Fic: Unspeaking
Author: Sara, a.k.a. ragingparsley
Rating: PG or Teen or whatever system we're using today. Pretty much dark, with a few bad words
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Overall Depressing themes
Pairing: John/Angela, maybe, if you squint
Summary: Sorry, Angela, he mouths into his liquor but doesn't move. Maybe she'll take the hint, leave him alone. Leave and give herself a fighting chance to survive the next forty years.
A/N: Figures, the first fic I write in a while is in the fandom I dabble in the least, but instead of studying for my midterm today, this came out. Let me know what you think. Plus, I've only seen Constantine twice and that was a year ago. Let me know if there's any glaring plot error or if it's out of character.
Unbeta'd. Any errors contained within are my own.
Unspeaking
Chas's funeral is four days after he gives Angela the Lance.
He doesn't see her there. He doesn't see anyone besides the half-hidden face of the kid he'd led right to his death.
But he knows she's there. A psychic cuts through the ether like a foghorn, and she's one of the strongest he's ever met.
She sits in the pew behind him, both of them hanging at the back of the church. For a moment he smells her perfume and can almost pretend they're not here, but anywhere else. The moment doesn't last long; the church is hallowed grown and the death here cuts to the bone.
Neither of them are welcome, exactly, but both of them need to be here. It's as much emotional penance as a good-bye. As much an 'it's my fault' as an 'I'll see you soon.'
When the service is over, he leaves. he can't stand the thought of a slow procession past the casket, to see the face of a kid who should have been practicing his pick-up lines in that cab rather than 'Kramer, Chas Kramer, asshole.' ---The memory of coming across Chas in the cab, saying that, makes him smirk a moment before it cuts to the quick of him. That was so Chas.
He leaves as soon as the preacher stops speaking, but Angela doesn't. She's the good one. The damsel in distress with a crucifix and a gun. She'll pay her respects, offer a prayer and sympathy to the family, and an explanation why he's not there to a cold body that can't care that he isn't there.
He just goes home, wanting a smoke now more than ever, but settles for a bottle of Jack and his thoughts, they burn better anyways. He settles for memories of dark, toxic places and the bright, eager face he'd never see again this side of the grave. He thinks of his curse. To see. To know. How it kills. He thinks of Beeman, an older, meeker Chas who met his end at the hands of a demon he'd never have met if it weren't for John. He thinks of Hennessy, who would have been wearing the medallion, cut off from the ether. Hennessy who would have been safe behind the trappings of a faith that John rid him of.
He thinks of Gabriel, the one who did deserve to die that day, and will one day, now. But it's not today. And it wasn't then. There's a kid getting put in the ground because he stood up and tried to save the world, and a fallen angel walking in it because he tried to destroy it.
There's a man with a two pack a day habit who got the death ripped out of him. The man who killed himself twice and managed to walk away from both. The man who played a hand with the devil himself and fucking won. That man is still walking the world while a kid ---a kid--- gets buried.
He feels Angela's presence long before he hears her knock. He doesn't get up. He doesn't answer the door. He doesn't feel like company. Besides, she's the good one, with wide open eyes and a target on her back thanks to him. It's only a matter of time before something happens because of him.
"John?" she calls through the door, giving it another knock.
She knows he's in here, and he knows she knows. She's really coming along, for only having her Sight back a few days.
Sorry, Angela, he mouths into his liquor but doesn't move. Maybe she'll take the hint, leave him alone. Leave and give herself a fighting chance to survive the next forty years.
But apparently there are skills in the fair Homicide detective's handbook that would be frowned upon by her fellow detectives.
Apparently the glyphs on his door do jackshit to keep out the closest thing to a friend he has left in the world.
She closes the door behind her, sticking the lockpicks in her purse, and makes herself at home. A jack on the back of a chair, a purse on the counter, her heels by the door, still wet with clumps of telling mud.
She says nothing, just stares at him for a moment while he ignores her. It's safer this way, for both of them. She won't die and he won't--- She won't die.
After a minute of silent observation she walks into his kitchen and roots around for a while. She comes back with a glass and sits beside him, pouring for herself. But she says nothing, and he can't bring himself to throw her out.
He doesn't know how long they sit there, unspeaking, unmoving but for the rise and fall of their glasses; time blurring in an alcohol-induced haze. He's out-drinking her, two to one at least, but that doesn't surprise him; he has a feeling that she thinks she's on duty somehow, even if she's not required at the station. When sun goes down and neither of them move to turn on a light, they're unnecessary this evening.
The second time he falls asleep at the table she gets him up and maneuvers him into his bedroom. It's a trick. John's thoroughly smashed, she's halfway drunk herself, but they get there without spilling to the floor. He has a feeling that if they went down, they'd stay down; neither of them are sober enough to pull the other up. Still, it's more than he'd manage alone.
She gets off his shoes and socks, strips him of his belt and leaves him in his t-shirt. When she turns off the alarm, the one sober corner of his brain realizes she's probably had a lot less to drink than he thought.
She's closed the bedroom door halfway and he's halfway to sleep before he remembers.
"Hey, Angela," he slurs from drink and grief and fatigue.
She turns saying nothing, just looking.
"Thanks."