One-Shot inspired by my current infatuation with The Great Gatsby. Un-Beta'd and likely a bit OOC.
Also, Nick is so gay. I stand by that and won't accept anything less than Bisexual but male leaning. Fix-it. Unedited and written with not nearly enough sleep.
Apologies for the commas. I'm pretty sure I use too many, but they are my favorite punctuation, along with perhaps a semi-colon.
Nick Carraway loved Jay Gatsby. Jay Gatsby loved Daisy Buchannan. And Daisy Buchannan loved no one but herself.
These revelations occurred to Nick on that dreadfully hot summer night, as he watched Daisy flee the hotel room, with Gatsby not far behind her. It was a rather inopportune time for him to realize this, though he had known these things all along. Gatsby had kept his love for Daisy no secret, not to him anyways, and really anyone that looked at the pair could see how much Gatsby adored Daisy, just from his expression.
And loving Gatsby, Nick had loved him for months now, since the night he came home to Gatsby standing outside, with every light on in his house. He had never quite pinpointed the exact moment in that conversation that curiosity and distrust had turned to adoration and love. He'd known it and ignored it because feelings like that could get him killed. It was still there, but just then, watching Gatsby chase his cousin, had been the first time he had admitted it to even himself. It was also the first time he had seen just how little Daisy cared for anyone.
He knew she was flighty, shallow, and vain, of course he knew those things, but most of it had been an act; at least the part where she acted stupid. Because while Daisy was all those things, shallow and vain, she was far from stupid. She knew she had Jay Gatsby wrapped around her little finger, and if she asked him to jump out of a window he would have only asked which one. Daisy was smart and manipulative. It was painful watching her string both men along, particularly Gatsby, when he knew, Nick knew she had no intentions of ever leaving Tom.
And it broke his damn heart, to watch the man he loved run after someone who would never, ever care for him past the thrill of adventure she gave him, and since that was over? Gatsby would be heartbroken.
Yes, it hurt Nick, yet he was numb. Just so… numb. Perhaps because of the fighting and heat, the revelations didn't pack quite the punch one would anticipate from a world changing epiphany. Perhaps it had something to do with it being his birthday.
When he mentioned that to Tom and Jordan (not because anyone particularly cared it was his birthday but it was something to say), they said nothing and just gave him an odd look, one that Nick hardly noticed. He was far too busy being numb, wondering abstractly what would happen in the next years of his life. He had already lived thirty and had little to show for it, besides a deep affection for a man that would never see him as anything more than what he was now; Daisy's cousin and perhaps a friend.
It were these thoughts that plagued Nick for a majority of the car ride, distracting him from the tension in the car and the stilted attempts to converse. Nick was practically a mannequin until they reached the Valley of Ashes. Then, with Myrtle Wilson dead, her husband insane with grief, and Jay Gatsby the remorseless killer, love was the farthest thing from Nick's mind.
However, it did not remain that way for long. As Nick spoke with Gatsby, the poor man's mind hardly in the conversation as he watched the Buchannan home, it occurred to him that Daisy's murder of an innocent woman had not damaged her in his eyes. She was still perfect to him, she was still coming back into his arms. He either believed it truly or lived in a world of terrible denial. Nick wasn't sure which one was worse.
And despite knowing the truth, that Gatsby had no chance anymore, that Daisy certainly would not return to him now, Nick let the man be. Though he had seen the two at the table, together, not happy but together and conversing (no, not conversing, plotting. They were planning something he was sure.) Despite these things, Nick let him keep his vigil, not able to be the one to break his heart.
The coming of night had only diminished the late summer heat slightly, yet Nick wouldn't help but note that Gatsby still looked pristine, if a little tired. He stood there a moment, watching Gatsby stare at the house intently, as if staring would make Daisy appear sooner. As if it could fix the events of that night.
So Nick went home, Gatsby's parting words ringing in his ear "I want to wait here till Daisy goes to bed. Good night, old sport."
Nick hardly slept that night, dread heavy in his stomach. Something was wrong, he thought in a half-awake, half-asleep, full delirious state, something was terribly wrong. But he didn't know what. So he spent the night restlessly, never asleep but never awake. Nick finally got a hint of relief when he heard a taxi pull up in Gatsby's yard. Without another thought, he sprinted to Gatsby's house, worry still clinging to him.
The door to the mansion was still open by the time Nick got there. Nick closed the door behind him softly. "Gatsby?" he called quietly and gently "Jay?" For a moment Nick though he wouldn't respond, or that he had passed out somewhere. But after a moment he heard a tired and worn reply.
"Here. Old-Sport." It was weary and so soft that Nick briefly wondered if he had imagined it. But it only took him a moment to find Gatsby, dressed in the same pink suit from the day before, collapsed in a chair, staring vacantly at a wall. Nick's worry eased only slightly at the sight of Gatsby, for while the man was unharmed, he looked so broken that Nick's own heart broke.
Jay looked on the verge of tears, and Nick had never hated someone more than he hated Daisy in that moment. She had done this to Gatsby, his Gatsby, usually so full of life and hope, was crushed to nothing in front of Nick's eyes.
