Fandom: Quantum Leap
Pairing: Sam/Al
Title: Stardust
Author: Sue
Status: Complete
Disclaimers: Quantum Leap and the characters of Sam, Al, etc belong to Belisarius Productions. No copyright infringement is intended.
Rating: R, m/m slash.

Feedback and comments are very welcome. Email Sue at . Please note that due to work commitments, replies may be delayed or not possible. Apologies in advance.

Stardust

by Sue

Quantum-leaping around through time, you have to be ready for just about anything at a moment's notice. Or no notice at all. Sometimes you know what it is you have to do to leap; other times it hits you right out of the blue. Take the time I wound up as a movie director in Hollywood in the late Seventies, for example; one moment I was talking Harry Rawlinson through the critical scene in his comeback movie, next moment my consciousness was off on a switchback ride through nowhere. You probably saw the picture - most people have a copy of it in their video collection. Next time you watch it, check out the love scene in the garden - that's the one that got him his Oscar, and that's the one I directed. Move over, Spielberg.

As usual, though, I didn't have any time for self-congratulation. I leaped the moment I yelled 'cut and print' and flopped back in my chair, exhausted, staring across at Harry's stunned but exultant expression. Time, or God, or whoever, wasn't about to give me the chance to get complacent; I did the work, but the real Jerry Morgan zapped back to take all the credit.

* * *

When I got control of my senses again I was in a tightly-packed little room that looked like something out of a doting mother's nightmare; it was hard to suppress a grin of incredulity at the sea of stoned expressions turned in my direction, most of them of indeterminate gender and almost all floating in the smoke-laden gloom somewhere between a black polo-neck and mop of greasy hair. Either this was some refined form of punk I hadn't been aware of, or I'd found my way into one of the strongholds of Trad Jazz - ideal for a guy who doesn't know Bunny Berrigan from Berry Gordy. The saxophone in my right hand and the members of a small jazz combo grouped around me on the tiny stage confirmed my worst suspicions.

A balled fist landed roughly on my shoulder. "Maxwell? You okay?"

I coughed uncomfortably. "I guess. Dizzy," I added, apologetically.

"You got that right." The guy who had battered me was fifty-ish, shorter than me, wispily bearded and wearing round gold-framed spectacles. "It's the smoke. Take a break and cool off a minute," he suggested, genially.

"Uh-huh."

Usually I take a little time to get my act together after leaping, but this time I was doing well. I'd seen a sign marked 'Exit - Toilets' at the rear of the room and I figured I'd make for that, but first I set the sax down carefully on top of its velvet-lined box on the chair beside me. Sometimes you have to be really quick to notice these things; people expect you to behave logically, and it's wise not to disappoint them.

I stumbled off the dais, with a grin of acknowledgement to the guy with the glasses, and began to elbow my way through the crowd towards the exit.

I didn't hear exactly how it started, but there was some kind of an argument going on around the back of the room. A couple of guys were being jostled by a loud-suited character who was built like a B52, while a pretty fair-haired girl tried to soothe his temper. He broke free of all three of them, and the next thing I knew a fist like a wrecking ball hit me in the face.

"Just stay the hell away from my wife , Maxwell, or you'll be holding up a freeway somewhere."

I lay on the floor counting my teeth; it wasn't difficult, two of them were in my hand. Above me towered this six-foot eight psychopath unspooling the kind of cliches I hadn't expected to hear outside a movie theater.

"Vince! Vince! For God's sake!" The girl had run forward and braced herself between us before her tame gorilla could do any more damage to me. I watched the lights go on behind his deep-set eyes when he looked at her.

Hands clutched from behind at my arms and shoulders, and someone heaved me to me feet. Obviously I had at least one friend here.

"Dave?" A soft voice I felt I ought to recognise. "Are you hurt bad?"

I shrugged off his concern, not taking my attention from Vince for a second; if there's one thing I've learned it's that you never turn your back on a charging rhino.

"Nah," I mumbled, utterly bemused. "I just like to bleed." I felt as if my nose was spread across my face; I'd have two black eyes in the morning.

The girl was staring at me. "I'm sorry, Dave," she said, with her eyes full of something I didn't understand. "He didn't mean it; he just gets jealous. I tried to tell him I was just getting your autograph, but he wouldn't listen."

My autograph? I'm the kind of musician who has to give autographs? I stored that thought away for future reference, and concentrated on the here and now. The big guy couldn't decide whether to look shame-faced or furious and had settled on a compromise which left him half-crumpled against the people who were restraining him with an expression of vacant stupidity on his face. I figured that on a good day Dave Maxwell would eat guys like him for breakfast.

"Just keep him on a leash in future, honey," I suggested, sourly, shrugging away from the conflict. With all the dignity I could muster I headed for the exit, leaving the whole damn' crew of them to manage without me; I needed a few landmarks from Al before I ventured any further into this unknown territory.

The men's room was deserted. I filled a basin with cold water and washed the blood off my face, rinsed the two teeth under the tap and pushed them back into place. With luck their roots would re-attach themselves and the guy wouldn't have to manage without his teeth. My - his - lower lip was split, and I dabbed it cautiously with a handkerchief. That would be a damn' good excuse not to play saxophone for a couple of days; I'd just have to hope he didn't double on piano.

I was just contemplating Dave Maxwell's face in the mirror - thirty-five-ish, thin, framed by faded fair hair - when I heard an apologetic cough behind me and turned around to find no-one there.

"Uh, Sam, can you hear me?"

" Al? " It certainly didn't sound like my hologrammatic time-travelling companion, but no-one else in the immediate vicinity was likely to be addressing me by my real name.

"Er - Sam, it's not Al. It's Gushie. Al's in Tel Aviv; I'm handling things this leap."

I couldn't think of a single good reason for Al to be in Tel Aviv, especially without mentioning it to me first, and I felt a little aggrieved. That wasn't all I felt; apprehensive would probably just about cover it.

Gushie didn't materialise. I was staring at the walls, the ceiling, the doors of the stalls, but there was no sign of him anywhere.

"Gushie, where are you?"

"Sam, you can't see me, only hear me. I'm on Ziggy's standby circuit; I guess you don't remember but you once said we needed a backup in case Al got thrown in jail or crowned by a jealous husband or something, and you had me volunteer."

"I did?" I liked the irony; it wasn't Al who was meeting the jealous husbands this time around. "So why'm I here, Gushie? And where exactly am I?"

I was visualising the little technician in his white lab coat, poring over Ziggy's digital reader. I almost saw him scratch his head before he replied.

