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“Alex, are you and Strand still in Wenatchee?”
“We’re in Leavenworth for late breakfast, actually. We should be back in Seattle by early afternoon.”
“Can – can you pick me up?”
“...From where?”
Nic pauses, then recites, as if reading, “The Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Skykomish District, Official Ranger Station. It’s, uh. Skykomish, Washington.”
He sounds tired.
“What? Where? Nic, are you okay?” Alex frowns and cradles the phone.
“I’m alright,” says Nic. He pauses, then admits, “I don’t know how I got here.”
“Nic.”
“I don’t have my phone or anything on me, but – pick me up? At the ranger station? Please?”
“Of course. Where even is – Skykomish, you said? I’ll have to look it up.”
“It’s on Highway 2. You would have passed it coming in. It’s just on this side of the ski area.”
“Stevens Pass? Okay, we’ll there in… like an hour.”
“Thanks. I’ll be in the parking lot.”
“The – Okay. See you soon.”
Nic hangs up. Alex stares at the phone. Strand had shifted away out of politeness when she first picked up the call, but as her confusion and distress became apparent, he’d listened in again, frowning. “What was that about?”
“My producer has gotten himself into some bullshit,” she says. “Pardon my language. We have to pick him up. Can we get out of here quickly?”
“Of course,” says Strand, reaching into his wallet. He clearly has no idea what’s going on, but the man catches on quick.
When they arrive at the ranger station which is in fact right off the highway, it’s closed. They find Nic sitting on a picnic table, his arms wrapped around himself. He’s shirtless, and shoeless, wearing only a pair of thin gray sweatpants. His hair is loose. His feet are filthy. He waves at them when they get out of the car.
“Nic! What’s going on?”
Nic shrugs, looking helpless. He’s distracted by Strand, who’s momentarily been struck speechless, moving his jaw up and down.
Strand settles, eventually, on: “Aren’t you freezing?”
Nic laughs, a stuttery huffed-out breath. “Yeah. Yeah.”
He gets off the table, slowly, wincing as his feet touch gravel. “I took the bus home after work last night,” he explains, “ate dinner. Took Chewie out for a walk. Did internet stuff. Went to bed. I woke up out here.”
“Oh my god,” says Alex. She hugs Nic, impulsively, and he hugs back. She goes to open the car door for him.
“I don’t have anything on me,” Nic goes on, his voice picking up speed. “This is what I wore to bed wearing last night. It was really early in the morning. I was standing in the woods – walked until I found a trailhead. Got a ride to the ranger station from these two white hunter guys in their fifties with a confederate flag bumper sticker on their truck. The station is closed on tuesdays, for some reason, so I borrowed a cell phone from these hikers. I told them I’d gone camping with my girlfriend and she broke up with me and ditched me here. I don’t know how I got here.”
Paradoxically, he’s starting to shiver only now that he’s settled in the warm car. Alex gets a blanket from the trunk and drapes it over his bare shoulders. It’s wool and scratchy, intended more for impromptu picnics than comfort, but he takes it.
“You think this is about - “
Nic snorts. “Yeah. I’d say so.”
“You think this is about what?” Strand asks. He’s been mostly quiet, watching over Nic as he hobbled to the car.
Nic and Alex catch each other’s eyes, briefly.
“Tanis,” says Alex.
Strand’s eyes flicker.
“Dr. Strand, have you been listening to my podcast?”
Strand is, to a trained observer like Alex, struggling to restrain himself. “I’ve listened to a couple of episodes,” he says, carefully.
“Well,” says Nic. He gives up on finishing that thought and leans back against the back seat window uncomfortably, propping his legs up on the other seat. Alex starts the car and peels back on to the road.
“You must have driven here in your sleep,” says Strand.
“I don’t have my keys,” murmurs Nic. “And, more importantly, my car’s in the shop.”
“It is,” pipes in Alex. “It was the transmission, I think?”
Nic shrugs. “I don’t have it.”
Strand frowns. His voice is soft, but in the end, he is who he is, a researcher. “You must have come here on foot, then.”
“You saw him last afternoon,” points out Alex. “I saw him when we left work. And we’re still, what, two hours outside of Seattle? Even if he started running right after work - “
Glancing over, Alex can see that Strand is doing the math in his head.
“Nic is a healthy, athletic young man,” he says, but his voice falters as he starts coming up with numbers, and then cuts off entirely. He looks back at Nic, mostly no longer shivering, holding the blanket weakly around his shoulders. His eyes are half-lidded, but they meet.
“Richard,” says Alex quietly, “Look at his feet.”
Strand does. They’re dirty, muddy, maybe even cut in places – he’d clearly been walking in the forest, but …
“Those are not the feet of a man who’s just run a hundred miles barefoot,” admits Strand quietly.
