Generation Kill - The Dog Days Are Over (Nate/Brad, Brad/OFC, PG-13)
Happy belated birthday alethialia!
Generation Kill
Brad Colbert/Nate Fick, Brad/OFC
Rated PG-13
The Dog Days Are Over
NATE
Nate makes up his mind at 4:57 on a Tuesday morning.
He gently extracts himself from sheets and tangled limbs and goes off to take a shower. He should feel rested, ready to face the day, but he's not. He's tired. He always seems tired these days. Too tired to fuck. Too tired to talk. Too tired for this life. Maybe today will put an end to that.
He uses the last of the shampoo and opens a new bar of soap. He wraps a towel around his waist when he's done, rubbing steam from the mirror and studying his face in his reflection before slathering on shaving cream.
He doesn't look that different: a line or two, a gray hair or three - but the way he feels... he feels different. Five years is a long time.
Eventually he finishes up and goes back to the bedroom. Brad's still sleeping; Nate is wide awake.
He dresses in the burgeoning light of day, packs a bag and waits.
Brad will be up soon enough.
BRAD
Brad used to wake up in an instant. One minute he was asleep, the next he was awake. Over the years he's started to awaken in stages: cossetted by sleeping in a real bed and not on the ground, lured into alertness by Nate's presence next to him and not thousands of miles or hundreds of feet away.
This morning he wakes up with a start. He couldn't say why.
Nate's not in bed next to him.
Brad blinks at the empty space and looks around the room, bleary-eyed. Nate's sitting in the overstuffed armchair in the corner by the laundry hamper. He looks awake. He's dressed.
Brad sits up. "What?"
NATE
Nate opens his mouth and the words falter. He can't count the number of times he's watched Brad sleep (918). The number of days they've woken up in this bed together (1,142). He couldn't tell you when he started to feel differently. When he realized that something was wrong (183 days ago). He just knows that he doesn't feel the same anymore. That he doesn't think this is working. He understands now why his sister divorced Kevin two years ago.
It's possible to just wake up one morning and not have anything left to give.
It's not that he doesn't care for Brad, he's just not sure that it's enough.
How do you know when it's enough? What do you do when you don't have any reserves left?
BRAD
Nate's staring at him. It makes something in Brad's chest constrict.
Brad knows every look Nate has: bored, tired, horny, proud, aggrieved, irate, distressed, thoughtful, happy.
He hasn't seen resigned in a long time.
A very long time.
He swallows and licks his lips. "Nate..." Brad's voice is softer than usual, coaxing. But there's an edge to it. Something wary. Something hesitant.
He moves to get out of bed and Nate holds up a hand that's as effective as a tether to the mattress.
NATE
"I'm leaving, Brad."
BRAD
Brad sinks back down into the sheets. "You're leaving?"
He feels confused. There's something he's missing. It's early. He hasn't had his coffee or his shower or his blow job. He hasn't surfed or gone running yet. Nate hasn't even said "good morning."
Brad Colbert doesn't miss things; there's something wrong.
"Where are you going?" he presses.
NATE
He swallows.
"I'm going home."
BRAD
"This is your home," Brad starts, and then he gets it.
"You're leaving me."
BRAD
It's very civilized as far as break-ups go. Nate walks out the front door and Brad lets him. Seven minutes and thirty-nine seconds after Nate's Volvo starts in the driveway and drives off, Brad climbs out of bed. He opens the blinds and looks out at the glaring San Diego sun. It looks like it'll be a great day for surfing.
He picks up his phone and flips through various text messages looking for the surfing notice he receives every morning from Jerry and Pam.
The waves are fucking killer. Get out here now.
Fucking killer.
The phone falls out of Brad's hand, lands on his bare right foot and bounces onto the carpeting.
What the fuck just happened?
NATE
He takes the first flight available from SAN to BWI. Delta has got to be the worst carrier ever; they even charge for water now. Nate hasn't packed anything to eat; he apparently didn't pack to leave, either.
He was shocked when he went through security and was pulled aside because his duffel has thirteen pairs of socks, eight undershirts, no pants, no shoes, no toiletries and no underwear.
When the TSA guard raised an eyebrow, Nate stood there at parade rest.
"I just left my boyfriend," he announced.
The guard's face softened. "Oh, baby," she said. "I'm sorry."
Nate shakes his head now just thinking about it. She's sorry.
Nate parks in front of his childhood home instead of pulling into the driveway. His parents are most definitely not expecting him. His mother is working in her garden when he climbs out of the white Ford Focus he rented from Avis, and she shields her face when he slams the car door closed. "Nate?"
He drops his duffel bag and stands on the edge of the lawn with the rental keys in his hand. "Hi, Mom."
Nate's mom has always had a sixth sense about him. She has it about his sister, too: she says it comes from carrying each of them for nine months. There's nothing they can do that she can't figure out in under two minutes.
The first time Nate brought Brad home for Christmas his mother knew what was happening before Nate had even finished making introductions.
He jumps when her damp hand cups his chin. "Nate, where's Brad?" she asks bluntly.
Nate turns his head away.
BRAD
Brad does not want company. He wants to drink and throw Nate's things out and drink some more and then surf. Maybe not in that order. Instead, two days after Nate leaves, he finds himself babysitting his niece, Leah, and her rabbit, Goliath.
His mother suddenly has an appointment and can't watch her granddaughter.
His sister has suddenly decided that she just has to go out for the better part of the entire day.
He's not going to kill himself just because Nate finally did what everyone does; his family needs to get a fucking grip.
And yet, here's Brad, kneeling on fresh carpeting once covered by Nate's favorite chair, trying to get Goliath to stop shitting everywhere.
At least it's not runny shit; runny shit could lead to a Fatal Attraction moment.
"You have to be nice to him, Uncle Brad," Leah insists as she chases her rabbit all over the living room. For such an overweight rabbit, he's fast as hell. "He knows when you're in a bad mood!"
Bad mood. No, Brad is not in a bad mood. According to his mother, Brad is in shock. Brad, however, would beg to differ: he is not in shock. He is...
Fuck whatever Brad is; he doesn't have to discuss his feelings anymore.
Leah just misses clipping her hip on the coffee table as Brad picks up the last of the rabbit poo with a paper towel. Enough is plenty. He strides into the kitchen, disposes of the paper towel and then surveys the AO.
Goliath is a brute of a rabbit, probably over 20 pounds. All fur and ears and currently hovering by the bookcase, nose twitching, and batting at his ears with his feet.
Brad runs through possible scenarios in his head and plans his course of attack. Without a word he motions for Leah to chase Goliath towards him, but he stays hidden until the very last minute and then he pounces, scooping the rabbit up against his chest in a forward roll.
It's a little disorienting to find himself with a handful of fluff.
"You caught him, Uncle Brad!" Leah says triumphantly, throwing her arms around Brad's neck and hugging him hard enough to almost bruise his windpipe.
Brad pats his niece with his free hand. "Of course I caught him," he says blithely.
He hasn't completely lost himself.
NATE
Nate eats and sleeps and shits and drinks and thinks about going outside. Every time he tries to jerk off all he sees is Brad: Brad over him, Brad under him. Brad smiling, Brad stoic, Brad's face sliding from worry into that perfect mask that's anything but perfect. He can still smell Brad on his skin, taste him on his tongue. Touching himself feels wrong. His hands are supposed to be Brad's hands.
His mother says he's in shock.
His father leaves a bottle of Xanax on his dresser.
BRAD
It's not the first day or the second day that causes Brad problems. The first week without Nate goes by fine - if you ignore the fact that Brad throws out pretty much everything that Nate left behind. It's entirely possible that Nate's going to come back, but Brad doesn't work on possibilities anymore. If Nate left, then Nate is gone, and if Nate is gone then there's no reason for his belongings to be in Brad's house anymore.
It's definitely Brad's house now.
The whole facade lasts nine days, thirteen hours and four minutes longer than it should.
Nine hours, thirteen days and five minutes after Nate leaves him, Ray Person comes for an unscheduled visit. "You don't call, you don't write, I had to make sure the LT was letting you out of your sex dungeon of depravity to piss and call your mom," Ray announces from the doorstep before brushing past Brad and walking inside.
Ray stops in the middle of a conspicuously confused room. There are books missing, large sections of the DVD collection are gone. There's a chair, a lamp and an end table missing and there are large blank spots on the wall where photos and art used to be.
And then there's the rabbit.
"'What the fuck happened in here? You get robbed?" Ray asks incredulously.
Brad ignores him and sprawls out on the floor next to Goliath. The large black-and-white rabbit nudges at Brad's fingers and Brad goes back to hand feeding him baby carrots.
"Okay, seriously Brad, you're freaking me out," Ray says crouching down near him. "You've got a rabbit, your house looks like it got repoed by Poke and I don't see one fucking laptop anywhere. Where's the LT?"
Brad smirks down at Goliath.
"Nate's gone."
"Gone where?"
Brad's smile feels all wrong. "How the fuck should I know?"
