So, this has been in the works a long time. Months, and months and months. Well, actually, I haven't been working on it that long, but it's just been stewing in my mind, and I finally took the time to just write it out. So yay. Anyway, Darcy is the you, this is modern, and no, I'm not going to continue it; it's just a oneshot.
The song for this songfic is Sometime Around Midnight by The Airborne Toxic Event, and the title is the first line, none of which I own.
And it starts…
Sometime around midnight.
Or at least that's when you lose yourself
For a minute or two.
It's sometime around midnight when it happens; you're just standing there, talking with Charlie and a few other people that he knows – they dragged you out of the office, you've been so melancholy lately, and you're here and actually starting to relax, with the help of plenty of alcohol.
Sometime around midnight, you don't know exactly when, you drift off over another glass of wine, and find yourself staring around, standing alone in a sea of people. And standing there, just looking around, you see her.
--
As you stand…
Under the bar lights
And the band plays some song about forgetting yourself
For a while.
The lights of the bar are multi-hued and flashing, and the music is pounding loudly in your head, too loud to hear anything else, and you're caught staring at her, unable to look away, or she might be gone.
You hear a song end, and another one start, and you stay there, frozen in shock, because Elizabeth Bennet is walking up to the bar and sitting down in front of you.
--
And the piano's this melancholy soundtrack to her smile.
And that white dress she's wearing – you haven't seen her for a while.
You don't know when, but at some point the pounding bass changed into a piano, and a quieter song, something about love, surrounds you. Couples are dancing, Charlie among them – you see him take Jane out to the floor, and now you really are standing alone, holding a glass and staring. You would look away, but she's wearing a white dress, more like a sundress than something one would dance in.
And there's lace, and her cheeks are flushed from the heat of the room, and she sits down right in front of you, and you haven't seen her in so long. You can't breathe, you can't move, she's right there and smiling and she hasn't even looked at you.
--
But you know…
That she's watching.
She's laughing, she's turning, she's holding her tonic like a crux.
The room's suddenly spinning, she walks up and asks how you are.
So you can smell her perfume, you can see her lying naked in your arms.
You know that she knows you're there, though, and she does, because after she gets a drink, she turns – laughing – her friend is there, maybe, and has said something amusing, you aren't sure, everything is a blur but her – and she smiles at you, still laughing, meeting your eyes and holding up her drink – a tonic, she always gets a tonic – like she's making a point with it.
Her eyes are dark and enveloping, and suddenly the world begins to spin around you, all of it falling away, because she's walking up to you now. She sips and smiles, and asks hey, how are you doing?
Her perfume hits you in a wave of vanilla and suddenly you're assaulted with images of her in your arms, naked in bed together, and something stabs straight through your stomach leaving you speechless and lost.
--
And so there's a change…
In your emotions.
And all these memories come rushing like feral waves to your mind,
Of the curl of your bodies like two perfect circles entwined.
And you feel hopeless and homeless and lost in the haze of the wine.
But it isn't just lust, and you're starting to think again that it never was, because you still can't talk or even move, and memories of everything is rushing into your mind, refusing to leave, of her smiling, of her kissing, of her laughing, of her eyes, words, the two of you together, curled in passion that seems like it will never end, and you know with certainty that you lost it all.
She's still talking to you, brief words well, I just thought I'd say hi and your tongue is glued to the roof of your mouth, and the room is too hot, and you feel hopeless and alone and you miss her, and you think you're drunk, because she walks off, she's dancing, and you just keep on swallowing wine and trying not to think or remember, and failing.
--
Then she leaves…
With someone you don't know.
But she makes sure you saw her, she looks right at you, and bolts.
It's still sometime around midnight when she leaves, but later now, and she's with a man, someone you don't know and someone you don't think she does, either. Your heart is heavy, and she says goodbye to Jane from across the room, and she takes his hand, slender fingers twining with a stranger's, and looks back at you, dark eyes sad and lovely.
--
As she walks out the door, your blood boiling and your stomach in ropes.
Oh, and your friends say "What is it? You look like you've seen a ghost!"
Then she turns, and she walks away, and your stomach is roiling, you're filled with a helpless rage, choking at the man, you don't even think you can breathe through the haze of hate, and your guts are knotted because she met your eyes and left.
Charlie's back now, back from the dance floor with Jane with him, and he smiles only to stop when he sees you there, clenching your glass in a tight fist, staring at the door, and say what is it? you look like you've seen a ghost! still happy and joking, and Jane is smiling and her sister, and your lungs don't want to work for you anymore.
--
Then you walk…
Under a streetlight
And you're too drunk to notice that everyone is staring at you.
Then you don't know how long it's been, only that it's no longer midnight, but maybe still sometime around there, and you said goodbye to an overjoyed Charlie and Jane, together once more, and now you're walking under a single streetlamp, and maybe people are staring at Will Darcy, the executive stumbling down the street but if they are you don't see them.
--
You so care what you look like
The world is falling around you.
You find yourself concerned with the oddest things, now. Things like your hair and if your tie is straight, though when you reach for it, it's missing and you wonder when that happened only to remember you left it in the office.
The earth is spinning and the sky is falling down on your shoulders, and you're still hot and hazy and determined.
--
You just have to see her,
She's in her apartment with that man,
--
You just have to see her,
She isn't with you anymore,
--
You just have to see her,
This is what you wanted,
--
You just have to see her,
You're going to kill whoever he is,
--
You just have to see her,
You need her, you just have to see her face again, you have to see her face now, you're knocking, pounding on her door, yelling,
--
You know that she'll break you in two.
You love her, and she's opened the door, and the man is probably in there too, and your whole life has built up to, is hinged on this moment, she could destroy you and you know she's going to.
Her eyes are dark, and sometime after midnight, you don't care.