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Alex’s childhood dog had one eye. Her muted fur sprang and tangled in the form of a Red Setter, and from a distance you would have no immediate odd assertions. Really, he remembered the old thing was a nuisance. She chased birds and rodents which would have been useful in a time where food wasn’t farmed and produced by someone else, but in this scenario she was simply hoping her contribution would reward her with an extra morsel of food. It was borderline impressive; especially with her handicap.
Alex gave her the same of amount of food everyday regardless of her daily hunts but she didn’t stop doing it; She was too dumb to realize nothing was changing.
Back in Fairbanks, all conversation seemed to be about everywhere outside of Fairbanks. People cared more about the weather in Anchorage than any local affairs, so it was fairly inevitable and expected that Alex would leave home as soon he could. Everyone left as soon as they could.
The Setter died five years before Alex knew about it, and when he did find out over the phone with his dear mother, he was fairly certain his father had shot it in a culmination of boredom and frustration and insanity. Alex had always had the impression that his father wanted to shoot him but he’d flown off to the sunny South before any unfortunate circumstances occurred. Many of things wouldn’t have turned out the way they did if he had been offed before turning twenty.
He told himself every day that he would come home and visit but doing that became a habit and the words no longer meant anything anymore. If he did return, well, he wouldn’t be surprised if he found an empty space in the shape of Fairbanks; swallowed under all that snow, buried beneath the weight of simplicity. That was fine by him if he were to be honest because he was content with the memories of a one-eyed Setter, an archaic church that smelt like burning wood and incense, abandoned buildings he wasn’t allowed to enter but still did, fireplaces, parkas, and snow-boots.
He didn’t miss it, he just liked to think about it all like it was a picture book.
Frank liked his stories. They were charming or entertaining to him, or at least distracting. There was something appealing to him about the banality of a sheltered childhood in a nice city; what he never had. He seemed to like Alex talking about his parents and the food his mother cooked and the times he went hunting with his father. Of course, Alex left out the gritty details; the times his mother would forget to make dinner and would fall asleep in the garden with an empty bottle of wine, or when his friends begged him to steal the rifle from the shed and so he did and one of the more troublesome of his acquaintances thought it would be hilarious to shoot a squirrel and Alex had cried and cried all evening and told his parents he had a terrible stomach-ache.
Frank loved the Setter.
“Was the eye just gone, like, with fur there, or was it closed like this?” he asked as he mimicked the expression in a childish manner, and if Alex had developed a stronger attachment to the dog in his youth he might have taken offense.
His second beer was lukewarm in his hand, and every sip he took diminished in quantity until he was barely touching his tongue to the drink. Frank hadn’t even finished his first. Neither of them really drank, and Alex tried to remember why he believed he needed to buy it when it was just the two of them hanging out.
“She looked like she was winking. Sometimes – it’s kind of dumb – I expected her, one day, to just open it up. I mean, I didn’t think she was faking it, she was just a dumb dog. It just didn’t feel… real, I guess.”
“No, I understand.” Frank reassured him. Alex knew he would. “I wasn’t a big fan of dogs as a kid. Thought they would give me rabies or some shit.”
“Or turn you into a dog. It would explain all that fuckin’ hair…”
“You fucker.” Frank gave him a pointed look that looked all but menacing if it weren’t for the lopsided smirk that really turned the expression into more of a taunting sneer. This was an all familiar look, and Alex loved getting it out of him. “You love my hair.”
“Yeah. I love finding bits of it everywhere.” In a momentous effort, Alex took a big final gulp of his beer and placed the can on the coffee table. It was disgustingly warm and he could feel the carbonation in his nose. Frank’s eyes visibly softened as though he found the action endearing. For a quick second, Alex looked into them like one might glance at a stranger on the subway; subtly and fleetingly, in an attempt to not stare for too long.
The lights from the ceiling caught them in a way that made him seem like one of those painting where it was obvious that the artist started with the eyes and became lazy when it came to the rest of the piece. Alex pitied paintings that had been captured with utmost accuracy and detail to the point of life-likeness, their faces up on museum walls to be scrutinized to the last stroke. It was better to be a sloppy done painting. At least that way you can defer criticism to the artist, not yourself.
But in no way was Frank sloppy. No, he was effortlessly unhampered. Thousands would surely crowd in a tiny room to see Frank’s portrait…
“Alex? Don’t tell me you’re drunk already…”
“I zoned out.” Alex stated with a laugh, and Frank reciprocated with a snicker but his brow was furrowed and creased worriedly. Suddenly, without communicating, they’d come to the mutual understanding that they were going to have “serious talk.” Frank shuffled closer on the sofa, until the distance was respectable but tangible.
Talking with Frank was like talking to someone via tins cans connected by string. They had to be far away enough from each other so that the string would be stretched tight and the vibrations could travel across it, but close enough so that the string wouldn’t snap. It was a fine line and a fragile string, but it was the kind of communication Alex adored. He didn’t have it with anyone else, nor did he ever have it before Frank. It felt like he would never be able to have it again if something were to happen to him… Some tragic accident would rip apart his world in a minute... God, those types of thoughts always invaded his mind, even when thinking about something he loved. It was like he wasn’t allowed to have things without the accompanied fear of losing them.
