A Reversal of Fortune

Chapter 1 (of 4)

By S. Faith, © 2010
Words: 16,528 (This chapter: 4,237)
Rating: T / PG-13
Summary: There's nothing worse than kicking a man when he's down, and the universe has just delivered a roundhouse to Mark Darcy's solar plexus.
Disclaimer: I think we've established that this isn't mine, though how dearly I wish it were.
Notes: Postulates that some events had happened a little differently than in EOR (the film), and some events happen here that never did, but that's what makes it fun, right?

I actually dreamt part of this, hence the frenzy of writing.

Everything's white, and it's painful to open his eyes, but he tries. He doesn't know where he is or how long he's been there; the last thing he can remember with any certainty is a dry desert road, the vehicle in front of him kicking up sand and dust as they travel slowly down it, snippets of conversation, equal parts pleasantries and an unnameable tension. There are other flashes in his mind, sights, sounds and even smells that would have been terrifying to him had he the sense that they had actually happened to him, but as detached as he feels from these sights, he knows they are his memories and not just some dream. Rather, nightmare.

At the thought of this, at the thought that the memories might be in the all-too-recent past, he tries not to panic and fights the urge to keep his eyes closed, to stay in the comfort of the darkness and the bliss of ignorance. He cannot stay in the dark forever, though, and is rewarded when the edges come into focus and the brightness dims to a point where it doesn't seem quite so harsh. He is in a hospital room, sterile and white. He turns his head a little. He realises he is not alone; a figure sits in a chair by the window, reading a book.

He opens his mouth to speak but nothing comes out except a rasp of air. This sound, his movement, does catch the attention of the person there, and from the sound of the voice that emerges he knows it is his mother. Relief washes over him. Whatever had happened, he is safe now.

She comes nearer and only then does he see how haggard and pale she looks, her face drawn, dark circles smudging her eyes. Tears are rolling down her cheeks but she is smiling; she sits beside him gingerly and he feels her take his hand in hers. Her skin seems surprisingly papery.

"Oh, Mark," she says, her voice thick with emotion. He can't recall ever hearing her sob like she is now. "I have never been so happy to see those brown eyes of yours."

"Where am I?" he asks in a voice barely recognisable as his own.

"In hospital. In London. You're home now."

He is not sure what's happened between where he was and where he is now. All he can remember with clarity is what occurred before.

…

Things had been going so well from the end of December, when he'd started seeing her, through February; the ski weekend at the end of that month, though, intended to be a little mini-holiday, ended up being a complete disaster. He wouldn't have thought things with her could have turned so sour so quickly, but they had. With the wisdom of hindsight he believes it was the nature of their discussion—no, their fight—that had made the difference; the serious subject of babies and childrearing and the unknown future thrust upon them in that three minutes when they thought she might be pregnant, when up until that point their relationship had been something new, something fun: happiness and sex, spontaneity and excitement. They had confessed their love previously, and he believed it had been sincere for both of them, but they had made the mistake of not speaking of anything quite so permanent before, and in doing so under such pressured circumstances, they had not handled it well. On top of all of this she had also questioned his faithfulness to her, charged him with infidelity with another woman, an associate from work named Rebecca. He had been so incredulous at the very accusation that in reacting as he did—a refusal to answer the charge—he realises in retrospect that he had probably sealed her fears.

And so they had split. He had not known how to fix things, and he was not used to not knowing how to fix things, so he'd done nothing at all. It made him feel weak, and he hated feeling weak.

It was in April, oddly centring around something again baby-related, that he saw her next. She was to be godmother to the same child to whom he was to be godfather. He thought it would be a good opportunity to try to approach her, to talk to her about what had happened, in the hopes that time and distance had healed over the hurt and they could try to begin anew.

He'd discovered rather bluntly that she had already moved on, though, had gone back to a man who had proven himself time and again to be nothing but trouble, to be nothing but a source of pain and anguish: Daniel Cleaver, who had betrayed each of them in turn, yet was in her eyes somehow a better choice than Mark.

He had known then it was truly over, that he had to get away from London, from his supposedly happy life there and from everything that had hurt him. He'd actively searched out work that would take him out of the UK. In very short order he found then volunteered for a humanitarian mission in Ethiopia with a group of like-minded individuals, mostly other professionals searching to fill a void and needing to serve others. His mother begged him not to go but he did anyway. He realises now that he'd wanted to punish himself, to intentionally put himself into a risky situation, even if he hadn't fully realised it at the time.

