Hunter's Moon 3- Epilogue

This is the last part of Mike and I's story, more like an update than an epilogue, really. For those who have read the first two parts already, yay! Thanks, and enjoy. For those who haven't, go back and read 'em. I'm not a writer by any means, but (biased though I am) it's a good story... Love, Ray

One early May morning, Mike climbed out of bed and snuck off to bathe, hoping not to wake me. But I was already up, just laying there, pretending to sleep. I was kind of bummed out- for the first time since we were married, we were going to have to spend some time apart. Mike had to fly out that morning to New Mexico, where he'd been offered a job. I heard the water turn off, and looked at the clock. 4:32 AM. I shut my eyes just as Mike came back in the room. I heard him dressing quietly, but remained still and silent. When he was done, I heard him walk near the bed. I could feel the bed move as he sat down beside me.

He ran his knuckles across my face, soft as he could, and whispered, "Love you so much, baby..." His lips brushed against mine. I wanted to grab him, pull him there, make sure he wouldn't leave. But I continued pretending to sleep. I didn't want to get upset over a silly week-long absence, but in truth, I knew if I looked at him, I'd cry.

He kissed me again in the spot that drives me crazy, just behind my left ear, and told me again, "I love you." I held my breath as he stood up. I heard him grab his bag and jacket, and a moment laterm the door clicked shut. I got out of bed and walked to the bathroom. I turned on the shower, sat under the spray, and finally exhaled. It was going to be a long, long week.

But three days later, I came home to the sounds of country music filtering from our apartment. I opened the door and there was my husband, my life and my true love, standing in the kitchen, drinking a Coke. I ran into his arms.

"Why are you back so early?" I asked, between the kisses that were being rapidly exchanged.

He picked me up and set me on the counter. He spread my legs and moved in between them, and grinned. "I got the job."

I laughed and hugged him. It was a big deal- he had been offered a spot that more than doubled his salary, and in turn, given us a chance to move back to the States, which we'd wanted but couldn't possibly afford. Or so I thought.

"And I bought you a present, too!"

I'm sure I lit up like a little boy on his birthday. "What is it?"

He pulled a packet of papers from his back pocket, and kissed my cheek. "Read 'em," he said, quietly.

I took the papers and wrapped my legs around his waist. Opening the packet, I started reading, waiting to see if there was some kind of joke. Then I saw the picture.

I gasped.

"Do you like it?" he asked, a little nervous.

I remembered a conversation we had had months before. Mike asked me what my dream home was like. I'd grown up in trailers and apartments, or sleeping on the couch of whoever had taken my family in that week. So I thought of the kind of placeI wanted to call my own- a little adobe house, with a garden and trees, and the whole beautiful desert spread out behind it.

That was exactly what the photograph showed.

I looked at him with total disbelief. "Are you kidding?"

"No," he said, his face serious. "I just, I saw this place and..." He pointed to the picture. "It's built around a courtyard, see? And the rooms open into it with French doors. I know it's small, and it needs a lot of work, but," and here he took my hand, "I know that you've spent your whole life in apartments and trailers and hotels. It's time you had a home."

I looked at the papers again. They were all filled out, except for one line on each that was still blank. Mike had signed on the payment agreement, but nowhere else. "You haven't signed these yet, Mike."

"I know," he said. "That's because it's your house, baby." He handed me a pen. "So you should sign them."

I tried to argue, but Mike wouldn't listen. "I've made up my mind, darlin'. The place is yours, whether you like it or not."

I finally put pen to paper and signed my name on the douments. Then I took Mike by the hand and led him to our bedroom to say "thank you."

* * * * *

We moved into my little adobe house in the beginning of June. Leaving Vncouver was bittersweet- Will had been accepted at a school back East, so we parted ways for the first time in our whole lives. We cried as we stood there, wrapped in each others' arms in front of the apartment where Will moved after I married Mike. It was painful, but we also had hope that maybe we'd both finally be headed home after a long, hard trip.

When we first pulled up to the house, Mike told me, "Just remember that it needs work, but we can do it, and in a short time, too."

I couldn't see anything past how perfect it felt to be there. We moved our things inside as quickly as we could. Night had fallen, and our mattress lay on the bare, hardwood floor of what we'd decided would be the bedroom. We pulled out quilts and pillows, not bothering with the sheets. I could see the spots where the floors warped. All the tiling in the bathroom and kitchen had to go. And whoever had decided to put fucking lime green carpet in the living room was definitely on my shit list.

