Letters: Matt and Gabe
Characters: Matt Cavanaugh and Gabe Wilder
Place: Guantanamo Bay and Utah, primarily
Time: Late 2002, around Christmas, probably through 2006.
Rating: PG
Summary: An exchange of letters.

The guard hit the walls of the hallway as he came down it. The thing Matt had been most surprised to find out was how very much like a real prison this place was, this tiny little pied-a-terre on the tip of Cuba, a place that shouldn't have existed and certainly not for as long as it did. Everyone had their own cell, yeah, true enough, but other than that - guards were guards.

He wondered as he rolled over in his bunk, wondered for the three hundredth time since there wasn't the most stimulating of environments outside to make him curious, whether they were treated differently in this part of the prison than in the other part, if they were supposed to believe that the government was doing the right thing and they wanted to help, but empire wasn't right, in Matt's mind, and he'd had no intention of taking part in it.

Not until it had grabbed him.

"Cavanaugh," the guard said, laughing at him. He held something in his hands, something so prosaic that Matt could hardly believe he was even seeing it. "Mail call. Merry fucking Christmas."

The letters, all four of them, went everywhere as Matt scrambled out of the bunk, too happy to even care if he was showing weakness to the other man. He was tough enough, and not so tough that he couldn't show that this pleased him, because he did not care. Not in the rush of joy at the site of letters.

Two were from his family, one from Mike alone, and the fourth was unfamiliar but almost remembered handwriting, until he looked at the return address.

Gabe.

He tore them all open at once and started reading whichever came to his hand first.

*****

July 21, 2002
1 am

Matt,

I don't know how to write this.

I didn't find out you were gone until tonight. I've been throwing pennies at your window for the past week. I spent about ten bucks (and that's a lot of fucking pennies) before Mike finally came out and told me to stop. I don't think he meant to tell me where you'd gone. He didn't want me to write to you. But I finally got it out of him, or part of it. All I know is you're some kind of mutant and I don't know what kind or how they fucking found you but I know you're gone.

I just- fuck, Matt, (a portion of what appears to be a few paragraphs is censored here)

It doesn't do any good to sit around and ask you questions, I guess. If you are still alive and you're getting this, maybe you don't want me to be angry. Maybe you don't want to hear about (censored).

This is what it's like, then, at home. Sometimes, it's easier to say things when I write them down than when I'm actually looking at people and talking to them. I never was really straight with you. I wanted to explain what was going on with my mom and dad sometimes. There were times when I wanted to tell you what it was really like on that trip that I met you on, some of the things that happened on the way to Chicago. It was a weird journey- sometimes, I think meeting you at the end of it was the most normal part. I didn't want you to think I was some sort of freak though or, I guess, to stop liking me for not always being what you thought I was. Of course, I've never really known what that was.

So maybe I should play Scherazade for you now. I don't know if you ever read that story when you were a kid- the Thousand and One Nights? My mom used to read it to me when I was little. I used to think of it like she was the storyteller. I guess it always seemed like she would tell me stories to keep things away, like the golems that she used to dream about. I feel like her now, only it's the opposite. Maybe if I can tell you a story every day, I can keep you safe. It's stupid but you're not here to laugh at me.

It's just a matter of where to start.

This story begins in the dead sea of America.

There was a boy who came to the sea with his father. Only he wasn't a boy, really. He was what some people call on the verge of manhood, I guess, only he didn't feel it. He didn't feel mature or responsible or adult, even though he was. Nope. When he stood at the shore of that sea, all he felt was tired. He couldn't see the Wasatch from where he was standing at that place. All he could see was how oily the water was. When he knelt in the sand, it made his jeans grey and his fingers brown where they touched the bracken. He used to come home from the dead sea with the scent of it in his hair. His father didn't really say much of anything. His father was a lot like him but he didn't know it then. He thought being told to wash the stink of the dirt and oil from his fingers was just that. What he didn't know was that it meant "I love you". Well, as much as his father could love anyone. That's the measure of love- it means not leaving someone behind.

But he didn't hear love. All he knew was that getting his hand dirty and coming home with the smell of the sea in his hair got him noticed. And the boy hadn't really been too noticed before. It was sort of a heady feeling, all that irritation, all focused on him.

So he got to love the sea but he hated it too. He hated it because it was the only thing in his life that made him stand out.

After a while, he got lonely for other things. He missed the way that it had been inland. There were things about living in a city of towers- things like lights that were always on and people that told stories on street corners. The boy hadn't ever really been alone when he lived in places where everyone was a stranger. Because you see, everyone was the same there. They were all different. But by the dead sea, there were so few people that each one had a name that was known to everyone else. And instead of making them unique, it made them the same. He couldn't live like that.

So he went to the highway. He'd seen a lot of movies and he thought that it would be easy to stick his thumb out and get a ride. But it wasn't easy to escape. He walked a long time before anyone picked him up. The first time, it was a group of jocks. When they shoved him out of the truck, it was on the sand. He had a hard time walking after that for a day or two but they hadn't hurt him badly. The next one to take him on was a man in a truck a couple of days later. He was kind but asked for kindness in return. The boy didn't care enough to say no. It got him closer to his destination.

But the thing was, he didn't really know what that was. He got into the back of a truck one night just to stay warm. He thought he was moving further into the shifting sand. There were a lot of stories his father used to tell, about people he had known, men who were taken into the desert and never appeared again. It seemed romantic for someone who hadn't ever really appeared in the first place. Poetic justice, I guess. It was a stupid thing for the boy to do, but he was always a bit stupid when it came to thinking the right things.

But the truck didn't take him to the desert but instead, to the wind. It wasn't a place of still death but one of change.

And I guess you know the rest of the ending to that story or else you can make it up yourself. The next story will be happier, I promise. I'm just still in shock.

Gabe

*****

A few days later, the guard came back with paper and a pen, in response to Matt's quietly urgent question of the day before. It didn't look like enough paper, but then he thought of the blocks of text that were missing from Gabe's letter and his mouth twisted grimly.

It wasn't enough freedom to tell his stories in return.

He started writing.

December 27th, 2002, too damn late

Gabe,

First of all, let me say that your letter didn't go astray, or at least not until quite late in the process. I don't know - they seem to find it fun here to be kind sometimes. I was handed your letter two days ago, with a couple others from my family, and told that it was my Christmas present. I kind of figure that the smirk on the guard's face was his way of telling me that he didn't care if I had a Christmas or not. So it's not that I'm not talking, or not listening to your Scheherazade stories, but that I'm not getting them.

Maybe I'll find out for New Year's that you've sent me more letters. I don't know. I sort of hope you have, I hope that you didn't think that I just disappeared forever and didn't want to talk to you. Because - and I will appropriate your story if I fucking well want to, thanks - if I was in the place of the wind, I don't think I was done changing you, but it sounds like a harder trip than I'd thought. Not in terms of what happened, but in what happened in your head.

How bad it was.

Anyway, I guess I'll find out whether you can read that or not, maybe. I don't have a lot of stories here, or at least not ones that'll get past the censors, so I won't tell you them, because all you'd get back would be a page covered in black marks, with maybe a single word showing. It's kind of funny, how you start censoring yourself so you don't have to believe that you're being censored - you were, by the way. But only because, you know, I used to believe in freedom and all that. Not that it believed in me, apparently.

So. I'll tell you what I am, and you can decide from there, and we'll hope that it comes through. As long as you want to tell me stories, I'll listen. I need an anchor in this place, even if it's only once or twice a year. I'm adrift - this isn't my place.

Or I'll save the stories. Because someday I have to be out of here, and I really don't think I'll be able to get away with telling you (censored). I don't think that'll work out, really.

Yeah, I'm a mutant. If you want to know what sort, go find Mike and ask him. He'll tell you, because I damn well told him to, at least in this letter. He knows the story, since he was there. Show him this, if you want to know.

Mike, you fucking punk, tell him. Or there'll be hell to pay when I'm out of here.

It's kind of sad when the only stories I can tell you in return are the ones my brother knows. But maybe they'll lighten up a bit. Enough to give me your letters.

I need an anchor, Gabe. Maybe not so good to ask of a man who found me in the place of wind, but there you have it.

Keep writing, Scheherazade.

Matt

*****

"Sure and you think you can stare out the window all day?" Sean Wilder's voice broke the stillness of Gabe's thoughts, drifting as they were across the flat, cramped buildings that marred the landscape of Rose Park. The whistles and aberrant bass was blowing through the open window of their small apartment and he shook his head, glancing back up into his father's grey eyes.

"Maybe," was all he said as he shoved another box up in the corner. Gabe hefted a heavy sigh as he brushed a strand of brown hair from his eyes. He'd let it go back to its usual color, as drab as the fading stains on the wallpaper of this place.

"You're thinking about moving," Sean's eyes were sharp as they looked at his son. Yet there was a kind of concern in their depths, one left unexpressed by the tone of his voice. "It's that girl, isn't it? Well, if she's worth having, she can handle a drive. Aurora's not that far."

"It's not that, Sean," he muttered as he slammed the tape gun down on another box. The ripping of the tape against steel was gratifying in its way and he tore off a piece, then kicked the box to the corner. No, it wasn't that at all. Julie wasn't the type to leave- not even if you wanted her to, sometimes. His face turned, staring out blankly at the sunset. "How long's a forwarding address last anyhow? Are you even leaving one?"

"Never do."

Fuck, Gabe thought. Fuck you. But he didn't say it. Instead, he just kept packing. Slamming the tape against the cardboard. Crushing it down.

*****

He kept going back to the old apartment, even after they'd found a place in Aurora. He didn't quite dare go to the post office and give them his forwarding address- he never knew why they moved and so he thought that perhaps Sean had them running from something again. But they hadn't run far- Aurora was only 7 hours from SLC. And seven hours didn't seem like all that much. He always told his father that he was visiting Julie but it was something else that kept him dropping by the old place, never quite daring to ask for the mail.

Finally, in mid-January, he knocked.

A woman answered the door, her face flustered as she stood there, balancing a chubby toddler on her hip, a phone on her opposite shoulder. "Hang on a minute-" She snapped her gum and glanced up at Gabe, blond hair bleached and frayed at the ends. "You want something? I ain't got no money."

"Yeah," he said, shoving his foot in the door and wincing hard as she tried to slam it against his toes. "I'm Gabriel Wilder- I used to live here."

"So?" She answered, then heaved a sigh in the phone. "Hang on, Dar- I gotta call you back." An exasperated puff as she pressed a button on the phone. He noticed that it didn't even move her bangs, glued as they were with some sort of hairspray. "What you want? Your mail? Should've sent a fucking change of address. I ain't your mother."

"I got mail?" He couldn't keep his voice from sounding hopeful. It must have touched her because the woman glanced down, looking shamed.

"Yesterday. But Andrew took the garbage out to the dumpster- hey, where you going?"

*****

Gabe tore open the letter, blinded and searing as he blinked away the stench of garbage and the stinging moisture in his eyes. Matt was alive. He just stood there for a moment, hand tracing the postmark, not quite willing to let himself think about what it meant or where his best friend was.

December 27th, 2002, too damn late...

"Not too damn late," he said, his hands gripping the paper so tight the knuckles were going white. "Not too damn late. Ever."

*****

March 3, 2003
sometime before sunrise
Aurora, Colorado

Matt,

If you've gotten any of these letters, you're probably bored with me because I always seem to start them the same. I always wonder if you've gotten the others or if you know that I've written you every day since the first one. I guess I like the idea of it. I like the thought that somewhere, there's some dead letter office where the thoughts pile up between you and me and maybe someday when it's all getting to you, you'll get this flood of letters. Sometimes, I even picture you escaping away on them- surfing this giant white wave of paper... all my crazy, stupid words taking you somewhere else for a while. Even if the somewhere else isn't here.

Sorry if this letter's got blotches of blue in it. It's Kool-Aid this time, not antifreeze or anything scary. Put it up to your nose and maybe you can smell it, like one of those scratch and sniff stickers the dentist used to give me when I was a kid. I always hated those things, y'know? You're fucking edgy about going to the dentist anyhow, then they load you up with laughing gas, put that tangy orange floride shit in your mouth, drill away, then give you a sticker that smells like the whole damn thing? Anyhow, I got tired of having my hair brown- Julie hates it but I guess if she likes me as much as she says she does, she'll get over it, right?

Sean, though. He was pissed. He's got it in his head that I can do some of his work for him. Get this- he wants me to be a repo man. Or something. First thing he did when he saw me this morning was start pouring orange juice on the table, then he swatted me on the head and said, "Who in the hell's going to take shit from a blue-haired repo man?". Or something like that.

I don't fucking care anymore. I don't live in the same house. I don't have to take his shit.

