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rainbowfic2016-05-18 12:37 am
starphotographs) wrote in rainbowfic2016-05-18 12:37 am
Entry tags:
Meme Party 30, Baby Pink 11
Name: starphotographs
Story: Universe B
Supplies and Styles: (...I'm not sure? Do the "party" prompt lists count as something?)
Characters: Satchel (POV), Frankie
Colors: Meme Party 30 (X, X Everywhere), Baby Pink 11 (So basically I spent my whole life being punked?)
Word Count: 1,444
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Choose not to warn.
Summary: Satchel visits his brother in the hospital, and continues an old family tradition.
Note: References something I came up with for this. And while we're on the subject, I'm totally doing the Dare to Write Challenge on tumblr, so I'll probably be doing some crossposting and using their prompt list for additional inspiration for a while! (Also, hey! I know I've been kinda dead here. :P)
Art History
“...Fuck is this?”
Frankie sounded kind of blurry, but I didn’t expect much better. This was the first time in two days that he’d been awake enough to do anything more than try to roll over, get caught on a tube, and give up halfway. Plus, a lot of that awesome drug-water was dripping right onto the expressway to his brain.
“Oh, c’mon! You don’t remember? Or did you just think you were safe now, because you assumed I don’t remember? Well, buddy, you’re wrong.”
I laughed. Frankie kept running his hand over his paper-covered face, adjusting his blanked-out glasses, staring at the ceiling with his mismatched ballpoint eyes. Eventually, he let his arm drop next to him on the bed.
“You didn’t.”
Well, what else was I supposed to do this whole time?
“Dude. I so did.”
He tried to push back his hair, but that had a bunch of paper stuck to it, too. His hand passed over a Chupacabra and a shark wearing sunglasses, then went back to his side.
“Jeez, Satch, how old are you?”
Now he was laughing, too. Or trying, anyway. At least his lungs were rattling now, not whistling or silent or full of the noise of a million slimy white tubes flapping like old windsocks. They’d loosened their hold on him, and the worst was over. (For him, at least. I was probably going to have to watch something pretty gross in the next five minutes, but I didn’t mind.)
“Older than you, dingus.”
Frankie kept moving his hand from the bed to his body, surveying the damage. I noticed that he was being careful not to dislodge anything, at least not until we’d exhausted the conversation.
“I feel like I’ve been, like, shingled or something. Jesus, how long was I out?”
Long enough to scare me half to death.
*****
When we were kids, Frankie used to take afternoon naps on the weekends, because something about the sound of lawnmowers in the distance always put him right to sleep. I was pretty good at amusing myself, but I still preferred it when we amused each other, so I had to find a good way to play together when he was asleep. Somehow, I ended up drawing on sticky notes, and seeing how many of them I could stick to him before he woke up. I got pretty quick at drawing shitty little things, but still, he was only ever asleep for an hour or two, so I couldn’t get as far as I would have wanted.
I wish I could go back in time. I’d tell myself: one day, I’d have time to cover his entire adult-sized upper half.
But that, by then, I wouldn’t want it.
Because I’d be spending two days and most of two nights scribbling, watching a bulky cube of paper dwindling to a stupid unsatisfying square, and the neon colors running out one by one. Leaving his left arm empty so the staff could fiddle with it, and telling them to be careful of the rest of him, because he was kind of my project, and I’d been working on him for a while. Watching the army of monsters I’d stuck to the front of his gown sinking, and waiting for them to rise again, bracing myself for when they wouldn’t, because they’d told me this was a big cast with a lot of branches, and they weren’t sure if he’d be strong enough to cough it up. That he had pockets of infection that were hard to reach, sealed in by whatever the fuck those things are made out of. I’d be preparing myself for every eventuality. Having vivid daydreams about getting in a screaming argument with an orderly, trying to convince him to let my brother go into the cold metal drawer still covered in my stupid drawings, because no one was allowed to take them off until he woke up, and that’s how we’d been doing it forever.
All told, I had a fucking miserable time.
But still, I was kind of proud of my work. In the time I spent sitting by his bed, I’d managed to cover everything not buried under the sheets or needed for important medical shit. About an hour ago, I ran out of space, and started sticking things to his oxygen mask. (A molecule copied from a picture I looked up on my phone and drawn with a shit-eating grin, a fire-breathing dragon, a stickman giant blowing away a stereotypical farm.) When that was pretty well covered, I took his glasses out of my flannel shirt pocket, applied drawings of eyes belonging to a zombie and a snake, and placed them on his face. He looked like one of those grimy walls you see around, covered in posters stuck on with homemade library paste. My shitty art doing its best to brighten his foreclosed body. I thought, well, I’ve done all I can for him. All I had left was sitting and waiting, with nothing to do with my fucking hands. I clicked my pen five million times.
It didn’t wake him. I wished like hell it could.
*****
“‘Bout two and a half days. They gave you some TPA and heparin.”
