Tino wished he could forget about the war readying itself like a huge clockwork machine, breathing on the window panes. He wished he could forget that his heart was lost somewhere East of the Wall, and he was alone, still trying to pick up the mismatched pieces of his life. He didn't know how much longer he could still wander through Berlin like this, when every bright splash of green-blue on the concrete walls made him think of Berwald's eyes. He didn't know if he could work and sleep and eat and push himself through life if every moment in this art city brought him back to gentle kisses beneath the stars.

If he could forget everything, he would have been happy. He couldn't, though. Memory made him stronger. Memory let him hold onto the hope that one day he'd be with Berwald again, in some nebulous, ridiculous far-off future where things would all be better. Tino couldn't forget, and he couldn't let go, so he held on instead.

His heart beat with questions. Was Berwald safe? Was he happy? What was he doing behind the Wall?

Did the Stasi have him?

Yao sometimes got word from people in the East, who'd called around for Tino's writer and found him still editing. Going out on nights and weekends to smoke with a friend. Keeping his head down, keeping safe. It was just scraps of guilty information, but every time he got word, Tino knew that Berwald was alive and safe.

What the messages never said was if Berwald missed Tino as well, if he was stuck treading water and memory. Tino's thoughts always felt like the crumpled paper after a failed script, with half-formed sentences folding out around the sharp edges. His head hurt so much. The pain would come in the middle of washing dishes back at his home, or wandering beneath the streetlights. He'd remember Berwald's voice, or the gentleness in his gaze, and he'd have to turn around and stumble somewhere far away from there, confused and aching.

This time, it had been that night on the border of Berlin where Tino had thrown his caution to the skies and opened his heart to the north wind of love. A happy life with someone after all of this, that was what he had wished for. His own hopeful, foolish words came back to him: 'Somewhere up where the northern lights shine every night. Something safe and domestic. A house to ourselves. And a little dog.'

He sat on the bench just outside the glitter of the Ku'damm, unseeing, vodka bottle loosely gripped in his hand. He could almost feel Berwald's hands on his, tracing up his skin, promising him everything.

It was long after he got home that the idea of the book started fluttering like paper-winged butterflies in his head. Berwald had wanted a library, and Tino had loved all the stories he could see in him, but this book wouldn't be a story. It would simply be a place to put the memories, and if he filled the pages enough maybe his head would hurt a little less.

He went to buy a blank book from one of the used bookshops. He slowly browsed their collection, fingertips skimming the pages until he lit upon a yellow cover. It was old, almost rosy gold with age. It reminded him of sunlit days in the city with Berwald, watching movies they shouldn't have in dark theatres. He bought it and walked home with it tucked under his jacket, against the thin fabric of his undershirt and his beating heart.

It sat on the mantelpiece, glowing bright in the quiet. Tino took it down the next day, after seeing a blackbird singing outside and turning to point it out to Berwald, heart singing the same. He wasn't there, of course.

I love you was the first thing he wrote, pen dripping ink like tear stains in the margins, over and over. I love your laugh and I love that you trusted me with everything, I love you for your honour, for your bravery.

The page opposite, Tino wrote about his eyes. How they'd looked in the swirling multicoloured light where they'd first touched and whispered hello, how they'd looked under the steady clear stars. Bright and lit up with laughter, surprised and gorgeous. I love you! the pages shouted, and it felt so, so good. The catharsis shuddered out of him in laughter and tears, both the first he'd had in weeks. He welcomed them both. Anything was better than the daze of not knowing how to do anything but hurt.

The dull pain whenever he saw something he thought Berwald would like was almost comforting after he started the book. The warm glow of imagining how Berwald would smile that secret smile just for him almost soothed away the sting of knowing he wasn't here to smile at all.

Tino walked slowly to his work, drinking in the sights just like always. He liked to try to find one new thing to remember and tuck away, and if- and when Berwald was back, he could show him everything of this city. There was a bite to the air in the last few weeks, and he'd put on a light sweater. Carlos was dressed in a thick jacket, and he laughed in disbelief when he saw Tino.

'It's not that cold,' Tino teased, setting his sweater aside. The teasing woke him up for a bit as he moved to his station, reaching to gather up some cups. He needed to keep busy, or the loneliness would start to seep in. If he was alone with his thoughts piling up like the paper stacks in a house he'd loved across the Wall, the full pain of missing Berwald would crash in like a tidal wave. Not even the book could save him from that.

Like waves, that was how the pain came and went. Tino stared up at the silvery moon through the window as he gathered glasses. High tide, low tide, wandering through the shoal of memory, only able to hold on and keep afloat. He closed his eyes and imagined swimming in the lakes back in Finland, for those blissful minutes before the cold soaked through. Floating on his back, staring up at the glimmer of the stars. Somewhere peaceful. Somewhere where his fuzzy, cluttered, twisted-up thoughts would all make sense again, laid to rest in the pages of a book.

Berwald had listened when he'd confessed about some sweet, domestic life, and all of that had never felt so far away. Berwald was gone behind the Wall, and Tino was in a strange waking dream in West Berlin, wandering through life longing and terrified of the future.

Carlos was waiting when he came back to the kitchen, leaning against the wall with his lips pressed together. Yao was speaking quietly to him. When Tino entered, they silently moved to make space for him.

'What's wrong?'

