Perfect Day

Let's call this what it is: a perfect short story. I've read this at least five times. It works on so many different levels and to my mind improves on each read. Recently I got In Sunshine or In Shadow which is an audio bundle of Josh Lanyon shorts and it opens with this story. I was floored. J.M. Badger is a ‘new to me' narrator but he shines in this AB, achieving the exact tone for this bittersweet gem.

Wyatt Finley is in love with Graham and in a moment of passion, during a camping trip, he has committed the grave mistake of saying it out loud. The problem is that Graham is still grieving the loss of his partner Jase and isn't ready for something new.

“You can't start a stopwatch on grief. Or love for that matter.”

or as Warren Zevon said:

“They say love conquers all You can't start it like a car You can't stop it with a gun”

Life sucks.

The amount information and real emotion that Josh manages to pack into 20 some odd pages without resorting to triteness is awe inspiring, even poor deceased Jase, is vividly brought to life. The story is brimming with beautiful passages and I probably could've highlighted the whole thing but here are two:

“Nah, no dramatics. Hearts got broken every day. Nobody died from that. But it did kind of fade the sunlight and drain the color from the days.And the nights ... the nights would feel too long to live through.”***“My own eyes stung. I couldn't bear for him to hurt so much. I wanted to put my arms around him, protect him. I didn't think he'd welcome it, so I didn't move.Why did we all crave love so badly when half the time it left us annihilated?”

I know this all seems sad but, though the story deals with loss and letting go, it is also about new beginnings and hope and about “... fields of goldenrod that in the early morning looked like a distant golden lake.”, all told from Wyatt's P.O.V. Wyatt who's self deprecating, funny, and wry. Wyatt who has unexpectedly fallen in love with Graham:

“It's not like I had gone looking for this, wanted this, had opted for the pay-per-view gay soap opera with angst in hi def. All I'd wanted was an ordinary relationship with a nice guy. A guy I could share my life with. The good times. The bad times. Maybe even share my mortgage with. A guy who would get along with my friends – a guy who had his own friends. Maybe even a guy I could take home for the holidays. I don't know. Whatever I had been thinking, the pleasant fantasy was so far removed from the vibrant and painful reality of Graham.”

Okay. I'll stop. Just go read this story and thank me later.