Disclaimer: WB owns 'Moonlight.' I make no money off this.
My eternal thanks to J, who betas and helps me clarify things even when she has papers to write. To Mariah, who read successive drafts whilst ignoring my bitching and to Lisa, who let me ramble obsessively till I was done.
-x-
These days ice tea sat thickly on his tongue. It clouded the need to taste the air without the smell of mud or bombing. Where was the ash in the clear California sky?
Of course war is victory. In some ways you couldn't lose; how could you if you were still here?
The ceiling fan squeaked and Mick turned roughly in the nest of sheets. Of course war was hell. Of course you wanted to come back, walk straight into the arms of something infinitely loving - mother, woman, priest, child.
He went to see her in uniform. He wasn't sure she'd open the door to him and he wasn't sure who else to be. GI St John - honourable discharge. GI St John - where is the man you left with?
It's OK, he told himself. The boys are coming home.
There were lots of boys coming back, alone and not alone.
One week early. Right now the old patrol would be entering Paris, without him. No donkeys, he smiled, eyes alight with remembered pleasure. No olive branches. But plenty of cigarettes and damn fine American first aid whiskey.
He thought inexplicably of tin soldiers mounting attacks in the backyard; his little, food-stained hands pushing scads of plastic men to their death - plummeting off the edge of the flowerbed, canon fire from a slingshot, whole squadrons decimated by a malevolent bird.
Lila stirred softly beside him. He watched his hand trace the naked curve of her hip, mesmerised.
The last of the fireworks whistled in the night sky. He listened for the echoes of gunfire automatically. Then he listened for the echoes of living: the sensation of real, pulsing flesh around him, her eyes leaking tears, her lips embedded in his, the scorch of orgasm reminding him that he was, that he was here, that she was here. He listened to the sticky remnants of sighs. It was so warm. The windows were open to the sounds of drunken singing and celebration. He wasn't sure what he hated more - the noise or the disturbing uselessness of it.
One week and three days without gagging over the crusted sweat and dirt on every rank body, without cursing the red cross on his tin hat that was supposed to be a fucking talisman for a guy with no gun to defend himself, without the gurgling of blood and the night-time sounds of retching and coughing. No cigarette smoke - that was the really strange one.
Victory and they were probably singing in the streets of Europe. He'd stared blankly at the grocer whose perfect American accent made his ears bleed. After years spent doing everything in a pack, Mick avoided the strangers and the civilians. They didn't touch what needed to be touched.
He pushed into Lila's back, relishing the musky scent in her hair. Almost virgin territory, the need for her slamming like a strange, new malady through him. Half-remembering a face between them. It wasn't enough to stop whatever was raging inside.
She didn't ask as he lay on her, sweat-covered and spent, whispering, "I'm sorry." She said, "I love you," and it was the most natural thing in the world to stay inside her shell; all the soft, vulnerable, turtle parts of himself buried deep in the sands and the comforting warmth.
Tonight he remembered everything. He remembered bombed and bloodied trees in an Italian forest; the taste of grit in biscuits; the feeling of a water blister rubbing against thick socks; the smell of trenches and the teasing shouts of laughter when new Privates wet themselves in terror; waking up in a makeshift hospital; the punishment of the Ardennes; the insides of men that he became all too familiar with.
Mick put a hand on a sleeping, white shoulder and inhaled. He could smell Lila on his fingers. It was so beautiful he felt the familiar choking strangle-hold in his throat.
"Too hot," she told him sleepily.
He shut his mouth against the memories and held her.
Air wafted in and out of the open window; the whole world was breathing again. A half-finished saw job in the backyard and a half-cooked dinner on the stove, forgotten when he interrupted both their former lives. This sated, full lassitude in an unfamiliar bed. The whole world was beginning again, in time with him.
Of course someone won and someone lost. Lots of someones. War is the exhausted, green-tinged soldiers on the battle lines; the burned-out men with sleepless eyes that move them like pawns and worry about metaphorical hawks; the worried families beating scrap metal into bombs and tanks; the doctors, nurses and medics with their glues and patches and eyes hungry for life; the graves that each successive assault walked over.
He clutched a breast, holding fast to the intimacy. It breathed in-between his fingers, above her beating, living heart. This part he remembered. Come the morning...? There was carpentry and breakfast. If he tuned the guitar, he could wake her with a song. Life was taking care of people as long as there were people to take care of.
One week. Ray should have been coming home.
War is discharge, a river of blood, bone and faeces; pus-filled rivers of shattered cities.
The dogs were barking. Mick wondered if Ray had lain here on his last night and memorised everything - the bed, the shadows, the neighbours, the windows, the mirror, the pictures, his wife.
Lila smelled of Mick now, inside and out.
Orange juice for breakfast. No more bitter army coffee with dead bugs. Orange juice that smelled of California sunshine and bright Lila who smelled of sex and promise.
Parted lips skimmed her hair.
She's almost the same, buddy. A little more worn, a little tougher, a lot more private. You're the ache that won't go away. And she's a great piece of pussy, man. I don't know how you stayed sane over there.
A tongue flicked lazily over her back.
You wanna taste her again? You can take over, man. If you're anywhere here. You can be me. Look, she's wet. Can you smell that? She smells of sweat and pussy. She's got a little heavier. She's so lush. She's so goddamn responsive.
Lila smiled dazedly against his lips, "Again?"
Mick nodded.
You know what she feels like when I slide into her, Ray? She feels like nothing else. She moans like that nurse with the crooked teeth. Oh God, I need to come.
He was laughing this time as she nuzzled his neck. Ray had been underneath him when the fragments hit. It made no sense; Mick should've been the one in a box somewhere. Thank you, buddy.