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Actually, everything was good in their life.
No, they had it anything but bad. Alfie was earning good money, Tommy was earning good money, and they had so many things they had already experienced together. When it became clear that they didn't want to have children, they got a dog.
It was a mongrel, a very sweet guy, and Tommy still had to smile today when he looked at the photo he had taken the day they had picked up Cyril. Alfie had had such a happy smile on his face when Cyril had licked across his nose, the lines of his grin all over his face. It was one of the photos that actually made it from his phone to their kitchen wall, along with many other wonderful memories. Their vacations to different beaches around the world, their first date where Alfie had had a terrible haircut and had been a little fatter - and their wedding.
Seven years they had been married. And Tommy, with his Gypsy roots, tried not to think about it, even in the traditional or superstitious sense, that seven was a bad number. It certainly wasn't. After all, they had everything they needed, didn't they?
***
Tommy fumbled nervously with the sleeves of his sweater, tugging them repeatedly, then pulling the ends of the sleeves back over the tips of his fingers. A strange droning spread through his ears, a silence he had never felt before - if it was a silence at all. It was more like a murmur, like a dead, empty roar, and though Alfie held his hand, it didn't soothe Tommy.
The murmur was so loud he couldn't hear his own heartbeat. Tommy closed his eyes and leaned his head gently against the white wall behind his head, consciously blocking out the noise of the hospital waiting room.
It had started with something Tommy had first noticed as a change in their relationship. Alfie had sometimes, on rare days, grown cooler. Had thrown harsh and cold words at him, and had been much more easily irritable. They had often argued because Tommy had believed Alfie was having an affair, which he vehemently denied. Some days it had gotten Tommy down, because he'd wondered - why? Why was Alfie suddenly reacting differently than he used to? Did their relationship no longer excite him? Tommy had often asked if something was wrong. Had sought conversations, endless long nights, sleepless, they had been.
But Alfie had denied it again and again. After two days he had been back to normal. All he had ever said had been, I've got a headache, Tommy, that's all. Don't bother me now. You're fanatical, how can you even think such a fuckin' thing?
And the penny had dropped on a warm June morning, just before Alfie had left for work. There he had simply toppled over in the middle of the driveway in the yard, Tommy had seen it out of the kitchen window in a panic. He had hit his head so hard that Tommy had immediately called an ambulance.
And that's how they had ended up here.
Tommy hated the smell of this place, hated the crowds here, the germs, just everything. He clenched his hand tighter in Alfie's, slowly leaned his head on Alfie's broad shoulder.
"S' gonna be all right, you'll see. It won't be anything bad, stress from work," Alfie murmured softly, and though Tommy nodded, he didn't think this was anything stress-related. Because Alfie just wasn't like that. But he swallowed his words, pressed his pale cheek more firmly into the familiar smell of Alfie's shoulder.
Waiting.
Waiting was the worst thing anyone could do to Tommy. Especially when he didn't know what was going to happen.
***
"Did you hear me, Mr. Shelby?" the doctor said quietly, anxiously, the gaze of cool gray eyes fixed on him, while Tommy just stared at him. All he could hear was a buzzing in his ears as loud as a jackhammer, and breathing, breathing was hard for him. He had unconsciously reached for Alfie's hand, squeezed it tightly, to see, to feel that he was still there. To feel, to understand if those words were real. Were they not allowed to be, no.
Not those words.
Tommy's eyes widened, shifted in bewilderment to Alfie, who sat in his chair, equally shocked. The pressure of his hand was cool, as if all the blood had drained from his body. Tommy's breath caught.
"Mr. Shelby, Mr. Solomons-"
"A brain tumor." Alfie said dryly, and the doctor nodded, folding his hands on the table.
"Yes, but it's operable. We have to be quick, though. You need surgery in as little as two days."
Time, the clock ticked in the background, on and on. Tommy's gaze blurred slightly as he stared at the moving pointers, almost mesmerized. What was that? Why was it there? A tumor? Surgery, so quickly?
He wanted to say something, but he couldn't. As soon as he opened his mouth, it was as if it became so dry that it choked him mercilessly, like a cloth, like a numbing gas that slowly ate into his lungs.
