The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (5/5)
Title: The Greatest Man That Ever Lived
Pairing(s): Viggo/Orlando
Genre(s): Romance, drama
Length: 2120 words (+20 000 in total)
Rating: PG-13
Summary: The ever-changing love between two men throughout the years, as they grow together in both age and emotional maturity.
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Chapter 5
Their marriage was small, unadorned, and private. No frills, no champagne fountains, no party accessories, no seven-layer cake. Just the two grooms, their families, and their closest friends, held in a simple scarcely-decorated church with a mundane two-layer cake. It was meticulously planned, however, since Orlando’s mother refused to have her only son go through his marriage in anything worse than perfection. And anything that Sonia Bloom aimed for, she achieved, so the wedding was exactly how she (and everybody else) wanted it to be-absolutely perfect.
It had been quite a shock when Viggo and Orlando announced their official relationship. In addition to the nineteen-year age difference, they had always been known as father and son or less frequently older brother and little brother, but never in their life have they ever been mistaken as a couple. When Orlando broke the news to his mother, she had continued dismissing the idea until realizing several weeks later that her son was in fact telling the truth (and from there, she had just babbled on in gladness on how great Viggo was as a husband and son-in-law, tacitly granting her blessing). Even Sean and Liv, both of whom had already known of their mutual attraction, were still in awe of how nonsensically romantic the ending turned out: their love for each other was so palpable that one could almost see the magnetic forces drawing them together. Billy and Dom were Billy and Dom, so they took it just fine, in their standards anyway (Billy bet three years, Dom bet two weeks; neither of them ended up winning). The only person who had any sort of problem with the relationship was Samantha, but that was only because she was more concerned about the happiness of her brother than against the fact that he was dating Viggo (“As your overprotective sister, I’m pretty much obligated to tell you that you can do so much better than him,” she teased). The last to be told was Viggo’s son, and the father was at first apprehensive about how Henry would take the news, but when the information was thrown out into the open the preteen had looked up from his video game with the most unimpressed expression on his face that he pretty much told his father off (“You thought I didn’t know? Jesus, Dad, I’m almost twelve years old; I know how love works. And before you ask, yes I’m fine with it. Now do you mind scooting over because you’re in my way of total world domination.”). The child had already thought his father was dating again the moment Orlando stepped foot into the flat, and so the surprise that Viggo had expected evidently backfired.
Their first days as boyfriend-boyfriend were, for the lack of a better word, enjoyably anticlimactic. Life went on as it normally would, and the couple slipped back into their routine as close companions. The two of them wanted to take it slow, and so they started out with chaste kisses and casual dates before graduating to none-too-innocent skin ship and romantic night outs. Orlando moved into his boyfriend’s place soon after and slept in a separate room for a good half-night before sneaking into the one on the right to snuggle up against a certain larger frame because it’s freaking cold, dammit, turn on your heater! From there, their previously platonic relationship evolved into something more.
Not surprisingly, they had decided to marry soon after their official start as an item. After all, both knew that they could not live without the other, and both also knew that not being together would propel even more problems than otherwise. Orlando needed a father-type figure to idolize and openly adore; Viggo needed a significant other to care for with his entire heart. As a result, less than two months after they started dating, a marriage was well on its way.
All in all, nothing too drastic changed. The beautiful and newly engaged Liv and a three-month pregnant Kate were among the chief bridesmaids, both of them looking more than gorgeous in their tailored dresses. Sean was once again Viggo’s best man, and Samantha was Orlando’s honor attendant (for lack of anybody else he trusted enough to stand beside him on the most important day of his life). Kate’s oldest daughter was grudgingly cast as the flower girl (the little lass hated dresses with a heartfelt passion), and since Elijah-who was on the brink of reaching his twenties-was no longer young enough to be the ring bearer, Henry took his place because although he was already twelve he was still short and dumpy and therefore perfect for the role.
