Holidays in Blue

by Eve Morton

“I’m sorry to hear,” Cosmin said.

  “It is what it is, I guess.” Eric shrugged. He wanted to repeat, once again, that he deserved it—especially with what happened in the aftermath. After Trina had filed, Eric had thought he was free to live his dream, but when he’d asked Billy to move in with him, he’d said no. It broke Eric’s heart yet again, only this time he had no one to turn to. Eric wanted to say as much to Cosmin, but he rushed past his own heartbreak. He did deserve it, after all. “Then I moved to Waterloo. It was like Toronto itself had rejected me. I needed to go. So I did.”

  “How long ago was that?” Cosmin asked.

  Eric made a face. “Maybe...five years at most?”

  “And Trina’s married again? For how long?”

  “Almost as long as our divorce has been finalized. I know you might be thinking that she was fooling around too—my sister asked it a bunch of times—but I don’t think so. She filed for divorce the moment she knew a future wouldn’t work because she’s so utterly pragmatic. She’d never cheat because she always had a one-track mind, while I was trying to have both things. Both futures.” Eric sighed. “I think I still kind of am.”

  “How so?”

  “With my jobs. I moved away from Toronto because I didn’t want to act anymore, but I do auditions all the time. I tell myself it’s for audiobooks, so it’s different, but I know it’s not. I keep trying to act again, in some capacity, so I know I’m not a complete failure.”

  Cosmin furrowed his brow. Eric wanted him to tell him that he wasn’t a failure, but he squeezed his hand once more instead. “What kind of audiobooks?” Cosmin asked.

  Eric had to laugh again. Of course this was the thing that piqued his attention. He didn’t care about the movies, TV shows, the glamour shots of actors, or anything like that. But books? Oh, Cosmin knew books.

  “I don’t think you know the titles. It’s mostly gay erotic romance audiobooks.”

  “Oh. There’s a large market? Beyond Kindle, of course.”

  “Oh, yeah. And like you said, I have a good mouth.” Eric winked.

  Cosmin chuckled. The laughter was another collective release of tension, and they both gave over to the impulse for quite some time. In spite of all they’d done, in spite of how much time they’d spent together and the fantasies that Eric was fulfilling, he was still testing the waters for Cosmin’s judgment, still waiting for the final axe to fall like it had with Billy and Trina.

  Cosmin just didn’t seem to match who Eric was deep down. Cosmin was the upper-class gay, the kind who’d lived through so much and still kept an impeccable style about himself, erudite and fancy, a next generation Quentin Crisp. Eric was the slutty one, the kind who cheated on his wife with a hook-up who wouldn’t even move in and commit. Then there had been more hook-ups, Cameron acting as wingman, but even Cameron wouldn’t grow up or even muscle the resolve to be a half-decent friend. Eric’s life was so different than Cosmin’s. How could a momentary feeling of release ever manage to bridge the distance between them in who they were deep down?

  Eric didn’t want to think about this anymore. He leaned forward and pressed a kiss against Cosmin’s mouth. He was startled by the embrace, but eagerly opened and accepted Eric’s tongue. They teased one another with a slight pull apart, only to cascade together again as Cosmin took over. He put a hand against Eric’s chest and deepened the kiss.

  Eric’s mind reeled. He was hard from thinking about all his fantasies aloud all over again, but he also yearned for so much more than just Cosmin’s touch on him. He always wanted more than the touch. Even if he was slotted in with the party and uncommitted types, he would always want more than the night.

  But he would always take the touch, and the one-night, too. Even if it led to nothing but sadness or an empty bed, Eric always took what he was given.

  When Cosmin’s fingers dipped under his shirt to touch his skin, Eric swooned. They only had the one condom—but this, this, was how they wanted to use it. The sky was already at full darkness; the rain had relented. Maybe it wouldn’t be as bad tomorrow. Maybe it would really melt and they could walk hand in hand across the ice to get more condoms and do this all over again. Or maybe the last rubber would stretch between them and that would be all there was and ever would be. That idea saddened Eric, but not enough to let go.

