The Door

[Near]

In fact Near did not mean to leave his front door unlocked. While this is not exactly a crime-ridden complex that he’s chosen to call home, used as he is to living in rougher areas, habit generally spurs him to lock the door behind him, in or out. But here they are, three in the morning, and he is tired from being on his feet and may or may not be hungry and has been distracted by the uncertain prospect of a Jude visit for the last howevermany hours, and all of this has perhaps interfered with the muscle memory of turning the deadbolt.

Or.

Maybe Jude has magicked the lock open and is fucking with him. Who knows.

After taking in his visitor for a few seconds, his weird pose on the couch, he asks,

“Does it matter if I meant to leave it unlocked?”

Despite finding himself reminded of his long-shelved resolution to treat Jude like an unsocialized kindergartner – perhaps no one has ever explained to Jude that someone’s front door, locked or unlocked, invitation or no invitation, should be knocked on before wandering in – he colors the question with more than a hint of accusatory tone. Jude’s insistence on bully-for-youing himself into a farce of sophistication has more or less killed off the “maybe he really doesn’t know how to act” strategy, however true it may or may not be.

“Uneventful night,” he follows up, wary of the emptiness of the small talk-style question, as he swings shut the freezer door with a sticky thud. “I wasn’t expecting you to really show up. So.” A slight shrug, palms raised to the popcorn ceiling, confers the stage to Jude and whatever the hell he wants to talk about.

[Jude]

"I told you I was coming." The obvious inference was that Near did it on purpose, not wanting to bother coming to the door. Then Near says he didn't actually expect Jude to show up, and Jude frowns. He wipes it off his face quickly enough — it is so easy to offend Near Farr — but a trace of disappointment lingers in Jude's eyes. Even this minor act of trust seems impossible. If Near cannot believe Jude will pay a house call punctually, how can he possibly...

There is more at stake than me and you. Jude has to remind himself of that as he stares at the spot between Near's shoulder blades as Near shuts the freezer door. It would be one thing if Near was just another guy with money. Jude knows now there's quite a few of those, and they can be persuaded to reconsider their sponsorship of an influential death cult. Jude isn't sure if there is another Near Farr in the whole world. He's very sure that no one else should find out what's special about Near Farr.

He stares blankly when he's given the floor to speak. This is the opposite of how Near has wanted it before. This must be a test. "I mean," he says slowly. "Is now a bad time? Are you too tired?" Jude really does not want to leave and come back again, but some additional penance feels required after the sin of opening the unlocked door.

I won't be long, he almost says, but that would open the door to a timer. Maybe he will be long. He hopes not to be. But Jude has never spent the amount of time with Near that he anticipated.

[Near]

As far as Near is concerned, Jude doesn’t get to act like his saying he was coming meant anything. His proven record of vanishing into the ether when things get uncomfortable nullifies any real potential for trust in, among other things, his willingness to keep a verbally agreed-to appointment at an inconvenient time. Nevertheless, here Jude is, where and when he said he would be. Which has no bearing at all on his creeping in like a burglar, but that complaint, for now, can be shoved to the side.

“What?” is the first thing out of Near’s mouth – a brief, befuddled reaction to the question of whether it’s a bad time, the unexpected superfluousness of it.

Of course it’s a bad time; and he is probably always too tired for interacting with Jude. But it’s the time he proposed. A not-insignificant chance exists that he threw out the offer of a 3AM meet-up rather than a sane o’clock tomorrow one as a gamble on Jude simply flaking. He lost his gamble. Hell if he’s going to tell Jude to come back later now that he’s here. Crossing the short distance from fridge to kitchen counter he leans, propping himself on his elbows, to peer across the living room.

“No. I’m not too tired unless you’re going to ask me to do deadlifts or geometry,” he says. Or hedging or small talk or whatever is going on here. It’s funny – he’s sure he would appreciate the veneer of normal human interaction, questions about his comfort, if it were anyone else standing here.

“What do you want, Jude?”

[Jude]

What do you want, Jude?

I want to save your world, is the sincere, plaintive answer on the tip of Jude's tongue, but he imagines Near laughing at him and he feels hit prickle painfully all over his body. Jude remains too self-serious to tolerate laughing well, having never not been taken seriously – until he set out on his own, and thenceforth gravitas slipped through his fingers like sand. Still he cannot backpedal into humor, nor soften his desires so much that they lose all weight.

