she thinks that she can fly. and she might.
Wow, this has been a long time coming.
This here is my adventure into the world of original fiction. When I posted the first part there wasn't a name. Now there is, it's called Fog. It's unbetaed for now (my plan is to one day finish it and make real chapter length chapters and continuity and stuff). Until then we have Part 2 in which Julian is grumpy and we meet Michael, sort of.
Part 1, etc.
Fog - Part 2
The next morning it all seems rather like a dream, the events of the previous day, one of those dreams in which everything is disturbingly vivid and real, but a dream none the less. Julian stays in bed as long as he can willing himself to go back to sleep, trying to reassure himself that it really was a dream. The remnants of scotch pounding against the inside of his skull tell him otherwise.
He stays in bed long enough that he is annoyed with himself for laying there so long trying to avoid something that there is no avoiding. He’s not quite sure it needs avoiding in the first place or even what 'it' is. It's just instinct he supposes, wanting to avoid things that don't make sense or seem half threatening, but his instincts are those of a house cat, not a lynx, and he has a feeling they are likely to lead him astray.
There is not, as he had feared there would be, a man in a blue silk suit lounging on his couch - making it look even shabbier by comparison - idylly puffing on a cigarette. Though the smoke lingers in the air. Julian wrinkles his nose and wishes he had never stopped on that corner the previous day, never even spared a glance.
There is an empty bottle of scotch on the table and... Kimball (if that is his real name) was right, Julian’s apartment is disastrously messy, appallingly disorganized. Suddenly it feels too full, the acrid scent of expensive tobacco and the piles of unwanted papers; junk mail that hasn’t made it to the recycle bin and things he’s not quite sure why he’s saved. It is all too much. He forgets to grab his coat in his haste to get out the door.
It's pouring outside, and by the time he makes it to the cafe his shirt is soaked through, but the chai is warm and just-right spicy. He wishes he could wrap himself in the foam, a cloud of cardamom cinnamon milk fuzz, and stop his brain churning.
Julian makes a valiant but incredibly unsuccessful effort to read, at least, the articles on the front page of the newspaper he finds on the table, anything to take his mind off the fact that the events of the previous night disturb him as much as they do. Weird is one thing and it isn’t like he’s never met an odd character before (hell he's still friends with most of those he has met) there is no reason why Kimball should freak him out so much. He just does. That's the part that really gets to him, the ambiguity of the man. The way he seems to be much more that he let on, and then the fact that Julian is sure that's exactly what Kimball wants him to think. That's his trick, and Julian fell for it hook line and sinker.
What had Kimball meant by properly informed? Properly informed of what, and by who? The bastard had weaseled out of answering every question Julian had asked, and he couldn't help but think that he was missing something. Maybe there had been more than scotch in the scotch. This is not the sort of shit that happens. Not to regular people anyway, certainly not to him. He feels like he's being set up. But it's got to be just a feeling, right? Because who could possibly be behind it? Who does he know that knows anyone like Kimball and what would be the fucking point anyway. Fuck. He kicks the table leg in frustration sloshing chai over the edge of the table and onto the floor. He doesn't notice. And, now that he thinks about it (or is trying not to, really) Kimball was in his dream last night. Great.
The whole relaxing drink tea and read the paper thing isn't going so well. He takes a deep breath. "Nothing bad is happening here," he mutters to himself, but he can't stop the voice in the back of his head from adding yet. It's getting on toward noon and the start of Michael's shift. Michael who will flash his disarming smile at him and then Julian will inevitably say something about Kimball and, well. The entire situation is surreal enough as it is without bringing his, whatever Michael is to him, into it as well.
The first time Julian had walked up to the register and ordered a chai from him he had thought Michael was another one of those pretentious scenesters - someone whom talking to would automatically make Julian feel stupid, or at least very unhip - until he had smiled. It was a smile that made Julian feel like he was, if not the only person in the world, at least the most important.
It wasn’t until later that Julian realized that Michael smiled at everyone like that, but by that point the damage was done, there was a part of Julian’s brain that had decided there was a connection of some sort between the two of them and that was that. He found himself telling Michael things he really didn’t want to but couldn’t help. He would babble on until he said something really stupid and then retreat to a table around the corner, out of sight of the counter, and try to will himself not to be such an idiot. Wondering all the while, if Michael had any idea the sort of effect he had on Julian and if he had that effect on anyone else as well.
He’d always thought the name Michael was boring, average, until he met this particular one. Michaels (and even more commonly Mikes) had been a dime a dozen at school. Julian had always thought of it as a fall back name for unimaginative parents, but this Michael - Julian actually thinks of him as his Michael when he’s not paying attention - is somehow different. Suddenly the name has dimension, seems even vaguely exotic. Something old seen in an entirely new light, a new hair cut on an old friend and suddenly they look like a rock star.
