The Awakening (5/?)
Title: La fine di un sogno (or The Awakening)
Author: Spooky85
Pairing: Callie/Erica, who else?
Rating: Pg13
Disclaimer: Not mine, and I promise to put them back once I'm done playing with them..or maybe I won't.. we treat them way better anyway..
Author's Notes: Still Callie's POV, still leaning towards the angst
*Chapter5*
We ended up watching tv.
We are still sitting on the floor, of course. And we are eating ice-cream.
I opened the door to retrieve it, and the same bellboy of so long ago was standing there, smiling at me and wishing me a goodnight. And I smiled and tipped him a lot more than I had to, because he made me realize that somehow this place that I hate will always be here for me to hide whenever my life gets too screwed up to face.
The movie we're watching is one I've seen a hundred times, but Mark guilt tripped me into letting him choose, and I'm glad that I did. The fact that I know every scene, every line, is a comfort.
Well, I had to give him something. The man did clean up the mess I've made in the bathroom, after all.
The ice-cream is good. It tastes better than any ice-cream I've ever had. And maybe it is because it really is very good or maybe it is because for the past month I haven't felt much of anything, not even the comfort of food.
I was in a carefully constructed bubble, and I thought it could keep me safe.
Forever numb.
But like all bubbles it was destined to break.
I can only be grateful Mark was there to break my fall.
I don't think I'd have survived it.
I lean my head on his shoulder and he freezes for a second, unsure of what to do, what it means.
"Relax, we're still comforting me over the fact that my girlfriend dumped me. I'm still gay"
"You are"
"I am. Gay. I. Am. Gay. You know it doesn't sound so bad."
"It sounds hot"
I slap his arm.
"It does! Besides, you might be gay, but I'm still a man!"
"Whore. You're a man-whore"
"Exactly. I have a reputation to uphold. What kind of self-respecting manwhore wouldn't find the thought of you with another woman hot"
I can't help the smile. I really can't. I try but I can't
And we fall once again in companionable silence
The movie is still on. I watch it distractedly. I lip-sync to it, I know it by heart, and the comfort this brings wraps around me as real and warm as the blanket covering me.
"Erica was hotter than you"
I lift my head from his shoulder so fast I see the room spinning for a minute
"Stop! You.. you don't get to think about.. about naked-Erica!"
"Well she's not your girlfriend anymore, so I can think as long .. and as hard as I want to"
He didn't just say that. He didn't just say that wiggling his eyebrows at me.
Oh, man..
"Well, think all you like, 'cause that's about the only place you'll ever have your shot with her. She would have been too much for you, anyway."
"She wouldn't. She so wouldn't. You know, before you made her all gay and spoiled her for me"
"What can I say, she picked me. I am way better than you"
"No..it's just that I had a handicap with her. A long big handicap"
"Stop talking about your dick, please. I'm trying to eat, here."
"She was still hotter than you"
"Yes she was."
I feel guilty, talking about her. But it also feels great, like when you're still in school, and you spend hours on the phone with your best friends talking about how hot the quarterback truly is. And I guess right now, we are exactly like those girls. Only the quarterback this time is a girl too.
"She was more than hot"
"Feel free to tell me. Even details if you must. Especially details."
"You're disgusting, you know that?"
"Come on, throw me a bone here. I actually got you to hook up with her, and what did I get out of it? A thank you? No. A Threesome? No. I get that the woman I had a crush and a pole sized hard-on for ended up hating my guts!"
"You had a crush on her? Like, really? A crush?"
"Yeah. I did. Big crush. Big I-cancel-all-my-surgeries-and-follow-you-around-all-day kind of crush"
"Wow. I didn't know that"
"No. And neither did she. Well, except maybe she did. I hit on her once, you know?"
"Just once? Please. We spent months laughing at all the times you.."
shit
"Uhm.. I mean we.. uhm .. sorry"
He smiles. Like he's always known.
"It's ok."
"So.. when was it?"
"At Joe's. She was playing darts, by herself"
"Go figure"
"And I thought, for a moment I thought she'd say yes. But she shot me down big time. She was hot but she was rude"
"That's about half of what made her so hot"
"Yeah. She told me I was too pretty. And that we definitely would have been fucking if we didn't work together"
"She didn't!"
