair.  His
skin was smooth and tanned, and his nipples were erect from the shock of the
cooler bedroom air.  JC watched him walk across the room and then throw the
towel on the long leather-covered bench that sat at the end of the bed.
Lance smiled at JC as he crawled on all fours across the bed towards him,
kissing him when he got there, then crawling under the covers beside him,
and noisily exhaling as if having just crossed the finish line after a long
race.

	"I think you still have goblin grease on your forehead," JC said, licking
the tip of his finger and then rubbing it just above Lance's left eyebrow.

	"What?" Lance said, in mock surprise.  "You don't think green skin is
sexy?"

	"Uh, no," JC said, kissing the spot where the green face-paint had been.
"But I think it was nice that you dressed up like a goblin for Aaron's
Halloween party."

	"Did you see the look on his face when he first saw me?"

	"You mean that look of terror?" JC said, setting his book on the bedside
table.

	"That wasn't terror?" Lance said, trying not to sound defensive

	"Confusion then," JC said, teasingly.  "He'll probably need therapy.  I can
see it now: 'Hi, my name is Aaron, and my Dad was a goblin'."

	"Oh, shut up," Lance said, softly punching JC's arm.

	"Seriously, though," JC said.  "It was cool. Really cool.  And he was very
proud that he had the only Dad in costume at the party."

	"Right on," Lance said, settling into his pillow and smiling up at JC.
"And it was fun too.  I always wanted to be a goblin as a little kid, but my
Mom always dressed me up like a cowboy or an astronaut.  Boring."

	"Better than being dressed as a ballerina," JC said.

	"No way!" Lance said, sitting quickly up in bed.

	"I was kidding!" JC said, laughing.

	Lance laid his head back down and sighed loudly.  JC watched him for a
moment, and then turned the light off and lay down on his left side next to
Lance, listening to see if he was falling asleep.  JC knew that he had spent
the whole day getting everything set up for the party.  He had carved at
least twenty pumpkins, and there was still black crepe paper and artificial
cobwebs everywhere.  Lance had even put dry-ice in the pool to turn it into
a huge bubbling cauldron.

	"So how's Justin's new house," Lance asked, startling JC from his thoughts.

	"Oh," JC said, pulling Lance against his chest, and slipping his arms
underneath and around him.  "It's definitely got the 'wow' factor going for
it."

	"Really?" Lance said, speaking softly, and nestling his head in the crook
of JC's neck.  "What's it like?"

	"It's hard to describe," JC said, running his hand slowly down the length
Lance's arm in a long caress. "You just kind of have to see it for
yourself."

	"Is he going to have a housewarming party?"

	"I don't know," JC said.  "I suppose.  Did I tell you he bought a boat?  A
sailboat.  It's pretty big?"

	"Does he know how to sail?"

	"Probably not" JC said, burying his nose in Lance's still damp-hair and
inhaling deeply.  "But I guess he'll learn."

	"Yeah," Lance said, yawning. "Or drown."

	"Are you tired," JC asked, kissing the top of Lance's head.

	"Exhausted."

	"You did a really great job with the party.  It was really nice."

	"You think?"

	"Yeah, I think."

	"Thanks."

	"You're a great dad."

	"No, we both are," Lance said, taking JC's hand and holding it against the
side of his face.  "I couldn't do this without you, and I wouldn't want to."

	JC felt Lance's breathing steady and his body slowly relax.  He was falling
asleep, and JC felt himself beginning to fall asleep too, as if pulled along
with Lance away from wakefulness toward slumber, together.

November 28, 2007

	JC hung up the phone and turned around.  He had tears in his eyes and could
hardly see.  His vision was a blur and he felt as if he couldn't breathe.
The sound of the television seemed distant, and receding further, until he
suddenly remembered that Aaron was watching a DVD and he needed to make sure
he was all right.  Pulling the bottom of his t-shirt up, JC wiped his eyes
and walked toward the couch where Aaron was sitting.

	"You doing okay," JC asked, speaking softly and wondering whether he had
said it loud enough for Aaron to hear.

	Aaron turned around and looked at JC and then frowned.  JC watched as Aaron
set the remote control for the DVD player next to him on the couch and then
stood up and hung over the back of the couch.

	"Are you crying?" Aaron asked.

	"Yeah," JC said, feeling the surge of sadness return unexpectedly, and
fighting it down.  "Just a little.  I'll be okay though.  Don't worry."

	JC reached out and held Aaron's cheek in his hand and smiled weakly at him.