There was a sense of effortless cool about Michael - though unlike Kimball’s, which held a certain sinisterness just under the surface, it was benign, friendly - it seemed to be not so much a part of him as a cloak he had wrapped around himself. Something that drew people to him, only a certain type of person, yes, but it did all the same and Julian, it seemed, was that type.
He somehow felt like he was part of the club with Michael, part of the in crowd - even if it was just the two of them - but not even that really. Just rather amazed at times that Michael would talk to him at all. Mostly he didn’t think about it, at least not in that way anyway, until some point in the middle of a conversation. Julian would manage some wonderfully clever comment and then (his downfall) realize it, and Michael would laugh.
After that all Julian would be able to think about was the comment and how he had said something that made Michael laugh and his mind would wander to the possibilities (whatever those were) that that held and he would inevitably miss the next thing Michael said. Watch the conversation unravel before his eyes, like a sweater on a nail, until he found himself just gazing at Michael and Michael not saying anything at all for a minute or a moment - the indeterminate period of time when everything is in such sharp focus that it's blurry and time itself is completely irrelevant - before the inevitable uber clean yuppie woman would push in front of him and order her double mocha late with lite (not light) soy milk.
Michael is the figure holding court at the booth in the back corner when Julian walks in to a bar - giving off all the signals to indicate they are having a very interesting and engaging conversation - sitting, half lounging, long arms elegantly draped over the seat back on either side of him. He beckons Julian over with a gesture that seems to say more than he can quite pick up on. A gesture steeped in implication.
Conversation that had been easy over caffeine is like breathing over alcohol. Julian couldn’t have stopped it if he’d wanted to, and he hadn’t. But the end of the night they find themselves sitting too close in the booth - despite the fact that the majority of the others who had squashed them together in the first place are gone - gesturing over each other in conversation.
They fall, literally, into a cab - there strangely being only one and no others in sight - somehow managing to tangle their legs together. Julian ending up half on the seat, half on the grimy rubber floor mat, Michael half-sitting half-leaning over him.
Much to the driver's annoyance Julian clean forgets his address for a good thirty seconds as Michael tries, and fails, to keep from sniggering; hand brushing Julian's shoulder, arm, chest as he tries to get himself far enough into the cab to shut the door.
The back seat seems smaller that usual to Julian but maybe it's just that he hardly ever shares cabs with anyone. Or maybe it's that he can't seem to stop leaning against Michael (not that the other man seems to mind) or the way Michael seems to fill up the space. There's something bigger than life about him. Something that Julian can almost put his finger on, almost articulate.
Julian wakes with his head nearly in Michael's lap and Michael's arm draped across his chest. He can't have fallen asleep for more than two minutes, but the contents of the thought are gone (though the fact that there had been a thought, something he'd wanted to hold on to, isn't). The cab has already sped off - splashing him with particularly nasty puddle water - before he can reconcile what, if anything, had happened or what the look on Michael's face as he had said good night meant. By the time he has fumbled his way into his apartment (stupid always burnt out hall light) the cab ride, and the entire night, have been distilled to a pleasant, very pleasant, haze.
He avoided the cafe for nearly a week after that night, until he managed to convince himself that there was no reason at all he should feel strange about seeing Michael again. And he doesn't, and hasn't. Except for now and Kimball and the strange insistent feeling that the two must not find out about each other.
He looks down at the paper. He’s apparently made it to the editorials but doesn't remember reading anything on the front page. He might as well have not read any of it at all.
It's minutes before noon, and the cafe is slowly filling with people, groups of high school girls and middle aged women and contrived skater punks, each of them talking about their own brand of stupid shit. The bits of their conversations that he really wishes he couldn't overhear make him want to turn around and tell them all to shut the fuck up. Julian makes his exit quickly and authoritatively, like someone who’s just remembered a very important appointment, before Michael appears.
Back on the street the rain is still falling steadily but at least he can’t hear anyone else’s conversations for all it’s pounding on metal and concrete and brick. He doesn't want to go home, nor does he want to be anywhere there are people. Hoping for warmth, he shoves his hands deeper into his pockets as he walks.
The buildings steadily give way from concrete and metal and glass to brick and stone and wood as he reaches the older parts of the city. Here it’s almost like time has stopped if he looks in the right direction. Julian plays the same game he's been playing since he discovered these streets a year ago, turning his head and ducking down alleys and around corners at the correct moment to block out all evidence of the 21st century.
He wonders if life really was easier back when the buildings were first built, when the population of the area first grew from town to city, or if it's just that the problems were different then. He suspects it's the latter.
ps: lotsa lotsa love to longsunday for bugging me to continue with this.
