Stratford Story Part 2
Well, three people liked the first parts so here is more!
~~~
Titled: Stratford
Rating: PG
Author's Notes: DT/CT RPF Real Person Fic. Many thanks to Sykira for her MAAN meta and for a sneak peek at her MAAN stories. All the research and character stuff comes from her posts/writing. For catch up purposes first part is here http://akhilanda.livejournal.com/5791.html, the second is here: http://akhilanda.livejournal.com/6059.html
Summary: Fictional story set during rehearsals for MAAN
Disclaimer: No infringement intended, this is pure fiction, based on nothing but imagination. We have the highest respect for these real life people, forgive us for playing with these fictionalized versions of two of the greatest actors ever to grace our screen and stage.
**WARNING: REAL PERSON FIC**
Fiction story based on a fictional notion of real people, please don’t read if such things offend you, written for fun not for profit.
Chapter Two
He drove her home later that evening and when she turned to get out of the car his hand was on her arm before he knew what he was doing.
She looked up at him questioningly as she sat back in her seat.
“Just wanted-” He ran his other hand through his hair. He didn’t know what he wanted. Or rather, he did. His feelings for her had been strong from the day they had met and now were growing beyond his ability to hide them and that was very much a problem.
“…make sure you’re okay?” he finished with a shrug.
Catherine looked at him for a moment, worrying at her bottom lip. “Do you want to come in?”
Her voice was so faint he couldn’t be sure he heard her right. He scrunched up his face as the swell of emotion threatened to overwhelm him.
“I’d quite like that,” he responded quietly, searching her face to see if she really meant it. He had followed her into her house so many times now he practically knew it better than his own, but tonight felt different. The tension crackled between them.
He sat on her couch, waiting while she flitted about, closing the curtains, offering him drinks and food. Eventually he darted out an arm and snagged her wrist. She froze. Their gazes locked.
“Sit with me?” he asked her and when she didn’t resist he slowly drew her down on the sofa into the circle of his arms. She needed this, he realized, as much as Beatrice needed Benedick to finally grab her and kiss her, she needed him to take the lead in establishing any new level of intimacy between them because for all her light-hearted teasing and banter with him, she could no more easily accept his affection than Beatrice could Benedick. Her heart was too fragile to be given freely. She needed him to take her.
He waited until her body relaxed in his embrace and she nestled into him.
“Catherine…”
“Suppose we got to fix this, eh?” she interrupted him with a half-smile that put him immediately at ease. She was his friend; they could get past this.
He smiled back. “Why do you think we got so flustered today?”
She pressed her lips together as her gaze unfocused, she was remembering. He waited.
She turned from the crook of his arms to look up at him, her hands moving in her lap. He loved that about her, how her hands moved when she spoke earnestly.
"It's like, how does Beatrice respond? Is she still holding back? Is she falling on him as much as he is on her? Is she fending him off? Just standing there passively feels so wrong."
He blinked and tried very hard not to read too much of Catherine into her thoughts about Beatrice. She was looking up at him and he could tell how important it was for her that he understood.
He cleared his throat, wording his question carefully. “Does she…does Beatrice…” love him? “…want him?”
“Very much.” Her answer was forthright.
“Want him to kiss her?”
She thought about that. “Beatrice wants, needs, to know for sure that his love is real, that she can trust in it, before she can give up everything for him and accept his proposal.”
He breathed for a moment, loving how close her analysis was to his own, so much going on behind Beatrice’s defensive posturing.
“So yes,” she continued, tilting her head to look at him slightly shyly through her hair. “I think when he kisses her, she’s maybe a bit surprised at first but then she has that rush of knowing, feeling, how much this man longs for her, it makes it real, it melts her….she should come out of that kiss all doe-eyed and openly lovesick, she no longer cares who is looking on, she…surrenders to him then.”
Catherine’s hands had grabbed his, wonder in her voice, David could tell she was working this out as she spoke and he was honoured to be there in that moment with her. He found himself nodding emphatically.
