FIC: Only Time... :: Prologue :: The Man Who Cannot Move
Author's note: I seem to have an affliction. I cannot finish fics but for every one I can't bring myself to finish another one pops.
So this was inspired by this brilliant video by Cosmic Teardust :) That is excellent video editing.
But about this fic? Hmm it gave me hell at first, but I think I found my footing. We'll just have to see. Chapter one is ready but I'm an unhappy early bird tomorrow. But just so you know, next chap looks up ;)
Fairytales end when they do for a reason, she said. She was right, because the heart remembers a real loss.
PROLOGUE: THE MAN WHO CANNOT MOVE
Who can say why your heart sights as your life flies? Only time.
And who can say why your heart cries when your love lies? Only time.
- Enya, Only Time
Three years ago…
London. It rained. When did it not rain? Chuck wondered, watching the drops plunk against the thick glass, the machine gun-like sounds agressing to his ears. All this was nothing like the dull roar and thud of his blood in his veins. Dread. This was… it, what he’d been asking for and yet hated to do. He wanted nothing more than to tear down the perfect damask wallpapered walls around him. Yet he did… nothing. Couldn’t move.
It was full night here, evening in New York, and he pondered incessantly whether it was as drab and dark there as it was here. Sunless, nothing but doom and gloom, for days going on to a few weeks. He supposed he deserved it, the darkness, the lack of warmth. He had brought it onto himself.
“Chuck…” Eyes closed, body locked in an aural trance that had everything to do with his cowardice as well as the despair in her voice, he listened and wanted to die. “Where are you?” Blair’s small, hurt voice cut him deep as it continued. “It’s been weeks. You left with no word.” He imagined her hugging herself, and heard rustling, as though she were sliding down a wall slowly. “I wish you’d called at least once.” And then he heard it.
Chuck shot back the Scotch in his glass as far back his throat to occupy his fingers.
She was crying. Sniffling, really, but crying. And he was totally helpless, more so than ever because he was an ocean away and he still had the damn power to make her cry when, this time, he only wanted to make it stop, his hurting her, forever. He had no right to make her cry anymore, never had had it in the first place, but now less than ever before because he was gone. Making her cry had been his furthest wish.
Suddenly he heard her heaved breath - his brave, brave Blair - and her hollow voice spoke again with unimaginable strength that he’d always seen in her, and he knew she would finally… “Goodbye, Chuck.”
Click.
… let go.
She will never call again. Chuck snapped his phone shut and sent it sailing away, uncaring if all those precious saved soundbytes were destroyed. It would not be the first thing around him that was.