Elizabeth and Frandrew: SCENES
by Tessaray
STUDIO, Part 1
Drew switches on the overhead lights and stands in the center of Franco's studio, critically scanning the space. The contents are strange, yet not. From his dreams, he vaguely recognizes the giant scissors, the jagged graffiti markings on the walls, the dismembered mannequin parts… the undertones of chaos and violence…
And it strikes him for the first time that he has something in common with the man, besides the use of this body — they're both bringers of death.
Pre-op Franco may have murdered people for fun and profit, Drew may have killed for his country... but they've each caused and observed close-hand that mysterious moment when whatever animates a human being — consciousness, soul, simple electrical impulses — vanishes, leaving only a carcass.
Lately, he's had to contend with the subject far more than he'd like.
Yet what is this situation, really, but a kind of warfare? The difference is, he's never had to confront the grieving widow or the orphaned children before. He's never had to walk around with the dead man's face or feel him squirming inside like a parasite…
But it's all over now. He's won his competency hearing. He has the blessing of the American legal system to remain alive and free, and he intends to make the most of it. But he needed to come here first and learn all he can about his enemy in order to fight him, to end these alien dreams and impulses, to end all traces of Franco, forever...
That's what he tells himself, anyway. In truth, he doesn't know why he's here. After the hearing, he'd left Kim in the courthouse, telling her, as he gently disentangled from her grasping hands, that he needed time. He hurried back to the Metrocourt then, to change (the phony uniform had been suffocating him and he couldn't get out of it fast enough) and to think about his future. But the shocked, devastated faces of Franco's family haunted him, wouldn't leave him be. He needed fresh air before he punched something, so he left the hotel, climbed into Franco's car, dropped the top and ended up here, blinking in the bright overhead lights.
His body knows this place well. It automatically approaches the heavy wooden easel dominating the room and stops at a familiar angle to it. He looks down to find that his fingers are curled around that damned invisible paintbrush again and he curses, reminds himself it's not the parasite taking over — it's instinct, muscle memory, pure and simple. His original body had had it in spades. Among other things, his old hands could disassemble and reassemble a rifle within seconds with barely a glance or a thought. He doubts he could accomplish that with these new hands... but these hands have other abilities...
They know how to artfully arrange a body. They know how to draw and how to paint. They know how to love Elizabeth…
He flashes on her in the courtroom today, proud and determined in her dark suit, eyes so different from that day in the psych ward when they'd been filled with fierce, desperate love. No, today, she looked at him with hostility, like he was the enemy. It twisted his gut, made him swallow a throatful of pain.
He shuts down the memory, stalks to the metal shelving unit by the wall and yanks out a handful of paintings. He examines each in turn before shoving them back again with a disgusted grunt. It's all trash. Certainly nothing he'd call art.
Yet… they were made by these hands.
Franco may have been a destroyer… but he was also a creator. What has Drew ever created... except for a son he never knew?
He growls, drops into an overstuffed, spray-painted chair by the counter. His body wants to lean back, throw a leg over the arm, sprawl itself in a way Drew finds distasteful and undisciplined, but he allows it. He feels a lump beneath him, reaches under the cushion and pulls out a spiral-bound book. Mildly curious, he flips it open to find page after page of pencil sketches, all unfamiliar faces in varying degrees of finish. Some he grudgingly finds impressive, some troubling, some amusing… until he reaches a series that stops him dead.
Drawings of Elizabeth. Dozens of them.
Naked.
Nude, a voice deep in his mind corrects.
He quickly sits up, positions the book in his lap, breath coming faster. He recognizes the setting — she's posed on the very cushions he's now sitting on. The languid sensuality of her body suggests to him that these drawings were done mere moments after lovemaking. He swallows hard and chastises himself — these are private expressions of intimacy between a husband and wife; it's wrong to gawk at them. He wants to close the book, yet he's mesmerized by her soft expression — tender and trusting, deeply satisfied, utterly in love. He can't recall a woman ever looking at him in quite that way...
