By Blair Sandburg PhD

By Blair Sandburg

By Blair

Unfortunately, on occasion you may be awakened very early on a Saturday morning by a talking alarm clock that proclaims the (ungodly) hour in a loud synthesized male voice. A voice that sounds disconcertingly like Jim's.

"It is now six o'clock a.m. Get your ass out of bed."

Note: Yes, the clock really will talk, and yes, this is what it will say.

Jim, who has the day off but still set the alarm to spout its tyrannical decree before the sun was even up. If this happens, stay calm. To do so you may have delude yourself into thinking that because Jim is blind he cannot tell precisely when the sun comes up and therefore must be forgiven. You will, of course, be overlooking the fact that Jim can feel the heat of the sunlight on his skin (even the gray, sickly rays of Cascade sun leaking in through the sky light above) but that's okay. If it keeps you from killing him in a fit of sleep deprived frustration---go right ahead and delude yourself.

You may also feel inclined to roll over, stuff your head beneath your pillow and fall directly back to sleep but this is not always possible for several reasons, such as: 1) upon waking you discover that you have a critical need to urinate, and 2) Jim has rolled over as well and is snaking his hand across the bed toward you in an act of drowsy exploration that--sleep deprived or not-- has been proven on numerous occasions to drive you instantly and irrevocably wild with desire.

If such a situation arises, and you are unable to resist capturing his hand in both of yours and bringing it to your lips for a few fervent kisses, know that this reaction is perfectly natural. It is not, however, advisable to lean over and begin kissing his mouth just as fervently, wrapping your arms around him and letting him run his sensitive hands over your body. You never want to find yourself caught in the position of having to pull abruptly away from your wonderfully tender, passionate, fabulously talented, oh so tactile lover and instead of whispering "God! I love you," into his ear like you mean to, end up gasping out:

"Shit-- shit, sorry, Jim, but I have to take a piss!"

While it is true he may take this declaration surprisingly well, chuckling under his breath and groaning into the hollow of your neck (something else that drives you wild) he will still then proceed to disentangle himself from you and sprawl back against his pillows like Apollo the fucking Sun God naked under a loose tangle of sleep-mussed sheets.

Note: a) Nothing breaks the mood quite like the sound of you stumbling to the bathroom and cursing while you stand stranded over the pot for two minutes because you can't be half-erect and wiz at the same time no matter how hard you try. Those extra two minutes are critical to successfully keeping your Sentinel in bed, sleepy and pliant under your touch-- he can do a hellova lot of unspeakable things in two minutes like get out of bed and manage to be halfway dressed before you escape the bathroom. He is also highly skilled at covering the fact that he knows you're sulking by holding up a sweater and asking:

"Hey, Chief, is this one blue?"

b) There are Braille labels that can be sewn onto clothing that indicate things such as color but these labels fall off after a few washings and neither of you have the stamina to keep putting them back on. You can't sew for shit and Jim can identify many of his clothes by texture or by where they have been placed in a drawer. But when he picks one up right out of the laundry basket you haven't gotten around to unloading yet. . .

"Green," you say automatically. It is not unusual for him to shrug at your answer and put the sweater on anyway but he still likes to know what color it is.

While you are shaving Jim takes his guide dog, Sam, out to relieve himself. He will likely come back with the morning paper in hand. If you both happen to be following a highly publicized trial (like that of serial killer Simon Munch who murdered four women and a Cascade police officer before he was finally apprehended), Jim will come stand in the bathroom doorway and ask you to read the front headline to him. Hearing that you are busy shaving he will hold the paper out for you.

"Wrong side flip it over," you may have to say, "nope, now it's upside down--flip it--eh-eh I mean turn--yeah that's it. . . Okay, it says: "Munch defense presents new evidence toward insanity plea"."

"What! What new evidence?" he will then demand.

"I don't know, I haven't read it yet. Just give me a minute," you counter, tapping your razor on the side of the sink, wetting it again and starting on your other cheek. This will frustrate him, of course, but he will most likely take a deep breath, dredge up the exact measure of patience required to wait for you to finish your personal grooming and probably distract himself by heading to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee. You, by the way, can be just as skilled at pretending not to notice that he's sulking.

If, however, the next thing you hear is the sound of glass shattering on the kitchen floor, do NOT ignore it. Drop everything and run.

Note: It is easy to forget that even though Jim graduated at the top of his class in Orientation and Mobility Training and has four greatly enhanced senses that make him just about the most amazing blind person on the planet, he still has to be conscious of every single movement he makes. If he isn't, if he's even just a little bit careless, disaster strikes.

Upon seeing your Sentinel barefoot and surrounded by glass shards, the first words out of your mouth should be: "Don't move!" even if he is already standing frozen waiting for your guidance and actually rolls his eyes in your general direction for stating the obvious. Ignore this and ignore the fact that even though he is perfectly calm (aside from being pissed at himself for dropping something), your heart is in your throat-- one step in any direction means blood flow, stitches, a trip to the hospital(1).

Jim will understand if you fall instantly into melodramatic rescue mode and declare urgently that you are "coming" and to "just hang on."

Once you have cleared a path and gotten him the hell out of harms way then and only then can you allow yourself to remember that being in melodramatic rescue mode, naked save for a towel, still wet from your shower, and half covered in shaving cream makes Jim delightfully horny. He loves to run his fingers through your hair to soothe you. He loves to press his palm over your heart and murmur hotly that he can hear it pounding. His "thanks for rescuing me" kiss makes your knees give way.

Note: It will sometimes be necessary to postpone breakfast for the greater good of having lascivious sex on the dining room table. Jim has a thing for the dining room table. He says he likes to feel your body against something hard--"unyielding"-- he says. He actually uses the word. He can, in fact, make you come using the word and his extraordinary, talented hands. You love his hands. You worship his hands.

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(1) hos*pi*tal (hos`pi-tl) n, 1. An institution that provides medical, surgical, or psychiatric care and treatment for the sick or injured. 2. An institution in which Jim first woke up after his accident wild with terror, groping for you, hyperventilating because he believed he was literally being suffocated by darkness. 3. A place where you were forced to watch helplessly while the man you loved was strapped down to a bed and poisoned by doctors who would not listen to your screams of protest.

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 THE GUIDE DOG

"Cane or Canine?" That is the question. That is the question Jim's O&M instructor may have posed over two years ago soon after she realized (with no small amount of awe) how quickly your Sentinel was progressing in his training.

Note: A good Orientation and Mobility instructor is a life saver, literally. She may be rather homely and quiet and completely unlike the tough as nails yet nauseatingly cheerful Mary Lou Retton you were expecting when you and Jim first walked into Cascade's Center for the Blind to meet her. She may have been curled up in her office at the window seat with a child in her lap, whispering into his ear about red and purple Autumn leaves and an abandoned rake left in the yard under a big oak tree. She may have looked up when you knocked, smiled and said hello as though you were both old, beloved friends she'd been waiting a long time to meet again.

You will learn a lot from her. You will start learning the moment she walks across the room and introduces herself to Jim as Anna Shepherd, taking his offered hand in both of hers. You will see the way he responds to her immediately, the way her hands invite, suggest, assure, insist but never force. You will be constantly amazed by how she unobtrusively sidesteps Jim's inhibitions, defusing them before they are even born inside his mind. She will defy the laws of personal space. She will touch and be touched. She will be just as gentle as she is strong. People will do anything for her. Everyone loves her, including you. You sincerely believe that she is perfect and will one day achieve the stigmata.

If she happens to suggest getting a Guide Dog--get a Guide Dog.

_____

guide`dog` n 1. A dog that has been specially trained to lead a blind person in walking about. 2. A fiercely protective male Golden Retriever named Sam that is hopelessly addicted to peanut butter. 3. An extremely annoying male Golden Retriever named Sam that starts barking at exactly the wrong moment while you are having lascivious sex on the dining room table with the man you worship. 4. An animal you would kill with your bare hands if Jim didn't love him so much.

_____

You may say you hate the dog. You may say the dog is evil and will never ever, ever get another bite of creamy style "Jif" again in its entire miserable life, but you will still keep him from straying into the kitchen until you have finished sweeping up bits of broken glass. You will still accept his nuzzled apology and scratch behind his ears.

Note: Never forget this dog has saved Jim's life before, more than once. You can say you hate him but don't kid yourself. You thank God for his every breath and find no shame in being eternally grateful to his stinky-shedding-slobbering-four-legged- self. Enough said.

Amendment to Note: He is actually quite clean-- for a dog.

While you are sweeping, Jim gets the much more pleasant job of wiping down the dinner table, not that you mind. After being taken, claimed and utterly ravaged on his favorite "unyielding" household surface you will likely remain glowingly impervious to anything short of a hurricane for the rest of the day. You might even agree to Jim's requested trip down to 'Heavenly Fresh Donuts' for breakfast, on the condition that Sam stays home as he will just get in the way.

Note: Sentinels have been known to engage in lengthy (seemingly) one sided conversations with their guide dogs. Further study is needed to ascertain whether these conversations are linked to insanity or a unique facet of Sentinel hearing which allows the two to communicate supersonically. Observation has revealed that you are often the brunt of these interchanges, described archetypally as a wicked trickster or evil step- something or other. It is advisable to ignore sentences such as: "Big bad Blair won't let you come along." Feel free to remind Jim that whining is unbecoming of an ex-Army Ranger. If he argues that he wasn't whining, he was "alliterating", threaten to drive both Sentinel and dog immediately to the nearest bran muffin.

There are a lot of stupid people in the world. You are, in fact, surrounded by them. Stupid people are not always readily identifiable but Jim's blindness will draw them out like rain draws worms. For example: say there is a new waitress behind the cash register at 'Heavenly Fresh Donuts'.

"Good morning! How may I help you?" she asks brightly as you guide Jim up to the counter.

"Good morning," Jim says, "I would like two glazed buttermilk donuts and. . .what do you want, Chief?" he asks, ducking his head down to listen for your reply.

"Milk. I'll just have milk."

"You sure?"

"Yes."

"And two large milks."

The waitress looks back and forth between you and Jim, then settles her eyes on you.

"Does he want skim or 2%?" She asks you.

"I would like one skim milk and one 2% milk if you don't mind," Jim says enunciating clearly.

"For here or to go," the waitress asks, still looking at you. Jim raises an eyebrow, considering, then he turns to you and asks,

"Hey, Chief, is she wearing a name tag?"

"Why, yes she is, Jim. It says her name is Heidi."

"Hmm. She must be new here."

"Yes, I think she is."

"I wonder if I should introduce myself to her."

"I donno, man, you can try."

"Yeah. . .but I'd be pretty annoyed if she didn't even acknowledge my existence."

"Yeah, gosh, that'd be awfully rude wouldn't it?" you say, rocking back on your heels as you see Heidi's cheeks flush.

Note: With a few lessons most (but by no means all) stupid people can be taught.

You may find to your surprise that Jim is often much better at teaching lessons to stupid people then you are. While it is true that you are an approachable person, charming and readily liked, you get downright nasty with anyone who mistreats Jim. You completely, though temporarily, forget what your hippie mother taught you about peace and love and "other living things". You go Doberman Pincher on their ass. And to think, when you first met Jim you thought he was the hot-headed, impulsive, alpha-male, testosterone-crazed aggressor. HA!

Note: All it takes is one day with a blind person to change your definition of the word "patience". If you thought you were a patient person, if you thought you possessed the sufferance of the saints, if you thought you were, fucking, Buddha incarnate--you were wrong. As in, way off the mark. Go ahead, try it. Try accomplishing anything with your eyes closed (no peeking). Try walking across a room. Try getting dressed. Try sitting down at the table and eating a meal.

Exploration of place settings:

1. By running back of hands gently along the edge of table, align self with table.

2. To locate plate, with flexed arms and curled fingers, lift hands to edge of table and move gently toward center of table until contact is made.

3. Using plate as point of reference, locate silverware by lateral movement of hands to right and left.

4. A light trailing(2) of bowl of spoon, blade of knife, and tines of fork, indicate types of silverware at place.

. . .etc. The list goes on and on. Now, imagine what it would be like if every aspect of your life down to how to clean dirt out from underneath your finger nails was made up lists like this. It's a good thing Jim is meticulous. He was trained by the military. He likes to make lists. You, on the other hand, would be a disgrace as a blind person. You would turn into a bitter, helpless slob. Well, okay, you already are a slob, but a non-practicing slob. A slob at heart.

To keep Jim from tripping, falling, cracking his head open on, say, the coffee table, and subsequently killing himself, the loft is maintained as a clean, orderly, clutter-free environment. Nothing is left out of place (e.g. lying carelessly on the floor, or on flat surfaces). Nothing is moved without a "State of the Union" address, no chairs are askew, no doors ajar. The place is immaculate. But, for the sake of your sanity, Jim has recommended that you keep your old room downstairs as a space of your own to destroy as you please. It is called the "Colossal" and is in a constant state of disarray. It is an exquisite masterpiece of mess. Jim will not come near it.

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(2) Trailing v. The act of using the back of the fingers to follow lightly over a flat surface.

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Note: donuts are blessedly easy to eat even if they are horrible for you.

After breakfast as you are walking back to the truck, you might be reminded that there is milk that needs to be bought, and dish-washing soap, and that Jim has a shipment of Canadian Pine to pick up at the lumber yard. He took up woodworking as a hobby about a year ago and now he has a three-month waiting list for his hand crafted living room sets.

Note: Living room sets to die for. If you've ever seen anything so beautiful before in all your life it was during a long ago experiment with LSD (or. . .ahem. . . something) that had you weeping like a baby and proclaiming that you'd looked upon the face of God Almighty. These are living room sets that remind you that Jesus was a carpenter. You are still waiting for Jim to make you a dinner table (complete with saddle horn).

Head first to the grocery store while it is still early. If it happens to be the Saturday before Thanksgiving there may be a crowd and a crowd is a very scary beast for someone who can't see. You know this because your friendly Mobility instructor will not let you take the helm before you've experienced just how rocky the sea can get, so to speak. She will put you under blindfold and you will actually feel the world drop out from under you. If you happen to be afraid of heights the first image that will slam mercilessly into your brain will be scaffolding. Fifty miles off the ground. You. Standing on it with the wind whistling around you like a fiend. It will feel as though every step you take is going to send you plunging to your death, falling and falling through anti-matter blackness. You might freeze up completely, knees locking and find yourself clutching the disembodied arm that is attempting to lead you as though your very life depends on it. It does--you swear to God it does.

"Whoa. . . ," you might say shakily.

"I know. The first time is the hardest. Just take a deep breath, relax."

"Yeah okay, just hold up a minute. Give me a minute."

"We won't go until you're ready and we'll go as slow as you want."

"Oh--heh--okay, uuh. . .Yeah, All right, I guess I'm ready. . . No wait! Stop. Stop, just--."

"Blair."

"Sorry, sorry. I know it's stupid but I-- I just didn't think this would be so. . ."

"Blair, listen. I'm right here with you. I won't let anything happen to you but you have to trust me or this doesn't work."

"Yeah right, trust you. Okay, I got it."

"Okay. Now, why not try listening to your surroundings? What do you hear?"

"What do I hear. . .uuh, well, Cars. . .people. . .a-- sounds like airlock breaks-- a bus?"

"Yes, good. Now what do you say we get on it?"

After more than two years of blindness, Jim is a veteran at balancing natural fear with trust and helplessness with awareness. He honors you with his faith that you will keep him safe and be his lifeline, as corny as that sounds. On everything sacred, take this responsibility very seriously even if it means having to endure Jim's occasional cracks about you turning into "Secret Service Agent Man". Know that there are times when "Secret Service Agent Man" is exactly who he needs you to be. Times when say:

You come home late from work on a Friday night to find a note from Jim on the door, printed in his meticulous hand, that states:

"Out for quick drink with Cassie. Home by ten, latest."

As you are reading the note you check your watch. It shows ten thirty and you are instantly worried. Granted you would be worried no matter what the hour. You don't like leaving Jim in the care of anybody but yourself and especially not someone who hasn't undergone your personal three week ‘sighted-guide training course and lecture seminar'. This may seem excessive but there are reasons for the precautions you take. Reasons to worry. As you walk inside and set your satchel down by the door, you see that the light is blinking on the answering machine and feel your insides clench up. You know the message is from Jim-- or worse about Jim. Drawing in a steadying breath, you reach out a hand to press the play button and nearly jump out of your skin when the phone rings, sound exploding out into silence.

"Hello?" you gasp, snatching up the receiver. You hear noise-- someplace very loud, a techno-beat pounding in the background, a swarm of voices and. . . breathing. Frantic breathing.

"Blair?"

Jim. Oh-God-Jim. He sounds choked, scared. Your breath catches in your throat but you force yourself to speak.

"Jim? I'm here."

"Blair. . .I--I'm up on scaffolding," he grinds out through clenched teeth. There is both the edge of panic and relief in his voice. His breath gusts loudly into the phone. You know what this means and feel burning tears spring to your eyes. God damn it! You imagine him, where ever he his, clutching the phone in one hand and the wall with the other. You are a thousand miles away.

"Okay," you say, striving for calm. All the power you have in the world now lies in the sound of your voice. "Okay, Jim, I hear you. I'm here. I'm right with you, okay? Can you tell me where you are?" You hear him groan unconsciously. He is fighting with his fear. Fighting so hard.

"Some-- someplace called the "Outrage", he says "do you--do you know where that is?"

"Yes," you say automatically even though you don't, hoping he can't tell that you're lying.

"Blair. . ."

"Shh-- okay, easy. Listen to me. I'll find it, okay? I will find you. Just hang on. I'm on my way."

All you hear in response is more breathing, harsh pants. He is lost and scared and knows you're about to hang up the phone and leave him alone in a dark, wild, unfamiliar place called the "Outrage" while you scour the streets with a map in your lap. Damn it all to hell!

"Jim?"

"Okay," he gasps, "Okay."

"I love you," you vow before slamming down the phone.

~~

You find the place, finally. A hot, sweaty cave filled with murky smoke and sound. Sound like texture, stucco, rough plaster that is being pounded to bits with a sledge hammer. The music (if you can call it that) slams into you so hard your chest feels like a drum and your ears throb. Jim is both blind and deaf in this place. What ungulates inside these walls is the stuff of his nightmares, his hell. As you shove your way through the crowd you try to imagine how Jim ended up here but can't. He would never let himself be led into a lions din like this. You thrash though a jungle of elbows looking for the payphone. Looking for Jim.

When you catch sight of him at last, pressed up against the wall like a whipped prisoner, you stop cold. You want to rush to him, call out his name, wrap your arms around him but, unfathomably, you stand still and stare--unable to move. You see someone near him, a boy, hardly more then seventeen, bouncing up and down to the music. He looks only vaguely human, a wraith with thin limbs and a pale face frozen in an odd expression of rage-like ecstasy. He is not aware of his surroundings. He doesn't notice when he bumps into Jim. Doesn't see Jim cringe and lift his head in a fruitless attempt to see. You want to throttle the boy for his obliviousness, you want to scream at the top of your lungs, pull every plug out of every wall socket. You want silence and stillness for Jim. Can't you see? Damn it? Can't you see what you're doing to him?

Instead you close the distance and slip your arm around his waist, holding on even as he flinches in surprise. You say his name over and over again into his ear. You say,

"It's me. It's me, Jim. I'm here," until he finally believes and folds you into his arms, holding on for dear life. You feel his shoulders shake and know that he's crying. You rub your hands over his back in long soothing strokes, holding yourself still, shielding him between the wall and the world. When you start to move, slowly, he shifts his weight along with you. Not really walking, not letting go, just shifting. He is behind you now with his arms around you. To the onlooker he must seem like a horny lover intent on nothing but your body while you weave and push and shout your way to the door.

When the night air hits and space blossoms around you, you feel like you've just tunneled your way out from under enemy lines. Jim takes in great gulps of air, lifting his face to the sky. You keep moving until you reach the truck and then you push him gently up against the door so that he can feel something solid behind him.

"Breathe," you tell him, sounding amazingly calm despite the fact that you're not breathing too well yourself. You put your hand on his shoulder and your forehead there as well.

"Just breathe," you whisper. He covers your head with his own hand and gradually, after a while, his breathing slows to shallow, soundless gasps. Still, for a long time you don't move. There are a few people in the parking lot scattering drunken laughter out into the air. The sound of a car engine fades away down the street. The faint raucous drifting up from inside the bar seems innocuous now like the far away roar of a football game.

"Are you okay?" you murmur finally. Then you look up at his face. His eyes are closed and you can see the tracks of his tears under an eerie neon glow-- orange as though they are molten. He barely nods.

"Lets go home," you say softly. He nods again but doesn't move so you edge him carefully to the side and open the passenger door without letting go of his arm. Then you urge him into the truck, buckle his seatbelt, and make your way around to the driver's side. When you settle yourself behind the wheel he reaches out and lays a heavy hand on your thigh, keeping it there the whole ride home.

That night he makes love to you like the first time after the accident, silently discovering, made passionate by pent up fear, beautiful and flawed. You reach over and turn off the bedside lamp so that the room is bathed in darkness and for a while neither one of you can see.

 FAMILY TIES

Note: Drive-thru automated tellers have Braille on them. Whoever thought that up was a real genius.

While shopping you may find yourself wandering down the frozen foods aisle, acutely reminded of an upcoming ordeal involving your mother (the vegetarian), ten pounds of thawing meat and a talking turkey baster. Thanksgiving will be at the loft this year because: 1) your older sister, Suzanne, is in the middle of a decidedly feral divorce that has turned her nine year old son into a zombie (who looks just about ready to thrust his fist up through the dirt, claw his way above ground, and unleash some fury). You worry for this child. You will keep him away from sharp objects while he is in your home. And, 2) your brother's wife is expecting her first baby very soon. Over the phone she, (quite cheerfully), declined to host the holiday on the grounds that more then cornbread and stuffing might come popping out of the oven on the day in question. "So to speak", she said.

Note: Don't hold your breath hoping to find any holiday refuge from Jim's side of the family seeing as it consists solely of his younger brother, Steven, who is twenty-four and making a career out of "finding himself". He drifts in and out of your lives, ("like Caine in Kung Fu"), cryptic and remarkable. Steven is the only person close to you and Jim who has truly taken his blindness in stride, accepting it for what it is without ignoring the pain. You often wish he lived nearby, instead of "nowhere in particular", traipsing about all over the world searching for the meaning of life, destiny, forty-two-- whatever. Then you wouldn't have to open the phone bill and find that Jim has racked up nearly two hundred dollars worth of calls to Madagascar, (. . .who says guys never talk on the phone?).

A closeness exists between Jim and his brother born out of repairing motorcycles and surviving their father together. This bond inspires an enduring kind of loyalty that surpasses what your siblings are capable of. Your own sister and brother, even now, see you as merely the head over which they glared at each other. You were never their friend or their rival. They have, since birth, reserved a twinly passion for each other that vacillates between the extremes of love and hate. But they spare you only distracted glances, noting the tectonic shifts of your life with a slightly raised eyebrow. Part of you may, in fact, envy calls to Madagascar and having grown up with a brother who has a way of listening to you even when he's thousands of miles away on the top of a mountain somewhere; one who can hear through all the static and the bull-shit.

"Stay close," you may have to caution Jim as you approach the crowded checkout line and come to stand behind two bickering children, one of whom is trying to bludgeon the other with a ‘Tickle-me Elmo‘. The red fuzzy thing laughs maniacally as it is hurled through the air like a mace. Jim stiffens at the sound and you wonder if he, too, is reminded on some level of your mother and the talking turkey baster.

Note: Be very glad that your mother married a science teacher who does not believe in the Ch'i-deflecting powers of cut crystal, or that all a family's problems can be solved by moving the sofa-bed across the room. It’s always frightening to imagine one's life as it "might have been" without the single balancing force that kept your childhood from becoming one big pseudo-Taoist furniture experiment.

"This is going to be a disaster. It's always a complete disaster," you will likely find yourself declaring to Jim as you cross the parking lot, raising your voice over the clatter of the shopping cart.

"What's always a complete disaster, Chief?"

"Thanksgiving, what do you think?"

He will squeeze your arm and smile sympathetically.

"It'll be okay."

"Yeah right. My mother will rearrange the entire loft when I'm not looking. You'll have to ware shin-guards."

"Hey, that's not a bad idea."

Invariably in the afternoon it will rain, you live in Cascade after all. The world opens up for Jim when it rains, gaining new shape and texture. He can hear rooftops and awnings, the gaps of alleyways, the height of trees and telephone poles. He says that outside the city limits he can even hear landscape ghost out from behind rolling echoes of thunder. "Mountains" he says, "I can sometimes hear the mountains." He often likes to take Sam out for a cruise of the sidewalks when it rains, leaving you alone to label the groceries and finish writing up Monday's lecture on "The Inequality of Stratification".

Note: You will learn from experience not to put off labeling the groceries with adhesive Braille strips. It only takes coming home to one of Jim's "Russian-Roulette" dinners to teach you not to procrastinate the task. Unless of course you like asparagus fruit-cocktail combinations.

When Jim comes back from his walk, bringing in the smell of fresh earth and wet dog, you can tell from the stony expression on his face that he's rattled. Sam's flanks quiver, a tell-tale sign of lingering hyper-vigilance. He hovers by Jim even after his harness is removed, flashing anxious glances up at him as Jim shrugs out of his rain-coat and kicks off his boots.

"Jim?" You say quietly from the couch, closing your book and stripping off your reading glasses. He ignores you and heads straight for the kitchen, pulling a beer out of the refrigerator.

"What happened?" You ask carefully, coming up behind him. He stiffens at the nearness of your voice.

"Nothing, Blair, okay?" He says. He doesn't sound angry but the control in his voice is betrayed by the slight tremor in his fingers as he pops the cap off his beer.

"Okay," you concede, but then cover his hand with yours to reveal that you can see he's shaking.

"It's just adrenaline," he murmurs gruffly.

"But you're okay?"

"Yes. Fine."

"Your dog doesn't look fine. He looks ready to pee the carpet."

"He's all right."

"That's Good. . . But you know what? I think I'll put some newspaper down anyway."

"Blair--."

"You don't have to tell me, Jim," you say seriously, gripping his arm and feeling the tightness of the muscles there. "Whatever happened-- I get the idea. I don't need details, but. . ." Your voice trails off and a silence builds between you, filled only by the faint drone of the refrigerator and the very distant swish of cars passing by on the street down below.

"You can tell me if you want," you say finally, softly.

Jim takes a long swig of his beer and then sighs, turning to lean back against the counter. He tilts his head up as he speaks as though trying to feel the rain once again on his face.

"Someone--a woman--came up to Sam and according to witnesses, she started feeding him bits of the hot dog she got from the vendor nearby," he murmurs, unconsciously slipping into cop talk, his voice low, "I didn't even know she was there at first-- it was raining pretty hard, I didn’t smell her perfume. . .anyway it wasn't really Sam's fault. She must have rushed the light at the cross-walk, he started to follow without my command-- we stepped off the curb too soon and we--we had a close call, but Sam pulled me back in time."

As he speaks you imagine this happening all too vividly in Technicolor--in slow motion--and fear gusts the words "close call" through your body like hot after-burn. You can just hear the sound of tires squealing on wet pavement, a horn wailing. You see Sam shoving his body back against Jim's legs, planting himself in the way of the car as though an extra eighty pounds of flesh could really shield the blow. You can even nearly hear the phone ringing and the detached female voice of the nurse down at County asking if you could: "Please come to the ER, Mr. Sandburg," and no way. No way, can you go through that again.

"Jesus!" you snarl, tightening your grip on Jim's arm, your temper flaring, "What the hell kind of a moron-- what kind of a complete idiot feeds a guide dog and then steps out into traffic like the fucking pied-piper!"

"Sandburg. . ."

"And what the hell happened to the famous "jelly donut test" your guide dog boot-camp is so famous for, huh, Jim? The one where "supper canine", "wonder dog" here walks right past hidden lures of jelly donuts and pepperoni pizza without flaring a nostril?" Your voice quakes with disgust and deep seated dread.

"What about that?" Jim snaps back, facing you as though he knows you will feel punished by his lack of eye contact. "What do you expect? He's not a "wonder dog", Blair. He's pretty damn amazing most of the time and he probably ended up saving my life today but he's not perfect. It wasn't his fault, and I didn't tell you all this so that you would have a shit fit!"

Jim turns away abruptly, groping to press his palm flat against the refrigerator door as though he suddenly needs the support to keep his balance. Seeing him unsteady, made clumsy by anger, your own temper suddenly subsides. You take a deep breath and run a hand through your hair realizing why he might have hesitated to tell you about his "close call", wondering how many have come and gone without your knowledge.

"Sorry," you sigh, rubbing the back of your neck, "You're right, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to freak."

"Yeah, okay."

"Can I have some of your beer? I think I need it."

Your fingers brush his as he mutely passes the bottle over. You make the touch last longer then it has to. By the time you've taken a few swigs, the tension in the air has eased a bit. "I'm not sure they ever thought of the hot dog pied-piper test," Jim says, straightening up and offering you a small smile.

You smile back, wishing-- hard and fast like a punch in the gut --that he could see it. "Think I should write'em a letter?"

"Yeah. . .As long as there are weener-wielding idiots out there, the streets will never be safe for the likes of me."

Note: Mrs. Kurby, who lives below you, called 911 the first and only time Jim forgot to turn on the light in his shop while he was working after dark. She sincerely believed that a chain-saw wielding maniac (obviously equipped with night vision goggles) was hacking somebody to pieces up on the roof. It took over an hour to persuade her and the authorities, that though it might be disconcerting, it is entirely possible for a blind man to safely operate electric power tools. Now Jim keeps the light on all the time even if it's just after lunch on a Saturday afternoon lest, as he puts it, "Lieutenant Colonel Kurby sics her night watch Battalion after me."

Despite her pinched-faced paranoia you can sympathize with Mrs. Kurby--you've had your share of nightmares in which Jim is forced to fumble through life without fingers on account of his damn boy-toys. Sometimes you hear the telltale whine of a table saw and you too feel inclined to pace the roof with your arms crossed over your chest mumbling: "safety devices my ass. . .they call floating airplane seats safety devices for God's sake!. . .".

It is, in fact, a good idea to avert your eyes if you happen to walk in on Jim while he is running a gigantic spinning blade through a slab of the Canadian Pine picked up that morning, and spare yourself a heart attack.

"Blair?" Jim asks, cutting the power and pulling off his protective glasses.

"Yeah. How's it coming?"

"Fine. You want to see?"

"Sure."

Jim holds out his hand.

Note: Jim has great hands. Michael Angelo hands--broad and strong. He has always been strong, well built from his years in the Army and the police force. He lost weight after the accident along with some of his bulk but now, more then two years later, past the physical pain and the terrible, crushing depression that followed it, he is as fit as he ever was.

You can see that the muscles of his forearms are pumped up from exertion, drum-tight, veins raised and he is sweating through his tee-shirt despite the crisp November chill that hangs inside the shop. The faint, vital scent of his body mixes with the sharp odors of sawdust, Autumn air and varnish. The way he looks--slightly flushed, practically throbbing blood flow and open capillaries--reminds you of the first time you went with him, years ago, to Peace park.

You'll never forget that soft-ball game. The day had been one of summer's last sweet finales, near dusk when the light was long and soft on the grass and you watched him sprint all the way home from second base on a fly ball. You'll never forget standing beside him afterwards drinking beer--just 'shooting the shit' with the guys from the precinct--thinking he was the most breathless, grinning, beautiful man you'd ever seen, who made a show of wiping the sweat and grime off his forehead with the tail of his shirt. God the pheromones!

You take his hand and let him tug you over to his work table.

"I'm almost done with these table legs," he says with satisfaction, "the hard part's over anyway." He lays your hand over one of the shaped pieces of blond wood he's just fashioned and you smile at the way he guides your fingers over its contours, helping you map out the shape as though you were one of his blind students-- as though he's forgotten you don't have to use touch in order to see. The wood feels rough and fresh under your fingertips, grainy but artfully curved like unglazed pottery.

"Wow," you breathe, "this is really beautiful, Jim."

He shrugs but manages to look pleased.

"Are these the legs to my dinner table?" You ask, lowering your voice suggestively "‘cause I really like your legs. . ."

"Mmm, I really like yours too," he says, sliding an arm around your waist and pulling you up against his damp chest.

"Oh yeah?" you grin, "how'd I know you were gonna say that?"

He lifts a hand to your face, tracing his fingers lightly over your brow, cheekbone, lips, then he kisses you. You lean in, responding to his heat and strength--the full force of his exhilarating presence--suddenly filled with a hot, aching desire to be closer, an almost painful surge of frightened joy that leaves you with only one thought--that it is impossible to love someone so much and still be able to breathe.

"I'm glad you're okay," you gasp against his cheek, surprised by the delicate waver in your voice--a distant seismic flutter of unexpected emotion rising up from someplace deep. "You could have been. . . Today, with that car and that woman--."

"Hey. . ." he murmurs, concerned, "Hey, I told you I was fine." You feel his chest rumble, his hand sliding through your hair, passion yielding easily to compassion.

"I know--it's just--."

You don't often cry but when you do it is always like an earth quake--large or small--your tears are brief, subterranean, and out of the blue.

"How do I ever let you out of my sight?" You ask finally, wiping your eyes. You sound incredibly young.

"Beats me," he says gently, brushing your hair away from your face and kissing you again.

"Okay, so now Dr. Benton is sticking that-that thing, you know-- down his throat--the plastic tubey 'so-he-can-breathe' thing."

"Oh, Chief, the pictures you paint for me. . . So vivid, yet so. . .completely incoherent," Jim chuckles, his chest rumbling under your hand. You tear your eyes away from the T.V. to scowl down at him, his head is in your lap, his eyes closed.

"Oh shut up. It gets suspenseful and I lose all vocabulary. Shit! I'm glad we have this show recorded--." You pause the VCR and the emergency room scene freezes in mid-chaos, the screen a blur of pink and green scrubs.

"Intubation tube," Jim corrects sagely, his mouth curved up in a smug smile.

"Oh what? So you're a doctor now? Okay-- okay, so Benton is sticking the intubation tube down his throat. And. . . the paramedics are still hanging around in the background--the blond woman and the black guy-- I don't know their names. And Carol is-- oh, who the hell knows what she's doing?--she's standing there holding a pair of salad tongs, like a good trauma nurse."

"That would be a rib spreader," Jim corrects again, now openly grinning.

"Okay, thesaurus-boy I'm rolling my eyes at you right now, just so you know. Why is it that every show we watch turns into a comedy?"

"Why? You're asking me? Two words, amigo: "salad tongs"."

"Hey, man! That's what they look like!"

You settle back against the couch cushions and un-pause the VCR.

"Rib spreader!!" Dr. Benton yells dramatically, and you can't help but laugh.

"All right, okay, okay--"rib spreader" you were right."

"What did I tell you?"

"Yeah, bite me. This descriptive T.V. thing is harder then you think."

"I guess that's why they pay professionals to do it. Professionals who only talk during breaks in the dialogue."

"Hey, you want me to shut up? I'll shut up."

Jim gathers up your hand resting on his chest and brings it to his lips.

"No, no, go ahead--please. I'm sorry, buddy, you're doing a great job."

"Buddy. . ." you grumble as you rewind the tape.

 SLEEP PERCHANCE… AND DREAMS

Maybe you had a girlfriend in college, Denise, long gone by now (married to a tax lawyer) who used to read romance novels while standing in line at the registrars office. Denise, who also read Pestalozzi and Dewey and Marx and liked to make love on a blanket in the bowels of the library where it smelled like hay and the clank of the radiators drowned out all other sound.

"What do you see in those things?" You asked her once, glancing over her shoulder at the dog-eared paperback in her hand. You managed to read the words ". . . woke drenched in a cold sweat, his heart pounding inside his powerful chest", before she flipped the book closed to reveal a swooning sprawl of voluptuous bust, Fabio hair, and mosquito netting.

"Oh nothing, don't get jealous. It's just for fun."

"I'm not jealous. Can I see it?" She handed the book over reluctantly and you took a minute to read a page. (Union soldier, "Lance", has a nightmare and widowed southern bell, "Claudette", comforts him with passionate kisses).

"This is sexy?" you asked.

"No, Blair, it's boring. That's why I read it."

"What's sexy about a nightmare?"

"Not the nightmare, what happens after the nightmare."

"Oh. And what happens after the nightmare?" you asked flashing a grin, "They share a plate of milk and cookies?"

Note: Unlike in romance novels, there is nothing sexy about terror or pain, or wide blinking eyes, or groping hands, or a pounding heart. Nothing. So to hell with Danielle Steel and her perfect tortured Romeo who never woke up not knowing where he was or why he couldn't see. Even two years after the accident Jim will still wake up with a gasp and reach out for you.

"Easy," You whisper in the dark, "It's okay."

But he doesn't want to be consoled. He is all straining muscle and hot breath, rolling over to loom above you, a knee between your legs. You can just see his chest rising and sinking, too fast, and his eyes shining, eerie and distant as stained glass in the dimness. You know about his fear of forgetting what you look like. You can feel that fear in the rough sweep of his fingers over your face, hear it in his voice--

"Blair--I want to see you," he hisses, one hand roving over your mouth, your throat, your chest--too frustrated to be gentle. His other hand slides into your hair, gripping the back of your neck.

"Your face," he says desperately, "Your eyes--a thousand times a day--God damnit, Blair, what are you saying with your eyes?"

"Jim," you hiss back, sounding strangely angry, sensing his need for resistance rather then yield. "Shhh, Stop."

You arch up against him restlessly, grabbing his wrist to still him. Hands are not enough--never enough. He needs to feel your body pressed up against his--your shape like a negative image, flesh and groin the flip-side of sight.

"Dial up," You impel him, meaning touch--meaning everything. He makes an eager, incredulous sound like to a doctor offering a cure with harsh side-effects and you sigh, backing off for a moment to try to reassure him. You touch the side of his face. You can't say "trust me" with your eyes anymore so instead you try osmosis. You feel like a fucking Vulcan trying to mind-meld.

"C'mon, Jim, dial up," you say, softer this time and he concedes. Lowering his head to make mental re-adjustments, opening himself. When you feel him shudder you pull him down to kiss him hard, closing the distance, sealing it off. But he resists you.

"Not the same," he gasps raggedly, pulling away "It's still not the same."

With a heavy rustle of sheets he is up and gone, leaving a cold draft of air--an insult of vacantness in your bed. You hear his harsh breathing, the creak of his feet on the stairs and you get up too, refusing retreat, dressing as you follow him (socks, sweat-pants, flannel shirt).

Finally you snap on the light in the kitchen and there he is, standing by the sink, naked from the waist up. You see goose-bumps on his arms and can tell by his rigid stance that he's still dialed up--raw nerves exposed to open air.

"Jim," you say and your voice sounds throaty and low in the settled silence--everything harsher at three in the morning under yellow kitchen light. 'Time out' you want to say, 'let's back up', but there is a burning tightness inside your chest that makes you push forward. You cross over the him and touch his arm but he shrugs you off.

"Don't," he snaps, "Don't do that."

So angry suddenly, inexplicably affronted.

"Jim--what?"

"People are always grabbing my arm, God damnit! Pulling me places--out of nowhere, without a word and all of the sudden I'm sitting in a chair, stranded. Or- or fucking Cassie--she says she driving me home and I end up in a parking lot--"come with me inside or I'll leave you out here whichever you want"--trying to kiss me, rubbing around on me like some kind of humping dog, so I push her away and then all four walls of the universe come crashing down, of course, ‘cause there's nothing but space all around me--nothing--and she watches me but doesn't help. I can smell her behind me," he grimaces fiercely, "groping through all those sweaty bodies and the whole time she's watching--I'm a fucking spectacle-- so don't-- don't do that!"

You feel your heart throbbing like you've stood up too fast-- like you've been puking-sick for three days and you've just stood up too fast. Maybe you're going to pass out. Maybe you should sit down. You fumble into a chair--it scrapes the floor loudly.

"I'm sorry," you mumble inanely, squeezing your eyes shut. Opening them to find him still standing there with his head cocked, jaw tight. The dials are off but he holds them in check with caustic control.

"She's been following me, I think," he says after a long moment, "doing things--I don't know why."

"Was that her today?"

"I think so. I dreamed it was her. Maybe it wasn't, but--."

"You think your subconscious was putting two and two together?"

Jim nods. You nod too, standing up, approaching him cautiously. You can tell by the tilt of his head that he's tracking your heart beat. When you are close enough he reaches out, runs his hand over your shoulder and up to cup your jaw.

"I didn't mean you," he says gruffly, "you can touch me anywhere. Take me anywhere. I don't care as long as it's you. I know you won't leave me."

"Oh, Jim. . ."

You can't even imagine leaving him. You'd die first. His hands are on your face again, this time they move reverently. He rubs his thumbs over your eyelids as though they are delicate flower petals. His face softens, he almost smiles.

"I remember," he murmurs, "catching your eye across a room-- that 'come over here and eat me whole you big cave man' look." He does smile now, an expression so bitter-sweet you just can't stand it.

"I still remember," he says, "I won't forget."

 KINSHIP RITUAL HELL

Your parents will arrive early in the morning on Thanksgiving day because 1) your mother has no concept of time and 2) your father is hoping that at least you (unlike the econo-lodge off I-90) will be serving a free continental breakfast. The doorbell will start ringing just after seven a.m. while you are still in bed (and will not stop ringing until you stand, disheveled and fuming in the hallway).

"Dear God. . ." Jim will groan from under a mountain of warm bedcovers (a place he has no intention of vacating anytime soon), "They're here."

"No. . ." you groan back, rolling over to bury your face against his shoulder, "no, no, no--it's not my parents it's Martha Stewart come to cook the turkey for us."

"In your dreams."

"Yeah, yeah. Shut up and go back to sleep."

"If you insist. . ."

So, say you find yourself in the kitchen just after sunrise scrambling eggs for your father and watching your mother open every drawer and cabinet, peering inside each one as though she was a health inspector in a past life.

"What are you looking for, Mom?"

"Oh nothing, honey."

"If you tell me what it is, I can get it for you."

As though in reply, she will start singing a Christmas song under her breath--just a phrase from one actually--over and over again until you start to imagine her head as a stress ball.

". . .Down on your knees to hear the angel voices. . . ."

"Mom--."

"Yes, sweetheart?"

"Could you maybe not. . ."

"Hmm?"

"Never mind."

You might end up shooting a suffering glance at your father who smiles (with familiar sympathy) at you over his coffee cup.

Note: Your father is a quiet man--unlike yourself--and often makes his most profound statements without speaking. Seeing him again, seated at your kitchen table with his flannel sleeves rolled back and his elbows propped up, might make you remember (unwittingly) the night he took you home during Jim's hospital stay and watched as you stood, mindlessly scrubbing counter space because you thought you'd seen a speck somewhere and Jim hated specks.

"He can see every one," you might have even said before your mouth slammed shut and the word could screamed through your mind like something wild-haired and evil--Could see every one--used to be able to--not any more.

That night your father let you plunge back into childhood, to a place you always thought he resented where life's intimate necessities happened. He led you to bed, pulled off your shoes, your jeans. He even sat beside you while you laid in the dark fighting sleep--exhausted as you were. You remember him saying something about how you'd always been strong. Since the day you were born. Not like Suzanne and Jacob who needed to cling to each other. It takes the two of them together to be a whole person. "You'll come through this," he'd said. And as you drifted on alternating waves of numbness and grief you found yourself wondering what 'strength' really was and how you were supposed to 'come through' something that had no other side.

"Blair? Where's Jim?" Your mother asks, nibbling on a stick of celery she's found in the fridge and glancing around as though expecting him to suddenly appear before her.

"It's early, Mom, he's still asleep."

Note: Your mother thinks that because Jim is blind anything he does is utterly amazing. He goes to the bathroom by himself and she's awestruck. She will seem always to be waiting for him to perform some kind of trick. This will drive you crazy of course, but you've come to believe that at times her only goal in life is to test your patience. Just when you think you've gotten her all figured out you'll realize that you don't, and just when you think she can't possibly be any more infuriating. . .

"Oh hi Jim!" She says, rushing over to his side as he reaches the bottom of the stairs, and taking hold of his arm with both hands. The sight of this makes you go hot inside, filled with a strange kind of angry fear. How is it that you've never noticed her do this before? Never seen Jim's face grow fractionally guarded in response?

"Hello, Naomi. How are you?" he asks, patting her hand while at the same time quite firmly freeing himself from her clutches. He reaches down to greet Sam who--excited all over again--runs off to find his ball.

"Coffee, Jim?" You offer quietly.

"Coffee," he agrees.

Over breakfast Jim and your father will probably start talking about the making of book shelves, fine-grain wood, drill bits. They will get along pretty well until the conversation shifts (following the natural order of things "manly") to motorcycles and carburetors and your father will get nervous about the fact that Jim can't see to drive anymore--no matter how knowledgeable he is about engine parts. Then silence will descend while your mother continues to scour around in the kitchen.

This is Thanksgiving (Forever and ever. World without end. Amen.). This is just the beginning of kinship-ritual hell. Next will come, your pregnant sister-in-law, your ticking time-bomb of a nine year old nephew and your brother Jacob who has taken up the Torah again in preparation for fatherhood and now looks with disdain upon your relationship with Jim.

The only high point of the day--the one redeeming, worthwhile event of the whole day will come much later in the form of Steven Ellison; standing jet-lagged and bleary-eyed on your doorstep after everyone else is long gone and the turkey has been wrapped and put away. Only then will you see a genuine smile cross Jim's face as he folds his brother in a lasting embrace, running his hands over wild sandy hair and a three-day old beard.

"What's with the squirrel taped to your chin?" Jim will ask, grinning.

"Hey man, that's a work of art!"

Next comes the sobering pause in which Steven looks at Jim for a long, assessing moment, eyes flashing some indefinable blend of love, concern and joy. He grips Jim's shoulder and very briefly touches his cheek.

"How are you, Jimmy?" He asks.

"I'm fine," Jim replies warmly, "How 'bout yourself, little brother?"

"Hey, I'm cool!" Steven says glancing quickly around the room, catching your eye. "It's you two who look whipped! What gives? Have you just been through world war three or something?"

"You could say that man," you chuckle wearily "It's been kind of a long day."

Note: One thing you will learn fairly early in life is that there is a grain of truth in every cliche. Bad things will happen to good people. The Fates do conspire. Shit happens.

Walking across the library parking lot at ten o'clock at night you might happen to see something move out of the corner of your eye. The lot is dimly lit and deserted now that final exams are over. The December wind is startlingly cold as it gusts through your hair, whipping it up around your face like downy feathers. You smell snow brewing high up in the atmosphere and are reminded with poignant nostalgia of winter camping--Jim--sharing a sleeping bag. . .

And it is really nothing more than a flicker of shadow--off to the side--an opaque shape shifting out of blackness. You hardly notice it. You are only a few feet from the truck and more concerned about getting the engine to start in this cold weather than about the distant suggestion of footsteps approaching you from behind. You are thinking about Judy Beckman's research paper and how she forgot alphabetize her citations. It doesn't even occur to you that you might be in trouble until your legs are knocked out from under you and you fall hard to the ground-- felled so fast that you just barely manage to catch yourself with your hands.

Utterly astonished you will feel a sharp burn as your palms scrape asphalt, one of your knees cracks resoundingly against the blacktop and before you can even register the first reverberations of pain something cold and rigid presses to the back of your skull. You hear a click.