	"I'm just a little sad right now," JC said, crouching down in front of him.
  "But that happens sometimes."

	"Did I do a bad," Aaron asked.

	JC took Aaron into his arms and hugged him tightly to his chest.

	"Oh, sweetie," JC said, rocking Aaron back forth as he hugged him.  "You
didn't do anything wrong Aaron.  Nothing at all."

	Aaron wrapped his arms around JC's neck and squeezed it.  JC couldn't help
but cry now; and he did, softly, burying his face into the soft fleece of
Aaron's sweatshirt.

	"Don't cry Daddy," Aaron said.  "Everything will be better."

*	*	*	*	*
	JC stood at the edge of the room, near the front door, watching people he
mostly did not know mill about the bar, and wander in from the dining room.
Most everyone was holding a drink, and a lot of people were smoking.  He had
never seen the place so full, or so quiet.  Shirley's piano was covered with
flowers, and it looked strange to see the keys covered, like lips shut
tightly over teeth, and to not see her there, playing all the songs she
loved so much and would never play again.  He had not realized how much he
had liked and admired her.  She'd been a brave woman, with a wicked wit, and
an inability to speak anything but the truth.

	He remembered the day she had come to visit Aaron in the hospital and she
had said, "If he doesn't live, you can't let it kill you too."  Those words
had been so hard to hear.  And remembered how he'd gasped hearing them, and
how she had reached and held him hard by the wrists, and it had hurt but
reassured him too.  Now she was gone.

	JC looked up and saw Lance staring at him from the bar.  He was waiting for
the bartender, someone JC didn't recognize, to make their drinks.  Sam, the
usual bartender was sitting slumped in the small booth next to Shirley's
piano, which was where he and Lance always sat when they came to the Red Fox
Inn.  Making his way around the piano, JC walked up to Sam and forced a
smile.

	"You mind if I join you?" JC asked, tapping the edge of the table.

	"No," Sam said, not bothering to look up from the glass of melting ice into
which he was staring.  "Go ahead.  Have a seat."

	"Thanks," JC said, pulling a chair up and sitting down.  "How you doing?"

	"Shitty."

	"Yeah," JC said, almost smiling.  "I figured.  I've had better days
myself."

	"And worse one."

	"That too."

	"This place ain't never going to be the same without her," Sam said,
pushing his glass away and looking up at JC.  "Never."

	"I know," JC said.  "And it's just so weird to see her piano sitting there,
all quiet.  Do you think the owner will hire someone new to play?"

	"She owned the place," Sam said, his brow furrowed.  "I thought you knew
that."

	"She did?" JC said, plainly surprised.

	"Yup," Sam said, nodding his head.  "She bought the place way back when.
Must have been like 1955 or so.  It'd been closed for years, and was damn
near falling apart, but she bought it with the life insurance money she got
when Frank died, and she opened the place back up."

	"And all this wood here," Sam said, continuing. "It came from Surrey, back
in old England.  She'd heard from one of her relations about an old Inn that
was 'bout to be torn down, someplace where her father used to go to when he
was alive.  So she arranged to have it all shipped out here.  I helped her
put that there bar together myself."

	"You loved her, didn't you?" JC said.

	"Like no one else," Sam said, his shoulders slumping.  "She was quite a
woman."

	"Booze, music, and meat - that's what she always said. It was the secret of
the place, and she loved 'em all."

	"And she loved you too," JC said, taking hold of Sam's wrist and squeezing
it.

	"Yeah - but it was music she loved the most.  Not that I minded any.  I was
happy to make her want to sing."

	"So, what'll happen now?" JC asked.  "You going to close the place?"

	"Well, that ain't up to me," Sam said.

	"Why's that?"

	"She left this place to you.  She said you was the only person she ever met
that loved music as much as her. I guess she figured you'd know what to do."

	"She what?" JC said.  "How could she?  It should be yours."

	"I've had what was mine, JC.  She was mine, and we had this place together
for a long time.  I just hope you treat it right, and make that piano there
proud, because she wanted you to have that too.  Here's the key to it."

	"Her piano," JC said, taking the key from Sam's hand.  "Her piano."

