Disclaimer – I own nothing, not the characters, not the song, not the story... oh no wait... I do own that bit...
A/N – This is a songfic that has been knocking around in my mind for yonks now, and I've finally got around to writing it. It's kinda angsty, kinda bitter... the usual really...
The song is called "Labelled with love" and is an incredibly beautiful and emotional song by a band called 'Squeeze' in 1981. So yeah... 80s music rocks!!! Woo! Enjoy!
Labelled with love
She unscrews the top of a new whiskey bottle
And shuffles about in her candle lit hovel,
Cradling the glass between her hands, she gazed into the pale liquid and tried to remember where it all went wrong. The candles on the fireplace flickered in the breeze, reminding her of the draft that broke through the cracks in the window frame. Otherwise she would not have remembered. She doesn't feel much anymore.
Like some kind of witch with blue fingers in mittens
She smells like the cats and the neighbours she sickens,
If she had any senses left she would have known how cold it was in her home. No. Not her home. Home was a place of warmth, of love and of belonging. She didn't belong here. She didn't belong anywhere anymore. And so she was left there, in the empty shadow of the house that she remembered so well, and yet was so different to how it had once been. An unfamiliar young couple passed by the window, casting disapproving glances to the unkempt state of the front of the house. It never used to be this way.
The black and white T.V. has long seen a picture
The cross on the wall is a permanent fixture,
Cobwebs hung from every corner of the room, dust settled on every surface. There had once been a time when every mark on the wall, every aspect of how she lived had a story behind it. Now there was nothing to tell, no one to tell it to. The candlelight flickered still, casting shadows over the silver cross hanging on the wall. Though she cannot remember why she keeps it there. She lost her faith so long ago, the very moment that the world had lost it's faith in her.
The postman delivers the final reminders
She sells off her silver and poodles in china.
She had slowly lost everything. Her family. Her friends. Even the belongings that had once surrounded her, the objects and memories that she had collected over the years, were now nothing but a ring on the cabinet shelf where the dust had once gathered around the base.
Drinks to remember, I me and myself
And winds up the clock
And knocks dust from the shelf
The only things left on thetable that stood next to the chair she slumped in were the thick brass photo frame that she had treasured since childhood, containing a yellowed photograph of her childhood self, surrounded by the people that had made her feel so special and so popular, and the large bottle of whisky that had now become her only friend.
Home is a love that I miss very much
So the past has been bottled and labelled with love.
Tears began to blur her vision, and she looked away from the smiles and the love that she could see in the photo, echoes of their laughter still haunting her mind. But that was so long ago, and even though she still had the blissful memories of happier days, she would still choose not to remember. The past can be so painful when you've given it all away.
During the war time an American pilot
made every air raid a time of excitement,
Back when they all lived together in peach Creek, and she had the world at her feet, she had no idea of how true sorrow could feel. And she had no idea of the potential she had, of the dreams she could have followed. Blinded by love seemed to be a mistaken cliché, what she felt for Kevin could not have been love – if it were then she would not have ended up sitting alone in the silence with only her own thoughts for company.
She moved to his prairie and married the Texan
She learnt from a distance how love was a lesson,
But she had been young, and with youth came naivety. She had believed she was in love, and to her that's all that had mattered. When her parents would not approve of her decision to marry the boy she had known for her whole life, she had run away. She and Kevin had packed up and left for greener pastures, believing that the only thing they were leaving behind were their problems. In truth, their problems were the only things they had taken with them.
He became drinker and she became mother
She knew that one day she'd be one or the other,
And from there it all went wrong. It had been inevitable really. They had a child, a little girl who bought her light in days if such darkness, but it was never to last, as she, just like her mother all those years ago had done, left to follow her dreams away from her drunken father and dependant mother. All Nazz could do was hope that her daughter would never become the disappointment that she had become to herself.
He ate himself older, drunk himself dizzy
Proud of her features, she kept herself pretty.
She was no longer the girl that had been the centre of attention at home. She had become someone different now, as had Kevin. He spent his days in a drunken slur, not quite sober enough to know how many days had passed or to tell what his wife was feeling. To be honest he didn't care. He had wanted her all to himself, and now he had her. Now there was no need for him to care. Back in the cul-de-sac when they were younger he could take pride in wearing her upon his arm, the others would be so envious and would try and compete with him. But ultimately he beat them, and now the only thing left for him to do was to search for the answers to his regrets at the bottom of the next whiskey bottle. She knew this, and had broken inside, but every morning she would still spend that little time perfecting her make up. It was the only mask she ever got to wear.