"Uh, Sam, the where and the when are straightforward enough; this is Boston, Massachusetts, and it's December 30th 1959. You're Dave Maxwell, known as 'Dusty', and you play tenor sax for the Joe Ripley Combo. Joe's the guy with the beard and glasses."

"I don't double on any other instrument, do I?"

Gushie seemed taken aback. "Uh, alto sax," he said after a while. "Nothing else."

"So ... "

"So why are you here? Sam, I don't know what to tell you. Ziggy's refusing to answer questions; he's throwing out recipes, baseball averages, blueprints for space cruisers - even statistics on the Playmate of the Month - but nothing we can use. Until we can get him calmed down, you're just gonna have to manage on your own for a while."

"Oh, boy." Here I was, hiding in the men's room of a down-at-heel club in Boston, with no real idea what I was supposed to be doing or why; all I had to do was live some other guy's life for a few days until my so-called friends found a way to get me out of it. I'm not exactly your standard depressive type, but there are days when I feel I could learn to be; this was one of them. "Well, why don't you get Al back from Tokyo or wherever the hell he is?" I asked, irately. "You hear that, Gushie? Find Al! "

The door opened and someone stepped into the shadowed area just inside. That voice I'd heard behind me after Vince attacked reached me across the room, only now it had a more familiar ring to it.

"Hey, Dusty, take it easy," Al said. "I'm here."

It wasn't the first time I'd found myself plunged back into the past of someone I knew. I've crossed Al's trail a couple of times before, always with emotionally disturbing consequences. One time I found myself comforting his first wife, Beth, during a crisis time in her life, and once I narrowly missed saving Al himself from a Viet Cong prison. He'd given up several years of his life so that I could save my brother in 'Nam, but even then I'd never actually come face-to-face with a younger version of my friend. Now I couldn't help staring at him, drinking in the sight of a three-dimensional and substantial Al - younger, without the grey hairs and worry-lines, but complete with the laughing brown eyes and the confident, almost defiant, tilt to the chin I recognised so well.

"Packs a hell of a punch, don't he?" young Al remarked, cheerfully, stuffing his hands into his pockets and rocking back on his heels. He was conservatively dressed, by his own later standards, in what appeared to be the local uniform of black, black and more black.

"Al? What the hell are you doing here? I thought you were supposed to be in ... ?" I stopped myself in time. I could hardly say 'Tel Aviv', since that was thirty-something years in the future. A quick inventory of my Swiss-cheese memory told me I didn't have any idea where Al was supposed to have been around the end of 1959, and I guessed Boston was as good as anywhere.

As usual, Al bailed me out. "D.C.?"

"Yeah ... I, er, thought you were in Washington."

"I just got back. Walked into the club in time to see Vince taking a swing at you. Is he still sore about you giving Serina your - uh - autograph?"

I didn't relish the evasive way he said it. Maybe Maxwell had been messing around with Vince's wife.

"Well," I temporised, rubbing my chin thoughtfully, "I'm beginning to wish I hadn't bothered."

"I'll bet," Al laughed. "Even Vince isn't stupid enough to believe it takes three hours locked in a hotel bedroom just to write your name."

"Three hours? " The girl was certainly cute, but on a good day I wouldn't have given her more than three minutes.

The grin he sent in my direction was all Al. "Well, you know, Serina's a pretty determined lady. She's been tryin' to prove something about you ever since she first clapped eyes on you. Vince knows that; he knows what she's like."

"Promiscuous, you mean?" My lower lip was thickening nicely; by morning I'd look like I'd been giving the kiss of life to a rubber raft.

"That's easy for you to say," he chuckled. "Sure, Serina likes to ... 'spread her favours'. She picked the wrong guy this time, though." His manner altered subtly, became a little more serious. "Oh yeah - that reminds me - Joe says you can go; he wants you to rest up for New Year's Eve. Want me to drive you?"

"Thanks." My crazy luck was holding; that would solve the problem of figuring out where Dave Maxwell lived, and on the way I might get some clues from young Al about why I was here and what I was supposed to be doing. "Did you pick up my saxophone?"

"It's in the car."

I nodded. "How come you always seem to know what I'm thinking?" I asked him, with a smile that stretched my cut lip painfully.

Al held the door open for me; our hands almost touched as I stepped through it.

"Just naturally telepathic," was his mild response.

It was a joke. I knew it was a joke, but it made me shiver all the same. As I followed him out to the car I was struggling with a lot of unanswered questions - like what had happened to the hologram Al in the future, and why had he never mentioned knowing a jazz musician named Dusty Maxwell?

Since I had no idea whatever where we were supposed to be going, it didn't occur to me that Al might not be taking me to wherever Dusty Maxwell lived. In the car I made a big deal about being half-asleep, giving me an excuse to say 'Where are we?' when we pulled up outside an ugly, anonymous brownstone.

"I'm not surprised you don't remember," Al informed me sourly. "The only other time I brought you here you were so blasted you could hardly stand. That was the night

Joe heard about you and Serina," he added, by way of explanation.

"What about me and Serina?" I asked, snappily. It was beginning to annoy me how everybody seemed to think I was having an affair with this girl - including Al. " Et tu, Brute? "

"Relax, Dave. I know you don't mess around with women; you told me, guys only. I don't think Joe seriously believes you and she - uh, you know....."

"We didn't. " I wasn't sure where the certainty had come from, but I was prepared to defend Dusty Maxwell's honour with my life.

"You don't have to convince me , Dave, but I think you may need to convince Joe. I know you agreed you'd both see other people, but the thought of you seeing Serina could really hurt him."

I stared at him then, my incredulity circuits on maximum overload. So Dave Maxwell was exclusively homosexual; thanks, Gushie, you could have warned me. More to the point, Maxwell was obviously involved in some sort of long term, if not exactly monogamous, relationship with Joe Ripley. The thought chilled me to the bone; Joe might be an excellent musician, but a guy who looked like an ageing Glenn Miller in a false beard did absolutely nothing for me sexually, and I could only hope I wouldn't be called upon to.....

Al unlocked a door and ushered me into a small, cold, crowded room. Its interior could best be desribed as 'spartan'; the best Al had done to soften its hard edges couldn't conceal the fact that it was dingy and unpleasant. No-one in his right mind could have described it as 'comfortable'.

"Home, sweet home, Al," I breathed sadly, unconsciously addressing the remark to his older self thirty-five years down the line.

"Just till tomorrow," he hedged, taking my coat and hanging it on the back of the door. "Then I'm out of this town for good. Sit down. You want an 'Old-fashioned'?"

