For blackeyedbrother on tumblr.
Two days after Christmas, and the scene in the Anderson-Perry dorm room showed no sign that any holiday had come to pass. It was what one might stumble in on any average Sunday night: Neil was reclined against the head of his bed, glasses on and studying chemistry in the beam of his reading lamp. Todd-he was slumped into his pillow, which was in turn slumped into the corner of his bed. His notebook hung limp in his hands, and crumpled pages lolled into the crease between his mattress and the wall. His head lay cocked back as he stared through the scar on the wall above.
While it didn't look like Christmas had effected either of them, Todd was reeling from the vacation, short though it was. Returning to the dormitory was like coming home; stretched out on his mattress, with Neil across the way, and most of the Dead Poets scattered throughout the neighboring rooms. (Meeks was the only one who had yet to return, as he was prone to be during holiday breaks. Unlike the rest of them, Meeks went home and didn't have to face a parent-run puppet show or bootlicking contest. Honestly, the boys were glad at least one of them had a decent relationship with his family.)
He was only gone a week, but Todd thought he could spend every last second of the school year breathing in the must of aged books that lingered in the dormitory, and even then it wouldn't be enough.
Though the smell was not the only thing he took in as he reabsorbed the place. At this point he gazed at the impress above his bed, but earlier he had watched entranced as Neil's reading light and the desk lamps spread their glow into the darkness of the room, like fishermen casting golden nets into a dusky sea.
Then there was also the wind which moaned through the bare branches and breezeways, carrying snow to roost on their windowsill. It drew attention to the only thing Todd would wish to be better: the radiator. The lamplight oiled a new bronze sheen onto it, but that didn't change that the contraption must have been older than either of the boys, and hadn't seen a toolbox for more than a rattly screw in about as long. It heated the head of either bed well enough, but come morning their toes would be stubs of ice.
Thing is, despite its failings, even the ramshackle radiator was a welcome piece of Todd's return home, simply because it was a sign that he was home.
But none of it, not the scent or the lamplight, nor the knobby beds or the lack of parents compared to how immediately unbeleagured he became upon finding his roommate already rooted in their room.
Neil, living closest to the school, was one of the first to return. Todd, Pitts, Charlie, and Cameron arrived at various points the next morning - this morning.
Todd's eyes drifted away from the wall, scarcely landing on Neil when there came a trembling knock at the door.
"I got it," Neil said as he dropped his book and glasses to the side. That was fine by Todd, but he still found himself trailing after, standing at Neil's shoulder when the door swung open.
"Hey, Gil," Neil greeted. It jostled Todd, hearing Spaz's real name; he was too used to the nickname. "What can we do for you?"
"Um, hi. Hager said this's been in the office all day. For Todd." The boy meekly held out a chunky, white package.
Neil dropped his arm from the door to let Todd by.
"Thanks," Todd said with confused timidity to match Spaz's own. They bobbed a nod at each other and all three bid goodnight.
"What is it?" Neil asked after the door closed behind them.
To: Todd Anderson
With Love: Grandma Norma
"It's from my grandmother."
"Oh, so you got a late present." Neil leaned against Todd's desk and looked on as Todd set the package on his bed so he could anxiously fist his hands around his thumbs. Neil crossed his arms over his chest. "Well? Aren't you gonna open it?"
"I-M-my grandmother-she doesn't really send gifts for me," Todd forced out.
"What do you mean?"
It took a minute of great effort for Todd to gather his thoughts. "I mean, they're-they're intended for me-they're addressed to me, but she sends things she should be giving to Jeffery. Like-like two years ago, she sent me an advanced chemistry set. I've never taken chemistry before this year. Jeffery was the chemist. Jeffery's the one who's good at it."
"Maybe she got your gifts confused," Neil suggested.
"No. I've asked before. Once. It-I got a speech about 'stealing the baton' from him and 'fighting for it'. But she never answered my question."
"Well," Neil said after a pause. "You won't know what it is if you don't open it."
Eyes flitting from Neil to the package, Todd hesitated.
"C'mon, open it, open it." Neil pushed at his shoulder.
"Alright. I-" Todd crammed all of his nervousness into a sigh and heaved it out. He ripped into the paper.
