Chapter Twenty-Eight
Christopher
Christopher wakes in an empty bed.
They had been up late, far later than he’d expected Nash to want to be after his Christmas Day seizures, but he had insisted that he hadn’t been tired, some kind of sleep cycle thing.
So, they’d watched movies and kissed and eaten yet more leftovers, and when Christopher had shown Nash the gingerbread house, he’d taken photos and even told him how good it was.
Kind of a perfect evening really, especially because they got to eat the gingerbread house, something he hasn’t been able to do in decades, what with his mother always offering them up to Christmas fêtes over the years rather than letting him enjoy them.
He stretches out, his hand finding the cool of the sheets where Nash usually is. Hopefully he’s not constructing another gym somewhere.
Karma/Felix/Paddington is curled up around his feet, and grunts in protest at being disturbed, presumably for the second time this morning.
‘Do you want some breakfast, cat?’ Their eyes prick up slightly, and he takes that for a yes.
While Nash was sleeping yesterday, Christopher had managed to drop off some supplies at the community centre, only to be presented with several pouches of wet cat food from Tamara, whose own cat had shuffled off this mortal coil several months ago.
That saved him yet another trip to a shop, though realistically he’s going to have to go today.
God knows what food is even left, and even if the cat is an obligate carnivore, he’s not sure how long he and Nash can live off leftover lamb alone.
He finds Nash in the kitchen making coffee, dressed fully, with his hair properly done for the first time in a few days. Perhaps he’s feeling a bit more himself today. The cat, who looks particularly tiny next to Nash’s broadness, weaves around his ankles.
‘Morning,’ Christopher says, leaning against the door frame.
It’s a curious look that passes over Nash’s face. He looks happy to see Christopher, he’s pretty sure, but there’s something else there in the eyes.
‘What? Do I really look that terrible?’ Christopher laughs.
‘You look lovely,’ Nash says softly, kissing him on the cheek, which sets Christopher’s alarms running even louder.
Something tells him not to look at the stairs, to stay focussed on Nash and this cat they’ve taken in. But he does turn, and there, he sees a suitcase. Nash’s suitcase.
His heart is beating so loudly that it thunders in his ears in desperate pleas.
‘What’s going on?’
Nash closes his eyes. ‘I have to go.’
‘Go? Now?’
‘Yes. There’s a car coming for me, and I’m flying home to LA in a few hours.’
Christopher’s mouth is dry and he’s begging himself to wake up because this has to be a dream. It cannot be right that Nash is leaving right now?
‘Don’t be silly,’ he says, shaking his head. ‘The airports must still be closed. And the roads too?’
Nash holds up his hands, as if placating a wild animal. ‘It’s cleared enough that I can go. Flights are running again too.’
‘Oh.’
‘We always knew I had to go back,’ Nash says, carefully not looking at him. ‘Kurt booked everything for me. I have to go.’
‘You spoke to him? When?’ Christopher asks.
‘Yesterday. I spoke to him yesterday.’
Christopher doesn’t know where to look or what to say because speaking to Kurt was exactly what Christopher himself told Nash to do, but he’s drowning. He thought they had more time.
‘Can’t you go another day? Later?’ God he feels foolish, desperate to say this.
‘I can’t. It has to be now.’
‘Please. Please, don’t go.’
The distance between them feels enormous and he wants to cross it, he really does. But he watches something shutter across Nash’s face, as if everything that they were is gone in an instant. ‘It’s over, Christopher.’
It’s over.
His words echo in Christopher’s body, a ricochet of hurt. ‘You spoke to him yesterday?’ he repeats.
‘Yes.’
‘So you’ve known for definite that you were going to leave today?’
‘Only since last night.’
‘Oh, well that’s fine then, isn’t it?’ Christopher spits, his hurt turning bitter and sharp. ‘And you didn’t tell me?’
‘I didn’t want to hurt you.’
‘So, what? You were just going to pack your things and disappear in the night instead? How very fucking chivalrous of you.’
‘I was always going to say goodbye.’ It’s barely a whisper, and Christopher can’t quite believe it, either.
‘Well, go on. Goodbye.’
‘It doesn’t have to be this way, Christopher.’
‘What way?’
‘Angrily. Bitterly. Can’t we say goodbye as friends?’
Christopher can’t grasp all the things he’s feeling, but that word feels absolutely terrible on Nash’s lips.
He feels hot tears pricking in his eyes and, for Christ’s sake, he will not cry in front of this man, not when he seems so unmoved himself, so willing to just disappear without a word.
Without a conversation, because clearly he’s decided that’s it.
There is no future for Christopher and Nash, not as far as Nash seems to see it.
The space between them is a gulf.
The only sound is Nash’s phone vibrating on the counter.
‘You should get that,’ Christopher says, his voice flat.
It’s only now that Nash looks at him, as he answers the phone, and Christopher doesn’t hear what he says, because he’s just looking at him, pleading with him to change his mind, to stay a little longer.
‘That’s my car,’ Nash whispers. ‘They’re here already.’
‘Stay. Don’t go.’
‘I have to.’
The cat loudly miaows in protest, and Nash bends down to stroke them between the ears.
Christopher steps aside to let Nash past, but can barely follow him towards the door. If he hangs back, maybe it’ll prolong this goodbye? There must be something he can do to slow Nash down.
But it just means that he watches Nash pick up his case from the top of the stairs, while he grips the back of the couch, knuckles white with desperation.
‘Don’t hate me, Christopher.’
And with that, Nash Nadeau is gone from his life, forever.