Title: Through the YearsSummary: A look into the life of Zack and Cody as they grow together and apart.
Pairing: Zack/Cody, Zack/OFC, Cody/OMC
Warning: This story contains twincest. Deathficish.
Disclaimer: Don't own, you know that.
Author's Note: I don't really watch the show, so I don't know much about their background other than their parent's are divorced. Sorry if eight is wrong. This is the product of late night ramblings about favourite shows we watched as kids versus today's shows and a fierce desire to procrastinate.
Through the Years
At eight their parents got divorced. Differences of opinion they said, lives going in different directions. We love you both, you had nothing to do with it, you'll still get to see your dad, just not as often. All the platitudes told to kids of recently divorced parents.
Cody cried. Zack got angry. Neither of them talked to either of their parents for a week.
"You'll never leave me, right?" Cody whispered to Zack one night during that long week, crawling into Zack's bed and curling up next to him.
"Never," Zack whispered right back, putting his arm around his brother, "now let me sleep you girl."
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At twelve they moved into a hotel. A fabulous expensive hotel, but still a hotel. It screamed impermanence to them. Monumental things happened in that hotel. First crushes, first kisses, first dates, growing up, the hotel bore witness to it all.
"Have you ever kissed a girl?" Cody whispered to Zack one night shortly after Zack had declared his love for Maddie, knowing the answer since Zack would never do something like that without telling him.
"No," Zack whispered back, "and the first girl I do kiss is going to be Maddie."
Cody looked over at Zack's bed, so close. He got up, walked over, and sat on Zack's bed. "We do everything together, right?" he asked.
"Right," Zack whispered, sitting up slightly. "Everything."
Staring at each other, a choice to be made. "Everything," Cody whispered back and then leaned down and kissed his brother, his other half, softly on the lips.
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At sixteen they gave everyone else a reason to add another dichotomy to their relationship. The smart one, the dumb one; the shy one, the loud one; the responsible one, the playful one; the gay one, the strait one. None of them were quite true, just labels added to make people feel better about two boys who were so physically alike.
"I have a boyfriend," Cody whispered to Zack one night.
"I know," Zack whispered back, "and I have a girlfriend. I always did say you were a girl."
They really were too big to share a bed now, especially the little twin beds that were necessary if two beds were to fit in the room, but that didn't stop them.
"Have you ever…you know?" Cody asked as he lay down on Zack's bed, again, knowing the answer.
"No, Kara says she wants to wait," Zack said, turning so he was facing Cody.
"Do you?" Cody asked, his face dangerously close to Zack's. They weren't twelve anymore after all. "Want to wait that is?"
"You have a boyfriend," Zack whispered, they were so close now.
"And you have a girlfriend," Cody affirmed. "Do you want to wait?"
"No," Zack said, barely audible, and Cody closed the few inches between them and captured Zack's lips with his own. This was no shy first kiss of two twelve year olds determined to do everything together. It was a kiss of promise, a kiss that said there was more to come.
"I don't know what to do," Zack whispered as Cody started taking off clothes.
"Let me show you."
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At eighteen they learned that staying together forever really isn't an option. That they must take different paths no matter how much they want to stay together.
"I can't believe you're going to New York," Zack whispered as the two spent their last night together in their room. Cody was off to Columbia, something he had worked so hard for, and Zack was staying in Boston. Community College.
"Columbia's a great school," Cody whispered back, "you'll visit. And maybe in two years move up there with me. We'll have our own apartment." It was a familiar conversation. One they'd had many times since Cody had been accepted early decision to his dream school. But it was so real now, bags packed, car ready for the drive.
"I'll miss you," they said at the same time, and just looked at each other from across the room. If they had been too big at sixteen they were certainly too big at eighteen, and yet Cody still moved to Zack's bed, shedding clothing along the way.
"We'll always be closer than close, even when we're far away," Cody whispered as he climbed into Zack's bed.
"You really are a girl," Zack whispered back in between kisses.
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At twenty two they attended a wedding. The father gave away the bride, and the brother gave away most of the groom.
"I'm getting married in the morning," Zack whispered, as they lay in their room in the hotel where the reception would be.
"I know," Cody whispered back. He was working on his MBA and had driven to Philadelphia for the wedding. "The rest of you're life with one woman."
They hadn't even bothered climbing into separate beds, although the room did have two. It was their last night together and it would be well spent.
"She can't have all of you," Cody whispered, planting soft kisses along Zack's stomach. "You're still mine, but I suppose you can be lended out."
"Just as you're mine," Zack whispered back, flipping Cody so he was now on top and he began repeating the motions Cody had used on him. "And this will always be ours."
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At twenty eight they learned that going to different schools, living in different states, having different lives, did not really mean they were apart. Visits, phone calls, e-mail, it kept them together. But they weren't invincible.
"You can't die," Zack whispered sitting beside Cody's hospital bed, holding his had.
"Get in," Cody whispered, not because he was scared someone would hear, but because it was all he could do. Cancer. Two years of fighting it, and now the doctors said there was no more to be done. It was a waiting game. Waiting to die.
"I won't let you die," Zack whispered. "We're going to grow old together and you'll spoil my kids rotten and maybe even adopt a few of your own. They'll drive us crazy and we'll love it"
His kids had visited Uncle Cody earlier in the day. Amy would never remember him, he'd be a vague memory augmented by pictures in John's mind. They both knew it.
"I wish," Cody whispered, dissolving into another coughing fit.
"Shh," Zack said, silencing him with a kiss. He sighed and curled up with his brother as best he could with all the wires. "I promised I'd never leave you, I suppose I should have gotten the same promise from you."
"Zack…" but no words could make it better. Finally Cody just closed his eyes and leaned against his brother, giving another kiss. "I love you."
"I know," Zack whispered back, "I love you too."