"Don't move," a low voice growls, the sound ringing out clearly in the silence of the empty lot. You are sprawled in a half-crouch, arm muscles straining to hold yourself still. The white puffs of your breath rise in fast clouds around your face. You hear the gritty shift of heavy boots behind you and for an instant you wish for Jim's ability to decipher the subtlest sound, tracking movement with predatory awareness. Jim, who you just called to say you were finally on your way home. Jim who is warming dinner up for you in the oven.

You feel a tug at your back pocket as your wallet is removed. The pressure of the gun never wavers. Take it', you think, 'all sixteen dollars of it'.

"This all you got?" The voice demands gruffly, a sound that makes you feel as though someone is raking their fingers though your insides and causes a serge of wild belligerence to pass over you like a hot wind. You almost say: 'no man, I always keep a grand stashed away in my underwear just for occasions like this' but then a backwash of fear stops you-- a white static of terror actually--that spreads out from the pit of your stomach, down your arms and legs leaving you numb. 'Jesus!' you think frantically, 'Keep your fucking mouth shut, Sandburg! Just keep your fucking--.'

"Your watch, Bitch--hand it over."

Very slowly you reach across yourself and, with an unsteady hand, pull at the Velcro strap of your digital 'Timex' that you got for forty dollars at Target. You hold the watch up like a rat by its tail and a moment after it is snatched away you hear a furious curse.

"This ain't nothin' but a piece of shit!" Your attacker whines in a voice so comically petulant it nearly makes you laugh--the giddy cackle of the temporarily insane--but a savage kick to your gut stifles that impulse, driving the air from your lungs and leaving you swimming in red agony, suffocating.

You curl in on yourself, mouth gaping--sucking desperately for air that doesn't come. You remember, distantly, Jim coming to your rescue the last time you got the wind knocked out of you, rolling you over onto your back, bending your legs and levering them up against your chest. You remember clearly that he could see then-- how his gaze locked with yours. "Small breathes, Sandburg," he'd said soothingly, "That's it, buddy, just take it easy."

You try for small breaths now but succeed only in making a sound that is disconcertingly like air leaking out of a balloon. Your forehead is pressed to the ground, tiny rock bits digging into your skin. You can smell motor oil, gasoline and suddenly you come to the lightheaded realization that nothing is substantial in the world--everything is merely vapors and circumstance. You feel an insistent tugging at your feet as your shoes are removed. You hear the flutter of papers and the almost musical clatter of a whole box of number two pencils tumbling to the ground as your satchel is dumped out. Still gasping you can just make out the angular shadow of one of your Anthro. 270 midterm exams flapping in the wind just inches from your face. 'What did you expect, asshole?' you wonder blearily, some breed of deranged smile pulling at your lips. There is spittle on your chin, your stomach is shuddering, cramping. 'I got 'money' written all over me, or what?'

Another bout of fury catches you hard in the ribs and you lurch like you've been shocked by a high voltage current. The sheer force of the pain that shoots through your chest is overwhelming--raw, splintering, amplified by every breath. Your vision blurs and before it clears you feel yourself hauled up onto your knees. The gun deftly flips up and is slammed into the center of your forehead. The words 'I'm going to die' stagger through the hot white desert of your mind. 'In a parking lot over sixteen dollars and a 'Timex' watch.'

Very faintly, you hear the far off wail of a siren and wonder which of the night-shift librarians has called 911. You wonder who will call Jim to tell him that your body has been found. Jim. . .oh man, oh baby, I'm sorry. I don't want to die like this-- out here in the cold, within sight of the truck, the back of my head blown off. At least you won't see it--Oh God forgive me-- but for once I'm glad you can't. I love you James Ellison. I love you so Goddamn much. What a fucking waste.

``

 You can throw around phrases like: "It is better to feel pain than to feel nothing at all", "Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger", and "Pain is nature's way of telling you that you're still alive". But until you are lying behind a curtain in the emergency room with your ribs taped up, your knee wrapped, and your head feeling like it has swelled to three times its normal size--only then will you realize that whoever first said those words was a masochistic moron who deserves to be tied down and tortured by Lilliputians with cattle prods (too bad he'd enjoy it). You will feel idiotic yourself for ever having uttered them and if it wasn't for the drugs you've been given you would have already tried to strangle the nurse who told you that: "You were lucky, Mr. Sandburg--" as she was stitching up your face "-- not to have been more seriously injured." This is the same nurse who called Jim and later claimed to have misinterpreted your emphatic: "don't you dare!", as woozy rambling.

"You don't understand," you will end up slurring, eyeing her forearms angrily, "I don't want him here! I never want him to have to set foot in this place again!"

"Nobody wants to come to the ER, Mr. Sandburg, but you need somebody to look after you."

"You don't understand," you groan again, feeling the drugs start to pull you away into a hazy realm where conviction is impossible.

When she finally leaves you alone, whisking the curtain closed behind her you fall back against the starched pillow of your hospital bed and close your eyes. Somehow you manage not to think about having almost died or the painful point of pressure a gun makes between your eyes--but instead a barrage of images rise up out of primordial memory to assault you. You see Jim's battered body, spectacularly discolored, so swollen and fleshy under the thin white bed sheet. You see his drug-dazed eyes staring blankly up at the ceiling. You see Captain Simon Banks standing out in the hallway talking to a uniformed police officer--both of them so urgently professional after the assignment has already gone to hell and Jim has been so badly--God--so terribly hurt. The assignment, which you have always referred to as an accident even though it wasn't.

You tend to make yourself forget that there are people responsible for Jim's blindness (one man in particular) despite the arrest reports, news paper clippings and parole board meetings that all serve to remind you. You forget because Raymond Carr would be six feet under if you let yourself think about him too much. Hearing the sound of his name is enough send you into a rage. You forget in order to keep from committing revenge murder and ending up in jail.

Note: Being in the hospital again will bring back an amazing array of terrible memories dredging up everything from the cryptic phrases the doctors muttered under their breath while flipping briskly through their charts, to talk of blunt head trauma, interachiasmal hemorrhage, CAT-scans and worst of all-- the remote possibly that Jim might perceive light again but only just a few shades of gray. Oh, and the fear--the cliff-edge, plummeting, dark, bottomless fear. This, the place where it all started. This is ground zero.

The nurse comes back after a while to tell you that it's okay to go home--the only thing she's said so far that you agree with--and you struggle to sit up in bed, wanting to get yourself discharged as fast as possible so that you can meet Jim outside. You don't want him coming in (If you can hardly stand the smell of latex and ammonia. . .) You manage to lever yourself up onto your elbows before the pain in your ribs knifes through your chest and takes your breath away.

"Damn that hurts!" You hiss.

"Mr. Sandburg, you need to--" the nurse protests before you cut her off.

"---Get out of here? Yes, I know."

"No, sir, I meant that I think you should wait--."

"For me."

Your eyes snap up instinctively when you hear Jim's voice. He is standing just a step behind Simon Banks, one hand gripping his elbow--looking pale but outwardly calm.

"Jim," you gasp, relieved to see him despite the fact that you didn't want him to come for you.

"Here, Jim--the bed is four--five steps straight ahead," you say, reaching out with one bandaged hand to grasp his as he draws near. The nurse and Simon share a glance before backing away, closing the curtain behind them.

"Careful, there's an I.V. stand just to your right."

Jim flinches at the unexpected touch of the gauze on your palm when you take his hand and he quickly fumbles out of your grasp.

"No-no, hey, it's okay," you murmur, "It doesn't hurt--just minor scrapes."

"Blair," Jim whispers miserably, "What happened? Where are you hurt? Where. . . can I touch you?"

"Here," You say, claiming his hand again and bringing it to the un-bruised side of your face. Jim holds himself deliberately still, afraid of exploring but needing desperately to know the extent of your injuries.

"What happened?" he asks again.

"I was mugged," you say, making an effort to sound calm but there's a tremor in your voice. "The guy--shit--he was so stupid. All he got from me was a few dollars, my piece of junk' watch, and a ratty pair of tennis shoes."

"God, Blair," he says in a voice so fervently low that it rumbles, "tell me you're all right."

"I'm all right, Jim."

"Your hands?" he asks worriedly.

"They're just skinned. The guy knocked me down."

"What else? What else did he do, Blair? Why do I smell blood?"

"It's not bad, Jim. It's just a few stitches." His hand shifts ever so slightly in your grasp and you let go of his wrist, freeing him.

"Really, it's not that bad," you say again as he very delicately runs his fingers over to the hot, swollen side of your face, encountering your burgeoning shiner and the sutured cut over your left eye-brow.

"Your eye--."

"--is just fine. It's a beauty, actually, if you ask me--about a hundred different colors right now."

"This wasn't--Blair--this wasn't caused by a fist," Jim says flatly, ignoring your nervous attempt at levity.

Silence. Your heartbeat speeds up. His fingers shift again and then stall on your forehead over the spot where the gun was pressed hard against you. There must be some kind of mark there because after a moment of concentration, realization dawns on his face and Jim exhales sharply--taking a step back.

"A gun? . . ." he gasps, "Jesus, Blair. . ."

"No, Jim--. " Reaching for him causes you to strain your ribs, your breath catches.

"What?" he gasps, surging forward again, his hands hovering over you but not touching, "What is it?"

". . .S'okay," you grunt, shifting gingerly, "just my ribs."

"Your ribs? Blair--Please don't keep me in the dark like this--. "

"Okay, okay I'm sorry," you apologize. Contrite, weary, in pain--defiantly not at your best at the moment, "give me your hand."

He holds out his hand and you take it brushing the backs of his fingers gently across the tape stretched around your torso.

"Three cracked ribs," you say softly, "and my knee. . . just banged it on the ground and now it's swelled up like a melon-- but it's nothing serious. And--my face where he hit me with the gun before running off. He must have heard the siren and decided to cut his losses--get the hell out of dodge. That's it, Jim." 'I've been hurt worse' you almost say but then think better of it. Jim is silent for a moment, absorbing your words, then,

"That's not it, Chief," he says, his voice pained, "He held a gun on you."

Jim brings his fingers back up to your forehead where you have been marked and suddenly you feel defiled as though some stupid, punk-ass kid has managed to change you in Jim's eyes-- damaged you. Defeated you.

"He was an idiot!" You growl fiercely, "He-no dammit! If I hadn't been so distracted and in such a hurry to get home this never would have happened!"

"If I hadn't asked you to help me work on the computer all day yesterday you wouldn't have been at the library so late tonight," Jim says softly.

"What? What? No, Jim. This wasn't your fault!"

"Not yours either, Chief," he says gently, running a hand over your hair, "you hear me?

"Yeah okay," you murmur wearily.

"Hey--." Jim cups your jaw with one hand and leans over you so that your faces are almost touching. He closes his eyes, kisses you tenderly on the temple, the cheek. . .

"This was not your fault," he whispers. You feel his breath on your face, it smells strongly of coffee.

"Okay," you breathe.

"It's all right to be scared," he says.

"Okay."

"You're safe now, Blair. I'm here."

You wrap your arms around him and he stays still, letting you hold him. He doesn't pull you up against his chest because of your broken ribs but somehow you feel enveloped anyway. Your breathing grows ragged, evens out and grows ragged again but your eyes remain almost painfully dry. You hold on, feeling your connection to the world waver. Everything but Jim's warm, familiar body shudders unsteadily around you. You are floating between contentment and panic

“Shh," Jim soothes "It's over. You're okay."

"Am I?" you wonder aloud.

"You're alive."

"I could not be," you murmur shakily.

Jim stiffens and then very slowly relaxes.

"I know, but you're alive," he says again with more conviction, "We're going to go home now and you're going to wake up tomorrow in the loft. You survived. That's what matters."

"He's still out there," you whisper.

"Not for long," Jim says.

 FLASHBACK

Home, on the couch, propped up by about a hundred pillows and feeling like a despairing princess in a fairy-tale you will watch as Jim pours you some more tea gauging the fullness of the cup by sensing heat through porcelain. He will have taken a day off work to be with you just in case you are not as "fine" as you claim to be. Just in case you flash back on your most recent traumatic experience and attempt to hurl yourself off the balcony in a fit of psychotic delusion (as if you were capable of more than laying very, very still and trying not to take deep breaths). Your ribs feel like steel shards that grate jarringly against each other every time you make the mistake of moving.

Arranged strategically within reach around you on the coffee table are an assortment of books, papers to be graded, a bottle of pain pills, a glass of water and a box of Kleenex because insult to injury has come via overnight delivery in the form of a sinus-clogging head cold.

Note: Jim will have been wonderfully sweet all day long, trying deliberately not to hover as he goes about his business, playing around with his new computer software, fixing you pot after pot of Chamomile, and making about a hundred and twelve phone calls to the station checking up on Simon's progress on your "case". But you know the whole time he has kept one ear out listening for you--monitoring every hitch in your breath, every grunt and groan. You don't mind so much. If you weren't in pain having Jim take care of you would be a rare kind of bliss. But as it is you are too uncomfortable to fully relish his gentle touch as he passes by the couch on his way to the kitchen, or his soft-spoken "Can I get you anything, Chief?"

You are too vividly reminded of those first terrible months after Jim was discharged from the hospital. Months that passed with geological slowness and caused stalactites of resentment to form between you, fueled by the dripping, acidic waters of his bitterness and your frustration. Months of stalking around each other like sharp-toothed animals vying for dominance.

Jim had been so far away then. Etched in stone. He wouldn't talk to you, wouldn't let you touch him. He stumbled around the loft like a ruined old man snapping at anyone who tried to take hold of his elbow to steer him. He regressed, falling into helplessness. He started eating with his fingers and nothing you said or did got through to him. You tried everything-- you tested out different kinds of patience, different tones of voice. You tried begging him to let you help him, you even tried threatening to leave him but in the end you became the supplicating, cringing epitome of everything you despise about yourself. You couldn't stand pitying him but--God help you--you did. And you couldn't fix him this time. You couldn't find words to make it all better.

You found yourself floundering in the depths of your own failure until one day the air lost all its oxygen, your chest wouldn't expand and finally you just snapped. You completely lost your mind for about five minutes and grabbing Jim by the shoulders, you stared up into his empty blue eyes and screamed into his face. You screamed that you really were leaving this time and that you wouldn't be back until he decided to stop wallowing in a shit-hole of his own making like a pathetic invalid, never accepting help from anyone. "You want to be alone?" you seethed, "you want to go stumbling around in the dark by yourself? Okay then. Fine! I'm done, Jim, you hear me?--I can't stand this anymore--I'm outta here!"

And the sound of the door slamming behind you had been excruciatingly final but not so excruciating as the sound he had made. Oh Jesus, the sound. . . it wasn't a scream--no-- it was a shriek of undifferentiated rage and terror that held your name captive somewhere inside it. A death cry-- that part of him unable to come to terms, that couldn't say the word "blind"-- dying a hard, violent death as he threw his shoulder against the door like some wild, desperate thing trying to escape from hell. Dear God it had been awful--so long overdue--and you had felt utterly unworthy of life after that as you fumbled for the door handle and staggered back inside to find him on his knees just sobbing out mindless grief--tears that didn't end even as you flung your arms around him and held on so tightly that you quaked with strain.

You had broken him and there he was spilling out all over the floor and you had no idea how much of him would be left after-- if any. So you held on and you urged him to lie down on his back and you pressed your whole body down over him. You took his face between your hands and shoved your mouth over his quivering, wailing mouth. He made a sound like he'd been muzzled-- a strange, surprised, muffled sound and he had arched up, his fingers digging into your shoulders, still crying-- oh Jesus still crying even as he surrendered to your stubborn mouth that really had no power at all except that somehow it did.

And you kissed him over and over again--kisses that weren't kisses--they were some other kind of grasping act that had more to do with trying to burrow your way down inside to his dark place than anything else. And he grasped back, trying to claw and suckle his way out, driven by newborn sightless survival instinct. Still crying and begging--

"Pleasedon'tleaveme--pleasedon'tleaveme--pleasedon'tleaveme--"

--between gasps, grasps, shudders, clutches. And then all of the sudden he stilled. Blinked in surprise, and went weak under your hands. Worried, you said his name, touched his cheek and saw his face contort into a horrible grimace.

"I'm blind," he said finally, shuddering, his voice an astonished whisper. "I'm blind. . ."

And then it was as if he couldn't stop saying it--the dreaded word. He started wailing it in panic trapped in the inescapable knowledge of it, the endless cycle of grief that it was until you--well--you slapped him like a T.V. movie actor caught up in all the drama. You slapped him and then hauled him up into your arms with an incredible strength you didn't know you had, and you hugged him to your chest.

You'll never forget the damp heat of his breath puffing through the front of your shirt as he sobbed, the hard, hot roundness of his skull, the corded bands of his arms wrapped around your waist and those long unbearable moments on the floor by the door; the loft sprawled out behind you as an elaborate display of neglect. So many weeks of watching him stumble around, cursing, pushing you away and now. . . He won't let you go.

"Don't leave me Blair. Please." he begged frantically. This was not Jim, this was the small wailing child of his fear.

"No, I'm not leaving you," You said fervently into his ear, the words dredged up from the depths of your burning throat. "I didn't mean what I said, Jim, I swear to God I didn't mean it. I won't leave you. I will never leave you. You're not alone, Jim. I'm here. I'm right here. . ."

"I'm. . . blind," he croaked, his voice so hoarse it was barely audible. He lifted his head so that you can see his face, his eyes drifted listlessly as though seeking yours.

"I know," you said softly, touching his damp cheek.

"Blair-- I'm blind."

A hot ache rose in your eyes and you blinked rapidly, nodding.

"Yes, Jim," you said.

"I'm never going to see again."

"I'm so sorry, Jim-- oh baby. I'm so sorry."

"It's not. . .It's just not. . .fair."

"No," you murmured, your voice wavering. You rubbed his cheek feeling the soft stubble there. You kissed his forehead tenderly,

"You're right. It's not fair. It's not fair at all."

~~

Standing in the kitchen after midnight, holding your ribs, you will have gone from the despairing princess on her pile of pillows to an old Chinese peasant who shuffles around from place to place hunched over at the waist. Jim is sleeping soundly upstairs, has left you to your couch-nest, and for some reason (that you can't quite pinpoint) this grants you a childish sense of freedom as you gaze into the refrigerator, bathed in a cool fluorescent glow.

Snack time. After pissing blood (just a little, the doctor said you might) you feel you deserve a snack. Pulling out a plastic container of left-over spinach casserole you make your way slowly, painstakingly, (socked feet sliding over linoleum) to the microwave. You have to stop and rest when you get there, leaning heavily on the counter and taking a series of tiny hissed breaths through your teeth.

The clock on the microwave blinks green zeros at you because you still haven't reset it since the power went out weeks ago. Jim used to do that--set the clocks. He used to make the rounds as soon as possible, putting time back into its proper place. You think it gave him a feeling of power, as though he could right the entire universe just by pressing a few buttons.

You keep thinking about Jim--remembering the early days of his blindness, your thoughts like tufts of thread snaring on barbed wire. You run your fingers over the Braille dots on microwave as you punch in two minutes for your casserole, and cast your mind back to the day you modified it with yet more adhesive strips. So triumphant because at least you were doing something. At least you had regained the hope that (in time) Jim would eventually heat up his own spinach casserole if he wanted to, get a fork and sit down at the table to eat it instead of say. . .

"God dammit!"

The fork goes flying across the room. It hits one of the lower cabinets and skitters across the floor to disappear underneath the refrigerator, lost forever. You watch almost dispassionately, numb by this point, even as Jim sweeps an arm over the table and sends his plate crashing to the floor. Peas, a chicken patty, mashed potatoes and shards of hand painted ceramic become impressionistic art on the kitchen tile. Instead of balking in surprise you find yourself making a mental note:

Walmart, plastic dishes, ten ninety-nine a set.

You have kissed him passionately, made promises never to leave him, he has cried and finally admitted to himself that he is blind but two weeks have passed since then and you are starting to notice that things have not miraculously improved like you thought they would.

"What the fuck are you trying to do to me, Sandburg? What? You think I need another challenge?" Jim shouts, his head tilted at a weird angle. You can't stand that. You want him to look you in the eye when he yells at you. You want to grab his head and force him look you in the eye. But you can't do that and to make matters worse, somehow the fact that his peas roll off his fork is suddenly your fault. Somehow you are torturing him with the dinner you've made and placed before him.

"Sure, yeah," you say leaning forward onto your elbows, quietly seething. To hell with the gentle side of pity, time to play rough. You look at him and for a moment you don't see the person you have come to love-- all you see is a grown man having a temper tantrum. Screw that.

"Yeah, I'm sorry, Jim," you say, "How thoughtless of me to make you dinner. Did you want me to feed it to you too? Is that what you wanted?"

"Fuck you!" He yells, spittle flying. He shoves himself up out of his chair so fast that it topples over backwards and hits the ground with loud pop.

"Fuck you!"

"Yeah, whatever--Why don't you come over here and fuck me, Big Man."

He freezes, standing stock-still, breathing heavily--then, suddenly he spins around and starts to walk away from you, one hand groping out in front of him. You see that he's about to walk right into the mess he's just created on the floor-- barrel right through the impressionistic food-art in his socked feet, sharp shards of pottery everywhere.

"Jim!" you lunge out of your chair after him, catching his elbow and roughly wrapping an arm around his waist to still him. He surges hard against you once, trying to shrug you off but, strong as he is, you will not let him break free. You are not about to let him hurt himself no matter how angry you are at him.

"Hold still," you growl urgently into his ear, "Don't move, Jim." You shift so that you can spread your hand wide over his chest. You feel the fast heaves of his breath.

"Please! I'm only trying to help you," you implore him, speaking more gently even as tighten your grip.

"I don't want your help," he grinds out, panting.

"I know, but you need it man--big time--and don't say 'fuck you' again ‘cause that's getting pretty old right about now."

"Ff--, " he starts before your words register, then you hear him let out a long breath of bitter laughter. Laughter that grows into something unbearable--a barrage of insults, bitingly sarcastic, almost menacing.

"All right, Sandburg. You win," he says finally, "You're right. I need your help. I'm blind and I can't even fucking dress myself in the morning, okay? I admit it! Are you satisfied? But you know what I don't need? I don't need your God damned pity!" He shoves against you again, this time with such force and focused skill-- years of training kicking in--that you end up flat on your back on the floor, the cradle of his hand the only thing keeping the back of your head from cracking hard against the tile.

"You hear me?" he hisses in a low, deadly voice.

"I--I hear you, Jim--" you stammer from the other side of shocked. He hasn't moved with this kind of utter surety or reflexive speed since before the accident and you have (quite frankly) forgotten that it lies coiled up inside him. Until now you have only seen the frightened, tentatively groping man who used to be Jim Ellison.

"Not. . .not that I blame you," he says finally after a long moment, his voice a bare whisper. He lifts his free hand to hover just above your face. "I am. . . pathetic now. . .aren't I?"

He hasn't shaved in over a week, hasn't showered or changed his clothes in four days. His breath smells sour. The admission of his blindness has brought with it a deep grouting depression that you didn't anticipate. You thought it would free him, let him move on but instead it has kept him firmly trapped within the same groove. He still drinks juice out of the carton (all house rules have been long ago abolished). Unless you fix his meals for him he lives off of chips and crackers. If you don't cut his meat for him he picks it up and rips it with his teeth. His hands wonder around the dinner table like interments of mayhem knocking over both his glass and yours if you don't watch out. He is still so lost and scared. And yes--- he is pathetic.

"No, Jim," you lie before amending: "You don't have to be."

He sighs and bows his head.

"I'm not going to go to one of those places where they teach you how to type and weave baskets, Sandburg. And I'm not going to use that fucking white cane."

"Fine," you concede flatly, shoving him back far enough so that you can sit up, "But how about going to one of those places where they teach you to use a fork? Or make a sandwich or brush your damned teeth for God's sake! How 'bout going to one of those places where they teach you how to clean up your own messes for once!" You push yourself to your feet, brushing off imaginary dust and you stare down at Jim who is crouched mere inches away from the potato Picasso. He has covered his face with one hand. You take a step away from him and he lashes out with his free hand to grab your leg.

"Blair?" He groans, his voice muffled.

"Jim--."

"I'll clean it up. I-I'm sorry," he stammers, his voice breaking.

"Oh man--shh, Jim--no, okay? You could cut yourself and. . .don't apologize. I'm sorry too-- and if you say you're sorry then I'll have to and I'm being too much of an asshole right now to apologize," you try to smile but end of watching sadly as Jim nods behind his hand.

"Okay," he murmurs and the hopeless resignation in his voice tears your heart out.

"Hey. . ." You breathe, sinking down to crouch in front of him. You grip his shoulder, gently pulling his hand away from his face, "Hey. . ."

You touch his cheek--this has become a familiar gesture-- the signal for a kiss. You tilt his chin up slightly and rock forward off your heels to press your lips to his. He moans deep in his throat, an oddly disparaging sound and you bring both hands up to hold his face.

"Shh, I'm sorry, Jim" you murmur "I don't know what the hell I'm talking about. I say things. . .You gotta bear with me. You gotta work with me here."

His lips part and you slip gently inside, kissing him deeply.

"We'll figure this out," you sigh softly against his mouth "Tomorrow we'll get on the phone and figure this out like we should have done a long time ago--what'daya say, Jim?"

"I just want this to be over--, " he moans "I want somebody to come along and turn the fucking light on."

"Yeah. . ." You touch your forehead to his, rubbing your hand over his tense shoulder, down his back, "I know, but we're going to have to settle for the next best thing."

"Which is?"

"That figurative light. Knowledge, man. Tomorrow--you and me--lets go seek the light of knowledge."

"You're so full of shit, Sandburg--you know that?"

"Really? I thought I was starting to sound a little bit like Plato."

 SHEPHERDS AND SHEEP

Eyes open you will see him standing over you, feel his broad hand on your cheek-- your skin is hot and damp with sweat.

"Jim? What is it?" You whisper in a voice reedy from sleep. The sheets are twisted and draping off the couch, your feet have gotten all tangled up.

"You have a fever," he murmurs softly from above, his face obscured by darkness--just an etching of gray features.

"Really?" you ask, even as you feel it, the floating cold-hot shudder of sickness.

His knees creak a little as he crouches down beside you, a minute sound, the only flaw in his graceful movement.

"I'm afraid so, Chief."

"Damn," you sigh half-heartedly, too tired to be appropriately irritated. "Just let me sweat it out, okay?"

This is a solution you've heard about before--somewhere-- that has always sounded appealing, nice and Shaman-like. Makes you think of being half-naked in a hammock. Makes you think of Jim being all-naked and dancing the 'sweat-it-out-baby' dance.

"Sorry, buddy," he says "I never thought I'd say this but sometimes you being too hot is a bad thing-- we've gotta get you cooled off."

"Who's we?" you ask, turning your face into his hand. He gently runs his fingers through your humid hair-- a caress-- then stands up again. You just glimpse the side of his smile shining out of the darkness like something enchanted and moon-lit.

"Don't go anywhere," he says over his shoulder in that warm tone you love.

"Hadn't planned on it."

Water tinkles into water as he squeezes out a washcloth. His wet fist glistens in the sallow lamplight, rivulets streaming like tears down the tight bulge of his forearm.

"I can't stop thinking about it," you say suddenly, out of the blue like you're making a comment on the weather.

Jim nods solemnly but also like the you've just said: "We really need rain". He runs the cloth over your forehead and down to the side of your neck--to that especially hot, sensitive hollow. You shudder with both pleasure and discomfort and he stills at your movement before slowly continuing his path over the delicate cage of your throat. He dips the cloth again.

"I figured."

"It just keeps happening over and over again inside my head like it's on instant re-play, ya know? Continuous loop."

Jim nods again and the washcloth tugs a little, tickling as it slides through your chest hair.

"It's kind of like an electric shock each time," you say, still in the same quiet, casual tone "I can't get my muscles to relax."

He doesn't touch your ribs. Instead he skips over them completely, all the way to your groin, peeling back the sheets and slipping your boxers down. You jump as the cold cloth touches the curve of your hip and slides.

"Sorry," Jim murmurs as you hiss against the echo of pain in your ribs.

"S'okay," you say, staring up at his profile, the angle of his jaw, strong neck, his broad sloping shoulder. Such a beautiful man. . .a filling heat flows through your body, downward, and you feel yourself start to grow hard but you quickly look away from Jim and force yourself to take deep breaths. Force yourself to think about how much having Jim bring you off would hurt your three broken ribs right about now. You have a fever, you should be thinking about--

"Margaret Thatcher, the line at the DMV, taxes. . ." Jim murmurs.

"What?"

"Just trying to help."

You chuckle and gingerly shift your weight, trying to find a more comfortable position.

"If you really want to help, you'll keep your hands off the patient's package, doctor."

"But, Chief, this is a medical emergency."

"I'll show you a medical emergency. . ."

He drapes the cloth over your penis as though the phrase: 'out of sight, out of mind' actually holds meaning for him and he reaches for another washcloth. While he is doing this you realize that --all of the sudden-- you are cold. Cold from the inside out. You feel like your skin has thinned and grown transparent. You feel like all of your body's vital heat is leaching out of you, replaced by an icy ache in your joints and in the pit of your stomach. You groan out loud.

"Shhh. . ." Jim soothes, laying his hand gently on your cheek.

"Oh man, I'm so cold."

"Yeah, I know."

"I said sweat it out not shiver it out."

"How about I make you some tea and get your pills?"

He starts to rise but you stop him. When your fingers brush his arm he catches your hand in his and easily sinks down to sit beside you on the couch.

"How do I stop thinking about it?" you ask urgently, teeth nearly chattering, "How do I stop feeling the gun pressed against me right here?" Taking his hand, you bring it up to touch the center of your forehead.

"I can't answer that, Chief," he says softly, rubbing his thumb over the spot on your forehead like a priest giving blessing.

"But you know the feeling," You say, searching his face, your fingers curled around his wrist.

"Yes. I know the feeling."

"Then Jim, how-- ?"

"I'm the wrong person to ask, Chief."

You sigh plaintively, "Jim. . ."

He leans down and touches his lips to your hot forehead, breathes in the scent of your hair.

"It takes time. That's all I can tell you. That's all I know," he murmurs, "Go see a shrink if you want to but lay off the booze. Run naked through the snow but don't get hypothermia. Get mad and throw things but not at me-- unless you tell me when to duck."

You chuckle.

"That would be a sight to see."

"I wouldn't know."

You roll your eyes and shove his shoulder.

Jim gets up to fix you some tea. You listen to him move around in the kitchen, his bare feet swishing almost soundlessly as he walks. Bare foot--better to sense the vibrations through the floor and the change in texture from smooth wood to cool tile. Living room. Kitchen. Rug by the fireplace. Eight steps from couch to door. Eleven steps from door to refrigerator…

"Run naked through the snow?" You call to him, smiling up at the ceiling, shivering.

"Too cold, man. Much too cold!"

~

The term "line-up" no matter how much it will start to sound like something you are being forced to do in front of a firing squad, actually refers to an act of civic duty--one that requires you to take a trip down to your local police station.

Note: You would rather join the Republican party then set foot in a police station again. And you would rather pay a stranger off the street fifty bucks to stand over you and piss then to let Jim set foot into a police station again.

You still remember, vividly, the one and only time after his accident that Jim visited the Major Crime unit of the fifty-seventh precinct of the Cascade P.D.. You remember it like a fevered dream--a truly surreal, awful experience--like a scene out of some sweaty-browed Hitchcock film. One of those movies that really plays up the drama. The camera zooms in on the main character (tilted at a crazy angle) just as some devastating realization hits him like a knee in the balls--just as his eyes go wide, his breath catches in his throat, the music spikes.

There are (as you have come to find out) only so many devastating realizations that Jim can withstand before he ends up in the men's room beating the shit out of the paper towel dispenser. Only so many times he can endure people treating him like a child or speaking to him slowly (in italics) like he's mentally challenged. People he used to play poker with and bitched to about bad "stake-out" coffee. People he used to call his friends.

Only Taggert, Rafe and Simon Banks handled themselves well. Conner fell prey to the contagious and fast-acting 'he's blind so he must also be deaf' disease and yelled in his face. Brown kept tripping over "sight" words (ex: "It's nice to see you", "I'll see you later"). Rhonda actually started to cry when Jim walked into the bullpen.

And in the end you found yourself running cold water over Jim's bloody knuckles in the bathroom under the harsh glare of fluorescent lights, calming him as best you could with your strategic touches. Your silent nearness. In the end he gripped your shoulders and all but begged you to take him home-- "Just get me the hell out of here," he said.

To say that it hasn't been easy for Jim to come to terms with not being a cop anymore is about as big an understatement as saying that life in a Jewish concentration camp during World War II was a little inconvenient. Police work was much more than just a job to Jim, it was his life, his calling. It framed his every perspective and in many ways it still does. It was not a job easily given up in favor of "selling beaded necklaces"--as Jim so often used to say back in the days when his own concept of what a blind person could get paid for included hand-crafting any number of semi-useful objects that could be sold off the side of the highway for less then five dollars a pop.

Note: You will still sometimes wake up in the middle of the night--roused by the void his absence has created in your bed--and find Jim downstairs sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee and fingering the gold facade of his old detective's shield with the same kind of deep longing he so often harbors when he traces the contours of your face; trying to resurrect the memory of it inside his mind. You will come up behind him and wrap your arms around his neck. You will catch his wrist to stop the guilty move he makes to set the badge aside and pretend like he's just come down for coffee. You will kiss his neck, his jaw, his temple wordlessly.

Remember there are no right words to say at a moment like this. Not even you will be able to come up with any meaningful phrases. Words only morph into platitudes, bluntly inept attempts to assuage deep pain--underground rivers of pain so remote that they are impenetrable by light or warmth.

Hold him. Touch and kiss but do not speak. Let him talk and (for once) don't interrupt even if you get confused by what he says.

Note: No matter how much you want to or how hard you try you are not always going to be able to understand Jim. Sometimes in the pent-up intensity of his voice, the true shape of Jim's frustration and hurt will reveal itself like some kind of huge, pre-historic bird aroused from tenuous slumber. One glimpse at its unfathomable wing-span and you will be harshly reminded of just how little you actually know about Jim's loss.

This is the same creature that people bow down to with phrases such as: "I can't possibly know what it's like for you". This is the creature that stands between you and the man you love and you will secretly despise paying homage to it, being forced to your knees by its armed minions who call you insolent. You will want to stand in its presence and denounce its very existence. You will want to scream:" I do know!" in its face even though you don't--you can't.

As you are holding him, Jim might begin to speak to you, hesitantly at first but gradually with more conviction. He might say:

"I was laying in bed just now thinking that if--by some miracle-- I was given the choice to become a cop again, I might actually have to stop and think about it for two seconds before flinging myself back into my old life--fucking weeping with joy. Can you believe it? And I found myself thinking that two seconds for two years of being blind was this big accomplishment. I thought that maybe in ten years I might actually have to think about it for all of ten seconds before. . ."

His voice trails off and he runs a hand wearily over his face, shaking his head.

"You'd think I'd be satisfied with being able to help people,” he says, " Instead of sitting on my ass feeling sorry for myself. I am helping people, Chief. I'm the one who rolls up my sleeves and gets down into the shit-hole with people. I'm the one who says: "I'll stay in here with you in the shit-hole until we can find a way out of it together. We might have to claw our way out--end up bleeding and battle-scarred and panting in the dirt but at least we'll be out of the shit-hole." I'm the one who teaches the scared-shitless blind guy how to clean up his own messes now--believe it or not. You'd think it'd be enough to have a new tribe wouldn't you, Chief?. . . But then there's this."

He picks up the badge and clutches it in one hand so hard his fingers turn white.

"This that I can't stop thinking about. This that wakes me up in the middle of the night and calls to me like some kind of fucking ghost. This thing that I can't get rid of and I can't keep!" He throws the badge down and stands up abruptly, easily (though not roughly) shrugging you off. He walks over to the balcony windows and presses his hand against the glass.

You feel like you are on the other side of that glass--like you can only touch hands with him, mirroring but never quite connecting flesh-to-flesh. You come stand by his side, near and yet still a thousand miles away until he reaches out and rakes his hand gently through your hair, claiming a loose fist-full.

"What do you see--out there?" he asks, thumping the glass with his flat hand. You turn to look out at the night sky, the small bright eye of the moon, the city lights.

"Cascade," you say, "the city."

He nods, head bowed. You hear him swallow hard and draw in a long breath.

"And. . ."

"And Lenny's already up across the street at the bakery, the light is on."

"Yeah, I can smell the bread in the ovens," Jim murmurs softly.

You smile.

"Cool," you say.

"What else?"

"There's a young couple standing in the doorway of "Glen's Cafe" necking with their hands inside each other's coats."

"Hmm," Jim's lips quirk up into a slight smile.

"Yeah and a little further down there's a drunk guy staggering his way up the sidewalk doing a bang-up impersonation of Gene Kelly."

Jim's hand slips down to the back of your neck and he pulls you to him slowly, still careful of your newly healed ribs. He wraps his arms around you, enfolding you against his wide, warm chest.

"I want to go with you tomorrow," he says suddenly, his voice rumbling in your ear. You hold yourself still for a long moment then finally, amazingly, you nod against him.

"If you're sure," you say. You feel the embers of familiar fear grow hot inside you, but you let them smolder unkindled "I doubt that it'll be much different than last time," you say unable to keep from issuing a gentle warning.

"I'm different," he says.

After a few long moments of holding each other Jim sighs and releases you. He grins when you take his hand, kiss it, and begin to lead him across the room and up the stairs to bed.

1) Initial contact: The guide touches the back of the blind person's hand as a signal for them to take the guide's arm.

"Ready?" Jim will ask you for the third time, his tone patiently indulgent as though he is speaking to someone who is heavily medicated or-- your mother. He has been waiting by the door for twenty minutes since the last time you indicated your "readiness".

"Yeah sure-- no wait--keys. Where are my keys? I thought I put them in my pocket," you say shrugging the rest of the way into your coat and patting yourself down.

"You did. But then you took them out of your pocket on your way into the kitchen and left them on the counter by the microwave."

"Oh yeah that's right, but then I--"

"--Then you took off your coat, ran upstairs, came back down and picked up your keys."

"Uh-huh, right so then why don't I have them?"

"Because you forgot your coat and before you went back for it you handed the keys to me and I put them in my pocket." Jim grins triumphantly and you can't help but laugh.

"All right, okay so hand'em over, Smart Guy." Jim takes the keys out of his pocket and jangles them in the air in front of you only to snatch them up into his palm again when you reach for them.

"Jim, c'mon man, give me the keys already!" He shakes his head.

"No. Wait a minute." The smile disappears off his face like it never was and he takes your shoulder with his free hand.

"Chief," he says, "Blair. I know that my concept of moral support is pretty screwed up here and it's messing with your head. I know that by coming with you today I'm giving you twelve hundred more things to worry about then just this line-up which is the only thing you should really be worrying about. And that's why you're running around like a manic forgetting your keys, your glasses, your coat... I just want you to know that, well, I'm probably not going to one-hundred percent today-- "

"Paper towel dispensers beware?"

"Something like that. But when it comes time for you to go into that room and point the finger at the bastard who mugged you, I'll be right there with you okay, Chief? Nothing to worry about."

"Okay. Thanks, Jim," You say, smiling warmly. He pats your shoulder and then slides his hand down to grip your arm just above the elbow.

"Okay. So can we get the hell out of here or what?"

"Yeah man, if you'll give me the damn keys!"

2) Stairs: The guide always approaches the stairs squarely, never at an angle, and stops at the edge. The guide should indicate if the stairs lead up or down. To make use of the handrail change sides if necessary. The blind person may wish to find the edge of the first step with their toe.

"Why are we taking the stairs again, Chief?" Jim asks.

"Because I don't care what the Nike commercials say. Conquering your fears is overrated and I am not getting into an elevator!"

"Don't you think conquering seven flights of stairs is a little overrated?"

"Jim, any time you have to weld--hello weld-- for your life there is going to be lasting psychological damage. Add to that plummeting at high speeds and doing the Macarana--a desperate act at the best of times--and you have the makings of a full-fledged phobia. I am not getting on an elevator!"

"Okay, okay, whatever you say, buddy. We'll take the stairs."

“Thank you. I don't know if you know this, Jim, but me and gravity haven't been on speaking terms since I was four years old and fell out of a barn loft. So what if I landed in a bunch of hay? It still scared the shit out of me."

Note: Elevators are a scourge from hell. Avoid them at all costs. Remember that those "Just do it" ads on t.v. do not apply to real life. Television is also a scourge from hell because it will try to sell you a stupid, cardboard life that is shiny on the outside but flimsy and empty on the inside. Case in point: on t.v. the main character of any given show will be blinded at least once by a conk on the head at the beginning of the episode and then un-blinded by a conk on the head at the end of the episode--like field-mice.

"Jim? I know it's seven flights up but you're in great shape. Why are you breathing so hard man? Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm okay."

"Good then can I have some circulation back in my arm please? Circulation is good. I like circulation."

"Sorry, Chief." He eases his grip only fractionally.

"Okay, you know what? We're going to stop up there at the next landing for a minute ‘cause I don't think you're really okay."

"Yes I am. I'm fine. Just a little-- "

"--on the verge of a panic attack?"

"No. Blair--"

"Humor me." Upon reaching the landing you maneuver Jim carefully over to lean with his back against the wall.

"Aw man, look at you," you say with serious concern, touching his cheek "You're pale. You're sweating all of the sudden. C'mon, talk to me. What‘s going on?"

"It's just my body reacting to anticipated stress," Jim says with clinical detachment.

"Post traumatic stress you mean?"

"Sandburg--"

"Play macho later, Jim. Right now I want you to breathe."

"I am breathing now can we please just get going?" Jim starts to move away from the wall but you stop him with a hand to his chest.

"Sure, after you breathe," you say calmly, your voice given an eerie volume by the high acoustics of the stairwell.

Jim sighs and slumps back against the wall,

"All right if it'll get you off my back." He closes his eyes and draws in a long, loud breath through his noise.

"Good. Now hold it...and let it out slowly. Again. Good. Hold it. Let it out." You place both hands on his chest and slide them outward, stripping his coat off his shoulders. He lets you tug at him until the coat is free completely. Then you slip your hands underneath his sweater and tee-shirt to the warm, secret skin there, spreading your hands over the broad smooth muscles of his chest.

"Keep breathing," you murmur, "Just relax."

His head falls back against the wall as you start to gently fondle his nipples, moving in closer to press your body to his.

"When we go in there, to the bullpen Jim, just think about me. Think about me being with you--being part of you. You reach out, and I'm there under your hand. You say my name, and I come. You say: "get me out of here," and we're history. You say: "kiss me", and I will-- to hell with what anybody thinks."

"And if I say fuck me in the stairwell?" Jim gasps, clasping your face in his strong hands. You reach down and cup his balls very lightly, hardly touching. You feel his throbbing heat as he begins to grow hard.

"Right here?"

"Yes. . ."

You squeeze a little harder and his breath hitches.

"Yes..."

Then suddenly Jim stiffens and his head snaps up,

"Blair, someone's coming," he says tightly. You back up just enough to glance around. Jim shudders when you let go of his cock.

"Damn!" you hiss "who is it?"

"Taggert, huffing and puffing his way up. He's two floors below us." Jim's face hardens abruptly, he stands up straight and squares his shoulders.

"He's not alone," he says in a low, malevolent voice.

"Who's with him?" You ask worriedly. "Jim? Who is it?"

Just then you hear distant voices echoing off the walls below. One a low rumble, the other higher and lighter.

"Jim?"

You watch, alarmed as Jim turns his back on you and you reach out automatically to touch him, keep him from straying. You lay your hand between his shoulder blades and then lock your eyes on the landing behind you, waiting for someone to appear. You hear Joel Taggert's voice saying:

". . .exercise program to try to lose some weight after Thanksgiving. I've been climbing these stairs ever since. I figure it just might work if it doesn't give me a heart attack first." He rounds the corner and glances up, stopping short when he sees you.

"Sandburg? Blair Sandburg? Jim? Whatthe-- Well I'll be damned." He grins widely and you manage a nervous smile, trying to peer around to the person behind him.

"Hey Joel."

"Is there some kind of reunion going on that I don't know about? Guess who I found downstairs flirting with the desk Sergeant?" He steps aside and you come face to face with Cassie Wells.

SEEING RED

Note: Even as a child you avoided conflict. You were easy-going and considerate. You used to rescue earthworms off the sidewalks after heavy rain when, driven up from the ground by mindless thirst they found themselves beached on glistening concrete. But you have also always had a bad case of what your grandfather used to call "the short man's temper"; this streak of something hot and frenzied like sweat on the basket-ball court in mid-summer-- this Kamakazi Sandburg gene that makes you get right up breast-to-breast with someone twice your size and shove.

First discovered in the fifth grade when Jason Farley ambushed you in the boys room and was about to re-arrange your face but you wrapped the red ribbon of sudden rage around your knuckles and sunk your fist into his gut instead.

"Fight or flight" your mother called it when later, under the harsh glare of a reading lamp, she dabbed iodine on your cuts and scrapes of victory-- but your father knew better. "Nope, the kid just finally found his breaking point" he said and he was right. You had found your threshold, your "line in the sand" and stepped across it into the oblivious 'beyond' of fury.

When it comes to protecting Jim you are a single-minded, formidable force. Your lines in the sand are clearly drawn and you are easily provoked. Once, in a crowded pizza joint, a drunk man accosted Jim with one of those "What? Are you blind?" kind of remarks that make your blood boil and you just went crazy. Your eyes blazed and people backed away from you like you were the "Incredible Hulk" in denim cut-offs ready to let out a barbaric roar and splinter wood with your bare hands. You were.

Note: So, knowing your temper, knowing that what she has done is a thousand times worse than insults in a pizza joint, coming face to face with Cassie unexpectedly in a stairwell might be more than you can handle. You might completely disassociate, your mind overtaken by one, sheer, righteous imperative to: do damage to the enemy. It won't matter anymore that you once actually liked this woman, called her your friend, shared Chinese take-out and deciphered obscure engravings with her. She has trespassed on sacred ground. She has committed the unforgivable sin. She has hurt Jim. It will be a good thing (realized in retrospect) that she is at the bottom of the stairs, out of your reach. A good thing that Jim senses your intent to hurl yourself across time and space, and makes a move to hook an arm around your waist.

"No," he orders in your ear, "you just take it easy, Chief. Get a hold of yourself."

As if you could. As if you weren't like one of those mothers lifting a car off her son's body, absolutely flooded with adrenaline, only one act in mind--fucking unstoppable.

"No, Jim! It's her!" you seethe, staring malice down at the pretty red-head who stands frozen on the stairs. You register shock in her eyes and this serves to infuriate you further. You want to tell Jim about how she has the gall to look surprised as though she doesn't know full well why you're pissed-- but you can't bring yourself to string words together. All you can do is clench and unclench your fists and feel your face grow hot.

"Why?" You finally manage to grind out between your teeth as you struggle wildly against Jim's hold. "What the hell is the matter with you lady? Are you fucking-- crazy?"

She and Taggert both stand below you with open mouths and craned necks like dumbfounded birds. You ache to sink your teeth into tender flesh and taste tail feathers-- there is a reason why your spirit animal is a wolf God damnit! Too many people have hurt Jim. There have been too many helpless moments in his life after blindness. Too many helpless moments in your life after blindness. God have mercy on anyone who makes it worse-- for no reason at all. Fuck, "I had a nervous breakdown" fuck "I'm sick and need help".

