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He arrives . . . uses the key I gave him. He’s still wearing the tuxedo, white shirt, that ridiculous bow tie. He looks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . immaculate.

No words are spoken and I leave him standing there . . . because I don’t know what to do.

He grins, that self-conscious, half-embarrassed grin. He doesn’t get the reaction he wants . . . he doesn’t get any reaction at all.

I am being deliberately provocative.

He pouts, pulls faces . . . it makes me smile . . . but still I don’t move.

He grows impatient . . . bored . . . rolling his eyes . . . which annoys me.

I say, "I want to see you."

He flashes me a look . . . and I can read every thought in his head.

He removes his shoes, his socks. He’s being careful, slow. That annoys me.

I stand, walk towards him, stand in front of him, ruffle his hair. He pulls his head back disapproving.

I undo his tie . . . roughly, stripping it from him . . . throw it on the floor. He pulls another face . . . he is irritated . . . but lets it go.

I slip my hands inside his jacket, push it off his shoulders, off his arms onto the floor. Now he’s annoyed and bends to pick it up . . . but I grab the collar of his shirt, start to undo it, pinching it tight. His hands come up.

"Hey! Watch it."

I brush the suspenders from his shoulders, drop my hands to his pants, roughly unzipping them, forcing them down . . .

. . . and I get that look . . . the one that I wanted . . .

. . . I know what I want now . . .

I want to put him in a room . . . one he can’t get out of. I want to reduce him to nothing. I know I can do it. Make him into something he’s not. It doesn’t have to be pleasurable . . .

**************************************************************

**************************************************************

"Dr Kovac."

Lydia snapped her fingers in front of his face. "Dr Kovac. Are you in there?" He blinked, surprised at the closeness of the image, of the sound. He pulled his head back sharply, tried to focus, ended up cross-eyed.

He flexed his jaw. "What!" It came out harshly, as he intended. She thrust a chart painfully into his chest and strode off, immune, from experience, to any slight. He glanced down at the chart and scowled, looked up, looked back to where he was looking before . . . before he was interrupted.

**************************************************************

John was standing at the desk rapidly flicking through charts, adding his signature wherever necessary. He blanked anyone that dared to hinder his progress, anything that prevented him from finishing on time. He signed the last chart and slid it into the rack, turned to the board and erased his name.

"I am done," he announced to no one in particular. He turned around . . . and Abby was standing right in front of him, seeming to appear right out of nowhere. He studied her carefully, his eyes widening slightly as they roamed over her hair, her face, her figure. He nodded his head, sucked in a breath. "You look . . . beautiful."

She did a mock twirl, scrunching up her face, rolling her eyes. "Sure. You ready?"

He looked down at his attire, spread out his hands. "Don’t I look ready?" She frowned, plucking an imaginary piece of lint from his lapel, straightened out his bow tie.

"You’ll do."

"Gee, thanks."

She sidled up to him, hooked an arm round his. "Come on . . . the sooner we get there the sooner we can leave . . . then the sooner I can get out of this . . . thing." She pulled roughly at her evening dress, the one that he had chosen for her. He unhooked his arm from hers, slipped it around her waist.

"In or out . . . both is fine with me."

**************************************************************

He chewed on his thumb as he watched them make their way to the lounge. He was used to watching them. In fact, he found he watched them more than he ever did . . . watched him more than he ever did. He had become accustomed to the feeling of irritation that always arose when he was confronted by such public displays but he had developed certain ways of coping with it.

For one, he found himself re-evaluating his own relationship with her and discovered that, however much he blamed himself for their failure, there was something about her that was . . . to put it bluntly . . . damaged . . . maybe irreparably so. The thought saddened him but what saddened him more was that the two of them seemed incapable of seeing it. Still, that wasn’t his problem . . . he had enough of his own. And, in a strange way, he was grateful that life had resumed its normal course, after what had happened, and that he had managed to instill a certain amount of emotional detachment from the situation so that, in effect, he became nothing more than a voyeur . . .