  “Get on your back,” Eric said. He swallowed hard and felt his Adam’s apple rise and fall with each exhalation. Cosmin’s gaze seemed heavy lidded, almost predatory in the near dark. He remained impassive, unmoving.

  “Get on your back,” Eric said again. “I want to ride you.”

  Cosmin opened his mouth in a near-silent moan. Eric thought of what he knew now of Cosmin’s youth, that he’d been mute until Suzanne had come to the Tessler family. The thought of Cosmin as quiet was strange. Complete anathema, given his career.

  But as Cosmin removed the rest of his clothing and also helped Eric with his own, Eric could see the fragments of that muted selfhood. Cosmin was quiet. He watched. He observed. He was strong and solid, not needing words, especially as Eric slicked his cock with a condom over it and sank down slowly.

  The pain was sharp. His back was bruised and still tender from the fall, and the pressing against the bed from their morning interlude. But Cosmin put his hands over Eric’s waist, concern written all over his gaze.

  “I’m fine. It’s just...”

  Cosmin turned Eric to the side, so he could observe the blue bruise that etched his body. Eric wanted to push through it. He didn’t want Cosmin to see his marks because it meant the sex would stop, and they’d already opened and used the condom. He lifted himself a little, ready to rock into Cosmin and to keep going without issue. Cosmin relented. Yet his hand didn’t move from the bruised area. He held Eric like he was a vase with a crack in it; still beautiful, but in need of support.

  Knowing and understanding the caring gestures for what they were, Eric allowed himself to fully feel Cosmin inside of him. He rocked back and forth; he listened as Cosmin’s breaths became ragged. Eric ran his hands over Cosmin’s chest, finely marked with hair that became thicker and curlier in the centre. He loved men’s bodies. It overwhelmed him. It consumed him. They were hard and rigid and so powerful. He could feel the power in his own legs as they poised him carefully and held him in place as Cosmin met his own thrusts. They were both powerful, unyielding in their desires.

  But as Cosmin’s hands came and traced the head of Eric’s cock, he knew they were both soft, too. Cosmin held him in his hands and broke down all their barriers. They melded together; they came together; vulnerable bodies falling into a heap of gasps and motion. And Eric let go, falling over Cosmin’s chest and meeting his lips, allowing himself and all of his weakness revealed.

  * * *

  At around midnight, according to his still barely charged phone, Cosmin came into the guest room with another kettle filled with green tea. The heat was never on long enough to keep the house up to standard levels of warmth, and without the sunlight, it was far colder than Eric ever anticipated. He wore all his clothing again, though he still yearned for the touch of Cosmin’s skin. The tea also helped, even if he was getting sick of it. Cosmin sipped his mug and produced a book he’d taken from his father’s bedroom.

  “What’s that?” Eric asked.

  “Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. Have you heard of it?”

  “I think I’ve seen it come up on Audible. I get free credits because of the work I do. Should I get it?”

  Cosmin nodded, just barely. It didn’t seem like a shining endorsement, but he opened to a passage near the front. He read aloud a line that was nice, but a bit jargon-heavy for Eric. “My father had this highlighted,” Cosmin said.

  “Oh.”

  “Yes. I think he was trying to tell himself something.”

  “And you something?”

  “Perhaps.” Cosmin deliberate
d a moment, glancing at the book’s cover, before continuing. “This book is awful. I’ve always hated it, because why would I want to read about the camps? Other than basic historical knowledge, I know what happened and I know how bad it was. I also lived through my own. Those orphanages in Romania were bad. But I was a kid, a baby, and didn’t even know words to qualify my suffering.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Eric said, biting his lip. A silent beat passed. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “It’s fine. You don’t have to say anything. I don’t want a pity party, or even a sadness fest in spite of what we’ve been doing the past few hours. Or days.” Cosmin cracked a small smile and placed the book down. It was clear, though, that he was not done processing whatever he’d found in his father’s notebooks. “I think, I suppose—no—I wonder if rather than focusing so much on the suffering, and overcoming it, my father could have just focused on love. I’m not talking about being a Pollyanna at all times, blindingly positive and head buried in the sand to the ills of the world—but maybe something in between these two extremes.”

