Alternate ending/ AU Epilogue/ Optional Coda
It was a perfect night.
So, no they weren't discussing literature. Or tearing up the dance floor. Or pigging out on junk food.
They were pouring their hearts into one another.
Ingrid kissed him like she had no other before, fervently, rapidly and all over. The first liplock had been deliberate and concerted. Now her method reflected her state of mind, hectic, passion overflowing. It was like they were making up for lost time. She kissed his nose, his cheeks, his lips, his ears, all in succession. The revelers had left some half hour ago. She and Fillmore (Cornelius?) hadn't left the couch.
For his part, Fillmore had traveling hands in lieu of lips. He traced her jaw, caressed her shoulders, and ran his fingers through her hair. It was the best form of paradise that, now known, he could never imagine not knowing.
The something missing---from before---was that longing? Or was longing present but unfulfilled? Thinking was terribly difficult at the moment, but then, he did not feel all that pressed to do so.
But too soon, and too quickly, it would be vitally important that he manage to.
"Fillmore—" Ingrid breathed, and he smiles into her kiss. Even now, she uses his family name. Surnames it is then.
"Yeah Third?"
"Heart . . . race—ing . . ."
He grins again. "Me too. Mile a minute." She could not be more beautiful, he thinks, hand gliding to the small of her back.
"No . . . not that . . . race-ing, but abnorm . . . .not right." She has stopped kissing, and now braces herself on his arms. She's not kissing him, but she's clearly out of breath. Fillmore pulls back a little, still in a daze, infatuated at the sight of her in his old sweats, hair disheveled, rosy cheeks---that seem to be draining.
This sobers him enough to reach over and check her pulse, the carotid just under the jawline. While his mirrors a jogger warming up, hers is clearly not right---like a terrified mouse sprinting for its life. On speed.
Ingrid watches him count and calculate. In a disconnected way she knows something's not right, but she remains calm, trusting Fillmore implicitly to tell her how bad it is.
And 60 seconds never seemed longer. As he watches the clock and times the beats his eyes catch Danny's polaroids strewn across the table. On top rests Ingrid's amazing feat of interception---- the midair tackle shows her right knee connecting with Bradson's stomach, just before she lands on that foot and breaks it. She has a vice grip on both his arms, but his left, the hand bearing the syringe intended for Mayor Folsom, is bent at the elbow. And the angle almost looks as though . . .
No, thinks Fillmore. No no no no no no no no no no no no no . . . and he begins to panic in earnest, grabbing her left arm, and rolling up her (his) sleeve.
No. Impossible. It was full at the scene. It didn't break, and Ingrid would have mentioned feeling . . . she would have felt . . . but no, we went to the ER, the nurses would have seen . . . Ingrid would have saw . . .
Nothing. All clear. The front of her arm is clean. On the back there are her three perfect little moles in a neat and perfect little triangle.
Except there are four, and it's a diamond.
So small. So small, but he sees it, and even though he knows what it will be, is horrified to find out, he absolutely must.
The teeny tiny (fresh) little scab flecks off easily.
And Fillmore feels dead in his chest.