**************************************************************

Whoa. Stop.

To say that ‘life had resumed its normal course’ was wholly inaccurate. To an independent observer what they were experiencing was the equivalent to what any individual goes through when coming to terms with any significant event, regardless of how life-changing or traumatic that event is. They had, in effect, entered a process that had set steps to complete, the initial stages of which were equivalent to the ‘Shock’ and ‘Denial’ that accompanies grief or sudden loss. This was evident from the first few days at work.

They had avoided each other: that is, when possible, within the confines of their professional relationship which meant that they had to work together. But, they seemed to develop a sixth sense as to the location of the other so that they could avoid those places, taking stairs rather than elevators, choosing the canteen rather than Doc Magoos . . .

Then, surprisingly, their relationship seemed to improve. It may have been because they were both eager to show that they could cope like mature adults with an embarrassing situation. For whatever reason, they managed to engage in a few polite conversations, one of which centered on the Alliances de Medicins Internationales, the medical relief program that Luka advocated. Of course, John was irritated when Luka mentioned it in the middle of a trauma, before he had the chance to talk to Abby about it, taking it for granted that he was going to go. And, to be honest, he wasn’t even sure that he wanted to go, wasn’t sure if it fitted into his plans . . . he was, after all, only being polite. But, he hated it when she tackled him on it first at work and then later at home.

"I just don’t understand why you need to go abroad."

"Because . . . it’s where you can be of value . . . you know . . . do something that can make a real difference in people’s lives."

"Yeah . . . but don’t people need help nearer to home."

He smiled, then, because her words sounded familiar. Familiar because he had used similar words to Abby. Abby Keaton. God, that was years ago now. At the thought of her a strange feeling swept over him, something like a warm glow . . . Of course, their relationship had been based purely on sex . . . nothing but sex. Illicit moments squeezed here and there, frantic couplings seized . . . The whole affair had been wild . . . exciting . . . . . . dangerous . . .

The memory slowly faded and the feeling ebbed away as he thought about how much he’d changed since then, how much had happened in his life.

"Well its nice to know that you can talk to Luka about things."

**************************************************************

It couldn’t last. Once one stage of the process had been completed then it was time to move on to another, the transition to which was usually prompted by some occurrence . . .

The Men’s Room was one place where they had managed to avoid being alone together . . . until now. On this occasion, they had both reached the door at the same time, without realizing it, until it was too late. Of course, when they did realize it, they both hesitated, hovering outside, uncertain as to whether or not they should turn around. Then, bizarrely, they both grinned and carried on through the door.

Maybe they were over-confident.

They stood side by side separated by one urinal, a not uncommon arrangement for the two of them, and they both chose not to look at each other, both concentrating on the task in hand. Except . . .

John couldn’t go. He tried to quell the mild feeling of alarm that instantly arose by staring hard at the wall directly in front of him, rocking on his heels a few times. But he still couldn’t go. He unconsciously shook his head, looked to his left, away from Luka, focusing on a brightly colored poster on the wall, one that advocated ‘safe sex’. He scowled, shaking his head, trying to think of a few procedures, distasteful procedures, something like a rect . . .

"Jeez!" he muttered under his breath.

Luka turned his head in his direction. "What?"

John flicked his head to the right, flicked it back again. "Nothing."

He stood there, eyes closed, biting his lip, wondering how he was going to extricate himself . . . when his pager went off. Unable to contain his relief he flashed a quick smile at Luka. "Gotta go."

He pushed his cock back inside his pants, a task more difficult than it should have been, and dashed to the basins. He washed his hands quickly, ripping a paper towel from the dispenser as he made his way to the door. He wiped his hands, balled the towel and tossed it over his shoulder, unintentionally hitting Luka on the back of the head.

Luka turned his head, stared at the door as it slowly closed. He then looked down at his cock, took a deep breath, stared up at the ceiling, trying to think of something that would make his erection wilt . . . some procedure . . .