Propriety catches up to him shortly, and he clears his throat. “Anyways, I’m just glad you’re alright.”
“That, we can agree on,” says Alex. “Nic, there’s a water bottle in my cup holder. Do you want coffee? Or food? There’s a roadside espresso place coming up – it’s Bigfoot-themed, you’ll love it – or there’s a diner in Sultan.”
“Kind of,” says Nic. “Um, but I might just sleep the whole way back.”
“That’s fine,” she reassures him. He’s clearly struggling to stay awake.
“Thanks for coming to get me,” says Nic. “Um, especially you, Doctor Strand, I really appreciate the time.”
“Of course,” says Strand. Then he adds: “Please, call me Richard.”
Nic’s eyes finally slip shut. A light fall drizzle has started up outside, and Alex drives the quiet car down through the mountains, onward to home.
Strand next sees him a few days after that. It’s the next time he makes it out to Alex’s office, having done a few phone calls, pulled some notes from his own records on the history of that place in Wenatchee. He wants Alex to see. He passes the common room, where Nic is sitting, holding a cup of coffee. No laptop or anything, a notebook in front of him which he isn’t even looking at, just gazing into space. His legs are crossed. He’s wearing thick wool socks, no shoes, for some reason.
“Nic,” Strand says, after a moment of taking the site in. “How are you doing?”
Nic looks up. He smiles. “Hi, Richard. A lot better. My feet are still giving me trouble, but, um, I’ve woken up in bed every night this week. So that’s pretty good.”
“Is that kind of wandering, uh. Is that a regular occurrence?”
Nic’s smile drops. “Not like that, it isn’t.”
“I’m sorry,” says Strand, kicking himself mentally. “I don’t mean to bring it up. Or pry.”
“You’re not prying,” Nic says. “Honestly, questions like that don’t offend me. I want to know more about it too. It’s what I care most about.”
Strand feels a sudden wave of kinship for the tired-looking young man in front of him, folded up on his chair so his feet don’t touch the ground. He also realizes that Nic is good-looking. A sort of handsomeness Strand doesn’t usually associate with men – long hair back in a bun, delicate features, a kind of relaxed grace. He’s serious but doesn’t have to prove anything.
Strand’s face heats up as he realizes what he’s thinking.
“Well,” he says, “I’m – glad you’re alright. I’ll see you around.” And he nearly trips himself getting out of the room.
“I’m simply saying, Nicodemus, that if -”
“Hang on,” says Nic, “did you just ‘Nicodemus’ me?”
“It’s your name, isn’t it?”
“How did you know that?” Nic asks.
Strand is flustered. “I’m sure I saw it on the website.”
“My first name is not on the website.”
“What I’m getting at is -”
Alex puts it together before he can change the subject. “He’s been listening to Tanis!”
Nic sits up, with interest. “Is that true?”
Strand sighs. “...After we found you having either been kidnapped or teleported a hundred miles overnight, yes, I figured I had better look into it.”
“What do you think?” Alex asks.
“It’s… interesting.”
Nic looks delighted.
Strand almost restrains himself, but adds, “...I’ve been struggling not to call you Nicodemus ever since I heard it. How often do you get to say a name like that? Nicodemus.”
Alex is laughing so hard she has to set her drink down. Nic looks like a kid on Christmas. Strand lets himself grin, and can’t even summon the dignity to be embarrassed. For a moment, he feels like he fits right in.
Strand keeps listening, in his off hours, when he’s driving across the floating bridge. He’s unimpressed at the research methods. He likes this MK figure a great deal. He wonders how he ever took Nic for the stoic, rational one of the team. Or – he is when it comes to the Black Tapes, but when it comes to Tanis, it’s like his mind is distorted. Operating on some kind of moon logic that worked there, but everywhere else, was completely off-the-cuff and insane. Still, he can't stop listening.
He hates it, this idea of "exceptions" from reality, like cause and effect stop applying at some point once your situation is confusing enough. The important thing about reality is that it is always true. But the idea of Tanis as a kind of fairy realm fits with... whatever narrative Nic is weaving. Rules, and no names. He could make some notes, and send them to Nic. He certainly has the books for it, and the research background to know what he's talking about.
... As long as he asks Nic to keep his name off of the episode. God.
He meets another of Nic’s “friends” in the PRA hallway, a while later. It’s a stranger – late thirties, a little world-weary around the face, definitely not an intern. Muscular and tall, nearly as tall as Strand, with close-cropped sandy hair that would be curly if it were longer. Strand is saying goodbye to Alex as he closes the door behind him. The stranger seems to recognize his voice, and looks up and down. “You’re Richard Strand.”
“...Can I help you?”
“Yeah, I’m Geoff van Sant. God, Nic was not kidding. I love the show.”
