{american horror story} free like the birds
Title: Free Like the Birds
Author: Aaronlisa
Fandom: American Horror Story
Pairing/Characters: Tate Langdon, Violet Harmon, Vivien Harmon, Ben Harmon, Constance Langdon, Moira O'Hara; Tate/Violet, Vivien/Ben, implied Ben/Hayden
Rating: FR13/PG13
Warnings: Swearing along with mentions of murder and infidelity
Disclaimer: American Horror Story belongs to Ryan Murphy and company.
Prompts: Written for the second round of the AHS Exchange. I was given the following prompt: "Who will take care of me my love, my dark angel, when you are gone?" along with Tate/Violet, abandonment, regret, guilt, redemption and lots of angst with a happy ending. My recipient was GinHermi.
Notes: Set after the first season of American Horror Story.
Summary: In the end, Tate will do anything to have Violet's love.
Word Count: 5881
The house seems to sigh in disappointment as he watches mother and daughter from the shadows as Vivien laughingly drapes an arm around Violet's waist as they celebrate having chased another family out of the murder house. He watches with dark eyes as jealousy almost consumes him. It's not fair that he's always alone and she has everything he's ever wanted: a loving mother. He's done so many things to have a mother who will love him but it's never been enough. Constance found him lacking but then again Constance was the one who shaped him into the monster he had become. And for Nora he was never that small infant that she had lost and then when he found her a baby: well it was too much work for her. Vivien seems like the type of mother who would always love Violet no matter what and it just makes him want to hate Violet even more.
* * *
Tate!
His name wraps around his body, almost choking him with the urgency and need that rolls off of her tongue as she calls for him. And he's powerless to resist her call, even had he really wanted to. There are specific rules that they are bound to obey in the afterlife and this is one of them. Without specific thought, he materializes in his old bedroom, which is now her room. Despite how he still feels for her, he doesn't really want to be there, he doesn't want to hear how much she still hates him rolling off of her tongue, he doesn't want to hear how much he still disgusts him, and worse of all, he doesn't want to wake up and find out that this was all a dream.
Tate.
This time his name falls off of her lips with a sigh but he refuses to give into her. Instead he stares at a spot on the wall just above her head, refusing to give into the temptation to look at her. He won't let her win. It's bad enough that she has everyone else in the house (except maybe Hayden and Chad) believing that she's nothing more than a sweet and lovely girl who merely went through a dark phase prior to her death but he knows the truth. He knows just how cruel she can be. He knows that she can be worse than he could ever be if she sets her mind to it. The silence stretches out between them until it thins and becomes brittle. He needs to clench his fists to keep from giving into her; this time he won't let her win.
Finally she sighs and the spell is broken, her power over him washed away with a single exhale of her breath from her lungs. Against his will, his gaze drops from the wall and down towards her face. His eyes linger on her lips until he meets her eyes. She looks up at him and he can feel his dead heart skipping a beat because he can see the love and sadness in her eyes. He takes a step back, away from her, away from the lies shining in her eyes. When she raises her hand out towards him, he's not sure if she's intending to slap him or for him to take her hand. Either way it's far too much for him so he melts into the fabric of the house, escaping her and escaping what he sees in her eyes.
Tate.
This time he resists the pull of his name and she lets him go.
* * *
He's not sure why Constance still comes to the house. She has everything she ever needed from it. The perfect little boy who she'll mould into yet another monster with her hate. He doesn't really care if that boy is a part of him, he feels no connection to it. The brat only reminds him of all that he's lost.
Constance frowns at him, a cigarette held in her hands and he wonders just how many lies she's told him over the years. Lies that he's never quite figured out. He wishes that he didn't have to care but he does. He wishes that there was a better therapist in the house instead of Dr. Harmon who is useless as a doctor.
"What do you want?"
His words come out snarled and angry. He hates this woman and always will. She was always too drunk, too wrapped in himself to care about him.
"Is that anyway to talk to me?" Constance asks, before taking a drag on her cigarette.
She blows the smoke in his face. He sighs in frustration, he doesn't want to play her perverse little games. Yet he has no choice. She knows more about the house and it's power than he does.
"What do you want Mother?"
The last word drips off his tongue, coated in poison and hate. Surprisingly enough she lets it slide, clearly she desperately wants something and a little part of him dies inside. Hasn't he done enough? Hasn't he sacrificed enough of himself without ever gaining anything? He's tired of how much he's given up for this woman and for Nora and how little he's gained in return.
"Michael wants to meet his father."
The laugh is brittle and raw. He's not a father and despite how that thing was created, he wants nothing to do with it.
"Are you going to introduce it to his mother too?" Tate asks.
"Don't be smart, boy," Constance snarls.
He finally looks at her and he sees her age for once. And he realizes that despite all of her cleverness, despite all of her machinations, she's old. He can taste her death on his tongue when he breathes in through his mouth. Somehow this shocks him more than anything else. It still doesn't make him feel soft towards her. She had goaded him, pushed him until he saw no other way out than his own death. He had never taken into account that he'd be locked in this house for all of eternity, unable to escape her.
"No," Tate finally says. "I don't want to meet your perfect child. I have nothing to give him or you."
Before she can push the issue, he melts away into the shadows. He's given her everything and she's given him nothing.
* * *
"Why is your mother hanging around the house?"
Violet's voice startles him and Tate turns around, trapped between Beau and Violet. He would never do anything to hurt his brother so he doesn't just escape instead he shrugs in response to Violet's question. She sighs as she sits down beside him, Beau clapping his hands in delight as he rolls his ball towards her. Tate sits there inhaling her scent: smoke from her cigarettes, rose from her body wash, the sweet scent underneath it all that's pure Violet. It's sheer torture but for the first time in years, he doesn't feel compelled to either leave or stay. He stays because he wants to.
For a moment, he can almost pretend it's like it was before his house of cards came tumbling down, before Violet knew the truth of who and what he was. For a few minutes, Violet seems content to just play with Beau, to roll the ball back to his brother and for his brother to roll it back to one of them. Of course, it doesn't last.
"She's looking for you," Violet quietly says.
He has to bite his tongue to keep from yelling at her. His mother had hated her, probably still does and Violet's up here telling him that Constance is looking for him. Tate wonders what she'd do if she found out the reason. Instead he shrugs again.
"She can look for me all she wants, I have nothing to say to her."
"She's your mother Tate."
