Dead, Not Gone

Antonio has a dream about his dead husband. Apparently, Lovino has a couple things he would like to reinforce for both their sakes.

Antonio knew it was a dream as soon as he opened his eyes to see his dead husband young and straddling his waist. Instead of a balding, wrinkly, old man, there was coconut brown hair, smooth skin, and ungnarly fingers. Lovino looked twenty-three years old again, the same age he had been when they had gotten together. The only true difference was that his golden wedding band, the one he had been buried with, was curved around his ring finger. And Antonio didn't have to see himself to know he was back to the age of twenty-five and wearing his ring as well (as if he would ever take it off). This was definitely a dream.

Lovino smiled warmly at him, raising a hand to stroke his face. The metal of his ring was cool against Antonio's skin. "Tesorino."

Antonio reached to touch the hand on his cheek, pressing down. It felt so real, as if his husband was really there. "This is a dream, though."

"So what if it is?" Lovino scoffed lightly, warm smile never fading. "I didn't leave."

"You died."

"I couldn't help it. I got old."

"I'm older and I'm not dead."

The corners of his mouth curled further upright. "Are you blaming me for dying?"

"No," Antonio replied, digging the pads of his fingers into the hand. "You had a heart attack. You couldn't have stopped that. I just wish you hadn't."

"I'm sorry," Lovino leaned down to kiss him lightly. "You have better genes than I do. You'll live a few more years than I did."

Antonio followed him up in a sitting position, wrapping his arms around his waist. Lovino didn't remove his hand from his face.

"I don't want to," Antonio argued. "All the passion's been sucked out of everything. I can't enjoy anything anymore."

"You're grieving," Lovino informed him matter-of-factly.

Antonio shook his head. "Te adoro. Te quiero. Te amo. Te necesito! I can't live without you. It's not really living!"

"Nice poetry, mio tesorino. I adore, want, love, and need you, too, but you're alive, whether you feel like it or not," he dusted his cheek with his thumb. "It's not like I left. I'm still here. I'm waiting for you."

"You're the one with nice poetry," Antonio frowned. He pushed himself forward so their foreheads touched, closing his eyes. What was he thinking? "This is a dream. You're not real. I'm going to wake up crying again because you're under ground instead of beside me."

Lovino's hand slid to his shoulder. "I love the carnations and daisies you planted on my grave. You picked the best ones from the garden."

Antonio snorted. "This is how I know you're not real. Lovino always had a mouth, even when he was happy."

"Would it make YOU happy if I fucking called you a jerk-bastard who better realize fast I'm here, damn it?" he chuckled. "You know this is real, tesorino. All of your other dreams were memories of the past or nightmares about my funeral. This isn't a memory or a nightmare. You can feel me."

"We're seventy-six and seventy-eight. I don't see or feel like an old man - "

Antonio pulled his head back and opened his eyes, and started. He was greeted with the sight of his husband the day he died, from the balding head and wrinkly gnarles to the light red shirt and khaki pants he had been wearing. Lovino's smile brightened, and Antonio felt his bones ache. He didn't have to look at himself to know he was his proper age again.

And just like that, it was gone. They were both young once more, free from red shirts and soreness.

"It's a dream, yes," Lovino explained, "but believe me when I say I'm here."

"Why?" Antonio breathed.

"Why should you believe me or why am I here?"

"Both."

"You should believe because I said so," his tone became slightly, familiarly, stubborn. "I'm here because, like I said, I'm waiting for you. You have time, Tonio, and when that time is up, I want us to be together again as soon as possible."

Antonio's throat croaked. "I want my time to be up now. You don't understand, Lovi, I'm miserable! We've been married for fifty years, together longer than that! It's not fair that you went first!"

"If the shoe was on the other foot, I would be telling you the same thing - that it's unfair you died first. Unfortunately, one of us had to be put in this position."

"We could have died together," Antonio replied darkly.

Lovino laughed. "That was unlikely to happen from the beginning."

"If you're real, why are you in my dream? Why not as a - a ghost?"

"Tesorino," he clasped both hands on his face, "I can see, without you telling me, how miserable you are. I know you're hurting. It's not a one-way tunnel; I'm hurting, too. You just can't see me and my pain like I can you and yours. I had to contact you somehow."

"And?" Antonio requested. "I know there's more."

"I may have been grumpy in our life together, but I've never wanted you unhappy," Lovino said. "That doesn't change because I'm dead. I won't tell you not to grieve because you need to, Toni; but you shouldn't waste your last years not enjoying anything, either. Go back to eating more, hang out with Gilbert before he passes, too, and take care of the tomatoes before they dehydrate. I'd do anything to have more time to be with everyone I love and do what I love; don't waste yours."

"They're not fun anymore," he protested, brow furrowing.

"Only temporarily."

"Lovi..."