"Oh, but she did"
"Well, she never said she couldn't fuck me because we were working together, so I guess I was even prettier than you, huh?"
"Or maybe she just had bad taste"
And we laugh, and this time it's not in denial or anger or hurt. This time it's because I'm happy I can still count on him, on the fact that he's always been here, that he will always be
"Thank you"
"Don't mention it. Just mail me that sex tape of the two of you and we'll call it even!"
The movie is long gone, the credits roll endlessly, but we still sit here, watching the screen as if we've never seen anything more fascinating.
And suddenly I'm brought back in time, on the first time we watched a movie together. Erica and I. We were at her place, one of the rare times she's brought me there. She used to say she hated it, that it was the same home she'd grown up in, and even though it was beautiful, I could see how a kid would hate it.
I tried imagining a young Erica, a little baby girl with golden curls and a beautiful smile being shouted at by a nanny for breaking one of the precious porcelain dolls that made up her mother's collection, all neatly seated in endless row after row in the study.
She'd left the door open to it once, and I couldn't help but look inside, just for a second.
My blood ran cold when a thousand cold glass eyes stared at me from all over the room walls.
Erica's hand on my shoulder made me jump a feet in the air, but she didn't acknowledge it, she just quietly closed the door, like a strict voice and hand I am sure had thought her to do as a kid, and led me to the sofa in the living room.
Her lips on mine prevented me from asking anything much about that room, and soon her tongue managed to push all thoughts of it from my mind.
Samurai Ambush. I still can't believe I made her watch Samurai Ambush.
But she did, and even though I'm sure she hated it, she never said a single word.
She just silently sat through it for an hour, her eyes on the screen, her body seated next to mine on the white sofa. And I remember that, as I was animatedly explaining the beauty of a particular scene, I turned to her, and caught her, eyes closed, a shy smile on her face.
She was listening to my voice, looking at that godawful film through my eyes and seeing it's beauty through me, as she'd explain later. But in that moment I didn't know all that, I didn't know that this whispered revelation would make me blush and that it would start the very first necking session that led us to second base. In that moment I only thought that her smile had had to be the sweetest sight I'd ever seen, I only knew that I'd give up my life to see it again everyday for the rest of my days.
And my hand moved of it's own will against the cushions and my fingers entwined with her unsuspecting ones. And the look she gave me then, the smile, the little tremor that went through her as I let my thumb sweep across her knuckles, those things will always be with me, no matter how far away she'll go.
"What are you thinking about?"
His soft whisper brings me back to reality. Out of the dream and the memory of her.
But still she's everywhere. As real as if she was sitting here with us.
"I love her"
He's silent. His face doesn't betray a single thought
"I love her, even though she's not here now. I love her and I'm sad because I'll never get to tell her, or see her reaction, or hear her say it back"
He's silent for the longest time, like he's looking for an answer. But I am not waiting for one. I'm past trying to look for an answer. I'm past trying to fix this. Even though I'll never be past her.
"What if you could talk to her"
And even though it's not possible, even though he doesn't have the power to make it real, even though I know it will only be an endless line of 'what if's for me from now on, still I look at him, shocked and expecting.
Like a kid who wakes up on christmas night to see if Santa's already brought him his presents. Not to open them ahead of time. No. Just to see the brightly colored wrapping paper, feel the bow on top of it, rattle it a little to make sure it's real.
Like that kid I need this gift, I need Santa, I need Christmas to be real. I need her.
"How?"
"I'm not saying I know how, I'm just .. what would you do IF you had the chance to talk to her?"
"I .. I don't have the slightest idea" I feel drained. This conversation, this whole day, this whole month, has utterly destroyed me. And I feel empty. Like I'm not really here, like I'm not really living this moment.
"I honestly don't have the slightest Idea. I'd probably tell her that I'm sorry. That she was right, about the hospital, about leaving. I'd tell her that she had no right leaving me. That I wasn't the enemy. That .. that .. I miss her. Even though we hurt each other, I miss her. That I haven't slept in my bed since she's been gone because I can't lie there anymore and not expect to see her face when I wake up, that I can't go back to my place at all, because she's everywhere. That I can't escape her. That all I want to do is escape her and I can't"
"Would it change anything? Would it make it better, make you feel better?"