I keep getting all this pressure though... Julie wants me to move back in with him so I can get my GED and go to college. She keeps telling me I should go into business because I'm good with numbers. I think she has Plans. I'm not sure. Part of me wants to agree with her and just sort of do it and the other part of me- well, I guess, it's not done changing yet. I'm not quite ready to settle down and become a Mormon and make little babies. Shit, I don't know if any of this letter's going to make any sense to you. I don't even know if you've read any of the others or even if you'll get this one.

(censored - a long series of paragraphs that appear to have been something of a rant judging by the pressure on the paper at points, causing it to appear ragged)

I guess you don't need me to talk like that. It probably doesn't make it any better for you.

So, here's tonight's story, in case you can still read them. It's not my story, not really, but it means something to me.

Once upon a time, there was a small town. And in that town, the days passed one by one by one, every day blending into the next until the people didn't really know what week it was all of the time, or maybe even what year. Time stopped mattering- you have to be alive for it to count- and the people in the town had stopped living, really. Even the air was still. You knew it when you walked on the street there. Strangers who came to the town noticed that their footsteps were the only ones that seemed to make a sound.

It was like until the sea began to smell like roses. It happened a couple of days before a man came to the town. This man told the people there that he was there to change things, that his "heart was too big for his chest" and so he planned to give of himself to all the people so that he could breathe again. Sometimes, he made them do incredible things, but sometimes, all he asked them to do was to really look at the world around them. But this man brought people with him to this town. And the people all had a spark- they all loved life- and the tides began to swell again and the clocks began to move. He started time just by being there.

But then he had to go. And when he went, he left by sea, not by boat but by walking into the waters, holding another man's hand. That man had thought he was old before the giver came but when he appeared, he learned what it was to be young. And so he was happy to follow him into the depths. Only... only, the giver stayed behind and the other man had to return. He'd seen how quickly the hands of a clock could move. But when his head broke the surface of the waves, all the clocks were broken.

Good night, Matt, if you're reading this. The sun's coming up over these mountains and I guess I better go to bed.

Gabe

*****

Another holiday, more mail. They were working harder on him, kindness and cruelty both, and he held himself carefully, trying to avoid putting pressure on his left side ribcage. It wasn't broken, he knew that, but it was bruised to fuck, and it hurt to touch.

And after the stick, the carrot. More mail. More signs that it could be like this always, he could have all the letters he wanted, if he would agree to the things they asked.

*****

Early April, and I'm not sure what date. Call it three days after Easter. It's hot already, and it's only four fucking am. Jesus, this place is awful.

You know, I don't really like that I don't know what date it is and that's the last story of yours I've got - letter dated the third of March. Fucking Easter fucks me up. Never know what date it is.

So start from the beginning and we'll hope it comes through, or that I get out of here while I still have hair and an interest in life and we'll get a beer. War can't last forever, right?

But enough about that. I don't know who Julie is - this and the letter I got at Christmas are the only ones I've seen. Girlfriend, right, and one with more plans than you've got, but tell her you don't want to do what she wants. Yes?

I think I was the one who walked you into the water - again, I'll make your stories mine if I want to, dammit - but it's funny that I'm the one who's lost time now.

Christ, Scheherazade, I'm so fucking lost. My side hurts, my arms, my skin - if mail won't convince me, if air con won't convince me, if television won't convince me, then beating me will. Won't it.

That's the logic around here.

That's all the news that's fit to write, unless you want to hear about how I saw another fucking twelve-inch spider that stood six fucking inches off the ground this afternoon. You know, you poke those fuckers with a stick, and they rear back on four legs because they have a leg advantage, and they fucking grab at the stick with the other four and then they fucking hiss.

Ever had a spider hiss at you before? I didn't think so.

This is a fucking vacation spot. I love it, I want to buy it, I'll live here when I'm fucking old.

Fuck. (words crossed out, but whether by the censor or by Matt is unclear)

Fuck.

Keep writing. We've a lot more nights to get through.

Jesus, I wish I could see you. It might make it all worth while. How's my horrible brother? He's acting like everything's fine, and he's lying.

Tell me your address in every letter. Maybe it'll help. I thought you hadn't gotten my last.

Matt

*****

He lay down under the high light of noon and slept, no longer wondering whether his letter would go or where or when, but trusting that it would, because something had to be right.

*****

Gabe held the last letter from Matt in his fingers as he started yet another piece of paper, trying to think of what to say and wondering if it would ever reach him. The garage that he'd moved into was cold and he shivered as he pulled the blanket around his shoulders, curling his knees against chest as he leaned forward, pencil barely touching the page. He'd switched to pencil a few weeks ago- Julie had told him that it was indelible. Whatever that meant. If it meant that what he wrote might last a little longer, it was worth it.

It had been a long, long time since he'd heard from Matt. After the last letter, he'd started trying to tell him the same basic things over and over. Every fucking day. Eventually, Gabe reasoned, Matt would read it. And then he could stop writing that much at least. Aurora was just like SLC. Nothing ever changed.

December 7, 2003, No. 504
Maybe 10 in the evening, I don't know.
Aurora, Colorado

Matt,

Happy fucking Pearl Harbor Day. Think that'll get censored? I'm betting not. The last thing you sent me didn't have much of anything crossed out. The one thing that was, I thought you might've done it.

I moved back in with Sean. Julie might drive me crazy sometimes but she had a point about me trying to get my life together. Since I don't know what letters you've gotten, I guess I should spend a little time telling you about Julie. It's about the 199th time I have, I think, but until you write me and tell me that you know who she is, I'll probably keep doing it.

Julie is Julia diMatteo. We're dating- it's pretty serious, I think, but I don't really know why. Yeah, I know you're sitting there thinking it's really fucked up to say that but I sort of fell into this. Mike's not really been the same since you left and Julie was just kind of there. She's older than us, by about three years. She's got dark hair that she dyed pink when I first met her but that she stopped dying because the elders at her church raised a fucking stink about it. We've been seeing each other pretty much exclusively- she's in SLC and I'm in Aurora so I guess I don't really know that she's just seeing me but I think that's the case. She talks a lot and I'm so quiet these days, I guess that's a good thing.

I'm sitting now in my bed thinking about what it's like where you are. I'm sort of living in the garage. It's easier than putting up with Sean's shit all the time but it's really fucking cold in winter. Maybe that might amuse you, to think of me sitting here shivering while you're in the land of the iguanas. I always sort of liked the cold though- remember that night we met?

Anyhow, I wish I knew more about where you were. All I can do when I sit here and think about you is use my imagination and that's not good.

I started protesting. (long paragraphs, again censored)

I haven't seen Mike for a long time. Danielle and I went out for coffee the other night which was sort of odd. You know, she and I never talked all that much. But she's getting married soon and I read her a couple of paragraphs in your last letter when I got it. I guess, in a way, it's something for her to connect to you with, talking to me. I like her better than I used to.

I'm trying to think of a story to tell you, Matt, but it just seems like all the stories I tell you lately have been heavy. I want you to write me back- I want you to tell me a story. Tell me that you're still fucking alive because I want you to be. Tell me that you're not coming home broken or in a fucking box. (censored)

But I said I'd tell you a story every night until you came home and that's a hard habit to break. Here's something to rest your head on.

Once upon a time, (are you tired of that yet, Matt?)

Once upon a time, there was a king who lived in a castle with two towers. These towers were the pride of his country- in fact, some would say they even represented it. So, of course, as all things do, one day, the towers had to fall.

(censored- several paragraphs)

Did you hear any of that story? Probably not but I wanted to tell it to you anyhow because it comforted me.

So, I guess this means good night. I'd hum you a lullaby but I don't think you could hear it from here.

Gabe

*****

504, and he'd gotten three.

For two days, Matt raged, inside his head where no one could see it, or hear it, or use it, at that fact. On the outside, he was calm, always calm, always willing to do what was asked, always willing to be silent or be loud or work or sit or whatever gave the impression of compliance.

They'd started trying to test his powers, or they'd thought they were going to, and that was the one thing Matt would not simply acquiesce to, other than the other thing he wouldn't do. He'd simply stared at the sergeant assigned to make him do the work and drawn what had come to his fingers.

This time, it had been a rat, and Matt had wondered, a little nervously, why that might be. It wasn't as though bubonic plague was unknown, or the other diseases rats carried, and he wondered that, watching the sergeant with dead eyes as the rat's tiny claws pricked into his skin and its tail wrapped around his wrist.

He'd gone back to his cell early that day, with a broken wrist, and the memory of the sergeant nearly vomiting with fear as he slapped the rat out of Matt's hand. It had landed with a broken back, but the other man hadn't been able to kill it, and still Matt stood there, staring with those eyes.

He thought that perhaps this letter was a consolation prize. And by now they let him have a pencil and paper all the time, so he didn't even have to ask.

The bones ground together as he wrote.

May 10th, which is a holiday somewhere, but right here, it's a fucking war zone or something, Gabe, I'm serious.

This letter's short. My wrist hurts. Don't ask. Long story. Tell you later.

I'm going to miss the wedding. I love her and I'll miss it, and my stupid brother's fucking up and it's killing me, Gabe, but I can't do anything because I'm not going where they want.

Stopping before they censor.

Jesus, this is fucking depressing. Still, a bit of interest comes in when hearing about your life. Why are you with her? Haven't told her the truth or what? I don't see Mormons as your type, or your dad as helping you sort out your life. Sorry. I'll write more in a few weeks.

I get paper now. Isn't that nice? And a pencil and all the spiders and rats and fucking, I don't know, fucking geckos or whatever the hell they are, nothing that grew in the Wasatch, I know that. I can write whenever I want.

Letter three. Notes from a dead place. Hope you get this.

But not me. I promise I'm not coming back in a box or broken much of me, anyway.

Your story was censored. Talking about those towers (censored, one sentence).

Sing, you bastard. Sing for me. Even if I can't hear it.

Fucking hell. I'm alive, I'm coming home some day, but this hurts.

Matt

*****

He started again, a few weeks later.

June 19th, letter four, 3 am and I'm not sure if I'm looking at the sunset or the sunrise.

No letter yet, but if you've written 504 of them so far, I'm guessing that you haven't stopped now. Did you get mine, I wonder?

My wrist still hurts a little, but it's better. I got a splint for it and everything. As the medic pointed out, they want me in Iraq, they don't care if I'm there in one piece or not. But I guess I need my hands for my power, so that's probably why they fixed it.

Danielle got married last weekend, and true to form I wasn't there. Mikey sent me pictures, though, those got through, maybe because he told them what it was, or something. I don't know what their game is here. Some days are really almost good - like, it takes a while before you realise you're looking over the barbed wire at Cuba and it's another country and yet you can't (censored, two paragraphs).

If I were in charge of how long I'm here, I'd find this place fun. Sick, no? But it's so typical. So tell me what you're doing. Your dad wants you to do repos? No offence, but that's not your gig, Gabe. Do something else. And get away from Julie. Mormons are bad news, most of them.

I'll sing a lovely song for you in Spanish, which I'm getting pretty good at. It's sort of a lingua franca here, because we can pretend that we're not speaking a language the guards understand. In their infinite wisdom, of course, the military now staffs this place with a bunch of people from Miami who probably don't speak English.

The food's exactly as bad as you'd imagine, only worse. Yack. I wouldn't feed this shit to a dog. I've lost weight from that. Other than that, I think they're pretty much trying to kill us with boredom. Fight or be bored.

I wish you could tell me what's happening at home. You started protesting, but I don't even know if that was your dad or the goverment or (censored).

Sometimes I think I should just go over there. They'll get me to sooner or later. I'm sort of losing interest in principles right now. The advantage of boring someone to death rather than beating them to death.

You'll be amused to note that my hair's really short. They gave us all pig-shaves when we got here, and I guess that's better than getting fucking prickly heat and dandruff from the humidity, but it's not a real happening look for me.

Matt

*****

"Gabe-" He could hear Julie's voice in the background as it always was, whining... cajoling. She was trying to clean the garage and she'd even brought in a huge pot of flowers and was trying to set them next to the boxes of merchandise that his father had piled at the end of his bed. He stood up, pulling his crutch close to his chest and leaning into it, hobbling over to see what she was doing.

She'd found the letters.

"Fucking hell, Julie-" Gabe reached out and snatched them from her fingers so quickly that he almost fell over. He was weaving as he clutched them. Her nostrils were flaring as she shot him a look that could have toppled him if he let it. "Those are private."

"Matt Cavanaugh?" Her tongue clicked. "You're still writing to him?" The word him could have been substituted for a number of words that he'd heard her say with the same loathing- heathen, Muslim, faggot... he lost track of Julie's prejudices but tried to tell himself that everyone had something you had to live with. She wasn't much worse than Sean, after all. But something about the way she said Matt's name hurt.

"Yeah, I am." For once, Gabe's voice was harsh. "And you know what? I owe him a fucking letter too. So why don't you go home?"