I glanced at the bottles on the table. "Sure." It wouldn't be Dusty Maxwell's first drink of the evening and if Al's expression was anything to go by it certainly wouldn't be his last. "Mind telling me why I'm here?"

Something about this whole situation just felt odd. I couldn't figure out why Al had brought me to his home instead of my own, nor why the older Al had suddenly deserted me. I needed Gushie and a few straight answers to straight questions.

"It's December 30," he said, solemnly, handing me my drink.

"So?"

"So ... wherever I am on December 30 I invite a good friend to get drunk with me. December 30 was the date my little sister died."

"Trudy." I handled her name with caution. The memory of Al telling me his sister's tragic story was still raw and painful and I knew that however long he lived he would never stop blaming himself for what happened to her.

"I told you about her?" he sounded puzzled, but quite willing to believe he'd forgotten telling me.

I remembered I wasn't Sam Beckett but Dave Maxwell. "Some," I shrugged. I lifted my glass. "Trudy," I said.

Al met my eyes over the rim of his own drink. "Trudy," he echoed, throwing the liquor down his throat like a cossack about to pitch his glass into the fireplace. I followed suit, and Al reached out to build me a refill. When he had finished he stretched out his arm and switched on a huge, reel-to-reel German tape-recorder.

Mesmerised I watched the brown ribbon of tape spool through onto the takeup reel and the room was filled with the rich warmth of Ella Fitzgerald's voice as she lived and suffered through every word of 'Smoke Gets In Your Eyes'. I don't remember ever sitting down and thinking about the words before, but Ella drew the pain from them and sent it flowing through my veins. I knew Al had been hurt many times in the past; I knew there was more hurt waiting for him in the future. The tragedies of his life were burned into my memory. That one man can go through so much and still find a reason to go on is a constant source of astonishment to me. I wished I could save him from the heartbreaks of the next few years. At that moment, with the whisky and the music wrapping around one another in my brain, I wished I could just throw my arms around him and protect him for the rest of my life.

When I looked up I saw he had tears in his eyes. That was fine; so did I.

His scrutiny was painful; I felt he could see right through me and read my thoughts. I've never been a coward, but this time I was the first to look away. The music was getting inside my head, filling me with hopes and fears I didn't want to name. Suddenly being with Al was a very special and important thing for me, and I didn't want it to end. There have been times since I first Quantum-leaped that I've felt very close to him; living Mrs Bruckner's ordinary suburban life with her crowded schedule, her three insane kids and her demented dog had brought us together in a way I hadn't expected, and Al's sacrifice to save my brother's life just set the seal on the way I felt about him. If it wasn't love, I didn't know what it was.

"We ought to spend more time together, Al," I said rawly. "I enjoy your company."

"Yeah," he drawled. "I know what you mean. I just - don't like to be around Joe too much. He makes me uncomfortable."

"Why? Because he's homosexual?" The words were out before I had a chance to stop them. Al met my eyes without flinching.

"Nah. Because he's possessive." He got to his feet. "Gotta go to the bathroom," he explained mildly, passing in front of my chair and making for a door on the other side of the room. I couldn't suppress a smile, recalling his objections to the men's room as a venue for our conversations; at least his tactical retreat had been prompted by necessity, not by embarrassment. The more I got to know this young Al, the more of my friend I saw in him; being with him was making me feel very much at ease.

The disembodied voice caught up to me again as Al left the room.

"Sam?"

"Gushie?" Feeling faintly ridiculous talking to empty air I decided to locate Gushie in a large, ugly lamp on a side-table and addressed that.

"Gushie, that's Al ."

"Uh ... yeah, Sam, I know. I saw him. Keep calm, now, and just ride along with it - whatever happens."

"What's going to happen?"

"I don't know," he admitted. "Ziggy wasn't real specific on that point. All he says is that after January 1st 1960 Al and Dusty never met again. They parted on bad terms; maybe Dusty made a pass at him."

I cursed under my breath. So Gushie had known about Dave Maxwell's sexual allegiance. Generally I don't bear grudges, but in this case I was prepared to make an exception.

"Well, he's quite safe from me ," I told him coldly. "Gushie, we know roughly what happened to Al after tonight, but what about Dusty?"

"Not good, Sam. A guy named - er - Vincenzo Martelli busted his jaw in a fight around the end of January. Although he recovered, it was the end of his career. About a year later Joe Ripley died in a car smash and Dusty really went on the skids; he drank himself to death inside two years."

I glanced down at the drink in my hand and saw it for the potential poison it was; in that moment I hated it.

"So how do I change that?" I asked, apprehensively. "Convince Martelli I'm not messing around with Serina?"

"Maybe ... " was the vague response. "Sam, I just don't know how any of this works out or where Al fits into the picture. Just play it by ear for now and I'll try to help you out as much as I can."

Gushie meant well, but if his help so far was a representative sample of what I could expect I'd probably be better off by myself. Unless, of course ...

"Can't you get Al back for me?" It would solve everything if he could; Al had to remember whatever it was that had happened between himself and Dave Maxwell at the end of 1959, and maybe he could give me some clues about how I could survive the next couple of days.

"I'm sorry, Sam," Gushie said, with mournful finality, "that just isn't possible."

"Were you talking to me?" the young Al enquired brightly as he returned to the room.

"No, just ... er, singing along with the tape."

He positively beamed. "You should sing more often, Dave; you know you have a good voice."

I shifted uneasily in my chair. "Al, most people think they're Pavarotti in the shower."

"Pava ... who? "

My Swiss-cheese brain scrabbled for an equivalent. "Mario Lanza."

He nodded. "Another drink?"

"No, thanks. I should ... I should get back." I winced at the prospect. If 'getting back' involved sharing a bed with Joe Ripley, maybe I wasn't in such a hurry after all.

"You could always stay," he suggested, almost wistfully. "I only have one bed, but you're welcome to share it."

If I was a cartoon character a little lightbulb would have appeared above my head at that moment. The invitation, the drinks, the music all suddenly made sense; they were the elements of a planned seduction. It wasn't an unwelcome approach from Dave that had caused their falling-out - it was Al who had asked and been rejected. Well, at least I could make sure that didn't happen again. I didn't know - dammit, I couldn't remember - whether Al and I had ever been lovers in that other life, but I knew that the way I was feeling we damn' well should have been. If being Dave Maxwell meant anything it meant that I could do things Sam Beckett would have found impossible. If loving Al was one of those things then I was determined just to go ahead and enjoy it.

"Thanks," I said. "In that case, maybe I will have another drink."

