Brian sat opposite Declan on the bench seat of the man’s private car, feeling far less triumphant than he should have.

Everything had gone as planned. He’d won. So why this creeping sense of dread? he wondered. Was it because of what had just happened? Brian glanced self-consciously over to Declan, hoping that he hadn’t noticed his mood. Was it because of what’d happened last night with Justin? Brian decided that it must have been the latter: the Justin thing. A surreptitious wriggle where he sat reminded him that his ass—much like his pride—was still a little sore.

Brian closed his eyes briefly as he remembered yet again, that he’d only very recently made the biggest mistake of his life. He’d told the kid he loved him. And worst of all: he’d meant it.

Brian continued his internal struggle, staring blankly out the car window at the passing scenery as he continued contemplating the things he’d said to Justin, and the things he’d done the morning after. Brian knew he couldn’t take those things back anymore. Gone were the days of redrawing the boundary lines after realizing that he’d let Justin a little too close, revealed a little too much, cared a little too deeply. There would be no more acting nasty until he was alone again, no more redrawing of lines, no more take-backs.

Brian opened his eyes again, still not seeing anything beyond his own faint reflection in the car window. The most frightening part was the realization that he didn’t want to take those things back anymore. The look that’d shone in Justin’s eyes when Brian had admitted how he really felt about him had been too wonderful to ever intentionally crush again. Besides, Justin wasn’t the sort of person who would forget it or let it go. He’d latch on like a limpet now, harder than he ever had before.

But again, Brian didn’t think he would mind. Limpets had their purposes, after all. Oblivious to his audience of one, Brian tried hard to lose himself in thoughts of his deepening relationship with Justin, pushing thoughts of less pleasant matters aside for the time-being.

Declan had been staring at Brian for the past ten minutes, waiting for him to say something. But all Brian seemed capable of doing was sitting silently and watching the view from the window. Declan had expected some sign of enthusiasm, or at least of relief, for the way the morning had gone. Brian was, after all, a self-described “shark” at a top notch advertising agency, and that hadn’t happened by accident. Brian loved the adventure of the hunt, the thrill of the kill. Declan had always known Brian to be a man who loved winning in any circumstance. But all that their trip to the courthouse had seemed to inspire in the other man was an urge to sit placidly and say nothing. Some shark.

Declan sighed, relaxing back into the leather of his seat. “Well it’s a relief, I’ll tell you that.”

“Is it?” Brian shrugged. “I guess so. He’d certainly agree. I think he knew it all along though. Am I really that obvious?”

Declan frowned, confused by Brian’s distracted response. “What are you talking about mate? ‘He’ who?”

Brian’s eyes flicked over, blinking once as if he’d been thinking about other things. “Sorry, what? I’m talking about Justin.”

“Yeeah… and I’m talking about the fucking castle you just won. You haven’t said a word about Justin since we met at the courthouse this morning,” Declan said, still looking confused.

Brian shrugged, intensely embarrassed to realize that Declan was right. He hadn’t spoken of Justin at all that day. He’d just been thinking about him so much that he’d forgotten he hadn’t told his friend yet. “I told him, Deck.”

“Told him what?”

“…That I love him.” Brian knew he hadn’t said it in so many words, but he also knew that Justin had heard him. “I took your advice and I fucking told him.”

Declan looked across the space between their seats with astonishment. “Wow. So that’s what’s been giving you that vacant stare all morning, huh?”

Brian made a sound of protest between his teeth. “I have not been vacant. I was there for the whole thing.” He had been there for the whole thing. He’d met Declan and the cruise line lawyers at the county courthouse, they’d convened in front of the judge and presented their case against the far less-substantial arguments of Maeve and her friends, and then they’d all listened as the judge had told them exactly why no one could stop Brian Kinney from pawning off every last piece of his inheritance. “I’m well-aware of what happened,” Brian muttered.

“Then why don’t you look pleased?” Declan pressed. “You just fed Kilkenny back its own bullshit and got that judge to agree with you. You’re officially the legal owner of the estate. You can do whatever you want with it now.”

Brian chewed his lip, thinking both of the look on Maeve’s face when the judge had read out the verdict, and of the look that he was sure to see on Justin’s face, once he was forced to relay the news of what’d happened. “Justin’s going to be crushed,” he admitted quietly, well-aware that for some unfathomable reason, he too felt a little disappointed. Justin had chosen to stay in town with friends, rather than bear witness to the court proceedings. By now Brian kind of wished he had too.

