A/N: I just realized I started this story in 2008, sigh. I have a few others in that category as well but the good news is that the boys' never ending night has finally come to close. I imagine they're happy, it was a rough ride. No rights to GH or the characters.
Epilogue
Jason stood in his bedroom critically regarding his image in the mirror hanging over his bureau. Such an inspection was a rare occurrence, usually he never bothered. Ordinarily, he would grab a pair of jeans and one of his ubiquitous black t-shirts, toss them on and he was good for the day. Tonight though was different, tonight he had promised himself he was going to do something which he despised, tonight he was hosting a costume party.
He was watching himself knot the broad striped tie that went with his outfit, when there was a quiet knock at the door followed by a tentative, "Stone Cold?"
"Come in," Jason called over his shoulder as he continued looping the tie over, under and through.
Spinelli stepped into the room and seeing Jason occupied by the dresser walked over to stand next to him. His reflection appeared next to Jason as their eyes met in the mirror. Spinelli gave his mentor, as he constantly felt obliged to do these days, a small smile of reassurance. Jason for his part secretly used the opportunity to take the mandatory inventory he couldn't help but perform whenever he saw his roommate. Jason's sharp scrutiny was encouraging, he looked good. Spinelli's eyes were clear and untroubled while his face held a tinge of color and was beginning to reclaim its former fullness now that the hacker had regained his appetite. Then, as though irresistibly drawn to it, Jason's gazed at the thin, pink raised line of tissue running across Spinelli's throat.
It was exactly two months since John Smith had nearly killed Spinelli and things were slowly returning to some approximation of normal within the penthouse. Yet, whenever Jason saw the scar on the boy's neck it would inevitably catapult him back to the day of the injury and the succeeding endless time period of emotional and physical recuperation.
Spinelli had stayed in the hospital for a week. Jason rarely left him and only in order to return home for a shower or a change or clothes or a quick nap. He knew full well in his mind that John Smith was dead. His body was currently residing in a deservedly ignominious grave far out in the Atlantic Ocean where Port Charles transported its trash on barges while his soul had gone straight to hell. His mind accepted this fact but some atavistic part of him still feared for his roommate, still stayed on alert to guard him against unspecified danger. If he were honest with himself, a condition that mostly transpired between the hours of midnight and dawn as he kept an insomniac watch over a restlessly sleeping Spinelli, his irrational dread was also driven by guilt. He had failed his friend, his roommate, his brother and all because of Jason's hubris that he would prevail against their insane opponent and Spinelli would be safe with him. Yet, the plain fact was that he was instead responsible for him almost dying.
It was only during the daylight hours when Mimi's commonsense and her calming presence cast out Jason's demons that he could begin to start the long process of his own healing. She attempted to get him to make peace with his devastating guilt and to calm his tortured blame filled thoughts. No matter how hard she strove to help Jason find internal peace as he dealt with all the ramifications of that one terrible night her efforts were always superseded by the more pressing needs of Spinelli to recuperate both physically and emotionally. Together Mimi and Jason placed his recovery as their single most important priority. Jason often pondered the mystery of how he would have ever dealt with everything associated with Spinelli's stay in the hospital followed by his convalescence at home without Mimi's magic touch.
She kept Spinelli's hospital environment a haven, somehow managing to minimize not only the medical intrusions but the social ones as well. Even Maxie's sharp edged personality was altered by Mimi's expectations that everyone provide a serene environment for Spinelli as he lay in a hospital bed weak and mute. Jason would have aimed for the same achievement by issuing dogmatic demands and ultimatums in an uncompromising tone. Such a confrontational approach would undoubtedly have backfired on him by surely ending in the simultaneous undesirable goals of alienation and noncompliance.
Where Jason would have blustered, Mimi instead soothed and suggested her way to an understanding with the various temperaments that crossed the threshold of Spinelli's hospital suite. Frenetic Maxie became docile and meek while exuberantly self-involved Lulu spent hours quietly reading to the patient. During his stay, Spinelli's hospital room was transformed into a veritable hothouse with get well cards lining every horizontal surface.
