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rainbowfic2015-08-18 09:52 pm
starphotographs) wrote in rainbowfic2015-08-18 09:52 pm
Alien Green 4
Name: starphotographs
Story: Corwin and Friends
Supplies and Styles: Graffiti (Summer Carnival, Lilith Fair Second Stage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl_eNu4NUVI), Glitter (http://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/you-make-culture), Nubs
Characters: Hal (POV), Spenser
Colors: Alien Green 4 (I would never lie. I willfully participated in a campaign of misinformation.)
Word Count: 731
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Choose not to warn.
Summary: If I pull your speech on the carpet of impossibility, will you speak this immediate need for movement? The immediate need of not drowning in public? (Hal stops kidding himself.)
Note: Nubs because it expands on something from this.
What You Can’t Fix
My god, you look like everything I’d been trying to convince myself you weren’t
That was the first cogent thought I had when Spenser walked into the office for what felt like months. Maybe a year. He didn’t want parts or anything. I don’t even think he knew what he wanted, or why he was there. Just that I was here, too, and I guess I’m all he was after, after all.
I tried to make conversation, but he couldn’t follow me, and I couldn’t keep up with him, and I thought, my god, what a pair we are. Then I noticed his arms, and bit that thought off at just, my god. Period. There wasn’t anything else I could think to say.
Now, I remembered that he always used to get in all these macho contests with that jerk Tyler, who used to be the one who ran over here for parts before Spenser started working there. I remember, because he used to tell me all these stories about it, with excessive description, just because he knew I was squeamish and would turn a gross plasticky white when I heard the gory details.
Okay, I guess that makes Spenser a jerk, too. Spenser is a lot of things. But, I’d spent so long trying to convince myself that “crazy” wasn’t one of them. I figured he just needed to sort himself out. His personality was too intense, and would mellow with time. He’s just boisterous, and maybe kind of young for his age. A poor sense of danger. A disorganized mind. Prone to going through weird phases. Outlandish.
Of course, there’s a point when you realize outlandish is just a byword for crazy. And, watching him pace the floor, scanning his speech for something that makes sense, and watching the shitty overhead lights playing off the tacky crusts on his arms, I finally made that realization. Spenser was fucking nuts.
I knew it all along.
You had to be crazy to do this to yourself. It’s like something someone would do if they thought their flesh could heat up and glow lava-orange like an iron poker. Or if they were trying to prove themselves invincible.
Well, buddy, you just did anything but.
Eventually, I got him to sit down. On the other side of my desk, like I was going to ask him what he wanted, check the inventory to see if we had it in.
God, I wish.
I wanted to fix him. I wanted to apologize for all the times I saw this coming and dismissed it, as if that would do him any good. I wanted to turn back the clock, and put more effort in to being friends. Like that would have saved him.
I couldn’t save him. Half the time, I was too wishy-washy to even do damage control. And I guess this time was no different. All I could come up with was that, if I couldn’t fix his head, I could at least fix his arms. So I focused on that. I rubbed him down with alcohol and peroxide, until some of the scabs tore open and started bleeding. I wrapped the whole mess in gauze, and, the whole time, Spenser just sat there, completely still, for the first time in his life. He looked like he didn’t give a shit about whether or not I did this.
That’s how far away from himself he’d gotten.
I wanted to throw in the towel, say, fine, if you don’t care, neither do I, fucking get lost. Like I had so many times before, if only through my actions. I decided I wanted this time to be different. And, in the middle of the process, he finally spoke so I could understand him.
“Hal, I am shithouse crazy.”
I didn’t respond. Hell, what was I supposed to say? “I know?”
When I was finished, he had to leave, and I knew full well what I was supposed to say then. I was supposed to tell him that I didn’t think he should be alone. That he could stay with me. But, I couldn’t bring myself to say anything at all.
That night, I couldn’t sleep.
All I could think about was what I’d possibly unleashed.
