FIC: "After The Fall" [RPF; Lea Michele, Dianna Agron]
Title: After The Fall
Fandom: Glee/RPF
Pairing: Lea Michele/Dianna Agron
Rating: R
Warning: hint of DubCon
Word Count: 5366
Summary: ANGST ALERT!! Breaking up is hard to do.
Disclaimer: While the characters are based upon real people, this is a work of fiction intended for fun and not profit.
**
Dianna’s asleep and, already, you feel guilty. Your insecurities have caught up with you, turned to doubts and now questions. Questions you have to find the answer even if you’re wrong. And, God, how you hope and pray that you’re wrong. Using only the pale street light filtering through the tiny crack in the curtain, you slip out of the bed.
Her purse is on a chair in the corner and you will yourself to stop. This is wrong, your internal voice says. You’re being an idiot, it says. Go back to bed and snuggle with your girlfriend, it says. You don’t listen. The voice screaming at you to stop only makes the doubts that much greater and now you have to know.
You slip your fingers into her purse and pull out her Blackberry. The other one, the one most people don’t know she has because you’re the one who gave it to her and you‘re the only one who knows the number.
Like a thief in the night, literally even, you scurry quickly into the living room. Heart in throat, you sit on the couch staring at the screen, like this is your last chance to return to sanity and forget the craziness that’s taken you over ever existed.
Instead, you check her emails.
The heart in your throat drops. It falls through the floor and lands with a hard splat several stories below. For starters, you’d never use a handle as garish and tacky as ‘smth-opr8tr’ and you almost respect her a little less for associating with someone who does.
The emails are bad, confirm every suspicion, every doubt you’ve had. The photos? Take your already crushed heart and obliterates it. The two of them, together, and she’s looking at him the way she used to look at you.
Him. It shouldn’t make a difference but does anyway. You flop back against the couch, like all your bones have been zapped from your body. You just sit and stare at the picture - her gazing lovingly at him, him staring into the camera, smiling like he’s the luckiest guy on the face of the planet because he’s with her.
It takes everything you have just to remember to breathe, let alone cry even though you want to so fucking badly. Instead, you just sit and stare at *them* wondering when your world went wrong.
“Lea?”
The lights flick on and your eyes blink at the sudden intrusion. She’s standing at the edge of the room, a hand rubbing over her puffy eyes, wearing *your* Rent t-shirt, *your* sushi, pajama bottoms.
“How long?” You turn the Blackberry in your hands, showing her the picture. Her gasp is audible, she steps back as if struck, a hand going to the base of her throat.
“Lea..” is all she can say. She moves like she’s about to take a step forward then stops.
“How long?” your voice is louder now, tinged with the anger that’s been building since your first suspicions and ready to blow.
“A couple months.”
A hammer falls on your head as the pieces slam together. It explains everything. Her evasiveness. The growing distance and declining sex. The little things that, now looking back, should have been big, honking neon signs. And the little voice in your head asks how could you have been so blind?
“Do you love him?”
“I didn‘t want you to find out.. I mean, not like this.” She lowers her head. She’s never been good at confrontation and you wonder how long this *would* have gone on before she had the balls to tell you.
“Have you fucked him?” You don’t want to know. You *really* don’t want to know but her silence tells you what her words don’t.
“Lea, please.” She looks at you, her lower lip trembling, her eyes welling with tears and the anger explodes from you.
“NO!” you scream, shooting up from the couch, finger pointing at her angrily. “You do *not* get to cry! You do not get to cry!”
She wants to say something, she wants to say something so badly. And there’s a part of you that wants her to, wants her to apologize, say she’ll break it off and things between the two of you can go back to the way they used to be. You want her hands in your hair, her lips on your own, her tears on your skin.
But, there’s that.. distance now. Things done that can’t be undone. At least, not right now. Not when you’re so angry your entire body is quaking. Because you’re just one giant ache right now, a nerve ending, exposed and raw and bleeding.
With everything you have, you throw her phone at the wall. The phone *you* bought her. The one she used to tell him how much she missed him while she was with you. The one she used to read about how much *he* missed *her*, and all the things he wanted to do to her. You don’t bother to question when she read them or whether she was with you or not. You’re too busy staring at the tiny dent in your wall, shocked and kinda terrified of the violence that has sprung up within you.
You don’t want to hurt her. You don’t want to hurt her. You want her to hurt as badly as you do.
Your shoulder barely brushes hers as you make your way towards the bathroom. You stop, not wanting to look at her as you speak. “I think you should leave now.”
**
The next two days are a blur. The front door closes and you exit the bathroom. The silence is deafening. She’d changed clothes before she left and your t-shirt and pajama bottoms are on the bed. You grab the shirt, climb onto the bed, curl into a ball and stare at the wall. Her pillow’s still warm, still smells like her. The anger recedes and all that’s left is the emptiness and the ache.
All you can do is cry.
**
The first two days are hard, the next week is excruciating. You arrive on the set and it’s like no one notices. No one notices that you’re nothing more than a shell, hollow and empty inside, just ready to break into a million pieces. No ones notices when you all sit down for the table reading and Dianna hasn’t saved a seat for you. The two of you have broken up but you’ll be damned if *you’re* going to be the one to break the news.
Of all of them, it’s Mark who notices first. He’s waiting outside your trailer as you return from the set. His hands are in his pockets and he has that hangdog, sheepish expression on his face.
“You okay?” he asks.
You pause after opening the door to your trailer, brows crinkling in thought. “No.”
**
Jonathon’s waiting for you when you return to your apartment. He’s in the kitchen, humming softly to himself. The air smells of Bolognese sauce and fresh cut vegetables. He turns on his feet, realizing you’re home.
“Hey,” he says, walking towards you arms outstretched. “Thought you could use a friend.”
You didn’t think you could break anymore than you already have but you do. Face scrunching, fighting against the tears already streaming down your face.
He is your rock. The hollow shell you‘ve become finally cracks and you crumble in his embrace.
“It’s okay,” he coos softly, petting your hair. “It’s okay.”
His words mean nothing. It’s not okay. It’s definitely not okay.
**
“It’s not like I’ve never broken up with anyone before,” you sniffle before taking another sip of wine. The two of you are on the couch. Your face is still red from all the crying, eyes still puffy. You told him everything. Everything. Even some of the stuff he probably didn’t want to know. He’s blown away, of course. He saw that certain something between you and Dianna before either one of you did.
