Free Fall
Here's my entry for round seven of writerinadrawer, and some how I've made it through again, albeit this time with a score of -4 (All my scores up until now have been between +2 and -2), but since the average was -3 I'm thinking that isn't so bad, especially considering I wrote this at the last minute.
Title: Free Fall.
Character: Owen.
Rating: PG-13 for language and implied sex.
Prompts: Wasted (Somebody is more than a little intoxicated), an Olympic sport, and 500 words or less.
Owen stumbles out of a pub and into the cold December night, not wishing to be part of the enthusiastic countdown to the New Year that has just started inside.
Around him Cardiff city-centre is buzzing with life, the streets, despite the late hour, are thronged with people, all seemingly happy in their chosen celebrations.
If he were just a little bit drunker, he tells himself, as he reels through the streets, leaning against walls and shop fronts, he’d tell them all what a load of crap it all is, how all the smiles and laughter are just covers for the lies that everybody tells.
A group of young women, coatless despite the cold, pass him. The last, a brunette, turns and looks back, smiling at him, before she is lost in the crowd.
He kicks a discarded can viciously, angry at the irony of it. One way or another they all leave him, either emotionally, physically or both, and the result is always the same, he’s left alone and feeling like shit. Why had he thought what he’d had with Diane would end any different?
Deciding that if he’s still thinking then he’s definitely not drunk enough, he pushes into the next club he finds. It takes him a few minutes to realise that it’s the same gay club that Jack had dragged him to during the course of an investigation a few months back, trying catch an alien who’d been spiking drinks.
Downing a couple more shots at the bar he heads for the dance floor. The press of bodies is stifling and the floor seems to tip and roll beneath his feet. For reasons that temporarily escape him he’s reminded of being on the diving board, high up over the pool, back at a school swimming lesson. He thinks maybe it’s something about falling.
Sure, professional athletes could make it look graceful, leaping off the high board, waiting for the judges to hold up their cards, but all it is, in Owen’s opinion, is a fancy way of falling.
He doesn’t fall though as a guy grabs hold of him, steadying him. "You okay, mate?"
"Yeah." He’s tall and blond and male and everything Diane isn’t. So despite the fact that the club still seems to swim, Owen knows he’s found his distraction for the evening and starts to move against him, hips pressing close.
After a moment the guy seems to get the message, and shouts over the music into Owen’s ear something that sounds like ‘fuck.’
Owen nods and lets the guy lead him outside. He’s vaguely aware that this could be a bad idea, but comes to the conclusion that his whole life up to this point has been one continuous bad idea so one more isn’t likely to make any difference.
Pulling the guy in for a kiss, Owen decides that if his life is going into free fall, then he might as well enjoy himself on the way down.