“But you got what you wanted, yeah?” Declan was asking. “Isn’t this what you wanted all along? To sell to the cruise line and make off like a bandit? You’re rich now, mate,” Declan reminded. “So cheer up. This is all working out for you. Just like you planned.”

“Yeah.” Brian nodded, and he tried to let Declan’s words permeate the frostiness that had invaded his limbs since that morning’s trial. He tried to remember how happy he should be, now that he’d finally gotten what he wanted. He would be rich. Sure, he’d have to sell off the castle and the town of Kilkenny to do it, but he’d get his three and a half million euros. And he’d have a condo in Ibiza and one in Miami, and he’d spend every vacation day for the rest of his life sailing around the world on Royal Caribbean’s dime. “Yeah,” Brian reiterated, reaching to help himself to whatever liquor was kept in the limo’s carafe. “Yeah it’s what I wanted. Of course I’m happy. Why wouldn’t I be?” His words hung there; hovering in the car, as artificial as the circulating air.

Declan pursed his lips in disbelief and reached for a legal brief to read over, and Brian didn’t complain as this provided him the perfect opportunity to remain shuttered and taciturn for the rest of the drive.

---

Justin had avoided the court date and stayed in town.

Despite what he wanted to believe, he’d been pretty sure that Brian would win the suit. So rather than bear witness to the spectacle that it was sure to be, Justin had stayed behind and met with a few villagers who’d contacted him about saving what little pieces of Kilkenny they could, in what little ways they could. Apparently, word that he was an artist had gotten around, and that was the impetus for the meetings that he’d been conducting. An old woman who must have been closer to eighty rather than seventy was the fifth such person that day, and she was seated right across from Justin at one of the café’s little tables that were scattered along the patio.

When the fancy car that’d come by the castle that morning pulled up to the curb in town and deposited Brian outside the café, Justin stood up from the table and the woman—a Mrs. Mahoney. Brian was walking over and the car had pulled away. Justin’s keen eyes picked up every detail of the other man as he walked over, from his expensive suit, to his perfect hair, to his sober expression. It was the expression that had him holding his breath.

For a split second, Justin entertained the notion that Brian had actually lost the case. He certainly didn’t look very happy as he approached. But that brief fantasy was quickly put to rest the moment that Brian’s eyes lifted from the sidewalk and locked on his gaze. Brian’s eyes, normally of the most shallow brown depths, were pooled deep enough that afternoon to actually say something. And in that one shared gaze, they only said: I’m sorry. Justin’s heart sank. He’d won.

Justin tried to rein his feelings in as Brian arrived and introductions needed to be made. “Hey,” he greeted softly, offering Brian the extra chair at their table. Brian only shook it off, apparently preferring to stand. Justin directed one hand to the old lady. “Brian, this is Mrs. Mahoney. She’s one of the people I said I had to meet today. Mrs. Mahoney: this is Brian Kinney, my uh…” he paused, not sure which was worse to say: “my boyfriend,” or “the guy who’s selling your town.”

“His partner,” Brian supplied helpfully, not missing Justin’s shocked look at the title. “I was just coming to pick him up for a late lunch, but it looks like you two have some business to see to so I’ll just—“

“Oh no no, don’t mind me dear.” The old woman had an ancient warble to her voice that made her entirely affable. She stood up from her chair with surprising agility for someone her age and offered a polite nod to both men. “We’ve already set everything in order, right Justin?” Justin nodded, and she gathered her purse and her sweater and went to set off down the sidewalk. “I think you’re very lucky to have such a nice young man, Mr. Kilkenny. He’s the best thing you brought here with you.”

Her comment may have been a compliment, or it may have been a dig at Brian himself, but neither man had much time to contemplate that because Mrs. Mahoney was off down the street before either one of them could say a thing. “What were you meeting with her for?” Brian asked, confused.

Justin had gathered some papers off of the little table and handed them over to Brian to see. “There are people in town who wanted to commission some paintings.”

“Of what?” Brian had taken the papers and quickly ascertained that they were actually photographs. “Of this?” he asked, flipping through them. They weren’t remarkable pictures, just snapshots of ordinary life in Kilkenny. One was of a group of young men outside the local school, another was of a little girl standing next to a humongous tree. Brian flipped to the last one in the pile. It didn’t even have any people in it, its subject matter being only a tarnished gold ring with hands and heart and crown. There was something very simple about the image. Something quaint and very unintentionally beautiful. Something very… Kilkenny. Brian thought of the couple they’d spied in front of the Douglass-Wilde museum that one night weeks ago, and the similar ring those strangers had exchanged. “What was this called again?” Brian asked, pointing.

