Memento Amare

by G. D. Cox

  Have you found her, Clyde? Have you found what you were looking for, with her?

  He shuts his eyes once more, and instead of the dark, he sees ... Clyde. He sees Clyde in a black t-shirt and jeans and boots, sitting with those long, lean legs folded against a hunched torso on the tiled steps of a picture-perfect, single family bungalow's front porch. He sees the bungalow's picture-perfect, mowed front yard and iridescent, blossoming flower garden, the Tartarian maple trees with their dense, round canopies and smooth-gray trunks lit by balmy afternoon sunlight. He doesn't know where this is, but then he has eyes only for Clyde who still looks so gorgeous with such unkempt, spiky hair rimmed by sunshine, with a bristly face that hints at neglect.

  Clyde is staring sightlessly with reddened eyes at a stone path leading from the front porch to a black car parked in front of the bungalow. Clyde's hands are grasping something that's hanging from a silver chain necklace around his neck.

  You've found her, haven't you? Are you happy? With her?

  He hopes that Clyde is. He'd meant it when he said that he wishes only happiness and freedom for Clyde in that voice message (his final love letter, his will). It's his sole consolation now, that it'd been worth it to let Clyde go even as it immolated him to do it. At least one of them will make it and find some peace in this vast, unfair, unpredictable, senseless world.

  He's dying and he knows it. He's yearning more than ever to be with Clyde, his Clyde that he knew (knows) and loved (loves), his Clyde who must be waiting for him.

  He's dying.

  He's dying, and the rest of his body is finally catching up with his heart.

  He thinks he falls asleep. He thinks he's asleep and dreaming. He thinks that perhaps he's finally, finally leaving this broken world and this broken body when the door of his cell slams open to reveal a celestial being with spiky, golden hair in a sleeveless, high-necked, black-and-red outfit. The celestial being has a weapon in hand that looks very much like a GATF-issued gun, and he'd laugh if he actually remembers how at an angel manifesting before him with no wings but a gun.

  Well, then. It seems his own seams have finally cracked and crumbled and snapped too.

  Is this angel going to take him to heaven? Or to hell?

  He stares up at the angel as the angel stares back at him with big, wide-set blue eyes like those of a big cat's, with something akin to shock, to horror. He's unsurprised by that. He's a total wreck, he knows. Something certainly too indecent to show up at the gates of heaven, much less enter it.

  He stares on as the angel lowers and sheaths the gun, as the angel stumbles into the cell and onto gloved hands and padded knees in front of him. This close up, he can better see the angel's face and it's ... it's so ... familiar. So exquisite, even with that furrowed, high brow and those beautiful eyes glistening and turning pink and swollen around the edges.

  Don't be sad, he tries to tell this angel who's lifting him up so carefully, so gently from blood-crusted cement and into the warm embrace of strong, muscular arms. It'll all be over soon.

  "Phelan," the angel says hoarsely, touching his cheek with the softest brush of callused fingers. "Phelan. Oh god."

  He is also unsurprised that the angel knows his name. The angel is, after all, going to take him away from here.

  "You're gonna be okay, babe, you're gonna be okay. You're gonna be okay."

  Cole tries to blink when something scorching and wet plummets onto his face from the angel's eyes. He knows that some angels can lie, and so sweetly too. He didn't know that angels can cry too.

  It's sweet, really, that there is someone crying for him at all in the last moments of his existence.

  He stares up at the angel's familiar, exquisite face and once more, he sees Clyde. He sees his Clyde gazing back at him, hair trimmed and styled and rimmed by eternal sunshine. He sees Clyde's big, blue, beautiful eyes crinkle in a smile that's his alone. He sees the luxurious platinum, court-shaped ring adorning the fourth finger of Clyde's left hand. He smiles back as best he can, as he hears Clyde say his name so ardently.

  He's dying.

  He's dying, and it's so nice that he gets to see Clyde one last time before he goes.

  I love you, he tries to say.

  Goodbye, he does say with his eyes slowly closing.

  From light-years away, he hears the angel whispering, "No, no no no no." He feels the angel's strong, muscular arms tighten around him. He feels lips moving against his forehead and they ... they feel so much like Clyde's, his Clyde's. But he has to go back to sleep now. He has to sleep.

