Title:Let Nothing Ye Dismay
Author: Paul Plesko
Email address: pplesko@hotmail.com
Series/Sequel: n/a
Character/Pairings: Brian
Category: Brian POV
Rating: R
Date: Dec. 20, 2002
Summary: Christmas is a tough time for some people. The sweet sentimentality sometimes reminds them of what they don’t have… the love the holiday represents. The Rage Party had been just two weeks before Christmas… so the wounds had barely healed.
Spoilers: None
Warnings: None
Author Notes: Readers should have read several of my other stories before attempting this one. It refers to Brian’s past in the "Requiem" series and in "Prometheus Unbound"… and it follows shortly after much of the narrative of "Aftermath."

Let Nothing Ye Dismay
by Paul Plesko

Dismay (dis mā’) v.t. 1. to break down the courage utterly, as by sudden danger or trouble; dishearten utterly; daunt.
–Syn appall, terrify, horrify, frighten, disconcert.

Blackness. Utter, cold blackness… like deep ocean water. Feeling my body rise but unable to use my arms to swim. Like rising from a cesspool; the swirling dreams pulling me back. Then breaking the surface as the filth streams off of my torso in black rivulets. [I had used this image in the Bill’s Automotive campaign… the naked, male torso rising from the oil pool… black goo parting to show tanned skin… "Get lubed." An appeal to the ladies.]

Alone in-bed. Propped-up with a few pillows… breathing deeply as if I had actually run-the-race in my dream. I had delivered my presents last night… to Deb, Vic, and Mikey… to Gus, Lindsey, and Melanie (he loved his presents… a miniature drum-set and a Razor Scream Big Wheel)… and to Mom and to my nephews, the ungrateful little bastards. But driving back along Liberty Avenue, I found no one; the street was practically deserted. All the potential tricks had places to go on Christmas Eve. I didn’t stop at Babylon. It would have been almost empty. Even the paid dancers had the night off. Just the serious drinkers were there. I had done my drinking alone… in the loft. Waking up alone isn’t so bad… but going to bed alone just made me face the fact that Justin was gone.

The dream that started it… reviewing it in my consciousness. The coach wanted me to run the hundred-yard-dash, a distance I had never run before. Crouching at the starting line… not knowing how to put my feet in the blocks… feeling uncomfortable with my ass in-the-air… looking from side to side to try to figure-out where to put my hands… afraid the gun would go off before I could get in-place… the fear of failure… of not living up to his expectations… of making a fool of myself. I could still feel the tension in my body… the insecurity… the impending, inevitable failure… set-up to fail, perhaps to give me humility or to punish me for something. Coach demanded more from me than anyone ever had… never satisfied… driving me to succeed. I felt the warmth of his hand on my shoulder even now. I turned to kiss my shoulder, now, as I had never been able to kiss his hand to thank him for instilling the desire for success in a lonesome, insecure boy.

And then another running image… falling in a race because my running shoe fell apart and tripped me… seeing the track meet my face in slow-motion… watching legs run past me… wondering why I couldn’t have decent shoes like the other runners. My father never came to any of my races. He was never proud of me. I sank further into the bed as the images of Christmas Morning swept over me, turning me into a small boy again.

A Christmas morning, long ago: How old was I? Four, maybe? And I had made my first Christmas present… for my Dad. A pot holder woven from the brightest colors of cloth loops I could find… no concern for what colors "go" with what… red against orange… pink with green… but a perfectly-woven checkerboard of colors. I had fixed every mistake to make it the perfect gift. I even had wrapped it myself although I couldn’t tear the tape. "What in the Hell am I supposed to do with THIS?" he growled when he opened it. "Cook dinner?"

=====

Another Christmas: "Winnie-the-Pooh? Boys don’t play with dolls. Why did you buy that shit for him, Joan?"

"It’s a bear… from a story," she said. "He likes the story." She took the bear away from me. I remember finding it several years later in a bag of stuff headed to the rummage sale at the church. I was tempted to buy it and bring it back home… just to spite him.

=====

He put his arm over my shoulder in the locker room, first making sure no one was watching. "I have a present for you," he said. "Can you come over tonight… and maybe… stay until morning?" With his other hand, Lee flattened the cotton fabric of my tee-shirt over my chest.

"I have something for you, too," I said. "But it’ll be hard to get away tonight. And I can’t ride my bike in all this snow. And my tracks will show if I climb in your window." I was thinking of all these reasons why I couldn’t be with him, while knowing full-well that it was the only thing I truly wanted for Christmas… to be with him.