He can't take it anymore. This is worse than her calling him in the middle of the night and playing head games with him, making him think that she might still want him and that she might even still love him. Tate rolls the ball back to his brother and stands up.
"Stay out of things you don't understand," Tate tells Violet and then he leaves.
* * *
He finds himself in Ben Harmon's office. The mediocre doctor looks up from his book, setting his glasses on his desk.
"What do you want Tate?" Ben asks.
There's a look on Ben's face that makes Tate want to punch him. He's caught Ben Harmon fucking Hayden far too many times to count, yet Ben still treats him like scum. If it wasn't for Tate then Ben wouldn't be able to have his perfect little life: a wife who can never leave him, a daughter who still loves him, a baby who'll make his wife happy, and his mistress all in one happy home. If Tate's a sociopath then what exactly is Ben Harmon? He's tired of how the older man sits across from him with a sanctimonious smirk etched on his lips judging Tate.
"My mother wants me to meet Michael," Tate spits out as he drops onto the leather couch.
His statement seems to unsettle the doctor, the first time in years. And it makes Tate wonder how long has it been. The whole house knows about Michael but he can't recall how long it's been since the Harmons actually died. Was it only a handful of years or has it been longer? For a moment, Tate is confused as he tries to figure it out.
"And how do you feel about it?" Ben asks, easily slipping on his mask of concerned professional.
"How the fuck do you think I feel about that?" Tate angrily asks.
"This isn't about my feelings," Ben replies.
Tate sighs as he runs a hand through his hair. Sometimes he wishes he knew how to actually kill a ghost for real, if he did he'd kill Ben Harmon so he'd never have to deal with the bastard's smugness, his annoying platitudes and his inability to have a normal conversation.
"I'd rather not meet that thing," Tate finally says.
"Why do you call y-your son a thing," Ben asks, stumbling over the words.
It's the first time in a very long time since Tate's seen a crack on the perfect mask that Ben Harmon wears during these impromptu sessions. It almost makes him want to needle the doctor more, instead Tate responds to the question.
"You know as well as I do that despite what Constance think it's a nothing more than a monster," Tate says.
"Perhaps you're projecting your own feelings of inadequateness on the child?" Ben says.
Tate looks up at Ben Harmon in confusion. How can he not know of the things that go on in the house next door? How can he be so self-absorbed to not realize what's going on? It's one thing to lose track of time in this house but to be that clueless is something else. This isn't about Tate and his failures but about the fact that the child he created with Vivien is far more of a monster than Tate could ever be.
Tate gets up and leaves the office. He doesn't even know why he bothers with the doctor, he's mediocre at best and Ben Harmon never actually helps him. He just sits there and judges while he gets to pretend that everything is perfect. Then again Tate doesn't really have many choices as to who he can talk to and who he can't. It's a rather limited list in a house full right up to the rafters with dead people.
* * *
There's no where he can escape within the house where he won't be reminded of how alone he truly is. He finds himself on the backyard gazebo, almost as if something pulled him there. And perhaps Moira did, Tate's never very sure as to what motivates the older ghost. She's young and beautiful and Tate can't help but wonder who she's all dolled up for. Certainly not for him. Whatever it is that they have, it's certainly not sexual. She opens her mouth to say something but he silences her with a glare.
"If you're gonna tell me that Constance is looking for me, I'd rather not hear it," Tate says.
Moira shrugs as she leans against the wooden railing of the gazebo. She's about the only one who doesn't seem to judge him, perhaps the only one in the house who gets him. He wonders what she gets out of playing house with the Harmon family. Tate never once thought that Moira wanted a life of servitude yet there she is playing maid to the Vivien and her baby.
As the breeze shifts the leaves in the tree above them she hums a melody that seems to calm him down. He sits down beside her on the bench. For the first time in along time, he doesn't feel alone. It doesn't matter that in the end, despite how sweet she had been to him whilst alive, she had left him too. Every woman that has ever claimed to care for him has left him in the end. He can feel some forgiveness for Moira because he understands now that it was Constance who killed her, Constance who imprisoned her in this hell of a home.
"Do you ever wish that we could just die?" Tate quietly asks.
"Every single day," Moira replies. "But it's not possible."
"What should I do about Constance?" Tate asks.
Moira sighs. "I don't think you have a choice."
He knows she's right but it doesn't help ease the pain that surges up inside of him. He nods at her as he stands up before walking away from her and towards the fence.
* * *
Tate.
He's not sure how long he's stared at the house for. He's not sure how long he's been wrapped up in unpleasant memories but it's been long enough for him to have faded into nothingness as he watches. Tate sighs.
Tate.
His name again. He allows himself to be wrapped up in it, to be taken to whoever in the house wants him. This time he's not surprised to find himself in her room again. It's become habitual between them: she calls and he answers. He doesn't bother trying to resist her this time though, he's far too lost, lonely and afraid.
When she pulls him down onto her bed, he lets her. He gives into her heated kisses and wonders how long this will last for, how long until she stabs him in the stomach with a knife, either literally or figuratively. It hurts all the same. They don't speak as they kiss and touch each her.
Even after all this time, he knows her body by memory. When she pulls off his t-shirt, he lets him even though he's afraid of her eventual rejection. He knows it's only a matter of time before she comes to her senses and the lust that's clouding her mind fades away. Still he breathes her name against her skin when she arches her body up against his. He's lost against her desire.
Tate.
His name falls off her lips and he kisses her into silence. He gives her everything he has left to give, knowing full well that it'll never be enough. He worships her body with his lips and hands trying to tell her without words how much he needs her, how much he loves, how lost he is without her. When she falls asleep in his arms, he slips out of her bed. It's better to leave now in the afterglow instead of waiting until she wakes up in the morning full of loathing for him and herself.
* * *
It's Vivien who finds him up on the roof. He's there with Violet's music device listening to all of the songs that she had downloaded for him when she still loved him, when she still thought she was alive.
He can't recall the last time he and Vivien were actually alone together and he feels the weight of his guilt crushing him as yanks the headphones out of his ears. The tinny sound of Kurt Cobain's anguish bleeding through them as he bites his lower lip, tensely awaiting for Vivien to say what she came to say. He knows that she hasn't found him by accident although he can't quite figure out why she'd even want to be near him. If not for him, she'd be free of this house and her husband.
