(Before you read this story, please click on my name to go to my author's page. There is an explanatory note that will help connect my stories. Thanks for reading! - Rob)
"There never was a better bargain driven." Sir Philip Sidney
(Note from Sean: "These two letters were found among Dan's personal effects. The first was written on the occasion of Dad and Dan's twenty-fifth anniversary. They had gone to Europe again, and they were staying in the Opera Suites, where they had stayed in Vienna on their first trip together. The second letter was written in Houston six years later, near the end. I kept the first letter and made a copy of the second.")
Dearest Jack,
I can hardly believe that it's been twenty-five years since we were married. So much has happened in that time. Sometimes, when life is stressful, the years drag by slowly. Sometimes, in happy times, even "normal" times (whatever that may be), the years fly by so quickly that it takes my breath away.
As I watch you sleeping in our bed in our hotel room, I don't think so much about all the things that have happened in these years, the thirty years since I first met you. What I do think about is you. How you have shaped me. How you have always been my rock, my anchor.
When my friend Ian was killed in that horrible train wreck. When the hurricane nearly destroyed our home. When you supported me through my heart surgery. Things that, before you, would have probably devastated me, were actually turned into times of growth. Your love for me has always been the rock-bottom fact of my life, and my love for you has been a natural response.
After we made love last night (it's heartening to know that two old men can still be that frisky!), you fell into peaceful sleep. I stayed awake for a while, just watching you in wonder. You are a passionate and tender lover, the wisest man I've ever known, full of humor and kindness, with a heart that gives and gives without expectation of return.
I sit here, still feeling you in me, and I know that however much our bodies are joined, our hearts are joined even more deeply. You amaze me, Jack Middleton, my heart of hearts, my love, my joy, the one who makes me a better man.