"We'll be okay," Alfie hummed to him, why could he, why could he even talk? Tommy's body stiffened, the numbers on the clock blurred, became nothing and nothing again. He swallowed, but it was almost as if there was no spit in his throat. His hand, still connected to Alfie's, felt like it was dead.
We're going to make it, Alfie said.
Tommy wanted to believe it. Because Alfie had been right about so many things already, about so many things in life.
And he was strong, wasn't he?
A tumor. In the brain.
They gave him a name, not a nice one, because he would be gone soon, or so they hoped. They called him Gollum. A creature Tommy didn't like to have in Alfie's body.
Since that day, if they could, they didn't sleep without physical contact. If Tommy could sleep at all.
***
The operation went well.
If an operation of that severity could be called good. The doctor told Tommy about it afterward, explaining what they had done. Alfie was strong, he had said - they had had to remove a small part of the brain, a tiny one that was responsible for the motor activities. But Alfie's brain functioned exceedingly well, so the odds were good that he would be back to his old self, and that with enough practice, the part could be made up for.
The doctor gave him hope, at least that day. Tommy wasn't allowed to see Alfie right after the surgery yet, but he only went home to take care of Cyril, to drop him off at Alfie's parents' house because he didn't want to leave Alfie's side. He packed a bag, with everything he needed, and took it with him to the hospital.
When he was allowed to see Alfie for the first time, he got a shock.
His hands went up to his mouth in fright, closing it to suppress a loud groan of fear and anxiety and sheer panic as best he could. He had to be strong, all alone for Alfie.
Alfie's hair had been shorn short because of the surgery, and it was a sight Tommy had never seen before, one that simply ripped the ground from under his feet, because that hairstyle was suddenly yelling, screaming something into the room that had been invisible to Tommy until then: that this was real.
It was only with a great deal of effort and all his strength that Tommy managed to walk up to Alfie's bed, and gently stroke his hand, where countless IVs and tubes hung, as they did everywhere on his body. Alfie was not awake. But Tommy felt a twitch in his hand, minimal, that told him Alfie somehow knew he was there.
He never left his side. No matter what, he wouldn't have left, not when Alfie was lying in that room so helpless and cool and pale with what had been done to him, what life had done to him.
Tommy read to him every night, even if it was something he was sure Alfie wasn't always actively aware of - but it calmed Tommy, somehow. He read everything to him, said what was on his mind, told him a lot, reminisced.
The doctor said it would be a long recovery.
***
"Of course I didn't forget," Tommy snorted in amusement, stirring around in the big bowl. Alfie sat at the kitchen table, the corners of his mouth twisted into a warm grin, his eyebrows raised in amusement.
"You could have, though." he said, slow and ponderous, as he had been long after the surgery.
"No way, sweetheart. There's lemon pie today." Tommy said, smiling warmly at Alfie.
Alfie was on the mend - but what mend was, Tommy dared not put into words. He could walk, slowly. He could talk, act, react, and he could do what he enjoyed. But not everything anymore. Some days he was at a loss for words, and it took him a long time to find them. He could no longer speak as fluently, many things were difficult for him, and he had switched to a fairly basic vocabulary. All things the doctors had prepared them for. What they hadn't prepared them for was what it planted between them.
To Tommy, it sometimes felt like a shadow that kept growing and growing, slowly dividing them. Not from their love - but from their ability to communicate with each other. He stared out the window for a moment, exhaling deeply, the wooden handle he used to stir the dough still in his hand.
It was everyday life that was changing. It was the little things that made it hard for Alfie, that sometimes made him angry. Tommy baked a cake at least every other day - because there was no other way, and because Alfie wanted him to. Alfie had always liked to butter his sandwiches then, with honey or other sweet spreads, had always snacked on them before Tommy had cooked.
Now he couldn't. Greasing the sandwiches was an activity that Alfie could no longer do in that way. His hands no longer coordinated properly, leaving his hands completely numb to delicate things. The first few times, Alfie had thrown the board away, yanked it off the table, and had screamed. Until Tommy had hugged him, tightly, and promised him he would always bake a cake for it.
Simply because he loved him. And it was okay, after a few times - then it was alright for Alfie to just eat the cake. Tommy always made soft cake so it was easy for him to eat it.