It was after touching down in that desert nation that their caravan of old, battered vehicles crawling down the sun-baked road towards Dire Dawa (amidst nervous joking about it being too quiet for comfort) was caught by surprise, ambushed in broad daylight for reasons unknown to him. His memory after this point is spotty, but he does remember that they were some kind of outlaws, that he was barely able to communicate with them due to their nonexistent English skills; that he was told the others in his group were killed and that if he did not comply he would be killed as well. He believes they may have drugged him to keep him compliant; he remembers them holding him down to shear off his hair on more than one occasion. He was kept in a small room with one open but barred window that was barely enough to shield him from the heat of the day and the extreme chill of the night, shackled by the ankle to a bed bolted to the floor. He would stretch his bonds to the limit to press his face into the sun whenever he could, though his vantage point, what he could see through the window, told him it was a long way to the ground, that they were miles from nowhere. He was too parched to cry for help, and to do so would have likely meant death anyway.

Days blur together in this state of oblivion; he recalls only short walks at gunpoint after the sun sets as his only exercise, and even then he marvels at how fast the moon phases seem to change when there is any moon at all. What he is able to remember, he does so with a palpable numbness.

Then something changed. Gunfire in the vicinity, footsteps on the stairs then his door bursting open. A man he had not seen before. Shackles released. Then blackness.

…

It is his name being gently called that brings him back to the present. He looks to his mother again, then to their clasped hands. He notices then he is being fed intravenously. She smiles again, but it is pained. He wonders how bad he must look.

"How long?" he asks.

"You've been back about two days," she answers.

"No," he says almost soundlessly, then wets his lips with his tongue. He'd murder for a pint right now, he thinks somewhat whimsically.

She reaches for a glass of water, raises it to his lips as he lifts his head, and he drinks so quickly he starts to cough a little. "Sorry," she says, putting it back.

He shakes his head. "No," he says, meaning she shouldn't apologise. He clears his throat. "How long was I gone?"

He wonders if he spoke the words at all or only thought he did, because she doesn't reply, only looks at him unblinkingly for the longest time. "Oh, Mark," she says. "It's nearly November. You were gone almost six months."

He can hardly believe his ears. "Six… months?" he asks quietly, disbelievingly. He'd missed his own birthday.

She nods. "There's someone who wants to see you."

"Father?" He is expecting it to be no one else.

She smiles, even chuckles a little through her tears, taking his hand and squeezing it again. "Yes, he will want to as well," she explains, "when he's back with our coffees… but no, I mean someone else."

His mental facilities aren't as sharp as they ordinarily would have been; he can't bring to mind to whom she can be referring. She sobs audibly to see him struggle like this.

"When you're ready," she adds, a tremor in her tone. "I'm not sure you're ready quite yet to be seen."

He must look pretty bad. "Who?"

"Mark! Son!"

It's his father, overjoyed to see Mark conscious. He sets the coffees down, tears in his eyes. He sits on the other side of the bed, and, as if Mark is a child, bends and kisses his forehead. He doesn't recall his father having ever done that, even when he was a child.

Mark's already forgotten someone wants to see him.

…

His appetite returns, but, he thinks impatiently, not fast enough. He's sick soon enough of gelatine and beef broth. He insists on eating his first solid meal (macaroni and cheese) the next day, but he eats it too quickly and ends up vomiting it into a trash bin. He cries tears of frustration; he is angry at himself for not being stronger. He hates everything about this situation. He wants a nice glass of wine, a steak dinner, dessert.

By his third conscious day in hospital he's able to stand without feeling vertiginous, and he gets up on his own from the bed, pulling the IV stand along with him. He wonders if it's because he's been given proper nutrition, if the drugs he'd been given have finally cleared his system, or both. He has never been so glad to use a toilet to piss.

It's only then, in the bathroom of his hospital room, that he sees what he looks like. He is startled and horrified at what the mirror reveals: hollow cheeks, dark circles ringing his eyes; he's clearly lost a good amount of weight and muscle mass. His hair is cropped fairly close to his head, bearing out the memory of it being shorn to the scalp and only now growing back in. With the slightly darker pigmentation around his eyes and nose, and an obvious pattern of lighter skin on his lower cheeks and chin, it is clear that he had developed a fuller beard while he was captive and that someone had taken care to shave off since his return. If he had to guess who'd done it, it would have been his mother. Since he now has a couple days' worth of growth again, he would also guess it was upon his return.

It makes him furious to think about what's been taken from him: his freedom, his health, his vigour. Six months of his life. These are things he wants back, and impatiently so. He hates feeling so fragile and feeble… particularly he hates feeling so feeble-minded. There is a small part of him, however, that can blame no one but himself for his present situation. He had sought out and taken the job of his own free will.

It is then he remembers someone else wanted to see him.

His mother and father visit every day, and they show up right on schedule that afternoon. He had asked about the drive from Grafton Underwood to London, but his father had told him they had taken residence in his house while he's been in the hospital.

"We didn't think you'd mind," his mother had said; indeed, he does not.

Today they tell him they have been arranging for care in his home when he's released from hospital, which is targeted for sooner rather than later. He protests what feels like an excess, but he knows its futile. He can barely make it to the loo without feeling exhausted, and his parents, while they love him, could not be expected to nurse him day and night at their age.