“Hm?” Justin got a look at the photo. “Oh. A claddagh ring. Colin said it’s like an Irish love token or something, I don’t really remember.” He busied himself with gathering the photos back and stowing them carefully in his bag, and Brian was not oblivious to the fact that Justin was avoiding his gaze. Brian fought not to raise a sarcastic eyebrow, because he didn’t believe for one second that Justin had forgotten what the chintzy Irish rings meant.

If Brian hadn’t forgotten it, then Justin sure as hell couldn’t have.

“And the little girl under the tree?” Brian had thought he’d seen that very tree somewhere around…

“That was Mrs. Mahoney, seventy two years ago,” Justin mumbled.

“Jesus.” Brian shuddered at the thought of being so, so old. “And I thought thirty was bad.”

Justin glanced over at the obvious omission of that extra year. “That spot is very important to her, so she wanted me to paint it before it’s gone.”

“Gone? Why would it be gone?”

“It’s growing right where they’re putting the highway, Brian. A lot of things are going to be razed for that thing. But unfortunately for the people around here, they don’t own the rights to every memory they’ve ever made.”

Brian had nothing to say to that. He simply stood there looking as confused as he had when he’d shown up, and Justin deflated a little when he realized that his continued insults weren’t going to be needed. Brian obviously hadn’t returned to Kilkenny to flaunt his victory in his face. “How did court go?” Justin dared to ask once he’d put everything away. His eyes told Brian that he already knew, but that he felt obliged to ask anyways.

“Well… I guess I’m officially still the great Devil of Kilkenny. Declan’s happy as a clam.”

“And what about you?” Justin reached to draw his fingers down the sleeve of Brian’s suit jacket, barely brushing his hand at the end. He didn’t know if Brian would want him to take it. “Are you? Happy as a clam?”

Brian stared at him for a long time, longer than should have been appropriate. Justin thought that he was able to see everything that Brian would never say in that long stare. Brian wasn’t happy as a clam, and Justin didn’t know how to comfort him if he wouldn’t at least admit it. “What are you thinking?” he finally asked, feeling awkward with this non-verbal communication happening right in public.

Brian inhaled and turned back to look in the window of the little café in front of which they stood. “I’m thinking… I’m hungry. Famished actually. Have you eaten?” He glanced back to see if Justin would take the bait and let the matter be for the moment.

And being that this could very well be one of their last afternoons in Kilkenny together, Justin did take the bait. He accepted Brian’s hand when it was offered, and the two of them walked into the shop and ordered lunch. Luckily, news hadn’t spread fast enough for them to be refused service just yet.

---

Selling Kilkenny wouldn’t be so bad.

That was Brian’s new motto. He’d formulated it between the hours of four and six pm, during which Justin had gone off to start sketching his commissions, and he’d been left alone in the hulking castle to wait for the inevitable deal with the devil. Brian shook his head yet again at that thought, and that terminology. No, he chided himself. Selling Kilkenny won’t be so bad. Change was all it was. Change wasn’t always bad. Change with Justin hadn’t been so bad, and neither would this.

The romantics could try and tell him it was wrong all day long, but Brian reminded himself that things got bought and sold all the time. It was commerce. It kept the world spinning. And that was what he was doing: keeping it spinning, helping the momentum along. And if there was some lingering guilt… well that would fade with time. Most scars did.

Brian sat in the meeting room of the castle, tapping his foot and waiting for the late arrivals of the cruise line’s lawyers. Declan was wining and dining them at some steak joint in Dublin before bringing them over, getting them even happier and drunker so that when they made their final offer and Brian signed on the dotted line, he’d profit to the greatest degree possible.

In the meantime, the sun idled halfway down the horizon as if it would never set, and Brian flipped through the images that Justin had collected from the townspeople. He couldn’t have said why he’d brought them into the meeting room in the first place. If passing the time was the issue, he could have brought a book to read instead. He certainly didn’t want the lawyers to see the photographs.

