I cut the arrow from your neck
Stretched you beneath the tree
Among the roots and baby's breath
I covered us with silver leaves
Gloria, we lied, we can't go on
This is the time and this is the place to be alive
The Hush Sound, "Wine Red"
Mark did find Roger on the roof of the building, smoking a cigarette. He was casually leaning against the ledge. His shift was unbuttoned even more, halfway down, and he had the sleeves rolled up.
"You found me," Roger said. He coughed a bit as he exhaled on his cigarette.
"Those things'll kill you," Mark commented about the cigarette.
"I'm counting on it. Collins ask you to find me?"
"Stephanie did. Why'd you bolt out of there so fast?"
"I don't know. I felt like I was having a panic attack or something." Mark approached him, as he kept talking. "My chest closed up, I felt like I couldn't breathe."
Mark paused and came to stand beside his friend. "Roger…if there's something wrong, you know you can talk to me, right?"
Roger narrowed his eyes, intense hazel-green. "Oh, is that supposed to make me forget about what a giant tool you were to me a few hours ago when I first stepped in that door?"
"I'm sorry. I was mad," Mark admitted. "I felt like you were cutting me out of your life. I miss you, Roger."
"I miss you too, Mark."
"So, why won't you stay at my place with me and Steph?"
"I'm sorry, Mark, I'm afraid I can't do that," he replied, in an impressive imitation of Hal in 2001: A Space Odyssey.
"Can you at least tell us where you're staying?"
"Nope."
Mark paused. "Are you going to come back inside?"
"Eventually. I need to cool off." Needless to say that it was hotter outside than it was inside the apartment. It was late May, almost Memorial Day, and the temperature was already climbing.
"But you're okay now, right?"
"For now, yeah."
"Okay, I'll let everyone else know." Mark gave Roger a little smile and shoved his hands in his pockets. He turned to leave, but before he reached the staircase, he called to him, "For what it's worth, I liked your song a lot! I thought it was great."
"You think?"
"Well, I liked it a lot better than I liked 'Your Eyes'."
"Really?"
"Yeah," Mark grinned mischievously. "I…I actually thought 'Your Eyes' kind of…sucked."
Roger chuckled. "You're an asshole."
"Sorry. I know. I'll work on that." The pair shared a smile and, the last thing Mark saw before he opened the door to head downstairs was Roger shooting him the middle finger.
When Mark returned from the rooftop, Stephanie and Luc were doing dishes and Collins was sitting on the couch, looking worn out. Mark sat beside him.
"How's he doing?" Collins asked.
"He just needs some time alone," Mark replied. "I'm sure he'll be fine."
When Mark and Stephanie finally returned home a few hours later, Mark immediately retreated to his production room—just a spare room in the back of the apartment that Mark had set up when he first moved in, a small, airless and windowless room that consisted of three computers set up on a semicircle desk. He had a shelf that was filled, top to bottom, with VHS tapes and blank DVD's.
Stephanie, feeling miffed that he'd abandoned her so suddenly without even taking off his shoes, followed him.
"I don't think you'll want any dinner, right? I'm still full," she said with a forced cheerfulness, leaning against the doorway of the production room.
"No," was Mark's simple answer. His head was currently under the desk, turning on all three computers.
"Maybe later we can watch a movie?"
"I don't know, I have a lot of work to get done," he said, settling into his high-backed office chair. "I have deadlines."
Screw your deadlines. "You can't take a few hours to—"
"Shut the door on the way out, would you?"
Stephanie sighed and put her hand on the doorknob. "Sorry to bother you, then," she said softly. She pulled the door closed.
At one AM on the Upper West Side, Joanne was in front of her computer, a mug of tea within arms reach. She was looking over several affidavits for an upcoming case that she'd been trying to get her head into. She'd wrongfully neglected it the past two weeks, leaving the majority of the work to be done by her partner, in favor of spending time with Collins. It was a paternity suit that had arisen when a client of Joanne's was killed in a car accident. Her will had stipulated that her child be placed with his real father—but whether the father was her husband, her fiancé, or her boyfriend was another story.
Maureen had tried for hours to sleep, but the heat made her toss and turn. Now, she read through Ibsen's Hedda Gabler. She'd never really been interested in Ibsen's work, finding it too dry, not to mention the fact that she'd read A Doll's House in high school, and disliked it. She hated Nora, calling her weak and uninteresting. However, one of her actors suggested that she read this particular work, calling the title character a "female Hamlet".
