BBC Merlin fanfiction - "In the end"; pg13

[reveuse2]

I've written fanfiction on and off for longer than I care to remember, in several universes. More off than on these days, while I strive to be strong and concentrate on my original fiction. But every now and then a show comes along and...I just can't help myself. Like BBC's "Merlin".

What's completely different about this one, for me, is that it's a real person fic. Something that I've read occasionally but never thought I'd be moved to write. Something which I still feel a little peculiar about but... The perversely enjoyable thing about "Merlin" is that the real person stuff (not that it is 'real' - we all know that, huh?) and the character stuff are equally fun...and, on occasion, interchangeable. (Someone wrote that already.)

Yes, of course, we're making all this up - but go watch some undeniably-slashy Merlin and Arthur and/or self-confessed bromancers Bradley and Colin, and you can absolutely see why. My 'get out of Uther's dungeon free' card is: they bring it on themselves!

Enough babble and on with the story. Inspired by three real life events and, other than that, comprised entirely of my own fevered imaginings.

Title: In the end
Rating: pg13
Word count: 4,291
Pairing: Bradley/Colin (implied)
Warnings: Adult language and concepts; excessive angst
Spoilers: None
Disclaimer: Not true, not mine, don't sue
Summary: Bradley's leaving Pierrefonds...Tony tries to stop him.

Author's note: I have no knowledge, professional or otherwise, of filming schedules, accident reports, how scary or not Ruth is, Eurostar timetables, or the workings of Bradley James' mind. I made it all up.

IN THE END

In the end, the arrival of the day he'd been dreading was a relief.

Bradley crossed the small, unnaturally tidy room and dropped his wash kit into the overstuffed bag lying on the floor beside the bed. He glanced around, knowing he wouldn’t spot anything else that should go in there, but needing to look anyway.

The Pudsey bear balanced among the dust bunnies on top of the wardrobe - his single concession to, on occasion, being the one who was ‘such a girl’. Half a handwritten sign taped to the back of the door - 'je suis loser' - its joke now firmly on him. The fuzzy photos tucked into the mirror frame - Richard on Space Mountain; the girls looning with the mime artists on one of their rare weekend escapes to Paris; Tony, splendid in Uther’s cape and crown, swearing at his Nintendo; and Colin...reading, grinning, hugging him in the pub, sleeping on Bradley’s bed - pictures downloaded from Bradley’s phone and printed onto cheap paper, a fading storyboard of the last two years of his life.

Bradley saw nothing that didn’t need to be left behind.

He dropped onto the bed, allowing the weakness in his knees and his chest just a moment; long enough to grind the heels of his hands against his eyelids and run his fingers through his still damp hair. And then he breathed. He breathed in the determination that had got him through drama school when just about everyone told him that average didn’t cut it, even if you were good looking, not if you wanted a real career; he breathed in the calm that had kept him at the table for the god awful Sunday lunch with-all-the-trimmings when he’d finally told his mother why he wouldn’t be celebrating his new-found success with that lovely Gina from the sixth form, or Emily from drama school, or any other member of the steady stream of “nice” girls he’d paraded through the house since he was 15. Most of all, he breathed in the strength that had driven him these last few weeks, helped him give some of the best...no, the best performances of his life, as Arthur opened his heart and Bradley quietly closed his down.

He breathed. And then he bent and pummelled the old army kit bag into submission until the zip closed. And then there was nothing to do but sit and wait, watching the sun fade at the window, imagining the colours as it sank behind the towers at Pierrefonds and the crew began lighting the torches he’d seen them place around the courtyard this morning.

The knock startled him - he was early and he’d expected the driver just to hit the horn - but Bradley was there in an instant, opening the door and looking back into the room as he said, “I’ll be with you in a minute, just let me get my bag.”

His French was less pathetic than usual. But then Colin had been so good at it from the start and, as Arthur might say, ‘why keep a dog and bark yourself?’, and Bradley had wanted to practice, to get better at it rather than embarrassing himself, and then, one day, to really, really surprise Colin by coming out with something perfect.

Bradley shook his head, wishing he could dislodge the unwanted thoughts and leave them on the dresser with the pictures they matched. He reached for his jacket and the open envelope beside it.

“Bradley?”

He froze at the sound of Tony’s deep voice.

“Bradley, what on earth...where are you going? I came to collect you, for the wrap party.”

He drew the jacket close to his chest, his other hand fisting tight around the envelope, crumpling it, as he turned around. “I told you I wasn’t going.”