With delight I watched the way the tension fell from his shoulders. His expression, though, was still anxious. "What about Joe?" he asked.

"The hell with Joe," I told him, resolutely. "He doesn't own me." I glanced around the room. "Where do you sleep, anyway?"

Al indicated the couch. "You're sitting on it," he said, with a smile I never want to forget.

Don't expect me to explain why I didn't find the idea of making love to Al repulsive. I can only say that the cold shivers down my spine that I'd experienced at the thought of spending the night with Joe Ripley had turned to shivers of anticipation as I watched Al move about the apartment. There's something about the way he moves that's always fascinated me; he has the natural grace of a dancer, the sort of poise that draws the eye. Whether you happen to be male or female it's difficult to resist that sort of attraction, and I didn't try. Al meant a lot to me; if for some reason I didn't understand he had set his heart on a sexual encounter with Dusty Maxwell I wasn't about to deny him.

The thought of what I was presumably about to do sent ripples of terror and delight alternating through my body. Never since I lost my virginity - at quite an advanced age, if Al's opinion is any guide - had I reacted to a prospective lover with such breathless anticipation. I had moved from the couch to allow Al to operate the mechanism that turned it into a queen-sized double bed, and I watched him throw a sheet, an afghan blanket and a moth-eaten quilt over it and slip pillow-covers onto two cushions. The whole construction looked makeshift and uncomfortable and indescribably wonderful. I stared up at the ceiling for a moment, offering silent thanks to whoever it was who was leaping me around from life to life; if this was some sort of reward I didn't know what I'd done to deserve it but I wanted Him to know I appreciated it.

Al was smiling as he turned to face me, a secretive and triumphant sort of smile. Sure of his full attention I removed my jacket and hung it behind the door, capitulating to the inevitable without a fight, and stretched my shoulder and back muscles expansively. My arms remained outstretched until he stepped into them and, without my direction, they folded around him automatically.

"Are you sure you know what you're doing, Al?" I asked him, fearful that a sudden change of mind might rob me of him. "I don't want you to regret this."

It sounded noble and altruistic enough but the tightness of my embrace belied the sentiment. I had already forgotten how to let him go. He clutched back, his cheek resting against mine. "Dusty, I need to ... find out ... " he said, gruffly. "Let's just ... take it slow ... one step at a time."

The thirst for knowledge; I could relate to that, even if in this manifestation it meant Al's smooth hands gliding across my back, hot through my shirt, stroking strange sensations into my spine. My own hands began to respond and unconsciously I found I was touching his face, drawing delicate lines of awareness around lips and eyes, and before I had time to think about what I was doing I had captured his mouth with my own and conquered it absolutely. Al's mouth opened to me and I plundered it with my tongue, needing him urgently and overwhelmingly.

Abruptly I set him free and he hung in my arms. If he was stunned by the suddenness and intensity of his own reactions I could sympathise - it's been a long time since I could truly say I recognised myself, but the man I had become with Al was a complete and total stranger. Whether I was Sam Beckett or Dusty Maxwell scarcely seemed to matter any more; I was a man in love - I could no longer ignore the evidence - and about to consummate that love.

"Al?" I whispered. "Are you okay, babe?"

"Yes." His breath scorched across my neck as his fingers fumbled for my shirt buttons. "Don't stop, Dusty."

Whatever was driving him it obviously wouldn't let him go. He was tight against me and his arousal was no secret; my own was its equal as I pressed against him. Too much of this and I would no longer be able to keep control of this borrowed body.

Carefully I drew back a little - then kissed him again, this time with exquisite attention to detail, framing his face with my hands and touching his lips lightly. I've never kissed a woman so tenderly - probably because I've never loved any woman as much as I love Al.

"If you were thirty years older ... " Raggedly I exhaled the words into his hair.

He dropped light kisses onto my throat. "What?" he asked distractedly.

"There are things I'd say to you ... Oh, Al, I wish I could stay here with you!"

"I know. Me too. But we've both got other lives ... "

There was sadness in the way he said it. Whatever responsibilities were taking him away I wished I could lift the load from his shoulders.

"Could be ... " I started, recklessly, "could be some day you'll meet someone ... who cares about you as much as I do ... "

He tightened his hold on me. "Forget about 'some day'," he told me, almost brusquely. "Think about 'now'."

It was sound advice. I brought myself back to the present and tugged at his black polo-neck sweater. "Like this, you mean?"

"Yeah."

In a moment his bare chest was crushed against mine, and the touch of skin against skin almost sent me into orbit. Somewhere in the semi-darkness that tape-recorder was unspooling a love-song I wished I had written; its bittersweet cadences depicting a love sundered by time underscored the hopelessness of our situation. Words and melody wreathed like smoke through the air, drifting around and between us as Al turned in my arms and gently drew me towards the bed.

"I need to find out," Al had said, sliding comfortably into my embrace. I remembered my lectures to Kevin Bruckner, the fifteen-year-old boy whose kidnap and murder I'd averted while living his mother's life. "There's no special age when it should happen but there should be a special reason - when you love someone so much that making love with them is the most natural way of expressing it."

Everything about being with Al felt natural and right; the way he filled my arms with strength made me recognise the exaggerated tenderness I'd always shown towards women for what it was, a fault that even my female 'lives' hadn't cured in me. I needed a broad back, firm muscles, hard, flat chest against me to make me feel complete; I'd never made love as a female but I thought now that I had some understanding of how it might feel. Al and I lay face to face, calm and solicitous, learning touches from one another like the novices we both were. The skin of his shoulders and upper arms was creamy and smooth over well-defined musculature; his collar-bone was an elegant sculpture above a sprinkling of dark hair that trailed in a sharp line to his navel. I found him beautiful.

Although theoretically the more experienced partner I was content to let Al set the pace, which he did without any suggestion of awkwardness. He was careful and considerate, everything I could have hoped for in a lover, trying out touches and caresses with a delicacy that set every nerve and pore in my body tingling as he sensitised them to danger level and beyond. I would be a liar if I suggested that I could remember all - or even most - of what happened during the next few hours. Great happiness, like great pain, is sometimes too much for the human mind to contemplate without fear. I felt torn apart and rebuilt by every touch, redefined by Al as he taught me things about my body that astonished me, secrets I had never realised I possessed.

He kissed the palm of my hand with the sort of artistry his Italian ancestors would have applauded, then sucked my fingertips one by one - a sensation I can hardly explain but another priceless piece of self-knowledge to add to his many gifts. Later he also sucked my toes and placed kisses on the sensitive skin at the backs of my knees. There was no area of my body he did not explore thoroughly, and fumblingly aware of my inexperience I returned his caresses, gradually losing my self-consciousness in his comforting presence.