	JC turned and looked at the piano. He reached out and touched it.  Its
ebony skin was cold like the black ice that clings to stones in winter.  But
it warmed as the tips of his fingers lingered there, touching it, and the
piano seemed almost to come alive. Standing up, JC shoved his chair to one
side, and walked the few feet that was the distance to it, and he sat down
on Shirley's stool.  His hand shook as he slid the small brass key into the
lock and turned it.  He heard the soft metallic thud of the piano unlocking
and then he uncovered the keyboard, and it was like the piano had smiled at
him. Wiping his hands on the sides of his pants, he stared straight ahead
and started to play.  It was her favorite song, and he started to sing it.

Fate may often treat me meanly
But I keenly pursue
A little mirage in the blue,
Determination helps me through.

Though I never really grumble,
Life's a jumble indeed
And in my efforts to succeed
I've had to formulate a creed.

I believe in doing what I can
In crying when I must
In laughing when I choose
Hey ho, if love were all
I should be lonely.

I believe the more you love a man,
The more you give your trust,
The more you're bound to lose.

Although when shadows fall
I think if only
Somebody splendid really needed me
Someone affectionate and dear
Cares would be ended if I knew that he
Wanted to have me near.

But I believe that since my life began
The most I've had is just a talent to amuse.
Hey ho, if love were all.
Hey ho, if love were all.

Although when shadows fall
I think if only
Somebody splendid really needed me
Someone affectionate and dear
Cares would be ended if I knew that he
Wanted to have me near.

But I believe that since my life began
The most I've had is just a talent to amuse.
Hey ho, if love were all.
Hey ho, if love were all.

Hey ho, if love were all.

	As JC brought the song slowly to an end, his voice trailing off in a long
sigh, he noticed for the first time that his cheeks were wet with tears.  He
felt too the soft pressure of a hand on his shoulder, and he looked up and
saw Lance standing there.  The room was quiet except for the sound of the
piano, and it was as almost if Shirley was not gone at all.

*	*	*	*	*
	Lance descended the stairs, running his hand along the wooden banister
without being aware of it.  He had woke up to find that JC was no longer in
bed with him, and he wanted to find him.  When he got to the bottom of the
stairs, he stood there for several seconds, looking around, wondering where
he had gone.  Probably outside, he thought.

	Opening the back door, Lance looked outside.  He could see that JC was
sitting by the pool, his legs dangling in the water, and his back was to the
house.  JC heard the back door shut, and Lance walking towards him.  He
turned his head around as Lance approached and smiled weakly.

	"You okay?" Lance asked, sitting beside JC and taking his hand.

	"Yeah," JC said, looking away and then staring at the water.  "I couldn't
sleep."

	"Okay," Lance said.

	"I didn't mean to worry you."

	"That's what I'm here for."

	"To be worried?"

	"No. But to care about you.  And to come looking for you when you wander
off."

	"I'll be okay."

	"I know," Lance said.  "I just wanted to see how you were doing."

	"Thanks," JC said, squeezing Lance's hand and resting his head on his
shoulder.

	"That was nice of you to play the piano tonight.  It was really beautiful."

	"It felt good too," JC said.  "It was like I'd forgotten what it was like."

	"To sing?"

	"Yeah.  To sing."

	There was a long silence, and the breeze seemed to turn cold. JC looked up
and saw that clouds littered the sky, hanging low like the top of a sagging
tent.  There were no stars, and the air smelled like damp soil, like a
just-watered lawn.

	"You know, Josh - I've been thinking ...."

	"Wait," JC said, cutting him off.  "I know what you're going to say, and
you don't need to.  I already know."

	"What do you know?"

	"I love music."

	"Okay," Lance said.  "So what do you want to do then?"

	"I don't know.  I mean, I need to do something.  I guess I just assumed it
needed to be something different, something new.  Like you making movies."

	"But if it's something you love."

	"Yeah."

	"Josh," Lance said, wrapping his arm around JC's shoulder and turning him
so that he could look directly into his eyes. "I know it's the biggest
cliché in the world, but just be yourself.  Be you.  I mean, you're so
fucking talented.  My god, remember your song for The Ghost Road. You think
Justin could do something like that?"

	"It's not a competition."

	"I know that," Lance said.  "But it's your life.  And I want you to be
happy with it.  I don't want to be afraid that in twenty years you're going
to be bitter and sad about not having done what you wanted, or needed to do.
  And I really would hate myself if I ever felt like I'd held you back."

	"I'm not unhappy, Lance.  I love our life together."

	"I do too," Lance said.  "I really do.  But I think you need to be more
selfish sometimes.  I mean it."