“As will Benedick-he’ll emerge from kissing her completely overwhelmingly silly in love and no longer trying to hide it at all. He’ll be so joyful, giddy.”
“But yet in charge,” she supplied. He grasped her hands in return and raised a questioning eyebrow, wanting her to elaborate.
“In accepting him, Beatrice gives him the status of a husband, his own estate to head up - the thing Don Pedro mocks him for its lack in their very first scene - gives him a promise of family and future, head of his own household. He’s been coming into his own as a leader of men throughout the play as he starts to believe in her love for him. Taking charge, stepping out from under the prince’s leadership-”
David was nodding enthusiastically now. “And this is the fruition of that…he goes from here to overrule her uncle when he says they will dance before the wedding vows ‘first of my word’ and even the prince - Benedick overrules him too when he wants to go take vengeance against Don John. Benedick tells him to hold off a day. You’re right. The whole play traces how Benedick steps up into his role of being the man Beatrice wants him to be.”
“Oh that I had any friend would be a man…” she whispered in understanding. Her eyes drifted to his lips momentarily.
“So then the kiss…” he prompted quietly.
“I think…” She took a deep breath. “I think it has to be sudden, like you did before, in rehearsal, he has to come at her quickly and take her in his arms before she has a chance to escape.
“She doesn’t want to escape, ” David interjected, feeling slightly defensive. “It’s important to him that she wants him too.”
“No, I didn’t mean escape, I just mean, for so long she’s protested against marriage, resisted countless suitors, held fast to her fragile independence as an orphan living on the kindness of her aunt and uncle - and they are looking on - I don’t think he can give her a chance to refuse him, her pride would trip her up.”
“He’s cottoned on to her, by now, though.” David lifted a hand to stroke Catherine’s hair, his eyes holding hers, their faces close as she turned in his lap. “He knows he needs to-sort of-overrule her too, or her objections anyway. He will stop her mouth with his lips.”
She was quiet now, her eyes round, going still in his arms.
"Cate?” he breathed. “Was I too fast? Did it scare her? Too forceful? Too like her uncle and Claudio?"
Catherine shook her head. "No, if anything, that pause you put in, like he's giving her a chance to escape or demure, I like it. It’s very Benedick. I just don't know what she does then?" She trembled briefly as David’s hand cupped her face and he brushed the pad of his thumb across her bottom lip. He knew he shouldn’t touch her like this, it was so close to revealing how he felt about her, but she was so beautiful he couldn’t resist her.
He struggled to bring his mind back to Beatrice and Benedick. "Do you want to try it without the pause?"
Her eyes widened. "Umm, maybe."
He drew her close for a moment, desperate to hug her and take the trepidation from her eyes. She clasped him close then let him go and when she met his eyes she looked more like herself, although still with the shadow of vulnerability she let only him see.
“We don’t have to,” he began.
“No, I want to fix this,” she said resolutely, her devotion to Beatrice shining through.
~~~
He stood up, bringing her with him, then moved to the side a few paces.
Catherine felt fluttering in her stomach that she was determined to ignore.
“Come, I will have thee,” he was quietly intense as he stared at her, “…but, by this light, I take thee for pity.” He cocked his head in challenge.
Catherine could never turn down his challenges, his acting prowess always made her step up her game. She lifted her chin defiantly, the persona of Beatrice slipping around her like a shield.
“I would not deny you;” she began, disdain dripping from her voice as she regarded him coolly, “but, by this good day, I yield upon great persuasion; and partly to save your life, for I was told you were in a consumption.”
She ended primly, Beatrice’s scorn a comfortable second skin.
He drew himself up and spoke with command. “Peace, I will stop thy mouth.”
Then he was on her before she knew what was happening. His lips crushing hers, his hands around her back, one hand moving up to wrap his long fingers in her hair. She blinked rapidly, trying not to move away, completely knocked off-kilter with no idea how to respond. She screwed her eyes shut and lifted her arms, knowing she should embrace him in return but having to fight off Beatrice’s instincts to resist this invasion.
