Hands were clasped around a silver chain, fingers carefully pressing against each of the links while he mouthed the numbers while he thought. He'd already counted several times, there were three hundred and sixty five beads on the long chain, fifty-two on the short one; he'd passed his fingertips across the name on the tags enough times to know what they said simply by touch. The stream of numbers made him calm and mitigated the loneliness that made their apartment seem a little darker. He counted for the third time and then counted the days Rick had been gone; it was a bit under six months. One hundred and sixty-eight days, to be exact and it had been thirteen days since his last letter.
The letters always kept what he was doing fairly vague, though it didn't dampen the worry Craig harbored because of it. If anything it made it worse, but in his own silly little way, he knew how to make it better. Rick wrote about how much he missed him and reminded him of things they did together; it made Craig uncertain because he didn't talk at all about what he was working on, but the fact that he was so focused on coming home was relieving. Craig had been with Rick for several years now and if he knew anything about the man, he did whatever he set his mind to and did it well. Memories of when they first met and how vigorously they fought had the corners of Craig's mouth turning upward despite themselves and promises of things they would do together when he returned were collectively hopeful and distressing.
Under different circumstances, Craig liked to keep his living areas clean, but he left the letters Rick sent scattered on the coffee table so he could read them when he got home from the archive; there wasn't a lot to greet him aside from the mail and a small meal. They heartened him and kept him going when things got lonely. It wasn't like Craig to socialize too often, he was going to sit in his living room and weather this by himself. It became almost a reward to remind him not to fall into old habits of forgetting to care for himself when he was especially thrown into his work.
Craig slipped the chain over his neck to its rightful place, holding the tags in his hand over his chest, lying down on the couch with his arm over his eyes. Today in the archive he'd stumbled across a word in a foreign language that translated to missing someone for what felt like years. The accuracy was hitting him kind of hard and it made him feel even more pathetic. He was a thinking, logical, functioning adult, for god's sake and he could get on perfectly fine without company, but Rick had a way of worming where he didn't belong at first and now there was a hole where the brute had left, where he once was a bright spot in an otherwise depressing existence. Craig couldn't be too mad at him for that; he only wished he were here.
Today was a Saturday, right before the mail came and it was the fourteenth day since the last letter. Rick had been surprisingly systematic about writing every two weeks; another letter was due today. The mail came precisely at 3 pm and it was exactly 2:59, so Craig lifted himself off the couch to check the mail. Bills, subscription offers, junk, and a messily addressed envelope for Craig Renshaw. He smiled, looking the envelope over before returning to the apartment to open it, there was never a return address, due to some secrecy for the work Rick was doing, but Craig could ignore that for now with a quick few rips and an opened letter. Rick's deplorable handwriting was now far more charming now that it was Craig's only contact with him; he pushed his glasses up his nose and curled up on the couch to read, shuffling papers before settling his eyes on his name with a nostalgic smile on his lips.
Dear Craig,
Something kind of hit me today: you'd hate it up here. It's cold and wet and it snows a lot really early, half the people here have a cold most of the time, and they're all keen on sharing! Not that I'd mind it at all if you were here, I'd be more than happy to warm you up and then some! Don't mind taking care of you if you get sick much either, they have some really great soup up here that I think you might like, but that's about the extent of good food they have up here. After thinking about all of that, I realized I'd really rather be home with you and dammit, the sooner I am the better. I'd much rather sleep in our bed, warming you up there.
I'm sorry things had to be like this, I'm kind of regretting leaving more and more each day, but I'll be back soon, I swear to god. Last I remember seeing of you, you were half-way between angry as a hive of bees and sad as a lost puppy. I can remember you smiling before, but I feel like shit that I left you looking like that. Damn, every time I write one of these, I hope it makes you smile. I'm not leaving again after I get home, that's for sure. You remembered what I promised, right? The money I'm getting from my work here, we're going to go look for a house, right? I should have enough to pay for a hefty chunk of that and a couple part-time jobs will get that knocked right out in no time. We'll have something that's ours and that'll make up for being gone so long, I hope.
It's been a long time and sometimes I worry someone else figured out how great you are and decided to snap you up while I can't knock some sense into them. I know you can't write me back, but if you're still reading these and that's the case, you can tell that asshole he's got one hell of a beat down coming for him. He better be one handsome devil or I'm going to be mighty offended. I'm pulling your leg, I know you. Don't get too down on me, you hear? Hell, it'd be good for you if you went out and got hit on or anything out of the house! I'm betting you're holed up in the apartment or working all the overtime you can. Got to remember there's sunshine outside, sweetheart.