RAY
Ray is going to kick the LT's ass. All he had to do was one fucking thing: look after Brad.
Fucking officers can't do anything right.
NATE
"But you love Brad," Nate's sister, Katie, argues. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"
"Language," Nate's mother chides mildly.
"Mom, he's being stupid."
"He is right here," Nate says irritably.
It's been like this for almost two weeks. Nate sleeps, shits, checks his emails, ignores the IMs from Ray Person, Stafford and Christeson, goes for runs, talks to his clients, drinks copiously and tries to explain something he's not sure he understands.
At least he's finally leaving the house.
Katie waves a half-empty bottle of Heineken in Nate's direction. "You don't get to talk until you can prove you haven't suffered severe brain damage."
"Then why the hell are you asking me what my problem is? I didn't give you this much grief when you left Kevin."
Katie's laugh is throaty. "That's because you never liked Kevin in the first place. I'm not even sure I ever liked Kevin," she continues after a moment of consideration.
Their mother looks up from stirring the meat sauce on the stove. "That's the father of my only grandchild you're talking about," she says.
"If you didn't love him then why did you marry him?" Nate says, popping the cap on a fresh beer and offering it to their mother.
Evelyn Fick takes her beer, swallows down an impressive amount and goes back to her pot on the stove.
"Because," Katie offers. Both Nate and his mother look at Katie expectantly as she pushes shiny black hair behind her ear. Katie takes a large swallow of her beer and belches.
"Katelyn Emma Fick," their mother scolds.
Katie's cheeks color slightly. "I loved him," she confesses. "I just didn't love him enough."
Nate looks at his sister. "So maybe I just didn't love Brad enough," he offers.
Nate's mother stops stirring the sauce and eyeballs her son. "Bullshit, Nathaniel."
BRAD
The only thing worse than Ray Person stuffed to the eyeballs with Ripped Fuel and dip and babbling about whiskey tango crack babies and NAMBLA is Ray Person stuffed to the eyeballs with righteous indignation and too many shots of tequila.
Ever since Ray showed up in San Diego and found Brad living with a rabbit he'd suddenly been conned into caring for, he's been all over Brad like a bad case of syphilis.
"Don't even worry about this," Ray slurs over what's possibly his eleventh shot of the evening. "I've got people who've got people."
"Ray, I don't think you and the poon-guzzling, trailer-park dwelling rabbit fuckers you call family could be called 'people'," Brad says dryly.
Just over Ray's right shoulder a redhead with a rather impressive rack is playing pool. She's been eying Brad for at least thirty minutes, and most of her trick shots don't need to involve nearly as much contorting as she's giving them. Ray's saying something about Q-Tip and Gunny, about how he's got more Mexicans than the border patrol, but Brad's not listening.
He's thinking about how long it's been since he's had pussy.
He hasn't missed it, but times change. People leave.
Life is about evolution; Brad's going to fucking evolve.
"Find a ride home," Brad says, swallowing the last of his Stella before getting to his feet.
Ray cranes his head, following Brad's target sight. "You know that's a bad idea," Ray hiccups as Brad walks away.
"Yeah," Brad tosses over his shoulder. "So, it's a good thing I'm not paid for my ideas."
The redhead's name is Naomi.
Two nights later there's a brunette named Nicole.
Naomi and Nicole are followed by Noelle.
A week after that there's a peroxide blonde who almost makes it, but her name doesn't start with an 'N' and Brad is nothing if not consistent.
He never brings them home; that's not what this is about.
NATE
"Nate, phone."
Nate looks up from the biography of Andrew Jackson he's reading in his dad's overstuffed plaid armchair and blinks at his mom. "For me?"
It can't be Brad. Brad wouldn't call. Brad would - no, Nate doesn't get to guess what Brad would do anymore.
His mother rolls bright green eyes. "No, for my other son named Nate."
"Yeah, I've been meaning to talk to you about him," Nate winks, taking the proffered handset. His mother just shakes her head as she walks away. Nate closes his book before putting the phone to his ear.
"Nate Fick," he says brusquely.
"Mike Wynn," the voice on the other end answers dryly.
"My god, it must be bad if I'm hearing from you," Nate laughs.
"You know that's pretty much what I'm thinkin' right about now, too."
There's a long pause and then Nate realizes what this is about. "Ah."
"I dunno if 'ah' is the word I was gonna use," Mike says. "I was thinkin' more along the lines of 'what the fuck is goin' on, Nate?'"
A muscle in Nate's jaw sets. "I didn't think Brad--"
Mike looses a howl. "You think Brad Colbert would call for help if he was bleedin' in a bear trap and had to chew his own foot off? I know you two've been livin' together, but do you know that man at all?"
"What's that supposed to mean?" Nate demands.
"That means you left Brad in a bear trap and he's chewing his own leg off. I didn't think you were the kind of man to just leave somebody behind like that."
"I'm not getting into this with you, Mike."
"Fair enough."
"And I didn't just disappear," Nate carries on angrily. "I told him I was leaving."
"That's real nice of you, Nate. And I'm sure, after all y'all've been through, that if he just up and left you one day without any explanation at all you'd be just as obliging about it."
Nate opens and closes his mouth.
"Fuck," he says finally.
After Nate hangs up with Mike he calls Brad.
It's around five in the evening on the West Coast.
He doesn't know what he's going to say, so it's probably a good thing no one answers.
Not even the answering machine.
BRAD
Twenty-eight days after Nate leaves him, Brad meets Trish. It's a little after six in the morning on a Wednesday and Brad's out surfing with the usual suspects. The waves this morning are pretty impressive; there's supposed to be a big thunderstorm later tonight and the currents are confirming this.
Brad's just setting himself up for a wave when this blur of dark green neoprene and reddish-blonde-brown hair snakes him, which is extremely fucked up. Brad stares and then follows. He gets to the top of the crest and less than five feet away is six feet of Amazon.
She smiles at Brad and totally cuts off his ride.
Brad falls off his board and is still sputtering and pissed when the Amazon swims back out. "He who hesitates is lost," she calls out.
Brad gives her the bird and on the next wave he snakes her so hard their boards collide.
This time when Brad swims back out, she gives him the bird.
Pam and Jerry laugh at them from a good fifteen feet away. "I see you've met my sister!" Pam calls out.
Patricia "Trish" Taylor is a 36 year-old pediatrician, born and raised in San Diego. She's a partner in a practice that requires its doctors to volunteer for Médecins Sans Frontières, UNICEF or any other good cause every two years and Trish has just returned from Darfur. She's staying with her sister while she gets her housing sorted out.
After they spend the morning surfing, Brad buys Trish a beer at Doña y Doña's Taco Stand and then calls her a liberal hippie quack.
Trish just yawns. "If that's the best your whiskey tango inbred ass can do I'm surprised you haven't been run out of the Corps yet."
Brad blinks. "How did you know I was in the Corps?"
Trish just laughs. "Men don't look like you unless they're in acting, modeling or the military."
Brad's mouth curls at the corner. "You don't think I could be an actor?"
Trish studies Brad intently for a minute. "What do you think about universal healthcare?"
Brad opens his mouth and Trish holds up her hand. "Yeah, no, if you can have a real opinion then there's no chance in hell you're an actor."
Brad laughs.
He can't remember the last time that happened.
NATE
Nate calls every other day for two weeks before Brad answers the phone.
Except it's not Brad that answers. It's a woman. Not Brad's niece Leah or his sister Rachel, but a woman. A woman Nate doesn't know.
"Hello?" she repeats.
Nate coughs. "Is Brad there?"
"Sure," the woman says helpfully. "Hold on a minute."
Nate hangs up the phone. What the hell is going on?
BRAD
Brad wipes his hand on a dishcloth and reaches out for the phone. He's promised Leah that he'd make her her favorite butterscotch and chocolate cookies to take to class for her birthday, but he had no idea that would involve making 60-something cookies. Apparently every child needs to have at least two.
When Brad was little you got one cookie - and that's if you were lucky and Jeremy Fitzpatrick, that greedy fucker, hadn't eaten them all.
There's no one on the other end of the handset, it's just the dial tone. Brad gives Trish a quizzical look. "You sure there was somebody there?"
Trish looks up from the pink happy faces she's drawing on the cookies with a tube of frosting. "I may be high on sugar, but I can still fucking hear," she says. "The guy asked if he could speak to you and I said sure."
Something tight clenches in Brad's stomach. "It was a guy? You're sure?"
Trish rolls her eyes. "It was either a guy or a very convincing woman, happy now?"
Brad flicks an errant butterscotch chip at Trish's head. "I'm fucking thrilled."
NATE
Only a desperate man would call Ray Person; Nate's not desperate. If he were desperate he would call Brad. If Nate were desperate he would go back to San Diego and apologize and try to explain something he can't even verbalize to himself.
And yet, he calls Ray anyway.
"This has be somebody's idea of a joke," Ray snaps in greeting after the third ring, "because my entire Facebook wall says to shoot Nate Fick on sight, so I know he wouldn't be stupid enough to fucking call me."