"Excuse me?" Julie's hand flew to her hip as her mouth gaped for a moment. Quickly recovering, she snapped back, "Look, Gabe, I don't get you. You spend all this time writing letters but you can't even fill out a college application? How do you expect to get anywhere?" Her cheeks were red as she grabbed for the letters again, eyes bright in anger. "It's not like he's getting out. He's a mutant. All that this is going to get you is put on some government list somewhere and then what happens, Gabe? I thought we were going to get married. I thought you were going to college and then we were going to get an apartment. I thought we talked about this."

"No, Julie," Gabe said, his mouth suddenly chalky. "You talked about this. Maybe... maybe that's not what I want."

"You said yes." Her eyes were squinted, so small that he couldn't even see the whites. All he could see was how very black they were. He stumbled back, his head feeling numb and confused.

"Did I?" He managed. His foot was starting to throb and he swayed slightly, catching himself on the bedrail. "I don't remember really being asked, Jules."

She burst into tears.

"I hate you, Gabriel Wilder. I hate you." Her eyes were starting to leak water, cheeks growing puffy and swollen. Gabe stood his ground. He wasn't giving up the letters. He didn't care how much she wanted to read them. The woman sniffled, drawing her wrist against her nose. He thought to himself that she looked ugliest when she was faking it. "Fine then. Just fine. You see if you find someone else who'll put up with this crap."

His fingers clenched tighter around the paper but he didn't say anything. Just watched her leave.

*****

The bottle felt good in his hands even if the drink made his stomach hurt. Pulling his leg up, he tried to balance the pad of paper on a knee but wincing, the pain forced him to roll on his stomach to write. Taking another swig of whiskey, Gabe rested the glass on the concrete floor, pulling his blanket up over his shoulders as he clutched the pencil.

The truth was, he didn't know what to say tonight. His head was still blurry from alcohol and pain medications and the pencil was swimming on the page as he tried to write. He almost stopped but then reminded himself that Matt had written to him with broken bones. He couldn't stop now. Especially not if Julie was really gone. The idea of that was only a faint, dull ache in his stomach. It should have been more, if he really loved her, and that was what bothered Gabe, suspended the lead in mid-air as he tried to think of what to say.

He tugged the corner of one of Matt's letters closer to him, his fingers unfolding the well-known pages.

Sing, you bastard. Sing for me. Even if I can't hear it.

His head spinning, he pushed the button on his tape player. If he couldn't think of something, he'd just take what fate gave him. Then he laughed as the old music drifted into the garage, echoing across the wooden door.

"Wild Horses," Another laugh broke his words and he just started shaking his head. "Yeah, Matt, this one's for you."

*****

December 1, 2003, No. (censored)
11:59 pm
Aurora, Colorado

Matt,

Remember how you told me in one of your letters to sing you a song? Well, I flipped on the radio and "Wild Horses" started playing so that's what you're getting. I don't even know if you like that song- in fact, I guess, I think you probably hate it. Which is funny because it sort of reminds me of writing these letters.

Julie and I had a fight about it tonight. I'm not going to say anything else about it because you've probably already got a bad opinion of her. But she loves me, Matt, and I guess that maybe I love her back. At least... I haven't left her behind and that's something. All that stuff you keep saying about Mormons, it's right, but... there's just something about not being alone all the time.

I still feel alone though.

Oh, hell, I'm really drunk, Matt. And I never get drunk. I don't think it helps that I'm also on painkillers. I'd tell you what kind but the bottle's looking pretty blurry right now. This must be what it feels like to be my mom.

Can't believe I wrote that either.

You know, sometimes, I think that they only give you the bad letters. I think that they use me to punish you maybe and that you'd be happier if I stopped writing. Maybe I tell you all this crap because I know you aren't going to answer it. It's like playing Russian Roulette with my soul, stupid though that is. I've been telling you more than I'd ever be able to actually say but because there's almost no odds that you'll ever get these things, I can say whatever the hell I want. And you know, it sort of scares me that you're going to hate me when you get out.

Oh, well. Fuck it, right? I've got a captive audience, I guess.

You know why I'm on painkillers? It's because I shot off the toe on my right foot. That's right. Gabriel Avinoam Wilder, Man at Arms. Fuck. You were so right- it's not my gig. I probably should have saved the toe- the doctor said they could've put it back on but I was too busy running away.

What happened was that Sean gave me a gun and sort of said that I should just pull the trigger if this guy he sent me after, Tad Schlieff, tried to kill me. With a name like Tad, I sort of really didn't take him seriously and so I never much bothered to actually- y'know- learn to shoot the thing.

If you were here, you could sign my cast.

It wasn't my dad I was protesting, by the way. I thought you should know that. Anything else I say will be censored. Dammit, Matt, I had to fight for you somehow.

What story should I tell you tonight? I'm running out of the happy things and I was never a happy drunk anyhow. I never drank a lot around you, that's why. Nobody likes a sob story, not really. So I'll tell you someone else's. Too drunk to give you one of mine.

Once upon a time, there were two people. A man and a woman because that's always how those types of stories go. They'd been together once. Were friends. Laughed a lot. Were in and out of one another's lives because that's how it was, even then. He knew her uncle- the family trusted him. I guess they thought that her virtue was safe with him, that he wouldn't take advantage of it to do anything socially unacceptable.

So, of course, he did. Because if he hadn't, there wouldn't really be a story, would there? And the uncle came for him. Because who they were was wrong, they took her away and locked her up. Not able to talk. Not able to see each other or even know what one another was.

And so they wrote letters.

Kind of like us, maybe, only probably not.

I better get to bed. I'm not making any fucking sense, even to me.

Sleep well, Matt.

Gabe

*****

January 3, 2004, Gitmo, Cuba, North America, the World, the Universe.

Gabe,

You're my anchor. I can't hate you, no matter how much you tell me. It keeps me sane, tells me there's a world out there that I'm temporarily not part of. That said, it's kind of funny to me that you're bothered by being alone all the time. I'd trade places with you in a heartbeat right now. I'm too close to too many people, always.

They moved me last month. I guess right around the time you wrote the last letter I got. I have a lovely view of the guard tower now, rather than of the water. The person in the cell next to me is dangerous - I can hear him at night, tormenting the kid on the other side, who used to cry a lot. He's stopped now. But this guy - I don't know. I think he can talk you into thinking things that aren't real, but I don't know if it's hallucinations or some sort of weird projective empathy. He makes me have nightmares.

(censored, four paragraphs)

I'm sorry about your toe, less sorry about Julie. She sounds like bad news to me, particularly if she's going to stop you writing to me.

I wish I had stories to trade you, but there's nothing here that I want to immortalise in pen. Nothing. Another hot day, another day of crappy food and worse conversation and finding out how many men it takes to dig half a hole and (censored, two lines). I want to be out there with you, not you in here with me, and you would be, if I told you my stories of this place. At least, any deeper than I have.

Sometimes we have hurricanes. Those are fun. There's that to look forward to, in the summer.

I'm going to get old here and die here, aren't I?

Lately I've been hearing "Dub Mentality" in my head. It's the best song I've got to share with you.

You'll have to play Wild Horses for me when I get out of here.

Don't shoot off any more toes.

Matt

*****

He handed the letter over to the guard with no change in expression. It was his talisman against fear that they would simply lose the letter not to act like it meant anything.

But this time was different.

"Cavanaugh," the guard said, and Matt stilled, though he did not turn. Not so beaten that he turned.

"Yeah."

"These letters," the guard said thoughtfully. "I'd ask if the person you write to matters, but you'd just give me a smart-ass remark, right?"

Matt smiled, still facing away. "Do you like your job, Aguilar? Or would you give me a smart-ass answer?"

"Yeah," the guard retorted, "I like it." Matt flinched away involuntarily as he heard the whicker of wood through the air, but pain still exploded in his side and he staggered.

"The person I write to matters," he said quietly, when he'd regained his balance, his breathing even again.

He'd probably just cursed that letter never to arrive, but the tiny part of him they still couldn't touch wouldn't let him believe that completely.

*****

July 12, 2004
Midnight-ish
Aurora, Colorado but it feels like the moon right now

Matt,

Mikey sort of grabbed me by the scruff of my neck today and dragged me off to get lunch with him and Danielle. (Amazing, how he does that- I'm six inches taller than any of you midgets. Guess when you're that short, you get good at jumping, right?) Her husband wasn't there- he's not generally when I see the two of them. I'm a bit shy about going to anything where all the Cavanaughs are. It would seem weird, I think. Sometimes, I feel like they want me to help them remember you. I mean, it's not that they've forgotten but... the you I knew is different than the one they did. Mike and I talked about that once.

But they were both so fucking happy when they came and got me. She made us go to Martine's. I don't think you know that place- they built it about a year and a half ago over on S. 100th. It's not the sort of place you'd expect to see me and Mikey in, I don't think. It's in one of the old buildings down there- they took a brownstone and tried to make it sort of trendy by giving it a French name and serving everything on little plates. There's like four kinds of tapas- I didn't even think Utah knew what tapas were. Of course, they're not really good. It's sort of like they use one red sauce for everything, whether it's Italian or Mexican. Thinking about it, I don't think Martine's a French name. I guess they picked it so SLC would think it was sophisticated. It seems to be working.

I guess I better get to the point.

You're going to be an uncle, Matt. Isn't that great? Danielle showed me a bunch of pictures of the "bean". That's what they're calling it. She says that they don't want to know if it's going to be a boy or a girl. I think they're just doing that to make your mom crazy though.

It's the craziest thing, looking at an ultrasound. Have you ever seen one? I hadn't. It's almost like looking at a drawing of the universe, all blacks and greys and whites. You can see the shape of a half-circle, like the sky at night, then there's a little tiny figure in the distance. Except it's not really a figure, is it, more of a cluster, I guess. It's hard to look at it and think that we all started out that way, just tiny little cells that became human. I wanted to send you a copy of it but I'm afraid that they'll take it from you. And Danielle didn't seem that warm to the idea. Does she even write you? Do any of them? Or is it just me now? Fuck, I hope not.

I showed it to Julie, though. She didn't seem all that impressed.

All she wants to do lately is talk wedding. It's a year away but I guess there's all this stuff to do to plan up for it. She got mad at me when I told her I wasn't going to have a fucking best man. My best man's in Gitmo, is what I told her. Julie just doesn't want to hear it. She sort of shut down and told me it was going to be her brother. Fine. Whatever, right? It doesn't matter, I guess. This is for her, not me. And I want her to be happy- she doesn't seem to think that we can be happy any other way. Not with the elders and her parents and everyone putting pressure on her to settle down. I think it's harder for women, maybe. Or something.

Sean seems to think it's not a bad idea although I've got the sense that he doesn't feel it'll work out. He keeps telling me it'll make me grow up some.

The thing is, Matt, I've been grown up. I've had to be an adult all my life. It's being a child that I want to learn. Oh, well. Julie and I almost broke up over this. It was that point where I realized that I really did sort of love her. I mean, she's hard to live with and she doesn't like a lot of me- well, the things I do, at least- but she can be nice and she's got a good smile and she's trying to make me into a better person. I signed up for a class at Mesa State like she wanted. (Of course, I didn't really tell her it was pyrotechnics but it's college, yeah?)

So, yeah, guess there's a lot going on. I'm gonna skip the story for tonight, I think. The phone's ringing and it's a bit hard to think.

Night, Matt.

Gabe

*****

Gabe,

Fuck off.

Matt

*****

His fingers itched to keep writing, to keep telling Gabe exactly what he thought of telling Matt something that Danielle hadn't been able to yet, because her letters didn't always come through at the same time as Gabe's.

To keep writing his rage and anger and pain.

*****

"Fuck off." Gabe said the words aloud as he tore open the envelope, expecting a long letter and only getting four words. "Fuck off?"

Julie glanced up from the paper that she was working on, pushing her glasses down on her nose. "Gabe, what-"

"Nothing, Julie, just- fucking nothing." He crushed the letter in his fist, biting his lip angrily, then thought better of it and uncurled it from the ball, slowly uncreasing it. "I gotta go."

"You just got here," she pointed out, her mouth slightly ajar. "And your car's barely running- and it's seven hours away." She didn't say what Gabe could see she was aching to- why did you wait to read that here?

Gabe just shook his head.

"We have to pick our colors-" The words were spoken in a voice he might have expected from the demonically possessed. Stumbling back, he just shook his head again. Still fighting a snarl, Julie added, "Just write the letter here."

"No- I can't-" And with that, he snatched his keys off the table and headed for the car.

*****

September 11, 2004, No. 791
I don't even fucking know
Somewhere in the Red Desert

Matt,

Fuck you. Just fuck you too.

I don't get you. I just fucking don't. Why did you say that? Are you trying to get to me?