She was trying to summon all her acting abilities to make herself return the kiss when David broke off and her eyes flew open. He looked at her, shock in his eyes, and fearful regret as he slowly released her from his grasp.
“It’s not right,” he said abruptly.
"No, no definitely not." Her fingertips fluttered to her lips. She reached for him as he backed away from her looking guilt-ridden.
“I’m sorry, Catherine." He took a step toward her then, watching her carefully.
“Nothing to be sorry for,” she said briskly, wanting more than anything to take the guilt from his eyes. Her heart was still hammering in her chest.
After another moment of just looking at her, David came forward and Catherine closed the distance between them, moving into the gentle circle of his arms. Now she could breathe again. She allowed herself to rest her head on his chest and he held her to him.
"You okay?" he whispered and at the tenderness in the question Catherine hugged him. "I'm fine," she mumbled against his shirt. This close she could smell the clean scent of his aftershave and she turned her face into his chest, inhaling him, hoping it wasn't obvious what she was doing but unable to resist. She loved how he was always so incredibly gentle and careful with her, even when she protested there was no need, it was just who he was, her perfect gentleman.
She swallowed against the sudden lump in her throat. "Benedick...He's the only man to have been gentle and respectful with her, he can't suddenly not be that, then he really is just trying to stop her mouth, you know?"
His hand moved to her hair, stroking it so softly she felt hypnotized even as his touch sent sparks across her skin. He cupped the back of her head, holding her even closer. The firmer his embrace the more she felt herself relax against him. She never wanted him to let her go.
She sighed against him. They had been touching each other and spending time just the two of them more and more lately. She knew they were friends, a friendship they both held dear, but she couldn’t stop herself from wanting more…and daring to hope that he did too.
“What are you thinking about?” he murmured, his lips against her hair.
Oh. "I just... I don't know.” Catherine retreated back to their characters to answer him. “Beatrice is all over the place emotionally, she loves you, but she can't wrap her head around it - around loving any man, much less yielding to him with all of the Elizabethan marriage stuff. She's brittle and then she's vulnerable and he turns her into a pile of mush and then she frights and she's denying him. I can't quite grab the whole thing."
David nodded solemnly, listening patiently. "Benedick is not dissimilar."
She loved how he knew when to just let her ramble on as she had been tonight. "But once he settles on Beatrice, he's focused on that."
David nodded again. "And everything about him hinges on his belief that she would have him. He's clear after that, he knows."
David paused to run his fingers through her hair. She closed her eyes for a moment, just enjoying his gentle touches as they were silent together.
Finally he spoke, his voice tentative. "Remember in drama school all those silly little exercises? To get familiar with your character?"
She looked up at him sheepishly. "I sorta loved those."
"Me too!" He beamed at her.
She drew back reluctantly, suddenly aware of how long she had stood there lost in his embrace.
He took a step in her direction even as she moved away. His eyes on her were intense. "I'm thinking of the one where you play out how your character is in other parts of their life, or even just before or after the events of the play."
She swallowed as he caught her hand, something about the smoky darkness in his eyes filled her with a thrilling trepidation.
"What are you thinking?" she asked weakly. Her legs felt as if they would give way at any second.
"Well, it's kind of like two different exercises, like if it scares you to jump off the stage you should rehearse with an even bigger jump so on the night it will be easy?"
She nodded and licked dry lips. “And the second exercise?”
“Just a simple trust exercise really. When you practice letting go and letting someone else be in charge of you, of your body.” His eyes were so dark and her stomach dipped at his words in a way that was anything but unpleasant.
“Someone you trust,” she added faintly, feeling flushed. He nodded.
“I can see how that suits Beatrice’s situation,” she began. Her head was swimming. His hand tightened on hers and she looked up again.
"Catherine, how would it be if we played out Beatrice and Benedick's wedding night?"
