Britannia, NY

Buddy had tried to move on after he found out that the old truck was never going to run again. Not a good idea to stay in one place too long. But something kept nagging at him all the way to Rhode Island.

And then the dreams started up again.

And suddenly, against all good sense, he's back in Britannia. A little cleaner and better shaven than last time, but with the same old army jacket and duffle bag. And a copy of Tennyson's Idylls folded over and stuffed in the pocket of his jeans. And an almost manic glint in his eyes.

He's either figured it all out, or finally gone all the way off the deep end. And damn does he need a drink.

Jim is back to Albany to see the neurologist for what's really a routine procedure: more phenol injections. He waits quietly in the curtained off room, wearing a hospital gown over his legs (he gets to keep his shirt on for this) and looking mildly bored if anything. He brought some of the student midterms to work on while he waits, although he's been doing less of that and more reassuring Nathan that nothing is wrong and this happens all the time.

The doctor has already been in to do the evaluation and she'll be back for the injections any time now, but she's out right now speaking with Nathan, and Jim is just hoping she doesn't stick him hard to punish him for the trial that will probably be.

The conversation with Enfys has left Jim with the distinct feeling that despite everything he has been majorly played, and he goes on home with a heavy step, smacking acorns and large pieces of gravel aggressively with his cane.

When he gets in the door he hangs up his coat and goes to the cupboard to get himself a drink, frowning darkly.

Having spoken to Nathan, Jim is not feeling anything so much as intensely irritated with Merlin. And, he figures, Merlin doesn't have anything to lose by talking to him, so there's no reason for him to stay away.

So he's having his coffee outside the shop, wearing a wool jacket against the autumn cold that he didn't expect. Best to be conspicuous. He can sit here all day.

( I'll be your liquor bathing your soul/Juice that's pure/And I'll be your anchor you'll never leave/Shores that cure/Well I've seen you suffer/I've seen you cry for days and days/So I'll be your liquor/Demons will drown/And float away )

It's been almost twenty years since Jim's gotten stinking drunk for no good reason (good reasons, like Amanda's being born, don't count). But somewhere in between Nathan's getting shot and Mike throwing him aside like that at the school, and this damned strange person inside him who he keeps trying to press back into a memory--

He's had a few shots of Jack Daniels before he stopped at the liquor store, and now he's at the park, sitting on one of the empty swings with his bottle of Southern Comfort in the brown paper bag. At least it's Friday; and it's late enough that most decent people in Britannia are seriously considering bed. If the police do drive by, they should give him a little leeway for at least being of the legal drinking age.

Actually, he hasn't thought it out that far. He isn't really even that drunk. He's jostling the swing a little, morosely, feeling confused and sad and mostly very, very sorry for himself.

((Anyone who'd want to see Nate for any reason, or who'd just be wandering around the hospital, is welcome to poke their head in. :)))

( Don't know why, don't know why, we can't stand aside/There are all too many faces, we don't see right/If I had known back then/Whatever I know now/I'd think I'd have answers but I don't know why/So we finally gave up/The meanings tend to give out/The time was gone to act out/But here I am and I'm still living )

Monday is almost a relief, aside from the headache he woke up with. He's been at this job long enough that the routine is familiar, not so long that he's lost all his enthusiasm for it, and by afternoon he's tired but almost content. Nonetheless, he's avoiding Jim as much as possible. Yesterday is still raw, a wound that Tiernay only salved, and if he thinks about it too much his mind fills again with cold white rage, a feeling far worse than the hurt and the frustration. So he's resolutely not thinking about it, as he gets ready to leave.

Something hit Gary, maybe one of these nights when he was lying awake trying to calm the rocking worsening misery of what Nathan made him know (oh God you're her)--that Jim still has his gun. The realisation came from the same part of him that won't let him even look at Mike that way (do what she did, destroy what loves you, lose what you love) without a good deal more alcohol than is conscionable; and somehow getting up and doing something about one straightforward thing feels like the only way to do something right.

So he slips out of the house around noon. He's still hard to notice, hard to get a bead on, more than ordinary, insignificant. He knows the way he's going, and he still has Jim's spare key, and Jim, this time on a weekday, is bound to be at the school, just as Mike is now.

He unlocks the door with the quiet dexterity he used to use to steal sandwiches and paint in the city, palming things into his pockets. The trouble is where in God's name Jim put it, and his first thought is--guest room? But he already knows that room like the back of his paint-stained hand, and it's empty. And then it occurs to him that probably the most likely place is Jim's bedroom itself.

Sure enough, the revolver is in the back of Jim's closet in a shoebox. Gary tucks it into his jacket with a sigh of relief.

Jim has taken to wearing mostly long-sleeved shirts with the collars buttoned all the way up, even since Nathan moved in properly. It's one thing to have a happy, successful relationship, and another thing for the student body to know about it. In the meantime, he has been thinking about this whole knight thing, but it's true and he can't help it that a part of him thinks it all seems immensely trivial and almost unreal next to the realities of the world, especially the one he grew up in, the one that's still haunting in his bones.