“I know,” Tony took a step into the room, his eyes flickering from Bradley’s face to his bag and back again, “but I hoped you’d change your mind. None of us could bear the thought of you sitting here on your own, on the last night...”

Bradley could feel his heart beating against his hand, even through the several layers of wool he was clutching. “None of us?” he echoed quietly, “so you told them that I wasn’t coming? Why is it, do you think, that no-one takes my requests seriously?”

“C'mon, Bradley,” Tony took another couple of steps towards him, the length of his legs carrying him too far into Bradley’s space. Bradley took a step back, his calves bumping against the bed. “Yes, I told them. Did you think they wouldn’t notice when you didn’t turn up tonight?” Bradley willed his expression to stillness, thought he’d succeeded until Tony raised an eyebrow. “What, then? That they wouldn’t care? No...”

The bed prevented an elegant escape. He resorted to awkward side-stepping that took him further away from the door but closer to his bag. But Tony wasn’t stupid, or insensitive. He’d already seen, moved away enough to let Bradley breathe again. And now Tony was pacing, reasoning it out, mapping Bradley’s future just as surely as Uther had mapped Arthur’s - until these past few weeks. Weeks when the lines between fiction and reality had become curiously blurred, and both Bradley and his alter-ego had finally begun to accept that fulfilling their destinies might mean breaking with people they couldn’t imagine living without.

“It isn’t as bad as you think,” Tony was saying, “everyone's been wound tight, working all hours to get everything finished. Especially you and Colin... God knows, it’s no wonder tempers got frayed. And you’ve both been incredibly professional, putting your feelings to one side, not letting it affect your performances. But tonight’s the chance to let all that go. Have a few drinks and mend the bridges before we break for the winter.”

Tony’s voice washed over Bradley - rich, soothing, ineffective. Bradley stared at the floor, noticed the red wine stain peeking out from underneath the chair. He bit his lip as he pictured Colin’s long, lean limbs draped elegantly and undeniably drunkenly across that chair, red wine leaking from the bottom of a paper cup, trickling over Colin’s wrist and down one pale forearm...like blood...blooming into a bright stain at the elbow of his white shirt, dripping slowly onto the carpet at his feet. Bradley had been mesmerised, had wanted to crawl across the floor and lick the wine from Colin’s skin, suck the pulse he could see beating in that impossibly fragile wrist. Colin, on the other hand, had been hopping mad that Bradley hadn’t pointed out the leak until after he’d ruined a perfectly good shirt.

Bradley wanted to smile at the memory but his face wouldn’t let him. And Tony was still talking. Or, rather, he’d stopped talking and was trying to get Bradley to answer him.

“You do realise that, don’t you? Of course you do. Bradley?”

Bradley wondered whether his mouth would co-operate if he stopped biting his lip. In the end it didn’t go as badly as it might have, though he did have to clear his throat. “Sorry?”

He watched Tony take a deep breath, gathering his patience before he repeated himself. It wasn’t his fault, and he was trying to be helpful, and kind. Bradley accepted that. Tony simply didn’t have a clue.

“You realise you can’t let things fester over Christmas? It’s all very well for a couple of weeks but it’s past time you and Colin cleared the air. Look,” the skin around Tony’s eyes crinkled, his expression softening into concern, affection. Bradley wished it wouldn’t because it just made this harder. “I understand you’re not in the mood for a party - neither is he, I should think - but, well, the crew deserves for you to at least show your face, say thank you, and then you and Colin can go off and work things out. Get everything sorted so when you come back in February-”

“I’m not coming back.”

Tony’s mouth opened but no sound came out. He frowned and Bradley held out the envelope. Tony took it, slid out the crumpled sheet of paper, smoothed it and scanned it quickly from top to bottom. The frown lines were even deeper when he looked up. “You can’t send this. Bradley, you musn’t-”

“It’s already done,” Bradley interrupted quietly. “Emailed to the BBC, Shine and my agent an hour ago, and copies on Julian and Johnny’s desks.”

“Then withdraw it. Call them in the morning and say it was a mistake. They’ll understand - you’re young, hot tempered, working too hard...”

Bradley felt a smile flicker then, for a second or two. “All of which is true but I can’t take it back. I’ve had a lot of time to think about this, Tony.”

