Necessary Endings
Yielding to the wind’s admonition and power, the leaves in the glade fell faster.
Niles gathered them up, as if keeping them out of sight meant the leaf-shed hadn’t happened.
He didn’t want to return to his quiet, lonely existence, where his only human conversation consisted of ‘good morning’, ‘thank you’, and ‘have a lovely day’.
Not after the contentment and simple happiness of the last few weeks, after having had the chance to discuss books, art, history, and the needs of trees with Orren.
Not when his curiosity was far from sated, and he still had hundreds of questions.
“Don’t grieve for what hasn’t happened yet,” Orren admonished him one morning, when his morose mood must have made it onto his face. “You’re missing what’s good and beautiful right now.”
Niles stared at slick cobbles and misty drizzle, the nearly bare, drooping branches of his trees, then turned his head and took in Orren in deep green jeans and a jumper of muted orange.
His russet curls tumbled this way and that and his dark eyes brimmed with warmth.
“The only thing good and beautiful right now is you,” he muttered, and refused to feel embarrassed.
“Then look at me. What has changed in the world that none of you live in the present? You’re all so busy searching for the next exciting thing, you miss the breathtaking beauty that’s right in front of you.”
“We don’t miss it,” Niles disagreed with a lopsided smile. “We capture it in photos and post them online.”
“Dull ghosts, as dimensionless as pressed flowers. All your life is happening in these small, overlooked moments. You should cherish them, not ignore them.”
Sound advice from a man who could spend an hour contemplating the way sunlight moved across a maple leaf. Niles didn’t know why he argued, unless it was for the pleasure of hearing Orren’s voice.
He’d wondered, in the past, if sailors or polar explorers who had survived on rations for months at a time remembered their first decent meal and whether they’d take the time to savour it.
Because Orren’s arrival had made him feel like those sailors, starved for comfort, and he had cherished every conversation.
And moping while he still had time to ask more questions was idiotic. Orren was right about that.
“Tell me, then,” he said. “Is there anything you miss from your human life?”
“Cats,” Orren replied without a moment’s hesitation.
“For most of my adult life I had four, and when they weren’t following me around as if they’d missed their calling as guard dogs, they took over every padded surface in my study while I worked.
” His smile had misty edges. “Though my valet complained endlessly about the cat hair on my coats and breeches.”
“You had a valet?” Niles couldn’t imagine employing a PA. The very idea of letting a stranger near his underwear… And why was it that every time Orren answered one of his questions, it sparked a dozen more?
“Gentlemen usually did.” Orren shrugged. “I watched the world change, Niles. I know it’s different now. But my memories are what they are.”
“And so they should be. I just… find it fascinating how well you fit into the modern world. As if it’s the most natural thing.”
“I watched the world change,” Orren repeated. “Nothing I encounter is unexpected. Though I wish I could try more of your food.”
“That can be arranged,” Niles said, unsure where the sudden boldness was coming from, but forging ahead anyway. “Would you like to stay and share dinner with me?”
“Only one way to ensure dinner is to your liking,” his mother had told him when he’d complained about lime-green sponge cake in home economics class.
Then she’d taught him to cook, and Niles had never stopped being grateful.
He didn’t like to eat in crowded restaurants and didn’t want to subsist on takeaways, and while he usually cooked just for himself, he did have the necessary skills—and well-equipped kitchen and larder—to cook dinner for two.
So Niles cooked, watched Orren, and tried to work out what he was doing.
Orren would be leaving soon. Niles wanted to show him how much he had appreciated Orren’s company, and that the gift Orren had bestowed, while looming large and overwhelming, was appreciated too.
Showing Orren what he could have if he stayed was equally important.
Companionship and food, certainly. A place to work on his research.
Hot chocolate, whenever he wished for it.
And maybe, in the furthest reaches of Niles’s mind, swirled other dreams he didn’t let himself contemplate, lest it make the parting too painful.
When the scent of roasting vegetables filled the kitchen, and the saffron risotto was just the right hue of old gold, Niles picked a large handful of sage leaves and threw them into foaming butter.
“Dinner is ready,” he announced a moment later, and Orren’s interest—muted while he’d watched Niles work—sparked bright.
“Tell me what you’ve made,” he requested.
“Saffron risotto,” Niles said, dishing food onto two white plates. “Mushrooms simmered in tea. And roast butternut squash in sage butter.” The plate, when he presented it to Orren, looked like a feast matching the season.
Orren got the message. He raised his wine in a silent toast, and they clinked glasses and drank before tackling the food. Orren ate slowly, savouring each component of the meal separately and then in combinations. And when his plate was bare, he eagerly accepted seconds.
Niles let Orren enjoy his food and fought to stay in the present, though their future separation weighed on his spirit.
He took note of the tiniest details: the movement of Orren’s wrist as he lifted the fork to his mouth.
The glints of red the candlelight struck in his hair.
And the heat in Orren’s eyes whenever they rested on Niles.
It was beyond unfair to have something amazing and wonderful just in reach, and have it snatched away before he could gather the courage to do anything about it.
They kept silent until they sat with coffee and glasses of port in the glade, wrapped in Niles’s fluffiest blankets.
“You told me not to fear the empty branches, but it’s not just trees that die of loneliness, you know?” Niles blurted, awkward as always with anything interpersonal. He could present data to a conference hall full of people, but when it came to chatting over coffee, he was lost.
Except with Orren.
Because Orren heard him, slipping his arm under the blanket and pulling Niles into his side. And Niles soaked up Orren’s warmth and used his solidity and strength to find courage for another question.
“What would make you stay if asking isn’t enough?”
“I’ve told you all I’m allowed to.” Orren traced Niles’s cheekbone with his fingertips. “You’ll work it out. I have every faith in you.”
A moment later he jerked off the bench, dislodging the blankets, and turned in a circle. When Niles followed suit, he saw what had startled Orren.
Autumn had come to an end, even here in his glade. The trees stretched bare branches to the night sky, with only the gingko clinging to a single golden leaf.
Niles forgot propriety, shyness, and his own worries. He took two steps right into Orren’s space, and Orren opened his arms and closed them around him. They clung to each other, and Niles couldn’t breathe through his grief. How had the seasons turned so fast? Why did Orren have to leave?
“I’ll be back,” Orren answered the anguish in Niles’s heart.
“I’ll wait,” Niles whispered back. “Even if I’ll never see you again, I’ll wait.”
A sob fought its way free of his throat and Orren loosened his hold by a tiny degree.
“Do you remember how we watched the maple shed its first crimson leaves? It let them go with grace so they could dance on the way down. Treat your doubts this way. Let them go without fear, because your heart, your fire, the core of you—that’s the tree itself, standing strong, even in a storm. ”
Niles was a couple of inches shorter than Orren, and when he raised his head, Orren was looking at him with an expression Niles hadn’t seen before—undisguised want. The space between them was too wide and too narrow all at once, and it was Niles who moved first.
Their lips met for the first time, with warmth, assurance, and a rightness Niles felt in the searing crush behind his ribs. He tasted wine and coffee, Orren’s fingers twined in his hair, and Niles made a sound between a sigh and surrender.
“I don’t want to—” Orren started, voice cracking like old wood under a sudden weight.
Gold flashed in the periphery of Niles’s vision, the air shivered, and Niles stood in the glade, arms empty, as alone as he’d always been.