WARNING: More G-rated M/M angsting. Follows "How Am I Supposed To Live Without You?"
O.K., here we go again. What can I say? My Muse is back and she's on speed....
Guess who's turn now?
Anyway, this one was harder... Benny takes more convincing to spill
like this. I'm not even sure that it really follows the song much at
all, but the words did definitely act as a catalyst, so I'm leaving
them in there.
WARNING: More G-rated M/M angsting. Follows "How Am I
Supposed To Live Without You?", but probably can be read
separately. Has a bit more resolution, but not much. If this works
o.k., I'm sure y'all will beat me into writing more. I have no idea
where this is going, I'm just along for the ride, guys.
DISCLAIMER: Not mine; if they were I'd take better care of them.
(Notwithstanding all evidence to the contrary ;-) No offense intended.
I'm not making a cent off it and, if you count time, pain and
suffering
I could see it in your eyes, you know.
That's why I couldn't, wouldn't look at them.
It would never work. I have a life, don't you understand? A life
outside of this city, this country. Sometimes I wonder if you even
realise what I've left behind.
How would you feel if it happened to you? Something took place
beyond your control and suddenly doing the right thing meant
everything went wrong? What if you lost your mother and chased her
killer up into the Territories. And found him and _still_ managed to
bring him to justice rather then ripping his throat out with your bare
hands... and then found out that you couldn't go home? That Chicago
didn't want you, that the force never wanted to see you again for what
you'd done, and there was nothing that you could do but suck in the
pain and the betrayal and try to wait them out, knowing perfectly well
it might never happen?
What if you might never see your family again?
You think I don't have any family to lose, but it's not true. I have
the snow and the mountains and the scent of a storm on the wind off
the Arctic Ocean. You're right, I didn't have a family for so much of
my life that I've made these my family. It's in them that I find
comfort and peace and love and home.
And if I stayed here with you I might never see them again.
Linda. I keep trying to tell myself that I haven't used her, that
somehow she knew all along.
Oh, God. What have I done?
It just began with talking, you know. I said something in passing
about Tuktoyaktuk, fully expecting the confusion or the disbelief or
the mirth or simply the glaze-eyed look that is always the result. But
she was entranced. She seemed to feed off of the stories of the places
I knew so well, to gain energy from the images of starkly beautiful,
empty wilderness. And it was addicting. To be able to go on and on and
know that she really wanted to hear it all.
I talked for hours, until my voice went hoarse, and I felt such a
sense of relief, of a weight lifting. It was almost as though I was
home again, talking to her. And I went back to my apartment that night
floating on a cloud, floating on memories and dreams. And the next
morning it was still there, as I fed Dief, dressed in my red serge,
and went downstairs, my heart as light as a snowflake....
Until I saw you. An oh-so-familiar green sedan pulled up and
everything came crashing down, my exile, my loss, my pain.
For a moment I hated you.
The shock of realizing that hit me so hard I'm surprised I remained
standing. I got in the car in a daze, trying to make some sense out of
my feelings. I've never been very good at that.
And you noticed right away. I don't know how, but your usual
monologue stopped immediately and you looked at me with such
concern in your eyes and asked if I was all right-- no teasing, no
joking.... And I almost turned tail and ran.
I don't know what I said, but I somehow managed to convince you that
things were fine and you took me at my word and went on with news of
your sisters and mother and nephews and I just let it all wash over
me, the familiar mix of frustration and love in your voice as you
spoke of them that usually somehow makes me feel so warm and safe
inside too. But this morning it just cut like sharp lines underlining
what I was missing, what I had lost.
Come to think of it, you probably weren't convinced, were you? You
were always so good at letting me have the space I needed-- accepting
that I couldn't hold my emotions up for all the world to see the way
you could-- that I always convinced myself that I had you fooled. I
think I was wrong.
The space you gave me was too carefully constructed to be the result
of accident or even blind acceptance of my terms. It may have been
space, but it was never empty-- you filled it with stories of love and
warmth and hope. And sometimes, when you thought I needed it, you
barged right in and refused to hear my automatic pleas for distance.
More often than not I fought you off. If hours and hours of sentry
duty has taught me nothing else, it has taught me to be able to
out-wait, out-stubborn anything. Even you.
But you made me push you away. And because of that, I knew you were
always there.
That was that day that I faced it. I stood there at attention, eyes
focused on the air in front of me and I looked at all the emotions
that scared me so. I pulled them up one by one and sorted them out in
rows like soldiers in a regiment....
