August Corcoran was unmistakably dead, and that was that.

That was the thing Lance Dyer thought of before anything else. It was, in fact, all he could think of, that August Corcoran had died, because seeing so much death in your life may make it easier to see the bodies of those who had passed, but it also gives you a greater appreciation for their life and for the great loss that has been suffered. Some may have said that Lance was too soft for the job— that perhaps his care might make it more difficult to see things as they were, but Lance only thought it would help to give closure to him and the loved ones of the deceased.

Lance dipped his head in a silent respect to the ermine. Lance was intruding on his space, after all. And, while Lance did not specifically believe in any higher power, he had not entirely ruled out the possibility that August might be somewhere now, watching him, because he understood that there are things about this life that were never meant to be understood.

Yet, it was Lance’s job to understand, and he did that job very well.

The chair on which August Corcoran was slumped, much like most other things in the small apartment, could be seen from the door. It faced it, even, almost as though it was greeting any guests. Though, with the state of the apartment, it would have rather surprised Lance to come to the conclusion that August had very many guests. It wasn’t as though things were strewn about, in that messy and unwelcoming way he had found so many scenes in before, with the sorts of people who holed themselves up in their apartments for weeks on end as they slowly deteriorated. There were no scraps of food, no stains of any bodily fluids, of which Lance was thankful, as he had seen all kinds, no cigarette butts or beer bottles piling up. And Lance noted each of these things with some assurance to himself, as he thought it was just as helpful to define a scene by what was missing just as much as what he saw, because in this particular instance it could help him gather the picture of someone who led a life that was, in some ways, put together, and, in some ways, healthy.

It was those unwelcoming details of the room that gave him pause in defining the ermine fully.

August wore a collared shirt and slacks, though the collar was unbuttoned and even up around the back of his neck, in a way that Lance suspected he was not privy to. The wrinkles gave a clear reason for the slight fraying of the threads, though that fraying was especially prominent around the cuff. Compared to the right, it clung much less tightly around his wrist, even given that both were buttoned. The left was fastened to the cuff by a loose thread of yellow, contrasting, as Lance saw it, with the deep blue of the shirt itself, and certainly not matching the black by which all of the other stitching was done.

The shirt hung fairly loosely, as Lance noticed, particularly in length, as though it were intended to be tucked in. And, to that expectation, it was, bunching up below his belt only behind his waist.

That belt, itself, was in poor shape, or perhaps just well loved. A few additional holes of what must have been the ermine’s own creation extended past those that were manufactured into it, and even that furthest one seemed as though it wasn’t quite enough to hold the garment to him with any sort of security, and, judging by the bunched up waist of his pants, that was something he needed.

Finally, Lance noticed, the ermine sunk heavily into the plush below him, so much so that the very top of its tan fabric covering was nearly higher than the tops of August’s thighs, at least on the outer edges of the seat.

Lance wanted not to look very much further, as this was all he could gather without further invading the personal space of the ermine, who might not have smelled particularly great while he was alive. He was also meant not to disturb the body, to preserve the scene, and he had every intention of doing so.

The room at large was rather empty. A couch, looking much newer than all else in the room and very out of place in its brighter coloring, sat along one wall. A table in front of it looked as though it’s owner had been passed for far longer, seeing many seasons of loneliness in its thick layer of dust. In one corner towered unrealistically high piles of papers and letters and envelopes and all sorts of things one might toss aside and never look at again, but Lance was quick to discover that that wasn’t the only sort of note. Indeed, there were three piles set about and each had a very specific purpose. The tallest by far seemed to contain the most eclectic and colorful envelopes and cards.

Lance learned more about the town than about August Corcoran. He learned about the new donut shop a few blocks away, and he learned that the town was rebudgeting its taxpayer dollars and where he might be able to attend a meeting, (since passed), to give his word, and he learned, if the touting praise on the postcard were to be believed, who would get the job done with the best rates and make sure it was done right if he needed a plumber.