“A lot of time to think about how to throw away your career? Because that’s what you’re doing, Bradley - you do realise that, don’t you? You signed a contract - a five year contract - with one of the most powerful broadcasting companies in the world. They’ll sue. And even if they don’t, they’ll think twice before they ever employ you again. And so will everyone else. Do you know how many kids coming out of drama school would sell their souls for the chance you were given?”

Tony was pacing again, striding up and down the room with such force that the teacup on the bedside table rattled in its saucer and a pen vibrated against the glass-topped dresser. Bradley watched the pen creep towards the edge of the dresser imagining, when it fell, how it might feel to stretch out his hand and have his eyes flash gold as he suspended the pen in midair, then let it float gently to the floor. How good it would be to have the ability to suspend disaster like that; to freeze time and rearrange things just before your life crashed and burned.

“And what about your colleagues, your friends, Bradley? This could kill the show. Did you think about anyone but yourself before you did this?”

Bradley swallowed hard, didn’t flinch from the look Tony was giving him, reminded himself that Tony really didn’t have a clue, and that this was good practice for all the other confrontations and accusations he was going to face when he got home. Because Tony was right, it was going to be messy.

“My leaving won’t kill the show,” Bradley said firmly. Of this, at least, he was all too certain. “Like everyone says: Colin is ‘Merlin’ and ‘Merlin’ is Colin, but me? I’m just a pretty boy who’s good with a sword and there are plenty of those around. Who knows, one of those kids who wants to sell their soul might do a better job of it than I have.”

Tony looked genuinely shocked, which surprised Bradley - gave him some small satisfaction that he’d never felt before. Pity it was too late to make any difference.

“Bradley, you can’t mean that. You don’t really think...don’t you know what a great job you’re doing? The chemistry you two have-”

“Had. Whatever...” Bradley fought it again; bit down until he tasted blood. “Whatever we had, he...he killed it stone dead that day. And since then...” his voice dropped, “I can’t work like this, Tony - I can’t live like this for eight months a year. And even if I could...he can’t. You’ve seen what it's doing to him, we all have. When I watched him crumple like that, stretchered into a bloody ambulance, for Christ’s sake... I won’t be responsible for that.”

Bradley knew he was shaking all over now, not just his damned chin - but he couldn’t seem to stop. Until he realised Tony was right there, trying to put his arms around him, and Bradley couldn’t, he just couldn’t, because he knew if Tony held him, that he would finally, finally lose it and he wasn’t going to let himself do that. Not until he was gone from here; not until he was back in his flat in London, alone, and France was just another bad dream that he had to conquer.

“Don’t.”

The single word and the rigidity of Bradley’s body was enough to get Tony to back off - physically, at least. “Okay, okay. But why can’t you talk to him? For God’s sake, Bradley, you two have been thick as thieves for two years. How can one argument do so much damage? What the fuck did you say to each other?”

He’d never talked about it; couldn’t. And he knew Colin hadn’t, either, because otherwise everyone else would have stopped pestering him. After a few days, they did anyway - seeing him and Colin getting on with their work, apparently unaffected, made it easy for everyone to decide that whatever-it-was would blow over. So what if Colin and Bradley weren’t sitting next to each other at lunch, or bunking off to climb towers, or hanging out in the evening to watch DVDs and drink only a measly amount because they had to get up early and look fresh? They’d argued before, and sulked before, and they’d got over it.

Except that, before, it had been different. From whenever the row ended there’d be veiled looks, and jibes, and snarky texts; there’d be ridiculous faces, until one of them would crack and laugh and suddenly all the anger would be gone, and it was difficult to remember what they’d quarrelled about in the first place.

This time there was politeness, and professional courtesy, and a complete and utter lack of communication beyond exchanging lines on set. Bradley felt the temperature of his world drop by several degrees; found himself channelling the unbearable build up of heat in his body into the most passionate performances of his life; told himself it was co-incidence that Colin seemed to be channelling it right back. Colin had always been good, after all - always the better performer. Only now, Bradley was allowing himself to recognise that.

The silence between them was oppressive. Bradley honestly hadn’t realised how much of the noise of his days was the sound of Colin’s brogue until he didn’t hear it any more. And then the only thing left was to try to remember it. But every time he did, the words he heard were the last ones Colin had spoken to him. Never whole sentences - just big, heavy words like self-serving and manipulative and betrayal, that pressed on his chest like rocks; and small, sharp words like never and lie and you?, that slipped in between his ribs with the lethal precision of a blade. Of all of them, the last was the worst. The way Colin had said ‘you?’, and left that brutal fucking question mark hanging in the air between them until Bradley turned away from the damning look in those blue eyes and fled out of the door.