The wind blows a few leaves off of the trees and onto the roof and Tate realizes that the summer is over and he can't recall if it was only a few days ago when he sat next to Moira on the bench over her grave or if it was months ago. Was it last night when Violet had called him to her bed or was that a lifetime ago? He wants to ask Vivien how long has it been since her family first arrived in the house but he's pretty certain that would be in poor taste. And although he normally doesn't care about those sort of things, around Vivien he does.
"Your mother has been persistent in her need to see you," Vivien finally says, her voice flat and emotionless. "And although I could care less about what Constance wants, I don't want her in my house."
"I can't control her," Tate quietly says. " No one can."
"I don't want you to control her but I want you to take care of what it is she wants you to do so that she will stop coming over here," Vivien tells him. "The last thing I want is for that bitch to die in this house. I'll never be rid of her then."
A shudder runs down his spine at the thought of Constance imprisoned in this house for all of eternity. Still he's not sure he can stomach going through with his mother's request. He has no desire to meet the monster he had created.
"She wants me to meet Michael," Tate says, stuttering out the child's name.
"Then do it and be done with it," Vivien spits out.
"What if it wants to meet you next?" Tate asks.
Vivien sighs as she sits down next to him. He thinks that if he had lived, he would have been closer to her in age than he is with Violet. Kurt Cobain screams from the forgotten headphones and she looks at him. For the first time in years, they're face to face and Tate realizes that no matter what Ben Harmon says or believes, he's not a sociopath. He feels sick at the thought of what he did to her. He killed her just as surely as he killed Patrick and Chad.
She smoothes some of his hair off of his face in a gesture that can only be described as maternal. He leans towards her and he certainly doesn't expect the next words that come out of her mouth.
"Halloween will be here soon," Vivien quietly says. "You can take advantage of that and ensure that Constance and her son can't hurt anyone else."
Hate rolls through him. She's using his desperate need for love and a mother to hone him into a weapon just like Constance and Nora before her. It doesn't matter that she's right. Constance and Michael are ticking time bombs. It's a only a matter of time before they explode and the devastation they'll leave in their wake will be worse than anything Tate's ever done. Still he pulls away form her with a sharp nod.
"Fine," Tate roughly says.
He shoves the headphones back into his ears, turning up the volume as Kurt Cobain snarls and yells about something that Tate doesn't even care about anymore. What he wants doesn't matter. What he needs doesn't matter. He ignores Vivien until she finally leaves, probably to play house with her husband and dead baby. It's easy for her, no blood will be on her hands. Then again his hands are dirty enough to do what needs to be done.
* * *
He finds Moira in the kitchen. This time she's an old woman with a dead eye. It's another reminder of his mother's sins. Moira stinks of vinegar, beeswax and sweat. It's as unpleasant as the faint odor of decay that lingers in the house underneath her attempts to keep it spotlessly clean. He wonders why she bothers when they can all will the house to appear a certain way.
"You know what she wants me to do, don't you?" Tate angrily asks.
Moira sighs as she sets down the bucket. Tate wonders if it was Moira's idea to use his guilt and need against him. He wonders if Violet's been fucking him to help make him pliable.
"I might have made a suggestion or two," Moira admits. "But you would have eventually gotten there on your own."
"Then why push me?" Tate asks.
"What year is it?" Moira asks instead of answering his question.
He sighs in frustration but knows she won't tell him her motivations until she has her answer from him.
"I don't know," Tate tells her. "It's 2014 or something. Why does it matter?"
"The boy's fifteen years old," Moira sadly tells him. "Our chances of stopping him are rapidly failing."
"Why me?" Tate demands.
Moira sits down on one of the chairs by the counter. She looks sad, tired and far too old. And he doesn't need to hear what she says next because he realizes it as he looks at her.
"You're the only one who can."
"Is Violet a part of your little game to set me on the right track?" Tate asks.
He tries not to choke up when he says her name but he doesn't think he'll survive if he finds out that she's only been using him to get what needs to be done. He doesn't want to be forced to see just how mercenary she can be. Moira shakes her head in denial.
"No Violet has no idea of what's happening," Moira says.
Still the doubt hangs over him. He knows how Violet likes to listen at doors, how she likes to know secrets. What he doesn't know is how she feels about Michael, about how she feels about Constance and if she thinks that the pair of them need to be destroyed.
"I'll do it but don't ask me to do anymore of your dirty work afterwards," Tate says. "And tell her to leave me alone."
* * *
When Halloween finally arrives, Tate wakes up alone, cold and stiff, on the gazebo's floor in the grey light of dawn. His body is solid and whole again and for one day he's alive and free from the chains that bind him to the house. Tate feels a sense of elation until he realizes what today is and what he has to do. He only has one chance to get it right. He doubts that he'll be awarded with the same opportunity next year if he fails this year.
He stays on the floor, gazing up at the ceiling as he tries to figure out what he should do. He tries to figure out if he's the monster that Ben Harmon claims he is or is he just the misguided individual that he likes to believe he is. Moira stands above him and he knows that the longer he delays, the less chance he'll have to do what needs to be done. Even in his own mind he can't quite admit what it is that he needs to do.
"I don't think I can do this," Tate quietly tells her as he stands up.
Moira doesn't offer him any false comfort or words of praise. Instead she hands up a cup of hot tea. He drinks the liquid, ignoring the fact that it scalds his tongue as he drinks it. Perhaps the fact that it burns and hurts as he swallows it reminds him that he's alive, if only for a brief moment in the grand scheme of things.
"What happens if I fail?" Tate asks her.
"I don't know," Moira tells him. "Perhaps it's best if you don't think about failing."
He doubts if they'll be given a second chance if he fails. He hands her the empty cup and creeps over the lawn towards Constance's house. Even now, he can't understand her obsession with the house. Even with her perfect child, she delights in living in the shadow of the murder house.
* * *
He watches as the sun set and he wishes that he'd never have to leave this place. That he could stay on this beach forever but he knows that there's only a few more hours left and he'll be back in the house, imprisoned within it's confining embrace. He wishes he could be like his brother and content in his death but he's not. His guilt, regret and loneliness are like weights tied around his neck: inescapable as they pull him under the waves.
Tate knows when she's there the moment she sets her foot on the beach and he wonders why she's there. Is she there to judge him for his newest sins or is she there to comfort him? Either way there's a part of him that doesn't want her to be there at all. He doesn't quite wish that he had never met her but he does wish that he could just be free of her.
