(Fic) FN - Samhain
Title: Samhain
Summary: On All Hallow’s Eve, Peter takes a moment to remember someone he’s lost.
Word Count: 1529
Disclaimer: Fright Night and all characters therein © Tom Holland/Craig Gillespie
Warnings/Rating: PG-13 for language
Author’s Note: Written for the Three Days Only Challenge at 5_prompts, using Table 16, prompt 03: Light a single candle. (If you’re keeping track, This makes four fics in a little over six hours. I’m on a roll here! Let's see if I can get the full five!)
The Joint and Body English are two of the main event halls at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. You can find more information at the Hard Rock Hotel website, which, if you are a writer for Fright Night, I suggest you take a look at to get more of a feel for Peter’s penthouse and workplace.
I have been DYING to write Pagan!Peter for AGES now. I just feel like it could fit into his character so well; honestly it’s kind of become part of my general head-canon. I would have prompted it myself, but I’m not sure if anyone else other than me knows anything about modern Paganism, so I decided to wait until the right opportunity came along, and then I saw this prompt and knew EXACTLY what I wanted to do.
Please keep in mind that while I consider myself Pagan, I do not practice regularly, and a lot of what I do tends to be a blend of several different Neo-Pagan traditions. So please don’t get on my case about accuracy or falsehood - I am writing this holiday as I imagine fits with Peter’s character and as I understand it, and that may be different from other more traditional Pagans. The best way I can describe it is highly eclectic Celtic Wicca. Everyone practices differently, which is part of what makes these complex and varied religions so beautiful and powerful to me.
Anyways, I hope you enjoy the story!
He didn’t have long, just a few spare minutes before he needed to get back to the stage for the final prep work before the show. Tonight was Halloween, so of course the Hard Rock insisted on a spooky holiday extravaganza with him at the helm.
They had already insisted upon a special appearance for the Fetish & Fantasy Halloween Ball on Saturday, but he’s Peter Vincent, and they hold his contract in the palm of their hands. So, regardless of how he wished to spend his holiday, he was at their mercy first, which of course meant a special one-night-only Halloween show, one that took months of planning and rehearsal and generally wasted his time.
Halloween meant something very different to Peter. While others were headed off to costume parties to get drunk, or readying their bowls of candy for trick-or-treaters, Peter’s thoughts were usually a little more somber. For him, this night was a different sort of celebration - the new year, the death of summer, and a day of remembrance.
After the curtain fall this evening, when Peter had some time for a proper dinner, there would be a handful of extra places set at the table. Charley had been kind enough to offer to eat with him, on one condition that Peter was more than happy to fill. Alongside Peter’s three extra plates (Mum, Dad, Ginger) Charley would set out three plates of his own (Ed, Adam, Doris); plates that would bear food that would never be eaten, that would stay there untouched.
They would go down to the party at The Joint afterwards, of course, or perhaps to Body English for something a little quieter, and they would probably dance and laugh and have a grand time just like everyone else. Peter was thankfully not under any obligation to remain in costume for the festivities after his show, which meant he could relax and enjoy himself with Charley, and Amy if she was able to make it after all. Nothing said he couldn’t have fun on Samhain, he just had a few more layers of meaning to his holiday than most.
After the party, he and Charley would come back upstairs to his place, and Charley could make himself comfortable while Peter made his final preparations, and then he would do the sacred rites - to honour the ancestors, to honour the dying god, who would rise again at Yule, and to remember loved ones lost.
But that would all come later. For now, in his dressing room in the fifteen minutes he had free, he had a small private ritual of his own to perform.
He took a small, white, taper candle out of his bag, then the holder, and set them on the bureau. The long hair from his wig was hanging in his eyes; he pushed it back behind one ear distractedly. He drew a box of matches out of his bag, and finally, a long narrow object wrapped in white cloth.
Peter unfolded the soft cotton with care, revealing a double-edged blade with a dark handle. The dulled knife was old and worn, the carvings on the wooden handle smoothed out from years of use. Peter took the athame in one hand and the candle in the other, and began to inscribe words and symbols into to the soft wax with the tip of the blade.
He started with her name, and continued with an array of ancient runes. Raidho, for justice and safe travel. Kenaz, because it suited what they had shared together - creativity, passion, lust and love and fresh starts. Wunjo, because if anyone’s spirit deserved a happily-ever-after, it was his partner-in-crime. Daeg, for new beginnings. He carved in other words too, in English and her native Spanish. I miss you. Te amo. I’m sorry.
