Archive of Our Own

Mike could never pinpoint the exact moment in his life in which he realized he was vastly different from every person around him. Try as he might, he could never quite manage to put his finger on the memory; the irony of the situation, of course, had never been lost on him, either. Mike? Couldn't remember?

Although sometimes he believed it was less a matter of remembering, and more one of distinguishing the muddy line between remembering and, well, not. He couldn't recall a time in which he couldn't remember something, but surely there had been. He didn't remember his own birth after all, but what if at one time he had? What if he simply couldn't remember the very act of remembering because it had become so much a part of him, as natural as the blue of his eyes or as instinctual as every breath his lungs took? He didn't actively tell his lungs to draw in breath, but they did it anyhow. It wasn't something he had to remember to do.

Realistically, he knew the two actions weren't related in any normal sense of the word. They were controlled by two vastly different parts of the brain, or so the image of the medical journal he'd scanned in the library a year ago told him. Which, really, just brought him back to the crux of the issue.

If he couldn't remember something occurring, was it really an issue of not remembering, or rather, was it one of forgetting? The two seemed to be different yet somehow intrinsically intertwined. He couldn't not remember something without having forgot it to begin with, but if he remembered forgetting it, had he really forgot it at all? It was an endless paradox.

It made his head hurt.

It was too much for any normal person to consider, let alone any normal six-year-old. But then again, there was nothing normal about Michael Ross.

So, Mike being Mike, begged Grammy every weekend to take him to the library for the weekly story time. Not that he wanted anything to do with Amelia Bedelia or Where's Waldo? and his abhorrent taste in fashion. They did, however, provide a handy coverup for a child looking to run amuck amidst books he would usually have been forbidden from. Who would expect to find a first-grader nose-deep in a textbook on neurology when there were Fruit Roll-Ups and picture books right downstairs? Textbooks had pictures, too, and he might not know all the words, but that's where the dictionary came in. Once he read something, he understood it. And once he understood, well, since the day he figured out that the oddly shaped characters on a page formed the same words he spoke, he had never forgotten a single thing he'd read.

The Fruit Roll-Ups didn't hurt either.

With that being said, he had learned just about all he thought there was to learn about his brain. Or, specifically, his eidetic memory. Also known as total recall.

"Eidetic" from the Greek noun eidos, meaning "form." "Memory" from the Latin term memor, meaning mindful or remembering, and the Italian word of the same definition, memori. That one was a bit trickier, as it tumbled around and changed appearance through languages and years, but still all the same. It meant he could remember the form of just about everything he'd ever read.

Which led him to quickly realize not everyone could do what he did. Statistically, less than 10% of people reported the ability to recall images in perfect form, and even then, they were nearly all children and not one could retain the immaculacy of the image past a handful of minutes.

Not Mike. No, he could still remember with perfect clarity each grocery list his mother had written since he was cognizant enough to know what a grocery list was. Some people liked to claim there was no such thing as total recall, but that simply wasn't true. Mike knew what he was, and he knew how he felt. He couldn't speak for the accusations claiming he was likely to lose his superpower the older he got—he was only six, after all—but he wasn't a liar.

He somehow knew better than to tell people, though. Not even his parents or Grammy. While they were likely to just laugh at his silliness, shake their head with fondness, and mutter something about his wild imagination, he had read his fair share of comic books. He knew what happened to superheroes who were misunderstood for their powers. Granted, he had never been exposed to radiation or bitten by a radioactive spider, but he didn't really think it would matter. People feared what they couldn't understand.

His proclivity for reading texts far beyond his years didn't mean he didn't also thoroughly enjoy a good, age-appropriate book, one filled with colorful pictures and easily palatable words. Especially, when his mom read to him.

She was just about his favorite person in the world, right next to Grammy. His mom, with her quick wit, had to be the smartest person ever, he was sure of it. She taught math that was more letters than numbers to kids much bigger than himself; sure, Mike could do most of it in his sleep ever since he'd read that novel on trigonometry, but that was Mike and his stupid superpower. His mom didn't even have a superpower, and she could still do the equations faster than Mike's sloppy scrawl. And if she ever found it odd that her first grader had miraculously developed a taste for trig faster than most of her high schoolers, she never said anything. She just grinned and kissed the top of his hair, all spiky from the copious amounts of hair gel he'd forced his dad to pile in there—his dad had been on a recent Top Gun kick, and Mike had taken a sort of kinship to the formidable Iceman and his patented gel-lathered locks.

If her brains weren't enough, then every other thing about her surely made up for whatever fault someone could find in her mind. She was absolutely stunning, and he wasn't the only one who thought so. Every time his father laid eyes on her, his eyes would shine with a sort of wistful love, and really, Mike only ever hoped to find someone in his life who looked at him like his dad looked at his mom. Because surely Lindsay Bigley down the street couldn't be it; she picked on him relentlessly for his gangly limbs and spiky hair. His mom said she thought he was cute, and little girls picked on little boys when they liked them. Which was fine by him, really, as long as he could reciprocate. But every time he did, she would burst into tears, and hours later, Mike's mom would get a phone call from her mom that ended with Mike in the time-out chair.

So no, Mike did not like Lindsay. Besides, she could barely even read.

Mike's mom was also the best cook. Her chocolate chip cookies were even better than Grammy's, but he was a smart enough kid to know better than to ever tell his grandmother that. She played piano, and taught him, too. It really wasn't hard at all; music was all about math, and Mike loved math. He also loved the way the smooth ivory keys felt beneath his fingertips, cool and soft. He loved the satisfying thump the keys made as his fingers gave them just the right amount of pressure to strike the note before skirting on to the next chord.

But most of all, Mike loved his mom's voice. It had a soothing lilt that he felt could lull even the most chronic insomniac into the most peaceful sleep of their life. When she sang along to her playing, Mike could get lost in the moment for the rest of his life. When he had wrecked his bike the year prior, snapping his wrist, it was his mother's voice that had broken through the tears and heaving sobs to calm him down enough to get him to the hospital.

Needless to say, in the evenings when Mike was curled up beneath his blankets while she read from whatever the night's pick was, that was his absolute favorite time of day.

It didn't matter what she read. Some nights they were chapter books, ones without pictures she would hold so they could go back and forth reading with a dictionary standing a silent vigil on his bedside table just in case they came across an unfamiliar word, which happened with increasing infrequency the more they read. Other nights, however, she would rifle around his bookshelf, the shelves of which were bending sadly under the weight of their many heavy charges, until she found one of the few picture books he had left as if she just knew he needed the reminder that his brain didn't mean he wasn't still just a kid.

It didn't really matter what she read, but he undoubtedly had his favorite. It was easy to tell, with the small book's worn spine and page edges discolored from the countless times fingers had rubbed over them. Some had small tears, others were dog-eared on favorite pictures or scenes. Page six was held in only by one long strip of tape.

But he couldn't help loving Curious George. He adored that little monkey.

Even though he had every word memorized, every image burned into his mind, he still pleaded with his mother to read it to him at least once a week. She couldn't even remember like him, and he was pretty sure she had it memorized. Sometimes, she would try to convince him otherwise, offer other options that weren't the curious monkey and the man with his yellow hat. But he was always steadfastly adamant. It had to be George.

He wasn't even entirely sure what it was about the book that had turned him into such a devout fan. It was many years older than he, and arguably mediocre. Perhaps he related to the insatiably curious monkey, and his inability to keep himself out of trouble. Maybe he enjoyed the wild adventure, each page another depiction of George's antics and each one more unpredictable than the last—or, at least, they had been unpredictable the first time Mike had read it. Or even more, maybe he just enjoyed the simple words and bright, colorful pictures with no need for a dictionary.

Sure, he could read it just fine himself and had many times before. But it was so much better when his mom read it to him. She did all the voices, even two different ones for the thin fireman and the fat one who catch George after he falsely calls the fire department. No matter how many times she read it to him, she still managed to seem just as happy, tickling his belly and messing with his hair as she read over the sacred words. She didn't even scold him when his excitement got the better of him, and he interrupted her with the rest of the dialogue. She just smiled and gave him a sloppy, wet kiss on the cheek that had him grimacing, wiping his face, and shoving her away.

"He felt he MUST have a bright red balloon. He reached over and tried to help himself, but—"

"—but instead of one balloon, the whole bunch broke loose!" Mike couldn't help but cry. He was practically vibrating in his bed as he strangled his Pound Puppies stuffy with two small hands.

His mom laughed and placed her hands over his. "Hey, cool it. Poor Howler's gonna asphyxiate."

Mike perked up. He loved it when his mom used big words around him. It made him feel all grown-up. And he needed the practice, anyhow. How was he going to become the best superhero in the world if he didn't practice using his powers? "Asphyxiate: to kill someone by depriving them of air."

His mom laughed again and ran a hand through his hair, which was now soft and fluffy again after his bath had freed it from its gelled prison. "Alright, my little dictionary, I think it's time to give old George a rest. It's past a certain little boy's bedtime."

"But, Mom, we didn't even finish the book—"

"Nope, George will still be here tomorrow, I promise." She kissed his forehead. "Goodnight, Mike. I love you, baby."

Mike sighed and tried to stifle a big yawn even as he rubbed his eyes tiredly. "I'm not sleepy."

His mom snorted. "Uh, huh. Yeah, I believe that about as much as I believe I won't be reading Curious George again tomorrow night."

"You read it the best." It was true. No one would ever read it like his mom, not even from his own memory.

"Goodnight, Michael."

"'Night, momma. Love you."

0000

Mike hated school.

For that matter, he didn't just hate it. He loathed it. Abhorred it. Despised it. And if he could think of a stronger adjective, he would use it. Because Mike Ross hated school, and he went to bed every night praying that a great hole would open in the dark of the night and swallow the stone building like some great monster come to seek its prey, punish the building for torturing young children such as himself.