Brian spread them out in a long line, admiring each one. Funny, he didn’t know any of the people to whom these memories belonged, but he could tell from each image what each person treasured about Kilkenny, what it was they most loved, and what it was they would most miss. It was all the things that Brian had experienced in Kilkenny himself, but had been too dense to appreciate at the time. It was in the faces of friends and family, on the surfaces of places and things. It was celebration, laughter, and perseverance. It was commitment, honor, and love.

Brian ran a finger over the picture of the claddagh ring and thought of the night they’d walked the town and seen the private exchange of that very same token. “It’s a tradition in the gay community that’s carried on for years,” Colin had said. “Guys’ll give a claddagh ring to their sweetie at Douglass house.”

Not anymore, Brian realized. Like all of the other things in the photographs that touched Brian’s heart a fraction of how they touched others’, this tradition, this special memory, would disappear. But not because it’d been forgotten or faded away through time, like some old shirt that’d been washed too much. Because he’d made it disappear.

Brian sighed in frustration, gathering up all the pictures back into one stack so that he wouldn’t have to stare at them anymore. He wondered privately when he had become such a masochist, and again tried to repeat the new motto back to himself. “Selling Kilkenny won’t be so bad,” he whispered. The words hung on the air of the dusty old room, and for the first time, Brian felt rotten.

---

When the lawyers finally came, it was apparent that Declan had outdone himself. The usual-stern woman who headed the group seemed to be in cheerful spirits, and the crotchety man from the international development team was downright giddy. Brian got close to his attorney to whisper, “How many bottles of wine did you buy them?”

“Only enough to have them in… generous spirits,” Declan grinned. “You look like you’ve had a few?”

Brian nodded his head back at the room’s bar cart. “Hundred year old scotch.”

“Jaysus.”

“My nerves needed it.” In truth, he’d only had one drink, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t wanted more, or that he wouldn’t have a lot more once this meeting was adjourned. Alcohol was one of his favorite ways to self-medicate, after all. Brian walked over to join the others at what served as their conference table, listening as they spoke jovially about the first stages of construction hat would take place.

“We’ll demolish the back ends of the structure first, of course. The front façade will be kept so that it still looks enough like a castle. The proposed timelines put completion of the hotel at just around the same point as the dock structures, so that fits in perfectly. They can pour off the ship and come right on over.”

“The highway will take longer, but it’s been given a three year timeline of course.”

“We can work with that.”

Brian tried very hard to school his expression away from the scowl it wanted to display. Listening to the lawyers drivel on made his stomach churn. Privately, he wondered when that had started.

“Mr. Kilkenny?”

Brian grit his teeth at hearing the incorrect surname used for the billionth time. “What?” he mumbled. The leader—the woman—was looking at him jovially.

“Were you ready to start signing or are there any final points you’d like to revise?”

Brian raised his eyebrows, only to be side-stepped by Declan who, having grabbed himself a drink, came forward and assured, “No I think we’re ready to sign off on those terms we set weeks ago, with the added value of the property factored in of course.” He glanced at Brian and winked, and Brian surmised that whatever the “added value” was to which Declan was referring, that it had been achieved through that night’s wining and dining. Whatever, Brian thought. So Declan had managed to get him an extra hundred thousand euros or something. Brian hadn’t hired the best lawyer around for shits and giggles.

But it was when they began sliding over all of the packets of documents to him, lining them up across the table in the same place where Brian had laid out all of those photos—those memories of Kilkenny—that he snapped. He opened his mouth unbidden, and for the first time since hiring a cutthroat attorney to do absolutely all of the dirty work for him, Brian said something that he wasn’t supposed to. “Wait,” he said. Six pairs of eyes slid over to meet him. “I have some stipulations too.”

“Brian?” Declan asked. “What are doing?” He looked nervous, and Brian didn’t blame him. Lawyer rule number one: never ask a question you don’t already know the answer to.

“I want a few things added to the contract,” Brian insisted, and the lawyers across the table from him looked eager to be compliant.

“Anything your Lordship. Of course it has always been our goal to strike an agreeable arrangement for everyone.” They smiled pleasantly at him.

“I want the salaries of the current employees of the estate retained in perpetuity,” Brian asserted, feeling ambitious; like some child with a stick and hornet’s nest. “That means the gardener, the handyman, and Carrick.”

“Who’s Carrick?” The lead lawyer asked dismissively, shaking her head even as she asked. “Mr. Kilkenny I understand that concern, but really there will be no need for their services anymore and the cruise line can’t accommodate every single person’s request for compensation. This is a legal sale and there will be casualties.”