"It was nearly four." Gatsby said hoarsely before Nick even had even formed the words to ask "Before the lights started getting turned off. It was four thirty or so when she snuck out to meet me." A humorless laugh escaped Gatsby's lips and Nick's face creased with worry. "And then, then it was only to say that she couldn't leave Tom. She told me to go home and sleep. She would be gone by noon. And do you know what she told me Old sport? She told me not to forget her."
Nick was momentarily stunned into momentary silence, at the audacity of Daisy, to do such a thing. Finally he found his voice. "Gatsby… maybe she'll, or, well… I- I'm sorry." Nick had no lies this time. There was not point. He couldn't fix this, and a small part was glad that he couldn't. Daisy didn't deserve Gatsby, shady business or not. "I'm so sorry."
Gatsby finally looked at Nick when he said this, his eyes slightly less vacant. It was if this was the first time he had truly noticed Nick's presence that night. "You have nothing to be sorry for." He said quietly. It was somewhat shocking to Nick that his trademark 'Old Sport' wasn't tacked onto the end either. It was one of the only times Gatsby had addressed him without the phrase. "This… this isn't your fault." The unspoken 'but it is mine' hung between them. Nick grimaced but said nothing, only talking a seat across from Gatsby, letting silence enrapture both of them. Gatsby started blankly at the wall; Nick watched him pensively.
Nick had finally formulated something to say, awkward, but better than silence when Gatsby stared speaking. HE spilled his story to Nick. The true one, Nick could tell, with Dan Cody, his parents, and his first days with Daisy Fey. It was after dawn before he stopped. Nick was taking it all in, when Jay abruptly asked "Care for breakfast, Old Sport?"
They ate together with hardly any conversation, but it was comfortable, unlike the silence from the previous hours. They were already done, and Nick had been shown to the door when Gatsby said "Daisy truly isn't going to call is she?" The way he said it was not a question. It was a statement of fact.
Nick grimaced. "I don't think she will Jay. I truly don't." Gatsby's shoulder's slumped slightly, and Nick patted his shoulder somewhat awkwardly, because he didn't know what to say. He hated that Gatsby was so broken, yet was relieved he was perhaps free of Daisy. He offered a tiny smile before setting across the lawn for his house. He had to work that day. However, Nick stopped at the edge of his lawn, and turned back to Gatsby, who was still watching him go.
"They're a rotten crowd." He called across the yard. "You're worth the whole damn bunch put together." Nick realized that was the first compliment he had ever paid the man. Though he loved he man, he had still judged him, disapproved of him on some level. But perhaps he had only been disapproving of Daisy. But no matter why he hadn't paid Gatsby a compliment before, he was glad he did, because Jay gave Nick the most beautiful smile he had ever seen, and something inside Nick melted. God, how he loved Jay Gatsby.
Nick waved goodbye, and went home to get ready for work, and despite the warmth he still felt from that smile, he couldn't shake the feeling of apprehension that seemed to squeeze around his chest as the morning progressed. Nick simply ignored it and boarded a train for work, without looking at Gatsby's house, because he knew he would see the man if he did. And if Nick saw him, he would never go to work.
Nick got off the train in New York and went to work. He left less than an hour after he arrived, and got back on another train headed home. He had been useless at work anyhow. Maybe he and Gatsby could get lunch. Because though they could never be more than friends, he would certainly be Gatsby's friend.
The train couldn't move fast enough for him, and every stop felt like an eternity. Why had he even bothered to go in the first place, he mused as he started out the window. When they stopped in the Valley of Ashes, he kept his eyes firmly on the floor in front of him; not looking at Wilson's shop.
Perhaps if Nick had looked up, or not gone to work, or left later, the outcome of the day would have been differently. But, Nick left work before lunch, which meant that when grief wrought George Wilson arrived at Gatsby's house, he found it missing the man itself, and he was safe from harm. This was because the two were at Nick's house, having a lunch, because Nick insisted Gatsby get out of the house. They found his body not long after hearing the shot. This seemed to change something in Gatsby, Nick noted over the next few months. The first few were horrible, but slowly he noticed a change, from both Gatsby's depressive state and his fanatical self. Nick saw that he was realizing Daisy for what she was. Shallow, Vain, and self-serving. She cared nothing about the man who loved her and would have let Gatsby die for her. Nick never told him about that night, when he saw the two sitting there, planning and plotting, but he always wondered if this was the plan. Nick felt sure it was.
Jay mentioned Daisy less after that, and when he did, it was less fantastical. It was more...nostalgic. Realistic. Even a bit angry. He still loved her a bit, or at least the memory of her. But Nick could live with that. Because now rather than Old sport and Gatsby, they were Jay and Nick. He could live with it because the parties started again, but less wild this time, he lived with it because now the cottage was empty, for Nick lived in the mansion with Jay, mostly because Nick had lost his job and defaulted on rent. It was a temporary arrangement that turned permanent. Besides, it gave him plenty of time and space to write, like he'd always dreamed. Nick of course had another job, part time, working at a bookstore, so he had his own money. Even if Jay didn't love him and never did, that would be alright, he never expected more.
He knew that he loved Jay. He knew that Jay partly loved Daisy. But Nick also knew that Jay hated Daisy too, and for then, it was enough for then.