Amidst all the visitors and general bustle accompanying his hospitalization, Spinelli remained a cipher. His throat was healing slowly but on schedule. It was clearly understood that cartilage took longer to heal than the soft tissue of skin, muscle and blood vessels. He was forbidden to speak and was restricted to a liquid diet. His only mode of communication was through writing and his expressive eyes. He was prohibited his laptop as being unduly tiring for him. Yet, Jason was more concerned by his lack of resistance to the restriction then if he had been upset. He was quiet, his spirits subdued and he slept close to sixteen hours out of every twenty-four.
Each time Jason returned to the penthouse there was some redecorating activity occurring. Edna Caldicott and Louise Murphy were in charge of the project at Jason's behest. The two women were martinets as they made sure the workmen adhered to a strict schedule. There was common agreement amongst all the residents of the towers that when Spinelli returned home there shouldn't be a single indicator of the bloodshed which had so marred both the upstairs and downstairs of his shared abode.
To that end there was a concerted attempt to remove even the slightest reminder of the horrific Halloween he had endured. The carpeting in the living room, on the stairs and in Spinelli's room was removed and replaced. All the living room furnishings downstairs-couch, chairs, tables and lamps-were replaced as was Spinelli's bed. Even the door to the hacker's ensuite bathroom was taken away and another of clearly different origin took its place.
Jason only requested one modification for himself and that was requiring a new refrigerator. He still felt chills run up and down his spine when he thought of the deadly snake's body stashed in the freezer. By the time the redecorating process began, he had cleared out all physical evidence collected by himself and Spinelli. He couldn't do anything about the various bloodstains distributed throughout the penthouse but then again his neighbors were also his cohorts and they didn't need to have such signs explained away.
During the renovations, Perkins lay dolefully in a small basket lined with a plump cushion which was placed strategically in the living room of the penthouse where his mistress could keep an eye on him. He was released from the veterinary hospital three days after his surgery. Jason accompanied Mrs. Murphy to retrieve him and was both surprised and touched when a small pink tongue flicked out and briefly licked his hand as he drove them both home. Louise saw the overt sign of thawing antagonism but wisely refrained from giving any indication beyond an inward smile.
On the eighth of November, Spinelli returned home, driven in Jason's brand new silver hybrid SUV. He was greeted at the penthouse by a welcoming group made up of Maxie, Lulu, Johnny, Diane, the Hunters, Mrs. Caldicott, Mrs. Murphy and Perkins. Studiously avoiding the couch, an action which didn't go unmarked by Jason, Spinelli opted to sit wordlessly on one of the new chairs. He only lasted for a half hour before his eyelids began to droop and both Jason and Mimi immediately began to usher people out.
The first night Spinelli spent back in his pink room the nightmares began for both him and Jason. Something about the anonymity of the hospital setting or exhaustion or another indefinable factor had held them at bay while they both slowly recuperated. That night was the first time Jason woke himself up shouting as a grinning Smith drew his infinitely sharp and shining knife blade across Spinelli's tender and already marked throat.
He was gasping for air as though his was the wounded neck when he realized something horrific. Stumbling over sheets dragged to the floor in his need to get to Spinelli he forged an erratic path down the hall toward his roommate's room. Thrusting open the door, he fumbled for the light switch instinctively wanting to flood the scene with light. "Spinelli!" He rasped catching sight of the boy twisting in his sleep as he clawed frantically at his throat. There were pitiful little sounds erupting from his yet to be healed larynx, rough inhalations and exhalations of air which failed to produce words.
