Safe and Sane

Hey give me a call, let me know you're okay.

Love you.- C

Four days and Colin was starting to slowly lose his shit. The third day had started it. One or two he could understand. Losing Jason for four just. No. He'd gone to Denver and Jason wasn't there. So he went to Jason's house, broke the locks and went inside. He found Jason's phone with all his missed calls and growled, prowling around the house and looking for any hints on well, Jason.


Which he got a few minutes later when he heard Jason's explorer in the driveway.

The snow crunched under his bare feet as he crept outside in the icy dawn. Lights winked from the trees up and down the block, and even in a few of the windows as he stood, arms crossed over his bare chest, shivering as snow melted in his hair.

( Children were racing from their beds, feet pounding on the stairs and around corners... )

Dear Jason,

I'm not much of a letter writer. But I'm even less of a talker and we know that. So I'm going to try the writing, try to tell you some truth this way.

You know how amazing I find you? No, you don't, do you? You can't see what I see. You don't see your eyes light up when you see something beautiful, artistic. A line in the sand, the way the snow falls, the way light catches skin in the morning.You don't see the way the color of your eyes change, the way your breath catches, don't know what your skin tastes like, first thing in the morning when everything's new.

I never imagined falling in love. Not with you, not with anyone. But now, I can't imagine not having you in my life. I can't imagine not being able to kiss you, touch you. It's not even sex, not just sex, the immediate physical reaction I have to you. It's capturing your mouth when you laugh so I can see how something that joyous and beautiful tastes.

I love you, Jason. Thank you for being with me. I'm honored.

Love you,
Colin

It had been days. Days since he'd heard from or seen Colin. Again.

So when Brad suggested that they all go dancing after fucking around at the gallery all afternoon, Jason tossed his phone into the glove compartment and said he was in. He wasn't sure who scored the ecstacy but after a few hours and a few trips to the bar, he didn't really care about it either.

He was with friends, the music was screaming loud and never seemed to stop, and he was higher than God, stripped bare to the waist and dancing in a mass of people that seemed more animal than human.

Most importantly, he couldn't hear the phone not ring anymore.

It was Thursday and Colin was in the club when Jason and Jon walked out. Jon kissed Jason one more time and then wandered off to find Ben, sure that Jason was up and fine.

Colin was tense, fingers clenched in his newspaper. He'd been distant all week; not gone, but not as intimate as usual. He'd kept away from any sexual intimacies. He just flat out refused to do more than kiss Jason. But mostly, mostly he avoided. He didn't leave when Jason got out of the scening room, was in the lounge.

Colin showed up at Jason's door at 6pm on Sunday night. He was shaved, in jeans and a sweater. He was relaxed and smiling. He'd missed Jason, which, distantly, he thought should worry him more than it did. He just let it roll instead. "Come play with me. I usually bring out the flowers at this juncture but." He pulled out a bottle of wine.

Colin was in jeans and a thin white shirt, shoes gone, and wandering around the club. He was chewing a cracker when he found Jason in a lounge. He promptly sat down, half on him, and pressed his face against Jason's neck, smelling him.

He fortunately remembered to swallow.

It was a party. It was a costume party. There was food, there were traditional Halloween games- bobbing for apples, a place to carve jack o' lanterns and way, way too much candy and junk food. A place to dance. There were also a few open play rooms, set up for groups or exhibitionism, but that wasn't the focus of the night.


There were awards for the best costume, for the scariest, the funniest, the most creative, the sexiest.

There were pumpkins. Mulled cider. Pie. Sweet, scary treats. Long suffering cafe employees dressed in costumes.

Colin caught up with Jason just inside the club, reaching for his hand and asking, "Can we talk?"

It'd been three days and they'd not gotten lost, which was, granted, easier for not having a specific destination in mind. The sun hung bright over head each day, the nights cold which made the fire brighter, warmer at night and he'd sketched so much his hand cramped from the cold until he'd cut the fingers off his gloves.

Their campsite was cooler for the water falling over the entrance to the wide-mouthed cave, but it was so worth it to hear the roar of the water at night.

It was the last night and Jason had gathered enough wood to keep them warm. Shirtless in the sun, he barely felt the chill in the air due to the exertion. Smiling at Colin, he ran his fingers through the spray of water from the waterfall. "Wanna go for a swim?"

He stood in the middle of piles of stuff that somehow had to be compressed into two packs that didn't weigh more than he and Colin combined. Switching the cigarette smoldering in one hand to the other, he sent Colin a quick text.

Any feelings on jerky?

Colin caught Jason at the club, just as Jason was arriving. He wrapped his arms around Jason's waist, stopping him from going in. "Hey."

Up the night before, the several nights before, Jason came home on the first flight he could get Thursday morning and crashed hard. Fell into bed fully dressed and slept like the dead and woke up in the middle of the gardens curled up under one of Chris' hedges. Yeah, it'd be awhile before he tried the sleeping thing again.

He stumbled over to the pool and stripped down, fell more than dove in and swam until the cobwebs were washed away. Wet footprints marked the stone pathway back to the carriage house and he traded cold water for hot, showering away the chlorine and working a stubborn leaf out of his hair.

Dinner would be simple. Sort of had to be. Jason's culinary skills were limited to stir-fry and Ramen and the occasional casserole, which tasted much better than they looked. He threw on a t-shirt and jeans, ran his errands and came back with fresh veggies, a chocolate cake that sang to him from the refrigerator like a siren and butter-pecan ice cream. He strung Christmas lights along the trees and bushes that sheltered the small patio off his house, and when he was finished, laid the small table for dinner.

Then he texted Colin.

B-day boy - dinner tonight?
Directions to follow.

Four.

Another shower later, and he was dressed up rather than down, slicing vegetables in the kitchen.

He'd had a late evening, but he'd been in street clothes for it. It was easier to share out of Mr. Hart and into Colin when he was in normal clothes. So Colin came into the club in jeans and a tee shirt, located Jason, then sat in the other man's lap and kissed his throat, "Hey."

Jason wasn't sure what kind of food Colin might be hungry for, but figured he couldn't go wrong with good home cooking. Not his, of course, but the cook at the diner managed to put together a meal without the fire department needing to intervene.

He carried the bag of styrofoam containers up to the door and rang the bell.

Shoving his hair out of his face, his feet shuffled on the front porch as he waited for Colin, and tried to figure out how to look like he wasn't making up a reason to come over and see him.

Which he was.

But there was pie. So...

You hungry?

Colin showed up a few minutes after six. He had on jeans and a tee shirt with, of all things, flip flops. The gun was no where in evidence and his pager wasn't on his belt.

So uncharacteristically unencumbered, he located Jason in the lounge, sliding his hands down Jason's shoulders and arms possessively, to take his hands. "Ready?"

What are you doing tonight?