At night, when he lay awake smoking a cigarette on the balcony, he would often stare up at the sky, his eyes clear yet clouded by his own tears. Because he did not understand, could not understand, why such a dear person as Alfie had to go through this slow, agonizing process, why his very dearest person on earth had to go such a way. Alfie was killed by the inability to move, a little more every day. And although his hair had long since grown back, he often couldn't bear the sight of himself in the mirror.
And Tommy just couldn't stand it aswell - but he never showed it. What else could he do? He had to be strong, for Alfie, always. He could not and must not give up, no matter how unbearably some days were, drowning in melancholy and hopelessness.
Alfie walked at least ten thousand steps every day, and he always went out with Cyril, sometimes for hours, alone in the woods. At first Tommy had worried, but with time it got better, even if Alfie's expression became gloomier after many walks. And Tommy didn't know why that was for a long time - in his eyes, Alfie struggled and fought, and was damn good at what he did.
But one rainy day in November, the scales suddenly fell from his eyes: Alfie was struggling so much with these walks because he was afraid he was losing his ability to walk. And with every step he could take less, that fear grew.
And Tommy couldn't take it away from him, no matter how much he wished he could.
***
It was one day after Christmas, when they were just lying on the sofa with a warm cocoa, watching Home alone and cuddling, Tommy's body tight against Alfie's, when suddenly Alfie said, "Tommy, I think this is going to be my last spring."
It was like a knife stab that Alfie made in Tommy's heart, so much did it cut off Tommy's air. He couldn't move, didn't want to, refused to, even when Alfie grabbed his chin with a slow movement, tried to lift his head.
Tommy turned his head away, tears like a burning fire in his eyes.
"Tommy, I know you don't want to talk about it - but it's about time."
"No, you can't talk like that, Alfie. Don't," Tommy groaned out, and he was startled at how broken his voice sounded. He had always been able to be strong until now, had to be strong, every day. It was his job. But this, this was... What was it?
Tommy's vision blurred, but Alfie lifted his chin again, more forcefully this time, looking deep into Tommy's face with those familiar eyes.
"You can't talk like that," Tommy said silently again, and it burned, it burned so badly, everywhere. In his bones, in his heart, in his eyes, his lungs. In his soul. They had had a nice Christmas, finally, and Cyril was at their feet, sleeping peacefully. Why did Alfie say that? Just like that?
"I have to talk like this, my angel. I want you to know that. We need to talk about what's to come. Because you're going to have to do this all by yourself someday," Alfie replied, and he was so soft, speaking without stuttering, without searching for words - as if he'd known those words for so long, as if he'd practiced them forever on walks with Cyril. It killed Tommy, and he sobbed out of himself from a very deep, dark place as he pressed himself against Alfie - and just cried.
He wasn't ready for this.
They weren't ready for this yet.
They still had so much to do, how were they going to get through all of this? Tommy didn't calm down all evening, and cried until there were almost no tears left for Alfie to stanch. For once that evening, it was he who was strong - who had to hold Tommy because Tommy just couldn't take this anymore.
***
At some point in this process, there came a point when Tommy asked himself: when was the last time you really did something for the last time?
The question to that answer was difficult, and he couldn't answer it. But he knew, deep down, that it was becoming more and more apparent that they were doing some things together for the last time - only they didn't know if and when it was the last time. The last time they went swimming together, the last time they had a barbecue, the last time they laughed lightheartedly over a movie.
One becomes deeply aware that these moments became as precious as nothing else in life, especially when they could be the last time. In a very special way, it made everyday life as difficult as nothing else. Living with the disease was one thing, living with this thing in Alfie's head was another - it was back, they knew that - but how to live, how to enjoy, when these moments could be the last times?
Tommy found it hard to hold on to these moments because they took so much out of him. He didn't want to and couldn't accept that some things were simply no longer possible with the advancing disease - that Alfie was getting worse. That he could move less and less, that he could no longer do many things he had wanted to do.
The clock was ticking. And it was moving far too fast for Tommy's liking. It was simply killing him even more, a little more each time he had to remind himself that maybe he had just made love to Alfie for the last time - and whether he had made it a once-in-a-lifetime, last beautiful memory for Alfie. Whether it would be his last memory of this, or whether they would do it again. It was something that took the breath away.