  He's so tired. He has to sleep and he's so sorry for making this celestial being cry for him when he doesn't deserve it.

  He's so sorry.

  He's -

  XXXV.

  NO ONE DARES TO SIT with Clyde in the waiting room of the OR although he's cleaned up and is in clothes that aren't soaked in Croenian terrorist blood. No one dares to ask Clyde how he's holding up. No one dares to even look at him, not with the way he's sitting with his spine ramrod straight, staring sightlessly at the wall with red eyes. His empty, ashen face speaks for itself. The luxurious platinum, court-shaped ring on the fourth finger of his left hand, clenched in a fist on his lap, speaks for itself.

  Malik had tried to remove it from his finger in the Ark, when Malik, Carter and Don had hauled him away from the medical bay to the showers and were stripping him of his ruined Long-Shot outfit. He knows now that Malik was just removing it to clean it too and store it somewhere safe while he got hosed down, but his vision had gone red as the blood splattering him from head to feet. His ears were ringing. He'd slammed Malik against a tiled, white wall and encircled the guy's throat with his hands while Carter and Don tried to knock him out when he wouldn't let go. Someone slung an arm around his neck and tightened.

  He doesn't recall much after that. He'd woken up in one of the bunks, still on the Ark racing back to New York, swathed in several blankets and garbed in a plain white t-shirt and black sweatpants. His ring was still on his finger. Don was sitting slumped on a chair facing the bunk, in a dress shirt with sleeves rolled up to the elbows and stained, dark gray trousers. An unmistakable bruise was forming across Don's left cheek. Don was gazing at him with dark brown eyes too damn old and weary even for a guy like Don.

  "Cole's still alive," Don said, knowing that was all Clyde cared about. "They had to shock his heart back into action a second time, but he's still alive."

  Don has a wedding ring of his own, a gold one with inlaid diamonds that is stored in a safe in the Stewart family home. His wife Susan, the mother of his three young kids, wears an identical, smaller one. Don, of all people, knows what a ring on the fourth finger of one's left hand means.

  Now, Don is lingering in the waiting room with him and other agents. There are at least fifteen other people in the room. There are more outside the room, all silent and tense, all in tailored suits and ties common of GATF agents to wear. They're all waiting for Bertillon and his surgery team to do their magic on Phelan. To save him.

  Phelan.

  Phelan, who Clyde had found in a crumpled, horrifying, half-naked heap of contusions, gashes and slick blood in that disgusting, cold cell. Phelan, whose bruised, bloodshot eyes were open but didn't recognize him at all. Phelan, who shut those big baby blues like he was saying goodbye and went limp and even paler in his arms like a corpse -

  No, Phelan isn't dead. Phelan isn't dead. Phelan's still alive and Bertillon's going to do his magic and save him (save them both). Phelan's going to live. Phelan has to. He has to.

  Fabry shows up at some point. So does Rajah, the only guy to rush up to Clyde and sit next to him, to his left. Rajah doesn't say a word. Rajah doesn't have to, not after looking at his face. He stares on at the wall with sightless, red eyes but he also sees the bobbing of Rajah's throat above the stiff, white collar of a dress shirt and lavender tie. He feels Rajah's solid presence next to him. He feels cold. He feels like his skull's stuffed with cotton wool. He feels like his chest
is hollowed out and missing something fiery and undeniable and vital like the sun.

  "Bertillon! Hey, Bertillon's coming!"

  There was a lot of blood when he aimed R&D's latest prototype magazine-fed carbine and its grenade launcher at those Croenian terrorists and squeezed the trigger until the first magazine ran out. Then he reloaded, slotting in a new magazine even as the fuckers still alive and screaming tried to crawl or sprint away from him or foolishly fight back.

  "Is Cole gonna make it?"

  Aim. Trigger. Reload. Aim. Trigger. Reload. Aim. Trigger. Reload.

  "Cole's a tough bastard, man -"

  "He's gonna be okay, right?"

  He made sure to go through the entire bunker from one end to the other. Don will later tell him that it took him eight minutes to do it, that the explosions could be heard from inside Ark that was parked nearby and camouflaged from sight and detection due to its advanced cloaking tech.