"Hello to you too, Ray."
There's a long pause. "I can only assume you've been hit by a bus and have amnesia."
"Ray."
"I'm not talking to you, LT. You fucked up."
Nate rubs his forehead. "I know I did."
Ray's laugh is brittle. "If you say you're sorry, I will fucking cut off your nuts and choke you with them myself."
"It's not that simple. I--"
"No," a pause. "You don't get to be sorry. You have no fucking idea what you've done."
"I know -"
"You were supposed to take care of him," Ray snaps. "That was all you had to do!"
Nate tries to explain but there's no point in talking to a dial tone.
BRAD
Ray calls religiously on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday at 9:13 a.m. barring death, dismemberment or hangover. Every now and then Brad even answers the phone instead of just letting it ring. He used to have an answering machine, but that went the way of the expensive mountain bike, the black-and-white prints and the running shoes he doesn't fit into. The only thing he didn't throw out was the extra surfboard - there was no reason to act crazy.
When the phone rings at 8:03 in the evening, Brad picks it up. He's sitting at home watching The Hangover and drinking a bottle of very expensive whiskey he found under the sink.
It might be Trish calling and he wouldn't mind that. She's turned out to be very good company.
"That motherfucker had the nerve to call me!" Ray bitches vociferously. "As though I'd have anything to say to him that didn't start with 'fuck' and end with 'you.' Brad, you know I've got your back on this; I'm telling you now, be strong, don't take his ass back."
Brad swallows. His head hurts. "Nate called you." A pause. "Nate called you?"
"Oh, no," Ray pleads. "Don't do it, homes."
Despite whatever Ray's worried about, Brad's not going to call Nate. He's not. If his mother couldn't convince him to call Nate, and his sister forcing him to take care of his niece's rabbit couldn't make him capitulate, and throwing out every last item couldn't make him break, there's no way he's going to give in now. Every warrior needs a battle.
NATE
People keep laboring under the assumption that Nate knows why he left. That there's just this one thing that happened. That something set him off. That he snapped. That he cheated or that Brad cheated.
Nate would never cheat on Brad.
Katie asked if Nate had met someone else. If Brad was mean or cruel. Did he hit Nate?
His mother wanted to know if there were ideological issues. Was it marriage? Was it children? Was it political or religious?
Did Nate just fall out of love?
But it was none of these things.
Sometimes there's no one reason.
Nate's father is the only one who's even come close.
The day after Nate came back to Baltimore, his dad took him down to Obrycki's for crabs. They sat across from each other, hands slippery and beers half-consumed, and only after they'd ordered dessert did his dad say anything. "Relationships are hard, aren't they? Half the time you're in love; the other half you're thinking of murder."
Nate looked up into his father's ruddy visage and sighed. "Don't you ever just get tired?"
His dad smiled ruefully. "All the time, but your mother is worth it."
"Yeah, but you're married."
Theodore Fick narrowed his eyes at his son. "I never thought you were so small-minded, Nate." Nate paused with his bottle of Grolsch halfway to his lips. "Marriage is just a joint filing with the IRS - if you're committed to someone a piece of paper has nothing to do with it."
Nate put his beer back on the paper covering the table and tried to meet his father's piercing stare. "I thought you were committed to Brad, son, but I guess I was wrong."
NATE
It's been almost six weeks since Nate left San Diego and he's pretty sure that a moment hasn't gone by that he hasn't thought of Brad. That he hasn't known he fucked up. Nate's never been one for half-measures though. He is the one that left. He's brought this all on himself. Sometimes life is just like that.
BRAD
On Sunday morning Brad goes surfing with Trish, Pam and Jerry and the rest of the surfing cabal. He and Trish are the last two to leave the beach. They trudge up the sand, water-logged, sunburned and content.
When they get to the street, Trish pauses to unzip her wetsuit and push it down around her hips. Underneath the green neoprene she's wearing an orange-and-blue one-piece racerback. There's nothing showy or obvious about Trish.
She's absolutely gorgeous: long and lean, not so fit as to be unfeminine, but not so feminine as to seem overly high-maintenance. Her hair falls past her shoulders in wet tangles, and her mouth quirks up at Brad's appraisal. "See something you like, Brad?"
"Well, seeing as I'm a male with a functioning brain, what do you think?" Brad tosses back.
Trish just laughs and strolls off in the direction of Brad's house.
Somewhere between the beach and the house, Brad makes up his mind.
When they get to the bungalow, they walk around the back to get rid of the sand and leave their boards to air out. Brad watches Trish brace herself against the east wall of the house to brush off her feet and when she stands back up, he leans in and kisses her.
It's not a bad kiss, but she plants a hand on his chest and pushes him away carefully. "Brad," her tone is light, cautious. "I don't know what you're doing, but I was under the impression that you're gay - at least that's what Pam said."
Brad huffs out a breath and looks at the woman before him. He could love her. He could. It would take some time, but he can see how it could happen. She would be so good for him.
She has the most beautiful green eyes...
Brad rubs his hair and some sand falls on his nose. "I -"
"It's complicated?"
Brad sighs. "Yeah... "
Trish pats him on the shoulder. "It always is."
NATE
Katie brings her four year-old daughter Rosie over for Sunday dinner. Nate doesn't get to see Rosie as much as he wants to, but since he's been home he's been able to spend a lot more time with her. In fact, the second after Rosie walks through the door she runs over to him and clings to his leg. "Up!" she demands.
Nate laughs even as he picks her up and swings her around before settling her on his hip. "You're getting bossy like your mommy," he says.
Katie looks over from where she's hanging up coats and various child-size items. "I heard that."
Nate makes a face at Rosie who giggles and pats his face with sticky hands. "What've you got on your hands, kiddo?" he asks, tugging Rosie's left hand away from his cheek.
On her wrist is a bright yellow Big Bird watch.
Nate looks at it curiously. "Where'd you get this?"
"Brad!" Rosie says proudly.
Nate clutches at Rosie so he doesn't drop her in shock. Katie looks at him meaningfully. "He sent it to her last year for Hanukkah."
"We're not Jewish," Nate protests feebly.
"He said he saw no reason for to Rosie suffer just because we weren't part of the chosen ones."
Nate resettles Rosie on his hip and heads for the den.
"Where are you going with my child, Nate?"
"I'm going to buy a plane ticket," Nate calls over his shoulder.
"Took you long enough!" Katie hollers after him.
NATE
Long-term parking at San Diego International is $16 a day. Nate's been gone for 47 days.
The cashier pauses as she rings up Nate's ticket and looks down at him from her booth. "You know it probably would've been cheaper to take a taxi," she says.
"I wasn't thinking that far ahead when I left," he confesses, handing over his credit card.
He's been saying the same thing to his office, but at least they stopped hounding him when he installed Skype on his parents' desktop computer and started conducting weekly conference calls.
He drives towards the house by rote. As though he's returning from a business trip and not from ruining his life. The Volvo even has a half a tank of gas left and there's a Lauryn Hill CD in the player.
It takes Nate twenty minutes to realize that's he's got "Ex-Factor" playing on repeat.
How can I explain myself? As painful as this thing has been, I just can't be with no one else...
NATE
Brad's bike is parked in the middle of the driveway.
Nate pulls up to the front of the house and cuts the engine. He sits in the Volvo for long seconds reminding himself that he can't really pussy out now. Eventually he pulls himself together and gets out of the car.
The lawn looks perfect and the roses Brad's mother planted are coming in. Roses seem to bloom year-round in California; that doesn't happen on the East Coast.
BRAD
On Mondays Brad goes running. He got a late start this morning because he was having a new bed delivered. Since Nate left, Brad's spent a good amount of money making the bungalow into someplace he wants to live on his own. He could just move, but he likes where he lives now. He likes the proximity to the beach. He likes that he can teach classes at Pendleton and still get home in time for Monday Night Football. He can make adjustments without being melodramatic.
Brad has never been given to overt displays of emotion.
NATE
Nate pauses on the doorstep with his key in his hand. It might be better if he knocks. There's no telling what could be on the other side of the door.
His key may not even work anymore. It would serve him right.
A lot of things would serve him right at this point.
He still doesn't know who that woman was who answered the phone.
BRAD
Monday runs are more for distance than speed.
Brad's planning his course along the beach when he opens the door and finds Nate there, key hovering over the lock.
BRAD
It's instinct that makes Brad punch Nate. Nothing more, nothing less.
He wants to inflict pain, so he does.
NATE
Nate staggers back.
He's earned this. He's probably earned more.
He plants his right foot back to distribute his weight; it's the only thing that keeps him upright when Brad swings again.
He tastes the blood when his lip splits open; his teeth ache, and there's a wet copper tang on his tongue.
BRAD
Brad looks everywhere but at Nate. At the sun high in the sky, at the hummingbird hovering around the azaleas by the corner of the house. The street is deserted. All of his neighbors are at work or at school or at the supermarket or doing whatever it is that civilians do. Nobody is there to witness broken hearts and bloody mouths. But like trees in the forest, just because you don't hear them doesn't mean they're not falling.
