Here's Chapter Two *sigh* I need to keep a beta with me at all times.
I have a tendency to listen to one song on repete when I write a fic. The song generally reflects the mood of the piece and I use it to keep me focused. This chapter, however, is the product of switching between NIN's Something I Can Never Have and Johnny Cash's rendition of Hurt. My muse apparently didn't like the lack of cohesion and this chapter went all over the place as a result. So, it's sloppy and maudalin. My bad. I'm hoping chapter three goes easier. Now I just need to find its song so I can get back to writing. I'm thinking I'll either go with Vitas's Opera #2 or something from 30 Seconds To Mars. I'll be just sticking to one song though. I don't think I can handle the mental switch up with that combo. The fic would probably end up in Hogwarts or something.
Also- sorry it took so long. WoW released patch 3.2 and I've been game-nerding instead of fic-nerding.
Title: Whipping Bottles
Chapter Two: Memories Hum
Characters: Oh screw it, everybody’s here but Bobby D and he’ll probably show up if I’m not careful. Mary and Marshall star, as always, but other people pop in for plot purposes.
Rating: Code Tangerine: Language, Violence, and A Level of Marshall Pissiness Never Before Seen
Summary: Mary gets her angry drunk on and Brandi convinces Raph to hide. Marshall doesn’t hide though. No- Marshall faces Mary’s drunk head on and with a vengeance. Oh- and it starts out with a lot of BrandiRaphJinx but they’re only there for exposition purposes. Don’t worry. There’s plenty of MaryMarshall action in chapter two.
Spoilers: Mild spoilers. Nothing specific really but I reference something from the USA spoiler video for ‘Ponzi’. I know, however, that this won’t fit in the timeline so technically this is an AU.
Chapter One: Like Little Glass Grenades
The rattle of the front door startled Raph. What surprised him even more was the sound of keys turning in the lock. He lived there and he didn’t have keys yet. So it wasn’t that much of surprise when Raph felt a twinge of annoyance when Marshall strode into the house. ‘He doesn’t even live here,’ Raph thought, ‘Why the hell does he get keys and I don’t?’
Without sparing a glance to the three people on the couch, Marshall stalked over to the back door and threw it open. Brandi, Jinx and Raph looked at each other in shock from the usually laid-back man’s abrupt entrance and exit. It seemed like Mary wasn’t the only one having a bad day and all three wondered if a fight between the partners was the reason for the case of beer. Whatever the cause of the blatant hostility from both marshals didn’t matter at the moment. All that mattered to the three people inside the house was the imminent train-wreck and they scrambled to the window to watch.
Marshall showed no fear as he stomped down the back steps. On the other side of the yard, Mary sat barefoot and cross-legged on a lounger staring at the reflection of the moonlight on the pool. She didn’t even look before she lobbed a bottle towards her partner. Brandi and Jinx cringed from behind the pane of glass. The toss was a little low and would have missed Marshall completely had he not quickened his pace to intercept it. In one fluid motion, Marshall snatched the bottle out of the air and launched it back towards Mary with a surprising amount of force.
The bottle shattered against the concrete privacy wall behind Mary and exploded in a shower of tiny shards. From inside the house, Brandi and Jinx gasped in unison. It had missed Mary by a good five feet but her head jerked up like it had hit her. She stared, in shock, as her partner crossed the yard in a barely contained rage. Despite not being about to hear, those inside the house could easily read Mary’s lips.
“Jesus Marshall- what the hell?”
* * *
Marshall glared down at Mary in response to her question. It wasn’t fair. She drops two huge bombs on him in a matter of days but she’s the one that gets to go home and get drunk? He had been planning on spending the night at the bottom of a bottle but, instead, had been searching in vain through her hellishly unorganized computer for a report that Stan had been bugging her about for days. Common courtesy had never been Mary’s strong suit but she had really been pushing it lately. She didn’t tell him she was engaged. She didn’t talk to him before she told Raph about the job. She couldn’t even turn in her own paperwork and now she was throwing bottles at him. Granted, he knew she hadn’t been trying to hit him when she threw it, but it still pissed him off. After everything he had done for her, she was treating him like everyone else in her life. She was pushing him away and he was sick of it.