His mom said he would grow out of it. One day, he would learn to appreciate school for all of the wonderful opportunities it could offer him and his ever-expanding mind, but he seriously doubted it. He had no use for the condescending teachers and suffocating classrooms disguised with posters and colors, like a pig in make-up. He knew how to add, thank you very much, and did not need four posters reminding him that, shockingly, two plus two still equaled four. Unlike the boy who sat next to him, a tall, snot-nosed kid named Trevor Evans, he had already blown through all of his math facts, multiplication and division. From what he heard Miss Hertz whispering to his parents, those were a third-grade skill, and the fractional math he was breezing through wasn't seen until fifth. Privately, Mike rolled his eyes and huffed out an annoyed sigh. He could run circles around these fools, find the derivative of a trig function without breaking a sweat. And she thought fractions were a challenge.

At least Trevor was willing to share his comic books and Teddy Grahams.

He was endlessly bored and beyond exasperated with his teachers speaking to him as if his IQ was no greater than his age. Being trapped in academic jail for eight hours a day was a waste of both his time and abilities, and he made that abundantly clear to just about every teacher he ever encountered. Hence, the numerous comments on each one of his quarterly reports that always managed to circle back to, "Attitude problem."

His dad would scoff at those anecdotes, tear up the page, and toss the scraps into the garbage before hanging his immaculate grades on the front of the refrigerator with a grin.

"Damn school doesn't know how to handle a kid as smart as Mike, that's all," he said. "Bet you could teach those teachers a thing or two, couldn't ya, kiddo?" And his mom would always promptly swat his dad's shoulder disapprovingly, sending his dad back to the den with his tail between his legs and a shit-eating grin on his face, mumbling something about the Mets game.

Mike, even at such a young age, was more a Yankees fan, but he'd be hard-pressed to even utter those sacrilegious words around James Ross.

There were moments, although few and far between, that Mike genuinely enjoyed within the brick-and-mortar confines. Computer days were always fun. It was cold and quiet in the lab, and he enjoyed playing the little games whenever he finished his typing work. So was music class. The room always smelled nice, somewhere between cinnamon and freshly baked bread. He was hopelessly bored in there as well, far beyond the likes of anything his teacher could possibly think to teach them, but playing with the egg shakers was fun all the same. Plus, she had the best stickers; Mike had one proudly displayed on the front of his 'Take Home' folder, a little electric guitar proudly proclaiming, "You Rock!" in swooping black font.

He used to enjoy arts and crafts, at least until Trevor had decided it would be a good day to brush up on his cosmetology skills using Mike's hair as a practice dummy. He'd walked around for weeks after sporting the near-buzz his mom had forced upon him thanks to the large chunk his so-called best friend had nabbed from the nape of his neck.

His favorite part of school, undeniably and irrevocably, was the library. Once a week, his teacher would trudge the entirety of his second-grade class up the stairs to the library for weekly reading time, and he adored it. There was just something so entrancing about the towering shelves of books, the bright pops of colors from the reading corner, the way the light filtered in through the window and made the dust particles dance like sparkles as they drifted gently down. The room smelled perpetually of ink and bubblegum—even with his memory, it was a scent so distinctly unique, possibly sickeningly so to the unenthused party, that Mike was sure he wouldn't forget it for the rest of his life.

He would enter his classroom every Wednesday morning, vibrating with anticipation, waiting to see the vibrant blue marker across the front board declaring it 'Library Day.' Sure, he didn't have much interest in any of the books they had to offer him, but that was just as well all the same. He was content with sitting atop the fuchsia shag rug as Miss Banks settled herself in the rocking chair and pulled out the week's newest story. She seemed to have an endless stockpile of them as well; never once had she repeated a story. Everything from Harold and the Purple Crayon to The Giving Tree, none of it mattered. Stories had been and he thoroughly believed, always would be, one of the most intrinsic parts of his being. They were the only part of learning that allowed his memory to be more of an asset than a hinderance where he could replay the words in his mind like his own movie reel, lie in bed at night and repeat the words to himself into the darkness, taste the shape of them over his tongue and feel the way they made his stomach tingle with happiness. Books were proof his superpower was at least good for something. Because what was a superhero with no good use for their powers? A supervillain.

Sometimes he thought Trevor was a supervillain. He certainly had powers, powers of persuasion and a silvery tongue to boot. He was but seven-years-old and already, Trevor had developed the perpetuation to lord his self-appointed prowess over the unsuspecting masses of their second-grade class.

But he was Mike's best friend. He never turned his powers on him. Heck, he had even gotten into a fist fight with Liam Donahue on the kickball field after the other boy had called Mike a fairy. Whatever that meant.

Trevor was just overly protective. Perhaps, he was more of a Loki.

That didn't stop him from digging his elbow into Trevor's ribs each Wednesday as they sat cross-legged on the fuchsia shag rug, and Trevor sniggered about one thing or another for the thousandth time. He wasn't going to allow Trevor to ruin the one thing he looked forward to each week of school.

Although, in the end, it turned out that Trevor needn't meddle in a thing. All it took was Miss Banks pulling out a copy of Curious George, the cover all sleek and shiny and new, for Mike's stomach to drop to his shoes.

And really, he couldn't even explain why. He loved that book, practically begged his mother to read it to him at least once a week. He had the whole thing memorized, word for word, cover to cover. Every image was permanently etched into his mind; if he closed his eyes long enough, he could recall them with the same clarity one would see through a TV screen.

It just didn't feel right, hearing those savored, sacred words from anyone but his mother. Realistically, he knew the book wasn't exactly new—it had been published for decades before he was even born. It was a popular children's book, and he had no real justification for feeling a sort of jealous twinge of self-righteousness at the thought of all his classmates hearing the same words he held so dear.

He bit his tongue, nonetheless. Best not to give his classmates a reason to dislike him anymore than they already did or anymore fuel for the fire of writing material his teacher garnered to relay back to his parents like she thought that was really going to fix Mike's "attitude" anyhow. Really, she chastised them for tattling.

He sucked up his feelings and stared dutifully at the carpet, running his fingers methodically through the tufts. He tried not to cringe at every stumbled word. He even tried to keep his glaring to a minimum, citing the fact that it may appear a bit strange for him to be frowning at the area rug like it had personally offended him. It was so hard, though, to keep his features schooled. Miss Banks didn't even do the voices, and Trevor's colorful commentary certainly didn't help his mood.

That night, after he had ranted and raved about the occurrence to both his parents and Grammy over his mother's spaghetti Bolognese, he insisted that their story be Curious George. He needed to hear it from his mother—the only acceptable way—to drown out the noisy buzzing of his mind, to bury the reminder of Miss Banks desecrating his book as deep into his mind as his superhuman memory would allow.

Sometimes, superpowers sucked.

0000

He didn't realize how true that was until he was standing in the kitchen, still clad in pajamas and sporting a truly heinous bedhead, while Grammy choked out through her own tears that his parents were gone.

Gone. As in, never coming back. As in, Mike would never see them again, would never hear their voices, listen to their laughter. He would never again hear his dad crooning out Billy Ray Cyrus in the car, only turning the radio up louder if Mike dared to complain. He would never sit next to his mom at the piano again, never help her set up her classroom for another year of torturing high schoolers with trigonometry.

He would never get to apologize to his dad for shrugging him away before they left, for fighting with him. He would never get to give his mom that one final hug, never tell her how much he loved her.

All because someone had too much to drink and made the fatal decision to get behind the wheel of a car.

Try as he might, he couldn't purge the look on his dad's face from his memory, the soft hurt and sad smile. He swore he could still feel the phantom pressure of his dad's hand squeezing his shoulder, still hear the quietly whispered, "Love you, buddy." Mike didn't say it back.

And he never would again.

Because his parents were gone.

In was incomprehensible. He was cursed to remember everything he'd ever read, every word he'd ever laid eyes on, yet it seemed that his mind had decided to pump the brakes in that moment. He could practically feel his mind screeching to a halt. He could feel the gears grinding in his mind, the dull aching beginning to bloom from the center of his chest as if he'd taken a fastball to the sternum.

He couldn't breathe. The collar of his sleep shirt was suddenly too tight, his skin too warm against the fabric as the Darth Vader outlines on his pajama pants began to blur behind a haze of tears.

"No, no. They can't be," Mike insisted, slowly taking his hand from Grammy's grip and backing away from the kitchen island. "You're wrong."

Grammy only cried harder. Had Mike not been so concerned with the way his shirt was trying to suffocate him, he might have put his hand back in hers. He might have comforted her. Because, despite how ardently he denied the fact, if what she was claiming to be true—which it absolutely was not—actually was, then she had lost a son and a daughter-in-law just as much as he had lost two parents. But, his whole body had gone numb, walking into the snow without a coat kind of numb. Dizzy, loss-of-reality kind of numb, like the time Mike and Trevor had been camping in his backyard and the other boy had dared Mike to take a puff, just one, from the special cigarette Trevor had gotten from his next-door neighbor, who just so happened to be five years older than them.

He'd hated it then, and he hated it even more now. The feeling had passed, if not at a rather indeterminable speed, then. Mike had a feeling he wouldn't be so lucky a second time.

"I wish I were, baby, I wish I—" Grammy cut herself off with a soft sob. Distantly, Mike could feel his head shaking, but he was sure it wasn't of his own volition. He couldn't remember ever telling his body to do such a thing, couldn't remember telling his body to do anything, really, and that scared him to no end. For the first time in his life, he couldn't remember anything besides the word gone.

He felt himself crying, in a dissociated, detached way. It was almost like he was a third-party viewer to his own body, standing outside, watching the scene unfold, clip after horrifying clip, like a tragedy with no happy ending. He hated the books that didn't have happy endings. He'd cried for twenty minutes after his mother had once read to him The Little Match Girl. And this disembodied ghost saw no happy ending in sight for the little boy standing in that kitchen, bare feet ice cold against the hardwood floor, tears flooding down his cheeks, and his world crashing down around him.