The second biggest pile, just to the side of that first, held a slightly more uniform look in color and size of its envelopes, and some were even torn open at the top, though those were mostly those on the bottom of the pile. In the middle, each envelope was opened, carefully and neatly, with a blade with an edge sharp enough that it took even an astute caracal like Lance a few passes to realize they’d been opened at all.

Then, the top half of the pile sat entirely unopened.

Lance could easily determine what sort of letters these were, though, even if he hadn’t been able to open all of those at the bottom. ‘Hill Family Mortgage,’ ‘Faulkner Medical Group,’ and ‘Zee and Associates Lending Firm’ gave Lance an idea before he could even parse them ‘URGENT’ in bold red lettering.

Sitting right between that second pile and the only space on the table free of that thick layer of dust was the third and final pile, this one the most curious of all. It was perfectly uniform, every single letter the same boring white and the same standard size. Each and every one remained sealed, as though August Corcoran didn’t want their secrets, though to know so assuredly that he didn’t would lead one to believe that he knew very well what was inside. And it would be rather difficult not to, as they were addressed to August Corcoran from ‘National Center for Disability Insurance.’

Lance Dyer, being a wise young man, nodded with a sagely look towards the resting August Corcoran, and looked over the room one last time. He inspected the couch, but found nothing. He found nothing under the table, and nothing else interesting about the ermine himself. And that was that. There was no television for him to inspect, to see what channel might have come on when it awakened. There were no art pieces or decorations or even a clock for him to glean anything from. Just a dim light, an ugly couch, a dusty table, an old recliner, and a dead ermine.

With another dip of his head, to bid August Corcoran farewell for now, Lance Dyer found his way to the kitchen.

He felt stifled the moment he stepped inside. There was just enough space to walk, and very little more. It didn’t help that there were no windows, no openings of any kind apart from the one that allowed Lance into the room. The ceiling was low, and the cabinets which lined both walls felt as though they were jutting out into the space meant for him. The fridge couldn’t open at the same time as the oven, though both could hardly open very far at all without touching the counter on the opposite side of the walkway.

Dishes filled the sink, even going so far as to spill out into the counter itself, though still managing to confine themselves into one small corner. The only other thing on the counter, anywhere at all, was a bowl, etched glass or something of the like made to resemble crystal but certainly not the real thing, stacked high with oranges and peaches and apples that looked plenty fresh, as though they’d been picked that very day.

Yet, in stark contrast, the fridge was near empty, and the freezer full of only single serve frozen meals, certainly not implying an interest in his health or particularly fresh food.

It seemed as though he wasn’t just trying to make a change all too late, though. A search through the trash can, (a favorite of Lance’s, as very little can tell you more about a person), revealed that it was a long time habit. Indeed, the nearly full bag was layered very neatly. A discarded TV dinner, atop an orange peel, atop a discarded TV dinner, atop an orange peel, and on into the very bottom. August Corcoran, it seemed, was a creature of habit. Lance had suspected as much, but a look through someone’s trash will always tell you something, and he was rather glad to have that fact confirmed.

Very little else in the kitchen was of interest to Lance, though, apart from that seeing the mess that was the ermine’s stovetop reminded Lance that his own needed cleaning.

Suddenly, the kitchen was filled with music, the sort of which the apartment, as Lance thought, very well might never have heard. It was a pop song, the chorus of the number one pop hit from a few months before. Lance didn’t usually enjoy that sort of music, but, sometimes, one just stuck out. It was certainly rare that anyone used music of any sort as a ringtone any more, and that was especially true for text messages, but Lance enjoyed the brightness it might bring to his day.

Rousseau wanted an update. It had always bothered Lance how impatient his boss could be, but he knew what they said about squirrels. He just liked to be meticulous, and for his work to be uninterrupted. And, for all the complaints about the time it took Lance to complete his search of a home, Rousseau had never once complained about what he gathered in his time spent.

At times, Lance didn’t bother to text Rousseau back, knowing that he’d have his answer soon enough. But something about August Corcoran wasn’t making sense to Lance, and, while he could find his answer at any time, he still wanted to learn whatever he could. He owed it to the ermine.

If he was going to rifle through August Corcoran’s things, to invade his personal haven in which he spent so much of his time, Lance wanted to do him the justice of making certain to contact anyone who he would want to know of his passing, and to make sure to portray him accurately as the man he truly was.