Frankie took off his glasses, squinted his real eyes at his false ones, took the notes off the lenses, stuck them to the bedrail, and put the glasses back in their rightful spot. He looked a little more like his old self. Granted, he was still tired and sallow and covered head to stomach in sticky notes, but it was a start.
“...And you stuck all this crap to me.”
I laughed again.
“Yeah. I stuck all that crap to you.”
Frankie tried to pull himself up in bed, but he was having kind of a hard time, so I had to help him.
“...That was really dumb.”
“Well shit, Frankfurter, you were kind of on your deathbed for a while there. Pardon me if I couldn’t think of anything better to do.”
He shook his head.
“It’s not dumb in and of itself. It’s dumb ‘cause I’m probably gonna wreck it. Give me your coffee cup.”
I didn’t know how he knew I had one, because it was sitting at my feet. But, I guess he just expected it, because I always had coffee when he was in here. I passed him the styrofoam cup. He pulled off the mask and started coughing, his face down in the cup like he was wearing a muzzle. Wondering how that somehow made everything louder, I waited for him to finish. After about a minute or two, he leaned back against the bed, peered into the cup, and cringed.
“...Ew. Hey, Satch. Check it out.”
He tilted the cup towards my face. I craned my neck to get a better look, even though I knew whatever I saw was going to be horrible. Because that’s what brothers are for. (That, and a bunch of other, equally bonkers shit.)
A good portion of the cast was heaped at the bottom of the cup, swimming in a puddle of dark red blood. It looked like some kind of Nightmare Spaghetti.
“Gross, Franks.”
He shrugged, in an “eh, seen grosser” kind of way, then moved to put the cup in the wastecan.
Except, he was still a little shaky, so it ended up tipping a little too far. Before I could do anything, the contents slipped out and splattered on the floor, hitting my jeans and left boot on the way down. Frankie muttered “shit” under his breath, then dropped the empty cup in the bin.
“...Sorry.”
I nudged the cast with my shoe. It moved like wet hair.
“...Don’t worry about it. I don’t have any drawings on me. It’s cool.”
Frankie laid back down on the bed.
“Can you help me take these things off… I might pass out again for a little while.”
I nodded, took the shark drawing off his hair, and stuck it to the wall.
“Sure. You probably need more sleep.”
Frankie closed his eyes. I removed a particularly awful drawing of the Mothman mooning passing cars from a bridge.
“And I need new drawings for when I wake up.”
I tapped his arm with my pen, which was almost out of ink by now.
“You got it, kiddo.”
Who knows how long he’ll be down for.
I sure don’t.
So I’d better clear myself plenty of space.
Story: Universe B
Supplies and Styles: (...I'm not sure? Do the "party" prompt lists count as something?)
Characters: Satchel (POV), Frankie
Colors: Meme Party 30 (X, X Everywhere), Baby Pink 11 (So basically I spent my whole life being punked?)
Word Count: 1,444
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Choose not to warn.
Summary: Satchel visits his brother in the hospital, and continues an old family tradition.
Note: References something I came up with for this. And while we're on the subject, I'm totally doing the Dare to Write Challenge on tumblr, so I'll probably be doing some crossposting and using their prompt list for additional inspiration for a while! (Also, hey! I know I've been kinda dead here. :P)
“...Fuck is this?”
Frankie sounded kind of blurry, but I didn’t expect much better. This was the first time in two days that he’d been awake enough to do anything more than try to roll over, get caught on a tube, and give up halfway. Plus, a lot of that awesome drug-water was dripping right onto the expressway to his brain.
“Oh, c’mon! You don’t remember? Or did you just think you were safe now, because you assumed I don’t remember? Well, buddy, you’re wrong.”
I laughed. Frankie kept running his hand over his paper-covered face, adjusting his blanked-out glasses, staring at the ceiling with his mismatched ballpoint eyes. Eventually, he let his arm drop next to him on the bed.
“You didn’t.”
Well, what else was I supposed to do this whole time?
“Dude. I so did.”
He tried to push back his hair, but that had a bunch of paper stuck to it, too. His hand passed over a Chupacabra and a shark wearing sunglasses, then went back to his side.
“Jeez, Satch, how old are you?”
Now he was laughing, too. Or trying, anyway. At least his lungs were rattling now, not whistling or silent or full of the noise of a million slimy white tubes flapping like old windsocks. They’d loosened their hold on him, and the worst was over. (For him, at least. I was probably going to have to watch something pretty gross in the next five minutes, but I didn’t mind.)
“Older than you, dingus.”
Frankie kept moving his hand from the bed to his body, surveying the damage. I noticed that he was being careful not to dislodge anything, at least not until we’d exhausted the conversation.
“I feel like I’ve been, like, shingled or something. Jesus, how long was I out?”
Long enough to scare me half to death.