**************************************************************

It was after this that things got slightly worse. The ‘Anger’ stage? Maybe. A natural reaction to their natural reactions. It started gradually: the occasional annoyed glance; the odd terse word; then the inevitable confrontation. It was stupid really. They contradicted each other over the treatment of a patient . . . John’s patient. Luka was passing as the patient coded and he had resuscitated and intubated before John had the chance to confirm that the patient was DNR.

Luka’s response should have been to just walk away, once he had argued his case but, for some reason, he didn’t. He stayed put, fixed to the spot, listening to John’s tirade. Or rather . . . not listening. Instead, as John went on and on, getting more and more animated, more and more flushed, Luka had this strange, overwhelming desire to . . . kiss him. In front of everyone. Just to see what his reaction would be. Just to see that look of absolute confusion on his face. Just to see him dissolve into . . . chaos.

Of course, he didn’t. It would have been ridiculous. Embarrassing. Inexplicable.

But the thought that he could have done it . . . God . . . it was empowering . . . and it was after this that the fantasies started. Part of the reason may have been because he didn’t quite understand how John could have carried on as though nothing had happened. So, it was his way of exerting control over the situation. So, he allowed himself the indulgence of a few fantasies. So much for emotional detachment.

****************************************************************************************************************************

I tie his hands behind him . . . thin rope . . . I pull it tight so it bites into his skin. He inhales sharply . . . sucking the breath between his teeth. I force him down onto his knees, ass on his heels. I tie his ankles, thread the rope through the rope on his hands so he cannot stand . . . so he is helpless . . .

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Of course, Luka’s belief that John carried on as though nothing had happened was an assumption. John had certainly made the decision not to tell . . . and he wouldn’t . . . because it was in all their interests not to . . . and it wasn’t as though he had been unfaithful . . . he hadn’t . . . not really . . . not in the way that the majority of men are unfaithful. That didn’t stop him from feeling guilty about it. He did. But he had decided not to tell so all he could do now was forget about it. So, he put it out of his mind . . . Well, maybe not out of his mind . . . but in the deepest, darkest, recess of his mind. That place he didn’t go to very often . . . for self-preservation’s sake.

Shame really.

Because the place where he put it, along with all those other areas of his life that were too painful to confront, wasn’t sealed. It leaked, like a toxin that poisons the water. It seeped into the one place where he couldn’t protect himself . . . where he was open to attack . . . as open as though he was naked and tied to a bed. It seeped into his subconscious, into his dreams.

Now, that may not have been a problem. Dreams are just dreams. Fleeting . . . evasive . . . . . . intangible . . . . . . . . . . seductive. Sometimes you can’t even remember what it was you were dreaming about; those dreams that evaporate as soon as the eyes flutter open. Then there are others that remain for a few seconds longer . . . . . . . . . . then they vanish . . . however much you want to cling to them . . . savor them.

Of the two which was better, or, more accurately, healthier? The wayward imagination of a man willing and able to indulge in fantasy or the incoherent ramblings of a mind under pressure. It’s debatable. The only known fact is that fantasies are controllable and dreams not. The most alarming thing for John . . . if he had known it . . . which he didn’t . . . was that it happened straightaway, the very night of her return . . .

Shame really.

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He dreamt of the mouth around his cock . . . slipping in and out . . . coaxing . . . teasing . . . Then the sweet rush of release . . . and he awoke . . . coming. He lay there, disoriented, catching his breath, letting the spasms die away. He opened his eyes . . . focused.

"Good morning." It was said joyfully, playfully.

His eyes widened . . . trying to comprehend . . . this was a joke . . . right . . . a dream . . . right . . . His eyes showed his confusion.

"It’s the only way to start the day." It was said with a coy smile.

He was numb, not knowing how to react.

"Maggie called first thing this morning . . . she said to say thank you . . . for the money . . . for the tickets."

