Disclaimer: This story contains adult content and language, which includes an implied romantic relationship between two men. If you are underage or live in an area where this is illegal or you just plain dislike it, well, here's your out, my friend.
Although she may be in denial about it, Darien Fawkes and Bobby Hobbes don't belong to Chalie; she's just borrowing them for a little while. Darien, Bobby, The Keeper, Alex Monroe, Eberts, The Official, and any other characters mentioned are the property of Stu Segall productions. No copyright infringement is intended, and no profit is being made.
Notes: Feedback is, as always, incredibly appreciated. I can be reached at chalie@saintly.com, and would love to hear from you. This story is darker than my previous foray into the world of The Invisible Man, so count yourself forewarned. Yes, it's true. Angst ahead.
Thank You
By Charlotte Ruocco
"We'll have steak tonight for dinner," he says to me. "To celebrate. Medium rare. Sounds good, huh?"
I smile at him, because I know he needs me to. "Yeah. Sure thing, kid."
"There's a bottle of wine in the sock drawer at home. I've been saving it. You bring it later, sneak it past, we'll have a damn good little party on our hands. Okay?"
He has to stop looking at me like that.
I glance past him, over his shoulder, to where she's waiting. She's trying hard to be unobtrusive, trying to stare at her nails like they're the most fascinating things in the world.
"The Keep'll kill me," I tell him. "But okay. Whatever you say."
"Bobby." He takes my hand and squeezes it, squeezes it to stop the trembling. I'm glad that she can't see that I'm shaking, even though she'd understand.
I know she understands.
But I don't want any of them to see me like this.
He leans down and kisses me quickly, and I know it's quick for two reasons, quick because there's part of him that's embarrassed that she's in the room, and quick because he wants it to mean that he's okay, everything's okay, see how wonderfully okay we are that I don't need to kiss you like anything's wrong.
Across the way the look she gives us is something like sad, emotion caught between two extremes. Her job and her friend.
I wonder if she's trembling, too.
"Darien," she says. She says it slowly, like to give us more time.
"That'd be me," he answers. And his voice is light, joking, Darien's. I want to latch onto that voice, hold it, break down the sounds and live in them.
"I'm sorry. We have to go. They're ready for you by now."
"Man of the hour, huh?" His eyes flash something at me, too much, I can't even look at him anymore. I'm sorry for that.
She opens the door and slips outside, and he goes to follow. I think he forgot that he's still holding my hand and I move along with him.
"Fawkes?"
He turns back. This time his eyes are dangerous, pleading, begging me not to say anything. We'd agreed to keep it simple. Simple, because everything was really okay.
"You call that a kiss?"
I promised him I wouldn't, I promised both of us I wouldn't, mostly I promised myself.
But I can't. I'm not that strong. I'm not strong at all.
I'm crushing him now, I'm trying to force his body and his lips against mine because maybe if I hold tight enough they won't be able to take him away from me.
I'm probably hurting him but I don't care, I can't care. I have to press him into me. He's mine, he's mine. I won't let go. I can't.
He breaks away. His eyes hurt. They hurt me. They're literally painful.
"Don't forget the wine," he says, because that's all that he can say.
He's out the door before I can realize that I'm no longer holding his hand.
* * *
I wonder at first why they send Eberts.
He's a curious choice for a messenger.
Perhaps not.
They don't know how I'll react. So they figure Eberts is a safe bet, because God knows the man takes enough abuse on a daily basis.
I don't need to look up to know that it's him, and that he's afraid.
His shoes squeak on the floor, which is clean, and white, and bright.
I've been studying the floor for some time now. There are seven scuffmarks, thirty-five dents, and a broken tile three feet away from the door.
"Thank you, Eberts," I say. I'm surprised that my voice is calm. I'm surprised that I'm not screaming, but maybe I am. I don't know.
He had a speech all planned out. I can hear it stopping in his throat.
He doesn't know what to do.
I still haven't looked up.
"I'm extremely sorry, Agent Hobbes."
Yeah. Me too.
I get up. The floor looks different from this perspective.