“This was different,” he says. “She was different. It wouldn‘t hurt this much if she hadn‘t been.”
“I know,” you sigh. The little voice inside you says ‘she was the one’ but you don’t say it aloud.
**
Jonathon stays for two weeks. You cry less, smile more, laugh a little even. He’s a trooper because the cast quickly finds out. Mark’s never been good at keeping secrets and her cast mates aren’t *that* dim. It’s like the phone never stops ringing.
‘How are you?’
‘Are you okay?’
‘What happened?’
Your answers are pat, mostly evasive. Despite it all, you don’t want them thinking badly of her.
The hardest part is telling your Mom. You thought coming out to her had been hard, crushing her dreams of a nice Jewish wedding with the nice Jewish boy she’d always intended for you to marry. Which all eventually turned into dreams of a nice Jewish wedding with the lovely Jewish girl you’d brought home. You remember the look she gave you after first meeting Dianna, the coy little ‘you did good, official Mother approves’ wink. Now that dream is dashed and it takes everything you have to not dwell on the times you, too, had thought about that wedding.
**
The next two months, well, you’re not sure how you got through them. It’s all mostly a haze. You buried yourself in work because it’s what you know, what you’ve done for most of your life. It’s comfortable, familiar, and doesn’t make you cry at the drop of a hat like certain other aspects of your life.
A part of you doesn’t want to go to the season end wrap party. But, despite recent developments, the past two and a half years of your life have been a dream with mostly good memories. You can’t just leave without saying goodbye to the cast and crew that have become like a second family to you.
“Lea?”
You’re on your third glass of champagne when the familiar hand slips into the crook of your elbow. There’s a sudden and palpable tension within the group of people surrounding you. You turn your head towards her. The two of you haven’t been this close since.. Well. It rushes back to you, as if the past three months of healing had never begun. Not just the hurt but the longing, the desire. Her eyes are like a dagger in your heart. Those excessively long eyelashes and how they would brush against your skin when she kissed you. You’re drunk enough to try and kiss her.
“Can I talk to you?” she half-whispers in your ear.
Before you’ve even thought of answering, she’s pulling you away towards a less crowded part of the room. The little voice in your head fires off a million questions. Does she want to apologize? Does she want to get back together? Does she want to kiss you as badly as you want to kiss her?
“Listen,” she says, eyes darting about like she’s afraid to look at Lea. “There’s something I have to tell you.”
“Dianna!”
You watch as her face falls, like she’s run out of time. Then, you lift your eyes towards the voice calling her name. A voice you don’t recognize.
Him.
She’s invited Him to the party. Of course, you recognize him immediately. You were holding Dianna’s hand when Cory introduced him to the two of you. He’s tall and tan, with brown hair and even darker eyes. Dianna certainly has a type.
He’s all smiles, his teeth practically blinding you. He slides up beside her, curling his arm around her waist and planting his lips on her forehead. “Hey babe.”
Something twists in your gut.
“It’s so great to see you again,” he says and it takes a moment to realize it’s you he’s talking to. He’s affable and friendly. You don’t know him, you just know of him. He’s considered one of the nicest guys in Hollywood.
So why is the guy who stole your girlfriend talking to you like he knows you, like the two of you could *ever* be friends? How could the nicest guy in Hollywood be so tactless?
Then it hits you and it hits you hard. He’s not tactless, he’s oblivious.
Oblivious because Dianna never told him.
You can tell by the way she’s looking at you, both guilty and apologetic.
The champagne in your stomach turns to acid. The blood leaves your face. The room starts to feel overcrowded, like the air has left the room.
“I’m sorry, I have to..” you mutter, muscling your way past both of them. “Go throw up.”
**
In two hours, you’ll be leaving for the airport and flying back to New York. But you’re not thinking about that right now. Your agent, manager and publicist are all on conference call and you’ve just dropped a bombshell. They’re sympathetic, supportive even but you can hear it their voices - ‘please don’t do this, please don’t tank your career’.
**
The day of the second season finale, your interview with AfterEllen goes online.
AE: Why now?
LM: Why not? Whether people love me or hate me, I’d rather it be because of who I actually am than some manufactured image of someone I‘m not just to sell a few more cd‘s or movie tickets, you know. Acting is my job, not my life. Why now? Because I didn’t want to start this next step of my career lying about who I am.
**
The next day, you get a fruit basket and a toaster from Jane Lynch delivered to your door.
**
There’s some damage. A couple movie offers are suddenly retracted. A few dates on your upcoming tour are scrubbed. But, the scandal of FOX’s romantic lead coming out is immediately swept under the rug, literally the next day, by the scandal of a multiple murder on the set of a reality show.
While some doors have closed, more doors have definitely opened. You’re not just ‘Hollywood Out’, you’re OUT Out. Jonathon takes you to a club and it’s like you’ve been dipped in honey and thrown to the lesbians.
You remember the first. Her name’s Linda. She’s a foot taller than you with jet-black hair and pale blue eyes. She eats you out in the bathroom, then takes you to her place in SoHo and breaks that taboo you’d been saving for Dianna.
You remember the ones after that but, soon, they all become a blur. A string of one-night stands, tall, short, and everything in between. Instead of Dianna and *him*, it’s you showing up on TMZ. A picture of you having the time of your life on some dance floor, sandwiched between a blonde and a redhead. That you’d taken them home for your first threesome somehow escapes the gossip hounds.
Every other day, there’s a phone call from your manager because some agent’s called him and he wants to know if you wanna go on a date with some young actress or another. Your answer is always the same -
“Is she out?”
“No.”
“Then fuck her.”
YOU took the risk. You‘re young, out and fucking *proud* and you’ll be damned if you’ll go back into the closet. For *anyone*.
The phone rings a little less. Not because your ‘new’ friends have stopped calling but the old ones. The ones you’ve known since childhood. The ones you considered a second family. It’s Jonathon who plays straight with you.
“Everyone’s worried about you,” he says.
“I’m fine,” you huff back.
“You’re going down a path you don’t want to go down, Lea.”
**
You don’t realize how right he is until it’s almost too late.
**
Two weeks before Glee starts shooting and you’re back in LA. A hungry shark in fresh waters, craving nothing but fresh meat. You hit the clubs with a vengeance.
