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It was like catching movement at the edge of his vision and turning too late. Nothing was ever quite there, only a sense of baffling familiarity lingering after. Take the ducks at the park, for example, or a classic old black car he sees once on the street, or even a sword at the Renaissance Fair – for some reason, all of these leave him with a quiet sense of recognition he can’t quite explain or shake.
This feeling only intensifies when he meets Anthony. The red hair, the smile, everything about him is so confoundingly right that he is taken aback and not just by his own immediate infatuation. It’s like he’s not remembering something that ought to be obvious.
“Let’s do a fancy dinner,” Anthony says.
Asa adores the idea, of course, by now firmly of the opinion that any time they spend together is a wonder. Even if it would be only their second date. “That sounds splendid, what did you have in mind?”
“You know, I woke up this morning thinking of the Ritz,” the other replies. “I haven’t been there in my life, and yet I suddenly can’t wait to go with you, how is that for strange!”
Asa is floored by that feeling again. He fixes his bowtie, and ignores this in favor of answering his companion’s dashing smile. “I would love to go!”
The lobster thermidor at the restaurant is some of the best he’s ever had, expertly paired with a wine Asa picks out almost on instinct. The crème brûlée arrives with a gorgeous glass shell of caramelized sugar, and Anthony looks absurdly pleased when Asa closes his eyes at the first spoonful. Perfection. When Anthony talks of space, and the beauty of looking at the past through the stars, his bright eyes are fixed on Asa, his voice soft and sincere in its awe for the majesty of the universe, and Asa knows. Not in thought, not in argument—simply as fact. This is who he has been waiting for. There’s more, more that would explain this certainty, but he doesn’t know what.
Still, their first kiss is almost all the explanation he needs. They’ve gone for a walk, and the cool air of the autumn has left them making the trek close together for warmth. Asa is regaling Anthony with the story of his short stint as an actor in university, and his missteps in attempting Hamlet while battling the flu.
“Not my most shining moment, I can tell you!”
“Oh, I couldn’t have taken my eyes off you.” Anthony catches himself even as he smiles, as if the sentence spilled out unbidden from his lips. His eyes are wide, though he barrels ahead. “To be honest, Asa, I find that difficult to do.”
Asa can’t breathe for a second. “Anthony?”
They’ve stopped walking. “Yeah?”
Asa hesitates but continues, “do you ever get the feeling-”
He doesn’t get to finish. Anthony’s lips are on his and for one impossible moment Asa feels... remembered. It’s ineffable. That word comes to his mind along with that feeling, but it’s chased away soon by the warmth of Anthony’s hand cradling his cheek.
It’s a long while before they separate. And longer still before either of them can form words at all.
“Asa?”
His voice comes out soft, shaky, “yes?”
"I've never felt this before," Anthony declares.
Asa cannot help agreeing. He thinks, distantly, that he always has.