"What?" she gasps, "Blair? What are you talking ab--"

"NO!" you bellow, your voice thundering off the walls, echoing, "Don't you pull that shit with me. I know what you did you twisted little bitch!"

And then from somewhere distant you hear Jim's voice, feel his hot breath on your face. You hear him say the word "enough" the way only he can say it, to put a stop to things, and he spins you around, wrapping you up into some kind of full-body hold that is so encompassing, so strong yet painless--so Jim-- that it casts a calming spell over you. And like magic, your struggles subside and you fall still against him, breathing hard, your hair in your face.

"Just take it easy," he says again with astounding calm. You can't believe his self-restraint. You can't believe that he's turned into Gandhi in the midst of your own homicidal rage.

"How can you?--" you gasp, "How can you be so. . ."

You feel light-headed, dizzy, on another planet. You feel suddenly as though nothing is real. Nothing is just.

"Jim? She hurt you." You say in a bewildered voice.

"I know, Chief," he soothes, "I know, but it's all right. Just take it easy okay?"

Note: This is what it feels like to be terrified of space and have someone else's presence be the only solid thing. His chest against your back. This is what it feels like to be 'anchored'.

'Whatever you say Jim', you think, 'anything for you.' And with that, you are calm. You hear Cassie's voice behind you, her puzzled murmuring, but it has no effect on you. There is only Jim. His hand sliding up your chest to find your heartbeat.

When Taggert comes to peer around Jim's shoulder at you (poor Joel, always just slightly out of the loop, always coming up from behind), the concern in his eyes is downright poignant and it makes you suddenly miss his daily doses of kindness

"Joel," you murmur, "hey man."

"Hey," he says, "are you all right?"

"Yeah, but you'd better keep her away from me."

"I gathered that much. You want to tell me what's going on?"

"It's kind of a long story, you sure you want to hear it?"

"Uh-huh, I think this is something that you might need to get off your chest, Sandburg, before you explode."

"I agree," Jim interjects firmly. "but not here. Chief, let's move this into Simon's office. Taggert, would you mind escorting Ms. Wells into the squad room?"

"Sure, Jim," Joel says, "You guys go ahead. We'll be right behind you. . . or, on second thought, make that way behind."

GLASS HOUSES

Note: When you turned nineteen your best friend developed a serious psychiatric ailment. These two things were not, as far as you know, related in any way but they occurred simultaneously. At your party-- after actually-- as you were picking up beer cans and crusty pizza boxes at two o'clock in the morning and complaining about the fact that she wasn't helping you clean, Lizzie suddenly made a declaration.

"I can't concentrate", she said. Not offhandedly like you say when you've been studying for six hours straight, you're hyped up on too much caffeine and you throw down your pencil in frustration: "Man, I just can't concentrate!" No. This was said abruptly, with dread. And when you lowered yourself down beside her on the couch, the trash bag you were filling still clutched in one hand, rustling, she held out her arm and asked if you thought it looked dirty.

Lizzie, who was someone you'd known for years, ever since freshman orientation, who had always been entirely rational, reserved, a bit too anal (rather like Jim). She was constantly calling you crazy and living vicariously through your acts of romping abandon.

"What do you mean you can't concentrate?" You asked, brow furrowing.

"I can't concentrate," she said again, "All I can think about is how I can't concentrate!"

And then she began to panic about breathing. Somehow she got it into her head that if she stopped thinking about inhaling and exhaling she would die. So she had a little fit of terror on the love-seat in your dorm room, started to hyperventilate and eventually she ended up in an ambulance. You have never forgotten her sudden plunge into unreality or standing out on the curb in a tee-shirt and sweats listening to the clank of a gurney against bay doors while red and blue lights swooping around you like diving birds.

OCD as it turned out-- obsessive compulsive disorder. Over three million Americans suffer from it. "It" being a thousand ordinary acts turned into frenzied super-conscious imperatives. Hours spent counting, checking and re-checking the locks, issuing silent orders from brain to body: "Brush your teeth with your left hand only", "Touch your throat four times". . .

Doctors say that obsession can arise as the result of underlying fear or some kind of sudden trauma-- one of those things that spring up out of nowhere once you've cleared childhood-- just when you were beginning to believe that you'd come out of it okay. Lizzie ended up on Nortriptyline, Amitriptyline, Prozac. Ended up living her life in brief stretches of calm, her mind a tangled forest interspersed with clearings.

She still calls you up from time to time, still pauses in her speech to count to fourteen, fifteen, twenty. . . To put her at ease you say: "It's okay, Liz, I've got all the time in the world." And she laughs relief. Living with Jim has taught you the soft-spoken art of casual patience.

Knowing Lizzie has taught you that the mind is fragile and for some people it ticks like a bomb.

Sitting in Simon's office--a glass house, unsure of who will be throwing stones--you stare out at the bullpen at Cassie who is standing beside Taggert's desk shaking her inhaler. You remember her overzealous attempts to solve every case by herself. You remember the glint you often used to see in her eyes, the one you recognized right away as jealousy directed towards Jim. And you remember how she once crouched over a dead body of a friend and spouted off about "scoring a field-goal" as though the demise of life was, in some way, a game. 'Just jaded cop talk?', you ask yourself, or ambition closing the gates on humanity? The seeds of some Nazi doctor soullessness? Surely not. Cassie was, when you knew her, a good person, and yet. . .

That night, after having been abandoned at "The Outrage", Jim was so shaken. Knocked back to an almost pre-verbal state by too much sensory input and too many worst fears realized. What happened that night scared him badly-- and Cassie had been the cause of it all. . .

Jim stands by the window in Simon's office, silhouetted against dusky afternoon light. and seeing him there again, his face obscured, makes you feel a sad tug of nostalgia--the kind of October sadness that comes over you when you remember the chilly twilights of your childhood, hay-rides and pumpkins--some pure joy long past.

You are reminded of the days when Jim could see-- that golden time canonized in your mind as an achingly vivid montage of smiles. All too easily you can recall Jim driving the truck through wet streets, his gloved hands on the wheel, casting you a side-long grin that turns his eyes the brightest blue. You remember wearing tuxedos in a crowded restaurant, candle-light glinting off crystal, linen set with silver, his gaze meeting yours over the centerpiece... such blessed days that will forever dwell in memory's favor as free and unencumbered.

A dim reflection of that time comes forth again now in Simon's office, just a brief, flash-bulb afterimage of Jim as a cop, his arms crossed over his chest, discussing points of law with Simon. But there is a fragility in his pose as with all things that exist only for a moment: sand mandalas, the last cord of a nocturne... You know that in a short time he will step out of afternoon stillness and into a pale shaft of light. Then you will see that only your veil has been lifted, only your clouds that have drifted past the sun.

Simon, leaning up against the front of his desk, keeps his distance like a stranger. His friendship with Jim has, for the past two years, flared during crisis but only smoldered otherwise. Ever since the "accident" things have been strained between them the way it is between brothers--one having transgressed in a moment of weakness to cause the other harm. Love, guilt and the fear of rejection exhale with their breaths and hover around every word. Simon hesitates at the outskirts of Jim's life unable to either step forward or retreat. He can't bear the prospect of discovering what he believes to be the torturous daily trials that define a blind man's life and therefore he remains shamefully ignorant of that life.

Note: Ignorance is one of Jim's worst enemies (yours too). It hovers right up there with cruelty and indifference. Open your nearest thesaurus, look up the word "blind" and you will find words such as: imperceptive, irrational, oblivious, blocked and unaware. Words that are like odorless gases that nearly everyone breathes in at some point during their lives--between the guileless acceptance of youth and the frightened discrimination of adulthood. Say the word "blind" and somewhere in the subconscious a vent is opened and up from secret depths these gasses hiss.

Once, after discovering him to be blind, a kid asked Jim: "How do you know when you're awake?" Simon has, thankfully, progressed beyond this point but he still struggles to see Jim as the same person he has always been--a man who is also blind. There are still frequent skirmishes of awkwardness, wrong assumptions, unvoiced complaints. For example, As Simon speaks, Jim sways his head slightly away from him, giving the impression that his attention is wondering. The Captain's brow furrows and he asks: "Jim? Are you listening to me?"

He still has not yet, even after two years, gotten used to the fact that Jim follows conversation with his ears rather than his eyes.

"Yes, Simon, I'm listening to you. But I don't think you're listening to me," Jim says, rubbing his forehead. "I know it sounds far-fetched and I have no real idea what her motives are, but yes, on several occasions Cassie has. . . accosted me."

"Why?" Simon persists, abruptly plucking his cigar out from between his teeth, "I mean, Jim, it's pretty twisted to mess with--"

"A blind guy?" Jim asks, raising an eyebrow.

Simon grimaces and looks away,

"I didn't mean--" he mumbles but Jim cuts him off,

"No it's okay Simon, "blind" is not a dirty word. Go ahead and say it. And while you're at it, why not ask yourself why you think it's so twisted to mess with a blind guy. Is it because he's helpless and can't take care of himself? He just lets himself be led blindly around like some kind of dumb animal at the mercy of the good intentions--the charity-- of others?"

Note: More words from the thesaurus: docile, reliant, melancholy, subservient. . .

". . .Or is it because no matter how careful he is, or how diligently he trains himself, someone he thought he could trust can still suddenly walk back into his life and with one strategic tip of the scales make his world come crashing down around him? In which case, how different does that make him from say, anyone? Ask yourself that, Simon-- blind or not? Cassie and I met, we had coffee together, we talked about old times, laughed over old cases and then--when she said she was going to drop me off back at the loft--I believed her. I had no reason not to. Why did she take me to that night-club instead? I don't know, Simon. Maybe she enjoyed the thought of having power over me. Maybe after being in charge of so many cases, being the detective that she could never be, she thought she could finally show me who was boss. Maybe she just gets off on dominating people. I can't tell you for sure, and frankly I don't really care. I didn't come to the station today to bring this up with you. I came here to be with Sandburg while he fingers the asshole who mugged him, that's it. Cassie showing up and dredging all this up again was not part of the deal."

"She really did it," Simon murmurs in a bewildered voice, suddenly realizing the truth from Jim's conviction, "She actually put you in danger--left you at that night-club, tried to lure you out in front of oncoming cars. . ."

Jim nods, "Yes, but I'm not about to let it happen again."

"I'll make sure that it doesn't happen again," Simon says, stepping forward to grip Jim's shoulder "you have my word on that."

"Thanks, Simon but--"

"I know, I know, you can take care of yourself, you're not helpless I know, and I'm sorry if I implied that you were."

Jim nods again solemnly, then he lifts his head and draws in a deep breath.

"So why is she here, Captain, do you know?" He asks, his tone softer.

"I'd say that's pretty obvious." you interject suddenly, breaking into the conversation for the first time. You are seated in front of Simon's desk, your elbows on your knees. You run you hands wearily through your hair before glancing sideways at Jim, "She's following you."

"No," Simon contradicts grimly, "actually she has an appointment with me about getting her old job back."

"What?" You bellow, astonished, surging out of your chair, "What? Oh no-- oh no, Simon, you can't even be considering--"

"Sandburg--" Simon raises a staving hand and pins you with a hard stare that you recognize from your days as an observer, one that says:" put a lid on it, kid".

"Clearly, this information gives me a. . .new perspective," he says pointedly, casting a malevolent glare outside his office at Cassie. "Don't worry, Blair, if I have my way she'll be on a plane back to San Francisco by the end of the week."

Jim indulges in a slight smile, hearing the determination in Simon's voice, then he is all business again, reaching out a hand to you,

"Okay, Chief, I believe you still have a line-up to view. Don't you think it's about time to get it over with so that we can go home?"

He says the word "home" with a well-masked hopefulness that probably only you can hear.

HAND LANGUAGE

Jim stretches out on the couch and you hear two muted thumps as he kicks off his shoes.

"Shit, I'm glad that's over," he groans, crossing his arms behind his head and closing his eyes. You come to stand at the foot of the couch and smile fondly down at him. Stripped of his sweater, the wide plane of his chest thinly veiled by a gray tee-shirt, his white socks showing below the cuffs of his jeans, he looks like one of those posters you can buy at the drug store; the one in between Elvis on a motorcycle and the sign of Pisces-- the one called: "Sexy Siesta".

"You look like you're ready for a nap," you say with a smirk, tugging the tail of your flannel shirt out of your jeans and toeing off your own shoes.

"Oh yeah? I must be getting old if I gotta sleep in the middle of the day." He slips one arm free from behind his head and reaches down to absently scratch beneath his shirt. You catch a glimpse of his bellybutton-- the flat smoothness of his stomach.

"Oh, I think you've got a few more miles left in you," you say, your voice dipping low.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, and I'll prove it to you," you say, rounding the couch and coming to sit beside him. He reaches out and lazily runs the backs of his fingers up your arm--very "lord of the manor". His hand makes its way up to your face and you rub your cheek against his knuckles.

"Sounds like a plan," he murmurs, "I'd like that. But first--, " his fingers uncurl and spread wide over the side of your face, his pinky lying along the bridge of your nose, his thumb pressed against the joint of your jaw, "tell me the truth, Chief, are you okay?"

"Sure," you say, "why wouldn't I be?"

"Oh, I don't know, Cassie, the line-up. . ."

You think back on the six disheveled "suspects" who had stood before you in a too-white room reading off index cards like actors at a screen test. You remember Jim's hand coming to rest between your shoulder blades just when you needed his silent intimacy to ground you.

It had been dim as a cave in the "viewing" room and no one had seen Jim touch you-- not the tired, middle-aged lawyer in the brown power-suit, not officer James speaking into the intercom-- only you knew the extent of his nearness.

It hadn't been easy to ID your attacker. In truth you never actually saw the guy, you just heard his voice, and without an icy wind blowing in your face or a serge of adrenaline carving your senses down to their raw focused edges, it had been hard to distinguish between one mumbled monotone and another. In the end it was Jim's quiet prompting, his voice in your ear saying: "Close your eyes. Visualize the parking lot. It's okay to remember", that had finally sparked recognition.

"I'm fine," you say, loosely gripping his forearm and relishing the feel of his corded strength under your fingertips, "How ‘bout you?"

He draws in a long breath and lets it out slowly.

"No bloody knuckles this time," he says with a wry smile.

"Yeah, I'm glad," you reply seriously, and as you speak his fingers move down to your lips as though drawn there by necessity, as though he is deaf as well as blind and has to feel the shape of your words. You love his free-ranging touch, the uninhibited exploration of his hands over your body. "And I'm glad I was wrong about Conner and H and everybody. I really didn't think they would--could--have changed so much since last time, but they. . .they were actually--"

"Cool?" Jim says, raising his eyebrows.

"Yeah, they were cool. Somebody must have handed out etiquette pamphlets or something. Megan didn't shout--"

"--And Brown said: "You're lookin' good man" without a hitch." Jim smiles but then his face grows solemn and you see the muscles in his jaw define sharply before smoothing out again.

"What?" you murmur with a lurch of concern, gripping his arm more tightly.

He blinks and his eyes have a distant, rheumy look that worries you--like he's delirious or grieving.

"Jim?"

"I don't know," he says thickly, blinking again, "it's just that. . .I didn't expect them to be so-- happy-- to see me. . ." his voice trails off and he swallows, his Adam's apple bobbing.

"Oh, Jim," you murmur shaken by the sudden depth of feeling in his voice, afraid of it. A life lived anticipating rejection and being surprised by acceptance is too wrong for Jim, too unbearable for anyone. You shift to lay your hand flat on his chest, "Oh baby no," you gasp helplessly and he laughs-- a breathless, nervous laugh that sounds like the precursor to tears. He covers your hand with his.

"Uh-oh, Chief," he says," you only call me 'baby' when I'm acting like one." His voice falters and he clears his throat, turning his face away from you toward the couch cushions.

"Aw, no, come on," you say, bringing your other hand up to turn his face gently back towards you. "Where is this coming from, huh, Jim?"

"Nowhere," he croaks, "don't get all deep on me. Don't start talking about how I need to "process my issues, okay?"

"I'm not-- I wasn't going to. . .Jim--"

His fingers curl around your hand, still resting on his chest, and he lifts your palm up to his lips. The kiss lingers long enough for you to feel him breathe out through his nose, a warm, moist breath.

"I just--it just makes me think that maybe I shouldn't have stayed away so long. All this time I thought they couldn't stand--"

He stops abruptly, clenches his eyes tightly shut and shakes his head, fighting hard for control. Finally he lets out a long shaky breath and says: "You know what? I guess I just miss poker night."

"Poker night?"

"Yeah, poker night."

A tentative smile crosses Jim's face and he reaches up to rub the tell-tale moisture out of his eyes with his free hand.

"Taggert's chunky tomato salsa. . ." he says, sounding stuffy, and unsteady.

"Rafe's chicken wings?" you say carefully, catching his drift.

He nods.

"Yeah, and those little egg-plant things you used to make. What were those called?"

"Little egg-plant things."

He chuckles, "Yeah, I miss those."

"What about Simon's stinky feet?" you ask, "Remember how he used to wait until he was in the middle of a losing streak before he'd take off his shoes and then-- whoo man!. . .Of course everybody got distracted, especially you. Remember: "dial down the toe-fumes, Jim, dial down. You can do it".” You laugh.

"God, that was like his emergency strategy or something."

Jim crinkles his nose and grimaces,

"Yeah, I remember. How could I forget? That, at least, I don't miss," he says.

A moment passes and you sober realizing how much you have missed poker night too. You stare down at Jim, steadily, and then,

"We could-- " you begin cautiously, searching Jim's face, "Maybe. . ."

His grip tightens on your hand and you see apprehension creep over his face like a fog.

"I don't know, Chief," he says guardedly.

"Home turf," you remind him leaning in closer, touching his cheek, "we could always kick them out if they start acting like assholes--more than usual that is."

"That's true," Jim concedes before something changes in his face. You see desire flash like heat-lightening across his features and then suddenly he is saying: "Blair, kiss me. Please--Blair--right now. I need--"

The urgency in his voice drives you to act and without a moments hesitation you cradle his face, tilt his chin up, and ever so tenderly brush your lips against his-- a 'hello', a 'here I am'. . .He lets out a pent up breath and his lips part invitingly.

"Kissme," he whispers again, fervently, before you capture his mouth with yours. The moan that escapes him rumbles through the bones of his face and passes into your fingers like electricity. His mouth is hot and soft and yielding. He lets you dip down deeper and deeper until finally you have to come up for air.

"Yes," he gasps, arching up restlessly, begging for more. In one swift motion you swing your knee up over his hip and straddle him. You run your hands roughly up his chest, over to his shoulders and then you dive down to the hollow of his neck devouring the sensitive skin there. He lets out another throaty moan and sinks his hands into your hair, you feel his fingernails gently scrape your scalp. His hips rise beneath you, straining. He holds you to him for a moment and then he frees one hand to fumble for the collar of your shirt. He slips the top button free with urgent fingers then works his way swiftly down. You switch over to the other side of his neck, licking and sucking until he loses muscle control, dropping his hand weakly to your shoulder and tilting his head back.

"Strip" he begs helplessly "but--d-don't stop..."

You lift your face up to capture his mouth again, and with a wild struggle you tug out of your flannel shirt and have yourself free enough from your tee-shirt that it hangs around your neck like a bandanna. Eagerly Jim's hands rove over your chest, ruffling through the soft mat of hair there. Your kisses are wet and relishing, he is a sweet feast under your tongue, deliciously hot.

"Love you," you shudder against his lips "I want you--your hands."

Your erection is throbbing against the rough denim restraint of your jeans, seething with pleasure, ready to burst free. He has slipped his fingers down below the waistband of your jeans and popped the top button loose-- his knuckles dig into your stomach like a promise. The zipper comes down slowly and you rock forward, eager for release.

"Touch me," you plead, wanting to feel him so badly that your mind clouds with desire. Thought melts away and you fall into a blissful erotic dream-haze. When his fingers curl around your hot, craving thickness, your breath hitches and you lift your head in exaltation.

Your thighs tremble, and your hands wrap around his wrist as he begins to tug. Your hips move, your lips move and the sounds that escape your mouth...inarticulate beseeching nonsense. You are speaking in tongues,

possessed. . .

You cry out as you come, feeling your face twist into fierce grimace as a glorious, sweet pulse of pleasure floods through your body-- rocks and shudders, swelling hard, blooming silently like the birth of the universe before you slump slowly forward onto Jim's chest, boneless and quivering. After a while you become aware of the sound of your own panting breaths and the frantic hammering of your heart inside your chest.

Distantly you feel Jim, urging your head up enough to slip your shirt all the way off and then guiding your head back down to rest against his shoulder. You feel him wrap his arms around you and hold you as the last shudders of pleasure pass through your body. He rubs your back soothingly and murmurs in your ear.

"I love you too," he says softly, "more than anything."

Note: If you come home late from work on a Tuesday to find only one lamp on in the living room, casting a muted glow over the couch and reflecting an eerie orb-eye off the balcony windows, you might assume that Jim has gone to bed. He has been tired lately, under the weather ("Not as young as I used to be"). But if, as you are hanging up your coat and dumping your satchel by the door, you hear the faint sounds of coughing coming from the bathroom around the corner, you should amend your assumption. Jim is not asleep.

He stands, bracing himself over the sink, looking oddly frail under the stark shadows thrown by the defective light fixture in the downstairs bathroom. The cough that punches up from deep in his chest is the same one you've been hearing carry across crowded lecture halls for the past week like some kind of strange, subhuman distress call. His shoulders heave and bare-chested, wearing only a pair of sweat pants you can see the muscles in his stomach clench and relax almost rhythmically.

"Easy," you murmur from the doorway, "You're going to need at least one of those lungs for breathing pretty soon." You cross the short distance over to him and grip his arm, steadying him as you reach up to press your palm against his forehead. He has a fever but it is not alarmingly high--yet.

"When did this start?" you ask anxiously.

"Don't worry," he rumbles in a hoarse voice, "it's just this damn flu that's been going around."

"How are your dials?"

You scrutinize him as you edge around him to open the medicine cabinet. The reflection of his bowed head swings outward with the mirrored cabinet door.

"Without you, pretty shaky. Better now," he murmurs and you nod, reaching over to briefly grip the back of his neck and knead gently.

"Sorry I'm so late," you say, unscrewing the cap of the cough syrup bottle you've just pulled from the cabinet. "Dr. Larson stopped me on my way out to regale me with stories--what he calls "E-lore"--classic American folklore revived through the modern medium of E-mail. I don't know if I'd call a tall-tale about getting your organs fried by a tanning-bed "classic", but. . ."

Jim doesn't seem to be listening to your words, instead he runs his hand over your shoulder and down your arm to your hands, rather wistfully feeling the bottle you are holding.

"Jim?" Your brow furrows, "Are you okay? I mean, I know you're sick but--"

"I was worried," he says quietly, "the last time you were late coming home you. . . " his voice trails off and you fill in the blank spaces provided: 'You were mugged', 'You ended up in the hospital', 'You almost got killed'.

"Aw, shit, Jim. . ." You sigh contritely, setting the cough syrup bottle down on the edge of the sink and reaching up to touch his face.

"I didn't even think about that. I'm sorry." Jim starts to lean into your hand but abruptly turns his head away to cough again.

"Yeah, well next time just make sure your cell phone is on okay, Chief?" he says when he is able.

"It was on! Wasn't it? I could have sworn-- Oh Jim-- Oh man, I'm--"

"It's all right," Jim breathes, shaking his head "Just double check if you're going to be late next--" yet another bout of coughing overtakes him and he leans over the sink again, one fist coming up to cover his mouth.

You rub his back until the bout passes then pick up the syrup bottle again.

"Here, have you taken any of this cough medicine yet?"

"No I. . .s'just about to."

"Okay, this ought to help."

You measure out a dose into the cap and hand it over to Jim.

"It's the safe kind," you assure him, "Completely Sentinel friendly, I promise."

"Good. Though I wouldn't mind if this puts me out for a while. All I want to do is be able to sleep-- for about a week."

"That's exactly what you're going to do," you say," starting right now. C'mon, let's head upstairs."

Jim wraps his arm around your shoulders and lets you lead him from the bathroom. You can tell by the way he leans on you just how worn out he is, weary, and maybe even a little--

He staggers and you tighten your hold.

"Whoa, dizzy?" You ask softly. You have crossed the living room and now stand at the foot of the stairs.

"Yeah, it's an inner ear thing I think."

"Tomorrow we're calling Peter," you say, catching his hand and placing it on the hand-rail to orient him.

Peter is a good friend of yours, one of the ER docs you and Jim met after the accident who is now best acquainted with his "sensitivities".

"Don't even try to argue. And hang on to me, I'm not about to pick you up off the floor."

"Your concern for my well being is truly touching, Chief."

You are easing him down to sit on edge of the bed, when Jim, suddenly overswept by vertigo, loses his bearings. Exhausted, woozy and confused by the downward motion he gropes out for you even as you are pressed up against him.

"Blair?" he gasps in sudden panic, his hand bumping into your chest and gripping a tight fistful of your flannel shirt.

"Easy, no, I've got you," you murmur calmly in his ear, "We're just sitting down on the bed, it's all right."

He relaxes slowly, loosening his grip on your shirt to spread his palm flat against your chest.

"Oh, okay," he sighs, managing a weak chuckle as you gently coax him to lie back.

You lean down to kiss his forehead as he sinks back against the pillows.

"Just relax," you whisper, "rest."

He lies passively as you tug off first his shoes and then his sweatpants but he grows restless when you step away from him to strip out of your own clothes and into something more comfortable.

"Stay," he moans rolling over on his side to face you.

"I will, Jim," you assure him, "I'm not going anywhere."

He sighs heavily when you slide in bed beside him, draping the covers up over his shoulder. He pulls you to him and tucks your head under his chin, holding it there with one hand. He is about to drift off to sleep when suddenly he stiffens.

"What is it?" you murmur.

"You-- I'm going to get you sick too if--"

"Shhh," you breathe, smiling, "Go to sleep, Jim."

~~

You hear him stir on the couch and abruptly stop typing. The kitchen chair creaks as you twist around to glance at him. It's late and he's been sleeping fitfully on the couch for hours having decided to forgo the dizzy struggle of the stairs again.

Note: Flu + ear infection = one capsized Sentinel.

Every time he moves vertigo crashes over him in stormy waves and his internal compass goes haywire-- "up" becomes "down" and "down" becomes "up". This is, of course, very disorienting and has kept him practically beached on the couch all day long.

"Blair?" he moans groggily and something in the sound of his voice sets you immediately in motion. You are out of your chair and across the room just in time to catch his weakly reaching hand.

"Hey," you murmur, sinking down to sit beside him and wrapping his fingers firmly around yours. His grip is warm and dry. "How are you feeling?"

"Feels like I'm. . .spinning," he whispers. "Dizzy."

"Yeah I'm sure it does, but you know what? You're not. Spinning that is. Well except technically I guess you are, we all are, because the earth is, ya know, but-- ."

"Sandburg?"

"Yeah, Jim?"

"Could you maybe just hold my head or something so it doesn't feel like I'm spinning?"

"Oh, okay," you say, your tone gentling as you smile. You lay one hand on his forehead and one on his chest like a faith healer about to cast up a prayer.

"Is that better?" you ask softly.

"Yeah. . ." he sighs with relief and closes his eyes again. But then, after a moment, he grimaces and shifts restlessly under the blanket you've draped over him. He has been fidgety and unsettled all day, despite everything you've done to try to make him comfortable. You've unplugged to refrigerator and turned off the heat (temporarily-- just until he fell asleep) because the whir of their small motors was bothering him.

You've fed him soup, read to him, and (his favorite) held his head many times during the course of the evening but nothing has satisfied him for long and every time you ask him what's wrong he mumbles something non-committal about his hearing being on the fritz on account of his ear being infected. And you follow with a careful inquiry about dials which only serves to make him cranky and in the end you're holding his head again and helping him to visualize that he's someplace very still and quiet.

His muscles tense, he arches his back slightly and lets out an exasperated sigh. You lean down so that your lips are near his ear and your hair brushes his cheek.

"What?" you breathe soothingly for what seems like the hundredth time, "What is it, Jim?"

"My hearing's off," he reports yet again, as though you don't already know this. As though you haven't already helped him adjust the dials to a place where sound doesn't hurt him, shrinking his world down to the size of the living room.

Note: It is a common misconception, a myth if you will, that in order to make up for a lack of sight, normal human senses: hearing, touch, smell and taste, morph to take on super compensating powers. In truth these senses do not improve with blindness, not even for a Sentinel. No, instead what happens is. . . well, think of it this way: think about the way the downstairs bathroom door sounds when it closes. You know that sound-- that door. You've learned to distinguish it from other sounds. When you wake up to that sound you know that Jim has just finished his shower and if you get your ass out of bed quick enough you might still be able to catch him while he's still wearing a towel (and nothing but a towel so help you God).

Emphasis: Blind people don't really hear better then sighted people--they just hear smarter.

Jim's hearing happens to be very, very smart and without its heightened abilities he feels deprived, frustrated, lost. . .

"I can't hear your heartbeat," he admits finally, his breathing quickening as though he's just discovered the root of his distress-- and perhaps he has.

"Or Sam's--Where's Sam?"

At the sound of his name Sam trots over to the couch, sits down and props his chin up on Jim's ankle, whining softly as if to say, "Don't worry, here I am." Jim calms fractionally at this but still seems on edge.

"What time is it?" he asks tightly, turning his head toward you. He sounds breathless, suddenly scared, and you stroke his cheek trying to calm him.

"Relax, Jim, it's a quarter after eleven," you say softly.

"Morning or night?" He demands, his voice cracking a little, and he tries to rise up onto his elbows only to be pushed back by another wave of dizziness, "Blair?"

"Whoa, hey, take it easy, Jim. Easy. . ." you press your palm to his forehead again and he relents under your touch, gasping from exhaustion and some kind of old awakened fear.

It's eleven o'clock at night," you tell him gently, unable to keep from glancing over your shoulder at the darkened balcony windows as you speak-- as though part of you likes being tortured by poignant moments of bitter irony. . . Monet was blind, Beethoven was deaf and Jim, who once could see in the dark has to ask--

"Night?" he repeats bewilderedly, blinking up at the ceiling, gripping fistfuls of the blanket covering him. For an instant he seems, to you, delirious as though his fever has suddenly spiked and he has slipped under the surface of reality, floundering in the rising waters of panic. Then you realize that with his hearing dialed down and his equilibrium out of whack, his is only partially connected to his usual world of balance, movement and sound.

"Yes, Jim." To get his attention you shift closer to him and cup his face in both hands.

"Hey, man, hey-- listen to me here, okay?" you implore him, "I know you feel really weird right now but everything's fine. I'm right here to tell you whatever it is you want to know." His breath comes out in agitated puffs,

"No," he shakes his head, "something's wrong-- I can't--"

"Jim-- it's okay. Everything's okay."

"No!" he struggles to sit up again and this time you help him, hoping the change of position will assuage his fear.

"It's not okay. I need--" his voice trails off and he raises his fingers to his temples as though he is incredibly frustrated, or has got the hangover from hell, or both.

"All right, Jim, talk to me," you say worriedly, rubbing his shoulder," just tell me what you need."

He raises his head but instead of speaking he reaches for you, fumbling with the buttons of your shirt until you take over the task and quickly unfasten them for him, baring your chest. He slides his hand up to rest flat over your heart-- seeking and finding that anchoring rhythm.

"This," he sighs with profound relief, letting his shoulders slump and air gust out of his lungs, "this is what I need. . ."

"Oh," you say, watching his face relax and his breathing even out. "Okay," you murmur, "I get it."

As if driven by hypnotic imperative, Jim moves, fighting dizziness to position you against the arm of the couch. You follow the silent urging of his hands without resisting and let yourself be placed against his pillow. You sink down into the couch cushions and the sweet warmth of his settled body-heat surrounds you. He presses you back gently, parts your flannel shirt again and very slowly lowers himself to rest his ear over your heart. The way he relaxes utterly against your chest makes you think of some epic hero-- Ulysses, finally coming home after twenty years of fighting monsters and capricious gods-- weary, homesick, and battle-scarred, but safe at last in loving arms.

"Yeah," you murmur tenderly into his ear, stroking his head, "you found me."

He carefully snakes one arm around your waist and holds onto you tightly before letting out an even more contented sigh. Something about that sound tries to bring tears to your eyes. The beautiful, sometimes shell-shocked simplicity of Jim's love for you touches you more deeply than anything else in the world-- at times you think his love is going to crack your heart right open.

"I'm yours" you say, reassuringly, like a vow.

"Mine," he agrees, half asleep already, his breaths flowing out in steady streams against your chest,

"love you, Chief. . ." he sighs with the last of his consciousness and the words sound like a heavy burden being set down.

"Oh, I love you too," you just manage to rasp before your voice falls out from under you with a crack like a branch giving way and you bow your head to kiss the top of his.

~~

Note: If the phone rings in the middle of the night, you might wake up with your heart pounding, wondering who has ended up in the hospital or worse--the morgue. You might fling your arm out across Jim's chest like a driver making a last ditch effort to protect his passenger from a collision. This is a conditioned response that stems from a lifetime of being ambushed by tragedy--of dressing frantically in the dark, stumbling into your shoes and running out the door without your coat, chanting 'pleasegodno', over and over again until your mind goes numb. Worse after Jim's 'accident', the sound of the phone ringing after midnight can literally lock your lungs inside your chest making you incapable of drawing air until Jim. . .

He rolls over, stretching his body possessively across yours as he reaches for the telephone. His lips meet your ear for the briefest moment and he whispers the word “breathe” like a doctor demanding life in a yearning moment of flat-line. You obey with a gasp, thrusting your head back to sink deep into your pillow.

Jim knows about all the people you have lost in your life-- how blessed you have been when it comes to family but not with friends. The people you know die in car accidents or get AIDS or go blind. Jim has tired valiantly to persuade you that this has nothing to do with you-- that you're not cursed, but at times like this you can hardly believe him.

"Ellison," he clips, in a low, sleep-roughened voice and you wait for his body to go tense, wait to feel grief burst up through your body like a flock of startled birds. When his shoulders stiffen you hear yourself say, 'no!' under your breath. Jim sits up slowly and you all but scramble to follow his movement, gripping his shoulder so tightly that your fingers ache.

"Who?" he says, sounding confused, "Whoa -- wait, okay, slow down, honey, take it easy--just tell me who you are?"

Very faintly you can hear a panicked female voice fluttering across a great distance. You hear the words 'can't find' and 'have to help me' interspersed with tiny hitching sobs.

"Okay, shhh," Jim says soothingly, reaching up to hold the phone with both hands, "Hey now, it's all right, don't cry."

The gentle surety in Jim's voice helps you recover your own wits and you lean over without releasing him to snap on your bedside lamp. The loft bedroom defines reassuringly around you, each familiar piece of furniture still in its rightful place, staring mutely out of arching shadows.

Listening intently to Jim's soft words of comfort, you realize that, if not hurt, someone is at least in trouble and asking for help so you slip out of bed and quickly get dressed -- tugging on yesterday's jeans, undershirt and flannel. You walk over to the dresser and pull out fresh clothes for Jim who has disentangled himself from the bed clothes, swung his feet to the floor and now he sits hunched over with his elbows on his knees asking question after question in a calm, level voice,

"What time did you notice he was gone? Did he have his cane with him? His cell phone? Did you call the police?"

You set Jim's clothes beside him in a neat pile, extract one of his hands from its grip on the phone and lay it on top of the clothes, indicating them. Immediately he starts dressing too, juggling the phone from one ear to the other as he wrestles into a heavy sweater. By the time his shoes are tied he is saying, "All right, Claire, I'm on my way. You just hang tight, okay?"

"Where to?" you ask as soon as he hangs up the phone and stands.

"The suburbs," he says succinctly, "One of my students is lost." You hear all kinds of other words behind the ones he speaks out loud, substitute words like 'tribe' instead of 'student' and 'afraid' instead of 'lost'. You see the Sentinel in him rising up like smoke above ruins.

"Who?" you ask, following him without hesitation down the stairs and toward the door.

"Andy," he answers, pulling on his coat and snatching Sam's Juno harness off a hook on the wall. The dog is at his side by the time Jim kneels down, quivering and whining with excitement, keyed up from all the anxiety in the air around him. Jim pets him with long confident strokes, says a few mumbled words into his ear and then stands again, ready to go.

"You got your phone, Chief?" he asks and you pat down your coat pockets,

"Yes."

"Hat? Gloves?"

"Yes."

Jim holds out his hand to you and you take it, squeezing once, hard.

"My heart's going a hundred miles an hour," you confess, even though you know that he can hear it, "but don't worry I'm --"

"So's mine," Jim interrupts unexpectedly.

". . .Really?"

He nods and pulls you closer.

"Yeah, it feels like old times, going out on a case together except this time--"

"This time I drive?"

Jim laughs, the kind of relived, breathless laugh that makes him sound like he's just come in from the cold.

"Yeah. This time you drive. C'mon, let's go find this kid."

In the car Jim recounts what the hysterical girl, Claire, told him on the phone. Claire, being Andy's girlfriend who went with him to a party and somehow ended up separated from him. As Jim speaks you imagine them, two sixteen-year-olds, newly in love, like characters in a Shakespeare play, subject to equal measures of fortune and bad luck. You remember the rambling high school parties of your youth that used to start in the overrun burrow of some rich kid's rec-room and end up half way across town at a frat house or a public park. No one ever stayed in one place, people followed the beer supply in loosely formed packs like predators banded together to maximize their spoils. You can just see Andy and Claire getting swept up in a capricious tide of divided allegiances and drifting unwittingly apart.

"So they ended up at different parties?" you wonder aloud, "Some kind of mis-communication? He wants to hang with his friends, she wants to hang with hers, that kind of thing?"

"No. Andy's not that sure of himself yet. He would want to be as close to Claire's side as he could get the whole time. And besides, Claire told me that she thinks he was taken against his will by a group of guys with a history of violence, one of which is her ex-boyfriend."

"Oh," you say, catching on, "Shit. Does she think these guys are going to hurt him?"

"She tracked them to this house in the suburbs where we're headed. All the guys are there except Andy. She looked into her ex-boyfriend's car, thinking Andy might be passed out drunk in the back seat or something but instead all she saw was his pants and shoes."

"What the hell? His pants? Jim, it's thirty-five degrees outside!"

"I know."

"Should we call Simon? Put an All Points out on the kid?"

Jim shakes his head 'no'.

"Why not?"

"Because those boys know exactly where Andy is and after I'm through talking to them, I'll know too."

"After you're through talking to them?" you ask Jim, feeling a small, hard smile creep across your face.

"I can be very persuasive," he says.

~~

Note: You will know the girl is Claire the moment you drive up and see her standing on the lawn. Who else would be outside in thirty-five degree weather wearing nothing but a slinky black dress looking like she's just run out of a burning house? A little girl rubbing her arms against the cold and crying her eyes out.

You cut the trucks' engine and wave at her before pulling the key out of the ignition and opening your door. She waves back, stiffly, but spares you only a moments notice. Her eyes lock on Jim the instant he steps out of the truck, ushering Sam to follow him. You can tell from the expression on her face that she wants nothing more then to rush over, fling her arms around him and sob out all her panic into the front of his sweater, but she holds herself back like a scolded child; shifting from one foot to the other and swiping her thin blond hair back away from her face with the side of her hand.

"Jim?" she says unsteadily, once he has closed the passenger door and settled Sam at his side with a soft command. Her voice is so weighed down by tears that it quakes.

"Yeah, Claire," he says gently, reaching out to her with one gloved hand, "C'mere, it's okay." And she plunges at him, rocking him back with the force of her embrace. He absorbs her easily, enfolding her against his chest.

"All right," he says in a low voice as she clutches him and weeps. He strokes her hair and makes soft shushing sounds above her head, "It's all right now."

"They won't tell me where he is!" she declares wildly, "He's out there somewhere and they won't tell me where he is! They took his clothes and--he can't see and-- "

"Shh, we'll find him," Jim assures her firmly, pulling back to touch her face. "I'm going to find him. Now, why don't you go and sit in the truck and warm up? Blair can give you the keys. Turn the motor on and blast the heat, okay? There's a blanket behind the seat."

Claire nods against him but is reluctant to leave Jim's comforting sphere. She gazes up at him with wide, scared eyes.

"They've done something really bad to Andy. I know they have," she hisses, "Ryan--he's more than just an asshole when he's drunk. He's-- more then that. I know."

"Okay," Jim says, sounding warm and kind and convinced, "Now, go sit in the truck and wrap up in that blanket. Blair and I will be back out in a minute."

You pass the keys over to Claire like you're giving her a secret loan, pressing them firmly into her hand. She catches your gaze and seems grateful to be able to show you her fear with her eyes-- as though she's been long deprived of this form of silent, earnest communication.

You nod at her, understanding deep down in the pit of your stomach.

"Push the key in real hard," you murmur, "you gotta kinda jiggle it a little to make it turn sometimes, okay?"

She just nods and walks around the front of the truck. You turn to Jim.

"I'm your back-up, man," you say, "I follow your lead."

Jim nods curtly and orders Sam forward, leaving you to take up the rear. As you are walking up the driveway you count only two cars, one belonging to Claire, no doubt, and the other to Ryan-- Mr. 'More than an asshole'. You wonder where Mom's SUV is or Dad's BMW. You wonder what kind of parents would leave their bully of a son home alone for the weekend without at least chaining him to a stake in the front yard first. Do they not fear for the safety of others? Or at least their own upholstery?

Jim doesn't even knock on the front door. He just barges right in like he's got a badge to flash and some ass to kick-- like he doesn't even need a badge--just some skinny-punk- high school-kid-ass to kick.

Which he has. Four asses actually, all of which are sprawled out on a stiff white couch, Gap- attired and utterly doomed. Outclassed and outmatched by one pissed-off blind guy and his dog. (Sam has transformed from Cringe to Battle-Dog in less than 2.4 seconds and he now looks like he's ready to sink his teeth into some sweet Nentindo-playing-meat. His lips have curled away from his teeth and you see (not for the first time) that he has fucking railroad ties for fangs. The boys, all four of them, hear the sound of the front door hitting the wall with a bang and look up at Jim with identical slack-jawed expressions on their faces. They look like they've just come face to face with The Terminator. And they have.

Jim's got on the sunglasses he fished out of the pocket of his black leather coat sometime during the drive over from the loft. These are the sunglasses that normally you hate because he's got such beautiful eyes and no reason to cover them up as far as you're concerned. But they do give him a kind of a 'don't fuck with me' look that can come in handy every once in a while.

He stands square shouldered beside Sam. The boys dwarf before him. They don't stand a chance.

"Where is Andrew Hudson?" Jim asks in a booming voice that makes him sound downright Old Testament-- so righteous he could stir up his own wind. The boys are too flabbergasted to answer. One of them has gone so loose that he drops a video-game controller from his hand and if falls to the floor with an almost soundless thud. Then, as a disproportionate echo, silence slams down into the middle of the room.

Jim's fists clench at his side.

"I will ask you one more time," he bellows with the cadence of a drill Sergeant, his voice rising as though he's about to follow that statement with: 'and then I'll turn you into slime!', "Where is Andrew Hudson?"

"Uh. . . he, uh, w-we haven't seen him-- " one of the boys stammers--the bravest and the stupidest of the group-- probably Ryan.

Honing in on his voice, Jim lets go of Sam's harness and swoops down on the kid with such ferocious accuracy that even you are startled. He hauls him effortlessly off the couch and before the kid can blink he is trapped in some kind of Rambo headlock maneuver that makes him look like a chicken about to be dinner.

"Where is he?" Jim grinds out between his teeth "You tell me now or I'll rip your fucking spine out, boy."

"H-he-h..." The kid's voice defects and he has to swallow forcibly, his Adam's apple doing a dance, "he's at Bethel Park-- the-p-place we call the 'Blair Witch Project s-spot'."

"Did you take his clothes?" Jim asks with absolute disgust.

"Yes-- H-is pants and his shoes."

"Did you tie him up?"

"Yes."

You see Jim's face twist into an exquisite manifestation of rage. You see him tighten his grip around the kid's neck. You see the kid's face go beet red and you don't move a muscle to stop him. But then after a satisfying moment you do say very quietly, under your breath so that only he can hear,

"Jim. Priorities, man. Let's go get Andy."

And Jim lets the kid go with animal abruptness. He snaps his fingers in the face of one of the other boys causing him to flinch as violently.

"You-- " Jim orders tersely, "draw me a map to this Blair Witch project spot. Now, damnit. Chief? Get an ambulance down to Bethel Park pronto and then check this guy's map and see if you can make any sense of it, okay?"

"You got it, Jim."

It doesn't take you long to get a fairly clear idea of where you're going. You used to drive out to Bethel Park as an undergrad for nice private 'necking in the car' dates. And you still remember some of the more secluded places good for doing a little bit more than necking in the car. This Blair Witch Project spot most likely used to be the site of a whole different kind of Blair Project.

"Ready," you signal Jim, straightening up and folding up your map. You wait for him to precede you out of the house with Sam. Then you follow him briskly closing the front door so hard behind you that the fake holiday wreath falls off.

~~

The leaves glint like blades in the beam of your flashlight. The rain has picked up, turning the ground to mud and you are wet and chilled to your bones. You walk a step behind Jim, gripping a fistful of his jacket in order to help steer him as well as keep your balance. The tractionless tennis shoes you've worn do nothing to keep you from slipping down rock-pitted inclines or over roots slick with leaf-rot.

Sam is skillfully winding a path through the dense wood of Bethel Park, attuned to Jim's every cue, but even with his canine acuity he has not yet picked up on Andy's scent-trail. Only Jim has any clue which direction you three should travel and the progress is infuriatingly slow over the rough terrain. Jim is frustrated with himself for not being able to see (despite the fact that sight holds little advantage in the dark-- something you've told him repeatedly: 'all my flashlight is doing is keeping me from running smack into a tree-trunk anyway'), and pouring all his energy into piggy-backing his sense of smell with his sense of hearing almost to the point losing control over both.

"Take it easy," you call to him over the clatter of the rain, steadying him roughly with both hands (your flashlight tucked hastily into the front pocket of your coat), "C'mon, Jim, focus but don't let your senses swallow you up man."

"A person can die from hypothermia in seventy degree weather if it's raining and windy," Jim says in response, sounding oddly detached even as he gasps for breath and grapples for control over his dials-- he sounds like he is reciting a first-aid brochure.

"We're close, Jim," you say, trying to reassure him even though you have little proof of this, Jim's sense of smell can stretch incredibly far and the distance is hard for him to gage, "We'll find him and the ambulance will be waiting when we bring him out. He'll be okay."

"I'm not so sure of that," Jim says gravely, his voice heavy with worry, "I haven't heard a heartbeat yet. I should be hearing a heartbeat."

He walks on, directing Sam to 'hup-up' and you follow at his heels wondering what you are going to do if the kid is dead. Jim will turn wild, or draw in on himself. Either way he'll fall apart and it will be up to you to put him back together. You know this with painful certainty.

As he walks, Jim gradually becomes more confident of the trail he is sensing and begins to walk faster, letting you and Sam take over the more practical aspects of navigating in favor of keeping everybody headed in the right direction. You are helping him down a short but rugged slope, shining your flashlight on the ground at your feet and directing Jim's steps with muttered commands when suddenly he stops cold, lifts his head and draws in a long searching breath. He waits, listens for a moment with his whole body, and then suddenly he rips off one glove and reaches out for you. His hand bumps clumsily into your face, spreads wide for an instant, then grips your chin, turning your head.