**
The pain forces you to open your eyes. Not the vice-like thing crushing your skull, no, the pain between your legs. You open your eyes and a wave of nausea hits you. It takes a couple minutes for the sensation to decrease but, by that time, your heart’s going a million miles a minute and you’re trying your damnedest not to hyperventilate.
The room is unfamiliar. You have no idea how you got here. The two females passed out to next you are only vaguely familiar. But then again, these days, they’re all starting to look the same. As your eyes adjust to the dim light, you realize it’s not just the three of you in the room. Other females are there, passed out on couches and on the floor, scattered about like flotsam left on the shore.
You slide your legs over the edge of the mattress, breathing shallowly as another wave of nausea hits you. The air reeks of stale sex, cigarette smoke and sweat. It’s not the ruined dress bunched around your waist that makes the tears well in the corner of your eyes. No, it’s the bite marks on the insides of your thighs. The fact that you’re not wearing panties and you can‘t remember when you took them off.
It’s the video camera set up on a tripod pointed back at you in the corner of the room.
There are flickers of images in your brain of a person who is you but not you, doing things *you* would never do. The scariest part of all - you’re not sure who you are anymore. Because you know, deep down, there was a part of you that *enjoyed* letting them take you, use you, hurt you.
You finally find your purse, stuff every cell phone you can find into it because you remember the tiny flashes and clicking sounds, their laughter, the hoots and hollers. You’re starting to remember. Remember why there are rug burns on your knees, what the acrid after-taste is in your mouth, why you’re so fucking sore between your legs. You fucked them. They fucked you. Repeatedly and not just one at a time. The tape in the camera is next, along with the ones scattered on the floor around the tripod. The nausea’s receding, sort of, but the haziness fogging your brain remains and you stumble towards the door. No other thought in your head but ‘away’.
In the hallway, you find the phone that’s yours and dial the first number that enters your head.
**
The buses stopped running hours ago but you sit on the bench anyway, looking small, buried in your coat. LA’s like New York, a city that never sleeps and you busy yourself by counting the cars that drive by.
A car you don’t recognize pulls up to the curb. But you recognize her.
“Lea,” Dianna says, rushing around the car as you rise to your feet, lower lip already trembling. “Jesus Christ! What happened to you?”
You don’t answer. Her arms are around you. The tears are flowing as your body‘s wracked with sobs. You tried to forget her. For awhile it worked until it didn’t. Until you fell further than you could have ever imagined.
“It’s okay,” she says. “I’ve got you now.”
**
The shower lasts forever. You don’t step out until long after the water’s gone cold and your skin’s all pruney. Blotches of red cover your skin from where you tried to scrub the sin away. She still has some of your clothes, a pair of pajamas and a robe sit neatly folded on the counter.
Standing before the mirror, you take a large inhale of breath because you don’t want to see your reflection. But you wipe off the condensation anyway and gasp at the person staring back at you with her pale, almost gaunt skin, dark circles under bloodshot eyes and colorless lips.
She’s waiting for you in her living room with a cup of your favorite tea. Your eyes glance about the room. She’s redecorated. The apartment almost unrecognizable. It’s the smell that puts you at ease. It might not look like Dianna’s apartment but it smells like her.
Your bones creak wearily as you sit down on the couch. You feel like you’ve aged a decade in a day, maybe you have.
“Thanks,” you say as she hands you your mug and sits with a comfortable distance between the two of you on the couch.
“You wanna talk about it?”
“Not really.”
The room quiets into silence, you sipping your tea, she sipping hers. The tea warms your blood, increases your circulation, slowly dissipates whatever was dropped into your drink and coursing through your system. You take the time to lift your eyes from your mug, scanning about the apartment. There are the pictures you remember - Dianna and her family, pictures of the cast, vacation photos. It takes a moment but you realize there’s something missing. No, not something..
Someone.
“Where’s..”
“We broke up,” she answers immediately.
“Oh.. sorry.”
“I read that interview you did. I thought it was really brave.”
“Brave,” you snort. “More like stupid.”
“It’s not stupid to be yourself.” She turns her head, finds something of interest on the coffee table. “I wish I’d been as brave as you.”
At that, your eyes lift to look at her. She’s as beautiful as you remember but there’s a solemnness to her. “You’re braver than you realize.”
“No I’m not,” she huffs, setting her mug down on the coffee table. She leans back against the couch, her shoulders sagging as she exhales. “I got scared.”
“Of what?”
“Of us. Of you. What it all meant. Being with you was like flying without a net and I‘ve never been one to leap before I looked. And everything was moving so fast, the show, my career, us. I freaked and went with what was safe. What I knew and understood.” She turns to look at you. “You know?”
“Yeah,” you mumble even though you don’t, not really. But it’s something and that something is more than you’ve had for a very long while.
“I read your interview and I realized how big a mistake I’d made. It wasn’t fair to him, or to me. So, I broke it off. By then, the damage had been done. The worst part was realizing I hadn‘t just lost a you, I‘d lost my best friend. Do you think.. Do you think we can be friends again?”
Friends. After all this, she wants to be friends. “I loved you.”
“I know.”
“Something in me died that day. And then to meet him and realize you‘d never told him? That I was nothing more than your dirty, little secret.” You don’t mean to be hurtful but the words cut her like a knife. But you have to get this out. This thing you’ve been holding inside for too long, the thing that’s killing you. “I tried to forget you. God, how I tried to forget you. I did.. things, Dianna. Things I’m not proud of. But I thought they’d make me feel better, make me forget you, pull me out of the abyss. Instead, I just kept falling. You just want to be friends? Jonathon’s my friend. I don’t need anymore fucking friends.” You pause because the anger’s rising and now’s not the time for anger. Anger got you into this whole mess to begin with. “You were always something more. You were the one I wanted to go to sleep next to and wake up with. The first one I wanted to call whenever something good happened. The one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. And definitely *not* as a friend.”
It quiets again. She merely nods her head, like she’s accepted her role in all this and, for once, you can see the guilt in her. Guilt and shame. You know her enough to know it’s practically weighing down on her shoulders, threatening to crush her. You watch as a tear rolls down her cheek, drips off her chin and onto the floor. She takes a deep breath and turns her face towards yours.
“I‘m still in love with you.”