It took the edge off somehow. It seemed that sometimes sex wasn’t so much something that they shared but more like a service she performed . . .

He instantly felt guilty for the thought. After what he had done.

"It’s not a problem . . . you know that."

He reached out to brush a strand of hair from her face. She took his hand, kissed his palm, placed his hand on the sheet between them.

"So . . . do you want breakfast?"

He nodded at her silently.

"You okay?"

He smiled but inwardly his mind was reeling. Here in front of him was the most important person in his life . . .

"Yeah . . . I’m glad you’re home." Home, he said, and meant it, as he gently squeezed her hand.

**************************************************************

He flinched when she touched his back, circled her arms around him. He turned in her embrace, hugged her, as the water cascaded over them. She tilted her head to his, kissed him on the neck . . . on the cheek . . . on the lips. He tried to relax . . . but . . . God . . . he couldn’t even close his eyes. He put his hands on her shoulders, gently pushed her away.

"Come on. We’re going to be late."

She frowned but nodded. "Okay. Can you do me a favor . . ."

**************************************************************

His reaction to her did improve with time, and he was able to return to the role of being an attentive and caring lover, providing the support he truly believed that she desperately needed and, yes, life ‘resumed its normal course’ . . .

Hey, all things are relative. ‘Normal’ within their accepted parameters . . . as defined by previous experiences.

**************************************************************

". . . and that’s easy for you to say . . . " Susan bantered

John interjected, spinning a chart in his hand. "Keep telling you . . . money isn’t everything."

"Well when you inherit the family fortune . . . you can donate some of it to me."

John shook his head woefully. "It doesn’t work like that . . . its all part of the Foundation . . . it has nothing to do with me . . . and . . . I’m happy as I am."

"Talking of money . . . I had an amazing dream last night . . . that I had bought the winning Lottery ticket but I didn’t know where I put it . . . and I went around searching everywhere for it . . . and I couldn’t find it."

"Well . . . you know what Freud said about dreams." It was Pratt, leaning over the desk, chin propped on his fist, failing to look inconspicuous whilst waiting for something juicy to come in.

"What?" Susan asked as she deposited a chart in the rack.

John sipped his coffee, flipped through a chart . . .

"About dreams being nothing but wish fulfillment."

. . . and John choked on his coffee, ended up snorting it out through his nose.

Pratt and Susan stepped back out of the line of fire. "You okay?" Susan asked laughing.

John nodded his head. "Yeah . . ." he tried to clear his throat ". . . just . . . went down the wrong way."

"Came out the wrong way too," Pratt observed wiping the front of his lab coat in disgust.

John coughed again, cleared his throat. "Sorry . . . anyway . . . Freud’s . . . interpretation of dreams has been . . . significantly undermined."

Pratt looked at him blankly. "I know that."

John nodded his head. "Good."

"But not totally." A voice came from behind him.

John turned round. "Really." He tried to say it politely but somehow it came out as a sneer.

"As Freud illustrated in his own example . . . if a person is thirsty during the night they may dream that they are drinking a long cool drink . . ." Luka looked directly into John’s eyes ". . . and that drink may taste as good as any real drink . . . and you will feel that your thirst has been quenched. The dream serves a function . . . from the sensation arises the wish to drink . . . the dream shows you the wish fulfilled."

John nodded his head coolly. "Interesting . . . but the example is too simplistic."

Luka smiled. "Certainly it is one of the simplest . . . the desire to satisfy a bodily need."

Pratt snorted. "That’s why to Freud dreams were all about sex . . . right."

John and Luka turned their heads towards him. Luka was smiling. John was not.

Luka answered. "Freud believed that the sexual instinct over rode all other human instincts . . . but he exaggerated the case." He picked a chart up from the desk, examined it.

Abby, having finished propelling a patient towards chairs, sauntered over to the desk. "Who exaggerated what?"

"Freud . . . interpretation of dreams." Pratt informed her.