"Look over there," he demands in a hard-edged voice, "Do you see him, Chief? Can you?"

You swing your flashlight up and shine it in the direction he has pointed you, straining your eyes for any sign of the kid. The thin yellow beam glows like a miniature sun illuminating small round patches of tree trunks and the darker gaps between them. You inch the beam along in a slow half-circle but you see nothing of Andy. No patch of clothing-- nothing. You are about to admit defeat to Jim when your light catches something bright, gleaming in the distance, white as a flag of surrender.

"There!" you shout, reaching frantically for Jim's arm and snagging hold of it as though you are afraid he's going to bolt, "I see him!"

The kid is dead. Or at least you think he must be. Bound to a tree, half-naked and getting pummeled by the rain, he looks like a corpse dredged up from the bottom of a lake. Eerily pale and long since drowned.

The beam of your flashlight wavers as it crawls over his still form, over his bare legs and his drenched white button-down shirt that is plastered to his body like wrinkled cellophane. His head hangs down as though overwhelmed by sorrow and for an instant you are frozen by the horrible certainty that the kid really is gone.

"Jesus, Jim. . .Can you hear a heart beat?" Your voice trails off and you stand still watching as Jim makes his way the last five steps over to Andy. His hands reach out and sweep quickly over the kid's chest and shoulders making their way to his neck. Jim's fingers press into the soft lax skin under Andy's chin. He is checking for a pulse. He shouldn't have to do that.

"You've gotta cut him down, Chief," Jim orders gruffly, sounding like he is very close to losing it. He flings one hand out to grab you and ends up knocking the flashlight out of your numb hands. It falls to the ground and it's beam is instantly snuffed out on impact plunging you into blackness.

"Shit!"

"What? What was that?"

"The flashlight. Damnit! It fell and went out and now I can't see anything, Jim."

"Shit," Jim agrees hotly, "okay, forget about it. Just cut the ropes Blair. He's not breathing. I gotta start CPR now!"

Without sparing the time to reply you dig into the pocket of your jeans for your Swiss Army knife and, wishing suddenly that you had a sharper blade, you grope your way around the tree and find the rope with your fingers. Trying to be careful you start sawing. When the rope finally breaks and you've worked Andy's hands free, you sense, rather then feel, Jim catching the kid's weight and lowering him to the ground.

"Help me," Jim's voice clips from out of the darkness. You hear him draw in a deep breath, and then you hear a muffled hissing sound as he blows it out into Andy's mouth, "C'mon, Chief-- start compressions!"

Again you feel your way around the tree trunk. Your eyes have adjusted a bit and you can make out Jim's dark shape nearby as well as Andy's limp horizontal form on the ground.

The kid's chest feels hard but at the same time, very fragile under your hands-- and cold. As you press down against him you imagine his bones cracking and his lungs collapsing under your weight.

[One-one-thousand, two-one-thousand, three. . .]

You start wracking your brain, trying to dredge up everything you know about hypothermia. The phrase: "Not dead until warm and dead," hurls across your mind.

[Four-one-thousand, five-one-thousand. . .]

"Jim. . . the paramedics. . .I should go back for them. . . Lead them here."

"Yes. Go," Jim gasps, then he lifts his head briefly, "Can you?"

You are already searching on the ground for your fallen flashlight, groping around in the wet leaves. When you find it you give it one hard shake and it flares back to life.

"Yes. Yes. I can do it.

"Take Sam with you."

"Okay. Jim-- don't stop all right, man? Don't give up. We can't be sure he's really gone until the doctor's get him warmed up, right? They could still revive him."

"Just hurry, Chief-- and be careful."

UNANSWERED QUESTIONS

When will you first detect your body's defection? Will it be while you are stumbling and clawing your way out of a dark forest, he bob of your flashlight drawing you onward like an alien beacon filled with some kind of frantic, otherworldly energy? Or will it be later when you are standing half-frozen amid the chaos of a late-night emergency room, dripping mud, and shivering so hard that you can hear your muscles creaking?

Or. . . will it be later still, when you are home, taking a shower, and you suddenly realize that your legs will not hold you up any longer-- not one more second-- and you start to slide down the wall, very slowly, like a staggering movie bad guy right after he's been shot, leaving a smear of blood behind.

Is it then that you will feel as though you really have been mortally wounded? Like you really are bleeding out, unable to speak, wanting to call for Jim but instead just blinking at the bathroom door and waiting for him to appear, or for you to die-- whichever comes first.

And why do you feel like you're dying? Is it because you are so tired that you're on the verge of weeping and every inch of your body hurts deep down? Or is it because a kid, who yesterday was buying shoes at the mall with his girlfriend is now lying in the hospital, comatose, having his lungs inflated every five seconds by a machine?

The wrongness of this stares you straight in the face like a starving child, a beached whale, an ancient tree uprooted-- it pains you. . .

But not so much as the look on Jim's face when he comes into the bathroom, walks right over to you, bends down and wordlessly hauls you out of the shower. The exhausted, fragile look on his face--

Like he is about to crack wide open.

Like he's been injured internally.

This is the look that will make you protest and try to find your footing once again, make you say,

"No, I'm okay. I can walk." Despite the fact that you know he will ignore you.

Ignore you all the way into a pair of sweat pants, and up the stairs to bed.

Will the kid--Andy-- die? Or will he remain still as death, except for the mechanical pumping of his lungs for years to come? Draped in white sheets, tubes invading his body like tentacles?

Jim has already decided the worst, typically-- he can't help himself. He has already nailed himself to the other side of grief, like Christ.

And his grief, his bone-deep ache, fills your bed as he lies on his side facing away from you, pretending to be asleep. It pools around him and spreads out until it has engulfed you as well, making you feel pinned down by the crushing gravity of some uninhabitable planet.

You want to roll over and meld your body to Jim's. You want to dispel the hurt that now sings through you both, with your own solid body. But your inability to move is breathtaking. It leaves you dizzy and terrified.

"Jim--" you whisper, hardly managing to breathe. The dim early morning light that spills into your bedroom from the sky-light above shows you too much-- too many ordinary objects. And you can see Jim's smooth, muscled back-- see but can't touch.

'God damnit Jim--You're killing me!' You want to yell, cry out, with utmost sincerity, but the only sound that escapes your lips is a weird throaty groan.

Is your survival tied completely, directly to Jim's? Is there really some precarious umbilical bond between you that, if severed, would send you into flailing death-throes? Are you so physically addicted to him that if he suffers, you do as well? What else could explain the tremors now circulating through your body? The hitching of your breath?

"Adrenaline," Jim says as he rolls over to face you. Despair has made him calm, his voice is so low it rumbles. He pushes himself up to hover over you. His face is a mask, his eyes remote. He presses a heavy hand to your chest, "it will pass."

"No," you gasp, unbelieving. This is not something that you can 'ride out'. This feels like your organs are being carved out. You are being devoured, "Jim, please. . ."

Please what? Please take my pain away by letting me take on yours? Please make the world not be so cruel? Please--

"Hold me."

Jim blinks and a vain starts twitching in his jaw. He shakes his head as though he is going to refuse you, but even as he does this, he slips an arm under you and-- so strong-- lifts you up into his arms.

Relief shudders through you and all you can think is: 'Thank you, Jim. . .dear God thank you'. . .

Then your mind is wiped clean and for a moment you are aware of nothing but deep, redeeming contentment. Until--

"Why?" he asks, the word dredged up from dark depths, the sound as agonizing and protracted as torture.

Three letters put together. How can three letters put together become something so unfathomably huge? The head of a firey comet trailing miles and miles of hot chemical vapor behind it.

He is rocking you now and making sounds. His arms feel like thick bands of rope, binding you against him, fiercely tight.

What is this? A lament for Andy? Or something more-- something tribal? Is this what Jim's ancestor might have done, ages ago, in the midst of his village, in front of all his people? Squat down in the dirt, clutch his Guide, and weep so that everyone could see the sorrow he felt for his rare but devastating failure?

The Sentinel mourns. . .

"Shhhh," you breathe into the crook of Jim's neck, your hands spread flat over his shoulder blades, "Shhh. This was not your fault, Jim. . ." Not your failure. He groans in denial, still rocking, wracked with grief and guilt.

"You did everything you could. Everything. Jim, listen to me-- it's okay to let this go. . ."

Note: When you wake up hours later, in the middle of the afternoon, you will feel drained as though someone has come along and mummified you. You will feel the stretched skin under your eyes and a throbbing in your sinuses. The idea of getting out of bed will flit across your mind as an utterly preposterous notion. If Jim is still beside you, sleeping, there will be no reason to move-- not more than a few inches, rolling over. Asleep he will look susceptible, paralyzed, trapped inside the broad cage of his own body. You will have to touch him, cradle his hand in yours, lift gently, hold, feel his solid warmth.

You will have to lean over him and press your lips to his lips, his temple, and breathe in the scent of his skin until he opens his eyes--blue gaze unveiled. He will whisper your name and squeeze your fingers but will not otherwise stir, even as you push yourself further up to loom over him. Even as you stare down into the still pools of his eyes-- seeing but not seen.

"I'm looking at you," you will whisper, freeing your hand from his to brush your fingers over his forehead. He will blink, nod stiffly and lie still, bravely letting you. But his face will remain passive, closed off. You will see signs of last night on his face-- scrubbed from crying, his skin soft and pink around his eyes. But last night will seem like it happened three thousand years ago, in a harrowing epic filled with underworld battles and ritual grieving-- Jim, like Achilles, shrouded in a black storm cloud of pain, scattering dust and ash.

He does not anticipate you as you lean down again. He is waiting and unaware until the moment your lips brush his, then, as though awakened from a spell he opens himself to you and you slid in-- gently, deeply. His mouth is warm and somehow delicate. His hands come up to feel your face, tracing lightly. You kiss him, breathe, then kiss again-- every moment done with care. You sense in him a listless sadness that will have to be coaxed away.

"Blair," he whispers.

Your hands look tan against his face, and square, meant for healing.

"Whatever you need, Jim," you sigh back.

"Just--," he takes your wrists and gently pulls your hands down to rest over his chest, "touch me."

Clouds move away from the sun like floating ice-burgs and the smokey light of afternoon swells down from above, gleaming off the sheets. Jim's skin glows, smooth. His chest is a sculpted expanse under your fingertips. You move slowly. Downward.

"I saved a baby once. . ." Jim says, out of the blue, his breath quickening. "Off duty in a restaurant. She was choking."

You slip one hand beneath the waist-band of his boxers.

"I was in Vice. . ." he pants, "The whole world had gone to shit."

Your fingers curl around his cock. He arches up, an extension of your hand.

"But I saved her life."

"Jim. . ."

"Why couldn't I--"

"Shhhh. . ."

"Save him?

He comes somewhere in the middle of pleasure and pain.

~~

It is cold in the kitchen but Jim stands at the counter in a tee-shirt and sweat pants. His feet are bare. He is waiting for coffee and you are waiting for tea. It is a day for waiting.

"Do you want to talk?" you ask quietly from your seat at the table, your fingers laced together, "about anything."

He rubs his shoulder and draws in a purposeful breath, but then your kettle starts to sputter and the next few minutes are spent in silence as you pour steaming water into a cup and stand beside Jim at the counter fixing your drink. He listens to your movements, tracing the rim of his mug absently with two fingers as though he expects it to sing like crystal.

"No," he says finally.

"No what?"

"No, I don't want to talk about anything."

"Okay."

"I mean, I just don't feel like. . ."

"Okay, it's just that. . ."

"I know. Maybe later after-- visiting hours."

Visiting hours. The hospital. There are certain places now, in your life with Jim, that are like condemned buildings. Boarded up with warning signs tacked on the doors stating: 'to enter here is dangerous'. The ground is unstable. Breathe too hard and the roof could cave in on top of you. The hospital, like the police station, is one of these places. You do not want to go there again. You don't think you have the energy, the strength to face it again. Except you do-- if Jim does.

~~

In the truck Jim lifts his hand and runs his palm up your arm from your wrist to your shoulder, lightly stroking. His touch fills your whole body with a tingling heat and you want him to touch you everywhere, but then he drops his hand back onto his thigh and you have to force yourself to keep driving-- eyes on the road.

~~

You spot Anna Shepherd at the end of the hall still wearing her trench coat. She is talking to a doctor. You haven't seen her in a while, not since last month when Jim was sick and she came by with a pot of soup-- " cliche but nutritious". Her voice carries, a dim echo between narrow walls.

"People do recover from this kind of thing, don't they?" she is asking. The doctor mumbles something you can't quite make out and then Anna hears your footsteps and glances behind her. "Oh Jim, Blair-- ," she breathes, relief flooding her face, "I just heard this morning. Are you both all right? I tried calling but I got the answering machine. Andy's in a coma."

"We know," Jim says, reaching for her. She takes his hand, just as she always does, in both of hers as though she's accepting a coveted gift. She squeezes his fingers so tightly her knuckles turn white.

"My God, this is so terrible," she says with tears in her eyes, "Jim, if you hadn't found him. . . I'm so-- I'm so proud of you for going out there and finding him." She hugs him suddenly, flinging her arms around him and holding on, clutching fistfuls of his jacket. Jim staggers a little in surprise and then pats her awkwardly between the shoulder blades. When she doesn't let go his pats turn to gentle rubbing.

"I had a good teacher," he says finally, humble, "and I had help."

Anna lifts her head, looks at you, and smiles.

"Don't you always," she murmurs softly.

BOXES

Note: The sound of the ventilator may remind you of standing in a stable doorway when you were thirteen, watching your grandfather's horse die of Colic. You may, upon entering Andy's room, actually smell stale hay and animal sickness instead of recycled hospital air. You may even feel the electric charge of a summer storm brewing, see the horse's broad, gray girth rising and falling with each pained breath. Hiss and sigh. Hiss and sigh.

Rain falls hard outside Andy's window and the dark clouds cast a dimness into the room that seems to you appropriately dismal as Andy lies, half-shrouded in bed, still except for the stiff but steady rhythm of his lungs.

"Describe him to me?" Jim asks softly, his voice stirring the air like a breeze, and you shift your gaze from Andy to glace up at him. He stands utterly composed except for an almost imperceptible twitching in his jaw-- that familiar seditious vein of grief.

Since Jim lost his sight, you have had a thousand dreams that begin with the words: "describe to me". Dreams in which he asks you to reinvent the sky with words-- the splendor of sun-set, the Aurora Borealis, the whole entire universe strewn with a billion bright stars-- but when you try to speak, all that comes lurching out of your mouth with Greek myth strangeness is a string of child-sized puzzle pieces. Each one painted a primary color. Each one engraved with an adjective. You wake from these dreams, your mind so crowded with syllables and sentence fragments that you can hardly find room enough inside your own head to think. You feel addled and incompetent, failure plagues you like a hangover. You feel as though you've been trying to build a castle out of cardboard boxes.

"He looks pale," you say with the resignation of someone who is fighting for a cause that is noble but doomed, "there are tubes . . ." your voice trails off suddenly and you have to clear your throat.

You take Jim's hand from your arm and hold it firmly between your palms, feeling lost but determined just like you do in the dreams-- as though you could will a miracle to occur if only you could come up with one brilliant flash of Shamanistic insight to tell you how to transplant what you see with your working eyes, into Jim's brain. 'There has to be a way,' you think with a surge of hope before a tidal-wave of reality rushes in and pulls you off your feet. This is how it has always been. The ideal is silt and sand, the ocean is the awful truth.

"He looks . . ." you start again, but there are tears in your eyes because all you can think of to say is that he looks like your grandfather's dying horse.

"Blair?"

The way Jim says your name makes you feel as though your body is the earth cracking open under the pressure of too much love.

"Jim," you say, bewildered, overwhelmed, "I can't. . ." And you move without thinking to pull away from him, fumble free, but Jim catches your forearm and grips it two-handed.

"Whoa, hey, Chief," he says using the gentle, taming voice you have always associated with farmers and shrinks.

"It's okay-- whatever he looks like, it must be pretty bad. I understand. You don't have to tell me."

But the truth is that Andy doesn't look very badly hurt. If it wasn't for the tube in his mouth and the steady pumping of his chest, he would almost look as though he was sleeping peacefully after an unfortunate scuffle with tree-branches. There are only a few cuts and scrapes on his face.

"It's not that," you moan, "he looks fine, like he's sleeping--not bad. . ."

Puzzlement flickers across Jim's face before it is replaced once again with concern.

"What is it then?" he asks softly, "what's wrong?"

"It's not enough," you say in a strained whisper, "You've said so yourself-- Hands, words-- they aren't enough. You deserve more than what I can describe to you. You had more-- so much more than anyone. . ."

"Yes," Jim sighs, reaching up to touch your face experimentally as though he's not sure what he's going to feel under his fingertips, "and the things I used to see, Blair-- there were so many incredible things that I couldn't ever share with you because I just couldn't put them into words. . . I know how frustrating that is-- I know it hurts. But for God's sake, Chief, don't think for a minute that being able to-- getting the chance to-- see the world through your eyes isn't just as amazing."

Jim smiles briefly and two of his fingers come to rest at your temple, indicating both your eyes and your mind with the same subtle touch.

"Chief, the pictures you paint for me. . . you make poetry out of going to the grocery store." He laughs a kind of exasperated, loving laugh. He grips your face, kissing you once, very quickly and hard.

"Okay?" He demands after, still holding you, firmly poised to shake some sense into you.

"Okay," you gasp and despite the fact that you are still in a hospital standing beside a battered boy in a coma, you feel a smile spread across your face.

~~

Anna and Ms. Hudson come in after a while looking haggard. Ms Hudson, Andy's mother, has a kind of shocked, stretched look about her-- like she'd scream if you touched her. And Anna, her hair slightly disheveled and her sleeves rolled up has the air of a mid-wife about to deliver premature twins both of whom will likely die. Something in her eyes tells you that she has buried bread-box coffins before.

Ms Hudson thanks Jim, in a halting monotone, for having gotten Andy to the hospital.

"They told me you did CPR," she says, her eyes traveling up to his face and then back down to stare at Andy lying in bed. "They say that you did the right thing, not giving up on the CPR even after so long-- that with Hypothermia you can't be sure someone is--," her voice falters, but she presses on, "--dead until they get warmed up. It's like your body goes into hibernation. They say maybe this coma is like hibernation and that Andy. . ." The rest of her words dissolve into tears and Anna drapes an arm across her shoulders, steering her over to the chair beside Andy's bed.

"I just wish I could have done more Ms Hudson," Jim says once she is settled. His voice, though quiet, carries easily across the small room. Ms. Hudson looks up at him again over a wad of Kleenex held up to her mouth.

"You didn't give up on him," she says, "That's something at least."

~~

Even if he has been in the shower for nearly an hour trying to wash the smell of the hospital off his body, but he calls through the door that he's all right-- know that Jim is not all right. Go in after him, into the bathroom filled with fragrant steam, not to rescue him but just to be there under the water-- under his hands. It has been a long, sad day. A day of holding hope hostage inside your chest, like a bird in a cage, so that it won't fly away. Hope for Andy who may not live. May not make it through the night.

You might have to shed your tee-shirt, (your belt and shoes), crack the shower door and peer inside at him. His lean flank and the curve of his shoulder gleam like wet rock as he stands with one hand braced on the wall, head bowed.

Water pounds the back of his neck with wild force, gusting moist air fitfully against your bare chest. Sensing you, Jim tilts his head up and you can see that his eyes are closed. Without speaking you grip his wrist and step into the shower, ducking under his arm to stand in front of him. Your Khaki pants are soaked instantly and they cling to your legs.

"Okay?" you breathe without raising your voice over the thunder of the water. Jim wraps his arm around your waist, buries his face into the crook of your neck and nods. His hand slides up to span between your shoulder blades. You tilt your head back, briefly letting the water run like raking fingers through your hair, before returning your gaze to Jim. He breathes you in, then surfaces and seeks your mouth with his own. His kisses are strong and hungry, the kind of kisses that could hold back a crowd-- the whole encroaching world if need be.

You take his face in your hands, he takes your hips in his-- then fumbles for the top button of your pants. You like coming half-dressed to the shower so that Jim can peel the clothes off you-- it makes you feel. . .excavated. You (with your many flannel layers) have always enjoyed being slowly exposed. But Jim's hands move efficiently now, not lingering. He strips you and is about to touch you but you shove your palms roughly up his chest, pressing him back. He slumps hard against the wall, his skin gleaming tan against a shock of pristine white. You lean into him and feel him straining hot and swollen against you, hear the rough rasp of his breath in the close air.

"Take me," you rumble, staring up at his exposed throat, feeling your own hot, searing ache. He groans, low as though your words pain him and then he pulls you suddenly into a rough embrace, one arm coming up to hook around your neck. Rising to his full height, crushing you to his chest, he plows into you-- one violent thrust of his erection into your groin.

"Yes--c'mon-- do it," you demand, shuddering as Jim's body melds to yours-- all broad planes and hard angles. You feel the tight, almost painful band of his arm around your neck. You rock with his fierce, battering-ram thrusts, absorbing each arching assault of Jim's pleasure. Finally, beautifully, he comes with a throaty cry, slamming you up against the flimsy shower doors that rattle under the impact. And Jim's warm, sweet seed slides down your leg while the now cool water sprays the air, sparking off your body-- your hip and thigh, your arm around Jim's back. . .

"So good. . ." you hear yourself breathe as your chest heaves, as Jim gasps, "you're so good baby-- so good. I love how strong you are."

And he sags even more heavily against you. His knee knocks the shower door, between your legs, making it rumble like thunder and he lets out a long, soft moan of satisfaction that makes you smile-- makes you gently rub the back of his head.

"I want you in bed," he murmurs softly, when he can speak again, "I want you to fuck me."

"You need more?" You whisper, softly kissing his neck

"Yes, more," he says, his voice filled with stark sincerity. Slowly he pulls away from you and feels along the wall, moving unsteadily across beaded squares of tile to the water faucets. When he finds them, he twists the knobs, abruptly cutting off the water. In the silence that follows you can hear the loud sighs of your own breathing and suddenly, the bed is a thousand miles away. You think of the loft as a dark, bottomless chasm to be crossed. Cold air grouts along your still-wet skin.

"C'mon," Jim takes your forearms and pulls you, naked and dripping out of the shower. Your feet burn on the cold floor. You can feel Jim's arm muscles quivering as he dries you with a towel. The towel is yellow, you notice in a strange moment of detachment--rough along your thighs but soft when Jim presses you carefully back against the bathroom wall, trapping the towel between your chest and his. You feel his hands shifting up to your chin-- into your hair. You feel him tilt your head back before his strong, soft mouth mines kisses up from your depths. You feel the weight of his single-minded need for closeness. It is a kind of wonderful, unbearable pressure that could crush you if you let it. He kisses you until the yellow-lighted bathroom-- yellow like the towel--blurs before your eyes, turning into a hot, airless blaze-- the inside of the sun.

"God," You gasp, pulling away just enough to dredge breath. And he hones in again, relentlessly. This time his mouth is warm and wet on your neck.

"Jim. . ."

He begins to move you-- wrapped around you--edging along the wall and breaking free into the wide universe of cold air that is the living room. Your body is hard, every inch of you throbbing as he propels you through space. Your cock-- skin to skin-- is a deep, aching core of heat. You see the end-table with its one lamp casting a soft, cheery light. You can feel heat from the fireplace now--sharp and dry. The edge of the couch brushes your leg and you hear yourself begging in short gasps,

"Here, Jim-- bed's too far-- please here--."

But he doesn't stop-- can't make himself-- and the stairs are dark and jarring and endless and you stumble up them with Jim bearing your weight. You can just make out the dimly etched features of his face, and his eyes that take him from you to far away places despite the nearness of his body-- and his voice as he whispers, urging you on, promising you sweet, devastating things. . .

The softness of bed swells around you and, blinking up at Jim, you see light and shadows from the fire below, on his body-- somehow on his very skin. Feathers of light and wings of shadow fluttering over the muscled span of Jim's chest and the angle of his collar bone. His face is a tribal mask, subtlety painted by fire. So stunning. . .he is now some speechless, beautiful, half-divine being met in ancient days. More god than human.

"Sentinel. . ." you hear yourself marvel, imagining the jungle and a soft bed of soil and green plants.

He moves, lithe-light shifting, and leans down to kiss the side of your mouth, your brow. His hands smooth gently over your forehead as though to wipe away the kiss and then he reaches out to the night-stand beside the bed. You arch up against him, driven to move by desire. And when his cool, slick palm grips your cock, you nearly come-- right then--but Jim's words have the power to stave you,

"Make me ready, baby," he says hotly, speaking close to your ear, "Want to be ready for you."

You are panting so hard you can feel the humidity of your own breath swell around you, trapped by Jim's body. He reaches for your hand and you feel the oily satin of his lubricated fingers as he laces them with yours. There is something primal in his touch as he passes the lube from his palm to yours, like sex itself.

When he rolls off of you, turning onto his side, offering himself, cool air pours over you like water and you follow his movement instinctively seeking his lost presence. You find entrance with the same unconscious ease-- his deep, hot, welcome center-- and you slide your fingers sweetly in. He hitches, moans, swells-- easy to coax open. He presses back, wanting more than your slick, insistent fingers. He moans and grows frantic for. . . oh, the moment when you finally ease--slide--plummet in and the red-gold liquid pleasure comes-- blooms and melts out of you-- blooms and melts again and again as you rock long, silently passionate thrusts into him. Over-arched. And--oh God-- in the moment, everything is both too much and not enough. . .until that pillowy bliss of after.

When it is over, you lie still breathing, bathed in the soft-exhaustion of utter satisfaction. In your arms you feel Jim turn over. He kisses your cheek lightly before laying his head on your chest. Long minutes pass as you bask in afterglow. You have nearly dozed off when Jim speaks,

"What do you think it means. . .tell me honestly. . .that I want to be with you all the time."

You breathe in his words and they settle inside you like silt in a stream.

"Sounds like love to me," you say softly.

"Sure," he says, his voice rumbling, "but also like obsession."

You shrug, "Yeah, well, the feeling's mutual."

Jim smiles against you.

"I guess I just worry that I'm. . .holding you back from things."

"What things?"

"Having a life."

"I have a life," you sigh, knowing now where Jim is heading.

"With me, you're going to say."

"Yes, with you. And it's a--"

"Wonderful life?"

You chuckle.

"That is not what I was going to say. Not exactly-- but almost exactly."

Jim lets out a long breath and shifts to push himself up into a sitting position against the railing. He hauls you up along with him, dragging the comforter up from where it is tangled around your legs. Moving, you find yourself chuckling again.

"A lot of good that shower did," then changing nuance, "a whole lot of good."

Jim clumsily arranges the comforter around you and when you lean down to rest against his chest, he runs his hand over your hair.

"I have a life, Jim," you say again, sobering. "One I like very much just the way it is okay?"

"Okay," Jim says too quietly.

"I mean it. You're not holding me back. That's total bullshit. "

"Okay."

"I don't need space. I need--- guess what I'm going to say next?"

"Hmm, let me see. . .You're going to say something really corny like: you need me."

"Hey! Exactly. Right answer. You win a million bucks."

"Gee, aren't I lucky?"

"I'd say you are."

"Yeah. . ." he breathes, stroking your face "I'd say I am too."

~~

When Jim gets home from the hospital looking stricken and weary, he wraps his arms around you like he's trying to sink right down inside you and never come out again.

"How is he?" you whisper in his ear.

"He's-- not doing so great, Chief," Jim rasps pressing his lips to your neck. His nose is cold from outside chill.

"Jim I'm--"

"I know."

"Sorry."

"I know." His arms tighten around you and you feel his chest swell and sink as he breathes. You reach up and grip the back of his neck, holding him steady against you.

"What do the doctors say?" you ask softly, "What are the chances of Andy coming out of this?"

Jim doesn't answer right away and in the silence that follows you hear the distant sound of water flowing through pipes. You hear your soup simmering on the stove. Sam sniffs your leg and then trots off. Finally you draw back to look up at Jim. There are unshed tears in his eyes and he doesn't seem to know where to point his face to hide them from you. You touch his cheek and he lets out a pained sigh before pulling himself back together again, binding his emotions up with mental steel.

"It would take a miracle," he says.

These are familiar words. You have said them yourself with the same tremor of grief in your voice, hating their futility; hating how you flung your faith into them anyway because you couldn't bring yourself to face the truth.

You said these words to Simon once in a deserted hospital corridor, staring down at a square of reflected light on a square of tile floor. He stood before you wearing his long brown trench coat and holding his cell phone in his hand in an attempt to look prepared for anything. When you spoke, he was silent and you could hear the creak of footsteps receding down the hallway. You could feel dread like a tutelary demon hovering in the upper air. And you were angry. You seethed inside, under your skin, very muscle quaked with rage-- because Jim needed a miracle and you didn't live in a Disney movie, you didn't have a fucking magic wand.

"That's-- bad news," you say gruffly, still touching Jim's cheek, knowing what it feels like not to be able to fix what's broken no matter how much you want to.

"Yeah," Jim nods. He pulls away from you and strips off his jacket, hanging it up slowly as though he hardly has the energy.

"Jim I. . . I've made some soup," you sigh, not knowing what else to say. He nods again but makes his way over to the couch instead of into kitchen, sitting down wearily.

'Damn,' you think, watching him. He's so tired. He hasn't been sleeping well at all.

Coming up behind him you wrap your arms around his neck. He tilts his head back and you kiss his temple.

"Why don't you lie down? Try to get some rest. The soup can wait."

"Okay," he says, reaching back to cup your neck.

After a moment you start to straighten up, but Jim doesn't let you go.

"I thought I'd go put the food away."

"No," he murmurs, "come here."

"Oh, okay." You take his hand from your neck and hold it as you round the couch, coming to sit facing him.

"Forget the soup."

Jim reaches out and his fingers encounter your face. You are so used to this touch-- this exploration-- and yet every time he traces the curve of your brow or the shape of your nose; every time his fingertips brush over your lips, you are struck by the careful intimacy of his touch. You sit reverently still, as patient as a portrait model. When he is finished Jim leans forward, and with perfect aim, kisses you softly on the lips.

"You're beautiful," he whispers.

You smile, your throat tightens, you lay your hand along the strong line of his jaw and all you can think to say is:

"Thank you."

Then you lean in and gently claim his mouth with yours, tasting his sweet warmth.

"Lie back," you breathe, pressing on his shoulder, urging him back even as you move with him. Once he is lying down your hair falls into his face causing a small smile to touch his lips. Then Jim's hands come up to frame your face and he pulls you into a deep kiss. He is caressing your tongue with his, when suddenly his whole body stills. And he pulls slowly away from you.

"What?" you gasp, staring down at him.

"Carolyn," he murmurs, quietly surprised, ". . .in the elevator. Coming up."

"What? Carolyn? Your ex-wife Carolyn?"

Jim nods, slumps back against the couch, drops his hands, and closes his eyes. He lets out a long sigh.

"Yes. My ex-wife Carolyn."

"Oh -- my God," you say, thrown.

Carolyn has been out of Cascade, living in San Francisco for years. She moved away not long after you started riding with Jim. The only time you ever hear from her is at Christmas when she sends a card with pictures of her tan-faced plastic surgeon "hubby" and her little blond-haired daughter tucked inside. She has never once come to visit-- not even when Jim was in the hospital.

"What is she doing here?" You ask, feeling trepidation creep into the pit of your stomach.

Jim starts to sit up, nudging you gently away in the process. He squares his feet onto the floor and leans over, resting his elbows on his knees. He rubs his face.

"I don't know," he says, "I just hope she's not here to give me bad news. I'm kinda tapped out as far as that goes."

"Tell me about it," you murmur, touching his shoulder. Letting out another sigh, Jim shoves himself up off the couch and heads reluctantly for the door.

From where you are sitting you can't see her face but you can imagine the expression on her face as Carolyn gets her first good look at Jim in what? Five years? You imagine her staring up at him, smiling, waiting for the light of recognition to dawn in his eyes-- surprised, despite herself when she doesn't see it, when she can't even catch his gaze. She has not learned to watch his body the way you have, to see what he once would have said with his eyes.

"Jim. Hi. It-- it's me. Carolyn."

You roll your eyes and murmur: "well, duh," under your breath, just loud enough for Jim to hear.

"Hello Carolyn. This is -- a surprise."

"Yeah. . .I know. I'm sorry. I should have called first."

Jim widens the door and takes a step back, allowing her to enter.

"That's okay," he says, "you know you're welcome to visit. It's just been a long time, that's all."

Carolyn takes a few hesitant steps into the loft and starts to shrug out of her coat.

"Here, let me take that," Jim murmurs, helping her, taking her coat and purse and hanging them both on a hook by the door.

"I know it's been a long time. I should've. . .Jim, when I heard about what happened, I should have come, I-- I'm so sorry, Jimmy--" she reaches up in an impulsive attempt to connect with him but her hand never quite makes it to his face and instead hovers just outside the range of his awareness.

"Carolyn no," Jim interrupts with a tenderness that surprises you, carefully patting her arm.

"Don't apologize. That was two years ago. It's all in the past now," he says.

"Still. I should have come," she persists, and you find yourself nodding inwardly. 'Damn right you should have come', you think bitterly, Jim needed all the support he could get back then-- and for God's sake, you used to be married. . .'

Carolyn catches sight of you sitting on the couch and she can read the look in your eyes well enough.

"Blair," she says, speaking your name as both a greeting and a plea-- for forgiveness. You stand up slowly, measuring the shame in her eyes, unable to deny the genuineness of it.

"Hi Carolyn," You say, coming forward. She offers her hand and after a beat, you shake it.

"What brings you back to Cascade?"

She glances back up at Jim, reaches out and takes his hand.

"Just to see old friends. . .and because I left my husband," she says, just as matter-of-fact as she could be. Jim blinks, turns his head in puzzlement, his brow furrows.

"What? You left Richard?"

"Yep. I sure did."

"Why? I mean, if you don't mind my asking."

Carolyn sighs and looks perturbed for the first time.

"Lots of reasons which, if you've got time I can tell you about. If not, maybe tomorrow? I'm going to be in town for a while."

'Tomorrow,' you think automatically. 'It's undoubtedly a long story and Jim's tired. You just dropped by out of the blue and--'

"Why don't you come in and sit down," Jim says, ushering Carolyn over to the couch.

"Jim--" you whisper, under your breath, but he ignores you.

Running a frustrated hand through your hair you stalk off into the kitchen, hoping that Jim will meet you there once he has Carolyn settled. Hoping that you'll be able to talk some sense into him.

Knowing that you won't.

~~

Carolyn is not all together evil, you may have to remind yourself when she shows up unannounced at your doorstep with a suitcase and a sob story. Well, okay, maybe it's not exactly a suitcase, it's a rather large purse but-- whatever. You may have to remind yourself that as far as evil goes-- as far as raving lunatics go-- you've seen much worse lately in the form of Cassie Wells. She takes the cake. She makes Carolyn look saintly by comparison. And there really isn't anything wrong with Carolyn, she just has bad timing (and bad judgment, as far as you're concerned, for finding it conceivable to divorce Jim-- not that you aren't glad she did).

When Jim follows you into the kitchen finally, and starts making a pot of coffee, you wedge yourself up against the counter beside him and whisper:

"Jim, c'mon man. Can't this wait until tomorrow?"

He nods, "Yes. It can," he says, measuring out coffee grounds.

"Okay, so then why not let it?"

"Because she'll keep my mind off-- other things," he says, meaning Andy.

"So would I," you say, running your hand down his arm. He lets out a pent-up breath and smiles a little.

"Your mind's on Andy too," he says, "and anyway," he touches the side of your face and runs his thumb along your cheek bone, "the night's still young."

"And you're tired."

"So I'll have some caffeine."

"Yuck, Jim. Come on. Why not just tell her to come back tomorrow? I'll do dinner. She can cry on your shoulder. I'll buy Kleenexes."

"What if she wants to stay the night?" Jim asks smiling.

"Stay? Oh no. You don't think--?" You shoot a frantic glance at Carolyn on the couch and grimace. "She's. . .she's put two and two together hasn't she? About us? I mean we still live together-- she sends us Christmas cards with both our names on them. . ."

"Is that a sign that people know? The Christmas card thing?"

"Isn't it?"

"I don't know. Maybe she thinks you live with me because I'm blind and need somebody around to cut my meat."

~~

As it turns out Carolyn doesn't want to stay long after all. She's gotten a clue that you aren't too happy about her having her little heart to heart with Jim just now and she says that she'd be glad to come for dinner tomorrow night-- that she'd bring Hannah, her daughter.

"We're staying at my sister's place," she says, "in Pierpont," a suburb west of Cascade.

"We'd love to meet her," Jim assures her.

"She's seen pictures of you. She calls you Uncle Jim, you know," Carolyn says as she edges her way out the door.

~~

It may seem like you've gotten rid of her too easily but then again you know that you'll see Carolyn again real soon. The notion that she may even become a regular visitor crosses your mind with a strong sense of foreboding. You're not exactly worried that Carolyn will pull a Cassie and go all 'fatal attraction' on you, (or rather Jim), but you do wonder about her motives for returning to Cascade.

"Why do you think she's here?" you ask Jim, glancing over at him lying next to you in bed. The room is dark, you can just make out the line of Jim's profile. His hand is on your thigh, rubbing absently.

"Hmm, she wants to woo me back," he rumbles teasingly.

"That's what I thought," you say, turning to smile up at the ceiling.

"Not that I'd let her. You're a much better cook."

"I can't sew though."

"That's okay, honey."

You bust out laughing.

"Okay, okay one more question, if you're Uncle Jim what does that make me?"

"I don't think that's something you want to think about for very long."

"You're probably right."

After a pause Jim turns over onto his side and his hand moves further up your thigh shoving up your plaid boxer shorts.

"How did she look?" he asks in a quieter tone.

"Fine," you say, "I mean like, exactly the same."

Your cock is waking up and saying 'hello' with Jim's hand so nearby.

"I've got this image of her in my head," he says, "but it's strange."

"How so?"

You are genuinely curious. You wonder how clear his memory is. You wonder if his memory of you is just as clear.

"It's clear," he says as if reading your mind, "but flat, like a photograph."

"Isn't that what an image is supposed to be? Flat like a photograph?"

Jim shakes his head, "No," he says sincerely, "not for me at least. What I can see in my head-- the best images-- I can also touch. You," he says, "I can also touch."

"I don't-- I'm not sure I get it," you say, straining suddenly very hard to understand.

"I guess it's weird," Jim says, sounding a little discouraged.

"No-- I mean yes, weird, but not bad. It sounds really good to me. I just wish I understood it better."

"Well," Jim says, rising up a bit on his elbow. He reaches out and covers your eyes with his hand, "it's like. . .making love with your eyes closed. No moonlight shining in, no silhouettes, just darkness-- and me."

Your cock is saying more than 'hello' now, it's saying, 'hey baby, how are ya?

"What would you remember?" Jim asks, "my body, me touching you, the feel of me against you, your cock in my mouth. . ."

"Jim," you moan, arching your back a little.

"But you'd also remember what you imagined I looked like. The memory would be both. . .visual and tactile. . ."

"Oh-- I think I'm starting to get it-- but let's do it, Jim. Let's try it. I want to have that memory."

Jim's hand leaves your eyes and you blink them open, staring up at his shadowed face. You see the clench of his jaw and know that he is retreating, regretting what he started.

"Why not?" you ask, your voice rising somewhat.

"I didn't mean-- a game," he says and his words, the undertone of what can only be hurt in his voice, makes your stomach flip.

"No," you say sitting up and reaching for him. You grip the back of his neck and on instinct reach out to turn on the bedside lamp. Jim flinches at the snap of the lamp and suddenly, feeling the dread of having done something wrong, you turn the lamp right back off again.

"God-- sorry," you say, not entirely sure what you're apologizing for but sure that you should. Jim has never had a problem with the lamp before. He's practical, he usually turns it on for you so that you don't stub your toe on the way to bed, but for some reason-- just then-- the light was insulting, it was painfully unfair.

Scared by this sudden shift of what's normal, you move toward Jim. You wrap both your arms around his neck.

"Oh man," you breathe shakily, "Jim. What's the matter here? What'd I do? I need help here."

"It's okay," he murmurs, spreading his hand across your back, "nothing's the matter."

You hold onto him with a sudden upsurge of strength that comes through your body like one big muscle cramp-- the sharp pain of which makes you gasp. Jim enfolds you just as tightly.

"What'd I do?" you ask again, your voice muffled against Jim's neck.

Jim let's out a kind of soothing laugh that you can feel in your chest. He smoothes his hand over your hair and rocks with you, just slightly, unconsciously.

"Nothing," he says, "nothing to freak out about. What are you freaking out about?"

The gentle amusement in his voice makes you feel relieved and sort of silly.

"I don't know," you admit, "Why did you flinch like that when I turned on the light?"

He shrugs, "It surprised me I guess."

You exhale and Jim loosens his grip as you pull back. He rests his hands on your shoulders.

"It was more than that I think," you say, "wasn't it?"

Jim leans forward and kisses you in a deflecting sort of way but, gripped by a sudden urge to act-- like Perry Mason in a courtroom-- you reach out and snap on the light once more. And it happens again, the flinch, and the harsh feeling that you've fucked up somehow.

Jim tenses and pulls away from you, going as far as to turn his back, setting his feet on the floor. Your heart is pounding, you can feel it going crazy inside your chest. You have no idea what's really going on.

"Jim," you say, and all the confusion and contrition and fear that you feel comes out in your voice. Silence gathers between you and then you say the only thing that makes sense, "Talk to me," you whisper.

And Jim let's out a sigh and consents to turn back. He stretches out onto the bed beside you again and crosses his arms behind his head. You can see him clearly now under the lamplight.

"Should I turn it back off?" you ask carefully and Jim shakes his head.

"It's just so damn easy for you," he says, "snap," (he snaps his fingers), "and there's light."

"I'm sorry," you say, meaning it so much you hurt.

"Or you put on a blindfold and we make love-- and then--."

"--when we're done I slip it right back off again and I can see."

He nods. "You know, I used to hate going to sleep because I could see in my dreams and then when I woke up it was like going blind all over again."

You rub your face roughly, there is a painful burning in your throat.

"Blair it's not that I don't want you to turn on the light, and see. I mean it's not that-- thank God you can. . .and it's not that I don't want you to experience what I experience because that's really-- beautiful-- too-- the way I feel you. . .the way I know your body. . . but I guess I'm not so well adjusted as I make myself out to be. I guess I still wish I could snap on the light or--"

"Take off the blindfold?".

"Hell yes," he says.

"Me too," you say, touching his chest and leaning down to brush your cheek against his. You turn off the lamp one last time and this time both you and Jim let out a sigh of relief.

"I still want to," you murmur kissing him.

"What?"

"Know your body the way you know mine. You can't take off the blindfold but I can put it on. Jim, I want to be as close to you as I possibly can." You pull back enough to stare down into Jim's shadowed face.

"Please let me," you whisper, "please--."

Jim reaches up and touches his fingertips to your lips.

"Yes," he says softly. "Okay. You want to. Of course." And he rolls over, leaves the bed, and then, after a moment returns with piece of cloth. You can't see it very well but it feels a lot like silk when he puts it on you.

"What is this?" you ask, fingering it.

Jim chuckles,

"It's a blindfold, Sandburg."

"You just happen to have the sexy kind of blindfold just lying around?"

"It's not the sexy kind," he says, "it's the kind I use with my low vision students."

"It is the sexy kind!" you say, laughing, "and I bet you got it out of a catalogue too."

"Yeah a catalogue with 'Rehabilitation' in the title-- not exactly 1-800-sexyblindfolds."

"Uh-huh," you say, reaching for him. You touch his face and all of the sudden everything goes perfectly still. Jim hovers above you, your fingertips are resting lightly on his cheek and his mouth. The only thing you can hear is the sound of your breathing mingling with his. And it is utterly dark. You feel kind of floaty and Jim's skin under your fingers is very warm. His body is a big mass of warmth so near that it pulses. You exhale a long breath and the air shudders past your lips. Then, all on their own, your fingers start to move and (just as he has done so many times to you) you are tracing Jim's face.

It strikes you that you are doing this, and the contrast from the normal order of things is startling. You are conscious of how 'blind' your fingers are, how little they know about piecing things together. You recognize Jim's nose and his forehead and his mouth and jaw but each part of his face seems kind of separate and smaller than it should. His eyes are totally off limits and that bothers you a lot-- it makes him seem farther away then he really is.

Your own body seems vast, like it stretches on forever-- every part of you is wonderfully naked, except for the boxer shorts. You are all skin.

"Jim," you murmur, halfway expecting your voice to sound different -- echo in the darkness or something.

"Blair," he answers back, calmly. He takes your wrist and pulls your hand down. You let your fingers fumble together with his; the two of you-- both of you-- are feeling. You think of sea-creatures meeting underwater. This is an image that you often associate with Jim's hands; beautiful, super-sensitive underwater sea creatures. . .and now your hands are sea creatures too.

"How do you feel?" Jim asks, and his voice is everywhere, all around you like special air for you to breathe in.

"Different," you say automatically, "but good."

"Scared?" he asks.

"Not even a little," you answer, surprised by the question.

You do feel a little bit lost though, like there's so much of Jim to touch that you don't even know where to start. When his mouth covers yours, you are electrically startled and you let his tongue in with a gasp. He is huge hovering over you. You can feel the ghost-weight of his presence against your face. His tongue is burning in your mouth. His breath practically steams. His hands go up into your hair-- so now he is a mouth and hot breath and two big hands. The dipping-down, pressure of his forearms on the bed, frame your face. His knee brushes up along the inside of your leg and his cock-- you can feel the sudden, angry heat of it against your own cock. Suddenly dizzy, you take hold of Jim, spreading your hands across his shoulder blades. This reminds you of a roller-coaster ride-- the kind that goes upside down and does loopdy-loops through dark tunnels. You are hanging on for the sheer thrill of it.

Jim shifts to cradle your head with one hand and he kisses you deeply. His other hand pulls down your boxers, stretching the elastic band around your hips. He takes hold of your dick like he's about to release it out into the wild.

"Yes," you gasp, agreeing to that. And before you know it he's started up a pumping rhythm with his hand. When you feel slickness you know that your cock is leaking. It feels impossibly good-- swelled and full and tingling inside his grip. He is moving again, his whole body, downward, and you can feel invasions of cool air coming in around where his warmth used to be. The first touch of his lips against the head of your cock almost makes you come. You press yourself down hard to the bed, groaning, and reach awkwardly for Jim, expecting to feel the softness of his hair but instead touching skin, his forehead, then the unmistakable curve of his ear. The urge to see comes with a ferocity that surprises you, but then it is banished completely by the sensation of your cock sinking into Jim's soft-firm-wet-wonderful mouth.

He sucks you off with his hands around your waist, his fingers pressing in deep as your back arches and your hips rock up and down. You are completely attuned to his every moment as your erection pulses out and Jim's grip slowly loosens. When he finally pulls back so that your cock slides gently out of his mouth, you become aware of the sound of his heavy breathing. You hear the sound of him swallowing. Your whole body shivers as he runs his fingertips up your ribs. When he places his hand flat to your chest you feel the rapid, fluttering beat of your own heart. You feel the air stirring awake the sweaty-coolness of your skin and your wet lips. You also feel that strangely far-near presence of Jim. He is close, touching you, but he is 'away' too, somehow. Away. Behind a wall. Just barely out of reach.