She is. Dear God, she is. You can see it in her face, the desperate sliver of hope she’s been clinging to. But you don’t know what to say. Do you still love her? Yes. Probably more than ever. But she took so many things away from you, pieces of your soul you still haven’t found. And you still have to crawl out of this abyss you’ve fallen into. It’d be easier with her but, even after what she’s done to you, you don’t want to taint her with the darkness you used to fill the emptiness.
“Please say something,” she says.
It’s your turn to turn your eyes away because your guilt, *your* shame are suddenly weighing down on your shoulders. “You don’t want me.”
“Lea..” She slides across the couch. Her hand lifts, fingers brushing the hair off your face and tucking it behind your ear. Like she used to. The ache swells within you. All you’ve ever wanted was for her to touch you again. But, you’re a different person now. Less than you once were. A person tainted with all the things you’ve done. Dirty.
“Don’t,” exhales in a pained whisper from your lips and you shrink from her touch like a wounded animal. “You don’t want me.”
“Shhh.” She leans in closer, presses her forehead against your temple. Her eyelashes flutter across you skin and you whimper at the contact. “I let you go once,” she whispers. “I have you now and I’m not letting you go. You’re my best friend and I’m not letting you go through this alone.”
She slides her arm around your shoulder, uses the other to pull you against her. You try to fight it, you *want* to fight it but there’s no more fight left in you. Just bone-weary and exhausted. You’ve been running from her, running from yourself and even your reserves are nothing but fumes. Which leaves you with just enough energy to cry.
She pulls you down with her as she lays down on the couch. Your body molds against hers as she wraps her arms around you. Which just makes you cry even harder because you feel safe, secure and loved. Because you don’t deserve it.
You don’t deserve her.
**
Despite the rumors and blind items in regards to your ‘Summer of Lesbian Debauchery’ and less than vanilla proclivities, your public image remains relatively intact. Your second CD is released and, despite having been prepped by your management team to expect the worst, it goes gold within a week.
Dianna’s new movie also premieres and the two of you go together. As you exit the limo, she clings to you like a lost puppy. But, it’s not you who kisses her fully on the lips in front of a hundred paparazzi. No, it’s she who kisses you. It’s not an interview with an online, lesbian infotainment site but it’s an announcement nonetheless and confirms the rumors that have been going around since the third season of Glee started airing. Dianna’s with you. Fully. Completely. Publicly.
**
The next day, you get a gift basket filled with sex toys from Jane.
**
Sadly, despite all the highs, there’s a huge low. Word comes down from the network right before Thanksgiving - Glee’s cancelled. It’s shocking and not exactly unexpected, with the declining ratings, increased competition from the other networks. The network, at least, gives enough notice so Ryan and Brad can write a series finale.
The last day on the set is brutal. Just when you think you’ve reached the point where you can’t possibly cry anymore, the tears start flowing again.
The mourning period doesn’t last long. You’re off to do a mid-sized club tour to promote your new CD. Dianna’s off to Australia for a film. You keep in touch. Constantly. Twittering, texting, emails and voice mails. The webcam’s are Dianna’s idea and the things the two of you do? Soo much better than phone sex.
**
A private and secluded beach. Dianna’s wearing nothing but a sarong wrapped around her waist, you sunbathing on a towel wearing even less. Despite the romantic surroundings, you’ve been a bit melancholy all day and you’ve finally discovered the reason why.
Today’s an anniversary of sorts, at least, not the kind people celebrate. Exactly one year ago, you broke up with Dianna. It feels like the past year happened in the blink of an eye and like it took ten times as long. You changed so much. So did she. Together, you’re stronger, better, complete. And you wonder how it was the two of you came to that point a year ago.
“Penny for your thoughts?” She’s lying next to you now, head propped up with a hand while the other draws lazy circles on your stomach.
“Mmm,” you purr. “I was thinking lunch, then sex. Possibly lunch while having sex. A nap to recover from said sex. More sex. A walk on the beach. Dinner. Ending with, of course, sex.”
“You’ve thought of everything,” she laughs.
“Our modern lives are so very busy and complicated. I’ve found it makes things easier to have everything mapped out as completely as possible.”
“And what about tomorrow?”
“You mean do we have sex before or after breakfast? ‘Cuz I’m pretty open to both options.”
“No, I mean later. Next month, next year..” The fingers on your stomach move to you face, turning your chin towards her. Her eyes are intense. Serious. “Marry me.”
Your eyes go wide. You think you may have forgotten to breathe. “What?”
“God,” she smiles weakly. “This really is like the worst proposal ever. I just.. I realized earlier that today is the day you broke up with me. I meant it when I said now that I have you back I wasn’t going to let you go. I don’t want to be without you, Lea. Ever. Be my wife, or life-partner, whatever. Marry me.”
You swallow even though there’s, like, no saliva in your mouth. At all. It’s your hips that move first, hurriedly sliding away from her, coordinating with your arms that help lift you onto your feet.
And then you’re running.
Bursting into the cabin, not caring if the doors are still intact or not, you grab the phone that’s closet to you. Dialing the number twice because your hands are shaking so hard.
“Mom!” you practically yell into the phone, words spilling from your lips a million miles a second. “You’renotgoingtobelievewhatjusthappened.SHEASKEDMETOMARRYHER!!!”
“What?” is all your Mom can say.
“Dianna,” you inhale, waving your hand before your face because you seriously think you may have the vapors. “She proposed.”
“Well?” Her voice is as loud now as yours. “What’d you say?”
“What?” Your body freezes and you suddenly drop the phone. “Shit.”
And then you’re running again. Thankful that the beach is private and secluded because the last thing you need is police showing up to find the crazy, naked woman running around.
Dianna is right where you left her. Only she’s sitting now, arms wrapped around the knees pulled to her chest. Devastated look on her face. You practically collide into her when you drop to your knees.
“Dianna. Oh God, I’m so sorry,” with trembling fingers, you cup her face. “Yes,” rushes from your lips.
Her face lights up. “Seriously?”
“Yes,” you press your lips against hers. “I’ll marry you.”
She pulls you back down onto the towel. There are tears. Which leads to kissing and growing passion. The two of you make love and it feels like the first time. Maybe it is.
You’d fallen so hard and so far. That you made your way back to her, maybe not a miracle but you have no other word for it. But you do think about words like fate and destiny and all those things, great and small, that brought the two of you together. Even if it wasn’t ‘meant’ to be, it is now and it’s better, greater than before. Especially..
