Disclaimer: I don't own the boys, but I own the unnamed orig chara and the poem.

Rating: Pg

Warnings: Angst, angst

Author: Nightshadow

Fading (Sequel to Standing)

Kneeling on this floor,

I scrub what shouldn't shine.

But yet these words won't fade,

For in stone they are engraved.

We are at the doctors again. Those pristine walls I loathe. It's odd how after so much time you come to see white as Death's color instead of his black shroud and odder still how I hate this place, but not Death. Maybe that's not as odd as it seems, I do live with him after all. The results are in and the words he speaks engraved in memory. The cancer is stage three; we knew that. But what they neglect to tell you is that it has no cure. The treatments only prolong the inevitable, cause it to shrink for a while before beginning its devouring path again. I watch as two pairs of eyes meet, one resolved blue gaze and one anguished amethyst, and they cling together. I want to scream that life isn't fair, but the irony is that it is. First my violet-eyed father has cancer and now his blue-eyed husband bears it as well, but it's the final words, which land the harshest blow.

There's a knocking at the door.

I dash my ruined brush to the floor.

Answering, I find that reason's lost all rhyme,

For there stands the Ender of Life's time.

There are times when I wish to laugh until I cry and cry until I scream at what I find behind a new door I've opened, but it would do no good so I remain silent as we huddle together, three turned into four by the words a so called Doctor spoke. Death will walk with us and inhabit a place in our lives, not the laughing, violet-eyed Death we call Shinigami, but the one who truly claims life's end. Where as Papa had an enemy to defeat, Dad was gifted with an enemy who held all the cards, leaving us only the capability of postponing the inevitable. I close my eyes to the figure entering for time unknown into our lives.

The words will always stay,

As will the guest I gained this day.

Death walks through my halls,

An unwanted guest within my walls.

The treatments can never kill their target and we will be trapped in that hell of medicine and the eternal question, "Is the cure worse than the Illness?" until our newest tenant claims the member of our family who stood strong during the previous years of turmoil, my Dad with his hands of iron strength, which protected both me and Papa. It seems that now we must stand instead for him and carry him when he shall fall. People say with time you forget that which harms you, but words you live with everyday never go away.

I suppose that I could hate the irrevocable decree,

But I can't in the face of its sympathy.

Compared to the pain to be, Death is benign.

And with time to this fate I'll be resigned.

We leave that hated place and return to our own private haven, our guest tailing along beside the one who even now seems so strong. I wish I could hate what I know shall be. It would make everything so much easier, but I knew from the beginning that to hope and expect are two different things. In the end I'll probably be grateful for this guest, for death is preferable to being slowly eaten alive by the very cells which once gave the life that each of us holds so dear. Life is full of ironies. Thanking Death for its service will only be one more among many.

Death walks beside him, guiding as he falls,

But knowledge of its mercy doesn't end silent screams.

I watch one I love fading as he's fighting.

The stone is worn as we walk, but always clear in its writing.

It's not over yet and I don't know when it will end. I could say I don't wish it too, and for now that's true. But when pain fills those blue eyes I've known for so long, I'll change my tune because in a way watching him fade into Death's timeless hands will be harder than when it ends. It's ironic really. He married the one he called Death only to find that the true Death has laid its claim upon him. The grief though will have no bounds and knowing that the pain has ended will be useless, like trying to stem a flood with a pebble. I have no idea, for which it will be the worse, but in the end only our memories of the times we've had and the times we have yet to make will be left to us. That though is all to come. For now we are gifted with this time and the pain at the end of the rode is no excuse to waste what we have, no matter who or what travels with us.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Ns: It seems we're not quite done yet with everything. My Mom's still going through her complications, but the cancer is staying gone. This one is for my Grandfather who has raised me since long before my own father walked out. My Grandfather has been there through everything and now it's my turn to do the same for him until the time comes that I must say goodbye, a word I wish I could strike from the dictionary and memory, silly yes, but they're words I have no wish to say.

Fading

Kneeling on this floor,

I scrub what shouldn't shine.

But yet these words won't fade,

For in stone they are engraved.

There's a knocking at the door.

I dash my ruined brush to the floor.

Answering, I find that reason's lost all rhyme,

For there stands the Ender of Life's time.

The words will always stay,

As will the guest I gained this day.

Death walks through my halls,

An unwanted guest within my walls.

I suppose that I could hate the irrevocable decree,

But I can't in the face of its sympathy.

Compared to the pain to be, Death is benign.

And with time to this fate I'll be resigned.

Death walks beside him, guiding as he falls,

But knowledge of its mercy doesn't end silent screams.

I watch one I love fading as he's fighting.

The stone is worn as we walk, but always clear in its writing.