And now Tony was still waiting, in many ways deserving of an explanation, but how could Bradley possibly explain all that? How did you explain things that had always been left unsaid? Bradley didn’t doubt that everyone on ‘Merlin’ suspected how he felt about Colin - he wasn’t that good an actor, after all - but the point was that nobody knew; not for certain, not for a fact. And that gave him the room to breathe; to jump whichever way Colin wanted him to jump, if he ever wanted him to jump at all; if everything Colin might or might not want to receive, and Bradley might or might not want to give, wasn’t just left hanging in the air between them, forever.

Which was okay; which Bradley had accepted was unbelievably frustrating but less traumatic than the thought of his saying something and ruining everything. He’d left the ball very definitely in Colin Morgan’s court - his balls, he’d thought, allowing himself a moment of fantasy, very firmly in Colin Morgan’s hand. Where Colin might decide, one day, to give them a squeeze, or simply to let them go. What Bradley hadn’t anticipated was doing something which made Colin give them a vicious twist before ripping them right off.

He’d walked the tightrope so carefully, for so long. Always light-hearted but sincere; a few jokes to show he wasn’t threatened, never too blue to demonstrate that he took these things seriously. He took equal care in his responses to fan mail from everyone, regardless of age, gender or persuasion, and made sure he behaved the same way when he met them. And most of all - most of all - whenever he and Colin were together, alone or in company, he never, never came on too strong, or acted awkward on the rare occasions when Colin got drunk enough to be affectionate.

So very careful, until two seemingly harmless remarks - one off the cuff during a Q&A, the other a considered one during an interview - had mysteriously combined, in Colin’s head, into a lethal explosive. It wasn’t as if Bradley hadn’t joked about the fans mixing up Colin and him with Merlin and Arthur before and, although he’d never given their relationship a label in previous interviews, he had spoken about how well he and Colin got on. So when he’d walked into Colin’s room that night, ready to run lines for what they both knew was going to be a demanding scene the next morning, he’d had no inkling of what was about to hit him.

Bradley’s fall from the tightrope had been spectacular and bloody. Colin might have given nothing away in the previous two years about the extent of his feelings for Bradley, or his knowledge of Bradley’s for him, but he knew enough to ensure that every word hit Bradley’s vulnerable spots; left Bradley defenceless and hurting and totally incapable of hitting back. He was left in no doubt that Colin considered his privacy violated and Bradley irredeemably untrustworthy. And yet Bradley was still, and would now remain, totally and utterly in the dark about what, if anything, Colin had ever felt for him. It was exquisitely painful. It was masterfully done. It was worthy of Merlin.

He looked at Tony and he didn’t know where to start. The sound of a car horn gave him the excuse not to try. He slipped into his jacket and hefted his bag over his shoulder.

“Bradley, please,” Tony’s hand was gentle at his wrist, “don’t go like this. Let me talk to him. There must be something I can do."

Bradley gripped the older man’s arm. Strange how familiar it felt, like father and son, the lines blurring again. “There isn’t, but thank you. Thank you for everything. You’ve taught me such a lot and I’m sorry...” his throat felt tight and Tony’s eyes were shining. He had to get out of there. “I’m sorry if I’ve let you down.”

Tony drew him into a desperate hug, his hand tight around the back of Bradley’s skull, tugging his hair. “Bradley...”

He couldn’t return it, encumbered by more than the bulky bag slung across his shoulder. He pulled back and headed for the door.

“Your letter,” Tony called out and Bradley paused in the doorway, looked back. Tony held the creased sheet of paper out towards him.

Bradley shook his head. “Bin it. It was meant to be Colin’s copy but then...there didn’t seem much point.” The taxi sounded its horn again. “Bye, Tony, give every...give the girls my love.”

He sprinted the few yards to the car, yanked open the door, threw his bag into the back seat and himself after it. “Paris Eurostar,” he barked, “as fast as you can.” The driver glanced at him in the rear view mirror and started to say something, until Bradley met his gaze. “Just drive.” The man shrugged and, as the car pulled away, Bradley sat back and closed his eyes.

Two weeks later...

