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1
Nate has a playlist of songs that remind him of Dan. Songs he’d heard that had the right vibe, songs Dan had hummed under his breath or played on his vinyl during the time Nate had stayed with the Humphreys in senior year. Songs that’d played on the radio and gotten Dan to say, beaming, “That’s my song!” and sing along enthusiastically, songs that Dan had recommended to Nate.
Even before – even when Dan was still with them, even then – listening to the playlist was a tragic experience. It was yearning, more intense even than how he’d felt about Serena, like Nate was entirely in Dan’s orbit. He made a home in the feeling of it. Listening to the playlist was like salt in an open wound back then, some sort of it doesn’t matter how much you love him, you’ll never get your happy ending.
Now? Nate wishes he’d said something, anything. Even if it wouldn’t have made an iota of difference, even if Dan would’ve just laughed in his face, at least he would’ve known. If Dan would’ve still made the same choices, he would’ve made them knowing.
Nate’s not as naïve as everyone thinks he is; he knows love doesn’t fix everything. But sometimes, just one person loving you can make things at least a little better. Maybe Nate could’ve been that person for Dan. Maybe not.
Not like it matters now, anyway. It’s not going to change anything.
2
The shitty part of it is that he’s been grieving Dan even when he was alive, Nate thinks, doing his hair the way he used to back in college, pulled back to expose his forehead. Dan had laughed at him for it once, but Dan used to do that always, make fun of Nate’s hair, but this felt different – he’d sounded a little awed as he made fun of Nate, and he’d even pressed a kiss to Nate’s forehead in a way that was either the most cruel joke possible, or the sweetest and most tender gesture. Nate had been too afraid to ask.
Nate had spent so long, wanting Dan, afraid of how it’d change things for them. He did it all halfway; little gestures of love that could be denied if need called for it, holding himself back. Sitting close to Dan on the sofa as they watched movies, but not too close. Laughing at his jokes, but not too much. Patting him on the shoulder, but not touching him for too long. Texting him, but not too frequently. Complimenting his writing, his clothes, his hair, but not enough that Dan would pick up on anything different about it.
And Nate had gotten used to the hollowness, the void. The wanting, the lying, the hiding. “You okay, bro?” Dan had asked once, concern in his eyes, and Nate hadn’t known what to say, how to tell Dan something along the lines of, you’re so cute that it physically hurts me, how to say, I’d forgotten being in love hurt like this, hurt so much, from inside to out, all day, every day, I’d forgotten.
3
Or maybe Nate has never even known a love like this. The feeling had felt like too much.
Now, sitting next to Jenny in an uncomfortable, stiff chair, not knowing what to say beyond the regular condolences, drinking a coffee that reminds him too much of Dan, Nate thinks the feeling hadn’t been enough.
He’s always been aware of his insufficiency, but it’s never felt this serious or painful before.
Jenny looks at him with sad eyes, takes his hand, holds it. They sit there quietly. Nate thinks that he doesn’t deserve Jenny’s kindness. But there is something compassionate in Jenny’s expression, like she understands how devastated Nate is, how central to everything Dan had been to him. She isn’t really comforting him as much as she is reminding him that he is not alone in his grief.
It’s alright, he supposes. He can do the same for her. Dan wasn’t his elder brother, but Dan had made him feel cared for in ways that nobody else had, made him feel like someone really believed in him. Dan had been a powerhouse of love; Nate hates thinking that all the love has just gone somewhere.
He looks at Dan’s little sister, at the blankness in her expression, the way she’s staring into the distance. He knows, with a sudden, nameless conviction, that he needs to take care of Jenny, be there for her. That they need to stick together. It’s what Dan would’ve wanted.
He doesn’t know what Jenny wants, but he can ask. What do the two of them even have now, other than this shared sadness, this common memory of Dan, the one person both of them loved more than they loved anyone else in the world?
4
After the ceremony – and Nate doesn’t want to use a word like funeral, something grim and dark and bleak; he spends an hour with different thesauruses, trying to find a word he thinks Dan would’ve liked, finds that vigil in certain contexts fits, with its tone of staying awake while someone else rests, but vigil works better for what Nate and Jenny are doing, for how they feel, being alive in a world without Dan – after the ceremony, he and Jenny leave together, get high solely for something to do.
“I loved him,” Nate says eventually, lying there on the floor with Jenny. Neither of them has cried yet, and Nate thinks maybe this would be easier, if they had. If they could cry. “Jenny, I loved him so much.”
“I know,” Jenny murmurs.
“No, I was in love with him,” Nate says, softly.
“Shit, Nate,” she murmurs, softer than before. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
She hugs him, then. He presses his face into her bony shoulder, exhales, feels weird, smelling Jenny’s shampoo and her perfume and knowing he’ll never have this tangible feeling of Dan’s arms around him, of the way Dan smells, the shape of Dan’s body, none of that, ever again. It hurts so much, but he cannot cry. It feels awful, holding all the pain in, not even able to express it through tears.
There’s no outlet, and he’s just boxed in with all the grief and sadness. But there is Jenny. She looks at him, her eyes bright with concern for him, despite everything she’s undoubtedly going through.
She lost her brother. Nate lost the love of his life. They’re grieving the same person, but their grief is different. It doesn’t feel that different, though. The magnitude of their love for him was probably enough to bridge the differences in the nature of their love for him. Nate exhales, deeply. He’s never been an overthinker, but he just can’t seem to turn his brain off now.
“At least we got to know him, right?” Jenny asks.
“Yeah,” Nate says. “Yeah, Jen, exactly.”
Better to have loved and lost than to never have loved, right?