For a few moments, his gaze bores into Near's chest. He works up the energy to meet Near's eyes, so that when he looks, he can hold that skeptical, critical, tired gaze, which seeks him out but does not seem to rest with fondness. Only frustration. Only this tangle of thorns.

"I feel like we've failed to understand each other," he says, voice soft. "Perhaps I failed to explain." He doesn't know what a secret room underneath one's house couldn't or wouldn't explain, but he's already spread on the first layer of superfluity, why not another?

"I can do things that other people can't, Near. And I thought it was only me and my sister. But..." He nods to Near with his chin. "You can too." His pause is heavy. "...did you know?"

[Near]

“Oh, bullshit.”

Not their failing to understand one another. Not Jude’s botching of explanations. About those things, the assessment is unequivocal. Since Jude walked through the door at The Reaches, Near has felt like he stumbled into a sequel and is being punished for not having seen the original installment and learned the rules. How the hell was he supposed to know that magical reality-fucky superpowers and vague eschatology weren’t some kind of Team Courtland in-joke? That Jude wasn’t just off his meds? Then his good-faith attempt to engage ended with him stuck in the floor. No, they do not understand one another.

The earnestness in the other part of the proclamation hits weird. The way Jude tacks on Near’s name. He means it. And maybe Near should learn from past experience and just roll with it, agree, thank Jude for his insight, and move on. But the denial is kneejerk. If he missed the first part of whatever he’s caught up in now, he saw the entirety of his own Near-centric prequel and is reasonably sure it contained zero evidence of his being a chosen one, or whatever Jude is getting at.

“Is this still about the floor?” he asks. “It is, isn’t it? Because I’m telling you, all I did was pull my feet out. Anyone would have done that. Maybe you didn’t melt it right …”

[Jude]

Were it any other time than three in the morning – were Jude livelier, perhaps more positioned to react with anger or anxiety – Near's absurd dismissal of their collective memory might have Jude leaping once more to his feet. Even in their great uniqueness, Near will allow them no common ground. It is enough to drive a saint to drink. Saint Jude's tipsiness went so poorly before.

Maybe you didn't melt it right. He can't help it: he laughs. His lips crack open with the guffaw, which Jude fights successfully to subdue. Didn't melt it right! He casts his eyes downwards, scanning the floor for the next hint in navigating the labyrinth of conversation. Jude addresses his shoes. "Well, if you're so certain of that, we can always try it again."

When he looks up, his expression is a mixture of slyness and tiredness. Didn't melt it right! Anyone would have done that! Near is a terrible chosen one. Not only is he apparently unaware of his gifts, but now that they've become apparent, he wants to reject them. To what? Herd cows in Montana? Tend bar in Wisconsin? Jude found it strange enough that Near insisted on selling The Reaches, and stranger still that Near chose this mediocre apartment as home. It is too much, much too much, that Near will reject not only Jude's magic, but his own.

How many times will Near deny St. Jude? Is three his lucky number?

[Near]

“Certain? Jesus … There is nothing I’m certain about, Jude. You’ve knocked all the certainty right out of me.” Or, well, he’s still reasonably certain he didn’t call upon any supernatural powers other than pulling hard to perform the miracle of extracting himself from the floor, but it’s like talking to a brick wall, so he declines to reiterate.

Instead, he thinks back to what prompted this. Why Jude is here again, taking up Near’s space. Breathing Near’s air. Come with me, Jude had said in the alley behind The Door, and that was so close to being ... something, until the part about because you might be useful wrecked it.

Here’s a mortifying secret: nothing makes Near happier than an opportunity to prove he’s useful. Or maybe not a secret. Maybe you could ask anybody who’s ever spent more than twenty minutes with him. But it’s not supposed to work like that, Jude’s way, with patronizing declaration that cast Near as a bulky umbrella when there’s a non-zero chance of rain in the forecast. It’s supposed to be a package deal, bundled up with some need, some kismet, some self-satisfaction. Some goddamn gratitude.

“Fine,” he concedes, “I’ve been holding out on you. I’m a wizard too.” In the space immediately after, he turns back around, jerks open the refrigerator and peers inside at the half-empty jar of pickles and five bottles of Modelo that are all that’s left since he cleared it out the other day. He’s moving, remember? And it’s either the moving or the bottle that tickles against a thought that’s been stacked up in the back of his head somewhere for a while, like he’s forgotten something important.

