It is not when you move into a house, it becomes your home. It is not when you first turn your key around in the lock; you walk inside and know that this house, this house is mine. Though that feeling sends spark into Francis' stomach, and make him smile just a bit wider, because this is where he is going to live now, finally free, without his grandfather constantly hanging over him, telling him how much he resembles them, how he never became nothing but a substitute.
His house is not the biggest. He is only 20 when he decides to move out, and this is the only thing he can afford. The roof needs fixing, there is a leak in the kitchen, and it only has one floor and one bedroom. It is at the size of a flat in a big city, though it is in the countryside. Not too far away from where he (they. Arthur and him. The 'us' he never dares talking about, but that never seems to leave his thoughts) grew up. He is not ready to leave the city yet – he does not have any ambitions for the future, but he has a house now, and it is a start.
Arthur left the town the minute he could. Francis can still recall the day he told him, how he was going to study the English language, its history. He was going to become and author, and Francis knew he could, because he was Arthur and Arthur was so perfect and what they had had was too fragile so who was he to keep him from chasing his dreams, just because he has none of his own?
He spends his days working at the supermarket. The customers love him because of the smile that never fully reaches his eyes but the only ones to notice does not care, because he is just the man working at the supermarket and they have wives who refuses to sleep with them or a dog with cancer, their children are failing maths and Francis is so young and so handsome, so it is impossible for him to have any troubles that may possibly be worse than their own. His allowance slowly rises, though. It is still just a work at the supermarket, but he can, gradually, begin to make the house a home.
The minute he has enough money, he buys "Harry Potter and the philosopher's stone". It stands out next to his very few other novels – it is mostly Jane Austen, books Arthur gave him because he wanted him to realise the wonders of the written world but he never truly did. But this Harry Potter was always Arthur's escape, the thing that made him so very interested in the English language, so between the endless redecoration and breaking his nails despite this being his biggest fear, he reads it and he never quite understand why Arthur can like this, but he does, and it is the reason he is not here in his hands right now and it is tearing him apart.
He paints his walls, because he cannot afford wallpaper and it is easier to distract his mind this way.
On one wall, the one in the kitchen, he paints Arthur's favourite sonnet, the one he once read to Francis on a cold winter's night. Arthur was only 16, Francis 17, and they had both escaped from their guardians (Arthur never felt that his mother was much of a parent and Francis never had any), locked away in Francis' basement. Listening to the Beatles, because even though the music was a bit too fast and a bit too much rock for him, the lyrics really got to him, because they spoke of love as he saw it. Suddenly Arthur had turned it off, looked Francis into the eyes, and very quietly proclaimed;
"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimmed.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st.
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee"
and Francis had just stared at him, in the beginning, but then their lips had met and it sent sparks though his chest and he longed for it to last longer, but then it was over and Arthur had blushed and Francis had just smiled, because it all made sense now, and in return he very quietly song Blackbird, and when he reached "you were only waiting for this moment to be free" Arthur was in tears and Francis kissed them away between the lyrics, and from that day on Francis always thought of Arthur as his blackbird.
And Arthur had left, but Francis was still here, painting Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade, and now he was the one in tears but he had no one to kiss them away.
In the living room he paints his blackbird. The walls are green, though he leaves one a painting of a forest, and highest up, under the ceiling, right over the bookshelf (he bought a larger one than he needed, just in case), is his bird, and it is the first thing he sees when he gets home after work, and it watches him at all times of the day and he finds a strange comfort in this painting.
At the same time it breaks his heart and tears him apart and he seldom goes to sleep without shedding a tear or two, especially if he is reading Harry Potter. As he reaches the fourth book, he starts painting the bedroom and ends up sleeping on the couch for three months because he never quite manages to decide how to paint it and in the end it ends up with a strange mixture of flowers and Beatles-lyrics("all the lonely people, where do they all belong?" right above an English rose, "Life goes on within you and without you" next to a meadow of tulips, but it does not really) but he is still not pleased with it, so he sleeps in the living room with the bird just as often as he sleeps in the bedroom.
And then the day comes when he reaches 22, and he would not even notice if Antonio and Gilbert had not stepped by, and they spend the night drinking wine and it was almost like when they were teenagers and Francis laughs, genuinely, for the first time in these two years, and even though it is not much, he is grateful, and they decide to go out on Saturday, because they (he) need a night out. The town may not be big, but this is England so of course there is a pub there, and even though all the regulars are above 50, they decide it is going to be fun, because it is summer and all three of them are going together and Antonio will bring his girlfriend, but she is a cheerful girl and Francis actually likes her, so it is fine.
But it never happens, because the next day he wakes up to the smell of burnt eggs and at first he has no idea what is going on but then he remembers he only knows one person who could ever be able to burn their eggs like this and his heart skips a beat because this cannot be true, but it is.
In his kitchen there is an Englishman he never expected to see again, and their lips meet immediately, but not before Francis is able to save his stove from complete disaster with a gracious movement, still tangled in everything that is Arthur and then he cries into his shoulder because this cannot be real.
It is, though, because Arthur quietly says that he wrote, in which Francis replies that he never got the letters.
"That's because you changed your address without letting me know, idiot", he murmurs, and Francis knows that this might be true, because his grandfather never forgave him for moving out, and probably hid all the letters, maybe even burnt them, and they both whisper quiet apologies and Francis skips work that day and they make the sweetest love, on the bed, and then Francis cooks a real meal. Arthur discovers the books on his shelf, and Francis says that he tried reading them, but never quite got it. Arthur just shakes his head because this man is obviously beyond helping, and then they make love again.
Their happiness does not last forever, Arthur has to go back to school once the summer is over, but they keep writing, and Francis finally decides to get one of these cell phones despite his phobia of them, and they even call, and when he learns how to, they text, and when Christmas comes, Arthur does too.
Francis proposes, and Arthur tells him it is too early, but it does not break his heart like he thought it would, because he said "too early", not that he did not want to marry him, one day, and he is content in his heart.
And finally, it is no longer just a house, but his home.
... I'm.. not going to say much about this.
It's my first attempt at something above 500 words ever.
/hides
Oh, and the Sonnet it Shakespeare's XVI