Fic: Move Along (Passing Weeks)
So, I have four series in the works right now (and that's not counting the one I haven't posted yet... God, I'm sad). I fugured Move Along would be the quickest to finish a chapter for. Now I just have to figure out if I feel like kid based fluff, wild, plotless sex, or a seasons of... wild, plotless sex.....
Author: Stephanie (Gildedmuse)
Series: Move Along
Chapter: Passing Weeks
Characters: Roger(/Mimi), Mark
Rating: PG-13 for language and themes
Prompt: Weeks
Word Count: 2,120
Summary: A series of shorts reflecting how the other bohemians see the filmmaker. Coming home from Santa Fe, Roger is worried his best friend won't be there when he needs him the most.
Other Parts:Only In Hours, Days Between Us
Move Along
Passing Weeks
It's weird, but once he's out of the city and into the wide, bright space of Santa Fe where he's free from all the death, the gray, the hopelessness that had suffocated him back home, all Roger can think of is New York.
Santa Fe is probably gorgeous, but he wouldn't know. He gets there and stays three weeks before he's turning around and coming home. All in all, he misses out on November, and that is pretty much it. It seems like the longest part of the trip is getting back to New York. Back home where everything is miserable and broken and dying all around him, and the only place Roger can imagine being happy.
He doesn't call. He promises everyone he will. Swears to Collins to keep in touch and, well, he can't bring himself to pick up the phone and risk thinking about Angel. Collins' Angel is Roger's Mimi, the same fate awaiting her and everything. No, he doesn't want to talk with Collins. Doesn't want to feel pain that close to home. He isn't a tough, emotionless rock star. He pretended to be, once, during the withdrawals and April. Tried for a while to act like nothing could touch him but... but... Death doesn't care if nothing can touch you. Roger has never been solid, never been stable. He isn't anyone's rock, and so he doesn't call Collins.
He sends a postcard to his mom. One post card, before he leaves, to tell her that he's moving out to Santa Fe. That's it. He doesn't call. He doesn't write, not really. Every time he calls it's like the fucking Spanish Inquisition. How are you doing? Are you taking your meds? What's your T-cell count. Caring, loving mom. Roger can't stand her. It's not like he's going to forget that he is dying. It doesn't slip his mind, get lost in his head for a while. Does she think she is reminding him with those phone calls? Oh, by the way, Roger. Remember that you killed April. That you're killing yourself. That you couldn't save Mimi.
God, Mimi.
Roger looks down at his notebook. He needs to finish this song for her. Needs to give her something, some last form of life to show how much she means to him. He saw her before he left. She's sick. She's dying and Roger couldn't stop that. He couldn't stop the drugs, couldn't stop her from running back to Benny. This he can do, though. Show her how much she means to him and give her some life. Mark had been right when he said... Mark....
Mark has been Roger's best friend since he moved in with them, four years ago and, well, Roger has been pretty nasty to him a lot. With the drugs and the guilt and withdrawal, and Mark is the only one who stuck around. Even Collins moved out, and Roger knows that hadn't all been because of him but back then, when his entire world had been ripped away from him. When he didn't have April, couldn't have drugs, knew he was dying and didn't care if he did or not. There had always been Mark to look out for him and clean up after him and force Roger to look past the pain of the withdrawal to something else, some unattainable future Roger had always figured. He still remembers Mark in the bathroom as Roger throw up and could barely keep himself kneeling with the shakes that wrecked his body. "You'll see, Roger," Mark would say, not leaving even when things got disgusting and hard and Roger just wanted to leave himself. "You're going to be happy again if you can just get through this."
Even though Mark had gotten him through the drugs, Roger never really believed him. He just figured they had been words to get him to stop whining and begging for smack, and maybe Mark didn't even believe them himself back then. How could he have known about Mimi? No one would have guessed that Roger could be in love again, could find a reason to live other than to drag out the guilt over killing April. Only then came Mimi with her candle and her smile and those bright, young eyes that lit up for Roger. Mark had been right. Roger could be happy again. All he needs it to get back to New York, to fix this damage he has done when he left for Santa Fe. To get Mimi back and healthy, and play this song for her.
He looks back to his notebook sitting across him on the seat of the worn out car he's driving back. How is Mark going to react when he gets back? He's probably pissed as hell at Roger for running off like he had. Shit, one of the few times Mark had yelled at him had been as he was leaving. He could see the hurt twisted on his friend's face, and that isn't something Roger sees often. Mark doesn't like being open with people. Roger could never figure out why, but he doesn't push. Not his place to make Mark talk about what he doesn't want to. They're best friends. They don't get on each other's backs like that, unless it's important. Mark is Roger's best friend, and he takes him as he is even with the bad habit of hiding in his work.