There was only one thing Tommy knew, and he knew it with absolute certainty: that he would never leave, and that he would take that step with Alfie. No matter how hard it would get.
And so he also had to jump over his shadow, had to finally stop running away from the one unknown thing, as they lay one evening in the lukewarm grass of the meadow behind the house, pressed together, close to each other, and stared up into the slowly darkening sky. The first stars were already beginning to show as Alfie tightened his arm around Tommy, pulling him closer as best he could. Tommy swallowed hard. There was a feeling, deep in his gut, that he knew what was coming now.
"Tommy?" Alfie's voice was careful, yet calm. Tommy squeezed his eyes shut, then nodded softly.
"What is it, sweetheart?"
"I-I want you to... That you don't feel sad and go on when I'm gone. Will you promise me that?"
His throat tightened, so damn tight and unyielding, but Tommy consciously tried to find words to fit it that didn't sound like a total breakdown. "Yeah, I'll try."
"Trying is not enough for me. I want it to be like this. Okay? You don't have to be afraid because I'll always be with you. And you have to take care of Cyril. Besides - besides, the coffin..."
Tommy blinked, pushing down the burn in his throat, swallowing and gulping against the awful feelings, against the faintness and fear. "Alfie, I can't - I don't want you to go."
A warm kiss trailed down Tommy's forehead, and tears flowed down Tommy's cheek. "I have to, though. And I want to go pick out a coffin with you soon. Or no - I want you to do it. S' better that way."
What did one say to such words - when they came from the mouth of the person one loved above all else? With whom one had imagined an endless life until old age, when one had wanted to grow old and wrinkled, together? What did one say?
In those moments, Tommy realized that he no longer had a choice, and that this was not his path. Alfie couldn't speak much anymore, and it was hard for him - and he consciously sought Tommy's closeness, mustered the strength to say these things. It was selfish for Tommy to start refusing again now. He thought of the last times they'd had together - and that maybe this was also a wish Alfie was making. And that this could be a last one, too.
It still broke Tommy's heart, and it took him a long time to act on Alfie's words - but he did.
Because it was just love. And love hurt sometimes, but love made you endure that pain too.
It became one of the hardest and worst, but also most poignant moments of his life when - just a few weeks later - he took Cyril to the mortician, and dipped the dog's paw in colorful paint, dark blue because Alfie loved dark blue so much - and pressed the dog's paw onto the coffin to leave an indelible imprint. Like a farewell note that Alfie could take with him.
The whole family had already done it, and Cyril, with Tommy, was the last to leave their imprints on the beautiful, light wood of the coffin.
For Tommy, the hardest part was pressing his own hand onto the warm wood. He dipped his numb hand into the red paint, and it was almost as if he was leaving a part of Alfie and himself with that imprint, like an early goodbye.
But it burned into his mind like something that would just be there forever, like the last few times.
***
Some ways to death were beautiful because you could prepare for it, because everyone could prepare for it. Because you could say things to each other that were on your heart, that you desperately wanted to get rid of.
But some ways became hard despite the most beautiful love stories.
Tommy's heart could hardly bear the day when he had realized that Alfie had said, had been able to say, "I love you" for the last time. The brain tumor, now inoperable, had taken away his ability to speak after months, and besides moving, it had been one of the things Tommy and he had done for the last time without knowing it had been the last time. Yet Tommy remembered it clearly. It had been a normal day, he had fed Alfie cake from a fork because Alfie had had a very painful day - that's when Alfie had said it. And if Tommy had known that it had been the last time he would hear these words - he would have remembered that moment better, and would have wanted to make it even more special.
But as he had had to learn a long time ago: you never knew when the last time was for anything.
And Tommy broke it down that he hadn't been able to capture that moment, like a smelly memory in a jar that he could have opened again and again, only to drown in the smell of that memory.
Alfie was confined to a wheelchair, and he could no longer speak. It put an inexplicable barrier between them, a deep one that could only be bridged with small movements. And Tommy knew, intimately, that it was up to him now to show Alfie how much he loved him. The last few times.
He wasn't ready to let him go yet.
But he also knew that Alfie couldn't stand this lock in his body anymore, that he couldn't stand this cage, this prison, his own imprisoned soul like this. It was one thing not to want to let his love of life go - and another if the other, however, wanted to leave.