Her eyes lit up. "Really . . . Carter had a good one . . . involving some handcuffs." She playfully punched him in the ribs and John’s eyes widened in alarm. Why would she say that?

"Ooooh," Susan giggled, playfully punching him in the arm. "Tell us more."

"Tell us more about what?" Jing-Mei, emerging from the lounge, joined them at the desk . . . and John suddenly started praying for all kinds of trauma.

"Carter had a hot dream . . . involving some handcuffs," provided Susan gleefully.

"Really," said Jing-Mei, playfully punching him in his other arm.

John rubbed at his arms and his ribs, wishing that people would stop doing that, knowing that he was starting to blush and that Luka was still standing there. "It wasn’t . . . a hot dream . . . it was just . . . a dream," he finished lamely.

"I always knew you had a thing about handcuffs." Susan added laughing.

"I do . . . NOT . . . have a thing about handcuffs." His voice rose as he spoke and he was conscious that all eyes were on him. "I don’t." He grabbed the first chart that came to hand and strode off down the hallway.

Luka watched him as he walked away. Before entering Exam Three John paused, turned to look back at the desk. Their eyes met for a fraction of a second . . . and then he was gone.

**************************************************************

It was much later when John sought refuge in the suture room, taking a lull in traffic to snatch a few moments of peace. The room was virtually in darkness, with ill-defined streaks of weak light breaking through the closed blinds. He didn’t switch on the light, but, instead, cautiously made his way to a gurney. He jumped up onto it, swung his legs round and lay down, wondering for how long he could get away with avoiding people . . .

"Tell me about your dream."

"Jesus." He was upright in an instant, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end. The voice came out of the dark, from a corner of the room. He looked from the corner to the door, looked at the short expanse of floor that lay between him and escape . . .

Escape? He didn’t have to answer him. He stared into the corner trying to penetrate the darkness. He could see him now . . . quite clearly, in fact. He lay back down, placed his hands behind his head.

Silence.

"You can’t tell me?"

He wasn’t going to answer but he had to at least set him straight on a few facts. "It wasn’t a dream. I mean I didn’t dream anything."

"What did I do . . . in your dream?"

John rubbed the back his head with his hands. "You’re making a lot of assumptions . . . It had nothing to do with you."

"It was about me."

"It wasn’t about anyone . . . in particular . . . it was very non-specific."

"Liar."

"It wasn’t about you . . . I don’t want to discuss it. I came in here to get . . ."

"Shall I tell you about my dream?"

John lifted his head, peered into the corner. He couldn’t see him that clearly. "I’m really not interested."

"It was about a rich man . . ."

John snorted his contempt from across the room. "Sure it was."

". . . a man who had everything. He lived in a castle . . .

"Sure that this was a dream and not a fairy tale?"

". . . surrounded by people who pandered to his every whim . . ."

"Right."

". . . and he indulged, without reservation, in whatever took his fancy . . . indulged until he could no longer find any satisfaction. He became bored with his life . . . despite his money, his power. So despondent did he become that he took to wandering alone at night, unable to sleep. One night he heard a groan coming from his dungeon . . ."

Another snort. "Dungeon?"

"He walked quietly towards the sound, peered through the grill in the door. There was a man . . . completely at the mercy of another. It was impossible to determine if the man was in pain or ecstasy. He seemed oblivious to everything. Sweat dripped from him . . . his body convulsed. The rich man watched, transfixed, as the man cried and begged . . ."

"For what?"

". . . lost in desire. Confused the rich man went to his bed where he had a dream."

"Thought you said he couldn’t sleep."

"He dreamt that he was the man at the mercy of the other. He was never sure what he felt, never sure whose emotions were driving him. But he woke up screaming, begging . . ."

"For mercy?"

". . . to be fucked."

Luka looked in John’s direction. Then he stood, walked towards him, stood at the foot of the gurney, stared into his face. "I should have made you beg."