With a sudden vicious clarity, Mike felt anger surge inside of him. "Why didn't you wake me up?" He demanded from his Grammy, who was silently shaking her head, looking just as lost as he felt. "I could have gone to the hospital! I could've seen them!"

"They didn't make it to the hospital, sweetheart, and I–and I didn't want to tell you until I had to."

Mike was filled with a sudden, overwhelming need to get away, to run, to run as far away as he could from the house and from Grammy and from that horrifying shell of a little boy, bare feet ice cold against the hardwood floor, tears flooding down his cheeks, and wishing he had never became a superhero.

Because the one thing he had never accounted for was the fact that he'd never heard of a superhero with two living parents.

His body was backpedaling away from Grammy, tripping over its own icy feet. "How could you do this to me?" Mike's body was running, running, running like the Flash, back towards the stairs, trying to outrun the horrible lies that his parents were gone, and he would never get to apologize for what a horrible son he'd been only the night before.

"How could you not wake me up?" He cried, but his anger wasn't really aimed towards Grammy. The genius in him, the same part that knew he was no superhero and could never hope to be one, could see that it was far from Grammy's fault. It wasn't as if she had asked to lose her family any more than he his, but it still hurt. It was a deep, burning, indescribable hurt, unlike anything Mike had ever experienced before.

Mike collapsed on his bed, pulling his knees to his chest and allowing the tears to flow freely down his cheeks. He couldn't breathe, couldn't even think. He pressed his face into his pillow and sobbed, practically suffocating himself with the fabric, but he couldn't care less. He couldn't care past the putrid word spinning around his head: gone, gone, gone.

Even after he ran out of tears, he lay there in his mess of sheets, his bed still unmade in his excitement to get downstairs and see his parents, just staring blankly at his poster of The Amazing Spiderman. It was taunting him.

The same quick anger that had risen in him at Grammy flared up again, hot and sour in the back of his throat, his tongue salty from his tears. He felt his body rise from the bed, grip the poster, and rip it from the wall with a half-scream, half-sob. He took comfort in the way the glossy paper tore right across Peter Parker's stupid mask.

It was high time he figured out superheroes weren't real.

~

It was a few weeks after the funeral, and Mike sat on his bed, staring listlessly at the marks where his poster purge had torn the paint from the wall. The pieces were still crumpled on the floor, Grammy not having the energy to get him to do much of anything at all, let alone clean it up. He rubbed his thumb over the pendant of Saint William that Father Walker had given to him outside the cathedral. It was cool and smooth and had a pleasant weight in the palm of his hand.

Not that he really believed any of Father Walker's mumbo jumbo about orphans. He hadn't lied when he'd told the Reverend he wasn't mad at his parents; he truly wasn't. How was it their fault? It's not like they'd chosen to get hit by a drunk driver. He was really mad at God and, yeah, he was a little mad at Father Walker. How could that man stand before the congregation each Sunday, preaching about God's mercy and compassion and love, and then turn around and feed him some crap about how he wasn't an orphan, because true orphans were all alone, and he would never be? If God was so merciful, surely, he wouldn't have taken two of the kindest, loving people Mike had ever known. If He was so compassionate, orphans wouldn't even exist; there would be no need for a Patron Saint. If he was so loving, he never would have cursed a defenseless little boy with the inability to ever forget how well and truly alone he was, no matter what Father Walker said.

Because he loved Grammy, more than just about anything, now. He knew that he should be eternally grateful for her; there were plenty of kids in his situation, much worse off without a family member willing to take them in. If not for Grammy, he knew he would have already found himself in some group home that likely had far too many mouths to feed and far too little funding to do so. But she would never be his parents. He could spend the rest of his life giving her hugs and kisses on the cheek, and it would still never be enough to make up for the hugs he had missed that night, shrugging his parents away out of petulance for something he couldn't even remember now.

(That was a lie. He remembered with perfect clarity, just as he did everything else, the cause of his petulance that night. He had been angry at them for going out to dinner to celebrate their anniversary instead of staying home to watch the new Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson movie with him like they'd promised. And he was so ashamed of his petty dismissal that, for once in his life, he had convinced himself he had forgotten it.)

But then, that only got him thinking about the eternal paradox of remembering and forgetting once again, and the philosophy of how exactly his curse worked to torture him was one of the last things he wished to think about.

There was a soft knock on his bedroom door, and Grammy was slowly pushing it open with a long creak. She gave him a thin-lipped smile, the only kind she gave him these days.

"Hello, sweetheart."

He didn't respond. He just kept staring at the wall, at the shredded remains of Peter Parker staring up at him from the floor like he was in just as much pain as Mike.

She sat carefully next to him. "I wanted to check on you. How are you doing, baby?"

He shrugged a shoulder and toed the carpet with one socked foot. His feet were ice cold. He couldn't bring himself to look at her.

"Michael, please talk to me."

He couldn't. He wasn't mad at her. It wasn't her fault, but he couldn't talk to her, in the same way he couldn't forget the look on her face when she'd been forced to tell him his entire world had just been ripped from him by one man who'd had too much to drink and made the fateful decision to get behind the wheel of a car.

Vaguely, he heard her rummaging around the bookshelf next to his bed. After a moment, she must have found what she was looking for, because she hummed thoughtfully to herself.

"Oh, you used to love this one."

Mike couldn't stop himself from glancing over, and he immediately wished he hadn't. His heart practically froze the minute he saw Curious George in big, bold letters right across the cover. He hadn't seen that book, let alone had been read to from it, in years, and now of all times certainly wasn't a good moment for its reappearance. Mike had half a mind to give the stupid smiling monkey the same treatment that he'd given Spiderman.

That was Mom's book. Her's and no one else's, not even Grammy's. Not once in his whole life had he been able to stomach someone else reading it to him, and the thought of Grammy even touching it in light of what had happened made him physically sick to his stomach.

Grammy carefully opened the front cover. "This is George," she began. "He lived in Africa."

"Put that down," he snapped, grabbing for the book.

Grammy handed it over easily, but that didn't stop an affronted look from crossing her face. "Michael!" She chastised. "Have some manners, child."

He didn't even look at the book as he shoved it deep into his bookshelf, back with the dust bunnies and stale gum sticks from his baseball cards.

Grammy took a deep breath. Mike tried to ignore the way she gripped her hands together to keep them from shaking. "Michael, I know it's been hard. I only thought, maybe we could read something together—"

"No."

"Michael—"

"I said 'no,' Grammy. Please, just leave me alone." Mike tried desperately to quell the guilt in his heart over snapping at Grammy, but it really didn't matter. He was already so full of guilt that just a little bit more didn't make much of a difference.

He slowly curled up on his side, pulling his comforter over his head like the meagre fabric could ever hope to block out the rest of the world. His dad had once told him that if he couldn't see the monsters under his bed, then they couldn't see him, and the guilt in his chest surely felt like a monster. The only problem was how did one hide from themselves?

He felt Grammy's weight rise from his bed and her soft, shuffling footsteps over the floor. At least he waited until he heard the door click behind her to let out the first sob.

0000

College was…an experience for Mike.

Not in a particularly bad way. He loved Columbia, and he would be forever grateful for the opportunity to attend an Ivy, on a full scholarship at that. Its location allowed him to stay at home with Grammy while still attending class full-time, and his classes, for that matter, were a breeze. He was yet to finish with anything lower than an 'A'.

No, the main "experience" came from his shithead of a best friend.

Mike loved Trevor like a brother and cared about him deeply. But for some unfathomable reason, despite their many years of friendship, Trevor just couldn't seem to get it through his head that some of the people who went to college were actually there to, you know, study. Sure, Mike would be the first to admit that he enjoyed a good joint now and then, something to take the edge off of his overcrowded brain, something to drown out all the noise. And sure, he'd been to his fair share of house parties; he'd found himself knockout, blackout drunk until he could barely recite his own name—which, in total honesty, Mike wasn't often complaining about—more times than he or Grammy cared to admit, but he didn't have a problem. Or at least not as serious of one as Trevor.

"Liquor before beer, you're in the clear" his ass.

At least Mike never left a party empty handed. He could always find some wannabe high-rolling douche far too intoxicated to be fairly wagering the amount of money they were on a frat house poker game just asking to be hustled. Mike almost felt bad for them until he remembered that half of them had trust funds worth more than Mike's house, and miraculously, the guilt faded away just as quickly as their money.

It wasn't that Mike really chose to count cards; his mind kind of just did it without his consent. (The one time he'd told Trevor that, the jackass had laughed about it until he snorted beer out of his nose, so Mike had at least got some level of satisfaction.) Not only that, but even with the scholarship, they were flat out broke. There weren't many people who would drain their 401K years before retirement to take care of their grieving grandson, but that didn't change the fact that they had virtually nothing, even with Mike's bike messenger job. Hustling poker was quick and easy, even if it did put a massive target on his back.

Trevor, though. Trevor did not know when to quit. Not only with poker, but with drinking, with the weed, with everything. Like some twisted Clarence the angel, he was determined to give Mike the "full college experience" by showing Mike all he would be missing if he holed himself up in the library all the time. But Mike really didn't want to be George Bailey.

Women were no exception. It was like he had some sixth sense for them, and more often than not, Mike got dragged into being an unwilling wing man for whatever Trevor's latest scheme to get a girl's phone number was. What made it worse was that Trevor almost always decided partway through the night that he was Mike's wingman, not the other way around, regardless of Mike's protests or preferences. Grammy had instilled him with morals, and there was just something about picking up a girl or a boy at some smokey, alcohol-filled house party that made Mike feel icky.

It wasn't that Trevor even cared that he liked boys just as much as girls; he certainly had no room to judge with some of the things Mike had walked in on him and one girl or another doing. It was more the fact that Trevor couldn't take no for an answer. He couldn't seem to understand that, really, Mike was perfectly okay going to a party and leaving alone. Or, even, not going at all.

