Felicity Huffman/Marcia Cross (Rated R for swearing)
Title: We Sing Love Songs
Pairing: Felicity Huffman/Marcia Cross
Disclaimer: Has never happened. None of what happens regarding the Felicity/Marcia relationship in this story is true. Its all fiction. Hence the name fic.
Rating: R for swearing
Author Notes: My first RPFS so be gentle with me : )
Summary: Every touch is an admission to feeling
She'd been told, warned even, of what the media liked to do to prospective stars. They liked to expose the underbellies of lives, the backstory that hadn't been told because of mere mediocrity or disinterest, they wrote of lies and sometimes of truth, but not caring which. They smirked as a nation exploded at the tidbits of experiences that their favourite actors went through regardless of how harrowing or disturbing. It might have sounded like a bitter cliche from an already jaded star, but it really was all a game. Who can destroy who first.
Her agent had telephoned her the night before, telling her of the story that was soon to be splashed across the celebrity tabloids in bold writing, sensationalist pictures for sensationalist words. Like for like. Out of everything that had happened, out of all the tragedy and determination and desperate want for success, this was the last thing that she wanted her closest allies to know, let alone the whole country. And Europe, she thought with a sigh as she read the converted prices at the bottom of the cover. Yes, even the British would know every detail of her life despite an ocean, and several thousands miles, separating them.
Filming started late but she wasn't sure whether that was a blessing in disguise or not. Thankfully most of the extras, save a few of the more bold and curious, would have gone home seeing as the last scenes were for The Housewives themselves. As she checked her watch for the tenth time that hour, and looked to the window where the studio-employed driver would, in a few minutes, be waiting for her to leave her modest home in the Hills, she dreaded work for the first time since she'd started working with "her girls". They were her friends, trusted friends who she shopped and dined with, who lent her their cooking skills for a day. They hadn't signed on for this.
There was no possibility that they could have missed the story, her name garishly printed all over, selling on every street corner. Teri, she knew, would have read it as soon as it hit the stands. Normally it would be her that, with a sense of trepidation as she opened the pages, would scan the names for her own in the fear that they have summoned another newspaper selling story about what had become their favourite talking topic; her shrinking waistline. Or it would be Nicolette who, on the outside, brushed off the critical remarks and comments, the whispers that said she was getting ideas above her station yet still bought the magazines like a confused believer of a twisted religion. Eva obsessively read the gossip columnists in the vain hope of acceptance, like the nerdy teenager in high school who desperately tries to impress the popular clique but faces constant rejection. She poses and gives racy interviews for men that are old enough to be her father who drool and whose conversations are laden with innuendos, but days later they still prefer someone else. Felicity however, in what seems to be her role as "the wise and sensible one", ignores what little press coverage she receives regardless of whether its bad or good. Marcia wishes she could take the advice of her serene co-star and to try to ignore this story, pretend that it doesn't exist and that the repressed grief she felt for a child that was never hers isn't the only thing she can think of when she sees Teri and Felicity with their children or when diaper commercials show on the television she doesn't shed a tear that she will wipe away before fucking away her conscience using whichever poison, be it drink or men, is closest.
The doorbell rings and it sounds like a funeral march.
Her driver, that the studio insisted she have to protect their "invaluable" actress, isn't the one standing on her doorstep at midday on a relatively warm day underneath the LA sun. "Felicity..."She stumbles over her name, slightly awkwardly. She looks beyond her friend's shoulder, trying to gauge if the small car is the only one in the vicinity.
"It's just me..." Felicity answered, almost reading her mind, "Teri and Eva are busy on set recording their scenes with Nicolette. We figured you wouldn't be in today."
She looks to the doorstep where her hiking boots sit, muddied and untidy. She has the urge to clear them away, clear everything away. "You're here."
Felicity shrugs, "I got the day off," She gestures with her hand in mid-air, "Something about a friend needing a shoulder to cry on."
She steps aside, and Felicity brushes past her, quickly shaking off the Scholl sandals she was wearing. Marcia tries to hide the deep breath she takes as their bodies touch in the smallest way. She smells of roses.
"Why didn't you tell us?" Why didn't you tell me? She knows that's what Felicity meant to say, what she wanted to say. She has strong relationships with all her co-stars, people she has come to like beyond what she could have imagined, but with Felicity, everything is that much stronger, more adult. Everything is that more intense and she can't explain why but it is, "Why didn't you explain it to us before we had to read it in some trashy tabloid?"
"Because I can't even explain it to myself?" Marcia offered weakly, following Felicity into the kitchen with its minimalist decoration which her interior designer had said was in vogue but which she hated. "Its upsetting enough to deal with it every day, let alone with the whole world watching and criticizing."
"They're not criticizing..."
"Aren't they?" Marcia sighed, "That's what is feels like to me. They're telling me that I'm an awful person because of this, because my heart wasn't strong enough to cope. They're telling everyone that they should hate me because I am an uncaring, uncompassionate bitch of a woman. And the thing is, I'm starting to believe they're right."
Felicity rubbed her arm, her glasses slipping down her nose slightly. "They don't know anything about you. If you hadn't had all this success, then they wouldn't know you from Adam. They just want to put you in your place for a while. You've seen it before," She pauses, "And there are millions of people who watch the show and still know you off-screen as an amazing, talented and compassionate woman. Like I do."
Marcia's watery eyes stared into her friend's, a small smile encroaching onto her face. She'd always seen Felicity as a warm, maternal person, someone who nurtured and encouraged, sometimes without even saying a word. It was only as Felicity's lips brushed her forehead, stroking back her fiery red hair and tucking it behind her ear, that she fully understood who Felicity was without the grace or the fame or even the husband. And something inside of Marcia broke.
Felicity pulled her lips away lazily, and everything felt that little too comfortable, too ordinary and accepted. Her eyes darted as coughed awkwardly, before inhaling a deep breath of air. Every touch is like an admission of feeling. Outside she could see the lawn where her children had played and Marcia heard the sigh of a woman with too much to lose.
She felt lips press up against her own. Warm, sensuous. Marcia tasted of apple bubblegum and espresso. For a split second, Felicity allowed herself to move with the passion that spread through her and she gripped Marcia's thighs, half warning, half encouragement to continue.
[x]
"We can't do this anymore," Felicity's tone is cold in the sunlight that streams through the bay windows. It's harsh and she strains her poor eyesight to see straight but she retains her composure. She says this every time. They both do.
"I know."
She watches as Felicity gathers her clothes, dotted around on the wooden floors, occasionally pushing her black glasses further up her nose.
This time, she doesn't look back. And Marcia finally believes her.
The End