NATE
He stands on the front lawn, bleeding and broken, and it occurs to him that almost all of his scars from this will be literal. If you discount the gaping hole where his heart used to be.
BRAD
There's a difference between running and running away. Nate ran away; when Brad leaves he's just running.
NATE
After Brad leaves, Nate stands in the front yard for a while just looking around. The sun is too bright, the birds in the trees too loud. The house looks perfectly maintained. Nate's face is wet and his jaw aches. He can't stay here looking like this; he'll cause talk. Brad doesn't deserve that.
He gets back into the Volvo and drives to the only refuge he can think of.
Sarah Colbert opens the door promptly when Nate rings, her eyebrows climbing for her hairline when she takes in his appearance. "I'm going to assume that Brad knows you're back."
"You could say that," Nate agrees.
"He's very upset with you, you know."
"I know," Nate wipes at his mouth and his hand comes away smeared red. "He has every right to be."
Brad's mother produces a tissue from somewhere as mothers often do and reaches out to wipe at Nate's face. "Come inside before you bleed all over my new doormat."
Mrs. Colbert sits Nate down at her kitchen table and leaves him there, only to return a short time later with a bag of ice, Neosporin and a juice glass of something clear. "This first," she orders, handing him the glass.
Nate knocks it back and starts coughing hard enough that he almost ignores the fact that his split lip is on fire. "A little vodka never hurt anybody," she says dismissively. "Now, before I clean you up, I want to make something clear: my son loves you, Nate--"
Nate tries to speak but Mrs. Colbert makes a hushing noise.
"My son loves you," she repeats. "And you love him, but I swear if you ever put him through this again, I have a shovel and a .45 and know several Marines who will help me dispose of your corpse. Are we clear, Nathaniel?"
Nate's lungs are too busy burning for him to reply; he just nods.
BRAD
It's been a long time since Brad's run hard enough to actually be tired. Today he runs until his fist stops throbbing, until his head stops aching, until the burning in his eyes is from the glare of the sun and not from whatever errant feelings are attempting to make themselves known.
The sun is in a completely different position in the sky when he finds himself at his mother's front door.
She opens it before the bell has stopped ringing, as though she's been standing there waiting for him.
Maybe she has.
He stands on the doorstep, sweat stinging his eyes and blisters forming on his heels. "You have sunburn on your arms," she scolds, gesturing him inside.
Brad peels off his shirt in the foyer and kicks off his shoes. He mother looks him over, her gaze lingering on his hands. He flexes his fingers. "I told you he would come home," she says softly.
Of course she knows. She always knows.
"Go upstairs and take a shower," she directs. "You know where the aloe vera is."
Brad makes his way upstairs, stopping and turning back when his mother calls his name. "Yeah, Mom?" he says. Exhaustion has caught up with him, finally.
"It's going to be okay," she says. "I promise."
NATE
His key still works, but the minute Nate steps inside 145 Magnolia Terrace he knows that this isn't his house. His books are gone. So are his DVDs. There's a rabbit in a cage where his armchair used to be. None of his toiletries are in the bathroom, his suits are gone from the closet. The bed looks completely different. Nate drops to his knees and looks at the box spring - it's not the same bed that they shared.
Brad's erased him just as effortlessly as Nate walked out.
It's not just the monetary investment; it's the emotional investment.
An apology isn't going to make this better.
Nate takes one last look at the home that isn't his home anymore and then he lets himself out. He locks the door and sits down on the tiny concrete square that they called their front porch to wait.
And wait.
And wait some more.
BRAD
Nate's Volvo is still parked on the curb when Brad's mom drops him off that evening. Brad doesn't hesitate to get out of the car, but he does move a little slower than usual.
"Go on," his mom urges. "Go have your say - with your mouth, Bradley, not your fists."
Brad cuts a glance at his mother, but her face is perfectly passive.
God, she's good.
Brad sighs as he shuts the passenger door behind him. He's wearing an old PT shirt that's a little loose in the shoulders, but it's soft and clean. The khakis he's wearing have to be at least ten years old, and in his hand he carries his running shoes.
He's not going to throw them at Nate's head. Really, he's not.
He watches his mother drive off before he walks up the path to where Nate's sitting.
There's a dark bruise blooming on Nate's left cheekbone and his mouth is swollen. Brad glances down at him pointedly. "You're loitering; you don't live here anymore."
"I know," Nate says, getting to his feet. "But I will again one day."
Brad makes a derisive noise. "You were always terrible at gambling."
The porch light isn't overly strong, but despite his bruises, Nate's still just as gorgeous as Brad remembers. He scowls at the memory. "You can leave anytime," he snaps. "It would seem you're better at retreats than the Corps gave you credit for."
NATE
Brad's face glows in the yellowing radiance of the 40 watt bulb. The square jaw, the bright eyes and pink mouth. Nate can't quite understand how on earth he left or what exactly he thought he was going to find that would ever be better than this.
"I know you hate me," he says. "I know I left and didn't say why and you're never going to forgive me. But I'm going to make it up to you."
BRAD
Brad's laugh is hollow and bitter. "What makes you think I want you to make it up to me? Actually, what makes you think that I want you anymore? I'm pretty sure you leaving is the best thing that's happened to me. I've met somebody else."
This is technically true; the fact that Trish now knows all about Nate and spends half her time cursing his name and the other half urging Brad to go find him is totally irrelevant.
NATE
The idea of Brad with somebody else makes Nate's blood run cold, but he soldiers on. "I don't care who he is," he says. "I don't care if I spend every day of the rest of my life making this up to you. You belong with me."
Brad rolls his eyes. "I belong with you? That sounds like some sort of pussy-ass fake idealistic shit that this guy I used to know believed in."
"He sounds like an asshole."
"He is," Brad says pointedly.
"It also sounds like he believes it," Nate offers.
"If he believed it then he wouldn't have left me without so much as a fucking explanation," Brad retorts sharply.
That cuts Nate as deeply as it's meant to.
BRAD
Brad can feel himself getting riled up. He can feel his pulse rising, his palms getting damp. He wants to hit Nate, and yell at him, and kiss him and lock him up somewhere so that he can never leave Brad again.
Nate takes a step closer and Brad gives him a warning glare, but Nate doesn't move back.
"Maybe," Nate begins, "maybe this guy loves you. Maybe he's just human and fucks up from time to time."
Brad shifts from one foot to the other. The concrete is warm underneath the bare soles of his feet and his running shoes knock against his thigh. "You can be human, Nate, but you can't treat me like this. This guy who just walks out; I don't know him."
Brad looks at this man before him, who looks like Nate and sounds like Nate. He even smells like Nate; Brad's body assures him, this is Nate.
But he's not.
NATE
This is Nate's opening. He honestly didn't think he would get this far.
"I'm staying in a hotel downtown," he says. "But it's only temporary, until I get a place of my own. I know I don't live here anymore, but I'm not going to leave again. I'm going to get a place, hopefully close by, and I'm going to come by to see you. I'm going to come and see you everyday. I'm not going to give up. I'm going to take you out, if you'll let me. I'm going to make this right. And maybe one day you'll even let me in the house again."
BRAD
Brad studies Nate. The determined set of his jaw. The hope in his voice. The light in his eyes. This Nate... this is the Nate he knows. This is the Nate he loves.
He shrugs nonchalantly. "Anything's possible," he says mildly. "After all, Ray never shot off his own nuts, so miracles do occur."
Brad's not expecting it when Nate leans in and kisses him on the corner of his mouth, but he doesn't pull away. Instead he waits until Nate's moved back before he says, "I'm going inside now."
Nate bites his lip. "Can I see you tomorrow?"
It's on the tip of Brad tongue to say no, but instead he finds himself saying, "Don't you have a job?"
"Yeah, I do - getting you back."
"Getting me back is your job?"
Nate brushes past Brad, his hand stroking along Brad's sunburned forearm as he steps off of the porch. The touch is like being branded.
Nate stops on the grass and turns back. "You are the only job that matters," he says, before walking to his car. "I get that now."
"You didn't get that before?" Brad calls after him.
Nate stops by the passenger side door. "I wish I could say that I did," he admits. "But you've always deserved better than that. I'm just sorry I didn't give it to you."
Brad rubs his temple. "You can see me tomorrow," he says in a low tone. Maybe Nate won't hear him.
"What about the day after that?"
Even from fifteen feet away Nate's face radiates hope; Brad snorts softly. "Don't push your luck," he warns, unlocking the front door.
Nate's voice carries in the San Diego evening. "I'll never be able to tell you how sorry I am."
Brad looks over his shoulder. "So don't tell me," he says before stepping inside the house. "Show me."
-end-
Happy Belated Birthday alethialia. ::Porn Swat 4eva::
Title from the song by Florence + The Machine.