This here is my adventure into the world of original fiction. When I posted the first part there wasn't a name. Now there is, it's called Fog. It's unbetaed for now (my plan is to one day finish it and make real chapter length chapters and continuity and stuff). Until then we have Part 2 in which Julian is grumpy and we meet Michael, sort of.
Part 1, etc.
Fog - Part 2
The next morning it all seems rather like a dream, the events of the previous day, one of those dreams in which everything is disturbingly vivid and real, but a dream none the less. Julian stays in bed as long as he can willing himself to go back to sleep, trying to reassure himself that it really was a dream. The remnants of scotch pounding against the inside of his skull tell him otherwise.
He stays in bed long enough that he is annoyed with himself for laying there so long trying to avoid something that there is no avoiding. He’s not quite sure it needs avoiding in the first place or even what 'it' is. It's just instinct he supposes, wanting to avoid things that don't make sense or seem half threatening, but his instincts are those of a house cat, not a lynx, and he has a feeling they are likely to lead him astray.
There is not, as he had feared there would be, a man in a blue silk suit lounging on his couch - making it look even shabbier by comparison - idylly puffing on a cigarette. Though the smoke lingers in the air. Julian wrinkles his nose and wishes he had never stopped on that corner the previous day, never even spared a glance.
There is an empty bottle of scotch on the table and... Kimball (if that is his real name) was right, Julian’s apartment is disastrously messy, appallingly disorganized. Suddenly it feels too full, the acrid scent of expensive tobacco and the piles of unwanted papers; junk mail that hasn’t made it to the recycle bin and things he’s not quite sure why he’s saved. It is all too much. He forgets to grab his coat in his haste to get out the door.
It's pouring outside, and by the time he makes it to the cafe his shirt is soaked through, but the chai is warm and just-right spicy. He wishes he could wrap himself in the foam, a cloud of cardamom cinnamon milk fuzz, and stop his brain churning.
Julian makes a valiant but incredibly unsuccessful effort to read, at least, the articles on the front page of the newspaper he finds on the table, anything to take his mind off the fact that the events of the previous night disturb him as much as they do. Weird is one thing and it isn’t like he’s never met an odd character before (hell he's still friends with most of those he has met) there is no reason why Kimball should freak him out so much. He just does. That's the part that really gets to him, the ambiguity of the man. The way he seems to be much more that he let on, and then the fact that Julian is sure that's exactly what Kimball wants him to think. That's his trick, and Julian fell for it hook line and sinker.
What had Kimball meant by properly informed? Properly informed of what, and by who? The bastard had weaseled out of answering every question Julian had asked, and he couldn't help but think that he was missing something. Maybe there had been more than scotch in the scotch. This is not the sort of shit that happens. Not to regular people anyway, certainly not to him. He feels like he's being set up. But it's got to be just a feeling, right? Because who could possibly be behind it? Who does he know that knows anyone like Kimball and what would be the fucking point anyway. Fuck. He kicks the table leg in frustration sloshing chai over the edge of the table and onto the floor. He doesn't notice. And, now that he thinks about it (or is trying not to, really) Kimball was in his dream last night. Great.
The whole relaxing drink tea and read the paper thing isn't going so well. He takes a deep breath. "Nothing bad is happening here," he mutters to himself, but he can't stop the voice in the back of his head from adding yet. It's getting on toward noon and the start of Michael's shift. Michael who will flash his disarming smile at him and then Julian will inevitably say something about Kimball and, well. The entire situation is surreal enough as it is without bringing his, whatever Michael is to him, into it as well.
The first time Julian had walked up to the register and ordered a chai from him he had thought Michael was another one of those pretentious scenesters - someone whom talking to would automatically make Julian feel stupid, or at least very unhip - until he had smiled. It was a smile that made Julian feel like he was, if not the only person in the world, at least the most important.
It wasn’t until later that Julian realized that Michael smiled at everyone like that, but by that point the damage was done, there was a part of Julian’s brain that had decided there was a connection of some sort between the two of them and that was that. He found himself telling Michael things he really didn’t want to but couldn’t help. He would babble on until he said something really stupid and then retreat to a table around the corner, out of sight of the counter, and try to will himself not to be such an idiot. Wondering all the while, if Michael had any idea the sort of effect he had on Julian and if he had that effect on anyone else as well.
He’d always thought the name Michael was boring, average, until he met this particular one. Michaels (and even more commonly Mikes) had been a dime a dozen at school. Julian had always thought of it as a fall back name for unimaginative parents, but this Michael - Julian actually thinks of him as his Michael when he’s not paying attention - is somehow different. Suddenly the name has dimension, seems even vaguely exotic. Something old seen in an entirely new light, a new hair cut on an old friend and suddenly they look like a rock star.