Brian gaped. Casualties? “First off, Carrick is the fucking stable manager at the castle. If you cared about this property at all you’d have known that. Second: I’m not asking you to compensate everyone. Just the handful of people who work directly for the estate! You can afford that.”

The woman’s mouth thinned, her alcohol-infused mirth dying away a little more. “Yes well when this is all said and done you’ll be able to afford it too, so if you’d like to donate to a noble cause, have at it. Royal Caribbean is a not a charity organization.”

Brian felt his disgust with these people—disgust that he’d tamped down for far too long— growing.  “You could give a fucking inch.”

“We have Mr. Kilkenny. Four point two million of them. To you.”

“And to hell with all the rest?” Brian astounded, standing in his rage. “What about the bay? Would you be willing to amend the water rights agreement so that local fishing businesses can continue to use their existing port?”

Her lip curled. “That would not be a good idea Mr. Kilkenny. Those docks are an eyesore. We’re purchasing the water rights from you for this very reason; so that we don’t have to share. People don’t want to see a working shore and dock. It’s not very picturesque and it certainly doesn’t smell very nice.”

Her tone was adamant, but a mood had struck Brian and he wasn’t going to cave so easily. It was still his property, goddammit. He’d won it, not them. Crossing his arms stubbornly, Brian repeated, “I want these provisions written in.”

The woman looked ready to say something nasty, and one of the other lawyers cut her off. “Your Lordship,” he simpered, “you are a smart man. We’ve been discussing this all along. Come now, nothing has changed. Kilkenny is a lovely Irish town that so many people would love to visit and enjoy. That’s what we’re trying to do here, isn’t it? To allow people to enjoy this place? So you must understand the need to make sure that we do this the right way.”

“The right way?” Brian sneered. “What is that?”

“Well the construction and the infrastructure we’ll put in are a large part of it. And we have consultants coming in to discuss more cosmetic issues such as the old docks and some of the less… picturesque elements of the town.”

“Excuse me?” Brian glowered.

“We need to make sure that Kilkenny is the right, attractive sort of town that people want to see, you know? When we’re through with it, it will be the quaint Irish experience that tourists expect.”

“It is a quaint village.”

“Not the right kind.”

Brian cast about, struggling to find the words that were so foreign to him. “It has... inherent value. Or can’t you realize that?”

“Please,” the woman scoffed. “‘Inherent value’ is just a made-up term, coined by someone who was very poor. Now will you please calm down Mr. Kilkenny, and sign the papers? Then perhaps we can look in to booking the first of your many complimentary cruises with the Royal Caribbean cruise line.” Her simper was concrete, and it was the final nail in her coffin.

“My name… is Kinney,” Brian said lowly. He stood slowly back from the table, from the packets and packets of documents with highlighted lines waiting for signatures. They wanted his name on all of those marked lines so badly, yet not one of them had been able to call him by that very name. How hard was it to remember that? “My name is Brian. fucking. Kinney!”

Brian took a step back from the table, and another, and then one more. Every additional step made the prospect of leaving the room that much less outrageous an idea. Brian glanced over to Declan who, poor guy, looked like he both enjoyed the show yet didn’t know what to do about his friend’s behavior. “Declan, I’m sorry. I won’t do this until these assholes make those changes.”

Declan frowned, but nodded anyway. He was getting paid his commission either way. Brian continued to back away, and the lawyers stared at him like he was nuts. “Mr. Kinney,” the woman stressed his real name with daggers in her eyes. “Are we doing this or not? …Are we doing this or not?!”

Brian didn’t say no, and he didn’t say yes. He simply didn’t have an answer. Brian continued backing away, until he’d left them and that room and the decision that he had to make.

He’d finally spoken up and asked the hard questions that no one had yet volunteered. And those greedy bastards weren’t willing to compromise for the humblest of causes. It was unconscionable to think that they wouldn’t even set aside a little extra money to help out an old, uneducated man like Carrick. Brian Kinney had never been a champion for the less fortunate, but he had never intentionally screwed someone over just for the sake of it either. The cruise line had finally showed their true colors, and Brian was immensely disappointed because what he’d really been hoping for was some shred, any shred of a reason to feel better about selling. But those bastards couldn’t even give him that. Damn them.

Needless to say, Brian had trouble sleeping that night. He’d never felt so conflicted in his entire life.