All Tommy could do was to be there.
Many days it was hard for him, suffocating him, and many days he cried, permanently. It broke his heart more and more to see Alfie try to touch him - how he could lift his arm, yet only get it halfway up. Tommy took over every little gesture, and performed the movements for Alfie. He learned it like vocabulary, to interpret even the smallest things.
And yet, despite all these things, it was a life not to be endured. It killed Tommy more every day to watch the love of his life suffer. And he could do nothing but talk, care for him, and enjoy the few touches he had left.
One night would stay with him forever.
It was a thunderstorm night in October, it must have been around two in the morning, when Tommy was jolted out of sleep by the thunder and lightning. He had always been afraid of thunderstorms, and this time, too, it left him breathless and shocked, trembling fearfully - until he felt the hint of a touch on the side of his body. He turned on the small, warm bedside lamp to see what was going on - it was Alfie, staring up at him with his gray-green eyes, one arm raised a little. And Tommy understood immediately.
He was crying, silently and motionlessly, as he curled up in Alfie's arms, all tight and close and warm, like they hadn't been in a long time. His head buried itself tightly in Alfie's shoulder, and he soaked up the smell of his husband like never before. It was like a magical embrace that seemed to take a whole lot off Tommy's shoulders all at once - just the breathing, the closeness, the smell.
It was the first time in a year that Tommy could sleep well. As if that cruel shadow didn't lie between them, and as if for once, for one night, everything was the way it had always been between them.
There was no more fear. No weight on his shoulders. All that was there was love.
***
Tommy kissed Alfie the next morning, woke him up, as always. And gave him a few minutes of the time he always needed alone in the morning - at least Tommy always gave it to him, because Alfie had always been like that, even before the tumor.
He went down to the kitchen, fed Cyril, and turned on the coffee maker. He pulled on a warm sweater, glanced out the window. The rain pattered coolly against the windows, and Tommy sighed.
And when he came back up and went into the bedroom, Alfie had gone.
It took everything, really everything in Tommy not to faint, not to scream, not to shake Alfie's lifeless body. Not two moments had it been that Tommy had been gone - couldn't he have waited...-? Where was his goodbye, where was...?
It was like fainting when Tommy dialed 911. And while he waited, his hand resting on Alfie's cool chest, too numb to cry, he realized that Alfie had said goodbye, last night, with the last move and the last hug. With the last protection, with the last "I love you", without words, yet so loud between them.
Tommy squeezed his eyes tightly shut, bent over Alfie's body, and pressed one last kiss to his lips. "I love you, and I can do this, somehow. I promise." he whispered, because he knew - every person went when they wanted to, and whenever it was their time. And he also knew that Alfie hadn't wanted to do the moment of death to him - because otherwise, Tommy would never have forgotten this again.
And they had gathered too many beautiful, last times together for that, to have it ruined by the last way.
The house was silent, so silent, when Alfie was gone. Not even Cyril's yowling came close to Tommy. There was only the silence of an empty house, pressing like ballast on his soul.
The only thing that comforted Tommy, a little, was the funeral. Because despite the goodbyes and the inevitable death, the coffin was a box full of love. Because the whole family had painted on it, written on it, left prints on it that Alfie could now take with him.
Wherever he had been gone.
But Tommy knew he was only going ahead. Someday, one day, he would follow him - and could tell Alfie about all the things he had missed.
***
Tommy didn't cope well, only with difficulty, the first months without Alfie. There were moments when he didn't know what to do - when he just wanted to end it all, because he just couldn't live without this person. There were moments when he just wanted to fall asleep and never wake up again - fall somewhere, drown, die in an accident.
But he kept reminding himself of the promise he had made to Alfie: that he would go on.
And he did.
There was a moment when Tommy broke down months later: it was when he was cleaning out the closet with his sister, and found some of Alfie's old clothes. In one of the jeans, Tommy found a picture he had been looking for for years: it showed him and Alfie happy in a bar, pressed together, where Alfie was kissing his cheek. Tommy's heart nearly burst at the sight, and his sister had to sit him down on the bed to keep him from falling over. She wanted to call an ambulance, but Tommy caught himself after a while.
