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From the moment he met Frank - well maybe not the first moment, or the second, or the third - but somewhere along the way, somewhere over a plate of food, somewhere by the piano, somewhere in bed, somewhere along the way he realised there would never be enough time, he realised mornings passed too quickly and conversations made time pass too fast, that hours flew by as he stared at Franks face and every interruption felt so much worse because it meant he was taken away from all those seconds he could be with Frank, all those ones he’d never get back.
Somewhere along the way he realised something, and he’s not sure when; maybe it was the grey hair, or the new wrinkles, or the moment Frank started to get sick, or maybe it was just one morning when the world outside was quiet and the sun hit that beautiful mans face in just the right way, but somewhere along the way he realised that there would never be enough time, there would never be enough lingering moments, there would never be enough of any of it. Bill was old and he’d keep ageing; they lived in a world where the old rarely kept going, they lived in a world where despite all the defences, despite everything he’d done, it could all leave. It was fine when it was just him, it was fine when there was nothing in his little enclosure except for himself, a stray zombie outside the fence felt like fun, felt like something different, until Frank came along, until he realised that it could take everything away from him.
He curated a world, curated a fenced off perfect defence but it didn’t matter how small or how large it was, how many things he added or took away, how secure it was because that little world he’d created changed and it wasn’t his any more, it changed from an electric fence to the face of a man he fell in love with, a man he never had enough time with a man who lived in the world he’d created, who changed it to mean something different, changed it to something for them to live in instead of for Bill to survive in because that’s all he knew how to do. And they did, they lived in the little gated community he’d made, the two of them, in their happiness and their anger, in their sadness and their solitude and Bill lived in a world that revolved around Frank because everything outside of him lacked so much colour now that he was in it.
He thinks it’d be one of them in the end, one of the dead, one of the things he can protect against, he can stop those, build every defence to make sure that never happens but it’s not, its an illness, it’s an incurable twist of fate, all the walls all the plans can’t do anything to stop that, stop the way Frank suffers, the way he changes, the way his body turns against him. With all the will in the world Bill can’t fix it the way he fixed the town for the two of them, what the hell was the point of making something so impenetrable only for Franks own body to go against them in the end. He thought of everything, of every way something could harm them, of every way to survive it, to avoid it, he thought of every calculated move except for the fact that bad things happen to good people and Frank was the best man he’d ever met.
So it’s not the government, or the dead or the damn people thinking they’re owed what isn’t theres, it’s just the universe reminding them both that despite it all, despite finally finding each other in the twisted world they live in that it doesn’t matter, that in the end there’s nothing they can do, that for all their hopes, their wishes, their desires; some people will just die.
He’d stare at him for hours if he could, if Frank didn’t question what he was doing with that dopy smile of his, if Bill wasn’t too awkward to look away and claim he had to check one of his trip wires over. He’d stare at him for hours or days or weeks, anything to try and remember the shape of his face, anything so that he’d see Frank even when he wasn’t looking at him, anything to make him linger a little longer in his memory.
Maybe if they were younger, maybe if he’d happened across him sooner, maybe if Frank had lived across the street, if Bill had gone out of his comfort zone, maybe if something had happened in the universe to put them together earlier so that they weren’t too old for it to feel already cruel to find each other now. Maybe if something was just a little different they’d have more time. Maybe if he wasn’t set in his ways they wouldn’t argue and Frank wouldn’t storm off and the long hours without him wouldn’t feel so cruel. Maybe if there was no zombie outbreak, maybe if the government wasn’t insane, maybe if Frank hadn’t gotten sick.
There were a lot of ways it could have been different, it could have changed, they could have had longer. Every second felt like borrowed time and as he looks at Frank with his paints sat by flowers that don’t do anything but add colour to their world he wonders if they ever did anything to deserve a life so cruel but Bill smiles at the man who smiles back at him and he thinks that if there was any second he’d get to linger in for the rest of his time it would be every part of Franks smile.
The bed feels softer than it normally does and the meal feels more filling and Franks eyes look so much more tired than they normally do but he feels tired too and he fights against it, fights to keep looking at him for as long as he is able with that soft smile that echos on his own face and the slight breeze through the window. A hand holds his and he stares and he looks and maybe they didn’t have enough time and maybe the world was cruel to them in the end but at the very least, for just a little bit, for just the parts that count, for the end, he was happier than anything he could have hoped for and even as the world closes around him it’s so full of colour because in the end Frank was the only thing that he wanted to exist in it.