I've been sitting too long.
"Thank you, Eberts," I say again, and I move past him out into the hallway. I don't look at his face because I can't.
I find her in the corridor near the pay phones. Her head is pressed against the wall, her face turned in to the plaster.
"It's my fault," she says because she knows I'm there. She's crying, and I'm glad, because I can't. Someone should cry for him.
"It was as we suspected. The gland had shattered and was interfering with his brain functions. We thought we could..."
I wait for her to find the words. I don't say anything, but I don't think she really expects me to.
"...there was too much damage. When we tried to remove some of the sections, we realized how deep the problem went, and his body just..."
"Thank you, Claire," I say.
I don't know if I'm capable of forming any other sentence, but I don't really want to try.
I turn around and walk outside.
Outside it's clear, warm, earlier than I'd thought. The sun's still up. This seems strangely inappropriate.
I get into the car that pulls up.
It's interesting focusing on purely manual things, the sound and feeling of the door as I yank it closed. The click of the seatbelt that I remember to belt. I pull the visor down because the sun hurts.
Alex doesn't say anything, and part of me thanks her for that.
When the car comes to a stop I realize that I'm just sitting there. I should be getting out, I know.
I stare at the glass, watching the light reflect.
Alex gets out. She moves around the side and opens my door.
"Thank you, Alex," I say, and in some ways it's strangely comforting that my vocabulary's been reduced to two words and the remembrance of names.
She lets me go. It must be hard for her. They probably told her to stay with me, make sure I didn't do anything crazy.
But some part of her understands.
Thank you, Alex.
They shouldn't worry.
I'm not capable of doing anything at all.
* * *
We're not neat freaks, neither of us, really, but the apartment is spotless.
We were careful about that. We cleaned. It was a strange thing to do before going to the hospital, but it was something to do together.
This morning,
This morning?
This morning, we got up early and made the bed. We usually don't do that.
We changed the sheets, too.
We stretched them tight, folded neat corners in at the edges.
He'd been proud of that damn bed, this morning.
No.
I'd made breakfast. It'd felt good, a real meal for us in the morning. We usually don't adhere to the most nutritional of diets.
We sat next to each other. Just close together. Afterwards he washed the dishes and I stood next to him and dried them off.
The shower was hard.
He didn't think that it was a good idea. Being in there together.
Too much potential, he'd said.
No. No. No.
He had a way of wiggling his eyebrows that drove me crazy.
Just that. That's all he had to do.
I said I'd be good.
We'd already had last night.
I held onto him in the water.
My hands in his hair.
Inside the apartment it's too quiet. I can't look at the bed. I can't look at the table, the chairs, the books. I can't look anywhere. I stand blinded in our home with nowhere to look.
Don't forget the wine.
So I don't.
The sock drawer should be harmless enough.
Of course it isn't.
His socks are orange, teal, maroon, peach, striped, polka-dotted, crazy-patterned. He dug them out of bargain bins in vintage stores, searched for them at flea markets.
I slam the drawer shut.
I can hear the wine roll in the back.
I think my hands are shaking when I tug the drawer back open and reach for it, but I can't look.
There's something else in there, too.
"Fuck you."
The words surprise me even as I say them. They break the silence, but it doesn't help.
"You can't do this to me."
I appear to be addressing the socks.
The kid was right to save this wine. It's a good vintage. Good year. Good stuff.
Focus on the bottle.
The bottle.
There's a tape next to it.
No.
"You can't do this to me, Darien. You can't fucking do this to me."
Darien.
I lose it then.
I'm hysterical, I'm screaming, my face is in the carpet so that I don't have to see, don't have to look, don't have to hear the sound of my own voice.
I stop.
My fingernails are biting into my palms. The pain is reassuring.
I will it not to be there.
I try hard.
It doesn't go away.
My hand is shaking so badly that I drop it twice before I stand up.
I take the wine, too, and pair of socks.
They're green, with yellow loops across the top.
I put the tape into the VCR before I can stop to think about it, before something makes me destroy it, before something makes me hold onto it like it's my only hope of salvation.
