'Ello! I know it's been forever and a day since I posted a Rent-fic. I guess I can pass it off as schoolwork, play rehearsals, etc., but I'll admit this too: I've been insanely blocked up. I tried some stories, but they didn't work out. I wrote some bare-fics, but now it looks like I'm on Rent again. I think. Maybe. I don't know.
Anyway, enjoy the fic. Or don't…
A Night Like Any Other
I used to write screenplays. No surprises there, of course, and what's probably even less astonishing is the fact that they all were shit. Eventually I stopped, and that coincided with a life-changing night, and that led to the first thing I was satisfied with in years. But you probably know that already.
I remember one particular evening when I was working on one of these screenplays. I never did go back to this one, come to think of it, though the reasons for that are quite obvious. Regardless, it wasn't a special night or anything. It was just the last time I would ever see April alive again.
I was half-laying on the couch with more holes than a sponge, half-leaning on the wood table more warped than April and Roger were half the time. The place smelled more like pot, cigarette smoke, and sour milk than usual, and all I could hear was April and Roger going through their daily fight-and-fuck cycle that would pause for what felt like too short a time as they shot up.
And then—like all nights—it ended.
A door creaked open and closed again. The floor creaked as well, and then a pair of large feet came into my field of vision.
"Hey." He sounded tired and as if he were greeting me out of courtesy.
"Hey yourself." I looked him up and down—shitty jeans, messy hair, no shirt, tattooed shoulder and knuckles, eyes still a bit glazed over from the most recent high—and turned back to the notebook and my failure at writing.
Soft guitar chords filled our sorry excuse for a living room, but I didn't mind it. I tapped my pen on my notebook out of time with the music.
"So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell, blue skies from—"
I threw my pen down at the floor, where it rolled away.
The music stopped. "What?"
"Shit, Roger, can you not do that?"
"Sing?"
"No!"
"What, then?"
"I don't know! …Shit." I breathed the last part.
I forced myself off the couch and walked out to the fire escape. I lit up a cigarette, which I still do to this day when I'm stressed, and stared out at the skyline. My shirt was sticking to me, so took it off and leaned back against the brick wall of the building. It felt relatively cool against my back. I shut my eyes, and somewhere along the way the music stopped and I finished my cigarette. Footsteps and the hiss of an opening can of beer followed the former, and a crushing against the wall succeeded the latter.
An arm reached behind my back and another pulled me into an awkward hug. I remember smelling something like peaches.
"April?"
"Mark?"
"It's hot."
"So?"
"Get off."
"You suck."
"Love you too."
She let go and I opened my eyes.
"Want some food?"
"We don't have any money."
I shrugged.
"Is Maureen coming home soon from… whatever show she's in now?"
"Aren't you dating her?"
"Aren't you two, like, attached to the hip?"
"Not 'like.' We are."
"So wouldn't you know?"
"No."
"No?"
"No. I wouldn't."
I looked at her. She was staring out at the moon hanging low in the sky, and it was reflected in her eyes. There was something eating her, something she wasn't telling anyone.
"Are you alright?"
"Perfectly marvelous."
I laughed one short, almost-whispered bark of laugh.
"There's something wrong, isn't there?"
"Sort of."
"What does that mean?"
She didn't answer me.
"Roger?"
"Kind of."
"C'mon, April, what is it?"
She didn't answer for a while. Then, she looked at me and smiled.
"You know, Mark? You're a pretty good guy after all."
"Shocking, I know." I rolled my eyes and turned back to the skyline.
She grabbed my hand, and I looked back at her. Our eyes met and she smiled again, showing her teeth this time. They were obnoxiously white.
"Goodnight, Mark."
"Goodnight, April."
With a squeeze of my hand, she went back inside, leaving me alone again. I reached in my pocket for the box of cigarettes to light up again, but it was empty. I went back inside then, leaving the box out there. Roger had fallen asleep on the couch, his beer tilted dangerously towards the floor, indicating that I would have to clean the next day.
The bathroom light was still on when I went to bed.
I don't really know what this means in terms of me being back to Rent. I'm pretty sure I won't be turning fics out every other week, but God knows what I'll do next.
R&R.