Trevor's inability to know when to stop was exactly what had led to one of their biggest blow-outs since the day they had met in second grade. It was some time after the sold calculus test that had gotten Mike expelled from Columbia and his offer from Harvard Law rescinded. No one had been there for him more than Trevor. Sure, Mike could have seen it as Trevor trying to make up for the grand scheme that had been totally his fault at the expense of Mike's future, but Mike was more inclined to believe, or rather, hope, that the care came from a deep and profound lifelong friendship. After all, Mike could have thrown Trevor under the bus at any point. He had chosen to take the blame for something he hadn't even done, just because he cared about Trevor that damn much; he was that goddamn loyal. And the memory of that decision never quite left Mike's mind no matter how he tried to smother it with weed and cheap booze. As was the wont of his curse.

So, when Trevor returned to their apartment mid-morning with a baggie full of joints, telling him they were going out that night, what else was Mike supposed to do? Any morals Grammy had instilled in him had disappeared as quickly as his Harvard acceptance. Long gone was the do-gooder college boy who gave a damn about things like morality and one-night stands. He hadn't felt so shitty since the morning he had stood before Grammy in his own kitchen as she told him his entire world had shattered because of one car.

Jenny was, undeniably, drop-dead gorgeous. From the moment he had laid eyes on her, Mike, for once, wasn't complaining about Trevor playing wingman. And her friend Nicky wasn't too bad herself.

It was going well. Really well, actually, even with Trevor mooching off his mind and calling him a "genius" as if he could ever deserve such a title. The word did carry around some weight, however, especially when one pleading look from Jenny's sparkling blue eyes had him reciting Moby Dick and The Old Man and the Sea like some show pony at a circus. God was he a sucker.

Women and men alike loved the word "genius." It was almost amusing to watch the way their faces would change from disbelieving exasperation to awe as soon as he showed his hand. But to be completely honest, those were the people Mike found the least enticing. Clearly, they had no value in him beyond his brain—not that Mike had even that much value in himself—but they could at least pretend otherwise. It made him sick, seeing the way people revered him because he could recite the entirety of the phone book from 1995 verbatim, not knowing what a burden it was to bear, what a curse. He was yet to find someone who understood that, not even Trevor did, completely, and that hurt, more than Mike cared to admit. It was a hurt that cheap liquor and even cheaper weed couldn't cover. Not only that, but he didn't just want a partner who saw him. He wanted someone who saw him, met him tit for tat, and challenged him at every turn. Someone to help quiet the noise without ever needing drugs again.

After so long, Mike was beginning to think he would never find someone like that.

But Jenny, for all of the ten minutes Mike had known her, seemed sweet and funny and intelligent. He could imagine himself with a girl like that, even if it would never feel completely right. He knew he didn't have any room to be picky.

"Curious George."

Mike's breath caught in his throat. He knew, he just knew, that it had been going too well. Something had to go wrong. Of all the books in the whole damn world, Jenny had to go and pick that one. It was bad enough Mike already felt like he was part of some sideshow, and it didn't help that Trevor was staring at him with that condescending smirk, head tilted like some demonized puppy. It just had to be that book.

But Mike was a grown-ass man. He had learned long ago that most people thought it was strange for a twenty-three-year-old man to still have such a freakishly strange attachment to some old children's book. He easily smothered his discomfort with a self-deprecating smirk and distracted himself by picking at the label of his beer bottle.

"I can't," he said quickly, glancing back at his hands and watching a bead of condensation roll down the neck of his bottle. "I can't do that."

"What? C'mon, you can do the other ones, but you don't know Curious George?" Jenny demanded.

The lie came as easily as they always did. "I never read Curious George."

"You never read Curious George?" And now it sounded like she was mocking him. For some reason, that only made him incredibly sad.

But he hid it well. "Monkey's freak me out," he joked, which couldn't be further from the truth. In fact, up until his parents died, monkeys had been his absolute favorite animals, aside from the brown and white mutt he had spent half a year trying to convince his parents to adopt. He had finally thought he'd gotten them to cave when…well.

Nicky excused herself and Jenny to the bathroom, which Mike knew was the universal girl code for them to size up their catch of the night. He told himself that he wouldn't care if they never came back.

That was a lie, too.

It took Trevor all of about five seconds after they had left to pounce. "Dude, what are you doing? Are you trying to blow this?"

"What are you talking about?" Mike demanded. He privately hoped he didn't sound nearly as defensive as he did in his own mind.

"I know that you have Curious George. I've seen it on your bookshelf. For once, we don't have to lie."

And really, was that what Mike's life had come to? Lying to women just so they'd spend one mediocre night with him and ditch him before he even rolled over in the morning? The fact that the last piece of his mom he had was being used against him, being used as ammunition for Trevor to accuse him of ruining their whole scheme which they both knew they could pull on just about any other woman in the godforsaken bar, royally pissed him off.

"My mom gave me that book, alright?" He snapped. "I'm not going to use it just to pick up some girl."

"You don't have to do anything. Let me tell them!" Trevor insisted. Mike huffed and glared at the table.

"Okay?" Trevor went on. "You'll probably go home with both of them."

"Trevor. Stop," Mike warned and tried to disguise his irritation behind a deep swig from his beer.

Trevor stared at him for a long time. Honestly, for so long that Mike began to worry Trevor might, for once, not actually let it go when Mike insisted.

Finally, Trevor sighed as if Mike had thoroughly inconvenienced him, took a sip from his own bottle, and said, "Fine. But I hate your guts."

And really, despite how it felt like a curse, Trevor really hadn't been lying when he'd said Mike was a genius. He only wished he'd had the two brain cells he needed at that moment to realize that Trevor never really let anything go.

~

It was much later that night, and Mike was lazing on the mattress in Trevor's living room, pleasantly buzzed from the alcohol and halfway to sleep. He was pretty sure Trevor had crashed out barely half an hour after they had returned from the bar.

He really should have known better.

Because he had known Trevor for a long time. He'd seen him puking-his-guts-out sick, morning-after euphoric, black-out drunk, high, and just about every other state of being in between. So, more than anything, he knew that a drunk Trevor was a mouthy Trevor, and a mouthy Trevor didn't rest until he got every last word off his silver tongue.

Someone cleared their throat across the expanse of the sorry excuse for an apartment. Mike cracked his eyes open to see Trevor leaning against the doorway to the singular bedroom—if it could even be called that—holding something in his hands.

Through his boozy fog, it took Mike longer than he cared to admit to identify the object, but once he did, he jackknifed off the mattress and was on his feet in seconds.

"What the hell do you think you're doing with that?" He demanded.

Trevor glanced up briefly from the copy of Curious George he was idly leafing through. He smirked. "Just thought I'd find out what the hell's so special about this book."

"You have no right! Put the book down, Trevor!"

Trevor backed away from him, effectively trapping himself in the bed area of the studio as Mike came to block the doorway.

"This is George," Trevor began to read, his voice raising an octave. It made Mike's blood boil. "He lived in Africa."

"Goddamn it, Trevor!" Mike shouted. Vaguely, Mike remembered that they had neighbors and extremely thin walls—he also had absolutely no idea what time it was, but he was certain it was some time after two in the morning. He wouldn't be surprised if the cops showed up thinking they were a drunk gay couple having a domestic dispute. Or then again, maybe they wouldn't show at all; Mike had certainly seen his fair share of shady shit going on in this godforsaken building with no one blinking an eye, so he wasn't sure a lover's quarrel would exactly take precedent at the ass-crack-of-dawn o'clock.

"Give me the book back, or I swear to God, I'll kill you!"

Mike lunged for the book only for Trevor to raise it way out of Mike's reach. Unfortunately, a drunk Trevor was also a clumsy Trevor, so the momentum from trying to keep the book out of Mike's grasp sent them both tumbling on to the bed.

And Trevor, the absolute moron he was, was laughing.

Mike really was going to kill him.

"He was very happy," Trevor went on, giggling while Mike practically climbed across him to try and wrench the book from Trevor's surprisingly strong grip. "Whoops, guess that one's not so true. Mikey's not too happy with me."

"You're a goddamn idiot, Trevor Evans!" Mike shouted as he finally managed to pull the beloved book from Trevor's hands. Trevor, for his part, appeared to be completely unfazed. He gazed at his now empty hand with a slightly quizzical look before shaking his head as if to rid himself of the unnecessary memories, and leaning back with his hands behind his head, grinning impishly.

"Aw, c'mon, I just wanted to know what made the book so special that you'd give up the chance with two gorgeous women for it! You never let me touch it." And honest to God he was pouting.

Mike glowered. "For good reason. You could have ruined it!" He leaned in close, balling the collar of Trevor's t-shirt in his fist. "If you ever touch my stuff again, I'll make sure you never sleep with any woman, ever, you understand me?"

Trevor just stared at him until Mike decided he wasn't worth his time and relented, letting his "best friend" go.

He kicked Trevor's leg as he passed to make himself feel better. "Just leave me the hell alone for a while, okay?"

Back out in the main area, Mike threw himself onto the mattress with an irritated huff. He was sure the alcohol wasn't helping his anger, but still, who the hell did Trevor think he was? He knew how strongly Mike felt about that book and still had the gall to tease him with it.

And God, Mike couldn't get the words to stop repeating themselves in his mind. Usually, he could cast something from his mind as long as he had something else to focus on, despite his infuriatingly infallible memory, but now it was all he could focus on. He hadn't thought about that book in so long, not until Jenny had to go and bring it up (not that it was her fault at all, and somewhere in the recesses of Mike's booze-and-anger addled brain he acknowledged that fact) but it still pissed him off. Nothing got him more upset than that book, and Trevor knew that. Hell, Trevor had walked in on Mike crying over the damn thing more than once. Even drunk, Mike couldn't believe his nerve.