~~~
Part 3: http://akhilanda.livejournal.com/6384.html
~~~
Titled: Stratford
Rating: PG
Author's Notes: DT/CT RPF Real Person Fic. Many thanks to Sykira for her MAAN meta and for a sneak peek at her MAAN stories. All the research and character stuff comes from her posts/writing. For catch up purposes first part is here http://akhilanda.livejournal.com/5791.html, the second is here: http://akhilanda.livejournal.com/6059.html
Summary: Fictional story set during rehearsals for MAAN
Disclaimer: No infringement intended, this is pure fiction, based on nothing but imagination. We have the highest respect for these real life people, forgive us for playing with these fictionalized versions of two of the greatest actors ever to grace our screen and stage.
**WARNING: REAL PERSON FIC**
Fiction story based on a fictional notion of real people, please don’t read if such things offend you, written for fun not for profit.
Chapter Two
He drove her home later that evening and when she turned to get out of the car his hand was on her arm before he knew what he was doing.
She looked up at him questioningly as she sat back in her seat.
“Just wanted-” He ran his other hand through his hair. He didn’t know what he wanted. Or rather, he did. His feelings for her had been strong from the day they had met and now were growing beyond his ability to hide them and that was very much a problem.
“…make sure you’re okay?” he finished with a shrug.
Catherine looked at him for a moment, worrying at her bottom lip. “Do you want to come in?”
Her voice was so faint he couldn’t be sure he heard her right. He scrunched up his face as the swell of emotion threatened to overwhelm him.
“I’d quite like that,” he responded quietly, searching her face to see if she really meant it. He had followed her into her house so many times now he practically knew it better than his own, but tonight felt different. The tension crackled between them.
He sat on her couch, waiting while she flitted about, closing the curtains, offering him drinks and food. Eventually he darted out an arm and snagged her wrist. She froze. Their gazes locked.
“Sit with me?” he asked her and when she didn’t resist he slowly drew her down on the sofa into the circle of his arms. She needed this, he realized, as much as Beatrice needed Benedick to finally grab her and kiss her, she needed him to take the lead in establishing any new level of intimacy between them because for all her light-hearted teasing and banter with him, she could no more easily accept his affection than Beatrice could Benedick. Her heart was too fragile to be given freely. She needed him to take her.
He waited until her body relaxed in his embrace and she nestled into him.
“Catherine…”
“Suppose we got to fix this, eh?” she interrupted him with a half-smile that put him immediately at ease. She was his friend; they could get past this.
He smiled back. “Why do you think we got so flustered today?”
She pressed her lips together as her gaze unfocused, she was remembering. He waited.
She turned from the crook of his arms to look up at him, her hands moving in her lap. He loved that about her, how her hands moved when she spoke earnestly.
"It's like, how does Beatrice respond? Is she still holding back? Is she falling on him as much as he is on her? Is she fending him off? Just standing there passively feels so wrong."
He blinked and tried very hard not to read too much of Catherine into her thoughts about Beatrice. She was looking up at him and he could tell how important it was for her that he understood.
He cleared his throat, wording his question carefully. “Does she…does Beatrice…” love him? “…want him?”
“Very much.” Her answer was forthright.
“Want him to kiss her?”
She thought about that. “Beatrice wants, needs, to know for sure that his love is real, that she can trust in it, before she can give up everything for him and accept his proposal.”
He breathed for a moment, loving how close her analysis was to his own, so much going on behind Beatrice’s defensive posturing.
“So yes,” she continued, tilting her head to look at him slightly shyly through her hair. “I think when he kisses her, she’s maybe a bit surprised at first but then she has that rush of knowing, feeling, how much this man longs for her, it makes it real, it melts her….she should come out of that kiss all doe-eyed and openly lovesick, she no longer cares who is looking on, she…surrenders to him then.”
Catherine’s hands had grabbed his, wonder in her voice, David could tell she was working this out as she spoke and he was honoured to be there in that moment with her. He found himself nodding emphatically.
