5 Drabble series
Title: Constant
Author: Illwynd
Characters: Boromir, Faramir
Disclaimer: Tolkien gets the credit for the good. I take the blame for the bad.
Notes: Inspired by Heinlein's "I Will Fear No Evil." I had meant to make a longer fic about this concept, and I still might, but I started drabbling it and couldn't stop. Hope you like it, it is my first LotR drabble.

Constant: Share Everything

I have known brothers who fought over possessions, over duties, over affections. Not so with us. What was mine was yours, and yours was mine. I would have shared your death with you, to ease it.

The elven boat floats onward, but you have made it home at last. We wade back out of the river, clothes wet and clinging. I barely notice. You keep silent, trying to spare my sanity. It is worse to wonder.

I feel you. Tell me, are you really there?

(Yes, brother. I could not leave you.)

Then stay, and share my life with me.

Constant: Memory

In the darkness together, the pain fades away. We're as close as we could ever be, naked, intimate. Nothing else exists. You keep me strong, you hold me here. We chase away sorrow.

(We'll make it, I promise.)

Just don't leave, brother.

(Don't worry. I'm here. I'm staying.)

Do you remember when we…?

(Of course.)

We distract ourselves with memories as hours slip away.

(Time to wake up and face the world, love. I think someone's calling us.)

I open my eyes and hear you gasp.

What is it? What's wrong?

(Nothing, brother. I'll tell you all about him. Later.)

Constant: Old times

Our friends will be here soon. I comb gray hair with wrinkled hands.

You are lucky, I think. Do you feel this weariness?

(Yes, I am lucky, for I do feel it. Growing old with you is no grief, and it gives me an excuse to tease you like I used to, my dear senile little brother.)

You are the senile one, if you think I will not spend tomorrow boring you with old books, just for that remark.

I realize I spoke aloud, and the housemaid is looking at me strangely.

I hear you laugh.

(See? Told you.)

Incorrigible.

Constant: Luck

One last gathering of what remains of the Fellowship. I am here by courtesy. If they only knew… but in all this time we have not told them. You insisted. You are quiet all through dinner, pleased to see them all well, and enjoying their tales. I am quiet also, feeling your happiness.

Only Eowyn knows. I insisted. For years she thought it was a madness, some lingering wound. Later she came to believe it. She smiled and said I am lucky, then, for I am twice-loved. I agree with her. I hold her, and I can feel your embrace.

Constant: Together

Strange to wake from death to wet, cold wonder. Strange to feel the motion of life again. Strange to be inside the skin I knew so well from without. I couldn't even question if I deserved this chance; I took it. You welcomed me.

Peace.

We have kept our secret for so long. We shared your life's joys. We shared our hidden smiles over your children, now grown. A full and happy lifetime we have had. We now will know a rare comfort; we face the end together. Eager, we set off, once again boys on a bright summer morning.