It doesn't happen very often, and it doesn't always have
something to do with Josh. When he looks for things he
can be proud of, that's what he comes up with.

_________

This time, it has everything to do with Josh.

_________

When it bleeds through, it's because of the fact that
they never finish a conversation; not about anything
that matters. Not about things like life and death,
or why he left a city and a good woman for rain and eyes
and nothing more.

_________

He never thought they were meant to be, not exactly.
Never thought of her when she was six years old, wearing
a yellow sun dress (she always looked good in yellow),
all scraped knees knocking together and scrambled hair.
And him, beneath that same sky. He never thought of
them that way.

Then, she left. He'd wake up thinking that his heart
would break his chest.

But it never did. It never does. Not until New
Hampshire; and it's an ice storm, and it's Josh, and
it's everything intersecting. Everything.

_________

There's a rift in something. In the universe, maybe.

He imagines his life crashing towards this singular
moment. There's nothingness, and then there's this.
Here. And in between, he writes his undergraduate
thesis about a broken system; innocent people and jail
time. In between, he still becomes a lawyer.

And he falls off of his bicycle too many times, and he
doesn't make love to a girl named Wendy in the back of
his father's car, he has sex with her, and a wasp stings
his finger at the beach, and it swells, looking angry
and red. His mother with the sun in her eyes, and she
kisses it better. She looks young.

The snowflakes fall fat and white, and Josh has some
caught on his eyelashes when he bursts into the motel
room. "We're, do you know what we're talking about?
Wiley's going to drop out after South Carolina, we
think. That's what we're talking about. So, Sam. Sam,
Sam, Sam." Josh doesn't look like he knows what to do
with himself. Sam knows what that feels like.

"South Carolina is a long time away," he says, strange
and slow. The bed's uncomfortable; the headboard cuts
into his back.

"Yeah." Something jumps in Josh's jaw. "What's going
on? You've been, and, I mean, the world's coming
together here."

Sam smiles. Josh can always make him smile, except when
he's making him bite back tears. "It is?"

"Yeah. Yeah, it is."

"I miss Lisa," he says abruptly, even though it isn't
about that at all, not anymore.

He jumped off a pier once, gangly at eleven. The
outline of his hand splayed across a red canvas of a
sky. Dark, dark, dark underwater. And the silt
stinging his calves, and the pinpoints of light,
refracted. Kicking his legs, and not knowing which way
was up, directionless.

"Sam, it's, uh, it's been awhile, man. You suddenly;
you pick today?" Josh is trying to tease, but he's
serious, and they both know it. He still hasn't sat
down; hasn't even taken his coat off.

This feels familiar.

Sam's voice sounds thick. "You know, you've never
understood the way I do things, Josh. But you
understand the way you do things even less, and I think,
I think that's why we work; why we're friends."

Josh stares, incredulous. "Are you, are you trying to
piss me off?" His lashes still look damp; unnatural
with darkness. "Because, Sam. Do you know how many
times that you've just--" He winces at something; the
way his words sound. Something. "Do you know how many
times you've saved my life? And, and you won't even let
me help you." The wind claws at the window, and Sam
tries to say something, but it's just swallowed. (Help
me.)

Josh leaves. And Sam sits there on the bed, and he
thinks about the illusion of light where there isn't
any. And he thinks about Josh.

And at the back of his mind, he thinks about the world
coming together.

_________

"We need to talk," Josh says later, the way they do in
the movies; ominous. Face too serious, and Sam's
terrified, but he has to laugh.

Josh takes one look at him.

From the bed, the bad painting of the flower in the vase
is all crooked against the wall. It's always a flower
and a vase, Sam thinks. There was this one time,
though, and it was a raven. Crazy black wings throwing
shadows, and he supposes flowers are better than that,
at least. Bright splashes of colour; bright like Josh.

There is that brightness, and counting ribs, and
beautiful spaces. No talking.

He doesn't think anyone is taking advantage of him, not
exactly. Because he and Josh never finish a
conversation, but it's no one's fault. It's in the way
they do things; the way they are.

_________

"Sam, seriously. We need--"

"Everything isn't always about you," Sam says softly;
blankets scraping wrists.

Josh just keeps going. "This-- whatever is going on
with you, then."

"Yeah?"

"It doesn't have anything to do with me."

It doesn't sound like a question, but it's too dark in
here to see Josh's face; too dark to really tell.

"No," Sam answers anyway, helplessly. "No." Burying
his head into a warm shoulder and closing his eyes, too
tight. Seeing spots; these little green sparks of time
and space.

_________

They get to Illinois; and Josh's father dies. On the
telephone, they talk about how Connecticut is thawing
out. Josh sounds surprised, like nothing ever changes
and winter in Connecticut is perpetual, all water colour
shades and ice.

"It's called spring," Sam says gently.

Josh chuckles; a laugh that isn't really a laugh. "Is
Leo there? Let me talk to Leo."