He lounged on the mattress, mentally reciting the New York State Penal Code to himself in an attempt to suppress all thoughts of idiotically curious monkeys and just plain old idiotic friends.

But that was the thing about his curse. It was inconvenient at the best of times and downright maddening otherwise. The more he mulled over the provisions of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Law, the more the words of Curious George persisted—and the more he realized he was more intoxicated than he had initially thought.

Sometimes, even the alcohol didn't numb his mind enough for him to forget, and he certainly wasn't about to go find a joint, not when that would require him to face Trevor again.

He would rather suffer.

So, he closed his eyes and allowed the words to float behind his eyelids. This is George…

Stupid monkey.

0000

Some part of Mike had always known it would come to this.

No matter how he tried to deny it, the knowledge that one day his secret would come crumbling down around him always sat in the back of his mind, looming like some shadowy beast. With each lie, each manipulation or half-truth, Mike knew that he and Harvey were only digging their hole deeper and deeper.

Now, Mike could see that hole for the grave it had been all along. And what a truly tragic thing that was; they had been so busy saving every shady businessperson that crossed their paths from imminent doom that they'd completely missed the fact that it was irrevocably leading them closer, case by case, to their own.

Well, to Mike's. He'd be damned if he let Harvey go down for a crime he'd committed.

It's how he found himself in the cathedral library, sobbing, while Father Walker awkwardly patted his back. It was ridiculous, truth be told. Nothing had even happened. His secret was still safe with the people he cared most about in the world. But that's exactly why he felt the sudden need to act before something did.

He wouldn't let his family suffer for a choice he'd made. No matter how Harvey would try to twist it, to turn the culpability back on himself, the matter of it was that Harvey hadn't forced him to take this godforsaken job. He hadn't held a gun to his head, hadn't threatened to turn him in for his briefcase full of pot. And anyhow, Harvey was the one who taught him that when someone holds a gun to your head you either take the gun or you pull out a bigger one. Or, you call their bluff. Or, you do any one of a hundred and forty six other things. Even if Harvey had used his smoking gun (or rather, the evidence one used to smoke, spilled all over the ridiculously expensive Persian rug of The Chilton conference room) to get him arrested for drug possession, it would have been a hell of a lot shorter of a sentence than the one he'd be facing when he was inevitably caught for defrauding the New York Bar.

Still, he couldn't bring himself to regret his decision, no matter how hard he tried. He was fairly certain that even if Harvey had pulled a gun, Mike would have let it go off, unblinkingly. There wasn't a bullet in the world he wouldn't take for Harvey Specter, he had discovered in the six years of working for the man. And wasn't that terrifying.

He'd had his chance to leave. He had left, for real, and had attempted to multiple times. Yet, at the end of the day, he always came crawling back, claiming he missed the thrill of the corporate world.

He'd long ago come to terms with the knowledge that the only thing he missed about the corporate world was a "who" rather than a "thing."

It wasn't just his job that had him in tears; it was everything else piled on top of it: his catastrophic relationship with Rachel which had crashed and burned harder than any train wreck Mike had ever heard of and his vastly unreciprocated, pathetic, head-over-heels feelings for Harvey, being the main two culprits.

Donna called it puppy love, teasingly, but he had caught her staring at him with this horribly sad look the night he had drunkenly confessed his love for their boss over a bottle of Chardonnay. Something in that look told him she really was only teasing—there was nothing shallow or juvenile about his feelings in the slightest. She had been there, he knew, but had eventually realized hers truly was puppy love, born out of years of close partnership and the endless devotion of only the truest friends. Mike was glad they both had a friend like Donna.

It had pained Mike to do so, but he had made her swear on every grave he could think of that she wouldn't tell Harvey. The last thing he needed was her interfering in his dismal love life, not when Rachel had already accused him of there being three people in their relationship.

Ironic, wasn't it, that Scottie had once told Harvey the very same thing.

Sitting on the bench in front of the bookshelf filled with his parents' books that the cathedral had dedicated to Grammy, Mike cried for all he had lost and for all he'd never truly had to begin with. It felt a bit selfish, admittedly, to lose himself over something that had never been his to begin with. It may have felt like it, for a long time, but Harvey Specter had never been and never would be his. And it felt even more selfish to come apart over a situation he had gotten himself into—there was no one else to blame.

It's why, with Father Walker's help, he had decided to resign from Pearson Specter Litt. For all that it felt like he was losing a piece of himself, losing his home, he knew he was bound to lose so much more than that if he didn't, and if he didn't do it now, he never would. Louis goddamn Litt would be able to convince him to stay at this point, let alone even one look from Harvey or Donna.

Mike cried for himself, too. For the age-old hurt and shame over the night his parents had left, and he'd shrugged them away, for cancelling on Grammy the same night she'd passed. For every other person he had hurt in one way or another—Jenny with Rachel, Rachel with Tess, Louis for all the times he'd turned his back on him for Harvey, Harvey for all the lies, even Jessica Pearson for putting the firm she had fought tooth and nail for in jeopardy. The curse of his memory wouldn't let him think, wouldn't let him breathe. Round and round the memories circled in his mind until he could never forget what a worthless human being he was.

He clutched the old copy of Curious George to his chest like it was his only life raft in a sea of misery. It was the very same copy his mother had read to him all those years ago, the one with the inscription scrawled on the front cover in her loopy cursive:

A reader lives a thousand lives, but you only really get one. Live it with all your heart and never be afraid to show others how special you are. One day, you'll find the people who appreciate your gift for what it is, our little superhero, and you'll change lives. —Mommy and Daddy

He'd never truly understood the message until after they had passed. They had known, all along, about his self-appointed "superpower," and had said nothing, had never judged him or belittled him for it like so many people had. He'd never experienced that kind of unconditional love again until…

…Well, until PSL.

"Michael," Father Walker said softly. "If you're worried about Harvey abandoning you if you stop doing what you're doing, I don't think he will."

"How do you know?" Mike choked out. "It's not like he cares about me, not like that."

"'Cause I have faith. And for what it's worth, he may never care about you in the same way you do him, but that doesn't mean he does not care for you at all. Sometimes, even that much has to be enough. From what you've told me, he doesn't seem to be the kind of person to just leave someone he cares about."

Mike swallowed hard. "He's not. God, he'd take a bullet for any one of us."

"Well, then, there you go. Your worth is not defined by what you sacrifice for others, Michael. I think it's high time you learned that. You are no less Michael Ross to me or any of your friends, lawyer or not."

Father Walker gently took the book from Mike's hands. "You know, you never did like this book during story time at Sunday School, Michael. You'd always get this horribly grumpy look on your face, and I could practically hear all the names you wanted to call me; certainly, most of them shouldn't be uttered in a place of worship."

Mike couldn't hold back his laugh. Father Walker smiled indulgently. He carefully opened the front cover of the old book, the spine cracking under the layers of Scotch Tape from years of half-hearted repairs.

"I think about this message a lot."

Mike stared at him quizzically. "You do?"

Father Walker nodded. "In fact, I do. It's a good one to live by. The Lord works in mysterious ways, but He does truly provide us with only one life to make our own. And while some of us may stray far, it's never too late to find our way back. He doesn't expect us to be perfect, Michael. We're flawed—it's what makes us His greatest creations. You've lost your faith, and I understand, but just know that they," he gestured towards the book, "never lost faith in you. And from where I'm sitting, I think you've more than lived up to their expectations."

Mike tried to swallow around the thickness in his throat. "How can you say that, Father? After everything I've done?"

"You wouldn't be here, otherwise. You came to me because you were worried for the family you've found, but never once did you mention yourself. Even when you admitted to being scared, you were scared of your choices affecting their lives. That is not the behavior of a selfish man, Michael."

Tears were running down Mike's face again before he could stop them. He didn't know what to do with himself. He had spent so much of his life drowning in guilt, smothered in this overwhelming, indescribable sense of selfishness, like his very existence was a sin. How could he be allowed to live his sad excuse for a life when his parents' own had been cut so horribly short? Would they even be proud of him? He couldn't imagine they would be; what kind of parents would be proud of a drug-dealing, two-face, pothead? Surely, they would be proud of all he had accomplished at Pearson Specter Litt, but how he had gotten there in the first place? No chance.

"I noticed you refer to your memory as a curse, but I think that it is far from it. You're extraordinary, Michael, and if I may, I think you've finally found the people who accept you for who you are, not for who they want you to be."

"How could it not be a curse, Father? What could I possibly have done to deserve it? Every single horrible thing that's happened to me, I can never forget it. It's enough to drive anybody crazy."

"You could look at it that way. Or you could look at it as you'll never forget the good things, either. Let me ask you something: what is the first memory you think of? The very first one."

"Um," Mike paused, his mind spinning around in flashes, bits of color and people and sounds and places, all suddenly too much to pinpoint just one. "Uh, this case file I just read. Folkner Pharmaceuticals is being sued by a doctor claiming they engaged in fraudulent marketing and violated FDA regulations by downplaying the side effects of one of their new drugs, and they're countersuing for slander."

"Good. Now, what's the first good memory you think of? Not some book or case file, but a memory that makes you genuinely happy."

Mike chuckled, despite himself. "A few weeks ago one of the associates slipped an exploding ink pack—you know, the kind they use in banks—into Louis' desk, and it was rigged to go off right as he held the thing up to look at it. Exploded all over his face, and that stuff stains. He walked around for days looking like Papa Smurf with a bad case of chicken pox. I thought Harvey was gonna piss himself laughing." Mike at least looked sheepish. "Sorry, Father."