Look- you know what? I didn't put you there. It's not my fault that you're missing things. Not my fucking fault that you're the one sitting there getting tortured while I'm out here. Do you think I like it? No. FUCK NO. I've tried to think of some fucking thing I can do. Some way to save you. For every letter I write you, I write someone else. I've tried protesting- I tried sit-ins- I tried everything short of going to fucking Cuba because I can't. I'm just not any sort of fucking hero. All I can do is these stupid, worthless things and yeah, fuck me. Fuck me that none of it matters but I'm trying, all right?

And you don't even have to fucking be there, Matt. You can get out. It's not like you haven't got the option of saying that you'll join up. Don't like it? Fucking desert. At least you'd see the sun again.

Yeah, and I know I'm on every list the government's got if they see this letter. And probably you're thinking that this is something that they faked to fuck with you. But it's not. I'm fucking pissed, Matt, and I'm not going to let you sit there and tell me to fuck off.

Because that's not how it works. You don't get to drop me because you don't like the fact that I told you whatever it was that I told you that pissed you off. Was it Julie? Was it Danielle? What am I supposed to do, Matt? Censor my own words and hope that someone else gets to tell you? 791 letters, Matt- how many have you gotten? You'd know everything about me now if you'd seen them all. I've told you things I'd never tell anyone and you know what? I can because you'll never fucking see them. What makes you think that Danielle telling you would even fucking get through?

And I'm making assumptions. For all I know, you're pissed about the fact that I never told you about my mom sooner, or growing up with a dad in prison or fucking going to jail myself last month. I don't even fucking know, Matt.

Whatever.

Just... fuck it, Matt. Whatever. You write me back when you're ready for me to start talking again and we'll hope that letter gets to me.

I don't think it will. One way or the other.

Good night, Matt.

I miss you, whatever happens.

Gabe

*****

April 15th, 2005
Guantanamo Bay, the whole entire world, all sixty square feet of it.

Gabe,

Do you really think it's better to be in the Middle East killing people who never did anything to me? I told you that Mikey would tell you what I could do, and I know he told you I kill. I'm not trading my life for theirs.

I thought about it, when I got your letter. I'm still angry at you for telling me about Danielle, and I'm still angry at you for telling me to go the fuck to the Middle East and kill people for this war.

But I killed the last of the geckos in this cell today, and I don't have anyone else to talk to. Fuck you; aren't you lucky?

The only reason I'm writing to you, aside from that, is that the baby's born by now, and I don't even know what it is.

Fuck you for taking my place, you son of a bitch. Fuck you for being more a part of my family than I am right now. Fuck you for being more useful to them than I am right now. Fuck you for your freedom, your casualness, your ability to do things. Fuck you for not being here with me, fuck you for not being the one to take this away from me. Fuck you for going away from me.

Fuck you, Gabe.

I just...you broke the rules, Gabe. You're there, I'm not. You're more an uncle to my niece or nephew than I am, you're more a brother to my sister and brother than I am, you're more to my family than I am. Because you're there. You can be.

And then you tell me I should enlist just to have that freedom...fuck you, Gabe. I'm not going to be someone else's pawn, and I'm not going to be their weapon. I'm not going to go kill people, and I'm not going to support this empire. I've lost too much of my life, too many days and too much blood and sweat and skin and tears and too much of me to say I'm going to war for them.

Do you really think I'm so fucking stupid I haven't thought about enlisting, just to have the freedom to escape? Do you really think I like it here, where the rats are about the size of dogs and the spiders hiss at you and every single fucking thing I see is fronted with either barbed wire, chainlink, or fucking fencing? I'm not here because it's fun. It's not that easy.

Nothing that hurts this much could be.

So fuck you for suggesting the easy way out. What next, suicide? What should I do, Gabe, hang myself? Throw myself on the fence and see whether the electric or the guns kill me first? The next time someone decides to beat on me, continue to talk smack to them so that they kill me?

There are no easy options, Gabe.

I picked the one I could live with. Yeah. It parked me in this fucking hellhole, it took me away from my family and friends, it took me away from you, but Jesus Christ, do you really think I'm a killer for something like that?

Fuck you.

Don't take my life from me, you son of a bitch. Don't take my family.

I've been in this prison and this cell and this pain too long for you to take that from me.

And now I'm going to go exercise my right to bribe a guard so that this letter does get to you.

Because that's where I live now. In a land where a cigarette's worth a hundred dollar bill in your money. A land where I only have the right to have mail if I'm happy and the right to give mail if I bribe the guards. It's a tiny place, here in Guantanamo Bay. We don't have your economy.

But you'll get your letter.

Matt

*****

He stared down at the bill in his hands, then bit his lip- hard- as he picked up a marker. Hastily, Gabe scribbled across the face, Please get this letter where it's going, before slipping it into the envelope. Then, drawing the paper close to him, he let the pencil tremble across the page before he actually started to write.

He'd never stopped writing to Matt. The letter told him quite clearly, that there'd never been any received apologies. That his anger had hit home whether or not he'd meant it to. And Gabe was surprised to find, as he stared down at the page, that he really had meant it.

April 23, 2005
10 pm
Aurora, Colorado, on another universe, apparently

Matt,

Didn't it ever strike you that I know you're not a killer? Just because you can kill doesn't mean you will kill. You've managed to tell them no in a jail cell for years. Why would telling them no in the desert be any different?

I'm sorry, so fucking sorry, that it's me out here and you in there. Because you're right about your family. It's not right and it's not fair that I should've gotten to be a part of their lives when you can't. But- and I think that you're not going to want to like me any better for this, Matt- if I see them from time to time, it's because I fucking miss having you around. You're my best friend but- you've been in there so long I'm starting to forget little things about you. Like the name of your damn cigarettes- I know it was three numbers but I can't remember which ones. And fuck it, Matt, I can't stand that. I hate it that the one person who ever made any sense is disappearing- and you are, whoever I talk to or however many letters I write.

And if you're disappearing, then I'm disappearing too. I'm getting married in June. June. That's only a couple months away. She's bought her fucking dress, Matt. And I feel like it's going so fast and so far that I don't even know what I'm doing.

So, yeah, you're right to call me out. I was being selfish. I guess it's brave what you're doing but what do you expect to get out of it? Do you really think they're going to let you play the game forever? It's either going to end with you dead or them forcing you to do to others what they're doing to you. If they haven't already.

And Mikey never told me what your power was, Matt. I wanted to hear that from you.

Gabe

*****

Matt debated what to do about the letter he held for a few weeks, though his first impulse was to write back immediately. He needed to come to terms with the only solution to present itself.

Finally, he sat down with the colonel in charge of the prison and said what he wanted.

The letter he sent Gabe was short.

*****

June 1, 2005

Gabe,

You don't need another best man.

Matt

*****

It had taken some doing, but Matt knocked on the door of Gabe's apartment in Aurora the day before the wedding. He didn't like that he'd traded his principles for this, but he'd missed Danielle's baby - he wasn't about to miss Gabe's wedding, too.

Even if he was marrying the wrong person. The person who was wrong for him, Matt amended in his head, not sure where the other construction had come from. It wasn't as though there was a Miss America pageant lined up waiting.

"Gabe," he said simply, with a smile at once pure and worried as the door opened and he saw his best friend for the first time in three years. "Gabe," he repeated quietly.

Gabe simply stood at the door, unable to speak as he stared at his friend. His eyes glimmered, the green of them glowing like grass after a rain as he looked. Slowly, his hand went to the back of his neck, resting there and touching the now-brown hair gingerly, feeling where it was cropped short and tensing. He knew how he must look to Matt, still dressed in the suit he'd agreed to try on before the wedding, the shirt half-open, tie draped across a chair, half in one life and half in the other.

"Matt." He shifted, his hand dropping and resting on the opposite forearm as he tried to stop staring. Gabe felt vulnerable as he stood there, wondering how much of what he'd written had gotten through. A tingling sensation was racing up his skin, the hairs on his arms prickling as he tried to find something else to say, some words that would stop him from reaching out to touch the other man and see if he was real. Matt had always hated being touched. Gabe wondered if it was still true. His eyes asked the question as well, one thought echoing in his mind: How has he changed?

"More than you could imagine," Matt said, reading Gabe's expression easily enough. "Oh for god's sake, this once won't hurt."

Slightly tentatively, he closed the distance between them and tried to pull the taller man into a hug. It was a little awkward, but finally he managed it, and simply clung to him for a moment before his natural tendency not to touch overwhelmed him. Gabe was one of the few he tolerated it from, and after so long avoiding any contact it was a lot to take in.

"Right," he said, pulling away. "So here I am, on your doorstep, and there you are, in a suit. Did I miss something? I thought the wedding was tomorrow? At least, that's what Mikey said."

He closed his eyes for a moment as he felt Matt against him, hands gripping the other man's back for a moment with an intensity that he knew was too much. Letting his fingers relax, Gabe stepped back as he felt Matt pull away, embarrassed slightly as he heard the next question.

"Yeah," he flushed slightly. "It's tomorrow. But Julie told me to try it on the night before in case I, you know, gained some weight or something." Not that he ever did- as much as Gabe had always wished he could look stronger, he'd never managed to accomplish it. He'd written to Matt about it once, in a letter he thought he'd probably never gotten.

Fingers creasing the front of his shirt, nervous as they brushed a button, Gabe glanced over at the other man. "Let's not fucking stand outside all night. Come on. I bet you need a drink." The smell of whiskey was drifting from his own pores, slightly soured.

"Funny, that," Matt said, crossing the threshold and looking about him with interest, "I haven't had a drink in three years. Time to catch up, though I don't want to think what my tolerance'll be like after so long."

His eyes were curious though, as he followed Gabe's movement across the room. He couldn't possibly have missed the smell of sour alcohol, the smell that said that someone had been drinking far too much for far too long, and it was odd. Gabe had always been the sober one, the one who didn't drink, and Matt the one who smelled like that.

"Nervous?" It was the only thing he could think of - that, and telling Gabe he was doing the wrong thing, which Matt didn't quite think he would appreciate. And which Matt was not quite ready to say.

"About what? You? Or getting married?" Gabe said, his voice trying to sound at ease but failing miserably. The apartment was sterile and he hated it- Julie had swept through it the week before, boxing up the few things that he'd had and pushing them all back into the closet. She hadn't wanted her family to see how he lived if they decided to "drop by". What she meant by that, Gabe thought, was that she was planning to bring them herself.

He waved Matt into the kitchen, tossing the jacket of the suit on the couch and rolling up his sleeves. "There's JD in the cabinet-" He pointed. "It's shoved back against the very back. Julie doesn't drink- she hates it but I guess you know that." And his voice caught again, uncertain of what Matt did know.

"Listen," Gabe scratched the back of his head, "I'm gonna go change." He hooked his thumb towards the small bedroom a few feet away. "I can hear you if you keep talking though, so don't stop, okay?" He was afraid that if he turned his back Matt would disappear and he found himself walking backwards, half-stumbling over his own feet before he found the door.

"Both, I suppose," he said, but he looked slightly distracted as he made a beeline for the kitchen, pouring a generous amount of whiskey into two glasses. "Since you're more than a bit nervous and you've been drinking, I'm going to guess that the wedding's more on your mind than you're saying. But," he added, quirking an eyebrow even though the other man couldn't see him as he leaned against the fridge, looking out the small window onto the back of another apartment building, "remember that I only got like...less than ten of your letters. Six, in fact. Only six. So I'm not sure what to think of Julie, or of what you're doing, because I don't know what you think of those things."

He pulled a shirt on over his head, listening to what Matt was saying and contemplating it. It was a few moments before he emerged, arms folded as he walked towards the counter. He took a glass and gulped at it, setting it down as he paused.

"There was a lot more than six letters," Gabe said. Then he sighed. "You're going to meet Julie in about five minutes. I guess you can decide what you think of her then." His eyes lingered on Matt- how had he gotten here? He wanted to ask but none of the answers emerging struck him as good. Instead, he switched the subject. "Have you seen Mikey yet? Or Danielle? I guess they told you about the wedding. Or maybe you got one of my last letters."

"Last one I got," Matt said, handing Gabe his glass, "was dated April 23. I decided I'd missed the baby but I wasn't going to miss being your best man and sometimes you have to compromise. So here I am. And yes, I've seen both of them - the military very kindly escorts you home, so I saw Mikey, who was overjoyed, the little punk. I'm not sure why he chose BYU, but I guess the phrase "captive audience" works better than anything else. And Danielle, and Richard. And I saw Susannah for the first time. Only time," he said soberly. "But they'll give me pictures. Which helps. And I saw my parents."

He smiled fondly as he sipped the whiskey. His tolerance for it had declined, though not as much as he'd feared; just enough that he could feel it a little bit.

