Come Go With Me
Author's Note: This is a relatively short Ned/Chuck piece. I'm not sure how this little attention whore managed to pop out, given I have a list of over 20 started fanfics that have been begging me to write them, when all of a sudden this little piece jumps into my head, and tells me to ignore the other 20+ fics I've been working on that have already been started for some time, and write this one in one sitting after not even having any ideas or previous inspiration for it. It's clearly very demanding and demands of you the readers that you please review.
Disclaimer: If I did own Pushing Daisies (which I clearly do not), I'd grab Ned's finger and bring the series back to life.
Come Go With Me
To everyone else they were a curiosity at best and obscene at worst. He was an elderly man and she was a young woman, and they lived together along with their dog. Oh, things had gone well enough at first, back when people assumed that the old man was the father of the young woman. It was sweet, her living with her father, presumably to take care of him in his old age. Then the neighbors started to really notice the couple, watching the way he smiled at her and the way she would giggle when he whispered in her ear. It turned into a scandal quickly as word spread like lightning around the small community that the new arrivals—the man and his daughter were having some sort of illegitimate affair. The man was hated by the community for abusing his daughter in such an appalling and unlawful way, but the young woman didn't remain a subject of pity for long when it seemed she enjoyed the attention and reciprocated her father's feelings. Soon women and men alike would pass them on the street, men threatening the old man they viewed as a "sick pervert" and women scoffing at the young girl they called "skank" and "devil's spawn" behind her back.
Eventually, another man moved into town, a middle aged man with a wife and three children. The man's name was Eric, and he had decided to become a policeman because of his high regard for morals and ethics. It didn't take long before he began to hear talk from the public about the strange old man who sexually used and his beautiful daughter in a way no father ever should. Outraged, Eric marched straight to the house where the two lived prepared to arrest the father of the girl for sexual abuse, shamed on behalf of the girl who was plenty old enough to not allow her father to use her in such a way. He could only imagine the psychological damage this poor girl had endured.
What he learned when he took the time to listen to what the aged man and the youthful woman had to say shocked him. The man's name was Ned, and the woman's name was Charlotte—although she preferred to be called "Chuck"—and they were not father and daughter. What Eric learned was that Ned and Chuck were married. Although deeply disturbed by the age difference between the man and his wife, the man left the property of the two friendly people, knowing the matter was out of his hands, and out of the reach of the law. When Eric confided in his wife the nature of the relationship between the man and the woman later that night as they lay together in bed, he voiced the three thoughts that had been plaguing him all day. The first thought was that the man didn't seem overtly rich, although he couldn't imagine why else the young woman was married to him. The second thought was that the girl must be some actress, for if Eric didn't know any better, she seemed to be genuinely in love with her husband. The third thought was that Charlotte's eyes were the oldest eyes he'd ever seen in a woman so young.
Over time, the word spread about the true nature of the old man and his wife, and although the situation was far more legal than the townsfolk had originally believed, they still were not eager to welcome the woman and her husband into the community. Soon, gossip about the "gold-digger" and her "pimp" flooded the town, and the couple became the pinnacle of discussion. Although the girl and the man were friendly, and people who attempted to get to know them swore up and down they seemed to really be in love, no one had seen them entertain physical contact of any kind. They did, however, notice an alarming number of empty saran wrap boxes in the couple's recycling each week.
No one bothered to ask them how long they were married, or when they had met, and for that Ned and Chuck were thankful. The truth would never suffice, as even if they did say it, who on earth would believe them? Ned and Chuck were not oblivious to the contempt toward them from the town, but they were happily self-contained, and after so many years together, knew better than to expect anything different. It pained Ned to see Chuck as young and as beautiful as the day he had awoken her from the dead, while he knew every day he aged more and came slowly upon the end of his life. He knew it was selfish of him to keep her with him, especially when he knew she had so much more to live for, and deserved so much more than a man of his age could give her. Ned knew that she deserved someone to be able to touch her and kiss her and hold her as he had always wished to be able to do, but he also knew that Chuck wouldn't entertain such a thought, and somewhere deep, deep down in the insecure heart of the ex-pie maker, he knew Chuck didn't want anyone else.
Then the fateful day came when Ned received a call from the doctor's office, and the knowledge of a death that forever lurked just outside the immediate present as some vague, blurry reminder of his mortality finally came barging into focus with the announcement that he had less than a week to live. The knowledge neither shocked nor disturbed him, and perhaps on some level offered him the comfort of no longer having to guess when his life would end. It took him three days to gather the strength to break the news to Chuck, and when he did, every word he had rehearsed for hours about how 'his time was up, but hers was not, and she needed to promise him to live her life, find someone else she deserved who could touch her in ways Ned never could' flew from his mind at the sight of the woman he loved with every fiber of his being, the woman he had spent so many years of his life with, the woman who was always optimistic break in front of him. Through thick tears she whispered that she knew the day was coming, but she wouldn't allow herself to dwell on it. Ned wished more than anything he could wipe the tears from her face and kiss away her pain, but for the millionth time in his life, could do nothing more than offer words of support, and attempt to comfort her through words and layers of cloth.
It took her a long time to finally stop crying, when suddenly she spoke, her voice husky from crying, but resolved all the same.
"Ned, I want you to take me with you."
