Completed: Friday February 21, 2003
Rating: PG-13 (implied slash)
A/N: Yep, I'm still around. I just moved, my site was hacked, I lost my email addresses and I forgot what I was writing. And I only just remembered my password.
Inspired by "Goodbye Love" on the OBCR. The fic does not actually take place during RENT, but some time after. I used Roger's line to start the story because it was what gave me the idea, and it gives the reader who is familiar with RENT a background on what has happened. Thank yous go to resident muse Paul, Adam Pascal for being a brilliant Roger, and as always to Daniel, for being there and giving me a reason to continue writing.
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"I'll call - I hate the fall."
Ye he hadn't called. It had been so long, and Mark had not heard from Roger. Nobody had. It was as if Roger had disappeared into the sunset like a Western hero, never to return. As far as Mark knew, that was exactly what Roger had done.
But still, with this perpetually knocking at the back door of his mind, wanting to be let in, Mark always hoped it was Roger when the door squeaked open, or the phone rang. He hadn't changed the message they'd recorded together when they'd first gotten the answering machine from Mark's mom. Roger was going to come back, one day.
He won't come back, his subconscious kept telling him. It threatened his sleep, showing him images of Roger walking through the door, closing it behind him, and proceeding to torture Mark in ways that had once made him willing to sleep, willing to dream, but now they only made Mark's waking moments more strenuous. He knew that he didn't want to dream, the memories, the afterimages burned into his mind would talk to him, telling him he'd never get to know what Roger was like for real. Reality no longer enticed him, appealed to him. There was nothing he wanted to film, nor anything he could look back on without the pain of the past returning out of the flames that had burnt it. He had nothign to do, nowhere to hide, nothing to absorb himself in.
He went into Roger's room, and forced himself to sit on the bed. He could remember Roger sitting there, hair messy and the peroxide growing out, cracking sick jokes as the dreaded withdrawal wracked his body. And then he remembered coming in here after Roger had called out in his sleep, called out for Mark in a voice that wrenched at Mark's heart, and finding Roger quietly sleeping. He had sat at the end of the bed watching him for the rest of the night, unsure of why Roger had called his name. Roger never mentioned anything about his dreams, never opened up to Mark. Mark wondered why this was so, but accepted it. Roger grew quieter, more introverted, but Mark still waited for the moment when Roger would grin and say something stupid, and they would both laugh and be friends as they used to be... Or more...
But it would never happen, because Roger had left, and he was not coming back.
Deep inside, Mark knew this had to be true. And so he allowed himself to cry, allowed himself to grieve for the friend he had lost. And knew, that one day, Roger would know to grieve for him.