Enigma II. Fighting the Man - 39. Epilogue

RIVER

I have been such a fool. Sam was the first to tell me and the last to let me live it down. I was more than a fool. I almost lost the best thing that ever came into my life because I didn’t know how to hold him, how to let him grow and be himself.

I was so proud of Silver at the funeral. I knew how much he was hurting and yet he held his head high and looked everyone in the eye. His friends surprised me. Ariel is an angel. He’s an evil little minx but then I’ve always thought that angels are dangerous. He was a good friend to Silver, I can see that. I can see, too that he is in love with him. I don’t know if Silver sees it but if he does he makes absolutely sure he does nothing to encourage it, whilst still maintaining an easy friendship that I envy.

The others are more solid and... real but every single one of them holds their head high and acts with dignity at a very difficult time. They all cry. They are all genuinely devastated and they all clearly adore Silver. He could so easily have walked away, gone back with them, taken his share of the club, but he told me clearly and often enough that his life isn’t there and never was: his life is wherever I am. I understand that completely because my life is him. I believe him now.

They all walked straight and tall when they carried the casket to the grave and then stood erect, listening to the words of the priest, words which meant very little to me but obviously a lot to them.

The journey home in the car was a lot less tense than the journey there had been. We talked and I listened. It was something I had been failing badly at doing but I doggedly listened as Silver talked. I watched the way he lit up, the way his eyes gleamed when he spoke of Ash and Ariel. For the first time I didn’t feel jealous, I didn’t feel guilty. I felt glad. The sun shone through the window and made the red in his hair glow. It glinted off the silver in his ears and around his hips and waist and it wasn't strange any more. It wasn’t threatening.

That was part of it, part of the reason I had been so closed, so afraid. It wasn’t the way he looked, it was never the way he looked. Hell I have to admit that after the shock wore off, I goddamned loved the way he looked. No, it was what that look represented. It represented the fact that he had changed and that I believed part of him had been taken away from me.

Of course I was an idiot. Nothing had been taken away, nothing at all... only a burden that had been crushing my heart. No wonder I didn’t recognise it when it was gone... it just hurt too much.

That was the beginning of the healing. We went straight back to Sam’s and we all talked. Then we got drunk and we talked some more.

When I took Silver home that night we made love in a way that we never had before. It was gentle and sweet and cleansing and we took our time... we took all night.

In the morning there was a surprise waiting for us on the mat. The psychological assessment had come early, very early. It was glowing. The psychologist couldn’t see any reason whatever why Silver, Ben and I couldn’t be together as a family.

Of course things didn’t change overnight, they never do. There were assessments, investigations, reports and another conference that was very different to the first. For one thing Silver was sitting at my side throughout. There was no more cowering in the waiting room. He was still very nervous. He held my hand so tightly but he told me before we went in that he wasn’t afraid of them any more because there was nothing they could say or do to him that was worse than what he’d already experienced. That thought gave me strength too.

In his short life, Silver has been through so much. He has watched his lover die violently... twice. He has been abused in every way imaginable. He has been tortured, beaten, violated...and through it all he has retained his innocence. He’s looked into the jaws of hell and come back stronger than before. If he can do all that then we, together, could face down a room full of sour faced hags and walk away with our heads high.

Except that this is not the same room as before. These are not the same people. These people all have smiles and are full of praise for us.

They had the effrontery to offer us help. To say that they could remain involved and help us access services, to find help for Ben. I laughed at them. The only help that any of us needed was to be left alone to find our own way... and we were.

I could barely believe it when we walked out of the meeting, picked up Ben at Sam’s and went home, as a family.

It all happened so quickly in the end, so quickly that my head was spinning by the time we closed the door and threw Ben’s bags onto the floor in the living room.

Silver and Ben threw themselves on the couch as if there had never been a moment they were not together and I was sent to get menus for takeaway. I watched them chatting and sparring. I saw the way that Ben looked at Silver, and I saw the way that Silver looked at him. It had changed. They weren’t equals any more and they both knew it. Ben was a child and Silver wasn’t, not any more. But they were still friends and they have always been friends.

It’s dark now; dark and cold. I think I must have left the window open because there is a deep chill in the room and the smell of snow. Snow?

Sliding carefully out from under Silver’s arm I cross to the window and open the curtains. A cold but very bright moon shines through and lights up the room. I stare in wonder. Impulsively I slip out of the room and without even putting my shoes on I open the front door and step out into the moonlight and the swirling white flakes that land on me, catching in my hair and eyelashes.

It’s beautiful. Everything is clean and fresh and new and... I look around quickly, taking in the garden, the street beyond. It was all the same but so different. The blanket of snow made everything different, the whole world magical, beautiful, enhanced. It hits me like a brick. This is Silver. He is different, on the outside he is different. The way he dresses, the way he looks, even the way he thinks... but that’s just snow. Underneath, everything is just the same as it always was.

The rose bushes are beautiful, glittering with crystals, white and sparkling like diamond. But they are not as beautiful as when they are blushing pink, their petals swollen by the attention of bees. The lawn is an expanse of soft whiteness, but when we walk across it there will be holes and in a few days it will melt and disappear... but the grass will always be there and the snow could never smell like cut grass on a warm day. It was different but it was all...still... there.

“What is it?”

Silver is always so silent. As usual I jump. If I had been holding a coffee cup I would have dropped it. He wraps his arms around me and I lean back into him with a sigh.

“It’s snowing.”

“It’s beautiful. Have I seen snow before?” He asks thoughtfully.

“I don’t know. I expect so.”

“I don’t remember. I like it.”

“It’s water, frozen mist.”

Silver holds out his hand and watches the fat white snowflakes land on his palm. He laughs and the sound of that laugh, that sweet, unrestrained laugh melts the very last of the ice around my heart. In this moment I am happy, as happy as I have ever been. I am his and he is mine and there is nothing... nothing else that matters. Well almost...

I smile at the sound of heavy footsteps running down the stairs behind us.

“River. Silver. It’s snowing. Have you seen the snow?”

“Yes, come and see it.” Silver calls. “It’s beautiful isn’t it?”

“I love it, I love it, I love it.” Ben sings, and we both wrap him in our arms, clinging together to keep warm.

Suddenly Silver laughs as if he’s been trying to hold something inside that won’t be held any longer and then... then he dances. Under the cold blue moon, with the swirling snowflakes and air so cold it crystallises our breath, he dances. Like a snow angel, red and black with wings on his feet, he dances. My Silver... dances.