FanFic: RENT
Title: Unraveled
Fandom: RENT
Characters: Mark, Roger, and April
Prompt: #3, Ends
Word Count: 769
Rating: I guess R (swearing and suicide)
Author's Notes: Pre-RENT. The day April kills herself. Told from Mark's POV. This story is not for the faint of heart, it's depressing. It made one of my "editors" (best friends) cry.
This is actually an excerpt from a much longer fic that I've been working on. Once I finish editing the whole thing I'll post it.
Unraveled
“April? You in there?” There was no answer. He tried the doorknob. Locked. “Fuck!” he hissed. “April, babe, come out.”
I could tell he was getting anxious. He banged his fist on the door a few times.
“April!” I gently set my bag down on the couch.
“Goddammit April!”
“Roger…” I said warningly, taking a few steps toward him. He held up a hand and I stopped.
“I can handle this Mark!”
I decided it would be better for me to just back off and let Roger and April deal with this. So I plopped down on the couch next to my bag, playing with the strap nervously. Something was not right about this; I knew it in my gut.
Roger took a deep breath.
“April…just stop fussing and come out. You know I think you look gorgeous.”
We both knew she wasn’t fussing, she didn’t do that. She wasn’t Maureen. I think saying it just made Roger feel better.
“April, open the damn door!” He slammed his palm against the door. Now Roger was desperate. He backed up a few feet.
“Alright, that’s it!”
“Roger, what the hell are you doing?”
“I’m getting this door open,” he said through clenched teeth as he rammed his shoulder against the door. I flinched against the noise.
“One way or another,” he finished, more for himself than me. He crashed into the door again. I heard the door frame splinter and winced, hiding my face with my arms. Roger stumbled into the bathroom.
“Jesus Christ, April what-” He abruptly stopped his reprimanding. I craned my neck to try and see what was wrong. For a few precious seconds there was total silence in the apartment, a very rare thing. My stomach was twisting itself in knots. I needed to know what was going on.
With the same force he had used to get in, Roger burst out of the bathroom. I jumped up, startled. Roger collapsed against the wall just outside the door. From a distance he looked like he was going to be sick. He was all doubled over, hanging onto the wall for dear life. As I got closer I could see the silent tears running down his face.
“Roger, what happened?!” I asked firmly, gripping his shoulder. He just shook his head furiously. He couldn’t get the words out. I stepped past him, toward the bathroom, afraid of what I would see. Roger slid down the wall, landing with a soft thud on the floor. Once I was standing in the doorway I could see her. My breath caught in my throat, it reminded me of when I was the nerdy, blonde, Jewish kid with asthma. But I hadn’t had an attack in years. My knees felt weak, I grasped the doorframe and leaned into it, trying to keep my balance.
The first thing I noticed was her eyes, staring blankly at the door. I could understand why Roger had started to scold her, she looked perfectly normal, except for the deep slice in each wrist. Her auburn hair was still damp from her shower; a few tears still clung to her face. One of them barely tickled the corner of her upper lip. Her freckles seemed to stick out more than they normally did; I couldn’t tell if it was from lack of makeup or lack of blood. The hint of a smile tugged at her lips. An all-knowing, pleased kind of smile. Blood was smeared against the porcelain sides of the bathtub. Just like April, trying to keep the damn bathroom clean. She hadn’t exactly succeeded. One of her arms dangled over the edge of the tub, a pool of blood had collected under it. The walls closest to her were spattered. The whole scene seemed so unreal, like some twisted screenplay. I hated looking at it, but I couldn’t manage to tear my eyes away.
I breathed out one word which seemed to sum it all up, “Fuck,”
That was probably only the third time I’d ever said that word in my life. Under any other circumstances, Roger would have congratulated me. After that day, the word became a habit. I use it all the time now.
I kept telling myself not to cry. There were a million thoughts running through my head, but that seemed to be the most prominent. Don’t show weakness. Don’t cry. Even as I told myself that, the tears started coming. My lips tightened, I tried to blink back the tears, but I was unsuccessful. I simply stood in the doorway, tears streaming slowly down my face, unable to move.