Before long, the wedding march was played, and Viggo, once again dressed in the same black spiffy tuxedo he wore for his first wedding, stood at the altar staring at the back of the church where his young husband-to-be stood. Though not nearly as polished as Exene was, Orlando held the same elegance as he walked down the aisle with his mother at his side, looking absolutely stunning in his bleached white tuxedo and matching bowtie. Within half an hour, they had recited their vows and said their I dos, and the tears that Orlando had tried so hard to restrain throughout the day finally spilled when the rabbi officially announced them as husband and husband. “You may kiss,” the rabbi whispered, and Viggo spared not a second before clasping his younger lover against his chest, lips locking in an almost desperate fervor.
Thunderous applause, cheers, and laughter from the audience were heard. Dom and Billy’s whistles reverberated throughout the hall. Jovial tears flowed freely. And when their breathtaking wedding kiss finally broke off, Viggo and Orlando were formally connected in matrimony as well as in heart, mind, and soul.
And so began Orli’s first day of eternity as a happily married man named Orlando Bloom Mortensen. He returned from the honeymoon feeling like a new man, and immediately dropped out of university against Viggo’s wishes to immerse himself in his ever-so-perfect life alongside his husband and step-son. He found a simple job as a bookkeeper at the bookstore several buildings from the flat and spent his idle time on the job honing his mildly dyslexic reading capabilities. Viggo, on the other hand, finally landed a decent-paying occupation as a horse trainer in a ranch some fifteen-minute drive down south and every day without fail he returned home smelling like manure and sheep.
Time passed. They had blissful times as well as serious crises, as do all marriages have. Perhaps the darkest days of their marriage consisted of the six months when Henry entered a comatose state after being fatally injured in a motorcycle accident. The boy, then twenty-one, was merely cruising down the highway as per usual before a truck driver failed to notice the motorcyclist in the rear view mirror, resulting in a crash and a minor explosion. The incident drove Viggo mad-so mad that Orlando would have left his married life behind in sheer desperation if he had not stayed strong by reminding himself of how much he loved his husband and how much his husband needed him at a time like this. Day after day, Orlando had to live with a hardly responsive companion and put on a everything will be okay facade, and it was starting to take its toll of his own sanity. When Henry finally woke up, Orlando was beside himself sobbing with relief, both for the welfare of his beloved step-son as well as for the return of the man he fell in love with.
Year after year, Viggo lovingly watched his husband as he grew from a handsome energetic young boy to a proud confident man whom anybody would have been proud to have known. He watched as Orlando became older and more mature, and though his pretty boy look may have been deteriorating by the time he hit his forties, he found himself falling more and more in love every minute. Surprisingly, it was Orlando who had a more difficult time growing old with the love of his life. On Viggo’s sixty-ninth birthday which they celebrated alone together, he literally burst into tears when he realized that as every minute passed, Death became increasingly more evident in his husband’s previously strong and healthy body. Viggo gradually started forgetting things and he obviously no longer had the agility and muscle mass, and simple actions became progressively difficult to carry out no matter how easy it seemed, and Orlando would weep softly each night as thoughts of his husband’s incoming death plagued his mind. Throughout their forty-five years together, Viggo always managed to make Orlando feel like a little boy again, and the latter could hardly imagine a life without the elder by his side. The prospect of losing him was terrifying.
“Orli, you awake?” Viggo asked one night after hearing a faint sniffle.
Orlando quickly wiped his tears away. “Yes. You alright, dear?”
With a groan of exertion, Viggo shifted to his side to face his husband. “I think I should be asking you that question.”
“I’m fine.”
“Orli,” he said sternly, using the voice that he always used whenever he knew a lie was being told. Orlando almost snickered at how some things never changed even after forty-five years.
“I’m just thinking.”
“About what?”
“You know, just thinking.”
Vig let out a long sigh, intrinsically sensing his husband’s sorrow and unease. “I love you, Orli. You know that. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll be around whether you like it or not. Okay?” He felt around under the covers for a little bit before grasping his soul mate’s hand in his own.
“…Okay. Yah, okay.”
The next morning, Orlando woke up to find his husband porcelain white, ice cold, and unmoving beside him. He burst into tears the moment he saw the soft smile painted on his insipid lips. Viggo was ninety-two.