"So who was it that wanted to see me?" he asks.

His parents share a look and tell him.

He furrows his brows. "Why would Bridget want to see me?"

"Why wouldn't she?" his mother says. "Even if you aren't… together, she still cares about you very much."

His father Malcolm leans towards his wife and asks in a low tone, "Elaine, do you think it's wise?"

Mark thinks it's because his dad feels she wouldn't want to see him like this.

Elaine nods. "I think it's just what he needs." Mark knows she's always been optimistic about their reuniting, far more optimistic than he had ever allowed himself to be.

He is not sure he wants to see her, not when she's with Daniel, but in the end he decides he needs to. After all, he still loves her, and he's pretty sure it's thoughts of her that got him through his darkest hours. He nods his consent.

Elaine agrees to bring her the next day, and when she does, he realises his father was right to be concerned, but not for the reasons Mark ascribed.

…

When they appear at the door together, it's almost like Bridget doesn't want to emerge from behind the protective barrier of his mother. There's a moment she can't disguise her shock when she sees him, and reflexively her hand goes to her mouth.

Whatever unhappy and troubled times they had been through together meant nothing compared to seeing her now; he knows in that very moment his love for her has not diminished. He's too frail, emotionally and physically, to hold back a smile. The head of the hospital bed has been elevated, so he has no trouble seeing tears spill down onto her cheeks… but like his mother had before her, she's smiling too. Despite her worry, she looks beautiful and radiant, and clearly elated to see him.

She looks to Elaine. "Is it all right if I go in?"

"Yes, but we haven't told him yet," Elaine says. He supposes she hadn't intended him to hear what sounds awfully mysterious and foreboding to his ears. "You're okay?" she asks not of him but of Bridget, which is also strange to hear.

"I'm fine." She looks to him again, her blue eyes sparkling with more tears. "Can I come in?"

As if he could refuse. He reasons she wouldn't be so insistent if she didn't still maybe love him a little. "Of course." It's not until that moment that he realises how raw, how gravelly his voice must sound to her, because more tears are shed as she hears him speak.

"Oh, Mark."

As she moves past his mother, it becomes clear in an instant what it was they hadn't told him yet. His face must have done something very weird—drain of colour, fall slack in his own surprise—because she stops before she reaches him.

Gently she's talking, asking how he is, if he's feeling all right, but he doesn't hear. He can't; his shock is too great to see her stomach obviously rounded with child. In an instant he's angry; he doesn't want her there out of pity, and pity must be all it is, because she's pregnant, and the only logical conclusion to draw is that it's Daniel's child. After all, Mark hadn't had sex with her since the negative result on the pregnancy test that rueful ski weekend; her stomach is not so large to suggest birth was imminent. She's clearly over me, he thinks, clearly doesn't love me anymore. He's envious too, because he really would have loved having a child with her, whereas Daniel… well, it wouldn't have surprised him to learn Daniel had half a dozen progeny floating around that he didn't even care to acknowledge.

"I think I should go," Bridget says tearfully, backing away.

"I'm sorry," he hears his mother say. "I thought he'd be able to handle it."

The next thing he knows they're both gone, and he can't hold in his own tears. He turns over to lay on his side, mindful of the needle delivering nutrients into his arm, and lets those tears streak freely down his face.

Some time later—how long, he is not sure, as his sense of the passage of time is still somewhat skewed—he feels the rough skin of his mother's hand on his upper arm. She's obviously returned alone. He doesn't turn to face her.

"Mark, I—"

"Mother," he says in a rather strained, pained voice. "I don't want to talk about this, not at all."

She says nothing, simply strokes his arm, then smoothes what's left of his hair down with the pads of her fingers. They then move to dry his tears. He does not resist. She speaks at long last, breaking the silence. "I don't like seeing you like this and not be able to help." He thinks maybe she wants him to open up to her, but when he doesn't, she continues. "When you do want to talk, you know that I'm here…"

"I know."

"…but you really should talk to her."

The very thought is too painful. "I don't know if I can see her again. It's just too much."

"Surely in a few—"

"No," he says, as firm as he's able. He's resigned that if this is the choice she has made, if this is what makes her happy, he would have to accept it. He thinks it is probably best to stay away from her to not prolong his own agony, and to let her carry forward with her new life. He's only a part of her past now. "Not in a few days, not in a few weeks. Not again."

He imagines she is pursing her lips. "You'll feel differently when you've had a chance to absorb the shock," she says tautly. "I know you will."

They do not, however, speak of it again.