Father Walker smiled. "That's quite alright, Michael. It sounds very amusing, but there's a reason I asked you to tell me the first good memory that came to mind. As I suspected it would be, it had to do with your colleagues at the law firm. And while I fully support your decision to leave, I also wanted to show you that your memory does not have to be a curse. It is a wonderful thing that allows you to relive all of your best memories over and over again. I, for one, think that vastly outweighs the disadvantages. You're afraid of them abandoning you if you leave. But, Michael, there's a reason that was the first memory you thought of. Family does not abandon each other, even when we grow apart."

"Thank you for everything, Father. I…I needed this."

"We all need help sometimes. It is okay to ask for it. I am always here for you, as is He, no matter the choices you make in this life." Father Walker watched him for a long moment, clearly deep in thought. He held up the book again. "How long has it been since someone has read this to you? All the way through?"

Mike released a slow breath and watched his hair bounce from his peripherals. "Elementary school, probably. Why?"

Father Walker opened to the first page. "I think it's time you stop running from your memories. You have very good ones from before you joined Pearson Specter Litt, and I think it's a tragedy that you've allowed life to tell you it's a curse for remembering them."

"Father…"

"Hush." Father Walker cleared his throat and began to read. "This is George. He lived in Africa…"

Maybe his memory wasn't a curse. But maybe it wasn't a superpower, either. Maybe he wasn't a superhero at all. Maybe he was just Mike Ross, and he finally realized that was okay.

0000

Harvey Specter, on principle, was not a sentimental man.

That wasn't to say he had never experienced a moment of sentiment; he just wasn't inclined to let his emotions rule his life—there's no room for emotions in law and all that. He couldn't hope to uphold his image of Harvey Specter the cold, cutthroat, Best Closer in New York City, if he allowed his personal emotions to bleed into his professional life. As many times as Mike had proven to him that there was actually some merit to be found in intermixing the two, Harvey had been burned too many times to loosen his grip. In fact, he could remember the exact number of times in life he had actually, honest-to-God cried.

.

.

He was twelve years old, and he had just found his mom in his parents' room, with a man that wasn't his dad.

Middle school wasn't a place for the faint of heart, so he wasn't exactly naïve. He knew that his mom wasn't scrambling to put her top back on because her and the man had been "talking" or whatever other bullshit she tried to pawn off on him. He knew what sex was. He knew where babies came from. And he certainly knew it wasn't something you were supposed to just do with whomever you pleased.

Maybe he was naïve, though. Or maybe he just so desperately wanted to tell himself that it hadn't happened, that his mom wouldn't do something like that to his dad. They loved each other so much. He had wanted to find love like theirs for as long as he could remember, and now…

Now, he wasn't sure he ever wanted to be in love, not if it meant this. Not if it meant lying to the one person you were supposed to care about most in the world.

But it was his mom, and he, although not naïve, was twelve years old. What else was he supposed to do but agree when she asked him to keep it a secret? He might not have completely understood the gravity of the situation, but he knew well enough what the information would do to his dad. And he loved his dad, more than he had ever loved another person. He couldn't hurt him like that, couldn't break up their family.

She promised it would never happen again.

He spent the rest of the day locked in his and Marcus' room. Not even his brother's calls to play on their NES—the one they'd gotten the Christmas before—and promise to let him be Mario could draw him out.

Promises, promises. That night, crying under his bedspread and wallowing in the guilt of what he'd done, Harvey promised never to lie for anyone ever again.

.

.

He was thirteen years old, and he was on top of the world. Undefeatable. Plagued with the sort of superiority complex only a preteen boy could experience, and his first girlfriend had broken up with him.

They were sitting on the front porch of his house, sharing a pack of Mallow Cups after he'd hit the game-winning homer of his last middle school baseball game. Next year, he'd be in the big leagues—high school freshman, varsity baseball, all that jazz, and he couldn't wait.

Baseball was his life. His coach said he had some real talent, and he was determined to play in the major leagues one day, the Dodgers, or maybe even the Mets if they hadn't finished the season fifth in the National League for team ERA; ERA wasn't everything, but it certainly didn't hurt. The Houston Astros had come out of the '89 season with the highest ERA, and the Athletics had taken the Series even with the earthquake right before game 3, but he had always had a soft spot for the Dodgers. They hadn't been Series champions since '81, but that had been after the mid-season strike, and they had still swept the Yankees in six games after having the same thing done to them by the Yankees in '77 and '78. He couldn't help but respect tenacity.

Apparently, Katie Bergstein didn't give two shits about ERAs or World Series. She hadn't even come to his game, not like she had before. She just turned to him, her fingers still sticky with marshmallow filling, and told him she couldn't keep seeing him. She wasn't ready for a relationship. It took everything in Harvey not to grab her as she walked down the porch steps, to tell her about his dreams of the MLB and money and being someone. Not that she would have cared.

That night, he cried harder than he ever had in his life. He wouldn't talk to his mom (not that he did that much anymore), had kicked Marcus clean out of their shared room. It hadn't been until his dad had come home from a gig in some dive bar in the wee hours of the morning and found him nursing a bottle of Yoohoo at the kitchen table that the tears had started up all over again.

That night, he vowed never to cry over a girl again.

.

.

He was eighteen, and it had happened again.

Now, he knew he'd been naïve. How stupid was he, thinking she wouldn't do it again? And better yet, what kind of fool was he for not realizing it had kept happening, right under his nose, since that first day he'd found them and had probably been happening long before that?

This time, he had the audacity to try and reason with Harvey, and she had the audacity to try and stop him from calling his dad.

He had warned her he would tell if it ever happened again. He had vowed never to lie again, and he wasn't about to start now. He didn't care what she said, begging him not to tear them apart because as far as he was concerned, she had done that the minute she'd let that man, Bobby, into his father's bed. She'd made her choice, and now he was making his.

He regretted that choice as soon as he found himself sobbing on the mat of the boxing ring having just beaten his own father for a crime the man hadn't even committed.

.

.

He was twenty when he threw out his shoulder and learned he'd never be able to play baseball again. He at least had the humility to wait until he got back to his dorm to cry.

He was twenty-three when he failed his first law school exam and felt like he'd failed Jessica, too. He'd never been more thankful in his life that his roommate had chosen Harvard for all the wrong reasons and was out galivanting the bars at eight o'clock on a Tuesday night because he could let the tears flow in peace.

He was twenty-six when Donna came into his office and told him his father had passed. He hadn't meant to make a scene at the funeral but seeing his mother, seeing him, standing in the very same house where his parents had once professed their undying love to one another made him see red, even past the misty tears in his eyes.

He was thirty-six when Mike Ross told him that he'd slept with the pretty paralegal, Rachel Zane. Harvey smirked and congratulated him, teased him for wrecking the file room, and pretended like he wouldn't go home that night to his cold, empty penthouse and let his tears slide into a glass of Macallan 18.

He was forty when Mike Ross went to prison to protect him. He rode with him, all the way up to the gate. He stood beside him and offered him some bullshit about doing it all over again that they both knew was bullshit. Or, at least they both knew in his mind. God, he'd do it all over again, but he wasn't talking about the fraud or the cases or anything like that. Mike Ross was worth everything, and he refused to let Mike see him wipe his eyes as the man he was hopelessly in love with, despite the implausibility of it, walked towards a future neither could predict. He was forty when he realized that despite vowing never to shed another tear over a girl, he had never told himself such a thing about a boy.

He was still forty when Mike Ross was released from prison three months later. That time, when he cried, it had everything to do with the way Mike pressed his lips against his own like a drowning man, in the same parking lot where Harvey had watched him leave for what felt like forever.

He was forty-one when he stood holding Mike Ross' hand as Father Walker pronounced them married, and he slipped a silver band on Mike's finger. Harvey leant in and kissed him in front of their whole family, whispering, "Hello, Michael Specter-Ross" against his lips and tasting salt on his tongue. Mike laughed and said, "Hello, to you, too, Mr. Harvey Specter-Ross."

He was forty-three when they stood together in the lobby, holding hands once more, staring up at the wall embellished with the brand-new words Specter Litt Wheeler Williams Ross. Neither had a dry eye.

He was forty-four when he first held their son in his arms, tears rolling carelessly down his face as he gazed down at the single most wonderful creature he'd ever laid eyes on.

.

.

James Gordon Specter-Ross was born on May 7th at 5:12 pm, 6lbs, 14 oz. Harvey and Mike were in a partnership meeting when they got the call that Amy, Mike's secretary from his tenure with Sidwell and their surrogate, had gone into labor. Harvey honestly didn't even remember saying anything. One minute, Mike was on the phone with Ray and the next they were sitting in the hospital waiting room, relegated to an agonizing wait.

It had been a long road, to say the least, with no shortage of arguments. First, it was whether to even have a kid or not, and once Mike had managed to charm Harvey into the idea, it was the decision between adoption and surrogacy. Mike was partial to adoption, knowing better than Harvey what it felt like to live without your birth parents. And Harvey, of course, was partial to surrogacy, wanting their child to have a piece of at least one of them. Eventually, it was Mike who conceded that time, allowing Harvey to choose as it was Harvey agreeing to give parenting his best shot despite his crippling fear of becoming like his mother.

Once they got that far, it was a matter of who would actually be the surrogate. Neither wanted it to be a stranger, but neither had any ideas, either. Mike had briefly proposed asking Donna, only to be quickly and sharply shot down. It wasn't that Harvey didn't trust and love her with his whole life but given their history…he thought it was best to leave her out of that part.

And then, like some cosmic omen or message from the universe itself, Mike bumped, literally bumped, into Amy at the grocery store down the street from the penthouse. They hadn't talked in years, yet somehow one thing led to another, and they were all having lunch and Amy was offering to be their surrogate in exchange for paying off her student debt from her PhD, which they were more than happy to do and then some.

The disagreements didn't end there. Amy was only half of the equation. From there, they couldn't agree on who should be the kid's biological parent. They both wanted it to be the other, yet there was something unnerving about Mike's staunchness on the subject. Harvey only wanted a little girl or boy who looked like Mike, but there was something more to it for Mike, he could tell.