There wasn’t much that Lance felt comfortable writing in stone yet, so a small update would have to suffice for now, and he gave it with some difficulty in finding just the right words.

Lance, not the sort to dwell on things for very long, dove right back into his work as the text was sent, and found himself in the bedroom of the deceased.

The bedroom, at times, could tell you everything you needed to know at a glance, and, at times, required some very serious digging around. Knowing what he knew of August Corcoran, Lance Dyer suspected the latter to be the case at hand, and, he saw upon entering the drab room, that he was correct. The walls were that same eggshell color many homes or apartments or new rental properties seemed to love, if only because of how universally boring it was. The sheets of his bed were gray, as were the pillowcases, as were the blankets, of which there were several in their own little piles on the bed, as though one each one had been given its own turn and unceremoniously pushed aside. A lamp on the side table was already on. And, the room looked very open in that light, only just bright enough as the rest of the apartment was, because very little else was in it at all. Lance thought it was strange to find an apartment with no television in sight at all, and no sign one had ever been there, but that was certainly the case. Instead, the top of August’s dresser was lined with a very modest collection of books, neatly lined up between two rather minimalist bookends.

Each and every book looked nearly untouched. There was not a crack in a spine, and not a corner was bent, like each and every one was on display for Lance to buy, brand new and enticing, and opening one gave Lance the very same sensations, new book smell and all.

Two books sat outside of the bookends, though, almost lovingly laid out atop the dresser, that were nothing like the rest. To call them well-loved would be doing them a disservice. The first, a hardcover copy of a book Lance had never heard of, titled ‘The Threat to Our Lives.’ Many of its pages were dog-eared, or had clearly been at some point, and even the edges of the cover itself were starting to come apart, as though it had been shoved into a bag, perhaps time and time again. The book certainly was old enough for it. At least 30 years, by Lance’s estimation, maybe more. And, indeed, a glance inside the cover told him he was right to think it could be more— 1984 was the publishing date, before even Lance himself, but not August Corcoran. The ermine, if Lance was any better at estimating ages of people than books, (which, he thought, he was), would have been somewhere between his late teens and mid twenties when it was published.

Lance allowed the book to fall open where it might, right to whatever page saw the most love. He had to hold back a snicker, though, when the page was titled, as bold as what Lance had assumed it was claiming, ‘The Homosexual Agenda.’

Lance didn’t need to read the text under it to understand what it was trying to say. His knowledge of what the world was like at the time served to tell him all he needed to know in that regard. He was far more concerned with the highlighting, the underlining, the notes in the margins, much of which made some portions of the text almost entirely illegible, when they bled through the back side, or when the book might have been closed too soon after dropping the pen. Some of the text, too, was blacked out with a bit more intent.

But those notes weren’t quite notes at all— they were a conversation. If the responsive tone of much of the words weren’t enough to indicate as much, the vastly differing handwritings were. The first writer wrote in a very practiced script and with a steady hand, and it was clear that any smudging that happened occurred after the fact. The second writer interested Lance Dyer far more, at least stylistically. Some of their words ran into each other and in a very loose and fast style, while others it was clear by the pressure of the pen alone, enough to sometimes bleed through a whole page, that they were making a concerted effort to slow it down and keep it neat. It was rare to find the two styles in one note, and, for the most part, the styles would switch every few notes.

Despite the intensity of the rhetoric contained in the pages, both writers seemed to be having fun. Whether they were refuting the words contained in the passages, or perhaps they were mimicking the haughty tone the original author took. The words, full of hatred, and bile, and fear, became something for them to find joy in. The joy of life, Lance thought, and the joy of living it the only way you knew how.

Lance allowed the book to close gently, deciding that he had learned all he could without carefully reading through the margins of every single page, and turned his attention to the second book, a much smaller one by the name of ‘Fun Home.’