"So if I'm interrupting something, I can go to a McDonald's or something and wait for you." Green eyes searched Gabe's, curious to know what they'd find.

"No," and his hand shot out without even thinking about it to grip Matt's shoulder. "You're not fucking leaving so don't even think about it." Gabe opened his mouth, then closed it again, pulling his fingers away reluctantly. "It's not like I'm not going to see her every damn day of my life anyhow. Look, why don't I just call her and tell her not to come over? Unless... well, I guess, unless you do want to meet her. Are- are you staying?"

"I've got twelve days," Matt said quietly. "I feel like I should meet her, if I'm going to stand up in her wedding tomorrow and tell the world it's all right that you both marry - or marry her myself if you don't make it," and that was said as jokingly as he could manage. "Plus," he added, "she might want to know that her plans have changed. Whoever she rounded up to stand by you can just return the fucking suit, unless it would fit me, and sit the fuck down."

"No." He shook his head. "I don't think I want you to stand up there." The words surprised him as they came from his mouth and he stared at Matt with a look mingling shock and horror as he realized what he'd said.

Then he heard it. Footsteps in the hall and the door began to swing open before he could explain what he'd meant- hell, before he could understand it himself.

Matt couldn't help it - he gaped at the other man, stared at him, tried to make sense of what he'd just said. That he didn't want Matt to stand up at his wedding?

That Matt had wasted everything he'd just spent, buying something that Gabe didn't want?

"You might not realise," he said, trying to keep his voice calm, even as the footsteps came closer, "why I'm here, how I got here, but believe me - it took enough doing that I want an explanation for that statement right fucking now."

"I- I-" Gabe stammered, green eyes glinting wide as he heard the door shut. "Fuck it, Matt. Later, okay? Not now-"

"Not now what?" Julie's voice came floating into the room. She paused to pick up his coat, folding it neatly as she walked towards the kitchen, brown hair bouncing on her shoulders, her slightly uplifted nose lifting even higher as she saw the pair of them. She stopped, the coat draped over her arm, hand touching it possessively as she stared at Matt, her eyes narrowing slightly, then relaxing as she turned to Gabe. "Is this a friend of yours, Gabe?"

Her voice was deceptively sweet, her smile light as it focused on Matt.

Matt disliked her instantly. There was something about the way she carried herself that said that she was better than him, something about the look in her eye that told him she thought he was worse than trash.

"I hope so," he said mildly, working to keep his voice even. "I'm Matt." He didn't offer to shake hands. "You must be Julie." Gabe's told me a lot about you, he resisted adding. This would be bad enough as it was, most likely.

If her nose was any indication.

"Matt," she repeated, trying to force a smile. Her hair whipping across her face, she shot a burning look at Gabe. "I didn't know you were coming."

"For the wedding," Gabe supplied as her arm slipped around his waist. He noticed how rigid her touch was and twisted away from it.

"You must be so happy," Julie answered, her voice acid. Tangling her fingers in the hem of his shirt, she tugged him closer, face relaxing into a satisfied smile.

"No," Matt said. "You're the bride. You get to be the 'so happy' one. I'm just the dumb son of a bitch who enlisted to go overseas and kill people so I could come to my best friend's wedding." He drained the glass and looked at her.

It wasn't that he'd decided to say any of that, it was that he had this burning desire to throttle her.

"He told me what you said about not having a best man, you see," he commented. His fingers itched, they had been for a moment, and he gave in, curious to know what would come to them.

It was a tiny green mermaid, her arms thrown back, made of plastic, and it took him a moment to figure it out, but he realised it was a cup decoration - and it had many sharp edges. "Even if I think he's crazy to marry you. That's just my opinion, though."

He lit a cigarette and stared at her, his free hand playing over the tiny piece of plastic.

Julie simply smiled at Matt, triumph so clearly on her lips that she needed to say nothing.

"Well, I'd simply hate to think that you wouldn't be there to watch us get married." Gabe's stiffening was visible as he stepped away, moving back from the both of them, his fingers digging into her arm so hard that they were leaving white indentations. She didn't move but only stood there, smiling hard.

"No you wouldn't," Matt said, amused. "I have a pretty good idea what you think of me, you see. My sister's a Mormon too. However, she's not a bigot."

He grinned and held out the mermaid. "You might want that. Call it a friendly gift. But I'll be at your wedding tomorrow, one way or the other, because he," he jerked his thumb at Gabe who was nearly out of the room by then, "is my best friend. So I'm delighted that you're happy with my presence. Because the other option is that I object to the marriage."

Gabe jerked her away before her outstretched hand could take the object Matt was offering to her, a glint of green reflecting in his fingers. Without saying anything to his friend, he pulled her out of the room and into the hallway, the door slamming behind them both furiously, the echo of raised voices still audible behind the walls.

It was a long time before he came back.

When he did, he didn't say anything to Matt. Instead, he walked over to the couch and picked up the phone. His fingers reached out, angrily threading the cord through them and yanking it out. The phone fell to the floor, the bell inside clanging as he kicked it. Foot stomping on the plastic, he crushed the pieces against the carpet with his heel, jabbing at it, then sending them flying with one final kick.

"Give me the fucking bottle," he said as he sank down into the cushions of the couch, a wire still hanging from his boot.

"You've got a wire hanging from your boot," Matt pointed out, bringing Gabe the bottle. He refilled his own glass, fairly certain it was the last he was going to get for the evening, and handed the bottle to Gabe.

"So. I understand the shouting, though I have no idea what was said, but not the phone, unless you think she's going to call you." He looked at the other man, curiously, doubting that this was a good time to say anything, but needing to know.

"Why did you come back?" Gabe asked, not answering the question at all. He took a swig from the bottle, then set it on the table. "Why did you come back, Matt? It wasn't to dance at my wedding- I think you made that pretty fucking clear."

"Because if I can't convince you that you're doing the wrong thing," Matt said seriously, "then at least I can be there for you. It really bothered me that I wasn't there when Susannah was born, because I should have been - I should have been a better brother. And this is important."

He paused and added "She's wrong for you, and you know it, Gabe. Don't do it."

"Yeah, I know it, Matt. That's why I didn't want you to be there." His hand was shaking a little as it picked up the bottle again. "I can't marry her anyhow. It's not her- it's me."

"Interesting," Matt commented. "Cause I would have said it was her, now that I've met her. So is the wedding off?" It was said with curiousity, and he decided he'd done the right thing by enlisting, if it meant that Gabe wasn't getting married - he'd meant it when he'd said he wanted to be a better person to his family and friends.

A slight shrug.

"For now, I guess." The bottle came to his lips again. "So. I guess this means you're off to the Middle East since you've done what you wanted to do." He still didn't know what Matt's power was, didn't know why he'd offered Julie a piece of glass or what he thought about the way that Gabe was living, trapped in a small apartment with bleak white walls.

Gabe handed Matt the bottle without saying anything for a moment, then he asked, grin weak on his face, "So... when you signed up for that shit, they ever give you the rest of your mail? I've still got a letter half-started in my room somewhere if you want me to send it for old times' sake."

Matt threw himself onto the couch next to Gabe and took a drink from the bottle before passing it back over. "My friend, I'm going to do what you suggested. I'm fucking deserting. I just needed to get out of Cuba." He grinned, but sobered.

"I guess I did do part of what I wanted to do," he murmured quietly. "Didn't I. Your letters sounded so unhappy. About her, I mean. Well, the six I got. They said something about the rest of my mail when I get processed out of Fort Dix and go overseas. They didn't look happy, either."

"Unhappy?" Gabe asked, forehead scrunching as he curled up in the corner of the couch. "Yeah, maybe. But she- I don't know, Matt- she cared about me, at least. Cares." He paused. "We split up last year for a while. I wrote you about that but you probably didn't get it. She started seeing other people- you know... all that shit..." He closed his mouth as he pulled his legs up tighter, knees bumping his chin. "There's not a lot of girls who really wanted to be patient with someone like me. Guess I just got tired of being alone."

Gabe leaned forward, slightly. "You wrote something in one of your letters- you said you were too close to many people, always. And I know you don't really like having that many people around or at least not, well, at least not close. But I've never wanted to be alone, Matt. The only reason I guess I ever tried to be different was because it was better to choose to be an outsider than to always be forced into it."

He bit his lip. "Julie let me in. I know she's bigoted and I know she's mean but she does care about me. I didn't make it easy for her, Matt. I guess I thought that marrying her- giving her that, anyhow- I thought that was the best I could do."

The alcohol was moving in him quickly now, and Matt was aware of that, but not entirely able to stop himself when he said "I was in prison, Gabe. 8 foot by 8 foot cell, and there were soldiers, guards, brass, other prisoners, all around me. You were never out of sight of someone. That was what I meant, that I was too close. Nothing else. Besides - you're different."

He paused, resting his elbows on his knees and leaning forward. "I let you in," he commented neutrally. "Mikey did, my family did, our friends did. Why do you have to get married just to have someone let you in all the time? Did you think she wouldn't divorce you when she got tired of trying to make you into someone else and you never measured up to the standard of the perfect Mormon husband?"

"I loved her, Matt," was all he said. "Just not enough."

And Gabe fell silent again, adding a simple epithet inside his head. Not as much. Shaking his head, he reached down and started pulling off his boots, then paused when he reached his right foot, "Look- you've only got a day here, maybe two, then we've got to figure out a way to get you hidden, right? Let's enjoy what we've got and not sit around talking about her."

Leaning back, he kicked his left boot off, leaving the other on as he wiggled his toes and leaned back. With a slight grin, Gabe added, "I still don't even know what your power is unless it's something to do with chaos. Creating it, I mean."

"Ha ha," Matt said sourly, standing and retrieving the mermaid.

Holding it slightly diffidently, he said "I can, um, summon things. If I want to...well, if I want to kill someone. I can summon the thing that'll do it. I have to figure out how to use it, but...that's what I do. Summoning. I think if I'd put this on her glass at the wedding, she probably would have choked to death on it. Or, at least, the next time I saw her with a glass. I mean I wouldn't have, that's a bit extreme, but I could have. And right then, what she was saying - I wanted her to die. So...that's what I do. And that's why they want me so bad."

"You wanted to kill her?" Gabe said, his voice incredulous as he moved his fingers around Matt's for a moment, pulling the mermaid away. It rested in the middle of his palm and he stared down at it for a moment, before squeezing his fist around it. "Why?"

"She's wrong for you," Matt said, and it was quietly fierce. "I don't know more than that. She's wrong for you, and I don't want you to marry her just because I'm in prison and you miss me - because everything you've said so far is that if I weren't in Gitmo, you wouldn't have gotten involved with someone as selfish as her."

"There's more than eight hundred letters you're missing, Matt," Gabe pointed out. He opened his palm. The mermaid inside was now crushed, its arms and legs snapped into tiny pieces. He dropped it on the carpet, then looked over at Matt, "Don't kill her, alright? I mean, not that you would but..."

He shook his head, mirth contorting his face at the absurdity of it all. "She's not so bad, Matt. I mean, she hates you because she's afraid of you. It's not all her fault... not really." Gabe stood up, walking over to the window and cracking it, his eyes focusing on the darkened sky and the mountains that lay in the distance. "Where are you going to run to now? Is this it? I mean, now that I managed to get you to leave, is that the last I'm gonna see of you?"

His fingers trailed against the windowpane, the chill of the glass almost painful where it touched the skin.

"If I was writing a letter, this'd be the part where I started telling you a fucking story, Matt. Did you ever notice how I started making shit up when I got afraid of what I was going to say?" Nails drummed against the window, the thin glass vibrating under the steady rhythm. He leaned forward so that his forehead touched it, staring out into the darkness. "Of course, you never really said much at all. That I got."

"What I noticed," Matt said, watching his friend, "was that you stopped being alive when you told me those stories. They were dead stories, Gabe. They were you shoving your words into a format that didn't fit. Trying to give me something that you thought I wanted. What I wanted was you, not dead stories."

He didn't answer the rest of the questions - he didn't have answers to the rest of the questions. Not yet.

"You didn't answer my questions, Matt," Gabe said, keeping his voice even. "You haven't really thought this through, have you? I mean, you just got as far as what? Breaking me and Julie up, then running off into the desert?" He turned around, arms folded and eyes narrowing as he watched the other man, back growing still colder as a draft teased his skin. "Look. We've got to plan this out- you can't just run off and not think that they won't catch you."

His breath slowed as he added in a whisper, "Even if it means that this is it, Matt- I don't want you going back to that place."

"I'm going to Canada," Matt said quietly. "We don't have that place yet. So...I'll go there. And if I have to go further, I will."

He stood in front of Gabe for a couple of minutes, looking at him, watching him breathe, and finally said "Come with me."

"Yeah," he answered, a wicked twinkle in his eye. "I think I better. You don't have a car."

