When It Rains
Author's Note: Another short MR piece. No names are mentioned, but you should be able to figure out who this vignette centers around, even though I fear they're both horribly OOC and that this is horribly SWMNBR-esque. Either way, it's for Nita and Storm. I think they'll remember why... *hums Pinky and the Brain themesong*
* * *
Sometimes, when it rains, she stares out her window. She won't move or speak when we talk to her, so we've taken to leaving her to herself. They call her crazy, but I don't think she's that. Just lonely. It's not often that one of us falls in love. There's a reason we don't.
When it rains, it makes her think of him, of the dancehall she tried to save. She was doing it for herself, but also for us in a way. She needed us to keep the show alive, like we needed her to seduce him and convince him to finance our little venue. None of us expected her to fall in love. But it came as the biggest surprise to herself, for she above all the others had thought herself soulless and heartless.
But maybe she had simply forgotten.
She was dark like the devil and just as wicked, just as crafty. She was willing to do whatever was necessary to get what she desired. And she desired him, in all his rich glory. But it hadn't been love, not then. Merely power-lust, a desperate hunger of one who has been starving.
It was the hope that excited her, that brought the flush to her cheeks and the burning to her stomach. It was the hope that allowed her to dance without cringing with the filth that eyed her hungrily each night. But none of us realized how far she had gone until she became our Judas. That was the night she went too far.
That was the night she realized.
She was in love.
It was a grotesque and twisted emotion, tainted with power and money and corruption, but love for a prostitute is seldom pure and never innocent.
The night after that terminal show, he finally paid for her, took her and ravaged her, wanting all the while for her dark hair to be red curls, his nails scraping over her skin and drawing raised tattoos. His mouth drew blood at her shoulder; she bruised beneath him. And with the violence she fell more deeply and darkly. Her own claws bit into his shoulders, her own mouth profaned him, saying a thousand injuries against him.
For a few months, their brutal ardor lasted and with it was carried the life of the Moulin. There was never a show like the writer had penned and never a star like the one who faded. But he insisted that his new whore be the star, and found a new writer. They were expendable after all, especially so near Paris. The audiences came but dwindled, and at last the guise was over. The Moulin Rouge was truly dead.
It rained the day the dancehall closed, the day our financier left the filthy town at last. She had cursed him and spat at his feet; he had slapped her roughly across the cheek before turning and climbing into the carriage. But those were their twisted endearments, and in them she knew that he had stopped pretending that her hair was as scarlet as her lips.
In the rain, the moisture on her face might have been tears, but I doubt it. She had never cried and certainly would not do so over something so trivial as love.
We were prostitutes, the lot of us. We were paid to make people believe we loved them. There would be other men, other nights, other diamonds to burn. Those were the easy things. The hardest part had been convincing herself that she hadn't truly loved him.
By now, she had almost forgotten.
She only remembers when it rains.
END
Author's Note: Another short MR piece. No names are mentioned, but you should be able to figure out who this vignette centers around, even though I fear they're both horribly OOC and that this is horribly SWMNBR-esque. Either way, it's for Nita and Storm. I think they'll remember why... *hums Pinky and the Brain themesong*
* * *
Sometimes, when it rains, she stares out her window. She won't move or speak when we talk to her, so we've taken to leaving her to herself. They call her crazy, but I don't think she's that. Just lonely. It's not often that one of us falls in love. There's a reason we don't.
When it rains, it makes her think of him, of the dancehall she tried to save. She was doing it for herself, but also for us in a way. She needed us to keep the show alive, like we needed her to seduce him and convince him to finance our little venue. None of us expected her to fall in love. But it came as the biggest surprise to herself, for she above all the others had thought herself soulless and heartless.
But maybe she had simply forgotten.
She was dark like the devil and just as wicked, just as crafty. She was willing to do whatever was necessary to get what she desired. And she desired him, in all his rich glory. But it hadn't been love, not then. Merely power-lust, a desperate hunger of one who has been starving.
It was the hope that excited her, that brought the flush to her cheeks and the burning to her stomach. It was the hope that allowed her to dance without cringing with the filth that eyed her hungrily each night. But none of us realized how far she had gone until she became our Judas. That was the night she went too far.
That was the night she realized.
She was in love.
It was a grotesque and twisted emotion, tainted with power and money and corruption, but love for a prostitute is seldom pure and never innocent.
The night after that terminal show, he finally paid for her, took her and ravaged her, wanting all the while for her dark hair to be red curls, his nails scraping over her skin and drawing raised tattoos. His mouth drew blood at her shoulder; she bruised beneath him. And with the violence she fell more deeply and darkly. Her own claws bit into his shoulders, her own mouth profaned him, saying a thousand injuries against him.
For a few months, their brutal ardor lasted and with it was carried the life of the Moulin. There was never a show like the writer had penned and never a star like the one who faded. But he insisted that his new whore be the star, and found a new writer. They were expendable after all, especially so near Paris. The audiences came but dwindled, and at last the guise was over. The Moulin Rouge was truly dead.
It rained the day the dancehall closed, the day our financier left the filthy town at last. She had cursed him and spat at his feet; he had slapped her roughly across the cheek before turning and climbing into the carriage. But those were their twisted endearments, and in them she knew that he had stopped pretending that her hair was as scarlet as her lips.
In the rain, the moisture on her face might have been tears, but I doubt it. She had never cried and certainly would not do so over something so trivial as love.
We were prostitutes, the lot of us. We were paid to make people believe we loved them. There would be other men, other nights, other diamonds to burn. Those were the easy things. The hardest part had been convincing herself that she hadn't truly loved him.
By now, she had almost forgotten.
She only remembers when it rains.
END