“If you’re going to pull this shit again,” Marshall snapped, “then keep your goddamned phone with you.”
Mary blinked rapidly and tried to focus. Marshall could see the confusion and hurt in her face but it was really hard for him to care. She had hurt him so many time over the past few years and it was about damn time for her to get a hint of what he had been feeling.
Quietly, very quietly, she asked, “Did I miss a call from you?”
Marshall closed his eyes and tried counting to ten. When that didn’t work, he just kept his eyes closed and responded as calmly as he could, “Not from me. Stan needs your DAF report and we can’t find it. He called but Raph wouldn’t bring you your phone because you were throwing bottles.”
“Oh.” Mary bit her lip and turned back to watching the lights bouncing on the water.
“Mare,” Marshall waved his hand in front of her face, “Where’s the report?”
She turned her face to look up at him. There was no way she could mistake the neutral façade he knew he wore. She had seen it enough over the years and she had to know how angry he was. For someone that could be so oblivious sometimes, she could always read him like a book. Well, except for that one thing but Marshall never knew if she couldn’t tell or if she just chose to ignore it.
“I put it under yours. It should be on your desk.”
Whipping out his cell phone, Marshall called Stan and told him where to look. After a few second filled with the noise of shuffling paper, there was a triumphant “Finally!” and Stan promptly hung up so he could get the report faxed in. Job completed, Marshall turned to leave.
“Wait!”
Her voice called out, compelling him in so many ways, and he stopped. He didn’t turn around, didn’t face her because he couldn’t see her looking sad and lost without losing the anger. Right now, he needed that anger. He needed to feel betrayed or he’d go insane. So, instead of putting himself through the hell of forgiving her and hating himself, he said in a voice as rough as sandpaper, “Why should I?”
There was a slapping of feet against concrete and Marshall sighed as he felt Mary’s hand on his shoulder. The light touch was more painful than the usual punch. Weariness killed the anger and Marshall could feel himself turning towards her against his will.
“When are you going to stop being mad at me,” she asked.
“I don’t know.” Such a simple answer- completely devoid of his normal verbose ramblings. But the question wasn’t so simple. When can a person stop feeling betrayed? What could she do to make the empty pit inside whole again? She couldn’t untell Raph. As difficult as it was to admit that there was something he didn’t know, it was worse to admit to himself that it wasn’t just her telling Raph about the job that was the problem. The problem was that she was pushing him away and he couldn’t handle that. Together they were a tornado- she was the whirling chaos and he was the calm center that kept their path focused. Without him, Mary would just be unconstrained fury and without her, he would just be still. Boring and bored in the silence. He needed her just as much as she needed him. But how the hell could he tell her that without making her push him further away?
“Marshall,” her voice was like a whisper as she reached up and touched his cheek. She pulled his attention to her face like she knew it would and Marshall felt it all disappear. The shock and anger from when she couldn’t tell him in words that she had already told Raph about the job. The hurt from finding out that she had been engaged long enough to get a tan line on her finger but hadn’t told him. The bitterness of loosing her even though she wasn’t gone. She was just changing and his was missing her a little more each day.
“Mare,” he breathed out as he tucked as strand of her hair that had fallen loose back behind her ear. How was he supposed to stay mad at her? She was Mary. His brash and wild Mary. She was his partner and friend and he never could deny her anything. The anger was to help him cope but seeing it hurt her like this made it hard to understand why he was putting her through this.
Mary looked up at him curiously and Marshall knew he was teetering off the edge of anger and plummeting into forgiveness. What had been done was done and there wasn’t anything Marshall could do to stop how he felt. Just because he couldn’t have what he wanted didn’t mean that she didn’t deserve to be happy. The rage and bitterness submerged and a weary sense of loss was all that was left. There was nothing that he could do to stop the pain but now there was nothing that she could do that would make the resentment flood back in to encase his heart.
“Would you stop being mad if I told you I loved you too?”
Well, almost nothing.