John stared back at him, his face impassive. Then, very slowly, he smiled. "Well, I guess you missed the only opportunity you’ll ever have."

**************************************************************

Not surprisingly, Luka was the first to break. He had been barely functioning for months and there was no single event that caused his meltdown but more a combination of factors that eroded away at his already perilous mental state. His relationships, or lack of them, played a part, as did his unsatisfactory sex life. His behavior became increasingly erratic as the fabric of his life slowly unraveled and he found it hard to cope with the continuous stream of selfish, idiotic patients who engaged in mindless, self-destructive behavior, wasting his time, his limited resources . . .

He desperately needed time off to get his life sorted out, to get his thoughts straightened out, and he had, more-or-less, begged Kerry for the time. She refused him . . . so he took it anyway . . . and then nearly got fired for it.

In his brief, unauthorized absence, Luka missed another crisis in the on-going drama of Abby’s family. So, there were other benefits. He was lucky that he wasn’t subjected to it the way that many others were, those that had no choice but to watch, as though they were a captive audience, regardless of their concern or affection for the players concerned.

**************************************************************

* "And women don't know what the hell they want. Am I right? I'm right, right? They all want a commitment till you give it to ‘em, then they want their freedom. So naturally, you oblige. Then they accuse you of trying to be with somebody else. I'm telling you, you can’t win."

Pratt was standing at the admit desk. John was standing on the other side, filling in a chart, only half listening to his rant. Without looking up he said, "Women can be hard to figure out sometimes."


"Sometimes? Nah, you know who's got it all figured out, I think? Homosexuals."


John looked up . . . just as Luka arrived at the desk.

"No. I'm serious. Just listen to me. Look, there are two guys living together. Toilet seat’s always up. Channel’s always on ESPN. You can drink beers in the bed, leave your clothes on the floor. I'm telling you . . . gay cats got it good."


John shook his head. "Why are you telling me this?"


Pratt paused for a moment. "I have no idea." *

They were both surprised to see each other. Actually, Luka was more than surprised; he was a little shocked by John’s appearance instantly noticing how tired and pale he was, how much weight he had lost. "I thought you were on vacation."

John smiled thinly. "I thought you quit." Rumors were that he had quit and a significant part of him had hoped that he had quit . . . so he didn’t quite understand why he was pleased to see him.

Strangely, it was immediately after this that John went up to the roof and proposed to Abby. Well, sort of proposed. The proposal that he had shouted out at the top of his lungs. Was it coincidence? A cynical observer would assume that John had now entered the ‘Bargaining’ stage: that he was now strenuously asserting himself, trying to make an open proclamation for what he wanted in his life, reacting to what he didn’t want in his life . . .

John wasn’t cynical. He genuinely believed that this was he wanted, that this was what they both wanted. More than that . . . that this was what they both needed. He had cut short his vacation so that he could be there for her. It distressed him to discover that she had been drinking but he didn’t criticize her for it because he could see how much Eric’s disappearance was tearing her apart. Because what is worse than the loss of loved one? When you need someone to stand by you, to support you . . .

**************************************************************

He couldn’t go through with it. When it came down to doing it properly, in the restaurant, when he had everything planned down to the very last detail he couldn’t go through with it. Even after his speech to Maggie . . . Or was it because of his speech to Maggie? Was that the point when he finally realized that all he was doing was searching for reassurance?

He tried to talk to Abby about it, told her about that night, the night he failed to propose . . . telling her that it didn’t feel right . . . that it wasn’t working. She said that she ‘got it’ . . . which shocked him because he didn’t ‘get it’. He wanted it to work . . . was that so bad?

** "Stop! Stop! Stop with this whole routine, this whole fatalistic, black cloud, nothing good is ever gonna happen routine."


"Problem is, it’s not a routine."


