Fic: Three Mornings (Frequency gen, PG-13)
Title: Three Mornings
Author: harmonyangel
Fandom: Frequency (2000 film)
Word Count: 1,500
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Frank Sullivan, John Sullivan, Jack Shepard
Warnings and Spoilers: Serial killer POV in the third section?
Summary: Three morning vignettes
Notes: Written for Vyola for Yuletide 2010! Betaed by the lovely likeadeuce, who did so despite barely remembering the film. Link to the version on AO3 is here.
Don’t change the timeline, Frank reminds himself. It’s his mantra each morning as he tucks the tails of his shirt into his jeans and combs his hair in the mirror, ready for another day at the firehouse. Don’t change the timeline. Followed by Don’t pick up that cigarette and Don’t even look at the wallet under that loose board and Be thankful you’re alive.
Jack Shepard won’t bother him as long as he doesn’t bother Jack Shepard. Frank knows this, because he talked to Johnny in the future and he knows they all live to see November of 1999. Frank has figured out, from the faint crashes he heard in the background and the sound of his own voice, that he’ll be the one to take the bastard down, one day. That he will step in and save his son in his moment of need, and everything will finally be resolved.
But thirty years is a long time to wait. A long time to live with the knowledge that a man who would have killed your wife, who tried to kill your son, is not only on the loose but on the police force, sworn to protect the very people he would happily murder. At least he isn’t murdering anyone anymore, as far as Frank knows. His close call was apparently a little too close for his own comfort, and besides, Satch is keeping an eye on him. In fact, if it were up to Satch, Shepard would be locked up already. But Frank told him to drop the case. The future was already in the best possible state. Who knows what would happen if they changed things again?
So Frank keeps his thoughts to himself, hiding them from Johnny and from Jules, and tries his hardest not to think about that moment, that single, terrifying moment, when Shepard held a gun to the head of his Little Chief. If he’d fired… what then? With no Johnny to grow up and use the radio, would Frank have died in that fire after all? Or would they be stuck in an endless loop, frozen in time and in fear?
Those questions are just too heavy for a blue-collar firefighter from Queens like Frank Sullivan. The only way to handle them is to lock them away in a corner of his mind, just like he locked his CB radio in the hall closet, hidden in a dark crevice to be rediscovered in thirty years’ time. In the meantime he straightens his collar, kisses his wife and son, pats the Mets pennant on his living room wall, and walks out to his car, ready to be a hero the only way he can. For now.
~*~
John doesn’t know what’s real.
He knows who he is. He knows that he’s John Sullivan, NYPD cop. He knows that he lives in Queens, New York in the house where he was raised, right down the street from the smaller place his parents now share in their retirement. He knows he’s married to Samantha Thomas-Sullivan and that they have a son, Frank, a wonderful little boy who John loves more than he ever thought he could love anyone. He knows these things because he checks every day to make sure they’re still true.
Every morning at 5 a.m. John rolls over in his bed and finds Sam lying there, breath slow and even with the sleep of a person who doesn’t have to wake up until 6:30. John kisses her temple and tries not to dwell on the memories he has of their breakup, of the words she said and the things they threw, because he knows they’ve never broken up. He stands up, gathers his clothes, and doesn’t let himself think about the world where he and Sam never even met, where he was visiting his mother’s grave instead of the coffee shop where Sam was working on grad school papers. That world never happened.
Down the hall he sees his son in his bedroom, tangled in blankets. Frank snores in his sleep, just like the grandfather he was named after, and the snores reassure John that his son exists. He reminds himself that all the years he remembers living alone, or with Sam but with no kids, aren’t real, even though they make up three different lifetimes and Frank himself is part of only one.
In the kitchen John makes coffee and checks his watch, reminding himself that he doesn’t have to rush through breakfast to pick up Gordo for their carpool. Gordo has millions now and doesn’t need to save money on gas, and last Christmas he bought John the kind of car that saves more gas money than carpooling ever could. John wonders if he’ll ever be able to tell his best friend that he was the mysterious voice on the radio that gave him his magic word. He’s pretty sure Gordo would think he was crazy. He’s pretty sure he wouldn’t argue that point.
John makes himself oatmeal and finishes his coffee and tugs a jacket over his shoulders. He thinks that maybe today he won’t need the last part of his ritual, won’t need that last piece of reassurance. But he still remembers the day he made a phone call to find his mother’s number had never belonged to her at all. He has to be sure. He walks to his car, fumbles with his cell phone, and calls his parents.