I had imagined I had a fair idea where most of the erogenous zones were located, but Al's fingers and tongue were constantly discovering new ones. His tongue in my ear sent a thrill through my whole body, and the darkly muttered words that followed made me roll over and pin him to the mattress, my teeth branding his mouth in a fierce parody of a kiss. Our play became rougher, clutching fingers and raking nails replacing gentle whispering touches, hoarse commands replacing shyly-voiced confidences in the near-dark. Al was the stronger, his smaller body packed with wiry strength, but even if he had not been I would have allowed him whatever he wanted; this loving answered some need for him, some question about his own sexuality, and I wanted him never to forget our brief time together.

Although I did all that I could for his pleasure it was Al who brought me to climax first, teaching me another very special lesson about myself in the process. I was arching frantically towards him, on the verge of begging for release, when the touches in my groin that had driven me to the edge of madness suddenly ceased and I felt Al's weight shift in the bed. Whatever I had expected it was not the hand that clamped like an iron shackle around my right ankle, tightening until it almost halted the flow of blood into my foot, nor the knifelike fingernail that gouged a line up the inside of my leg. Then an imperious hand fastened on my genitals and crushed and twisted me until with a cry against his mouth I spilled into his hands. I had never experienced a climax of such intensity, nor such gentle concern for my welfare afterwards, the endearments whispered into the space between us as I made an effort to stabilise my painful breathing and reassemble my dazed wits. When, finally, I could speak, what I said was blazingly unoriginal.

"Al, I love you." I hadn't meant to say it at all, but I couldn't stop myself. "Remember that, no matter what happens. Remember it all your life, whoever you're with, wherever you are. Remember that tonight I told you I loved you. One day it just might mean something to you."

"It means something now," he said, dreamily, as my uncertain hands traced a path to his groin. "It means a lot. Thank you for tonight, Dusty. Thank you."

There's something insidious about a hologram-substitute who doesn't announce his presence visually. Gushie's voice wafted out of the darkness a couple of hours later as I lay awake, Al's dark head cushioned on my shoulder and my arm paralysed with cramp beneath his dead weight. It had all seemed so easy, so blessedly simple slipping between the bedcovers with this younger version of my closest friend, but after Al had dropped off to sleep I'd been left to deal with the doubts and uncertainties that had marshalled in formidable array against me.

Long after Al fell asleep my brain was teeming with scenarios; since Gushie and Ziggy hadn't come up with a reason for my being here it was at least possible that my purpose was to change Al's sexual orientation, to prevent the five broken marriages and all their attendant heartaches. I couldn't figure out, though, what purpose that would serve, unless it was to enable me to enjoy some sort of relationship with him if and when I ever leaped home. It seemed a remote enough hope, and the hologram Al's continued absence seemed like a very powerful argument against it.

If Al knew exactly what was happening, maybe he was staying away out of horrified embarrassment. I couldn't forget what had happened the first time I found I had leaped into a female personality. Al had fallen in love, heavily, suddenly and damagingly, with 'Samantha Stormer' - or at least with my mind in her body, which was quite a departure for Al as he usually likes his women at the lower end of the intelligence scale. At any rate, he'd found it very difficult to deal with the knowledge that he not only loved me but was sexually attracted to the body I was inhabiting. He'd suffered from accusations of 'repressed homosexuality' that were levelled at him by the project psychiatrist, Dr Verbina Beaks. If Al had faltered at the mere idea of loving me when I was an attractive young woman, how much more difficult would it be for him to accept that his younger self had made love to me as Dave Maxwell? Beaks would know by now that her worst fears were justified. Could it be that she had recommended the committee to have Al removed from the project entirely? Would I ever see him again? The prospect caused me to tighten my embrace on his sleeping form; I was almost afraid to know the truth.

"Sam ... I'm sorry ... " The voice only I could hear filled my head. Gushie, the little pervert, breaking the precious intimacy of my one and only night with Al. I wanted to curse him for a voyeur, but he could well be the only friend I had left after tonight and anyway I didn't want to risk waking Al. Maybe if I ignored him he would just go away.

"Sam, I know you're awake. I know you can hear me."

"Then you also know what's been happening," I said. "Get out of here, Gushie."

"What's been happening isn't important, Sam. What's important is we've figured out what was the matter with Ziggy."

Despite my annoyance I was curious. "What?"

"He ... uh, he was bored. You know hybrid computers, they're just like kids - you have to keep them amused or they get bad-tempered."

"So what did you do?"

"Interfaced him with a computerised film archive; he's busy watching every movie ever made."

That was all I needed; up to my ears in the most serious situation of my entire life and the computer that could help me through it was at the drive-in.

"Couldn't you interrupt him for a moment, Gushie, and find out what happens to ... to my friend here?" I asked with dangerous politeness. "Does he still get married five times?"

Gushie was silent for some minutes, minutes during which I listened to Al's even breathing with a sort of desperate nostalgia, trying to store up every moment of my time with him in my erratic memory in the cold certainty that tonight was all there would or could be for us.

"Uh ... five wives, five divorces," Gushie said bluntly. "There's no evidence of Al ever being interested in men again after tonight - this was the only time. And you haven't changed Dusty's life, either; he still dies an alcoholic a couple of years from now."

"Then why ... why am I here? And how do I leap out of here?"

"Uh ... Ziggy thinks maybe you're supposed to stop Vince Martelli ruining Dusty's career. The possibility rates 68.3 percent, but it's the best we've got."

"Then all I need to do is persuade Vince I'm gay and I never laid a finger on his wife? That might work ... "

"No." He cut in abruptly. "She already told him that and he doesn't believe it. Whatever, Ziggy says you're here for Dusty, Sam - not for Al. Not even for - Al and you."

His words stung. My feelings were not a consideration for Ziggy; they couldn't be reduced to equations his systems could read.

"What does Ziggy know, anyway?" I demanded, huskily. "He doesn't have any emotions - how could he know how Al and I feel about each other?"

" Which Al, Sam? This kid isn't the Al you know - he's just someone Al used to be. He's an illusion, like Samantha Stormer. You just fell in love with illusions of each other - real life doesn't work that way. Dr Beaks says you're living in a paranoid fantasy delusion.... "

Beaks. Gushie's attitude made sense at last; his words sounded like a verbatim rehearsal of some of her favourite prejudices. If I'd ever noticed an anti-gay bias in Project Quantum Leap's own resident black widow spider she'd have been off the team faster than you can say 'neurological hologram', but if the second-hand analysis Gushie was spouting was any yardstick she'd certainly developed one now.

