Disclaimer: WEP owns Voltron. Cyndi Thomson owns the song. I own my CD collection.
I Always Liked That Best
The spring sun was bright, but not terribly warm as Lance exited the castle. It was about midmorning, early for him. The air was crisp, freshly washed in the aftermath of the night's rain, and he took a deep breath. He smiled faintly as it seemed to recharge his lungs, and stretched carefully, wanting the item he'd tucked inside his jacket to remain hidden. It was a secret.
Ambling almost aimlessly, he made his way across the bridge, underneath the lion monument at the other end, and along the lakeshore. The trees dripped on him occasionally in the breeze, cold water sliding down the collar of his jacket, and the wet grass soaked his pant legs. From time to time, he looked around himself, to regain his bearings, but mostly, he kept his eyes fixed on the ground just in front of him, while his mind turned inward. His face was blank, his thoughts unreadable.
After several minutes walking, he reached his intended destination. From the top of the knoll, he had a view of the castle and lake, each glittering in the slowly strengthening sunlight. An ancient tree stood hulking behind him, alone.
Just like me, he thought, then shook his head, pushing down the weak anger that tried to rise. Don't think about that just yet. He's left, he's gone, even though I still cry . . . and I can't even think his name without wanting to. He rested his back against the rough bark, staring up at skeletal limbs, just starting to leaf out for the spring, past them at the bright blue sky.
Finally, he gathered his resolve and reached inside his jacket. The cheap notebook he pulled out was battered and old. The cover was hanging onto the wire spiral by a few threads, and threatened to come off in his hands as he opened it. He smiled at the first page, covered in a rather childish scrawl, and sank to the ground, unmindful of the damp. Slowly, he turned the pages, reading snatches here and there.
Several sheets of loose paper fell onto his lap, but he didn't unfold them, merely slipped them back between the pages. It was music paper, on which his lover had scribbled the notes for his songs. Each melody was imprinted on his memory, as was the sight of his lover hunched over his guitar, dark hair falling into his eyes, trying to translate the music in his head to the strings. He knew the lyrics by heart, too.
I ought to, he thought, a touch wryly. After all, I wrote them.
What a pair of hidden talents we are. No one knows I write stories, and poems, and . . . no one knows what a beautiful voice you have . . .
Abruptly, Lance turned to the last few blank pages, right at the end of the notebook, and caught the pencil that dropped out. It's been so long since I've even thought of this notebook, he thought, studying the empty page for a moment. But the words had started pounding in his head last night, demanding to be released, and this was the only way. The music filled his head, slow and sweet, the last his lover had written for him, one to which he'd never gotten around to writing the lyrics. He sat motionless, the tip of the pencil hovering over the paper. Waiting.
He paused, chewing on the end of his pencil. His smile grew when he realized what he was doing. "No, I'm not a chipmunk," he said in mocking response to the voice he heard only in his imagination, asking the question in a slightly annoyed tone of voice.
He could still remember the way his lover's hair had tickled his nose when they stargazed together. And they'd always been stargazers, long before they admitted their love, long before the academy. Wanting to fly among the stars . . . their earliest dream together. They'd lain on the hill behind Lance's house and looked at the stars for hours, often falling asleep there.
Later, on Arus, it had been an excuse for getting away from everyone, and making love outside. That had been fun, too, even if it had been raining, like last night.
That drew him into another memory, of a rainy day on Earth, not long before they'd been ordered to Arus. They'd taken a ride on Lance's motorcycle, and gotten caught in a storm. He could remember his lover hanging onto him for dear life as he'd revved the bike around corners at high speed, water spraying, risking death.
He smiled sadly down at that. Their kisses had always been wet. They hadn't always been as frequent as they would have liked, but still . . . very satisfying.
The words covered the paper faster now, as the memories filled his mind.
That had only happened once. It had been while his lover had been gone from Arus. Missing him terribly, he'd let himself into his lover's room, and crawled into the bed, inhaling deeply of his scent on the pillow. It had been very faint, so he'd reached out for the pajama top, thrown carelessly over a chair, and had curled around it and wept himself to sleep. It had been such a depressing time that he hadn't mentioned it to his lover upon his return, and he'd never tried it again.
It was always better to have the real thing, anyway.
"Lance? What are you doing?"
Lance started at the voice. He'd been hearing only the inner one for so long that he'd nearly forgotten that there were others in the world. When he looked up, Allura was smiling down at him, the sun behind her.
"Hi, Ally. I was just . . . writing." He started to close the notebook, but she snatched it out of his hands.
"I didn't know you wrote!" she said, starting to flip through it.
"Hey, give that back!" Rising, he made as if to grab it, but she held it behind her, out of his reach, grinning mischievously at him.
"What were you writing?" she asked, looking up at him, her blue eyes wide and innocent. Just as if she weren't standing there, flipping through my most private thoughts, he thought venomously. "Can I read it?"
The fight went out of him, and he slumped down again, back against the tree. "Oh, all right," he said grudgingly. "Go ahead." She hadn't actually looked at anything, he realized, but had just flicked the pages with her fingers. She had been looking at him for permission the whole time she teased him. "It's the last thing."
She sat down beside him, her legs curled under her, leaning against the tree as well. I'm not going to watch her, he told himself. But his eyes flew from the now-dry grass to her face when he heard her intake of breath, and he saw she was grinning at him again, her nose wrinkled.
"Your writing is so neat!" she exclaimed. "Knowing you, I would have expected something much messier."
He rolled his eyes. "Just read it, if you're going to."
"All right." She settled back, her eyes on the page now. He half-turned away from her, but couldn't stop himself from watching her out of the corner of his eye. He saw her smiling, but the nervousness, the insecurity of letting someone, even a friend, see his raw feelings wouldn't leave.
Her smile grew, and he tried to see the words through her eyes, tried to untie himself, just for a moment, from the memories that had forced them to the paper. They were happy times, he reminded himself. Before everything went wrong.
Then her enjoyment faded. She frowned, biting her lip, and he closed his eyes, knowing she'd reached the last verse.
"Lance . . ." He opened his eyes again, and saw tears rolling down her face as she looked at him. Quickly, he glanced away, out toward the lake, blinking rapidly. Her arms encircled his neck from behind.
"Lance . . . it's beautiful," she murmured.
"But?" he asked, more harshly than he'd intended.
She winced, and for an instant, he was sorry. Then she continued softly, "But he's dead. He's gone. We all miss him, and I know it's hard for you, but you have to move on."
"I can't, Ally," he whispered. "Every moment, I expect to hear his voice. Every time I turn around, I expect him to be there. There are days when it hurts so much that I can't even make myself get out of bed." The tears that had been burning his eyes slipped his control and started to fall. "I . . ."
"I know," she said, barely audible. "I have days like that, too."
For a few minutes, they leaned against one another, each shedding silent tears. Then Lance took the notebook from her lax fingers, and ripped out the last few pages covered with his neat script. Allura gasped as, very deliberately, he tore the pages into small pieces and tossed them into the air. The breeze that had been drying out the air caught hold of them and they fluttered in a hundred different directions.
"Lance! What . . ."
"You're right, Ally. It's time to move on." He watched the white scraps of paper for a moment, and felt the heaviness that had been weighing him down start to ease, just slightly. When he faced her, he was smiling . . . and it was the smile he'd worn before Keith's death. "Let's go."
***
March 12, 2002
© randi (K. Shepard), 2002.