Just as Hedda was encouraging Løvborg to commit suicide, Maureen heard Nina stir in her crib. When Maureen went into her daughter's room to check in on her, she saw that the baby was still asleep. With a small sigh of relief, she closed the door behind her and approached the crib. Maureen gently brushed Nina's dark curls with her fingers, adjusted the blanket that she'd kicked off, and kissed her cheek. Then, she sat on the floor beside the crib, hugged her knees to her chest, and watched Nina sleep.
At two AM in Chelsea, Collins was awaking from a feverish sleep, a cold sweat on his brow, coughing a horrible, wracking cough that jolted Luc awake. Collins scrambled for his oxygen mask, trying to catch a breath. Luc went to the bathroom and brought his lover a glass of water. He held the glass as Collins took a sip, the liquid smoothly going down his throat. After that ordeal, neither could return to sleep. The pair sat up in bed and Luc turned on the fourteen-inch color television they kept in the bedroom, and flipped through the channels until they found The Birdcage playing on a cable channel. Luc wrapped one his arm around Collins, who rested his head on his shoulder.
At three AM in SoHo, Mark was wide awake. He'd been shut away in his production room for five hours straight. The three computers surrounding him hummed a white noise, the heat of the equipment adding to the heat of the small room he was in. He had suddenly come into four projects—two segments for ABC, one for NBC, and a wedding video. Of course, he took them all on at the same time: either to prove himself or so he wouldn't have to think about anything or anyone else for some time.
He was working on the wedding video at this point. He studied the footage of the ceremony: attractive young couple, perhaps in their early to mid-twenties. The groom was deeply tanned, with dark hair. The bride was a dark blonde, with an ornate tattoo that was revealed by her backless dress. He was about to add the opening titles when he looked at the order form to check the correct spelling of the couples' names. He had to do a double-take when he did: Antonia and Mark Dorian. He chuckled wryly to himself as he typed in their names, along with the date and location of the wedding, information copied off from an extra invitation the bride had given him when she dropped off the footage.
As he cut and edited the film, Mark thought about his own wedding to Stephanie. He was twenty-seven when he married her; she had been twenty-three. He had waited until she graduated college to propose to her, and the wedding took nearly a year to plan. She wanted an extravagant affair with flowers, candles, ice sculptures, a six-piece orchestra and nine bridesmaids. Just the thought of such decadence gave Mark cold feet and a wicked case of heartburn, and he'd begged and pleased with Stephanie to tone it down. After several arguments, Mark managed to persuade her out of ice sculptures; suggested using only one kind of flower instead of three for the bouquets; and talked her down from nine bridesmaids to four. Her dress, however, was something Mark had no say in, and ended up being the most expensive thing out of the whole ordeal.
In that same loft in SoHo, Stephanie rolled over in bed and reached her hand out for her husband—but his side of the bed was cold. She opened her eyes, peering through the spider web of lashes, only to find Mark's side unoccupied. It looked like he never came to bed at all. Crestfallen, she pulled herself out of bed and went to the production room. She wore only a silk negligee, blue, printed with butterflies on it, showing off the rise of her breasts and her slender legs. The fabric stuck to her skin in the heat.
"Mark?" Stephanie called. Her voice was deep.
"Yeah?" Mark didn't turn his chair to face her.
"Come to bed. You've been at this for hours. Please?"
"I will."
"When?"
"When I'm done."
"When will that be?"
"Stephanie!" Mark snapped, whirling his chair around to face her. "This is work, alright? I'm not doing this for my own enjoyment!"
Stephanie wilted inside. This wasn't the first time he'd spoken harshly to her, but she never got used to it. "I'm sorry."
Mark turned his chair back around to face his computer again. "It's alright. I'll be there when I'm done, okay?"
"Okay," she replied in a whisper. She closed the door to the production room and went back to the bedroom. She crawled back into bed and pulled the comforter over her tightly, hugging it to herself. She then burst into tears, smothering her sobs into a pillow.
A/N: I have nothing against Henrik Ibsen. I actually like A Doll's House. Just…wanted to put that out there. And yes, I know this is just a filler chapter—it'll be getting better. I promise. Oh, and I really do hate "Your Eyes". Well, except when Tim Howar sings it. Hehe. I went to see him in Rent yesterday and he kissed me on the cheek. GLEE!