His strategy of testing where a book wanted to be opened to proved useful once more, when Lance found a small folded piece of paper right around the center, between two pages that were entirely clean of dog-ears or folds or slight tears, as though they’d been protecting the page within. Though, if they had been, Lance thought, they weren’t doing a very good job– the folded paper seemed about to come apart, each fold looking as thin as if it had been folded and folded again hundreds of times.

Lance was even more careful than he thought possible as he unfurled the page, laying it out flat on the dresser to read to himself.

My Dear August,

My apologies for reaching out to you.

On my way to work every day, (as a bartender if you can believe), I pass this adorable little queer bookstore, and I can’t help but think of you. I’ve had to keep myself from walking in, though, because I knew this would happen if I did, but, you can probably tell, I couldn’t help myself this time. I found this in the New Releases section, and the lady working there, (an ermine, I think, which absolutely did not help in the moment), saw me looking and began to describe it to me. I know you’re usually about the novels, but it sounded very interesting and I thought I’d try one last time to get you to branch out into my zone a little.

I’m realizing now that sending this is a little stupid, but, if this makes it to you, I also decided that I care more about getting in touch with you again than feeling like an idiot. The book can be your birthday gift, to give this all an excuse.

You can throw the book away, or donate it, or whatever, but I also bought a copy and if you decide to read it and decide you want to talk about it, emailing me is faster than sending letters, so my email is [email protected].

I’d love to talk to you about Auburn some time.

All the best,

Nathaniel

P.S. Drafts 1 through 3 were, in fact, even more awkward than this one. I decided it probably wasn’t going to get much better.

The script was rigid, certainly as stiff as the postscript implied the writer might have been upon its writing, but it was unmistakably the very same writer as whom Lance had dubbed the first in the other book, underneath that nervous twinge.

Lance thumbed through the book for any other signs, but learned that, apart from that it had been read over and over, there was nothing extra to learn about August, or even about this Nathaniel, within its pages. He folded the page, again treating it as though it could break apart with just the slightest tug in just the wrong way, and tucked it safely back where he had found it.

He had his first lead. A Nathaniel, presumably Lyon, who had lived in Auburn. That lead gave him a task, too. If he had emailed Nathaniel back, August Corcoran must have been hiding a computer with which to do so somewhere.

Lance Dyer, expert that he was, knew just where to look, and was rewarded right away when the drawer to the bedside table revealed a small brick of a laptop and the charger to go with it. Unfortunately, trying to turn on the device left him feeling far less accomplished than he’d felt moments before, because everything he had learned about August Corcoran so far should have told Lance that the ermine was not the sort to need to ensure his laptop was ready at a moment’s notice. Even plugging it in and trying to turn it on proved fruitless, as the ancient, blocky thing only got as far as a screen with a red, empty battery flashing across it before shutting back off again.

The light on the side indicated to him that it was, in fact, trying to charge, though, so Lance set it down in the hopes that he might be able to return to it later.

As he was ready to walk away, something appeared to Lance out of the corner of his eye, peeking out from under the piled blankets, at an angle he’d never have seen before.

When he moved the soft, heavy fabric, he discovered not one, but two treasures. If the laptop didn’t work out, he thought, at least he’d discovered something important. A cell phone, and an ereader, the latter far more up-to-date than the former, and both certainly moreso than the laptop. And, to Lance’s surprise, both came to life with no outside aid.

He tried the cellphone first. If you could guess a person’s pin, the most important information you could gather in Lance’s line of work, the most contacted persons of the deceased and the best avenue to contact them, was right in your grasp. Yet, it required such an intimate understanding of them, of what was important to them, because, in Lance’s experience, it was incredibly rare for someone to choose a number that meant very little.

And, again, Lance realized that he should have thought about August Corcoran just a little more, because, before he could even decide what to input first, the phone unlocked for him. What would a man who hardly ever left his home need in the way of privacy?

And, what would a man who hardly ever left his home need in the way of privacy when he had less than 10 contacts?

A quick scan through them yielded none of the usual suspects one might find in a contact list. No contact labeled Mom, or Dad. No Aunts, no Uncles, nothing that could even, as far as Lance could tell, be a sibling or a cousin. Seven of the contacts were labeled Doctor, and one a bank. One, to Lance’s relief, was labeled Nathaniel. And, the last, ‘Emergency.’

