Happy Fourth!
I realized today that TWO WHOLE FICS that I have written contain scenes set during the Fourth of July and containing fireworks. So, I thought I'd get this post in under the wire with these two scenes, in celebration of the holiday!
This first excerpt is from the fourth chapter of my Justified fic I Read on a Hillside Gravestone. Raylan is waiting for Boyd to come see him. :)
Raylan was real careful about driving up to the outcrop. He’d only been there a few times, and tonight his head was pounding and his jaw was aching and his tummy was rumbling. He should have felt like complete and utter shit, but really he felt fine, he felt like… really good. He smiled through his careful concentration, thinking how upset Boyd would be if he wrapped his pickup ‘round a tree on his way up there.
The fireworks had just started as he got the pick-up backed up as close to the rocks as he could. He pulled the emergency blanket out of the cab and laid it out on the bed. Raylan then laid himself down and took in the show.
The Crowders always did put on some nice fireworks, not anything like the county or the town could afford, but it was small and pretty, real artistic like. Flashes of red and blue and green appeared in the sky with that loud crack and the boom following. And those white ones that shot up like rockets, stringing stars behind them like a comet, those were Raylan’s favorite.
The finale was short, but intrepid in its use of a shit ton of fireworks in about a thirty second period and Raylan could hear Boyd’s whoop all the way up where he was. Boy, did that maniac love to blow shit up.
This next one is from a way old Labyrinth fic that I wrote. It follows this fic, and can be found here. This is basically the last few hundred words of the story. It was a song fic, you know, 'cause I did that. The song was "Waiting for the Moon to Rise" by Belle and Sebastian.
And then he heard it, a snap, like a match, a louder crack and a whiz from across the silent park. Then the sky ignited, shining silver light over the water. The fireworks had begun, and the two of them were right underneath it.
Red, blue, green and gold light followed. It played across the dark water of the lake and it illuminated Sarah’s tearstained face.
And the noise was almost deafening. Nothing more could be said now, so they stood and watched them. Sarah had taken a few steps towards him onto the bridge, so that the trees on the far side would not obstruct her view. They were close now, but not so close that he could touch her. He turned to her and smiled, and she tentatively smiled back. The answers didn’t seem so necessary now.
The light soared up into the night sky and the smoke fell right back down. When the finale began in earnest, it was all explosions and noise, one after the other, two, three and four at a time, more and more and more. The light was so bright it hurt the eyes, but he couldn’t look away. He couldn’t see, or feel, or think anything else.
When it was over, and no more flew into the night, he felt almost hollow. His ears were ringing and everything seemed dark. The sky seemed black and forbidding now. He could see no stars. It was as if they had all spent their energy in one shining terrible moment, but had now fallen to earth. He felt as if the sky could swallow him whole with its darkness. He turned, to find Sarah gone from his side.
I was following a trail
I'd never been along before
Chasing darkened skies above me
He watched the smoke move silently across the water from the open field where all those stars had shot from. It was grey and opaque, and it flowed over the water, like fog in the early morning. But it was only just dusk, or had he spent the entire night with Sarah again?
He laughed at himself. He’d never spent a night with her, just a few moments of reality and then she dwelled only in his thoughts.
The smoke rolled over him. It smelled acrid and it tasted like ashes in his mouth. But it caught the light, or maybe it retained something from those fallen stars. Everything looked a little brighter.
This first excerpt is from the fourth chapter of my Justified fic I Read on a Hillside Gravestone. Raylan is waiting for Boyd to come see him. :)
Raylan was real careful about driving up to the outcrop. He’d only been there a few times, and tonight his head was pounding and his jaw was aching and his tummy was rumbling. He should have felt like complete and utter shit, but really he felt fine, he felt like… really good. He smiled through his careful concentration, thinking how upset Boyd would be if he wrapped his pickup ‘round a tree on his way up there.
The fireworks had just started as he got the pick-up backed up as close to the rocks as he could. He pulled the emergency blanket out of the cab and laid it out on the bed. Raylan then laid himself down and took in the show.
The Crowders always did put on some nice fireworks, not anything like the county or the town could afford, but it was small and pretty, real artistic like. Flashes of red and blue and green appeared in the sky with that loud crack and the boom following. And those white ones that shot up like rockets, stringing stars behind them like a comet, those were Raylan’s favorite.
The finale was short, but intrepid in its use of a shit ton of fireworks in about a thirty second period and Raylan could hear Boyd’s whoop all the way up where he was. Boy, did that maniac love to blow shit up.
This next one is from a way old Labyrinth fic that I wrote. It follows this fic, and can be found here. This is basically the last few hundred words of the story. It was a song fic, you know, 'cause I did that. The song was "Waiting for the Moon to Rise" by Belle and Sebastian.
And then he heard it, a snap, like a match, a louder crack and a whiz from across the silent park. Then the sky ignited, shining silver light over the water. The fireworks had begun, and the two of them were right underneath it.
Red, blue, green and gold light followed. It played across the dark water of the lake and it illuminated Sarah’s tearstained face.
And the noise was almost deafening. Nothing more could be said now, so they stood and watched them. Sarah had taken a few steps towards him onto the bridge, so that the trees on the far side would not obstruct her view. They were close now, but not so close that he could touch her. He turned to her and smiled, and she tentatively smiled back. The answers didn’t seem so necessary now.
The light soared up into the night sky and the smoke fell right back down. When the finale began in earnest, it was all explosions and noise, one after the other, two, three and four at a time, more and more and more. The light was so bright it hurt the eyes, but he couldn’t look away. He couldn’t see, or feel, or think anything else.
When it was over, and no more flew into the night, he felt almost hollow. His ears were ringing and everything seemed dark. The sky seemed black and forbidding now. He could see no stars. It was as if they had all spent their energy in one shining terrible moment, but had now fallen to earth. He felt as if the sky could swallow him whole with its darkness. He turned, to find Sarah gone from his side.
I was following a trail
I'd never been along before
Chasing darkened skies above me
He watched the smoke move silently across the water from the open field where all those stars had shot from. It was grey and opaque, and it flowed over the water, like fog in the early morning. But it was only just dusk, or had he spent the entire night with Sarah again?
He laughed at himself. He’d never spent a night with her, just a few moments of reality and then she dwelled only in his thoughts.
The smoke rolled over him. It smelled acrid and it tasted like ashes in his mouth. But it caught the light, or maybe it retained something from those fallen stars. Everything looked a little brighter.