There was a sense of effortless cool about Michael - though unlike Kimball’s, which held a certain sinisterness just under the surface, it was benign, friendly - it seemed to be not so much a part of him as a cloak he had wrapped around himself. Something that drew people to him, only a certain type of person, yes, but it did all the same and Julian, it seemed, was that type.
He somehow felt like he was part of the club with Michael, part of the in crowd - even if it was just the two of them - but not even that really. Just rather amazed at times that Michael would talk to him at all. Mostly he didn’t think about it, at least not in that way anyway, until some point in the middle of a conversation. Julian would manage some wonderfully clever comment and then (his downfall) realize it, and Michael would laugh.
After that all Julian would be able to think about was the comment and how he had said something that made Michael laugh and his mind would wander to the possibilities (whatever those were) that that held and he would inevitably miss the next thing Michael said. Watch the conversation unravel before his eyes, like a sweater on a nail, until he found himself just gazing at Michael and Michael not saying anything at all for a minute or a moment - the indeterminate period of time when everything is in such sharp focus that it's blurry and time itself is completely irrelevant - before the inevitable uber clean yuppie woman would push in front of him and order her double mocha late with lite (not light) soy milk.
Michael is the figure holding court at the booth in the back corner when Julian walks in to a bar - giving off all the signals to indicate they are having a very interesting and engaging conversation - sitting, half lounging, long arms elegantly draped over the seat back on either side of him. He beckons Julian over with a gesture that seems to say more than he can quite pick up on. A gesture steeped in implication.
Conversation that had been easy over caffeine is like breathing over alcohol. Julian couldn’t have stopped it if he’d wanted to, and he hadn’t. But the end of the night they find themselves sitting too close in the booth - despite the fact that the majority of the others who had squashed them together in the first place are gone - gesturing over each other in conversation.
They fall, literally, into a cab - there strangely being only one and no others in sight - somehow managing to tangle their legs together. Julian ending up half on the seat, half on the grimy rubber floor mat, Michael half-sitting half-leaning over him.
Much to the driver's annoyance Julian clean forgets his address for a good thirty seconds as Michael tries, and fails, to keep from sniggering; hand brushing Julian's shoulder, arm, chest as he tries to get himself far enough into the cab to shut the door.
The back seat seems smaller that usual to Julian but maybe it's just that he hardly ever shares cabs with anyone. Or maybe it's that he can't seem to stop leaning against Michael (not that the other man seems to mind) or the way Michael seems to fill up the space. There's something bigger than life about him. Something that Julian can almost put his finger on, almost articulate.
Julian wakes with his head nearly in Michael's lap and Michael's arm draped across his chest. He can't have fallen asleep for more than two minutes, but the contents of the thought are gone (though the fact that there had been a thought, something he'd wanted to hold on to, isn't). The cab has already sped off - splashing him with particularly nasty puddle water - before he can reconcile what, if anything, had happened or what the look on Michael's face as he had said good night meant. By the time he has fumbled his way into his apartment (stupid always burnt out hall light) the cab ride, and the entire night, have been distilled to a pleasant, very pleasant, haze.
He avoided the cafe for nearly a week after that night, until he managed to convince himself that there was no reason at all he should feel strange about seeing Michael again. And he doesn't, and hasn't. Except for now and Kimball and the strange insistent feeling that the two must not find out about each other.
He looks down at the paper. He’s apparently made it to the editorials but doesn't remember reading anything on the front page. He might as well have not read any of it at all.
It's minutes before noon, and the cafe is slowly filling with people, groups of high school girls and middle aged women and contrived skater punks, each of them talking about their own brand of stupid shit. The bits of their conversations that he really wishes he couldn't overhear make him want to turn around and tell them all to shut the fuck up. Julian makes his exit quickly and authoritatively, like someone who’s just remembered a very important appointment, before Michael appears.
Back on the street the rain is still falling steadily but at least he can’t hear anyone else’s conversations for all it’s pounding on metal and concrete and brick. He doesn't want to go home, nor does he want to be anywhere there are people. Hoping for warmth, he shoves his hands deeper into his pockets as he walks.
The buildings steadily give way from concrete and metal and glass to brick and stone and wood as he reaches the older parts of the city. Here it’s almost like time has stopped if he looks in the right direction. Julian plays the same game he's been playing since he discovered these streets a year ago, turning his head and ducking down alleys and around corners at the correct moment to block out all evidence of the 21st century.
He wonders if life really was easier back when the buildings were first built, when the population of the area first grew from town to city, or if it's just that the problems were different then. He suspects it's the latter.
ps: lotsa lotsa love to longsunday for bugging me to continue with this.