What is he getting at?
"Yes. I think it would. But I don't know. I mean, we'd probably only end up fighting some more and make it all worse, if it's even possible .. look, I don't want to talk about it anymore. I'm .. tired, and there really is no point in talking about what I'd do. Because I will never see her or talk to her ever again. She made it pretty impossible for it to be any other way. For all I know she might not even live in Seattle anymore, hell she might not even be in the United fucking States of America. How can it possibly help me to talk about 'what if'!"
I'm angry again. Damn. I thought I was done being angry.
"She is"
Huh?
"Huh?"
"In the US, she is. Still. She's .. uhm .. you should probably just call Addison"
"Why? W..what do you mean? I.."
"I think .. I know .. that she's in LA"
"What?!"
"Well, she was two weeks ago. I don't know if she still is, but.."
"How do you know all this!!"
I stand up. Fast. My head starts throbbing, the room spins wildly around me, and I close my eyes. For a moment I think I'm gonna faint, I know I'm gonna faint. But he is there to hold me up, to steady me.
And I don't want his hands on me. I push him away with all the strength left in me. I don't want his arms, I want answers.
"How long have you known this? HOW?!"
"I told you. Two weeks! Addison called me, said she thought she'd seen her in a taxi at a red light, and then again crossing the street."
"Why did she call you! Why not me!"
He looks down, at his feet. Hands in his pockets, he feels guilty. Good. He should.
And I am trembling, with this piece of news and the shock it brings, with rage, with the sheer force it takes my hands to stay balled up at my sides and not beat him, not break each and every one of his bones.
"You should just call Addison. Really."
I make a mad dash for the phone. And I don't care that it's 4am by now. That she'll be asleep. That she'll get pissed I woke her up.
I don't care. Because she knew. She has known for two whole fucking weeks and she never told me. And she told Mark and not me. And she needs to talk, now.
The longer she makes me wait on the line, the madder I get. Mark doesn't know what to do. Should he stay? Should he go? Should he leave me alone to talk on this goddamned phone that Addison is not picking up? I make up his mind for him.
"Don't you dare leave."
"Hello?" Groggy and pissed off. I woke her up. Good.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Wh .. what? Who's this?"
"Why didn't you tell me. Why did you tell Mark and not me."
"Cal, is that you? Oh.. it's.. it's 4 in the morning Cal! Couldn't you have waited?"
"No! YOU told MARK and not ME!"
"Oh God .. Erica. I .. I know. I didn't know what to do! I saw her, and I spoke to her, and I didn't know what to do, so I told Mark"
"And you decided that, what, that it wasn't worth mentioning? That I wasn't supposed to know??"
"We.. decided..that..I'd talk to her again and we'd..see"
"You'd see. You'd SEE, Addison? You'd .. huh, I can't fucking believe this. You'd.. I haven't slept in a month, I have barely eaten, or worked, or functioned at all, in a month and you two were taking your sweet time in deciding if I was supposed to know?"
I'm still pacing, and now the hand that's not holding up the phone goes to my forehead, because I need to know that my head is still there, still the same, because right now it feels about the size of a giant balloon, filled with air, swirling endlessly.
"Hey! It's not my fault, ok? I'm not Erica! It's not me you're mad at!"
"Oh, but it is. It's you and Mark. You're supposed to be my friend!"
"Yeah, and you were supposed to be mine too. But you disappeared. You never called, you never even ask how I'm doing. I'm here in LA, alone, and you never asked."
"Don't make this something it's not, Addison. This is not about you! It's about me! For once, leave it about me!"
"Ok. I'm .. sorry. I'm sorry, Cal. Really"
"Look. I didn't mean to call and snap your head off"
"Could have fooled me"
"I just need you to tell me"
"It's pretty long, Callie. You sure you want to do this over the phone?"
"No. I'm not. I'm not even sure I want to do this at all. But I need to, you know? I NEED to know."
"I know. I know"
"I'll talk to the chief and I'll be there as soon as I can, ok?"
"Ok."