That, he assumed, was an old man’s archaic way of giving himself a speed dial for the emergency services if needed, but that wasn’t it at all. It was a real phone number. Lance thought he knew much of area codes, particularly local ones, but this phone number rang no bells. And, indeed, upon looking it up, Lance felt no surprise at all in learning that belonged to a suburb of Auburn. Lance had had to search the internet for phone numbers many times, and learned all of the terrible and private things you might be able to find with just that little. A name, an address, employment history, whatever you’d like.

It restored Lance Dyer’s faith in the world when he found nothing, and yet, in this particular instance, it arose a deep frustration. He suspected what the number might be, and the only way to receive any sort of confirmation would be to call it himself.

He made a policy of not doing such a thing before leaving a house, though. Returning with anything less than the full picture would be an insult to August Corcoran’s memory, and Lance Dyer held the same deep-seated hope that someone else wanted that memory so badly. Yet he knew that, sometimes, he walked away from a scene the only one who cared. But he always cared.

A return to August Corcoran’s phone showed he was not a texter, as Lance would have predicted. His inbox was incredibly similar to the physical one held outside in the living room– notifications of bills, advertisements or spam, and the like, with no personal messages at all.

The call history told a different story, though. August Corcoran almost never answered a single phone call, at least not for the past few years, and he made them even more rarely. Scrolling back that far took very little effort, too, as communication was fairly rare. Doctors, he’d occasionally call, and pick up their calls, though, again, more rarely in recent years, and he never once answered a call from a number not already in his contacts. But every week, without fail, there would be a call from Nathaniel, and, every week, without fail, August Corcoran would pick up. The earliest call on the phone was one such, in 2013.

Abruptly, though, the pattern changed in early 2020. One week, there was no call from Nathaniel, and, instead, August Corcoran had made the phone call, once, twice, three times with no answer.

Then, one call to ‘Emergency.’ ‘Emergency’ called back the next day, and there was no more communication after that between ‘Emergency’ and August Corcoran, nor was there between August Corcoran and Nathaniel Lyon. For over a year, until his death, August Corcoran did not answer a single phone call.

A completed picture was beginning to take place in Lance Dyer’s mind, though it wasn’t one he was very happy with, so he quickly replaced the phone in his paws with the ereader.

August Corcoran liked stories of all sorts. It seemed there wasn’t a story he would not try. The worn down sides of the device where August might have kept it close in his paws and the small dents where he would tap his claws to turn a page allowed Lance to easily imagine the ermine, laid comfortably in the very bed he stood aside, as rapt as he could be and in a world of his own.

August Corcoran had a favorite genre, too; at least, as far as Lance Dyer could see by numbers alone. It was romance that kept him, and not just any. It was the sort that brought Lance as close as possible to confirmation of what he had been suspecting about the ermine. Assumptions were a part of his job, of course, but he didn’t want to make such a leap knowing that his own experience might have been clouding his judgment.

But, lo and behold, it seemed August Corcoran had just finished one such romance story, one between a young writer fox and a musician wolf, and the beautiful thing they found in being able to help and inspire each other. At least, that was what Lance could gather from the synopsis. That, and that it foreshadowed a rather unhappy ending for the two men.

Further searching revealed to Lance that his interests within the wider genre were about as varied as those outside of it. Historical, science fiction, fantasy, coming of age, even those shameless stories that were nearly pure smut, each and every one indicated as 100% complete.

Lance found himself drawn to the period of time in which August Corcoran had been absorbed into biographies, finishing one after another those on Freddie Mercury, Liberace, Harvey Milk, and Michel Foucault. Lance found himself smiling in spite of himself, seeing those names together on the page in front of him. He felt the respect that August Corcoran had for those who paved the way, and he knew that the ermine had lived through much of that time himself.

Before finding himself inevitably absorbed in one of those books, though, Lance moved on once more, finding the final piece of the puzzle, the bathroom.