“As will Benedick-he’ll emerge from kissing her completely overwhelmingly silly in love and no longer trying to hide it at all. He’ll be so joyful, giddy.”
“But yet in charge,” she supplied. He grasped her hands in return and raised a questioning eyebrow, wanting her to elaborate.
“In accepting him, Beatrice gives him the status of a husband, his own estate to head up - the thing Don Pedro mocks him for its lack in their very first scene - gives him a promise of family and future, head of his own household. He’s been coming into his own as a leader of men throughout the play as he starts to believe in her love for him. Taking charge, stepping out from under the prince’s leadership-”
David was nodding enthusiastically now. “And this is the fruition of that…he goes from here to overrule her uncle when he says they will dance before the wedding vows ‘first of my word’ and even the prince - Benedick overrules him too when he wants to go take vengeance against Don John. Benedick tells him to hold off a day. You’re right. The whole play traces how Benedick steps up into his role of being the man Beatrice wants him to be.”
“Oh that I had any friend would be a man…” she whispered in understanding. Her eyes drifted to his lips momentarily.
“So then the kiss…” he prompted quietly.
“I think…” She took a deep breath. “I think it has to be sudden, like you did before, in rehearsal, he has to come at her quickly and take her in his arms before she has a chance to escape.
“She doesn’t want to escape, ” David interjected, feeling slightly defensive. “It’s important to him that she wants him too.”
“No, I didn’t mean escape, I just mean, for so long she’s protested against marriage, resisted countless suitors, held fast to her fragile independence as an orphan living on the kindness of her aunt and uncle - and they are looking on - I don’t think he can give her a chance to refuse him, her pride would trip her up.”
“He’s cottoned on to her, by now, though.” David lifted a hand to stroke Catherine’s hair, his eyes holding hers, their faces close as she turned in his lap. “He knows he needs to-sort of-overrule her too, or her objections anyway. He will stop her mouth with his lips.”
She was quiet now, her eyes round, going still in his arms.
"Cate?” he breathed. “Was I too fast? Did it scare her? Too forceful? Too like her uncle and Claudio?"
Catherine shook her head. "No, if anything, that pause you put in, like he's giving her a chance to escape or demure, I like it. It’s very Benedick. I just don't know what she does then?" She trembled briefly as David’s hand cupped her face and he brushed the pad of his thumb across her bottom lip. He knew he shouldn’t touch her like this, it was so close to revealing how he felt about her, but she was so beautiful he couldn’t resist her.
He struggled to bring his mind back to Beatrice and Benedick. "Do you want to try it without the pause?"
Her eyes widened. "Umm, maybe."
He drew her close for a moment, desperate to hug her and take the trepidation from her eyes. She clasped him close then let him go and when she met his eyes she looked more like herself, although still with the shadow of vulnerability she let only him see.
“We don’t have to,” he began.
“No, I want to fix this,” she said resolutely, her devotion to Beatrice shining through.
~~~
He stood up, bringing her with him, then moved to the side a few paces.
Catherine felt fluttering in her stomach that she was determined to ignore.
“Come, I will have thee,” he was quietly intense as he stared at her, “…but, by this light, I take thee for pity.” He cocked his head in challenge.
Catherine could never turn down his challenges, his acting prowess always made her step up her game. She lifted her chin defiantly, the persona of Beatrice slipping around her like a shield.
“I would not deny you;” she began, disdain dripping from her voice as she regarded him coolly, “but, by this good day, I yield upon great persuasion; and partly to save your life, for I was told you were in a consumption.”
She ended primly, Beatrice’s scorn a comfortable second skin.
He drew himself up and spoke with command. “Peace, I will stop thy mouth.”
Then he was on her before she knew what was happening. His lips crushing hers, his hands around her back, one hand moving up to wrap his long fingers in her hair. She blinked rapidly, trying not to move away, completely knocked off-kilter with no idea how to respond. She screwed her eyes shut and lifted her arms, knowing she should embrace him in return but having to fight off Beatrice’s instincts to resist this invasion.