Ned couldn't manage to do anything other than stare at Chuck. He could never conceive asking such a thing from her, it seemed far too much to request from the woman he had already asked so much of through the years. Sensing his uncertainty, Chuck continued.
"I've lived just as full a life as you. I haven't aged since you brought me back to life, and frankly I don't want to be immortal. It's too much. With you gone, I don't know what else is left for me to live for. Our friends and family are dead, and people already resent me so much. They don't understand. They think I married you for your money. I can't marry someone so much younger than me, even if I could convince myself to marry without loving them. The truth is, I know I'll keep going forever, but without you, there would be nothing left worth living. Unless you want me to continue living all eternity in a miserable, sad, lonely existence moving every so many years before people wonder why I don't age, unless you don't love me, I want you to kill me Ned. I'm ready to take on whatever's next with you. We've been fighting it for so many years, aren't you ready to know what comes next?"
Much to Chuck's surprise, Ned did not fight her, or argue with her. Instead, he swallowed hard, nodded his head and simply said, "Okay".
They spent the rest of that day and the night holding each other through beekeeper suits, holding hands with gloves, and kissing through saran wrap. The next morning when they woke in each other's arms, they spoke for a long time, discussing everything from memories to what they imagined the afterlife to be. Finally, as the sun started to set, Chuck looked at Ned and said, "It's time."
Chuck and Ned had discussed it earlier and decided Digby, the one person—or animal who knew most what Chuck felt, and who had shared everything with Ned should venture onward with them. Perhaps it was selfish, but Ned had been through everything else with Digby, the thought of leaving him behind and moving on was too much. Sighing, he looked at Digby, who needed no explanation of what was to occur as he lay down and waited for his master to approach him. Ned was reminded of the only other time he had intentionally killed someone he had allowed to live again. Years ago, Chuck's father had approached them, claiming that he was done with his time on Earth and asking Ned to help him move on. After discussing it with Chuck, he had agreed. After giving Chuck and her father an afternoon alone, Charles Charles had said his goodbyes to his only daughter, and turned to face Ned, telling him to treat his little girl well. After assuring him he would, Charles nodded knowingly, telling Ned he had no doubt of that, He stuck his hand out for Ned to shake. Ned responded, and the moment his hand clasped that of the elder man who would have looked no older than Ned himself were it not for the decay of the body, Charles Charles died for a second and final time.
When Ned was just inches away from Digby's fur, the dog barked, and Ned pulled his hand away. Instead, Digby sat up and licked Ned's face, before becoming stiff and dying for the second and final time. Ned shed a few tears, knowing from the sniffing across the room that Chuck was also crying. For the first time since he was a boy, Ned reached out and began to pet Digby, rejoicing in the feeling of the dog's soft fur he had so long been denied against his wrinkled hands. Chuck too approached, scratching behind the dog's ears and whispering some goodbyes and promises of reuniting. Ned pet Digby for what seemed like hours, until finally he forced himself to stop, and complete the task he knew lay before him.
He turned to face Chuck, and the two of them looked into each other's eyes, until finally Chuck broke the silence.
"I'll see you soon."
"I love you, Chuck."
"I love you too."
With that, Ned leaned forward and kissed his wife. He could swear that he felt her respond to his kiss for just a second longer before she too turned cold. Somewhere in the back of his mind he wondered if whatever powers that had bestowed his ability upon him had allowed Chuck and him that extra fraction of time before she died, but for the moment he couldn't bring himself to stop kissing her. For years he had only felt them through various forms of plastic or material, and now that no barrier was between them, Ned was certain her lips had been just as soft as he remembered them being when they were children. He took a deep sigh, certain now that his time on Earth was to end very shortly, it would be too cruel for the universe to keep him alive now. As he waited however, he took the time to touch her, to feel her, and to explore the body that had been so available to him, yet so inaccessible for so long. He memorized every curve of her body, relishing in every touch of her body he had never felt with bare skin. He had long since been fully acquainted with the body of the woman he loved, but he had never been able to experience it so freely, the texture of her so new to him with his unexposed body.
And that was how he was found just mere hours later by a neighbor who had come to collect a recipe for a pie. It was the triple murder that baffled the authorities and the neighborhood alike. A dog was found dead in the house, and next to him, also dead, was his owner, the aged old man called Ned who held in his arms, as if trying to press every part of his body against hers, a third dead body of the woman he called his wife. It turns out that there were no records of the marriage of this man and this woman, at least none that they could find, but the most confusing aspect of the case, aside from the fact that two people and a dog were found dead of natural causes within a few hours of one another, was that a search for the woman's identity concluded that there was no match, save that of a woman "Charlotte Charles" who had died many, many years ago while on a cruise. The DNA matched perfectly, but Charlotte Charles had been dead and buried for years, and even if she hadn't been (as the empty coffin lead inspectors to believe), this woman couldn't possibly be mistaken for a woman as old as Charlotte Charles would be… right?
Author's Note: Well that was short and sweet, and now it's finished. If you wanted to read some of that as necrophilia, be my guest. If you did not, then by all means, don't. It's all ambiguity and interpretation and whatnot. Please be on the lookout for two other PD fics I'll have coming this way soon (coincidentally ones that are already started that this little buddy decided to push out of the way). Please review!