What's it like there outside, with the living?

[silver-falcon24.livejournal.com]

Title: What's it like there outside, with the living?
Word Count: 583
Rating: PG
Warnings: booze, but that's it.
Pairing: Could be either one of them, I'm not even sure. How you read it, I guess!
Summary: When we take a chance, it doesn't always work out. Not even for the lucky ones.
Disclaimer; Not mine, it belongs to the wondrous Barratt and Fielding, though i do like to play
AN: this came from something toratio wrote,  which put me in a kind of melancholy mood, which is okay, because this came out. Anyway, title comes from 'The Living' by Natalie Merchant, that woman's voice is just so haunting and amazing, and when i was trying to find a title this song came on and it just seemed right.
Anyway, enjoy!

The glass is glinting in the light from the single lamp still on. He watches it, watches how the light dances around the rim, how it ripples through the indented glass. There’s a sticky lip print left from too much lip-gloss, and coloured droplets run down the side to join the remnants of his drink in the bottom. The dregs fragment the light, shooting gold streams of colour around the edge of the glass. 

He blinks too hard, watching too strictly. Something has to happen, something because if it doesn’t, how does he know any of this is actually real? How does he know that he isn’t just crazy, that he’s isn’t dead? - Because he can’t feel a thing. He hasn’t moved in what seems like eternity, he just doesn’t know how to.

The flat is empty and quiet, and he’s not sure whether he’s been swallowed by it, by the silence. It’s heavy and domineering and he doesn’t like it; he wants to cry, but the weight of the silence wont let him.

A shuddering breath escapes his lips, and in that second as diamond tears push at his eyes in another bid to escape, the door creaks open. In the total silence, the creak of its whining hinges is like thunder overhead and he jumps, violently. He snaps his vision straight to the figure standing awkwardly at the edges of the room. A look passes between them, a direct meeting of eyes, passing of thoughts, whispering of emotions and memories and dreams.

He looks away first; dropping his gaze back to the glass, back to the fragmented light. It wasn’t meant to be this way, it was meant to be perfect. Things don’t often go exactly to plan, but they usually end up in his favour. Tonight, tonight was the only thing he really wanted to work out. But the silence is heavy; the space between them is just so… wide. The room was never this big, of that he’s sure, but now, now it’s like a fucking canyon. He licks his lips, nervous. He doesn’t like silence; he doesn’t like not being looked at. If no one is looking, if no one can hear him, then how does he know he won’t just disappear? He looks up again; tears feel heavy on his cheeks.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, remembering those lips on his own, remembering for a second how perfect life seemed to have become, and how pointless, how much it hurts now.

“Don’t be,” a hand gently slides under his chin, pulling his gaze upwards. Their eyes meet and that same hand gently caresses his cheek, wiping away the diamonds sliding down them.

“I should be the one apologising,” his heart is pounding a thousand times faster than it ever has, even before. His eyes slide closed, long lashes pressing his tears back, tears of joy, as a moustache tickles his upper lip, just as those lips press themselves back against his own. A hand at the back of his hair, the other on his cheek, lips pressed fervently against his own. The flat is quiet, the air tingling with magic. A single lamp illuminates the room, a glass sits on the table, droplets fragmenting the light golden brown, and in the quiet, in the peace, no one can see him, no one can hear him. He doesn’t feel real; he’s not sure whether or not he’s alive.

But it’s okay, because living or dead, he’s in heaven.