When she sits down beside him he can't control the way his body flinches as she wraps her arm around him and leans into his body. If it troubles her, she doesn't let on. She sighs when he wraps an arm around her. It's like that night when he brought her here before she found about him, before she saw all of the cracks in his soul and realized how tainted he truly is. Even now that he knows what lurks under her deceptively innocent face, he still wishes that she had never stayed in the murder house. The fact that it was one of his crimes that made her want to stay in the first place and then another that had caused her to die makes him sick to his stomach. They're entwined in such a way that it doesn't matter if she yells at him to go away or calls for him.
* * *
Violet can't tell how she feels as they watch the sun set. She wonders if he hates her now or if he still loves her. She, herself, is conflicted about how she feels about him. The one thing she's certain of is that the things that bothered her when she was alive don't seem to have the same importance in her death. The fact that his hands are covered in so much blood (literally and figuratively) doesn't really bother her at all as she pushes him down to the sand.
He doesn't resist her as she straddles her and she can feel the evidence of his want when she presses down on him. Violet leans down and bites his lower lip, hard enough to draw blood. When she pulls back, he licks away the blood on his lip and she shifts so that she can undo his pants He presses his bloody hands against her, shaking his head in denial.
"No," Tate tells her.
And she hates him for denying her what she wants. Doesn't he know how much she needs this?
"I can't," Tate whispers.
It's like that time so many years ago when he brought her here and she found out his dark secrets and it killed her because she found out she was afraid. She yells at him, a wordless shriek ripped from her throat as he pushes her away. He silences her by kissing her and she returns the favour by punching his shoulder. Tate pulls away from her with sadness etched on his face.
"I can't be what you want me to be when you want me to be," Tate tells her. "I love you Violet."
He leaves her and she doesn't follow after him. She's still such a child because she doesn't know what to do with his love now anymore than she knew back when she was still alive.
* * *
Tate is good at avoiding people in the house. He has far too many years of practice at it and for the most part he's still aware of his own existence. So far, he's not become a ghoul like Thaddeus always hungry for flesh, nor has he become a sorry ghost like Nora always searching for her baby in the glory of her former home. There are things that he forgets at times, things that take on a dream like quality for him, but he still knows that he's dead in the murder house and that his hands are stained red from blood that he's spilled.
Unless someone calls him (and almost no one ever does) he stays by himself in the quiet of Beau's attic. He listens to the songs that Violet had once downloaded for him when she still loved him, lost in books and his daydreams of a world where he's free like the birds he sometimes watches from the roof. And in some ways he is free.
* * *
Tate.
The word wraps around him and he feels like he's floating until he finds himself in a familiar room. The room smells of stale cigarette smoke and of faded roses, underneath it there's a sickly-sweet scent that he can't quite place. Maybe there was a time when he knew what it was but now he's not so sure. The girl that's standing in front of him seems familiar to him but he can't be sure. She looks up at him with sadness in her eyes.
"Moira is gone."
Her words are tinged with grief as he tries to place who Moira is and why this should matter to him. He looks at her in confusion as she sinks down on her bed.
"Don't you care? Moira is gone."
He swallows as he tries to figure out what to do next. It seems natural to sit down on the faded purple comforter and to wrap an arm gently around her shoulders. He feels a sense of regret and loss when his skin makes contact with her skin. When he shuts his eyes, he can almost envision a woman with graying red hair in a severe black dress. The name and image seem familiar but it's gone when the girl shifts on the bed. She slaps him as tears fall down her face.
"Nora and Charles are both gone too. The little girls and their mom are gone too."
He thinks that once upon a time these names held some weight for him but now they're meaningless.
"Don't you care Tate? They're gone, I can't find them and when I call them they don't answer!"
Her voice raises in her hysteria and he shrinks away from her as she jerks away from.
"Something's happening and you just sit there like you don't care."
"I don't know who they are," Tate sadly says. "I don't even know who you are."
She stops moving and sharply inhales as she stares at him, eyes wide in fear.
"You're forgetting just like Moira was."
The girl moves so that she's sitting on the bed again, her tear-stained cheeks make him hurt on the inside. He wishes he could make her happy again, make her realize that it's okay to let go, to forget. He light grips her wrist and pulls her closer.
"It's okay, I'll show you."
He takes her by the hand and leads her upstairs to the attic. It's quiet there, the afternoon sun lighting the room up. He smiles at her as he guides her towards his bed. They sit down beside one another and he points out the window at a flock of birds that fly by.
"We could be free like them."
"But I am afraid."
"Of what?" Tate asks her.
"Of dying, of being gone for real, of where we go when we die."
He tries not to laugh at her but he can't help it. They're already dead, what's left for them. Her name falls off of his tongue without him realizing it.
"Violet, we're already dead. Those people you can't find, the ones that are gone, weren't they already dead too?"
She nods in answer. Before he can say anything else, she leans forward and presses a chaste kiss on his lips. He thinks that if he could spend all of eternity with her on this dusty bed in the attic with her lips on his, he'd be happy. When she pushes on his shoulders, he lets his body fall backwards onto the bed. She straddles him, her hands on his shoulders and her lips on his.
This must be what heaven is like: nothing but contentment and joy flooding through his veins as she moves against him rushing towards her own pleasure. Later as they lie on his bed entwined as the sun's glow slowly leaves the room, he presses a kiss against her bare shoulder.
"I am afraid of leaving you behind. I always thought I'd have forever to tell you that I love you, that I forgive you, that I need you but now with everyone slowly disappearing, I am afraid that I left it all too late," Violet tells him.
Tate sighs as he pulls her closer to him. He doesn't know what to say in response. There was a time that he thinks her words would have meant everything to her. But now, although they're pleasant for him to hear, he's not desperate to have her love or forgiveness. Maybe it's because he doesn't know why he would need them so much.
"Promise me that you won't leave me behind," Violet whispers against his chest, her words broken as she cries.
His heart almost breaks at her sadness. He decides then that he'd do anything for this girl.
"I promise."
Something seems to lock into place within him and he feels like something has changed. He still doesn't remember who he once was but it's as if he feels more solid than he did a moment ago. A moment ago, he hadn't been aware of how thin and stretched out he had felt but now he does since he feels solid and whole. As if the house was waiting for him to say this vow.
"I promise I won't ever leave you again Tate," Violet says and the air in the house shifts again.
Their words are powerful magic that the house seems to eagerly eat. He wonders what it means but he finds that he doesn't care enough to find out. All that matters is Violet is in his arms.