Frank placed his hand in the middle of the space between them, startling Alex. “You have a thinking face.” He said warmly.
Alex smiled at the statement so clearly filled with thoughtfulness, and he felt a little affectionate at the thought of Frank being so familiar with his features that he could pinpoint the subtleties in it. He loved feeling seen by Frank so much so, that he couldn’t care about the slight selfishness in that sentiment. He felt compelled to put his hand upon Frank’s, and lifted his wrist to do so. He couldn’t follow through, however, so his hand landed in that small space between them, leaving five inches between their fingertips.
The two of them stared down at the scene, until Alex began to strangely feel as though his hand had been put under a spotlight in a role it hadn’t bargained for, and he retreated back to his lap to clench his thigh. Frank stared at the action with soft disappointment and slowly brought his own arm back to rest against the back of the sofa.
“What’s on your mind?” Frank asked, leaning forward, intent to find the source of his unease.
Alex inhaled slowly until his chest was puffed up with air and let it all go in a single second out of his nose.
“The usual. Just… scared.”
Frank nodded vigorously like he’d just cracked a hundred digit code after a lifetime of work. “Bastard.” He huffed. Alex wanted to laugh; only Frank would insult the abstract concept of fear like it was a friend of his. “Scared about what?”
“Scared about… losing things, I guess.”
Frank looked like he was puzzled at whether Alex was referring to the menial forgetfulness he harboured (the countless times he’d found his car-keys after half an hour of searching in the most unforeseeable of places) or a more profound horror at the thought of death. He then seemed to decide that it didn’t matter which of the two it was, and smiled reassuringly.
“Do you still get the nightmares?”
“They’re not nightmares anymore. They’re just inconvenient dreams. I don’t wake up in the middle of the night anymore like I used to, I just...” he paused to think. “…I wake up still tired, like my dreams sucked the life out of me.”
“And they’re still about…”
“Vorkuta, yeah. But-" he stopped short of continuing. Frank didn’t move to interrupt. “Not just that. It’s fucking bizarre, but sometimes I dream of things that I have good feeling towards, except it’s all… wrong. I’m back in Alaska with my old man, but he’s not the same. He’s got this look in his eyes like if I make a wrong move he’ll knock me out with whatever he’s holding. And I’m walking on the street and I’m passing everyone I know – I mean everyone, people I didn’t even know I still remembered – and I say hi to them, but they don’t respond. They just look at me terrified, like I’m a monster....
“…And my dog; she looks like how I remember her until she looks up at me and opens her closed eye and instead of there being an eye, it’s all fucked up. Blood starts pouring out and she just stares and I get this weird feeling that it was me who did it to her.”
“But you didn’t, did you?”
“Of course not. She was like that when we found her. It’s stupid, really.”
“Dreams are like that. You get these weird feelings that don’t make sense. Guilty for things you didn’t do, regret things you didn’t say. I get it all the time. You’re not alone.” He looked so serious, and Alex felt compelled to reach out and touch him just for reassurance. If this compulsion was somehow audible, Frank heard it and his smile flickered on then off, back to forlorn. “We’re flying to Berlin for the Perseus operation in two weeks. Are you going to be okay for that?”
“I’m fine.”
Frank didn’t like that answer, and shuffled ever so slightly closer. “You sure?”
“What, you don’t believe me?”
“Jeez, I don’t know. You’re pretty bad at lying.”
“Fuck you, man. I’m an excellent liar. I’m so good you can’t even tell how good I am.”
“If you’re so good at lying, then I’d be on my way out the door thinking you were perfectly fucking fine and left you here with your cheap beer, but no. You can’t fool me. I’m the master of this shit and I know you too well.”
Alex couldn’t help but smile at that statement, but Frank took this as a laugh.
“What are you snickerin’ at? You don’t think I’m serious?”
“I know you’re serious. I just think you don’t understand that I’m not trying to lie to you.”
“Good. You know I’m just tryin’ to look out for you. You get me so worried.”
“I worry about you too. You spent a year as a POW in Vietnam. I heard Da Nang was rough…”
“It wasn’t fuckin’ fun, I’ll tell you that. But they were amateurs. Couldn’t break me, not even close.”
“They should have gotten me to help. All I’d have needed to do was put on that one Carl Douglas song.”
“You’re a dick-“
“That one with the really annoying long intro with the guy going “Oh hoooo…’
Yes I know the one. It’s not like you sing every god damn seco-“
“The one that goes: “Everybo-“
Frank leaped forward to clasp his hand around Alex’s mouth but he could only keep it there for a second as Alex managed to kick him with his heel, sending him sprawled at the other end of the couch, heaving with laughter.