…

A few days after Bridget's visit, when he can prove he can hold down a solid meal, can climb a flight of stairs without getting dizzy, he is released. His mother and father have hired him a live-in nurse, and she is already in his home when he arrives. In her very first day she proves she can care for him with great attention and skill, bringing him meals, checking his vitals, parsing out multivitamins and medications alike. She takes him for a walk around the house, down to the kitchen, then back up to his room, encourages him to eat live-culture yoghurt to rebuild his flora and fauna. She is dedicated to his health and very good at what she does, but he cannot help thinking how much he would have preferred a girlfriend, a wife, to be caring for him instead.

Thinking negatively will only hinder his recovery, though, and his goal is to be back in the office within the month. He agrees to trauma counselling not because he feels he needs it, but it's a means to an end. He wanders down to his home office, fires up the computer, and places an order for a treadmill and some hand weights to build muscle mass. These things can only help between the scheduled physical therapy sessions, and he hears it's chilly and raining more often than not lately, so walking outside is not really an option for him.

In the quiet of his room during the night that first night home in his own bed, his mind returns to his mother's mentioning, only briefly, that Bridget had gone into labour and had prematurely had the baby. He's worried for the baby's health for being born so soon; he's also worried for the well-being of this innocent child borne of such a father. He should consider his own feelings, but out of deference to her and not wanting to add to her stress, he suppresses them and does not contact her.

When her birthday comes and goes he still does not reach out to her, though he thinks of her, of that birthday dinner a year prior, with a mixture of fondness and regret.

…

Two weeks pass since his release from hospital. It's mid-November; he is feeling much healthier but isn't sure he'll make his goal of returning to work in a month, though God knows he wants to just for something to do. He can walk at a brisk pace for ten minutes at a stretch now on the treadmill. It's a far cry from the jogging he used to do, but he takes whatever progress he can get.

He indulges in a few more sweets and treats than usual—the housekeeper, back on schedule, is amused when he asks her to buy these things—and slowly but surely he can see his face filling out a little, becoming more like it was. As he eats from the Ben & Jerry's pint, he thinks unexpectedly (but not unsurprisingly) of Bridget; they had shared more than one over a film on the telly.

The nurse only comes during the day every other day now, and he doesn't expect he'll need to keep her on past the end of the week. He's just had his supper—a hearty beef stew his mother had made in bulk and had frozen for him before heading back to their own home—and sighs in satisfaction at this near-return to normalcy.

Just as he gets to the top of the stairs from the subterranean kitchen to the main floor, there is a knock at the front door. He can't fathom who'd be coming to visit at this time of the night during the week, then reminds himself it's not yet seven in the evening. As he crosses the foyer to answer it, the knocking begins anew with some agitation and insistence. "Coming," he calls. Surely whomever it is must know he's moving a little more slowly these days.

He swings the door open and is floored by who is standing there.

Daniel Cleaver.

His former friend's look of indignation and anger quickly dissipates when he lays eyes on Mark. "Christ," he says. "You look like hell."

Mark doesn't need this right now, and moves to shut the door. He cannot imagine what business Daniel would have with him, doesn't want to know, doesn't want to see him, anyway.

"Wait," says Daniel, stopping the door with his hand.

"Are you here to gloat?" he offers quietly.

"What? No. I was here to punch your lights out but now that I've seen you… Jesus. I don't have the heart."

"Go away," he says.

"I won't," Daniel returns, barrelling past him and into the house. "I came here because stepping back from death's door or not, you're being a complete and utter fucking bastard."

Coming from Daniel, this is a surprise. "Excuse me?"

"What the fuck is wrong with you? You can't bloody well avoid them forever."

Them? Mark realises he must mean Bridget and the baby, and snorts dismissively. "She doesn't need me."

"What are you talking about? Why wouldn't she need you?"

He's beginning to wonder if this isn't all some kind of post-traumatic-stress-induced hallucination. "Because she has you—"

"Mark." It's as loud and abrupt as a pistol shot, and stops him in midsentence. "Are you completely mad?"

With the way Daniel's regarding him, Mark's not sure if he's speaking in hyperbole… or might actually have been right. "What do you care if she sees me again? I would've thought you'd be glad to be rid of me. In case you hadn't noticed, she's had your child."

Daniel's staring even more intensely at him, as if he is genuinely worried. "Mark," he says again, quietly, patiently, calming himself, or perhaps he is hoping to calm the lunatic before him. "I'm sorry for shouting. I know you don't like shouting."

He looks down; the wind's gone from his sails at this unexpected nostalgic chord struck at the oblique reference to their own shared past. "It's all right." He sighs heavily. "Would you please get to the point? I was having a nice evening before you came along."

"Mark," Daniel says a third time; it's beginning to feel a touch condescending. "I didn't know. I don't think any of us knew, I mean, that you didn't know, that you thought… what you thought. Christ. A terrible, terrible misunderstanding."

He pinches the corners of his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. "You're not making any sense."

Daniel's voice is a velvet-covered hammer when it comes down on him: "That child is yours."