"And Addison? I'm sorry too."
Author: Spooky85
Pairing: Callie/Erica, who else?
Rating: Pg13
Disclaimer: Not mine, and I promise to put them back once I'm done playing with them..or maybe I won't.. we treat them way better anyway..
Author's Notes: Still Callie's POV, still leaning towards the angst
*Chapter5*
We ended up watching tv.
We are still sitting on the floor, of course. And we are eating ice-cream.
I opened the door to retrieve it, and the same bellboy of so long ago was standing there, smiling at me and wishing me a goodnight. And I smiled and tipped him a lot more than I had to, because he made me realize that somehow this place that I hate will always be here for me to hide whenever my life gets too screwed up to face.
The movie we're watching is one I've seen a hundred times, but Mark guilt tripped me into letting him choose, and I'm glad that I did. The fact that I know every scene, every line, is a comfort.
Well, I had to give him something. The man did clean up the mess I've made in the bathroom, after all.
The ice-cream is good. It tastes better than any ice-cream I've ever had. And maybe it is because it really is very good or maybe it is because for the past month I haven't felt much of anything, not even the comfort of food.
I was in a carefully constructed bubble, and I thought it could keep me safe.
Forever numb.
But like all bubbles it was destined to break.
I can only be grateful Mark was there to break my fall.
I don't think I'd have survived it.
I lean my head on his shoulder and he freezes for a second, unsure of what to do, what it means.
"Relax, we're still comforting me over the fact that my girlfriend dumped me. I'm still gay"
"You are"
"I am. Gay. I. Am. Gay. You know it doesn't sound so bad."
"It sounds hot"
I slap his arm.
"It does! Besides, you might be gay, but I'm still a man!"
"Whore. You're a man-whore"
"Exactly. I have a reputation to uphold. What kind of self-respecting manwhore wouldn't find the thought of you with another woman hot"
I can't help the smile. I really can't. I try but I can't
And we fall once again in companionable silence
The movie is still on. I watch it distractedly. I lip-sync to it, I know it by heart, and the comfort this brings wraps around me as real and warm as the blanket covering me.
"Erica was hotter than you"
I lift my head from his shoulder so fast I see the room spinning for a minute
"Stop! You.. you don't get to think about.. about naked-Erica!"
"Well she's not your girlfriend anymore, so I can think as long .. and as hard as I want to"
He didn't just say that. He didn't just say that wiggling his eyebrows at me.
Oh, man..
"Well, think all you like, 'cause that's about the only place you'll ever have your shot with her. She would have been too much for you, anyway."
"She wouldn't. She so wouldn't. You know, before you made her all gay and spoiled her for me"
"What can I say, she picked me. I am way better than you"
"No..it's just that I had a handicap with her. A long big handicap"
"Stop talking about your dick, please. I'm trying to eat, here."
"She was still hotter than you"
"Yes she was."
I feel guilty, talking about her. But it also feels great, like when you're still in school, and you spend hours on the phone with your best friends talking about how hot the quarterback truly is. And I guess right now, we are exactly like those girls. Only the quarterback this time is a girl too.
"She was more than hot"
"Feel free to tell me. Even details if you must. Especially details."
"You're disgusting, you know that?"
"Come on, throw me a bone here. I actually got you to hook up with her, and what did I get out of it? A thank you? No. A Threesome? No. I get that the woman I had a crush and a pole sized hard-on for ended up hating my guts!"
"You had a crush on her? Like, really? A crush?"
"Yeah. I did. Big crush. Big I-cancel-all-my-surgeries-and-follow-you-around-all-day kind of crush"
"Wow. I didn't know that"
"No. And neither did she. Well, except maybe she did. I hit on her once, you know?"
"Just once? Please. We spent months laughing at all the times you.."
shit
"Uhm.. I mean we.. uhm .. sorry"
He smiles. Like he's always known.
"It's ok."
"So.. when was it?"
"At Joe's. She was playing darts, by herself"
"Go figure"
"And I thought, for a moment I thought she'd say yes. But she shot me down big time. She was hot but she was rude"
"That's about half of what made her so hot"
"Yeah. She told me I was too pretty. And that we definitely would have been fucking if we didn't work together"
"She didn't!"