It came out one night when they were curled up together watching Dead Poets Society. Mike had jokingly proposed the name Todd for their kid if it was a boy to which Harvey rolled his eyes.

"Oh, come on," he teased. "I'm much more partial to Nuwanda."

"Of course you would be. Sneaking college girls and booze into a prep school? Totally your thing. I mean, that was practically your entire high school experience, wasn't it?"

Harvey shoved his elbow into Mike's ribs. "I can neither confirm nor deny that, Counselor." Harvey sighed and took a sip of whiskey. "Besides, I'd feel weird naming him Todd. Everyone knows he and Neil are clearly in love with each other. Who's gonna be Neil?"

Mike hummed thoughtfully. "Lucy Litt?"

"Are you trying to kill me?" And Mike laughed.

A moment of silence passed between them, but Harvey, never one to pass up an opportunity for a back door into a tough conversation, began, "You know, we actually have to create the kid before we can name it, right?"

It was only because he knew Mike so well that Harvey saw the way Mike's shoulders tensed imperceptibly, and his knuckles tightened around his beer bottle. "Harvey…" Mike sighed, closing his eyes and reaching up to massage the bridge of his nose. "Can we not talk about this right now?"

"Why not? Carpe diem, Mike."

"Haha, very funny," Mike deadpanned.

"Seriously, Mike, why the hell are you so adamant about this? Does it really matter that much? Me or you, the kid will still be ours."

"Just drop it, okay?"

Harvey sat up straighter and set his glass on the end table. "No, I'm not going to 'just drop it.' You're the one who wanted to have a kid so bad—"

"Oh, so now it's my fault? What, you don't want to have a kid, now?"

"Goddamn it, Mike, that's not what I meant, and you know it."

Mike stared at him. "Then pray tell, what the hell did you mean? Because that sure sounded a lot like an accusation to me."

It was Harvey's turn to close his eyes and run a hand down his face. He had learnt, over the years, that the best way to deal with Mike was with emotion. His husband wore his heart on his sleeve, that much had been clear since the first day they had met at The Chilton and Mike had spilled pot all over the carpet. What Harvey had once viewed as a liability that would get Mike eaten alive in the world of corporate law, he now saw as the asset it truly was which only made Mike a damn good lawyer. But God, did it take some adjusting in their private lives. Harvey wasn't exactly known for his bleeding heart.

Harvey took a moment to breathe and collect himself. "I only meant that I never knew how much I wanted to have a kid until you proposed it. And ever since then we've done nothing but argue because we both want to please each other. But you haven't been this stubborn about anything else when, arguably, it's one of the things that matters the least, and whenever I try to confront you about it, you get defensive and shut down. Mike, whatever's going on, I just want you to tell me."

Mike sighed. "I'm afraid, okay?"

"Afraid?"

"Yeah, I'm afraid, Harvey," Mike said softly, resolutely. He peered up at him like he was ashamed. "My whole life I've felt like there's something wrong with me for my mind. I didn't stop feeling like it was a curse until I met you, but even at the firm it used to make me feel so ostracized. It's exhausting. And if there's even the slightest chance I could pass my freak gene or whatever it is on to our kid, I don't want to take it. I won't put my kid through what I went through, Harvey."

And if that didn't absolutely break Harvey's heart.

"Mike," Harvey whispered because what else was he supposed to say? He couldn't hope to know what Mike was feeling, and if he'd known what was truly going on, he never would have pressed so much. Wordlessly, he opened his arms, and Mike slotted himself against his chest.

Harvey pressed a kiss to his hair. "Okay then. It'll be me. But on one condition: if it's a boy we name him James. If it's a girl, Nina."

Mike opened his mouth like he was going to protest, but Harvey held up a hand. "Before you say anything, if it's a boy, his middle name can be Gordon for my dad. But Mike, I get to be our little girl or boy's biological parent. The least we can do is give them just as big a piece of you and pay homage to your parents in the process. God knows the kid'll be in elementary school before they can spell their own name anyhow."

Mike laughed at that. "I love you."

"I know. And for the record, I don't think you're a freak. At least, not in that way. Hell, you show me every day how much smarter you are than me. What would be one more person?"

Mike turned over to pillow his head on Harvey's chest and gaze up at him. "Did you just admit I'm smarter than you?"

"Two words, Mr. President: Plausible deniability."

"You're an idiot." He paused, his eyebrows scrunching how they did when he was working through something in his mind, the way Harvey adored. He reached up and pretended to smooth the wrinkle away with the pad of his thumb.

After a beat of silence, Mike finally spoke. "Wait, what did you mean by 'at least, not in that way?'"

"I think you know exactly what I meant," Harvey said, lowering his voice.

"Harvey, shame on you. We're gonna be parents. You can't be implying such things about me," Mike said, clearly trying to play it serious, but the way the corner of his mouth twitched into a smile totally gave him away.

Harvey nosed along Mike's jaw, ghosting his lips along the juncture of his neck. "Kid doesn't even exist yet. Gives us plenty of time for, what does Donna call it? Getting our freak on."

"So, it's our freak, now?"

"I mean, you totally fell for the Specter Special."

Mike snorted a laugh and rolled his eyes. "That sounds like a shitty drive-in item, Harv."

"It does. But I've seen your eating habits; that's never bothered you before."

"Now, why would you say that about yourself?"

Harvey scoffed. "And you said I needed to rein myself in."

.

.

And so, Amy had gotten pregnant and for nine long months they waited and prepared and waited some more. In fact, Harvey had never realized exactly how much waiting was involved in pregnancy.

But in the end, it didn't matter. It was all worth it the moment he sat in that hospital room, cradling this tiny human, this tiny human that was a piece of him, that was his and Mike's to raise and love and cherish and protect from all the cruelties of the world. He was so small, barely the length of Harvey's forearm, all swaddled in a worn blue blanket that Grammy had knitted for Mike as a baby, and they were now passing on to their own.

Mike was plastered to his side, running a single finger gently against their baby's, their baby's, downy-soft cheek.

"Look at him. He's perfect."

Harvey choked on a breath as the baby blinked at him owlishly, great big chocolate brown eyes that felt like looking in a mirror. He couldn't pull his gaze away from the baby, the way he fit perfectly in the crook of his arm. Harvey knew in that moment he'd give that little boy the world, he would give up the world for him.

"Of course, he is, Mike. He's ours," he quipped instead of the thousand other things he wanted to say, all some variation of, Holy shit, he's ours.

Harvey's phone buzzed in his pocket. "Probably Donna," he said absently without ever looking away from James. He couldn't stop tracing every minute detail of their baby's face.

"Aunt Donna is going to lose her mind over you," Mike whispered to the little boy. "Oh my God, is she gonna spoil you."

"Aunt Donna's already spoiled him plenty," Harvey said. "Jesus, I represent a runway model with less clothes than he has because of her."

They lapsed into comfortable silence. As he watched their little boy give a tiny, heart-melting yawn, Harvey felt tears gather in his eyes.

Harvey Specter was forty-four years old when he realized there were only two people in the world he'd shed tears for.

.

.

Harvey Specter, on principle, might not have been a sentimental man, but Mike Ross had never made such a claim.

Just about anyone who had ever met him would attest to that fact, as well. Mike wasn't keen on hiding his emotions, not in his daily life, and certainly not from their son. He never wanted James to grow up feeling the way Harvey had for so long, like emotions were a weakness. Harvey had changed, too. Mike had never seen him so affectionate as he was with their son, and if his husband needed any more proof that he was a good father, Mike would be willing to serve up any one of the hundreds of pictures he had stored on his phone as evidence.

It was exactly that such sentiment that had Mike doing the impossible one innocuous Tuesday night in the middle of an icy New York November. It had snowed infrequently all day, just enough to give the entire world a light dusting. Mike loved the snow; he always had, ever since he was little. His parents would take him ice skating at Rockefeller Center every year, and he had every intention of carrying on the tradition with James, despite how Harvey complained about the tourist trap.

(Mike recognized it for the poorly disguised worry it was. Having known the man for eleven years and having been married to him for five, he had become somewhat of a connoisseur at what he deemed the Harvey not-speak.)

With that said, Mike had never been more content to curl up inside the warm condo, the lights low and the twinkling of the city below beautiful against the dark sky. As much as he loved the snow, there was just something so special about watching it drift through the air, high above the New York skyline. If it were another night, he might have even slipped out onto the terrace just to feel the bitter wind against his cheeks.

As it was, there was nowhere in the world Mike Ross would have rather been.

Harvey was trapped at the office, wrapping up a breach of contract suit between a luxury yacht company and the company that manufactured its parts. Mike felt guilty leaving Harvey at SLWWR, (Mike joked that the acronym looked like one of FDR's Alphabet Soup), but it really was only fair. They traded off who would stay late on cases, the other going home to relieve the nanny and be with James and since Mike had just spent the past week working on a real estate merger, Harvey had drawn the short straw.

"…George slid down the post, and the man with the big yellow hat put him under his arm," Mike read softly. James nuzzled his little head into Mike's chest and blinked sleepily. Mike smiled, brushing his fingers through the little boy's chestnut fringe, soft and damp and still smelling like his strawberry shampoo. Both Mike and Harvey loathed to get the boy his first haircut, even at almost two years old. His heart ached at the thought of James losing his little curls which had grown out to the ends of his hair. He knew the boy would more than likely end up with Harvey's completely straight hair, but there was still something so sad about James losing his sweet curls.

Mike slowly moved them in the rocking chair. The thing was undeniably gorgeous: handmade from dark-stained cherry wood and imported straight from Italy, but the sheer price was obscene. It had been a gift from Jessica in Chicago when she found out about James' imminent arrival and while she had never directly told them a price, of course, Donna estimated over two thousand.

