Britty Boy
By rainxface
Disclaimer : I own nothing except the plot line, maybe. MR is JP, "Britty Boy" is B. B. Brunes :)
I stood at the entry way of Le Café Cristal, just outside of Paris. I checked my watch nervously, the shaking tremors of my hand making it near-impossible to read. I fumbled with my purse hung over my shoulder, looking for the little scrap piece of paper. When the lavender edges peeked out from under the numerous nick-nacks I had acquired from a little over two hours in the city of love, my trembling fingers dragged it out, my eyes scanning every word delicately.
I checked my watch again. I'm on time, I thought anxiously. I pulled down some of my hair. I started twisting the ends, quickly forgetting I had cut it above my shoulders just before I had left.
Minutes passed. Neither way on the street did his figure ever manifest. Before long, it became ten, fifteen, twenty minutes past. The sky was beginning to calm down, letting the sun paint one last oil canvas before going to sleep beyond the horizon. The temperature was also going with it. I pulled my light jacket closer to my body.
The sun fell for the next ten minutes. I stood, half frozen by the early May frost. My desire to stay alive over ruled the desire to wait for him. I nodded up and down the street, then entered the small café.
I sat in the back corner, facing away from the other come-and-goers. When the coffee came to my table, I mindlessly sipped it every couple of seconds.
"Bonjour, Mademoiselle. Comment ça-va?" growled a low voice haunting from behind me. It snapped me out of my comatose state, blank faced at the wall. I spun around in my seat, ready to fight. But before I even had time to put my fists up, large, callused hands held mine down. "Bonne soir?"
His crooked grin, the contrasting white teeth to his skin, and the deep chocolate brown eyes threw my mind in a whirl. Tears began to blur my vision, but all my memories flooding from my heart created his figure again.
Oh Lili Lili pleure,
Lili pleure pour moi
C'est que je ne suis pas fier
C'est vrai que je suis redoutable
Mais une britty britty girl,
Une british venant de Soho
Qui met dans ses cheveux des fleurs,
Qui se balade à vélo
I reached up to his face. My voice was lost, but if it were mustered, I would have whispered his name. But the just formation of the name upon my lips danced all the way down to my toes and back again.
His fingers caressed my cheek, their warmth streaking across a new pathway. The small glinting gust through his eyes took me back. He hadn't aged. His face was still chiseled like the bust of Julius Caesar.
Then, softer than a bee landing on a rose, his lips grazed my forehead. "You look even more beautiful than I remember," he said next to my ear, low so only I would hear. His hands abandoned me, but he took the seat opposite me at the table. He quickly flagged down a waiter for a coffee, and turned back to me.
If his eyes were lasers, I could have developed immunity to lasers.
"You've been looking around for me, haven't you?" He let his head fall to his hands, his eyes scrutinizing me.
"It was only because I –"
"Because you felt the need to see me, even if it meant that in the process my presence could and would have killed you?"
"We're all dying, Fang. So what if Angel says you'll cause the flock lives – our lives – we're still going to die one day, and there's not anything we can do to stop it," I hissed. I pulled myself back from accidentally hunching over the small table.
"But we can at least prolong it from things that may end it sooner! If you were to die by just trying to find me… What don't you understand?" Fang slouched back in his seat as the waiter came back with his coffee, his stance controlling to believe nothing was happening at our table.
I stared at him, sipping my coffee. I put my purse on the table, reaching in for the little Euros I had traded for back in the States.
"Max, stop it," Fang said, trying to push my purse back into my lap. "I'll pay for your coffee. But I understand if you want to leave. I deserve it. I left you. I'm sorry."
I looked at him sullenly before getting up and walking out the café.
Le soir quand elle s'ennuie,
Le soir elle s'enfuie de Soho
Viens me voir à Paris, m'embrasse
Sur la bouche de métro
Down the street, I wiped away my tears and ran down the subway station. I didn't even like that I was already running away from him. But I knew that I would seem even more cowardly if I was to turn back and see him again.
I sat, collapsed within myself on one of the old, metal woven benches, my body taking up the whole six feet of it. I watched as fast whizzing trains pulled the lost leaves through the tunnels. Behind each train, I couldn't help but remember years back when it was the six of us living in tunnels like that. I couldn't help but see Fang as he defended me as I was unable to do anything but see the images. It hurt me to remember because he had left me. But it was an inevitable past that we had together.
I closed my eyes, frightened as the images didn't go away with everything else around me. And silence never came, each train echoing my name as I laid there, helpless. Footsteps around me were scarce, people already gone home to their perfect families.
"Max, I'm sorry. I really am, but you know that I was doing it just to save you. If I didn't, then you know that we would have all been killed," Fang's sorrow voice came through the silence between trains.
"But you're still alive! How could we have all died if you're still alive?" I screamed. "You're still alive! And I'm still waiting for you!" I sat up and glared at him. "You're just self-ish! That's all you ever are!" I stormed off the bench and waited for the next train.
