Studio 60: Reconciliation
Title: Reconciliation
Author:Kasey
Prompt: 26 - AU - what would have happened if Jordan had died?
Fandom:Studio 60
Rating:Teen-ish
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Jordanny
Warning:Angsty, AU (per the prompt)
Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters.
Summary: Of all the things he anticipated being the hardest, he was surprised by what was actually the most difficult.
The hardest part wasn't going back to work.
Sure, it wasn't easy watching everyone watching him. They were ready for him to detonate, to go back to cocaine, to do something destructive. He couldn't blame them; after all, he was very publicly a recovering alcoholic and addict, and his fiancee had just died out of nowhere. But he managed to stay in check, and he wished he didn't have to watch every comment he made for fear someone would worry about something else.
He did the show - that was enough. He managed to make do living on the post-show high to get through the weekend, and during the week he was busy enough to give his mind something to do at all times. That didn't make it go away, but it didn't go away even when things were good so he couldn't expect any better under these circumstances.
The hardest part wasn't watching Jack do the up-fronts and introduce a new network president.
She was blonde, pretty, and not at all his type. Her skirts were too short, her nails were too long, and she knew she had the legs. She was fine with using her ass instead of her wit, and she talked like one of them.
The hardest part wasn't the funeral.
He'd gone to funerals before - the coke-addict path had plenty of roadkill, and his dad wasn't around anymore. There was a way of being not-quite-there while Father WhatsitsName said prayers and Harriet squeezed his hand. Listening to Jack's voice quiver during the eulogy almost made him break and laugh at the same time, but he kept himself from doing both.
The hardest part wasn't the hospital investigation to see why her infection had gotten better then taken a nosedive. Though apparently the young doctor hadn't screwed up. “These things just happen.” Somehow, it turned out, post-op infections cause more deaths a year than surgeries themselves. He still couldn't figure that one out.
Accepting the lack of answers wasn't the hardest part either.
The hardest part wasn't trying to be funny. He wasn't Matt, he didn't have to be able to write jokes. He just needed to be able to see what was funny in the things other people were creating, and Jordan's death didn't make him any less able to figure out how to produce something funny with his all-star cast. The bits he did with Matt were slower, less sharp, and he didn't laugh as much, but he felt relatively confident it could return with time. Not right away, but at some point. Maybe. He hoped.
Realizing that no words he could ever come up with, no material Matt could ever write, no impression Harriet could ever do, no amount of description or stories could come close to explaining to Rebecca what an amazing woman her mother was, and realizing that was all Rebecca would ever have of Jordan. All of that was difficult, yes, but not the worst of it.
He made a pretty good single dad, despite having horrible luck with that stupid Real Baby doll. That didn't surprise anyone, really. He reluctantly hired a nanny to watch Rebecca during the show, and Harriet watched her during Meetings once a day, but the rest of the time the little girl lounged out happily in a snuggly-sling on his chest. He got used to sitting with her against him during table-reads and production meetings and rehearsals, and he figured out the perfect pace at which he could dash through the studio and the offices, or hop up and down the stairs, without jostling her from her nap.
He had never been much good at taking care of himself, much less anyone else; two failed marriages, a handful of bitter ex-friends, and a couple of hard falls off the wagon were evidence of that. But somehow this little child, his darling baby girl he'd vowed to take care of long before she was legally his...somehow she put everything in enough perspective and gave him enough purpose to make most of life seem easier.
How could the worst night of his life have also been the best? How could the event that left him the most lost also fill his life with the most purpose? How could he possibly ever learn to celebrate on Rebecca's actual birthday, the day that the woman he loved - more than he'd ever loved any woman sober - had died?
He wasn't sure he would ever be able to reconcile the pain and the joy, the loss and the gift, the bitter and the sweet.
That was the hardest part.
Author:Kasey
Prompt: 26 - AU - what would have happened if Jordan had died?
Fandom:Studio 60
Rating:Teen-ish
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Jordanny
Warning:Angsty, AU (per the prompt)
Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters.
Summary: Of all the things he anticipated being the hardest, he was surprised by what was actually the most difficult.
The hardest part wasn't going back to work.
Sure, it wasn't easy watching everyone watching him. They were ready for him to detonate, to go back to cocaine, to do something destructive. He couldn't blame them; after all, he was very publicly a recovering alcoholic and addict, and his fiancee had just died out of nowhere. But he managed to stay in check, and he wished he didn't have to watch every comment he made for fear someone would worry about something else.
He did the show - that was enough. He managed to make do living on the post-show high to get through the weekend, and during the week he was busy enough to give his mind something to do at all times. That didn't make it go away, but it didn't go away even when things were good so he couldn't expect any better under these circumstances.
The hardest part wasn't watching Jack do the up-fronts and introduce a new network president.
She was blonde, pretty, and not at all his type. Her skirts were too short, her nails were too long, and she knew she had the legs. She was fine with using her ass instead of her wit, and she talked like one of them.
The hardest part wasn't the funeral.
He'd gone to funerals before - the coke-addict path had plenty of roadkill, and his dad wasn't around anymore. There was a way of being not-quite-there while Father WhatsitsName said prayers and Harriet squeezed his hand. Listening to Jack's voice quiver during the eulogy almost made him break and laugh at the same time, but he kept himself from doing both.
The hardest part wasn't the hospital investigation to see why her infection had gotten better then taken a nosedive. Though apparently the young doctor hadn't screwed up. “These things just happen.” Somehow, it turned out, post-op infections cause more deaths a year than surgeries themselves. He still couldn't figure that one out.
Accepting the lack of answers wasn't the hardest part either.
The hardest part wasn't trying to be funny. He wasn't Matt, he didn't have to be able to write jokes. He just needed to be able to see what was funny in the things other people were creating, and Jordan's death didn't make him any less able to figure out how to produce something funny with his all-star cast. The bits he did with Matt were slower, less sharp, and he didn't laugh as much, but he felt relatively confident it could return with time. Not right away, but at some point. Maybe. He hoped.
Realizing that no words he could ever come up with, no material Matt could ever write, no impression Harriet could ever do, no amount of description or stories could come close to explaining to Rebecca what an amazing woman her mother was, and realizing that was all Rebecca would ever have of Jordan. All of that was difficult, yes, but not the worst of it.
He made a pretty good single dad, despite having horrible luck with that stupid Real Baby doll. That didn't surprise anyone, really. He reluctantly hired a nanny to watch Rebecca during the show, and Harriet watched her during Meetings once a day, but the rest of the time the little girl lounged out happily in a snuggly-sling on his chest. He got used to sitting with her against him during table-reads and production meetings and rehearsals, and he figured out the perfect pace at which he could dash through the studio and the offices, or hop up and down the stairs, without jostling her from her nap.
He had never been much good at taking care of himself, much less anyone else; two failed marriages, a handful of bitter ex-friends, and a couple of hard falls off the wagon were evidence of that. But somehow this little child, his darling baby girl he'd vowed to take care of long before she was legally his...somehow she put everything in enough perspective and gave him enough purpose to make most of life seem easier.
How could the worst night of his life have also been the best? How could the event that left him the most lost also fill his life with the most purpose? How could he possibly ever learn to celebrate on Rebecca's actual birthday, the day that the woman he loved - more than he'd ever loved any woman sober - had died?
He wasn't sure he would ever be able to reconcile the pain and the joy, the loss and the gift, the bitter and the sweet.
That was the hardest part.