The funeral was held on an ironically sunny Wednesday with no cloud in sight. Aside from Orlando, Henry had cried the most, and the two of them had stood in front of his grave for over five hours, sobbing so many buckets of water that they nearly died of dehydration. His headstone had a simple inscription, just the way Viggo would have liked it:
IN LOVING MEMORY OF
VIGGO MORTENSEN JR.
OCTOBER 1958 - FEBRUARY 2051
LOVING HUSBAND, FATHER, & GRANDFATHER
Orlando lived the last few years of his life with utmost impatience. He hated mourning his deceased lover and, as morbid as it sounds, could not wait for it to end. He hated waking up and not feeling anything beside him. He hated eating at his dining table and having nothing to look at but a vacant chair. He hated watching television without having a shoulder to lean his head on. He hated taking walks in the park with nobody by his side to hold hands with. He hated celebrating their anniversary and knowing deep in his heart that the slice of cake that he cut for his other half would remain uneaten. He hated the fact that the only time he did not feel lonely was when he stood in front of a damn tombstone. God, he absolutely hated the grieving process! (Still, at the same time he knew that Viggo was still there somewhere, and that was probably the main force that drove him to keep on living.)
It was several days after his seventy-seventh birthday when Orlando felt the jolt in his heart. It was late in the evening, and he was lying in bed getting ready to sail off into Dreamland when he noticed that his breath was beginning to slow. Orlando found himself paradoxically excited, and he basked in the feeling of letting go of everything. He started wondering if this was what dying really felt like for Viggo-release and freedom. As his last breath approached, Orlando smiled peacefully. He was more than ready to go, with no regrets. He could feel a familiar hand stroke his cheek, and if he strained his ears, he swore that he could hear Viggo’s soothing voice, whispering fondly into his ear.
I love you, Orlando.
A tear of happiness trailed down the crease of Orlando’s temple, and his smile widened. As he exhaled for the final time, he slowly opened his eyes, so certain that it was real, that behind his closed eyelids, he would see the one person who he longed to see more than anything else. And so, he took in the last sight of his whole life-straight into the eyes of the man who said that he loved him.
THE END
Pairing(s): Viggo/Orlando
Genre(s): Romance, drama
Length: 2120 words (+20 000 in total)
Rating: PG-13
Summary: The ever-changing love between two men throughout the years, as they grow together in both age and emotional maturity.
```
Chapter 5
Their marriage was small, unadorned, and private. No frills, no champagne fountains, no party accessories, no seven-layer cake. Just the two grooms, their families, and their closest friends, held in a simple scarcely-decorated church with a mundane two-layer cake. It was meticulously planned, however, since Orlando’s mother refused to have her only son go through his marriage in anything worse than perfection. And anything that Sonia Bloom aimed for, she achieved, so the wedding was exactly how she (and everybody else) wanted it to be-absolutely perfect.
It had been quite a shock when Viggo and Orlando announced their official relationship. In addition to the nineteen-year age difference, they had always been known as father and son or less frequently older brother and little brother, but never in their life have they ever been mistaken as a couple. When Orlando broke the news to his mother, she had continued dismissing the idea until realizing several weeks later that her son was in fact telling the truth (and from there, she had just babbled on in gladness on how great Viggo was as a husband and son-in-law, tacitly granting her blessing). Even Sean and Liv, both of whom had already known of their mutual attraction, were still in awe of how nonsensically romantic the ending turned out: their love for each other was so palpable that one could almost see the magnetic forces drawing them together. Billy and Dom were Billy and Dom, so they took it just fine, in their standards anyway (Billy bet three years, Dom bet two weeks; neither of them ended up winning). The only person who had any sort of problem with the relationship was Samantha, but that was only because she was more concerned about the happiness of her brother than against the fact that he was dating Viggo (“As your overprotective sister, I’m pretty much obligated to tell you that you can do so much better than him,” she teased). The last to be told was Viggo’s son, and the father was at first apprehensive about how Henry would take the news, but when the information was thrown out into the open the preteen had looked up from his video game with the most unimpressed expression on his face that he pretty much told his father off (“You thought I didn’t know? Jesus, Dad, I’m almost twelve years old; I know how love works. And before you ask, yes I’m fine with it. Now do you mind scooting over because you’re in my way of total world domination.”). The child had already thought his father was dating again the moment Orlando stepped foot into the flat, and so the surprise that Viggo had expected evidently backfired.
