“Do you think we’ll see him again?”
“I don’t know. I hope so.”
A bright flash of light in the distance. Too bright to look at. Like the sun had exploded. Like it was time.
Don turned toward Rodney. He leaned his forehead against his husband’s. “I don’t regret a thing. Not with you, not with him. All of it, every part.”
“Look at me.”
Don did. In Rodney’s eyes, he could see reflected a large wave of fire. It was coming toward them. Would it hurt? Don wondered. Maybe, but only for a moment. But then, that was life, wasn’t it?
“Don’t look away,” Rodney said. “Keep looking at me. There you go.”
“I love you.”
“Damn right you do,” Rodney said. “Don’t look away.”
He didn’t. Of course he didn’t. How could he?
“Nothing to fear,” Rodney said. “Nothing to fret about. We’ll be all right. We’ll be fine.”
“We will,” Don said. “I’m ready. I’m ready to go.”
“With me,” Rodney said. “Because where you go, I go.”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Rodney grinned at him. “I love you too.”
Don began to laugh. At the absurdity of it all. At the sheer audacity. “I loved being here!” he yelled into the blazing sky. “I loved it! I loved it!”
Rodney joined in, and as the Earth began to break apart, as everything they and humanity had ever known began to end, they laughed. Clutching each other under a shifting sky, they laughed.
And for the last time, a dying world laughed with them.