"Gushie," I said, swallowing my anxiety, "I want you to take a message to Dr Beaks for me."

"Uh - huh?" He sounded wary, as well he might.

"Tell her ... tell her that if she doesn't find Al and get him back into the imaging chamber within twenty-four hours I'll take the first available flight down to Kansas City and make damn' sure her mother and father never meet. Understand?"

"Sam, you can't do that!"

"Just take the message, Gushie."

"Sam, I ... "

"In exactly ten seconds I'm going to wake Al," I said, threateningly, "and we are going to continue living our paranoid fantasy delusion. Just get the hell out of our bedroom, will you?"

He gave it one last try. "Sam ... "

"Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven ... "

"Okay, okay, Sam, you win. I'll do what I can."

"Six. Five. Four ... Three ... Two ... One." I drew a long, deep breath as the last whispered syllable faded into silence and Al's regular, comfortable breathing once again became the only sound of importance in the room.

He shifted drowsily against my shoulder. "Who's Gushie?" he murmured sleepily.

"Somebody out of a nightmare," I told him, stroking his hair reassuringly. "Just somebody out of a nightmare. He's gone now - go back to sleep."

Uncharacteristically, for once in his life, he obeyed.

I slept intermittently, overtired and obsessed with the ramifications of the various difficulties I faced, by far the most immediate of which was the fact that I was apparently scheduled to play a set at the club's New Year celebrations that evening. I churned the problem around in my mind until close on 7 a.m. when I finally realised how I could not only resolve that difficulty but also save Dusty's future career at the same time. There was no way I could prevent Vince Martelli breaking Dusty's jaw in a jealous rage over Serina who - from what Al had told me - was scarcely worth all the grief she had caused, but I could at least make sure that Dusty would have some kind of life to look forward to after Joe Ripley's death. It would mean establishing an understanding with Joe, at least for one night, but I could live with that. Whatever Joe's failings he obviously had qualities that the real Dusty appreciated; I couldn't allow the knowledge that I didn't find him attractive to blind me to that fact or I would be guilty of a prejudice worse than Beaks's.

I can't hope to describe how it felt to wake up with Al beside me that morning in a shabby room whose light-well window overlooked nothing more romantic than pipes, weeds and broken glass greyed by an unforgiving sky. If I had expected any awkwardness from my avid partner of the night before it failed to materialise; somehow he struck the perfect balance between a lover's fondness and the easy-going manner of an old friend, prepared to be affectionate and even tender but showing no signs of wishing to make love again. When he mentioned that he intended to spend the whole day packing up ready to leave soon after midnight it didn't seem incongruous to volunteer to help him, an offer that was accepted. We spent a companionable day together sorting his belongings into bags and boxes which one-by-one we stowed away in the car.

I was emptying Al's wardrobe when I came across something so reminiscent of the older Al that I could have wept. It was an Hawaiian shirt, its pattern in peach and green on a pale blue background, and I stared at it for so long without speaking that Al stopped what he was doing and glanced over at me.

"Something wrong with the shirt?"

"I - love it," I faltered. "It's just like you, Al. Vivid."

He moved to stand beside me and took hold of the shirt, holding it up in front of himself and looking into the mirror. I looked over his shoulder into the glass, and Dusty's thin face, lank fair hair and grey eyes looked back at me.

"Vivid, huh?"

I couldn't help myself. "Al, if you have enough confidence you can wear absolutely anything on any occasion - just act like you're the only one in step, and you can get away with the brightest colours in the craziest combinations. Al, you could wear things that would make this shirt look tasteful."

He shrugged and hung the shirt beside the mirror. "Well, maybe I'll wear it to the club tonight," he said. "Bring a little colour to all those sad-sacks in their funeral outfits."

"Why not?" Impulsively I threw my arms around him and hugged him, and his arms tightened as he hugged me back. "Let's just enjoy the party, Al. Tomorrow can take care of itself."

There was an ominous silence from Gushie all day, which part of me welcomed and part dreaded. Either it meant there was a titanic power-struggle going on behind the scenes at Project Quantum Leap, or more likely Gushie was suffering from terminal embarrassment following my threat of the previous night. By my reckoning he had until 3 a.m. to produce Al in the imaging chamber, by which time Al's younger self should be well on the way to wherever his life was taking him next. At any rate I had persuaded him to see in the New Year at the club before leaving, and that evening he drove me down there in his car laden with every single item he owned. My mouth was still split and bruised - a night of unbridled passion with Al had done little to improve that situation - but the teeth I had restored seemed likely to stay in place for the foreseeable future so I was at least reasonably presentable once again, if a little fragile.

Joe Ripley cornered me almost as soon as I walked in through the door. Al was several paces behind, deliberately avoiding Joe for as long as possible, and I scarcely had time to throw him a glance before I was hauled into a tiny store-room behind the bar.

"Maxwell, you son-of-a-bitch, what happened to you?"

I was startled. If this was a lover's affectionate greeting Joe and Dave obviously enjoyed a relationship that was a world away from the one Al and I had shared.

"Sorry, Joe, I ... got distracted."

The bandleader was seething. I would have to tread very carefully through this dangerous encounter if I wanted to make an ally of him.

"You spent the night with Serina Martelli, didn't you?" he accused, spitting out her name as though it had a bitter taste. Surely the truth couldn't possibly hurt him half as much as his jealous suspicions.

"No," I said, carefully. "With Al Calavicci."

Joe stopped in mid-rant and stared at me open-mouthed. " Al? "

I nodded.

He took off his glasses and passed a weary hand over his eyes, the aggression leaving his posture as he digested the news. "Thought he was leaving town?" he said, flatly.

"He is. Tonight."

"Uh-huh." Joe paused, marshalling his thoughts. "I wish you'd told me where you'd be, Dusty. Vince came by looking for Serina, and when you weren't with me he assumed you were together somewhere."

"I'm sorry. It was kind of a last-minute arrangement. Did he find her?"

"I don't know." His expression was only mildly critical. "I like Al," he said. "But I didn't know he ... "

His thoughts hung unspoken on the air.

"Neither did I," I told him. "Neither did he."

"Oh." His eyebrows lifted and he shot me a measuring look, but I met his gaze levelly. It was difficult to dislike a man who reacted so calmly to the news of his lover's infidelities; his possessive attitude towards Dave obviously only extended to affairs he saw as a potential threat to his own and the combo's well-being. For some reason, while Serina was a threat, Al was perceived as safe - a view I felt he would have reversed if he had any idea how deep my feelings for Al actually went.