Drinks to remember, I me and myself
And winds up the clock
And knocks dust from the shelf
She had gone over this story so many times in her mind, taking herself back in time to the past, each time recovering something new to regret, another part of history that she'd rather forget. She had sworn so long ago that she would never end up like her husband, and this was her one comfort as she emptied the last of the alcohol into the glass and threw it back. At least she would never end up being like Kevin...
Home is a love that I miss very much
So the past has been bottled and labelled with love.
One more look at the photograph of her old friends, and she lifted herself from the old armchair, heading for the next bottle of whiskey that stood on the cabinet. If only they could see her now. They probably wouldn't even recognise her from the pretty blonde that they had spent their childhood with. She certainly could not recognise Kevin from the young boy in the photograph with a world of ambition in his mind.
He like a cowboy died drunk in his slumber
Out on the porch in the middle of summer,
She knew it would happen. She had often told him that his drinking would be the death of him. Suddenly she found that she was alone in the world. Completely alone. Not that that was anything different of course, she had been alone from the beginning. She could look into his eyes and not once would he look back at her. His soul had died long before. She had looked sorrowfully upon his body, but found no tears were able to fall. Instead she took the half empty glass of whiskey from his hands and lifted it to her lips, savouring the bitter taste of the alcohol. It had bought about such peace.
She crossed the ocean back home to her family
But they had retired to roads that were sandy,
She left the house that they had made and returned to the place she loved the most. Her heart warmed as the taxi had turned around the corner into the cul-de-sac she had grown up in. She could not wait to see the others. Her family would be at home, her mother and father settling down to a homemade Sunday roast, and would open their door and their hearts to their long lost daughter and would sit her down to share the dinner that her mother always made too much of. She would see Sarah and Jimmy, and they would be so happy to see the girl that had given them so much advice and help when they were young. Of course, there would be the Eds, still best of friends, and no doubt still trying to trick the others out of their cash. Of course they would have grown up now. Nazz smiled as she thought of all the stories and the catching up they would be able to do...
She moved home alone without friends or relations
Lived in a world full of age reservation,
But there was no smell of warm dinner coming from the dilapidated and empty house that he parents had once lived in. There was no sign of the others on the old and rusted playground that obviously hadn't been used for years, nor in the old lane, that had now become a dark and desolate back ally filled with garbage and burnt out cars. The only sign of life came from the larger cul-de-sac further down the road, the place she could only ever remember as being a building site. There groups of children would play and argue, just like they had when Nazz had been younger, living in the place that time had obviously forgotten.
On moth eaten armchairs she'd say that she'd sod all
The friends who had left her to drink from the bottle.
Because they had all left her. Gone to follow their own dreams without remembering her. She had once been so loved, so popular. Now, she was alone. Jimmy had probably left to become the artist that she knew he always could be. Sarah could have gotten her chance as an actor that she had always wanted. No doubt that Double D would have left long ago, he had the whole world at his feet, and wherever one of the Eds went, the others were sure to not be far behind. Not that she wanted to think of them any more. They had all left her, alone with only such ugly emotions to see her through each day. Jealousy. Regret...
Drinks to remember, I me and myself
And winds up the clock
And knocks dust from the shelf
She looked back to the window and noticed that the young couple that had stood outside earlier were still in view. Not that any of this surprised her. Time seemed to drag by so slowly now. She could not be sure of what day it was, each sunrise and sunset seemed to blur into each other, unlike her memories which were too sharp, too real for her to bear. She could not stand to hear the echoes of the voices that had once surrounded this place, only to desert her, an elderly woman at the age of thirty-seven.
Home is a love that I miss very much
So the past has been bottled and labelled with love.
She lifted the glass to her lips and watched the sunset by the flickering candlelight. A new day was beginning, but at least she knew that she would never turn out to be like her husband...
Ah Nazz... you are so foolish my small friend... Well, I'm not sure on this fic... I was dubious about posting it... but once a song grabs my attention it won't leave me alone till I've written about it.... So anyhow, review and tell me what you think – remember, if you don't tell me that you are tired of my ramblings by now I might be forced to haunt this fandom 'till you do –makes spooky noises-