Don’t even start with how I’ve been neglecting my duties of updating. I -won’t- listen. Now that that’s out of the way, let us continue! .

Rating: PG

Warnings: Homosexual themes.

Author’s Note: Well, I’m almost getting annoyed (almost) by the number of slash stories involving young sprites that can bend this way and that way and that -angst- over each other in the nearest Gay Teen Club or whatever. Screw that. This story involves an old man. Don’t worry, I’m not going to make him bend this way and that way with his main squeeze; he reflects upon him. Sound interesting? Good.

I’ll See You Soon

Apathetic. I believe that’s the word my daughter used when we were at his funeral. Yes, it was. She said I was apathetic about the whole situation. Bah! I was just as devastated about it as any one of them. I just controlled it easier. I’ve never been one to cry about things, even things as tremendous as this. What? Am I obligated to cry and weep just because my lover died? He was old, and old people die when they get too old. It happens. Life moves on.

My granddaughter whispered that I was just too old to know what was happening. Of course, dear. Too old. Nice words for it. I commend you. Really though, I just let it pass through me like my medication for my arthritis.

Honestly, you’d think adults would behave like adults at these things! Nearly everyone was weeping there eyes out and blowing their noses. Even my ex-wife. That was a shock. I nearly joined him right then and there when I saw that woman standing by the door before they wheeled me in. She came bustling over, dripping apologies as she opened up like a flood gate and let the torrent nearly drown us all. Please, woman! You’re seventy-nine, for Christ’s sake!

I absolutely abhorred the way they displayed his body in that stupid box like that. That was just disgusting. I mean, why would anyone want to stand there and gawk at a corpse? They wouldn’t do it to a stabbing victim, so why would they do it to an old man who died in his sleep? It almost makes me want to die in a fire, so they don’t have anything to stare at while their mouths hang open and flies pour in.

My son asked me why I was so…calm about it all. I just smiled. I didn’t feel like telling him that I knew I would leave soon, so a smile was what I replied with. His daughter, my granddaughter mentioned before, brought up the age factor again. She’d wanted to spilt us up because we were “too old to properly care for each other,” as she put it. They put us both in a home, instead.

If you think it’s bad to be a gay teenager with a boyfriend in high school, just wait till you’re a gay senior-citizen with a boyfriend in and old-folks’ home. People are nuts there. Absolutely bananas. You got the women who try to “save you.” You got the men that glare at you. And you sometimes get the random person in a wheelchair that tries to kill you.

At least he could push me in my wheelchair. He wouldn’t let anyone else do it. I could walk, just not well, and it hurt like hellfire to try. So he pushed me, and I made sure he didn’t kill himself by doing it. Old men have egos, too, so I had to make my requests for him to rest subtle and practical.

I woke up with him dead in my arms. Dead. Such a strong word. Anyway, after I got over the initial shock, I called someone to help me with him, and when the left with his body, I shed a tear or two, I’ll admit. Then the whole family (wow, this many people actually care?) came and said how sorry they were that he died and all that other sentimental bull. Bah! Hypocrites.

After the funeral, we wet to a restaurant to “remember his life,” as my son-in-law put it. I never knew you remembered someone by getting drunk of your ass and singing karaoke. Young people these days.

Now I’m just laying on the bed I used to share with half my heart, my soul, my mind. It seems so big, now. I can still smell him; minty. He always liked mints. I wonder where spirits go when the have no body? Heaven? Hell? Another dimension? I wonder if he has his mints…

Are you listening? I think I can hear you. Right beside me, like always. Slight breaths that tickle my ear. I smile. Like I always did, every night when you would do that. I miss you. You miss me, too, I know. Don’t worry. I’m closing my eyes now. So tired. The funeral was a grand mess, you would have loved it. Just wait a bit, my love, I’ll see you soon. I won’t let you leave alone. You always liked company on trips…

“He died of a broken heart, I just know it!” She turns to the husband and cries.

“Shh. It will be alright.” He puts his arm around her, comforting her.

The other wife bows her head, looking into the box with the man. The father of her children. “They were so happy with each other, It’s not hard to believe.”

“What old age can do to people,” says the younger girl. “They would have lived longer had they been separated.”

“No,” says the son of the man. “They would have died of a broken heart then. A heart that had been ripped in two…”

However

No hearts were broken.

One was born.

I’m really quite proud of this. beams Review with your thoughts, please. It would be appreciated muchly. Thanks.