Joe's arms slid around me affectionately. "I repeat, Maxwell, you're a son-of-a-bitch. Why don't you try spending a night at home now and again?"

I leaned down and kissed his forehead. "Sure, Joe," I told him cheerfully. "How about tonight?"

With Joe in such a forgiving frame of mind it was relatively easy to persuade him to agree to the scheme I had cooked up. He was surprised, but after a moment's thought merely nodded and smiled and patted me on the shoulder. I didn't have the least idea how relations had stood between Joe and Dave before I leaped in, but at least I didn't seem to have done anything bad enough to damage them beyond repair.

I found Al talking to the barman. The Hawaiian shirt certainly made him conspicuous among the sombrely-clad regulars, but being different and looking eccentric didn't seem to worry him in the least. His smile was relaxed and welcoming as I sat down beside him.

"You're causing a minor sensation," I told him.

"Yeah, I noticed. How's Joe?" To his credit, he actually sounded interested in the answer.

"Relieved to hear I was with you. Apparently Serina went missing again last night."

"So Tiny was telling me," he said, indicating the barman. "He says she spent the night with the bass-player - what's his name? - Claud?"

I glanced across at the bass-man. He was truly and unreservedly hideous. "You're kidding? "

Al shrugged. "Some women are just weird."

"That's true." I leaned closer, lowering my voice. "Listen, Al, I wanted to ask you ... What was last night all about? Why did you have to find out ... if you could ... ?"

"If I could make it with a man? Long story, Dusty."

I looked at my watch. "You have an hour and a half," I said. "Joe doesn't need me till 11.45."

Still he seemed to hesitate so, with a quick glance in Tiny's direction, I took the risk of reaching out and touching Al's face and turning it towards mine.

"Al, you know and I know that after tonight we're never going to see each other again. Maybe we both wish that could be different, but since we can't change it I don't see why we shouldn't tell each other the truth in the time we have left."

He looked at me with serious eyes, searching out my sincerity. I held his gaze while he fought out a battle within himself, and then abruptly he came to a decision.

"Okay. I've ... been interested in women ever since I found out I wasn't one," he told me, with bitter self-mocking in his tone. "Girls of all shapes, sizes, colours just fascinate me. I like to watch them move, I like to hear them speak, and I like to make love to them. I never seem to have any trouble finding company when I need it - tell you the truth, Dave, sometimes it's too easy. But back in the orphanage there was a kid who wasn't like me; he didn't have Garbo and Dietrich pinned up on his wall, he had Errol Flynn and Ronald Colman. Mikey was a couple of years older than me and he was a great kid - you know, strong, good at school, good at games, kind. He thought I was something pretty special. Matter of fact he managed to convince himself he was in love with me."

As he spoke, I knew that this was the first time he had ever told anybody about Mikey. I reached out a hand and squeezed his arm in reassurance.

"I just couldn't understand it," he went on, painfully. "I couldn't figure out what a man could see in another man. I was frightened of Mikey; I thought he was crazy, but the poor guy was only unhappy. God knows how he got up the courage to tell me how he felt, and I ... What did I know? I was just a kid, and kids hurt each other's feelings all the time."

He fell silent again, but I knew the story was far from ended. "What happened to him?" I prompted gently.

"He took it really bad. He was only just old enough to serve but he joined the Army and shipped out to Korea almost immediately. He died out there. You know, sometimes when I think about Mikey and I remember how much I hurt him I feel so ... angry. I guess since that time I always wondered if I could have been the kind of person he wanted me to be."

"So you decided to find out ... with me?"

Al turned towards me, his horror and grief meeting my calm understanding as our gazes locked. "I used you, Dusty. I'm sorry for that, but I found out what I wanted to know. I learned ... how good it can be with someone who really cares about you."

"I'm glad."

"I don't have a way to thank you," he said, despairingly.

"Maybe I had an ulterior motive," was my carefully neutral reply.

"Maybe you did. Yeah, maybe you did." He looked away, as if all this emotional openness had finally got too much for him.

I got up, wrapped an arm around his shoulders, and squeezed him to me briefly. Then, for the last time, I released him. Al had one more lesson to learn from Dusty Maxwell - that it was possible to end a relationship without pain.

"I have a surprise for you," I said, mildly. "Stay until midnight and you'll find out what it is. I hope your life works out the way you want it to, Al. You're strong, you can make it. Maybe I'll see you around."

Shocked eyes turned towards me. "But you ... "

"Goodbye, Al."

At last he seemed to understand that we had reached the end of our day, and from the depths of his memories he flashed me a crooked smile. "Yeah, you're right. Goodbye, Dusty. Remember me sometimes."

"That's a promise," I told him, unsteadily, as I turned and walked away.

Claud, the bass-player, may have been repulsive but he played like an angel. Shortly before midnight he was entertaining the festive crowd, which had grown until the club was almost bursting at the seams, to a very hot rendition of the old Jack Buchanan song 'I guess I'll have to change my plan' which I've never heard bettered. Vince and Serina had arrived, noisily, a few minutes earlier and were now installed by the bar where Vince and Tiny seemed to be deep in conversation. Every time I glanced over to where Al was sitting he seemed to be trying to disentangle himself from Serina's clutches, with little or no success, but even from the other side of the room I could see that all her actions were directed at claiming her husband's attention. I wondered if the poor boob was really too stupid to have figured out for himself what was going on, or if he understood her far too well and was merely ignoring her antics.

Joe had stepped off the stage to smoke a cigarette and choke down a shot of whisky and I was standing beside him when Claud's bass-notes died beneath a thunder of appreciative applause. Claud was a genius; I wondered if the real Dusty had ever appreciated that. Joe left my side and climbed back onto the stage, taking hold of the microphone.

"Ladies and gentlemen, 1960 is almost here," he said, drawing the biggest cheer of the evening so far. "It's time to refill our glasses and prepare to say goodbye to the Fifties. While we do that, let's all listen to Dusty Maxwell!"

It wasn't the most elegant build-up I'd ever heard, but the paying public didn't seem to have noticed. Their applause wafted me onto the stage; they wanted to see the year out to a background of cool jazz sax and they assumed that was what I was going to give them. They were wrong. Joe stepped back into a gap between Claud and the drummer, whose name I'd never got around to learning, and stood pursing his lips and flexing his fingers over the stops of a silver trumpet. He was all business, but the look he shot me was encouraging.

