TFATF New Fic: Three
Title:Three
Author: blackberry belle
Written for:
smallfandomfest
Fandom: The Fast & The Furious
Pairing/Characters: Dom/Brian
Rating/Category: PG, Slash
Disclaimer: Characters are so not mine
A/N: These are three standalone fics. Numbers 1 & 2 were written specifically for the prompt. Number 3 was a sequel I was thinking about doing for a TFATF fic I have already written. It fit with the prompt fairly well, so I decided to polish it up for this prompt as well.
#3 works as a standalone if you know these basics. It's a sequel to a post movie AU in which Dom is in Mexico, Brian has a boyfriend in LA named Patrick, who is a fellow cop, but he still manages to see Dom on the side. If you want to read that fic, it's here http://chase65.livejournal.com/16677.html#cutid1
Warnings: Character Death in 1 of the 3.
Prompt: Regret
ONE
There is a place in the bar that lets Dom watch without being seen. The bar is always just crowded enough that he doesn’t look suspicious leaning against the post nursing the one beer. He is not at the bar to drink. He’s watching, keeping watch maybe he’s not sure. He thinks it’s probably keeping watch.
They have never been to this bar as a couple. This place belongs to Brian. From his vantage point, as Dom has done for almost six months, he watches Brian nurse what is probably his second beer of the night. He watches Brian discourage the attention of everyone that makes an attempt with him. There is always a slight shake of his blond head and a slight smile before he goes back to drinking his beer. Sometimes, there are enough beers that Brian has to take a cab home. There is the teeniest, tiniest part of Dom that wishes that his other half was having an affair. It would at least give him something flesh to fight against. But this. It hurts in ways he has never experienced.
Three words have gotten them into this situation. And Dom wonders sometimes where they would be if he had said something else or if that moment, with the wreckage behind them, he had said nothing at all.
When Brian eventually comes home, comes to bed, Dom holds onto him more tightly than he has anything else in his life.
Fin
TWO
O’Conner’s eyes drift briefly from the apartment he and his partner, Michel Lewis, have been sitting on for a couple of hours, to his partner’s face. Michael, who is catching a quick nap, is dark haired, lean, a little bit of a badass. He is the right kind of wrong. There is a bruise on Michael's neck that's too faint to really see unless you're looking for it. It is mostly obscured by the collar of his polo shirt. Since Brian put the bruise there, he knows exactly where to look.
There are other bruises on Michael's back, on his thighs that are hidden by his clothes. Brian can't help but smile at the memory of how his partner ended up with those bruises. But the smile fades as quickly as the pleasure had. The way it always does.
After the IA investigation cleared him, Brian was assigned to the gang unit. At the time he'd thought they were trying to orchestrate a death in the line of duty to get rid of him. It turned out that wasn't the case. He'd found himself another crew of adrenaline junkies.
They had all been high a couple of nights ago, the aftereffects of an intense gun battle. The kind that ends up on newscasts in other countries and is bad for LA tourism. After the appropriate reports were done, they'd all gone out drinking to relive it and begin the process of coming down. It eventually dwindled to just the guys who had no one waiting at home. He and Michael. In the three years since Brian's life went to hell there have been a few men. Other cops, a firefighter or two, even a city councilman. Men who had the same kind of things to lose that Brian did. That was his m.o. now. "I got beer at my place," Michael had grinned at him.
He wonders what those same bruises would look like on Dom. He wonders if Dom would bruise as easily. The spiral is starting. The other part of his m.o. His eyes shift away from his handiwork, back to the apartment under surveillance. He stares at the building, but only sees three years ago, only sees Dominic Toretto and a cop who can't find the words to go with the career threatening gesture. A man who knows it's his moment, but the blare of approaching sirens tells him he's run out of time. Brian clutches the steering wheel, once the replay starts, he can never make it stop.
The plummet down memory lane always leaves him brittle. After shift, he turns down Michael's invitation to grab a couple beers in favor of going home. Walking into his house, he tries not to look at the answering machine that haunts him, mocks him. He's kept his landline and remained listed under his full name in the book. He glances quickly and sees what he always sees. The light, not blinking.
