Author's disclaimer: All things Sentinel belong to Pet Fly and UPN and Paramount. This is for love, not profit.

Author's notes: Catharsis. You are warned. = )

Affirmation
by Brighid

Blair moved quietly into the loft, appreciative of the dim glow cast by the light over the stove. It was a thoughtful gesture on the part of his roommate, considering that the man certainly didn't need the extra light, and in fact may well have been disturbed by it. The young anthropologist mouthed "Blessed Protector" and smiled despite the weariness that dragged at his bones. He set his bag down, glad to be home.

It had been a hard three days, made more so by the long drive to and from Vancouver. Still, he'd had to go; there really hadn't been any other option. He'd promised Rose, and Blair Sandburg kept his promises -- especially deathbed ones. He breathed heavily at that thought, and moved silently into the kitchen, grabbing a cold soda out of the fridge. He popped the tab as quietly as possible, took a long pull on the can. He drained it quickly, then set it on the counter. In the morning he would rinse it and toss it into the recycling bin. Tonight he was too damned tired and too damned clumsy; he'd just wake up Jim, and the big guy had to work in the morning. Couldn't be out catching Cascade's most wanted without his beauty sleep.

He shuffled quietly off to his room, pulling his clothes off as he went, and all but tumbled headlong into his bed, not even bothering to close the doors behind him. He noted that the sheets were clean, the blankets pulled straight. Hell, he was willing to bet the dustbunnies under the bed were trembling in abject terror. He wondered what other cleaning Jim had done. Another weary smile curved his lips, made them move against the crisp cotton sheets. Somehow, he didn't think the Chinese definition of "Blessed Protector" extended to housekeeping. Must be a Jim thing.

He really, truly, expected to fall asleep, he was that tired, but his brain had other ideas; it processed like a Pentium, whirring at top speed and re-playing the last few days in a never-ending loop that only served to exhaust him further. He felt his throat tighten, and the sting of tears he should have shed last night, but couldn't. He'd still been in shock, then. One wasn't, after all, supposed to be burying ex-girlfriends. One wasn't supposed to lose one's high school sweetheart at 30 to breast cancer. It just wasn't right.

She had been cremated, but he had visited her enough in the last weeks to carry the memory of her ravaged body, gaunt and stricken, horribly at odds with the plump, brown-haired girl who'd let him touch her breasts in 10th grade. It had been a lovely memorial, actually, as bright and open as Rose had been. They had sat in a circle in her mother's house, and been given tokens from her life. He had the ring he'd given her fifteen years ago, the tiny silver dolphin she'd picked out at the street vendor's stall on Granville. They'd shared their favourite memories of her, their best stories, the funny and the sad. They'd drunk toasts to her and played her music and just generally celebrated her life, and the whole time he'd felt hollow inside, knowing that the gesture was somehow meaningless and empty.

Knowing they should have celebrated her life while she was still alive to see it.

Without even realizing it, he was up and moving, wiping his streaming eyes and snuffling deeply as he walked up the stairs to Jim's loft bedroom. He sat down on the top step, and just stared at his Sentinel for the longest time, taking in the sculpted muscles of his back, limned silver by the faint glow from the skylight. He didn't know why he was there, exactly; he only knew that it was the right place to be, and he found a measure of peace in Jim Ellison's quiet, regular breathing.

He was more than a little startled when the older man rolled over and held up the covers, his eyes open and not even slightly clouded by sleep. "Get in here, Sandburg," he said gruffly, and Blair was there, he was in the bed and in Jim's arms and he cried and he cried and then he lay silent, or as silently as one could be with majorly congested sinuses.

Jim sighed, reached over him, and grabbed a handful of tissues from the box on the stand. When he made no move to take them, Jim held the wad up to his Guide's face and said, "Blow!" with such affectionate resignation that Blair began to laugh. He took the tissues and blew his nose and wiped his eyes and very carefully put them in the small garbage can.

"Thanks, man," he said softly at last, moving to leave the bed, but Jim's arms were iron about him, and he couldn't move. "Really, Jim, I'll be okay. I didn't intend to use you as a security blanket, man. You've got me all over your territory as it is. Having me in your bed is, like, so the last thing you need, right?"

Jim pushed up onto his forearms, and looked down at Blair, and the younger man thought he could almost, despite the shadows, read the older man's face, and what he saw made his heart triple-time; he fought to swallow, but not from tears. "You shouldn't be alone tonight, Chief," Jim said softly, his voice quiet and matter of fact, and it sounded so very odd, in the dark, with nothing but an inch and cotton boxers between them, that Blair wanted to laugh. He could feel it bubbling up inside him, felt it spill loose when Jim's warm, firm mouth ducked down to place a kiss against his temple.