I put it into the VCR and sit down on the couch.
It's just me, the socks, the wine, the television.
He's smiling at me.
Hi, Darien.
Oh, Jesus God.
I can't do this.
I can't.
I can't move.
I can't turn it off.
He moves forward from his perch on the bed, fiddles with the camera a little. His brow furrows. He blinks at the controls.
He sits back. He's wearing the blue sweater I got him, my one attempt at adding something to his wardrobe that he actually liked.
I can't.
I look away. He's smiling again.
"Hey."
Shut up.
"I guess if you're watching this, it means that the score is gland one, Darien zero. Which, well, kinda sucks for me."
Please. Please don't.
"So, uh. I'm not really sure what to say. Haven't done something like this before, y'know. I'm not even sure if that piece of crap camera we bought is even working, so."
I almost lose it again on the word 'crap'.
Jesus.
He'd probably find that pretty funny.
"I know we're not, like, religious or anything, so I don't really know what to expect. There's so much bullshit out there about what happens. If I could, I'd try to stay with you."
No.
Fawkes.
Fawkes, please. I'm not strong enough for this. I can't do it.
"Last thing you need, right? The ghost of Darien Fawkes added to the multitude of voices already in your head."
He grins at me from the television, like it's some kind of secret joke.
I curl up under that grin.
"So, uh, yeah. I know all this probably isn't helping. I'm sorry. I guess it's kinda selfish of me to make this, to be able to say all of this to you when you can't. Maybe I should have written a speech, or something. I'm sure there're things that I'll forget."
On the screen he pauses. Draws that slouching frame up a little.
"Well...I guess I'm supposed to say something PC, you know, that life goes on, ob-la-di, and all that. That you should find someone else, buy a house with a white picket fence and everything. I'm sorry that I can't say that right now. I'm a selfish bastard."
Stop.
"I want you to be happy, Bobby, of course, but right now, man, let me tell you. Picturing you with someone else is driving me crazy, so I'm just not gonna address that, okay, partner? You understand? I do want you to be happy, though, so I guess you'd have my blessing, and all that, for whenever--"
On the screen he blushes, rakes a hand back through his hair.
It hits me from out of nowhere that his hair is gone.
It hurts.
Of course.
They must have had to shave it off for the surgery.
Oh, God.
The kid and his hair.
My hands in his hair.
"Bad topic of conversation, huh? I didn't, uh, mean to start this off so awkwardly. I didn't know how to start it off at all. I'll have you know," and he levels a look directly at the camera's lens, "That I was seriously considering a strip tease for a little while there."
I'm staring at the screen, but I can't do anything.
I know he needs me to smile.
Smile, Hobbesy.
I'm sorry. I wish I could.
I'm so sorry.
He's more relaxed now, less freaked out by this. He's tugged his legs up to sit cross-legged on the bed.
"Then I figured, hell, we already have a whole shelf full of that. Got to love this video camera, huh, partner? Why not go for the wholesome image. So. Here I am. Blue sweater and all."
He pauses.
"I guess, well. Uh. I guess maybe I'd like to be buried in this. If they let you pick that sort of thing, you know?"
I turn off the tape.
The screen clicks out to black.
I get up and move away from the couch.
Away from Darien smiling on the bed in his blue sweater.
I put my head under the faucet in the kitchen and turn the cold water on as far as it will go.
It doesn't help.
He's waiting when I get back, frozen in the VCR.
"Yeah. I think I'd like that. You know I love this sweater. It certainly took long enough for my excellent fashion sense to rub off on you, though, I have to say."
I almost smile, but I think my face's nerve endings died with him.
"Anyway. I'm sorry for being so bad at this. I was trying to find some kind of quote, you know, something deep, about the meaning of life. I came up with squat. Big surprise there." His smile is bright now, real, and I'm staring at the cable box so I don't have to see it.
"There are, um, some letters. In the desk. You can read them if you want. But if you think they might like to have them, could you? You know. Give them. I don't think there'll be much Agency nostalgia for me, but, you know, I'm a charismatic kind of guy, they might sorta miss me."
