the coldest night of the year

He couldn't drink enough to forget that it was his own fault. Couldn't socialize enough to keep away the depression, so he didn't even try anymore. The rest of his days, he spent performing his job to the best of his not inconsiderable abilities, which had garnered him another promotion recently. But whenever the Queen's Prosecutor put away another criminal thanks to his work, he only smiled and congratulated the other officers he worked with now, before going back to his other cases. There were always other cases, always new injustices to pursue. He never joined the other RCMP officers in their celebrations, never felt like he'd done enough.

His drive, his obsessive need to uphold the law at the cost to him of any personal life had become legendary. He was seen as a man who had survived and returned from exile triumphant. The Muldoon case had made him a hero. Privately, he found that a joke. The RCMP might have made the arrests, but it was the American police, men like Ray Vecchio, Harding Welsh, and Ray Kowalski, who had broken that case open, set Muldoon on the run, and supported Fraser's pursuit of him. What had he done, beyond nearly getting both his friends killed, that any other good police officer wouldn't have done? Nothing, he thought.

And when it was over, when Muldoon was arrested, and even the ghosts of his mother and father were gone, what had he done? He had used his dearest friend's generosity of soul to hold him in a place that was foreign and unforgiving, repeatedly endangered his life, then used Ray's love to bind him close, just so he wouldn't be alone. He'd done it, knowing that Ray wouldn't ask for more than Fraser had to offer, because Ray loved him. He'd never stopped and thought that because Ray didn't ask, didn't mean Ray didn't need. He'd been selfish.

He'd never said the words. Not once had he told Ray he loved him. He hadn't even let Ray say them to him.

He sipped the cranberry juice the bartender had provided, condensation slick under his fingertips, the color rich and dark as wine. Red like his uniform. Red like blood. He felt bloodless, himself, a cardboard cutout of a man, instead of living, breathing flesh.

That was all he'd offered Ray, an animated mannequin of a man, one who always put everything else first. He'd been so confident that Ray would always be there anyway. Such hubris is always punished by the gods.

His punishment had been the slow destruction of the man who loved him, the knowledge that his own inattention and actions had eaten into Ray like acid, until the corrosion left nothing for Ray but pain and bitterness.

He was too empty to try to care for anyone else again, not after he understood what his failure had cost Ray.

The tale of Victoria had made it to Toronto, a myth of an evil temptress who seduced a stalwart young man who broke his own heart to do his duty and arrest her. Most of the young officers he worked with now thought it terribly romantic and tragic; they thought that he still carried a torch for the dark-hearted witch. Fraser never bothered correcting their misassumptions. It wasn't bankrobbing, murderous Victoria he missed.

She'd already been history for him when he lost—when he'd driven away—the only person who had really mattered. That he'd once mistaken lust for love was forgivable, he'd been young and still innocent. That he'd almost cost Ray Vecchio his career, home and even his life, to recapture that will-o-wisp illusion with her later, was less so—yet he'd been forgiven. But he'd almost forgotten her when he betrayed his Ray—not just with his body in a hotel room with Maggie Thatcher—but with his every choice that set duty above love.

He didn't think it was the infidelity that drove Ray away. If it had been that, Ray would have fought tooth and nail, yelled at him in fury, hit something to let out the pain. He wasn't sure Ray even knew about that damned trip to Yellowknife with the Chief Inspector. It had been the loneliness that made Ray leave. He'd given up everything to stay for Fraser, but he'd got nothing in return, not even Fraser's company, except when it was convenient.

He thought he couldn't have been more cruel to Ray if he'd meant to be.

He had his duty, his obligation. He had to be as good a RCMP officer as Robert Fraser had been. It was important to live up to his father's reputation and expectations, more important than any personal relationship. That's what he'd been taught and believed. He'd kept on thinking that only that was truly important until the day he returned to his cabin and found it empty. Ray had gone. There hadn't been anything of him left behind, except the beaded chain bracelet he'd left with Constable Hawley when he dropped off the jeep at the post.

At first, he'd foolishly thought Ray might return, but that didn't happen. He'd killed something in Ray, slowly and surely, stolen away all the warmth and life from his friend with his obliviousness, his assumptions and his ingratitude. Fraser had kept Ray in the cold too long, selfishly warming himself with that spirit that burned like an elemental fire, but never offered to feed it. The last time he'd seen Ray, setting out on another patrol, Ray's blue-gray eyes were dull as ashes, all his fire quenched. No, Ray had gone because he'd finally given up, and he hadn't turned back to try again.