“What do you want to do about it?”

[Jude]

You knocked all the certainty right out of me. Well, Jude thinks, you started it. Jude had felt very certain of himself too, walking out of the fog into The Reaches, convinced he would find Courtland the Elder waiting with open arms and the blueprint to salvation. To receive all the acclaim of a tired sideshow act beheld by a spoiled middle-schooler made Jude question his own reality. Now he has been firmly parted from that reality, a piece of it severed, and some alternate limb sewn back on in its place, a crab's claw or a centipede's leg.

There's something about the witching hour, the bad dream, Near's endless, circular protestations, that combine in a sweet cocktail just as Near presents the garnish of 'I'm a wizard'. Jude starts laughing again, palm over his eyes, rocking back slightly so his toes are pointing straight up as he balances on the edges of his heels. He is reminded again of the Harry Potter reruns that are so popular on hotel television. Jude's laugh is an echoing closed-mouth huff, 'hmph hmph hmph', denoting amusement because the octave goes from lower to higher, and the corners of his lips curl up outside the shade of his hand. Hmph hmph hmph!

What does he want Near to do about it? Dropping his hand, he raises his eyes and his voice gamely. "Well, I think two wizards are better than one." Maybe this is still part of the dream. He's dreaming yet, hasn't woken up from his car. Soon Near will pull a wand from the refrigerator and that familiar theme song will begin, along with their great adventure. Then, Jude will wake up, no closer to a productive conversation, but no further.

[Near]

Probably Jude’s awkward, tight-lipped guffaws should rankle him, but fuck it, Near decides. He’s going to take it as a point instead. Because, you know what? Jude should laugh. Near is funny. Near is charming and personable and as likeable as anyone can be when trying to conduct a conversation at two in the morning with someone who can’t answer a straightforward question but might fuse him to the furniture if he gets bored.

“I think two wizards are better than one” is cute but does very little to clarify what such a duo might be better for. Not that it’s anything more than rhetorical, since Near is not, in fact, a wizard, a sorcerer, a shaman, an esper, or anything else. Surely only one of either of these things would be required to perform most day-to-day tasks … And it certainly seemed as if whatever Jude has mistaken for wizardry on Near’s part interfered with his goal of slowly murdering Near, so perhaps two wizards in fact cancel each other out.

He snatches one of the Modelos and bumps the fridge shut with his elbow. Jude and booze mixed spectacularly poorly the last time he sampled the combo, but those were different circumstances: he’d been a few days into Daddy’s wine cellar at that point, tipsy and agitated by Jude’s Judeness. Now he is inured to the latter, divested of the former, and merely in need of something to sand the edges off. After brief consideration, he decides that if Jude wants one, he can ask.

Midway through peeling down the stupid gold foil, the thought catches again. Sticks this time. “Oh, shit,” he says mildly, setting the bottle down. “Hold on.”

It’s in the box closest to the bathroom, on the top. Box in a box. The lawyer handed it off to him with the rest of the paperwork, and he completely forgot it existed until he had to pack it away.

“Does …” (extended pause as he rifles through the contents, finds the envelope) “L.N. Dyer in … Nevada … mean anything to you?”

[Jude]

Frankness is only useful if one is believed. Jude's Judeness deducts credibility before he even speaks; at least his feelings will not be hurt if his joke is not considered funny.

Not for the first time, Jude wonders what the relationship was like with Courtland, whether Courtland possessed credibility. Had he been alive at The Reaches, could he have explained Jude to his son and been believed? Would Courtland have been able to make it make sense? Then Jude wonders if Courtland knew about Near, the third wizard. Near didn't.

Suddenly Near excuses himself, leaving Jude perched on the couch and waiting for the camera to return to his scene. He simply takes the time to look around the room again, to blink away a little more of his drowsiness, and wondering how in the world he can persuade Near of his magical nature without picking a fight. A wizard battle, he reasons, would offer more demonstrable proof. But what if Near is the superior wizard?

The thought, occurring first in jest, chills Jude when seriously examined. Not until this very inopportune moment did he evaluate the possibility of being the lesser man. A frown is lodged on his features as Near's question drifts around the corner.

"I've been to Nevada a few times," he says distractedly. "But not recently." He would do better with a face than a name. He didn't always get people's real names.