wednesday.

They didn't have sex at all on Wednesday, just spent the night sprawled out on the couch with Lance nestled sideways against the arm and Chris tucked in between Lance's legs and the overstuffed couch cushions. Two hours of silence punctuated only by the sound of the television later, Chris said, abruptly, "Tell me a story."

Lance realized that if you tilted your head just right, listened with just the right intensity, you could hear what Chris was really saying -- the tell me that it's all going to be all right even if you have to lie wrapped up with you're the only one who's never lied to me and I don't think I could bear it if you started now. It took him a long moment of thought before he opened his mouth, and even he didn't really know what he was going to say until he heard himself speak.

"There's a story I learned when I was in training in Russia, even though it isn't Russian." He bit his lip, and shifted his hips to get more comfortable. Chris didn't look up at him. "There was a god. Baldur. He was the god of beauty, and innocence, and purity, and peace. Every creature in the world loved him for his perfection, but Baldur began to dream about his own death, and told his mother of his fears. His mother Frigg traveled the world, and made every creature, every item in the world swear that never, never would they harm Baldur."

It was slow going; he had to translate in his head before he spoke, and he knew that his speech was coming out stilted. There were still, even after all these months, some things that only graced his thoughts in Russian. "All things except one; his mother didn't ask a single plant, the mistletoe. It was a young plant, and wouldn't know what she asked it. And when Loki, the god of mischief, heard about this, he made a spear out of the mistletoe bush.

"The Norse gods were direct creatures, and not subtle at all. When they heard of Baldur's invulnerability, they designed a new game. They would all gather in their hall and hurl things at Baldur, for the fun of watching their missles bounce harmlessly off of their brother. And Baldur smiled his beautiful smile, and spread his hands, and let them have their fun, no matter how much he wished only to be left alone in peace, because he knew that to them, the game was a way of paying him respect.

"And yet, Baldur's brother, the blind Hod, god of darkness and winter, stood alone in the corners of the hall, weeping, because he could not see to join in the game. Loki came up behind Baldur's elbow and asked, 'Brother, why do you weep?' 'For I cannot see to honor my brother in this game,' Hod replied. 'Weep not,' said Loki, 'for my aim is true, and I will guide your arm.' And Hod took to his feet, and took the spear that Loki pressed into his hands, and with Loki's guidance, loosed the spear that killed the god of beauty."

Chris had his eyes closed; the shift and play of light and shadow from the television set his features into sharp relief. Lance thought that Chris was, perhaps, the most perfect thing that he had ever seen. "And the gods placed Baldur on his ship, and set it on fire, and thus sent him on to the underworld, but beauty had gone from the world, and the gods found it barren and bare without Baldur's presence indeed. His mother went to the goddess Hel, overseer of the underworld, and asked for her son to be released. And Hel said, 'If it is true that all the world mourns the death of beauty, let all the world weep for Baldur, and I shall let him free.'"

Lance closed his eyes so that he didn't have to look at Chris's face, and tried to give the story the same sad hope that the old man in Moscow had managed to convey. "And so, as Frigg had once traveled the world to gain a promise, she traveled again to gather tears, and as everything had sworn, so did everything mourn. Until Frigg came to a giantess sitting on a rock, and said to her, 'Weep, weep, for Baldur is slain, and beauty shall not return to this world unless all the world mourns it.' The giantess looked at Frigg, and said to her, 'I weep no tears for Odin's son; let Hel keep what Hel has claimed.'

"And later, the gods discovered that the giantess had been none other than Loki in disguise, and so they bound him with chains and imprisoned him in a cave, where a serpent's venom drips endlessly into his eyes and he quakes the earth every time he trembles; but Baldur still dwells in Hel, where the honored dead may look upon his beauty, until the day of Ragnarok, when he shall rise again and rule the world hand in hand with Hod."

Chris was quiet for a long, long time. Lance was just beginning to wonder if Chris hadn't understood, if Chris mistakenly thought that Lance was telling the story as a way of saying that there was no way to win, when Chris let out his breath all at once, shivered, and relaxed. "Yeah," he said, nothing more. Lance closed a hand over the back of Chris's neck and held on until the network faded to endless infomercials.

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