. . .nothing could eclipse the stain of his dirty, mortal mediocrity.

The very dull truth is that writing love scenes is the same as writing other scenes - your job is to be fully engaged in the character's experience. What does this mean to them? How are they changed by it, or not? I remember being a little nervous, as I am when writing any high-stakes, intense scene (death, sex, grief, joy).

I will never leave him. It will be this, always, for as long as he will let me. If I had had words to speak such a thing, I would have. But there were none that seemed big enough for it, to hold that swelling truth. As if he had heard me, he reached for my hand. I did not need to look; his fingers were etched into my memory, slender and petal-veined, strong and quick and never wrong. “Patroclus,” he said. He was always better with words than I.

He is more worth to you, perhaps. But the stranger is someone else's friend and brother. So which life is more important?

. . .nothing could eclipse the stain of his dirty, mortal mediocrity.

It was almost like fear, in the way it filled me, rising in my chest. It was almost like tears, in how swiftly it came. But it was neither of those, buoyant where they were heavy, bright were they dull.

People are people, whatever age they're living in. The circumstances may have changed - we go to war with planes instead of chariots - but experiences of grief, longing, rage and love remain the same.