_________

Spring slips, and then it's the White House. And the
first time they step into the Oval Office all four of
them huddle just inside the door, like they're afraid,
or awed, or something. The President ushers them into
the room. "Well," he says, looking at Leo more than
anyone. "Here we are."

It's things falling into place, and other things just
falling.

It turns out that they all talk too much, even Sam. And
in between the small victories all there is is static.
Miscommunication, and white noise.

_________

He's always the designated driver; he's the one that
makes Donna laugh over mixed drinks that one night she
looks like she's been sucker-punched. He's the one CJ
dances with before the world ends that first time.

"You're the only one keeping it together tonight," she
says. "So, next time. Next time, Sam, I'm gonna be the
one in charge."

"You're always the one in charge, CJ," Sam tells her,
and then he blushes at the way that sounds.

"Next time," she insists, leaning into him.

_________

Everything is white, and something makes his eyes sting.
Antiseptic.

"Don't," Josh rasps, motioning to his own face, shifting
wires.

"I'm not--" Sam begins, because he isn't crying. But
then Josh's hand closes around his, hot and sweaty and
real, and Sam's throat tightens. All he ever wanted was
to squeeze someone's fingers and have them squeeze back,
but he still feels--

_________

Like he's missing something, Sam ineffectually pushes
the papers that are sitting on his desk around. Around
and around, and he's not getting anything accomplished.

Toby's been closing his door lately, and Sam pushes it
open. The other man is sitting there so still that it's
disconcerting. Then he licks his lips and Sam knows
he's alive.

Toby looks up, running a hand across his forehead at the
sight of Sam, or something. It leaves a red mark.
"Yeah?"

"I thought I'd, that I'd work in here," Sam says
carefully.

Toby tilts his head; asks no questions. "Okay."

_________

Josh, in the parking lot. Headlights reflected in the
whites of his eyes, but then the car is gone. Josh
isn't. Sam reminds himself.

"Sam. Listen, I'm fine. I mean, I'm not fine. But I
will be. The guy said so. And, uh, that didn't sound
nearly as convincing as it did in my head, but--"

"Josh."

"I just, I don't want to talk about this."

"Ever?"

"I don't want to talk about this with you."

_________

"Let me help you," Sam says, later.

Josh stares, and for an eternity there is nothing but
that. "You don't get to say that to me."

Sam thinks about it. "I do. This time."

Josh turns away. "Whatever. Whatever."

________

The next time they go out, CJ isn't there and Josh talks
about bananas and near death experiences. He smells
like soap; like something clean. He brushes Sam's hair
off of his forehead in the cab. "Let me see your face,"
he keeps saying, "I want to see your face."

"That wouldn't be very fair," Sam whispers.

_________

"I think I'll write a book," Sam says, sometime. He
can't keep his eyes open and he can't understand it. He
hasn't been able to sleep lately; he's been daydreaming
about sleep.

"Okay."

"Not now." He blinks with difficulty. There's the
ceiling, and streetlight yellow softening Josh's
features; blurring lines. "After I've lived."

Against his chest, hands still. Heavy.

_________

He didn't always want to be a writer; didn't always
write about the symmetry of waves.

When he was six, all he wanted to do was live forever,
out there on the ocean. "Forever's a long time," his
father had told him, lifting him up, up, up, into the
sky and the blue.

It turns out, his father doesn't know much about
forever.

_________

Neither does he.

Because the idea that the world will come together is
always at the back of his mind, sometimes at the
forefront. But it never does, and he gets tired of
waiting, or something. He just gets tired.

They're living in the basement of the White House. When
it bleeds through this time, it has everything to do
with the fact that the sunlight hasn't touched his face
in days, and nothing to do with Josh. Not yet.

On the telephone, Leo stammers, and Sam has a suspicion
that the world has ended again. It has.

He blinks owlishly in the hallway before ducking into
the Mess, just because he doesn't have anywhere else to
go. He doesn't want to be an underground creature;
doesn't want to see the sunlight anymore either.

Josh finds him there. "Mrs. Landingham," he says
slowly. "I can't, I can't believe it." He sits down
hard on a high-backed chair. It's too quiet. The sound
of a clock ticking, something steady at last.

And Josh's fingers searching out Sam's knee beneath the
table; Josh's skin stretching pale and tight across his
cheekbones. Steadiness gone.

It's Sam's apartment. It's always Sam's apartment. "I
should go," Josh says. After.

"Yes," Sam agrees. It's three in the a.m. He hasn't
slept. "Yes."

"So."

"Don't," Sam says, not meaning to. His voice is this
high, thin thing that makes him want to flinch.

Josh's eyelashes tickle Sam's cheek. "I don't want to,"
he says finally, fiercely.

Sam smiles, but he's tired, he has to close his eyes.
He dreams about dark things. Wakes up to a white
floodlight of a sun, and one side of the bed is cold.

The tears surprise him, but he doesn't wonder how he's
been reduced to this. He knows. He knows.