*******************
Leon watches Dom from the kitchen window. The big man’s fist is balled tight, but Leon knows those fingers are wrapped around a disposable cell. It’s the post LA code for don’t bother me. It’s been three years since things blew up in LA and every few months or so this happens. Dom will get a disposable cell and carry it with him everywhere. Toward the end of the spiral, he’ll spend more time in the backyard, with the phone clutched in his hand than in the garage. The first time it happened, he found Dom in the yard drinking. He’d brought his own beer out and flopped down in the patio chair beside Dom. The big man had already been drunk. More drunk than Leon had never seen before. Just as he was about to suggest that maybe Dom pack it in for the night, glassy unfocused eyes turned toward him. The words slurred a little but clear enough to floor Leon.
“I shoulda asked him to come with us.” Leon isn't a rocket scientist, but he didn't have to be to know who the ‘him’ was. Dom had passed out shortly afterwards. Leon had gotten him inside and dumped him on the couch. He didn't think Letty would appreciate having Dom beside her in that condition.
Leon wonders how it is that Letty can’t see it. Why she stays. Maybe, he thinks, the truth is that she does see and then doesn’t. It can’t be easy to have the guy you sleep with, the guy that you’ve gone outlaw with, freak out every few months or so over the cop who ruined your life. It is probably easier not to know.
It’s no skin off Leon’s nose. His life is actually better here than it was in LA. The truth is with Dom preoccupied and Vince in lockup, Leon has a level of play he'd never enjoyed before. His talents are finally front and center. It’s not that he’s shallow, he does mourn the loss of his family, but for him Costa Rica is more home than Los Angeles was.
As Leon continues to watch, Dom flips the phone open and just stares at it. For a long time he just stares at the phone and Leon stares at him. Suddenly, the big man bends at the waist. The phone slips from his hands as his palms splay flat against his thighs. It takes a moment for Leon to realize that Dom's shoulders are shaking, hard. Leon hopes that Dom is laughing at the absurdity of the situation, but he knows that's not what's happening. Three years. This is the worst it's ever been.
Leon takes a step back from the window. There's twice as much work to do with Letty out of town and Dom out of commission. It's not gonna do itself. Turning completely away from the window, Leon leaves Dom to his breakdown.
Fin
THREE
Standing in the doorway of the motel room, staring at the tanned unmarked flesh of Brian's back, Dom hesitates. He has to be so careful not to leave any evidence that they've been together. No evidence that Brian might have to explain to his asshole cop boyfriend. And just like that the rage is back. The rage he felt in that bar six months ago faced with an ultimatum he couldn't fight. Well, he can fight it now. He closes the door quietly so as not to wake Brian.
In the parking lot across from the motel, between two semis, Dom reaches into his pocket and pulls out the phone he was supposed to have destroyed already. The call is easy to make. It takes no more than a minute to convey the necessary information. He knows it will get passed on. It's too good not to. He presses the end button and crushes the phone underneath his heel.
Four weeks and some change. Brian's a little past due with his call. They usually get together every four weeks or so. As the time nears, Dom always makes his way closer to the US/Mexico border. When he gets the call, he's never more than a couple of hours away. Right now, he's in TJ waiting when he walks into the bar. He tries not to have too regular a pattern, but he likes this bar. It's crowded, touristy and reminds him of home. The couple day's growth of beard and baseball cap help obscure his identity. As he slides into a booth, an image on the widescreen tv over the bar catches his attention.
Dom had only ever seen the asshole cop that he hated, more than anything, when he thought about Patrick Jamison. It wasn't until this moment, this terrible moment that would always be the worst moment of his life, that Dom realized just how much Patrick and Brian looked alike. He knew Brian so intimately that he never would have gotten them confused. But without that knowledge, looking at the official LAPD photo of Brian plastered on the tv screen, Dom can see how easy that mistake would be.
Dom can see - . He bolts from the bar and runs, runs until his lungs ache and his side hitches. He will never be able to unhear the reporter's words. LAPD Detective Brian O'Conner was found beaten to death in an alley off of Spring street in downtown Los Angeles one week ago today.
As he falls to his knees in a Tijiuana alley, his rage is a distant memory replaced by an all consuming, madness inducing grief. He can see how someone who knew his public history with Brian might think he was dropping a dime on him. And like some very fucked up game of telephone it had come down to this. Brian instead of Patrick.
Even when the Policia, responding to a crazy man in an alley call, put the handcuffs on him, Dom doesn't stop screaming.