On impulse, unable to stop yourself, you rip off the blindfold and suddenly gasping like you've just escaped from some suffocating space-- some hot attic closet-- you blink up into the lesser darkness of your bedroom. Jim is there, of course, a familiar shape above you, but he isn't nearly clear enough. A kind of desperate physical need drives you to move for the light again-- that small, cheep, stupid bedside lamp. You actually pick it up and hold it before turning it on. It takes you a long moment of catching your breath and staring, fixated, at Jim before you realize that the lamp is really in your hands.

You shudder.

And Jim who is listening to you, still a patient distance away, asks:

"Are you scared now, Chief?"

"Yes," you say without hesitating, and you look down at the lamp that is almost too bright to look at-- the lightbulb instantly too hot to touch. "Yes. I am Jim. I am."

"Should we not have done that?"

"No! It was-- wonderful-- you were absolutely. . .but then. . .just then. . ."

You look at Jim feeling like you've just experienced something that a psychiatrists might call an 'episode'.

"Kind of felt like you were suffocating?"

"Yes. All I could do was--."

"--turn on the light," Jim says nodding.

"Fuck this light!" you fume suddenly, slamming it rather childishly back down onto the night stand."

Jim moves up behind you on the bed and wraps his arms around you.

"Blair," he says, rubbing your tense chest. "Come on. It's okay. Don't go feeling sorry for me. You're not allowed to do that remember? It says so in the NFB guidelines. You're not allowed to feel sorry for me or cut my meat, or be in anyway negative about-- well, pretty much anything-- especially lamps. "

He brushes your hair back from your forehead and turns his face in to the crook of your neck.

"Do I really have to remind you that I'm just about the luckiest guy alive? In the whole world? Ever? I would think that was pretty obvious. I've got you, don't I?

You turn to look at Jim and he's smiling.

"You never were that great with obvious," he says.

You are quiet and still shaken but you can't deny the way Jim's words make you feel. 'Don't feel sorry for me', he says, 'I'm lucky', he says, 'because I have you', he says. . .

"I love you," you breathe.

"I know."

"I just. . . really love you Jim."

"I know."

"I--

"-- really, really, really love me. I know."

"I was going to say that I still hate this lamp and I still want to kill it."

"Oh, okay. You can kill it. I'll stop by Wal-Mart on my way home from work tomorrow and buy you a new one."

Sometimes the sound of your alarm clock will get all tangled up in your dreams and you will hear it barking orders at you in your sleep for what feels like days. You will dream that a drill Sergeant (who looks a lot like Simon Banks dressed in jungle fatigues) is shouting: "It's six-twenty-five in the goddamn morning you little puke! Get up! Get up! Get UP!" until your eyes finally pop open and the first words out of your mouth-- startled but slurred-- are: "Yes Sir!"

You will find yourself looking around at the brand new daylight--and the empty bed beside you. Only after you have shut off the alarm clock will you be able to hear Jim's voice drifting up from downstairs, in a sporadic low murmur. When you roll out of bed and, pulling on a tee-shirt and a pair of sweats, make your way downstairs, you will see Jim standing by the balcony windows, talking on the telephone.

"It's good to know what kind of entrances you're dealing with--are they recessed? Is there a revolving door? If it's the front of, say, a department store, people will probably be coming out of it fast so you'll need to use a sorter cane technique to keep from tripping people. . . stuff like that."

You walk over to Jim and touch his arm. He covers the mouthpiece with one hand,

"Morning."

"Hey, who are you talking to?"

"This guy. He's making a tactile map of Cascade and he wanted my input. Anna gave him my name."

This sounds strange and interesting, so as you are fixing your algae shake you listen in on the one-sided conversation.

"Well, there are lots of ways to know you're coming to a corner," Jim says, "First you start to hear the perpendicular traffic as well as the parallel traffic. The curb breaks-- the shoreline isn't there anymore. Maybe it's windier on the corner; if you're going downhill. You can also tell the corner is coming up because of echo perception. Not that you can put that on your map."

Echo perception. The bat trick.

In the days before you met Jim you conducted all kinds of lab experiments that had more to do with you trying to figure out how the five normal human senses worked than with finding a Sentinel to study. You learned about echo perception-- the theory of it at least-- that it was possible to gain impressions of space by listening to sound waves bounce off solid objects. It wasn't until after Jim lost his sight that you started really researching this so that you could help him train his hearing to pick up important environmental cues. You read book after book, you talked to experts on the phone (at all hours, long distance, in three different languages), and you spent whole days reviewing what you knew about Jim's heightened hearing. Finally you found yourself taking Jim out to stand on street corners, at intersections-- telling him to listen: "Just listen. . ."

To buses roaring past, to the flow of traffic, footsteps on the sidewalk. And Jim would listen and answer your endless stream of questions: "What do you hear close by? What do you hear farther away--half a block down? What's in front of you? What's behind you?. . ." on and on your questions went as you and Jim slowly pieced together his mental map. Everyday there were new things to learn, new sound patterns to pick up on. You and Jim were always stopping in stairwells to analyze echos. Even now, you still sometimes stop so that Jim can take a moment to snap his fingers.

With your algae shake blended, you move to sit on the couch, still listening to Jim.

"After a while it becomes an automatic instinct to listen. You come into a strange building like, for example, a grocery store you've never been in before, and the first thing you do is move out of the way of the door and just stand still listening. You listen to the way people are walking so that you know where the aisles are. You listen for the cash registers. . . yeah even in familiar places you listen--" Jim laughs musingly, "when I walk into my bathroom here at home I can automatically tell whether or not the shower door is open or closed-- the pressure and the atmosphere are different. . ."

Sam trots over to you, wagging and sniffs hopefully at your shake. You pet him and watch as Jim turns to the balcony, reaches out his hand absently and touches the brick median between panes of glass.

"There's this thing called 'facial vision' that we all--everybody-- has. It's a sense that you get when you're about to run into something, like a wall. You feel this slight pressure on your face--like a cloud in front of you and an increase of temperature that tells you that there's something there-- it's kind of startling at first. If you practice you can stretch your 'facial vision' out to sense things that are several feet away. . ."

Jim's 'facial vison' extends out like a large powerful force-field that includes the textures of complex temperatures and fluctuating air currents. He can tell if someone has been in a room long after they are gone just by picking up heat patterns.

Jim turns back away from the balcony and pushes up the sleeve of his sweater to feel the face of his watch.

"It sounds like you have more questions but I have to head off to work soon. I'm having people over for dinner tonight so why don't you call me tomorrow or-- Saturday? Sure that's fine. Not a problem." He hangs up the phone.

"Hmm," you say, gulping down the last of your shake and setting your glass on the coffee table, "If the tactile map guy called me before seven in the morning I'd tell him just exactly where he could shove his map." You prop your socked feet up on the coffee table but quickly pull them back out of Jim's path as he walks over to sit beside you on the couch.

"I was up," Jim says, slumping down with a sigh.

"Trouble sleeping?" you ask worriedly.

"Mmm." He stretches his arm across the back of the couch, leans over and draws in your scent, nuzzling your neck.

"Why?"

"I hate to sound like Naomi but my 'rhythms' were off."

Because Jim doesn't have light perception his sleep cycle isn't regulated by the sun. He lives on his own dark planet of twenty six hour days.

"I have tea--," you start before Jim's chuckling stops you.

"I know, I know," he says, "some special native mumbo-jumbo 'knock you on your ass' tea that I'll be sure to drink tonight."

"Damn straight," you say running a hand over Jim's hair.

Jim touches your neck with his fingertips and smiles.

"You had that drill Sergeant dream again didn't you?"

"Yeah. You know, I really think we need a kinder gentler alarm clock."

~~

After work you stop by the grocery store to buy stuff for dinner. You've decided to keep it simple and just make pasta. The check-out lady, (her name tag says: Hi! I'm Trish), asks about Jim.

"He's still at work," you say, giving her a second look and smiling, not surprised that she's gotten to know Jim by name.

"Oh, I'm so used to seeing him in here with Sam, the two of them just walking around, shopping, like it ain't no big thing. All the kids going crazy wanting to pet that big ‘ol dog of his."

You nod. This happens everywhere Jim goes-- kids yelling DOGGIE! and making a bee-line for Sam as though he's Barney with fur. Jim usually takes the time to talk to kids about what a guide dog does, explaining that his job is to keep his owner safe and that they should always ask permission to pet him. Sam tolerates children just fine, and Jim, who used to think of kids as-- well, more like cute little aliens than people, now really enjoys getting down on their level. Somewhere along the way he's turned into a really great teacher.

"Speaking of kids," you say, "What kind of movies do four-year-olds go for nowadays?"

You've been eyeing the video department ever since you came into the store wondering if you should rent something for Hannah. The loft isn't exactly Disneyland and the poor little thing will probably be bored stiff within minutes of coming over.

"Can't go wrong with ‘Winnie the Pooh'," Trish says, "talking animals of any kind really-- you baby-sit'n?"

"Sort of. Jim's ex-wife is coming over for dinner and bringing her daughter."

"She Jim's daughter too?"

"No," you chuckle.

"Oh. . . from the way I seen him be with the kids in here, I bet he'd make a real good daddy."

With the grocery bags dumped precariously in the bed of the truck and "Pooh's Great Adventure" on the seat beside you, you swing by Jim's work to pick him up. Normally Jim goes to peoples' houses to do his 'rehab' thing but on Tuesdays and Thursdays he works with teenagers at the Cascade Center for the Blind. The CCB is in a building that used to be some rich old lady's mansion; a sprawling old Tudor that sits regally on the corner of twelfth and King across the street from the city park.

On your way around to the back parking lot you have to stop at a cross-walk and wait for a scraggle of high school kids to go by, each one wearing a backpack and swaying a cane. As you wait you glance around and notice, rather suddenly, that it is a beautiful day, cool and clear with the late afternoon sun slanting down, golden across the snow-patched front yard. The grass is starting to peek out from under melting slush like newborn fur.

Inside, the front parlor is a little too warm, stuffy, and smells like antiquated wood. There are brightly colored coats hanging on hooks by the door that remind you of big deflated balloons, and there are even a few pairs of slick rubber boots on the floor, neatly lined against the wall. You can hear voices echoing up on the stairway and down the hall that leads to the main offices but there is no one in the parlor with you except a young blonde girl who is standing over by a wall of cubbyhole mail boxes. She turns toward you and you can tell automatically by the way she holds her body that she's blind.

"Mr. Sandburg, right?" she asks, smiling.

"Yeah. That's right. Blair." You cross over to her, she holds out her hand and you shake.

"I'm Sarah Huffman."

"Hi Sarah. Nice to meet you."

"Don't you want to know how I knew it was you?"

"Well. . . I don't know," you hedge chuckling, "you're probably going to tell me I stink."

Sarah laughs.

"You do stink. But not in a bad way. Are you looking for Mr. Ellison?"

"Yep."

"He's still upstairs with John. They're really going at it. John's been really messed up ever since, you know-- Andy. . ." Her voice trails off and she makes a pained face. "But, you can go on up if you want."

"Okay, thanks, Sarah," you say, already glancing up at the stairs.

"It was nice to meet you," she says and turns back to the mailboxes.

From what Sarah said you half-expect a shouting match but as you approach Jim's room you hear him speaking in low, soothing tones.

"Okay, yeah. I know. Shh. It's okay. . ."

John is crying.

Through the slightly open door you can see Jim standing with his arms around the kid who is sobbing, just crying his eyes out like he's not ever going to stop.

Feeling guilty for spying, you turn and lean your back against the wall but you can't help staying by the door listening to Jim's soft words of comfort. You have known those words and your heart just can't tune them out. You listen, and you stare out at a long slant of reddening sunlight that is slowly spreading across the arm of a wooden bench in front of you, bathing it in brilliance.

Finally, after the room has been silent for a while, Jim comes out, with Sam, and closes the door behind him. He is wearing his jacket and has his satchel slung over his shoulder. He's ready to go.

"Hey," he says.

You look at him from your place against the wall. You let your eyes travel over him, and you can see that the front of his shirt is stained wet with tears.

"Hey," you say, "is uh. . ." you rub your chin, "is John okay?"

Jim turns his head, listening through the door that he's just closed. Then he sighs and nods.

"He's a strong kid. He's dealing with this the best he can."

"He and Andy are good friends?"

Jim nods again, solemnly.

You think about Wesley, a kid you knew in high school. You remember watching his reflection in the bathroom mirror as he walked out, hurrying to his next class. That had been the last time you'd ever seen him. You remember he'd been wearing a blue bandanna. There'd been a button on his backpack that read: 'I'm an undercover CIA agent'. The next day he'd been killed on his way to school. Hit by a tractor-trailer on the highway at seven-thirty in the morning; two days after he'd gotten his driver's license.

"Blair?" Jim's hand is on your cheek, "did you hear what I said?"

"Hmm-- what?"

"I asked if we needed to stop by the grocery store."

"Oh, uh, no. I already did."

"Are you all right?"

"Yeah," you say nodding, "just kinda tired. You ready to go?"

Jim drops his hand from your cheek and takes your elbow.

"Sure, Chief," he says softly, "let's go home."

Maybe you aren't expecting it but--

Jim starts touching you, in the truck, on the way home; absently at first, his hand straying over to your thigh, giving you a firm squeeze. Then more insistently, sliding up to your belt, toying with the buckle, those fingers doing their thing, just fingering the metal square of your belt and tugging ever so slightly on the leather.

You glance down at your waistline, then sidelong at Jim, curious, a little startled. Your mind has been on other things. You've been thinking about dinner, and the prospect of having a kid and a dog and an ex-wife all in your house at the same time. You aren't exactly expecting belt-buckle fondling, and yet--

He's pulling, he's nudging that little prong of metal out of its hole, planning to fondle much more than a buckle.

So you're a bit taken aback and one of your gloved hands drops down from the wheel to hover questioningly over his.

"Jim? . . . I'm-- uh-- I'm driving here," you say, because you are. You're in traffic. There are other cars around, and stop lights and probably school kids or a bunch of nuns crossing the street up ahead. But Jim just smiles that knowing smile of his; the one that reminds you you can't put anything past him, even when you thought he was tired and kind of, actually, a little bit maudlin sitting there so quiet in the passenger seat. It's a smile that says: "You may be driving, but you're not in the drivers' seat."

You have to stomp on the brakes at a red light to keep from running it because Jim has made it past the belt buckle, past the elastic band of your boxer shorts and his hand-- his cool, dry, strong hand-- has wrapped itself around your cock. And you just have time to think to yourself: ‘Jesus he's doing it, in the truck, at a red light’, before the light turns green and you have no choice but to crank the wheel to the right, gun the gas and escape into the parking lot of Wal-Mart, of all places.

Then, as the truck is still shuddering to a stop, you hear the emphatic "whipping" sound of Jim's seatbelt being released and he is rounding on you, reaching, coming in for the kill. His kiss is a long, deep drink, it makes you suck in air, hard, through your nose and press back into the door of the truck feeling cold glass and the bulge of the door handle against the small of your back. You take his face in your hands and he groans, speaking with his lips to yours,

"Take off your gloves," he murmurs breathlessly. His fingers slip into your hair. He kisses your jaw and your neck with yearning, open-mouthed passion.

"I want to feel you feeling me," he says. His voice is a rumble, his breath hot. His leather jacket makes a creaking sound as he moves, pressing in closer to you. His hand squeezes your cock, and you are hard-- as hard as you can get-- but you are yanking off your gloves and flinging them away. When you grab Jim's face again, he moans with pleasure and closes his eyes. His kisses grow more urgent. His hand slides down over your chest and he starts unbuttoning your shirt, thumbing the buttons free. . .This is going to be all about you, in the truck, in the parking lot of Wal-Mart. This is going to be all about you ending up half-dressed and spent with the cold, dusk-blue windows of the truck all fogged up.

"I can't put anything past you," you gasp, breathing hard because he is fondling you now, tugging, he knows just what to do.

"You're a lunatic," you say, arching your hips for more. And Jim lets out a chuckling groan, running a hand down your unbuttoned, exposed chest, then up again to find your nipple.

"I could have crashed the truck," you say, reaching out to cup the back of Jim's neck feeling a sudden, intense wash of what could only be called adoration come over you. You love this man. Everything about him. You love the way he is so familiar to you, his scent, his voice, the weight of his body pressed against yours. You love that you have spent years getting to know him, yet he's still unpredictable.

A cart rattles. You hear distant voices, the rumble of a van door sliding closed. It's cold outside and growing dark but it's blissfully warm inside, surrounded by Jim. His breath is humid on your neck, his hands make you so hot. . . and you come, straining to the sound of some soccer-mom's Mini-van growling to life.

~~

"I suppose you expect me to drive home now," you say huskily, reaching up to turn on the dome light. The cab of the truck glows softly yellow. On its way down, your hand cups Jim's cheek.

"You want me to?" he asks musingly. He is re-buttoning your shirt for you, lazily, from the bottom up.

"Sure," you say.

"Okay."

You let your head fall back against Jim's shoulder and breathe out a long, contented sigh. Then you glance up at Jim's face.

"So," you say, "that was impulsive."

Jim smiles and tweaks his eyebrows

"Spontaneous even," he says.

"Yes. Impressively spontaneous. We could have gotten arrested for, like, five different things-- which I'm sure you could name."

"Lewd and lascivious conduct," he says,

"Disturbing the peace."

"Any number of moving violations."

Jim laughs.

"Definitely. Multiple counts of moving violations."

"So. . .but, you're okay, though, right?" you ask and Jim stops his buttoning. He lays a hand on your chest.

"Sure, I'm okay," he says. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"I don't know. I’m just, uh, you know-- asking."

Jim groans.

"Uh-oh," he says, "This is bad."

"What's bad?"

"I do something spontaneous. I do something impulsive, and you have to ask me if I'm all right?

That's very bad, Chief."

You chuckle and pick his hand up from your chest, kissing it several times in various places, pausing to let your lips rest on the inside of his wrist; at the fragile skin there. When you are still, the mood shifts, and you realize that you are radiating some unexpected, deeper emotion. Some imploring sense of worry.

Jim tugs his hand free from yours and touches his fingertips to your lips, trying to read your expression.

"Are you okay?" he asks softly.

"I'm fine. I'm wonderful. You're amazing," you say under his hand. A second later you shift as though to leave Jim's arms but he holds you still.

"Ah, not so fast, Chief," he says, "Something's up. What's the matter?"

"Nothing," You say, laughing nervously, making another experimental attempt to leave Jim's hold. He lets you straighten up and you busy yourself with tucking the tail of your shirt back into your jeans. Then you flip your hair out of your face and give Jim a side-long glance. His arms are crossed over his chest-- in listening mode. You can tell he has tuned into the sound of your heartbeat.

"You're wigged about Carolyn coming over," he says finally, with quiet certainty.

"Wigged? Jim, you just said "wigged"."

Jim rubs his shoulder, his eyes tracking his own thoughts, acting like he didn't hear you say anything.

"You are. Of course you are. Why shouldn't you be? She's my ex-wife. You're my--"

"Boy toy?"

Jim stills and then quirks a smile. "Okay, so I'm a little wigged," you admit reluctantly.

"That's okay," Jim sighs, sounding relieved to have figured you out, "That's understandable. So am I, now that I think about it."

As if sensing your raised eyebrows he adds, "Well, I've been busy all day. I haven't really thought about it."

"You're the one that invited her over," you remind him.

"I know. I'm an idiot," Jim admits morosely, "She'll probably want to talk about how well I've "coped", and give Hannah a life lesson on the "visually impaired". She'll say the word "resilience."

Both you and Jim grimace.

"That's just yuck," you say.

~~

"Well, they're here," Jim says from his place in the kitchen, a piece of bread poised in one hand, a butter knife in the other.

There is a knock at the door.

"I'll get it," you mutter, setting the salad bowl down on the table and rolling up your sleeves as though preparing for a fist-fight.

You cross the loft and open the door to see Carolyn blinking slightly wide-eyed at you.

"Hey! So, uh, great. You made it," you say, flashing a smile.

Carolyn volleys the smile right back at you.

"Hi, Blair!"

She is wearing a dark wool coat, a red scarf and a matching headband that automatically makes you fast-forward in your mind to the conversation you will be having with Jim after this is all over, when the two of you are finally alone again in bed.

"Headband?" Jim will ask.

"‘afraid so," you'll say.

Then you shift your gaze down to Hannah, who looks like a blond-haired, pink marshmallow in her winter coat. You feel your smile soften.

"Hi, Hannah." You wave at her. She gives you a suspicious look and then hides behind her mother's leg.

Oh boy, you think, here we go.

As it turns out, not just any talking animal will do.

Strongly recommended: when given the choice between Winnie the Pooh and Barney, at the video store, pick Barney. Otherwise you might end up with a screaming child on your hands. You might end up with a child who has thrown herself onto the floor in front of the t.v. and started having a temper tantrum of Richter-scale proportions.

"I had no idea that Pooh was passé," you say, staring down at the video in your hands, chuckling helplessly. Hannah has started to wail.

Carolyn looks like she might cry too.

"I’m sorry," she keeps saying, "this hardly ever happens. It’s just that she hates for anything to change and so much has changed lately."

Carolyn has already told you about coming home to find her plastic surgeon husband in the shower with little miss tummy-tuck.

"I’m taking a few weeks lost time, staying with my sister," she told you and Jim over dinner. "I’ve asked for a transfer back to Major Crime. I hear there’s an opening in Forensics."

"Oh, there’s an opening all right," you told Carolyn, who sat across the table from you looking so comfortingly sane despite her wrecked marriage and transplanted life. You still have panicked dreams about Cassie luring Jim off curbs or into swarming crowds. You still wake up groping for the bedside lamp just to snap it on and look at Jim, stare down at his peaceful, sleeping face until your heart stops hammering, or he rouses and reaches for you, murmuring:

"Blair?" in a sleep-roughened voice. Pulling you to him. Kissing you, framing your face, asking, "What is it? What’s wrong?" Patiently convincing you that, hey, he’s fine, "I’m fine".

There is a part of him now that is unshakably patient with you, and with the world. He knows just what to say when you wake up scared in the middle of the night.

And he’s a natural with kids.

Jim puts the last of the dishes in the sink and crosses into the living room. You walk over to meet him, hooking a finger into one of his belt loops, pulling him close and hissing: "Help! How was I supposed to know that not just any talking animal would do? What’s so special about a big purple dinosaur, anyway?"

“Well, if you have to ask..." he says, grinning.

He moves over to Hannah, hunkers down, and gathers her little sobbing body into his arms.

"Oh," he says, huffing a bit as he stands up, "yeah, I know, sweetie. Things just aren’t working out like you want’em to right now, are they?"

He holds her to his shoulder, rubs her back, shushes her. And she buries her face in the crook of his neck, crying with the kind of sheer relief that comes from finally being enveloped, and acknowledged, and safe in strong arms. Jim walks over to the couch, sits down and eases back, prepared to wait for all the tears to come.

Note: Nobody comforts better than Jim. He picks up babies and they stop crying to the happy astonishment of mothers everywhere. If you ask him what his secret is, he’ll just smile enigmatically, rock slightly on the balls of his feet and say: "It’s all about balance."

Watching Jim with Hannah gives you a strong, blended feeling of love and pride and some vague sense of regret. You can’t help seeing Hannah as the child Jim might have had in some other, vastly different life. But you know Jim wasn’t happy, before, with Carolyn. Their marriage had been dispassionate and brief, much more about filling voids of loneliness than love.

"I bet your Mommy brought you something to play with," Jim says to Hannah, and she lifts her head to look at him.

"I sure did," Carolyn says, brightening. "I brought your coloring books."

"You wanna color?" Jim asks, and Hannah nods.

"That was a yes," you murmur from your chair set off from the couch.

"Well, okay then," Jim says, "Why don’t you-- " He stops talking when Hannah touches his cheek. She is staring at him intently. Staring with glittering fascination, like a cat at a string, suddenly captivated by something she sees in Jim’s face-- in his eyes, you realize. You can practically see her little wheels turning as she looks at him, trying to figure out what’s different about ‘uncle Jim‘.

"Here, Hannah, sweetheart," Carolyn says, pulling a book and a box of crayons out of her bag. "Come over here and color." Hannah doesn’t budge. She pats Jim’s cheek, her eyes still locked on his face. Jim chuckles and starts to turn his face away but Hanna presses it back with her strong little hand.

"Hannah, honey, don’t bother uncle Jim," Carolyn says, sounding worried, but Jim, who has stopped chuckling and sobered, just murmurs softly,

"No, it’s okay."

And it seems like something significant is about to happen between Jim and the little girl, some moment of enlightenment in which Hannah, at four years old, really realizes for the first time that Jim can’t see--

But then the phone rings.

"I got it," you murmur, shoving up from your chair and heading for the phone mounted on the kitchen wall. You answer it softly turning your back to the living room. The voice on the other end makes your stomach flip over.

~~

 "Jim," you say as you slowly hang up the phone; then you turn around to see him standing right there in front of you. You put a hand on his waist.

"You heard?"

He nods, and you feel a cold reality set in as you realize that it’s time for another trip to the hospital.

"He woke up," you announce unnecessarily, "they’re not sure yet if there’s any-- uh-- brain damage, but--"

"Andy’s awake," Jim finishes gruffly. You glance behind him at Carolyn who is standing now, watching you with concern.

"We’ve got to go," you tell her, "sorry but-- we have to go to the hospital."

"Why?" Carolyn asks, "what’s happened?"

You shake your head and step away from Jim, moving back into the living room. You grab your sweater off the back of your chair and tug it on, then you pat your pants pockets for your car keys-- which, of course, you left in the basket by the door.

"Sorry, Carolyn-- long story."

Carolyn nods and watches as Jim, who has made it over to the door, mutely shrugs into his coat.

"Okay," she says, "Hannah and I’ll let ourselves out."

"Thanks." You scoop your car keys up out of the basket, Jim takes your arm, and you open the door, glancing back at Carolyn. "Don’t worry about locking up-- this door locks automatically when you close it."

"Okay," Carolyn answers weakly just as you shut the door in her face.

~~

"I hate this place," you growl. Anna glances sidelong at you, offering a wry smile, then turns her gaze back to look at Jim who is sitting at Andy’s bedside, holding his hand.

"I know, but it’s not always so bad," she says. "The doctors think Andy’s going to be all right."

"‘All right’ is a relative term," you say, your eyes locked on Jim. You are feeling bitter despite the good news about Andy. Conversing with doctors invariably puts you in a bad mood.

Note: On a whole, you can’t stand doctors. They read, verbatim, from their charts, and talk to you as though you have the intelligence of a flashlight. They have no idea how many hours you logged in the ICU, sitting vigil after Jim was hurt, or that you were forced to learn how to read an EKG because it was the only thing in the whole damn hospital that would give you a straight answer about Jim’s condition.

"That’s true enough," Anna says, "‘All right’ is definitely a relative term, and you know what it depends on?"

You take a swig from your coffee cup and wait for Anna to enlighten you.

"State of mind. It’s all about attitude."

You grunt in reluctant agreement.

"Take Andy," Anna continues. "If he believes he’s going to get better, if he knows there are people on the sidelines, cheering for him, if he thinks of himself as being an Olympic champion, he’ll get better. Never underestimate the power of positive thinking."

"You’ve been listening to too many motivational speakers," you tell Anna, then grin tiredly at her.

She just smiles back, takes a sip of her own coffee, and watches Jim some more.

Over the PA system, a woman announces that visiting hours are over and with a sigh, you push away from the wall and walk across the hallway into Andy’s room.

Gently you touch the back of your hand to Jim’s cheek in greeting. He covers your hand with his, leaning into your touch, kissing your fingers.

"Hey," you breathe.

"Hey."

You look at Andy, who is lying, peacefully in bed, asleep. He looks so young and frail-- just a boy.

"Hey there, Champ," you whisper, reaching out to straighten the corner of his bedcovers.

~~

It will likely get to be too much for you; the almost nightly trips to the hospital, the cafeteria food, the painfully slow progress of a boy who has begun to remind you of a much younger, terribly wounded version of Jim. You will, despite deep pangs of guilt, start looking for excuses not to accompany Jim and Anna to the hospital. You will throw yourself into your work, start writing your second PhD, anything to keep from having to endure visiting hours.

Jim will be guardedly understanding but, you think, disappointed in you. For a week you will manage to spend evenings alone in the loft, or at the library, feeling Jim's closeness only when he slides into bed beside you late at night, exhausted and withdrawn.

By Friday night, the realization that an actual rift might just be building between you and Jim will make you face the facts.

The facts: You are abandoning Jim, leaving him alone to deal with a difficult situation simply because it hurts you to be reminded of the nightmare that was the early days of Jim's recovery. You are placing your own selfish desires over the needs of an injured young man. No doubt about it, you deserve to be shot.

Facing the facts makes you rush straight to the phone and dial Jim's number. It's after nine o'clock. Visiting hours have been over for twenty minutes and Jim should be on his way home but you don't want to wait for him to come walking through the door. You feel compelled to talk to him, apologize, grovel.

He picks up on the third ring.

"Ellison," he answers typically.

"Jim, hey, how's Andy?" you ask.

There is a deep pause and then--.

"Better. He said my name tonight."

"Really? He spoke? That's great. That's really great, Jim."

"Yeah, it is. Is something up, Chief? I'll be home in five minutes."

"Yeah, I know, I was just-- I just wanted to-- Jim, I'm sorry. I've been a real jackass this past week for bailing on you and I'm really sorry. I don't know, well, no, actually I do know why, but it's a totally selfish reason and I deserve to be shot, man, like, really and truly, because I should have been there for you -- with you -- and instead I was researching the toilet training techniques of the Chachi Indians for God's sake so-- "

"Blair?"

"Yeah?"

"Unlock the front door and let me in, would you please?"

"Wha-- oh. Oh yeah. Okay sure, hang on."

Startled by how quickly Jim made it to the loft, (the elevator must be working again), you cross the room, turn the locks, and open the door. Jim stands there wearing a wry smile and a rain speckled leather jacket.

"I'm sorry," you say again with as much sincerity as you can muster despite the fact that the absence of any real anger on Jim's face makes you feel almost giddy with relief.

“Yeah, okay, I believe you," Jim says just before he steps forward, reaches out and pulls you into an emphatic kiss. When he breaks away, you feel yourself grinning.

"I've been a real jackass," you admit.

"You deserve to be shot," Jim agrees, then kisses you again before stepping around you into the loft.

From out of nowhere Sam comes running, his toe-nails making a great racket on the hard-wood floor, his tail wagging like a big windshield wiper. Jim crouches down to pet the dog and get slopped in the face by a huge wet tongue.

 SAM

It may not seem possible, but--

Sam, the guide dog, knows that Jim is blind.

Skeptical?

Consider the evidence.

Two months after Jim brought Sam home from guide dog school, (boot camp), he took his new best friend out to the little patch of grass that passes for a lawn at the side of your building, for a final `relief time'. Sam was let out of his harness and off his leash-- he was officially off the clock. On their way back inside, as Jim was walking toward the ground floor entrance, Sam suddenly barked, rushed over and planted his body directly in front of Jim. Puzzled Jim reached out and felt the frame of a bicycle that he was about a step away from crashing into.

On another occasion, (and this one gives you shivers), Sam's harness broke in the middle of a crowded sidewalk. Jim was left holding the harness in one hand and Sam's leash in the other.

"Well, buddy, it's up to you. You've gotta get us home," Jim told the dog, and amazingly, without any further commands from Jim, Sam led him back to the loft.

Note: At times, you'd swear to God the dog is smarter than most people. Smarter than Lassie, even, and that's saying something.

It may seem like you and Sam don't hit it off, but really you just like annoying the hell out of each other. He hogs your side of the couch, he chews on your shoes and sleeps on your clean clothes. In turn, you make him stay home when the last thing he ever wants to be is left behind. You've grown to appreciate the fierceness with which he protects Jim, and, you think, he has grown to appreciate the same thing about you.

Sam hates it when you, say, go out of town and stay away for more than three or four days. When you get back it's nothing but the cold shoulder and the evil eye. He looks at you as if to say: "Damn right I'm pissed. You left him alone for entirely too long, Chief."

There's a kinship, of sorts, that exists between you and the dog, (yeah, scary). You share the same single-minded loyalty to Jim-- the same constant vigilance.

Last summer, you, Jim, and the dog packed up and went to California for two weeks of much needed R & R. Two weeks of nothing but sunbathing, beach bumming, (and of course lots of sandy sex). The instant Jim stepped foot in the Pacific ocean, Sam was standing at the water's edge, ears pricked up, his whole body rigid. As soon as Jim's head went under, Sam, thinking he needed to be rescued, had a Baywatch moment and dove in after him, ready to doggie-paddle him back onto dry land.

Note: you found this amusing but-- there's no disputing the fact that-- well, okay, fine... you wanted to do the same thing.

After Jim wrestles with Sam for a minute in greeting, he stands up, turns to you and announces:

"I wanna go out. Let's get out of here. Let's go to Jackson's and listen to some Jazz or something."

"Okay," you agree readily, surprised but grateful for the suggestion. It seems like it's been forever since you've spent any time with the man you love; had a conversation that didn't occur in a hospital corridor; held hands. God, you want that.

"Sam stays here," you declare unnecessarily.

Note: It's next to impossible to walk with Jim when he's being guided by Sam. The two of them work together so well that they fall into a kind of rhythm, a focus that requires their full concentration and can't include you. To say that you aren't just a little bit jealous of this would be a lie, not that you'd ever admit such a thing.

Jim grins, comes over, finds your shoulder, and speaks into your ear:

"What? Leave the dog at home, Chief? Is it the shoe-strings of drool or the pooper-scooper that turns you off?"

It will probably be crowded at Jackson's, the place is popular and usually packs'em in pretty well, but the nice thing about this night club is that no matter how full it gets, it somehow never feels claustrophobic. Jim thinks this is because of the high ceiling and the fact that the tables aren't crammed together for maximum capacity. Whatever the reason, you are left to marvel over the unlikely truth that Jim likes it here and doesn't feel the usual near-panic, drowning sensation that comes from being in the midst of so many people; so much motion and sound.

Still, you take all the appropriate precautions and murmur to Jim about dials before entering the club. You put a hand over his where it rests on your arm, and say softly, "I've got you."

Inside, the Jazz is flowing softly, seductively, all velvet and warm. The rush of conversation that passes over you is soft too, like a rustling breeze and the smell of smoke is in the air-- fresh but subtle, overlaid by the fragrant scent of what can only be buttered catfish.

"I'm in heaven," you admit, glancing up at Jim. He slips on a pair of sunglasses like the cool-cat that he is.

"Yep, doesn't get much better than this," he agrees.

A tall, smartly dressed hostess leads the way to the front of the room where there is an empty table, half-bathed in soft light. You follow her but are careful, still, to weave the clearest path, noticing but not commenting on how hastily people pull in their chairs to make way for the blind guy. You reach the table just as the music set finishes and applause erupts around you. Rather than trying compete with the noise to explain things to Jim, ( "there are three chairs at this table, all facing the band."), you take his hand from your arm and touch it briefly to the backs of the two adjacent chairs, indicating them. Jim curls his hand around the second chair and positions himself carefully into it. You sit beside him, close enough that your thighs are touching. A new, more lively set begins and, murmuring into his ear, you start reading the menu to Jim.

After a while a waitress (named Luanne) wearing a slinky black dress and no apron comes by to ask if you'd like something to drink. You order an expensive bottle of red wine that earns you a raised eyebrow from Jim. You caress his cheek and say, "My treat" before unrolling your tube of silverware and draping the linen napkin over your lap.

Jim reaches into your lap for your hand, squeezing your fingers.

Holding hands, you sigh inwardly, pouring your gaze over Jim, staring blatantly at him (because you can), savoring the sight of him. Jim says something about how 'my treat' doesn't mean much now that you have joint accounts, but you're not really registering his words so much as his voice, and his body, and the warm strength of his hand in yours. You scoot your chair even closer to him, lean over and kiss Jim's neck knowing that no one will notice, or, if they do they won't care-- yet another reason to like Jackson's. Jim's hand comes into your hair and he holds your head while you suckle his neck-- an act that unfortunately gets interrupted by the return of the waitress.

She smiles while she pours wine deftly into two glasses which she holds together in the same hand. She passes one of the glasses over to you and then holds the other one out for Jim to take. It's a full five seconds before she realizes that Jim can't see what she's doing. Then, predictably, she looks at you for confirmation, (as if you are going to nod mournfully, point at Jim, and mouth: "He's b-lllind".)

All you do is flash her a: "fend for yourself" smile. Jim pats the table and says: "Thank you. You can just set the glass down right here."

To her credit Luanne recovers quickly and puts the glass down where Jim indicated.

"Are you fellas ready to order?" she asks with a smooth southern drawl. Jim inquires about the dinner specials and Luanne recites them from memory, managing to look at Jim while she does so.

Note: People often find it disconcerting to talk to someone who doesn't give eye-contact. You will learn from experience to turn slightly away or avert your gaze at strategic times so that people are forced to speak directly to Jim. If you forget to do this, Jim will likely be ignored completely or talked about rather than to. (Case in point-- Heidi, the new girl at Heavenly Fresh Donuts.).

Tip: Taking a renewed interest in the menu works well. Wait until Jim has completely finished ordering before looking up.

In the end, both you and Jim request the catfish.

After Luanne has slipped away, you take your first good look at the band. There's a white guy playing stand up bass just like Phil Leshin, a beautiful brown woman stroking the piano, and a tall black man wearing a Hawaiian shirt playing the saxophone. . .

Your heart skips a beat and you choke on a sip of wine because you can't believe your eyes. The man on the sax looks amazingly like--

"Blair?" Jim is rubbing your back as you cough, "What'd you do, Chief? Just see a naked woman walk by?"

You shake your head and start laughing and coughing at the same time which makes breathing even more challenging. Jim's backrub expands to include, seemingly, your whole body; his hands roving everywhere.

"Okay, breathe already," he says, and, at last, you manage to.

"Wow," you croak finally, clearing your throat and taking another, more careful sip of wine, "I don't believe it."

"What?" Jim asks, perplexed.

You gaze up on stage, shaking your head again and chuckling.

"The man up there, on stage playing the saxophone wearing khakis and a festive blue Hawaiian shirt is-- Simon Banks."

 ~~

Jim is expressionless for a few seconds, and then his jaw drops.

"You have got to be kidding me," he says.

"No. Nope. It's him. Clear as day, man. That's Simon."

"Well, son of a bitch," Jim murmurs, sounding pleased.

"He always said he wanted to get up on stage somewhere and channel Charlie Parker." Jim laughs softly and then leans back in his chair to listen to Simon play. After a while you find yourself doing the same thing, consciously closing your eyes.

The music is hot with a Cuban beat. With your eyes closed, the jazz is vivid and cutting like a sexy dance done with colorful veils and lots of hip-thrusting. You like it. It makes you want to get out of your chair and move. When the saxophone finally wails its last note, the club erupts with rowdy applause and you open your eyes to see Simon staring right at you. You raise your eyebrows at him, surprised and amused and downright awed. He shrugs and flashes a grin. His sweat-gleamed face shines under the hot stage lights. His gaze passes over you and touches on Jim. Something in his face softens and his grin fades a bit. Still looking at Jim, he lifts the lip of the horn to his mouth and breathes into it again. A soft, rich sound pours into the air. It is a slow, sweet croon.

Leaning over to Jim, you whisper in his ear, "He's playing to you."

The song Simon plays puts the whole club into a trance and when it's over, the applause is slow in coming, roused finally out of silence as everyone wakes from the strong spell of the music. You never knew Simon could play so well. Hell, you never knew he could play at all.

"Thank you," Simon rumbles into the microphone, still watching Jim, "a little bit of Heaven from a man people have worshiped as a God. John Coltrane. For your listening pleasure."

As he speaks, Luanne comes by with your dinner plates and makes quick work of setting the food before you and asking if she can get you anything else. When she is gone, you look up to see Simon hopping down off the stage, his sax left gleaming in its case.

"Well, looks like my cover's been blown," he says, coming up to your table, grabbing the third chair and pulling it around so that he can sit facing both you and Jim. He wipes sweat off his face with a white towel and flashes another easy grin. He looks more relaxed then you've ever seen him.

“That was amazing," you tell him, still floored by the music.

"Why thank you, Sandburg, I though you might enjoy that."

Simon glances sidelong at Jim and asks, "What did you think, Jim?"

There is a trace of something genuine in the question that you can see underlined in Simon's eyes, some mix of worry and hope. You wonder why Jim's answer means so much to him.

"Jeez, Simon, what do you think I thought of it?" Jim says in a gentle, slightly playful way, "I thought it was incredible."

Simon smiles readily, looking obviously relieved, then he eyes your plates and says: "God, I'm starving!"

He laughs as both you and Jim tug your plates closer to yourselves and out of his reach.

~~

Simon watches with rapt attention as you quickly describe Jim's food to him using the classic clock system.

"Catfish at six o'clock, green beans at three, baked potato at ten. Your salad's in a bowl on the table at about two."

"Oh, I get it," Simon says quietly and then asks: "do you use that for other things besides food?"

Jim, picks up his fork, cuts a bite of fish and pops it into his mouth.

"Sure," he says with a shrug, "It's a good shorthand."

"What about. . . " Simon hesitates and Jim trails the table, reaching for his wine glass. He takes a sip.

"If you have a question, ask it, Simon," he says, not unkindly, "It's okay to talk about this stuff. You can ask me whatever you want."

"Okay," Simon says, taking a nervous sip of his own glass of wine. "The guide dog--"

"Sam," Jim interjects.

"Sam. How does he get you places? I mean, can you say: "Take me to the post office" or, how does that work?"

Jim smiles.

"No. Sam's incredible, but he's not that incredible. Think of it like I'm the big picture guy, right? And Sam's the detail man. I direct Sam where to go, and he makes sure we don't crash into anything on the way there. I can tell him: "Find the door, find the elevator, find the chair,"-- stuff like that. But not: "find the post office."

"So you have to know where you're going."

"Always a good idea," Jim says.

Simon considers this and then in a softer tone he asks,

"What's the worst thing?" .

"About being blind?" Jim asks.

"Yes."

Jim is silent for a moment, thinking it over, then he reaches out and cups your face gently.

“I miss seeing this."

You lose your breath, when he says this. Something hot and sweet and unbearably sad swells inside your chest and you close your eyes, leaning into Jim's touch. A lone trumpeter on stage starts playing a long, low note that seems inspired by your own feelings, born from your own heart. You take Jim's hand in yours and stand up.

"Dance with me," you say impulsively. Jim grins and starts to chuckle softly

"Right now?"

"Right now. Right here. Dance with me."

"And leave Simon alone with all this food?"

You glance at Simon who flashes you a shit-eating grin which you conveniently decide not to mention to Jim; instead you just squeeze his hand, silently imploring. The amusement fades from his face for a moment as he realizes the depth of your desire. He lifts a hand, hesitates, and then gingerly slips off his dark sunglasses. His blue eyes are pale, distant, and suddenly sober, but strikingly beautiful. Revealing them now, like this, seems like Jim is giving you a gift. Parts of you start breaking inside. You love him so much, you can hardly stand it. He sets the glasses down on the table, pulls his napkin off his lap, and stands.

A moment of connection passes between you and Jim. Then amusement touches his face again and he turns toward Simon.

"The catfish on my plate had better be here when I get back," he says pointedly before grinning despite himself. "any other catfish you might find on this table, though, is fair game."

Simon chuckles heartily and makes a show of picking up silverware and smacking his lips. You ignore him having eyes only for Jim whose grin widens as he, somewhat sheepishly, lets you tug him away from the table and lead him by the hand onto the dance floor, a small open area in front of the stage. The trumpet picks up a slow, sultry melody. A drum starts to tap, and you pull Jim into your arms.

"Tell me everybody's not staring at us," Jim murmurs in your ear.

"Who's everybody? There's nobody here but you and me," you say.

"Right," Jim sighs, wrapping his arms around you and tucking your head to his shoulder, "I'll believe that when I see it."

He starts an easy, sensuous sway to the music that is so mesmerizing it makes the world fall away, leaving nothing behind but Jim's strong, warm body pressed up against the length of yours. You close your eyes and the music pours through you. You feel Jim's breath, his heartbeat, his sway. Together, holding each other, you are filled with such utter contentment. Jim's hand strokes your back and you lift your head to look at him. He leans in and his lips brush your ear.

"I love you," he whispers in a voice that practically melts you to the floor.

Unable to speak for a moment, you can only swallow and work your throat uselessly.

"Love you too," you finally whisper back.

He strokes your hair and you sag against him again, settling your head back on his shoulder. You could do this forever-- stay here forever. You don't want the music to ever end. But it finally does, with one last sighing note. The drum stops tapping and the crowd of diners start to clap. You feel Jim flinch, just slightly, at the sound as though he really has forgotten there are other people in the room, then he pulls away enough to kiss you very gently, oh so tantalizingly, on the lips. It's all you can do to keep from letting out a whimper and coming in your pants.

On the way back to your table, holding Jim's hand, you bump into a bus boy, stumble over a chair leg and almost get lost. The only thing you can think about is that teasing touch of Jim's lips brushing yours.

Simon agrees to come over for dinner sometime next week and, though he doesn’t say so, you can tell that Jim is really glad. All during the ride home he talks about how maybe he’ll take up the saxophone too. “Blind people are musically inclined, you know,” he says, grinning in the passenger seat.

“Oh, yeah? According to who? Nancy Drew?” You chuckle.

“It’s one of the perks.”

“What other perks are there?”

“Well, of course, we’re better in bed.”

You take his hand and kiss it, as if to say: “can’t argue with that one.” Then the light turns green and you put your foot on the gas. A second later, out of the corner of your eye, you see the bright flash of headlights. There’s a screech of brakes, the trombone-slide of a horn honking and then it’s as if a gigantic meteor from outer space crashes into the back of the truck. The impact is earth-shattering. There is a hideous crunch of metal and the sound of glass shattering, then the truck whips around so fast that you blink and you’re facing in the opposite direction. With your foot somehow on the brake the truck skids and then shutters to a stop. Gasping for breath, you turn to look at Jim and see that he’s got a white-knuckle grip on the dashboard but doesn’t look hurt. A sudden, urgent silence fills the space between you.

“Blair?" he gasps finally.

"I'm fine. I’m okay. I’m not hurt. Are you all right?“ you ask, reaching over to grab his arm. He nods jerkily and you let out a breath of deep relief. Then you feel something wet and warm slide down your cheek, as though someone has cracked a raw egg on your head and now the yoke is oozing down. You touch your face and your fingers come back bloody.

“Oh, shit,” you say, “my head is bleeding.”

You almost laugh in a hysterical kind of way as you watch Jim tense up. Then, just like you always do when you’re freaked out, you start talking.

“I don’t think it’s bad though,” you say, “Head wounds bleed a lot. You know, you wash them off thinking there no way you’re not going to need like eighteen stitches and then it turns out to be just this tiny little cut. Are you sure you’re all right? God, I’m so sorry Jim. The light was green and I--”

“Hush,” he says, unbuckling his seatbelt and reaching for the door handle. “I’m going to get out and come around to your side. You stay put, okay? Don’t move.”