((END))
The original post of this story can be found here at the exchange.
Author: Aaronlisa
Fandom: American Horror Story
Pairing/Characters: Tate Langdon, Violet Harmon, Vivien Harmon, Ben Harmon, Constance Langdon, Moira O'Hara; Tate/Violet, Vivien/Ben, implied Ben/Hayden
Rating: FR13/PG13
Warnings: Swearing along with mentions of murder and infidelity
Disclaimer: American Horror Story belongs to Ryan Murphy and company.
Prompts: Written for the second round of the AHS Exchange. I was given the following prompt: "Who will take care of me my love, my dark angel, when you are gone?" along with Tate/Violet, abandonment, regret, guilt, redemption and lots of angst with a happy ending. My recipient was GinHermi.
Notes: Set after the first season of American Horror Story.
Summary: In the end, Tate will do anything to have Violet's love.
Word Count: 5881
The house seems to sigh in disappointment as he watches mother and daughter from the shadows as Vivien laughingly drapes an arm around Violet's waist as they celebrate having chased another family out of the murder house. He watches with dark eyes as jealousy almost consumes him. It's not fair that he's always alone and she has everything he's ever wanted: a loving mother. He's done so many things to have a mother who will love him but it's never been enough. Constance found him lacking but then again Constance was the one who shaped him into the monster he had become. And for Nora he was never that small infant that she had lost and then when he found her a baby: well it was too much work for her. Vivien seems like the type of mother who would always love Violet no matter what and it just makes him want to hate Violet even more.
* * *
Tate!
His name wraps around his body, almost choking him with the urgency and need that rolls off of her tongue as she calls for him. And he's powerless to resist her call, even had he really wanted to. There are specific rules that they are bound to obey in the afterlife and this is one of them. Without specific thought, he materializes in his old bedroom, which is now her room. Despite how he still feels for her, he doesn't really want to be there, he doesn't want to hear how much she still hates him rolling off of her tongue, he doesn't want to hear how much he still disgusts him, and worse of all, he doesn't want to wake up and find out that this was all a dream.
Tate.
This time his name falls off of her lips with a sigh but he refuses to give into her. Instead he stares at a spot on the wall just above her head, refusing to give into the temptation to look at her. He won't let her win. It's bad enough that she has everyone else in the house (except maybe Hayden and Chad) believing that she's nothing more than a sweet and lovely girl who merely went through a dark phase prior to her death but he knows the truth. He knows just how cruel she can be. He knows that she can be worse than he could ever be if she sets her mind to it. The silence stretches out between them until it thins and becomes brittle. He needs to clench his fists to keep from giving into her; this time he won't let her win.
Finally she sighs and the spell is broken, her power over him washed away with a single exhale of her breath from her lungs. Against his will, his gaze drops from the wall and down towards her face. His eyes linger on her lips until he meets her eyes. She looks up at him and he can feel his dead heart skipping a beat because he can see the love and sadness in her eyes. He takes a step back, away from her, away from the lies shining in her eyes. When she raises her hand out towards him, he's not sure if she's intending to slap him or for him to take her hand. Either way it's far too much for him so he melts into the fabric of the house, escaping her and escaping what he sees in her eyes.
Tate.
This time he resists the pull of his name and she lets him go.
* * *
He's not sure why Constance still comes to the house. She has everything she ever needed from it. The perfect little boy who she'll mould into yet another monster with her hate. He doesn't really care if that boy is a part of him, he feels no connection to it. The brat only reminds him of all that he's lost.
Constance frowns at him, a cigarette held in her hands and he wonders just how many lies she's told him over the years. Lies that he's never quite figured out. He wishes that he didn't have to care but he does. He wishes that there was a better therapist in the house instead of Dr. Harmon who is useless as a doctor.
"What do you want?"
His words come out snarled and angry. He hates this woman and always will. She was always too drunk, too wrapped in himself to care about him.
"Is that anyway to talk to me?" Constance asks, before taking a drag on her cigarette.
She blows the smoke in his face. He sighs in frustration, he doesn't want to play her perverse little games. Yet he has no choice. She knows more about the house and it's power than he does.
"What do you want Mother?"
The last word drips off his tongue, coated in poison and hate. Surprisingly enough she lets it slide, clearly she desperately wants something and a little part of him dies inside. Hasn't he done enough? Hasn't he sacrificed enough of himself without ever gaining anything? He's tired of how much he's given up for this woman and for Nora and how little he's gained in return.
"Michael wants to meet his father."
The laugh is brittle and raw. He's not a father and despite how that thing was created, he wants nothing to do with it.
"Are you going to introduce it to his mother too?" Tate asks.
"Don't be smart, boy," Constance snarls.
He finally looks at her and he sees her age for once. And he realizes that despite all of her cleverness, despite all of her machinations, she's old. He can taste her death on his tongue when he breathes in through his mouth. Somehow this shocks him more than anything else. It still doesn't make him feel soft towards her. She had goaded him, pushed him until he saw no other way out than his own death. He had never taken into account that he'd be locked in this house for all of eternity, unable to escape her.
"No," Tate finally says. "I don't want to meet your perfect child. I have nothing to give him or you."
Before she can push the issue, he melts away into the shadows. He's given her everything and she's given him nothing.
* * *
"Why is your mother hanging around the house?"
Violet's voice startles him and Tate turns around, trapped between Beau and Violet. He would never do anything to hurt his brother so he doesn't just escape instead he shrugs in response to Violet's question. She sighs as she sits down beside him, Beau clapping his hands in delight as he rolls his ball towards her. Tate sits there inhaling her scent: smoke from her cigarettes, rose from her body wash, the sweet scent underneath it all that's pure Violet. It's sheer torture but for the first time in years, he doesn't feel compelled to either leave or stay. He stays because he wants to.
For a moment, he can almost pretend it's like it was before his house of cards came tumbling down, before Violet knew the truth of who and what he was. For a few minutes, Violet seems content to just play with Beau, to roll the ball back to his brother and for his brother to roll it back to one of them. Of course, it doesn't last.
"She's looking for you," Violet quietly says.
He has to bite his tongue to keep from yelling at her. His mother had hated her, probably still does and Violet's up here telling him that Constance is looking for him. Tate wonders what she'd do if she found out the reason. Instead he shrugs again.
"She can look for me all she wants, I have nothing to say to her."
"She's your mother Tate."