Something in Marshall snapped and he couldn’t tell if it was his brain or his heart. She wouldn’t let him go and she wouldn’t stop toying with him. He didn’t care whether or not she knew how she could pull on his strings and tangle him in knots. The fact remained that she could and did. She threw his poorly concealed confession in his face and shattered whatever peace he had found. So Marshall did what he had seen Mary do so many times before when people got too close to her.
He pushed.
Also- sorry it took so long. WoW released patch 3.2 and I've been game-nerding instead of fic-nerding.
Title: Whipping Bottles
Chapter Two: Memories Hum
Characters: Oh screw it, everybody’s here but Bobby D and he’ll probably show up if I’m not careful. Mary and Marshall star, as always, but other people pop in for plot purposes.
Rating: Code Tangerine: Language, Violence, and A Level of Marshall Pissiness Never Before Seen
Summary: Mary gets her angry drunk on and Brandi convinces Raph to hide. Marshall doesn’t hide though. No- Marshall faces Mary’s drunk head on and with a vengeance. Oh- and it starts out with a lot of BrandiRaphJinx but they’re only there for exposition purposes. Don’t worry. There’s plenty of MaryMarshall action in chapter two.
Spoilers: Mild spoilers. Nothing specific really but I reference something from the USA spoiler video for ‘Ponzi’. I know, however, that this won’t fit in the timeline so technically this is an AU.
Chapter One: Like Little Glass Grenades
The rattle of the front door startled Raph. What surprised him even more was the sound of keys turning in the lock. He lived there and he didn’t have keys yet. So it wasn’t that much of surprise when Raph felt a twinge of annoyance when Marshall strode into the house. ‘He doesn’t even live here,’ Raph thought, ‘Why the hell does he get keys and I don’t?’
Without sparing a glance to the three people on the couch, Marshall stalked over to the back door and threw it open. Brandi, Jinx and Raph looked at each other in shock from the usually laid-back man’s abrupt entrance and exit. It seemed like Mary wasn’t the only one having a bad day and all three wondered if a fight between the partners was the reason for the case of beer. Whatever the cause of the blatant hostility from both marshals didn’t matter at the moment. All that mattered to the three people inside the house was the imminent train-wreck and they scrambled to the window to watch.
Marshall showed no fear as he stomped down the back steps. On the other side of the yard, Mary sat barefoot and cross-legged on a lounger staring at the reflection of the moonlight on the pool. She didn’t even look before she lobbed a bottle towards her partner. Brandi and Jinx cringed from behind the pane of glass. The toss was a little low and would have missed Marshall completely had he not quickened his pace to intercept it. In one fluid motion, Marshall snatched the bottle out of the air and launched it back towards Mary with a surprising amount of force.
The bottle shattered against the concrete privacy wall behind Mary and exploded in a shower of tiny shards. From inside the house, Brandi and Jinx gasped in unison. It had missed Mary by a good five feet but her head jerked up like it had hit her. She stared, in shock, as her partner crossed the yard in a barely contained rage. Despite not being about to hear, those inside the house could easily read Mary’s lips.
“Jesus Marshall- what the hell?”
* * *
Marshall glared down at Mary in response to her question. It wasn’t fair. She drops two huge bombs on him in a matter of days but she’s the one that gets to go home and get drunk? He had been planning on spending the night at the bottom of a bottle but, instead, had been searching in vain through her hellishly unorganized computer for a report that Stan had been bugging her about for days. Common courtesy had never been Mary’s strong suit but she had really been pushing it lately. She didn’t tell him she was engaged. She didn’t talk to him before she told Raph about the job. She couldn’t even turn in her own paperwork and now she was throwing bottles at him. Granted, he knew she hadn’t been trying to hit him when she threw it, but it still pissed him off. After everything he had done for her, she was treating him like everyone else in her life. She was pushing him away and he was sick of it.
“If you’re going to pull this shit again,” Marshall snapped, “then keep your goddamned phone with you.”
Mary blinked rapidly and tried to focus. Marshall could see the confusion and hurt in her face but it was really hard for him to care. She had hurt him so many time over the past few years and it was about damn time for her to get a hint of what he had been feeling.