"Well, you know what I want… a hard Christmas fuck after midnight Mass. You’ll find a way." And I did.

=====

The midnight Mass on Christmas Eve… dressed as an altar boy in a starched white surplice and a red cassock that was a little too long, always getting under-foot. I could remember the blue haze of incense… the heat of extra candles… the smell of balsam and ivy… the stifling feeling of breathing air that had been breathed so many times before in a series of masses beginning earlier in the evening. Even in the cool air of the loft I could recall the sickening smell of the incense. I had been light-headed… and it was past my bedtime. Standing for so long… would the mass never end? I looked down the center aisle; families of six and eight filled the pews… small children crammed between parents trying to focus on the liturgy. My mother sat in her usual pew, sixth one on the right, with my sister. Pop was out drinking with his buddies… or worse. I remember feeling sorry for her… tight-lipped and intense… saying the prayers with more animation than she had ever been able to muster for the rare reading of a story to a small boy. Even on Christmas Eve we were a shadow of a real family.

=====

"I miss you," John said. "How’s Christmas back there in Pittsburgh?"

I had craved the sound of his voice, so I had called his home at the first opportunity on Christmas Day. Carolyn answered. "We’re still opening presents," she said, "but I’ll call him to the phone… for a few minutes." She always set the limits for our interactions.

"Uneventful," I said. "No confrontations… no shouting-matches. Everyone just sorta keeps his distance and we get along fine. But I’m coming back tonight. I can’t take more than a day or two in this house."

"Come straight to the house when you get back," he said. "The boys want to show you their presents… and I have something for you… out in the studio."

"I have a present for the family," I said. "I intended to give it to you before I left, but I had exams up until the last minute. And I have a present for YOU… but I don’t want Carolyn to see it…"

"We’ll try to find some time to be alone. I promise," he said. That was my true Christmas present… the time we could spend together.

=====

We walked through the crisp night air to the studio… the crunch of dried snow… the rattle of icy branches in the wind. "She’ll go to bed," he said, shaking his head… "but she won’t sleep until I join her. But, on-the-other-hand, she won’t come out here either." He stopped to embrace me at the top of the stairs. "It’s been Hell without you for five days," he murmured in my ear. We kissed hard then… making-up for empty days. "I swear I smelled your shampoo on my pillow this morning. I ached for you," he said, gripping me tighter.

"I know," I sighed. "Every time I saw a guy who wore a cap like yours, I got this sick feeling in my stomach… wanting to see you again. Do you know how many guys wear caps like that in Pittsburgh?"

He started unbuttoning my shirt. "I want to kiss you in places I’ve never kissed before," he said. "I’m crazy about your body. I wish I were a sculptor. I’d have an excuse to study every square inch of you…"

"As if you needed an excuse," I chuckled. He was unbuckling my belt as he fell to his knees.

"Have you been with anyone… back home?" he asked, looking up at me with suddenly sad eyes.

"No," I said. "I’ve been an abstainer for five days… saving it for your Christmas present."

He smiled broadly and opened his mouth to swallow me.

Later, he told me about my real present. In addition to being an artist, John was also a writer of prose and poetry. "You can’t have it yet," he said, "but I’ll show it to you. I got the idea because we couldn’t talk for the last few days. It’s a book… a book dedicated to you… as a symbol of my love. It will be my accumulated messages to you, when we can’t be together. I’ll let you read samples of it sometimes… and someday I’ll give it to you as a cumulative symbol of my love for you." I held the book for the first time and opened the fly-leaf. "To Brian – with all my love." "Maybe someday someone will publish these messages… like Shakespeare’s sonnets to his boy-lover. We’ll be famous… posthumously, of course."

=====

I shifted in the bed… to lie in the middle instead of leaving the empty space for Justin as I had done every night since his departure.

I remembered waking up in this same bed… just one year ago… Justin’s kisses on the back of my neck. "Wake up," he whispered. "I’ve saved this to give you this morning… but I just can’t wait any longer. I’ve been awake for an hour… listening to you snore. But I need to go back to my house… early… because they’ll be opening presents. I need to be there." As I rolled over, he scampered off the bed to retrieve something from one of the drawers in the kitchen. "I was scared you’d find it," he said as he climbed the stairs to the bedroom holding a gaily-wrapped package in front of his pelvis. "Here," he said. "It’s my best."

The paper pulled away easily; there was no ribbon or tape. A matted-and-framed drawing…a tiny hand gripping the finger of a larger, male right-hand… with a cowry-shell bracelet on the wrist. "I got the idea a few weeks ago," he explained. "When you were holding him… and I had the sudden urge to hold your hand in the same way."

