By: Evangeline Henri
Fandom: Rent
Pairing: Mark/Roger
Rating: PG
Summary: It's night in New York. Someone is looking up, someone is looking down, and someone is not asleep.
Disclaimer: Oh, Jonathan Larson, I'm so sorry.
Notes: This is my first Rent fic, and my experience in taking back the play. Which I suppose is sort of like 'take back the night,' but not as cool. Um, and the POV switches after the first scene. This was a challenge response on "contrelamontre" on livejournal.
Out here in the real world, the night is fresh and cold, like orange juice on a hot morning. The boy supposes that perhaps he should have stepped out sooner, should have left the bright circle of the café earlier. He can't tell what time it is now-- late.
He raises a hand perfunctorily, and a cab shudders to a halt in front of him a moment later. He knows he shouldn't be spending money so quickly, that the wad of sweaty bills tucked safely away won't last him forever, that he needs to budget, but the night streets frightens him, and he steps in anyway.
He's only been in New York for a week; the city is still wild and strange to him. Los Angeles was different; there was more room there to breathe. Here, everyone is forever bumping into someone, stepping coffee on shoes and exchanging apologetic platitudes before slipping back into the crowds.
Night falls strangely here, too; it drops with the certainty of an overripe fruit falling and cleaves the world in two. He can't help wondering if New York City doesn't change entirely in those milliseconds after sunset, doesn't step out of the old universe and into a new one.
But that's why he's here, isn't it? To change, to leave this old him and enter something, someone new-- someone better than he, full of glitter and color and love.
As the cab turns, Angelo Shunard catches glimpse of a light, burning in the top window of and old building. Its lone vigilance pulls at him in a strange way that he doesn't understand. He turns, presses his fingers against the grimy glass, and sends a small thought to whoever is up there.
*****
There is something about after-midnight in Manhattan that Mark knows he will always love. Today has just become Thursday, and it's that fuzzy time of night, when one feels as if the world just might fall backwards, like a film reel rattling to the end and zooming into rewind.
Traffic has calmed, but Mark can still hear cars trickle by, filled with only the most determined of souls, scanning the dark streets and dilapidated buildings. Perhaps someone is even looking up at this lighted window right now, he thinks. The city has become quiet, reflective; it breathes in the cool air and sings a soft song to itself.
Roger's door is slightly ajar and Mark, sitting on his windowsill, sees that he's not quite asleep. For as long as Mark's known him, Roger's slept on his stomach, face buried deep into his pillow and sheets tucked up so high that the only part of him that can be seen is a tuft of yellow hair. He has dozens of theories about why Roger does it, most of them about fear and anger and all those other scapegoat emotions. But now, Mark can make out two legs, bent up and under themselves, so he knows he's still awake.
Not quite sure if what he's doing, Mark stands, pushes the city's song to the back of his mind, and crosses to Roger's door. His gaze is a steady shot of the body inside and as he steps closes, more of it pans into view. Hips follow legs, then torso, which is still clad in the ratty t-shirt Roger's been wearing since this-or, yesterday-morning. By the time Mark reaches the door, up to Roger's shoulder is visible.
He halts there, unable to hold back the introspection any longer. What am I doing? he wonders, but all his mind can come up with in response is an image of Roger smiling as they were hunched over dinner tonight. Mark can't remember what he said to cause it, but he remembers quite clearly the carrot flake from the Cup O' Noodles that had attached itself to Roger's upper lip. He'd wanted to reach over and wipe it off, drag a finger across Roger's mouth and catch the errant particle. Close-up of hand brushing lip.
Roger's been saying that they should find more people to share the apartment with so that they'll be able to afford a more proper diet, but Mark's developed an affinity for prepackaged soup.
"Mark?" Roger's voice wafts through half-opened door, one-am froggy.
"How'd you know I was out here?" he asks, as he pushes open the door.
Roger turns his face from the ceiling he had been contemplating to face him. "When you got to the door, you stopped humming."
Mark steps into the room, picking his way around the laundry and the music sheets that lay scattered about the room like roosting seagulls. "I was humming?" He hadn't realized he'd been singing to the city as he listened.
Roger nods. "Yeah. It was really soft; at first I thought I was asleep."
"I thought you were asleep, too." Mark pauses, cautious, before adding, "Having trouble sleeping tonight?"
And while he's sure that Roger's not going to answer, that the new smile he sees waiting in the wings will shatter into a scowl, Roger just nods. "I don't know why."
"Well, I'd offer you milk, but," Mark grimaces, "the fridge stopped working on Sunday. Remind me to see if we can find someone to fix it?"
"'Kay." Roger shifts his attention back to the ceiling.
Mark's not sure why he's watching his best friend like this, soaking up each rise and fall of his chest expectantly. He thinks it has something to do with the night, with the soft shushing of those scarce cars. It doesn't really matter why, anyway.
"Mark?"
"Yeah, Roger?" Mark says, feels a lump in his throat when he looks at him and sees that quiet-something-in his eyes.
"Lay with me 'till I fall asleep?"
"Um, sure." Obviously. Mark shouldn't have hesitated; there's only ever been one answer to that question.
Roger's smile comes back. "Thanks," he says. There's just a thin film of sleep in his voice.
Mark kicks off his shoes, wriggles his bare toes. He's run out of socks without holes, prefers to wear none. After a glance at Roger, he shucks off his well-loved sweater, too, shivering in a t-shirt in the room's cool complacency. This is an important moment, almost as important as when they first stepped into this apartment a mere twenty-seven days ago. Maybe it's even more. He settles his glasses on the orange-crate-turned-nightstand, and the world outside this circle of Roger and bed loses a degree of clarity.
Roger's quiet as Mark crawls in, and Mark's skin tingles from the temperature change when he touches the warm mattress. He shuts of the light next to the bed with a flicked finger, hears a little sigh. Then all is quiet in the room once more, and the city looms up to fill in the silence. Mark finds himself angry at it; he wants to hear Roger breathe. He adjusts the invisible microphones, refocuses his shot on the body that lies next to him, stiffly still.
When Roger slides over to wrap his arms around him, Mark can't help but utter a hmph-ing sound, as if to say, you could have just asked, you know. But he likes this not asking even better, and Roger, knowing that, laughs softly into Mark's hair. The puff of air tickles him; Mark shivers and Roger presses a small kiss to the tip of shoulder blade that's peeking out from the too-large collar of his shirt.
They lie like that for a moment, bodies whirring and minds momentarily muddled by the intimacy. "What were you humming?" Roger asks at last.
"I don't know," says Mark, as he turns around to brush a flake of moonlight from Roger's lips with his own.
"Maybe you could hum it for me again so I could write it down?" Roger whispers against Mark's lips.
And although he doesn't do anything but kiss him in reply, Mark's pretty sure that Roger knows what the answer is.
*****
"Is it time to get up yet?"
Roger's voice pulls Mark from a caramel-feeling state of semi-sleep. He opens his eyes, blinks once. Zoom in on Roger's face, inches from his own. He's confused for a moment, marmalade morning blurring his memory. Then he remembers last night, remembers the city singing.
Roger's looking at him with a question clouding his face. His brow's furrowed with tiny lines, and he's gnawing his bottom lip.
Mark unhooks his left arm from where it snugly curled around Roger's waist, and trails a hand across his wrinkled forehead, tries to smooth out the tiny lines. He realizes that, for once, Roger's not buried under a white drift of bedding, and he grins.
"No," he says. "There's definitely plenty of time to stay in bed."
Fade out.
*****
PS- In case you missed it, the last word of one sentence is the first of the next, and the last word of the piece is the same as the first.