“If you sing that fuckin’ song one more time, I swear to god I will cut your tongue out.”
“And as soon as you do that you’ll miss my beautiful singing.”
“Never.” He said, but Alex thought he could hear hesitancy in his voice, and in his eyes the familiar look of dishonesty that he had imprinted into his memory that signified when he was lying.
The exhilaration from the scuffle was still in the air, and Alex released a huff of laughter, intensively moving up the sofa, closer to Frank. They were back to the closeness of before. “You’re lying. You’d miss it.”
“I would.”
In the corner of his eye, he could see Frank’s hand lift up and levitate an inch above the sofa. Slowly, slowly, it inched forward until it was where it had been a few minutes ago, in the expanse between them. Then, he raised it up and brought it towards Alex’s face at a speed so gradual that he thought it would take an hour before it would reach his skin.
Alex brought his gaze down to the floor because looking at Frank was starting to become overwhelming.
At that moment, he could feel the calloused fingertip connect with his cheek, so very lightly that it felt like a fly crawling across his skin. It circled to the space under his eye and the side of his nose until he more confidently brought more fingers to cradle his jaw. The contact was so minuscule that it expressed so much intimacy; a sucker-punch would have been less impactful- and less confusing. Alex found himself instinctively leaning into the touch. For a moment, he allowed his eyelids to droop and himself to feel the gentle caressing of Frank’s cool fingers on his skin, dissolving the strangeness of the situation; embracing the strangeness. Accepting it’s unfamiliarity.
A hand that had ended the lives of countless in deadly neck-snaps or pulling of the trigger, a hand that had been soaked in the blood of a hundred men… a hand that was holding Alex face like it would shatter unless treated with utmost care.
When Frank’s hand left his face, his eyes sprung open in disappointment but the sight of Frank’s soft smile, he smiled back with relief.
But then he was overtaken with confusion because it was wrong. They couldn’t be doing this. His smile dropped. “This can’t be right.”
Frank frowned angrily. “According to who?”
“I don’t- I don’t know, man. What if people find out? We’ll get in trouble.”
“When have you ever cared about getting in trouble? When you killed Steiner, huh?”
“That was different. I mean-“
“You went directly against orders and killed him; a dude the military needed to stop a chemical weapon from fucking up the entire world. And guess what? You’re okay. You’re not in trouble. They put you back in operation despite that dumb shit you did- yes I know you didn’t mean to. So why the fuck would they give a shit you who you-“
He stopped at the cusp of the sentence. Alex finished it for him.
“Who you love.”
Frank suddenly brought his hand back to Alex’s face and placed his palm flush against his cheek. “If this is fucking wrong…” He looked like he wanted to spit, “…then nothing is fucking right in this world, you hear me?”
“I hear you.”
Frank’s hand fell to his shoulder and gripped it reassuringly. “So,” he said. “Are you in?”
Alex laughed and almost felt like holding his hand out for a handshake. “Done deal!”
It was easier to say yes when it felt like a business decision, but there was still a scary vastness between them, much larger than the space that physically separated them. If he’d been asked to strangle Frank it would have been an easier command than touching his skin in the way he’d done with countless women in his lifetime.
But he wanted to do it. It felt… simply right.
“I didn’t know I was…” It was a big word to say. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “…gay.”
Frank squeezed his shoulder. “That shit doesn’t matter. We’re going to hell.” He joked. “But we’re in this together. You and me.”
Alex looked into his eyes, directly and intensely. Their glossiness made him look so vulnerable and he hadn’t noticed how emotional Frank had become in the span of a moment. His irises were simultaneously icy and fiery, like they were holding an unrestrainable force within them. They glowed at the energy of him; they truly were the windows into his turbulent soul.
Then they were both leaning towards each other and Alex’s hand found Frank’s upper bicep and all he could think was ‘Don’t back down now, Mason...’ and he had never imagined doing this with another man, let alone Frank fucking Woods-
They’re lips connected in a moment of true uncertainty, that Alex was overthrown by the inexplainable right-ness of it. It was like every experience leading up to this moment was preparing him for the true king of all experiences: being able to kiss Frank. The squareness of his jaw, the facial hair; all so distinct to what he was familiar with, yet the newness excited him- filled him with so much adrenaline. The world felt like it was moving around him, under them, becoming irrelevant.
Their lips didn’t move, but stayed locked in an embrace. Alex ran his hand through the back of Frank’s hair. It was coarse and slightly tangled and if it were anyone else but Frank he’d worry about hurting him by snagging a finger on a knot but both of them knew that pulled hair was not the epitome of pain.
Frank broke away to press his nose against the side of Alex’s face, breathing in deeply. “You smell and taste like beer.” He muttered softly.
“You have too much hair. I think I have some in my mouth.” Alex teased. He ran his fingers through his beard to emphasize his point. Frank pressed a kiss to his temple in response and leant back.
“I should go. It’s getting late.” Frank said, but both of them knew he wasn’t leaving.
“You could stay.”
So, stay he did.