He can't take it anymore. This is worse than her calling him in the middle of the night and playing head games with him, making him think that she might still want him and that she might even still love him. Tate rolls the ball back to his brother and stands up.
"Stay out of things you don't understand," Tate tells Violet and then he leaves.
* * *
He finds himself in Ben Harmon's office. The mediocre doctor looks up from his book, setting his glasses on his desk.
"What do you want Tate?" Ben asks.
There's a look on Ben's face that makes Tate want to punch him. He's caught Ben Harmon fucking Hayden far too many times to count, yet Ben still treats him like scum. If it wasn't for Tate then Ben wouldn't be able to have his perfect little life: a wife who can never leave him, a daughter who still loves him, a baby who'll make his wife happy, and his mistress all in one happy home. If Tate's a sociopath then what exactly is Ben Harmon? He's tired of how the older man sits across from him with a sanctimonious smirk etched on his lips judging Tate.
"My mother wants me to meet Michael," Tate spits out as he drops onto the leather couch.
His statement seems to unsettle the doctor, the first time in years. And it makes Tate wonder how long has it been. The whole house knows about Michael but he can't recall how long it's been since the Harmons actually died. Was it only a handful of years or has it been longer? For a moment, Tate is confused as he tries to figure it out.
"And how do you feel about it?" Ben asks, easily slipping on his mask of concerned professional.
"How the fuck do you think I feel about that?" Tate angrily asks.
"This isn't about my feelings," Ben replies.
Tate sighs as he runs a hand through his hair. Sometimes he wishes he knew how to actually kill a ghost for real, if he did he'd kill Ben Harmon so he'd never have to deal with the bastard's smugness, his annoying platitudes and his inability to have a normal conversation.
"I'd rather not meet that thing," Tate finally says.
"Why do you call y-your son a thing," Ben asks, stumbling over the words.
It's the first time in a very long time since Tate's seen a crack on the perfect mask that Ben Harmon wears during these impromptu sessions. It almost makes him want to needle the doctor more, instead Tate responds to the question.
"You know as well as I do that despite what Constance think it's a nothing more than a monster," Tate says.
"Perhaps you're projecting your own feelings of inadequateness on the child?" Ben says.
Tate looks up at Ben Harmon in confusion. How can he not know of the things that go on in the house next door? How can he be so self-absorbed to not realize what's going on? It's one thing to lose track of time in this house but to be that clueless is something else. This isn't about Tate and his failures but about the fact that the child he created with Vivien is far more of a monster than Tate could ever be.
Tate gets up and leaves the office. He doesn't even know why he bothers with the doctor, he's mediocre at best and Ben Harmon never actually helps him. He just sits there and judges while he gets to pretend that everything is perfect. Then again Tate doesn't really have many choices as to who he can talk to and who he can't. It's a rather limited list in a house full right up to the rafters with dead people.
* * *
There's no where he can escape within the house where he won't be reminded of how alone he truly is. He finds himself on the backyard gazebo, almost as if something pulled him there. And perhaps Moira did, Tate's never very sure as to what motivates the older ghost. She's young and beautiful and Tate can't help but wonder who she's all dolled up for. Certainly not for him. Whatever it is that they have, it's certainly not sexual. She opens her mouth to say something but he silences her with a glare.
"If you're gonna tell me that Constance is looking for me, I'd rather not hear it," Tate says.
Moira shrugs as she leans against the wooden railing of the gazebo. She's about the only one who doesn't seem to judge him, perhaps the only one in the house who gets him. He wonders what she gets out of playing house with the Harmon family. Tate never once thought that Moira wanted a life of servitude yet there she is playing maid to the Vivien and her baby.
As the breeze shifts the leaves in the tree above them she hums a melody that seems to calm him down. He sits down beside her on the bench. For the first time in along time, he doesn't feel alone. It doesn't matter that in the end, despite how sweet she had been to him whilst alive, she had left him too. Every woman that has ever claimed to care for him has left him in the end. He can feel some forgiveness for Moira because he understands now that it was Constance who killed her, Constance who imprisoned her in this hell of a home.
"Do you ever wish that we could just die?" Tate quietly asks.
"Every single day," Moira replies. "But it's not possible."
"What should I do about Constance?" Tate asks.
Moira sighs. "I don't think you have a choice."
He knows she's right but it doesn't help ease the pain that surges up inside of him. He nods at her as he stands up before walking away from her and towards the fence.
* * *
Tate.
He's not sure how long he's stared at the house for. He's not sure how long he's been wrapped up in unpleasant memories but it's been long enough for him to have faded into nothingness as he watches. Tate sighs.
Tate.
His name again. He allows himself to be wrapped up in it, to be taken to whoever in the house wants him. This time he's not surprised to find himself in her room again. It's become habitual between them: she calls and he answers. He doesn't bother trying to resist her this time though, he's far too lost, lonely and afraid.
When she pulls him down onto her bed, he lets her. He gives into her heated kisses and wonders how long this will last for, how long until she stabs him in the stomach with a knife, either literally or figuratively. It hurts all the same. They don't speak as they kiss and touch each her.
Even after all this time, he knows her body by memory. When she pulls off his t-shirt, he lets him even though he's afraid of her eventual rejection. He knows it's only a matter of time before she comes to her senses and the lust that's clouding her mind fades away. Still he breathes her name against her skin when she arches her body up against his. He's lost against her desire.
Tate.
His name falls off her lips and he kisses her into silence. He gives her everything he has left to give, knowing full well that it'll never be enough. He worships her body with his lips and hands trying to tell her without words how much he needs her, how much he loves, how lost he is without her. When she falls asleep in his arms, he slips out of her bed. It's better to leave now in the afterglow instead of waiting until she wakes up in the morning full of loathing for him and herself.
* * *
It's Vivien who finds him up on the roof. He's there with Violet's music device listening to all of the songs that she had downloaded for him when she still loved him, when she still thought she was alive.
He can't recall the last time he and Vivien were actually alone together and he feels the weight of his guilt crushing him as yanks the headphones out of his ears. The tinny sound of Kurt Cobain's anguish bleeding through them as he bites his lower lip, tensely awaiting for Vivien to say what she came to say. He knows that she hasn't found him by accident although he can't quite figure out why she'd even want to be near him. If not for him, she'd be free of this house and her husband.
