There Are Worse Things I Could Do

[first_pink_lady]

Back home, Rizzo had to drive on down to the drive-in if she wanted to catch a flick. The options were pretty limited to whatever reel the man in charge had lying around, but she wasn't too big on the things anyhow. Here, though, they had plenty of movies just lying around on the bookshelf, waiting to be thrown up on the screen in the rec room - in

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[broken_brushes]

Well crap.

Like so many other people, I was a Grease fan. I wouldn't go so far as to say that was why Rizzo and I had become friends, but it had given me an undeniable thrill to meet her for the first time. Before her arrival on the island, I had even toyed with the idea of doing a production of it, but I had known enough to keep my lips firmly zipped the moment one of the central characters had shown up. In my experience, very few people liked finding out that millions of strangers had been privy to their most personal moments.

I wouldn't have even needed to look at Rizzo's face to know that she was upset; it just made sense. The hasty way she fumbled off the projector confirmed it, though, and I sucked it up and stepped over. I really hoped she didn't get too pissed at me for not having told her before.

"Hey," I began, and reached a gentle hand to her closest elbow. "Let's go to the ladies, huh?" If I knew anything about Rizzo, I knew she wouldn't want to have an emotional breakdown in public.

[first_pink_lady]

Rizzo whirled around to face Shari at the touch on her arm, thumbing away the tears on her cheek and attempting to gather herself up, get her walls back up. Then, as she looked at Shari, she wondered if she'd seen the movie, had known from the start about just how vulnerable she was, she'd always been. Still, she didn't want to be here, in full view in the rec room for everyone to see. She nodded, "yeah - I'm just -" then she was making a beeline for the ladies room, because the words had gotten stuck in her throat and she wouldn't cry, wouldn't be that weak.

[broken_brushes]

I followed at a less frantic pace, and then took a moment to make sure no one else was in the bathroom before I placed myself in front of the closed door. There were other bathrooms in the Compound if somebody just couldn't hold it.

"I'm sure it's not much comfort if I tell you that lots of people go through this here," I said as watched Rizzo with sympathetic eyes. Oddly enough, I hadn't been one of those people yet, but I had no doubts by that point that I had to be fictional to somebody, somewhere. My story was way too dramatic for me not to be.

[first_pink_lady]

She leaned over the sink, hands on the counter on either side, watching as tears dripped down into the bowl despite her efforts to stop them, and wondered if she was going to puke - she felt sick enough, that was for sure. She suddenly remembered another ladies room, and another confession - and how quickly that had goddamn spread. It was too late for that, here. Everyone could already fucking know.

"It ain't that I got a flick," she said, and hated how pathetic she sounded, her breath stuttering and catching in something suspiciously close to sobs, "fucking Superman gets his kicks around here."

[since_1997]

It's one of Robin's favourite films. He's seen it hundreds of times. But it's more than that. It's her. It's Betty. And he loves her. And he'd do anything to keep her from harm.

"Betty," he says, gently, walking up behind her. "It's okay."

[first_pink_lady]

She moved towards him before she could think about it, pressing her face to his chest as her breath got stuck in her throat in something suspiciously like a sob. She'd never had somebody like Paul before, that she trusted to protect her, to care for her despite everything - but then her thoughts stuttered to a stop, and she pulled away, looking at him with something like terror. "Have you seen that before?"

[since_1997]

His arms had already started to warp around her by the time she starts to pull away. He doesn't hold onto her though. He lets her go. For a moment, he considers lying to her, but Paul's never been a great liar anyway and there are a few people in the world that he values too much to ever consider deceiving.

He nods his head.

"Yeah," he says, throat suddenly tight. "Yes, I have."

[first_pink_lady]

He was the only one she'd let call her Betty day in and day out since middle school. He knew her - but he'd known her from the beginning, just like everyone else. She'd trusted him - but he'd already known. She stared at him, and felt more tears slip down her cheeks before she brushed at them angrily with the back of her hand and got livid.

"Jesus, Paul!" she said, hot and mad, and feeling more betrayed than even when Kenickie believed without question that she'd been sleeping around on him. She wanted to shout, to accuse - but there was nothing she could say that he didn't already know.

[sluttylyingliar]

Yeah, so...awkward.

Rachel's seen this movie. Rachel's known who Rizzo was from the beginning but it's not as if Anne of Green Gables and fucking Spiderman aren't here, too. It didn't seem worth mentioning.

"Hey," she murmurs, coming up behind her. "This place sucks, sometimes."