Their first days as boyfriend-boyfriend were, for the lack of a better word, enjoyably anticlimactic. Life went on as it normally would, and the couple slipped back into their routine as close companions. The two of them wanted to take it slow, and so they started out with chaste kisses and casual dates before graduating to none-too-innocent skin ship and romantic night outs. Orlando moved into his boyfriend’s place soon after and slept in a separate room for a good half-night before sneaking into the one on the right to snuggle up against a certain larger frame because it’s freaking cold, dammit, turn on your heater! From there, their previously platonic relationship evolved into something more.
Not surprisingly, they had decided to marry soon after their official start as an item. After all, both knew that they could not live without the other, and both also knew that not being together would propel even more problems than otherwise. Orlando needed a father-type figure to idolize and openly adore; Viggo needed a significant other to care for with his entire heart. As a result, less than two months after they started dating, a marriage was well on its way.
All in all, nothing too drastic changed. The beautiful and newly engaged Liv and a three-month pregnant Kate were among the chief bridesmaids, both of them looking more than gorgeous in their tailored dresses. Sean was once again Viggo’s best man, and Samantha was Orlando’s honor attendant (for lack of anybody else he trusted enough to stand beside him on the most important day of his life). Kate’s oldest daughter was grudgingly cast as the flower girl (the little lass hated dresses with a heartfelt passion), and since Elijah-who was on the brink of reaching his twenties-was no longer young enough to be the ring bearer, Henry took his place because although he was already twelve he was still short and dumpy and therefore perfect for the role.
Before long, the wedding march was played, and Viggo, once again dressed in the same black spiffy tuxedo he wore for his first wedding, stood at the altar staring at the back of the church where his young husband-to-be stood. Though not nearly as polished as Exene was, Orlando held the same elegance as he walked down the aisle with his mother at his side, looking absolutely stunning in his bleached white tuxedo and matching bowtie. Within half an hour, they had recited their vows and said their I dos, and the tears that Orlando had tried so hard to restrain throughout the day finally spilled when the rabbi officially announced them as husband and husband. “You may kiss,” the rabbi whispered, and Viggo spared not a second before clasping his younger lover against his chest, lips locking in an almost desperate fervor.
Thunderous applause, cheers, and laughter from the audience were heard. Dom and Billy’s whistles reverberated throughout the hall. Jovial tears flowed freely. And when their breathtaking wedding kiss finally broke off, Viggo and Orlando were formally connected in matrimony as well as in heart, mind, and soul.
And so began Orli’s first day of eternity as a happily married man named Orlando Bloom Mortensen. He returned from the honeymoon feeling like a new man, and immediately dropped out of university against Viggo’s wishes to immerse himself in his ever-so-perfect life alongside his husband and step-son. He found a simple job as a bookkeeper at the bookstore several buildings from the flat and spent his idle time on the job honing his mildly dyslexic reading capabilities. Viggo, on the other hand, finally landed a decent-paying occupation as a horse trainer in a ranch some fifteen-minute drive down south and every day without fail he returned home smelling like manure and sheep.
Time passed. They had blissful times as well as serious crises, as do all marriages have. Perhaps the darkest days of their marriage consisted of the six months when Henry entered a comatose state after being fatally injured in a motorcycle accident. The boy, then twenty-one, was merely cruising down the highway as per usual before a truck driver failed to notice the motorcyclist in the rear view mirror, resulting in a crash and a minor explosion. The incident drove Viggo mad-so mad that Orlando would have left his married life behind in sheer desperation if he had not stayed strong by reminding himself of how much he loved his husband and how much his husband needed him at a time like this. Day after day, Orlando had to live with a hardly responsive companion and put on a everything will be okay facade, and it was starting to take its toll of his own sanity. When Henry finally woke up, Orlando was beside himself sobbing with relief, both for the welfare of his beloved step-son as well as for the return of the man he fell in love with.