  No one had dared to go back with him into the bunker after they got Phelan back. Fabry hadn't followed either, but only he and Fabry knew why Fabry deliberately stayed on the Ark and let loose the mad animal he was becoming, instead.

  The sonofabitch has gray eyes, Fabry had said to him, the only man who dared to halt him in his tracks on the way out with two loaded pistols, the prototype carbine and a fuck ton of magazines and grenades hanging off him. Do what you want with everyone else.

  Now, Clyde hears Fabry speak again.

  "Alain. How is he?"

  A dismal and strained silence reigns over the few seconds before Bertillon answers. Clyde doesn't know what Bertillon says in that French-accented, tenor voice. He stares ahead at the wall and he can't comprehend the words pouring from Bertillon's lips. No one else makes a sound. Rajah is now standing next to Clyde, listening to Bertillon as intently as everyone else.

  He feels Rajah's hand upon his shoulder.

  And he hears Bertillon say, "You may need to call his parents, Nathan. The next twenty-four hours will be crucial."

  Pa, Ma, he thinks, and his eyes flood hot and stinging. They overflow. He doesn't care that the trails down his face glisten under the waiting room's lurid lights. He doesn't care that everyone present can see him this way, sitting there with his spine ramrod straight, staring on and on at the wall while crying his fucking eyes out. What he cares about is that he's crying at all, like he's already given up on Phelan. Again.

  He hears a wet sniffle from somewhere above him and to his left. He feels Rajah's hand squeeze his shoulder. He senses someone else approach him from the right. He feels another hand upon his other shoulder, a hand that squeezes his shoulder and then also pats it, and it feels like Don's hand.

  He doesn't look at either man. He stares on at the wall, and the trails down his face do not dry.

  Fabry barks a terse order. Clyde doesn't know what it is. The other agents, including Rajah and Don, gradually mill out of the waiting room until Clyde is alone with Fabry. He hears the heavy treads of Fabry's boots come nearer and nearer to him. He feels Fabry take the seat to his right, sitting down heavily as if Fabry has the weight of a dying universe upon his shoulders.

  Fabry's left knee is touching his right knee. Clyde doesn't shift it away.

  "They're moving him to the ICU," Fabry says to him, also staring ahead at the wall in front of them. "He's as stable as they can get him for now. He's in a coma."

  He's not dead yet, he hears Fabry say. He's not dead. He's still alive.

  "Go home," he hears Fabry also say, and Clyde would laugh out loud if he remembers how, if his teeth aren't gritting to the point of pain and his eyes keep on flooding and flowing.

  Home?

  His home isn't a building. His home isn't built from brick and cement. His home is here. His home is a person, now in the care of ICU nurses who are transporting him from the OR to a private room to be monitored and treated further.

  "With all due respect, sir, fuck you," he croaks, still staring ahead at the wall, still motionless. "You're not leaving and I'm sure as fuck not leaving. So fuck you."

  From the corner of his eye, he sees one end of Fabry's lips curl up in a slight smirk. It distorts the scar marring Fabry's lower left cheek and jawline.

  "Good to know that fire's still in you. Wouldn't wanna lose the maddest killer dog in my pound."

  He hears Fabry snort when he moves only his right hand and forearm and gives his boss, the scariest muthafucker on the planet, the finger. It's a snort of amusement, of self-vindication.

  "Go home," Fabry says a second time, in a firm tone that brooks no argument, no defiance. "You need to get your things to stay here in the ICU. You need to get Phelan's things." Clyde senses Fabry's heavy-lidded, brown, piercing eyes on the side of his face. "You know where everything is."

  The wedding ring around his finger blisters his skin like a brand.

  Fabry accompanies him to the apartment building in Brooklyn. He has a vague recollection of trudging down the hallway to the elevators with Fabry at his side, of people in white, sterile uniforms stepping aside for them and turning heads to watch them leave. He doesn't recall going down to the basement parking garage and climbing into a black SUV with Fabry. He has foggy, nighttime glimpses of the bustling streets of Lower Manhattan beyond the tinted front passenger window of the vehicle. He sees the buzzing, neon signs of bars and clubs opening up for tonight's revelries. He sees crowds of people strolling past on brightly lit sidewalks with smiles on their faces, hazy ghosts with black eyes and skull-grins. He hears them chatting and laughing like the world's going to go on forever and ever.