[first_pink_lady]

It's not that she's fictional. It's that she'd spent the last decade of her life building up who she was to hide what she felt. If people knew those things - knew how vulnerable she was, about everything that she hid behind her tough gal persona - she couldn't feel anything but sick about it. And she'd never in her life felt more naked.

"You seen this flick, honey?" It's accusatory, but her skin's crawling.

[sluttylyingliar]

"Uh..." Rachel stutters, for the first time in her life not able to come up with an immediate lie. Or denial.

"It looks kind of familiar. With the singing. There's a car, right? It's about a car?" she tries with a wince.

[first_pink_lady]

She felt sick, like she was going to puke, sweat prickling at her temples and her eyes hot and breath stuttering. She thumbed away her tears, turning reflexively to anger.

"Yeah, Greased Lightening, Kenickie's piece of shit hotrod, and the singing," she said, mean, but she didn't know who it was aimed towards - the flick, Rachel, or herself. Mocking Sandy in a sing-song fashion was one thing, at a slumber party with the girls, but seeing it on screen put to a goddamn tune was another thing entirely.

[oh_so_pleasant]

Elwood hasn't a clue about many of the mysterious things the island does to seemingly torture its residents, though he knows the young woman standing before him is upset about seeing herself on the screen for some reason(home movies, someone had told him about the other day, and so he assumes these are perhaps painful memories or reminders of a life left behind).

Without so much as a pause, he produces a handkerchief from the breast pocket of his suit jacket and a calling card from an inner pocket. In one motion, he presses his card into her hand and offers her the cotton fabric.

"Elwood P. Dowd," he says gently, looking at her with respect and not an ounce of pity. The human experience is sometimes a terrible thing. "At your service, now and whenever else you should need someone."

[first_pink_lady]

She could barely focus on what he was saying, mind reeling, eyes hot, and tears on her face for the first time in years. She simply found herself holding a handkerchief and a card, with a man standing in front of her, and felt horribly ill. "What?"

[oh_so_pleasant]

Elwood does not wish to overstep his bounds, and yet he cannot help but be extremely concerned for the welfare of the young lady before him. "I realize something is troubling you, miss. I simply wish to offer my assistance, if possible. Is there anything you need?"

He will not ask what specifically is troubling her. If she wishes to divulge the information, he will listen. Elwood is an excellent listener, when the occasion calls for it.

[first_pink_lady]

She didn't know him. That made it easier, a little - she hadn't assumed for almost a year and a half that he had no prior knowledge of her or her deepest and darkest goddamn feelings.

"Have you ever seen a flick called Grease?" She asked, breath stuttering despite her efforts and thumbing away the tears on her face.

[dishabille_mal]

Olivia had toddled into the rec room because there was singing. She was almost two, and her mother sang, and she knew she liked singing. It stopped abruptly and she paused, pressing her fingers in a little fan against her her face, watching the dark haired woman.

Maladicta followed her quickly in, sharp quiet curses in Uberwaldean on her tongue, and grabbed the little girl up.

"Where exactly did you think- Oh," she said. There was someone else there, someone who looked deeply upset. Maladicta was struck suddenly off-center. She'd been there too long, she thought. The distress, the way the young woman, who she recognized but did not know, was standing next to the projector- she had a dark gut feeling as to what the problem might be.

She sent up a silent prayer to the Duchess or whoever that Polly had found that book, all those years ago, and not William.

"...What did it show you?"

[first_pink_lady]

"An episode of This is Your Life," Rizzo tossed off, thumbing away the first tears on her cheeks in years, feeling horribly naked. Her eyes sunk to the child, and she remembered her own pregnancy scare, and how the flick had clearly showed just how terrifyingly alone she'd been - not tough, not capable of taking care of herself no matter what happened, but scared and young and believing the people who said she was trashy and no good. "Real peachy keen." Her voice skipped, at her chest stuttered in something awfully close to a sob.

[dishabille_mal]

"I don't know what that means," Maladicta said frankly, a worry mark appearing between her slender arched eyebrows.

"Mnuh," Olivia said, extending one hand, fingers curling open and shut.

"I don't know what that means, either," Maladicta murmured to her spawn. After a moment, she walked further into the room, to take up a lean against the sofa on the opposite side of the projector from the crying girl.

"The shelf gave me a book once. It's jarring, and not particularly fair."

[first_pink_lady]

She didn't seem to know Rizzo, know the film she'd been watching, and that made it easier. It was enough of a relief for to get herself together some, get some semblance of her usual persona up, as least outwardly by throwing a hand on her hip. "Everyone knows everything." She tried to toss it off, but it came out almost betrayed sounding. "If they've seen the flick."