After the fall.
END
Fandom: Glee/RPF
Pairing: Lea Michele/Dianna Agron
Rating: R
Warning: hint of DubCon
Word Count: 5366
Summary: ANGST ALERT!! Breaking up is hard to do.
Disclaimer: While the characters are based upon real people, this is a work of fiction intended for fun and not profit.
**
Dianna’s asleep and, already, you feel guilty. Your insecurities have caught up with you, turned to doubts and now questions. Questions you have to find the answer even if you’re wrong. And, God, how you hope and pray that you’re wrong. Using only the pale street light filtering through the tiny crack in the curtain, you slip out of the bed.
Her purse is on a chair in the corner and you will yourself to stop. This is wrong, your internal voice says. You’re being an idiot, it says. Go back to bed and snuggle with your girlfriend, it says. You don’t listen. The voice screaming at you to stop only makes the doubts that much greater and now you have to know.
You slip your fingers into her purse and pull out her Blackberry. The other one, the one most people don’t know she has because you’re the one who gave it to her and you‘re the only one who knows the number.
Like a thief in the night, literally even, you scurry quickly into the living room. Heart in throat, you sit on the couch staring at the screen, like this is your last chance to return to sanity and forget the craziness that’s taken you over ever existed.
Instead, you check her emails.
The heart in your throat drops. It falls through the floor and lands with a hard splat several stories below. For starters, you’d never use a handle as garish and tacky as ‘smth-opr8tr’ and you almost respect her a little less for associating with someone who does.
The emails are bad, confirm every suspicion, every doubt you’ve had. The photos? Take your already crushed heart and obliterates it. The two of them, together, and she’s looking at him the way she used to look at you.
Him. It shouldn’t make a difference but does anyway. You flop back against the couch, like all your bones have been zapped from your body. You just sit and stare at the picture - her gazing lovingly at him, him staring into the camera, smiling like he’s the luckiest guy on the face of the planet because he’s with her.
It takes everything you have just to remember to breathe, let alone cry even though you want to so fucking badly. Instead, you just sit and stare at *them* wondering when your world went wrong.
“Lea?”
The lights flick on and your eyes blink at the sudden intrusion. She’s standing at the edge of the room, a hand rubbing over her puffy eyes, wearing *your* Rent t-shirt, *your* sushi, pajama bottoms.
“How long?” You turn the Blackberry in your hands, showing her the picture. Her gasp is audible, she steps back as if struck, a hand going to the base of her throat.
“Lea..” is all she can say. She moves like she’s about to take a step forward then stops.
“How long?” your voice is louder now, tinged with the anger that’s been building since your first suspicions and ready to blow.
“A couple months.”
A hammer falls on your head as the pieces slam together. It explains everything. Her evasiveness. The growing distance and declining sex. The little things that, now looking back, should have been big, honking neon signs. And the little voice in your head asks how could you have been so blind?
“Do you love him?”
“I didn‘t want you to find out.. I mean, not like this.” She lowers her head. She’s never been good at confrontation and you wonder how long this *would* have gone on before she had the balls to tell you.
“Have you fucked him?” You don’t want to know. You *really* don’t want to know but her silence tells you what her words don’t.
“Lea, please.” She looks at you, her lower lip trembling, her eyes welling with tears and the anger explodes from you.
“NO!” you scream, shooting up from the couch, finger pointing at her angrily. “You do *not* get to cry! You do not get to cry!”
She wants to say something, she wants to say something so badly. And there’s a part of you that wants her to, wants her to apologize, say she’ll break it off and things between the two of you can go back to the way they used to be. You want her hands in your hair, her lips on your own, her tears on your skin.
But, there’s that.. distance now. Things done that can’t be undone. At least, not right now. Not when you’re so angry your entire body is quaking. Because you’re just one giant ache right now, a nerve ending, exposed and raw and bleeding.
With everything you have, you throw her phone at the wall. The phone *you* bought her. The one she used to tell him how much she missed him while she was with you. The one she used to read about how much *he* missed *her*, and all the things he wanted to do to her. You don’t bother to question when she read them or whether she was with you or not. You’re too busy staring at the tiny dent in your wall, shocked and kinda terrified of the violence that has sprung up within you.
You don’t want to hurt her. You don’t want to hurt her. You want her to hurt as badly as you do.
Your shoulder barely brushes hers as you make your way towards the bathroom. You stop, not wanting to look at her as you speak. “I think you should leave now.”
**
The next two days are a blur. The front door closes and you exit the bathroom. The silence is deafening. She’d changed clothes before she left and your t-shirt and pajama bottoms are on the bed. You grab the shirt, climb onto the bed, curl into a ball and stare at the wall. Her pillow’s still warm, still smells like her. The anger recedes and all that’s left is the emptiness and the ache.
All you can do is cry.
**
The first two days are hard, the next week is excruciating. You arrive on the set and it’s like no one notices. No one notices that you’re nothing more than a shell, hollow and empty inside, just ready to break into a million pieces. No ones notices when you all sit down for the table reading and Dianna hasn’t saved a seat for you. The two of you have broken up but you’ll be damned if *you’re* going to be the one to break the news.
Of all of them, it’s Mark who notices first. He’s waiting outside your trailer as you return from the set. His hands are in his pockets and he has that hangdog, sheepish expression on his face.
“You okay?” he asks.
You pause after opening the door to your trailer, brows crinkling in thought. “No.”
**
Jonathon’s waiting for you when you return to your apartment. He’s in the kitchen, humming softly to himself. The air smells of Bolognese sauce and fresh cut vegetables. He turns on his feet, realizing you’re home.
“Hey,” he says, walking towards you arms outstretched. “Thought you could use a friend.”
You didn’t think you could break anymore than you already have but you do. Face scrunching, fighting against the tears already streaming down your face.
He is your rock. The hollow shell you‘ve become finally cracks and you crumble in his embrace.
“It’s okay,” he coos softly, petting your hair. “It’s okay.”
His words mean nothing. It’s not okay. It’s definitely not okay.
**
“It’s not like I’ve never broken up with anyone before,” you sniffle before taking another sip of wine. The two of you are on the couch. Your face is still red from all the crying, eyes still puffy. You told him everything. Everything. Even some of the stuff he probably didn’t want to know. He’s blown away, of course. He saw that certain something between you and Dianna before either one of you did.
