A:tS FIC: In Memoriam (Connor, R)
I can't stop eating. Gah. Stupid hormones. Anyway. I was thinking of formative moments, and came up with this. I'm sleep deprived, so it may suck. Meh.
*
Title: In Memoriam
Fandom: A:tS
Summary: Connor & sex.
*
When Connor was a snotty-nosed pre-teen, one of the high schooler friends of his best mate's older brother let him look at some porn mags. The woman inside the magazine - he only saw one, across a couple of pages - was very naked. Like, completely naked. Like, she didn't even have hair. Now, Connor was no expert on the subject, but he was pretty sure that hair was supposed to be appearing on several key areas in accordance with what his Health teacher had said. He'd asked the best mate's big brother's friend about this, and the high schooler, who was, like, years older than him - maybe sixteen, even - said that the woman had shaved it all off. Like a guy shaved his face.
Well, Connor had thought that this was quite possibly the grossest thing he had ever heard of, and said so. No way a woman put a razor near there, that was just all kinds of wrong! Guys like their women smooth, the high schooler said with the infinite wisdom of the almost-laid. Makes them feel like young girls.
Connor thought that this, too, was rather gross. Who'd want to do sex stuff with a young girl? You wouldn't want to do it with someone too old, ok, that would be gross, but all the girls his age were, well, girls. They still liked their My Little Ponies and went about swooning over Brad Pitt. Ew. I like high school girls, he told the high schooler. I don't know if I want to do all that sex stuff with them yet, though. Do they look like that under their clothes?
The high schooler laughed. Better, he said. Man, you are so gonna enjoy getting laid, I bet you're gonna be a real player when you grow up.
Connor frowned. I don't think so, he said.
*
Touching Cordelia that first time was a revelation. He'd never seen a girl before he saw her, and it was most definitely the first time he'd seen one naked. His father had tried to explain with short, stuttered sentences here and there, what the concept of 'woman' was - his slut mother, and the fighter Justine, and the dead children the monster that had sired him had killed. Somehow, when you put them all together, you came up with 'woman'.
Well, something had clearly gone wrong at some point, because his concept of 'woman' did not match Cordelia; not at all.
Connor, she said, twisting beneath him. She had curves across her entire body, dipping in and out in soft swells of breast and hip and thigh. Connor, touch me. Connor. Please.
*
The first girl he touched in any sort of sexual way was called Marissa, and it happened behind the bleachers. Very Americana, huh? Marissa had long, straight black hair, and her nose scrunched up when she laughed. She drew hearts on her notebooks, and hung out with her friends after school, and wore emerald-coloured braces on her teeth. He remembers - he was so nervous, he'd been thinking about this for a while, trying to figure out a way to bring up the subject without having her leave because he'd said it wrong. When it did happen, it turned out that he didn't have to do anything. Marissa tasted of her morning coffee when he kissed her, and she helped him to slide a hand underneath her red sweater, cooing encouragement into his mouth.
Her schoolbooks fell on the grass, forgotten.
*
He wasn't too sure if he was supposed to keep touching her. He wanted to - of course he did! - but Cordelia wouldn't sometimes. Sometimes she said it was her 'time of the month', which he didn't really understand and which she didn't trouble to explain; sometimes she said she didn't feel like it. Sometimes she wanted him to do something first, and only later would touch him.
He has the feeling that he's being manipulated, but there isn't a great deal he can do about it. After all, it's not like he has a father to ask for advice.
*
His dad wanted to have a talk with him; did the whole 'birds and bees' thing that Connor sat through with a highly visible level of mortification staining his face. He couldn't quite figure out a way to break in and say that they'd already covered this at school, and he knew precisely what to do - and, more importantly, what not to do. His dad was helpful in one respect, though. He left behind some reading material, and a couple of other things. And, hey - condoms are expensive.
*
When he closes his eyes and holds himself still, his hand against Cordelia's belly, he can feel the baby kick.
Do you feel that, Connor? She asks, time and again. That's our child. Our baby.
Yes, he says. He does not ask, how do you know. He does not ask, why didn't you make it not happen. He does not ask, why are you happy. The horror on everyone's face tells him that this isn't something that he is supposed to want. This isn't something that Cordelia is supposed to want.
A ruined woman, his father whispers, long dead. A ruined woman and a damned child in her belly; this is what you take to your bed?
*
He didn't actually sleep with Marissa. Their whole fling had been flung by the end of his junior year, and he started senior year still a virgin. He wasn't too bothered about this, actually, despite what his friends implied, because he'd had a few offers. He reasoned that you only needed to be worried if you couldn't get any; evidently, he could afford to be choosy. And why not?
It's not like there was a deadline to these things.
*
He goes to Cordelia's grave. It's odd, somehow to be there: the grave of this woman he has never met, who played such a large part in the life he never led. There is no marker for Jasmine's death; his child, it seems, never existed.
Cordelia. I think - he says, and stops. Coughs. Draws breath and tries again. I don't know you, I know. And so I guess this is weird. But I think - I think I miss you. I think I miss both of you.
