Page 33 of Where Light Cannot Follow

The children's eyes ignite.

"Well, go see what it is."

They scramble out, a thunder of small feet on hardwood. Matthew falls back against the pillows. "You're a saint, Joshua."

"Not even close." He kisses Matthew's cheek and produces a small gift wrapped in ivory paper and gold ribbon. "But this might get me closer to canonization."

"What?" Matthew sits up in bed. "I thought we said no gifts."

Joshua only shrugs, but his dark eyes gleam. "Are you going to open it or not?"

Matthew tears into it with a kind of joy that makes him seem twenty-something again—smile bright, all pretense of dignity abandoned for pure delight. He rips back the paper, unfurls the bow, slides the box open, and pulls out a folded document. "Babe," he gasps. "You said you couldn't get the time off.”

"I know." Joshua's grin has been growing the entire time he's watched Matthew unwrap the gift. "But then I realized my husband would be about as devastated to miss this trip as our children will be if they don't get their cinnamon rolls within the next thirty minutes."

Matthew swipes tears away. "This means so much to me."

Joshua kisses his cheek again. "You mean so much to me."

Matthew looks at him, and I know that look. I've seen it and felt it. He's in love. He’s in love with someone he's been with long enough to build a life. Someone he does the routine and mundane tasks alongside—raising children, paying bills, negotiating whose turn it is to take out the trash. And he's still in love with him like that. Like it's the first morning and the thousandth morning all at once.

"I'll get the oven preheated and attempt to prevent anarchy while you take a few minutes," Joshua says, sliding away from the bed.

Matthew catches his hand and stops him. "Merry Christmas."

His husband's responding smile carves deep lines, the kind that come from making that expression frequently, from a life spent in laughter. "Merry Christmas, my love."

"Papa! Papa!"

"I'm coming, I'm coming."

The man disappears through the doorway. Matthew sits alone for a moment, staring down at the gift in his hands, a smile softening his features.

"Dante," Virgil whispers, so gently it's like a feather's touch against my consciousness.

I turn toward him, crying. Tears stream uninhibited down my cheeks, dripping along my neck until they catch on the collar of my shirt.

"I'm so sorry," he whispers.

He appears haunted, dark circles are carved beneath his eyes that I haven't noticed before, and his lips are pressed thin with concern.

"Why?" I breathe in reply.

"I'm sure this hurts." He gestures to where the scene has shifted. The room now smells like cinnamon and melted butter. Matthew clutches a coffee mug to his chest as he slides a pan into the oven. Beyond him, a tree decorated with silk ribbons and handmade ornaments glimmers in the morning light. The children bounce on their heels. Come on, Daddy, it's time to open the presents! Matthew laughs and walks into the living room.

I turn back to Virgil. "Is this real?"

His brow furrows as he studies the scene once more before meeting my eyes. "I believe so. I'm sorry."

"Sorry?" I laugh. It’s an actual laugh, wet and broken but genuine. "You think I'm upset?"

Virgil glances at the scene—wrapping paper flying, Matthew laughing, his husband holding an empty trash bag—then back to me. "Are you not?"

"No." I sniff and drag my coat sleeve across my cheeks, and I don't even feel ashamed of this display. Of the unnecessary externalization of emotion. Because it is necessary. Wholly and entirely. "He's happy, Virgil."

Virgil eyes me the way one might a startled animal—careful, uncertain. His response comes slowly. “And this makes you happy?”

I nod, more eagerly than I intend. "Matthew deserved better than what I could give him. I thought I’d broken him with my selfish choices. But I didn’t. He deserved the world, and he got it." I gesture toward the scene. To the children tearing into presents, the husband refilling Matthew's coffee without being asked, the easy choreography of a family that knows each other's rhythms. "I'm not sorry or sad. I'm... I'm happy for him."