	  "I don't know," JC said, sounding defeated, and closing his eyes. "That's
always been the hard part for me.  It's always been easier for me to retreat
into myself, like I did when you were gone, or to focus on other people, and
not me.  That's why being in the band was always so important to me, and so
easy.  I was never like Justin, wanting to be front and center all the time,
and always thinking about the next solo project."

	"I'm sorry I made you leave," Lance said.  "It was wrong of me."

	"You didn't make me.  It was my choice.  And it really was time."

	"But it was selfish of me, and not in any good way," Lance said.  "It was
just that I was jealous of it, your attachment to it, to being in the band,
and to the other guys. It was like I wanted proof you loved me more than
them.  Then when I got it, I didn't know what to do with it.  I'm sorry I
never told you that before."

	"I knew as much," JC said.  "And in some ways, you had reason to be
jealous. At times, I did love that band as much of you, sometimes more."

	"It's weird, because I always knew that about you," Lance said, his voice
so soft it was barely audible above the soft purring noise of the pool's
filter pump.  "I just didn't understand it.  Maybe I was too young.  I don't
know."

	"Well, I'm not sure I understood either. It was just something that felt
good, and required no thought.  It was like a drug almost, escaping into
it."

	"Remember how I used to stare at you when you sang "This I Promise You,"
and you'd always catch me and grin and laugh or something."

	"How could I forget?" JC said, wrapping his arms around Lance and wondering
if night air was making him cold.  "Even if I didn't look, I could always
feel you staring."

	"It was because when you sang it," Lance said, his voice wavering.  "When
you sang that song, our song, it was like you went someplace I couldn't
follow, and it always made me feel so alone.  But when you'd look at me, and
smile, it was like I'd pulled you back to me, reminded you I was still
there.  And when you did smile at me, oh my god, it was like falling in love
with you all over again."

	"Really?"

	"Really."

	"I never knew that."

	"I never told you."

	"Do you think you'll still feel that way?" JC asked, his voice timid now.

	"No," Lance said, opening his eyes and seeing JC's tear-filled eyes staring
back at him.  "No, because now I know what it's like - you know, to sort of
put your heart into a performance and disappear into it.  But most
importantly, I trust you to always come back to me, to not leave me. I
didn't trust that before. Now I do.  And I'm not afraid anymore."

	"Thank you," JC said, kissing Lance, his lips trembling and damp.

	"So what do you want to do?"

	"I'm not sure," JC said. "I think maybe I'll keep the Inn, you know, keep
it open.  I can't run it full-time or anything, and wouldn't know how to
anyway.  But I suppose I can pay someone to do that."

	"Like Sam?"

	"Yeah, like Sam," JC said.  "Or you.  You want to run a restaurant?"

	"I think I'll pass on that one," Lance said.

	"And it might be fun to play there once a week or so, and maybe work on
some new material, for an album or something.  I've never done a solo
album."

	"I think that would be great," Lance said.

	"Yeah. Me too," JC said, wiping his nose on the back of his sleeve. "But,
if I do it, it's going to be for the love of it."

	"Like Shirley."

	"Yeah, like Shirley," JC said, looking at Lance, and kissing him, and then
taking Lance's hand as he helped him to stand up.

December 24, 2007

	JC and Lance watched nervously as Aaron stood before the display of
Christmas ornaments.  He was trying to decide which one to choose.  Lance
had told him he could choose one, and Aaron was plainly taking the decision
very seriously. He'd been standing in front of the display for fifteen
minutes, bending close in to examine a candidate, then bending back, as if
to consider his options further.

	"Aaron, you can pick them up to look at if you're real careful," Lance
said.

	"No thank you," Aaron said, pointing.  "I want that one please."

	"Okay then," JC said, taking Aaron's hand while Lance picked up the
ornament that he'd selected.

	"Do you have your money?" Lance asked, crouching down in front of Aaron.

	"Yes," Aaron said.  "Dad's holding it for me."

	"Here you go," JC said, handing Aaron a crumpled ten-dollar bill.

	Aaron took the money and walked to the counter.  A young Hispanic woman
stood behind it, smiling at Aaron as Lance handed her the ornament.  She
wrapped the ornament in tissue paper and put it in small white sack.  Aaron
reached up and put the ten dollar bill on the counter and waited for his
change.

	"Will you keep the rest of my money for me?" Aaron said, taking the sack
off the counter and looking up at JC.

	"Sure thing," JC said, extending his hand and watching the young woman
place a dollar, two quarters, and a dime in his hand.

	"We're all set then," Lance said, jangling his car-keys.

	"I think," JC said, taking Aaron's hand.