"Oh, but she did"
"Well, she never said she couldn't fuck me because we were working together, so I guess I was even prettier than you, huh?"
"Or maybe she just had bad taste"
And we laugh, and this time it's not in denial or anger or hurt. This time it's because I'm happy I can still count on him, on the fact that he's always been here, that he will always be
"Thank you"
"Don't mention it. Just mail me that sex tape of the two of you and we'll call it even!"
The movie is long gone, the credits roll endlessly, but we still sit here, watching the screen as if we've never seen anything more fascinating.
And suddenly I'm brought back in time, on the first time we watched a movie together. Erica and I. We were at her place, one of the rare times she's brought me there. She used to say she hated it, that it was the same home she'd grown up in, and even though it was beautiful, I could see how a kid would hate it.
I tried imagining a young Erica, a little baby girl with golden curls and a beautiful smile being shouted at by a nanny for breaking one of the precious porcelain dolls that made up her mother's collection, all neatly seated in endless row after row in the study.
She'd left the door open to it once, and I couldn't help but look inside, just for a second.
My blood ran cold when a thousand cold glass eyes stared at me from all over the room walls.
Erica's hand on my shoulder made me jump a feet in the air, but she didn't acknowledge it, she just quietly closed the door, like a strict voice and hand I am sure had thought her to do as a kid, and led me to the sofa in the living room.
Her lips on mine prevented me from asking anything much about that room, and soon her tongue managed to push all thoughts of it from my mind.
Samurai Ambush. I still can't believe I made her watch Samurai Ambush.
But she did, and even though I'm sure she hated it, she never said a single word.
She just silently sat through it for an hour, her eyes on the screen, her body seated next to mine on the white sofa. And I remember that, as I was animatedly explaining the beauty of a particular scene, I turned to her, and caught her, eyes closed, a shy smile on her face.
She was listening to my voice, looking at that godawful film through my eyes and seeing it's beauty through me, as she'd explain later. But in that moment I didn't know all that, I didn't know that this whispered revelation would make me blush and that it would start the very first necking session that led us to second base. In that moment I only thought that her smile had had to be the sweetest sight I'd ever seen, I only knew that I'd give up my life to see it again everyday for the rest of my days.
And my hand moved of it's own will against the cushions and my fingers entwined with her unsuspecting ones. And the look she gave me then, the smile, the little tremor that went through her as I let my thumb sweep across her knuckles, those things will always be with me, no matter how far away she'll go.
"What are you thinking about?"
His soft whisper brings me back to reality. Out of the dream and the memory of her.
But still she's everywhere. As real as if she was sitting here with us.
"I love her"
He's silent. His face doesn't betray a single thought
"I love her, even though she's not here now. I love her and I'm sad because I'll never get to tell her, or see her reaction, or hear her say it back"
He's silent for the longest time, like he's looking for an answer. But I am not waiting for one. I'm past trying to look for an answer. I'm past trying to fix this. Even though I'll never be past her.
"What if you could talk to her"
And even though it's not possible, even though he doesn't have the power to make it real, even though I know it will only be an endless line of 'what if's for me from now on, still I look at him, shocked and expecting.
Like a kid who wakes up on christmas night to see if Santa's already brought him his presents. Not to open them ahead of time. No. Just to see the brightly colored wrapping paper, feel the bow on top of it, rattle it a little to make sure it's real.
Like that kid I need this gift, I need Santa, I need Christmas to be real. I need her.
"How?"
"I'm not saying I know how, I'm just .. what would you do IF you had the chance to talk to her?"
"I .. I don't have the slightest idea" I feel drained. This conversation, this whole day, this whole month, has utterly destroyed me. And I feel empty. Like I'm not really here, like I'm not really living this moment.
"I honestly don't have the slightest Idea. I'd probably tell her that I'm sorry. That she was right, about the hospital, about leaving. I'd tell her that she had no right leaving me. That I wasn't the enemy. That .. that .. I miss her. Even though we hurt each other, I miss her. That I haven't slept in my bed since she's been gone because I can't lie there anymore and not expect to see her face when I wake up, that I can't go back to my place at all, because she's everywhere. That I can't escape her. That all I want to do is escape her and I can't"
"Would it change anything? Would it make it better, make you feel better?"