Matt stepped closer and pushed into Gabe's grip, folding against the other man, forcing Gabe to hold him.

But all he said was "I better have a fucking car. I don't remember selling mine."

He felt Matt fall against him, head resting against the middle of his chest. His arms closed around the other man for a moment, heart thumping hard as he tried to concentrate on what he was actually saying. Then he realized what he was doing and stepped back a little, hand running through his hair as he laughed.

"Yeah, well, that car was a piece of shit anyhow, Matt- it's probably at Mikey's still. We've been keeping it running," Gabe's nose scrunched, slightly embarrassed by the admission of faith in Matt's return. "But you'll at least need me to drive you to SLC, right? That's where you can ditch me if you want. And mine's not that fucking bad. We'll just have to pull Sean's crap out of the trunk."

"I'm not ditching you," Matt said, staying exactly where he was. He hadn't wanted touch at all, not for years, but this was grounding.

Anchoring.

"You're still my anchor. Fuck you, hold me, you bastard." He grinned, feeling it move oddly on his face as he leaned against Gabe. "I suppose stealing Mikey's car isn't really the way to look all stealthy going to Canada."

"Don't think Mikey'd appreciate it," Gabe grinned. "You should see the engine we put in it- that thing's fast. I fucked with it a bit to see how good I could get it running." His hand rested against Matt's back, trying not to twitch.

"We should at least go there first," he said, growing serious. "To say goodbye. This could be a long time, Matt. It's not some fucking game we're playing." Then Gabe stopped, realizing how it had sounded. "Fuck, I'm sorry. I guess... I forgot... you already know that."

"Yeah," Matt said. "It's my life. All of it. Or at least until the government falls. It took them how long to pardon the Vietnam deserters? And my life is not a game."

He was surprised, in a distant way - the sort of way that you realised something you'd known all your life but never thought about - to realise what he wanted from the other man.

"Come with me," he repeated. "Not just to Canada."

"I already said I was," Gabe answered, pulling away. "What? You think I was going to let you get to Canada and then just walk away?" His head was reeling and he took a long, hard inhalation of oxygen to try and clear it. Reaching out, he tugged Matt's fingers with his own, giving them a firm squeeze before he began walking over to the kitchen.

"I fucking well need to sober up before we go anywhere," he continued. There were undertones in Matt's voice that he'd never heard before. He needed time to think about it- or at least to know that Matt had thought about it. "You do the drunk and driving thing. I can't. Want some coffee?" His speech was starting to slur as he reached for the coffeepot, sloshing water from the faucet into it clumsily.

"I fucking well need to say goodbye to my family before we go anywhere," Matt pointed out. "And stop Mikey from coming with us. And you," he added, "smashed the phone. Smart move, tough guy. But yeah, I want some fucking coffee."

He lit a cigarette and leaned against the wall in the tiny kitchen, watching the other man. "So...tomorrow had better be more than maybe over," he pointed out. "I mean, if you're going to be a fugitive with me."

"Tomorrow was over the minute you knocked on my door," Gabe said, his arm reaching up to pull a coffee filter from the cabinet above. He put it in the pot, slowly measuring out the grounds as a way of keeping his eyes focused. Clearing his throat, he commented, "So... I need to take Sean his shit before we go. And say goodbye. Mom- well. Anyhow, it'd be good to see everybody in Salt Lake. I haven't been there in a couple weeks."

"Priorities," Matt murmured, vaguely complimented that Gabe thought that highly of him. "Coffee first, Sean's stuff second, pack up and off to SLC to see my family, then Canada bound. Got your passport? I don't think," he added, "that I'd better plan on travelling visibly - so I'm glad your hair's brown, since I'll be the one in the trunk of the car."

"Just like old times," Gabe grinned. "I'll be sure I don't lock it this time."

*****

They stopped short of the border, and Matt climbed into the trunk of the car. It was fuller than he could want, but at least he was small. And there were just some things you didn't leave behind, even if you needed to get in contact with the black market on the other side of the border and start making yourself up.

They'd barely talked Mikey out of coming with them, and that was part of the reason they were here - the day that Gabe should have been getting married. Matt liked the symbolism, though he doubted that Gabe would appreciate having it pointed out if he hadn't already thought of it. Matt had insisted on crossing the border today, because it would give Mikey less time to wear him down and because the military wouldn't be looking for him yet.

The leave was traditional, but he imagined they hadn't wanted to give it to him.

He felt the car slow in the queue, heard the voice of someone outside speaking, but couldn't make out words, and concentrated on breathing and being calm.

Gabe knew something was wrong from the way the border guard looked at him when he presented his passport. Her eyebrow did one quick half-raise, then slumped. She didn't say anything, however, just gave him a calm look and asked, "How long are you staying?"

"Overnight," he answered, keeping his hands on the wheel so that she wouldn't see that they were sweating.

"How much money are you bringing with you?"

"Five hundred," Gabe said. He noticed that she was still holding his passport. Her hand was reaching under the counter and he sucked in his breath, willing himself not to gun it. He could see a woman in the other car staring.

"Drive over there to the left," the guard said, gesturing to the side. There were no other cars.

"I need that back." His finger pointed to the passport. She shoved it back in his hand and he noticed that her fingers were clammy. He wrenched the steering wheel so that the car lurched towards the side. His heart was pounding in his chest as a police unit came up from behind, flanking him. He heard it tell him to park from a loudspeaker and he shut off the engine.

"Step out of the car, son." The cop's voice was hard. Gabe opened the door and stepped outside. He saw that four more cops were coming from a building nearby, eyes fixed upon him. All you can do, Gabe thought. Is stay calm. Give Matt time to run. His eyes looked down at the man, much thicker than him but shorter. "Put your hands on the car."

He didn't.

"I said, put your hands on the car." A nightstick came flashing out, blistering pain erupting in Gabe's stomach as the cop slammed it against his skin. He fell against the car, the impact so hard that it started to rock. One hand pressed against it, not to obey but so he could stand.

"I've got a right to an attorney," he said.

"Where is Cavanaugh?" The voice barked at him. "Where is he?" Something in his head snapped and Gabe shoved the cop, pushing him so hard that he fell and started to run, knowing they would follow. The hit to his stomach was slowing him, however, and pain lanced through his body, making it impossible to breathe. Hands caught him, snagging around his wrist and snapping him backwards. A crowd of them was around him now, a cluster of blurred black and white forcing his arms back so tight he couldn't breathe.

"Where is he?" He didn't answer. Two of the cops pulled at his shoulders, dragging him towards the building. Out of sight.

Matt wasn't going down without a fight. Not the moment he heard it go bad, the moment that Gabe hit the car.

And he blessed the fact that the other man had been careful with the trunk.

Matt came out of the trunk like an avenging angel, but it took him a valuable moment to orient on Gabe, already almost out of sight around the building, and though his gun was drawn one of the cops tackled him, and he went down hard, the gun flying from his hand, spinning away across the concrete like a deadly star.

Ribs cracked and he screamed but fought still, kicking, punching, biting, struggling to grab the other man's gun or to get free and run, or something.

And he lost. They held him between them, standing him up so that his feet - he hated being short - didn't quite touch the ground, and his ribs were agony as he screamed obscenities at them.

Gabe was gone, out of sight as they dragged Matt - well, dragged was optional, given that his toes barely touched the ground still - to a waiting car.

One that he was displeased to note had a Canadian insignia on it. The motherfuckers were cooperating.

He pointed that out with gestures, and all they did was laugh and cuff his hands behind his back.

"Matt!" Gabe screamed until one of the cops punched him in the face, knowing that Matt couldn't hear it, knowing that it had all gone bad. He kept punching back, kept kicking and screaming until they finally knocked him out cold.

When he woke up, he was in a cell. He heard the wresting of keys in the lock and looked up, his eyes hopeful.

It was Julie.

"Your dad's on his way," she said, her voice brisk. "I know that you couldn't help it, Gabe. I called the border guards myself after he'd taken you." Her eyes looked sad as she added, "It wasn't right of him to use his powers on you. I'm sure we can get you out-" The sentence wasn't finished. His hands reached out, pinning her to the wall, his forearm against her throat.

"This was you?" He hissed. Her fingers were scrabbling at his arm, trying to force him off of her.

"Stop it, Gabe," she was whimpering, her eyes obviously surprised. "I was just trying to help you. Please, Gabe- stop." Her face was reddening, nails digging deeper into his skin. "I love you, Gabe- stop it, please, please stop..." Footsteps were coming down the hall- hard, heavy footsteps- and he let her go with one final shove. She flew away from him, her eyes wide as they blinked, obviously staring at the rapid breathing of his chest.

"We can get you help." He noticed that she was only saying it from behind the safety of the bars and the guard that had come to stand next to her, hand on his gun.

"It's over."

"You've got a problem-"

"You, Julie." Gabe sat down on the hard bench. "You were the problem."

*****

October 31st, 2005, a different cell in Gitmo.

Gabe,

I don't even know if you'll get this, and now I guess I know how you felt when you started writing to me - writing to me every goddamn day even though I didn't reply for damn near six months. I don't know where you are or what you're doing, but I haven't heard from you so I guess maybe what they tell me is right and you're in prison.

Don't ask me why I'm writing to your last address if you're in jail.

At least, I'm assuming that. Maybe they're just keeping your letters from me again. Fuck if I know. I hate shouting into a void like this, but I guess I'll do it. You did it for me, and you did so much more - it's the very least I could do.

I tried to get away, but they got me. I don't know if you saw that, but I'm assuming you did. You were almost out of sight, though, when I got out of the car. I've spent several of the last few months in what we don't call solitary here because there is no solitary here. Really.

(censored, two paragraphs)

So anyway, you know perfectly well what happened that morning, in case the above doesn't come through. I hope you're all right, and I hope you're free and they're just holding on to your letters again.

Apparently, when my sentence is up, I'm going to Saudi. Right now they've got me for desertion, but they're not going to discharge me that easily - I could live with that. They're sending me over to the sandbox anyway. I don't know why.

Maybe because they don't know that the enemy of my enemy is my friend or something.

But it was worth it to see you again. And to not stand up at your wedding. And to know you'd go with me to a life on the run.

Goddamn idiot, getting arrested for me. I should slap you upside the head, motherfucker.

Good night, Gabe. I hope you get this.

Matt

*****

He gave it to the guard - a different one, now that so much time had passed - with a casually fierce expression.

Daring him to lose the letter.

Wanting Gabe to get it. Wanting it more than anything.

Not caring who knew it.

*****

"You got a letter," Sean said. He was sitting behind the other side of the glass, obviously nervous as he drummed his fingers on the desk. Gabe had never noticed until he'd come to prison how similar the two of them were in their gestures, how his father had influenced his physical habits down to the way that his nails pounded rhythms whenever he was forced to sit in one spot for too long. And Sean seemed particularly restless today, his eyes flashing angrily at every guard that passed.

It took a moment for Gabe to register what he'd said, then his brows furrowed. There was no one who knew where he was besides Julie and he didn't think she'd write again.

"I- uh-" Sean didn't seem his confident self now. He was eying his son as if he'd broken a trust. "I filed a change of address. For your old place. Gave 'em my address." He cleared his throat. "I know- what happened- I mean, I know how it is. I thought maybe-" And his father's voice dropped to a whisper. "Thought he'd write and you'd want it."

The paper slipped through the slot in the window. Gabe's fingers grasped for it, trembling.

"They won't take it, will they, Dad?" He forgot himself in the anxiety of touching the page as his thumb and forefinger clutched it, rubbing so hard they were leaving smudges on the envelope. Sean shook his head emphatically.

"Fucking hell, I'll make sure they don't." There was an understanding in those eyes and the two men looked at one another for a long moment. Sean pulled away first. "I know... I know I never was much of a father, Gabriel-" Gabe started to say something but Sean held up a hand, silencing him. "But I'll make sure you get your letters." His eyes were full as he said finally, "Don't stop writing."

*****

He sat on his bunk, waiting for the slow jerk and hitch of his cellmate's breath before he started to write. He could barely see- the only light nearby was that of the guard station, two cells down- but there was enough for him to trace the words with blunted pencil.

December 1, 2005 - I think
(censored)
I don't know when

Matt,

Sean brought me your last letter. He set up a forwarding address so he could get the letters- I guess, it's his way of trying to make amends. He knows how important you this is to me.

I wish they hadn't gotten you. I tried, Matt. I fucking tried to run. I guess it was stupid but I thought maybe I could buy you enough time to get away or else they'd get so caught up in beating the shit out of me that you'd manage something. I'm so fucking sorry.

(censored)

I don't know what to say. There's a lot of shit I was going to say to you out there but everything's so fucked in here, Matt. I know now why you didn't tell me much. Everything I could say wouldn't be anything you'd want to hear, I don't think.