“Oh, thank you. Good to meet you.” They shake hands. Geoff has a firm, confident grip. “What is Nic not kidding about?”
“I gotta go, it’s good to meet you, man.”
“Geoff?” Strand asks. Geoff walks off down the hall, a casual swagger in his step, and doesn’t turn back. “Geoff!”
It is a well-known fact that Richard Strand both loves and hates mysteries.
He’s given up on romance, all but, and it gnaws at him that Alex and Nic are stirring this inside him. Touch is obviously not a biological need, like water or oxygen or even like social contact, but it’s a hunger of his own that he’s successfully quelled for long enough. Since Coralee, and the slightly more active days of his youth, there had been… a whole lot of nobody. There was Tannis Braun, a few times, which he enjoyed at the time but can’t believe he actually went for. There was a drunken conferencegoer whose name he shamefully doesn’t remember, and there was Monica, a professional colleague, who it ended badly with after a few dates when she didn’t understand why he wouldn’t sleep with her. Strand was built for solitude, he thinks. The solitary academic, introverted, dedicated to his work rather than the messy business of people. He wishes he could convince his darker nights of that.
It’s not as though he was ever comfortable being who he was. The world he grew up with isn’t the world Nic and Alex live in, where Nic has facebook photos of himself in dresses for concerts and isn’t shy about mentioning both Geoff and MK in romantic contexts (to him and Alex, if not on the show.) Where he and Alex talk about their mental health issues and bicker companionably about queer theory. Alex's insomnia and ADHD, Nic's sleep issues and possible PTSD, Nic's girlfriend's autism, their therapists, polyamory, bisexuality. Strand's pretty sure some of those words apply to him, but he pretends not to know. He doesn't know how to treat them so lightly. Maybe he won't ever have to cross that bridge. They're professional colleagues, after all.
He, uh, comes out about Braun to both of them by accident, in a moment of distraction.
“Really?” asks Alex.
“Yes,” says Strand, daring her to say something about not imagining him with another man.
“But you hate him,” says Alex, and then Strand almost laughs and falls over himself backtracking - “It was a long time ago, I was – not proud of it -”
Alex and Nic laugh, but when he asks them not to mention it on the show, they immediately swear not to. He relaxes fractionally. He still doesn’t feel like part of their world, but he thinks he likes visiting.
The three of them plan to get dinner after a long friday Friday – not an uncommon event – but Alex has to back out, realizing she’d double-booked. Nic suggests they go anyways, that he hadn’t been to his favorite in long enough, promising Strand would love it – if he could handle spice. They end up going to a Korean place apparently owned by friend’s of Nic’s family. The staff ply them with food, and Nic eats scoop after scoop of bright red kimchi and laughs at the tears gathering in Strand’s eyes. It really is good, especially when washed down with a strong sweet rice alcohol that Nic tells him very seriously to go slowly on. The two of them don’t entirely take his advice.
Despite the relative levity of the evening, Strand has never been accused of indulging in levity. He brings up his issues with Tanis.
“I worry about you,” says Strand. “I just got to the finale of Season 1.”
“Ah,” says Nic.
“And I remember that. Alex was gone for days, she was worried as hell, you come back and – the police question you, and -”
“I know, I know,” says Nic. “I’m not eager to repeat it either.”
“It makes me worried.”
“You said that. It scares me too.” says Nic, seriously. “But I have to know. You know what that’s like.”
“I… I’m not even sure if I believe it. Even if. Well, despite.” He trails off.
“I know. I’m not asking for your faith, Richard.”
Strand exhales. “...Good. Because you know faith doesn’t come easily to me.” He takes a sip of his soju.
“Yeah, I’ve gotten that sense,” Nic says, and Strand chuckles. Warmed by the acohol, and by Nic’s gentle voice, Strand reaches out impulsively and covers Nic’s hand with his own.
Nic looks at him, and then, slowly, meeting his gaze, turns his hand over so that he’s holding Strand’s.
The rest of Strand’s brain suddenly catches up with him, and he freezes. Nic pulls his hand away.
“I’m sorry,” he says, voice maddeningly level like it always on his show, even when staring into the jaws of death. “Did I misread that?”
“No,” says Strand. “It’s just – I’m sorry. I’ve lead you on. That was inappropriate of me.”
“You didn’t propose,” Nic laughs.
“Right, but.”
“And I don’t want to pressure you. But I’m interested, if you are.”
“I am,” Strand says, quietly. “You’re beautiful, Nic,” (and Nic blinks several times very fast,) “but, uh, I, the show, Alex and I -”
“Alex isn’t the jealous type,” Nic says.
Strand glares at him for reading ahead. “No. Alex and I haven’t even – it’s nothing like that.”