I can hear you laughing now. In my mind you're rolling your eyes and
throwing up your hands and saying "Fraser!" the way you do. I know
it's ridiculous, pathetic. But it was the only way I knew how to
approach something so wild and amorphous as the feelings that were
roiling inside me. And I had to find a way to understand.
It was then that I saw what was happening, the torture I was setting
up for myself. On the one side was the pull of home, so long a
background pain that I'd stopped paying proper attention to it.
Something in me had accepted it... not the loss, but the position of
martyr. I never gave up on wanting to go home, but somehow I'd given
up on trying to make it happen.
And on the other hand was you. You are so much a part of this place,
this city, that I can't see you apart from it.
It's not like you've never been outside of it--I still remember the
sight of you, bundled up beyond recognition, arm still in a sling,
complaining bitterly every moment, as you arrived to tell me you'd
discovered my father's killer. I'd never even thought to call, you
know. I'd taken you at face value-- the "Mountie thing" was just
another one of your cases, one that had taken far too much of your
time and strength already. There were plenty of other cases,
American cases, on your desk to handle once you recovered. You had
plenty of better things to do with your time.
But there you were. Barely out of hospital and you'd tracked me down
in the middle of nowhere to tell me, because you knew how much this
meant to me. You did care.
I promised myself never to accept you at face value again.
But you don't belong out there. You belong here. You would not be
complete away from this place anymore than I am complete in it.
And that was when I realised I had to do something quickly-- or I
might never get home.
Dief has a sadness about him ever since we left. Once upon a time I
would have remonstrated with him for going soft, for mooning after a
plush life in the city. But I know that's not the reason. For all his
carrying on he loves the wilds as much as I do. He's just more willing
to adapt to wherever he is because to him doing so is not a somehow a
betrayal, an admission that we're never going home.
He misses you. Not just the doughnuts or sleeping the day in the back
seat of the Riviera, but you... and what you did to me. What you did
for me.
He knew then. He could see what I wouldn't admit. What I wouldn't show
you. I caught that knowledge in his eyes as I stood there packing and
talking on with my newfound voice, my newfound hope about home.
Could you see that the joy in my eyes was for the family I was
returning to, far more than for the woman I was taking with me?
After that I started avoiding his eyes too.
And so I looked away. I buried myself in the feelings, the hopes, the
dreams of home. It was so unlike me. That was the way you always
felt-- emotions and passions blazing across the surface in such rapid
succession that sometimes I could only stare, entranced. I've always
envied that in you, your ability to just feel like there was nothing
else in the world for that moment.
And now I've used it against you. Used the incredible rush that comes
from of feelings suddenly released to hide myself from you, to bury
myself away even deeper
I can't even tell how much you understand yourself. Is it honesty or
hope that thinks it sees... love... in the eyes of an Italian-American
Chicago cop?
Your feelings are always running across your surface like a waterfall,
but how deeply do you ever look at them? Maybe I'm tearing myself up
over something that was never there.
I ran. I admit it. I ran from Chicago, from you, because I could see
what was happening to me. How someday all too soon it would be too
late and I'd never be able to leave at all.
Only I think I got my foot caught in the door.
I used Linda. I used her as a shield between us while I gathered
whatever I could take with me and ran.
But I left what I wanted most to take with me behind... where he
belongs.
I confessed it all to Linda on the plane to Yellowknife. I think she
already knew on some level-- I desperately want to believe that she
did. Not that that excuses anything.
We never made love, you know. We'd kissed, but more like friends or
siblings than lovers. And our abstinence was not the banked fires of
restrained passion, but a simple closeness that didn't seem to need
anything more.
That didn't want anything more.
We were each other's ticket out of Chicago-- both of us running for
different reasons. But she was running to, as much as away, so when we
arrived in Paulatuk she found what she needed. She's an extremely
skilled teacher, you know. She hasn't the brashness to face up to a
schoolroom in the heart of Chicago, but she's found a place here
already. The students love her and I think she's never been happier.
It's an incredible relief, I feel I owe her at least that much for
what I did.
But for me it is not so simple. For every second of pure joy at being
here, at being home, there is a moment of grief, of loss. Much as I
try to deny it, I've only traded one exile for another. I'm deathly
afraid that there is no longer any place on this earth where I can be
truly happy.
I want to hate you for that.
It haunts me now, what you said when I left.
