Title: Portrait of a Former Roommate
Summary: Mark remembers.
Rating:G/PG.
Warnings: character death
Disclaimer: Everything that's not the plot belongs to Jonathan Larson.
Author's Note: This came to me a long, long time ago. One day, the title popped into my head, along with this image of Roger. The story has gone through many, many changes since I started it, and ultimately, it came to this. Certainly not how I imagined it would come out, but here it is nonetheless. I think I'm generally happy with the result, but I also think it probably could have been better. However, I don't want to rewrite it eighty-seven hundred times. Feedback makes me wicked happy, so tell me what you thought! But be nice! Well, you don't have to be. But at least have a real reason for being mean. And it's the first time I've EVER written a story with character death. I love constructive criticism as well, but only if it really is constructive. (holy shit I used way too many synonyms for "but" in that paragraph.)
It had been a warm day, Mark recalled. Not brutally hot, like New York summers could be, but warm. The sun shone through the window at exactly the right angle, creating a sort of spotlight on the man in the picture. He was sitting on the windowsill, an acoustic Fender guitar cradled in his lap, though he was paying no attention to it. His eyes were locked on something across the room, and he was in the middle of a laugh, every one of his perfect white teeth showing.
It was the one photo Mark had ever kept in a frame.
He remembered that day perfectly. Back when Maureen and Collins still lived with them, but after Benny had moved out. Before April, before the drugs, before withdrawal, before disease. When they were all young, fairly new to the city, and still had hopes of making it big. The four best friends had been sitting around the loft that afternoon, doing nothing, when Mark had decided to whip out his ancient Polaroid camera and take candids. And of course, he had crazy photos of Collins and Maureen from that day, and even of himself, but there was a beauty embedded in the single photograph of Roger that had struck Mark more than any other photo taken that day.
The following morning he found a worn-out, wooden frame, put the picture in it, and placed it on the crate he called his "bedside table".
Even during April, the fights about the heroin, and the long nights of withdrawal, Mark had never moved that photograph. It captured the old Roger, the Roger that Mark had met all those years ago when he moved into Alphabet City, and the Roger that came back to life after he met Mimi.
The Roger Mark had loved.
And the Roger that, eventually, had loved him back.
It never, ever moved. Until now.
Standing in the church that day, staring at that photo on top of the coffin that held his best friend, his roommate, his lover, Mark realized that while at the time, he had regretted moving the photograph from it's sacred spot next to his bed, now he was glad. Glad to share the Roger he knew best with everyone coming together today not only to mourn Roger's death, but to celebrate his life. Mark was, for once, glad to share his Roger with everyone.
His Roger.
A/N 2: Blech, I hate that ending. But what do you think?