Jason strode rapidly across the room and wrapping his arms around him prevented Spinelli from scrabbling at his neck wound which was showing a slight seepage of pink through the bandages wrapped around it. "Ssh, ssh," he murmured just as he had barely a week ago when the boy had been in hysterics. Eventually, Spinelli's eyes opened and he looked up at Jason with dazed incomprehension. "You had a nightmare, that's all, it was a bad dream. You're safe." He assured him all the while cursing himself for forgetting that Spinelli couldn't speak, couldn't call out when he was in distress.
Jason hadn't hesitated, even though it was the middle of the night, he called Mimi. She and Brock showed up together. Mimi efficiently tended to Spinelli's reopened wound while Brock sat downstairs with a visibly shaken Jason, his silent but imposing presence managing to calm him down.
After that first night, Jason began sleeping on an air mattress placed on the floor of Spinelli's room. Still, the nightmares kept coming for both of them. Mimi asked Spinelli to write out what he recalled in a dream journal. Jason helped him with the writing each time he was jerked awake, encased in a cold sweat, as he tried unsuccessfully to call out. Jason only ever dreamed of the moment that Smith cut Spinelli's throat whereas it appeared the younger man's nightmares were more varied.
Sometimes it concerned the moment of discovery of the Russian Vassily hanging on his bathroom door or the hapless Louie under the bed. Other nights he was tormented by the snake striking at him and Sean Murtaugh's head landing in his lap. He also would relive the time Smith held him hostage but from a more personal and opposing vantage point than Jason's terror stricken one of guilt and loss. The worst dreams by far were the ones Spinelli had of Smith gently coercing Charlie up to the penthouse by using his falsified bona fides and then driving an ice pick deep into the recesses of his brain.
Jason couldn't bear to see Spinelli's pain wracked eyes, his drawn, hollowed out face as he shivered uncontrollably in the wee hours of the morning. While holding him helped, pouring the poison of those intolerable memories out onto the pages of the journal in spiky, almost illegible, handwriting appeared to actually work even better. Slowly, glacially, the power of the dreams dissipated, banished to the mystical pages of the journal. Jason would never have believed it if he hadn't witnessed it with his own eyes.
Finally, one night when he lay as usual on the air mattress, awake and apprehensive, awaiting the expected sounds of thrashing and low moans from Spinelli, he was amazed to find that instead he awoke to sunshine after falling asleep at some unmarked point in the dark. Abruptly he sat up to check on Spinelli, worried that he might have been so fatigued as to have been derelict in his duty to watch over him. He expelled a sigh of relief as he observed his roommate serenely sleeping having experienced his first nightmare free night since coming home from the hospital.
It was weeks later and Spinelli seemed mostly mended. The dreams reoccurred occasionally for both of them but Spinelli now utilized the dream journal without his mentor's assistance. Jason was once more ensconced in the privacy of his bedroom where he faced his own occasional night induced demon visitors. It was a rough, uneasy peace and neither knew if it would ever improve, ever attain some truer form of contentment. Still, they could manage to exist in this grey world of an in-between equilibrium for the time being as long as they had one another.
"The guests are arriving, Stone Cold." Spinelli's voice was hoarse and still alien to Jason's ears.
As would be true of most people, Jason was so caught up in the joy of the instant when the hacker could once again speak, could utter words and make Jason happy to hear his two syllable nickname drop from the boy's lips that he simply overlooked the timbre, the roughness of his tone. Yet, it seemed Patrick's concern about nerve damage had been well founded.
One of the pair of recurrent laryngeal nerves which controlled the larynx was damaged and when Jason confronted him about repairing it, Patrick ran his fingers through his hair and gave a frustrated sigh. "I can't, Jason, nerves aren't very good at regeneration unlike skin or muscle or bone. They are very specialized cells and once they achieve differentiation then they can't divide any more that is repair or replace themselves. Spinelli's voice will sound like that from now on out. I'm sorry."
Jason looked at him, disappointment and disillusionment evident in his eyes, "Does it mean he can't sing either?" He asked, needing to know how much damage he was responsible for.