It was worth it, though.

When you get to the desert, you better fucking write.

Sleep well, Matt.

Gabe

*****

Christmas had been a long, boring stretch of time with no letter. Thanksgiving had been a joke, New Year's had been a joke, and the best joke of all was that they were thinking of sending him overseas soon.

He didn't even know where Gabe was, let alone whether he was getting Matt's letters, and they were going to take him even further away.

But finally a letter came for him. Finally.

*****

February 8th, 2006

Gabe,

It wasn't worth it, anchor, so I'll just assume you're crazy.

They're making noise about sending me out of here. Maybe around September, maybe in July - might be next week for all I know.

When you're out of there, I want you to write back to me. I can't stand thinking of you in prison. I can't stand that you traded your future for me and I fucked up and got your future AND me taken away from you.

I won't stop you from writing before that, though - rereading that last, it looked like that was what I was asking you for, and it's not.

I wish you were here. That's all I have any more. Well, no. I don't wish you were here, I wish we were elsewhere together. But...yeah. You know why I didn't tell you stories now, huh.

But I've got one for you, I think, if I can get the goddamn geckos to stay off the paper long enough to write it. Not that it's a long story, just more that I don't really like geckos.

I'm telling my story a different way, though. And I don't mean anything by, you know, who's who - it's the idea I like. I'm just suggesting that perhaps someday things'll change. But if they don't, Bonnie and Clyde get me through the days right now.

Not that I want to die. If I did, I'd've solved this a long time ago. I just don't want to live on their terms, and I want to be with you.

Good night, Gabe.

Write back.

Matt

*****

March 22, 2006
(censored)
after dinner

Matt,

I'm in solitary now.

I swore I wouldn't talk about what it's like here but I can't keep my promises. I can't keep anything. I feel like I'm fucking falling apart and I can't even tell you the worst of it. I can't tell you what's going on in my head because they'll take it from me. I wish I was there too. At least there I could hear you maybe. At least there you'd know if I was going crazy or if it's just that being here's made me mad.

Sean keeps trying to get me out. But the thing is, he's been in and out of prison so many times that he's hardly a character witness. I told you that in a letter once, that he was in prison when I was a kid, didn't I?

I'm falling apart, Matt. I'm fucking losing it.

And the thing is, it's not even that it's bad here. It's that this crazy fucking thing is happening in my head. I need you- I need someone to explain to this to- I need to be out.

I'm in solitary but I'm not alone.

*****

The other man snatched the piece of paper from Gabe's hand.

"He's going to come for the mail soon," he said. It was richer than Gabe's own, mellowed with the sounds of age and weary, but the tones were so close as to be the same. "You need to calm down. We can't have him finding me here. This is solitary. He won't search the room so I can hide under the bed if we drape the blanket down but only if you're quiet."

"You're in my fucking head," Gabe said helplessly, his eyes staring up at the other man.

"I'm you."

The paper slid into the envelope. He watched as the other man rested his mouth on the fold for just a moment, the same way that he always did, then placed it by the door. Jerking the blanket off the top bunk, he draped it across the bottom so his other self could slide under the bottom and against the wall. If he was crazy, so be it.

*****

April 15th, 2006
Guan-fucking-ta-fucking-na-fucking-mo Bay.

Gabe,

You're scaring me. I couldn't lose it for three fucking years, I still haven't, and you are. And I don't know what's worse - that I don't know what's happening to you or that I don't know whether you're really the one sending me letters now.

Which probably sounds like I'm the one going crazy, doesn't it?

The motherfuckers are censoring me harder, by the way. So - imagine that you know what I'd think, because you do.

I've got a date. Do you have one? They ship me out of this fucking delightful place August 12th. Unless they change their minds.

No one's alone right now, Gabe. It's what solitary and prison does to you. You start imagining things, you start hearing things, you start thinking that maybe there's someone else there with you.

That's why it's solitary. Because they want us to go crazy.

Keep writing to me, Gabe. We'll hold each other together.

Matt

*****

He wondered if the other man would understand the doubletalk that went into his letter - that he was afraid that if he called attention to the situation, whatever it was, something would be done to one or both of them.

He wondered if Gabe was sane enough by now to know that he was doubletalking to keep from being censored.

*****

"Keep writing to me, Gabe. We'll hold each other together." Avinoam finished the sentence as he sat on the corner of the bed. Gabe was curled up against the rail, fallen silent. His throat was still swollen from the throttling he'd undergone two days ago when he called someone from the future who hated him.

He'd finally come to accept that what the first of these people had told him was the truth. He had a power, as Matt did- but his power was far more useless. He could summon different versions of himself from alternate futures. He'd started calling them Avinoams, if only to keep it straight in his own head, and they seemed to accept that. Apparently, it was their middle name too.

This one was older than the past three had been. He hadn't asked anything about the future that Avinoam had come from and he noticed that nothing had been volunteered. He tried to think about what that might mean.

"You're awfully quiet," Avinoam said.

"Just thinking."

"You should tell him the truth," the older man paused, his eyebrow arching. "Although he is right- they will censor it. It might make you feel better."

"I don't in your reality, do I?"

Avinoam paused, jerking his head away. "No."

"Why do all of you try to tell me what to do all the time?" Gabe said, frustrated. "And it's never the same solution- no one ever seems to agree on anything." He'd called three of them the other night after Sean had left him a deck of cards. He still wasn't quite sure how four versions of himself had managed to lose a game of poker to each other but the bickering afterwards had made that inconsequential.

"No one likes to see their mistakes repeated," Avinoam pointed out, standing up and dropping the letter in his lap. "I suppose it's our way of trying to stop them from happening in the first place." He bit his lip, looking younger for a moment as he glanced down at Gabe. "Or perhaps we're trying to make sure that we happen. I don't know what happens when you stop calling us. None of us do. Maybe we just... disappear."

Gabe glanced up at him with alarm.

"You hadn't thought about that, had you?" The other man's grin managed to be sad and sarcastic at the same time. "Write your letter, Gabe. Letters never hurt anyone."

"I'm not telling him the truth until I can tell him in person," he said stubbornly.

"Hope that you do, then."

*****

June 23, 2006
(censored)
night

Matt,

I didn't mean to make you think I was crazy. To tell you what was going on when that was written, well, I can't. Not and know that you'd get it or that I'd have any hope of seeing you again if I told you the truth. I might've killed myself right there, saying that much.

I'm still in solitary but I sort of like it here. They keep bringing me back. Guys in prison don't like "mutant sympathizers" much- I think it's sort of like being a rapist. You can hang out with other sympathizers and there's sort of a clique there but you've got to follow their rules for any sort of protection. I didn't want them to touch me. Rule #1 broken. So I lost my safety and every so often, I get thrown back in here for trying to- well, you know how it is.

Sean's said that I'm going to be released in the fall sometime. I don't know whether to believe him but he's got some lawyer filing appeal after appeal. My dad knows the system though, Matt, and he's never been one to offer hope. If he says that's true, then it's got to be true. But it won't matter 'cause you'll be gone by then.

I want you to tell me everything about what's happened when you're gone. At least tell me about what you're seeing, the people that you meet, the things that you do. If I can't be there with you, I'd at least like to know that you're okay or that they haven't broken you yet. Not that they ever could.

I guess if there's one thing to be gotten from all of this, it's that I've learned a lot, Matt. Prison's an education all in its own. I can go back to working for Sean and I think I might actually be able to, you know, do my job now. I don't know about college. Do you think they'd take me back, felon and all? I wish I could've shown you some of the things I got from that place- I meant to, when we reached where we were going. But it's too late now, I guess. For now, anyways.

I refuse to think that was the last time I'm ever going to see you. So, even if it's ten years from now, save me a drink, will you? I'm not letting this place beat me down.

Good night, Matt. I hope your dreams are quiet tonight.

Gabe

*****

August 1st, 2006
Poised to fly

Gabe,

You dumb fuck. Of course they'll let you back into college. Don't fuck up your life just because you're a mutant sympathiser. Which is not to say that I don't admire the support, and want it, just that you can climb into a fucking bottle if you feel like it, and don't blame it on me.

I doubt that even made sense.

Look, motherfucker, go to college, all right? They'll take you back. You're not a repo man any more than you were a husband, at leas to that woman, so go the fuck to college and get a fucking education, you idiot.

And take names, because I'll be kicking ass as soon as I get back. Anyone touches you - they answer to me. I guess I figure you're in federal prison, so maybe if I piss on a flag in the Middle East I'll wind up in the same prison as you and then I can kick some fucking ass. Or wait, is that actually illegal yet?

Pissing on flags, not punching motherfuckers out, I mean.

Anyway. I'm glad I heard from you, and I'm glad you're not wandering the streets of SLC vacant-eyed and crazy. Because I started to think that, when I didn't hear from you. Maybe they're holding our letters both ways. Maybe.

Maybe not. But I'm writing to you now, you're writing to me now, the world is all right again.

Except for, you know, how it's fucking not.

Fuck. This is fucking depressing and melancholy and not really a letter to send anyone. But here I am, in a hole deeper than I can imagine, and the person who was my light's being kept from me now.

I hope you don't slit your wrists when you read this. I'm just fucking miserable right now. But I expect it'll get better soon enough.

Better when I can see something other than fucking hibiscus and liana and Spanish moss and barbed wire. Maybe I'll replace my view with, fuck, I don't know, a rock and a camel and a bunch of sand.

I'll get mail there, they tell me.

Write to me in Jeddah, Gabe. Write to me as soon as you get this. Maybe we can meet somewhere. If they'll let you into a war zone. And by the way, if you fucking enlist, I'll fucking shoot you myself.

And something I never said because I never had to before because we knew it. It was part of being best friends, from the second I met you at that concert. Something I never said.

I love you Gabe. I'll miss you, I want to see you - I'll get leave someday. Maybe. If my attitude improves.

I'll see you then.

Never make me say that again. It's really not macho enough for me.

Matt

*****

The boxes were stacked up in the corner of the garage. Sean was still sweating, Gabe noticed, wiping his brow with the back of his forearm as he rested the last box in the corner. Gabe had grown a lot stronger in prison- days of nothing to do but exercise did that to a person, he'd found. He'd offered to do all the unloading himself but Sean had refused. There was an odd nervousness to his father and had been, all the way back from the storage unit.

"Want a drink, Sean?" Gabe grinned. "You look like you need one."

"No." Sean didn't grin back as Gabe had supposed. Instead, he reached into the back pocket of paint-splattered jeans and pulled out something. An envelope. An opened envelope. Gabe snatched it from him, his eyes angry, reflecting betrayal as he opened his mouth. Sean spoke first, cutting off his son before he could say anything more. "Count yourself lucky I read it. Someone there got this, you'd've had hell to pay."

Shooting a suspicious look up at him, Gabe pulled it out, noticing how the pencil on the page was smudged. At first, he didn't see what his father was talking about- it was the usual Matt letter- until he hit the bottom. Then he saw it. And he read it. Read it over and over as his father looked at him, knowing that both of them were giving that one precious sentence far more weight than Matt had meant it, but unable to stop touching the words. Just as he imagined Sean had- he could see the smudge of a fingerprint on the swirl of Matt's "l".

"What happened between the two of you out there?" Sean asked.

Gabe just kept staring at the page, his finger tracing that one word over and over.

"Nothing, Dad," and there was more honesty and pain in his voice than in anything he'd ever said to his father. "Nothing happened out there."

"Well," and then Sean Wilder said the one thing that Gabe would never, ever have expected. "I wish it would have. I'm sorry." His hand rested on Gabe's shoulder for just a moment, then flitted away. The sound of the door that closed behind him as he left was a soft shudder, the click of it barely registering as Gabe set the letter down.

September 11, 2006
Aurora, Colorado
3:30 pm

Matt,

I just got your letter. Sean kept that one. He said that he didn't think it would get to me otherwise and if you wrote other letters, I never got them so I guess it was the truth.

He read it, of course. I can't really say I'm angry about it even though I know I should be. (I bet you're pissed when you read that.) You get sort of used in prison to not having anything of your own. I always guarded your letters, though. It feels sort of odd being able to have them just sitting on my desk and to know that no one's going to take them. I have to stop myself from looking over my shoulder all the time. It's odd, how a place can change a person. Sean said it gets better. Prison was good for us, in a way that wouldn't make sense to any other father and son. I've even started calling him Dad sometimes. Who'd've thought?

As far as climbing into a bottle, I haven't got any plans for that. You're right. It's not really my thing.

I'm still settling back into my old life. Mom's called twice already asking for money- or excuse me, asking to drop by. Sean says she's told him three times she'll go into rehab. He looked bothered when he told me that. They hadn't been talking for years so he wasn't used to her excuses, I don't think. It's odd how he looks when he talks about her. His face gets softer, somehow. I've always wondered why he never got married again but now, I think I know.