When we were kids, Frankie used to take afternoon naps on the weekends, because something about the sound of lawnmowers in the distance always put him right to sleep. I was pretty good at amusing myself, but I still preferred it when we amused each other, so I had to find a good way to play together when he was asleep. Somehow, I ended up drawing on sticky notes, and seeing how many of them I could stick to him before he woke up. I got pretty quick at drawing shitty little things, but still, he was only ever asleep for an hour or two, so I couldn’t get as far as I would have wanted.
I wish I could go back in time. I’d tell myself: one day, I’d have time to cover his entire adult-sized upper half.
But that, by then, I wouldn’t want it.
Because I’d be spending two days and most of two nights scribbling, watching a bulky cube of paper dwindling to a stupid unsatisfying square, and the neon colors running out one by one. Leaving his left arm empty so the staff could fiddle with it, and telling them to be careful of the rest of him, because he was kind of my project, and I’d been working on him for a while. Watching the army of monsters I’d stuck to the front of his gown sinking, and waiting for them to rise again, bracing myself for when they wouldn’t, because they’d told me this was a big cast with a lot of branches, and they weren’t sure if he’d be strong enough to cough it up. That he had pockets of infection that were hard to reach, sealed in by whatever the fuck those things are made out of. I’d be preparing myself for every eventuality. Having vivid daydreams about getting in a screaming argument with an orderly, trying to convince him to let my brother go into the cold metal drawer still covered in my stupid drawings, because no one was allowed to take them off until he woke up, and that’s how we’d been doing it forever.
All told, I had a fucking miserable time.
But still, I was kind of proud of my work. In the time I spent sitting by his bed, I’d managed to cover everything not buried under the sheets or needed for important medical shit. About an hour ago, I ran out of space, and started sticking things to his oxygen mask. (A molecule copied from a picture I looked up on my phone and drawn with a shit-eating grin, a fire-breathing dragon, a stickman giant blowing away a stereotypical farm.) When that was pretty well covered, I took his glasses out of my flannel shirt pocket, applied drawings of eyes belonging to a zombie and a snake, and placed them on his face. He looked like one of those grimy walls you see around, covered in posters stuck on with homemade library paste. My shitty art doing its best to brighten his foreclosed body. I thought, well, I’ve done all I can for him. All I had left was sitting and waiting, with nothing to do with my fucking hands. I clicked my pen five million times.
It didn’t wake him. I wished like hell it could.
“‘Bout two and a half days. They gave you some TPA and heparin.”
Frankie took off his glasses, squinted his real eyes at his false ones, took the notes off the lenses, stuck them to the bedrail, and put the glasses back in their rightful spot. He looked a little more like his old self. Granted, he was still tired and sallow and covered head to stomach in sticky notes, but it was a start.
“...And you stuck all this crap to me.”
I laughed again.
“Yeah. I stuck all that crap to you.”
Frankie tried to pull himself up in bed, but he was having kind of a hard time, so I had to help him.
“...That was really dumb.”
“Well shit, Frankfurter, you were kind of on your deathbed for a while there. Pardon me if I couldn’t think of anything better to do.”
He shook his head.
“It’s not dumb in and of itself. It’s dumb ‘cause I’m probably gonna wreck it. Give me your coffee cup.”
I didn’t know how he knew I had one, because it was sitting at my feet. But, I guess he just expected it, because I always had coffee when he was in here. I passed him the styrofoam cup. He pulled off the mask and started coughing, his face down in the cup like he was wearing a muzzle. Wondering how that somehow made everything louder, I waited for him to finish. After about a minute or two, he leaned back against the bed, peered into the cup, and cringed.
“...Ew. Hey, Satch. Check it out.”
He tilted the cup towards my face. I craned my neck to get a better look, even though I knew whatever I saw was going to be horrible. Because that’s what brothers are for. (That, and a bunch of other, equally bonkers shit.)
A good portion of the cast was heaped at the bottom of the cup, swimming in a puddle of dark red blood. It looked like some kind of Nightmare Spaghetti.
“Gross, Franks.”
He shrugged, in an “eh, seen grosser” kind of way, then moved to put the cup in the wastecan.
Except, he was still a little shaky, so it ended up tipping a little too far. Before I could do anything, the contents slipped out and splattered on the floor, hitting my jeans and left boot on the way down. Frankie muttered “shit” under his breath, then dropped the empty cup in the bin.
“...Sorry.”
I nudged the cast with my shoe. It moved like wet hair.
“...Don’t worry about it. I don’t have any drawings on me. It’s cool.”
Frankie laid back down on the bed.
“Can you help me take these things off… I might pass out again for a little while.”
I nodded, took the shark drawing off his hair, and stuck it to the wall.
“Sure. You probably need more sleep.”
Frankie closed his eyes. I removed a particularly awful drawing of the Mothman mooning passing cars from a bridge.
“And I need new drawings for when I wake up.”
I tapped his arm with my pen, which was almost out of ink by now.
“You got it, kiddo.”
Who knows how long he’ll be down for.
I sure don’t.
So I’d better clear myself plenty of space.
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