I can hear that he wants to ask something.
What.
"Hobbes?"
Oh.
Hobbes. Official business.
"You have to tell Claire that it's okay. Okay? Promise me that you'll tell Claire it's okay. It's not her fault. If there was a way to help me, she would have done it. It must have gotten pretty crappy in there, if you're watching this now."
Yeah.
Pretty crappy.
"Bobby? Bobby, you have to promise me."
I stare at the screen.
No.
The idea of human contact is terrifying.
I want to scream. Maybe I do.
A conversation?
With Claire.
About Darien.
Darien's dead, Claire. But it's okay.
I don't think so.
"Bobby, please. I wrote that in the letter to her, but you have to talk to her, convince her that it's true. She had to do the procedure. We both know how much she didn't want to. But she did it because there wouldn't have been any chance at all if she didn't."
He crosses his arms. His chin firms. "Bobby. Promise me."
We stare at each other across the space of the television screen.
Stubborn bastard.
I can't believe you're doing this to me.
Just when I was all set to never go outside again.
God.
"Yeah, kid." The words hurt. "I promise."
"There," he says. "That wasn't so hard, was it?"
It's uncanny.
For a long second I'm scared. Real scared.
He grins.
"Don't look so surprised. You think I don't know by now the exact second that you're about to break? Please. I have a doctorate in Bobby Hobbes. Give us both some credit. I did have you as a partner, didn't I?"
Yeah. Yeah, you did.
His eyes flick away from the camera. He glances to the side and squints, drops off the bed and moves forward. The camera captures a screenful of blue sweater.
"God, I hate technology. The little red light thingy's blinking now, but I don't know if that's good or bad. I'm gonna play it safe and wrap this up now, I guess, so..."
No.
You can't do that, Darien. You can't do this and then go away again.
Darien.
Darien?
He comes back into focus, drops down right in front of the camera.
Half of his hair is flat from where he ran his hand through it. The rest of it is sticking up a little.
Okay. So it's sticking up a lot.
He smiles. Curves his lips like he knows what I'm thinking. Puts his hands in his hair and rubs crazily, grinning at the camera, at me, the whole time, grinning like a little kid.
Oh, God.
Oh, God, kid, kid, Fawkes.
You should have known that I'm not strong enough for this.
Darien.
We were supposed to have steak tonight for dinner.
To celebrate.
No more gland.
Gland one, Darien zero.
Bobby Hobbes.
Zero.
"It's kind of weird, you know, saying goodbye. I mean, like this." His hair's crazy now, as delirious as the cheerful expression he has turned towards the camera. "Since it's not goodbye, really. I know you're going to be home in a few minutes. I mean, uh, the other you. You know. I wish I had some kind of brilliant last words. I doubt whatever I said today was particularly awe-inspiring. There's a lot more I want to say. But the light thingy's going again. So, uh, here goes. I love you."
Darien's smiling at me.
Smiling at me from five feet and a world away.
"I know it's kinda cliché, to end this thing like that. But it's the only thing that works. I love you, Bobby. So much that I can't sit here and talk about it, because there's not enough tape or cameras, even if I knocked over a Nobody Beats the Wiz. And I could do that, too. Their security system's for crap."
"Anyway--"
He sucks in a breath, tenses for a moment. Blinks into the camera.
"I love you, Darien."
Around me the apartment's quiet.
His expression relaxes.
He smiles again. Part of me wants to believe that he knew I'd say that. Knew it like he knew I'll go to Claire and tell her that it's okay. Knew it like he knew he made my life better.
"Love you, Bobby. I'll...I'll see you around, okay?"
For a long time he sits in front of the camera.
I can't move. I can't turn it off, can't get up to see if the tape's done and he forgot to shut it down.
He's staring quietly at the lens, at me.
God do I love him.
"Thank you, Darien," I whisper.
I don't know if I actually said it.
On screen he shifts forward, and the picture starts to blur.
I think I hear something.
Far off. Scratchy.