"Don't go – I really am sorry that I left you." The train pulled up to the dock. "And you never know – maybe you wouldn't have been killed, maybe you would have been." I was about to load on. "But I didn't want to take that chance because that's just how much I love you," he shouted.
I halted. I turned back around, half my body inside the train. "Do you still love me? Or are they just words?" I closed the door and watched him quickly blur away with the rest of the station.
Mais quelle jolie scène
À Paris, à Paris
En anglais je m'entraîne
Et j'attends gentiment
le prochain rendez-vous
Back at the hotel, I stared at the blinking sign. My head fell into my hands, and my eyes were barely open. I could feel the small tears getting caught in the bags under my eyes. The lights were out. Under the soft bed sheets, I felt invisible and inaudible to anyone but myself.
My phone rang on the dresser. Loud and buzzing, the singular song I'd learn to associate my mom with played, interrupting my sorrows. Lethargically, I answered it.
"Yes, Mom?" I asked, trying to mask the thickness the tears and pressed upon me.
"Where are you? I can't find you anywhere!" Her rushed voice screamed at me, much as I'd imagined her to.
"I'm safe," I replied, and hung up.
I threw my phone back on the dresser. I laid down completely on my side. All I could imagine was Fang and what he did once I left him on the train. He was still on the platform while I just turned my back. I saw his lone, black body quietly pace up the tiled stairs. He walked the paved streets, only stopping when a random car drove by. Then, he turned a corner in an ally, and he was gone.
I snapped up, gasping for air. I pulled open the window and climbed out. I pushed off from the tiny ledge and snapped out my wings. I flew past the hotel. I was gone. I needed this escape. But this flight felt not as it had for the ten years I had before. I was missing something.
I landed on a building, some 15 miles away. From the rooftop, all I saw was stars. The night sky was bright the constellations telling their own stories from decades past. I sighed and sat down on the ledge. My eyes couldn't become unglued from the sky.
"Of all the rooftops in Paris, really, Max? You had to choose mine?" growled his omniscient voice.
I jumped up into fighting stance. "It's just a plain rooftop – anyone could be up here," I tried arguing.
"But, instead, it's you." The shadow swept close to me, his breath now beating on my naked neck. "Not that there's anything wrong with you – otherwise it could have been some girl who meets up with me after my decade long absence and then ditched me on a train not even half an hour later." His voice was monotonous; even I couldn't pull out any true bitterness and assumed sarcasm. "No, I suppose you are a good exchange."
"Look, I'm really sorry – I was just…" I railed off, not looking at him anymore.
"Scared?" His lips kissed my temple, but were quick to pull away.
"Yes."
His hand grabbed my face, hard but then caressing it. His breath came closer, warmer on my lips.
Then, quick as lightning, he walked out to a door, a stairway down. He stood in the yellow light, his face only lit so much. I couldn't help it – I joined him going down. Down three levels and halfway through a hallway, he stopped to pull out a key.
Before he opened the door, his lips grabbed mine. He pulled me into the apartment room by the lips.
Ce que c'est beau la Seine,
C'est beau les quais
Dit-elle parfois
Et à deux sur sa selle
We fell on the bed, the lights already out. Each kiss, at first only soft and inquisitive, grew hungrier and hungrier to the force of a thousand horses' firepower. At some point, Fang had pulled himself on top of me.
Our legs were entwined. We wiggled up the bed, closer so my head fell to the pillow. His hands grabbed my cheeks. Mine were lost somewhere on his back, pulling him in closer. One of his hands left my cheek, playing profoundly with my tee shirt's hem. Before too long, warmth flew under my skin as his fingers grazed my exposed stomach. Light but forceful, his hand laid there.
I pulled off his shirt. I ran my hands over his back, ruffling his black feathers through my hands. His hand ripped off my shirt. His hand crept up my stomach to my chest. The other help me sit up as his fingers unhinged the back. Slowly, he laid me back down. I shrugged off my bra.
For a second, Fang stopped kissing me. His eyes travelled not as a child in a candy store, but rather a chilling and loving way. He cupped my face again, and his gingers stroked my jaw line. His eyes fell in mine. Oddly, I didn't feel exposed.
He laid lopsided on me for a moment, his warm breath tickling my ear. "I love you," he whispered. He trailed a line of kisses to my lips, of where I became fully electrified. His bare skin was on mine. Defined lines I didn't know I would feel ran across my abdomen. His strong hand grabbed my breast, massaging it in ways I'd known. But it felt amazing.
Slowly, without me even realizing it, Fang began to stop, placing his hand now on my back. He pulled me up again, pulling on my lip until he spoke.
"I can't do that to you, Max," he murmured. He put both hands on my cheeks. He kissed me on the forehead and continued, "It wouldn't be fair to you. I'm sorry."
I was speechless. Fang got off the bed and gently placed my bra and shirt on the mattress next to me. "What do you mean 'it wouldn't be fair'?" I asked with both tears and rage meeting up. I pulled on my clothes. I climbed off the bed and chased him to the bathroom. I grasped his shoulder, giving a light tug with it.
