Disclaimer: Characters are copyright Jim Grimsely, from his novel Dream Boy.

Notes: DB fic for Piscaria. A oneshot, set about ten years after the end of the novel. The boys finally settle down. Roy misses the south.

Warning: Slash, possible OOCness. I haven't read the novel in about a year, so I apologize for any strangeness in characterizations, and the un-betaed nature of my works. Also, I've quite an addiction to alliteration, as you will see and hopefully aquire a taste for or accept in this instance. realizes she's doing it again, oh hell.

Please note that any southernish-ness can only be attributed to my being forced to read Mark Twain for class. I'm the most Northern/European person you'll meet, south of the Canadian border. dies

Roy spread his fingers, examining the soundless shifting of his suede gloves. "Tell me again why you chose this place?" he asked, words sliding out of his mouth in a plume of white. He nodded toward the long Manhattan street, cut apart by strict avenues and narrow alleys, fenced in by tall, sharp buildings. "No streams, no alfalfa, no front porches to laze about on in summertime. And I haven't seen a single damn cat since we got here. 'Fact, I think this is the most decidedly northern place you' dragged us to since we finished university down in Boston." Roy spat out the name of the city, contemptuous of its memory.

Reaching out, Nathan clasped his hand, and stroked the soft, fabric-covered knuckles with his thumb. A fond, quiet smile graced his lips, accentuated by the fluffy flakes of snow falling between them. The crowded streets were so fully lit as to mimic the daylight that had swiftly fleeted as they stepped out of the airport. Roy's face dimpled to see it, and the way it smoothed the slight creases from his lover's face. He relaxed his hands, and squeezed Nathan's, prompting him to speak.

"Before we moved to your town, there was a time we stopped here, in New York. My father was looking for work at the docks, and we managed to rent a little room with a view of the Jersey shore," his smile widened a bit. "He didn't drink so much, with the job being so precious in a place like this, and so hard to keep with the number of men looking to have it, so we ended up with enough money for a few extra things. I remember going to the cinema a few times, and once he took the three of us to see the circus—which is like the fairs down south only grander and gaudier than anything I've ever seen. He only touched me but one time, when he was sweating over his job application." Nathan's accent had all but disappeared over the years, until he began to speak with a graceful, clipped tone that reminded Roy of the professors back at college. The thought of what was lost—his southern home, his lovely, carefree adolesence—made him more appreciative of Nathan. Together they would be the last relics of that heady, romantic time. They hadn't rightly known each other then, twisting the memory into a kind of fairy-tale with nameless characters, tragedy, and the undeniable magic of young love. The happy memory infused Nathan with a rosy glow, independent of the streetlamps, which was easily transferred to Roy through their clasped hands, so that a pocket more sensed than seen enveloped them. It forced the waves of faceless passerby to divert and break upon them. "Plus," Nathan amended, "There're whole neighborhoods for people like us."

Roy cuffed him on the cheek, and steered him toward a slightly secluded slab of sidewalk. Pressing up against him, he leaned in until their jaws began scraping, and whispered, "Oh, so they've got a special place all set out for perfectly normal folk who're maddeningly in love? Do you s'pose we'll find some lemonade and tabbies when we get there?"

"Mmm," Nathan blushed, and kissed him soundly on the left eyebrow, blowing the fine hairs out of place in a way he knew would tickle Roy near to death. "Whatever you want," he murmured. "We'll buy up a whole second apartment and fill it with cats, if you want. Cats and hay, and all manner of pine boughs." Nathan took his cues from the scents that always lingered in Roy's hair. He figured that Roy spent so much time pining for them that the smells crawled right out of his skin and permeated the air all around him.

Sighing, Roy leaned into him and smiled. "You really love this place…why on earth did you ever leave?" A dark look followed a trailing snowflake across Nathan's face, falling away with it to die among a million others. The smile returned, brither than ever, and as grateful as Roy had ever seen it. Nathan brought him even closer, clinging with all the might of his pale arms, until it was a sight to warm the cruelest, stoniest city heart. It shamed the glittering skyscrapers and shook the people from their hurries, so they could slow down and think of fires and cocoa, and all manner of cozy things they had forgotten to long for.

"Because," Nathan said, with the slight husk of a ripping, raw feeling, "When you finally find a place to call home…why, the only thing left is to find someone to share it with. I just did it all backwards, you might say."

Roy stepped out of the embrace, gripping Nathan's shoulders. His eyes glittered with a mixture of joy and pure mischief, and he turned, waving at every cab that passed the corner. "Well," he said, "Let's start looking for a decent petshop—ye'r starting yer Christmas shopping early, this year." Nathan grinned, catching a bit of the mischief himself, what bubbled up with the unadulterated happiness of being in a new place with the only person who could make it home, so that he skipped a few yards off, and danced a bit across the street—suddenly more of a child than he'd ever been in his twenty-six years.

"Last one to that mess of taxis buys us supper!" He yelled with an abrupt laugh, before turning to sprint down the street. He never once looked back, nor doubted Roy would follow. He hadn't doubted it once in the last decade, in their long journey from a southern fairy-tale to a northern reality, all harsh and huge and beautiful as he'd remembered it.

Oi. I don't know where this stuff comes from sometimes.