"I don't think so," Patrick responded sadly, "He's alive though and healthy and that wasn't necessarily a given with his particular injury. You should be grateful for that…" Patrick was speaking to a leather clad back. Jason had glared at him, clenched his fists in ineffectual protest against Patrick's irrefutable decree, and then pivoted on his heel leaving mid-conversation.
Now as Jason automatically finished tying his tie and pulling his collar down over it, he continued to peruse Spinelli's face in the mirror. The scar on his neck and the altered sound of his voice were permanent reminders of what that night cost the younger man and they didn't even began to address his mental and emotional scars. Once again, Jason was disgusted to find himself virtually unscathed while someone around him paid for his sins, his crimes, and his past.
He nodded at Spinelli, acknowledging his remark about the guests. It was a long time arriving but tonight Jason Morgan and Damian Spinelli would be inaugurating the First Annual Harborview Towers New Year's Eve Costume Gala. While Jason cringed over the implications of the word annual in the preposterous and never ending title, Spinelli valiantly attempted to form the letters into some sort of catchy acronym. Eventually, after long examination of the conundrum, he admitted defeat. Henceforth, outside of the formally issued invitations, the event was referred to as either the CG or even more simply-the Gala.
It was testimony to the changes in Jason's behavior and perceptions that he was preparing to co-host such a party with the double drawbacks of being set on New Year's Eve and involving the wearing of costumes. That is if one could actually get past the fundamental premise of Jason even entertaining at all, never mind on such a lavish scale. Yet, it was Spinelli's idea and it was the first thing he had shown any honest enthusiasm about since Halloween. Jason would have agreed to far more invasive or extreme occurrences than the Gala if it brought happiness to his roommate.
Spinelli had wanted to throw the party to welcome the New Year and to forget the dreadful last few months of this one. He also desired to make amends to Maxie for mostly standing her up on her birthday and scaring her by almost dying. It was that reminder of the Crimson costume ball which had created the idea of a costume aspect of the Gala. Lastly, he wished to include all his friends and neighbors, to thank them for their help and their support during his recuperation. That was what accounted for the Harboview Towers part of the name. Those aspects of the party were all just barely tolerable to Jason but it was the words 'first annual' which sent shudders up and down his spine. He morosely contemplated hosting this ever burgeoning annual shindig years from now until he eventually keeled over dead of heart attack while wearing an astronaut costume or some equally absurd outfit that Spinelli would coax him into.
However, tonight's costumes weren't half bad, Jason thought with satisfaction as he looked at their twinned reflections. In fact, ironically, they were mirror images of what the two of them were wearing on Halloween night. This time Jason was the one dressed in a grey pin striped vintage suit complete with a maroon and white striped tie and a matching soft fedora. Spinelli was channeling James Dean to Jason's Dashiel Hammett. He was clad in his new leather jacket, identical to Jason's, white t-shirt and cuffed Jeans with his hair moussed high on his head. They had alternated personas with Jason as the world weary sleuth and Spinelli attempting a dead eyed stare of nihilistic contempt for the earth and all its inhabitants.
Jason dipped his head approvingly toward the jacket. He was happy to see it actually being worn rather than still pristinely hanging in Spinelli's closet where it had been placed with appropriately worshipful awe upon receipt.
"Looks good on you," he said with quiet approbation.
The hacker's face split into a delighted grin as all pretense of being a tough edged delinquent slipped away from him like an ill-fitting skin, "Do you think so, Stone Cold?"
Jason gave a little grunt of pleased laughter, still amazed at the sway his opinion held over Spinelli's life, his thoughts, and his moods. "Yeah, I do," he said roughly, hiding the emotions that flowed through him-gratitude, regret, melancholy and a pure, white streak of love, as he flung his arm around the younger man's shoulders and steered him toward the bedroom door. "Let's not keep all this hotness to ourselves. We'll spread it around among the ladies. I get Mimi Hunter but in trade I'll let you have both Edna Caldicott and Louise Murphy, can't say fairer than that."