The wind blows a few leaves off of the trees and onto the roof and Tate realizes that the summer is over and he can't recall if it was only a few days ago when he sat next to Moira on the bench over her grave or if it was months ago. Was it last night when Violet had called him to her bed or was that a lifetime ago? He wants to ask Vivien how long has it been since her family first arrived in the house but he's pretty certain that would be in poor taste. And although he normally doesn't care about those sort of things, around Vivien he does.
"Your mother has been persistent in her need to see you," Vivien finally says, her voice flat and emotionless. "And although I could care less about what Constance wants, I don't want her in my house."
"I can't control her," Tate quietly says. " No one can."
"I don't want you to control her but I want you to take care of what it is she wants you to do so that she will stop coming over here," Vivien tells him. "The last thing I want is for that bitch to die in this house. I'll never be rid of her then."
A shudder runs down his spine at the thought of Constance imprisoned in this house for all of eternity. Still he's not sure he can stomach going through with his mother's request. He has no desire to meet the monster he had created.
"She wants me to meet Michael," Tate says, stuttering out the child's name.
"Then do it and be done with it," Vivien spits out.
"What if it wants to meet you next?" Tate asks.
Vivien sighs as she sits down next to him. He thinks that if he had lived, he would have been closer to her in age than he is with Violet. Kurt Cobain screams from the forgotten headphones and she looks at him. For the first time in years, they're face to face and Tate realizes that no matter what Ben Harmon says or believes, he's not a sociopath. He feels sick at the thought of what he did to her. He killed her just as surely as he killed Patrick and Chad.
She smoothes some of his hair off of his face in a gesture that can only be described as maternal. He leans towards her and he certainly doesn't expect the next words that come out of her mouth.
"Halloween will be here soon," Vivien quietly says. "You can take advantage of that and ensure that Constance and her son can't hurt anyone else."
Hate rolls through him. She's using his desperate need for love and a mother to hone him into a weapon just like Constance and Nora before her. It doesn't matter that she's right. Constance and Michael are ticking time bombs. It's a only a matter of time before they explode and the devastation they'll leave in their wake will be worse than anything Tate's ever done. Still he pulls away form her with a sharp nod.
"Fine," Tate roughly says.
He shoves the headphones back into his ears, turning up the volume as Kurt Cobain snarls and yells about something that Tate doesn't even care about anymore. What he wants doesn't matter. What he needs doesn't matter. He ignores Vivien until she finally leaves, probably to play house with her husband and dead baby. It's easy for her, no blood will be on her hands. Then again his hands are dirty enough to do what needs to be done.
* * *
He finds Moira in the kitchen. This time she's an old woman with a dead eye. It's another reminder of his mother's sins. Moira stinks of vinegar, beeswax and sweat. It's as unpleasant as the faint odor of decay that lingers in the house underneath her attempts to keep it spotlessly clean. He wonders why she bothers when they can all will the house to appear a certain way.
"You know what she wants me to do, don't you?" Tate angrily asks.
Moira sighs as she sets down the bucket. Tate wonders if it was Moira's idea to use his guilt and need against him. He wonders if Violet's been fucking him to help make him pliable.
"I might have made a suggestion or two," Moira admits. "But you would have eventually gotten there on your own."
"Then why push me?" Tate asks.
"What year is it?" Moira asks instead of answering his question.
He sighs in frustration but knows she won't tell him her motivations until she has her answer from him.
"I don't know," Tate tells her. "It's 2014 or something. Why does it matter?"
"The boy's fifteen years old," Moira sadly tells him. "Our chances of stopping him are rapidly failing."
"Why me?" Tate demands.
Moira sits down on one of the chairs by the counter. She looks sad, tired and far too old. And he doesn't need to hear what she says next because he realizes it as he looks at her.
"You're the only one who can."
"Is Violet a part of your little game to set me on the right track?" Tate asks.
He tries not to choke up when he says her name but he doesn't think he'll survive if he finds out that she's only been using him to get what needs to be done. He doesn't want to be forced to see just how mercenary she can be. Moira shakes her head in denial.
"No Violet has no idea of what's happening," Moira says.
Still the doubt hangs over him. He knows how Violet likes to listen at doors, how she likes to know secrets. What he doesn't know is how she feels about Michael, about how she feels about Constance and if she thinks that the pair of them need to be destroyed.
"I'll do it but don't ask me to do anymore of your dirty work afterwards," Tate says. "And tell her to leave me alone."
* * *
When Halloween finally arrives, Tate wakes up alone, cold and stiff, on the gazebo's floor in the grey light of dawn. His body is solid and whole again and for one day he's alive and free from the chains that bind him to the house. Tate feels a sense of elation until he realizes what today is and what he has to do. He only has one chance to get it right. He doubts that he'll be awarded with the same opportunity next year if he fails this year.
He stays on the floor, gazing up at the ceiling as he tries to figure out what he should do. He tries to figure out if he's the monster that Ben Harmon claims he is or is he just the misguided individual that he likes to believe he is. Moira stands above him and he knows that the longer he delays, the less chance he'll have to do what needs to be done. Even in his own mind he can't quite admit what it is that he needs to do.
"I don't think I can do this," Tate quietly tells her as he stands up.
Moira doesn't offer him any false comfort or words of praise. Instead she hands up a cup of hot tea. He drinks the liquid, ignoring the fact that it scalds his tongue as he drinks it. Perhaps the fact that it burns and hurts as he swallows it reminds him that he's alive, if only for a brief moment in the grand scheme of things.
"What happens if I fail?" Tate asks her.
"I don't know," Moira tells him. "Perhaps it's best if you don't think about failing."
He doubts if they'll be given a second chance if he fails. He hands her the empty cup and creeps over the lawn towards Constance's house. Even now, he can't understand her obsession with the house. Even with her perfect child, she delights in living in the shadow of the murder house.
* * *
He watches as the sun set and he wishes that he'd never have to leave this place. That he could stay on this beach forever but he knows that there's only a few more hours left and he'll be back in the house, imprisoned within it's confining embrace. He wishes he could be like his brother and content in his death but he's not. His guilt, regret and loneliness are like weights tied around his neck: inescapable as they pull him under the waves.
Tate knows when she's there the moment she sets her foot on the beach and he wonders why she's there. Is she there to judge him for his newest sins or is she there to comfort him? Either way there's a part of him that doesn't want her to be there at all. He doesn't quite wish that he had never met her but he does wish that he could just be free of her.