At first he truly thought she sent a blanket, but then he lifted the top layer of cloth and it unfurled.
Neil came around to peer over his shoulder. "What is that?"
Todd wasn't sure if he could call it a sweater or someone's conceptual art piece, because it looked like somebody managed to spin rotten green apples into yarn and weave it all into a giant swatch of cloth.
...And then they slipped with some scissors and happened to cut a hole where a head might go. And some hands. And a waist. They just slipped a few times. It's an honest mistake anyone can make... Multiple times. Maybe they had a bad habit of running with scissors. And anyway some people just can't learn their lesson the first few times...
Todd realized he had no choice but to consider it a sweater.
"I guess she doesn't know your size," Neil tried.
Todd shook his head. "It's Jeff's size."
"Oh."
"Oh."
"What are the other ones?" Neil reached around to unfold another. This time it was royal purple. The one below that was bright scarlet, and at the bottom, to offset the rich colors that came before it, lay one in blanched orange.
Neil could only take Todd's disappointment for so long before he had to step in, so he draped the purple sweater over Todd's head and snatched away the rotten one. By the time Todd could see, Neil was stood in the middle of his own bed, tugging on the sweater. A flyaway piece of hair in the curve of his bangs came unsettled and whisked up like Todd's own.
"You didn't tell me your brother was Goliath." Neil pounced to Todd's bed. Towering over his friend, he grumbled, "Fe-fi-fo-fum!"
Todd staggered backward, laughing. "I don't know if I should find a slingshot or steal your goose."
"Neither." Neil loped to land before him. "Never fear, Todd!" He tossed off the sweater. "'Tis I, Neil Perry!"
"Neil! You must be the greatest actor in the whole world; I didn't even recognize you."
"A magnificent actor I may be, but this time the magic's in the costume." Neil swiped the sweater out of Todd's hands only to send it sailing back at him. "You try."
For a wonder, Todd had the baggy purple thing on before he stopped to think about it. He chuckled with Neil as it flopped past his hips and the sleeves spilled far over his hands. It was only then, as he looked at himself, that his attention was drawn to the lumpy cable-knit design that dribbled down each sweater. It brought to mind something curdled.
Todd found he couldn't rip his eyes away from the sweater - the way it sagged around him. The longer he stared the sillier, the smaller, he felt.
"I look like a kid wearing his dad's clothes," he said. Neil saw the pure smile fade from Todd's face; in its place rose one tinged with false levity. "Funny thing is, my dad couldn't even wear these." He huffed out a hollow chuckle, eyes landing somewhere near Neil's face. "It's no wonder I'm living in Jeff's shadow. He's humongous."
Todd flagged, slouching into Neil's bed. The other young man floundered through his bewilderment.
"You can't think that way, Todd," he said eventually.
"S-sure I can." Todd made that hollow noise again. "Jeff-he's-everyone around here knows who he is. 'Oh yeah, sure. Valedictorian. National merit scholar,'" he said, tone lilted up in an approximation of Charlie's. "I don't have any of that in me. He-he's ambitious, and he's not afraid of anything. Everyone says that I'm supposed to do better, but none of them actually think it'll happen. Besides, before I know it he'll be a renowned scientist with fifteen books under his belt and a Nobel prize in everything, because there's nothing he isn't good at."
Neil frowned. "Come on, no one's good at everything."
Half a smile on, Todd said, "You are."
"Oh, that's a laugh," Neil said. "You want a list? Alright, first one: I can't dance."
"I have trouble believing that."
"No, it's true. It's hard to be good at something you've never tried." Something seemed to strike Neil then. All at once he deflated and slumped down beside Todd. "Same reason I don't know how to stand up to my father."
Todd glanced over. He was caught just as unawares by Neil's mood swing as Neil was with his. "Why haven't you tried?" he asked.
A dead laugh. "He won't listen to me, he's too... I can't do it. I'm stuck-" Neil cut himself off. "I'm terrified."
It wasn't much, but it was the most insight Todd had received into what wilted Neil when he thought no one could see.
Silence swamped them. Minutes crept by while they dwelled together, a hair's-width apart, their calves chilled where the chipping metal bed frame pressed into their pajama pants. Todd just began to wonder if they would ever find the strength to move again when Neil piped up.