“This was different,” he says. “She was different. It wouldn‘t hurt this much if she hadn‘t been.”
“I know,” you sigh. The little voice inside you says ‘she was the one’ but you don’t say it aloud.
**
Jonathon stays for two weeks. You cry less, smile more, laugh a little even. He’s a trooper because the cast quickly finds out. Mark’s never been good at keeping secrets and her cast mates aren’t *that* dim. It’s like the phone never stops ringing.
‘How are you?’
‘Are you okay?’
‘What happened?’
Your answers are pat, mostly evasive. Despite it all, you don’t want them thinking badly of her.
The hardest part is telling your Mom. You thought coming out to her had been hard, crushing her dreams of a nice Jewish wedding with the nice Jewish boy she’d always intended for you to marry. Which all eventually turned into dreams of a nice Jewish wedding with the lovely Jewish girl you’d brought home. You remember the look she gave you after first meeting Dianna, the coy little ‘you did good, official Mother approves’ wink. Now that dream is dashed and it takes everything you have to not dwell on the times you, too, had thought about that wedding.
**
The next two months, well, you’re not sure how you got through them. It’s all mostly a haze. You buried yourself in work because it’s what you know, what you’ve done for most of your life. It’s comfortable, familiar, and doesn’t make you cry at the drop of a hat like certain other aspects of your life.
A part of you doesn’t want to go to the season end wrap party. But, despite recent developments, the past two and a half years of your life have been a dream with mostly good memories. You can’t just leave without saying goodbye to the cast and crew that have become like a second family to you.
“Lea?”
You’re on your third glass of champagne when the familiar hand slips into the crook of your elbow. There’s a sudden and palpable tension within the group of people surrounding you. You turn your head towards her. The two of you haven’t been this close since.. Well. It rushes back to you, as if the past three months of healing had never begun. Not just the hurt but the longing, the desire. Her eyes are like a dagger in your heart. Those excessively long eyelashes and how they would brush against your skin when she kissed you. You’re drunk enough to try and kiss her.
“Can I talk to you?” she half-whispers in your ear.
Before you’ve even thought of answering, she’s pulling you away towards a less crowded part of the room. The little voice in your head fires off a million questions. Does she want to apologize? Does she want to get back together? Does she want to kiss you as badly as you want to kiss her?
“Listen,” she says, eyes darting about like she’s afraid to look at Lea. “There’s something I have to tell you.”
“Dianna!”
You watch as her face falls, like she’s run out of time. Then, you lift your eyes towards the voice calling her name. A voice you don’t recognize.
Him.
She’s invited Him to the party. Of course, you recognize him immediately. You were holding Dianna’s hand when Cory introduced him to the two of you. He’s tall and tan, with brown hair and even darker eyes. Dianna certainly has a type.
He’s all smiles, his teeth practically blinding you. He slides up beside her, curling his arm around her waist and planting his lips on her forehead. “Hey babe.”
Something twists in your gut.
“It’s so great to see you again,” he says and it takes a moment to realize it’s you he’s talking to. He’s affable and friendly. You don’t know him, you just know of him. He’s considered one of the nicest guys in Hollywood.
So why is the guy who stole your girlfriend talking to you like he knows you, like the two of you could *ever* be friends? How could the nicest guy in Hollywood be so tactless?
Then it hits you and it hits you hard. He’s not tactless, he’s oblivious.
Oblivious because Dianna never told him.
You can tell by the way she’s looking at you, both guilty and apologetic.
The champagne in your stomach turns to acid. The blood leaves your face. The room starts to feel overcrowded, like the air has left the room.
“I’m sorry, I have to..” you mutter, muscling your way past both of them. “Go throw up.”
**
In two hours, you’ll be leaving for the airport and flying back to New York. But you’re not thinking about that right now. Your agent, manager and publicist are all on conference call and you’ve just dropped a bombshell. They’re sympathetic, supportive even but you can hear it their voices - ‘please don’t do this, please don’t tank your career’.
**
The day of the second season finale, your interview with AfterEllen goes online.
AE: Why now?
LM: Why not? Whether people love me or hate me, I’d rather it be because of who I actually am than some manufactured image of someone I‘m not just to sell a few more cd‘s or movie tickets, you know. Acting is my job, not my life. Why now? Because I didn’t want to start this next step of my career lying about who I am.
**
The next day, you get a fruit basket and a toaster from Jane Lynch delivered to your door.
**
There’s some damage. A couple movie offers are suddenly retracted. A few dates on your upcoming tour are scrubbed. But, the scandal of FOX’s romantic lead coming out is immediately swept under the rug, literally the next day, by the scandal of a multiple murder on the set of a reality show.
While some doors have closed, more doors have definitely opened. You’re not just ‘Hollywood Out’, you’re OUT Out. Jonathon takes you to a club and it’s like you’ve been dipped in honey and thrown to the lesbians.
You remember the first. Her name’s Linda. She’s a foot taller than you with jet-black hair and pale blue eyes. She eats you out in the bathroom, then takes you to her place in SoHo and breaks that taboo you’d been saving for Dianna.
You remember the ones after that but, soon, they all become a blur. A string of one-night stands, tall, short, and everything in between. Instead of Dianna and *him*, it’s you showing up on TMZ. A picture of you having the time of your life on some dance floor, sandwiched between a blonde and a redhead. That you’d taken them home for your first threesome somehow escapes the gossip hounds.
Every other day, there’s a phone call from your manager because some agent’s called him and he wants to know if you wanna go on a date with some young actress or another. Your answer is always the same -
“Is she out?”
“No.”
“Then fuck her.”
YOU took the risk. You‘re young, out and fucking *proud* and you’ll be damned if you’ll go back into the closet. For *anyone*.
The phone rings a little less. Not because your ‘new’ friends have stopped calling but the old ones. The ones you’ve known since childhood. The ones you considered a second family. It’s Jonathon who plays straight with you.
“Everyone’s worried about you,” he says.
“I’m fine,” you huff back.
“You’re going down a path you don’t want to go down, Lea.”
**
You don’t realize how right he is until it’s almost too late.
**
Two weeks before Glee starts shooting and you’re back in LA. A hungry shark in fresh waters, craving nothing but fresh meat. You hit the clubs with a vengeance.