You just blink at him as he sits poised with his hand on the door, listening. “Okay?”

“Yeah, okay. Be careful. We‘re in the middle of the street. There‘re cars--”

He’s out before you can finish your sentence, and half a minute later he’s tugging your drivers‘-side door open and undoing the clasp of your seat-belt. As soon as he can get his hands on you he starts examining the cut on your head. His shoulders sag with relief when it turns out to be just like you said, hardly a scratch. He pats you down, taking time to feel your wrists and your neck.

“Do you feel dizzy?” he asks.

“No. I’m shaking like crazy, but I’m not dizzy.”

Jim nods and then rubs his own neck. You clutch his arm. “Whiplash?” you ask, so worried that you hardly manage to get any air behind the word.

He grimaces, “Too early to tell. What about you? Any pain--”

“No. I’m fine-- I mean-- amazingly.”

You watch Jim lower his hand from his neck, thinking about how his whole body must have been jolted upon impact because he couldn't see what was coming; he was literally blind-sided.

“I think it’s safe to say that we got lucky,” Jim says. “Let’s just hope whoever hit us is just as lucky.”

“Oh man, yeah.” You glance around and start to get out of your seat. Jim takes your arm and helps you.

“C’mon, we’d better get away from the truck,” he says, “I smell gas.”

Once your feet are on the ground, Jim steadies you with his hands on your shoulders. He lifts his head. “Good, I hear sirens so at least the cavalry’s on the way.”

You take a look around, really getting to see your environment for the first time. What you see reminds you of something out of Road Warrior. You’re in the middle of the intersection, though facing the wrong way, and there is traffic stalled around you on all sides.

The vehicle that hit you turns out to be one of those completely indestructible VW Buses. The driver is a High School drama teacher chauffering half the cast of “Sing’n in the Rain” home from dress rehearsal. It’s quite a scene with all these teenagers wearing yellow raincoats, milling around like a bunch of addled ducklings-- but miraculously nobody looks hurt. The driver is completely beside himself trying to take a head-count.

One of the kids says: “Dude, Mr. J, you totally steam-rolled that pick-up truck.”

Another kid asks: “Do you think the driver’s okay?”

Mr. J, who has finally gotten his count, turns to look at your truck and all but faints at the sight of it. “Dear God. . .” he gasps, scanning around frantically for you and Jim.

“Over here,” You call from your place sitting on the base of one of the traffic-light poles. Jim is dabbing blood off your head with the tail of his shirt. “And get everybody away from the truck it’s leaking gas.”

“Holy shit!” One of the kids says, “Is it gunna blow?”

“Don’t sound so hopeful, kid,” Jim mutters dryly, above you.

Mr. J practically sprints to you, followed by his flock, and stands over you panting.

“Jesus, are you two all right?”

“We’re fine-- probably,” you say tightly, wondering how Jim’s neck is going to feel in the morning. Mr. J’s eyes are full of fear and contrition but you can’t bring yourself to feel sorry for him. Jim just clenches his jaw, pulls a Band-Aid out of the first-aid kit he salvaged from behind the seat in the truck, and rips the wrapping off with his teeth.

“I can’t even say how sorry I am. A couple of the kids were fighting, I turned to tell them to pipe down and then--”

“You almost got us all killed,” Jim finishes in a hard-edged, ‘take-no-prisoners’ voice; somehow managing to sound deadly while still putting a Band-Aid gently on your head.

Getting a good look at Mr. J’s face, you can see that he’s hardly older than twenty-five; blond and lanky, wearing jeans and a Cascade High School windbreaker. He physically flinches at Jim’s words.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispers and Jim nods as though to show that he believes him, but all he says is:

“The safety of those children was your responsibility.”

Any reply Jarvis might have made gets interrupted by the approaching wail of sirens.

~~

There is total chaos for a while, but it’s a kind of craziness (complete with paramedics and incident reports) that both you and Jim are used to.

Friendly advice: If you’re tempted to try to analyze this for its deeper meaning, just don’t.

The patrolmen interviewing everybody, recognizes Jim’s name and gets practically star-struck. “Jim Ellison? The Jim Ellison? And Sandburg, too? Wow, it’s an honor to meet you both, not that this is under the best circumstance of course but, wow. . . ‘cop of the year’ three years running, highest clearance rate in your precinct-- in the whole city-- man, you guys were unstoppable.”

“Nice to meet you too,” Jim says sounding like he’d rather have his nose hairs tweezed than listen to some bright-eyed rookie wax rhapsodic about his glory days.

“It’s a damn shame what happened to you,” bright-eyes continues, looking with pity at Jim, “that undercover bust going straight to hell and you getting hurt like that all because some low-life junkie and her baby got in the way. Everyone knows you did everything you could to try to save that kid.”

“Officer-- Machale is it?” Jim says in a dangerously quiet voice, “If you’re done dredging up every painful memory of mine that you can think of, I’d appreciate it if you’d concentrate on doing your job and finish your interviews.”

The patrolmen looks confused for a second, then he turns a couple shades paler. “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir,” he says.

 Later, after the interview is over and officer Machale has moved on, his partner (an older man named Roberts who has ‘veteran beat cop’ written all over him) comes up to Jim.

“I don’t make a habit of apologizing for my partners,” he says, “For over ten years they’ve been tossing me kids fresh outta the Academy sayin: “here, make a cop outta this”, and I’ve done the best I could with‘em. But over the years I’ve come to believe that if it’s a matter of training-- if they do the right thing when the shit hits the fan and life is on the line-- than that should be a reflection on me, how well I taught’em. But if it’s a matter of having some decent measure of manners and tact, well, I can’t work miracles, if you know what I’m sayin?”

Jim smiles knowingly and offers his hand for Roberts to shake, “Yeah, I think I do,” he says.

“Hey,” you say indignantly, whapping Jim on the arm.

~~

The paramedics get downright hostile after you refuse to go to the ER to get your tiny scratch looked at, but before things can get ugly Rafe pulls up to the scene of the accident, dressed to kill, and flashing his badge.

“I was on my way home when I heard the report on my radio. I thought: how many blue-and-white heaps of junk can there be in this city?”

“It’s a piece of junk now,” Jim grumbles from where he stands leaning up against the side of the ambulance, “Sandburg says it looks like King Kong stubbed his toe on it.”

“Sorry, Jim, but it actually looks more like King Kong sat on your truck.”

“Oh, great. Thanks.”

Rafe sobers and looks at both you and Jim in turn. “Thank God you guys are all right,” he says

“We got really lucky,” you say, “considering that in the past year we’ve been respectively stalked, mugged and had a friend in a coma. I figure we were due for a lucky break.”

“Way to look at the bright side,” Rafe says, looking slightly baffled. “why don’t I give you guys a ride home-- or to the ER?”

“Home,” both you and Jim say at the same time.

 ~~

Riding in the back of Rafe’s car watching the city glide by may seem dream-like and a little eerie considering the fact that just a few hours ago you were taking the same trip home in the pleasantly un-totaled truck when everything was cool-- nice and mellow. Now you’re stuck having skeptical thoughts about Cascade’s public transportation system, and insurance payments, and the best treatment for whiplash (which makes you feel both queasy and on edge because you’ve seen the lawyer ads on T.V. and heard the horror stories about fender-benders mysteriously causing years of chronic pain. That’s a hell of a lot of lawyers after all, crammed into one little room with book-shelves for walls, and an awfully long list of symptoms scrolling across the screen in big white letters).

“How are you feeling?” You ask Jim anxiously.

“Pissed,” he grunts. Then he squeezes your hand which he has been holding during the whole car ride, his fingers firmly intertwined with yours.

You take ‘Pissed’ to be a good sign because at least he didn’t say: “like I’m destined to have years of neck pain”. But you still feel queasy because, looking at him, you can’t keep from thinking: “what if we hadn’t been so lucky?”

Note: It’s important not to look at Jim and think: “what if I’d lost him?”, because that thought is just too unbearable-- too impossible-- the kind of thought you can’t even poke at with a really, really long stick.

Not for the first time Death (with a capital D) seems like a great big eraser in the sky-- just this giant eraser that comes down, out of the blue, and swipes people away. You feel, now as if it has grazed the man you love. He’s had another narrow miss.

Rafe drives with the radio on, probably sensing that right now’s not the best time for chit-chat. The washed-out light of streetlamps strobes across the interior of the car as it ferries you smoothly along. An old melancholy Simon and Garfunkle song wafts from the radio making you remember being young in a poignant way that hurts but also make you want to smile.

Time it was and what a time it was.

You remember a summer night, ages ago-- yesterday -- when you and a bunch of college friends stood outside under a dark sky full of stars holding a vigil protesting torture, or starvation, or the death penalty, all of you singing drunkenly with your arms draped over each other’s shoulders.

Back then it seemed like there was no problem too daunting. You were going to save the world because the world was big and beautiful and ultimately saveable.

When Rafe finally pulls to a stop in front of your building Jim has to nudge you out of a zone saying: “We made it, Chief”, as if arriving home again after a Friday night out wasn’t a given-- which, of course, it wasn’t. You thank Rafe, promising to call him about getting together for poker night.

“We miss you guys,” he says with sudden, unexpected sincerity, “everybody misses you.”

You just nod, not quite sure what to say to that. Jim stands very still behind you, the length of his body pressed up warmly against yours. He moves when you move, stepping back from the car to let Rafe drive away and leave you on the sidewalk in front of your building.

The sound of the car’s engine soon dies away and Jim sighs behind you, sliding his arm around your waist. He leans in to nuzzle your neck and breathe in your scent where you smell most strongly of stress, and probably blood, and God knows what else. You, in turn, lean back against his chest, getting a glimpse of the bright, high, chip of the moon in the night sky before you close your eyes.

“Your heart’s still beating too fast,” Jim murmurs throatily, kissing you, “Easy, baby, relax.”

You take a deep breath and let it out slowly, relishing Jim’s warmth, and the feel of his lips on your skin, and the way he calls you “baby”. But then an image of the truck’s crushed back-end flashes across your mind making your stomach roll over like a dryer full of soggy laundry.

“Jim, the truck-- it looked really bad, I mean crumpled like a soda can.”

“Shhh,” he sighs.

“But I was driving. You said the safety of those kids was Mister Windbreaker’s responsibility, and you were right, but I’m the one responsible for your safety and I should‘ve--”

“Blair, shhhh--”

He takes you by the shoulders and turns you around so that he can claim your mouth with his in a deep, devastating kiss that obliterates all words, all thought, everything but the staggeringly wonderful sensation of his tongue in your mouth. When he finally lifts from the kiss his fingertips come up to lightly frame your jaw. White puffs of your breath mingle with his as you struggle to replenish your oxygen supply. Slowly, after a moment of recovery, he drags you into a warm, enveloping hug.

“Obviously this wasn’t your fault,” Jim says softly in your ear, “obviously Mister Windbreaker wasn’t the most observant guy. Lot’s of little details escaped him like, oh say, oncoming traffic.” Jim strokes your hair, then straightens from the hug and takes your hand. “C’mon,” he says, “let’s go inside.”

CLOSE ENOUGH

Note: You may want to have breathless, life-affirming sex with Jim soon as the door closes behind you and your coat is hung up on its hook. You may feel like things won't be okay again-- the sun won't rise, the planet won't turn, and most of all the terrible helpless, 'what's-to-stop-him-from-getting-hit-by-a-bus-tomorrow?' feeling in your gut won't go away until you have him inside you again. But all it takes is one glimpse of Jim rubbing his shoulder in obvious pain to make you realize that the last thing making love is-- or should-- be about is burying your own fear or making yourself feel less small.

Jim pulls a package of peas out of the freezer and doesn't even bother to wrap it up in a towel before he drapes it across the back of his neck. He groans and rolls his head forward. Sam, who followed Jim into the kitchen, comes to stand in front of him wagging his tail and whining softly.

"I'm really going to feel like shit tomorrow," Jim murmurs with his chin on his chest. Then he carefully rolls his head back so that his adam's apple stands out from his beautiful, kissable throat. After a minute he turns his head gingerly in your direction.

"Are you sure you're okay? There's a package of carrots in here with your name on it."

"I'm okay. I'll be sore tomorrow too but not as bad as you, looks like."

"I just heard the horn blaring and then, boom."

"Well, I'm one up on you, I got to see a flash of headlights out of the corner of my eye and one of those stick-on Jesus fish, right before the boom."

"Jesus fish?" Jim chuckles.

"Yeah they're these plastic fish-shapes that have Jesus written inside them. You can stick them on your car."

"That's weird," Jim says, turning to open the refrigerator.

"Actually people have been putting that fish symbol on things for about two thousand years ever since this Alexandrian guy discovered that the Greek letters of the word "fish" formed an anagram for "Jesus Christ, God's Son, Savior" which I guess everybody thought was pretty cool though it could've stood for "Just Cuz Goats Shit, Sue'em" or something like that, but--"

"Sandburg?"

"Yeah?"

Jim pulls two beers out of the fridge, holding one out for you. "Enough with the ancient history of bumper-stickers, okay?"

You grin, then cross the kitchen and take the beer. "Yeah, okay."

Suddenly standing chest-to-chest with Jim, he senses the nearness of your lips and leans down to kiss you gently, savoring the taste of you.

"Let's go sit out on the balcony for a while," he murmurs, his lips brushing yours.

~~

Note: In the end sitting outside may seem more like camping with both you and Jim together on a big cushioned glider with a sleeping bag pulled up over your legs so as not to freeze to death.

You lean against Jim's shoulder and look up at the stars, contentedly sipping your beer. The sounds of the city below-- cars swishing by, and horns honking-- are distant but clear; they sound like strange bird-calls, an African Safari. After a while Jim says:

"So, I had a conversation with Andy's doctor today."

"Oh yeah? Please tell me he had some good news."

"Well, in between warning me not to get my hopes up too high, he told me that Andy is getting better and that, in time, he might make a full recovery."

"Really? Oh man, Jim, that's great news. That's really great."

Jim nods, taking a sip of his beer.

"Yeah. The doctor also said that there may be something they can do about his eyes."

Your head snaps up to look at Jim and your heart stumbles over a beat.

"What? His eyes? They can do something about his eyes?"

Jim's expression is calm but unreadable. He seems hardly to hear your words or the insuppressible note of hope in your voice.

"What? Like surgery? Some kind of operation?" You ask.

"A new kind of corrective laser surgery."

Your chest feels tight, suddenly your mouth has gone dry, it's as if your body is reacting to signals that your brain hasn't had time to process yet. Surgery? New? Corrective? Does this mean-- could it possibly mean. . .?

Jim, slowly sets his beer down and then turns to lay a hand on your chest. He slides his hand up to the side of your neck.

"I don't know," he says, his voice suddenly heady with doubt and fear and, dear God, hope. "I don't know if the surgery could work for me too."

You look wonderingly at Jim, searching his face, feeling completely bewildered. A minute ago there wasn't even the slightest chance that Jim would ever be able to see again, ever. And now. . . something very deep inside you stirs, it's hardly more than a shudder, but it's enough to make you sense a coming earthquake.

"What?" You whisper weakly, reaching up to cup Jim’s cheek.

"I asked," he whispers back, his soft voice shaking, "I mean, I actually asked, even though--" he stops and seems to be searching hard for what to say next, "It's not possible. It can't be possible."

"But, what-- what did the doctor say?"

"The doctor said he couldn't be sure. He said that I'd have to talk to a specialist. . .But, Chief, I shouldn't have even asked. I wasn't thinking-- it was a mistake."

You shake your head, confused. How could asking be a mistake if there was even the most remote chance-- ?

"A mistake?. . . Why?"

Jim lets out a frustrated breath and turns abruptly away from you. He tosses the sleeping bag off his knees and stands up. You watch as he walks over to the balcony wall and lays his hands on it to anchor himself.

"Because," he groans angrily, "thinking like that? Hoping? It's just too dangerous. It could mess up everything. It could make me feel like I'm back at square one, trapped--locked behind this blindness-- like before when I couldn't even stand it-- couldn't even breathe-- ."

Under bright moonlight you can clearly see the rapid rise and fall of his chest. You can see the agitated, white cloud-puffs of his breath. The fear that radiates off him is strong, enough to make you feel woozy, paralyzed. Your heart beats like an angry fist against a locked door. Everything about this situation just doesn't feel real. You aren't supposed to be having this conversation; you aren't allowed to even be thinking about this.

Jim leans on his hands and ducks his head, taking fast shallow breaths. There are still times (and you suspect that there will always be times) when the fact of his blindness catches Jim completely off guard; it just comes right up behind him and grabs him by the throat. During these times, as far as you can tell, being blind feels a hellofa lot like being trapped in a dark elevator that's about to plummet a hundred stories to the ground.

"Jim."

You're up from the glider and over to him before you even realize that you intended to move.

"Hey," you slide your arm around his waist, press your body firmly against him, and raise your hand up to span across his chest, "Hey, easy. Breathe. It’s all right--"

Jim shakes his head and pulls away enough to turn around so that his back is against the wall. You can feel his panic rising as he scrubs his eyes with the heels of his hands as though trying to rub the blindness out. When that doesn't work, he blinks hard a few times and glances around in a futile attempt to see.

"Jim."

You grab his face.

"No." You hold him still, "Don't do that."

"Blair?" he gasps, and you yank him into your arms, clutching him to you, pulling him away from the wall "No," you say, reaching up to span his head with your hand, holding on with everything you're worth, "No, it's okay. I'm here. You're okay."

Jim fists clench in the back of your shirt and his chest heaves against you as he fights frantically to regain control.

"Shhh," you breathe softly. "Close your eyes. You're not trapped, you're wide open. Everything's okay. Okay? I promise."

You rub his back, trying to soothe him, feeling the tension course through his muscles like voltage. For a long time he struggles but gradually, he begins to calm down.

"God," he moans finally, "Blair, I can't deal with this. I can't deal with 'maybe there's a chance I could see again'. I can't live like that. I'll suffocate."

You shake your head in denial but can't think of anything to say.

"It's gotta be definite," Jim goes on, "I mean, God, Chief, I thought it was," his voice breaks as he chokes back a sob. You clutch him harder, feeling hot tears spring into your own eyes.

"I know," you rasp.

A chilly wind rustles up, blowing against your back so that you end up shielding the cold from Jim, but he tenses anyway and pulls way enough expose his face to the air.

Still breathing raggedly, he reaches up and wipes wetness from his cheeks, "Damnit," he moans, "It's freezing out here. Let’s go inside."

You take his hand and tug him with you over to the balcony doors. Heat from the well-warmed loft hits you in the face with a welcome blast. Sam barks, instantly concerned by the anxious vibes you must be putting off but you ignore him muttering simply: "Couch."

Jim obeys when you murmur at him to sit down but he pulls you right down with him. He sighs with relief when he feels you kiss his mouth.

"I love you," you whisper fervently, hugging him hard before restlessly pulling back to caress his still-damp face with your cold fingers, "Nothing changes that, Jim. I swear to God. Nothing."

"I told myself I'd never get to look at your face again. I'd never get see your body, in bed where I could look at you, and see you, and tell you how beautiful you are. I tried to make myself stop wanting that-- but I couldn't, Blair. I can't."

"Jim--"

"No matter what I say, no matter how much I accept, no matter how well I adapt-- " Jim reaches out and slides his fingers into your hair, claiming two handfuls of you, "this desire-- it won't ever go away. And I don't want it to, no matter how much it hurts-- "

He takes your mouth, he delves in, drawing from you as though you feed him, you are food, and air, and water, and life.

"It hurts--"

"God, Jim," you gasp before he seals your mouth again. You respond instantly, holding nothing back. He needs you, so you give. It's that simple and effortless though you yearn to offer more.

"Take me," you beg, "I'm here. You can see me, Jim. You don't need your eyes for that."

"Yes I do," he protests, shaking his head.

"No you don't. I promise. You don't if you let go, if you open yourself, if you trust me--"

"I trust you," he says automatically, running his hands over your shoulders. You reach down and start unbuttoning your shirt as quickly as you can, nodding and murmuring, "I know, Jim. I know you do." You rip your shirt off even as Jim hungrily pulls up the tail of your undershirt, helping to yank it over your head. He flings it aside and then spreads his palms across your chest, using the full span of both hands.

"Yes," you gasp, letting Jim push you to lie down on the couch. He kisses you fervently, deeply, one hand roving down your bare side, searching until he finds the top button of your jeans which he pops open. You groan and arch up as his fingers slip inside your boxer shorts and curl around the hot shaft of your cock. His tongue is wet and hot, delicious in your mouth. He gives up his weight to you, pressing down, warm and solid-- so much Jim on top of you-- all thick cable-knit sweater, rough denim jeans, broad shoulders, and hot mouth. His hand tightens around your cock and-- God-- it's too much, too good. You rip your mouth away from his, gasping. He suckles your neck, your earlobe, travels down to your nipple.

"Jim. Oh, God, yes."

His tongue is wet and warm on your nipple, sweetly relishing. His hand is strong on your cock-- one hand holding on, the other traveling-- up, up over your chest, your neck, your chin, your mouth. You breathe moist heat onto his fingers and then he rocks upward again to kiss you, putting his mouth where his fingers were.

"Blair," he gasps between kisses, "I can't get enough. I can't get close enough."

You've snaked your hands up under his sweater and tee-shirt, pushing them up, wanting them gone--all his smooth skin and hard muscle is buried under too many layers. You let out a frustrated sound and then, somehow, one handedly, he manages to hook the sweater off over his head leaving you to make quick work of the tee-shirt. Then he is on you again, descending bare-chested, pressing you down hard into the couch cushions, which almost makes you come from the sheer, amazing force of him, but then he slides an arm underneath you and that-- the way he holds you, his strength-- sends you over the edge.

You throw your head back and come with a quivering shout in Jim's embrace. And maybe it's been too long since he's been this close to you, this open because you come fast, gasping and grinning like a school boy. But Jim is still striving for more, hard as a rock, bulging through his jeans.

"God," Jim gasps desperately, holding you with incredible strength. He holds you until you start to relax in his grip, heart pounding, breathing hard. Then he is kissing your neck, your hot cheeks, your gaping mouth. His breath is searing against your skin as he speaks between kisses, saying:

"Closer. Blair. Want to be--" He palms your face, wiping sweat off your forehead, "Can't ever get-- "

You can feel the merciless strain in his body, every muscle tense. Here he is half dressed and painfully hard, about to bust out of his pants, but you're pinned beneath his body.

"Jim," You moan, arching restlessly against him, trying to get a hold of his hips He tries only to get closer, to burrow into you. He buries his face the crook of your neck, huffing, straining, his one hand still roving ceaselessly over your body. You reach up and grip the back of his neck. You catch his roving fingers, intertwining them with yours.

"Jim, baby, let me-- let me--"

He shudders, letting out a helpless moan but he gives up some of the tension. His lips brush your ear. "Gotta-- get-- inside you," he begs, his voice heady with need.

"Yes," you say, wishing fervently that you and Jim were upstairs, blessedly naked in that big wide bed of yours. As it is, wedged on the sofa, there's not enough room and far too many clothes. "Hold on, Jim. Work with me--."

You finally manage to get a grip on his pants and start yanking them down. He's too uncoordinated to help much-- too tight, too horny, and too afraid he'll come before it's time.

"Hang on," you chant, "gonna make it, almost there."

He nearly loses the battle, when you tug down his boxer shorts but you talk him through it, making quick work of your own jeans. You grope wildly for the lube that is stored in a drawer in the coffee table (always good to be prepared). Things get hazy after that, a confusion of hands and lube, cock and ass until finally you've turned over and he is pushing his way down inside you. He slides his palm flat across your belly and bears down, rocking into the stroke. You throw your head back, close your eyes and let out a soundless cry of pleasure.

~~

You dream of a slick rain-washed street, a bright light, the terrible screeching sound of metal crunching against metal-- and wake with a start to the smooth darkness of your bedroom. Reaching automatically to snap on the bedside lamp, you whip your head around to look at Jim who is sprawled out on his back next to you, sound asleep, undisturbed. You exhale-- he's okay. Jesus, thank God-- and ease back against your pillow. You turn your head back to look at the clock. 4:36am. Damn.

Jim draws in a deep breath and stirs, waking up enough to roll over. His hand grazes lazily across the bed sheets until it bumps into your arm.

"Chief?" he murmurs groggily. You gather up his fingers and kiss them, whispering:

"Shhh, no, I'm okay. Go back to sleep."

His brow furrows and you shift closer to him, leaning over to kiss him there too. But instead of sinking back to sleep, he lightly touches your jaw.

"Wha’samatter?"

"Nothing. I didn't mean to wake you up."

"Heart rate woke me."

"I was just dreaming," you whisper, "it got a little trippy."

"Mmm. Headlights, Jesus fish, boom?"

"How'd you guess?" You lean into his touch, smiling into the palm of his hand. Then your smile fades and you reach out,

"How's your neck?"

"Sore. Massage helped though."

"The rest of you?"

Jim inhales and moves, rolling over on top of you, "I'm fine," he says throatily, fully awake now, dropping a kiss onto your lips, your forehead. You lay your hand on his cheek and stare up at him, riveted. He stills.

"What?" he murmurs. No words pass the lump in your throat. You mutely shake your head. Jim sighs and wraps his arms around you, pulling you close.

After a lot of hard swallowing you manage to find your voice again. "Can't ever get close enough?" you whisper and Jim stiffens before exhaling.

"It only sometimes feels like that."

"When does it feel like that? Why?"

Jim pulls back and it’s his turn to shake his head.

"I don't know. It just sometimes feels like you're-- on the other side. I can't get to you. There's this barrier . . ."

"I'm sorry--"

"No." Jim stops your mouth with a kiss, "It's not your fault. You're the one who breaks through. No matter how far away I feel, you always get to me. You find me."

Your eyes sting, Jim's face blurs above you. He reaches up and lightly fingers the Band-Aid on your forehead.

"I'm just so glad you're okay," he breathes, leaning down to touch his lips to your tiny cut.

"Jim, if I'd've hurt you. . ." your voice trails off.

"No, hey," Jim murmurs, palming your cheek, "Chief, look at me. Is the light on? Can you see me?"

"Yeah. I can see you."

"Do I look hurt to you?"

"No. You look just perfect to me."

Jim smiles.

"Well, there you go then."

You reach over and snap the lamp back off again, plunging the room into darkness. You grab Jim's face and kiss him hard.

"Here I go," you murmur.

 "So, what do we have in the cart?" Jim asks and you glance down at the big colorful heap of groceries that you're pushing around.

"A shit load."

"Yeah, well, I know that, but what are we forgetting?"

"Nothing. We can't possibly be forgetting anything. We have enough junk food here for a week of poker nights." You pick up a package of bologna and scowl at it. "And if this bologna has a first name I don't want to know what it is."

"What about chili powder? I could make chili."

You glance at him beseechingly.

"You'd better not be teasing. You know how much I love your chili."

"I never tease about chili."

You grin and then notice that Jim is blocking the path of a lady who wants to push her cart by in the narrow aisle.

"Oh, yeah, hey traffic jam," you say, "Get behind me," and Jim sidesteps, sliding a hand over your back to grip your shoulder.

"Okay, coast's clear," you say a half a minute later but Jim doesn't move away, instead he slides his arm around your waist and hugs you. An old lady standing a few feet away in front of the Rice a'roni boxes casts you a scornful eye and you chuckle.

"What?" Jim murmurs into your ear and you can hear the smile in his voice.

"We're getting vulture eyes from somebody's grandma."

"Mm, well then, I better not kiss you or anything, she might have a stroke."

Jim eases away but keeps his hand on your shoulder. He's been extra touchy-feely lately, and especially today. His appointment with the Optometrist is this afternoon at one o'clock, just a few hours from now. All day, you've been running through scenarios in your head. There's the miracle scenario in which, against all odds, the doctor pronounces Jim curable, the music swells, the tears flow, and there's cheering and streamers and big honk'n party after. . .then there is the other scenario. The one in which the music swells and the tears flow. . .but there ain't no party. Not even close.

"C'mon, Chief. Let's go find the taco aisle," Jim says sounding amazingly calm. If it wasn't for the fact that he can't seem to let go of you for more than two seconds-- hands on you everywhere doing the "you still there? ‘K, just check'n" routine, you wouldn't suspect that he was anything other than his usual calm, collected self. As it is, you know he's all tied up in knots inside (as if you didn't have pretzel-stomach too).

Note: You can't blame him for God's sake. Both you and Jim have tried valiantly not to get your hopes up-- but failed miserably. Every time you turn around you see something-- something breathtaking, something mind-blowingly beautiful. It's like the Goddamned Sistine Chapel is around every corner, and you think to yourself: next time he won't miss this, I just know it.

This morning you walked into the bathroom and found Jim touching the mirror. One hand on his face, and the other on the mirror, so deep in thought that he flinched when you said "hey". The two of you tried to act casual after that, talking about what to buy at the grocery store: "we need some more half-n-half," "and don't forget the eggplant," but it was definitely the worst acting job since Mariah Carey in "Glitter". It would have totally flopped at the box office.

"Here it is," you say, picking up the chili powder and tossing it into the cart.

"Okay, good. That's it then. I think we've got everything."

You stare down into the cart and nod.

"Yeah. Let's go check out."

You pick the shortest line and start surveying the contents of the cart again, taking a mental inventory-- half'n'half, eggplant, chips, dip, avocados--

"Cream cheese," you say out loud. "Shit. I forgot the cream cheese. Okay, hang on. I'll go get it." And then you're off at a trot toward the dairy aisle.

It's not until you get back and take a good look at Jim's face that you realize your little disappearing act freaked him out-- if "freaked" even covers it-- because, God, he looks terrible. He looks blanched, like a boiled turnip.

You grab his arm and try to say something like: "Jesus, Jim. I'm sorry," but nothing comes out.

Note: Free space. Free space. Free. Space.

Hindsight's always twenty-twenty but do try very hard to remember about the free space thing because it's God-awful when you don't. You feel lower than dirt. You feel worse than that even; you feel like ant shit.

There are rules, you see, of course, for the whole blindness thing, and forget etiquette or sensitivity or any of that PC crap-- they are just common-fucking-sense guidelines for the whole negotiating your way through life and the grocery store, thing. Somebody's actually taken the time to write them down, which was thoughtful. And it's a really good idea to read them and take notes even though, when you do, you'll think: "well, duh". Because, you think you won’t forget but then, eventually, you will, so make flash cards maybe, if that helps. Go ahead, write'em down:

The free space rule: "Do NOT leave a person who is blind standing in "free space" when you serve as a guide. Always be sure that the person you guide has a firm grasp on your arm, or is leaning against a chair or a wall if you have to be separated momentarily. "

Jim doesn't move. He just stands there with turnip-face, in the checkout line, with you gone all mute (because you're ant shit, remember, and neither ants nor shit can talk), and people are getting fidgety behind you. There's a fussy baby back there, and the bag boy is asking you something over and over again, annoyingly, sounding very much like the talking alarm clock.

"Paper or plastic, sir? Paper or plastic?"

"Plastic!" you bark, tossing the offending cream cheese onto the empty conveyer-belt.

Jim stands like a statue while you unload the cart, write a check, and then snatch your receipt out of the hand of a rather befuddled-looking check-out-girl.

He's still acting pliant and shell-shocked after you have unloaded the groceries into the trunk of the rental car and maneuvered him into the front passenger seat.

"I'm sorry," you finally manage to say, your lips just millimeters away from his ear as you reach over to snap on his seatbelt for him, trying to pretend that having to do that doesn't terrify the living piss out of you.

Then your palm is on his cheek. You grip his chin. You let your hand skate down over his throat to his chest.

"God, Jim. Jim? I'm so sorry, okay? I'm an idiot. I'm ant sh--"

And then, with a creak of leather and a rushing sound, he has reached for you and grabbed you; his arms come around your neck like roots. You clutch him back as best you can, stumble-stepping into the car and sagging over to get as close as you possibly can in the cramped passenger-side cab of the rental.

His breath comes out rough and hoarse. His arms quiver with the strain of holding on so tightly. You feel like one big muscle cramp yourself, your whole body's a fucking pretzel now. It's awkward, all elbows and knees. The door's hanging open, the ice cream is melting, and there's no possible way of getting closer-- which feels like your life right now.

"I'm making flash cards. I swear it," you say, "I won't ever do that again. I promise. On my life Jim. Jesus. Just shoot me."

~~

God, you're so nervous. You've reconnected with your Jewish side. You've started praying long, beggy prayers to Yaweh, promising to repent all your past sins and go to synagogue and to never eat pork again as long as you live.

Staring over at Jim, who is sitting in the optometrist's chair with that big mechanical octopus-thing attached to his face looking like he's getting the life sucked out of him, makes you feel so sick and clenched-up that can hardly breathe. Your mouth has gone dry. Your hands are tingling.

Dr. Isrealsen, a tall, soft spoken man who runs the Boston marathon every year and has seven-- count'em-- seven children, has his forehead pressed up so close to Jim's that they're almost touching. He is murmuring softly.

"Okay, there's going to be a strong puff of air and a little bit of pressure, but it shouldn't hurt, okay?. . .Good, now the same thing for the other eye. . .Good."

You watch Jim's fists clench, gripping the arms of the chair, and, unable to stay back, hovering behind the doctor, you hurry over to stand behind Jim. Dr. Isrealsen, looks up and catches your eye.

"Almost done," he murmurs using his gentle tone on you. ". . .All right, Jim, you may feel a slight heat now, I'm shining a light into your eyes."

Jim nods stiffly. Two seconds later the doctor pulls back and moves the octopus thing away from Jim's face.

"Okay, that's it. All done," he says reassuringly. He rolls the stool he's sitting on back a little and makes a few brief notations in Jim's chart. You drop your hand down onto Jim's shoulder and he flinches, startled, but then reaches up to cover your hand with his.

"Okay doc, don't keep us in suspense. What's the verdict?" he asks tensely.

The doctor nods and puts his pen back into his pocket.

"Yeah, okay. I know you don't want me to beat around the bush here so I'm just going to tell you this straight out. There is no surgical technique yet developed that is advanced enough to repair the damage that was done to your eyes. The new laser surgery that Dr. Johnson told you about has made significant strides in the area of repairing retinal tears and sealing leaky blood vessels but not in the area of complete retinal reattachment. And considering the fact that we don't even know the extent of nerve damage you may have sustained. . .There are several studies using SINEMET, originally developed to treat Parkinson's disease, that have had some limited success repairing optic nerve damage. . .but to be honest with you, Jim, I can't imagine any intervention that would restore your vision considering the extent of the damage-- the fact that you have no light perception at all. . . I'm truly sorry."

And that, ladies and gentleman, is that.

Jim's hand slowly slides away from yours and ends up on his thigh. He lets out a heavy breath.

"Yeah," he says roughly, "Yeah, I figured as much." He shakes his head and rubs a hand over his mouth. "I thought so. This was stupid. I'm sorry I wasted your time doc, Chief?" He makes a move to get up from the chair and you rush around to offer him your arm which he uncharacteristically fumbles for.

"No need to apologize," the doctor says, slowly standing up, "I wish I had better news."

"You didn't tell me anything I didn't already know-- realistically speaking," Jim says sounding angry at himself. The doctor glances away and nods. You start to guide Jim over to the door, concentrating desperately on putting one foot in front of the other, but before you can get the door open and leave, Isrealsen says,

"Jim?"

Jim stops, "Yeah, doc?"

"Look, it's probably not my place to say this but. . .Listen. My patients-- a lot of my younger patients are students of yours. I know because when I ask them about school they always talk about you, "Mr. Ellison". And-- I've seen what a difference you've made in their lives. Really. You've given them confidence. You've shown them that being blind can become part of who they are but not define them-- eclipse them. They don't have to be ashamed or hide, or be too scared to live. You show them how to live. . ." His voice trails off but his eyes remain locked on Jim's face. After a moment, when Jim doesn't say anything, he looks away as if embarrassed.

"Anyway," he mumbles, "I just thought you might need to hear that."

Watching Jim, you see his adam's apple bob as he swallows. He opens his mouth to speak but finally just ends up nodding.

Which means 'thank you' even if Jim can't actually say it out loud. You look at the doc and give him your own nod, not trusting your voice either. Then you and the doc have a brief but heartfelt conversation with your eyes.

~~

The sun is blazing fiercely when you step out onto the sidewalk. It's too fucking bright. You hate the sunlight and the breeze and the pale blue sky, clear of clouds for once. You hate the fact that it's a Goddamned, one in a million, gorgeous day outside.

"Step down."

The clinic has a brand new parking lot. The yellow painted lines of the parking spaces stand out crisply against the smooth black asphalt and the smell of tar is strong in the air. Light glints jauntily off all the glass and chrome of the lined-up cars giving you a headache. Automatically, you scan for the familiar blue and white hulk of the pickup before you remember that the truck is parked in a junk yard somewhere totally, well, totaled, and you're now driving the rental which is-- where exactly?

Shit.

You stop short and Jim plows into you.

"What?" he grunts, startled.

You rake a hand through your hair, looking first left then right. You feel something start to go tight inside your chest. Something hot and prickly like-- what? Indigestion? Anger? Rage?

"Fuck!" You shout, startling yourself, "Damnit! Fuck this!" and then you're tearing yourself out of Jim's grasp and stepping away from him, jolting the planet off its axis and setting it into a wobbly spin. Your voice is raw in the air and ugly which is satisfying in a grim sort of way. Very satisfying because at least you've managed to do something to mess up all the terrible beauty around you. You look at Jim and register the surprise on his face. There he is looking pale and stiff with one hand reflexively extended toward you.

"Blair?"

Free space. Adrift. Just a few hours ago you promised never to let this happen again. You can hear the fear in Jim's voice-- the betrayal-- and you know that you should step forward, right now, and take his hand again. Set things right. Realign the axis. But instead you're wheeling around and slamming your fist into the thick window-glass of a Mazda pickup truck, hard as you can. Hard enough to send shockwaves bolting up your arm to your shoulder. The glass doesn't break. It doesn't even crack, and isn't that just beyond pathetic? As if you didn't feel helpless enough already, as if life wasn't constantly sitting you down and gleefully flipping through the slideshow of your helplessness: this is Blair Sandburg helpless at the beach. This is Blair Sandburg helpless in front of the Eiffel Tower. . . and by God, maybe you can't fix anything, you can't make things right, but you ought to be able to at least break something for Christ's sake.

You stare at the un-cracked glass and, yeah, it's pathetic but it must be kinda funny too because now you're laughing. You lean against the truck with your palm spread flat on the window, your knuckles red and already bruising, and you laugh until your stomach hurts and your cheeks are wet. You laugh until you feel Jim slide his arms round your waist, one of his hands coming up to spread wide over your chest. Still, you laugh, even though you distinctly hear yourself think: "this isn't funny" and there's a frantic edge to the sounds that are coming out of your mouth, a creep of panic, not enough air--

"Blair. Hey. Hey, easy. It's okay. . ."

Jim's voice is infinitely calm in your ear. His body is strong and solid, pressed up against yours. You can feel the heat of his chest bleeding through your shirt.

It doesn't occur to you until after Jim shifts position and starts caressing your hair back away from your face, soothing you in earnest, that you're not actually laughing.

"All right, shhh," he says, "listen to me, Chief. Chief, nothing's changed. I'm the same today as I was yesterday. Please, baby, don't do this."

And you lean forward to rest your head against the window which is hard and cool. Your breath fogs the glass.

"I wanted it," you whisper. "Jim--I wanted it. So. Bad."

His arms tighten around you and he turns his face to the crook of your neck, letting out a long sigh that you can feel moist on your skin.

"I know," he says finally, sounding choked. "Me too."

~~

It's nearly impossible to focus. The day is so bright and clear that the light is like a scream. It grates at your nerves. Twice you nearly run a stop sign, only to lurch to a halt with a squawk of tires and an angry reverberation of horns honking behind you. Twice your hand ends up splayed across Jim's chest to hold him steady.

He says soft words to you. Calm. He pries your hand away but squeezes your fingers reassuringly. So awfully calm-- even when, without warning, you swerve out of traffic and pull over to the side of the road, stepping hard on the brake.

"I can't. I can't. This is crazy but I'm going to crash the car."

Scared because you never flake out like this. You're good in a crisis. You fucking shine in a crisis. People marvel. You've always been able to drive like a pro to the emergency room at a moments notice. At night. In the rain.

But this? Maybe this isn't the right kind of crisis. This time you're heading away from the hospital instead of toward it.

You turn the key in the ignition and the car shudders, dies. A truck roars past on your left. A guy on a bike flashes by. You reach up to rub your aching, light-dazed eyes. A fierce spasm of tension rises through you suddenly; it has to be released.

"Godammit!" You slam your palm into the steering wheel.

Note: Ouch. Getting pissed and hitting things, this is not exactly a good habit to start. Obviously.

"You want me to drive?" Jim asks quietly, his voice completely devoid of humor as though this old joke between you has suddenly gone stale.

Of all the things to say at a time like this--

"Dammit, Jim--"

Your voice cracks badly and, even though you thought this whole hysterical crying thing was over, there are scalding tears coursing down your face again as though maybe there's an endless supply of them. What if there is an endless supply?

"Jim?"

His seatbelt is off. His hands are on your face-- hot. Strong-- and his kisses are generous, abundant as though to tell you that: this is what there is an endless supply of. This.

He speaks to you urgently between kisses, coaxing. "No, hey, no, c'mon Blair. Listen to me. Listen. What does this mean? I'm blind. I can't see. . . I can't see you and I'm sorry, I know-- I know it's not better. . . but it's not worse either." He wipes at your tears with his thumbs, his own eyes are brighter than usual. "Okay? Please. Please roll with this one more punch, Chief. I need you to. If you let this make things different between us you'll end up resenting me. I'll become a-- burden--"

"No!" you shake your head fervently so that he can feel your denial between the palms of his hands. "That will not happen, Jim. No."

His face twists into a grimace of what looks a lot like pain.

"You promise me?" he asks fiercely, his voice rough with doubt.

"Yes, Jim. God, yes."

Quickly, (too quickly), he nods and he takes in a fast breath. He ducks his head, tilting it away as though to hide his relief from you.

Roll with the punch, Blair. Just this one more time.

You touch Jim's cheek lovingly-- such love-- and you wish--what a deep swell of desire. . .

Gently, you turn his face back toward you and kiss him on the lips, softly, lingering .

Then you take a deep breath, straighten in your seat, grab the keys and start the ignition again.

Life goes on.

~~

Who's blind?

You have to ask yourself this question because, honestly, you didn't see it. You didn't pick up on the warning signs until it was too late.

Home again, finally, Jim presses up close to you just inside the doorway of the loft and kisses your neck, slipping his hand inside your jacket at your waist. "Are you all right?" He murmurs.

"Yeah," you croak.

"I'm a little tired. I was thinking about a nap."

"You want company?"

"Please," he says.

So you take his hand and follow him upstairs. It's the middle of the afternoon and still bright-- there's just so much light streaming in from the skylight above, spilling over the bed, gleaming off the sheets. You shrug out of your jacket and toe off your shoes. Jim pulls off his sweater. You watch as his fingers work down the buttons of his jeans. And there's a dreaminess to this--to this whole day. You feel dazzled and exhausted as though you've spent too much time in the sun. You close your eyes.

Jim, steps in close to you-- his body warm and solid-- and he starts unbuttoning your jeans. He nudges you back toward the bed. You lie down and he lowers himself carefully on top of you. There's a little bit more kissing then, sweet kisses, savoring but soon you roll over, taking Jim with you so that you can look down at his face. He moans when you cover his eyes gently with your hand-- so tenderly as though you can protect what has already been wounded. His breath deepens.

"Blair--"

"Shhh. Just let me."

"What are you doing?"

"I don't know," Your voice is thick with unshed tears.

"Okay," he whispers, "whatever, Blair. Whatever you need."

When the sob comes you can't stop it even though you press the back of your hand hard against your teeth. Useless to even try. A second sob comes, easier, and then another before Jim reaches up, cups the back of your neck and pulls you down to bury your face in his shoulder.

Whispering, he gives you permission to cry.

~~

Some undeterminable time later you open your eyes and realize that you must have fallen asleep because your bedroom is dark.

The room is dark and Jim is gone.

"Jim?"

You roll over and squint groggily at the clock. 11:18pm. Then you reach out and snap on the bedside lamp only to recoil from the light. Your head pounds like you have a hangover. The act of sitting up takes a lot longer than it should and leaves you feeling slightly sea-sick. Glancing around the dim confines of the bedroom you see that Jim has picked up the clothes you dropped on the floor, folded them and stacked them on top of the dresser. With a groan, you get out of bed.

Downstairs, you flip on the overhead light and look automatically toward the balcony expecting to see Jim standing out there. But he isn't.

Strange.

You glance around.

"Jim?"

He's not in the living room. Not in the kitchen. Not in your old bedroom (of course, he never goes in there). So that pretty much just leaves the--

"Sam?"

Sam is sitting at attention in front of the bathroom door. Hearing you, he turns and barks, once, emphatically. Then, whimpering, he jumps up and scratches at the door.

There is a moment of absolute nothingness, perfect void, staring at the closed door, right before you feel an ice-cold plummet of dread

-- and then a terror you can’t explain, hits like a mind-altering drug.

"Jim!" You scream-- you actually scream. The doorknob rattles uselessly when you shake it because

-- he's locked it. He's locked the door.

"Jim! Open the door!"

You're about to throw your shoulder against the it when you hear the tiny clicking sound of the lock being turned. The doorknob twists easily in your hand. The door swings open and--

The first thing you see is the blood.

~~

There's a red handprint smear on the side of the white porcelain sink. Dark, burnt red has soaked through the white towel that Jim has wrapped around his fist. Shards of broken mirror-glass litter the sink and the pristine tile floor like bloody, extracted splinters. And Jim, sitting on the edge of the bathtub, shirtless, has more dried finger-paint stains on his smooth chest. He looks tan, almost brown against so much stark white-- organic and wounded.

Looking at him, your chest constricts. You feel your throat close up. It's hard to breathe. You have to reach out and clutch the doorframe just to steady yourself before your knees buckle.

"Jim?" You wheeze.

He raises his head and his eyes-- washed out blue. Pale. So pale-- fix on a spot just above your left shoulder. You can see the delicate working of his throat as he swallows.

"Chief--" He says in a low, gravelly voice.

"You're bleeding--" you say.

He tilts his head to `gaze' at a spot above your head and blinks a few times slowly.

"Yeah. It's okay, though, Chief. It's not bad. I'm sure it's not as bad as it looks."

You take a step forward and he flinches.

"No," he says hoarsely, "There's glass on the floor. You're barefoot."

You look down at the shattered remains of the bathroom mirror gleam shiny and black against the tile, and see that they are easy to avoid. You look back up at the pinched worry on Jim's face and suddenly feel much calmer; just like that, as though someone has flipped a switch inside you.

"Yeah. It looks like your fist took exception to the mirror," you say in a steadier voice.

Trusting your knees not to fold, you walk slowly forward, keeping an eye out for glass. Jim listens to you, tracking your movements intently. When you're close enough, standing in front of him, you reach out and start to unwind the towel from around his fist.

You hiss at the sight of his flayed, bloody knuckles but are relieved to see that it's really not serious-- nothing that the first aid kit won't fix.

A fugitive thought: he could've sliced his wrist, crosses your mind before you shove it away with a shudder.

