by Syd McGinley
"I told Miss Stacy you react strongly to what I administer..."
I giggled as Nyle pinned me down. “You said sedative ... Nyle ... oh..."
"You'll be relaxed ... hmmm ... nice to see you in daylight..."
Guy and I have always been nocturnal. I've kept my job by taking the two to ten PM shift. Guy's tattoo shop opens after lunch. We'd work a full day, “borrow” a room at my hotel to get ready in, and hit the clubs together at midnight. Now I come home to Nyle; Guy's happy with Tom. Nyle used to join us for a drink, but smile and say, “no, go on and dance. Be home by three—work tomorrow.” When I'd get home at four, he'd be reading in bed, and he'd lift the covers for me to roll in. No word or look of rebuke. He knew all I ever did was dance; he's all I ever needed or wanted. The most he did was quote Milton: What hath night to do with sleep?
Then he stopped even the drink, and I'd come home ever earlier. Our sands ran faster; I needed every moment beside him. He'd shifted his waking for me. His days held little except dialysis, and perfectionist laundering of his family linen—all he had once homophobic, primogeniture-blessed Uncle Joe inherited. He feels smaller for not being my provider, and still hurt by having no real family left. His small trust from his mum was gone on panicked flings when he was first diagnosed: drugs, a car he'd wrecked on drugs, vacations to places he needed to see. I felt cheated; he had his fling before me. I'm glad I have him, but I'm his settled down stage. Well, fair enough, he deserved both fling and me, but I wish we'd seen Niagara.
Now we stay up, watch movies, fuck sometimes, be together. I hated dawn. He'd say o lente lente cuurrite noctis equi, but insist I sleep. He'd threaten me with sleeping pills until I let him draw the shades against the sunrise.
"Day brings back my night,” he'd murmur as he kissed me, then, “sleep.” It sounded familiar, but until I peeked at his funeral plans, I didn't realize he'd paraphrased more Milton—the poem to his dead wife.
Nyle planned his own funeral, but he'd get furious if I grieved while he lived. He thought he made it easier for me, but what will I do without funeral fuss to ease those first hideous days? He got comfort in writing his memorial, but it was a cruel rehearsal. Did he imagine foreknowledge dimmed reality for either of us? My fear wasn't lessened, and death's reach over our living hours increased. He fooled himself he had control, just like Guy with his silly potions. But, when dawns came and I'd fade to sleep, I'd wonder about our last hours; will we say everything we can't now? Will our last seconds turn unspoken moments to crystalline articulacy?
Nyle habitually made dreams irrelevant. I came home in dawn's gloom, and the filtered light made our basement sepia. The lights were off; Nyle'd never gone to sleep early before. I saw his martini glass of water to wash down pills and his stacked books—the most recent sprawled across his chest, above his tattoo.
"I never missed kissing him goodnight there, until tonight ... he insisted I go dancing. Oh Guy ... thank God you came ... I need him back ... you must help ... you must know something..."
I'd dreaded a sneer, but Guy had the calm decency to eschew a “told you so” moment. He erased months of silence with a hug, and went to the bed. Nyle looked serene on his perfect linen, partially veiled by the night-flowering jasmine his funeral plan specified over lilies. I never said he was morbid for sleeping with it in the room—it smelt so delicious.
"Oh God Guy ... he looks funereal, bring him back..."
My eyes burned with suppressed grief. If a tear dropped, he'd be really gone.
"Guy, what do we do?"
"It's your belief. Your ritual. That's all magic is."
"You said a whole theory.” I didn't mean to shriek, but Guy panicked me.
"You were right, Lu. It could have been steak-and-kidney pie. We just had to believe. Nyle didn't have to if I did. If you did, too, even better. Magic's belief. Form doesn't matter."
I bit my tongue. He was my best chance, so I didn't say, “your beans could have killed him."
"What do I have to believe in? God? Not real, right?"