He had been looking forever for a picture to put on his nightstand - there were so many beautiful pictures, but this became it. Because it felt like one last goodbye, like a little too-late gift from Alfie.
That night, Tommy dreamed of that evening too, and yet it was different. They were older, and Alfie was happier, freer. And he told Tommy, "I love you," which he hadn't done in the real memory.
When Tommy woke up, everything was different. He couldn't describe it, not even to begin to - but it was almost as if that dream had given him a surge of strength, with the strength he needed to keep going.
To just try to live without Alfie.
***
Three years later
Tommy was pulling a fresh pie out of the oven when he heard Cyril's barking in the yard, and rolled his eyes slightly. "That dog.", he murmured softly, and with a low groan, set the hot cake down on one of the coasters.
It had taken him a long time to even start baking again - it was, after all, one of the core memories of Alfie when he hadn't been able to make himself sandwiches, and had become an ironclad routine between them. It was the first fresh pie Tommy had baked, just like the old days. With fresh berries and the eggs from the farm where he'd had chickens for two years now.
Tommy glanced out the window as he pulled off his oven mitts, and drew his eyebrows together slightly when he saw Cyril playing with someone. He could make out a mailman or package delivery outfit, and light brown hair with a hint soft gray in it, that was all. Still, he frowned and walked out into the yard. Actually, he usually didn't, because Cyril always greeted almost all mailmen that way - but today something drew him outside. He didn't even know what it was.
When he stepped out into the yard and cleared his throat, the man who was playing with Cyril raised his head, laughing slightly - and Tommy froze. It wasn't a real freeze, but a kind of numbness, tingling numbness that gathered in his limbs when he saw that face.
"I'm sorry, Mr. Shelby, but your dog is just too cute. He was really happy to see me, so I had to say hello," the man said cheerfully, petting Cyril wildly on the head. Cyril was happier than usual, jumping at the man, who laughed it off - while Tommy just stared at the man with his lips slightly parted.
This couldn't be.
"Are you- are you new?" Tommy asked, his eyes fixed almost stunned on the face of the man, who by now had joined Cyril on the ground. He looked just like Alfie. He just looked exactly like Alfie, hell, Tommy couldn't describe it any other way. The hair was a little different, and he wore a beard with some gray hair in it, like Alfie hadn't had - but he looked just exactly like Alfie.
Tommy had to swallow hard before he allowed this man's eyes to meet him again, before he could listen to the answer.
"I'm not at all new, Mr. Shelby - I've never actually been away. I've been delivering your mail for almost two years now," the man said, and he smiled at Tommy before Cyril licked madly across his face.
Tommy crossed his arms in front of his chest, blinking against what was brewing there in his chest and heart area - for two years, and Tommy had never noticed him. Except today, that strange day when he'd baked another cake for the first time.
He was still staring at the man, even as he picked himself back up and put the mail in Tommy's hand with a warm smile. Tommy took it, almost dropping it again, getting red on the cheeks.
"I haven't seen you here in a long time when I bring the mail. Glad to see you're doing well," the mailman said, and Tommy nodded, but it was more of an instinct. It was as if he wasn't moving his head himself, but his body was, without any command. As if that movement came directly from his heart.
"I never usually catch it when you deliver the mail," Tommy said a little shyly, and the mailman laughed. And it was weird, because that laugh somehow took away a dark and heavy part of Tommy's heart, deep from the darkest corner. Tommy lightly ran his hand through his hair, then returned the man's gaze.
"You're always the last house on my daily tour. You have a beautiful house, and a very nice yard," he said, and Tommy smiled. It had been a long time since he had smiled so freely without tears coming to his eyes.
"That means you're off duty now?"
"Oh yeah, great in this weather, innit."
Spring, Tommy felt the warmth of the sun suddenly on his skin, as if he had hardly noticed it for the last few years. His eyes returned the man's curious and strangely familiar gaze, and before the man could turn around, Tommy said softly, "Do you like pie?"
The man smiled and pulled his cap off his head. "I love pie. If you don't mind?"
"Not at all."
I've never actually been away, he'd said.
Tommy's heart had seldom felt gratitude and love as fiercely as it did at that moment, and it was a thing he would happily carry in his heart even years later.
You were never gone, Alfie. You were just watching until the time was right.