You look up at Jim's face and see that-- one minute so fiercely attentive-- now he's not with you. He's not there. He's in some kind of daze like a half-zone. Your head pounds. You can feel the rock of your heartbeat inside your head and a tingly feeling that could be the flow of your own blood through your veins. There's a hum coming from the overhead light and a hush in the air like it's the middle of the night. Suddenly, it feels like 3am.

Without saying anything, you palm Jim's face. Warm. Brown. Those pale blue eyes.

"Hey," you whisper. Your throat burns. "Stay with me, okay?"

Slowly, as a delayed reaction, he nods and even offers a half-hearted smile.

"Yeah. Okay. That's good. You were right. It's not as bad as it looks. Let me just take care of this."

Long minutes pass as you wash Jim's knuckles under the tap in the sink, rinsing and rinsing, sloshing blood down the drain, looking meticulously for bits of glass, and talking the whole time about whatever, nothing. Jim just sits passively, letting you do your thing. If it hurts, he shows no sign of being in pain. Even after you put ointment on and bandage his knuckles, wrapping spider-web gauze around his hand like boxer's tape-- he just sits there. He lets you wash blood off his chest with the wetted corner of a towel. He doesn’t resist when you pull him to his feet and guide him carefully around the fallen glass and out-- out of the glaring white bathroom that looks like a war zone.

And you don't like it one bit. Worry claws at your stomach. This isn't right. Not good. Not good at all.

"Jim?" Seated on the couch, with his head back and his eyes closed, breathing evenly, he doesn't answer you. But he’s not being stubborn, he’s not refusing, you realize-- he’s just exhausted.

"Okay. Yeah, that’s all right," You stroke his cheek unconsciously, "just hang on. I'll be right back."

Then you head upstairs and strip the bed of pillows and the yellow comforter. Again, he doesn't protest when, downstairs again, you urge him to lie down, nudging, guiding with your touch. You drape the comforter over him and run you hand over his hair.

"Everything's okay," you whisper to him, "just go to sleep. Just rest."

~~

Twenty minutes later when Jim is totally down for the count, you head into the kitchen, pick up the phone and dial.

A baritone voice answers, startling you.

"Oh, uh, hey Roger. I know it's kind of late and I don't want to bother her but-- is Anna in? This is Blair Sandburg."

Roger is Anna's husband. He's slightly portly and balding but he has a voice like Clark Gable.

"Hey, Blair, no, I'm sorry, Anna's off doing a camping thing with a bunch of the kids from CCB, the gutsy broad. Is everything okay?"

You touch your eyes. You don't know Roger very well having only just met him a few times in passing. He's not someone you'd ever figure to be talking to late at night with your stomach tied in knots, standing in the lonely territory of your dimly lit kitchen. But his voice is so wonderfully deep and slow and easy. And, you remember, he's an O&M instructor too, just like Anna.

"Something's come up," you admit.

"Something with Jim?"

"Yeah."

There's a pause and then you hear a creak of leather which you figure is Roger leaning back in his chair.

"I'm sorry Anna's not here. I'd give you her cell phone number but I'm afraid she's probably out of range. I know she's the one with the Miter's touch with stuff like this -- when things come up-- but maybe there's something I help with, in a pinch. It doesn't sound like this is a full-fledged emergency. . ."

"No, it's not. Not like that. Though there was some bloodshed involved. Jim threw a punch at the bathroom mirror."

"Uh-huh," Roger says, not rattled, and you imagine him nodding.

"That's not what worries me though. Not so much. It's how he acted afterward that's got me freaked."

"How's that?"

"Withdrawn. Real far away. Like the roof could've caved in and he wouldn't notice."

"And now he's sleeping?"

"Yeah," you sigh, relieved that he guessed this even though it's not a exactly a wild idea. Still, it feels good to know you’re both on the same page.

"And you're worried about tomorrow. When he wakes up."

"Yeah."

"I slammed my fist into a wall once and broke my hand. Anna had to wake up the kids and drive us all to the ER. I felt like a real ass the next day."

"I bet."

"Yeah, but it happens I guess. I mean, it happened to me." He huffs. "And I'm usually such a pillar of self control."

"Oh yeah, me too."

"My guess, you let him sleep and he'll be better tomorrow."

"Yeah."

"What about you? You okay?"

 You don't answer right away. You look over at the clock in the kitchen, hearing it gulp like it's eating away the seconds.

After a while you say,

"Do you ever feel like the world's too bright? You walk outside and there's just too much light?"

He doesn't answer right away either.

Gulp, gulp, gulp goes the clock.

"Yeah," he says finally, "I think I know exactly what you mean."

~~

“Blair?”

“Yeah.” You push yourself up out of the chair you’ve been sitting in all night, and catch Jim’s reaching hand. He is breathing hard as though he’s just ripped himself out of a nightmare. You must have dozed off for a few minutes and missed the fact that he was having a bad dream.

“Where am I?” he croaks warily.

“Hey. Yeah. It’s okay. You’re downstairs. On the couch”

You sit down beside him, wedge up against his legs, and place your free hand on the puffy yellow comforter, over his heart. You watch as he struggles to orient himself.

“What? Oh.” He clamps his eyes shut, squeezes your hand. “Oh, yeah.”

“Right,” you say, rubbing and patting the comforter. You expect him to calm down quickly and recover from whatever sudden fear has gripped him, but instead he grows more agitated, opening his eyes to stare urgently up at the ceiling.

“Are—are you okay?” he demands.

“Yeah. Of course I am. I’m fine,” you say, startled. You hold his hand tighter, despite the fact that it’s the one with the bandage on it, and scoot closer on the couch, “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“God, I had a dream. . . . There was a car crash. Glass breaking. You were. . .hurt, and then everything went black and I couldn’t get to you. I couldn’t find you. ”

You see tears in his eyes and stand up from the couch, alarmed.

“No, hey,” you palm his face roughly, looking down to see bright grief in his eyes, “God, Jim, no. It was just a dream. I’m here. I’m fine.”

“—and I just kept thinking: If I could see. If I could fucking see.”

He sits up abruptly, shoving the comforter away. You take a step back and end up sitting hard on the coffee table, knee-to-knee with him.

“Jim.”

It’s been a long time since—this. Since blindness was an airless room with no windows and no door. In your mind, you can see Jim slamming his fist into the bathroom mirror. You see yourself throwing the same punch in the parking lot outside Dr. Isrealsen’s clinic, and you wish to God that there had never been any mention of surgery, no tantalizing prospect of a miracle cure. Deeply, you vow not to ever succumb to that vain hope again. Not ever, ever again.

Jim sits on the couch with his head in his hands, breathing harshly. After a moment, you get up and wordlessly lay your hand on his shoulder, prepared to stay beside him for as long as he needs you to.

~~

Later, in the kitchen, Jim walks right into the open dishwasher, cutting his shin with a loud crash and a curse:

“God damnit!”

Furiously, he reaches down and yanks the door closed hard enough to rattle the dirty plates and silverware.

It’s your fault for not closing the door.

“Shit. I’m sorry,” you wince, hurrying across the kitchen to grab a paper towel, which you wet in the sink. He holds out his hand.

“Just give it to me.”

You hand over the towel. He hobbles a few steps to sit down at the dining room table, while you rummage through drawers until you find antiseptic and Band-Aids. The bleeding is mostly under control by the time you crouch down in front of him and pry the paper towel away to have a look. You hiss.

“Ahh. This is a nasty cut.”

“Yeah?” he grunts, still pissed.

“I forgot the door, Jim. I should have closed it.”

He sighs reluctantly.

“No. It’s my fault for not concentrating.”

You think about how much Jim has to concentrate, all the time, everyday, just to keep from crashing into things, or falling down stairs, or getting lost, and it makes your head ache. You remember the time last winter when Jim went by himself to a rehab conference in Cleveland. He navigated the whole trip beautifully, found his way without a hitch, everything went fine. Then, the instant he got home, he cracked his knee on an end table just because he was so damn tired of focusing.

“You should be able to relax in your own kitchen,” you say, ripping open one of the big square Band-Aids, pulling off the tabs, and laying it carefully over his cut. When you stand up, Jim takes you by the hip and tugs you closer, sliding his hand up under your tee-shirt to caress your warm, bare side.

“In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m a little off my game. If I’m not accidentally running into things then I’m deliberately punching their lights out.”

“Well, it’s been kind of a bad week, if you ask me.”

“About last night. . .”

“Last night was you showing remarkable restraint. If it’d been me, I think I would’ve tried to rip the plumbing out of the wall.”

“It wasn’t about having to stay blind— I mean, God, I wanted to see but—-.”

“I know.”

“No, Blair, you don’t—”

You put your hand on Jim’s neck and lean in to speak into his ear. “Nothing’s changed,” you whisper fervently, “You hear me? I do know and I’m sorry. I get that now and I’m so, so fucking sorry for losing it the way I did and making you think, even for a second, that I thought this had changed you, or us, or anything. It hasn’t. Nothing could. Absolutely nothing.”

You spread your hands over his shoulders and pull back to see him sitting there, breathing heavily. He tilts his head up, his eyes tracking his own thoughts.

“Blair, I was afraid that—-.”

“No,” you hiss.

“I was so afraid that you’d-—.”

“Never. I swear it.”

“Thank God,” he growls before surging up out of his chair, taking your face in his hands and seizing your mouth with his. The kiss is as hot and fierce and endless as summer in Hell’s Kitchen.

Simon is the first to arrive, standing at your door looking like the king of swing, with his tie tugged loose, and his white sleeves rolled up. He grins around the stub of a cigar and hands over a case of Sam Adams.

“Where’s your fedora and your sax?” You ask cheekily, widening the door.

“In the car,” he says, walking past you into the loft and glancing around as though he expects the place to look different. You turn to go stick the beer in the fridge.

“Where’s Jim?” he asks.

“Out actually. Working. He got called in for some kind of special case. He should be back soon though.”

“I guess I showed up early.”

You pause in the act of rearranging food in the refrigerator to make a face at Simon.

“Right, since when was there an “early”?”

“Oh, maybe since I haven’t been over to your house more than twice in three years,” Simon says quietly.

You pull two of the already cold beers out of the fridge and straighten up to look squarely at him. The laid-back cocky thing he had going is gone. Now he just looks like a guy who’s had a really shitty day at work.

You pop the top off his beer and hand it to him, meeting him half way.

“Long shift?” You ask gently, remembering what fourteen hour Saturdays at MC could be like. Simon takes the cigar out of his mouth and looks at it, grimacing.

“Yeah, well, what’s that line? I’m getting too old for this shit?”

You laugh and take a swig before rounding to go flop down on the couch.

“Ah, Simon, don’t say stuff like that. You’re only as old as you feel.”

“Exactly.”

You grin easily, watching Simon walk over to claim the chair across from you; he sits down with a groan that you think is mostly for effect.

The conversation turns almost inevitably to cop stuff. Nursing his beer, Simon tells you about the case Rafe and Brown are working that involves a dead teenaged boy who was found floating off the pier with a message carved into his body by some sicko with a screwdriver. Listening, you find, with a shudder, that you’re very glad not to have to deal with that anymore, thank you, regardless of the reason why.

“Hey,” you interject when Simon gets quiet, “what’dya say, enough with the shop talk for a while?”

He leans back in his chair.

“You gone soft on me, Sandburg?” He asks, looking grateful.

“As a baby’s bottom,” you say.

~~

Half an hour later Rafe and Brown show up and start rooting around in the kitchen. The smell of Jim’s chili simmering on the stove has them pulling bowls down out of the cabinets and hunting systematically for the silverware drawer. “Yeah, go ahead, dig in,” you laugh, tossing Brown a bag of chips for good measure.

Megan shows up soon after wearing jeans and a tight-fitting tee-shirt with the number 69 stamped across the boobs. She gives a little squeal when she sees you (“Sandy!”) and tries to kiss your forehead just to flaunt the fact that she’s taller than you, but you dodge just in time.

Taggart comes next, knocking on the door and very politely handing over a carrot cake (courtesy of Mrs. Taggart), before joining the growing chili line in the kitchen. And with that, everybody who is anybody ends up arriving at the loft before Jim does, leaving him no choice but to make, the dreaded “grand entrance” when he finally does come pushing through the front door at Sam’s heels. The dog, already liberated from his harness, goes absolutely loony-toons, running around to greet everybody, thrilled to see so many visitors in the loft. Jim, on the other hand, has the look of a man standing off stage, waiting nervously for his cue.

It only takes you a moment to abandon your hand of poker and go over to meet him.

“Hey,” you say, surreptitiously laying a hand on the small of his back. He leans in, ducking his head.

“Hey.”

“Right so, here’s what happened: we invited them and then they showed up.”

“That sounds like a logical progression. No big surprise there.”

“And yet. . .”

“And yet. . .”

“Hi Jim!” Megan pipes up, followed by a chorus of deeper-voiced “Hi Jim”s.

He smiles gamely and gives a little wave but, behind the scenes, his hand fists in the back of your shirt as though he expects you to bolt.

“The trick, though, I think, is just not to panic,” you murmur under your breath, “I mean, like, don’t go making any sudden moves.”

Jim huffs out an unsteady laugh.

“I’m serious, man. We’ll just keep feeding them and hopefully eventually they’ll get full and fall asleep, then we can grab Sam and make a break for it.”

He chuckles softly, very near your ear, and slowly unclenches his fist

“Riiight,” he says. His hand, rubbing your back, feels like an apology, “that’s a workable plan.”

“I thought so. And in the mean time, I figure we could eat a little chili and play a little poker just to maintain appearances. We don’t want anybody getting suspicious.”

“You’re always thinking ahead.”

“Well, I’m smart like that. Cagey even.”

Sensing a lull in conversation and the presence of curious eyes on you, you turn to your audience and smile.

“Hey, uh, yeah, why don’t you guys just keep on playing. I fold anyway. I had a shitty hand.”

“Good,” Simon calls out, looking meaningfully back and forth between you and Jim. “You leaving the game gives me a chance to wipe the floor with the rest of these Neanderthals.”

“Hey!” Megan says.

“Ya wanna bet?” Brown chuckles.

“Who you calling a Neanderthal?” Rafe scoffs, reaching up to adjust the collar of his shirt.

“Did you get that?” You murmur to Jim. “As far as the table goes, Simon’s at noon, Rafe’s at three, Megan’s at six, Brown’s at nine. . .oh, and then there’s Joel sitting on the couch having a religious experience with your chili.”

Jim nods, swallowing. “Yeah, I got all that.”

“Everything else is cool, nothing’s been moved. This isn’t like my mother and the Feng Shui experiment from hell, okay? So just breathe.”

Jim does literally take a deep breath and it’s your turn to rub his back.

“I’m with you,” you say very quietly. He nods and turns as though he’s going to kiss that especially sensitive spot right below your ear. Instead he draws in a deep breath of your scent.

“Good,” he murmurs back, just as softly.

~~

“So,” Jim says as you look up from your triumphant straight flush to cast Simon a gleeful grin, waggling your eyebrows. He glowers and throws his cards down onto the table with a derisive grunt. “I take it Blair won again?”

“Damn. Some things never change. This guy knows how to bluff.”

Jim is making his way back to the table from the kitchen, carrying a plate of chips and dip. Brown, who sees him coming makes a hasty show of scooting his chair in to stay out of the way.

“Easy there, big guy,” Jim chuckles. “Don’t strain yourself.”

When Jim is near enough, you grab hold of the front pocket of his jeans and tug him to your side, reaching up for a chip.

“What am I? Your waiter?” Jim mutters, setting the plate down in front of you.

“Yeah,” Brown starts up, looking a little embarrassed, but recovering, “We could’ve sure used hairboy undercover on the Johnson case.”

Everybody laughs, but of course neither you or Jim know why.

“Johnson was a strip club owner,” Simon explains, “Henri is still pissed over having to wear polyester leopard print to pose as a potential investor. We suspected Johnson’s business partner of doing the murder.”

“I don’t know what you’ve got to complain about,” Megan interjects, pointing her hand of cards at Brown, “at least you got to wear clothes.”

“Ooo.” You raise your eyebrows at her, “now this sounds like a story I’d like to hear. Megan undercover in a strip joint--.”

“Not under much cover.” Megan scowls before giving way to a decidedly leering grin. “Men are pigs.”

Jim sits down next to you and reaches for the plate, pushing a chip into some dip. A glob of the dip starts to droop over the edge of the plate but you shove it back unceremoniously with your thumb.

“What I’d like to know, Henri,” Jim says, “is where did you get the polyester leopard print?”

“From Brian’s closet, of course,” Henri says and Jim drops the chip, laughing as Rafe growls an indistinct curse directed at Henri’s polyester ass.

“Oh no,” Rafe, continues, propping his elbows on the table and pointing at Brown, “Jim, you should have seen this guy, he looked like an extra straight out of-- .” Rafe stops short and clamps his mouth shut, looking momentarily horror-struck. Then he closes his eyes and cringes.

“Ah, shit. Jim-- I’m sorry, man, I didn‘t mean--”

“An extra out of what?” Jim asks, sounding nothing but curious, “Saturday Night Fever? Shaft?”

Simon chuckles and flashes Rafe a sympathetic smile.

“Come on, Rafe, man, take it easy, there’s nothing wrong with using a figure of speech.”

You touch Jim’s leg to get his attention, “Yeah, hey didn’t we just see Simon the other night at Jackson’s?”

“Oh, that’s right, we did see him,” Jim says, nodding, amused, “and you guys should’ve seen him too cuz he was doing something you definitely’d have to see to believe-- I mean, you just wouldn‘t believe your eyes.”

Rafe buries his face in his hands and groans.

“All right! Okay, okay, I get it. So I’m an idiot. Just kill me now, okay?”

“It’s okay, Brian,” Jim says, picking up a chip and stuffing it into his mouth, “being an idiot it part of your charm.”

Rafe peeks at Jim through his fingers, looking thoroughly red in the face but managing a tentative smile.

“What I was gonna say was: Spencer for Hire. An extra. You know, with the gold chains and the flammable pants.”

Jim snorts a laugh, picks up a poker chip and flicks it playfully at Rafe. Then he stands up, just as the phone rings and heads off to answer it. You can’t help but watch him, admiringly as he makes his way, weaving a path to the kitchen. This time Brown doesn’t try to scoot out of the way, and Jim pats him fondly on the shoulder as he passes by. When Jim picks up the phone, you turn your attention back to raking in your winnings and counting the bills. You aren’t listening to his side of the conversation, (telling Megan instead, that she’d better start spilling about this whole no clothes, strip club business), so you are completely caught off guard when a few moments later you hear a clatter and look up to see that Jim has dropped the phone.

The air is cold and windless as the priest reads the eulogy. Snowflakes drift steadily down to the ground which is perfectly white, marred only by the bone-pale protrusion of Andy Hudson’s headstone and the stark richness of freshly turned earth. There are flowers too, standing brilliantly out against the snow like tropical plumage, red and yellow and velvety purple. Jim stands tall in his dark coat, his face tilted to the sky. His eyes are dry but he swallows thickly, his Adam’s apple bobbing, and there is that telltale muscle twitching in his jaw.

Claire stands nearby with an arm around Andy’s mother’s waist. So close together, they look related; both blond-haired and weeping.

The priest spills a handful of dirt onto Andy’s coffin and says a few familiar words: “ashes to ashes, dust to dust”. You look over at the framed picture of Andy wearing a stiff white shirt, grinning squint-eyed toward the camera. He looks so young, skinny and freckle-faced, hardly more than a child out of braces. You imagine his bedroom, his closet full of clothes, his backpack stuffed with books. You remember the time he came over to the loft and Jim taught him how to shave. It had been an early lesson by years, but Andy had begged and Jim had finally relented. You watched from the doorway to the bathroom as Jim stood just behind Andy and drew the razor carefully up his cheek, murmuring instructions in his ear. How you had wished for a camera. What a great picture that would have made.

You can’t believe that three days ago the kid was alive and healing, amazing the doctors with all the progress he was making, and now, because of an unexpected down turn, a twist of fate, a sudden brain hemorrhage in the pre-dawn hours of Thursday the 17th, mere days before Christmas-- the boy is dead.

There are lots of pictures at the reception after the funeral. Claire sat up late into the night with Andy’s mother and shell-shocked kid sister, compiling a photo-album for all the sighted people to flip through. There are baby pictures, Andy as a toddler wearing tiny coke-bottle glasses. Andy as a little boy asleep upside-down in an armchair. Andy in a boy-scout uniform. Andy and Claire floating together in a big black inner-tube; a jumble of pale legs and sunburned shoulders. There is even a picture of Andy and Jim about to board a yellow school bus. They stand posed for the camera, their arms slung around each other’s shoulders, smiling gamely.

You describe the pictures to Jim in a soft, shaking voice, watching with a lump in your throat as Jim runs his fingers over the laminated rectangles even though there is nothing there for him to feel.

After a while there get to be too many people at the reception, bodies jostling though the small rooms, cloying perfume in the air, a confusing mingle of voices all around and Jim starts to breathe heavily so you take him outside, across the blanketed lawn to lean against the truck.

“Okay,” you say, a white cloud of your breath streaming into his face. You touch his cheek briefly, and grip his arms, “We’re going home.”

But instead of being comforted by the familiar surroundings of the loft, Jim is inexplicably lost. He nearly walks right into the couch before you stop him, catching his elbow and slipping an arm firmly around his waist to still him.

“I’m a little turned around,” he confesses in a bewildered voice, sinking back into your hold.

“That’s okay. I’ve got you,” you say, and he lets you move him around to sit on the couch before you head off into the kitchen to make some tea.

You want to comfort him so badly, your body aches to hold him. You want him to break down and cry so that you can take him into your arms and hold his shaking shoulders as he weeps; soon, before he can get it into his head that he isn’t allowed to do that. You want to dispel his grief all at once in one big purge but you can feel that that isn’t going to happen. Jim’s grief has come indoors like cancer, home from the hospital, settling in for the long haul.

When the tea is made and you bring it over to him, you warn him that it is still too hot to drink, but he reaches out for it anyway, forcing you to intercept his hand.

“Jim--” you protest, and then realize, as he blinks in surprise, that he hasn’t registered your words at all. The confusion on his face scares you, it makes you want to shake him. It makes you want to pick up the phone and dial an emergency number. But instead you squeeze his fingers and repeat yourself.

“Just wait a minute. The tea’s too hot right now.”

“Oh,” he says but the confusion doesn’t clear all the way off his face.

You feel Jim drifting away from you, receding back to some other place where you, glaringly, are not. You think about all the time he spent teaching Andy, the daily sessions that you sometimes heard about after the fact but never actually witnessed.

“Something was bothering Andy today and I couldn’t get it out of him.”

“He did it. Finally, a breakthrough.”

“I should have seen the kid today, Chief. He was bouncing off the walls-- reminded me of you.”

Andy shared a connection with Jim that you will never be able to-- not completely-- because you’re not blind. And now that connection has been severed and there isn’t anything you can do to bring it back. All you can do is sit beside Jim as he drinks his tea with both hands curled around the mug. Sit and watch and hope he feels your presence.

When you ask him if he wants to talk, he touches your knee briefly but says: “Not right now. Thanks, Chief.”

“Thanks for the tea. I think I’ll go to bed,” he says.

It’s only seven thirty.

He makes it to the stairs on his own, says “good night” in a way that tells you he didn’t want company, and that’s that.

When you come up to check on him about an hour later he’s asleep. You snap on the bedside lamp and gaze down at him. You can clearly see the dried tracks of tears on his cheeks-- and how are you supposed to leave him alone like that? You toe off your shoes, round the bed, pull up the covers and slide in next to him. You settle in for the night, wrapping your arm around him and holding him close.

~~

The next morning, you wake up with Jim spooned against you, his arms wound around you like roots. You lie still, staring over at the far wall, and just let him hold you. You think he’s asleep until his hoarse, watery voice cracks in your ear.

“It wasn’t a nightmare. It really happened.”

“I’m sorry,” you whisper past the hot ache in your throat.

He cries then, briefly, silently. You feel the sobs lurch rhythmically through his body.

~~

Later, at breakfast, you eat and watch Jim pick at his food. The faded gray tee-shirt he has on makes his eyes look washed out but startlingly clear like glass. He is exhausted; you can tell by the way he moves his head in a slightly roving way.

“Jim?” You get up and retrieve his plate.

He lets out a breath and drops his face into his hands, his elbows propped on the table. You step in close and start rubbing circles on his back

“Hey,” you say, leaning over to speak against his cheek, “you wanna go lie down again?”

He is silent for a moment and then,

“Okay,” he sighs. You help him to his feet and lead him back upstairs. He seems dizzy or just really lost. He stumbles on the stairs. He doesn’t seem to understand you when you tell him to sit down on the bed until you nudge him back, his knees buckle and he sits.

“Oh,” he says, surprised, his fist caught in the front of your shirt. You start murmuring to him after that; soft, reassuring words. You tell him where he is. You pry his fingers free from your shirt.

“It’s okay. You’re just tired. Just lie down,” you say.

He is asleep in no time and you sit beside him, watching his face, listening to the slightly stuffy sound of his breathing. After a while you go downstairs again and wash the breakfast dishes. You call Simon.

“How is he?” Simon asks, his voice dipping low. In the background you can hear the jumbled hubbub of the bullpen.

“He’s sleeping,” you say, remembering the look on Jim’s face when he got the news about Andy, how he had nearly doubled over and the phone had clattered to the floor. You remember rushing over to him. You remember Simon surging up from his chair to come over and catch Jim on his other side. “Make them leave,” you hissed at Simon, looking around at Rafe and Brown, Megan, and Joel, all these people who you knew were friends but who suddenly looked a whole lot like strangers in your home.

“Blair?”

“What?”

“I asked you how you’re doing?”

“Oh. Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks.”

“Don’t give me that,” he says in a gentle tone, “I know that’s not true.”

You sigh and feel tears sting your eyes. You reach up and pinch them impatiently away.

“This sucks, Simon,” You croak into the phone, your voice dropping a whole octave lower. “I don’t know why all this shit keeps happening to him, I mean, how much is one person supposed to go through? Huh?”

“I don’t know,” Simon says in a soft but fervent voice. “I’m sorry, Blair. I really am.”

“He loved that kid, Simon. I mean, you know how Jim is. He sees these kids everyday. He feels responsible for them. He-- .” Your voice breaks and you clamp your eyes shut waiting for the terrible burning tightness in your throat to ease. “This is not like before when he was a cop on a case-- I mean, that was bad enough. But this? He was totally fucking invested in that boy, Simon. The kid was sixteen. He wasn’t supposed to die. And I want all three of the spineless pukes who did this to him, behind bars. I want Ryan Hale tried as an adult. He’s a killer. I tell you, Simon, I want that bastard to go down for murder one.”

~~ 

 Christmas morning you wake up and roll over, reaching for Jim, who is still asleep, lying on his back with the covers shoved down to his waist and one arm slung over his head like he’s posing for one of those naughty centerfold spreads. You rest your forehead on his shoulder and exhale, sliding your hand across the warm, hard muscles of his chest. He stirs, draws in a deep breath, and drops his hand down to capture yours.

“Hey,” you murmur sleepily, looking up at his face and intertwining your fingers lazily with his before he pulls his hand away, strokes your cheek, and sinks his fingers into your hair.

“Hey,” he says.

“It’s Christmas.”

“Yeah.”

You kiss his neck and then prop yourself up on your elbow so that you can lean over and touch your lips to the side of his mouth in greeting. Your hair tumbles forward and he moans, reaching up to claim two handfuls.

“Are you sure you want to stay home and not do the whole family holiday thing?” he rumbles with his eyes closed, his voice still rough from sleep, “Your mother’s going to give you endless shit for this.”

“I’m sure,” you murmur back, kissing him again, gently. Grief still lingers on him like the scent of a thunderstorm and sadness softens his words even when he’s trying to sound fine, which, despite the fact that it’s only been five days since the funeral, he is trying to do.

“Years of shit,” he says.

“Yes. I’m sure. It’s just you and me this time. As far as I’m concerned we might as well be in Canada, in some remote cabin, half buried under a mound of snow.”

“That sounds cold,” he says, shivering and pulling the covers up, rolling over onto his side. You fall easily back onto your pillow, gazing up at him as he cups your jaw between his thumb and forefinger and leans down to skim his lips over yours once before kissing you again, deeper, with longing. His kiss is both generous and tentative. You feel the sharpness of his teeth against your lips and the tickle of the tip of his tongue. Opening to him, you gently fuck his mouth, tasting delicious heat. After a while he pulls back and nuzzles your cheek, both of you breathless, your lips wet. You close your eyes and listen to him breathe, hearing a shudder where there shouldn’t be one, feeling a sudden tightness of frustration in his muscles. A surge of sorrow.

“Hey,” you murmur, reaching up to hold the back of his neck, just holding him. You have never met anyone as sensitive as Jim, but what you thought you knew when you first met him-- what you charted and measured, didn’t even begin to teach you about his capacity to love.

“I got you a present,” you say quietly, near his ear. He pulls back and touches your face questioningly before brushing your hair back away from your forehead as a caress.

“You didn’t have to,” he says and palms your chest as if to say: this is the only present I need. He leans down and buries his cold nose possessively behind your earlobe.

“Yeah well, it’s nothing too special,” you say, thinking that it really is pretty cool, if not particularly romantic. “I know you’re not exactly in a holiday mood right now, but it could serve as a distraction.”

“What is it?” he half sighs, sounding tired and sad but deeply in love with you. You can tell by the way his hands keep encountering various parts of your body, gently, imploringly, that he is comforted by your presence despite the pain of grief-- grief like a puncture wound deep in some vital place.

“It’s a brand new kind of high-tech radial saw. The blade can stop in a millisecond. They’ve tested it by pushing a hotdog along on a board. The saw senses the hotdog and shuts off, just like that.” You snap your fingers. “Mrs. Kurby isn’t the only one paranoid about you and power tools. With this thing it’s virtually impossible to cut yourself.”

“I’ve never hurt myself using power tools,” Jim says, a slow smile spreading across his face, a smile that is well worth the shit-ton of money you shelled out for the saw. “Not that I haven’t done plenty of damage to my thumbnails with plain old ordinary hammers.”

You grimace and chuckle, reaching up to cup his cheek. Then, looking at him, you sober.

“Jim, I. . .I’m so sorry about everything that’s happened. . .” You close your eyes, cringing at how lame your words sound.

“Andy. . .” Your voice cracks suddenly, and you graze your fingertips over the soft skin of Jim’s temple, “. . .and your eyes.” Your hand drops down to his chest. You feel such an overwhelming, protective urge to shelter his heart from the world. “I know. . . that you’re hurting.”

Jim’s head sags forward until his forehead rests against yours. Automatically, you find yourself kneading the back of his neck. The ache in your throat is so bad your tonsils burn.

“Just bear with me,” he whispers, and you wonder-- you are completely bewildered by this deep inner part of him that still believes that if he reveals how he really feels, he’ll drive the people he loves away. Despite all you’ve been through together, despite how much you know he knows you love him.

“Oh-- hey,” you croak, your vision blurring, and that’s all you seem to be able to say as you wrap your arms around him, pulling him close, cradling his head as he buries his face in your neck, “hey, hey, come on. . .”

He is warm on top of you, and heavy, breathing moist heat against your skin. You alternate between rubbing his back and clutching him fiercely to you, thinking that there’s no way you can possibly hang on tight enough. After a while, you roll over, slowly bringing him with you. He lets out a moan that sounds like a protest but that you know is really a plea. You pull back to look down once, deep into his face seeing that his mouth is slightly parted and his eyes are open-- such a sweet pale blue. In this moment he looks so tenderly vulnerable, it makes your chest hurt, it makes you dizzy.

You kiss his mouth, his neck, and sliding your hands down his chest, you bend and start suckling his nipple.

“Blair.” He cranes his head back as you smooth your palm flat over his stomach, kissing him wherever your lips happen to meet his body. He smells warmly of sleep and clean sheets and sudden arousal. His hands are in your hair but he lets you go as you slide down, pushing at the bedcovers and peeling his boxer shorts down below his hips. His cock is proud, and flushed, and silky-hot when you take it into your mouth.

Crying out, he arches up. You suckle him, wetting his cock with your tongue, tasting the sharp tang of sour salt. Your fingers dig into the meat of his thighs and you feel his powerful muscles bunch.

“God,” he gasps, his fists tightening in the sheets, “Blair.”

You feel your own cock throbbing hard, leaking into the front of your boxers. Jim pushes up, shoving himself deeper into your mouth and you take him in, hands gripping tighter, sensing release. . .

~~

When Jim comes out of the shower, he is wearing jeans and that thick white sweater of his that makes him look obscenely handsome, like he belongs in a commercial along with polo horses and yachts. He has spent several hours up in his shop on the roof, coming back down again when he smelled you making dinner. Now, he walks into the kitchen, rubbing his hair dry on a towel. He cocks his head, listening to you set two plates down on the table and he smiles.

“No, hey, don’t set the table yet. I’ve got something to show you.”

“Yeah?” You raise your eyebrows and come around to meet him. Taking the towel out of his hands you tilt your head up as he leans down to kiss you.

“Yeah.”

He takes hold of your arm and steers you over to the front door, pulling your coat down off the hook and handing it to you.

“Where are we going?” You ask, sliding your arms into the sleeves and zipping up.

Jim chuckles softly. Shrugging into his own coat, he steps around behind you and lays a hand over your eyes.

“It’s a surprise.”

You laugh. “Oh no. I’m not even going to say it.”

Jim steps forward, forcing you along with him. “Yep. It’s the blind leading the blind.”

~~

On the roof the air is sharp and smells of fresh snow. Jim’s body is a shield of warmth pressed against yours as he leads the way across the roof to his shop. Snow has fallen. You can tell by the heavy drape of silence that hangs in the air, interrupted only by the crunch of Jim’s boots and your shuffling feet. After a while you feel the slight shadow of walls come around you and smell the sharp, mingled scents of sawdust and varnish.

“Okay,” Jim says, sounding slightly breathless from the cold as he pulls his hand away, “take a look.”

You blink, squint against sudden brightness, and then you see it. There it is. Your dining room table-- all sanded and finished with the legs attached and everything-- and it’s beautiful. No, scratch that-- it’s gorgeous. This table is a work of art.

“Oh, Jim. . .”

“Do you like it?”

Wordlessly you turn around and grab his face.

“Are you kidding? I love it.”

You kiss him hard and then, holding Jim’s hand, you walk forward so that you can touch the table and run your fingers over its smooth blonde surface. The wood feels deeply healthy under your palm, solid, like--

“Jim. . .”

He steps in close behind you. Taking hold of your hips, he speaks into your ear.

“I know it took me forever to finish it, but I wanted it to be good for you.”

You turn around, one hand still on the table, and palm his cheek.

“It is good. It’s beautiful.” And you pull him down for another kiss; this one slow and relishing. “Thank you,” you say easing back enough to search his face before claiming his mouth again, “Thank you. This is the best present--.” He leans in this time, to stop your words, and you laugh and kiss him back.

 ~~

Note: If Simon calls you at work and tells you that you definitely are going to have to take a trip down to the local courthouse on Monday, try not to think about the fact that the last time you were there, it was to hear Jim testify against the man who blinded him. That might make you take your new-found habit of trying to kill inanimate objects with your fists to a whole new level, and you could find yourself having to ask one of the downstairs secretaries how much it would cost to replace a: “Property of the University of Rainier” file cabinet.

You call Jim from the faculty lounge where you are standing with your hand in the freezer because there isn’t any ice and it’s probably not very nice to use somebody else’s box of Lean Cuisine as a cold pack.

Faintly, you hear the sound of kids yelling on Jim’s end of the phone.

“Hey, where the hell are you?”

“Field trip,” he says, tensely. “Right now I’m standing in the “scratch-n-sniff” section of Shelter Insurance Botanical Gardens with about fifteen partially sighted first graders.”

“Holy shit.”

“Yeah--.” There’s a pause, then in the background you hear a little girl ask: “What’s this, Mr. Ellison?”, and Jim says, exasperated: “Justine, please don’t pull the leaves off.” Back to you, he says: “Yeah, Chief, now’s not exactly the best time-- everything okay?”

“Well, no, but it can wait ‘til tonight,” you say, looking at your hand, inspecting the knuckles.

There’s a moment of silence, then:

“Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.”

“Sure you are,” he says, unconvinced.

“Tonight,” you say, “we’ll talk.”

~~

When you pick him up from work, Jim looks like he’s about to come unglued like an old banjo, his strings popping, and Sam (whose coat is suspiciously wet) gives you a baleful glance that clearly says: This guide dog gig was not what it was cracked up to be.

“Jesus, were they first graders or vengeful mob?” You ask.

“They were a vengeful mob of first graders,” Jim says from the passenger seat, tugging up one pant leg to reveal a bruised and swelling knee.

“Jesus,” you say again, instinctively reaching out. Stopping yourself from actually touching his knee, you lay your hand carefully on his thigh instead, “What happened?”

Jim’s eyebrows raise as though the question is ridiculous.

“The garden. It just had to have a fountain. . .”

~~

The prospect of Jim having to sit on a witness stand and testify about what happened to Andy might make you remember a barrage of related things like. . .

. . .Jim is standing on the courthouse steps in a dark suit. He’s afraid to let go of you, his hand clamped so hard around your arm that you can feel the strain in his fingers. But he wants to be alone, hating the feeling that people are watching him, even you.

“Don’t stare at me,” he says, as if your gaze is unfair. Punishment. “Okay,” you say, watching him anyway, knowing that he thinks you’ve looked away.

Or:

Later that night, he wakes up coughing, or at least that’s what it sounds like. You try to wrap your arms around him but he pushes you away. Lashing out, he knocks over the bedside lamp, it crashes to the floor. You catch his wrists, listening to the rush of his words:

“He did this to me. The bastard did this to me,” Jim croaks, his voice like nails. He’s crying.

“Yes, and he’s going to rot in jail,” you say, struggling to hold him, “You made sure of it. You sent him away. He’s gone, Jim, and he’s going to fucking rot for what he did.”

Then, maybe you’ll remember Raymond Carr’s sentencing hearing and the fact that. . .

. . .Jim is somehow calmer than you are. Your heart hammers when you see the man, Carr, dressed up in a drab gray suit, his hair slicked back, looking like a drunk who’s been hauled into church on Sunday morning.

Jim ducks his head and murmurs: “You see him?”

“Yeah,” you glower, hating the sight of him. Then you tear your gaze away to find a couple of seats near the far end of the courtroom.

“Here,” you say taking Jim’s hand and placing it on the back of a chair, noticing how he hesitates seeming to need more guidance than usual, “Sit down.”

Note: That very morning, Jim was quiet. Nervous. He came into the kitchen with his tie in his hand, more abashed than frustrated, saying:

“I’ve tried five times and I still can’t get it straight.”

“Let me,” you said, setting your coffee cup down and taking the tie, grateful for anything you could do to help, even a small thing.

“You don’t have to do this,” you reminded him, “Simon’ll give us a full report. We don’t have to go back to that place.”

“Yes, I do,” he said, “I need to hear the judge say it out loud. I need to know it‘s. . .real. It’s finished.”

And you watched him for a moment, then nodded. He trailed a hand up your arm to your shoulder, holding on.

“Okay,” you said.

And, in the end Carr was sentenced to 25 years to life for murder and kidnapping and numerous counts of assault. You remember so clearly how. . .

. . .In the courtroom, the judge keeps looking at Jim as she talks, her eyes drawn repeatedly back to him, lingering.

“On principle,” she says, “I don’t support the death penalty but in your case, if I could, Mr. Carr, I would make an exception.”

It’s good to hear those words, in a bitter kind of way. Pent-up tension seeps out of your shoulders and Jim, on the way out of the courtroom, is clumsy with relief. You have to slip an arm around his waist. Simon catches up to you in the hallway where there are a few reporters milling around with their microphones and their whirring cameras. They see you, and almost instantly a crowd begins to form. Then somebody yells loudly:

“Detective Ellison!” And Jim flinches, his senses starting to slip out of control.

“Simon,” you call, slicing him an urgent glance, “a little help over here?”

And mere seconds later Simon is there, on Jim’s other side, blocking him protectively from the view of the camera and helping to usher Jim out of the courthouse onto the wide front porch that gleams crisply in the light of a gorgeous, Autumn afternoon.

“Okay. It’s okay. Are you okay?” Simon demands when Jim is standing against one of the massive outer columns, not yet ready to head down the stairs.

Simon’s hand on his shoulder, keeps Jim pressed firmly back.

Jim nods, breathing heavily through his nose like he’s nauseated, dizzy-- probably both.

“Let’s just get a handle on those dials,” you say as easily as you can, trying to sound calm. “Good work, breathing. Nice and slow. That’s good.”

“M’I going to be-- on the six o’clock news?” Jim asks between breaths, with a touch of wryness in his voice, trying to cover the fact that, underneath it all, he’s intensely uncomfortable.

“Sorry,” you mutter, angry with yourself as you work on loosening his tie, “Shit. I’m sorry. I didn’t even think about reporters--”

But Simon breaks in saying, “No, man. Both of you, don’t worry. There’s noth’n to worry about. The best thing they got was a shot of me looking pissed which is nothing new.”

“Thanks,” you say sincerely, even as you concentrate on Jim, taking his hand and squeezing his fingers, asking: “Feel any tingling? Any numbness?”

“No. Touch is fine,” Jim murmurs back, nearly calm now, “Everything’s fine. Just raw, I guess.”

“Yeah. Okay. So, we’ll have Simon drive us home.”

You glance at Simon and he nods: “Sure.”

Then you look down at the stairs and grimace. There are about a hundred of them, narrow and steep, with no hand rails. You suddenly despise these stairs, but finding a way around them means going back inside where the news crews are hovering.

“Dizzy?” You ask Jim, trying for casual, but it’s his turn to grimace.

“A little.”

“Mind taking Simon’s arm?”

There’s a tense, awkward pause in which Simon looks downright scared and Jim is grim-faced, wrestling with a surge of sudden pride. He needs help getting down the stairs. It’s plain, it’s undeniable, and it fucking sucks.

“All right,” he finally says.

So Jim trips once on the stairs, a stumble near the bottom, Simon catches him, and that’s it. That’s all. Nothing too traumatic. Everything’s okay until you get home-- and even then, it’s pretty much fine. There’s no drama, really. No emotional meltdown, just a slowly settling sense of relief.

You start a shower and, after a while, when the water is warm, Jim comes in to join you.

He doesn’t say a word, so neither do you. Instead you just watch him. And you’ve never seen anybody move so reverently with a bar of soap before. Jim washes you with dedication, like you’re fragile, which only serves to remind you of just how strong he really is. It’s you who ends up crying a little, right there in the shower, when he smoothes his hands over your head and starts scrubbing shampoo into your hair. It feels so good it almost hurts.

Later, lying on the bed, the room dusky with the shadows of early evening, light falling softly through the skylight, Jim touches your body-- and instead of clamming up-- instead of shutting you out, he talks.

“Anna thinks I should go to Guide Dog school,” he murmurs, “She says I’m the perfect candidate and it would mean a lot more freedom for both of us.”

“Oh, yeah?” you murmur back, letting your fingers skim over his as he palms your flat stomach. “So, that’s good, right?”

Secretly thinking: I don’t want more freedom. Not from you.

And maybe Jim reads your mind because he leans in and kisses your throat, your temple.

“It’d be safer,” he says, “If I misjudge traffic, or there‘s a low hanging tree branch or whatever. The dog’s trained to warn me of that.”

Any protests you might have voiced, die right there.

“I want you safe,” you say, rolling over to peer down at him, realizing that what a guide dog really means is: Jim is moving on, getting back to the business of living, which is a good thing. A really great thing.

You touch his lips and Jim blinks seriously up at the ceiling with that look on his face that tells you he can’t help but wish that the darkness would just finally, Goddammit, dissolve and go away. Why can’t it go away? A hard moment passes as you watch him. Your throat aches and after a while, you can't help but move to square your body so that you’re gazing down into Jim’s eyes, watching him not see you.

“I’m here,” you whisper suddenly, blurting it out without thinking, palming his face. “You know that, right?”

He nods, swallows. “Yeah.”

“Okay.” So you let your forehead drop down to rest on his, “okay. Good”

You close your eyes and breathe out a lungful of air. Then:

“All right. So tell me about this guide dog school.”

“Anna says it’s a hellova lot like boot camp.”

 OLD HABITS DIE HARD

“That’s the last time I do Elaine a favor,” Jim says, limping into the loft, sounding mostly like he means it. And you come in behind him, still chuckling, wiping tears of laughter out of your eyes.

“Did the groundskeeper really ask: “Can’t your dog read the “No Wading in Fountain” sign?”

It’s early March, and still chilly so you hang up your jacket and then cross the loft to turn up the thermostat.

“Yep. But that was only after he quit waving his arms up and down yelling: “Whaddya blind? You’re ALL blind?”

“And you really told him that: nope, sorry, Sam’s only ever learned to read German?”

You’re laughing again, and Jim can’t help but crack a smile.

“Yeah, well only the simple words like: Platz! Sitz! Komm!” He says with a perfect Stazi accent.

Sam, who hates to hear him yell, ever, even if he’s just pretending, lets out an exasperated bark and whines.

“Aw, no, hey. It’s okay, buddy,” Jim says, sitting heavily on the couch and reaching out for Sam’s ears, scratching them vigorously.

“You did okay today. It’s not your fault that little Cody Johnson has no sense of self preservation whatsoever.”

Then Jim leans back and rubs his face with his hands, looking suddenly stressed-out again.

“Shit, though, Chief. I should’ve stopped him before he even got close to that water. I mean, I was monitoring him, I knew he was getting adventurous-- I love that he’s so confident-- but it was too cold to get wet. And, by the time I knew what was about to happen it was just: “Cody, no!” and then splash.”

Coming back from the kitchen, you crouch in front of Jim with a bag of frozen peas.

“I’m gonna put this cold pack on your knee,” you warn him, and then: “So maybe that’s the best way for him to learn. He falls in the fountain once and next time he’s more careful.”

“Yeah, but then with a frantic rescue-dog splashing in after him and that idiotic groundskeeper calling security and screaming about how: the kid’s a friggin hazard, and that we should all be ashamed of ourselves for not staying safely inside where we belong. . . . added to the fact that I’m hobbling around, fuming because I just busted my kneecap on the wall of the fountain, careless because all I can think about is another one of my kids getting fucking hypothermia. . .” He stops abruptly, swallows, his jaw clenching, “Well, it’s no wonder that Cody flipped out. I mean, he really panicked. Once I got him out of the water and sitting on my lap with my coat wrapped around him, he started doing that rocking thing, you know? Back and forth. Trying to orient himself. God, that kills me.”

“Jim. It was an accident.”

“And he kept asking me over and over again if I was mad at him.”

“So, you told him “no” a bunch of times.”

“Like, twenty times, I told him.”

“I’m sure he got the message eventually.”

“Yeah. I think it did finally sink in. But at first he wouldn’t let go of me. Elaine tried to take him back to school with the rest of the class and he just shrieked his head off. So, what could I do? I picked him up and we stayed in the garden for a while.” Jim sighs, calming down a little, “And actually, I think that was a good idea because I walked him around the fountain and we talked about how it really wasn’t all that big-- not so scary after all.”

“Good thinking.” You push up to your feet and come to sit beside Jim on the couch. He drapes his arm across your shoulders and leans in to kiss the warm skin of your neck, behind your ear. He stills for a moment, quiet, and then:

“Hey. You smell like--, “ he pauses and then draws back, frowning. “Blair, are you hurt?”