"Stone Cold!" Jason was thrilled to hear the indignant whine in the boy's voice as he protested his teasing threat. It was the first time since that terrible night that they had reverted to the pseudo-bickering which had been a hallmark of their old relationship. "Ever since my unfortunate injury, they already hover around the Jackal far more than is healthy. Promise me that you shall do nothing to call their laser sharp eyes to any aspect of your grasshopper's physique. Besides, I can't answer for Maximista's jealousy when she discovers her paramour is surrounded by cougars, albeit aged ones."
"Cougars?" Jason had no idea what Spinelli was talking about but before he could inquire further they were at the top of the stairs. He looked down into his transformed living room with trepidation.
The room was filled to bursting with building residents and their other friends. Maxie was dressed in an extremely wide, bright red skirt that made her tiny waist appear a contender for Scarlett O'Hara's famed seventeen inches. She wore a red and white polka dotted scarf tied jauntily around her neck, a white blouse with the sleeves rolled up, completing the ensemble were a pair of two toned saddle shoes. She was chatting with Diane Miller who was dressed in a black cocktail dress that clung to every ample curve. She was four inches higher than her natural height due to the aid of a pair of stiletto heeled open toed shoes in bright crimson. On her head perched a black band of fabric with one curved white feather arcing out over it. It wasn't a costume per say but it suited her perfectly. Diane listened intently to something Maxie was saying while describing unintelligible shapes in the air. Almost absentmindedly, the lawyer periodically refreshed herself with a sustaining gulp from the martini glass clutched in her hand.
Jason saw Mimi and Brock Hunter each dressed in their military uniforms, his indicating the rank of Colonel and hers a Captain, as they stood next to the fireplace. He was startled to realize that they were talking to Elizabeth Webber. She was dressed as a nurse in an old fashioned traditional costume of a close fitting, white button down dress. A starched cap was pinned to her mass of chestnut locks and the clinging white stockings curving around her calves caused Jason's mouth to run dry. The rest of the crowd-Lulu, Johnny, Carly, Jax, and assorted neighbors-blurred into an indistinct mass and all he could see, all his eyes registered as he descended the stairs was a vision in white.
"Elizabeth," he said, interrupting their conversation and momentarily ignoring Mimi and Brock, "What are you doing here?" He cursed himself, wanting desperately to recall the rude sounding words as soon as they left his mouth. "I mean…I didn't expect…"
Elizabeth lips curled up in an amused smile, her ego flattered, as she bathed in the self-indulgent glow which consumes a beautiful woman whenever her mere appearance causes a grown man to become a blithering idiot. "Spinelli invited me but I gather he didn't tell you." The silvery sound of her charming laughter made Jason's face blush bright red as both Brock and Mimi looked at the couple with identical expressions of quizzical indulgence.
Jason managed to regain some element of self assurance as he said, "I owe that boy an orange soda. Brock, Mimi," he turned to the neglected twosome, "I'm so glad that you made it." His eyes, of their own volition, slid back to the enchantingly lovely nurse and he was lost. Jason never heard the Hunters' murmured excuses as they discreetly left the pair to gaze earnestly into each other's eyes.
The evening was a roaring success. Jason recovered enough of his wits to help Maxie and Spinelli make sure the catering and bartending went smoothly. He split his time between solitary interludes with Elizabeth in the kitchen, out on the balcony or anywhere they could find where it was just the two of them while in-between he stoically endured being talked at by all the building's elderly residents.
Jason had been extremely busy since Spinelli returned to the penthouse. He knew full well his roommate's propensity for worry and in order to forestall any concerns he might have over not being able to perform his usual duties around the building, Jason took it upon himself to step into the breech. Using a list written by Spinelli, and leaving the boy under Mimi's or Mrs. Murphy's watchful eyes, he would make the proscribed rounds to all the inhabitants who were used to receiving the hacker's kind offices.