What is he getting at?
"Yes. I think it would. But I don't know. I mean, we'd probably only end up fighting some more and make it all worse, if it's even possible .. look, I don't want to talk about it anymore. I'm .. tired, and there really is no point in talking about what I'd do. Because I will never see her or talk to her ever again. She made it pretty impossible for it to be any other way. For all I know she might not even live in Seattle anymore, hell she might not even be in the United fucking States of America. How can it possibly help me to talk about 'what if'!"
I'm angry again. Damn. I thought I was done being angry.
"She is"
Huh?
"Huh?"
"In the US, she is. Still. She's .. uhm .. you should probably just call Addison"
"Why? W..what do you mean? I.."
"I think .. I know .. that she's in LA"
"What?!"
"Well, she was two weeks ago. I don't know if she still is, but.."
"How do you know all this!!"
I stand up. Fast. My head starts throbbing, the room spins wildly around me, and I close my eyes. For a moment I think I'm gonna faint, I know I'm gonna faint. But he is there to hold me up, to steady me.
And I don't want his hands on me. I push him away with all the strength left in me. I don't want his arms, I want answers.
"How long have you known this? HOW?!"
"I told you. Two weeks! Addison called me, said she thought she'd seen her in a taxi at a red light, and then again crossing the street."
"Why did she call you! Why not me!"
He looks down, at his feet. Hands in his pockets, he feels guilty. Good. He should.
And I am trembling, with this piece of news and the shock it brings, with rage, with the sheer force it takes my hands to stay balled up at my sides and not beat him, not break each and every one of his bones.
"You should just call Addison. Really."
I make a mad dash for the phone. And I don't care that it's 4am by now. That she'll be asleep. That she'll get pissed I woke her up.
I don't care. Because she knew. She has known for two whole fucking weeks and she never told me. And she told Mark and not me. And she needs to talk, now.
The longer she makes me wait on the line, the madder I get. Mark doesn't know what to do. Should he stay? Should he go? Should he leave me alone to talk on this goddamned phone that Addison is not picking up? I make up his mind for him.
"Don't you dare leave."
"Hello?" Groggy and pissed off. I woke her up. Good.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Wh .. what? Who's this?"
"Why didn't you tell me. Why did you tell Mark and not me."
"Cal, is that you? Oh.. it's.. it's 4 in the morning Cal! Couldn't you have waited?"
"No! YOU told MARK and not ME!"
"Oh God .. Erica. I .. I know. I didn't know what to do! I saw her, and I spoke to her, and I didn't know what to do, so I told Mark"
"And you decided that, what, that it wasn't worth mentioning? That I wasn't supposed to know??"
"We.. decided..that..I'd talk to her again and we'd..see"
"You'd see. You'd SEE, Addison? You'd .. huh, I can't fucking believe this. You'd.. I haven't slept in a month, I have barely eaten, or worked, or functioned at all, in a month and you two were taking your sweet time in deciding if I was supposed to know?"
I'm still pacing, and now the hand that's not holding up the phone goes to my forehead, because I need to know that my head is still there, still the same, because right now it feels about the size of a giant balloon, filled with air, swirling endlessly.
"Hey! It's not my fault, ok? I'm not Erica! It's not me you're mad at!"
"Oh, but it is. It's you and Mark. You're supposed to be my friend!"
"Yeah, and you were supposed to be mine too. But you disappeared. You never called, you never even ask how I'm doing. I'm here in LA, alone, and you never asked."
"Don't make this something it's not, Addison. This is not about you! It's about me! For once, leave it about me!"
"Ok. I'm .. sorry. I'm sorry, Cal. Really"
"Look. I didn't mean to call and snap your head off"
"Could have fooled me"
"I just need you to tell me"
"It's pretty long, Callie. You sure you want to do this over the phone?"
"No. I'm not. I'm not even sure I want to do this at all. But I need to, you know? I NEED to know."
"I know. I know"
"I'll talk to the chief and I'll be there as soon as I can, ok?"
"Ok."
"And Addison? I'm sorry too."