"Man, did I take a detour into the twilight zone on the way down from B.C.?" Blair asked, even as Jim continued to plant gentle, almost chaste kisses down the side of his face and over his clavicle, and he felt the big man smile against him. "'Cause I gotta tell you, this is seriously weirding me out, here!"

Jim's breath was warm against his neck. "Listen, Darwin, you're always telling me I'm the biological throwback in this partnership. Give me some credit for insight into some of the basic biological imperatives. Sex is a natural antidote to grief. It's the universal F.U. to the Grim Reaper, okay? It doesn't take the hurt away," he said, and his mouth moved soothingly against Blair's throat, and Blair's body got the point, understood the lesson even if his brain was having a problem with it. "It does, however, numb it for a little while."

"But what will this do to us? What will we be in the morning?" Blair's body arched into Jim's, felt the other man against him, and a sizzle of current like a breaker snapping on. Jim's mouth found his, completed the circuit, and Blair's body told his tired brain to just Shut. The. Fuck. Up.

"We'll still be us, Chief," Jim said quietly when he at last took his mouth away. "Me Sentinel, you Guide. We just won't be alone this time, is all." He moved down the younger man's body, and Blair felt something inside him flare into brilliance, sear through him as Jim's mouth and hands spread their own form of healing balm over him.

"I love you, Jim," Blair said breathlessly, pulling Jim's head up, looking into the older man's eyes. "I love you so fucking much, man," he repeated, saying to Jim what he'd said to Rose's picture at the wake, and terribly, terribly glad that this time he'd got the timing right, that this time he remembered to say the words while they still meant something.

Jim's eyes were bright despite the darkness, gleaming like cat's eyes in the night. "I know, Sandburg. Love you, too," he said quietly before returning his attention to the body beneath him. Jim continued to say he loved him, with actions if not words, until Blair was suffused with it, exploded into kaleidoscope with it, and then tumbled into deep and dreamless sleep.

The morning sun was brighter in the loft, probably due to the skylight. He awoke earlier than usual, even before Jim's alarm went off, and he found himself watching his Sentinel sleep. Jim was right. Jim was still Jim, and he was still Blair, and while the hurt wasn't gone, would never wholly be gone, it was smaller, soothed. He reached out a tentative hand, but didn't quiet dare to touch his sleeping partner's face.

Jim must have felt the movement; his eyes snapped open, instantly awake, and his gaze was laser bright over Blair before his expression softened into a smile. "Are you gonna whack me or pet me?" he asked, a hint of laughter in his sleep-rough voice.

Blair completed the motion, and traced the angled plains of his Sentinel's face. "How'd you know?" he said softly. "What made you, you know, do that last night?" he asked, and his voice was a mixture of hope and fear.

Jim smiled at him, his face creasing up, and Blair thought it the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. Not Rose beautiful, or fine art beautiful, but craggy, pushing-forty, best friend ever beautiful. "I love you," his Sentinel replied simply, baldly, and kissed the tips of Blair's fingers as they passed over his mouth. "You needed me. It's that simple."

"This is so not what I pictured when I came up those stairs last night," Blair confessed, a bit distracted by the small, nibbling kisses Jim was bestowing on the pads of his fingers. "I mean, seriously, man, you never even gave me a clue. What does this mean? Where do we go from here?"

Jim groaned and shook his head at the younger man. "You over-analyse everything, you know that, Chief?" Jim reached out, pulled the younger man against his chest and kissed the top of his head. "You stay here, and sleep the day through, maybe do your lesson plans. I go catch bad guys. I come home, you feed me dinner and we take it from there." Blair closed his eyes tightly, wondering if it could be that easy. "It's that simple, Blair, it really is," Jim repeated softly.

Blair closed his eyes, and allowed himself to believe Jim's assurances. Jim was, after all, still Jim, was still his Blessed Protector and Anal Defender of House Rules. Maybe it was that simple, or as simple as anything would ever be between them. "I really do love you, man," he said at last, a bit drowsy between the warmth of the sun and the heat of Ellison's body.

"I'm glad," was the reply, and Blair could hear the smile in his Sentinel's voice, and was very glad he'd said the words, that this would never be something unsaid between them. He let his hands slide sleepily over Jim, cupping his pecs and stroking his abs and even daring to touch his cock, and he felt like he was fifteen again, touching Rose's breasts on the couch in the rec room, and it was so damned good. He kissed Jim's shoulder, then drifted into sleep.