It was a rather simple room, small, with a bathtub on one end, shower curtains drawn open, and a toilet and sink sitting across from each other just in front of it. It couldn’t have been much of a mess if August Corcoran had tried, but he certainly might have. That is to say, it was clear that its cleanliness was not the ermine’s top priority, but it was certainly not a hazard of any sort. Just, as much of the rest of his house was, lived in.

He had just one task in mind in the room, and a quick look around gave Lance Dyer no new ideas, and, so, he set right to the mirror above the sink. Prying it open revealed the medicine cabinet, just as expected. This, he thought, was always his least favorite part of any investigation. Everything he was doing felt personal, perhaps too invasive. However, in knowing just how many doctors August Corcoran had contact with, and in understanding that they were some of the very few he had ever spoken with, Lance knew that this was one of the most important steps.

A bright yellow paper taped to the inside of the door caught Lance’s eyes first. On it, the handwriting of the second writer from August’s ‘The Threat to Our Lives’ copy. The ink ran bold, due to the slow, deliberate stroke writing out doses, and medicine names, yet there were notes scrawled so hastily below that even Lance, practiced now in reading August Corcoran’s handwriting, couldn’t read.

Lance didn’t recognize any of the names of the medicine therein. There seemed to be a common thread amongst those who he was needed for, so Lance grew to recognize the names of depression, anxiety, and even ADHD medication, but those small orange bottles were entirely foreign to him, the labels nonsense, just like his first time ever entering one of those medicine cabinets.

He didn’t want to diagnose a dead man he had never met, but Lance certainly believed some of those meds that he was familiar with might have done August Corcoran some good. But, Lance learned that it might not have changed a thing; the end dates of each prescription had long since passed, and each bottle was far from empty. Yet, the paper on the mirror had been taped up, taped over, torn off, many, many times.

Lance, wanting to think through it all, had closed the mirror, and, as it happens, was met with his own muzzle, surprising himself, just a little, without thinking about what was in front of him.

He saw himself as other people saw him for the first time, how he might have seen himself if this were his own apartment he was rummaging around. Tan fur, ear tufts, dark eyes, and all. Large, perhaps too large, rounded glasses. Teeth so nearly perfect, white and straight; all but one, one sharp looking tooth on his bottom row just poking up above the top row, asymmetrical, but not important enough to get fixed. Collared shirt, buttoned straight, neat, and tight. It was a boring, drab white.

For a moment, that’s all he was. An amalgamation of the features that made up the man that was named Lance Dyer.

Soon, though, he was more. He was the teasing from his older siblings. He was the mystery novels he read alone in his room when he was meant to be doing homework. He was the first time he branched out from that hole, where he found the one person who he could trust. He was the first kiss that they shared, and the last. He was his work, and the love and care he put into it, against what everyone else told him to do.

While these things weren’t in his apartment, his own medication, what he decided he might need after seeing the aftermath of others going off of theirs, was. And he didn’t have much room for a library of his own, but he still had textbooks stashed away somewhere from his short stint in thinking he wanted to be involved in criminal justice. And he still had pictures, hidden away in a box, probably right next to those textbooks, from the photo booth he visited on his first real date, and that same first kiss documented, and the surprise in his eyes when it came. And he had his files, on most every surface in his home, because he brought his work home with him.

One last long, contemplative look at himself told Lance that he was almost done. He needed to be done, even— he’d never had an experience so jarring as to see his whole life behind him. Yet, even more, he needed to finish his work, because that story for August Corcoran existed somewhere, and he needed to know it. Perhaps it was because he could see himself in the ermine, if only because of his sexuality, or perhaps it was because he’d, at one point, also had a tendency to self isolate, or perhaps it was just because Lance had been trying harder to get into August’s mind than anyone before, because he still had unanswered questions, and still only had a vague idea as to what and who had shaped the ermine, and about who might want to— or need to— know of his passing.

There was only one more place for him to look, and, so, Lance left the bathroom, as determined as he ever had been to find the truth.

Lance thought he knew the end, and, while he didn’t know it all, he thought he understood enough of the beginning, too. But August Corcoran was not defined by his destination, the same fate which we all hold, and the beginning was just that, and, so, Lance was compelled, dragged in front of that computer by his own two legs, and he sat down, praying to whatever entity might listen, and even August Corcoran himself, that it might come to life.