Beta by the most profoundly awesome maurheti. Thank you for all your help and suggestions and just all around brilliance. :)
I totally love this story. Word to the motherfucking streets, yo! [/Ray]
Generation Kill
Brad Colbert/Nate Fick, Brad/OFC
Rated PG-13
The Dog Days Are Over
NATE
Nate makes up his mind at 4:57 on a Tuesday morning.
He gently extracts himself from sheets and tangled limbs and goes off to take a shower. He should feel rested, ready to face the day, but he's not. He's tired. He always seems tired these days. Too tired to fuck. Too tired to talk. Too tired for this life. Maybe today will put an end to that.
He uses the last of the shampoo and opens a new bar of soap. He wraps a towel around his waist when he's done, rubbing steam from the mirror and studying his face in his reflection before slathering on shaving cream.
He doesn't look that different: a line or two, a gray hair or three - but the way he feels... he feels different. Five years is a long time.
Eventually he finishes up and goes back to the bedroom. Brad's still sleeping; Nate is wide awake.
He dresses in the burgeoning light of day, packs a bag and waits.
Brad will be up soon enough.
BRAD
Brad used to wake up in an instant. One minute he was asleep, the next he was awake. Over the years he's started to awaken in stages: cossetted by sleeping in a real bed and not on the ground, lured into alertness by Nate's presence next to him and not thousands of miles or hundreds of feet away.
This morning he wakes up with a start. He couldn't say why.
Nate's not in bed next to him.
Brad blinks at the empty space and looks around the room, bleary-eyed. Nate's sitting in the overstuffed armchair in the corner by the laundry hamper. He looks awake. He's dressed.
Brad sits up. "What?"
NATE
Nate opens his mouth and the words falter. He can't count the number of times he's watched Brad sleep (918). The number of days they've woken up in this bed together (1,142). He couldn't tell you when he started to feel differently. When he realized that something was wrong (183 days ago). He just knows that he doesn't feel the same anymore. That he doesn't think this is working. He understands now why his sister divorced Kevin two years ago.
It's possible to just wake up one morning and not have anything left to give.
It's not that he doesn't care for Brad, he's just not sure that it's enough.
How do you know when it's enough? What do you do when you don't have any reserves left?
BRAD
Nate's staring at him. It makes something in Brad's chest constrict.
Brad knows every look Nate has: bored, tired, horny, proud, aggrieved, irate, distressed, thoughtful, happy.
He hasn't seen resigned in a long time.
A very long time.
He swallows and licks his lips. "Nate..." Brad's voice is softer than usual, coaxing. But there's an edge to it. Something wary. Something hesitant.
He moves to get out of bed and Nate holds up a hand that's as effective as a tether to the mattress.
NATE
"I'm leaving, Brad."
BRAD
Brad sinks back down into the sheets. "You're leaving?"
He feels confused. There's something he's missing. It's early. He hasn't had his coffee or his shower or his blow job. He hasn't surfed or gone running yet. Nate hasn't even said "good morning."
Brad Colbert doesn't miss things; there's something wrong.
"Where are you going?" he presses.
NATE
He swallows.
"I'm going home."
BRAD
"This is your home," Brad starts, and then he gets it.
"You're leaving me."
BRAD
It's very civilized as far as break-ups go. Nate walks out the front door and Brad lets him. Seven minutes and thirty-nine seconds after Nate's Volvo starts in the driveway and drives off, Brad climbs out of bed. He opens the blinds and looks out at the glaring San Diego sun. It looks like it'll be a great day for surfing.
He picks up his phone and flips through various text messages looking for the surfing notice he receives every morning from Jerry and Pam.
The waves are fucking killer. Get out here now.
Fucking killer.
The phone falls out of Brad's hand, lands on his bare right foot and bounces onto the carpeting.
What the fuck just happened?
NATE
He takes the first flight available from SAN to BWI. Delta has got to be the worst carrier ever; they even charge for water now. Nate hasn't packed anything to eat; he apparently didn't pack to leave, either.
He was shocked when he went through security and was pulled aside because his duffel has thirteen pairs of socks, eight undershirts, no pants, no shoes, no toiletries and no underwear.
When the TSA guard raised an eyebrow, Nate stood there at parade rest.
"I just left my boyfriend," he announced.
The guard's face softened. "Oh, baby," she said. "I'm sorry."
Nate shakes his head now just thinking about it. She's sorry.
Nate parks in front of his childhood home instead of pulling into the driveway. His parents are most definitely not expecting him. His mother is working in her garden when he climbs out of the white Ford Focus he rented from Avis, and she shields her face when he slams the car door closed. "Nate?"
He drops his duffel bag and stands on the edge of the lawn with the rental keys in his hand. "Hi, Mom."
Nate's mom has always had a sixth sense about him. She has it about his sister, too: she says it comes from carrying each of them for nine months. There's nothing they can do that she can't figure out in under two minutes.
The first time Nate brought Brad home for Christmas his mother knew what was happening before Nate had even finished making introductions.
He jumps when her damp hand cups his chin. "Nate, where's Brad?" she asks bluntly.
Nate turns his head away.
BRAD
Brad does not want company. He wants to drink and throw Nate's things out and drink some more and then surf. Maybe not in that order. Instead, two days after Nate leaves, he finds himself babysitting his niece, Leah, and her rabbit, Goliath.
His mother suddenly has an appointment and can't watch her granddaughter.
His sister has suddenly decided that she just has to go out for the better part of the entire day.
He's not going to kill himself just because Nate finally did what everyone does; his family needs to get a fucking grip.
And yet, here's Brad, kneeling on fresh carpeting once covered by Nate's favorite chair, trying to get Goliath to stop shitting everywhere.
At least it's not runny shit; runny shit could lead to a Fatal Attraction moment.
"You have to be nice to him, Uncle Brad," Leah insists as she chases her rabbit all over the living room. For such an overweight rabbit, he's fast as hell. "He knows when you're in a bad mood!"
Bad mood. No, Brad is not in a bad mood. According to his mother, Brad is in shock. Brad, however, would beg to differ: he is not in shock. He is...
Fuck whatever Brad is; he doesn't have to discuss his feelings anymore.
Leah just misses clipping her hip on the coffee table as Brad picks up the last of the rabbit poo with a paper towel. Enough is plenty. He strides into the kitchen, disposes of the paper towel and then surveys the AO.
Goliath is a brute of a rabbit, probably over 20 pounds. All fur and ears and currently hovering by the bookcase, nose twitching, and batting at his ears with his feet.
Brad runs through possible scenarios in his head and plans his course of attack. Without a word he motions for Leah to chase Goliath towards him, but he stays hidden until the very last minute and then he pounces, scooping the rabbit up against his chest in a forward roll.
It's a little disorienting to find himself with a handful of fluff.
"You caught him, Uncle Brad!" Leah says triumphantly, throwing her arms around Brad's neck and hugging him hard enough to almost bruise his windpipe.
Brad pats his niece with his free hand. "Of course I caught him," he says blithely.
He hasn't completely lost himself.
NATE
Nate eats and sleeps and shits and drinks and thinks about going outside. Every time he tries to jerk off all he sees is Brad: Brad over him, Brad under him. Brad smiling, Brad stoic, Brad's face sliding from worry into that perfect mask that's anything but perfect. He can still smell Brad on his skin, taste him on his tongue. Touching himself feels wrong. His hands are supposed to be Brad's hands.
His mother says he's in shock.
His father leaves a bottle of Xanax on his dresser.
BRAD
It's not the first day or the second day that causes Brad problems. The first week without Nate goes by fine - if you ignore the fact that Brad throws out pretty much everything that Nate left behind. It's entirely possible that Nate's going to come back, but Brad doesn't work on possibilities anymore. If Nate left, then Nate is gone, and if Nate is gone then there's no reason for his belongings to be in Brad's house anymore.
It's definitely Brad's house now.
The whole facade lasts nine days, thirteen hours and four minutes longer than it should.
Nine hours, thirteen days and five minutes after Nate leaves him, Ray Person comes for an unscheduled visit. "You don't call, you don't write, I had to make sure the LT was letting you out of your sex dungeon of depravity to piss and call your mom," Ray announces from the doorstep before brushing past Brad and walking inside.
Ray stops in the middle of a conspicuously confused room. There are books missing, large sections of the DVD collection are gone. There's a chair, a lamp and an end table missing and there are large blank spots on the wall where photos and art used to be.
And then there's the rabbit.
"'What the fuck happened in here? You get robbed?" Ray asks incredulously.
Brad ignores him and sprawls out on the floor next to Goliath. The large black-and-white rabbit nudges at Brad's fingers and Brad goes back to hand feeding him baby carrots.
"Okay, seriously Brad, you're freaking me out," Ray says crouching down near him. "You've got a rabbit, your house looks like it got repoed by Poke and I don't see one fucking laptop anywhere. Where's the LT?"
Brad smirks down at Goliath.
"Nate's gone."
"Gone where?"
Brad's smile feels all wrong. "How the fuck should I know?"
RAY
Ray is going to kick the LT's ass. All he had to do was one fucking thing: look after Brad.