Jason made sure groceries were brought and delivered without a bill ever being presented. He checked on the frailer members of the building, those with restricted mobility or who were dependent on oxygen. He even took long slow patient walks with a convalescing Perkins who Jason was sure was intentionally aggravating him as he stopped to sniff at some enticing smell every five feet. "Hurry up," he would grumble impatiently and he could swear that the dog's lips curled up into an evil little grin as he sat down on the pavement whining his exhaustion. Invariably, Jason would surrender and end up carrying the little terror, returning him to Mrs. Murphy's waiting arms with a glower.
The one thing he categorically refused to do was to participate in any of the social get togethers and clubs with which Spinelli was involved. He suggested Maxie or Lulu substitute for him until he could once again go on his own but after a session each, they reneged. Jason never did find out if it was because they didn't like the activities or if his neighbors had made them feel undesirable as replacements for Spinelli. Either way, it was clear no one was going to even temporarily take the place of the shaggy haired boy in the hearts and minds of the dwellers of Harbor View Towers.
So, tonight, every single able bodied person he had interacted with in any way within the building during the last several months decided it was time to express their gratitude. Jason grew more and more uncomfortable as one elderly woman after another stepped up and spoke appreciatively to him while he stood there trapped and shuffling his feet. His face was once more flushed with embarrassment while he reluctantly submitted to having his large hand trapped within their frail, bony ones.
"Mr. Morgan, thank you so much for watering my plants last week. My arthritis was so awful that day."
"You read The Legend of Sleepy Hollow in such clear and ringing tones, only Damian could have done it more justice."
"I do so hope you will make it on time next week to catch further episodes of 'Our Lives, Our Loves". Your insights and perceptions about what makes Brianna so self destructive in all her relationships ring so true."
Here Jason shot a significant glance at Maxie who was giggling as she eavesdropped. She belatedly registered the significance of his raised eyebrows and pursed lips as he smiled slightly at her. It worked. She stopped laughing, glared at him and flounced away to great effect, her skirt swirling around her hips. It was only a minor consolation for his unmitigated torture as various people including Elizabeth, Carly, Diane and Jax clustered around to hear first hand all about the fascinating intricacies of Jason Morgan's newly formed social life.
Finally, he managed to extricate himself by pleading the need to get champagne flutes ready to toast the New Year. As he stood by the kitchen counter, carefully placing Lila's prized crystal flutes on a wooden tray and filling them with champagne, he heard a small whimper. Looking down he saw Perkins staring up at him, wearing the little miniature leather jacket he, true to his word, had presented him at Christmas.
Jason looked stealthily around the empty kitchen to make sure he was entirely unobserved then he reached up into a cabinet and scrabbled around in the back searching blindly for a certain package. He pulled out what he found and bending down offered it on the palm of his hand to Perkins, "Here," he said gruffly, "Now go away," he commanded as the dog took his expected treat and insouciantly trotted back to the living room. "Happy New Year, little guy." Jason whispered, half ashamed of his sentimentality.
Ten minutes later the champagne was consumed, the New Year rung in and Elizabeth thoroughly kissed. Jason thought it hadn't been a bad Gala after all and the next one was twelve long months away, hardly worth worrying about.
"Ladies and Gentleman, if I could have your attention please." It was Spinelli, his voice not up to the task of speaking over the clamor as people chatted, blew noise makers and wished each other Happy New Year.
"Hey!" Maxie let loose with a fierce wolf whistle that made anyone's ears ring if they were unfortunate enough to be standing within five feet of her. "Spinelli is going to talk and you're going to listen! Go ahead, Spinelli," she smiled benignly at the flustered hacker.