It did. It was slow, and the keys stuck, and the screen was scratched and smudged in every way imaginable, but it turned on. No password, just as his phone had been.

August Corcoran had no programs on his desktop, no folders or files. All he had was the generic, preinstalled internet browser, which brought him right to his email, the very same service Nathaniel had used, one Lance hadn’t been sure was still in service, and a quick look told the caracal that August Corcoran had only ever used the laptop, going back years and years, to access that email.

The mailbox was full, going months back, of, once again, the same sort of messages August Corcoran had been receiving in the mail.

And, abruptly, nothing, as though August Corcoran only created the email a year ago. Knowing that that certainly couldn’t be true, Lance found several years worth of much the same quickly and easily in the junk folder. August might not have known that sending them to the trash rather than junk permanently deleted the emails after some time, and, surely, cut down on the time it took to load. Or, maybe, August Corcoran wasn’t particularly concerned about time.

Seeing that Junk folder, though, gave Lance Dyer the answer he’d been looking for— a folder underneath it just labeled ‘Important.’

Every message inside it was from the same sender, going well over a decade back. The first, and, I’m sure, the earliest message in the inbox at all, a response.

Lance wanted to read every word they sent, but settled for starting in the outbox, and the message that started it all.

[No Subject]

Nathaniel,

Thank you for the letter. It is good to hear from you again.

I’ve already finished the book. The woman at the bookstore has very good taste. Graphic novels might not be so bad after all. You just always chose to read the bad ones.

I’d love to talk about the story in more depth, but I won’t say anything yet, until I’ve heard back from you and know that you’ve finished it, too. I won’t make the same mistake Brandon made, with that one superhero movie. I don’t remember anything that happened in the movie, and I don’t even remember the name, but I could probably still remember your part of the argument word for word. (To call it an argument feels wrong, but any other words feel too cruel for something I remember very fondly).

Congratulations on the job. I can believe you’d be good at it. You’ve always been great with people.

I’d love to hear about Auburn some time. I hope Angelina and Rebecca are well.

August

And the response.

re: [No Subject]

Glad to hear you liked the book. I shouldn’t be surprised you finished it so quickly, but you were right to assume I haven’t. It’s very difficult to find the time, with family and work, but I’ve been slowly making a dent in it. The father reminds me of Brandon, actually, so it’s nice to hear you mention him, even if the context isn’t flattering for me. Though, if he’s as gay as he seems, maybe the father is more like me than Brandon. I hope you didn’t think very hard about that as you read.

The job is wonderful, and I get to hear all sorts of stories. Every night, someone comes in wanting a drink I’ve never heard of, so I get to learn how to make something new.

It’s far away from Haventon, but I’m not sure Angie would have liked me working there very much. I have gotten out there a few times, though, and it’s as interesting as they say. I know we always wanted to visit, but we’d have either destroyed the place or ourselves if we came here in our twenties.

I guess we did just fine at destroying ourselves, though, didn’t we? We’re both still here, though. I was really, really relieved to hear from you, after all this time. With Boris passing a few years ago, I guess we’re the last ones left. But I always had a feeling you’d be alright. You’re the strongest person I know.

I’m glad I decided to get back in touch with you, August. I’ll send you some pictures of Auburn soon, if you promise to learn how to send me some of back home.

Lance wanted to give every word the same attention, the same respect, that he had given their first three pieces of correspondence, but he knew that it would take far, far more time than he had. But he couldn’t stop himself from clicking and skimming the next email in the chain, and the next, and the next.

Lance Dyer saw pictures of a family home in Auburn, of a young otter girl, of the very apartment he was in and the town as he remembered it in his youth. He read about books he never read, about times long before he lived and the people, all gone even then, who had lived in them.

Sometimes it took a few days for one of them to reply, but they would always return. Sometimes, it was with news of something great, or terrible, or perhaps just interesting that had happened, and sometimes one had read a book the other had recommended, or remembered a time long past that they could reminisce on.