He kissed him more firmly. "It won't be forever. You don't have eternity on Earth. You have a limited amount of years left to tie the rest of your loose ends before we can be together. If the shoe was on the other foot, I'm certain you would be saying the same to me. And luckily, I'm the more stubborn of us. You have to move on, Toni."

"No!" Antonio yanked his hands off his face. "Moving on means forgetting! You won't mean anything to me! It means you stop loving that person and replace them! I won't do that!"

For the first time, Lovino frowned. "You honestly think you could stop loving me by living without me?"

"Yes."

"Toni, you underestimate yourself. There's no way, after all we've had, you could stop loving me just because I died."

"Nothing is good anymore," Antonio rejected. "There's no way I'll try to force myself to move on if it means enjoying everything without you!"

Lovino took a deep, exasperated breath. His never had had that much patience. Without much care, he shoved Antonio back on his back and fell on top of him, snaking his arms around his neck. "Are you that afraid?"

He slid his arms up and tightened them around his husband's torso. "Yes."

They lied there for what seemed like minutes, seeped in each other's presence (Antonio noted that he even smelled the same, like pizza sauce and mint deodorant), before Lovino spoke up.

"Tonio, I'm going to be fucking pissed if you do this on purpose. You can have all the time in the world to mourn me, but you've got to move on at some point. You won't stop loving me in the process, won't forget me, won't replace me. If you don't try, then I swear, when you die, I'm headbutting you."

"If the shoe was on the other foot," he mimicked, "you would know exactly how I feel. I miss you so much."

"You think I don't miss you?" he lifted his head to glare at him, brown eyes fierce with offense. "You think I don't miss lying beside you in bed, making pizza, taking care of our gardens? That I don't miss watching TV, drinking wine, going out on dates? I told you earlier, Tonio, I'm hurting, too. And I'll keep hurting so long as you don't move on. I promise you, you won't stop being my husband for this."

"And what if I do?"

"Then I'll headbutt you."

"So, either way, I get headbutted?"

"You won't if you would hear me out. You've always had that problem; why is it so hard to listen to me? I'm not making this shit up to torture you," he scolded.

Antonio couldn't suppress the smile creeping onto his face. Surprisingly enough, he had missed Lovino's nagging as well. "I wish you could still be alive to yell at me."

"I haven't left," he reminded him sternly. "Even if you can't see me, I am in the house. I am waiting for you. I just want you to be happy, god damn it!"

"If that's true, you should visit me every night."

"As much as I would love to, I don't have that much energy," Lovino softened.

"I'll tell you what, Lovi," Antonio offered, giving in. "If you have enough energy to make your presence known when I wake up, I'll believe you. I'll...try to move on..."

"It won't make you stop loving or missing me," he reassured him, smiling warmly again. "You'll see."

Antonio tucked his fingers under Lovino's chin, pulling him in for one last kiss. "Am I really going to have to wait another few years to do that again?"

His husband sat up, disentangling their arms. "Sadly. Your alarm clock is about to go off, tesorino. I'll hold you to your promise."

He scowled. "I always hated that stupid thing."

Antonio's bones ached harshly when the stupid alarm clock drove him out of his dream. He reached one trembling arm to shut the damn thing off, and tossed the covers off him. Withered, ugly, decrepit legs stared back at him. He was seventy-eight, not twenty-five. At least, he thought, peering down at his hand, he still had his wedding ring on.

Groaning at the soreness of his joints, Antonio pushed himself off the bed. He limped his way to his (formerly their) personal bathroom to go, shower, and brush his teeth.

A part of him wanted to believe the dream had been genuine, that Lovino's spirit really had been there. He was tempted to hunt for a sign of his presence, but now that the sleep was wearing from his tired brain, he realized how dumb that was. His husband was dead and buried at the local cemetary. And considering all the dreams and nightmares he actually had had, there was nothing that said this particular one had been anything more than wishful thinking.

Yet it had been a nice dream; he could still feel Lovino's lips on his. He wished it hadn't ended so quickly.

Stumbling out of the bathroom, Antonio made his way to the dresser to put on his clothes for the day. Clothes in hand, he lifted his head and nearly screamed.

The alarm clock, the top of which had the button to turn it off, was lying upsidedown on the dresser. No one could have done that; Antonio lived alone.

His jaw trembled.

"Lovino," his parched throat croaked. "Oh, god. Lovino!"

And just like that, he was on the floor in tears, exactly as he had told his husband he would be.

He guessed that meant it would be time it water the tomatoes later, and invite Gilbert over for dinner. Right after he was finished mourning.

Tesorino - Italian, "sweetheart" (literally "treasure").

Mio tesorino - Italian, "my sweetheart" (literally "my treasure").

Te adoro. Te quiero. Te amo. Te necesito! - Spanish, "I adore you. I want you. I love you. I need you!" ("Te quiero" can also mean platonic love, such as between friends and family).