**
The pain forces you to open your eyes. Not the vice-like thing crushing your skull, no, the pain between your legs. You open your eyes and a wave of nausea hits you. It takes a couple minutes for the sensation to decrease but, by that time, your heart’s going a million miles a minute and you’re trying your damnedest not to hyperventilate.
The room is unfamiliar. You have no idea how you got here. The two females passed out to next you are only vaguely familiar. But then again, these days, they’re all starting to look the same. As your eyes adjust to the dim light, you realize it’s not just the three of you in the room. Other females are there, passed out on couches and on the floor, scattered about like flotsam left on the shore.
You slide your legs over the edge of the mattress, breathing shallowly as another wave of nausea hits you. The air reeks of stale sex, cigarette smoke and sweat. It’s not the ruined dress bunched around your waist that makes the tears well in the corner of your eyes. No, it’s the bite marks on the insides of your thighs. The fact that you’re not wearing panties and you can‘t remember when you took them off.
It’s the video camera set up on a tripod pointed back at you in the corner of the room.
There are flickers of images in your brain of a person who is you but not you, doing things *you* would never do. The scariest part of all - you’re not sure who you are anymore. Because you know, deep down, there was a part of you that *enjoyed* letting them take you, use you, hurt you.
You finally find your purse, stuff every cell phone you can find into it because you remember the tiny flashes and clicking sounds, their laughter, the hoots and hollers. You’re starting to remember. Remember why there are rug burns on your knees, what the acrid after-taste is in your mouth, why you’re so fucking sore between your legs. You fucked them. They fucked you. Repeatedly and not just one at a time. The tape in the camera is next, along with the ones scattered on the floor around the tripod. The nausea’s receding, sort of, but the haziness fogging your brain remains and you stumble towards the door. No other thought in your head but ‘away’.
In the hallway, you find the phone that’s yours and dial the first number that enters your head.
**
The buses stopped running hours ago but you sit on the bench anyway, looking small, buried in your coat. LA’s like New York, a city that never sleeps and you busy yourself by counting the cars that drive by.
A car you don’t recognize pulls up to the curb. But you recognize her.
“Lea,” Dianna says, rushing around the car as you rise to your feet, lower lip already trembling. “Jesus Christ! What happened to you?”
You don’t answer. Her arms are around you. The tears are flowing as your body‘s wracked with sobs. You tried to forget her. For awhile it worked until it didn’t. Until you fell further than you could have ever imagined.
“It’s okay,” she says. “I’ve got you now.”
**
The shower lasts forever. You don’t step out until long after the water’s gone cold and your skin’s all pruney. Blotches of red cover your skin from where you tried to scrub the sin away. She still has some of your clothes, a pair of pajamas and a robe sit neatly folded on the counter.
Standing before the mirror, you take a large inhale of breath because you don’t want to see your reflection. But you wipe off the condensation anyway and gasp at the person staring back at you with her pale, almost gaunt skin, dark circles under bloodshot eyes and colorless lips.
She’s waiting for you in her living room with a cup of your favorite tea. Your eyes glance about the room. She’s redecorated. The apartment almost unrecognizable. It’s the smell that puts you at ease. It might not look like Dianna’s apartment but it smells like her.
Your bones creak wearily as you sit down on the couch. You feel like you’ve aged a decade in a day, maybe you have.
“Thanks,” you say as she hands you your mug and sits with a comfortable distance between the two of you on the couch.
“You wanna talk about it?”
“Not really.”
The room quiets into silence, you sipping your tea, she sipping hers. The tea warms your blood, increases your circulation, slowly dissipates whatever was dropped into your drink and coursing through your system. You take the time to lift your eyes from your mug, scanning about the apartment. There are the pictures you remember - Dianna and her family, pictures of the cast, vacation photos. It takes a moment but you realize there’s something missing. No, not something..
Someone.
“Where’s..”
“We broke up,” she answers immediately.
“Oh.. sorry.”
“I read that interview you did. I thought it was really brave.”
“Brave,” you snort. “More like stupid.”
“It’s not stupid to be yourself.” She turns her head, finds something of interest on the coffee table. “I wish I’d been as brave as you.”
At that, your eyes lift to look at her. She’s as beautiful as you remember but there’s a solemnness to her. “You’re braver than you realize.”
“No I’m not,” she huffs, setting her mug down on the coffee table. She leans back against the couch, her shoulders sagging as she exhales. “I got scared.”
“Of what?”
“Of us. Of you. What it all meant. Being with you was like flying without a net and I‘ve never been one to leap before I looked. And everything was moving so fast, the show, my career, us. I freaked and went with what was safe. What I knew and understood.” She turns to look at you. “You know?”
“Yeah,” you mumble even though you don’t, not really. But it’s something and that something is more than you’ve had for a very long while.
“I read your interview and I realized how big a mistake I’d made. It wasn’t fair to him, or to me. So, I broke it off. By then, the damage had been done. The worst part was realizing I hadn‘t just lost a you, I‘d lost my best friend. Do you think.. Do you think we can be friends again?”
Friends. After all this, she wants to be friends. “I loved you.”
“I know.”
“Something in me died that day. And then to meet him and realize you‘d never told him? That I was nothing more than your dirty, little secret.” You don’t mean to be hurtful but the words cut her like a knife. But you have to get this out. This thing you’ve been holding inside for too long, the thing that’s killing you. “I tried to forget you. God, how I tried to forget you. I did.. things, Dianna. Things I’m not proud of. But I thought they’d make me feel better, make me forget you, pull me out of the abyss. Instead, I just kept falling. You just want to be friends? Jonathon’s my friend. I don’t need anymore fucking friends.” You pause because the anger’s rising and now’s not the time for anger. Anger got you into this whole mess to begin with. “You were always something more. You were the one I wanted to go to sleep next to and wake up with. The first one I wanted to call whenever something good happened. The one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. And definitely *not* as a friend.”
It quiets again. She merely nods her head, like she’s accepted her role in all this and, for once, you can see the guilt in her. Guilt and shame. You know her enough to know it’s practically weighing down on her shoulders, threatening to crush her. You watch as a tear rolls down her cheek, drips off her chin and onto the floor. She takes a deep breath and turns her face towards yours.
“I‘m still in love with you.”