'I work near the Wall some days,' Carlos said slowly, as if fighting with every word. 'There are...rumours among the guards.'

Yao looked furious, the suggestion of a flush creeping up in his cheeks and across his neck. 'Tell him,' he snapped.

'This one guard-' Carlos winced as if even mentioning them was distasteful. 'Is trying to cause serious trouble for the Stasi.'

'Good,' Tino said automatically. His mind flashed to Berwald again- would he be safe? What was he doing? And the perpetual question: did the Stasi have him now?

'Not if it endangers other people,' Yao snarled. Tino remembered with a jolt that Yao's younger brother was part of a dangerous resistance, and his stomach twisted into knots for him. He was guiltily, horribly glad that Berwald would be away from all of that.

'Carlos, tell us everything,' he demanded. Yao threw him a strange glance. Tino thought it might have been relief.

'There's whispers that this one guard is planning to attack the Stasi directly. God knows why. It's nothing but a suicide mission.' Carlos shook his head, sighing. Tension feathered in his jaw muscles. His eyes were shadowed. 'Poor bastard.'

Yao didn't say anything until Carlos was gone. Leon's resistance felt like a pained weight that only they two carried.

'If I know the guard he speaks of, Leon will be in trouble.' Yao's eyes were shattered open with rage and sorrow. His voice shook. 'Every day I regret letting him leave. It was so stupid of me. This is my fault.'

Tino slowly sat down beside him. Yao seemed like an unbreakable man, and to see him so damaged hurt.

'I lost Berwald the same way.'

Yao didn't raise his eyes, but he sat down as well, body tense.

'It was not your fault.'

'I think it was. Sometimes I do, at least.' How could Tino not think it was his fault for letting Berwald walk away? 'I didn't know. None of us did. All we can do is hope they'll be okay.'

Yao sighed. He nodded and offered a rare smile to Tino. 'Leon will survive anything. He's hardy.'

His smile faded as he looked outside, in the direction of the Wall. He cursed softly.

'I could tell Ivan,' he murmured. Tino's breath caught. Did he mean the colonel himself? 'Once, I would have.'

'Ivan,' Tino heard himself echo. Yao turned to him, dark, bitter humour flashing in his eyes.

'Ivan Braginsky, yes. I once knew him very, very well.'

Yao looked out the window again. There was quiet in the kitchen.

'I would never, now.' Yao touched his golden dragon earring, fingertips barely grazing. His face was open with emotion like Tino had rarely seen before.

'Did you love him?' Tino asked, almost shocked at himself. Yao traced the fine scaled line of his dragon.

'Yes,' he said simply. 'Once.'

Tino joined him by the window. There was snow dusting the ground.

'Once, he was a hard man not to love. Ivan. My tiger.' Yao chuckled, low and bitter. 'He was a good man. I was a good man, too.'

'You still are.'

'Not at all.' Yao looked almost peaceful, staring out at the snow. 'I am still in love with that man.'

Through the snow, the stars shone. Tino thought of how Yao seemed to be carved into wiry, hard strength by his love, something self-contained and hurting on the inside. A survivor. Even though his own love hurt much more, Tino never wanted to love in the way Yao did: lonely and scared of your own heart.

'Not enough to tell him that guards are causing trouble?'

'Love has no place in the wars of this city.' His beaten-copper eyes shone a little brighter, full of hidden delight and sadness. 'I love him. I will never act for him again.'

Tino was left at the window as Yao went back to cooking, humming a strange song in Russian. Love had everything to do with this war city. Everyone here loved either too much or too little. The only different was whether you made it a weapon or not.

0o0o0o

Toris was silent as they drank. His eyes darted around the bar like a wild animal. Berwald had always preferred the silence, but right now he wished Toris would speak or Mathias would shout or some other noise would break the quiet buzz of thought in his head.

Did Tino know he was going to his death? Did Toris know he was sitting next to someone who loved just as he did? Berwald felt full to bursting with unspoken words and love, and at the same time it felt inconceivable to speak them to anyone but Tino. I love you, he would say. I miss you so much it hurts. The Stasi could try to shoot and burn and interrogate him to death, but they couldn't take away his memories of dancing with Tino in the tiny rooms of his place, singing for better days. His only regret was dying without saying goodbye properly, but that didn't have to be the case for Toris.

'I c'n tell Feliks things fr'm you,' he offered. Toris abruptly twisted to look at him, and Berwald felt ridiculous. Toris barely knew him. Berwald's friendship with Feliks was tainted by the Stasi before it even began.

Suddenly, Toris' guarded expression shattered. 'Yes,' he whispered. 'Please. Just tell him that I'm here. I'm coming. I'm going to save him. I never, ever meant to lose him. Tell him that I'm sorry, please. Tell him it will be okay.'

Berwald's throat felt thick. There were too many promises in love. Too many precious things all wrapped up in one love declaration.

He thought of Tino; soft purple eyes and softer angelic hair, dancing in the morning glow.

'I will,' he promised. Toris finally, finally smiled, a little broken, a little wild. Like Gilbert, drinking up the sharp-edged drug of power that Berlin gave in return for losing everything. Berwald looked away, unable to breathe.

What scared him was that he hadn't lost everything yet, but he was going to soon.

0o0o0o

:: The way old pages feel, dense but delicate in your hands