Fic: "Next Year" [Due South]

[cherry]

Next Year
By cherryice


Ray Kowalski, July 1983.


This is my much belated entry for picfor1000. Many thanks to gurrier and _bounce_, for beta. Image is behind the cut. Het/Slash.







Next Year
by Cherry Ice

1983 blew into Chicago cold and wet. Stella had a fake ID and Ray had his brother's, so they spent New Year's Eve hopping bars and knocking long necks down, stumbling on the sidewalk and laughing as the snow fell, sticking in their hair and eye lashes. They were both smoking then, Stella's cigarillos easy between her fingers as she talked with her hands, Ray with a cigarette tucked behind one ear.

Ray is thinking about it now, about the snow and the easy curve of Stella's neck as she laughed, thinking about the chill and the way they shivered together, as he watches the sun go down and shadows sweep across the beach. The air is still heavy with the heat of the day, the breeze coming off the lake only the ghost of a whisper. The sand is hot beneath his bare feet and the skin across his back and shoulders tight from a day's worth of sun.

1983 blew in cold and wet but it feels so far away from July; July and the drought that moved in months ago. Corn yields in the southern states are down, he hears every time he turns on the radio, announcers sober between Duran Duran and David Bowie.

Ray and Stella broke up in March. This is the twelve times now. (They love each other and they drive each other crazy but he looks at her and he knows yeah, this is it.)

It's the Fourth of July and there are flags everywhere, hot dog vendors set up along the boardwalk, kids with sno-cones streaked red and blue. Somewhere, just off the main beach, someone has parked their car with the top down and the radio up. There's a blonde girl standing knee-deep in the surf, white bikini bright against tanned skin, and Ray doesn't think of Stella. (She'll be at the ocean, wind tossing her hair into her face, smiling into the flickering light of a bonfire and not thinking of him at all.)

Ray is hot, lethargic and full of sun. The sand beneath his feet is soft and pale, the expanse before him broken by the shapes of driftwood and footprints slowly filling in. Parents are lighting sparklers for their children as the last hazy light fades from the sky, men on the beach heaving driftwood into one central pile. He turns his head away as they light it, orange light building.

Shadows dance across forearms and cheekbones and Ray closes his eyes for a second. He's in his swim trunks, skin tight and prickly, sun warmth radiating outward from his muscles. The car radio is playing Tom Petty, and he opens his eyes slowly, walking down the shore and toward the fire. A girl grabs his hand as he nears and he lets her pull him along. She has red hair and freckles, and they dance, hands low on each other's backs.

They sway as the bonfire builds, flames crackling against the night air as it begins to work its chill fingers toward them. The girl passes him off to one of her friends and he dances barefoot in the sand with blondes and brunettes, with girls with their heads shaved, with laughing boys. The girl in the white bikini puts her hands on his back and leans in close, and he closes his eyes.

"Sorry," he says, and turns away from her, face away from flames. "Gotta take a breather."

Ten steps takes him far enough back that he can breathe, and he flops to the sand, now a cool pressure against his skin. "Here," someone says, and presses a glass bottle into his hand.

"Thanks," he says, twisting off without looking. There's condensation on the bottle and the label is wrinkled from the moisture, but it's perfect, it's exactly what he's been wanting. He takes a pull and feels someone settle close by.

"Ray," he says, looking over. There's a guy sitting beside him, all loose limbs and dark hair. He's drinking, too, fingers pale against the neck of his bottle.

When he catches Ray looking at him he smiles, a long, slow smile that feels like the sun. "Richard," he says, teeth flashing in the night, and extends one hand. It's a press of palms that feels less like a handshake and more like –

(Tobacco smoke filled the bar with an easy sort of haze, television in the corner counting down to New Year's. Stella was laughing, talking about Tolstoy and Bjorn Borg.

Ray was watching her friend Jason, and thinking that if he was a better man, he'd be able to stop wanting.

Stella laughed too loudly and held his hand.)

Ray closes his eyes. When he opens them, Richard is looking at him, steadily, one eyebrow up. "Yeah," Ray says. Swallows. Smiles.

"Fireworks should be starting soon," Richard says, eyes to the night sky. "I know where there's a good view."

"Yeah?" Ray asks, taking another pull from his beer, climbing to his feet. He offers Richard his free hand and pulls him to his feet. Their fingers, between them as they make their way down the beach, brush.

The bonfire fades behind them into the night, stereo fading into the rush of waves and rustle of leaves. Richards places a hand low on his back and Ray shivers, thinks of Stella watching the fireworks with all the other Gold Coast girls, and he stops.

Stops and lets his beer drop to the sand, lets hands ghost up Richard's sides, fingers working beneath the bottom of his t-shirt. They are close, close enough that Ray can feel Richard's breath against his neck. Richard's hands come forward, settle on the jut of Ray's hipbones exposed by his swim trunks.

"Right," Ray says. Grins into the night, a baring of teeth. They come together, mouths and breath and throats as the fireworks start. Red and gold and blue overhead, breath laboured, hands against his skin, and --

Peace. It's a moment of peace.