"What do I have to say? What do I have to do to get through to you?" **

**************************************************************

Luka was fairing little better. On his return to work, Kerry had insisted that he receive counseling, something that he perceived to be a complete waste of his time. He seriously doubted that Meyers had the acumen to even comprehend his situation let alone be able to offer anything more than the usual platitudes. Actually, he found it easier, and more beneficial, to talk to the prostitutes whose services he was still using. Hey, at least he got a fuck out of it: he doubted Meyers offered that as an ‘extra’.

** "Time goes by faster at work. Treat and street a few lost souls . . . You’re with them when they’re most vulnerable, when they're naked, weak, hurt. You touch them, look at their bodies, see them more closely than their families, their lovers, but it’s mechanical and temporary. You fix them up or you watch them die. Either way, it ends and you move on. No next time, no strings, no real connection. Maybe that’s why I stay." **

‘Vulnerable’ . . . ‘naked’ . . . ‘weak’ . . . ‘hurt’ . . . ‘mechanical’ . . . ‘temporary’ . . . ‘no strings’ . . . ‘no real connection.’

Words that he could have used to describe his ‘relationship’ with John. Strange that he didn’t make that connection . . . well, not consciously anyway. This may have been because he believed that he was over his preoccupation with him . . . because he no longer fantasized about him . . . well, not as frequently as he once did.

He continued to watch though. Maybe because it was a hard habit too break. Or maybe because, in a way, it was like watching a bad accident when the normal reaction should have been to look away. Like the time in the elevator, when he tried to talk to them, his attempts to make conversation, his ‘little talk’ . . .

**************************************************************

Things change.

The month of May proved a turning point in both their lives. For Luka, seeing Gordana had been like a breath of fresh air. She had brought back so many memories . . . good memories . . . and, for the first time in years, he found that he could think about them without any real discomfort or pain. It was also the first time in months that he felt the true value of being a doctor. He had forgotten that he had a skill that he had worked hard for . . . trained hard for . . . made sacrifices for . . .

The boy . . . Ante. He had fought for him, battling against the hospital hierarchy, against mindless bureaucracy, using all of his natural instincts to charm and cajole, to bribe and blackmail people into providing the services that were required. It had felt so unbelievably satisfying . . . he hadn’t felt that good since . . .

But he was over that now. It had been a mistake. And now he could start to look at his life in a different light, make choices that would benefit people, people that deserved it . . .

**************************************************************

For John it was the opposite. All those moments in his life when he thought it couldn’t get any worse . . .

The loss of his grandmother was devastating, far more than he had ever imagined it could be. He wasn’t expecting it . . . even though he was expecting it . . . you never expect it . . . that moment when the person that means everything to you is gone. He was overwhelmed by his own reaction to it and it scared him. He was flooded with memories from his past, echoes of that moment in his childhood when his world had been torn apart, when all he could do was watch, wide-eyed and helpless, as his family disintegrated around him . . .

Except for his grandmother, the one constant in his life, the only person who gave him the stability that he needed, who gave him the comfort, the support, the love . . .

Thank God, he wasn’t alone . . .

Fuck.

He was alone.

Something else died that day.

Suddenly he felt that his life was changing, that he was being forced to change, that this change had a dynamic all of its own, one that he had no control over . . .

The money. All his life he had rejected it . . . making a point of how much he didn’t want it . . . didn’t need it . . . that he could live his life without it . . . and now the responsibility for it had been passed to him. He found that out on the day of the funeral . . .

The funeral . . . God. Eric. He couldn’t quite believe that she had brought him with her. What was she thinking? But that was it. She didn’t think. Did she take it for granted that he would always be there for her? That he had an infinite ability to absorb whatever chaos she created in his life. Later, at the hospital, after he had pursued her, seeking her out so that he could . . .

. . . could what? When he found her he couldn’t even explain to himself why he was there. Out of pure frustration he told her to leave him alone.

And she did.

What did he expect?



To be continued . . .

* Dialog: "A Boy Falling Out of the Sky."

**Dialog: "The Advocate"
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