They've been friends for all this time, and Roger still doesn't know how Mark is going to react when he gets home. Maybe he'll just shrug the trip off, give Roger a few nasty looks but otherwise not comment. Only then he thinks back to his leaving, and he's never seen Mark so upset over him unless there was smack involved. Mark doesn't unleash all his emotions like that. Sure, he didn't break down but it takes knowing Mark to see how close he'd been. Then Roger had gone, just left him behind because he couldn't stand to watch this girl, his second chance at love, fade away. He couldn't blame Mark if he hated him.
Mark couldn't hate him, Roger decides. He closes the notebook so that it's not distracting him as he heads into the city, trying to find some place to trade in this piece of shit for a car in for some cash so that he can get his guitar back. Mark couldn't hate him, because they've been through tougher times than this and he's never given up on Roger yet. There have been points where they're freezing and starving and what money they've had Roger has thrown away on drugs. Times when Collins has told them he's positive, and Roger couldn't handle the fact that one of his friends was dying so he turned around and told him to get out, he didn't want to live with someone who was sick. And Mark knows him and he keeps staying with Roger anyway.
Besides, Roger thinks as he tries to get some of those scary thoughts of Mark not being there out of his head, besides they have had good times, too. Plenty of them, right? Nights when the rest of the world and all the hardships it brought along could fade out, and him and Collins and Mark and whoever else happened to be around could lie on the roof of sprawl themselves out around the loft and just enjoy each other's company. Could remember that this life they chose still has some great parts to it, like the laughing together and not feeling put off by their own sense of closeness. That was a while ago, though, and after April it changed. Roger became isolated by the guilt and the diseases and the drugs, and even though Mark had still been there it was hardly the same.
Did Mark blame Roger for this? The thoughts are reeling around in his head as he sells the car, taking whatever he can get for it and heading down the street towards the loft. He'll get his guitar later, when his stomach doesn't feel ready to come out his throat. Now that it's in his mind, this panic that Mark might not want him to come back, it's driving him close to turning around and heading back down again. It's stupid, to leave just because his best friend might be upset with him. Roger had never had to think about it until now.
Nothing clears your head like leaving everything behind, getting away from the city and everyone he'd become so familiar with. Mark, he realizes, is who he depends on more than anyone else. Trying to help Mimi to get off drugs, to get her healthy and safe, that was all because of what Mark did for him. Roger wouldn't have even let her in that night, if Mark hadn't managed to save just a bit of his old self, the one that can still write songs about love and mean them. Mark saved him, and then Roger ran away after yelling at him, accusing him of being a coward for staying behind his camera instead of doing all that he wanted to do.
Roger frowns as he finds the door to the loft still broken from New Years. Mimi and Benny, that's when he really figured out about then. Fuck, he hates that guy. For how he took Mark's friendship and throw it out the second he got a decent, yuppie job. For taking Mimi away from Roger when he'd wanted to help get her off smack. Mark had been right. He let Benny get between them. He let Mimi run off to him, only after he accused her of doing so a thousand times. Roger doesn't want to watch her die, and he could see how much paler and smaller she got every day. He let it happen, because he's the one that is afraid. Then he'd accused Mark of the same thing to defend himself before running off. Worse yet, it's true. Mark doesn't need drugs or death to isolate himself. He does it anyway, and Roger has never been able to figure out why but he's seen it happen. When Maureen started cheating, it isn't like Mark didn't know but he ignored it. With April's death, and how he distances them from it so quickly. He probably did it with Angel, but Roger didn't stick around long enough to see.
The fact that it is true is what makes it worse. The truth gets under people's skin, upsets them in ways that lying can't. That is what Roger is afraid of as he heads up the stairs to the loft. That he's made Mark hate him, and in that he probably figured out damn fast that he doesn't need Roger as a best friend. What did Roger ever do to save him?
It takes a while before he can do it, knock at the loft door. Maybe Mark isn't here at all. Roger isn't the only one who can run away, is he? Roger never called, and it isn't like Mark even had a chance to tell him before he cut this whole, fucked up bohemian life loose and moved up with that whole Buzzline job. It's only been a few weeks, but a lot can happen in a few weeks. Your girlfriend could test positive for HIV and take her own life instead of letting the virus win while you shake and moan from the drugs your best friend wouldn't let you have. You could fall in love with a girl you never meant before and lose her a week later in a fit of jealousy. A friend's partner could die, you could hurt your best friend and then pack up and leave for Santa Fe. Roger knows from experience. Life happens all at once.
He knocks again, becoming more and more sure that Mark has simply left all together. What did he have left here? He isn't like Roger. He's still healthy and has time, so why would he stick around when he doesn't have a best friend to worry about. Roger is set on giving up, walking away and finding Mimi. Then there is a click, and the door is sliding away between them.