The stone says nothing.
He leaves the roses on the grass; takes the jasmine with him.
It has no place there anymore.
*
fin
*
Title: In Memoriam
Fandom: A:tS
Summary: Connor & sex.
*
When Connor was a snotty-nosed pre-teen, one of the high schooler friends of his best mate's older brother let him look at some porn mags. The woman inside the magazine - he only saw one, across a couple of pages - was very naked. Like, completely naked. Like, she didn't even have hair. Now, Connor was no expert on the subject, but he was pretty sure that hair was supposed to be appearing on several key areas in accordance with what his Health teacher had said. He'd asked the best mate's big brother's friend about this, and the high schooler, who was, like, years older than him - maybe sixteen, even - said that the woman had shaved it all off. Like a guy shaved his face.
Well, Connor had thought that this was quite possibly the grossest thing he had ever heard of, and said so. No way a woman put a razor near there, that was just all kinds of wrong! Guys like their women smooth, the high schooler said with the infinite wisdom of the almost-laid. Makes them feel like young girls.
Connor thought that this, too, was rather gross. Who'd want to do sex stuff with a young girl? You wouldn't want to do it with someone too old, ok, that would be gross, but all the girls his age were, well, girls. They still liked their My Little Ponies and went about swooning over Brad Pitt. Ew. I like high school girls, he told the high schooler. I don't know if I want to do all that sex stuff with them yet, though. Do they look like that under their clothes?
The high schooler laughed. Better, he said. Man, you are so gonna enjoy getting laid, I bet you're gonna be a real player when you grow up.
Connor frowned. I don't think so, he said.
*
Touching Cordelia that first time was a revelation. He'd never seen a girl before he saw her, and it was most definitely the first time he'd seen one naked. His father had tried to explain with short, stuttered sentences here and there, what the concept of 'woman' was - his slut mother, and the fighter Justine, and the dead children the monster that had sired him had killed. Somehow, when you put them all together, you came up with 'woman'.
Well, something had clearly gone wrong at some point, because his concept of 'woman' did not match Cordelia; not at all.
Connor, she said, twisting beneath him. She had curves across her entire body, dipping in and out in soft swells of breast and hip and thigh. Connor, touch me. Connor. Please.
*
The first girl he touched in any sort of sexual way was called Marissa, and it happened behind the bleachers. Very Americana, huh? Marissa had long, straight black hair, and her nose scrunched up when she laughed. She drew hearts on her notebooks, and hung out with her friends after school, and wore emerald-coloured braces on her teeth. He remembers - he was so nervous, he'd been thinking about this for a while, trying to figure out a way to bring up the subject without having her leave because he'd said it wrong. When it did happen, it turned out that he didn't have to do anything. Marissa tasted of her morning coffee when he kissed her, and she helped him to slide a hand underneath her red sweater, cooing encouragement into his mouth.
Her schoolbooks fell on the grass, forgotten.
*
He wasn't too sure if he was supposed to keep touching her. He wanted to - of course he did! - but Cordelia wouldn't sometimes. Sometimes she said it was her 'time of the month', which he didn't really understand and which she didn't trouble to explain; sometimes she said she didn't feel like it. Sometimes she wanted him to do something first, and only later would touch him.
He has the feeling that he's being manipulated, but there isn't a great deal he can do about it. After all, it's not like he has a father to ask for advice.
*
His dad wanted to have a talk with him; did the whole 'birds and bees' thing that Connor sat through with a highly visible level of mortification staining his face. He couldn't quite figure out a way to break in and say that they'd already covered this at school, and he knew precisely what to do - and, more importantly, what not to do. His dad was helpful in one respect, though. He left behind some reading material, and a couple of other things. And, hey - condoms are expensive.
*
When he closes his eyes and holds himself still, his hand against Cordelia's belly, he can feel the baby kick.
Do you feel that, Connor? She asks, time and again. That's our child. Our baby.
Yes, he says. He does not ask, how do you know. He does not ask, why didn't you make it not happen. He does not ask, why are you happy. The horror on everyone's face tells him that this isn't something that he is supposed to want. This isn't something that Cordelia is supposed to want.
A ruined woman, his father whispers, long dead. A ruined woman and a damned child in her belly; this is what you take to your bed?
*
He didn't actually sleep with Marissa. Their whole fling had been flung by the end of his junior year, and he started senior year still a virgin. He wasn't too bothered about this, actually, despite what his friends implied, because he'd had a few offers. He reasoned that you only needed to be worried if you couldn't get any; evidently, he could afford to be choosy. And why not?
It's not like there was a deadline to these things.
*
He goes to Cordelia's grave. It's odd, somehow to be there: the grave of this woman he has never met, who played such a large part in the life he never led. There is no marker for Jasmine's death; his child, it seems, never existed.
Cordelia. I think - he says, and stops. Coughs. Draws breath and tries again. I don't know you, I know. And so I guess this is weird. But I think - I think I miss you. I think I miss both of you.
The stone says nothing.
He leaves the roses on the grass; takes the jasmine with him.
It has no place there anymore.
*
fin