This story refers to a sexual relationship between consenting adult men. If you are under age or don't care for this, LEAVE NOW. As usual, characters from Highlander: the Series belong to Davis-Panzer et alia; I only play with them from time to time without any compensation. No harm; no foul; no profit. Anyone or anything new, however, is mine (left-overs again). Beta-read by Nikki Memmott. Thank you, merci beaucoup, tapadh leat, gracias, danke, grazie, spazebo, arigato. Any errors are mine alone.
June 2001 BRATFA winner.

Seacouver: May, 1997.

T he morning was grey and damp, and a fog bank had rolled in off the water, shrouding everything in its swirling tendrils. Richie Ryan walked purposefully through the cemetery, a bunch of flowers in his hand. He knew his way, having made this pilgrimage twice a year since he was six years old, first in the company of foster parents and social workers, later on his own. He made his way between the headstones and monuments, and finally stopped before a small, simply carved marker.

EMILY GRANT RYAN
1950-1979
Beloved Daughter

Grass had grown up around the stone, and Richie took a pair of garden shears from the pocket of his coat, knelt beside the grave, and carefully trimmed the greenery. He cleaned out the receptacle and settled the flowers he carried into it. There was a single white rose surrounded by yellow daisies. The small white buds on wiry stems were called baby’s breath, he knew, but there were half-a-dozen colorful flowers whose names he didn’t know. Carefully he arranged the bouquet, sat back on his heels to admire his handiwork, then stood in what he hoped was a single, graceful movement.

“I’m sorry, Mom,” he whispered. “I missed the last couple years.” He shoved his hands into this pockets and wrapped the short coat more closely around his slender body. “I was in Paris one year.” His face broke into a smile as he remembered. “I got to race motorcycles for one of the top teams in the world.” He didn’t tell her about dying on the track, or that another man died with him but didn’t come back to life like he did. He’d tried to explain immortality one year on Emily’s birthday, and it was important to him to believe that she understood about him and the life he had to lead. But he knew, deep in his soul, that she would have loved him forever, no matter what.

There was a long moment of silence as he stood beside the grave. He had come just after dawn this year, hoping to avoid the after-church crowd of people who descended on cemeteries all across the country on the second Sunday in May each year. Mother’s Day.

He scuffed his feet on the path, looking like a man-tall child. He lifted his eyes from the name and dates on the stone and looked across the gently rolling hillside. He could almost make out the harbor between the trees at the edge of the cemetery. This spot was perfect for Emily, he thought. Quiet and peaceful — everything she deserved after too short a life.

Still looking toward the harbor, he spoke again. “I’ve found someone special, Mom.” His fair skin blushed beet red. “I don’t know if you’ll understand, though.”

Of course I’ll understand, Richie, he heard in his mind. Tears welled in his eyes, and he blinked them away before he went on.

He closed his eyes and remembered the warm, safe feeling when Emily Ryan knelt next to him and put her arms around him in a massive hug every time he left the house. He couldn’t even go up the block to Andy’s house without that embrace and a kiss on his cheek. “Yuck!” he’d say, wiping the site of her kiss with the back of his hand.

He touched his fingertips to his cheek, feeling again the brush of her lips, and at the same time recalling Methos’s kiss to that very spot, earlier that morning.

“I won’t be long,” the younger man had promised his lover, leaving him snoring in the bed they shared. He sank down to sit on his heels, then sat on the ground and hugged his knees to his chest.

“His name is Methos, ” Richie said quietly. He felt the now-familiar sensation of his heart swelling when he thought of the man whose life, home, and bed he shared. “But I call him Adam . He’s, uh, he’s older than I am. A lot older, but that doesn’t matter.”

He wasn’t sure why he felt comfortable talking to an almost twenty-year-old grave, but he knew in his heart, or maybe in his soul, that whatever it was that had made Emily Ryan the special woman she had been could hear him. “I love him, Mom,” he heard himself saying. He’d never said those words to Methos; before this very moment he wasn’t even sure if those words were true. “He makes me feel special, and loved, and….” He sniffed back a threatening tear. “…and safe.”

He sat silently for several minutes, looking into the distance. As unfocused as he appeared, however, he was acutely aware of everything around him. He felt the breeze coming from his left, and heard the whup-whupping of the flags against the poles. He was particularly sensitive to the gentle thrum from the holy ground beneath him. There weren’t many places he could relax as completely, and there was no other place he dared go unarmed.