Fin
Author: blackberry belle
Written for:
smallfandomfest
Fandom: The Fast & The Furious
Pairing/Characters: Dom/Brian
Rating/Category: PG, Slash
Disclaimer: Characters are so not mine
A/N: These are three standalone fics. Numbers 1 & 2 were written specifically for the prompt. Number 3 was a sequel I was thinking about doing for a TFATF fic I have already written. It fit with the prompt fairly well, so I decided to polish it up for this prompt as well.
#3 works as a standalone if you know these basics. It's a sequel to a post movie AU in which Dom is in Mexico, Brian has a boyfriend in LA named Patrick, who is a fellow cop, but he still manages to see Dom on the side. If you want to read that fic, it's here http://chase65.livejournal.com/16677.html#cutid1
Warnings: Character Death in 1 of the 3.
Prompt: Regret
ONE
There is a place in the bar that lets Dom watch without being seen. The bar is always just crowded enough that he doesn’t look suspicious leaning against the post nursing the one beer. He is not at the bar to drink. He’s watching, keeping watch maybe he’s not sure. He thinks it’s probably keeping watch.
They have never been to this bar as a couple. This place belongs to Brian. From his vantage point, as Dom has done for almost six months, he watches Brian nurse what is probably his second beer of the night. He watches Brian discourage the attention of everyone that makes an attempt with him. There is always a slight shake of his blond head and a slight smile before he goes back to drinking his beer. Sometimes, there are enough beers that Brian has to take a cab home. There is the teeniest, tiniest part of Dom that wishes that his other half was having an affair. It would at least give him something flesh to fight against. But this. It hurts in ways he has never experienced.
Three words have gotten them into this situation. And Dom wonders sometimes where they would be if he had said something else or if that moment, with the wreckage behind them, he had said nothing at all.
When Brian eventually comes home, comes to bed, Dom holds onto him more tightly than he has anything else in his life.
Fin
TWO
O’Conner’s eyes drift briefly from the apartment he and his partner, Michel Lewis, have been sitting on for a couple of hours, to his partner’s face. Michael, who is catching a quick nap, is dark haired, lean, a little bit of a badass. He is the right kind of wrong. There is a bruise on Michael's neck that's too faint to really see unless you're looking for it. It is mostly obscured by the collar of his polo shirt. Since Brian put the bruise there, he knows exactly where to look.
There are other bruises on Michael's back, on his thighs that are hidden by his clothes. Brian can't help but smile at the memory of how his partner ended up with those bruises. But the smile fades as quickly as the pleasure had. The way it always does.
After the IA investigation cleared him, Brian was assigned to the gang unit. At the time he'd thought they were trying to orchestrate a death in the line of duty to get rid of him. It turned out that wasn't the case. He'd found himself another crew of adrenaline junkies.
They had all been high a couple of nights ago, the aftereffects of an intense gun battle. The kind that ends up on newscasts in other countries and is bad for LA tourism. After the appropriate reports were done, they'd all gone out drinking to relive it and begin the process of coming down. It eventually dwindled to just the guys who had no one waiting at home. He and Michael. In the three years since Brian's life went to hell there have been a few men. Other cops, a firefighter or two, even a city councilman. Men who had the same kind of things to lose that Brian did. That was his m.o. now. "I got beer at my place," Michael had grinned at him.
He wonders what those same bruises would look like on Dom. He wonders if Dom would bruise as easily. The spiral is starting. The other part of his m.o. His eyes shift away from his handiwork, back to the apartment under surveillance. He stares at the building, but only sees three years ago, only sees Dominic Toretto and a cop who can't find the words to go with the career threatening gesture. A man who knows it's his moment, but the blare of approaching sirens tells him he's run out of time. Brian clutches the steering wheel, once the replay starts, he can never make it stop.
The plummet down memory lane always leaves him brittle. After shift, he turns down Michael's invitation to grab a couple beers in favor of going home. Walking into his house, he tries not to look at the answering machine that haunts him, mocks him. He's kept his landline and remained listed under his full name in the book. He glances quickly and sees what he always sees. The light, not blinking.
