Chapter 13
Roman was the first one to regain consciousness. And for a few seconds he couldn't remember where he was. He opened his eyes and gazed up. The night sky greeted him back, clear and full of bright stars. The moon had moved across the sky and was no longer visible. That meant it was later than he thought.
His hands were wet. His fingers curled around something cold and liquid.
'Snow'
Then everything came back, hitting him like a freight train.
A jolt of electricity hit him and sat up faster than he should have. Dizziness overtook once more. The wound from hit he had taken on the head was still fresh. He looked around him and saw Dean and Seth lying right next to him.
Seth was stirring, moaning as his ears were still ringing from the loud blast.
But Dean was out of it.
His body was not moving. His face was still whiter than the snow and those lips were bluer than the morning sky.
His eyes… those eyes, he loved so much were closed and so very still.
"Dean?" Roman shook him and took him in his arms.
Seth sat up alarmed, only now remembering what had taken place. He approached Dean and placed his ear on his chest.
"Does he have a heart beat?"
He held his breath in anticipation. Seth held his own too. Dean felt so cold. He even closed his eyes in concentration.
Nothing.
"I… I can't hear anything…" he said but still tried to listen.
"No!" the desperation rose to his throat and held him closer. He leaned over his face and their cheeks touched.
He gasped when he felt the coldness of his skin against his own.
He shook him and pleaded him to wake up.
It was Seth who decided to take action and began CPR. It was something he had learned when he was very young and had never used it since the day he had learned it. He was surprised of much he still remembered. Quickly, they managed to put Dean into position. Seth would do the CPR on the chest, while Roman would blow air from the mouth keeping the nose closed.
The eerie forest silence seemed to drown Seth's counting. The pushes against the frozen chest seemed futile, as were the exhalations of air into Dean's lungs.
"Come on Dean" Seth mumbled between pushes. "Come on…"
Each breath Roman exhaled felt colder.
Each breath brought him closer to breaking down
Each breath felt like death.
He couldn't really tell how long they had been doing it. It could have been a few minutes or hours. The truth was that after a while Seth was exhausted and doubting whether he was doing the CPR right. His breaths had become loud groans and his arms were numb.
He looked at Roman.
And he looked back.
His eyes were so sad. He held Dean's head in his hands, while tears streamed freely down his face. Seth went to start CPR again but Roman stopped him.
"Stop…" his voice was broken.
"No… we have to keep trying"
One push.
"Stop…"
Two.
"Please"
Three.
"No"
No breath.
No sound.
Just silence.
Seth looked back up at Dean.
He looked so serene; so peaceful; like he was sleeping. His hands looked like they were made of ice; smooth and glistening, lying limp next to his breathless body. The wound was no longer opened. The blood had been frozen on his body forming a macabre river of icy blood.
Roman kept caressing his face. Sweat and snow had matted his hair and he was pushing it out of the way.
"He is gone" he whispered.
It was then the sobs came.
Seth didn't know what to do. He felt like all this had been for nothing. He didn't even realize he was crying himself. He didn't realize his palms were clenched into fists; nails that were digging into his skin, drawing blood. He wanted to console his friend but he found it impossible to disturb him.
So he sat back and waited.
Roman lowered his head and whispered to Dean, between sobs.
"I'm sorry… I never wanted it to end this way… there's so many things I wanted to say… so many things I wanted to do… and I never had the chance… and it's my fault. I was too blind to see it when we had time… and now it has run out… we are out of time… and I'm sorry…"
He leaned closer still.
"I love you" he breathed holding back the tears. "I will always love you. Till the day I die… maybe even after that…"
And he kissed him.
It was ironic this was their first and last kiss. And sadder was the fact that it was Dean who had had feelings for him in the first place. It was Dean who had kept everything inside because he didn't want to mess up Roman's family. The same man who now lay breathless, cradled in his arms.
It seems like they were always out of time. Like their lives were filled with regret and pain. He knew he should feel grateful for having all this time with him, but he couldn't help but feel heartbroken and angry. He felt like his life was over.
He just had to keep breathing till real death came for him one day.
Wait till he too would close his eyes forever.
Dean's lips were unsurprisingly cold. There were not frozen yet; they were soft. Roman pressed them softly with his own, tasting them for the first and last time, forcing his mind to remember how they felt; how they tasted; carve them into his memory forever.
He had taken Dean's hand I his own while the other one caressed his hair.
"I love you" he broke the kiss "forever".
Seth came next to him and put his hand on his shoulder, in silent support.
On the horizon, the sun was rising. The sky began to lose its blackness and the stars vanished one by one. The first sunray started its travel from the east, marking its path through the trees, into the clearing and onto the broken men.
They would have welcomed the warmth it offered had it not been for their loss.
The orange hue it cast upon the fallen body made it look alive again.
'If only'
"I love you"
Seth blinked a few times.
'Wait'
It took a few seconds to realize what he had just seen.
"Roman!" he nudged harder than he meant to. "Look!" and pointed at Dean's chest.
It was moving.
He was breathing.
"Dean?" Roman realized too that he felt warmer to his touch. He had thought at first that it was the sun, but he was wrong.
There it was. The unmistakable sign of breathing.
Fingers moved and wrapped around the Samoan's.
Seth and Roman held their breath. It felt like a dream; like the stuff they made in films and fairy tales. They were afraid it would end; they would wake up and Dean would still be dead.
But they weren't dreaming.
Dean opened his eyes tiredly and looked at him.
He could see him, finally.
So clearly.
"I… see you… finally…" The bleeding man was gone; forever. He had balanced himself out, along with Abigail and Drew. He lifted his hand up and touched the face above him. The first tear run down and fell on the snow.