Mark pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "Hey," he says, expression painfully neutral as Roger stands there, waiting for whatever it is Mark is going to yell at him for. It's how they left, so it makes sense that it is what Roger would come back to. "It's good to have you back. Come on inside, Rog. You look ready to freeze to death."
Author: Stephanie (Gildedmuse)
Series: Move Along
Chapter: Passing Weeks
Characters: Roger(/Mimi), Mark
Rating: PG-13 for language and themes
Prompt: Weeks
Word Count: 2,120
Summary: A series of shorts reflecting how the other bohemians see the filmmaker. Coming home from Santa Fe, Roger is worried his best friend won't be there when he needs him the most.
Other Parts:Only In Hours, Days Between Us
Move Along
Passing Weeks
It's weird, but once he's out of the city and into the wide, bright space of Santa Fe where he's free from all the death, the gray, the hopelessness that had suffocated him back home, all Roger can think of is New York.
Santa Fe is probably gorgeous, but he wouldn't know. He gets there and stays three weeks before he's turning around and coming home. All in all, he misses out on November, and that is pretty much it. It seems like the longest part of the trip is getting back to New York. Back home where everything is miserable and broken and dying all around him, and the only place Roger can imagine being happy.
He doesn't call. He promises everyone he will. Swears to Collins to keep in touch and, well, he can't bring himself to pick up the phone and risk thinking about Angel. Collins' Angel is Roger's Mimi, the same fate awaiting her and everything. No, he doesn't want to talk with Collins. Doesn't want to feel pain that close to home. He isn't a tough, emotionless rock star. He pretended to be, once, during the withdrawals and April. Tried for a while to act like nothing could touch him but... but... Death doesn't care if nothing can touch you. Roger has never been solid, never been stable. He isn't anyone's rock, and so he doesn't call Collins.
He sends a postcard to his mom. One post card, before he leaves, to tell her that he's moving out to Santa Fe. That's it. He doesn't call. He doesn't write, not really. Every time he calls it's like the fucking Spanish Inquisition. How are you doing? Are you taking your meds? What's your T-cell count. Caring, loving mom. Roger can't stand her. It's not like he's going to forget that he is dying. It doesn't slip his mind, get lost in his head for a while. Does she think she is reminding him with those phone calls? Oh, by the way, Roger. Remember that you killed April. That you're killing yourself. That you couldn't save Mimi.
God, Mimi.
Roger looks down at his notebook. He needs to finish this song for her. Needs to give her something, some last form of life to show how much she means to him. He saw her before he left. She's sick. She's dying and Roger couldn't stop that. He couldn't stop the drugs, couldn't stop her from running back to Benny. This he can do, though. Show her how much she means to him and give her some life. Mark had been right when he said... Mark....
Mark has been Roger's best friend since he moved in with them, four years ago and, well, Roger has been pretty nasty to him a lot. With the drugs and the guilt and withdrawal, and Mark is the only one who stuck around. Even Collins moved out, and Roger knows that hadn't all been because of him but back then, when his entire world had been ripped away from him. When he didn't have April, couldn't have drugs, knew he was dying and didn't care if he did or not. There had always been Mark to look out for him and clean up after him and force Roger to look past the pain of the withdrawal to something else, some unattainable future Roger had always figured. He still remembers Mark in the bathroom as Roger throw up and could barely keep himself kneeling with the shakes that wrecked his body. "You'll see, Roger," Mark would say, not leaving even when things got disgusting and hard and Roger just wanted to leave himself. "You're going to be happy again if you can just get through this."
Even though Mark had gotten him through the drugs, Roger never really believed him. He just figured they had been words to get him to stop whining and begging for smack, and maybe Mark didn't even believe them himself back then. How could he have known about Mimi? No one would have guessed that Roger could be in love again, could find a reason to live other than to drag out the guilt over killing April. Only then came Mimi with her candle and her smile and those bright, young eyes that lit up for Roger. Mark had been right. Roger could be happy again. All he needs it to get back to New York, to fix this damage he has done when he left for Santa Fe. To get Mimi back and healthy, and play this song for her.
He looks back to his notebook sitting across him on the seat of the worn out car he's driving back. How is Mark going to react when he gets back? He's probably pissed as hell at Roger for running off like he had. Shit, one of the few times Mark had yelled at him had been as he was leaving. He could see the hurt twisted on his friend's face, and that isn't something Roger sees often. Mark doesn't like being open with people. Roger could never figure out why, but he doesn't push. Not his place to make Mark talk about what he doesn't want to. They're best friends. They don't get on each other's backs like that, unless it's important. Mark is Roger's best friend, and he takes him as he is even with the bad habit of hiding in his work.