Or what I’d let him walk in to, out of ignorance.
And now I’m never going to see him again.
starphotographsStory: Corwin and Friends
Supplies and Styles: Graffiti (Summer Carnival, Lilith Fair Second Stage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl_eNu4NUVI), Glitter (http://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/you-make-culture), Nubs
Characters: Hal (POV), Spenser
Colors: Alien Green 4 (I would never lie. I willfully participated in a campaign of misinformation.)
Word Count: 731
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Choose not to warn.
Summary: If I pull your speech on the carpet of impossibility, will you speak this immediate need for movement? The immediate need of not drowning in public? (Hal stops kidding himself.)
Note: Nubs because it expands on something from this.
My god, you look like everything I’d been trying to convince myself you weren’t
That was the first cogent thought I had when Spenser walked into the office for what felt like months. Maybe a year. He didn’t want parts or anything. I don’t even think he knew what he wanted, or why he was there. Just that I was here, too, and I guess I’m all he was after, after all.
I tried to make conversation, but he couldn’t follow me, and I couldn’t keep up with him, and I thought, my god, what a pair we are. Then I noticed his arms, and bit that thought off at just, my god. Period. There wasn’t anything else I could think to say.
Now, I remembered that he always used to get in all these macho contests with that jerk Tyler, who used to be the one who ran over here for parts before Spenser started working there. I remember, because he used to tell me all these stories about it, with excessive description, just because he knew I was squeamish and would turn a gross plasticky white when I heard the gory details.
Okay, I guess that makes Spenser a jerk, too. Spenser is a lot of things. But, I’d spent so long trying to convince myself that “crazy” wasn’t one of them. I figured he just needed to sort himself out. His personality was too intense, and would mellow with time. He’s just boisterous, and maybe kind of young for his age. A poor sense of danger. A disorganized mind. Prone to going through weird phases. Outlandish.
Of course, there’s a point when you realize outlandish is just a byword for crazy. And, watching him pace the floor, scanning his speech for something that makes sense, and watching the shitty overhead lights playing off the tacky crusts on his arms, I finally made that realization. Spenser was fucking nuts.
I knew it all along.
You had to be crazy to do this to yourself. It’s like something someone would do if they thought their flesh could heat up and glow lava-orange like an iron poker. Or if they were trying to prove themselves invincible.
Well, buddy, you just did anything but.
Eventually, I got him to sit down. On the other side of my desk, like I was going to ask him what he wanted, check the inventory to see if we had it in.
God, I wish.
I wanted to fix him. I wanted to apologize for all the times I saw this coming and dismissed it, as if that would do him any good. I wanted to turn back the clock, and put more effort in to being friends. Like that would have saved him.
I couldn’t save him. Half the time, I was too wishy-washy to even do damage control. And I guess this time was no different. All I could come up with was that, if I couldn’t fix his head, I could at least fix his arms. So I focused on that. I rubbed him down with alcohol and peroxide, until some of the scabs tore open and started bleeding. I wrapped the whole mess in gauze, and, the whole time, Spenser just sat there, completely still, for the first time in his life. He looked like he didn’t give a shit about whether or not I did this.
That’s how far away from himself he’d gotten.
I wanted to throw in the towel, say, fine, if you don’t care, neither do I, fucking get lost. Like I had so many times before, if only through my actions. I decided I wanted this time to be different. And, in the middle of the process, he finally spoke so I could understand him.
“Hal, I am shithouse crazy.”
I didn’t respond. Hell, what was I supposed to say? “I know?”
When I was finished, he had to leave, and I knew full well what I was supposed to say then. I was supposed to tell him that I didn’t think he should be alone. That he could stay with me. But, I couldn’t bring myself to say anything at all.
That night, I couldn’t sleep.
All I could think about was what I’d possibly unleashed.
Or what I’d let him walk in to, out of ignorance.
And now I’m never going to see him again.
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