The sound's bad at this point. The battery was probably going.
"Hey, no problem, man. You're welcome."
Although she may be in denial about it, Darien Fawkes and Bobby Hobbes don't belong to Chalie; she's just borrowing them for a little while. Darien, Bobby, The Keeper, Alex Monroe, Eberts, The Official, and any other characters mentioned are the property of Stu Segall productions. No copyright infringement is intended, and no profit is being made.
Notes: Feedback is, as always, incredibly appreciated. I can be reached at chalie@saintly.com, and would love to hear from you. This story is darker than my previous foray into the world of The Invisible Man, so count yourself forewarned. Yes, it's true. Angst ahead.
Thank You
By Charlotte Ruocco
"We'll have steak tonight for dinner," he says to me. "To celebrate. Medium rare. Sounds good, huh?"
I smile at him, because I know he needs me to. "Yeah. Sure thing, kid."
"There's a bottle of wine in the sock drawer at home. I've been saving it. You bring it later, sneak it past, we'll have a damn good little party on our hands. Okay?"
He has to stop looking at me like that.
I glance past him, over his shoulder, to where she's waiting. She's trying hard to be unobtrusive, trying to stare at her nails like they're the most fascinating things in the world.
"The Keep'll kill me," I tell him. "But okay. Whatever you say."
"Bobby." He takes my hand and squeezes it, squeezes it to stop the trembling. I'm glad that she can't see that I'm shaking, even though she'd understand.
I know she understands.
But I don't want any of them to see me like this.
He leans down and kisses me quickly, and I know it's quick for two reasons, quick because there's part of him that's embarrassed that she's in the room, and quick because he wants it to mean that he's okay, everything's okay, see how wonderfully okay we are that I don't need to kiss you like anything's wrong.
Across the way the look she gives us is something like sad, emotion caught between two extremes. Her job and her friend.
I wonder if she's trembling, too.
"Darien," she says. She says it slowly, like to give us more time.
"That'd be me," he answers. And his voice is light, joking, Darien's. I want to latch onto that voice, hold it, break down the sounds and live in them.
"I'm sorry. We have to go. They're ready for you by now."
"Man of the hour, huh?" His eyes flash something at me, too much, I can't even look at him anymore. I'm sorry for that.
She opens the door and slips outside, and he goes to follow. I think he forgot that he's still holding my hand and I move along with him.
"Fawkes?"
He turns back. This time his eyes are dangerous, pleading, begging me not to say anything. We'd agreed to keep it simple. Simple, because everything was really okay.
"You call that a kiss?"
I promised him I wouldn't, I promised both of us I wouldn't, mostly I promised myself.
But I can't. I'm not that strong. I'm not strong at all.
I'm crushing him now, I'm trying to force his body and his lips against mine because maybe if I hold tight enough they won't be able to take him away from me.
I'm probably hurting him but I don't care, I can't care. I have to press him into me. He's mine, he's mine. I won't let go. I can't.
He breaks away. His eyes hurt. They hurt me. They're literally painful.
"Don't forget the wine," he says, because that's all that he can say.
He's out the door before I can realize that I'm no longer holding his hand.
* * *
I wonder at first why they send Eberts.
He's a curious choice for a messenger.
Perhaps not.
They don't know how I'll react. So they figure Eberts is a safe bet, because God knows the man takes enough abuse on a daily basis.
I don't need to look up to know that it's him, and that he's afraid.
His shoes squeak on the floor, which is clean, and white, and bright.
I've been studying the floor for some time now. There are seven scuffmarks, thirty-five dents, and a broken tile three feet away from the door.
"Thank you, Eberts," I say. I'm surprised that my voice is calm. I'm surprised that I'm not screaming, but maybe I am. I don't know.
He had a speech all planned out. I can hear it stopping in his throat.
He doesn't know what to do.
I still haven't looked up.
"I'm extremely sorry, Agent Hobbes."
Yeah. Me too.
I get up. The floor looks different from this perspective.
I've been sitting too long.