Fucking officers can't do anything right.
NATE
"But you love Brad," Nate's sister, Katie, argues. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"
"Language," Nate's mother chides mildly.
"Mom, he's being stupid."
"He is right here," Nate says irritably.
It's been like this for almost two weeks. Nate sleeps, shits, checks his emails, ignores the IMs from Ray Person, Stafford and Christeson, goes for runs, talks to his clients, drinks copiously and tries to explain something he's not sure he understands.
At least he's finally leaving the house.
Katie waves a half-empty bottle of Heineken in Nate's direction. "You don't get to talk until you can prove you haven't suffered severe brain damage."
"Then why the hell are you asking me what my problem is? I didn't give you this much grief when you left Kevin."
Katie's laugh is throaty. "That's because you never liked Kevin in the first place. I'm not even sure I ever liked Kevin," she continues after a moment of consideration.
Their mother looks up from stirring the meat sauce on the stove. "That's the father of my only grandchild you're talking about," she says.
"If you didn't love him then why did you marry him?" Nate says, popping the cap on a fresh beer and offering it to their mother.
Evelyn Fick takes her beer, swallows down an impressive amount and goes back to her pot on the stove.
"Because," Katie offers. Both Nate and his mother look at Katie expectantly as she pushes shiny black hair behind her ear. Katie takes a large swallow of her beer and belches.
"Katelyn Emma Fick," their mother scolds.
Katie's cheeks color slightly. "I loved him," she confesses. "I just didn't love him enough."
Nate looks at his sister. "So maybe I just didn't love Brad enough," he offers.
Nate's mother stops stirring the sauce and eyeballs her son. "Bullshit, Nathaniel."
BRAD
The only thing worse than Ray Person stuffed to the eyeballs with Ripped Fuel and dip and babbling about whiskey tango crack babies and NAMBLA is Ray Person stuffed to the eyeballs with righteous indignation and too many shots of tequila.
Ever since Ray showed up in San Diego and found Brad living with a rabbit he'd suddenly been conned into caring for, he's been all over Brad like a bad case of syphilis.
"Don't even worry about this," Ray slurs over what's possibly his eleventh shot of the evening. "I've got people who've got people."
"Ray, I don't think you and the poon-guzzling, trailer-park dwelling rabbit fuckers you call family could be called 'people'," Brad says dryly.
Just over Ray's right shoulder a redhead with a rather impressive rack is playing pool. She's been eying Brad for at least thirty minutes, and most of her trick shots don't need to involve nearly as much contorting as she's giving them. Ray's saying something about Q-Tip and Gunny, about how he's got more Mexicans than the border patrol, but Brad's not listening.
He's thinking about how long it's been since he's had pussy.
He hasn't missed it, but times change. People leave.
Life is about evolution; Brad's going to fucking evolve.
"Find a ride home," Brad says, swallowing the last of his Stella before getting to his feet.
Ray cranes his head, following Brad's target sight. "You know that's a bad idea," Ray hiccups as Brad walks away.
"Yeah," Brad tosses over his shoulder. "So, it's a good thing I'm not paid for my ideas."
The redhead's name is Naomi.
Two nights later there's a brunette named Nicole.
Naomi and Nicole are followed by Noelle.
A week after that there's a peroxide blonde who almost makes it, but her name doesn't start with an 'N' and Brad is nothing if not consistent.
He never brings them home; that's not what this is about.
NATE
"Nate, phone."
Nate looks up from the biography of Andrew Jackson he's reading in his dad's overstuffed plaid armchair and blinks at his mom. "For me?"
It can't be Brad. Brad wouldn't call. Brad would - no, Nate doesn't get to guess what Brad would do anymore.
His mother rolls bright green eyes. "No, for my other son named Nate."
"Yeah, I've been meaning to talk to you about him," Nate winks, taking the proffered handset. His mother just shakes her head as she walks away. Nate closes his book before putting the phone to his ear.
"Nate Fick," he says brusquely.
"Mike Wynn," the voice on the other end answers dryly.
"My god, it must be bad if I'm hearing from you," Nate laughs.
"You know that's pretty much what I'm thinkin' right about now, too."
There's a long pause and then Nate realizes what this is about. "Ah."
"I dunno if 'ah' is the word I was gonna use," Mike says. "I was thinkin' more along the lines of 'what the fuck is goin' on, Nate?'"
A muscle in Nate's jaw sets. "I didn't think Brad--"
Mike looses a howl. "You think Brad Colbert would call for help if he was bleedin' in a bear trap and had to chew his own foot off? I know you two've been livin' together, but do you know that man at all?"
"What's that supposed to mean?" Nate demands.
"That means you left Brad in a bear trap and he's chewing his own leg off. I didn't think you were the kind of man to just leave somebody behind like that."
"I'm not getting into this with you, Mike."
"Fair enough."
"And I didn't just disappear," Nate carries on angrily. "I told him I was leaving."
"That's real nice of you, Nate. And I'm sure, after all y'all've been through, that if he just up and left you one day without any explanation at all you'd be just as obliging about it."
Nate opens and closes his mouth.
"Fuck," he says finally.
After Nate hangs up with Mike he calls Brad.
It's around five in the evening on the West Coast.
He doesn't know what he's going to say, so it's probably a good thing no one answers.
Not even the answering machine.
BRAD
Twenty-eight days after Nate leaves him, Brad meets Trish. It's a little after six in the morning on a Wednesday and Brad's out surfing with the usual suspects. The waves this morning are pretty impressive; there's supposed to be a big thunderstorm later tonight and the currents are confirming this.
Brad's just setting himself up for a wave when this blur of dark green neoprene and reddish-blonde-brown hair snakes him, which is extremely fucked up. Brad stares and then follows. He gets to the top of the crest and less than five feet away is six feet of Amazon.
She smiles at Brad and totally cuts off his ride.
Brad falls off his board and is still sputtering and pissed when the Amazon swims back out. "He who hesitates is lost," she calls out.
Brad gives her the bird and on the next wave he snakes her so hard their boards collide.
This time when Brad swims back out, she gives him the bird.
Pam and Jerry laugh at them from a good fifteen feet away. "I see you've met my sister!" Pam calls out.
Patricia "Trish" Taylor is a 36 year-old pediatrician, born and raised in San Diego. She's a partner in a practice that requires its doctors to volunteer for Médecins Sans Frontières, UNICEF or any other good cause every two years and Trish has just returned from Darfur. She's staying with her sister while she gets her housing sorted out.
After they spend the morning surfing, Brad buys Trish a beer at Doña y Doña's Taco Stand and then calls her a liberal hippie quack.
Trish just yawns. "If that's the best your whiskey tango inbred ass can do I'm surprised you haven't been run out of the Corps yet."
Brad blinks. "How did you know I was in the Corps?"
Trish just laughs. "Men don't look like you unless they're in acting, modeling or the military."
Brad's mouth curls at the corner. "You don't think I could be an actor?"
Trish studies Brad intently for a minute. "What do you think about universal healthcare?"
Brad opens his mouth and Trish holds up her hand. "Yeah, no, if you can have a real opinion then there's no chance in hell you're an actor."
Brad laughs.
He can't remember the last time that happened.
NATE
Nate calls every other day for two weeks before Brad answers the phone.
Except it's not Brad that answers. It's a woman. Not Brad's niece Leah or his sister Rachel, but a woman. A woman Nate doesn't know.
"Hello?" she repeats.
Nate coughs. "Is Brad there?"
"Sure," the woman says helpfully. "Hold on a minute."
Nate hangs up the phone. What the hell is going on?
BRAD
Brad wipes his hand on a dishcloth and reaches out for the phone. He's promised Leah that he'd make her her favorite butterscotch and chocolate cookies to take to class for her birthday, but he had no idea that would involve making 60-something cookies. Apparently every child needs to have at least two.
When Brad was little you got one cookie - and that's if you were lucky and Jeremy Fitzpatrick, that greedy fucker, hadn't eaten them all.
There's no one on the other end of the handset, it's just the dial tone. Brad gives Trish a quizzical look. "You sure there was somebody there?"
Trish looks up from the pink happy faces she's drawing on the cookies with a tube of frosting. "I may be high on sugar, but I can still fucking hear," she says. "The guy asked if he could speak to you and I said sure."
Something tight clenches in Brad's stomach. "It was a guy? You're sure?"
Trish rolls her eyes. "It was either a guy or a very convincing woman, happy now?"
Brad flicks an errant butterscotch chip at Trish's head. "I'm fucking thrilled."
NATE
Only a desperate man would call Ray Person; Nate's not desperate. If he were desperate he would call Brad. If Nate were desperate he would go back to San Diego and apologize and try to explain something he can't even verbalize to himself.
And yet, he calls Ray anyway.
"This has be somebody's idea of a joke," Ray snaps in greeting after the third ring, "because my entire Facebook wall says to shoot Nate Fick on sight, so I know he wouldn't be stupid enough to fucking call me."
"Hello to you too, Ray."