Anyway, right now it doesn't matter. It's Sunday, and he's taking one of his leisurely walks through Britannia, leaning on the blackwood cane Nathan carved for him. Pretty soon he's bound to stop in somewhere for coffee, and the warm smile and warmer fresh rolls of the baker whose attentions he's parted from. They're still good friends.

He's happy in a way he hasn't been since Amanda was born.

Nathan's been sketchy about being available for the last few days, and finally Jim goes looking for him. Something he can't quite put a name to assures him the lake is the place he should be, and he makes his way down, easing along with his walking cane.

When he finds Nathan he doesn't immediately greet him; stands by him for a little bit and then says, softly, "What's wrong?"

( Invisible kid/ Never see what he did/ Got stuck where he hid/ Fallen through the grid/ Invisible kid/ Got a place of his own/ Where he'll never be known/ Inward he's grown/ Invisible kid/ Locked away in his brain/ From the shame and the pain/ World down the drain. )

The universe, at times, has a very sick sense of humor. Laurel has been thinking about Nathan, how weird but not unpleasant her conversation with him had been, and about the woman she'd dreamed she'd been since she was a girl.

And Laurel finally admitted to herself that, deep down, she was irrationally afraid of falling for a man who didn't love her back. But Jim was not, in any conceivable way, the man she'd dreamed about. If that were even possible, which it wasn't.

She felt more than a little stupid, calling him, but she would feel worse if she wondered, for weeks, whether there was anything going on or not, and was finally forced to concede there wasn't when enough time had passed. She hoped it wouldn't come to that. She liked him - she wanted this to work.

So, thanks to Nathan, her dreams, and the sense of upheaval both have caused... she's listening to Jim's phone ring, telling herself that she is an adult woman and that there's no need to feel like she's seventeen again.

( Don't know if our fate's already sealed/This day's spinning surface on a wheel/I'm ill with the thought of your kiss/Coffee laced intoxicating on her lips/Shut it out/I've got no claim on you now/Not allowed to wear your freedom down/No/Is there a chance?/A fragment of light at the end of the tunnel?/A reason to fight?/Is there a chance you may chance your mind?/Or are we ashes and wine? )

Jim, as promised, is wearing a blue tie, along with an old tweed riding jacket he bought back when Amanda decided she needed to accessorise at her riding events with appropriately horse-people-y looking parents; this is about as formal as he can stand to get, so that should work out well for Nathan, anyway, for the time being.

He's actually fairly nervous. He can't drive, of course, but he has made them unofficial reservations for the only nice-ish sit-down restaurant in town, which thank God serves drinks so he doesn't need to bring along a bottle of wine or something, because at the moment he thinks that might be a little beyond him. He doesn't really have this planned further than that.

So he's waiting, pacing staggeringly in the living room, and waiting for Nathan to knock at the door so he can stop psyching himself out.

( I'm searching rumors with my hollow plans/when all I wanted is what's mine/I'm lost and lonely in this foreign land/and left too far behind the lines/I want to tear down these walls between us/and I can't make it alone/a million spaces in the earth to fill/and here's a generation waiting still/We've got year after year to kill/but there's no going home )

As it happens, no one is required to wake Jim at nine, because his phone rings a little after eight in the morning -- Michael having gotten up at seven, and spent an hour fretting until it was a remotely rational time to call.

Gary remembers the house--he must not have been as drunk as he thought, or maybe it's that only he was drunk, and not the person he keeps mixing with. Either way, he ends up there, his backpack stuffed with clothes and art supplies, knocking on Jim's door steadily at one o'clock in the morning.

Laurel is at her flower shop, a huge thermos of coffee at her right elbow as she goes through the outstanding orders. There hasn't been much foot traffic today, which is just as well because she's running on fumes. The dreams have gotten much worse recently, and she's trying to compensate for lack of sleep with an increased caffeine intake.

It's somewhat working. She looks tired, but the shop is in good shape, for the time being. She's idly considering calling Jim when she gets off; she's more or less finally convinced herself that his Southern sensibilities wouldn't be offended by her making the next move. But for now, she's still got half a shift to go.

I apologize in advance for lag time; my computer is in the process of being replaced. But feel free to stop by and get some flowers.

Jim is doing his daily walk around Britannia--he does, every day after school and in the mornings on weekends. The slow steady progress makes his legs shake a little less, he doesn't know why, but it does help, and nobody here laughs at his drunken way of walking, they know him now, and there's something peaceful in that (and Jim has always, all his life, been a man looking for peace).

It's just good. Something always feels a little steadier--not in his body almost as much as inwardly, as though this place (which is his second chance: he believes this as strongly and secretly as he has ever believed anything, that this is his opportunity for redemption) is the magical cure the doctor could never give his mother for him.

He's whistling civil war songs; he doesn't notice it himself.