for Bryan [May]

 
David wakes up early on the eighth morning, takes a deep breath and slips out of bed. It's true what they say: losing a partner is like losing a limb. But he is never going to learn how to live without his husband Bryan if he doesn't put more effort into living with his boyfriend Bryan. He had come to that conclusion two hours ago and had been watching the numbers tick by on the clock until it reached an acceptable time to get up.

He lets the dogs out, passes a blissfully quiet Sawyer and heads downstairs to make breakfast. For Bryan. Not for his boyfriend Bryan. Not for his husband Bryan. Just for Bryan.

Differentiating between the two has to stop if they have any hope of staying together and making this work. That also means that the mourning has to stop. Comparing the two men will only ever end one way and that's not fair on David or the man asleep upstairs.

Or Sawyer.

"God." David breaths, pausing for a moment over a carton of eggs and pressing the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. At least he's only one. At least he won't remember this. Somehow that thought just upsets David even more, the fact that he won't remember his actual dad, the guy that has dedicated every day to him since he was born.

No more. Today is a new day and it's David's job to make Bryan feel wanted and loved and at home, which is why he climbs the stairs twenty minutes later with a coffee in one hand and two poached eggs on toast in the other.