There's a long pause. "I can only assume you've been hit by a bus and have amnesia."
"Ray."
"I'm not talking to you, LT. You fucked up."
Nate rubs his forehead. "I know I did."
Ray's laugh is brittle. "If you say you're sorry, I will fucking cut off your nuts and choke you with them myself."
"It's not that simple. I--"
"No," a pause. "You don't get to be sorry. You have no fucking idea what you've done."
"I know -"
"You were supposed to take care of him," Ray snaps. "That was all you had to do!"
Nate tries to explain but there's no point in talking to a dial tone.
BRAD
Ray calls religiously on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday at 9:13 a.m. barring death, dismemberment or hangover. Every now and then Brad even answers the phone instead of just letting it ring. He used to have an answering machine, but that went the way of the expensive mountain bike, the black-and-white prints and the running shoes he doesn't fit into. The only thing he didn't throw out was the extra surfboard - there was no reason to act crazy.
When the phone rings at 8:03 in the evening, Brad picks it up. He's sitting at home watching The Hangover and drinking a bottle of very expensive whiskey he found under the sink.
It might be Trish calling and he wouldn't mind that. She's turned out to be very good company.
"That motherfucker had the nerve to call me!" Ray bitches vociferously. "As though I'd have anything to say to him that didn't start with 'fuck' and end with 'you.' Brad, you know I've got your back on this; I'm telling you now, be strong, don't take his ass back."
Brad swallows. His head hurts. "Nate called you." A pause. "Nate called you?"
"Oh, no," Ray pleads. "Don't do it, homes."
Despite whatever Ray's worried about, Brad's not going to call Nate. He's not. If his mother couldn't convince him to call Nate, and his sister forcing him to take care of his niece's rabbit couldn't make him capitulate, and throwing out every last item couldn't make him break, there's no way he's going to give in now. Every warrior needs a battle.
NATE
People keep laboring under the assumption that Nate knows why he left. That there's just this one thing that happened. That something set him off. That he snapped. That he cheated or that Brad cheated.
Nate would never cheat on Brad.
Katie asked if Nate had met someone else. If Brad was mean or cruel. Did he hit Nate?
His mother wanted to know if there were ideological issues. Was it marriage? Was it children? Was it political or religious?
Did Nate just fall out of love?
But it was none of these things.
Sometimes there's no one reason.
Nate's father is the only one who's even come close.
The day after Nate came back to Baltimore, his dad took him down to Obrycki's for crabs. They sat across from each other, hands slippery and beers half-consumed, and only after they'd ordered dessert did his dad say anything. "Relationships are hard, aren't they? Half the time you're in love; the other half you're thinking of murder."
Nate looked up into his father's ruddy visage and sighed. "Don't you ever just get tired?"
His dad smiled ruefully. "All the time, but your mother is worth it."
"Yeah, but you're married."
Theodore Fick narrowed his eyes at his son. "I never thought you were so small-minded, Nate." Nate paused with his bottle of Grolsch halfway to his lips. "Marriage is just a joint filing with the IRS - if you're committed to someone a piece of paper has nothing to do with it."
Nate put his beer back on the paper covering the table and tried to meet his father's piercing stare. "I thought you were committed to Brad, son, but I guess I was wrong."
NATE
It's been almost six weeks since Nate left San Diego and he's pretty sure that a moment hasn't gone by that he hasn't thought of Brad. That he hasn't known he fucked up. Nate's never been one for half-measures though. He is the one that left. He's brought this all on himself. Sometimes life is just like that.
BRAD
On Sunday morning Brad goes surfing with Trish, Pam and Jerry and the rest of the surfing cabal. He and Trish are the last two to leave the beach. They trudge up the sand, water-logged, sunburned and content.
When they get to the street, Trish pauses to unzip her wetsuit and push it down around her hips. Underneath the green neoprene she's wearing an orange-and-blue one-piece racerback. There's nothing showy or obvious about Trish.
She's absolutely gorgeous: long and lean, not so fit as to be unfeminine, but not so feminine as to seem overly high-maintenance. Her hair falls past her shoulders in wet tangles, and her mouth quirks up at Brad's appraisal. "See something you like, Brad?"
"Well, seeing as I'm a male with a functioning brain, what do you think?" Brad tosses back.
Trish just laughs and strolls off in the direction of Brad's house.
Somewhere between the beach and the house, Brad makes up his mind.
When they get to the bungalow, they walk around the back to get rid of the sand and leave their boards to air out. Brad watches Trish brace herself against the east wall of the house to brush off her feet and when she stands back up, he leans in and kisses her.
It's not a bad kiss, but she plants a hand on his chest and pushes him away carefully. "Brad," her tone is light, cautious. "I don't know what you're doing, but I was under the impression that you're gay - at least that's what Pam said."
Brad huffs out a breath and looks at the woman before him. He could love her. He could. It would take some time, but he can see how it could happen. She would be so good for him.
She has the most beautiful green eyes...
Brad rubs his hair and some sand falls on his nose. "I -"
"It's complicated?"
Brad sighs. "Yeah... "
Trish pats him on the shoulder. "It always is."
NATE
Katie brings her four year-old daughter Rosie over for Sunday dinner. Nate doesn't get to see Rosie as much as he wants to, but since he's been home he's been able to spend a lot more time with her. In fact, the second after Rosie walks through the door she runs over to him and clings to his leg. "Up!" she demands.
Nate laughs even as he picks her up and swings her around before settling her on his hip. "You're getting bossy like your mommy," he says.
Katie looks over from where she's hanging up coats and various child-size items. "I heard that."
Nate makes a face at Rosie who giggles and pats his face with sticky hands. "What've you got on your hands, kiddo?" he asks, tugging Rosie's left hand away from his cheek.
On her wrist is a bright yellow Big Bird watch.
Nate looks at it curiously. "Where'd you get this?"
"Brad!" Rosie says proudly.
Nate clutches at Rosie so he doesn't drop her in shock. Katie looks at him meaningfully. "He sent it to her last year for Hanukkah."
"We're not Jewish," Nate protests feebly.
"He said he saw no reason for to Rosie suffer just because we weren't part of the chosen ones."
Nate resettles Rosie on his hip and heads for the den.
"Where are you going with my child, Nate?"
"I'm going to buy a plane ticket," Nate calls over his shoulder.
"Took you long enough!" Katie hollers after him.
NATE
Long-term parking at San Diego International is $16 a day. Nate's been gone for 47 days.
The cashier pauses as she rings up Nate's ticket and looks down at him from her booth. "You know it probably would've been cheaper to take a taxi," she says.
"I wasn't thinking that far ahead when I left," he confesses, handing over his credit card.
He's been saying the same thing to his office, but at least they stopped hounding him when he installed Skype on his parents' desktop computer and started conducting weekly conference calls.
He drives towards the house by rote. As though he's returning from a business trip and not from ruining his life. The Volvo even has a half a tank of gas left and there's a Lauryn Hill CD in the player.
It takes Nate twenty minutes to realize that's he's got "Ex-Factor" playing on repeat.
How can I explain myself? As painful as this thing has been, I just can't be with no one else...
NATE
Brad's bike is parked in the middle of the driveway.
Nate pulls up to the front of the house and cuts the engine. He sits in the Volvo for long seconds reminding himself that he can't really pussy out now. Eventually he pulls himself together and gets out of the car.
The lawn looks perfect and the roses Brad's mother planted are coming in. Roses seem to bloom year-round in California; that doesn't happen on the East Coast.
BRAD
On Mondays Brad goes running. He got a late start this morning because he was having a new bed delivered. Since Nate left, Brad's spent a good amount of money making the bungalow into someplace he wants to live on his own. He could just move, but he likes where he lives now. He likes the proximity to the beach. He likes that he can teach classes at Pendleton and still get home in time for Monday Night Football. He can make adjustments without being melodramatic.
Brad has never been given to overt displays of emotion.
NATE
Nate pauses on the doorstep with his key in his hand. It might be better if he knocks. There's no telling what could be on the other side of the door.
His key may not even work anymore. It would serve him right.
A lot of things would serve him right at this point.
He still doesn't know who that woman was who answered the phone.
BRAD
Monday runs are more for distance than speed.
Brad's planning his course along the beach when he opens the door and finds Nate there, key hovering over the lock.
BRAD
It's instinct that makes Brad punch Nate. Nothing more, nothing less.
He wants to inflict pain, so he does.
NATE
Nate staggers back.
He's earned this. He's probably earned more.
He plants his right foot back to distribute his weight; it's the only thing that keeps him upright when Brad swings again.
He tastes the blood when his lip splits open; his teeth ache, and there's a wet copper tang on his tongue.
BRAD
Brad looks everywhere but at Nate. At the sun high in the sky, at the hummingbird hovering around the azaleas by the corner of the house. The street is deserted. All of his neighbors are at work or at school or at the supermarket or doing whatever it is that civilians do. Nobody is there to witness broken hearts and bloody mouths. But like trees in the forest, just because you don't hear them doesn't mean they're not falling.