He worked slowly, taking his time to carve out each letter. When he was finished, the entire candle was covered with flowing script. He wedged the end of the candle into the holder and set it on top of the bureau before the mirror, then reached for the cloth. Peter wrapped the athame in its cloth, then settled the blade back into the bag and set it aside.
He picked up the matchbox, the cardboard dry against his fingertips. He slid it open and pulled out a single match, striking it against the side of the box to light it. The tip erupted and flared for a split second before the tiny flame steadied. He set the box aside and lit the wick, watching the first drips of wax start to crawl down the engraved sides of the taper.
Peter shook out the match and tossed it carelessly onto the bureau top. He leaned back in the chair, letting his eyes drift over the edges of the mirror. It was her mirror, actually, salvaged from her side of the dressing room before they took her things away. He had taken it and put it in front of his own. No one else had a right to that mirror. Despite Peter’s name taking all the credit, it had never just been his show. It had been theirs, and that mirror was the only tangible thing he had left of their show.
Tucked into the edges of the frame all around the mirror were all manner of memorabilia. Photos of her and Peter, in rehearsal, backstage, upstairs in Peter‘s flat. A program from the first performance at the Hard Rock. A few scattered post-it notes with messages in various feminine hands, in Spanish and English - good luck notes and words of encouragement from her girlfriends here in Vegas. A crucifix on a fine gold chain hung from one corner of the mirror. Pictures of her family back in Colombia - mother, father, siblings, grandparents, a million aunts and uncles and cousins and nieces and nephews. There was a clipping from the Vegas Sun, some scathing review of Fright Night that the two of them had cracked up laughing over, doodling mustaches across their own faces in the picture. A letter scribbled in a shaky child’s hand onto cheap paper, a birthday greeting from her little sister.
“I’m sorry I didn’t save you, Ginger,” Peter said, and winced. The room was so quiet that his sad whisper sounded out like a gunshot. He couldn‘t bear to look at the notes and pictures anymore, and found himself staring into that tiny little flame as he whispered out his confession. “You were just in the other room… I should have realized, should have heard… But you always knew I was no good. Dunno why you stuck around so long anyways. Sorry, luv.”
The candle dribbled more wax down, the hot fluid catching on the carved out letters as it crawled down the length of the taper. Peter closed his eyes a moment, a headache starting to pound in the back of his head. “They want me to write a new show for next season,” he murmured. “I can’t really say no, not if I want to stick around. It won’t be the same, though. It hasn’t been since… anyway.” He sighed and opened his eyes again. He watched the candle burn down, already melting away the top letters of her name, the smoke drifting away into the heavens and carrying his intent with it.
“I hope the Summerland is as beautiful as they say. Or wherever you’ve ended up. You were Catholic, so Heaven, I guess. Clouds and pearly gates. Whatever. As long as it’s beautiful.” He cast a sad look at the photos and messages trimming the edges of Ginger’s mirror, his eyes landing on one of the two of them together, half out of costume. One of the dancers had caught the pair of them making out backstage and snapped a photo before they could separate. They had their arms wrapped around each other, their faces turned to the camera with matching, comically surprised faces, flushed and happy and randy and alive. “You deserve beautiful, you fierce bitch.” he murmured, a grin tugging at his lips.
Someone knocked on the door, making him jump. “Mr. Vincent?” Damn, it was that new weedy weasel of an assistant. The man would not leave Peter alone for more than five minutes. “Mr. Vincent, you’ve got three minutes to get onstage.”
“Yeah, yeah, fuck off. I’ll be right there,” Peter called back, rolling his eyes.
“Mr. Vincent, now! You’re going to miss the opening!”
Peter slammed a fist down on the bureau, then quickly grabbed the candle when it wobbled in place, shouting all the while. “I said fuck off, you bag of douche! I will be. Right. There! Now bugger off!”
He heard the assistant utter some curse back through the door at him, then feet stomping down the hall. He sighed and turned back to face the mirror, looking down at the little candle.
“Sorry Ginger, got to run. “The show must go on,” and all that.” He stood and turned to go, then paused, looking back at the lone flame. “I’ll make it a good one for you,” he muttered, then hurried out the door.