Relief.
A tearful, happy, laughter escaped Roman's lips and squeezed the hand back.
"How?" Seth came close and held Dean's other hand. "You were dead!"
"It… was… you…" he looked at Roman "you… brought me back" his voice was rough, barely above a whisper but his eyes were shining so bright.
They were so alive.
"But how?"
"I don't know…" he shivered. "Will you take me out of here?"
. . .
THREE MONTHS LATER
The snow had melted only a couple of days ago. The earth was still wet and the leaves had yet to start turning green. It would still take a few days before spring would take a hold of nature and really warm the ground.
The sun had risen an hour ago and the sunrays cut through the trees from the east, like sharpened sword. Humidity drops cling from the edges of braches and leaves, hanging on the tips in what seemed like forever before falling soundlessly. The last traces of mist evaporated and for a few precious minutes the forest looked like it was on fire.
He sat on the porch, alone, taking in the warmth and the breathtaking view. He didn't mind the cold. Ever since that night, it didn't bother him much. He felt it, but his body could tolerate it. He knew their time here was ending. In a few weeks the cabin owners would come to prepare for the summer season, and that meant they would have to leave as soon as possible.
'Pity' he thought. He really liked it here. He would miss it. Despite the early bad memories, everything after that was hard, but he was there with him all the way; beside him; supporting him and loving him. The hard part was accepting the fact that maybe he would never get his older memories back. But maybe this wasn't such a bad thing after all. Roman had told him everything.
Everything.
Maybe it was a good thing he didn't remember. Maybe this was a chance to start fresh, a new life.
A quiet one.
But maybe those forgotten times where part of whom he was; part of the man Roman had fell in love with. And now that he didn't have them, maybe he wouldn't be a man he could love any more.
"I can hear you thinking all the way to the kitchen"
Roman walked outside and sat beside him on the porch steps. Dean didn't avert his eyes from the forest.
"Why all the sadness?"
He lifted his shoulders. He wasn't a man of a lot of words. He wondered if he had always been like that. Roman wrapped his arm around his shoulders and brought him closer, kissing the top of his head.
"Penny for your thoughts?" he tried again.
"What are we going to do?"
"With what?"
"Police"
"Seth has been in contact with a lawyer back home. He said that as long as you testify that it was not a kidnapping, we should be cleared from all charges. We have to go the police however… and you will probably have to go through a psychological evaluation…"
Dean stiffened.
"Hey…" he turned his face with his fingers "We have already talked about this… we can't keep running"
"I know…"
"It's going to be hard for a while, but we have been through worse… don't despair."
"I can't go back to the hospital" his voice got lost speaking the last word.
"She is gone. He is gone too. No one is going to hurt us. It's all over"
Dean shook his head and kept his eyes on the horizon and for a while they didn't speak. They didn't have to. They had said all they needed to say in the past three months. Instead they sat in silence, side by side, their fingers interlocked.
Seth walked out of the cabin and joined them on the steps.
"I just spoke to the lawyer"
Roman and Dean looked at him in anticipation.
"He's going to meet us in two days at the precinct."
"What are we looking at?"
Seth smiled wide.
"He said he is pretty sure we are looking at zero time"
"Are you serious?" Roman smiled too.
"Yes! He said they are going to drop the charges."
"How is that possible?" Dean was perplexed.
"Check it out… the doc never submitted his report on Dean!"
Both raised their eyebrows.
"As far as law goes, Dean was illegally held in the psych ward. There is no medical report stating that he needed to be committed."
Dean sighed in relief and lay down on the wooden boards.
"How did we get so lucky?" Roman asked.
"I don't know man…"
"I do" Dean said without sitting up. He had the attention of both men. "It's the balance"
"I don't follow" Seth couldn't understand.
"I think it away to set things right. We destroyed Abigail. I believe it's like a thank you gesture…"
Seth turned his gaze to the horizon. The mist had already evaporated and he had missed the spectacle.
'Maybe next time'
"I'm going to start packing. We have a long drive ahead" and left.
Roman looked at Dean. He lay down beside him on the porch. He was rubbing his chest where the arrow had pierced his flesh. The wound had left a nasty scar and he had no doubt it would never stop being painful.
"Does it hurt?"
"Yes"
"Is there anything can do?"
Dean turned and looked at him.
"Kiss me"
They needed no more words. They simply needed each other. Roman leaned and kissed him. He would never have enough of those lips. It had taken them so many years, so many sacrifices, so much blood and endless tears, but they had made it to the end.
He lay down beside him again and held his hand.
They stayed like this, in silence and relief.
In happiness.
"I love you"
"I love you"
THE END
. . .
Maybe this time,
Maybe this time I'll outwit my past
I'll throw away the numbers, the keys
And all the cards
Maybe I can carve out a living in the cold
At the outskirts of some city
I extinguish all my recent pasts
Become another man again
And have a quiet life
A quiet life for me
A quiet life
A quiet life for me
A quiet life for someone
An acquired life for me
I lost, I ran
I started once anew
In northern grey, in drizzling rain
In salted slush and bitter hale
But the order as always merciless
It wants to see me fail
So the hunter is now the hunted
Past voices call my name
I renounce my past to live again
A quiet life
A quiet life
A quiet life for me
A quiet life for someone
An acquired life for me
I thought I have been given
Another chance again
But heaven lies as usual
I repented but in vain
It tries to cheat me out of my good aim
Take away what I never really got
My quiet life
No quiet life for me
No quiet life
No quiet life for me
A quiet life for someone
No quiet life for me
This is the end of this story. I would like to thank all of you who read and reviewed it. It really means a lot to me. I hope you liked it.
Until next time.
Peace