"Do you really feel worthless?"
Todd faced his own bed and his eyelids fluttered. He wanted to tell Neil no. No, of course he didn't feel like the gum on the sole of the world's shoe - 'Didn't you hear Mr. Keating? I have something inside of me that's worth a great deal.' - but he couldn't get it out.
As though Neil's flame sparked anew, he twisted and clapped his hands on Todd's shoulders. "Builders."
"What-"
Neil flew to his desk. "Builders, Todd! In here." He took up Five Centuries of Verse and thumbed through it as he came back to Todd's side. He groped behind them for his glasses. "Look."
Todd looked, and aloud Neil read,
The Builders
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882)
All are architects of Fate,
Working in these walls of Time;
Some with massive deeds and great,
Some with ornaments of rhyme.
Nothing useless is, or low;
Each thing in its place is best;
And what seems but idle show
Strengthens and supports the rest.
For the structure that we raise,
Time is with materials filled;
Our to-days and yesterdays
Are the blocks with which we build.
Truly shape and fashion these;
Leave no yawning gaps between;
Think not, because no man sees,
Such things will remain unseen.
In the elder days of Art,
Builders wrought with greatest care
Each minute and unseen part;
For the Gods see everywhere.
Let us do our work as well,
Both the unseen and the seen;
Make the house, where Gods may dwell,
Beautiful, entire, and clean.
Else our lives are incomplete,
Standing in these walls of Time,
Broken stairways, where the feet
Stumble as they seek to climb.
Build to-day, then, strong and sure,
With a firm and ample base;
And ascending and secure
Shall to-morrow find its place.
Thus alone can we attain
To those turrets, where the eye
Sees the world as one vast plain,
And one boundless reach of sky.
When Neil turned his eyes to Todd, he saw that the unrest fled from his friend. It may not have been permanent, but he thought perhaps so long as Todd remembered The Builders, he would find in himself some significance.
But even if Todd did forget, the whole thing was worth it just for a glimpse at his pleased little smile. It plucked at Neil's lips until his own crooked up in a lopsided grin.
"What's that say?" Todd asked suddenly. He leaned forth to point at the poem across the page.
"What part?" Neil shifted to share the book between them.
Todd pointed again. "Look, see? To Hope by John Keats," he read. "Like Mr. Keating."
Something chimed in the back of Neil's mind. He closed the book over Todd's thumb and shot off again. He scuttled the chair out from his desk and climbed from it to the tabletop.
"Neil, what are you doing?"
"It's something I saw in Keating's school annual." Dust clung to the underarms of Neil's sweater as he reached atop his closet. Stretching as far as his toes would allow, he eventually pulled back with the whisper of a cobweb under his nose and the school annual in his hands.
"Why is that up there? Careful!" Todd flinched away when Neil leapt onto the bed. In the flurry, a slip of paper fluttered from the book, grazing Todd's neck.
He took it up. Centered, the top of the page read thus:
Friends, Scholars, Weltonmen, (Weltonwomen?)
Welcome to the Dead Poets Society.
"What's this?"
"Guidelines. For future Dead Poets," Neil told him.
"What, are you trying to start a tradition?"
By way of that cheeky grin and shrug of his, Todd knew Neil's answer. "If I have my way, sure."
Neil flipped to the middle of the book, then carefully turned page after page until he found what he was looking for. "There."
Sure enough, in quotes just under John Charles Keating was what must have been his nickname, "Keats".
Neil caught Todd's eyes. "Think we should see if 'Keats' does Keating any justice?"
Todd passed him Five Centuries of Verse in answer.
To Hope
John Keats (1795-1821)
When by my solitary hearth I sit,
And hateful thoughts enwrap my soul in gloom;
When no fair dreams before my "mind's eye" flit,
And the bare heath of life presents no bloom;
Sweet Hope, ethereal balm upon me shed,
And wave thy silver pinions o'er my head!
On Neil read for eight stanzas, each one a vivid supplication to hope.
After, while Neil folded away his glasses, Todd noted, "One consolation for each of us," and tapped both poems in the book.
A change came over Neil then, as though heartened to have the meaning of the poem vested in himself. He seemed to retreat into his thoughts, but it warmed Todd to see that Neil was grinning with his whole face. It was a smile he didn't wear as often.