But I knew that I was home.

* * * * *

We finished the repairs on the house by the middle of December, just in time to show off our home to Mike's coworkers, my classmates, and the many friends we'd made since the move. Will even flew out to see us on his Christmas break, bringing a beautiful Mexican woman named Esperanza with him. On her left hand she wore a simple, single diamond ring. They are to be married in April. I understand now what Will must have felt when I married Mike. I'm happy for him; still, it feels like someone else is taking my brother from me. But I'm honored to hand him over to Esperanza, simply because she makes him happy. I want my brother to have that.

I also got to see Amanda, and she met Mike for the first time in "real life". I realized, as she talked about her job and this guy she likes and trying to decide if she is going to enter a convent, that she and I are growing apart. When we were little, we used to tell each other every little secret there was. Now, I find out that she's thinking of marriage and children and what God's calling for her truly is. One morning, she and I went for a walk, and I asked her if she noticed that we were getting distant. She slipped her hand into mine. "It's time we did that."

"Why would you say that?!" I stopped dead in my tracks, and just barely kept myself from shouting.

She turned to me and put her hand on my cheek. "Because it's true. Ray, I will always love you and you're always going to have a place in my heart. But things will never be like they were."

It dawned on me that she had grown up suddenly, without me even noticing that the little girl I had needed for so long was now this beautiful, wonderful woman, and no longer belonged to me. I wondered what had happened when I saw her cry.

Mandy never cried.

But she moved into my arms and right there, in the middle of the sidewalk on a busy morning before Christmas, she laid her head on my shoulder and cried against my neck. I held her as tight as I could, feeling how her breasts pressed into my chest, smelling the sweet soap on her skin, and underneath her heavy wool coat, I could make out the curve of her waist and hips. The short, chubby, precocious little tomboy that I knew everything about had been replaced with a tall, pretty, intelligent and unmistakably feminine woman that I barely recognized.

The moment was a short one. Amanda composed herself and straightened up. "I'm sorry," she said. "I just realized that... I don't know. I guess I had always expected that we'd still be the giggling, laughing kids we always were. But this last year changed us a lot, huh?"

"Yes," I said, squeezing her hand. "I was just thinking that."

"You went and turned into a man when I wasn't looking." She laughed. "A cute one, too."

I kissed her on the lips, the big, smacking kiss that I'd always given her. "Holy shit, we actually grew up."

She started walking again. "Who woulda thought?"

When I opened her present later that day, I laughed. Under the paper was a wooden box she'd built, with the words "Coffee and cream, gin and tonic, Mandy and Ray, always and forever" carved on the lid. Inside the box were random bits and pieces of the childhood we had spent together- pebbles, stamps, stickers, bottle caps, movie ticket stubs... I sat alone that night and went through all those things and all the memories. At the bottom of the box was a picture of the school playground where we met. On the back, she'd written, "On this spot, a little girl met a little boy. The little girl was alone and afraid, so the little boy took her hand and promised he wouldn't let go until the little girl wasn't scared anymore. The little boy kept his covenant with the little girl, and finally, the little girl was no longer frightened. The little girl loved the little boy, and though it hurt, she knew it was time that the little boy let go of her hand. So the little girl told the little boy that she was brave enough now. The little boy asked if she was sure, and the little girl said yes. So he let go of her hand, and the little girl went into the world. On this spot, a little girl loved a little boy, and though he no longer holds her hand, she is not afraid."

I thought at first I would cry, but when I closed the box, I was strangely at peace with the loss of that little girl, because I wasn't afraid, either.

When she left for Utah the next day, I was sad to see her go, but happy, too. I knew we were no longer the children we used to know, but our friendship had survived. I don't know when I will see her again. I don't know if I ever will. But I do know that she is still my best friend, and always will be.

Will and Esperanza left that day too, late in the evening. I kissed my brother goodbye and gave Esperanza a hug. They walked toward security, but Will said something to her, and then hurried back to me. I grabbed hold of me and hugged me close, his face in my neck. When he pulled back, he rubbed his nose against mine, giving me an Eskimo kiss for the first time in years. Then he whispered in my ear, "I love her, Ray."

"I know you do." But I still felt a pang of jealousy, then of guilt. I'd put Will through this same thing, but he never once showed it.