Year after year, Viggo lovingly watched his husband as he grew from a handsome energetic young boy to a proud confident man whom anybody would have been proud to have known. He watched as Orlando became older and more mature, and though his pretty boy look may have been deteriorating by the time he hit his forties, he found himself falling more and more in love every minute. Surprisingly, it was Orlando who had a more difficult time growing old with the love of his life. On Viggo’s sixty-ninth birthday which they celebrated alone together, he literally burst into tears when he realized that as every minute passed, Death became increasingly more evident in his husband’s previously strong and healthy body. Viggo gradually started forgetting things and he obviously no longer had the agility and muscle mass, and simple actions became progressively difficult to carry out no matter how easy it seemed, and Orlando would weep softly each night as thoughts of his husband’s incoming death plagued his mind. Throughout their forty-five years together, Viggo always managed to make Orlando feel like a little boy again, and the latter could hardly imagine a life without the elder by his side. The prospect of losing him was terrifying.
“Orli, you awake?” Viggo asked one night after hearing a faint sniffle.
Orlando quickly wiped his tears away. “Yes. You alright, dear?”
With a groan of exertion, Viggo shifted to his side to face his husband. “I think I should be asking you that question.”
“I’m fine.”
“Orli,” he said sternly, using the voice that he always used whenever he knew a lie was being told. Orlando almost snickered at how some things never changed even after forty-five years.
“I’m just thinking.”
“About what?”
“You know, just thinking.”
Vig let out a long sigh, intrinsically sensing his husband’s sorrow and unease. “I love you, Orli. You know that. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll be around whether you like it or not. Okay?” He felt around under the covers for a little bit before grasping his soul mate’s hand in his own.
“…Okay. Yah, okay.”
The next morning, Orlando woke up to find his husband porcelain white, ice cold, and unmoving beside him. He burst into tears the moment he saw the soft smile painted on his insipid lips. Viggo was ninety-two.
The funeral was held on an ironically sunny Wednesday with no cloud in sight. Aside from Orlando, Henry had cried the most, and the two of them had stood in front of his grave for over five hours, sobbing so many buckets of water that they nearly died of dehydration. His headstone had a simple inscription, just the way Viggo would have liked it:
IN LOVING MEMORY OF
VIGGO MORTENSEN JR.
OCTOBER 1958 - FEBRUARY 2051
LOVING HUSBAND, FATHER, & GRANDFATHER
Orlando lived the last few years of his life with utmost impatience. He hated mourning his deceased lover and, as morbid as it sounds, could not wait for it to end. He hated waking up and not feeling anything beside him. He hated eating at his dining table and having nothing to look at but a vacant chair. He hated watching television without having a shoulder to lean his head on. He hated taking walks in the park with nobody by his side to hold hands with. He hated celebrating their anniversary and knowing deep in his heart that the slice of cake that he cut for his other half would remain uneaten. He hated the fact that the only time he did not feel lonely was when he stood in front of a damn tombstone. God, he absolutely hated the grieving process! (Still, at the same time he knew that Viggo was still there somewhere, and that was probably the main force that drove him to keep on living.)
It was several days after his seventy-seventh birthday when Orlando felt the jolt in his heart. It was late in the evening, and he was lying in bed getting ready to sail off into Dreamland when he noticed that his breath was beginning to slow. Orlando found himself paradoxically excited, and he basked in the feeling of letting go of everything. He started wondering if this was what dying really felt like for Viggo-release and freedom. As his last breath approached, Orlando smiled peacefully. He was more than ready to go, with no regrets. He could feel a familiar hand stroke his cheek, and if he strained his ears, he swore that he could hear Viggo’s soothing voice, whispering fondly into his ear.
I love you, Orlando.
A tear of happiness trailed down the crease of Orlando’s temple, and his smile widened. As he exhaled for the final time, he slowly opened his eyes, so certain that it was real, that behind his closed eyelids, he would see the one person who he longed to see more than anything else. And so, he took in the last sight of his whole life-straight into the eyes of the man who said that he loved him.
THE END