	"Great," Lance said.  "Time to go home and decorate the tree."

*	*	*	*	*
	Aaron sat cross-legged on the floor eating a peanut butter and jelly
sandwich.  He was watching as Lance put the last string of lights on the
Christmas tree, wrapping each branch carefully so that the small shining
lights seemed like the leaves of a glowing vine that had entwined itself
throughout the tree.  JC held the ladder steady as Lance climbed down from
it.  The tree was at least twelve feet tall and almost touched the ceiling.

	"Dad, I'm done," Aaron said, holding out the crust of his sandwich to JC.

	"Are your hands sticky," JC asked taking the sandwich from Aaron and
wrapping it in the napkin that had been spread on his lap.

	"My fingers," Aaron said, putting them in his mouth.

	"Hey, go wash your hands then," Lance said, looking at Aaron.

	"I want to put my or-ma-nent on the tree," Aaron said, standing up.

	"After you wash your hands," Lance said.

	"Come on," JC said, taking Aaron's hand.  "We'll get you in your pajamas
too."

	Lance smiled as he watched the two of them leave the living room and head
down the hall.  This was the first year that Aaron was old enough to fully
understand Christmas, and to participate in the traditions he and JC had
developed over the last nine years, most of them on purpose, but some by
accidental too.  Putting the ladder away, Lance laughed, suddenly wondering
how he and JC were going to make love in front of the tree this year, a
Christmas Eve tradition up to now, along with champagne, and shower together
after.

	After sweeping up the pine needles that had fallen from the tree, Lance
removed the lids from the plastic storage boxes that contained most of their
collection of Christmas ornaments.  Each ornament was wrapped in tissue
paper - a job that JC did every year, on New Years Day, while Lance cooked
homemade chili and cornbread.  There were three boxes, each one full.
Sitting next to the other boxes was the small wood box that he and JC had
bought nearly ten years ago to store their first few ornaments in; and it
still contained the first ones, the ones they always put on the tree last.

	Looking at the brass lock that secured it, Lance was seized with panic,
wondering where the key might be, but then he remembered that it had been
his year to keep track of it, and that he'd put it on the mantle underneath
his Academy Award.  He walked across the room to see if it was still there,
and it was. Lance smiled and slipped it into the pocket of his shirt,
relaxed again just as he heard the muffled thudding sound that he knew was
Aaron running down the hall in his stocking-covered feet.

	"Hey - looks like we're ready to go," JC said, following Aaron into the
room, and looking around.

	"Let me grab the champagne," Lance said, winking at JC and knowing he'd
blush at the obvious innuendo in the wink.

	"Aaron, do you want some ginger ale?" JC asked, watching him sit down
before the tree, the small white sack containing his ornament clutched in
his hands.

	"No, please," Aaron said.  "I want to decorate."

	"You can do both Aaron," Lance said, nearly out the door, and on his way to
the kitchen.  "Are you sure you don't want some soda?"

	"Okay," Aaron said, standing up and walking across the room to sit down
next to JC on the couch.

	JC picked up the digital camera that was sitting on the table next to the
couch, and attached it to the tripod that Lance had set up there at the end
of the room.   The camera had good view of the tree and most of the room
from this angle. They had never recorded the tree decorating before, and had
never felt any real reason to do so.  Now, with Aaron, they felt they need
to, as if the memory of it alone had always been enough between the two of
them, with both of them remembering it together, like two people carrying
something too heavy to be carried by just one.  But with Aaron, they didn't
want to leave anything to vagaries of forgetting, and they knew that it was
a remembering for Aaron, as much as for themselves, and it was something
they owed him as his parents.

	Thinking about this now, and staring at the camera, and then the shimmering
haze of the light reflecting in the window behind the tree, JC realized
that, like the ornaments he and Lance had selected and stored away so
carefully over the years, the digital videos, and the photographs, and the
report cards to come, and the lost first teeth, and the sports trophies, and
finger paintings hung first on the refrigerator and then put away for
safekeeping - all of these things belonged to a kind of archeology of caring
and love, a kind of finding and keeping that was not just about not losing,
but of celebrating too.  And just as retrieving the ornaments each year, and
putting them back on a still green tree, was about something more than
having kept them, recording and memorializing the details of Aaron's life:
it was both a duty and a gift, paid for by its own results.

	JC was startled from these thoughts by the sound of Aaron's giggles as he
ran into the room after Lance and sat in front of the tree again.  Lance
handed JC a glass and filled it with champagne, and he managed to kiss his
cheek while he did so.