"And I love Mike. And my friends, too. But I love you most of all."

I hugged him again. "I know now how you felt when I married Mike."

"Jealous? Angry? Lonely?"

"Yes," I said, close to tears.

"It will pass." He ran his fingers through my hair. "I ended up falling in love with Michael, just like you. And eventually you'll fall in love with Esperanza."

"It's upsetting," I said. "I can't believe I'm jealous of my brother's fiance."

"Look, Ray, Mike is your husband, and soon Esperanza will be my wife. We love them with everything we are, right? But we were brothers before we loved them, and will never stop being brothers, even when we love them. So you will never lose me, and I'll never lose you."

We finally let go a minute or two later. I watched them go through security. They turned back to me and waved, and then I left. As I drove back home, I thought about what Will said. It was true. It was comforting. That part of each of us, that place where the egg split at conception and we became two different people, was a part no one else could touch. Twins can feel each others' pain, yes, but we also feel each other' joy, and no one can take that away.

* * * * *

It's January 7, 2007- thirteen months since I met Mike, twelve since our engagement, ten since I began writing this, and exactly nine months to the day since our wedding. It doesn't seem like that long at all. More like a few days.

It's 1:30 in the morning. I'm sitting in our kitchen, typing this last installment, while Mike sleeps alone in our bed.

It's been so crazy lately, with the holidays and school and all the people that we've had around. We've been exhausted lately, which means that we collapse into bed and go straight to sleep. Our love life had dwindled over the past few weeks, which was okay with us. After all, there'd been a lot of emotion that accompanied this holiday, and emotional intimacy is just as powerful as the physical act of sex.

But tonight, we were both hungry for the physical act. We made love for hours, moving and touching and kissing. It went on and on, flowing from one act to another. It was that gentle, romantic, smooth sort of sex that all of us fantasize about having, but that is only possible with our one, true love. Mike's hands and lips moved over my body, and I met his every move in perfect harmony.

Everytime we have made love has been special, of course. But some of them stand out for certain reasons. Our first time was the best for all it carried with it, all the promises for our future. The make up sex is always incredible, too... sometimes enough to make us argue a little more than necessary. Sometimes it ends up being more about having fun than having sex, and those are special, too. All of those memories are.

But tonight, I can honestly say, was, physically, the most incredible.

After, our bodies tangled together as we came off that sexual, sensual high. Mike murmured his love for me, and I responded just as softly, until he drifted off to sleep. But I couldn't fall asleep, no matter how hard I tried to shut my brain off.

I sometimes wonder about what would have happened if I'd turned that library book in a day earlier, and Mike and I hadn't met. Would we have been brought together again by fate, or would I have missed my one chance at being well and truly happy? I wonder too what would've happened if we had been more patient, waited before we jumped into an engagement. Would Mike have still proposed if he had known me better? Would I have acted differently? If I could go back, what would happen if I took the ride home he offered me that first day? Or if I could change the event of Christmas Eve last year so we had had sex? Would he have respected me in the morning? Would I have respected me in the morning? Is he only so good for me because we met at just the right moment? If I hadn't been sick and freezing, would he have noticed me at all? Worse, would I have noticed him? Would I have wanted him if I'd known about the prosthetic from the start, or would I have treated him differently?

And what about our future? Will he still think I'm beautiful when I'm old and forgetful? What if he dies before me? What if he leaves me? What if I leave him? What if I don't become a doctor- will he still be proud of me? Will I be ready to face the temptation to stray when it comes? Will we get tired of each other, or will we keep falling deeper in love? Will we ever have to choose between what we have now, and what we could have if we walked away? And what if tomorrow we die in a tragic accident? What then? Will we be turned away from heaven for having loved each other, or will the saints and angels understand that we had no choice but to love as we did? And what if tomorrow we no longer burn with that desire for each other?

But those questions are so stupid. There are too many of them, but not a single answer, so why bother? No matter what happens, we've come this far and can face down whatever's next in line. And as long as he smiles when I say his name, as long as my heart still pounds when he's nearby, I won't worry.

I don't know what will happen to us. I pray that it will always be like this for us, happy and calm and bright. But no matter what, I do know that right now, my rightful place is in his arms, asleep and at peace.

And I love him.

Mikey, should you ever read this, you will always be my happy ending.

fin