She was trying to summon all her acting abilities to make herself return the kiss when David broke off and her eyes flew open. He looked at her, shock in his eyes, and fearful regret as he slowly released her from his grasp.
“It’s not right,” he said abruptly.
"No, no definitely not." Her fingertips fluttered to her lips. She reached for him as he backed away from her looking guilt-ridden.
“I’m sorry, Catherine." He took a step toward her then, watching her carefully.
“Nothing to be sorry for,” she said briskly, wanting more than anything to take the guilt from his eyes. Her heart was still hammering in her chest.
After another moment of just looking at her, David came forward and Catherine closed the distance between them, moving into the gentle circle of his arms. Now she could breathe again. She allowed herself to rest her head on his chest and he held her to him.
"You okay?" he whispered and at the tenderness in the question Catherine hugged him. "I'm fine," she mumbled against his shirt. This close she could smell the clean scent of his aftershave and she turned her face into his chest, inhaling him, hoping it wasn't obvious what she was doing but unable to resist. She loved how he was always so incredibly gentle and careful with her, even when she protested there was no need, it was just who he was, her perfect gentleman.
She swallowed against the sudden lump in her throat. "Benedick...He's the only man to have been gentle and respectful with her, he can't suddenly not be that, then he really is just trying to stop her mouth, you know?"
His hand moved to her hair, stroking it so softly she felt hypnotized even as his touch sent sparks across her skin. He cupped the back of her head, holding her even closer. The firmer his embrace the more she felt herself relax against him. She never wanted him to let her go.
She sighed against him. They had been touching each other and spending time just the two of them more and more lately. She knew they were friends, a friendship they both held dear, but she couldn’t stop herself from wanting more…and daring to hope that he did too.
“What are you thinking about?” he murmured, his lips against her hair.
Oh. "I just... I don't know.” Catherine retreated back to their characters to answer him. “Beatrice is all over the place emotionally, she loves you, but she can't wrap her head around it - around loving any man, much less yielding to him with all of the Elizabethan marriage stuff. She's brittle and then she's vulnerable and he turns her into a pile of mush and then she frights and she's denying him. I can't quite grab the whole thing."
David nodded solemnly, listening patiently. "Benedick is not dissimilar."
She loved how he knew when to just let her ramble on as she had been tonight. "But once he settles on Beatrice, he's focused on that."
David nodded again. "And everything about him hinges on his belief that she would have him. He's clear after that, he knows."
David paused to run his fingers through her hair. She closed her eyes for a moment, just enjoying his gentle touches as they were silent together.
Finally he spoke, his voice tentative. "Remember in drama school all those silly little exercises? To get familiar with your character?"
She looked up at him sheepishly. "I sorta loved those."
"Me too!" He beamed at her.
She drew back reluctantly, suddenly aware of how long she had stood there lost in his embrace.
He took a step in her direction even as she moved away. His eyes on her were intense. "I'm thinking of the one where you play out how your character is in other parts of their life, or even just before or after the events of the play."
She swallowed as he caught her hand, something about the smoky darkness in his eyes filled her with a thrilling trepidation.
"What are you thinking?" she asked weakly. Her legs felt as if they would give way at any second.
"Well, it's kind of like two different exercises, like if it scares you to jump off the stage you should rehearse with an even bigger jump so on the night it will be easy?"
She nodded and licked dry lips. “And the second exercise?”
“Just a simple trust exercise really. When you practice letting go and letting someone else be in charge of you, of your body.” His eyes were so dark and her stomach dipped at his words in a way that was anything but unpleasant.
“Someone you trust,” she added faintly, feeling flushed. He nodded.
“I can see how that suits Beatrice’s situation,” she began. Her head was swimming. His hand tightened on hers and she looked up again.
"Catherine, how would it be if we played out Beatrice and Benedick's wedding night?"
~~~
Part 3: http://akhilanda.livejournal.com/6384.html