Do me a favor and promise me something. I'm getting my ass there before Christmas, I'm going to go out on a limb and promise that to you. You have to do return the favor for me, though. Once I see you, you aren't allowed out of my sight for at least a day and kiss me harder than when I left, okay? I miss the hell out of you and I'm thinking about you all the time. Take care of yourself and think about me a little, too, would you?
Love,
Rick
By the end of the letter, Craig was indeed smiling. He read it twice more as was the habit and placed it on top of the last one, lying on the couch curled in the cushions. He daydreamed about living a steady life in some little house. It staved off gnawing feelings of depression until he fell asleep there without meaning to, waking up cold several hours later to drag himself to bed. He took the most recent letter along with him as an afterthought; closest he was going to get to sleeping next to Rick for a while. It would have to do.
Pleasant thoughts graced his dreams for once, thoughts of homecomings and catching up, their habits falling right into place where they had been with ease. In his dreams, Craig could give Rick his dog tags and refuse to take them ever again; taking them meant that he would leave again.
"Last thing I got from bein' in th'army," Rick had told him once, "Don't care too much 'bout th'rest, but I got it in m'head that with these guys, I can still do whatever I put m'mind to."
Craig woke up the next morning and counted the links in the chain again. It was sincerely… soothing somehow, not that he needed to know they were there. He kind of wished Rick had kept the dog tags; maybe then he'd be home by now, according to his theory on the tags. That little bit of doubt that maybe he wouldn't put his mind to coming back to him was quickly extinguished. No one wrote a letter that heartfelt and made no intention of pulling through, especially not Rick. The thought cheered him and he went about his day with a little more enthusiasm.
Two weeks went by without poignant note and the mail didn't come on Saturday. Not one single letter in his mailbox; not a bill, or an advertisement, nothing, least of all a hastily addressed letter to one Craig Renshaw. It was hard to swallow the disappointment, but Craig squared his shoulders and assumed it must have been a mistake. Regardless, he has spent six months without Rick and he was doing just fine. Everything was clean, he was healthy, and he was paying the bills, all things he did even while Rick was there, so he could deal with waiting for Monday to come and his letter to be with it.
Saturday and Sunday went by as normal, as always planned. Monday came by and he fully expected to find a letter when he came home from work, but there was nothing but junk, yet again. They were promptly shoved into the garbage and his regular perch on the couch was occupied. He flipped through the old letters to find a favorite, one of the first letters Rick had sent him. His angry sigh bent the paper, but he carefully smoothed out the crease and began to read.
Dear Craig,
You know, there's this huge lake here. I remember you telling me that this was the largest body of freshwater in the world, but shit, did you know it was so dirty? It's kind of nasty and you know I normally don't care. Oh well, I don't have to eat the fish from there, not sure I want to be glowing green by nightfall. Everything's so damn salty for being freshwater here, must have something to do with the mine.
I hate that you can't write me, but that's how it goes, they're telling me. I'll just have to guess what you're worried about, though I have to say, I'm getting pretty good at it. I'm doing fine, physically. My leg doesn't bother me so much as it did down there, but it's not so dry up here. I know you might be worried I'm stressing it, but I swear I'm stretching it out, sure, but not hurting myself. Nobody really took care of me like you did, though, so it gets stiff sometimes. That's one of the first things I noticed about you, you know? You have all these walls up, but I know the truth, you're really a fuss and a damn good nurse. You are a lot more compassionate than you want people to think.
I'm sure you remember bumping into me on the street that day we met, I knocked a bunch of books out of your hands and I tried to help you out. I think I called you a nerd or whatever and we got into it really bad; if it had gone on any longer, we might have gotten a crowd going. I know one of us was going to go hit the other, but my leg cramped right the hell up and I was down real quick. The look of concern on your face, that's what I noticed about you first, the fact that I had been some 'big dumb oaf' I think you said, and you were still nice enough to make sure I was okay. Once you helped me get up and out of the street, the second thing was your hands. I think I told you that you were pretty good with your hands, rubbing out the tension on my knee. It was your mouth I noticed after that, how you were chewing on your lip and turned redder than a tomato. I was smitten at that point, though I would never have told you.
Suddenly that big bad trash talker in the street went from fiery to nervous when I asked you to dinner. That was a good night, I still think about it a lot; I didn't mean to try to get you into bed, I hope you know. I liked you more than enough to take it slower than I might've, but damn, I don't regret it now. I still remember how you tasted that first time; keeps me warm at night sometimes. Not going to lie when I say that's something I miss, too, though I know you might kill me for writing that down. Don't matter, though, I'm missing all of you.