I found myself in front of the microphone, staring at it as if it could bite me.

"This ... " Suddenly I was the centre of attention. Obviously Dusty rarely came out from behind his saxophone long enough to speak to anyone, and the fact that I didn't even have it with me on the stage was probably enough to cause the disconcerted expressions on the few faces I could see.

I coughed, got a grip on my nerves, and started again.

"This ... is a New Year's gift for a special friend," I said, watching as the brightly-clad figure over by the bar put Serina away from him with a finality that was almost brutal. Joe's trumpet blew muted silver notes that were held aloft by Claud's soft bass-plucking; they made such a beautiful sound I hardly liked to intrude on it. I had painted myself into a corner, however.

Al had said Dusty had a good voice; here was my one and only chance to find out if he was right. I have sung to an audience before, but it's always an ordeal and I'm not ashamed to admit that I was terrified. I had only my Swiss-cheese memory to call on for the words of the song I'd heard just once, the previous night, but without further thought I abandoned myself to its mercies to sink or swim as Fate decreed.

" And now the purple dusk of twilight time

Steals across the meadows of my heart

High up in the sky the little stars climb

Always reminding me that we're apart

You wandered down the lane and far away

Leaving me a song that will not die

Love is now the stardust of yesterday

The memory of years gone by

Sometimes I wonder why I spend the lonely nights

Dreaming of a song

The melody haunts my reverie

And I am once again with you

When our love was new

And each kiss an inspiration

Oh, but that was long ago -

Now my consolation is in the stardust of a song

Beside a garden wall when stars are bright

You are in my arms

The nightingale

Tells his fairy-tale

Of Paradise where roses bloom

Though I dream in vain

In my heart it will remain

Our stardust melody -

The memory of love's refrain."*

As I sang I watched Al edging towards the exit, his eyes on me with every step. By the time the final note died he was standing in the doorway at the back of the room, and before the holocaust of applause hit me and Joe Ripley's bear-hug threatened my balance I saw him lift a hand in farewell. I responded, and watched him turn away abruptly and walk out of my life without a backward glance.

Joe's embrace was the public kind chat-show hosts inflict on their guests, and I hugged back heartily as he thumped my back. Hot tears burned like acid down my face and momentarily I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to clear my vision. When I opened them again it was to the sight of a small figure in an Hawaiian shirt, its head bowed, its hands stuffed deep into the pockets of its sky-blue trousers. I noticed with delight the wonderful streaks of silver-grey at its temples.

"Al ... oh, Al ... " I whispered fervently.

Joe eased his grip and momentarily blocked my line of sight. "I know, kid, I know," he said affectionately. "But I'll make it up to you somehow. I promise."

"Hey, Joe," Claud intervened, a cautioning note in his voice, "it's nearly midnight."

Joe detached himself from my paralysed grip. "Showtime, kid," he said, straightening his shoulders and returning to the microphone.

I stumbled off the stage, unco-ordinated and weak as a newborn lamb, towards the doorway where the bright figure stood - unquestionably the hologram-Al from that future I couldn't quite remember - waiting for me.

"Al ... ?"

His greeting was depressingly downbeat and my heart sank. "Hi, Sam."

"How ... uh, how was Timbuctu?"

He looked like a man who had been through a very rough time. "It was Tallahassee, and it stank," he told me venomously.

"Why were you in ... " The sight of him was killing me; he was perfect in every detail, dammit, except that I couldn't touch him. An air of defiance radiated from him like light.

"That shitbrained social disease Beaks wouldn't let me anywhere near the imaging chamber," he explained. "After the 'Nam thing and what happened with Beth she put a ban on me having any contact with my own past life. The Committee sent me to Florida on some damn' time-wasting conference and I never even knew you'd leaped into Dave Maxwell until I got back. Even after that I had to stay out of it until the kid left; I thought he'd never go."

Beaks. Roasting over a slow fire would be too good for her. I could lull myself to sleep some night thinking of ways to get my revenge on her if I ever found myself in the right time-line again.

"That's ... that's the same shirt," I said lamely, the knowledge only penetrating slowly through images of what I would like to do to Beaks.

"Yeah. I kept it."

"For thirty-five years? "

"Why not?"

The very triviality of the conversation suddenly reminded me that there were things we weren't saying to one another. There was so much I wanted to ask him and tell him, and now so little time left.

"Al, you know what happened here?"

He shrugged uncomfortably. "You just sang 'Stardust' for me," he replied evasively.

"No. Before that. Last night."

He looked away. "Of course I know, Sam. I was there, remember?" He drew the digital reader from his pocket and busied himself punching up information so that he did not have to look at me. "I guess you'll want to know what happened to Dusty? Yeah, ah ... Well, Joe still dies in the crash, but Dusty manages to build a second career as a singer. He stays around long enough to help get the Gay Rights thing started ... and he and Claud live together for fifteen years."

I bit back an exclamation of astonishment as I glanced across at the stage. Claud was still repulsive, nothing I knew about him or Dusty could change that. Serina was twining herself around Joe; in that moment I couldn't decide which of them I was sorriest for.

"What happens to Vince and Serina?"

Al prodded the buttons on the reader. "They divorce. She gets custody."

"They have children? " It didn't seem at all likely, but then I guessed some people preferred their marriages unpredictable.

"Four daughters. They all look like him. What a waste!"

"And what about ... Al and Sam?"

Finally he met my gaze, a troubled expression in his eyes. "What do you mean?"

"Do you realise ... I love you?"

"Uh, yeah." A look of grief transfigured his face. "And you know what?"

I smiled down at him. "Let me guess. You love me, too?"

"Sam ... " He swept me a helpless, open-palmed gesture of abundance, making me a present of his courage. "Let me count the ways," he said hoarsely.

I swallowed sharply, unable to cope with the possibility that it was happening for us at last. I wanted to hold him, but I couldn't even touch him.

"Hurry home," he said.

I took a deep, incredulous breath. "Oh ... boy!"

Al's features split into an insane grin which I returned with interest, and we stood there for what felt like ages just trading smiles and reading one another's minds, giving and receiving silent promises for a future we didn't know we had, while the party rioted on around us unnoticed and midnight struck. The revellers had already started on 'Auld Lang Syne' when I felt the tugging at my consciousness that denoted an imminent leap into some other time, and Al's eyes were still burning into me as the darkness took me and threw me out into the unknown yesterdays, todays and tomorrows of someone else's life.

* * * * *

(* Music: Hoagy Carmichael Words: Mitchell Parrish )

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