She is. Dear God, she is. You can see it in her face, the desperate sliver of hope she’s been clinging to. But you don’t know what to say. Do you still love her? Yes. Probably more than ever. But she took so many things away from you, pieces of your soul you still haven’t found. And you still have to crawl out of this abyss you’ve fallen into. It’d be easier with her but, even after what she’s done to you, you don’t want to taint her with the darkness you used to fill the emptiness.
“Please say something,” she says.
It’s your turn to turn your eyes away because your guilt, *your* shame are suddenly weighing down on your shoulders. “You don’t want me.”
“Lea..” She slides across the couch. Her hand lifts, fingers brushing the hair off your face and tucking it behind your ear. Like she used to. The ache swells within you. All you’ve ever wanted was for her to touch you again. But, you’re a different person now. Less than you once were. A person tainted with all the things you’ve done. Dirty.
“Don’t,” exhales in a pained whisper from your lips and you shrink from her touch like a wounded animal. “You don’t want me.”
“Shhh.” She leans in closer, presses her forehead against your temple. Her eyelashes flutter across you skin and you whimper at the contact. “I let you go once,” she whispers. “I have you now and I’m not letting you go. You’re my best friend and I’m not letting you go through this alone.”
She slides her arm around your shoulder, uses the other to pull you against her. You try to fight it, you *want* to fight it but there’s no more fight left in you. Just bone-weary and exhausted. You’ve been running from her, running from yourself and even your reserves are nothing but fumes. Which leaves you with just enough energy to cry.
She pulls you down with her as she lays down on the couch. Your body molds against hers as she wraps her arms around you. Which just makes you cry even harder because you feel safe, secure and loved. Because you don’t deserve it.
You don’t deserve her.
**
Despite the rumors and blind items in regards to your ‘Summer of Lesbian Debauchery’ and less than vanilla proclivities, your public image remains relatively intact. Your second CD is released and, despite having been prepped by your management team to expect the worst, it goes gold within a week.
Dianna’s new movie also premieres and the two of you go together. As you exit the limo, she clings to you like a lost puppy. But, it’s not you who kisses her fully on the lips in front of a hundred paparazzi. No, it’s she who kisses you. It’s not an interview with an online, lesbian infotainment site but it’s an announcement nonetheless and confirms the rumors that have been going around since the third season of Glee started airing. Dianna’s with you. Fully. Completely. Publicly.
**
The next day, you get a gift basket filled with sex toys from Jane.
**
Sadly, despite all the highs, there’s a huge low. Word comes down from the network right before Thanksgiving - Glee’s cancelled. It’s shocking and not exactly unexpected, with the declining ratings, increased competition from the other networks. The network, at least, gives enough notice so Ryan and Brad can write a series finale.
The last day on the set is brutal. Just when you think you’ve reached the point where you can’t possibly cry anymore, the tears start flowing again.
The mourning period doesn’t last long. You’re off to do a mid-sized club tour to promote your new CD. Dianna’s off to Australia for a film. You keep in touch. Constantly. Twittering, texting, emails and voice mails. The webcam’s are Dianna’s idea and the things the two of you do? Soo much better than phone sex.
**
A private and secluded beach. Dianna’s wearing nothing but a sarong wrapped around her waist, you sunbathing on a towel wearing even less. Despite the romantic surroundings, you’ve been a bit melancholy all day and you’ve finally discovered the reason why.
Today’s an anniversary of sorts, at least, not the kind people celebrate. Exactly one year ago, you broke up with Dianna. It feels like the past year happened in the blink of an eye and like it took ten times as long. You changed so much. So did she. Together, you’re stronger, better, complete. And you wonder how it was the two of you came to that point a year ago.
“Penny for your thoughts?” She’s lying next to you now, head propped up with a hand while the other draws lazy circles on your stomach.
“Mmm,” you purr. “I was thinking lunch, then sex. Possibly lunch while having sex. A nap to recover from said sex. More sex. A walk on the beach. Dinner. Ending with, of course, sex.”
“You’ve thought of everything,” she laughs.
“Our modern lives are so very busy and complicated. I’ve found it makes things easier to have everything mapped out as completely as possible.”
“And what about tomorrow?”
“You mean do we have sex before or after breakfast? ‘Cuz I’m pretty open to both options.”
“No, I mean later. Next month, next year..” The fingers on your stomach move to you face, turning your chin towards her. Her eyes are intense. Serious. “Marry me.”
Your eyes go wide. You think you may have forgotten to breathe. “What?”
“God,” she smiles weakly. “This really is like the worst proposal ever. I just.. I realized earlier that today is the day you broke up with me. I meant it when I said now that I have you back I wasn’t going to let you go. I don’t want to be without you, Lea. Ever. Be my wife, or life-partner, whatever. Marry me.”
You swallow even though there’s, like, no saliva in your mouth. At all. It’s your hips that move first, hurriedly sliding away from her, coordinating with your arms that help lift you onto your feet.
And then you’re running.
Bursting into the cabin, not caring if the doors are still intact or not, you grab the phone that’s closet to you. Dialing the number twice because your hands are shaking so hard.
“Mom!” you practically yell into the phone, words spilling from your lips a million miles a second. “You’renotgoingtobelievewhatjusthappened.SHEASKEDMETOMARRYHER!!!”
“What?” is all your Mom can say.
“Dianna,” you inhale, waving your hand before your face because you seriously think you may have the vapors. “She proposed.”
“Well?” Her voice is as loud now as yours. “What’d you say?”
“What?” Your body freezes and you suddenly drop the phone. “Shit.”
And then you’re running again. Thankful that the beach is private and secluded because the last thing you need is police showing up to find the crazy, naked woman running around.
Dianna is right where you left her. Only she’s sitting now, arms wrapped around the knees pulled to her chest. Devastated look on her face. You practically collide into her when you drop to your knees.
“Dianna. Oh God, I’m so sorry,” with trembling fingers, you cup her face. “Yes,” rushes from your lips.
Her face lights up. “Seriously?”
“Yes,” you press your lips against hers. “I’ll marry you.”
She pulls you back down onto the towel. There are tears. Which leads to kissing and growing passion. The two of you make love and it feels like the first time. Maybe it is.
You’d fallen so hard and so far. That you made your way back to her, maybe not a miracle but you have no other word for it. But you do think about words like fate and destiny and all those things, great and small, that brought the two of you together. Even if it wasn’t ‘meant’ to be, it is now and it’s better, greater than before. Especially..
After the fall.
END