His hand skims questingly over the front of your flannel shirt and down your arm to the swollen knuckles of your right hand where his fingers pause, light on your skin. Then he slips his palm under yours, cradling it.

“What happened to your hand?”

“Oh,” you try to shrug it off, “Well, that was just me showing the file cabinet who’s boss. It was getting cheeky with me, you know. Thought it was better than all the other file cabinets.”

“Blair--.”

“All right. What can I say? I got pissed off. Simon called. He says you gotta testify about Andy and that you might even have to do it more than once because they‘re going to family court first to decide whether or not Ryan Hale is going to be tried as an adult.”

Jim is silent, frozen for a long beat, and then he sighs.

“We knew that would probably happen,” he says, his voice pitched lower, the clench back in his jaw. You pull your bruised hand away from his and touch your hot knuckles to his cheek. Letting out a soft breath, he ducks his head and gathers your hand up again, carefully in his. Then he takes the cold pack off his knee and drapes it over your knuckles.

“No,” you whisper, “no. I’ll just go get another thing of peas.”

“Blair--.”

But you’re up, moving away from him, heading into the kitchen, feeling a sudden, awful tightness in your chest. Reaching out, you lean against the refrigerator because you’re tired now, gritty, washed abruptly with fatigue. You’re about to take a deep breath and force yourself to move-- reach up and open the freezer door-- when you feel him behind you. You sense him before his arm comes around your waist and the warmth of his body presses up against your back. His face turns to your neck nuzzling you there, and when he speaks, his voice is a soft, low rumble.

“You said we’d talk tonight. So talk to me.”

Reaching back, cradling his neck,

“I just-- I hate that place. I hate seeing you up there on that witness stand.”

You sigh and slowly turn around. Jim lets you move without taking his hands off you, they end up: one on your waist and one on your shoulder. He nods, swallowing. With his head ducked down a little, it looks like he’s staring at the top button of your shirt. You reach up and cup his jaw, not trying to lift his face. You can’t remember how many conversations have been spent like this-- touch a quiet substitute for eye-contact.

“I hate it too,” he says, leaning his cheek into your palm. “But this is something I can do for Andy. I have to do this.”

“I know,” you murmur back, “So you go. You testify. We get through it.”

“We,” he says, leaning in, touching his lips to your cheek, your forehead, taking his hands and brushing his fingertips into your hair, so gentle. . .

“Yes, “we”, totally “we”, always. . .” Your voice trails off when he takes your mouth in a deep, long kiss that is glorious, warm and sweet.

You moan.

 ~~

Note: At 6:05 A.M. Monday morning, Patsy Cline will fall loudly to pieces all over your clock radio and you’ll roll onto your back with a groan only to realize that Jim is not in bed where he belongs. Instead, he has switched the alarm over from ‘talk’ mode to the oldies station and left you to wake up alone. You hate waking up alone.

He’s been up half the night, you’re sure of it, worrying about testifying, and plagued by memories of the last time he set foot in that god-awful courthouse. You’d give anything to spare him that experience-- to just say “screw it”, pack up the truck and take Jim fly-fishing. You’d love to be able to forget about lawyers and justice and re-opening old wounds.

But Jim would never go for that. He’s got this classic epic hero’s sense of honor -- which is much better than a crazy right-wing, card carrying NRA member, John Wayne, shoot first and ask questions later sense of honor but still, you won’t be going fly fishing anytime soon. With a groan you throw back the covers and get out of bed.

Jim, when you find him, is sitting in a deck chair on the balcony. With his head leaned back and his eyes closed, you think he might be dozing but he reaches out when you pass by and, surprised, you catch his hand.

“Hey,” you say leaning down to kiss his cheek. He smiles sleepily

“Hey.”

His voice is rough and, looking intently at him, you touch his face.

“You okay?”

“Sure,” he shrugs.

“How long have you been up, anyway?”

“A while.”

Yeah. A while. Spotting his coffee cup on the table beside him, you reach over and pick it up. Taking a swig, you grimace.

“Yuck, this coffee’s cold.”

Jim’s brow furrows slightly.

“Oh. Yeah. I guess I forgot about it.”

“Yeah. Hey, what’dya say we go inside, make a new pot, and have some breakfast?”

~~

Jim picks at his food without really eating anything and he’s so distracted that eventually you set your own fork down, take his hand and lead him out of the kitchen into the bathroom where you start to play a quiet game of “strip tease”. He’s reluctant at first, mumbling: “Chief. . .Chief. . .” and not giving in to your kisses, but pretty soon he opens his mouth and leans into you, moaning with need.

Note: Impending emotional crisis makes you feel ambitious and romantic, like you can soothe any hurt with your hands, and your lips, and your heart. Maybe that’s a foolish notion but if it is, then that’s the kind of fool you will always be.

Jim sinks his hands into your hair and you slide your palms up his now-bare chest relishing the warm, taut hardness of his muscles. Honor aside, this man definitely has an epic hero’s body. He’s Achilles, or Odysseus (without the narcissistic, mass-murderer DNA). He kisses you deeply, his tongue wet and strong, lighting a fire behind your sternum and, yeah, down below your waistline too, of course, because God, he’s so beautiful and good and he means everything to you, really, when it comes right down to it-- which is admittedly dangerous, it’s downright reckless, but who said being in love wasn’t an extreme sport, anyway?

“It’s gonna be all right,” you gasp when he finally lets you breathe again and you reach up to caress his face, palming his cheeks. He swallows hard and then pulls you to his chest, burying his nose in the crook of your neck, one hand restlessly stroking your hair. “We’ve been through worse,” you remind him softly, “This‘ll be okay.”

“I keep thinking about-- Carr,” he admits, his voice low, burdened

“No, Jim, don’t,” you beg, “Please, don’t.”

“I can’t protect anybody. You think you can protect people but you can’t. I couldn’t even protect myself.”

“Jim.” You grip the back of his neck, holding on, hating the bitter cynicism in his voice. All that nihilistic fatalism pisses you off and makes you sad at the same time; it makes you feel like James Dean, ready to rumble, ready to get into a car and put the peddle to the metal, rev your engine and play chicken with fate. Bring it on, baby.

“That was a. . . terrible situation,” you say, your throat tightening just thinking about it: Jim’s “accident” was really a blown undercover operation; one that ended with Jim drugged and beaten within an inch of his life: broken ribs, punctured lung, brain hemorrhage, blindness. . .

The irony of Jim’s ability to repress things is that he forgets the wrong things, he doesn’t remember the lives he saved, only the ones that were lost. He remembers April, a seventeen year-old girl from Kentucky who ran away from home and got hooked on drugs. He remembers April’s ten-month-old baby girl, Sarah, who’d been born with brain damage and had seizures.

And of course, he remembers not being able to save either one of them from Raymond Carr’s gun.

“You did everything you could.”

“It wasn’t enough.”

“Shhh, come on, Jim. Your cover was blown, you were out-numbered ten to one, back-up couldn’t get to you fast enough-- I-- couldn’t get to you fast enough. None of what happened was your fault.”

Jim doesn’t remember the cops busting in, finally, with guns raised, and Simon shouting orders. He doesn’t remember arrests being made or you sprinting across the expanse of that abandoned warehouse and falling to your knees beside him, so scared you were shaking and babbling and begging him not to die on you: “Please, please, goddamnit, Jim don’t you leave me, don’t you dare leave me. . .”

He kisses you again and this time you reach down to curl your hand around his cock which isn’t hard anymore, not now, not in the midst of this conversation. You stroke him and you want to do more, but there are tears in your eyes and you feel slightly sick to your stomach.

“Let’s just take a shower,” he says thickly, sounding defeated.

In the shower he washes you and you wash him, the two of you moving with the silent fervor of addicts. Love is like a drug sometimes, you decide, as the hot water pelts you, it makes you insatiable; when you need it most, it’s impossible to ever get enough.

~~

Note: The courthouse, on the outside, may look exactly like you remember it with its massive empirical columns and steep front steps, but they’ve hyped up security since the last time you were here and now a gauntlet of metal detectors greet you and Jim when you step inside.

A man in a charcoal gray power suit is in front of you, flirting with a woman in a charcoal gray power suit. The two of them look like drones from some Orwellian, futuristic, repressed society in which there’s no such thing as free will much less anything as remotely radical as free love. You have no doubt that the two of them are lawyers.

The woman is too skinny but she doesn’t even bother to hide her Vogue magazine anorexia. If anything, she flaunts it with her expensive tailoring. You want to yell at the bony woman: “Eat a piece of pie!-- or, scratch that, an entire pie! With ice cream!”

The security guard, a Native American guy wearing a crisp white uniform interrupts the man’s flirting, (or should you say “tirade”? He’s in the middle of telling skeletal-girl how much he can’t stand “long-haired, Birkenstock-wearing, NPR-listening pacifists.”), by reminding him to check all his pockets for change. The man, annoyed, dumps a handful of coins into an offered plastic bin, and then walks through the metal detector only to set off the loud, beeping alarm. Jim, standing close beside you, holding your arm, flinches at the noise.

“Whoa, dial down,” you murmur, wincing along with him.

Note: Don’t be surprised if Jim is tense and cutting off the circulation in your arm. Don’t be surprised if you are feeling overprotective and inclined to go all psycho Robert DeNiro in “Taxi Driver” on anybody who looks at you crossways: “are you lookin’ at me? Are you lookin’ at me?”

The security guard, when it’s your turn to go through the metal detector, casts you and Jim a dull, underpaid, overworked, kiss-my-ass gaze and says:

“Sorry, but you both can’t go through together-- ya gotta do it one at a time.”

“Oh yeah?” You start, raising your eyebrows, but Jim leans in.

“It’s okay, Chief,” he says in your ear, “It’s thirty seconds. I think I can handle thirty seconds on my own.”

You want to remind him that the alarm could go off and his hearing could spike but instead you mentally concede that maybe you’re being a tad bit ridiculous-- just slightly-- and you dig into your pockets for your car keys and wallet dumping them into the bin. Jim takes his cane (which is partly metal) out of his back pocket and hands it to you along with his wallet, and then he lets you get him lined up squarely with the metal detector.

“Okay, so, just walk straight ahead.”

“Yeah, I think I get the idea.”

And you don’t blame him for being a little sarcastic, you know you’re overreacting but you can’t help it-- your heart rate spikes when he lets go of you and it doesn’t calm down again until you’ve grabbed his hand on the other side of the metal detector. God, you’re already a wreck and Jim hasn’t even made it into an actual courtroom yet where the real separation is going take place. . . him up there on the witness stand and you sitting too far away to touch him. . .You feel like you’re leading him into a McCarthy-esque inquisition where he’ll have to fend off questions from lawyers who have nicknames like: “Pit Bull” and “Ice Queen”.

I’ll show you Pit Bull, you think viciously, as you steer a course to the courtroom.

It was a mistake, you know that now; the courtroom, the brutally matter-of-fact question and answer session, Jim’s voice growing hoarse and cracking on the words: “no heartbeat” and “he wasn’t breathing”. One look at the slickly-dressed defense attorney (ambition shining all too much like lust in her eyes) should’ve been enough to make you grab Jim and hightailit home, but you were stupid and too afraid of disappointing Jim to do what needed to be done. So now you’re stuck picking up the pieces-- or, more accurately (and this is worse): wanting to pick up the pieces.

Jim is at Simon’s house across town which seems incredibly far away, like Tibet, right now, not that you couldn’t just pick up the phone and call, but you won’t do that. Not after Jim said: “Don’t wait up for me.”

Note: Yes, “don’t wait up for me” is actually code for: “I’m going to Simon’s to get good and plastered, as in absolutely positively shit-faced, which is something I can’t-- or shall I say won’t-- do around you because I’m not going let you see me so fucked-up again, it’s not fair to either of us.”

You want to call Jim up and ask if making you pace the floor of the loft with worry impacted so painfully in your chest that it feels like concrete and it aches to breathe, is fair-- but the phone stays in its cradle and time wears on.

The courtroom had looked much the same as it had the last time you’d seen it; the judge, the lawyers. . .It was all almost exactly the same, like some kind of dramatization, a surreal reenactment; only the faces had changed. What hadn’t changed was the atmospheric sense of helplessness that turned the air to a thin vapor that made you feel light-headed, you couldn’t catch your breath. You sat in the front row just behind the prosecutor’s table and stared at Jim with your hands gripping the edges of your seat feeling for all the world like you were a crash-test dummy waiting for the moment of impact.

But no impact came. There was just Jim, looking pale as he sat getting battered by cruel, flat-affected questions such as: “What was Andrew Hudson’s condition when you finally found him? How long did you continue administering CPR? When he arrived at the hospital, what did the doctors say were his chances of survival? And how long, in fact, did Andrew live?”

When it was over, you knew that, among other things, Jim felt haunted and crowded so you ushered him out as fast as you could into the cold air the smelled like snow. He’d been sweating. A biting breeze gusted up and stung your face, but Jim’s face was flushed. The day had slipped by while you were inside and the sun’s rays were slanted, glinting sharply golden off the chrome and glass of the parked cars that lined the street. In the car, Jim sat with his eyes closed and his head resting back against the seat. If you hadn’t known better, you’dve thought he’d fallen into deep, exhausted sleep.

At home, coming into the loft, Jim stepped away from you as he stripped off his coat. On the way to the bathroom, he peeled out of his suit jacket, started unbuttoning his shirt, and he did not invite you to join him in the shower. Not knowing what else to do, you drifted into the kitchen to make tea. When in doubt, make tea, right? But before the water started to boil, you poured it out, and dumped the kettle sink with a loud clatter.

A long time later, dressed in jeans and a Henley, Jim sat out on the balcony in the cold-- in the dark. You brought him tea then because the air had turned hard and tasted like loneliness. Standing behind him, you wrapped your arms around him, breathing in the warmth of his neck, but he was in a kind of perfect state of pain that had no weak spots, no cracks in the mortar. He let you kiss his temple, and he even turned his head to kiss your mouth, but his touch was remote-- achingly sweet but as far away as the moon. Not long after that he called a cab, took the six-pack out of the fridge, then turned and left the loft.

Now, five hours later, you sit on the couch perfunctorily watching late night t.v. Conan O’Brian is rubbing his hands together looking like a gleefully murderous leprechaun. “We’ve got a great show for you tonight, folks.”

What a psycho.

When the phone rings you snatch it up half-way through the first ring.

“Jim?”

“Hey, Blair.” It’s Simon.

“Hey,” you say, “How is he?”

“He’s fine, he’s fine. He won’t be coming home tonight, he’s sacked out on my couch-- but he’s fine.

You let out a heavy breath and then lean back against the couch cushions running a hand through your hair.

“I-- okay," you say, "I guess that’s okay. If you‘re sure he's all right.”

“Yeah. Yeah I’m sure. He just needed--.”

“. . .Yeah.”

“Blair, he's all tied up in knots--"

"I know. It’s this whole thing with Andy--.”

“No. No, it’s not. This is about him thinking how completely screwed he’d be if he lost you. Andy’s death is hard as hell to deal with, but this is more about him thinking about your death and how impossible that would be. ”

"Oh. . . .Simon. Shit."

"Yeah."

"Doesn't he know I feel the same way too. I almost lost him for real, and that was. . .I don't have words for that."

"Yeah, I know--."

There's an ache in your stomach that feels hot and awful and you can't help but wonder at how often love feels like you've got food poisoning.

"You'll bring him home tomorrow?"

"Sure. Coffee, a cold shower and he'll be as good as new."

"Uh-huh. I'll believe that when I see it."

~~

In bed, alone, you dream that you’re looking for something. You keep opening doors only to find empty rooms and more doors. You grow frantic. You start running. The doors bang open hitting against inner walls, loud as gun shots, but there’s nothing-- nothing but this mounting, desperate need that burns through your body like wildfire. Finally you come face-to-face with a door that’s locked. You grip the knob with both hands and try to turn it, try to shake it loose, try to pull it free with all your strength, but it doesn’t budge. The door is as implacable as a bank vault. Fury rises up through your limbs making you hot and sick, delirious. You kick the door, you pummel it with your fists-- you hate it so damn much. Then, distantly, you hear yourself screaming--really screaming. Your voice is tiny and very far away, but, yes, you're screaming, and the sound is growing louder and louder until its nearly unbearable, it's a scorching roar through your head, and--.

"Jim!"

Daylight splits your eyelids and pushes down into your body like a skewer and you roll over onto gold-dazzled bed sheets to vomit hard-- once, then twice.

Nausea folds around you like a dizzying fog but through it you can feel hands touching your body, strong hands, bracing. You hear a fast, shrill sound and it takes a moment for you to realize that that’s you, breathing, panicking. Then there is warm breath on your cheek, near your ear-- breath that smells of toothpaste, and coffee, and very faintly of beer and-- it’s Jim, his voice telling you that you’re sick. You’ve got a fever, but-- easy-- it’s going to be okay.

“Jim?”

“Yes. I'm right here. I’ve got you.”

The nausea rolls like a tidal wave, your stomach feels wounded, blood pulses painfully through your skull. You gag again and you feel Jim grip your shoulder, steadying you while as his other hand slips up under your tee-shirt, exploring. When his careful fingers press against your abdomen, you cry out.

He’s on his cell phone right after that saying the words “appendicitis” and “ambulance” in the same sentence like it’s some twisted episode of Sesame Street: “Okay kids, let’s all think of scary words that start with the letter “A”: aneurysm, asphyxia, appendicitis, ambulance!”

But it isn’t until later-- much later when the pain subsides some and you’re actually in the ambulance-- that it dawns on you that, oh, shit, you’re on your way to the hospital and Jim is holding your hand and palming your cheek, looking pale and stone-faced, (which means he’s freaking out).

“Hey,” you rasp, knowing he can hear you even though, melodramatically, they’ve got the sirens going. “It’s okay. Appendicitis. . . it's nothing, right? They get these. . . all the time. It’s totally routine.”

The ambulance bounces suddenly and you wince. Jim grips your hand even tighter.

“Really. All the med-students hate it. They’re like:. . . “Aw, damnit-- it’s another appendectomy. . . When we gonna get something exciting like a. . . triple-bypass amputation?”

Jim blinks and then can’t help but smile just a little.

“There’s no such thing as a triple-bypass amputation, Chief.”

“Oh, well, whatever.” You smile up at him, thinking the EMTs must have given you a butt-load of drugs because suddenly, nothing hurts anymore. And Jim-- God, he’s beautiful. Despite everything, he looks great wearing the same blue Henley from last night.

Sluggishly something dawns on you and, “Hey,” you say, looking even more closely at him, “D’ygot your cane with you?”

“What? Oh. . . Um, no. . .I guess wasn’t really thinking about that,” Jim says dismissively, one hand still on your face.

“Shit,” you groan, feeling all the pain come flooding back with the thought of him stuck, stranded an a hospital waiting room without any way to get around. Hearing your breath catch, fear flashes across Jim’s face and he leans in closer saying: “Hey, take it easy--.”

“Call Anna,” you hiss when you can manage speech again, “or Simon. I don’t want you to be alone--”

“Chief, you don’t have to worry about me.”

“Damnit, Jim, I don’t want somebody to just take you over to a chair and then fucking dump you there. You shouldn’t have to deal with that.”

He shakes his head. “I couldn’t care less about that right now.”

“Jim,” you reach up and palm his jaw, caressing his cheekbone with your thumb, “I care.”

He takes your hand in his, cradling it, kissing your fingers.

“Okay,” he nods. “Fine. Yes, I’ll call somebody. Whatever you want.”

You close your eyes.

“Thank you.”

~~

Note: So, hey, guess what? Here’s a news flash: appendicitis is not nearly as big a deal as it used to be. They’ve got this laparoscopic thing now that lets the docs just cut you a few times, making tiny incisions instead of splitting you all the way open. There’s no big scar, no long recoup time. It’s practically Botox. Not that Jim isn’t still half-convinced that you’re on your death bed. He looks calm enough on the outside and he’s devilishly soft-spoken with the nurses who have all fallen madly in love with him, but he keeps adjusting your bedcovers and checking your IV, and casting slightly abashed smiles when you cover his hand with yours to still his fingers.

“I’m okay,” you tell him over and over again, not caring how many times you have to say it, knowing that here, on the heels of having to testify, and Jim's subsequent freak-out at Simon's, his worst nightmare is staging a dress rehearsal. You, on the other hand, can’t stop reliving scenes from the past. Every time you close your eyes you get morbid images of Jim lying in a hospital bed.

Note: It’s been over three years but you remember everything clearly enough. You remember that the walls in Jim’s recovery room had been painted a faded purple that was, no doubt, meant to be “soothing mauve”, but which actually seemed mockingly to match the color of Jim’s bruises.

You remember that, behind Jim’s bed, someone had posted a cardboard sign that said: BLIND PATIENT, in big bold letters like a fucking bulletin board. Some “kick’em while they’re down”, bureaucratic asshole had to go and make a goddamned sign. The first time you saw it you were so furious, you ripped it off the wall and threw it across the room, aiming for the trash can but missing wildly. The second time you saw it-- stuck right back up there on the wall again-- you took it outside Jim’s room and smashed it over your knee braking it into a bunch of little, ragged pieces. And maybe that should have made you feel better but instead you felt utterly useless, and crazy, and so helpless that you had to sit down, right there in the hallway, because your knees decided they were going on strike. You looked down, then, at the cardboard that was scattered all over the waxed tile floor and it was like looking at all the pieces of your fractured life.

And Jim. God. Each time he woke up from his drugged sleep it was like watching a man drown in his own panic, his own darkness, panting, rolling his head around, trying frantically to see. “I can’t-- I can’t--,” he gulped, terrified, “ Blair-- Blair?-- I can’t see!--.”, reaching up to rub his eyes, one hand flailing out for you. “Is it the dial?” he begged, “There must be something wrong with the dial!”

And every time you ended up holding him down, grabbing his bruised face in both hands and talking feverishly to him. Just talking and talking. You leaned in close and crooned to him saying things that you wouldn’t remember later, making desperate promises that you’d never be able to keep. And all the while you had no choice but to glare at the doctors (with their needles full of drugs that might kill him), holding them at bay in whatever way you could.

Those early days had been pure hell. There’s no real way to describe how exhausted and fucked-up you were. You had seizures of rage that made you act like one of those WWF guys on t.v. Once, in the hospital corridor outside Jim’s room, you took a swing at Simon and actually managed to connect with his face, sending a spray of blood from his nose onto the wall. God, how you’d screamed at him, totally out of your mind, blaming him for everything. He’d been the one who’d assigned Jim to go undercover with the most dangerous biker gang in the country. It should’ve been Vice’s case. The gang, (apocalyptically named: The Horsemen), had been pushing Hillbilly Heroin all the way up from Kentucky. If Simon hadn’t taken the case so personally-- if Simon’s god-daughter hadn’t gotten mixed up in the shit and Oded-- none of this would’ve ever happened.

But it did happen. And blaming Simon only hurt the way slamming your head into a brick wall hurt. And you were already so tired. So fucking tired. Simon took hold of your arms after that, his face smeared with blood, and when you met his gaze you wondered how the tears in his eyes could make your vision go all blurry.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Blair,” he'd said. “I’d do anything-- anything-- to take this back, make this right again. I'm so, so sorry.”

That had been a long time ago, granted, and sometimes it felt like it'd happened to someone else-- in another lifetime, but then again, sometimes. . .it felt like just yesterday.

Jim wakes you up by rolling over and draping a heavy arm across your chest. He's deeply asleep, which makes this protective thing he's got going seem all the more elemental; not just subconscious, but seriously ingrained in his psyche. You reach up and stroke his arm. He's been worried about you for days now, a week, even though you're healing up nicely. Your little laparoscopic incisions are still tender but no longer bandaged, and basically, aside from being a little tired, you're fine. Not that Jim is easily convinced of this. He can't seem to get over the fact that, even sitting at home, just hanging out, watching t.v., you're not safe. There's appendicitis to worry about along with gun-wielding thieves, enemies from his past, and faulty toaster-ovens. Life is damn hazardous. Thinking about it too much, a guy's bound to get clingy.

Not that you mind clingy, God knows, you understand. It's a miracle that you ever let Jim out of your sight, much less daily when he walks out the door to go to work. Nighttime full-body hugging, not to mention daytime hovering and Jim asking you every five minutes if you're feeling all right, that's okay with you. That's all fine. But what's not okay-- what's really, very, not fine--is Jim having nightmares.

Note: There have always been nightmares, over the years, plenty of reasons for sleep to turn bad, even before “The Horsemen”, and blindness. But, still, amazingly, most nights are calm ones even for Jim. Because the human mind is a remarkable thing, right? As tough as an Australian Rugby player. It bounces back.

It's just that lately. . .So much has happened in the past few months. Jesus. Talk about kicking a guy while he's down. So much random, bad shit. It's like you and Jim have been living inside a curse, with this appendicitis thing coming as a kind of malicious coup de gras.

In his sleep, Jim inhales sharply, and you know that it's starting, this damn reoccurring dream of his in which he finds you (instead of Andy), tied half-naked to a tree, cold as ice, and not breathing. In this dream Jim can see (of course.  Give one up to cruel irony). He can see that you've been mugged and beaten and shot-up with a load of Hillbilly Heroin. He can see that the tree you've been tied to has grown up through the floor of a warehouse, the warehouse where he lost his sight, roots cracking concrete.

Jim turns his face on his pillow so that he's breathing into your ear, his hot puffs of breath are moist and agitated against your cheek. When he moans, it's a soft sound but you hear such a pure depth of fear in it that you moan too, helplessly, and roll over. God, you can't stand to see him afraid. 

He's easy to move when he's like this, or is it when you're like this? Nothing gets you adrenaline-pumped faster than Jim, scared. So you grab his arm and his shoulder, and push.

"Hey," you say, your voice coming out hoarse because it's your middle-of-the-night voice, your adrenaline-pumped voice, and you look down at Jim who is on his back now. "Hey," you say again, "Jim. Wake up."

He sucks in a startled breath and opens his eyes. The shudder that rockets through his body a second later is from shock; the vicious, slap-in-the-face shock of waking up blind. You've seen this before, countless times, and you will see it again. No matter how many years go by, no matter how consciously reconciled he is to his fate, some deep-down, somatic part of Jim will never fully accept that he can't see.

"I'm here," you say, made breathless by the terror in his face. You palm his chest, his cheek, desperate to connect, to break through the fear. "I'm here. It's okay."

He exhales, shuddering again, blinking frantically.

"Blair?"

"Yeah," You grab his face in both hands and caress his cheeks. "Yes, Jim. I'm right here."

In the darkness laced with moonlight, he looks shrouded and distant, much too far away, so you reach out quickly and snap on the bedside lamp, knowing that even though you can't share it with him, the light will help you focus. But for a moment, illumination only makes things worse, a hellofa lot worse, because, God. His eyes. . .In glaring clarity, the stark fear in Jim's eyes all but knocks the wind out of you, and for one terrible instant you are completely paralyzed by the sight of him, lying there, staring abjectly up at the bedroom ceiling.

Then, finally, with a huge effort, you recover enough to touch him again, slipping one hand behind his neck to hold him there.

"Jim," you say, and hardly thinking, just acting, you reach down and take hold of one of his hands, pulling it up to your face.

He closes his eyes at the touch of his fingers on your skin, squeezes them shut, helplessly, as though the sensation is electric, overwhelming. But, in the next breath, he has palmed your cheek with one hand and is tracing the contours of your face with the other, urgently: forehead, nose, lips, chin, then back up to your forehead again as if to double check, as if he can't quite believe that it's you.

"Blair," he says throatily, opening his eyes again, eyes that are flooded, now, with tears. You nod, grateful that he can feel you do it, because your voice seems to have deserted you. You swallow hard.

His breath is coming out fast, there are dark sweat stains between his broad pectoral muscles; for such a short-lived nightmare, this one has left its mark.

"It's all right. I'm all right," you finally manage to rasp, answering his unvoiced question; a question that seems to exist almost palpably in his unmeetable gaze. "I'm okay. It was a dream. You were having a nightmare."

"Blair, I saw you--you were-- I couldn't get to you.  I was too late--."

"Shhh." You put your fingers to his lips. "No. It's okay. I'm okay. It was just a dream."

Jim's questing hand moves from your face to your neck, your chest.

"I'm sorry," he croaks miserably, "I'm sorry I couldn't--"

"Stop." The word wrenches painfully from your throat, and you lean down to capture his mouth with yours. The kiss is deep and fierce. You inhale hard, feeling your breath shudder. When you break away finally, he gasps and wraps his arms around you, so strong and holding on so tight like it's the end of the world. Like a giant wave is about to swallow you up along with everybody else on the planet-- there goes New York city. There goes the statue of liberty. . .

"Easy," you whisper, "it's all right."

But he's not listening. He doesn't believe you.

And now it's his turn to roll over, bringing you onto your back, adjusting his grip so that he can hold on even tighter. His lips hover over your cheek gusting out fast, scalding breaths...

Appendicitis, terrorists, cancer, carbon-monoxide poisoning: death around every corner, no safe haven in sight. No sight at all. . .

"Jim."

He's shaking now. Is he crying?

You grab his shoulders and push, trying to pry him away enough to look at him, for God's sake. You have to see his face. He's heavy and tense and does not want to move-- but he does, finally-- and when you see him, his face all pinched and twisted-up but dry, no tears falling, you let out a groan of anguish and sit up, intent on one thing. Just one thing: getting behind him and rising up onto your knees so that you can hook an arm around his chest.

He needs to know that you're strong. He needs to know you can hold him up, so that's what you do. And when he leans away instead of toward you, you use your free hand to palm his forehead and pull him back. You palm his cheek too and touch his parted lips. You turn his face up to meet yours.

"Jim. I'm here. I have you," you growl in a voice that defies any defenselessness he might fear is inside you somewhere, lurking. A voice that says: I am not some weak-ass putz who's sitting around waiting to get killed. Yes, the world sucks, yes, it's senseless and cruel and full of hate, but I'm not going down easy, not without a fight.

And when Jim twists around to grab your shoulder, to turn and face you, you can sense his helpless rage, the kind of anger that destroys from the inside out, and you want him to face you. Yes, bring it on.

What happens next is a wordless wrestling match. You rip Jim's sweat-stained tee-shirt off over his head. He cups your neck with both hands and starts kissing you like you've died and then come back to him, somehow, miraculously, afterlife be damned. To hell with heaven. His heat is so intense that his breath feels like steam and his hands, moving now, pressing on your shoulders seer you like brands. You wonder at this heat, where does it come from? From love? Anger? Need? He says your name and you hear the answers to your questions in the sound of his voice: Yes love, yes anger, yes need. . .

He pushes you back, taking charge, shoving you down onto the bed again-- kissing, still kissing-- and reaching for your boxer shorts. When the back of his hand grazes against your abdomen, touching one of your incisions, he moans, deep in his throat as if this touch has caused him pain, and he stiffens.

"No," you gasp, "It doesn't hurt--."

But the fight has gone out of him so abruptly and so completely that when you arch up to kiss his lips again, he shudders and doesn't kiss back.

"Jim. I'm fine," you say almost desperately but, looking up at him, you see that his eyes are clamped tightly shut and he's shaking his head.

"Jim." You cup his face, startled to see hard-wrung tears squeeze out of the corners of his eyes. "Hey. . ."

Damn that god-awful nightmare of his, such terrible images imprinted on his mind, and damn the fragility of life too, and of your own body.

You stroke Jim's face, brushing away his tears. You kiss his forehead, his left temple, his right cheek.

"Hey, shhh," you whisper soothingly, sighing as he leans down to bury his face in the hollow of your neck. "I'm all right. . ."

He holds you in silence for a long time. And you lie there, rubbing his back and gazing up at the glossy black square of the skylight, listening to him breathe, feeling his chest rise and fall.

Finally, he moves, lifting his head. 

"I'm sorry." His voice is contrite, a little foggy.

"S'okay," you smile, watching him, "nothing to be sorry for."

He blinks and then seems to get a little lost, his gaze roving left and then right as though he's looking for you. You touch his cheek stilling him.

"I think about you getting hurt. . .," he starts and then his voice trails off. He can't finish the sentence.

"I know. I can't think about it either. You, I mean."

You take hold of his hand, squeezing his fingers.

"The dream is just so vivid."

"Try not to think about it," you say gently, "concentrate on what's real."

You guide his hand down to your stomach, over the two small incisions there, insisting that he touch them, hoping that he can realize just how insignificant they are.

At first he pulls away reflexively, but then, after a moment's hesitation, he brings his hand back again, his fingertips feather-light on your skin.

"You've lost weight," he says throatily.

"Yeah."

Jim shifts slowly, carefully, moving so that he can lean over and kiss each one of your incisions tenderly. "Eight pounds," he says, straightening up again, speaking softly.

"Jim," you smile, "you only know that because the talking scale announces it to the whole world in an especially loud voice."

Jim smiles too, after a moment, reluctantly. "You hate that scale, don't you?"

"You're damn right I do.  It has a vindictive personality," you say, taking his face in your hands to steer him down to kiss your mouth.

IN TANDEM

If you wake up on Sunday morning to the intoxicating scents of fresh coffee and eggs, and (good God) bacon, know that you're in for it, doomed. Just resign yourself to your fate because there's no resisting him when he does this-- when it's Sunday, insanely early in the morning, and he's made bacon for breakfast. This means only one thing: it means he wants to go for a run.

Note: There's nothing inherently wrong with running, per se. Running is fine, great cardiovascular exercise and you should be proud of Jim for treating his body like a temple, 'cause lord knows you' worship that temple. All those great muscles of his don't just appear by magic, unfortunately. But, oh god, how you hate it-- running, jogging, the pound of the pavement under your feet, the sweating, the wheezing, the piercing pain that eventually stabs you in the side so that you weave exhaustedly, half-doubled over, and almost run into a telephone pole.

This is when Jim finally takes pity on you, when he slows down and asks, infuriatingly (breathing only a little bit hard): "All right, Chief?", like he doesn't know you're about to die. And this is when you'd cuss him out eloquently in five languages with full colloquial color, if you weren't too busy hacking up a lung.

Amendment to note: The true problem is not going for a jog. It's Jim's definition of what a jog really is. To him, a jog is a five mile sprint, preferably across craggy terrain (but he'll settle for sidewalk) wearing a backpack full of canned-goods and survival gear. And again, this would be great, this you'd love to watch, but you can't because, here's a newsflash, you're the GUIDE, and it's your job to keep Jim from running into telephone polls.

Normally, he goes to the gym to work out where there are plenty of very lean, toned women who line up to help spot him while he's lifting weights and who love to partner with him during Judo class. But he won't go jogging with any of these women. He doesn't trust anybody but you to do the tandem running thing (which is admittedly flattering, not to mention impossible--when he asks you do this for him--to refuse).

Don't kid yourself, if you think it's easy for him seek help with something that used to represent pure freedom and independence, a time of meditative solitude, physical and psychic release-- then you're dumber than a box of rocks. In truth, you'd run to China with the guy if he really wanted you to.

Rolling over onto your back, you draw in a deep breath and decide to relish the smell of bacon (which you secretly love and which he knows you secretly love, the bastard). But after a minute of this, you shove up out of bed and make your way, blearily, to the shower.

~~

"Hey."

"Hey." You head for the coffee pot.

"So, uh. I was thinking--." He carries two plates of food over to the table. "Maybe we could--"

"Go for a run?"

"Yeah," he grins, sits down, pours himself some orange juice. "How'd you guess?"

You pluck the crispy strip of bacon he's holding, out of his hand and stuff it into your mouth.

~~

The park is crowded with crazy people. People who habitually get out of bed before sunrise on Sunday morning (probably every other morning too) and put on spandex bicycle shorts. Standing near a water fountain at the beginning of a gravel jogging path, you see a woman run past wearing a sports bra and pants that say "bite me" on the butt cheeks. She is drenched in sweat and looks determined, happy to be torturing herself. You wonder if she's been the victim of brainwashing.

Jim, who has finished filling the water bottles, stashes them in his pack and pulls out the tether (this is really just a wide loop of cloth with some heavy-duty velcro on it). Taking it, forcing yourself not to groan, you wrap it around your right arm above the elbow murmuring: "Okay, let's get this show on the road". Jim puts his backpack on and then slips his left arm in through the loop, too, so that you're linked together.

You've already stalled as much as possible during stretching exercises. Now you have no choice but to run.

"Ready?" he asks. Damn him. He's smiling.

"Oh yeah," you say with all the gusto you can muster. "I'm so ready for this."

"Don't worry, Chief. I'll go easy on you."

You press your lips together in a tight smile. "Mm-hmm. That's what you said last time. Remember what happened last time?"

Giving Jim's arm a little signaling tug, you start running, setting the pace slow.

"What happened last time?" He asks innocently.

"I puked last time!"

"You did not puke."

"I did so puke. I horked. I spewed chunks, man."

"I think you're exaggerating.”

Coming toward you on the other side of the path is a man trotting along with his dog on a leash. The dog is huge, werewolf-sized. You speed up a little. Jim adjusts pace instantly.

"I'm not exaggerating."

"You are exaggerating," Jim says, "you got winded and maybe coughed twice. We stopped and rested. You didn't puke."

The person in front of you is going really slow, doing the mall-walking thing, swinging her arms like a marching band conductor.

"Old-lady alert," you mutter, and start to veer around her, speeding up a little more.

"S'cuse us," Jim says politely as you pass.

And you're about to say something snarky about Jim's concept of "resting" when you see a circus act heading your way. A woman is pushing her baby in a jogging stroller with one hand and holding onto a dog leash with the other. The dog, a big black lab, is barking furiously at something behind the tree line. As they draw near, the dog weaves behind the stroller, then changes direction and cuts in front of it.

"Shit," you curse, jerking Jim to a stop just as the stroller crashes into the dog. There's a yelp, a scream and the next thing you know the stroller has tipped over, the dog is howling and the woman is lying sprawled in the gravel.

"Blair? Jesus. What just happened?" Jim demands, catching your shoulder.

"The baby--."

You take an instinctive step toward the stroller but then feel Jim let go of you and slip his arm out of the tether.

"Jim?"

"Go," he says with an urgent shooing gesture, "get the baby."

"Don't move," You tell him fiercely.

The woman on the ground is getting up, but you reach the stroller before her, just in time to hear the baby start to shriek which, considering head injuries, is a good sign. The stroller has somehow ended up on its side, and kneeling down you can see that the little girl-- maybe two or three years old-- is wearing a bike helmet, thank God. She doesn't look hurt and your fear that she might need her neck stabilized goes out the window when you see her struggling heartily to wriggle out of the harness she's strapped into. You make quick work of unstrapping her and by the time you’ve turned around, her mother is fluttering her fingers at you chanting: "Give her to me. Give her to me."

Then the dog comes over, limping and people are gathering around. A man with a mini first-aid kit is offering the woman bandages for her bleeding knees. Taking a breath, you look around for Jim but the spot he's supposed to be occupying-- where you just left him-- is nothing but an empty patch of gravel with trees behind it.

Hot numbness hits your bloodstream, sweeping through your veins. He's not where you left him. He's not anywhere in sight.

"Jim!"

You spin around, searching in all directions. You see people, faces, spandex, stroller, baby, dog--but no Jim. No Jim.

"Aw, fuck!" someone shouts and you whirl around to see a guy standing beside his bike, peering down over the edge of the path. Sprinting over, skidding to a stop you look down and the world swims dizzily out of focus because, Jesus-god it's steep, a steep drop into dense forest. You see tree trunks and dead leaves, the sleeve of Jim's tee-shirt--

Oh God.

"He didn't get out of my way," the guy with the bike yells, "I was riding fast and I guess I just clipped him and he -- he fell!"

You're already scrambling down the slope grabbing onto whatever you can find for balance as your tennis shoes skid on wet, rotten leaves. There's his backpack. He's lying on his side, not moving. He’s not moving.

"Jim!"

And then you're by him, stepping over his hip carefully-- careful not to touch him Your hands hover over him but don't touch-- don't move him. He's unconscious, his eyes are open, blank, his face slack, white against the slick, brown leaves.

"Call an ambulance!" You scream up at the people standing silhouetted at the edge of the path. Your fingers shake as you reach out and touch the pulse-point on Jim's neck-- which is warm. That's good. Warm is good-- and then you're on your knees, icy wetness seeping through the fabric of your jogging pants. You feel weak, queasy.

You bend over him, looking for blood on his head and there is blood matting his hair and--

He moans and you flinch back, looking down at his face, seeing his eyes flutter as consciousness seeps slowly back into his body.

"Jim? Easy-easy, I'm here. Don't move," you stammer, palming the side of his face that isn't pressed to the ground. He starts to move anyway and you put your hand on his shoulder to still him saying, breathlessly: "No."

"What happened?" His voice is weak, slurred. He is blinking groggily, his eyes a bright, opaque blue. His hand moves, reaching for you. You take it quickly, squeezing.

"Don't move. You hit your head and got knocked out. You need to--"

He starts to roll over onto his back but you grab him frantically.

"No, stop, don't move," you rasp, your voice a shuddery whisper, "An ambulance is coming."

"Blair? What--? I'm. . . ambulance? No, I'm okay," he says, sounding stronger. He pulls his hand out of your grasp and touches the back of his head gingerly. Then he pushes up into a sitting position with such ease that you're too shocked to stop him.

"Jim."

Blinking, he turns his neck carefully, right then left.

"Ow," he mutters, wincing.

"Stop," you hiss, miserably, grabbing his shoulders. "Goddamnit. You probably have a concussion, you need to--"

Jim raises a hand, finds your shirt and palms your chest. He tilts his head in a listening gesture.

"Jesus, Chief, your heart's going a million miles an hour." His hand moves up to your cheek. "Take it easy. I'm okay-- just a little,. . .What happened? Where are we?"

"Halfway down a steep ravine with trees and rocks everywhere. You could've cracked your skull." Tears spring to your eyes, "God, are you sure you're okay? Let me check your pupils."

You take his face in your hands. He flinches a little but then stays still, letting you examine him. You can't do the "follow my finger" trick, but you can see that his eyes look clear, not dilated.

"Okay." You run your hands over his shoulders, down his arms. "tell me exactly how you're feeling? Be honest with me. Are you dizzy? Nauseous? Anything hurt?"

"A little dizzy," he admits, "but I don't think I have a concussion. I don't think I got knocked out."

"You did get knocked out. Believe me. I know knocked out when I see it."

"No. . . I think. . . I was listening to you and that little kid's heartbeat, and I think I. . . zoned."

"Okay, so you zoned and then you got knocked out."

"No," Jim insists, taking hold of your arms. "I didn't. I'm really okay."

You blink at him skeptically. With his head ducked down and tilted to the left a little, he looks like he staring at the ground beside your knee. You reach out and put your hand on his jaw.

"You better be okay," you murmur fiercely. Jim nods.

"I am. I'm hard-headed, remember?" He says with a crooked smile.

~~

You insist on having the EMTs check Jim out. They look at his pupils too and seem confused by his blindness as though they can't quite believe that he was blind before the fall. One of the guys keeps looking around like he's trying to spot a hidden Candid camera. The other one says "follow my fing--" before he catches himself.

"What's a fing?" Jim asks, deadpan.

You're holding his hand in a tight grip but if you're hurting him at all, he shows no sign of it, his face calm and tolerant. It's you who's freaking out, quietly, while you stand beside him watching the paramedics with hawk-like vigilance.

"So he's okay?" You ask when they're finished and are packing up.

"Yeah. Watch him during the next 24 hours for signs of a concussion but he looks fine. Just a little scrape on his head there."

Jim fingers the small square bandage on the back of his head and nods.

"Nothing to worry about, Chief," he says gently.

You swallow and nod, running your free hand through your hair.

"Sure. You're fine. Just took a header off a cliff. But, it's okay, nothing to worry about."

Jim squeezes your hand.

"There you go, Chief. It's good you can joke about it."

"Who says I'm joking?"

"C'mon," he smiles, "let's go home."

He stands up and you hook an arm around his waist.

"Still dizzy?"

He shakes his head. "No."

"Still think this running thing is such a good idea?"

"Running's fine. Falling is over-rated."

~~

Before you reach the car Jim remembers that he used the last of the coffee this morning and suggests going down to that new café on twelfth street.

“They roast their own coffee, I can smell it a mile away. I can smell it from here, actually.”

You really want to go home, but coffee does sound like a good idea, like the next best thing to a shot of whisky at this point.

“Okay, but let’s make it quick.”

Note: ‘Quick’ might have to be revised to ‘sometime this century’ when you get to the café only to find it packed with yuppies and over-achieving college students. You, may take one look inside the place and stand still, stunned by the sheer number of wackos who have chosen voluntarily to leave their beds at-- you check your watch-- it’s not even 8a.m..

“Christ.”

“No open tables?” Jim asks.

“Maybe in the back.”

“Chief, if you want to leave--.”

‘Yes’, you think, but the smell of the coffee is strong enough to be intoxicating. You can even hear it being roasted; there’s a satisfyingly loud hiss and crackle coming from somewhere not too far away.

“No. I want coffee,” you mumble and glance at Jim just in time to see him start to grin.

“Hey, I’m not about to stand between you and your brew.” He raises his free hand like he swearing on a bible. His other hand gives your arm a squeeze and you’re heartened by the strength of his grip and the warmth of his body close to yours. In your mind’s eye you get a flash of him laying unconscious, his face pale, eyes empty, and you shudder. He tightens his grip again.

“Okay?”

“Yeah.” You take a deep breath. “all right. Here we go. You ready? Just follow my lead.”

“Always,” he says gently. He’s such a sap sometimes.

You get lucky and catch a table near the back by a window. A harried-looking guy wearing a tee-shirt and old jeans busses your table. You want to tip him, right then and there.

“Our server looks like he’s staring in an independent film,” you tell Jim after he takes your coffee order and leaves.

Jim’s fingers encounter the little plastic menu on the table in font of him.

“What does that mean?”

“Just that he looks short of cash. And worried. Like an artist. The guy’s a talented but troubled local artist who paints murals on the walls of banks.”

“You can tell all this by looking at him?” Jim quirks a smile.

“I’m a highly trained observer.”

“Oh, well, in that case, ‘observe’ what’s on this menu.” He gives it a tap.

“You hungry?”

“No, just curious.”

“Right,” you flip the menu open. “Oh, hey, cool, they have gyros.”

~~

After your first cup of coffee you end up ordering a blueberry muffin. Jim seems content with listening to your detailed description of the café and the people in it. He laughs when you tell him about the two old ladies behind him who are playing a heated game of checkers. “Imagine Dr. Ruth and Larry King,” you say.

“One of them looks like Larry King?”

“Unfortunately.”

He grimaces, then says solemnly, “I hope she wins.”

“Me too. Keep your fingers crossed, man, seriously.”

Jim picks up his coffee cup and just as he takes a sip there’s a flurry of plastic slapping sounds and then a shaky voice cries: “King me!” Jim chokes and dissolves into a bought of coughing laughter.

~~

Later, walking out of the café into the bright mid-morning sunshine, you glance sidelong and Jim and realize that life is always going to be like this. There will be dangers everywhere, lurking in the midst of even the most seemingly mundane activities. . . But that’s true for everyone, not just for one blind guy and his guide. Looking up at the blue sky, you inhale deeply.

“God, it’s a beautiful day,” you sigh. Jim’s familiar grip on your arm is warm and strong. He tilts his face to the sun.

“Yeah, it is,” he says.