  “Like instead of focusing on what he lost,” Eric suggested, “he could see what he still had?”

  “Yes.” Cosmin met Eric’s gaze. A frisson of desire passed between them before he turned away. “That’s exactly it. We lost half our family in the car crash. But there was still half right here. And so,” Cosmin said, his voice becoming more professorial and less emotional than previous statements, “we shut ourselves off from others who may still bring love and then we fail to ascribe meaning to those moments, and the love all but disappears.”

  “I get that, I really do.”

  Cosmin nodded. There was more strained but contemplative silence. Eric wondered what Cosmin thought of people who did the opposite to what his own father had done; instead of closing themselves off to the meanings of love, what about the people who felt too much? Maybe everything was an act of love, and they let love touch them in all sorts of ways because it was intoxicating. He swallowed, knowing the vulnerability in a question like that, and knowing that he could so easily find himself in the answer of his own question.

  When the silence persisted, and Eric could think of nothing else to say, he merely wanted to take off his clothing again. Now that the last condom had been used, there was no pressure to fuck—but that intimacy, and familiarity of the body, was accessible. It was still there, and still possible, before their time ran out. Eric wanted more. He would always want more.

  When Cosmin picked up the book again, and seemed to read from another random point, Eric only focused on his voice. It had the same admiring cadence from when he talked about Shakespeare—or his show. No matter if the words were written by someone else or sprang from Cosmin organically, Eric was convinced he could compel the largest crowd or a single person in the most intimate of space. “Have you ever thought of doing podcasts?”

  Cosmin stiffened, all poise and grace now gone. “Sherry suggested it.”

  “Why didn’t you say yes?”

  “Because it wasn’t the point.” His answer seemed rehearsed. Tired.

  “And the last show is the point? The final send-off and goodbye?”

  Cosmin nodded. He didn’t say much else—but he also didn’t pick up the book again. Finally. Maybe he’d gotten all he wanted from it, or maybe it was yet another reminder of what he had lost in his show. Eric could understand doing the show on his sister even more now, especially given what he’d learned tonight, but he also didn’t think it could ever be just about Suzanne. Cosmin was always talking about himself when he talked of other people. He was always trying to find himself in others—yet another reality Eric knew all too well.

  “You should throw them away,” Eric said suddenly. He wanted to clap a hand against his mouth, shocked that he’d said the words aloud.

  “What away?”

  “The journals,” he said plainly, realizing he couldn’t go back. Cosmin stiffened behind him. Eric tried to turn to see his expression, but it was too dark beyond the candlelight to make out if the shadows were anger or merely shadows.

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Because they’re making you upset. And you’re mistaking that suffering for love. Your father wrote and wrote and wrote, but didn’t share it. It seems like he did that with everything. He let the objects take up space, as if they were emotions. But they’re just things. Words.”

  “Words, words, words, as Shakespeare would say. Shouldn’t I keep them purely because they are his words, and they are what’s left?”

  “And you’ve read them now. You’ve shown them to me. What other good would they do?”

  “I was considering reading them on air.”

  “Okay. But you’re not thinking that anymore?”

  Cosmin shook his head. “When I realized I still couldn’t find the birth records, and this was actually all I had, I wanted no one else to know.”

  “Even more of a reason to throw them away. That way you can remember your dad as both the cranky old man you knew and the prolific letter writer. The truth of the whole thing is somewhere in the middle, and I think that’s for you to decide for once. You don’t need to filter it through so many different factors, like with Frankl or Shakespeare or even that other guy, Proust. You can talk about yourself without filling the airwaves with other people’s words, you know.”

