Fiction

They sat in silence. Beer in one hand, cigarette in the other. Silence. Eyes, mocha brown; golden hazel, stared past twinkling stars, past the black sky, not looking at anything, but looking at everything. Everything they held dear was hiding behind that stratosphere, locked away in some unknown realm. Silence, true silence. Even nature said not a word. No hum of crickets, no chirping of tree-frogs, no hooting of owls, no rustling of leaves. Hair, longish and black; shortish and ginger, was caressed by muted breeze; not even their silken strands dared make a sound. Silence. One that was pregnant, almost overdue, with emotions that neither man wanted to display. Loss, pain, despair, sadness, anger, near immobilizing depression. Neither man was comfortable enough in who they were and with each other to reach out for help.

They sat in silence. On the damp grass in Brian’s backyard. The cold seeped through the fabric of dark jeans, chilling their bones. Deafening silence. A silence that was almost holy. It was feared by the men experiencing it for they were acutely aware of how unholy they were. Both men longed for the silence to be shattered, but in a way that wouldn’t break them. They knew, however, that Matt would be the one to break it as he had assumed the alpha role in whatever it was that they’d managed to build together. It had gone unspoken but they knew Matt was the dominant one in this… thing. What was it? It was more than plain old friendship, but what was it? What is it?

Jimmy would have known.

Matt took a swig of his beer. “You did good in Fiction tonight, Gates.” His voice had that post-gig rasp that the guitarist had quickly fallen in love with. Said guitarist turned his head to look at the beautiful man beside him. “Real good,” he was saying. “You should sing more. You have… the purest voice.” Matt could feel the other’s gaze on him and he shifted to return it. Honeyed eyes probed chocolate as they stared at each other. Both were transfixed by how divine the other looked when bathed in the moonlight’s ethereal glow. Pale light played off deep dimples and sculpted cheekbones. They stared as if in a daze.

Brian, naturally, was the one to break the spell by looking back at the stars. Matt followed suit. “Thanks, Shads,” the guitarist told the vocalist before giving the silence full reign again. He ground his cigarette into the earth having lost interest in it. He took a deep breath, dulled eyes searching the heavens for some sort of sign that Jimmy wasn’t totally gone. “It was really heard, y’know? Not breaking down on stage. It hurt trying to keep it together. It literally fuckin’ hurt.” His voice cracked, the tears he’d been holding in since they finished recording Nightmare were threatening to spill forth. “But I couldn’t lose it in front of those kids. I’m Synyster fucking Gates, I gotta be strong for them. They loved Jimmy too. But, sometimes, Brian Haner Jr… sometimes--” The slightly older man stopped halfway in his sentence. His body was racked by silent hysterical sobs.

Matt looked over at his best friend, band mate, and lover and panicked. What was he supposed to do? His mind was flustered. Out of instinct, he scooted closer to the weeping guitarist and wrapped his strong arms around him. He stroked the other’s hair, rubbed his back, cooed soothing words, trying to ignore the fact that he was indeed sobbing as well. Brian’s arms went around the other, clinging to the cotton of his shirt and the two men cried.

They cried the way society frowned upon. Their shoulders shook and they wailed and howled. Horrific sounds that betrayed how truly distraught they were over James Owen Sullivan’s passing. They held each other they grieved and in that moment, neither was the submissive or the dominant. They were equals, comforting and drawing comfort from each other.

There’s no telling how long they let the sorrow run its course, how long they stayed captive in each other’s arms during their mourning. How long they rocked each other, telling the other ‘it’s okay, don’t cry’ while weeping themselves. There’s no telling how long it was, but it came to a gradual stop with lots of sniffles and soothing murmurs. A lot of ‘shh… shh… I got you’ was exchanged as well. A simultaneous ‘I love you’ slipped past the barrier of lips. One set plush, the other slightly thinner.

They sat in silence, save for the occasional sniffle. Guitarist embraced by vocalist. Vocalist embraced by guitarist. They thought back to how they slowly went from Matt and Brian to MattandBrian. They realized how big a part Jimmy played in it. He got the whole ball rolling by smushing their faces together and yelling “now kiss!” all the way back in 2001. He was always there to confide in and could be counted on to give each of them a swift kick in the ass and say “quit being a fuckin’ pussy and make your fuckin’ move.”. Jimmy was a vital part in this whatever they have, without him they wouldn’t have ever discovered it. And the ‘I love you’ that was just uttered would have stayed in their minds forever. So what was it?

Jimmy knew.

“I’m proud of you, Bri,” Matt said, burying his face in the smaller male’s hair. He adored Brian’s distinctly masculine, subtly feminine scent. He could go around sniffing it for days. “I’m sure Jimmy’s proud too, and not just for keeping it together on stage. I’m sure Jimmy’s proud of us.”

Brian disguised the giggle that bubbled in his throat with a manly cough. No matter how much he loved Matt, or how often they had sex, Brian didn’t goddamn giggle. Matt noticed it, though and he gave a hearty chuckle, changing his angle to press a gentle kiss to Brian’s temple.

They sat in silence, golden silence. Finally they were comfortable with enough with who they were and each other to reach out for help. Souls still raw from Jimmy’s death, they knew they would find healing in each other and the love they’d come to share. They could almost hear Jimmy laugh his approval. Could almost hear the lisped voice say happily “I knew you’d find your own way, you fags!”

Smiles crossed their faces, creasing the tracks of dried saline that the tears had left behind.

“Marry me,” Matt blurted out, pressing his lips to Brian’s temple. “I know it’s sudden, but, fuck Bri, I love you. You’re my Art of Subconscious Illusion and my Second Heartbeat. I don’t want what we have to be Trashed and Scattered so please just say yes and promise to be my Little Piece of Heaven. I’m willing to love you Until The End and living without you would be a Nightmare, so please, p-l-e-a-s-e, say yes ‘cause I’m Not Ready To Die without officially calling you mine. I’ll buy you a ring tomorrow.”

“Did you seriously just propose to me using song titles from our own CDs?”

“Yes,” Matt said. “Yolo, right?”

“You’re so stupid and gay. Yes. Because, yolo.”

They sat in silence. A silence broken only by the soft sounds of their lips meeting in soft passionate kisses until they kissed for real. Lips moving in sync, neither tongue battling for dominance, just tangling in a dance choreographed solely for Brian Haner Jr and Matt Sanders. Because in this moment, they were equals.

They broke the kiss for air, loving mocha staring into adoring hazel and vice versa until a flash of light caught their eyes. They looked up into the night sky just in time to see a shooting star that shone the same blue as Jimmy’s eyes. But they didn’t make a wish; didn’t need to. They smiled as they watched the crystal blue enigma that was Jimmy soar across the sky. He was proud of them, they could feel it.

“Jimmy once said our last name should be Handers,” Brian said as he gazed at the miracle that always burnt out too fuckin’ quick.

Matt tucked Brian closer to him, protective now that they figured out what this was. “Handers, eh? I like it.” The couple, the engaged couple, shared another brief kiss, the kind of kiss that meant more than a hot make-out session. The sweet affectionate kind of kiss that meant ‘hey, this is forever, isn’t it’. They watched the stars again, thankful for the little glimpse of Jimmy the heavens had just blessed them with.

Somewhere amidst the cuddling, sobbing and kissing, Matt’s cigarette had burnt out and their two beers had been knocked over, their contents soaked into the dirt, but they didn’t care. They couldn’t give two fucks even if they wanted to.

They sat in silence. Three pairs of eyes: mocha brown; golden hazel that stared past twinkling stars, past black sky, not looking at anything, but looking at everything, and crystal blue that stared at his two best friends, looking at forever.