What had he meant by that? I examined the picture many times after that, interpreting it in different ways. Did he want a surrogate father?… a protector?… a provider? The little hand clutched the finger for support, perhaps… or just to know someone was there. We hold on to things that are important to us.

My son. And I wasn’t with him on Christmas morning. Last year, he was too young to notice, but this year I took his present to him on the night-before. The munchers could perpetuate the Santa Claus myth, if they wanted, but I was determined to let him know that I was there for him.

"Your present is in the drawer next to your side of the bed," I said. "Pull it out."

He retrieved the small, elegantly-wrapped package… mirrored-silver paper, black ribbon tied in a bow-tie bow. Its planes sent reflected beams of sunlight throughout the loft.

He opened it in three seconds. "God! My own cell phone," he exclaimed.

"Plus a year’s connection charges," I said. "Your number is THE-BRAT, 843-2728."

"Now I can call you all day," he continued, proving the appropriateness of the number.

"It’s for safety more than anything," I said. "No phone-sex allowed if I’m paying the bills."

He dialed. My phone on the nightstand rang. I picked it up. "Not even with you?" he said with that "melt-the-polar-icecap" smile.

"Why accept the substitute when I can have the real thing?" I said as I took the phone from his fist and rolled him into position.

It was the same phone he used to invite me to his prom… there at Babylon. I wondered if he knew that I had already renewed the service charges for another year. I could have called, I suppose, to make sure the number was still working.

=====

The Loft was silent except for an occasional rattle of a window buffeted by the winter wind. I draped my forearm over my eyes, trying to shut-out the sunlight streaming in at a low angle. My other arm stretched out absent-mindedly to convince myself the bed was empty. Empty and cold… just like my life, at the moment.

I had sent him away as surely as if I had bought him a ticket to Alaska. And I was so clever, I made him think it was his idea. As soon as the thought crossed my mind that there could, possibly, be something permanent in the relationship, I knew I’d taken a fatal step… and it was time to break it off. I had known he was different from the first moment; and the difference was refreshing… disarming… intriguing. But even when the puzzle-pieces fit together, it may not make a picture. The ability to love is not a mystery. The capability to love enough to let-go… there’s the miracle. Every mentor knows it. Every parent learns it by necessity. I had taken him to the promontory with every assurance; I had opened my enfolding fingers and tossed the fledgling into the breeze… and he hung there for an instant… and then flapped his wings for the first time in freedom… then sank… then soared higher. He was thankful for my mentoring… and he confused that thankfulness with love…

I, on the other hand, loved him more than he could ever understand. More than words could express. More than a heart could hold. He was too young to know that Love is a verb, not a noun...it is something you DO, not something you SAY. Being forced to say it is a sadness; it means the perception has not been felt. The message was sent, but not received. Saying that you love someone is an apology for not making it felt in all other ways. I failed to transmit the message or he wasn’t ready to receive it.

I sat on the edge of the bed. "Love came down at Christmas," said Christina Rossetti's poem. To some people, perhaps... but not to me. I never decorated the loft for the holiday... no tree... no lights...no holly or mistletoe. As an advertiser, I knew that the holiday was simply a business exploitation of people's good-will in the living-out of a quaint, ancient myth in fulfillment of an even more ancient prophesy. My need to believe in virgin-births and shepherds and angels had faded long ago. "Celebrate accomplishments"... not memories... or fantasies... or other people's accomplishments. "In dulce jubilo…"

Finally, I climbed out of bed. I had nowhere to go, but still had the urge to go somewhere. Anywhere but this empty, but memory-filled, loft. Perhaps a run along the river would do some good. I pulled on some black Poly-Pro running pants… tanktop, sweatshirt, windbreaker, warm socks, and running shoes… then wrapped a scarf around me neck, ready to pull over my face in the bitter cold.

As I gave the sliding door a heft a small package tipped onto the toe of my running shoe. It had apparently been leaning against the door. Only someone who knew the security code could have entered the building. I picked it up and carried it back into the loft. The card had a "B" on the front… in Justin’s unmistakable artistic printing. I slipped my coat off… then the sweatshirt, passing the box from hand-to-hand as I pulled the sleeves off.

Even in his anger, he had thought of me. I clutched the box to my shoulder, then tilted my cheek to nuzzle it. I didn’t care what was inside. The greatest gift was that he thought of me… after all that had happened.

As I looked up with the sunlight flooding my eyes, I saw the phone. I could call him, I suppose. To thank him. I knew his phone was still working.

=====

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