Faramir's Tears

Faramir was weeping. Boromir lifted his arm over his brother’s head and pulled him tight into his embrace. He did not know why Faramir was weeping. He had not seen him cry like this since he was a child, and even though Boromir was greatly disquieted, he did not say anything, he simply held him. His brother was not prone to such displays as this, he was a boy who kept nearly everything inside. And Boromir was not really a patient young man, but it seemed this night each of them was undergoing something unusual.

Boromir stroked his brother’s face, endlessly wiping his tears with his fingers. But Faramir’s tears were not abating. He made no sounds, did not sob at all, only poured out a stream of neverending tears.

Faramir slid out of Boromir’s embrace and gently pushed him, trying to turn him to his side. He was five years older than Faramir, and at twenty-two, his body was much bigger and heavier than Faramir’s and if he did not want to be moved, he would not. Boromir remained on his back and tried to read his brother’s face, but could not. Faramir would not meet his eyes.

So, heart breaking, he allowed himself to be turned to his side.

Faramir laid down behind him also on his side, pressing his nakedness to him. Boromir lay still, trying, perhaps, to meet his brother in his thoughts, to vanquish his despair. He felt his brother shift, and then push gently into him. Boromir gasped softly, because he never tired of this moment. Behind him, Faramir breathed quietly.

Slowly, as if in a dream he did not want to end, Faramir slid his hand over Boromir’s hip, up across his muscled stomach. His other arm slid under Boromir and came up around his chest. There, Faramir wrapped his arms tightly around Boromir and dug his fingers into Boromir’s body, pressing, clutching, as if trying to mark his brother for all time.

Then Faramir began to move inside him, and Boromir’s head fell back, conquered. Faramir let his own head drop into the warm curve between Boromir’s nape and shoulder, and left it buried there.

Against his nape Boromir could feel his brother’s soft, distraught gasps, nearly suffocating in his tears.

Covering the arms encircling him with his own, Boromir fought his own tears, understanding finally that though Faramir wept, he held Boromir to give him comfort, not to take. To give now, for a time when he would not be able to do so.

What had his brother seen? Dreamed? Boromir did not know, and he knew that Faramir would not tell. The silent anguish that Faramir was pouring into him would forever remain a puncture in him, an unanswered ache.

And as they strove, suffered together under the silver moonlight, he thought perhaps it was for the best, for what man should know too much of his own fate…?