"Thank you, Eberts," I say again, and I move past him out into the hallway. I don't look at his face because I can't.
I find her in the corridor near the pay phones. Her head is pressed against the wall, her face turned in to the plaster.
"It's my fault," she says because she knows I'm there. She's crying, and I'm glad, because I can't. Someone should cry for him.
"It was as we suspected. The gland had shattered and was interfering with his brain functions. We thought we could..."
I wait for her to find the words. I don't say anything, but I don't think she really expects me to.
"...there was too much damage. When we tried to remove some of the sections, we realized how deep the problem went, and his body just..."
"Thank you, Claire," I say.
I don't know if I'm capable of forming any other sentence, but I don't really want to try.
I turn around and walk outside.
Outside it's clear, warm, earlier than I'd thought. The sun's still up. This seems strangely inappropriate.
I get into the car that pulls up.
It's interesting focusing on purely manual things, the sound and feeling of the door as I yank it closed. The click of the seatbelt that I remember to belt. I pull the visor down because the sun hurts.
Alex doesn't say anything, and part of me thanks her for that.
When the car comes to a stop I realize that I'm just sitting there. I should be getting out, I know.
I stare at the glass, watching the light reflect.
Alex gets out. She moves around the side and opens my door.
"Thank you, Alex," I say, and in some ways it's strangely comforting that my vocabulary's been reduced to two words and the remembrance of names.
She lets me go. It must be hard for her. They probably told her to stay with me, make sure I didn't do anything crazy.
But some part of her understands.
Thank you, Alex.
They shouldn't worry.
I'm not capable of doing anything at all.
* * *
We're not neat freaks, neither of us, really, but the apartment is spotless.
We were careful about that. We cleaned. It was a strange thing to do before going to the hospital, but it was something to do together.
This morning,
This morning?
This morning, we got up early and made the bed. We usually don't do that.
We changed the sheets, too.
We stretched them tight, folded neat corners in at the edges.
He'd been proud of that damn bed, this morning.
No.
I'd made breakfast. It'd felt good, a real meal for us in the morning. We usually don't adhere to the most nutritional of diets.
We sat next to each other. Just close together. Afterwards he washed the dishes and I stood next to him and dried them off.
The shower was hard.
He didn't think that it was a good idea. Being in there together.
Too much potential, he'd said.
No. No. No.
He had a way of wiggling his eyebrows that drove me crazy.
Just that. That's all he had to do.
I said I'd be good.
We'd already had last night.
I held onto him in the water.
My hands in his hair.
Inside the apartment it's too quiet. I can't look at the bed. I can't look at the table, the chairs, the books. I can't look anywhere. I stand blinded in our home with nowhere to look.
Don't forget the wine.
So I don't.
The sock drawer should be harmless enough.
Of course it isn't.
His socks are orange, teal, maroon, peach, striped, polka-dotted, crazy-patterned. He dug them out of bargain bins in vintage stores, searched for them at flea markets.
I slam the drawer shut.
I can hear the wine roll in the back.
I think my hands are shaking when I tug the drawer back open and reach for it, but I can't look.
There's something else in there, too.
"Fuck you."
The words surprise me even as I say them. They break the silence, but it doesn't help.
"You can't do this to me."
I appear to be addressing the socks.
The kid was right to save this wine. It's a good vintage. Good year. Good stuff.
Focus on the bottle.
The bottle.
There's a tape next to it.
No.
"You can't do this to me, Darien. You can't fucking do this to me."
Darien.
I lose it then.
I'm hysterical, I'm screaming, my face is in the carpet so that I don't have to see, don't have to look, don't have to hear the sound of my own voice.
I stop.
My fingernails are biting into my palms. The pain is reassuring.
I will it not to be there.
I try hard.
It doesn't go away.
My hand is shaking so badly that I drop it twice before I stand up.
I take the wine, too, and pair of socks.
They're green, with yellow loops across the top.
I put the tape into the VCR before I can stop to think about it, before something makes me destroy it, before something makes me hold onto it like it's my only hope of salvation.
I put it into the VCR and sit down on the couch.