Julie's also called. I'm not going to mention how many times.

But what about you? Tell me about Jeddah- there's got to be more than camels there, you idiot. If they're going to send you there and make you stay, then fucking make it brilliant. Take everything you can- lose nothing. I mean, you've got a chance that most people don't.

If you're there to save the country, then save the country. And I don't mean by blowing shit up or hurting people. No, tell people what this country really is. As my grandfather says (he was an old anarchist), you love the country- you love the people, you love the land, you love the ideals, even, it was built on. It's the government you hate. So remind people of what we were. Who knows? Fucking hell, maybe we'll get there again.

But we won't if people forget.

I was going to send you a picture but then I thought that it was sort of stupid to do that and you probably wouldn't get it or want it anyhow. I look different than I did. I think I'm going back to the blue hair though. Fucking hell, I don't want to feel the buzz of a razor against my head again. Ever.

I guess this is it. It's not all I have to say, but I'm saving the rest for when you come home. Not if. When.

Gabe

*****

Matt thought about that for a while, wondering why Gabe felt so compelled to tell him that Sean had read it. It was a letter. A little brasher than most, maybe, but only a letter.

And as Gabe had found out, in prison you didn't get secrets.

But in the Middle East, weirdly enough, you sort of did. At least if you weren't in trouble, if you didn't make trouble, you were fine.

Matt thought about that, that night, sitting the bar, drinking as he did every night now. Drinking because being just a little bit drunk was better than being sober, and sometimes being a lot drunk was better than being sober. It was another of the not-funny parallels in his life - that the island that invented rum was dry, for Matt, but the cradle of a religion that forbade alcohol was a sea of whiskey and beer.

He had friends now, most of them not quite close friends. A lot were mutants, a few were soldiers, and some of the civilians on the base seemed to like him, but that was hard to evaluate. They could just be saying that, he knew, saying it to the occupiers of their country because that was prudent to do.

But he hoped they meant it, at least to him.

There was no one like Gabe.

*****

New Year's Eve, 2006
Jeddah, Saudi Arabia,

Gabe,

Why would I be pissed about your dad reading that letter? There's not anything in it that I want to hide - nothing I wouldn't tell him to his face. You forget that it's me we're talking about. I'm the one who doesn't care what anyone thinks, remember? I'll tell them to their faces.

I'm glad he kept it for you. Just because I don't mind that he read it doesn't mean that I'd have been exactly thrilled if he'd lost it or destroyed it, but he's not like Julie, because no one is, so he clearly does not believe that I am the sole root of evil in the universe.

I'm on his side.

It's weird to get letters so often now. I get a lot of them from my family - occasionally I get old ones from you. Like seriously old. I think Aguilar still has all your letters somewhere and likes to taunt me by sending them on. Not many so far, only five or six. But still.

Susannah's so big now, Gabe. You wouldn't believe. Mikey's got a girlfriend who seems serious - I don't even know if you see my family any more, but I guess you haven't had much time to get back in touch with them. At least not since getting out of jail.

Anyway, my money's on it that Mikey and Shelley break up because I don't believe he'll marry anyone named Shelley, of all things, but he says different. He's still a punk.

Danielle and Richard are trying for another kid, but no luck yet. My parents are fine - older, a little slower, a little greyer, but still going. My mom's practice is sort of half-shut right now. Not a lot of cause for social justice work in America, land of the free.

And me? I'm in Jeddah. It's pretty here, as long as you know that the adjective is really "pretty overstated". I don't think the Arabs found a light bulb they had a problem with, and they tell me this place is better than Riyadh or Abu Dhabi or the other one. Fuck, I can't remember. Starts with D.

Doha, that's it.

This place is crazy. I'd like it better if the civs liked us, but I guess I can't have everything and I know that. It just...well, I haven't killed any of them that I know of, and I wish I could wear a sign on my head saying that.

I guess it's my way of telling people what my country really is.

Two things I've learned: camels really do spit (they also can kick you with a back foot while you're standing in front of them, just like mules) and keffiyahs were invented for a reason. I think my brain's going to fry right out of my skull one of these days. Hence the protective pickling of it.

Anyway.

If I can't have you, I want a fucking picture, you tosser. Send it to me.

Also: I have a helmet now. Watch Platoon and you'll know exactly what it's like.

Happy fucking New Year. Next year in Salt Lake City, as they totally don't say in Israel, but close enough.

Matt

*****

"It better be next year," Gabe said with a sigh, glancing down at the piece of paper. The phone rang again. He yelled out to Sean, "Don't answer that! You know it's her!", and slammed the door. He wasn't quite sure which her he meant- his mother had started calling. Oddly enough, not to talk to him. And he didn't quite know how he felt about it.

February 14, 2007
Aurora, Colorado (but not for long)
7 pm

Matt,

It's funny how much things change, isn't it? A couple of years ago, I'd not have gotten this letter written until midnight or maybe dawn because I had to go out and sit at some formal table somewhere, squint at someone over candlelight and listen to tinny, sappy music playing over some canned stereo. I think I like this better. It seems more real.

I'm putting a picture in here but it's not a good one. You took it a couple years back- oh, fuck, it's been almost four years, hasn't it? Christ, Matt. Anyhow, I'll stick something more current in here too in case you forgot what I look like. Do the same if you've got one. Do they give you film now that you've done what they wanted? I don't even know if they're censoring my letters now.

I'm heading out to Grandpa's this week. He and Grandma have got a wild hair to move to Tuscaloosa, apparently. I don't know what cause they're off on now but I promised I'd help them move, part because I miss them but also because I feel weird being here now. I sort of feel like I'm in Sean's way a bit with all the strangeness surrounding him and my mom but I don't know why I think that. Or maybe it's just that she's calling all the time now and it's not for me.

I finally got stuck talking to Julie the other day. I wanted to fucking kill her, Matt. I'll be honest about that. I wish I would've hit her at least but Sean answered the door and Sean kept his hand on my arm so hard I couldn't even lift it. She just came by to tell me she was getting married and that she wanted to be "friends". I don't know what she gets out of it. It felt like she was trying to thumb it in my face. I guess to say that she found something better than me.

It wasn't much after that that Gramps called, so I wonder if Sean didn't have something to do with it. I managed a break off from classes- my Chem instructor likes me enough to let me send in some assignments from home, some I might do while I'm out there. Of course, I guess there's always the thought I could consider staying.

There's not much to keep me anywhere, now that you're gone. Maybe I'll travel. Or maybe I'll just stay put. It's hard to get letters when there's nowhere to mail them to and PO boxes don't seem like a real address, somehow.

Anyhow, maybe I'll drop by and see Mikey before I take off. Because a Shelley? That seems about as farfetched as me and someone named Julie, doesn't it? You going to drop by that wedding too? 'Cause if you are, let me know.

But I better get going. Mom's on the phone apparently.

Good night, Matt. And happy Valentine's day, whatever that means in Arabia.

Gabe

*****

Matt looked at the letter that he held curiously, as if expecting another letter to pop out from inside, possibly with a party-horn sort of noise.

It was weird to realise you weren't getting the whole story again, and not because Gabe's letters weren't coming through but because Gabe himself wasn't answering the letters.

*****

March 10, 2007
Tikrit, Iraq

Gabe,

You've got to start over, earlier. Why would you move to Tuscaloosa (I don't even know what STATE that's in)? When did you go back to school, and what are you studying?

I like your picture just fine. I'm enclosing one of me. I finally figured out where to get hair dye here, and, well, they don't really care what we do, if we're mutants, as long as we do what we're told. We can look like anything we want. So. Pink seemed festive.

I hear that, partly as a result of your visit, the thought of a Shelley in the family is no more. Good work. I'm proud of you. Because basically, if I'm not there, you're the fucking enforcer, Gabe.

Anyway. Tell me that you broke Julie's arms, or ran her over with a moving van or something, on your way out of town.

I hope this letter gets to you.

Matt

*****

He smiled as he saw the picture fall out of the envelope. Staring down at it, he noticed that Matt's hair was a florid pink. It amused him even more that it was sticking out from underneath a bulky steel helmet. He bit his lip as he wondered to himself who Matt was friends with now. It had taken a long time for him to get this letter.

"Maybe... maybe he's found himself now," he found himself saying to the empty air. He half-expected someone to answer him back but he'd finally managed control over his other selves. They no longer came when he was lonely- he had to actually call them.

It didn't matter, anyhow. They weren't Matt. It was no good talking to himself about Matt, no matter how much the others understood.

So he picked up the pen with a heavy heart and tried to write despite his apprehensions. He didn't know what else to do.

*****

April 1, 2007
Tuscaloosa, AL
8:10 pm

Matt,

I guess if anything, I've kept my old habit of writing to you on holidays. That was the one time when you were in prison where I felt my chances were best of getting a letter to you. It's gotten harder and harder to tell you everything about my life, I guess, because I know that you'll actually get it.

And don't ask me to explain how that is. At least not in a letter.

Tuscaloosa is in Alabama. Remember how I said I'd never lived in the Deep South? Alabama's not as bad as it sounds, though. I'm moving on at the end of the semester, so I can go back to Colorado. But Gramps and Gram are getting old and I wanted to make sure that they were okay. Moving's hard work for old bones and I guess, prison made me a lot stronger than I used to be. You should see the muscles I've got now- they'd probably make you laugh. Not that they're impressive. I'm always going to be sort of scrawny.

I went back to school right before that letter I sent you. I'm studying chemistry, or to be more exact, pyrotechnic chemistry. It's invention but of a different sort. Fireworks aren't as likely to kill anybody as robots are. Plus, I always sort of liked blowing shit up. I got into this the first time I went to school- I guess it was my subversive way of staying immature but doing something sort of mature at the same time. That doesn't really make much sense, does it?

But I'm good at it and I never really thought I'd be good at much of anything that wasn't fixing a car or building/breaking things. And I sort of like it. It's better than Riley's English class, even, and if you remember, I actually went to school for her. And unlike everybody else, it wasn't to stare at her legs.

Whatever. I'm going back up to the Wasatch first thing when I get home. I already told Sean that I'm spending the first couple weeks of May up there. He thinks I'm crazy but I miss the mountains. They aren't the same here.

So if my letters are erratic for a while, that's why. They've only got that little post office in the foothills and I plan to hike up past all those places you showed me. Think I'll survive the experience?

I miss you. I know you once said not to make you repeat that sort of bullshit, that you were too macho for it but I'm fucking saying it anyhow.

Wish you were here.

Gabe

*****

April 15th because I don't pay taxes

Gabe,

What I told you not to make me repeat was actually me telling you I loved you, moron.

And see, you made me repeat it. Why? Just like hearing it that much, or just not paying attention that much? Missing someone - well, I'm not so amazingly macho that I care if anyone else hears me say that.

You fucker. Maybe I don't love you if you're going to go hike my fucking mountains without me. Take pictures of those, will you? I want to see them.

It's amazing what a little bit of freedom will do for you, actually. Or at least for me. Knowing that I can walk away, for a given value of away, knowing that I can go farther - well. After four years in Gitmo, that's a breath of fresh air. Unfortunately, not quite the fresh air I want, but that'll come.

It must come, right?

The war must end, someday. If it doesn't...I don't know what I'll do. There's something appealing about what I told you I wanted to do once, but if I say more they'll get curious.

Still. That's full time. 24-7-365.

I think you're going to get eaten by a cougar, tenderfoot. That's what I think. But I hear they have nice mountains in BC, too. Just for comparison. Not as high as the Wasatch, but challenging all the same. And fucking cold.

Someday I'll hike those. Someday when all this shit's over and done with.

It sounds like Alabama agrees with you. I'm glad to hear that it's interesting, and that you're liking school because you should make something of yourself, by god.

I still miss you, Gabe.

Good night.

Matt

*****

For a minute, he thought that the phone call was about Gabe - or Mikey - or Danielle - or his parents - and his heart clutched, skipped a beat, went on too quickly, erratically, harshly.

When he found out what it was, it was scarcely better.

*****

May 5th, 2007
Riyadh, Saudi

Gabe,

Grandma died. I'll be home for a few days. I don't know if you'll get this, but if you do - I have a couple weeks, apparently. I leave tomorrow. I'm not sure what the point is, given the funeral's over, but fuck, I'm not going to hold that against them.

No point in shipping someone out if they're just going to make you come back.

Matt

*****

When the second letter came, Sean rested it next to the first. Gabe hadn't had much to say upon his return from Alabama. Instead, with a troubled look, he had packed his things and left again when he'd found there were no letters waiting.

Sean glanced down at the postmarks again.

"Must have been delayed," he said and for a moment, thought of going to the Wasatch himself to bring Gabriel these letters that obviously meant so much. Then he shook his head. No. Sometimes a man needed to be alone.