Sometimes, Mike almost had a heart attack when he stopped to realize that James' nursery cost more than six months of rent at his old studio apartment. Then again when he'd been paying said rent, not even in his foggiest weed-induced delusion would he have dreamt he'd be married to a man who made their combined net worth look like a phone number. With the area code.

Mike smoothed the old, knitted blanket over James, the one Grammy had knitted for him when he was a baby. It was, admittedly, worse for wear, but James couldn't sleep without it.

"Then he paid the balloon man for all the balloons," He continued. The book was a formality. Mike could recite it forward, backwards, and upside down on his worse day, but it wasn't about the words. Hell, James wouldn't understand half of it even if he weren't on the brink of sleep. No, it was all about Mike passing on a tradition to his son. His mom had read to him every night before bed when he was James' age, usually Curious George, and so, without fail, James got the same every night. Even on the nights when Mike was stuck at work, he was adamant that Harvey follow through, which his husband was only more than happy to oblige.

Whatever Harvey tried to claim, his lack of sentiment was complete and utter bullshit.

Bedtime stories had quickly become an integral part of their nightly routine from the time James had been only a few months old. They had got lucky, really, because James was just about the easiest baby they could have asked for. He was sleeping through the night by only three months old and even now, in the "Terrible Twos," James was a sweetheart. He only ever threw tantrums when he was tired, which with their meticulous nap and sleep schedule, was exceedingly rare.

Mike paused, simply staring at him for a long moment, the way his eyelashes fluttered over his rosy cheeks in sleep, the way his little breaths puffed out through parted lips. He ran his fingers through James' hair again, marveling in the way his little boy sighed and melted against him under the ministrations. He pressed a kiss to the top of his head.

"I love you, baby," he murmured.

His little boy. Sometimes, it was still hard for Mike to believe. There had been a time in his life when he hadn't even been sure he would make it to the next week. Now, his life was entirely surreal in the best ways possible.

He was so caught up in his staring that he completely missed the opening of the front door or any of the other sounds of Harvey returning home. He only looked up when he felt eyes staring at him.

Harvey was leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed, a fond smile on his face. He'd lost his suit jacket at some point and now stood only in his button up and vest. His eyes were crinkled around the corners where he smiled, his eyes impossibly soft.

"Hey," Mike whispered.

"Hey, yourself."

Mike rocked back a little. "Everything go okay with the case?"

"Do you know who you're talking to right now?"

Mike held back his scoff as to not wake the boy sleeping on his chest, but he made sure to roll his eyes rather emphatically so Harvey knew exactly what he thought of his arrogance.

Harvey laughed silently, his chest jumping with the force of concealing the sound. Mike loved it when Harvey laughed.

Come to think of it, there wasn't much he didn't love about Harvey Specter.

Harvey pushed himself off the doorframe and slowly bent down, pressing a lingering kiss to Mike's lips. It tasted like coffee and shitty Thai food and promises of things to come when they were alone once more.

His husband carefully scooped their boy into his arms, blanket and all, and placed him in his crib. He pulled the dinosaur bedsheets around his shoulders, laid the knitted blanket on top, and skillfully tucked the little stuffed puppy Donna had gotten him for his birthday under his arm. Mike watched as Harvey stooped to press a kiss to James' forehead.

"'Night, buddy. I love you," Harvey whispered. He pulled the rail back up and into place before reaching over and flicking on the baby monitor. He inclined his head towards the door, and Mike followed him out, turning off the lights and closing the door to only a crack behind them.

God, he was so in love.

Mike watched Harvey walk over to the bar cart and pour them each about two fingers of whiskey from the crystal decanter. Mike took his with a small smile of appreciation and took a sip, relishing the way the liquid washed over his tongue and coated his throat with a pleasant sweetness and warm burn that settled comfortably in his stomach. He'd always been more of a beer guy, but that was only one more thing in the endless list of things Harvey was right about. You got what you paid for. Cheap liquor would only ever taste exactly like cheap liquor.

"So, the infamous Curious George," Harvey said. He wrapped an arm around Mike's waist from behind, and together they stared out at the glittering New York skyline. "Was that your mom's copy?"

Mike hummed and knocked back the rest of his whiskey in one go. "Yeah. I'm not sure what made me pull it out tonight. That's the first time in my life I've ever read it to someone else, not that he really cares all that much."

Harvey rested his chin on Mike's shoulder. "Maybe not now. But he will, one day."

"I'm not really sure I care all that much."

Mike could see the look of confusion that crossed Harvey's face in the reflection off of the glass. Mike sighed. "I mean, what's the point? I was like Johann Schmidt level obsessed with that book when I was a kid, but now…it's just a damn book, right? I used to flip my shit when anyone but my mom read it to me. Now, I honestly feel kind of guilty about reading it to him. I know that makes me a shitty person."

"I don't think it does. It was something special you had with your mom. You lost your parents so young, Mike. No one can fault you for having some conflicted feelings over the book. And now, reading it out loud even to our own kid, it's got you stuck in your head. It kills me to think about Jay going through what you did, so I know thinking about your parents has got to be hard for you."

Mike snorted. "I just wish they could have met him, Harv. Met you. I mean, I know they'd be pretty disappointed in the way I got here, but they would have loved you both."

"Hey," Harvey said, setting his empty glass on the cart. He turned Mike around so they were facing each other. Mike threaded his thumbs through Harvey's belt loops. "I wish we could have met them, too. Honestly, I do. Because if they were anything like you, I bet they were pretty incredible. And for the record, I don't think they would have been disappointed in you. Yeah, some of the shit we've done has been—"

"—Unethical? Illegal? Morally corrupt?"

"Yeah, that about sums it up," Harvey said, smiling. "But you've come out stronger for it. The Mike I met all those years ago in The Chilton never would have survived prison."

"Survived? I never would have been there in the first place. The Mike you met in The Chilton would have sold out your douchey Armani ass to cupcake prison for the $25,000 and a couple bags of weed."

"I'm happy to know the entirety of our relationship is worth my yearly car club fee and a couple ounces of the stoner drug of choice."

"You know, I'm pretty sure I could sue you for slander, Counselor."

"And if you'd actually went to Harvard, you'd be certain you were wrong. Spousal privilege at its finest."

"First of all, is that joke ever going to get old? It's been eleven years, quit reminiscing about your glory days. And second, who said we would still be married?"

Harvey kissed the corner of his mouth. "Because I'm not a divorce attorney and my ever-benevolent husband would never take advantage of me for something he's better at."

"Ever-benevolent? Oh, you are laying it on thick. So, you admit there is something I'm better at?"

"Sure, I am. But movie analogies? Definitely not. Did you seriously compare Curious George to the Tesseract?" Harvey asked, clearly amused. He walked them both backwards until Mike was pressed between the glass and Harvey's warmth. Whatever witty quip he had on the tip of his tongue was lost in the back of his throat as his eyes traced the features of Harvey's face.

Harvey leaned in until Mike could feel his breath against his cheek. "Something wrong, dear?" He murmured and grazed his lips against Mike's cheekbone.

Mike shivered. "I love you," he blurted. Sometimes, even after so many years, saying those words felt just as exhilarating as the very first time. "I genuinely don't know why my brain just goes blank when I look at you. You make me forget how to even breathe, for the first time in my life."

Harvey kissed his lips, surprisingly soft and chaste. "I love you, too. You know that."

Mike searched his eyes. "Do you know what the one thing I wanted in a partner was when I was younger?" He wasn't sure why this was coming out now, but it felt like the right thing to say.

Harvey stroked his hip bones with his thumbs. "What was that?"

"I wanted someone who challenged me every day. I wanted someone who could take all the noise in my head away without drugs."

Harvey tilted his head. He looked beautiful in the low lights of the condo, the lights of the city below reflected off his deep brown eyes. "And what's the verdict?"

"Guilty on all accounts," Mike murmured.

Harvey reached up and cupped one of Mike's cheeks in the palm of his hand. "Glad to hear it. And while we're on the subject of our younger years, I have a confession to make."

"Yeah?"

"I used to keep track of every time in my life that I cried. I thought it made me look weak. And when I was about thirteen, this girl—God, I can't even remember her name now—she broke up with me, and like the hormonal prepubescent I was, I promised I'd never cry over a girl again. Well, I haven't, but I sure have cried over one boy quite a bit."

Mike felt himself tearing up. "Who knew I'd make an honest man out of you yet?"

"Yeah, that's the pot calling the kettle black."

"When have I ever been dishonest with you in our personal lives?"

"Did you not just say you would have sold me out to the authorities for cash and pot?"

"Yes, and? I was honest, wasn't I?"

Harvey chuckled and kissed him again, slow and languid. Mike couldn't breathe with the cool glass against his flushed skin and Harvey's warmth encompassing him everywhere else.

"You know," Mike said when they finally pulled apart. His hands drifted up, and he began to slowly unbutton Harvey's vest. "I used to think my memory was a superpower, too. I was convinced. After my parents died, though, it felt like a curse. I could never forget any of it: not the way they sounded, the way they looked, the way I treated them the last time I ever saw them. I felt like a monster, and I had this notion that superheroes didn't get happy endings. And that book only served as a reminder of everything I'd lost."

The vest dropped to the floor, followed by the tie, and Mike began to work on the button down. "But reading to James tonight, I also realized something else: sometimes the greatest superheroes are the ones who realize their powers are theirs to wield as they see fit. The ones who don't get a happy ending are the ones who become obsessed with greatness, so you never hear about the ones who realize that even after battling the darkness, you can choose to live in the light."

"God, you're incredible, you know that?" Harvey asked.

Mike smiled. "It's been said. And besides, in my superhero persona, I never accounted for the fact that I'd be married to one."

"So, what you're saying is you're Pepper Potts, and I'm Tony Stark?"

"Um, hell yeah. Pepper's awesome. But there's no life I'd rather have, Harv. I'd do it all again in a heartbeat."

"So would I, Rookie. So would I."