“No, but there’s something between you, right? I’m just saying, I don’t want to tread on that. ...Maybe I should, for, professionalism’s sake, but I don’t want to. But I’m telling you, she won’t mind.”
Strand sputters. “What, and – if I were to – I mean, you know this?”
“Yes,” says Nic, simply. He pauses. “I mean, we went to college together -”
“Okay, I’ve heard enough,” says Strand, raising his hands.
He might never get tired of making Nic laugh.
Then there’s the whole question of his asexuality, which he hasn’t even brought up around Alex. Which to say – not like he should, it will most likely never come up, and he wouldn’t be the first man in his late fifties to fall in love with a beautiful woman in her thirties and read far too much into her kindness.
On the other hand, Alex was very, openly bi, flag on her desk and accolades of past partners from across the gender spectrum and everything. He could just bring it up as a passing fact. Like a favorite film, or the color of his childhood house. And then she’d know, and -
Strand notes the fact that he’s currently, essentially, talking Alex’s best friend and coworker into a one-night stand, so he might have to speed up the coming-out process. Good lord.
Somehow, somehow, he ends up taking an Uber back with Nic to Nic's apartment. It's theoretically on Strand's way. ...Theoretically. He meets Nic's dog, an enthusiastic mutt named Chewie. They stand on the porch, and Strand says something about calling another car, and they end up just looking at each other.
He leans in.
Nic kisses him.
His lips are soft, softer than Strand remembers anyone’s lips ever being. He finds himself humming with pleasure. Warmth seems to pour off of Nic and into Strand’s skin, which Strand feels in a vision of white light. Nic’s hands wrap around his shoulder blades, and Strand very palpably shudders.
He flushes, instantly. Pleasure suddenly suffuses with… shame? Shame at being this old, lonely man being undone so quickly by this eager, pretty young thing before him.
“Dr. Strand?” asks Nic, incredulous and light, clearly grinning, Strand thinks. He ducks his head and avoids looking at Nic’s face, so he doesn’t have to check.
“...Do not call me that right now,” he manages.
Nic laughs.
“Just,” Strand says, resting his hands on Nic’s hipbones, wanting to re-establish that point of contact, “Can we… can we go slow? Very slow?”
“Of course, Richard.” By the time Strand has processed the sound of his first name in Nic’s mouth, and then noticed how while his own voice and the voices of most men he’s kissed get lower when they’re in that soft and intimate space, Nic’s gets higher, and how charmed he is by that – he finds he is kissing Nic again.
Nic can, it turns out, go slow. He can go very slow. By the time Strand would normally be brushing his teeth for sleep, they’ve moved from Nic’s entrance hall, to his couch, to his bed, to lying down on his bed with his arm gently wrapped around Nic. And still, Strand has only loosened his tie and undone the top button of his shirt for comfort’s sake, and set his glasses on the nightstand, and Nic has taken off his sweater, but that’s it. The topic of his boundaries hasn’t even been brought up. The closest it comes is when Nic sighed at him about how nice this was, on the bed, and Strand asked quietly, would something else be nicer? And Nic had shrugged, and said that he was honestly enjoying this a lot.
And Strand hadn’t kissed again out of relief, but he hadn’t exactly not done that, either. It felt a little wrong, like, was he really getting out of it so easily? But then again, the entire evening had had a floaty, slightly fae quality to it. Maybe this was just what being around Nic was like. He understands why all these smart, practical people, Amalia and Geoff and MK, fall for him.
“I don’t – you don’t have to, I don’t expect - well, you’re welcome to stay the night, if you like.”
Strand shouldn’t. He shouldn’t. But it really doesn’t seem like Nic will expect anything from him beyond what it sounds like. On the other hand, he hasn’t spent a night sleeping beside anyone else since … Tannis Braun? He doesn’t want to consider how many years that makes.
“I have nightmares sometimes,” he says, hoping with half his heart that Nic will change his mind.
“So, uh, so do I,” says Nic, fiddling with his hem, in a way that reminds him of something Alex might do. “And I sleepwalk sometimes.”
Strand lets out a breath. “Do… would you want me to wake you up? If you did?”
“Yes, please,” says Nic. “Or just – keep me here, at least.”
“I can do that,” says Strand. He runs a hand through Nic’s dark, silky hair.
It’s a quiet night’s sleep, for each of them. Strand doesn’t fall asleep for hours, and he wakes at intervals through the night as Nic turns, but he doesn’t mind. He just holds the incorrigible man until his eyelids shut again. This is just a night – a pleasant night, with pleasant company, a respite from his long vigils of loneliness. Nic doesn’t expect his faith from him. And he can’t give it, but he can give him this.
Strand calls him anyways, eventually, the next Friday. “It’s Richard. Are you free tonight? I’d like to buy you dinner.”
He can hear Nic smiling over the phone.