Look What You’ve Done
Chapter Thirty

We were strangers starting out on a journey
Never dreaming what we'd have to go through
Now here we are, and I'm suddenly standing
At the beginning with you
No one told me I was going to find you
Unexpected, what you did to my heart
When I lost hope, you were there to remind me
This is the start
And life is a road and I wanna keep going
Love is a river I wanna keep flowing
Life is a road, now and forever, wonderful journey
I'll be there when the world stops turning
I'll be there when the storm is through
In the end I wanna be standing at the beginning with you

-Donna Lewis and Richard Marx, At the Beginning

---

Their life together is not a fairytale.

There are days when Kay is silent and withdrawn. There are days when Josh is moody and bitter. Some days, Kay is more interested in his new law textbooks than he is in Josh, and others Josh would rather write paragraphs for hours than say a single word out loud. That’s when they’ll lock themselves up alone in the office and refuse to let the other one in. Kay still sometimes gets jealous over the relationship that’s formed between Josh and his son. Josh still cringes when Kay and Nicky are ‘over-affectionate’ with each other. And they still constantly snipe and complain and bitch and scream at each other.

But for all of that, Josh has never felt so at home. Kay has never felt so comfortable with his revoked ‘stud’ title. And even Nicky has never felt so much part of a family. They are literally sharing their lives, and every time Josh realizes that, it makes what he and Kay had had in high school feel like nothing more than coexisting. Well, coexisting with a lot of heated sex.

So there’s no happily ever after, but there is a happily. They are happy, all of them, despite all the little in-between grievances. And Kay even thinks it might be those grievances that make them into a real family. Yes, they’re dysfunctional; yes, they’ve fucked up and hurt each other, and yes, yes, and a lot of people probably wouldn’t understand why either of them had forgiven each other the things they had. Would probably think they were both psychotic and depraved, even. But as long as they both understand, Kay thinks that’s all that matters.

Tara comes over sometimes—biting her lip as she sees them with Nicky, because she and Jack still haven’t successfully managed to either conceive or adopt—and she talks about the past. The way things used to be. She compares the times. It’s something Kay and Josh have long since stopped doing out loud, and more recently stopped doing internally, but neither of them mind listening. Tara is more than happy for them. When she’s there the apartment seems smaller, but definitely brighter, and she swings her legs off the kitchen chairs and giggles over coffee about innocuous things. Once, she brings a camcorder. It’s not for a project this time, but she makes them “say something” about themselves again anyway, and once again, she brings up their getting married. This time, their ‘never’ comes in unison, and no one’s feelings are hurt.

They see Lex once in awhile, too, and even briefly reconnect with Jeanie when she comes over from Toronto to visit her ex-girlfriend. Neither Kay or Josh can see any signs of reconciliation in the former couple, though Lex has since broken up with her psych-major girlfriend and seems happy enough about it.

“Heartless lesbian,” Kay laughs, and rediscovers her only-semi-playful right hook.

Life settles into a routine and before long, Josh knows how things will turn out, even when they’re ‘out of the ordinary’ things. On the more noted holidays they invariably gather at Jack and Tara’s along with Johnny and, normally, a few of Tara’s stray friends. Christian will turn up with some woman, always a different one. Birthdays are a family dinner and a party. Mostly any celebration goes that way, actually. He falls into it easily and there is always so much to do he is never bored. And though sometimes he half expects to start craving a high—any kind of high—just because it was so thoroughly what he should be experiencing in his life, he never does. In a way that makes sense; Josh’s life has never gone quite the way everyone had expected.

Everything wraps up neatly. Everything all works out. Josh looks down at the first edition copy of his third autobiographical novel, reads the dedication (“pour que,” his favorite inside joke),andthinks back over every terrible thing that has occurred from the time his mother had died up until now.

In the end, Josh closes the cover without the slightest hint of regret.

In the end, Kay wakes up every day to Josh pressed up against him, and he smiles.

---

IT’S OVER.

…But there’s still more. YEAH, I suck that hard. Clickyclicky on my name to read Nicky’s story, “The Faster You Fall,” if you’re so inclined. Kay and Josh ARE still in it, obviously. :D

Preview: Nick Marks, at sixteen years old, is having an identity crisis. No matter how hard he tries, he can’t seem to outrun his accursed childhood nickname, and everyone expects him to be as gay as his two dads. Nicky’s determined to prove them all wrong—unfortunately, when he finally meets the person he wants to be with more than anyone else… he happens to be a man. And that man happens to be considerably older than him.

Shout-outs!:

Rube. For better or for worse, girly, thank you.

KOCHAN! You are my life girl. You started me on this mess. THANK YOU. –heart-

Chaos—It’s all you baby. –HEART-

Doctor C. You’ve been my world for my entire life. Thank you for my stories. Thank you for sharing EVERYTHING. You’re my ultimate. –heart- I couldn’t quit you if I tried. VEGAS BABY. :D!

Miss X. What do I say? You taught me to not “be pretty,” though you don’t know it yet. Thanks for freeing up my TMI sense and my ability to refer to Kay as “horny,” let him adjust his cock, and let Josh talk about pissing on rugs. (Not to mention my infamous sociopath writing exercise.) You let me dream. In the end indeed, je t’adore.

READERS: If I c/ped ‘thank you’ until Microsoft Word bitchslapped me with the anal paperclip thing, it would never be enough. You fucking made my life. This is to anyone who ever reviewed, of course, but most especially to those who followed me all the way through this fic and let me feel the love. Baneface, blondguy, diebyownhands, forsakenlove, Marie, whatifisaidno, Satanic-Cupid, Self-Inflicted, M Welles, Minako, xxFallin, Deadly Beautiful, TiGeR-BaBe1989, itsallaboutme, Kat, DamienEL, Esquirella, and Spawn of Hell, I LOVE YOU.