Fog
By Effervescent Shine
Disclaimer: Witch Baby and Angel Juan are owned by Francesca Lia Block. I'm just borrowing 'em for a little jaunt through the fog…
Summary: Takes place at the very beginning of Missing Angel Juan. Angel Juan's POV on the time he spent with Witch Baby in the fog.
We sit silently in my room, me slouched against my bed, bass in hands, plucking randomly at the strings. She is curled up on a chair, chin on her knees, watching me. I feel restless, but too comfortable to do anything. Thoughts float through my head aimlessly. And suddenly, I know. It's time to do this, now. The unexpected realization scares me, and my will to stay still vanishes.
"Come on," I say. "Let's go out, for a walk or something." My voice sounds uncertain, strange. She will know, I think. She'll be able to tell that something is wrong. But she doesn't.
"Now?" She asks. "It's late…the weirdos come out at night, you know." But she is grinning, and she uncurls herself to go with me.
Once we are outside, we are in for a shock, because the city has been blanketed with fog. A thick, almost green-colored fog. Witch Baby laughs in delight, and puts out her hand, almost as if she's trying to catch some of it. We wander slowly down streets, pausing here and there to admire things that seem so much more mysterious and glamorous in the fog. A twisty cat, a funky statue…things that we might not have noticed had we been walking any other time. The fog changes things, I think to myself, watching Witch Baby dance through it, laughing and happy and spinning.
The fog. I can tell that she loves it, but it's kind of scary. The way it wraps itself around everything, the way that it hides things. Maybe that just reminds me of me, hiding things. Maybe it just reminds me too much of the fact that I am going to have to tell her...and that she'll disappear off into the fog. Yeah, I know that she'll be upset, I know her that well. But I still have to tell her. Because I have to go. I know that she won't understand, and really, I probably couldn't even make her get it if I tried. If she even lets me try. Which she won't, I know that already.
I also know it's going to hurt, watching her leave, and then having to leave her. I know it's going to be painful, and I know that I have to do it anyway. Maybe that's why I don't like the fog tonight. Maybe any other night, it would be mysterious, romantic, and I would be able to let go and enjoy myself, enjoy just being with her, get caught up in the moment and race crazily through the fog. She wants to, I can see it, her body is tense and energetic, it's me that is holding her. It's me that is holding her back. She clings to me, like the fog, but it's a good kind of clingy, it makes me want to hold her tighter. The fog makes her look little, and almost fragile, although she would make a face if I told her that. She looks like she could get lost in the fog. A part of me wants to get lost with her, to disappear into the haze and find some hidden place and live there forever with her and never go back. But another part of me, the part that is being louder, more insistant, knows that I have to go and do my own thing. Because I've never really been on my own, never really been without her. I need to see if I can be a whole person. I need to find out who I really am. And because of this need, and only because of it, I decide that it's time. The longer I stay here with her in the fog, the harder it's going to be to leave. So it has to happen, now.
I turn to her. Decide to get it over with. "Listen," I say. "I have something I need to talk to you about." My insides are breaking, and at the hurt look that appears on her face, I feel myself float apart and dissolve into the fog.