When she sits down beside him he can't control the way his body flinches as she wraps her arm around him and leans into his body. If it troubles her, she doesn't let on. She sighs when he wraps an arm around her. It's like that night when he brought her here before she found about him, before she saw all of the cracks in his soul and realized how tainted he truly is. Even now that he knows what lurks under her deceptively innocent face, he still wishes that she had never stayed in the murder house. The fact that it was one of his crimes that made her want to stay in the first place and then another that had caused her to die makes him sick to his stomach. They're entwined in such a way that it doesn't matter if she yells at him to go away or calls for him.
* * *
Violet can't tell how she feels as they watch the sun set. She wonders if he hates her now or if he still loves her. She, herself, is conflicted about how she feels about him. The one thing she's certain of is that the things that bothered her when she was alive don't seem to have the same importance in her death. The fact that his hands are covered in so much blood (literally and figuratively) doesn't really bother her at all as she pushes him down to the sand.
He doesn't resist her as she straddles her and she can feel the evidence of his want when she presses down on him. Violet leans down and bites his lower lip, hard enough to draw blood. When she pulls back, he licks away the blood on his lip and she shifts so that she can undo his pants He presses his bloody hands against her, shaking his head in denial.
"No," Tate tells her.
And she hates him for denying her what she wants. Doesn't he know how much she needs this?
"I can't," Tate whispers.
It's like that time so many years ago when he brought her here and she found out his dark secrets and it killed her because she found out she was afraid. She yells at him, a wordless shriek ripped from her throat as he pushes her away. He silences her by kissing her and she returns the favour by punching his shoulder. Tate pulls away from her with sadness etched on his face.
"I can't be what you want me to be when you want me to be," Tate tells her. "I love you Violet."
He leaves her and she doesn't follow after him. She's still such a child because she doesn't know what to do with his love now anymore than she knew back when she was still alive.
* * *
Tate is good at avoiding people in the house. He has far too many years of practice at it and for the most part he's still aware of his own existence. So far, he's not become a ghoul like Thaddeus always hungry for flesh, nor has he become a sorry ghost like Nora always searching for her baby in the glory of her former home. There are things that he forgets at times, things that take on a dream like quality for him, but he still knows that he's dead in the murder house and that his hands are stained red from blood that he's spilled.
Unless someone calls him (and almost no one ever does) he stays by himself in the quiet of Beau's attic. He listens to the songs that Violet had once downloaded for him when she still loved him, lost in books and his daydreams of a world where he's free like the birds he sometimes watches from the roof. And in some ways he is free.
* * *
Tate.
The word wraps around him and he feels like he's floating until he finds himself in a familiar room. The room smells of stale cigarette smoke and of faded roses, underneath it there's a sickly-sweet scent that he can't quite place. Maybe there was a time when he knew what it was but now he's not so sure. The girl that's standing in front of him seems familiar to him but he can't be sure. She looks up at him with sadness in her eyes.
"Moira is gone."
Her words are tinged with grief as he tries to place who Moira is and why this should matter to him. He looks at her in confusion as she sinks down on her bed.
"Don't you care? Moira is gone."
He swallows as he tries to figure out what to do next. It seems natural to sit down on the faded purple comforter and to wrap an arm gently around her shoulders. He feels a sense of regret and loss when his skin makes contact with her skin. When he shuts his eyes, he can almost envision a woman with graying red hair in a severe black dress. The name and image seem familiar but it's gone when the girl shifts on the bed. She slaps him as tears fall down her face.
"Nora and Charles are both gone too. The little girls and their mom are gone too."
He thinks that once upon a time these names held some weight for him but now they're meaningless.
"Don't you care Tate? They're gone, I can't find them and when I call them they don't answer!"
Her voice raises in her hysteria and he shrinks away from her as she jerks away from.
"Something's happening and you just sit there like you don't care."
"I don't know who they are," Tate sadly says. "I don't even know who you are."
She stops moving and sharply inhales as she stares at him, eyes wide in fear.
"You're forgetting just like Moira was."
The girl moves so that she's sitting on the bed again, her tear-stained cheeks make him hurt on the inside. He wishes he could make her happy again, make her realize that it's okay to let go, to forget. He light grips her wrist and pulls her closer.
"It's okay, I'll show you."
He takes her by the hand and leads her upstairs to the attic. It's quiet there, the afternoon sun lighting the room up. He smiles at her as he guides her towards his bed. They sit down beside one another and he points out the window at a flock of birds that fly by.
"We could be free like them."
"But I am afraid."
"Of what?" Tate asks her.
"Of dying, of being gone for real, of where we go when we die."
He tries not to laugh at her but he can't help it. They're already dead, what's left for them. Her name falls off of his tongue without him realizing it.
"Violet, we're already dead. Those people you can't find, the ones that are gone, weren't they already dead too?"
She nods in answer. Before he can say anything else, she leans forward and presses a chaste kiss on his lips. He thinks that if he could spend all of eternity with her on this dusty bed in the attic with her lips on his, he'd be happy. When she pushes on his shoulders, he lets his body fall backwards onto the bed. She straddles him, her hands on his shoulders and her lips on his.
This must be what heaven is like: nothing but contentment and joy flooding through his veins as she moves against him rushing towards her own pleasure. Later as they lie on his bed entwined as the sun's glow slowly leaves the room, he presses a kiss against her bare shoulder.
"I am afraid of leaving you behind. I always thought I'd have forever to tell you that I love you, that I forgive you, that I need you but now with everyone slowly disappearing, I am afraid that I left it all too late," Violet tells him.
Tate sighs as he pulls her closer to him. He doesn't know what to say in response. There was a time that he thinks her words would have meant everything to her. But now, although they're pleasant for him to hear, he's not desperate to have her love or forgiveness. Maybe it's because he doesn't know why he would need them so much.
"Promise me that you won't leave me behind," Violet whispers against his chest, her words broken as she cries.
His heart almost breaks at her sadness. He decides then that he'd do anything for this girl.
"I promise."
Something seems to lock into place within him and he feels like something has changed. He still doesn't remember who he once was but it's as if he feels more solid than he did a moment ago. A moment ago, he hadn't been aware of how thin and stretched out he had felt but now he does since he feels solid and whole. As if the house was waiting for him to say this vow.
"I promise I won't ever leave you again Tate," Violet says and the air in the house shifts again.
Their words are powerful magic that the house seems to eagerly eat. He wonders what it means but he finds that he doesn't care enough to find out. All that matters is Violet is in his arms.
((END))
The original post of this story can be found here at the exchange.