“You know, Mom,” he went on. “As old as Methos — Adam is, as much as he’s seen and done, he’s still just a guy.” Richie twisted the cropped grass between his fingers. “At first I kept expecting him to be some sort of wise man who had all the answers.” He ducked his head to his knees, a broad grin splitting his face. “But he doesn’t even know all the questions.”

The crunch of gravel under shod feet quieted him and he sat silently while a middle-aged man passed by. It’s getting late, he thought. There’s gonna be more people around. He didn’t want to be caught talking out loud to his mother’s grave. People would think he was silly, or deranged, probably.

“I guess I just need to know this would be okay with you, Mom.”

The sun rose higher in the sky, chasing the clouds and overcast away. Bit by bit blue sky replaced the fog, and the chilling wind became a balmy breeze. It ruffled through the trees, the leaves still young and green. As he sat on the gravel path he heard the songs and calls of birds in the distance, the repetitive mew of the sea birds and the melodic songs of swallows and warblers.

“He’s never said it, Mom, but I know he loves me, too.” He hadn’t thought about it, the words just flowed from his heart. He knew they were his true feelings, what he truly believed. A random ray of sunlight found the flowers, gilding the fresh blossoms in golden light. An overwhelming feeling of happiness washed over him, and the brightness of his smile rivaled the sun.

“Thanks, Mom,” he said. “I knew it would be okay.”

The presence of another immortal swept over him and for a brief second he tensed, then relaxed, remembering he was on holy ground. Still wary, though, he breathed easy again, once he could identify the aura — Methos.

The tall, black-coated figure strode across the mown grass. “I thought you’d be here, Kid,” Methos said. By the time the older man stopped at his side, Richie was on his feet. They each looked right and left and seeing no one, greeted each other with a quick kiss.

“How did you know?” They held each other by both hands, still facing each other.

“A no-brainer, love. It’s Mother’s Day, and this is your mother’s grave. I told you I’d read your Chronicle.”

“Yeah, I forgot.” He blushed and smiled, happy to be with Methos once more.

“I guess it’s time for me to meet the folks, then.” Methos slipped an arm around Richie’s shoulders, and turned to face Emily’s stone.

“Huh?” Automatically, he reached around Methos’s waist.

“Introduce me,” Methos demanded. He looked back and forth between Richie’s face and the grave.

“What do you mean?”

“You’ve been talking to her, haven’t you? You told her about me?”

Richie nodded, astonished at Methos’s insights.

The older man stepped slightly away from his lover and stood straight and tall at the foot of the grave. He pressed the palms of his hands together and bowed slightly. “Mrs. Ryan, I’m Adam Pierson.”

“I told her your name was Methos,” Richie mumbled.

Methos glared. “My name is Methos,” he amended. He spoke as though Emily were there in the flesh. He stood quietly for a moment, then grasped Richie’s hand, interlacing their fingers. He lifted their joined hands to his lips and softly kissed the back of Richie’s hand. The dark head nodded, still gazing at the grave. “I promise, ma’am, on my life,” he whispered.

“And I thought I was crazy to talk like she was here.”

“She is here.” Methos turned his head so his eyes met Richie’s. “I think it’s like our quickening,” he explained. “Whatever force or energy made her alive and individual — it’s there.”

“That’s why I feel like she’s listening to me?” The young man sidled closer to his lover and snaked an arm around his waist. The strawberry head leaned on Methos’s shoulder.

“Probably.” Methos hung his arm over the shorter man’s shoulders, and they stood silently for several minutes more, then without a word turned and walked away.

“What did you promise?”

Methos’s only response was a raised eyebrow. In a second, he remembered his statement. “It’s nothing.”

“No, it wasn’t,” Richie maintained. “You said on my life . That’s a big promise.”

They reached the road where Methos had parked the SUV next to Richie’s motorcycle. Richie swung a leg over the seat and rocked forward off the kickstand, still holding his helmet in his hands. While Methos fished in his pockets for his keys, Richie pressed him for an answer. “What did you promise?”

Long, elegant fingers stroked the freckled cheek. “I think you know, m’love.”

Richie couldn’t imagine what Emily’s spirit might have asked of Methos. “No, I don’t, Me — Adam.” He fixed the older man with a blue-eyed stare. “Please?”

“If you have to know…”

Richie nodded once.

“What would you expect your mom would ask me to do — if she were alive — ”

“I don’t know,” he sighed, exasperated. “Probably, um, to take care of me?”

One slender finger tapped the freckled nose. “See you at home, love.”

This page last updated
22 August 2002

© 2001 Emma Keigh