Mac stood in the door of the locker room and silently watched Chad who packed his belongings into a box. He had watched a lot of people leave the lab over the years but it had rarely been as painful as now.
The young man flung his stuff carelessly down: clothes, shampoo, some pictures and magazines. Mac knew most of them were the most recent issues of different tabloids or interior design magazines. He could well remember the concentrated look on Chad's face when he had beheld the rooms in those magazines and had traced invisible lines with his fingertips.
Mac also remembers how they used to sit together on evenings, when he had tried to watch TV and listen to Chad telling him the latest news about Paris Hilton or Brad Pitt at the same time. For Chad nothing was more entertaining than rumour except maybe the silly little computer games he used to play. Games where you had to save lemmings, shot red grouses or throw eggs at British politicians. Chad's little stories about some star's life and how he 'cracked the record last night twice!' had kept Mac's mind from work and sometimes even from Claire (which was more the case when they were in bed, because Mac also still remembers that Chad gives fantastic, mind-blowing blowjobs).
But Mac especially remembers how he ruined it all.
He remembers the kiss he gave Rose on their first and only date.
He remembers how he came home and nothing was left of Chad.
He remembers the awkward talk the next day and Chad's request for a transfer on his desk.
Chad was finished with his locker. He put his jacket on( black blazer they had found after three hours of hoping from one shop to the next) and took the box. He noticed Mac only now.
'Came to say goodbye?'
'I've got something for you.'
'An umbrella?!' Chad smirked a little: 'How considerate of you since I move to Seattle.'
He took a step towards Mac: 'It's the best way, isn't it?'
'I don't know.' Mac felt a thick lump in his throat: 'but I guess we'll never know.'
Their last kiss was a short one, lips on lips for a final goodbye before Chad walked through the door and Mac added him to his eternal-regrets-list.