	"I love you," he whispered in JC's ear.

	JC smiled up at Lance and took a small sip of champagne, knowing it would
be cold and prickly on his tongue.  It always made him shiver, this first
sip.  Lance sat down next to JC and patted his knee.

	"Can I put my orm-a-nent on the tree now?" Aaron said, sitting his glass of
ginger ale on the floor underneath the coffee table so it would be out of
the way.

	"Go ahead," JC said, turning the camera on and checking the video
view-finder to make sure that Aaron was fully in the frame.

	Aaron stood up and carefully removed his ornament from the sack.  It was a
large but delicate crystal star, and the light caught it as he held it
aloft.

	"I want to hang it here," Aaron said, looking over his shoulder at JC and
Lance.

	"That's fine," Lance said, watching Aaron hang the ornament on a strong
branch a quarter of the way up the tree, and then step back to admire it.

	"What is that?" JC asked.

	"It's a star," Aaron said, his voice light and full of excitement.

	"A star?" Lance said.

	"Yes," Aaron said, still staring at it.  "It's magic."

	"Wow!" JC said, looking over at Lance, and finding that he was already
looking at him, and smiling.  "A magic star."

	  "You can make wishes on it," Aaron said.  "But only one. Not more."

	"Are you going to make a wish on it?" Lance asked, standing up and walking
over to Aaron and sitting next to him.

	"No," Aaron said.  "I don't need a wish now."

	"Well, that's good," Lance said.  "You can save it then."

	Lance and Aaron and JC spent the next hour decorating the tree, each taking
turns in selecting an ornament from the three boxes that had been carried up
from downstairs in the basement.  When the three boxes were finally empty,
and pieces of tissue paper lay littered around the room like fallen flower
petals, Lance unlocked the wood box and the two of them took turns hanging
the last few ornaments on the tree.  Aaron watched from the couch,
transfixed by the tree and the lights and all the ornaments there.  Finally,
there were only two ornaments left, and Lance and JC each held one.  Lance
held the wooden candy cane, painted red and white, and hanging from a green
silk string.  JC held a small angel; it was made of porcelain, and had white
feather wings.  They hung these last two ornaments next to each other, on a
sturdy bough near the top of tree; and it seemed as if the golden paper
mache' sun that topped the tree seemed to catch the waning light from the
sky outside and suddenly it shined.

January 1, 2008, 12:15 AM

	They were on the balcony of Justin's house, and from where Lance and JC
stood they could see that Justin and Melanie were sitting on the prow of his
boat, their bare feet dangling over the side, but not touching the water.
Lance was behind JC, with his hand on the deck-railing on each side of him,
gripping it, and letting JC lean back into him.  He could feel the warmth of
JC's cheek against his neck, and it felt good.  Lance released his grip and
wrapped his arms around JC's waist, slipping his hands into the front
pockets of JC's slacks, and cupped his hand over his crotch.

	"You're getting hard," Lance whispered in his ear.

	"Uh-huh," JC murmured.

	"Maybe we should go," Lance said, whispering again.

	"What about Justin and Mel," JC said, not moving from where he rested
against Lance, and in no hurry to escape this embrace.  "Shouldn't we say
good bye?"

	"We'd just be interrupting," Lance said, giving JC's crotch a squeeze.

	JC laughed in the way someone does when suddenly tickled, and he turned
around, and rested his arms over Lance's shoulders, and kissed him. Lance
held tightly to him, not wanting to let go, or for the kiss to end.  Pulling
slowly back from the kiss, but not away from Lance, JC looked at him and
shook his head slowly, as if in wonder.

	"What a year, huh?" JC said.

	"I'll say.  It had its ups and downs."

	"But you know what?"

	"What?" Lance said, playfully squeezing JC's waist as if to force the
answer out of him, or to at least hurry his reply.

	"It was an amazing year - miraculous even," JC said.

	"It was," Lance said, nodding in agreement.  "It really, really was."

	Lance kissed JC, letting his lips linger there, and then they together
turned to look once more into the distance and also at Mel and Justin.  The
two of them were standing now, in the bow of the boat, and looking toward
the horizon as if plotting the next course to sail. Taking Lance's hand, JC
led him away and into the house and back to the car and then home, the two
of them together, at the end of a year of miracles that neither would ever
forget - nor want to.


[Song Credit: "If Only Love Were All," music and lyrics by Noel Coward]