Dedicated with love to Betagoddess, who left us too soon.
"What's this?" Blair
picked up an envelope, light and thin, and read
the date scrawled across it. "Looks like your handwriting."
Jim took it from him and turned it over. The flap had been tucked in,
not sealed, and he eased it out and peered inside.
Oh.
Wordlessly, he passed it back to Blair, who leaned back against the
wall with a small grunt of discomfort and then shook the contents of
the envelope into his hand.
"Hair? Whose?"
Jim raised his eyebrows and let them say 'You have got to be kidding
me' for him. Blair chuckled, turning the twist of hair bound by a
prosaic piece of string between his fingers. "Okay, if you kept it all
these years, I guess it'd better be mine, though I don't remember it
being this color."
Jim took the lock of hair and held it up to the light from the window,
pale and fitful this late on a winter day. "It wasn't. It's faded a
little."
That earned him a mildly skeptical look. "Come on, Jim; it's been
years. Even you can't recall a shade that accurately."
"Oh ye of little faith." Jim stroked the curl against his face,
assessing its texture against his jaw, his lips, comparing it to
memories. "It's you. I know."
"That verges on romantic," Blair remarked dryly. "Want me to check you
for a fever?"
Jim grinned at him. "That depends on where you plan to insert the
thermometer, babe."
The smile he got was wicked enough to make him wonder just how much it
would matter if they didn't get the cabin packed up before nightfall.
One last time making love to Blair on a bed whose creaks were as much
part of their lovemaking as the wind soughing through the forest
outside or their soft, urgent grunts and gasps. One last time...
Of course, the bedding had been packed and the mattress was bare, so
maybe not.
Jim stood with some difficulty and reached down to help Blair up,
bestowing a kiss on the smooth, bare head, fringed with gray hair
around the edges, curling irrepressibly. Jim's own silvered hair had
receded so far, no further, which was a source of secret satisfaction
he had a feeling Blair was only too aware of and tolerant about.
They were getting older. It happened.
"So you saved it," Blair said, pursuing the subject. "Why?"
Jim honestly couldn't remember his exact motivation in detail, but that
was never an answer Blair would accept, insisting that the knowledge
was in Jim's brain somewhere and just needed to be dug out. Which
sounded painful and usually was. He went for something as close to the
truth as he could get.
"A memento, Chief; that's not so out there, is it? You've still got
ticket stubs from Jags games we went to twenty years ago, for God's
sake." Jim pointed an accusing finger at the trash bag where the
tickets had been tossed, along with one hell of a lot of other rubbish.
"They weren't saved; they were just still in the jacket pocket because
I forgot to take them out; there's a difference."
"Like you forgot to give that jacket back to Goodwill. Face it, Chief;
you're a packrat."
"Maybe I am, but you didn't answer my question."
"I just --" Jim stopped, still, after all these years, uncomfortable
with admitting to Blair just how besotted he was. The day was stressful
enough as it was, with yet another chapter of their life ending and a
new one not yet begun. Blair waited, patient for once, his expression
encouraging.
Okay. He could do this. It was Blair, Blair who knew him, mind and
body. He could tell Blair.
"You'd cut your hair before, but it always grew back, so it wasn't a
big deal. Hair. It grows. Then I started to notice that each time you'd
let it grow a little less before you went to Len's for a trim and I
realized you were going to cut it short one day and that would be it.
No more long hair. And I -- I liked it long. So I
snipped some off when you were asleep one day, just on impulse, and,
yeah, I know that's weird, but it was years ago, so don't give me a
hard time about it, okay?"
"Wow," Blair said after a moment, quietly contemplative. He glanced up
at Jim, a glint of blue, amused, appreciative. "Every time I think I
know Jim Ellison inside and out, you find a way to remind me that I
don't."
"Wouldn't want to get boring," Jim said, a sweet, warm relief filling
him. God, he'd really been bottling up that drop of guilt; it felt good
to spill it out and have Blair absorb it. "Predictability's death on
romance." He held out his arms and Blair obliged him with a hug,
fitting himself to Jim's frame so that Jim could feel Blair's heart
beating, a strong push-thump, reassuring on so many levels.
"So," Blair murmured against Jim's neck, nuzzling the skin there with a
clear intent that made Jim think again of beds and last times, "I guess
now I know who left that bottle of hair restorer on my desk."
"That was Henri," Jim said, throwing his friend to the wolves without
hesitation. "Or maybe Simon. Possibly Rafe."
"Liar," Blair said and led Jim toward the bedroom and the bare, soft
bed.
Return to Home
Click here if you'd like to send
feedback