*******************
Leon watches Dom from the kitchen window. The big man’s fist is balled tight, but Leon knows those fingers are wrapped around a disposable cell. It’s the post LA code for don’t bother me. It’s been three years since things blew up in LA and every few months or so this happens. Dom will get a disposable cell and carry it with him everywhere. Toward the end of the spiral, he’ll spend more time in the backyard, with the phone clutched in his hand than in the garage. The first time it happened, he found Dom in the yard drinking. He’d brought his own beer out and flopped down in the patio chair beside Dom. The big man had already been drunk. More drunk than Leon had never seen before. Just as he was about to suggest that maybe Dom pack it in for the night, glassy unfocused eyes turned toward him. The words slurred a little but clear enough to floor Leon.
“I shoulda asked him to come with us.” Leon isn't a rocket scientist, but he didn't have to be to know who the ‘him’ was. Dom had passed out shortly afterwards. Leon had gotten him inside and dumped him on the couch. He didn't think Letty would appreciate having Dom beside her in that condition.
Leon wonders how it is that Letty can’t see it. Why she stays. Maybe, he thinks, the truth is that she does see and then doesn’t. It can’t be easy to have the guy you sleep with, the guy that you’ve gone outlaw with, freak out every few months or so over the cop who ruined your life. It is probably easier not to know.
It’s no skin off Leon’s nose. His life is actually better here than it was in LA. The truth is with Dom preoccupied and Vince in lockup, Leon has a level of play he'd never enjoyed before. His talents are finally front and center. It’s not that he’s shallow, he does mourn the loss of his family, but for him Costa Rica is more home than Los Angeles was.
As Leon continues to watch, Dom flips the phone open and just stares at it. For a long time he just stares at the phone and Leon stares at him. Suddenly, the big man bends at the waist. The phone slips from his hands as his palms splay flat against his thighs. It takes a moment for Leon to realize that Dom's shoulders are shaking, hard. Leon hopes that Dom is laughing at the absurdity of the situation, but he knows that's not what's happening. Three years. This is the worst it's ever been.
Leon takes a step back from the window. There's twice as much work to do with Letty out of town and Dom out of commission. It's not gonna do itself. Turning completely away from the window, Leon leaves Dom to his breakdown.
Fin
THREE
Standing in the doorway of the motel room, staring at the tanned unmarked flesh of Brian's back, Dom hesitates. He has to be so careful not to leave any evidence that they've been together. No evidence that Brian might have to explain to his asshole cop boyfriend. And just like that the rage is back. The rage he felt in that bar six months ago faced with an ultimatum he couldn't fight. Well, he can fight it now. He closes the door quietly so as not to wake Brian.
In the parking lot across from the motel, between two semis, Dom reaches into his pocket and pulls out the phone he was supposed to have destroyed already. The call is easy to make. It takes no more than a minute to convey the necessary information. He knows it will get passed on. It's too good not to. He presses the end button and crushes the phone underneath his heel.
Four weeks and some change. Brian's a little past due with his call. They usually get together every four weeks or so. As the time nears, Dom always makes his way closer to the US/Mexico border. When he gets the call, he's never more than a couple of hours away. Right now, he's in TJ waiting when he walks into the bar. He tries not to have too regular a pattern, but he likes this bar. It's crowded, touristy and reminds him of home. The couple day's growth of beard and baseball cap help obscure his identity. As he slides into a booth, an image on the widescreen tv over the bar catches his attention.
Dom had only ever seen the asshole cop that he hated, more than anything, when he thought about Patrick Jamison. It wasn't until this moment, this terrible moment that would always be the worst moment of his life, that Dom realized just how much Patrick and Brian looked alike. He knew Brian so intimately that he never would have gotten them confused. But without that knowledge, looking at the official LAPD photo of Brian plastered on the tv screen, Dom can see how easy that mistake would be.
Dom can see - . He bolts from the bar and runs, runs until his lungs ache and his side hitches. He will never be able to unhear the reporter's words. LAPD Detective Brian O'Conner was found beaten to death in an alley off of Spring street in downtown Los Angeles one week ago today.
As he falls to his knees in a Tijiuana alley, his rage is a distant memory replaced by an all consuming, madness inducing grief. He can see how someone who knew his public history with Brian might think he was dropping a dime on him. And like some very fucked up game of telephone it had come down to this. Brian instead of Patrick.
Even when the Policia, responding to a crazy man in an alley call, put the handcuffs on him, Dom doesn't stop screaming.
Fin