Quietly, very quietly, she asked, “Did I miss a call from you?”
Marshall closed his eyes and tried counting to ten. When that didn’t work, he just kept his eyes closed and responded as calmly as he could, “Not from me. Stan needs your DAF report and we can’t find it. He called but Raph wouldn’t bring you your phone because you were throwing bottles.”
“Oh.” Mary bit her lip and turned back to watching the lights bouncing on the water.
“Mare,” Marshall waved his hand in front of her face, “Where’s the report?”
She turned her face to look up at him. There was no way she could mistake the neutral façade he knew he wore. She had seen it enough over the years and she had to know how angry he was. For someone that could be so oblivious sometimes, she could always read him like a book. Well, except for that one thing but Marshall never knew if she couldn’t tell or if she just chose to ignore it.
“I put it under yours. It should be on your desk.”
Whipping out his cell phone, Marshall called Stan and told him where to look. After a few second filled with the noise of shuffling paper, there was a triumphant “Finally!” and Stan promptly hung up so he could get the report faxed in. Job completed, Marshall turned to leave.
“Wait!”
Her voice called out, compelling him in so many ways, and he stopped. He didn’t turn around, didn’t face her because he couldn’t see her looking sad and lost without losing the anger. Right now, he needed that anger. He needed to feel betrayed or he’d go insane. So, instead of putting himself through the hell of forgiving her and hating himself, he said in a voice as rough as sandpaper, “Why should I?”
There was a slapping of feet against concrete and Marshall sighed as he felt Mary’s hand on his shoulder. The light touch was more painful than the usual punch. Weariness killed the anger and Marshall could feel himself turning towards her against his will.
“When are you going to stop being mad at me,” she asked.
“I don’t know.” Such a simple answer- completely devoid of his normal verbose ramblings. But the question wasn’t so simple. When can a person stop feeling betrayed? What could she do to make the empty pit inside whole again? She couldn’t untell Raph. As difficult as it was to admit that there was something he didn’t know, it was worse to admit to himself that it wasn’t just her telling Raph about the job that was the problem. The problem was that she was pushing him away and he couldn’t handle that. Together they were a tornado- she was the whirling chaos and he was the calm center that kept their path focused. Without him, Mary would just be unconstrained fury and without her, he would just be still. Boring and bored in the silence. He needed her just as much as she needed him. But how the hell could he tell her that without making her push him further away?
“Marshall,” her voice was like a whisper as she reached up and touched his cheek. She pulled his attention to her face like she knew it would and Marshall felt it all disappear. The shock and anger from when she couldn’t tell him in words that she had already told Raph about the job. The hurt from finding out that she had been engaged long enough to get a tan line on her finger but hadn’t told him. The bitterness of loosing her even though she wasn’t gone. She was just changing and his was missing her a little more each day.
“Mare,” he breathed out as he tucked as strand of her hair that had fallen loose back behind her ear. How was he supposed to stay mad at her? She was Mary. His brash and wild Mary. She was his partner and friend and he never could deny her anything. The anger was to help him cope but seeing it hurt her like this made it hard to understand why he was putting her through this.
Mary looked up at him curiously and Marshall knew he was teetering off the edge of anger and plummeting into forgiveness. What had been done was done and there wasn’t anything Marshall could do to stop how he felt. Just because he couldn’t have what he wanted didn’t mean that she didn’t deserve to be happy. The rage and bitterness submerged and a weary sense of loss was all that was left. There was nothing that he could do to stop the pain but now there was nothing that she could do that would make the resentment flood back in to encase his heart.
“Would you stop being mad if I told you I loved you too?”
Well, almost nothing.
Something in Marshall snapped and he couldn’t tell if it was his brain or his heart. She wouldn’t let him go and she wouldn’t stop toying with him. He didn’t care whether or not she knew how she could pull on his strings and tangle him in knots. The fact remained that she could and did. She threw his poorly concealed confession in his face and shattered whatever peace he had found. So Marshall did what he had seen Mary do so many times before when people got too close to her.
He pushed.