It's just me, the socks, the wine, the television.
He's smiling at me.
Hi, Darien.
Oh, Jesus God.
I can't do this.
I can't.
I can't move.
I can't turn it off.
He moves forward from his perch on the bed, fiddles with the camera a little. His brow furrows. He blinks at the controls.
He sits back. He's wearing the blue sweater I got him, my one attempt at adding something to his wardrobe that he actually liked.
I can't.
I look away. He's smiling again.
"Hey."
Shut up.
"I guess if you're watching this, it means that the score is gland one, Darien zero. Which, well, kinda sucks for me."
Please. Please don't.
"So, uh. I'm not really sure what to say. Haven't done something like this before, y'know. I'm not even sure if that piece of crap camera we bought is even working, so."
I almost lose it again on the word 'crap'.
Jesus.
He'd probably find that pretty funny.
"I know we're not, like, religious or anything, so I don't really know what to expect. There's so much bullshit out there about what happens. If I could, I'd try to stay with you."
No.
Fawkes.
Fawkes, please. I'm not strong enough for this. I can't do it.
"Last thing you need, right? The ghost of Darien Fawkes added to the multitude of voices already in your head."
He grins at me from the television, like it's some kind of secret joke.
I curl up under that grin.
"So, uh, yeah. I know all this probably isn't helping. I'm sorry. I guess it's kinda selfish of me to make this, to be able to say all of this to you when you can't. Maybe I should have written a speech, or something. I'm sure there're things that I'll forget."
On the screen he pauses. Draws that slouching frame up a little.
"Well...I guess I'm supposed to say something PC, you know, that life goes on, ob-la-di, and all that. That you should find someone else, buy a house with a white picket fence and everything. I'm sorry that I can't say that right now. I'm a selfish bastard."
Stop.
"I want you to be happy, Bobby, of course, but right now, man, let me tell you. Picturing you with someone else is driving me crazy, so I'm just not gonna address that, okay, partner? You understand? I do want you to be happy, though, so I guess you'd have my blessing, and all that, for whenever--"
On the screen he blushes, rakes a hand back through his hair.
It hits me from out of nowhere that his hair is gone.
It hurts.
Of course.
They must have had to shave it off for the surgery.
Oh, God.
The kid and his hair.
My hands in his hair.
"Bad topic of conversation, huh? I didn't, uh, mean to start this off so awkwardly. I didn't know how to start it off at all. I'll have you know," and he levels a look directly at the camera's lens, "That I was seriously considering a strip tease for a little while there."
I'm staring at the screen, but I can't do anything.
I know he needs me to smile.
Smile, Hobbesy.
I'm sorry. I wish I could.
I'm so sorry.
He's more relaxed now, less freaked out by this. He's tugged his legs up to sit cross-legged on the bed.
"Then I figured, hell, we already have a whole shelf full of that. Got to love this video camera, huh, partner? Why not go for the wholesome image. So. Here I am. Blue sweater and all."
He pauses.
"I guess, well. Uh. I guess maybe I'd like to be buried in this. If they let you pick that sort of thing, you know?"
I turn off the tape.
The screen clicks out to black.
I get up and move away from the couch.
Away from Darien smiling on the bed in his blue sweater.
I put my head under the faucet in the kitchen and turn the cold water on as far as it will go.
It doesn't help.
He's waiting when I get back, frozen in the VCR.
"Yeah. I think I'd like that. You know I love this sweater. It certainly took long enough for my excellent fashion sense to rub off on you, though, I have to say."
I almost smile, but I think my face's nerve endings died with him.
"Anyway. I'm sorry for being so bad at this. I was trying to find some kind of quote, you know, something deep, about the meaning of life. I came up with squat. Big surprise there." His smile is bright now, real, and I'm staring at the cable box so I don't have to see it.
"There are, um, some letters. In the desk. You can read them if you want. But if you think they might like to have them, could you? You know. Give them. I don't think there'll be much Agency nostalgia for me, but, you know, I'm a charismatic kind of guy, they might sorta miss me."