I deliberately planned it to be as rushed and abrupt as I could. My
grandmother always taught me to pull a bandage off fast so the pain
would be over quickly.
So I mumbled apologies about the inconveniences and aggravations I had
constructed myself and was gone as quickly as I could be.
You said something about being best man and my chest clenched in
horror at the thought. Even then, when I'd still managed to convince
myself I was doing the right thing, even then I knew I couldn't
possibly go through this charade with you at my side.
So I mumbled something about timing and distance and custom and
kept my eyes from yours. Then you said you were glad. You wished me
happiness and said you were glad I'd found someone worthy of me. I was
so startled I looked up.
Whatever mercy there is saw to it that you were looking away for that
split second or I might never have managed. But I could see it in your
eyes, the self-reproach, the sense of failure.
I couldn't deal with it then, couldn't process it, but it has haunted
me ever since. Did you somehow think you weren't enough, you weren't
somehow worthy?
Do you have any idea how much it hurts me when you run yourself
down?
It's your father, isn't it? Much as I never felt like I was quite good
enough for mine, at least he never told me so to my face. Yours did,
didn't he? If he were still alive I'm not sure I could keep my hands
off his throat for what he did to you.
I've never understood this pedestal I seem to find myself on. People
act as though I'm some paragon of virtue, some saint. But that's not
who I am. I try, I do my best, to follow the ideals I was raised with,
but that's not who I am inside. A saint wouldn't have to try. A saint
would never have done this to Linda... or to you.
You saw me with Victoria, damn it! You of all people should know just
how far from being a saint I really am.
Oh God, Victoria.
I can still feel the blood rise to my face in shame for what happened.
And I never apologised, did I? Afterwards I was still too caught up in
my fantasy of tragic, eternal love to think. And later it was too
awkward, the moment had passed. I don't know how you managed to ever
forgive me for the pain I caused, the things I did to you, the things
I almost let her do to you, to your family....
And yet you did, I could see it in your eyes. Complete forgiveness.
How could I ever be worthy of that?
But I want to be.
Oh God, Ray, what do I do? I could be just misreading this whole
thing. What do I know of emotions and feelings? If I am wrong, if I am
alone in this then I'll only be creating more problems, tarnishing old
memories with awkwardness and pain.
But if I'm right. What then? Will I be throwing away one half of my
soul for the other?
And what would I be bringing you? More embarrassment from 'the guy in
the hat'? More laughter from your friends?
Or worse? What would happen when they found out? What would they
think? What would they do?
You were right, you know. I am always dragging you into situations
against your better judgment. Since you've known me you've been shot,
hit by cars, beaten, thrown and bloodied by explosions. I nearly
drowned you in a bank vault-- nearly killed you by my own hand, my own
overconfident miscalculation.
For me you've jeopardised your family's home and blown up your
beloved car. You've risked your career and your dignity more times
than I could name.
The very thought of causing you any more grief makes me so sick I can
barely stand.
So what do I do?
I was trained to be stoic, Ray, to endure pain in silence for the sake
of others. My mind tells me that if I loved you even a fraction of the
amount I think I do, I'd stay away and leave you in peace. It also
says that it would be wrong to make such a decision for you. It says I
am only trying to justify my feelings. It says I am only trying to
rationalise my fear.
My heart won't listen at all.
For once I don't know, I only feel.
Once upon a time you ignored pain and inconvenience and traveled
hundreds of miles to find me because you had discovered something that
I needed to know.
I think, perhaps, it's my turn.
<finis>
Dianne
The Beat Of A Different Drum
by Dianne T. DeSha (a.k.a. "la Mercenaire")
Cat.Goddess@pobox.com
*You and I cotton to the beat of a different drum--*
*Or can't you tell by the way I run,
Every time you make eyes at me?* *You moan and sigh and say "It'll work out...",
But honey-child, I've got my doubts--
You can't see the forest for the trees.* *Now don't get me wrong: It's not that I knock it,
It's just that I am not in the market
For a boy who wants to love only me.* *Yes and I ain't sayin' you ain't pretty,
All I'm sayin' is I'm not ready
For any person, place, or thing
To try and pull the reins in on me* *So, goodbye-- I'll be leavin',
I see no sense in this cryin' and grievin'--
We'll both live a lot longer
If you live without me.*
Dianne la Mercenaire... -*- <cat.goddess@pobox.com>
Vanity Web Page-- http://moonlight.dreamhost.com/lamerc/
"I had to. I was depressed. When depressed, we must dance and throw a party." -- Chris