"Real, but we're his Christmas puppy; New Year's long gone.” Guy saw my anguish and stopped his snigger. “Lu, believe in Nyle, your desire, your rituals. No written spell. Gather your talismans..."
I pulled out my books with worn introductions and pristine chapters and rummaged for words I'd left as love notes, then scrambled through Nyle's books for his precise annotations ... nothing ... Nothing says what I need.
"Come on, Ludo. We need an invocation. Create your own ... all the words you whispered to each other ... call him back..."
I tried. I muttered words, but nothing happened. My hands did the distracted flutter Nyle calmed. They flapped the pages of his last book.
"Stop flying,” I said for him, and my hands rested, docile, on a page. My eyes blurred with unshed tears; my hands looked molten. I blinked back tears—careful not to let any fall—then the page focused.
"Guy, it's ok. It hasn't worked, but, shit, there's always a catch. He could've been a zombie, or be pulled from heaven ... Guy ... it's okay."
That scared Guy; he took Nyle's body, spells, my hysteria, but my calm freaked him.
"I should call this in soon. Don't wanna be one of those weird bereaved found sleeping with their lover's corpse. Guy, a favor first, please?"
"Of course."
"Sign his name across my heart. We can go to your shop and back before day begins. I need his name before he's taken."
"Simpler than you think. I've an expo today—my gun's in the car."
I giggled. “Wishful thinking does work."
I did two things while he was gone. I checked the pill bottle on the floor: empty. Guy'd tried to kick it under the bed, but I'd still seen it. Then I stabbed Nyle's arm.
His blood was thick already. I had to milk and massage the vein to fill his martini glass.
"Guy—use red ink—mix this in. I'm not delirious or stupid. Please, you know he's safe.” I touched Guy's tattooed wrist.
He groaned, but prepared the blood-ink. I lay next to Nyle, and rested my hand on his belly-compass. My lodestar of desire. Guy's gun buzzed, and made my pain briefly external. He cleaned me afterward, “all done, kid."
"Thanks. Guy?” I tossed him the pill bottle. “It didn't work because he left. He won't come back. He was always stubborn, and he'd finished falling. He's where he's meant to be."
Guy choked on a sob and smile combined: “Typical—wouldn't go to America without you, but..."
"Typical. Guy, it's ok. I can make the call. No need to be involved."
Guy was grateful to be excused, but said, “Are you sure? Call me later."
I needed him gone. He backed out into the poky living-room/kitchen. The stair-door banged.
I'd have paid for somewhere extravagant if I'd known Nyle'd leave so soon. This shitty basement was our sacrifice to the future—our cheap young-love story to laugh at in middle age. Instead, our love was spent underground. My parsimony was all for him, so we could go to fields, bread fresh-baked in the Aga, Aran sweaters, dog by the fire, green wellies; I wanted to give his childhood back. Nyle wanted dewy country dawns; all I offered were city basement nights and belief his name'd be on top of a list.
Some spells work slower than others. It began as Guy stumbled through his final “are you sure?” The bloodname over my heart is a scarlet ribbon through the labyrinth of loss. I'm racing along it towards the sky. I can feel my wings flutter, flap, then beat.
I pick up Nyle's funeral plan and write. Cremate me. Drop me in his urn. Nothing more.
My chest heaves from lifting my body, but my wings raise me up.
I grab Nyle's last book, and make my invocation. “Oh, night more lovely than the dawn, Oh, night that joined Beloved with lover, Lover transformed in the Beloved!"
I've never flown so high without Nyle. Was he Daedalus warning below me, or Lucifer laughing as he approached from above? It doesn't matter; I can feel his fingers stroking my feathers, and his loving whisper: boy, stop flying.
&nb
sp; About the Author
Syd McGinley has lived in the USA since 1989, teaches at a state university in Ohio, writes erotic novellas and novels, has a WWE addiction, and ignores housework until someone else does it. Write to Syd at [email protected].
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