  He's tapped out on tears for now. He stares out the window with drying, sore eyes. He stares at all these people who should have frozen in time and place just like him the moment Bertillon told Fabry to call Pa and Ma in Chicago. He wonders if this is just some screwed up nightmare from which Phelan will awaken him soon. Nightmares only last as long as you're asleep.

  C'mon, Phelan, wake me up so we can go back to reality.

  Wake up, babe.

  He doesn't recall climbing out of the SUV in the apartment building's basement parking garage or walking with Fabry to the elevator that brings them up to the tenth floor. He doesn't know how it is that Fabry has a key to the apartment. Maybe Phelan gave a clone to Fabry. Maybe Fabry had one all along, even before Phelan got the place.

  Clyde knows something is wrong the instant he sets foot in the apartment (in their apartment, Phelan's and his), his port in every storm, his refuge from the rest of the world. He can't quite get a fix on the wrongness of everything around him despite how familiar everything appears.

  The apartment still has its open-plan, functional design with its expansive living room windows to allow plenty of light to filter in. Said living room is still on the right with its wood-beamed ceiling feature, with its black, leather-bound couch and crimson throw pillows, its low, glass coffee table and end tables with minimalist lamps. The switched off flat screen television is still set on its rectangular, freestanding wooden stand. The open kitchen is still to the left with its smaller windows, its marble counters, stainless steel fridge and sleek, white floor-to-ceiling cabinets and curved, central island and single wall of appliances. The spacious, cherry-wood area between the kitchen and living room, where he and Phelan have slow danced so many times in candlelight, is still there.

  But his maroon mug is no longer where it should be on the kitchen counter next to the stainless steel double sink and drip coffeemaker. Phelan's black 'Big Boss' mug isn't there either. Instead, there's a random glass with Phelan's toothbrush in it and a half-used tube of toothpaste beside it.

  Clyde shuffles to the open kitchen with hesitant steps. Behind him, he can sense Fabry standing near the shut door of the apartment, watching him silently. He grazes the smooth side of the glass with his fingertips. He touches the white and blue bristles of Phelan's toothbrush and then withdraws his hand. He drops his hand back to his side. His hands clench into white-knuckled fists. He shuts his eyes and t
ells himself to breathe.

  Phelan had moved to the couch since the night he lost his memories of Phelan. Two days after that, Phelan had moved his toothbrush to the kitchen sink because of him. Him and his fucking stupid homophobia. The fact that Phelan's toothbrush is still out here months later instead of the master bedroom's en suite bathroom can only mean one thing: Phelan probably never went back in there. Phelan's probably been using the apartment's second bathroom all this time, the one next to the guest bedroom that Ma and Pa use whenever they're visiting. As to why Phelan hasn't bothered to move his toothbrush to the second bathroom, Clyde ... has no idea why.

  Maybe Phelan couldn't bear to do it. Maybe Phelan thought that the amnesia was temporary and that things would go back to normal soon enough. Maybe Phelan thought that moving his toothbrush into the second bathroom meant something ... final.

  And who is Clyde to blame Phelan for not going back into the en suite bathroom?

  He almost attacked Phelan in there, just for touching his shoulder. Phelan, his handler, his best friend, his lover. His husband.

  He doesn't deserve a good man like Phelan. He doesn't deserve Phelan at all.

  With his eyes still shut, he dips his head and presses cold palms to his aching temples, his shoulders stooped. He tells himself to breathe. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. Phelan's still alive. Phelan's still alive and he has to be there for his husband, he has to be useful to the bravest, toughest, most noble man in the whole damn world so get a fucking grip.

  He sucks in a deep and long breath. He lets it go slowly. He lowers his hands to his sides and he opens his eyes. He glances around the kitchen in which he's prepared meals so many times and it ... it seems so familiar and yet so ... wrong.

  Where have their mugs gone? And where is the spice rack that he bought four years ago when he and Phelan decided they were going to cook together on weekends if they were home? Where's that small oil painting he bought over two years ago for Phelan, the painting of lush rice fields by a Vietnamese street artist while he was in Hanoi? Where are the silly fridge handle covers with teddy bear heads that he'd bought for Phelan as a joke, that Phelan had ended up using anyway?