His mother picks up the phone. Her voice is thick with sleep but he can hear her smile all the same. “It’s always good to hear from you, Johnny,” she says, and she doesn’t even sound annoyed that he does this every day. John’s heart begins to slow at the sound of her words, and he dismisses as nightmares the memories he has of coming home from first grade to find his father sobbing and Satch with a hand on his shoulder, breaking the terrible news. Then his father is on the line, and John’s heart slows more, almost back to a normal rhythm. His father didn’t die in a fire, leaving his mother to raise their little boy alone; his father didn’t die ten years ago in a hospital bed, taking his last ragged breaths from an oxygen tank as John and his mother sat by his side. His father is here, now, and nothing’s going to change that. The radio is back in the hall closet, where it’s going to stay, and there are no more lights in the sky
“I know, Little Chief,” his father says, and John would feel annoyed and vaguely pathetic if it wasn’t so true. His father does know. He’s the only one who possibly can. “But things are ok now. We did it, you and me. We did it.”
John is sure that his father is right. This must be the best of all possible worlds. But when he’s seen some of those other worlds firsthand, when he remembers them as well as he remembers what he has here and now, how can he be sure? How can he know what’s real, what’s meant to be?
He doesn’t. But he’s a cop, and that’s the one thing that hasn’t changed, in all of the lifetimes John’s lived. Reassured as he’ll ever be, John hangs up with his parents, puts his car into gear, and drives off to the solid reality of the station.
~*~
Jack Shepard is sure the past will catch up with him. Or maybe the future will instead. He feels trapped, caught between what’s been and what’s to come, treading water. Every morning he wakes up he knows he’s living on borrowed time. He brushes his teeth, throws on a tie, and wonders when the other shoe will drop.
There’s something strange about those Sullivans. It’s something Jack can’t quite put his finger on, but strange all the same. Each day he leaves his house and makes a detour through their neighborhood, driving slowly past their house. He tries not to think about the people inside, about that bastard firefighter and his kid and the lovely nurse whose throat he’d like to cut. He can imagine killing her, in every intimate detail, as if he’s already done it. The image is more vivid than any other fantasy he’s ever had, and he has no idea why. But he knows he’ll get caught if he does, knows how easily he’d be connected to the crime, after what happened that day. So he lets his car pick up speed, driving to the station and away from the Sullivans.
After a few years, he stops driving by. The memories fade. He doesn’t see the Sullivan boy grow up, and after awhile he’s not sure he would even recognize him if he ran into him on the street. But that feeling every morning remains: the feeling that the end is nigh, that he’s already been caught, somewhere and somehow. That none of this is real, and the world could end tomorrow with a sky full of fire.
Author: harmonyangel
Fandom: Frequency (2000 film)
Word Count: 1,500
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Frank Sullivan, John Sullivan, Jack Shepard
Warnings and Spoilers: Serial killer POV in the third section?
Summary: Three morning vignettes
Notes: Written for Vyola for Yuletide 2010! Betaed by the lovely likeadeuce, who did so despite barely remembering the film. Link to the version on AO3 is here.
Don’t change the timeline, Frank reminds himself. It’s his mantra each morning as he tucks the tails of his shirt into his jeans and combs his hair in the mirror, ready for another day at the firehouse. Don’t change the timeline. Followed by Don’t pick up that cigarette and Don’t even look at the wallet under that loose board and Be thankful you’re alive.
Jack Shepard won’t bother him as long as he doesn’t bother Jack Shepard. Frank knows this, because he talked to Johnny in the future and he knows they all live to see November of 1999. Frank has figured out, from the faint crashes he heard in the background and the sound of his own voice, that he’ll be the one to take the bastard down, one day. That he will step in and save his son in his moment of need, and everything will finally be resolved.
But thirty years is a long time to wait. A long time to live with the knowledge that a man who would have killed your wife, who tried to kill your son, is not only on the loose but on the police force, sworn to protect the very people he would happily murder. At least he isn’t murdering anyone anymore, as far as Frank knows. His close call was apparently a little too close for his own comfort, and besides, Satch is keeping an eye on him. In fact, if it were up to Satch, Shepard would be locked up already. But Frank told him to drop the case. The future was already in the best possible state. Who knows what would happen if they changed things again?
So Frank keeps his thoughts to himself, hiding them from Johnny and from Jules, and tries his hardest not to think about that moment, that single, terrifying moment, when Shepard held a gun to the head of his Little Chief. If he’d fired… what then? With no Johnny to grow up and use the radio, would Frank have died in that fire after all? Or would they be stuck in an endless loop, frozen in time and in fear?
Those questions are just too heavy for a blue-collar firefighter from Queens like Frank Sullivan. The only way to handle them is to lock them away in a corner of his mind, just like he locked his CB radio in the hall closet, hidden in a dark crevice to be rediscovered in thirty years’ time. In the meantime he straightens his collar, kisses his wife and son, pats the Mets pennant on his living room wall, and walks out to his car, ready to be a hero the only way he can. For now.