He could have found out where Ray had gone, but believed he didn't have that right any longer.

He took the transfer to Toronto afterward. The cabin was a hollow hole in his heart, a reminder of just how badly he'd failed, the wrong he'd done. It took him too long to understand and it was too late, so he let them send him to the city as his penance. He would have sold it, but Diefenbacker was buried there, up on the hill, and part of him would always hope Ray might come back some day. So he left it untouched, a memorial to the two friends who had loved him.

Once a year, he stopped and remembered what he no longer had, the friend who would have walked into hell beside him with a smile and quip, the blazing spirit, the heart he'd callously ignored. Once a year, he let himself remember long, elegant hands and that lean, greyhound body that had melted compliant yet fierce in his arms. A universe of touch and skin and breath and hair, caught up in his arms, matching him, meeting him, alive with love. He'd taken it all in so greedily, without ever giving anything in return. Once a year, one night, he let himself ache for what he'd thrown away. One night, he let himself remember that he hadn't always been alone — but that he had no one else to blame that he was, now.

Fraser spread his hands flat against the top of the bar. There were pale rings against the stained wood, careless marks left on the finish like scars. Above the bar, the TV ran with a twenty—four hour weather station on. The anchor was talking about a hurricane in Florida.

How long since he'd talked to Ray Vecchio?

Years and years and years. Had his Ray contacted Stella perhaps, after leaving Canada? Would Vecchio know where to find him if Fraser picked up the phone and called to ask? Would he even know Fraser's voice after so long?

But he wouldn't make the call. He never did. He had no right.

He let his mind drift into the past, into the warmest memories of their adventure searching for Franklin's Hand. Teaching Ray to steer the dogsled, showing him a polar bear track, talking to each other every night from their sleeping bags beside the fire. He remembered Ray's flashing, joyous smiles, as Dief bounded through the snow, showering them both in white powder with a playful pounce, one afternoon outside the cabin. Maggie hugging them both when she gave them the crazy quilt she'd made for their bed ... she'd whispered into his ear as she squeezed him, 'You don't know how lucky you are, Ben. If I weren't your sister, I'd fight you for him.' Ray had run his hands over that quilt over and over again, he'd loved it, said it was them. He'd clutched handfuls of it in his fists when Fraser fucked him on it, gasping with pleasure.

... He remembered the first time he'd kissed Ray, the tentative touch of Ray's lips, faintly chapped and dry. Ray's light eyes had been wide, faintly apprehensive but so accepting at the same time, before those long, blond lashes dipped closed over them and his mouth opened for Fraser's tongue. Ray had had the most beautiful eyes, eyes that spoke volumes, eyes that hid nothing, soft blue-gray that could sharpen into steel if he was pushed too far.

On the TV, the reporter had moved on and was talking about Canada now. Fraser ignored the update on Toronto, he could step outside the bar if he wanted to know the temperature. The reporter went on, giving forecasts for first the eastern provinces, then BC and Saskatchewan, finally the Territories.

Spring break up had come early this year. The ice on the MacKenzie River would be booming and groaning, cracking with sounds like gunshots, far to the north. A warm Chinook was blowing, hurrying the thaw. Fraser listened disinterestedly. His last letter from Maggie had been full of descriptions of the land, as usual; she never wrote anything personal these days, either because Fraser didn't or from the awkwardness that set in after Ray left.

He was lucky Maggie still spoke to him, he supposed. She'd been so angry when he showed up years ago, wanting to know if Ray had told her he was going. She was a good sister though, better than he deserved, though he'd kept a certain distance between them since that time. She always wrote him a long letter a day or two before this anniversary, something to occupy his mind, something to look at and hold onto when he needed a reminder that he still had a connection to someone somewhere. Maybe he would go visit her on his next mandatory leave.

Toronto's air was filled with the warmth and scent of spring when he stepped outside at last. It would be good to get away, go back where it was still cold. He wanted to be some place that reflected what he felt, wanted to see someone who understood what he'd lost.

He wanted to go back.

But when he went home and stared down at his empty, empty bed, alone and waiting for the day, it was still the coldest night of the year.


-fin