A canon ficlet from the history of the two shirts
Brokeback ficlet/vignette - a glimpse into the history of the two shirts. Jack and Ennis on the mountain.
Ca. 800 words, movie canon, rated PG. No warnings.
Disclaimer: They do not belong to me, but to Annie Proulx, Diana Ossana, Larry McMurtry and Focus Features. I make no profit of any kind except for the inspiration I find in thinking and writing of Jack and Ennis.
A/N: The titles of this and two following ficlets are lines from Robert Browning’s poem “A Toccata of Galuppi’s”. That one poem has any number of melancholy lines that out of context serve perfectly to inspire Brokeback thoughts.
"I can always leave off talking when I hear a master play!"
Ennis rode down to camp in the afternoon, eager to see Jack again, hoping for much more than just seeing.
The sun was out, baking his back, warm enough to make him glad he had his hat on.
Getting close, he could hear noise. Jack would call it music, he figured. There was no mistaking the caterwauling of Jack’s harmonica. It grated on Ennis’s ears like the sound of cats in heat screeching at the moon.
Strangely, it didn’t grate on his heart.
Ennis dismounted right outside a camp and left Cigar Butt to his own devices, walked the last little stretch on foot and peered out from behind an old spruce.
Jack was playing his harmonica with much more enthusiasm than skill. He sure hadn’t gotten much better from practice. And there’d been far too much practice lately, in Ennis’s personal opinion.
Now Jack was reclining on the ground by the cooking fire, shirtless in the bright sun and sharp air, a folded blanket at his back. The toes of his boots were moving rhythmically, beating time to the harmonica’s wailing tune. He looked carefree and relaxed and good enough to eat. That thought came very easily to Ennis, - it being supper time and all.
The jaunty country music fit Jack’s ebullient mood, but pierced Ennis’s sensitive ears like knives.
Jack had their food going. A pot of something was steaming over the fire, and a couple of cans of beans had been set to heating.
Jack had clearly been a busy bee in the fine weather. He’d chopped wood too, and he’d done laundry. Their spare jeans and their shirts were hanging out to dry in the sun, side by side on a makeshift line - a rope stretched between two trees. The clothes looked about as clean as a mountain river and some serious beating and scrubbing against a stone could possibly make’em.
Their shirts, one light cotton plaid, one denim, were hanging side by side, still damp and heavy with water, moving sedately on the mountain breeze.
Spurred on by who-knew-which random impulse, Jack had used a wooden home-made clothes pin to fasten one bright blue sleeve to a patterned one. The two shirts up there were holding hands! Displaying their connection freely to the world, moving in unison, a slow and stately line dance on the wind to Jack’s off-key but happy tune.
A jolt of fear shot through Ennis, followed by blazing anger. Jack fuckin’ Twist, that crazy son of a bitch! What possessed him to be so reckless? What if someone came by and happened to see? Those shirts spelled shame, and pain, and danger!
He felt a scathingly furious shout burning on his tongue, was getting up steam to put an end to that damn ear-destroying melody, the thoughtless musician, those goddamn hand-holding shirts, all a it.
But somehow he managed to stop himself just in time, drawing breath sharply.
Off-key but happy. That was the very sum of their summer mountain existence. Off-key but doing good - the shirts, the tune, Jack and him. Nobody’s business but theirs up here, any of it. And no-one around to see, anyhow. They were invisible here, or near enough, and all alone.
He bet Jack’s screeching serenade had even chased off the wildlife.
And those shirts, they were… actually kind a nice.
No need for him to ruin the sunny mood.
He swallowed his angry words. Oh yeah, silence he could do, from long experience and much practice. Reality would catch up with them soon enough. The necessary lesson in caution could wait till some other day.
And he could easily enough see to helping Jack get that laundry down off the line, too, without talking about it none. But he needed to put a stop to that infernal music first. And he knew just the way. He’d had much better uses for Jack’s mouth on his mind during the entire ride down to camp.
He stepped briskly out from behind his tree and was greeted by sudden and blissful silence as Jack looked up, met his gaze, and let the harmonica drop to the ground with a delighted grin.
As it soon turned out, Ennis’s plan to redirect Jack’s energy and attention proved sweetly successful and gratifyingly time-consuming. The water bubbled forgotten over the diminishing fire. The beans boiled themselves into gooey, glue-like mush. And the shirts on the line had ample time to dry, floating giddily on the breeze, fluttering at an increasingly faster pace to mimic activities down below.
Two shirts side by side, sleeves entwined, moving merrily together in the wind like a makeshift flag, flapping joyfully on high in celebration of summer and solitude and laughter and loving.