  When Cosmin became quiet, so quiet he seemed like a mute child again, Eric wondered if he had crossed a line. They’d been inside one another, tasted the other person, but this was a boundary he should have known better about. Right? Why did he even think it was good to throw things like that out?

  He remembered his sister’s first relationship and how she’d burned every last thing that the guy had touched. His sister’s fear, rage, and then her sudden sadness had been palpitating. He’d watched her move through the stages of grief in a flash of a flame like a wicked creature. Then she’d walked away and moved on.

  Cosmin was definitely not Margo. But it wasn’t healthy to carry around baggage, metaphorically or not. Eric thought of a story he’d heard from one of the authors he’d worked with during an audiobook production. He’d lost one of the audiofiles on his computer during a meltdown, and had to ask for an extension. He’d anticipated the author being pissed—she was indie and new and still trying to get her work out there—but she’d told him about Hemingway losing a novel on a train. He’d had to write the whole thing again from scratch, but it made him a better person, and his work that much better, too. She’d been right, too. The audiofiles the second time around were better, and she used him again for her next book.

  Eric was sure that the same thing applied to notebooks. Journals. Maybe even more so. There was no novel to rewrite if Cosmin threw out his father’s notebooks. But there was a relationship he could try to reinterpret. A way to narrate his own life and his father’s legacy without dragging out the proof that only made him feel like a lost and loved child simultaneously, so much so he’d gone mute again.

  When he tried to explain this to Cosmin, though, Eric realized it was pointless. Cosmin already knew. He’d dragged the journals around not to narrate them aloud, but to make Eric bear witness to them. He’d wanted a witness before it would all disappear. Cosmin had planned on throwing them away from the start.

  Eric turned to face him. What he once thought was rejection in his eyes turned out to be pain, then acceptance. Cosmin placed his hands over Eric’s chin to draw their mouths together. Their bodies reacted—like teenagers all over again—but the touch atop clothing was enough.

  More than enough. It had been what he’d always wanted. And in a way, what Cosmin had as well.

  Chapter Twelve

  They woke to a bang. A crackle and fizz radiated through the early morning sky. The guest room was still dark save for a glow of a forgotten candle and a slight glow from cell phones coming back into power and the
n blinking off through inattention. The lights of the house flickered next, and were followed by a loud beeping echoing through the hallways. Cosmin rose first, opened the door, and discovered the red and green glowing lights of the smoke and carbon monoxide detector going off. Eric pulled back the curtains just as a blue-green flash shone in the distance.

  “What was that?” Eric’s breath was harsh, a gasp of a child after a nightmare. Each time Cosmin remembered Eric in bed with him, sharing the same space during the emergency, his heart tightened with a familiar and not all that unwelcome sense of responsibility.

  The green light flashed in the distance once again, illuminating a tree as if it were a crystal cage.

  “I think that’s a transponder.”

  Ice caked the necks of the power lines across the road. The same crackling as before sounded; the same blue-green flash; and then all the lights from their enclave for as far as they could see in either direction were plunged into eerie darkness. A caterwaul of sound emerged: cat mewls, insects—or electrical—buzzing, a chorus of disembodied voices, and the sharp splitting of trees.

  Eric let out a low whistle. “Wow, that pole is going to take forever to fix.”

  “The neighbourhood is going to be recovering from this damage for years.”

  Nostalgia took over Cosmin as he surveyed his childhood front yard. The oak trees which had once provided shade and something to climb were now bent forward like old men, branches stripped from the weight of the ice and discarded on a first icy layer of snow. Evergreens at the edge of his father’s property were now leaning into the neighbour’s yard, one young sapling practically bent over in half and its tip now frozen to the ground. Ice covered Cosmin’s car, like the rest of the world, making the vehicle’s position seemed precarious. It was resting underneath one of the largest trees on the lawn. Several limbs had already come down and scattered by his car—no damage done since they were no larger than twigs—but it would take one bad fall to crack his windshield or total the front seat.