They've been friends for all this time, and Roger still doesn't know how Mark is going to react when he gets home. Maybe he'll just shrug the trip off, give Roger a few nasty looks but otherwise not comment. Only then he thinks back to his leaving, and he's never seen Mark so upset over him unless there was smack involved. Mark doesn't unleash all his emotions like that. Sure, he didn't break down but it takes knowing Mark to see how close he'd been. Then Roger had gone, just left him behind because he couldn't stand to watch this girl, his second chance at love, fade away. He couldn't blame Mark if he hated him.
Mark couldn't hate him, Roger decides. He closes the notebook so that it's not distracting him as he heads into the city, trying to find some place to trade in this piece of shit for a car in for some cash so that he can get his guitar back. Mark couldn't hate him, because they've been through tougher times than this and he's never given up on Roger yet. There have been points where they're freezing and starving and what money they've had Roger has thrown away on drugs. Times when Collins has told them he's positive, and Roger couldn't handle the fact that one of his friends was dying so he turned around and told him to get out, he didn't want to live with someone who was sick. And Mark knows him and he keeps staying with Roger anyway.
Besides, Roger thinks as he tries to get some of those scary thoughts of Mark not being there out of his head, besides they have had good times, too. Plenty of them, right? Nights when the rest of the world and all the hardships it brought along could fade out, and him and Collins and Mark and whoever else happened to be around could lie on the roof of sprawl themselves out around the loft and just enjoy each other's company. Could remember that this life they chose still has some great parts to it, like the laughing together and not feeling put off by their own sense of closeness. That was a while ago, though, and after April it changed. Roger became isolated by the guilt and the diseases and the drugs, and even though Mark had still been there it was hardly the same.
Did Mark blame Roger for this? The thoughts are reeling around in his head as he sells the car, taking whatever he can get for it and heading down the street towards the loft. He'll get his guitar later, when his stomach doesn't feel ready to come out his throat. Now that it's in his mind, this panic that Mark might not want him to come back, it's driving him close to turning around and heading back down again. It's stupid, to leave just because his best friend might be upset with him. Roger had never had to think about it until now.
Nothing clears your head like leaving everything behind, getting away from the city and everyone he'd become so familiar with. Mark, he realizes, is who he depends on more than anyone else. Trying to help Mimi to get off drugs, to get her healthy and safe, that was all because of what Mark did for him. Roger wouldn't have even let her in that night, if Mark hadn't managed to save just a bit of his old self, the one that can still write songs about love and mean them. Mark saved him, and then Roger ran away after yelling at him, accusing him of being a coward for staying behind his camera instead of doing all that he wanted to do.
Roger frowns as he finds the door to the loft still broken from New Years. Mimi and Benny, that's when he really figured out about then. Fuck, he hates that guy. For how he took Mark's friendship and throw it out the second he got a decent, yuppie job. For taking Mimi away from Roger when he'd wanted to help get her off smack. Mark had been right. He let Benny get between them. He let Mimi run off to him, only after he accused her of doing so a thousand times. Roger doesn't want to watch her die, and he could see how much paler and smaller she got every day. He let it happen, because he's the one that is afraid. Then he'd accused Mark of the same thing to defend himself before running off. Worse yet, it's true. Mark doesn't need drugs or death to isolate himself. He does it anyway, and Roger has never been able to figure out why but he's seen it happen. When Maureen started cheating, it isn't like Mark didn't know but he ignored it. With April's death, and how he distances them from it so quickly. He probably did it with Angel, but Roger didn't stick around long enough to see.
The fact that it is true is what makes it worse. The truth gets under people's skin, upsets them in ways that lying can't. That is what Roger is afraid of as he heads up the stairs to the loft. That he's made Mark hate him, and in that he probably figured out damn fast that he doesn't need Roger as a best friend. What did Roger ever do to save him?
It takes a while before he can do it, knock at the loft door. Maybe Mark isn't here at all. Roger isn't the only one who can run away, is he? Roger never called, and it isn't like Mark even had a chance to tell him before he cut this whole, fucked up bohemian life loose and moved up with that whole Buzzline job. It's only been a few weeks, but a lot can happen in a few weeks. Your girlfriend could test positive for HIV and take her own life instead of letting the virus win while you shake and moan from the drugs your best friend wouldn't let you have. You could fall in love with a girl you never meant before and lose her a week later in a fit of jealousy. A friend's partner could die, you could hurt your best friend and then pack up and leave for Santa Fe. Roger knows from experience. Life happens all at once.
He knocks again, becoming more and more sure that Mark has simply left all together. What did he have left here? He isn't like Roger. He's still healthy and has time, so why would he stick around when he doesn't have a best friend to worry about. Roger is set on giving up, walking away and finding Mimi. Then there is a click, and the door is sliding away between them.
Mark pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "Hey," he says, expression painfully neutral as Roger stands there, waiting for whatever it is Mark is going to yell at him for. It's how they left, so it makes sense that it is what Roger would come back to. "It's good to have you back. Come on inside, Rog. You look ready to freeze to death."