I can hear that he wants to ask something.
What.
"Hobbes?"
Oh.
Hobbes. Official business.
"You have to tell Claire that it's okay. Okay? Promise me that you'll tell Claire it's okay. It's not her fault. If there was a way to help me, she would have done it. It must have gotten pretty crappy in there, if you're watching this now."
Yeah.
Pretty crappy.
"Bobby? Bobby, you have to promise me."
I stare at the screen.
No.
The idea of human contact is terrifying.
I want to scream. Maybe I do.
A conversation?
With Claire.
About Darien.
Darien's dead, Claire. But it's okay.
I don't think so.
"Bobby, please. I wrote that in the letter to her, but you have to talk to her, convince her that it's true. She had to do the procedure. We both know how much she didn't want to. But she did it because there wouldn't have been any chance at all if she didn't."
He crosses his arms. His chin firms. "Bobby. Promise me."
We stare at each other across the space of the television screen.
Stubborn bastard.
I can't believe you're doing this to me.
Just when I was all set to never go outside again.
God.
"Yeah, kid." The words hurt. "I promise."
"There," he says. "That wasn't so hard, was it?"
It's uncanny.
For a long second I'm scared. Real scared.
He grins.
"Don't look so surprised. You think I don't know by now the exact second that you're about to break? Please. I have a doctorate in Bobby Hobbes. Give us both some credit. I did have you as a partner, didn't I?"
Yeah. Yeah, you did.
His eyes flick away from the camera. He glances to the side and squints, drops off the bed and moves forward. The camera captures a screenful of blue sweater.
"God, I hate technology. The little red light thingy's blinking now, but I don't know if that's good or bad. I'm gonna play it safe and wrap this up now, I guess, so..."
No.
You can't do that, Darien. You can't do this and then go away again.
Darien.
Darien?
He comes back into focus, drops down right in front of the camera.
Half of his hair is flat from where he ran his hand through it. The rest of it is sticking up a little.
Okay. So it's sticking up a lot.
He smiles. Curves his lips like he knows what I'm thinking. Puts his hands in his hair and rubs crazily, grinning at the camera, at me, the whole time, grinning like a little kid.
Oh, God.
Oh, God, kid, kid, Fawkes.
You should have known that I'm not strong enough for this.
Darien.
We were supposed to have steak tonight for dinner.
To celebrate.
No more gland.
Gland one, Darien zero.
Bobby Hobbes.
Zero.
"It's kind of weird, you know, saying goodbye. I mean, like this." His hair's crazy now, as delirious as the cheerful expression he has turned towards the camera. "Since it's not goodbye, really. I know you're going to be home in a few minutes. I mean, uh, the other you. You know. I wish I had some kind of brilliant last words. I doubt whatever I said today was particularly awe-inspiring. There's a lot more I want to say. But the light thingy's going again. So, uh, here goes. I love you."
Darien's smiling at me.
Smiling at me from five feet and a world away.
"I know it's kinda cliché, to end this thing like that. But it's the only thing that works. I love you, Bobby. So much that I can't sit here and talk about it, because there's not enough tape or cameras, even if I knocked over a Nobody Beats the Wiz. And I could do that, too. Their security system's for crap."
"Anyway--"
He sucks in a breath, tenses for a moment. Blinks into the camera.
"I love you, Darien."
Around me the apartment's quiet.
His expression relaxes.
He smiles again. Part of me wants to believe that he knew I'd say that. Knew it like he knew I'll go to Claire and tell her that it's okay. Knew it like he knew he made my life better.
"Love you, Bobby. I'll...I'll see you around, okay?"
For a long time he sits in front of the camera.
I can't move. I can't turn it off, can't get up to see if the tape's done and he forgot to shut it down.
He's staring quietly at the lens, at me.
God do I love him.
"Thank you, Darien," I whisper.
I don't know if I actually said it.
On screen he shifts forward, and the picture starts to blur.
I think I hear something.
Far off. Scratchy.
The sound's bad at this point. The battery was probably going.
"Hey, no problem, man. You're welcome."