I know, I know, it hasn't been too long now, has it? I don't really care; I'm ballsy enough to say it. It's been two months and I miss the hell out of you. I'm looking to get back before fall, so I'm going to see you soon and we can celebrate in all the ways you and I are good at. Try not to miss me too bad, though, one of us should figure this long-distance shit out.
Love,
Rick
Upon reading it the third time, Craig's dreamy half-smile turned into a frown. That was right, Rick had said he was going to try to get home by fall, but the last one said before Christmas. No explanation was given as to why the date was pushed back, that was strange. It was already getting cold, it was the end of November and if Rick wanted to come home before Christmas, it'd have to be soon.
A little glimmer of hope shot through him: perhaps he was already on his way and that's why he wasn't writing. Driving all the way from… well, wherever he happened to be—somewhere north, presumably—was going to take some time, exactly like when he had left. If he was returning, that was a good reason to get out the decorations, he thought to himself. They had a little tree and lights someplace, it would brighten the place up and make it seem like he hadn't gotten a great deal more than his day job accomplished while Rick was gone. That was a warm and inviting welcome, he thought as he pulled out the Christmas decorations. A Christmas reunion was precisely what he needed to tickle the deeply closeted romantic in him; he hummed as he started to hang lights on the windows of the apartment. Now their catching up involved spiced wine and sugar cookies, in his mind and with the addition of Rick's slightly suggestive commentary, perhaps it would end on the table, encouraged by the wine. Somewhere in the corners of his mind, he knew he was jumping to conclusions, but the thought made him happy enough to keep it and guard it.
That cynical part of him was correct, though. Spiced wine was made, but Christmas came and went. No Rick, no call, no letter, no sign that he was even still alive or anything and Craig sat at the table with their stupid little tree, drunk with shoulders shaking, trying to maintain himself in spite of bone-crushing, disappointing assumptions that had made him happy for a moment. They were back with a vengeance right now, taunting him for being so naïve while he slowly got drunk on warm alcohol. Right now it was too sweet for his tastes; liquor that burned might have suited him better right now.
Staring at the glass of wine in his hand, he couldn't help but wonder where Rick was and what he was doing. Yes, it was starting to shape up like he'd been completely forgotten behind, but his pink eyes stared at the swirling bubbles in his wine glass while wondering if Rick was going to be happy where he was if it was without him. Now that he was 'up north' wherever, Craig almost had to bet that there was someone else involved. It was difficult, but he tried to tell himself that he was better off now. He could hate the asshole for not having the courage to tell him and then… move on. The wine bubbles were quickly washed down his throat and the rest of the night was spent pondering if this new person was better looking than him or possibly less difficult to handle, or if it was possible Rick ran off with some woman with both those traits and weighing which would hurt more.
Through the haze of melancholy, it was impossible for Craig not to wonder and fret if Rick was alright. Selfishly, a darker part of him wanted him not to be, for there to be some very legitimate reason he was not writing or coming home. If he happened to be preoccupied with an injury or worse, at least he was still Craig's, which made him feel horrible. It was simply encouraging that he was still on his way home and if he wasn't… Craig set his forehead against the kitchen table with a soft, tired sob. He didn't even want to consider the what-ifs anymore. The more he thought about them, the less all of this felt worth it. He fell asleep on the table once he stopped shaking with his arms curled around his head. Vague snippets of nightmares plagued him, but when he woke up he couldn't remember them. He blamed it on the wine and hastily threw out the remainder.
New Year's Eve was spent going to bed very early, as Craig was unwilling to start a new year this way without silent protest. He listlessly spent all of New Year's Day at the archive, putting in overtime to keep his mind off of all of the horrible possibilities. January second was the day he returned to a single letter in his mailbox, haphazardly addressed in a familiar handwriting. Craig swallowed and tried to stuff his heart back down from leaping into his throat, but he tore the letter open right there, shredding the envelope in the floor without a second thought. Inside was a neatly printed note along with what appeared to be the normal handwritten letter. Craig's shoulders relaxed and he took a deep breath before reading the note.
To whom it may concern,
Our apologies, but this letter has been redacted for the public safety. Please be comforted by the fact that your employee is healthy and happy and there is no reason to worry whatsoever!
Have a happy holiday!