They exchanged phone numbers and scheduled a weekly phone call, at a time where Angie was always at work. August got a new job. Rebecca started high school, and then college, with pictures to match, and August was proud as if she were his own, even though he had never met her.

Any rigidity in those first few letters melted away, slowly but surely, to reveal the comfort and familiarity of those who had spent so much of their youth together.

Lance’s reading just got faster as he approached the end, as August Corcoran grew into just the man Lance had profiled him to be in his aging, and as the end grew nearer. He needed to know what happened. But where he wanted, expected, needed a bang, there came only a whimper. The final message exchanged between the two came abruptly, and it was far from the usual exchange of hundreds of words at a time.

If I’m strong, it’s only because of the strength you give me.

Lance Dyer had never felt so powerful a whimper, and had never felt the world around him crash down so suddenly with his realization. He had forgotten where he was, what he was doing.

August Corcoran was dead, and that was that. No amount of caring for him or understanding his story could bring him back. Lance didn’t regret it for a moment, though.

Hours had passed since he’d entered the apartment, but Lance felt that he’d lived a whole new life. August Corcoran and Nathaniel Lyon had a way of transporting you into their world, and anyone who could have experienced it would have been grateful.

Wiping a tear from his eye, the caracal carefully closed the laptop, respectful of all it represented, and left the bedroom.

That brought him face to face with August Corcoran again. Ermine. 62. Died alone in his apartment. No living relatives or known associates.

Proud gay man. Lover of books. Incredibly strong-willed. Might have been a menace, in his younger days.

Lance Dyer was experiencing a loss of his own at that moment. He had seen the world through August Corcoran’s eyes, and had almost forgotten that the ermine was gone. Now, face to face with that reality, the tears he had wiped away moments before returned.

He wished he could have gotten to know the real August Corcoran, always in the small apartment just on the other side of town. He’d have had so many wonderful stories, and, Lance thought, maybe he could have used a friend over the past few years. Maybe he’d still be here.

Lance Dyer took a moment to compose himself, dipped his head in respect for the ermine, and walked out of the home.

He had ignored a text from Rousseau in his reading, but didn’t feel the need to bother checking. Instead, he pulled out his phone, and made the call he needed to make, still with some glimmer of hope inside of him.

A simple dial tone and a notification that he number had been disconnected dashed some of that hope, but Lance had anticipated that. He quickly tapped away at his phone the number of a small family home out in the suburbs of Auburn. After the right amount of rings, he was sent to voicemail. This, he thought, still feeling that slight glimmer, and the warmth that came with it, could very well qualify as an emergency.

“Hello,” a woman’s voice said. “You’ve reached the residence of Angelina Lyon. I’m not in right now, so—”

Lance hung up, walked as steadily as he could to his car, and drove off. He didn’t have much to report to Rousseau, so the later he was the worse it would be for him, he knew. He would tell the squirrel that August Corcoran was just who they thought he was, in the clinical way that they wanted. Single, no living relatives or known associates, and that he could be laid to rest in whatever way they saw fit.

There were things that were never meant to be understood. Lance knew when and where August Corcoran had died, and he knew what had killed him. What he never understood was why we all are doomed to the same fate.

Lance Dyer knew that not every story was happy in the end. But he knew that this one must once have been. It must have been beautiful. It must have been, he thought, because he could see it right in front of him, some of those visions as clear as his own memories. August Corcoran had a story of love. A pure love, spanning decades and half a continent. A love spanning years of lost time. That is how August Corcoran would be remembered. That is how August Corcoran would be defined. If nobody else would, or could, remember him, Lance Dyer would.

August Corcoran was the beautiful story he lived, in spite of his flaws, and in spite of the story’s unhappy ending.

When his work was done, Rousseau notified and August Corcoran buried, all the paperwork filed, Lance decided that he wouldn’t be taking any cases for a while. He knew that if Rousseau knew how he felt, he’d have been ordered time off, anyway. Getting attached, making things personal, was never good in Lance’s profession. But he also had a new appreciation for the life he was living, and he wanted to go out and live it.

Perhaps he’d take a vacation. He’d heard Auburn was beautiful this time of year.