Without turning around, he answered, "It just wouldn't be fair to you." He nodded off my hand and closed the bathroom door behind him.
On se colle contre le froid
Pari que je revienne,
Je revienne à Londres avec toi
Me dit-elle, me dit-elle,
La gorge remplie de vodka
I didn't cry that night. I had crawled back onto Fang's bed, curled up in a ball on top of the sheets, despite the frigid weather, and slept. I stayed laying down all through the night – even as Fang sat next to me on the bed, rubbing circles in my back and playing with my hair. When I woke in the morning, I was still in my ball. I didn't move.
For a couple of minutes, I was alone. This was only as Fang left to bring back breakfast. I don't recall eating any of it, but I remember Fang leaving again when he went out for lunch and dinner.
He tried to get me to eat. He'd roll an orange or apple across the bed, having it lightly stop at me, but only to pick it up ten minutes later and put them on the dresser with the other not eaten food.
When night fell again, Fang kissed my temple and said his goodnights. His arm draped over me as he positioned both himself and me inside the covers. I didn't fight. I was hoping for sleep to just take me over for a while.
As he slept, he faced me, his nose almost touching mine. His arm pulled my body closer to his. Until he was in deep sleep, his thumb rubbed small circles into my back.
Just as a blink, the night went by. Fang left again for food, returned, and rolled an orange at me. "Eat," he demanded.
My voice was gone, thick behind swallowed tears. I just shook my head.
"Why not?"
Not hungry, I wanted to mouth, but I didn't have enough energy to do that.
"Max, please just eat an orange. That's all I'm asking for: an orange," he pleaded. "It would make me feel a lot better if you ate something. Please?" He grabbed the orange from the night stand and started peeling it. "I'll even peel it for you. Please?" As he finished peeling half of the orange, he pulled out a slice and handed it to me.
I took it – the energy that even that took! – and stared at it. I set it and my hand down and looked away. "Not hungry," I groaned.
"What is that going to accomplish?" Fang retorted, pulling out more pieces of orange. "You're hurting yourself, and you're hurting me mentally because I hate seeing you get hurt. Eat, please."
As painful as I soon found it to be, I tried to flip myself over to the other side so I wasn't facing him.
Fang half groaned and got up. "Maximum Ride, if you don't eat something in the next couple of minutes, I am going downstairs and calling security."
I heard myself say, "So?" though I didn't feel it.
"What do you want from me? Confirmation that you're a lunatic? Money? Gosh, you're sure as hell shit out of luck there, cause all I have is a nickel!" He started tearing the pillows and blankets off the bed, from under me. His voice was getting louder and harder. "Or do you want me so you can have someone to toy with, that Dylan just isn't cutting it for you in the flock, huh?"
À Londres que je vienne,
Oh je prend le pari
En anglais je m'entraîne
Et j'attends gentiment
Le prochain rendez-vous.
I couldn't stop the tears even if I was given epoxy glue. I forced myself off the mattress and faced him. I wiped away a single tear, but let the others flow.
"No, Fang," I screamed. "What I've wanted was and has always been is you! But no, apparently you're too high and mighty! Well isn't that just swell? You can have all the girls you want, but I'm just not one of them."
"Bullshit! Bullshit, Max! This is not the case! You were the one that was always running off! I was the hopeful love one! It was always you making the decisions, not me!"
We took our stances across the bed from each other. My vision and breath were coming short, but I could clearly see the man that stood across from me, his old blue jeans tattered and stained paired with a worn out black tee. His eyes were set tense. His jaw line was squarer than ever. As if gifted with x-ray vision, I watched his heart thump, racing against his chest with every breath.
I kept myself up on the bedside table. Fang was quick to rush despite our dispute. He pulled me up and steadied me on him. He set me down on the bed and handed me the orange slices.
"Please eat these," he mumbled. His voice lacked all venom. It was quivering cold like a snow storm just struck.
As my eyes were caught in his, I lost all fight. The concern he had overshadowed his ignorance for the world. His eyes were soft, the curt creases around disappeared. I took the orange slices and almost immediately felt better. Fang handed me another, then another.
As he waited for me to finish the last slice, his hand fell through my hair, stroking and brushing it behind my ears. He cupped my chin with his two fingers, nudging it up. He kissed me.
Again with the firepower of a thousand horses, his lips were on mine, his hands on either side of my head. "You deserve this," he said in a kiss. My arms pulled him closer, attached at the bottom of his back.
"You deserve me and only me," I giggled greedily.
He stopped kissing me, his hands still on my cheeks. He looked down at me. He was almost at a three foot difference as I sat down and he stood. His bent down, kissed my forehead and said, "I do deserve you. I love you."
As he kissed me again, I whispered, "Je t'aime."
So I really wasn't expecting this to last as long as it did, but I have to say, I'm glad it did. At the end, I kinda started drawing from a recent - je ne sais quoi - hiccup in life. And it kinda scared my boyfriend, thus he and I had a small dispute about it, but in the end, I'm better! :D
I hope this was good and sappy. haha
Smiles,
rainxface