Underneath of the holiday wishes was a strange circular symbol. Craig didn't think too hard on it, swapping the paper for the one behind it, biting his lip in anticipation but… most, if not all, of the letter was blacked out with thick black bars. He scanned the bars, but nothing was intelligible behind them, not a symbol or a vowel. The words Dear Craig, where there in the familiar handwriting, but after that there were blocks of lines without another word breaking them up until the very end where it simply said: I love you, I miss you. Love, Rick.
Unsure of what his stomach was doing and how he was feeling, he managed to drag himself back up to their apartment to think. That had never happened before and Craig wondered why that was. Was Rick alright or did he break some kind of rule? Was there a new security feature that didn't allow employees to say anything to their loved ones? This was… this wasn't fair. First they take Rick away from him and now they say Rick can no longer write letters which was the only happy thing in the past ten months, the only thing that kept Craig a little hopeful that this might all return to normal.
The letter sat in his lap for a long time while he thought with his hand pressed to his temples, the fingers of his other hand draped across the opposite side of the well censored letter from his missing lover. He drew his both hands up to brush his blonde bangs out of his face, fingertips rasping the paper of the letter. He dropped them down to the couch suddenly, staring at the reverse side of the blackened letter. Shut eyes and a deep breath were what he needed right now, just to be absolutely certain he hadn't just imagined that feeling the raised edges of words he was not allowed to read. Gingerly, he set both letters on the coffee table before racing to get a pencil and paper. A gut feeling that he was about to read something forbidden and possibly terrible had his hands shaking while he lined up Rick's unfairly censored letter with a thin sheet of paper and pressed it to the table. He made short work of the pencil, tearing one side of the wood off to aid in making a rubbing, drawing the graphite against the paper with the utmost care. It appeared that the censors didn't forget everything, only a few letters and very deeply written words were legible.
Only a few passes of the pencil were necessary, Craig was worried about missing something if he pressed too hard. He set it aside and brought the rubbing to his face, inspecting the shapes that he saw there. There wasn't much, it appeared that the people blocking the mail did a better job than Craig had hoped, but there was still something there. The words something is going on and I'm not sure what will happen to me were plainly visible, making Craig's heartbeat speed up. He instantly regretted thinking anything as selfish as he had on Christmas; now he just desperately wished that Rick was okay. The last little bit of the letter made his heart drop right into his stomach: If I don't see you again, just remember I love you, I miss you.
The paper was dropped and his hands clutched at his stomach. Sheer horror had his stomach heaving and his whole body shaking. What did that mean? This didn't paint a very comforting picture about Rick's whereabouts or his ability to come back to him. The second paper was almost forgotten, Craig snatched it up with trembling hands, examining the surface for something, anything for a clue where Rick was; he wasn't going to just let them have him like that! Nothing on the paper gave him any clues to where he was going to begin looking aside from that strange symbol. It looked familiar, like it was a graphic of another type of symbol he'd seen before, but where it might be was completely lost.
He sat back into the couch and removed his glasses, pressing his fingers into his eyes in a vain attempt to think. It was really no good, the more he thought, the more his thoughts raced and the more they raced… he was simply working himself into a panic. The chain around his neck jangled against his chest when he slammed his hands down on the cushions. Right, he thought to himself, relax; he slipped it off, quickly counting until he could feel his heart rate reach an appropriate level. In past letters, Rick had said he was north, near a large body of water, the largest in the world. That was the Great Lakes, Craig knew, he'd told Rick about that and had been pleased he'd remembered in the letter. Alright, he was definitely in the Midwestern part of the country, that narrowed it down.
Unfortunately, it appeared those were the only clues he had. He spent the rest of the night sifting through the letters he had, scanning the words for more clues as to the whereabouts of this place might have been. Feelings of outright anger with Rick that he hadn't been looser with information cropped out every now and then, but they weren't important now and were immediately stuffed back down. Right now he only had so much to work with and what he was finding was dismally few ideas of where he might be right now. He had two, which narrowed it down to… eight states, one of which was split in half. The rest of the night was spent with his knees up to his chin and his fingers pressed to his head, reviewing everything he read, every tiny bit of information that might help him figure this out.
At a point he could not recall, he fell asleep on the couch and woke with a start early the next morning. A well-rested mind had him stuffing the note with the symbol into his pocket and pulling into work several hours earlier than they expected him dressed in the same clothes he left in last night. The first thing he did was pull out a map and a pad of paper, quickly listing all of the cities on the coasts of the Great Lakes. It was a large list, a huge list, but it narrowed him down from eight entire states to several pages of cities and towns. That entire morning was spent looking up populations and crossing out places that didn't have so much as a hundred people. That wasn't enough to warrant a grocery store, let alone a place where they hired war veterans for… for something. Something important.