Quick as a switch, Neil pattered a swift beat into Todd's thigh and sprung up.
"Do you think it'll keep me from getting roles? Not being able to dance?"
"Uh..." Todd shrugged, flustered. "Maybe some."
"Then I've gotta learn." Neil extended his hand. "Are you in?"
"I-No, Neil, I don't feel comfortable doing that stuff."
"I'll be doing it, too," Neil pointed out. "And I don't know how to dance, so at least we'll both look like dolts."
"That's encouraging," Todd murmured. Nevertheless, he stood.
They hemmed and hawed and hemmed and hawed until finally Neil rucked up his sleeves and caught Todd's hands.
"I don't think this is the right posture," Todd said.
Neil stepped half an arm's length back, keeping Todd's hands with him. "Sure it is," he said.
All of a sudden they were spinning, the somber colors of the room blurring around them like smudged paint. Todd couldn't help but whoop and crow along with his friend as they twirled. 'Round and 'round and 'round and-
As abruptly as it began, it ended when Todd smacked into the wall. Neil, who was still laughing merrily, fell along with him.
When the room righted itself, Todd found himself glued between Neil and the wall beside Neil's bed. The nearness of the radiator warmed his leg, while the cold outside gnawed through the window glass and folds of cloth to nip into his arm.
"Hey. Hey," Neil got out between chuckles. "Are you alright? Did you get burned?" He unraveled a hand from his sleeve to cup the back of Todd's head, combing for bumps or bruises.
"Yeah-no-I'm fine."
Neil soft-pedaled, pulling back to let Todd climb out of the cramping corner. He slipped Todd's sleeve from where it was ensnared in the window crank's knees.
"Wanna try again?" Neil asked, eyes alight.
He did, but hitting the wall must have thwacked some foreboding back into Todd because he couldn't help but send anxious glances at the door.
"We'll be quiet this time, I swear," Neil said.
Todd's eyelids fluttered nervously, but he nodded.
Once more, Neil gathered their hands. He stepped closer.
"Still not how it works," Todd added.
Neil shrugged. "Think of it like we're swimming against the stream."
It was a shameful battle, finding their pace, but both boys had picked up over the years a vague idea of how slow dancing was supposed to look, and eventually they were able to spin a complete circle without mashing any toes.
Upon their fourth full turn, Neil began to hum. And so they whorled slow as honey to Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, palms sweaty, noses cold, and their spirits fired high.
In the quiescence, Todd couldn't help but turn his mind back to his reunition with the dorm. To further liven the home there was also the sweep of their socks on the pied-brown floorboards, and the plaid that seemed to pattern everything from the curtains to Mr. McAllister's bow tie to the boys' pajamas - no matter if they were loosely detailed like Neil's blue, white, and red nightshirt, or intricately as Todd's, which wove together all the hues of a campfire.
But then there came new particulars to scribble onto his list of all things Home, like the petal-soft skin on the back of Neil's hands. And the jump of his Adam's apple when the song's pitch seesawed. And the crease under his eyes when he grinned.
Because home extends to the people you're likely to find inside it, Todd reasoned.
"Hey, Neil," Todd said softly, as though afraid to spoil the melody. When nothing stopped but the humming, he said, "Thanks for talking to me."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, about how you feel. About your dad." He was almost afraid of kicking up dust that was better left settled, but he continued on. "It makes me feel important."
Neil laughed a breezy laugh. "Of course you're important, dummy."
"Yeah." He laughed, too.
Todd looked into Neil's face while the other boy dropped his eyes to their shuffling feet and crescendoed back into song. Following, Todd joined in the down-gazing. Their bangs brushed together.
Then, nearly lost in the tune and the trailing wisp of Todd's breath, Neil heard, "We are."
He peered up at his friend.
It may have been the surest thing he'd ever heard Todd say.
Poems: The Builders by HWL, and To Hope by Keats.
The post that prompted me: "Neil and Todd slow dancing in their room in oversized sweaters with the arms pushed up just far enough that they can hold hands."
Hope you're having a great day!
[This work is part 1 of the Heroic Hearts series. Part 2 is entitled Even Demonic Santa Candles Get Better.]