~*~
John doesn’t know what’s real.
He knows who he is. He knows that he’s John Sullivan, NYPD cop. He knows that he lives in Queens, New York in the house where he was raised, right down the street from the smaller place his parents now share in their retirement. He knows he’s married to Samantha Thomas-Sullivan and that they have a son, Frank, a wonderful little boy who John loves more than he ever thought he could love anyone. He knows these things because he checks every day to make sure they’re still true.
Every morning at 5 a.m. John rolls over in his bed and finds Sam lying there, breath slow and even with the sleep of a person who doesn’t have to wake up until 6:30. John kisses her temple and tries not to dwell on the memories he has of their breakup, of the words she said and the things they threw, because he knows they’ve never broken up. He stands up, gathers his clothes, and doesn’t let himself think about the world where he and Sam never even met, where he was visiting his mother’s grave instead of the coffee shop where Sam was working on grad school papers. That world never happened.
Down the hall he sees his son in his bedroom, tangled in blankets. Frank snores in his sleep, just like the grandfather he was named after, and the snores reassure John that his son exists. He reminds himself that all the years he remembers living alone, or with Sam but with no kids, aren’t real, even though they make up three different lifetimes and Frank himself is part of only one.
In the kitchen John makes coffee and checks his watch, reminding himself that he doesn’t have to rush through breakfast to pick up Gordo for their carpool. Gordo has millions now and doesn’t need to save money on gas, and last Christmas he bought John the kind of car that saves more gas money than carpooling ever could. John wonders if he’ll ever be able to tell his best friend that he was the mysterious voice on the radio that gave him his magic word. He’s pretty sure Gordo would think he was crazy. He’s pretty sure he wouldn’t argue that point.
John makes himself oatmeal and finishes his coffee and tugs a jacket over his shoulders. He thinks that maybe today he won’t need the last part of his ritual, won’t need that last piece of reassurance. But he still remembers the day he made a phone call to find his mother’s number had never belonged to her at all. He has to be sure. He walks to his car, fumbles with his cell phone, and calls his parents.
His mother picks up the phone. Her voice is thick with sleep but he can hear her smile all the same. “It’s always good to hear from you, Johnny,” she says, and she doesn’t even sound annoyed that he does this every day. John’s heart begins to slow at the sound of her words, and he dismisses as nightmares the memories he has of coming home from first grade to find his father sobbing and Satch with a hand on his shoulder, breaking the terrible news. Then his father is on the line, and John’s heart slows more, almost back to a normal rhythm. His father didn’t die in a fire, leaving his mother to raise their little boy alone; his father didn’t die ten years ago in a hospital bed, taking his last ragged breaths from an oxygen tank as John and his mother sat by his side. His father is here, now, and nothing’s going to change that. The radio is back in the hall closet, where it’s going to stay, and there are no more lights in the sky
“I know, Little Chief,” his father says, and John would feel annoyed and vaguely pathetic if it wasn’t so true. His father does know. He’s the only one who possibly can. “But things are ok now. We did it, you and me. We did it.”
John is sure that his father is right. This must be the best of all possible worlds. But when he’s seen some of those other worlds firsthand, when he remembers them as well as he remembers what he has here and now, how can he be sure? How can he know what’s real, what’s meant to be?
He doesn’t. But he’s a cop, and that’s the one thing that hasn’t changed, in all of the lifetimes John’s lived. Reassured as he’ll ever be, John hangs up with his parents, puts his car into gear, and drives off to the solid reality of the station.
~*~
Jack Shepard is sure the past will catch up with him. Or maybe the future will instead. He feels trapped, caught between what’s been and what’s to come, treading water. Every morning he wakes up he knows he’s living on borrowed time. He brushes his teeth, throws on a tie, and wonders when the other shoe will drop.
There’s something strange about those Sullivans. It’s something Jack can’t quite put his finger on, but strange all the same. Each day he leaves his house and makes a detour through their neighborhood, driving slowly past their house. He tries not to think about the people inside, about that bastard firefighter and his kid and the lovely nurse whose throat he’d like to cut. He can imagine killing her, in every intimate detail, as if he’s already done it. The image is more vivid than any other fantasy he’s ever had, and he has no idea why. But he knows he’ll get caught if he does, knows how easily he’d be connected to the crime, after what happened that day. So he lets his car pick up speed, driving to the station and away from the Sullivans.
After a few years, he stops driving by. The memories fade. He doesn’t see the Sullivan boy grow up, and after awhile he’s not sure he would even recognize him if he ran into him on the street. But that feeling every morning remains: the feeling that the end is nigh, that he’s already been caught, somewhere and somehow. That none of this is real, and the world could end tomorrow with a sky full of fire.