His Blackberry rang, stopped, went to voicemail and then buzzed angrily with an incoming text. Bradley glanced at the screen, saw that it was Katie, again, and deleted the message - just like he had every other text and email and voicemail from her and Angel and Tony that had come in over the last fortnight. He wished he could switch the damn thing off and unplug the landline but some of the messages were from his Mum or his Gran (both worried sick), Ruth at United (angry and talking about career suicide), then latterly Jess at United (sympathetic, still talking about career suicide, and apologising that it wasn’t Ruth doing it but she was a bit busy) and just about everyone at the BBC and Shine (trying to get him to reconsider). And much as Bradley would have preferred to lose himself at the bottom of several more bottles of cheap French red wine than he’d managed so far, he did at least owe these particular people the courtesy of a polite refusal of everything they were offering.

Bradley groaned as the landline started ringing and he reached for the volume control on the answer-phone, ready to slide it to silent once he knew it was just Katie pestering him again. When he heard Richard’s voice he was momentarily surprised but was, nevertheless, fading him out when something in Richard’s words, or perhaps his uncharacteristic swearing, snagged in Bradley’s befuddled brain.

“... in’s giving a press conference, live. Right now - before this week’s episode. For heaven’s sake, Bradley, if you can’t pick up the phone, then at least turn on your fucking TV. Colin’s on now!”

He scrambled for the remote, fumbled, hit the wrong channel and then sorted it just as they were sitting down. A grim faced Julian and Johnny on one side, Ruth (well, that explained what kind of busy she’d been) and a woman he didn’t recognise from the BBC on the other. And in the centre...oh god...in the centre was Colin; so pale and thin that he looked almost transparent, for fuck’s sake. Why had they let him get that way? Wasn’t anyone taking care of him? Christ, the shadows under his eyes were so dark, the hollows under his cheekbones so pronounced he looked like a skeleton...worn down, tired, hauntingly beautiful.

Bradley’s stomach churned. He felt sick but took another slug of wine anyway. He hunkered closer to the screen, straining to hear before realising that he’d been so paralysed by the sight of Colin he hadn’t noticed the sound was muted. The BBC woman was half way through a prepared statement but she seemed to be saying...no, hang on, she couldn’t possibly be saying what Bradley thought she’s just said...because he thought she’d just said that Colin was stepping down from his role as Merlin for professional reasons. No. Fuck. No way! Colin couldn’t step down. He was Merlin; he was the show! Professional reasons? What the fuck did that mean? The twat. The absolute twat.

And now they were taking questions. Somebody was asking Colin why, what did he mean by ‘professional reasons’ and Bradley thought ‘yes’, and ‘exactly’, and ‘answer that one you stupid fucker.’ And now Colin was speaking and shit...his voice was breaking and scary Ruth was holding his hand.

Bradley was crying. Because Colin was saying impossible things - crazy, impossible things like, “devastated by Bradley’s decision to resign” and “unique chemistry that I can’t imagine finding with anyone else”. And...fucking unbelievable...“the show might be called ‘Merlin’ but it's the Arthurian legend. Arthur is the sole reason...”  Bradley watched Colin’s eyes fill up. Someone asked him if he wanted to stop (yes, Bradley thought, get him the fuck out of there. Colin’s so private, he hates this soul-baring shit) but Colin shook his head. Live, on national TV, with half the fucking country watching, a wrecked and breathtakingly beautiful Colin Morgan stared stright down the barrel and said, “Arthur is the sole reason for Merlin’s existence and, for me, Bradley James is Arthur.”

Bradley sort of lost track at that point - partly because he was laughing and crying so hard but mostly because he was watching Colin and the others’ voices kept fading in and out of his consciousness. He did catch Julian saying something like ‘hope we're not at the end of the road yet’ and he watched Colin jump guiltily and nod his head when Johnny looked directly at him and said, ‘depends on Bradley...perhaps Colin might reconsider...’  Colin had slumped low in his seat, his head bowed, and Bradley was wishing he’d look up so he could see Colin’s face, instead of having to wonder what thoughts Colin was lost in...until he saw the split second flash of light on Colin’s face and he realised... The fucker’s on his Blackberry...he’s live on fucking TV and he’s on his Blackberry! And then it wasn’t all that surprising that Bradley’s own Blackberry buzzed, or that the name on the screen was one he’d thought he’d never see there again, or that the text itself was brief, abusive and comprised the six sweetest words Bradley James had ever read.

It’s not a fucking bromance, ok?

To which there was only one possible response.

And so Bradley typed it, hit send and, along with maybe seven million other people, watched as Colin read the three words and blinded the nation with his smile.