NATE
He stands on the front lawn, bleeding and broken, and it occurs to him that almost all of his scars from this will be literal. If you discount the gaping hole where his heart used to be.
BRAD
There's a difference between running and running away. Nate ran away; when Brad leaves he's just running.
NATE
After Brad leaves, Nate stands in the front yard for a while just looking around. The sun is too bright, the birds in the trees too loud. The house looks perfectly maintained. Nate's face is wet and his jaw aches. He can't stay here looking like this; he'll cause talk. Brad doesn't deserve that.
He gets back into the Volvo and drives to the only refuge he can think of.
Sarah Colbert opens the door promptly when Nate rings, her eyebrows climbing for her hairline when she takes in his appearance. "I'm going to assume that Brad knows you're back."
"You could say that," Nate agrees.
"He's very upset with you, you know."
"I know," Nate wipes at his mouth and his hand comes away smeared red. "He has every right to be."
Brad's mother produces a tissue from somewhere as mothers often do and reaches out to wipe at Nate's face. "Come inside before you bleed all over my new doormat."
Mrs. Colbert sits Nate down at her kitchen table and leaves him there, only to return a short time later with a bag of ice, Neosporin and a juice glass of something clear. "This first," she orders, handing him the glass.
Nate knocks it back and starts coughing hard enough that he almost ignores the fact that his split lip is on fire. "A little vodka never hurt anybody," she says dismissively. "Now, before I clean you up, I want to make something clear: my son loves you, Nate--"
Nate tries to speak but Mrs. Colbert makes a hushing noise.
"My son loves you," she repeats. "And you love him, but I swear if you ever put him through this again, I have a shovel and a .45 and know several Marines who will help me dispose of your corpse. Are we clear, Nathaniel?"
Nate's lungs are too busy burning for him to reply; he just nods.
BRAD
It's been a long time since Brad's run hard enough to actually be tired. Today he runs until his fist stops throbbing, until his head stops aching, until the burning in his eyes is from the glare of the sun and not from whatever errant feelings are attempting to make themselves known.
The sun is in a completely different position in the sky when he finds himself at his mother's front door.
She opens it before the bell has stopped ringing, as though she's been standing there waiting for him.
Maybe she has.
He stands on the doorstep, sweat stinging his eyes and blisters forming on his heels. "You have sunburn on your arms," she scolds, gesturing him inside.
Brad peels off his shirt in the foyer and kicks off his shoes. He mother looks him over, her gaze lingering on his hands. He flexes his fingers. "I told you he would come home," she says softly.
Of course she knows. She always knows.
"Go upstairs and take a shower," she directs. "You know where the aloe vera is."
Brad makes his way upstairs, stopping and turning back when his mother calls his name. "Yeah, Mom?" he says. Exhaustion has caught up with him, finally.
"It's going to be okay," she says. "I promise."
NATE
His key still works, but the minute Nate steps inside 145 Magnolia Terrace he knows that this isn't his house. His books are gone. So are his DVDs. There's a rabbit in a cage where his armchair used to be. None of his toiletries are in the bathroom, his suits are gone from the closet. The bed looks completely different. Nate drops to his knees and looks at the box spring - it's not the same bed that they shared.
Brad's erased him just as effortlessly as Nate walked out.
It's not just the monetary investment; it's the emotional investment.
An apology isn't going to make this better.
Nate takes one last look at the home that isn't his home anymore and then he lets himself out. He locks the door and sits down on the tiny concrete square that they called their front porch to wait.
And wait.
And wait some more.
BRAD
Nate's Volvo is still parked on the curb when Brad's mom drops him off that evening. Brad doesn't hesitate to get out of the car, but he does move a little slower than usual.
"Go on," his mom urges. "Go have your say - with your mouth, Bradley, not your fists."
Brad cuts a glance at his mother, but her face is perfectly passive.
God, she's good.
Brad sighs as he shuts the passenger door behind him. He's wearing an old PT shirt that's a little loose in the shoulders, but it's soft and clean. The khakis he's wearing have to be at least ten years old, and in his hand he carries his running shoes.
He's not going to throw them at Nate's head. Really, he's not.
He watches his mother drive off before he walks up the path to where Nate's sitting.
There's a dark bruise blooming on Nate's left cheekbone and his mouth is swollen. Brad glances down at him pointedly. "You're loitering; you don't live here anymore."
"I know," Nate says, getting to his feet. "But I will again one day."
Brad makes a derisive noise. "You were always terrible at gambling."
The porch light isn't overly strong, but despite his bruises, Nate's still just as gorgeous as Brad remembers. He scowls at the memory. "You can leave anytime," he snaps. "It would seem you're better at retreats than the Corps gave you credit for."
NATE
Brad's face glows in the yellowing radiance of the 40 watt bulb. The square jaw, the bright eyes and pink mouth. Nate can't quite understand how on earth he left or what exactly he thought he was going to find that would ever be better than this.
"I know you hate me," he says. "I know I left and didn't say why and you're never going to forgive me. But I'm going to make it up to you."
BRAD
Brad's laugh is hollow and bitter. "What makes you think I want you to make it up to me? Actually, what makes you think that I want you anymore? I'm pretty sure you leaving is the best thing that's happened to me. I've met somebody else."
This is technically true; the fact that Trish now knows all about Nate and spends half her time cursing his name and the other half urging Brad to go find him is totally irrelevant.
NATE
The idea of Brad with somebody else makes Nate's blood run cold, but he soldiers on. "I don't care who he is," he says. "I don't care if I spend every day of the rest of my life making this up to you. You belong with me."
Brad rolls his eyes. "I belong with you? That sounds like some sort of pussy-ass fake idealistic shit that this guy I used to know believed in."
"He sounds like an asshole."
"He is," Brad says pointedly.
"It also sounds like he believes it," Nate offers.
"If he believed it then he wouldn't have left me without so much as a fucking explanation," Brad retorts sharply.
That cuts Nate as deeply as it's meant to.
BRAD
Brad can feel himself getting riled up. He can feel his pulse rising, his palms getting damp. He wants to hit Nate, and yell at him, and kiss him and lock him up somewhere so that he can never leave Brad again.
Nate takes a step closer and Brad gives him a warning glare, but Nate doesn't move back.
"Maybe," Nate begins, "maybe this guy loves you. Maybe he's just human and fucks up from time to time."
Brad shifts from one foot to the other. The concrete is warm underneath the bare soles of his feet and his running shoes knock against his thigh. "You can be human, Nate, but you can't treat me like this. This guy who just walks out; I don't know him."
Brad looks at this man before him, who looks like Nate and sounds like Nate. He even smells like Nate; Brad's body assures him, this is Nate.
But he's not.
NATE
This is Nate's opening. He honestly didn't think he would get this far.
"I'm staying in a hotel downtown," he says. "But it's only temporary, until I get a place of my own. I know I don't live here anymore, but I'm not going to leave again. I'm going to get a place, hopefully close by, and I'm going to come by to see you. I'm going to come and see you everyday. I'm not going to give up. I'm going to take you out, if you'll let me. I'm going to make this right. And maybe one day you'll even let me in the house again."
BRAD
Brad studies Nate. The determined set of his jaw. The hope in his voice. The light in his eyes. This Nate... this is the Nate he knows. This is the Nate he loves.
He shrugs nonchalantly. "Anything's possible," he says mildly. "After all, Ray never shot off his own nuts, so miracles do occur."
Brad's not expecting it when Nate leans in and kisses him on the corner of his mouth, but he doesn't pull away. Instead he waits until Nate's moved back before he says, "I'm going inside now."
Nate bites his lip. "Can I see you tomorrow?"
It's on the tip of Brad tongue to say no, but instead he finds himself saying, "Don't you have a job?"
"Yeah, I do - getting you back."
"Getting me back is your job?"
Nate brushes past Brad, his hand stroking along Brad's sunburned forearm as he steps off of the porch. The touch is like being branded.
Nate stops on the grass and turns back. "You are the only job that matters," he says, before walking to his car. "I get that now."
"You didn't get that before?" Brad calls after him.
Nate stops by the passenger side door. "I wish I could say that I did," he admits. "But you've always deserved better than that. I'm just sorry I didn't give it to you."
Brad rubs his temple. "You can see me tomorrow," he says in a low tone. Maybe Nate won't hear him.
"What about the day after that?"
Even from fifteen feet away Nate's face radiates hope; Brad snorts softly. "Don't push your luck," he warns, unlocking the front door.
Nate's voice carries in the San Diego evening. "I'll never be able to tell you how sorry I am."
Brad looks over his shoulder. "So don't tell me," he says before stepping inside the house. "Show me."
-end-
Happy Belated Birthday alethialia. ::Porn Swat 4eva::
Title from the song by Florence + The Machine.
Beta by the most profoundly awesome maurheti. Thank you for all your help and suggestions and just all around brilliance. :)
I totally love this story. Word to the motherfucking streets, yo! [/Ray]