Evidently there were no pressing tasks to be done at the archive today because Craig was left knocking out cities that had the wrong climate, that had very good food, and that were cleaner waters until the wee hours of the morning. He searched and circled cities where there might be a nuclear plant, from the comment Rick made about turning glowing green. Somewhere around two a.m. did it hit him: Salt mines. Rick mentioned the atmosphere being salty and there being a mine! He immediately pulled up information about salt mines in the Midwest, finding Michigan. He hurriedly crossed off any other cities he had left that weren't in the state of Michigan. Of course, of course, it was the one state that had two parts separated by a body of water; this couldn't be simple on him for once!
Another hour of searching through records yielded nothing fruitful. Most of the salt mines in Michigan had too much distance to the lake, he realized with a great deal of desperate frustration. Craig sat with his head in his hands, almost ready to give up. This wasn't getting him anywhere; he had an odd symbol and a myriad of clues that didn't actually point to anything specific. This was all just speculation and guesswork, which was not an area in which Craig was comfortable. He was used to cold hard facts being about as absolute as words without mathematical equations to back them up could possibly be. Playing detective wasn't his idea of fulfilling or secure work. He sat back and sighed, gently pressing his forefinger to the dog tags hidden under his shirt. He had to do this, he resolved. There was no backing out of this if he ever wanted to see Rick again and oh god did he want to see Rick again.
With that purpose settling into his mind, renewing his determination, he found the will to keep going. This time, he was looking through old mines, abandoned mines, anywhere close to a lakeside. Hours and painful hours of searching led him straight to a small scrap of news clipping that was simply a couple of town meeting-like notes. Population was down, jobs were leaving, but… the local abandoned salt mine was bought up by a company named Aperture. A jolt of realization shot through him; he yanked the note out of his pocket and smoothed it against the desk as best he could, staring at the circular symbol with a near wheeze of excited discovery. That symbol was the aperture of a camera, an aperture! Just like the company that had bought a salt mine!
Craig stepped back and let himself laugh in victory, chest feeling tight and head dizzy. He'd found a lead; it was only a matter of time before he packed up his car and left. Of course, he was not the impulsive type, so he sat down and went through the records again, looking for an Aperture company or some kind. There wasn't much, but it was there, an Aperture Laboratories, founded in 1947 by a Cave Johnson who had passed in 1976, but not much else on them… except an address. A vague address that only listed a town, but that was all Craig truly needed. He scribbled down the town he was headed for and immediately left, not bothering to replace the materials he had taken out. There were more important things to worry about; his job could be permanently gone in exchange for Rick again. He needed to hurry.
There was absolutely no use in sleeping until he had emptied out their bank account and packed the car with supplies. Clothes, food, maps, water, everything he thought he could even maybe need to make a journey of just under a day were stuffed into the car. His route was carefully planned for the fastest feasible trip up through the mainland of Michigan straight to the Upper Peninsula. Then and only then did he allow himself to take his sleep aid and pass out. His hands were still shaking with anticipation when he finally fell asleep. He wasn't sure he was ready for this, but it wasn't the time to prep himself. The sleep aid allowed him to slumber dreamlessly for as long as his body deemed necessary; he woke somewhere in the late morning and sat himself in the car, gripping the steering wheel.
There was no way to anticipate what was going to happen when he got up there, he could find that this whole business was an elaborate ruse for some reason or that Rick was in some serious trouble with the law or something. He would have all of the time to worry about the what-ifs while he was driving, but right now, he had to step back and pray to god he wasn't making a mistake by leaving. He was much too paranoid to leave without a trace of some kind; a long formal letter was written and left on the kitchen table next to the long-forgotten Christmas tree with a note to Rick written on the back, along with the a manila folder with all of the letters Rick had written him. It detailed where he was going and why, just in case something happened to him and just in case he was wrong and Rick got home before he did. He honestly hoped that would be what happened, but something that fortunate wasn't likely to be—the worrying side of him said he was doing the right thing. He removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes with the back of his hands before settling to his ritual of counting the links on the dog tags around his neck. Three hundred and sixty-five, fifty-two on the small one; the constant of the beads was the only thing trustworthy and dependable right now. He lifted the chain and hung it around his rear-view mirror—a reminder of why he was making a fool's journey to a place he was only ninty-five percent sure housed the man he was looking for and intended on bringing home. He sighed heavily and started the engine, pulling away from the apartment. He didn't plan on stopping until he got there.