"Ah, thank you, Maximista, for your stentorian intercession," he said, once more stepping forward. "As you all know, this party is a way for Stone Cold and myself to pay a debt that is owed. These last several months have been one of those periods in life which are sent to try our souls as we exist on this mortal plane. Without your kind words, thoughts, and actions this time would indeed have been much darker. The Jackal wracked his brain to think of some way of making this evening even more special beyond being a simple convocation of friends and I had an inspiration if you will. What does not kill us and so on, is a well known cliché…Well, I believe in another dictum which would be stated as follows-if bleak times can be alleviated by humor and entertainment why should we not indeed strive for that? Since Stone Cold during the renovations to our shared home so kindly kept his grasshopper's desires in the forefront of his consideration, I have the means to fully implement my concept." Spinelli paused as he grinned at a baffled Jason. "So, without more ado, if you could all find a seat…"
He had been busy setting up rows of metal folding chairs while everyone else was concentrating on seeing in the New Year. The guests all obediently sat down on the nearest chair while Spinelli personally escorted the Hunters, Mrs. Murphy and Mrs. Caldicott to places of honor, assigning them seats on the new sofa and matching chairs. Meanwhile, Jason found a pair of chairs for Elizabeth and himself in the back of the room.
When everyone was finally seated and the buzz of conversation had died down, Spinelli continued his speech. "Since his arrival at Casa De Stone Cold several years ago the Jackal languished uncomplainingly under the vicissitudes placed upon him by an antiquated television set and a rudimentary sound system. That deprivation was wonderfully resolved during the redecoration of the penthouse and as you can see we now have a sixty inch LED flat screen television set with accompanying theater grade surround sound and a blu-ray DVD player. I thought long and hard about what films ought to be used to inaugurate the system but really when it came down to choosing, it was a no-brainer. It was between two films, each relevant to recent events in their own way. I vacillated between showing 'And Then There Were None' and the film which I finally decided upon. I hope it proves worthy of your time and enjoyment."
Spinelli stood in front of the hushed expectant guests, the television was turned on and the screen showed a bright blue background as it patiently awaited signal input. He nodded to Johnny to turn off the room lights simultaneously hitting the remote control to activate the DVD player. The credits came up for a black and white film starring Cary Grant. When the words 'Arsenic and Old Lace' appeared on the screen, all the tower residents and a few other knowledgeable guests burst into spontaneous applause.
The rest of the clueless audience sat in bemused silence, sharing an awkward feeling as though the punch line of a joke had bypassed them. Jason was a member of the latter group but he didn't care. His eyes were fixated on Spinelli's face as the flickering light of the movie played across his features. He sat off to the side, looking out over the assembled guests. Maxie was sitting next to him as she concentrated on the film, her lips parted in anticipation. Spinelli and Jason locked gazes and for a long moment they simply stared at one another and then a slow, shy smile spread across his brother's face. Jason gave a sigh of contentment, Spinelli might not be fully recovered but he was well on his way, he had him back. Settling back in his chair, he gave Elizabeth's hand a quick squeeze as he prepared to discover what all the fuss about this old movie was.
A/N: For those of you unfamiliar with the movies 'And Then There Were None' and 'Arsenic and Old Lace', I will give a brief synopsis of each. The former is a film based on Agatha Christie's novel 'Ten Little Indians' where there is a house party and the guest are cut off by a storm (I believe). Corpses start showing up and it turns into a race against time to solve the murders before everyone is killed. Then 'Arsenic and Old Lace' is a Frank Capra film. It's a wonderful comedy where Cary Grant's character plays theater critic Mortimer Brewster who on Halloween night inadvertently discovers his spinster aunts and his brother have a house full of bodies. It is a fun romp wherein he tries to protect his family, keep his new wife in the dark and avoid getting tortured and killed by an insane escaped convict played by Raymond Massey who also just happens to be Mortimer's other brother. While I intentionally took the basic plot idea of 'Ten Little Indians' and reworked it to form my story, it was only later when I noticed some similarities to 'Arsenic and Old Lace' as well. I wanted to pay tribute to both and decided to end the Gala with a movie showing. I chose 'Arsenic and Old Lace' because it is a classic screwball comedy and it seems to me everyone would be in the mood for something light hearted after everything that happened. As always, reviews are appreciated