He gingerly turns the pages, lingering like a voyeur, feeling guilt, envy… and most of all arousal. A simple reaction to seeing a beautiful, nude woman, he tells himself. But no, this is different. His body is stirring with a deep, carnal heat, like an animal recognizing its mate. His senses register visceral memories of touch, scent and taste as he stares at the fullness of her breasts, the curve of her thighs… an undeniable hunger growing inside him…
But something makes him stop. It's a lurching sensation, like an internal slamming of brakes, and before he knows it, he's flipping to the back of the sketchbook and is looking down into the face of a girl with long hair and laughing eyes, a girl he recognizes. Kiki. He's seen her photograph… but he knows her, too. He turns the page to find another drawing of her, and another, and another… all rendered in charcoal, each smudged image more haunting than the one before. A raging, violently grieving hand made these images, and he squints at small spots on the paper, thinks they might be dried tears…
Intense, unwelcome emotions suddenly erupt inside him, making him feel alien to himself, threatening his control. NO. He doesn't feel in this way — not this deeply, not this wildly. He never has, and dammit, he never will. With a snarl, he mentally kicks at the offending emotions, trying to scatter them like he would a pack of rabid dogs, slamming the book shut…
And as he does so, a page slips free and flutters to the floor. He scuffs at it with the toe of his shoe, realizes it's yet another drawing of Elizabeth... a portrait done in pencil. He bends, lifts it… and gasps at the delicate beauty of the thing. Her eyes are shyly downcast, her hair falls over her brow, creating a striking pattern of light and shadow on her skin...
He sees the same depth of feeling here as in the drawings of Kiki, but there's no rage, no grief. Rather, it's the opposite — a tender reverence... and a profound love that shames him. Yet he raises the page closer to his face, traces the curve of her cheek with his fingertip, caresses the fullness of her lips…
"You don't belong here."
The harsh voice startles him. He shoots to his feet and wheels to find Elizabeth standing in the open doorway of the studio. Her eyes are fierce, her face wounded, radiant, angry, defiant and so beautiful. All at once. He doesn't know how she manages it, and it takes his breath away.
"I was just...," he stammers, swallows, shoves her portrait into the sketchbook and holds it in front of himself like a defensive weapon. Her abrupt presence has thrown him... and he's never thrown.
"Put that down, please," she says. He blinks, follows her gaze to the sketchbook in his hands and sets it quickly on the nearby counter like a guilty child.
She scowls, her warrior eyes flashing...
"What are you doing here," she says, like ice. "You won. Why aren't you and Kim on your way to Timbuktu by now?"
He throws his shoulders back, trying to force his body into its usual military stance, but it feels uncomfortable, awkward. Maybe it's the savage way she's looking at him, or the way he was just looking at her… but he finds he has no grip on this situation, or on himself.
"I'll go," he says, dropping his eyes.
He takes a few stiff steps toward the door, but she quickly moves into the room, turns and closes the door, leaning a small hand on it as though for support. He hears her pull a few ragged breaths and straightens his spine, bracing for the inevitable confrontation.
"For all intents and purposes," she says quietly, evenly. "You've succeeded in murdering my husband. The fact that you feel you have a right to be here, to ransack his studio, to lay your hands on his private things is… abhorrent to me."
She turns and faces him then, chin held high, exuding a simmering rage that daunts him. "You are going to tell me, right now, exactly what you're doing here."
He shifts his weight, can't quite look at her. "I don't mean to upset you, ma'am… Elizabeth, but—,"
"Ma'am, to you."
He nods, chastened. "Ma'am."
"Go on," she says.
He's not sure how to go on. He's not certain why he's here, doubts she'll accept that answer, but he has no intention of lying to her.
"I don't know."
"You don't know what?"
"I don't know why I'm here, ma'am," he says, as though addressing a superior officer.
She regards him with narrowed eyes, her posture gradually easing.
"Where's your little costume?" she says.
He bristles, clenches his jaw at the mocking tone. "At the hotel."
She moves farther into the room, claiming the space for herself with each advancing step... making him feel small, defensive. She's still wearing that dark suit from the courtroom… and it's clear she's been crying. The only thing he seems proficient at these days is making women cry…
Don't leave, Drew, I can explain…
He lets Kim's tear-choked voice linger in his mind for a moment, lets his disgust with her bloom in his gut before exhaling it away.
"Funny," Elizabeth is saying. "I figured you'd never take it off. I imagined you parading around in it as proof to the world that you're Drew Cain, Navy Seal."
"Proved it to the judge. No one else matters," he says, and instantly regrets it. It's an unchivalrous victor who gloats.
But she's frozen, dagger eyes locked on him... and they cut him, deep. He wants an altogether different look from her... sensual and tender, like the one captured in those drawings…
"I'm sorry," he says, raising his hands, advancing a step. When she flinches he halts, drops his hands again, heart so heavy it hurts to breathe. "Please understand. I just… I want to live, Elizabeth."
"So did Franco," she cries, voice finally breaking. "But you took that chance away from him!"
A dozen self-justifications flood his brain, all accepted by a court-of-law. But none of them will convince her. Or lessen her pain.
"Yes, ma'am, I did," he says, unconsciously laying a hand over his heart. He sees her eyes widen at the gesture, but he continues. "That's the truth of it. And I know there's nothing I can say or do to make it right. But please know that I'm sorry… for you, for your sons. For Franco even. Believe me, I wish none of this had happened, but it did, and I'm here. I'm not sorry about that. I'm grateful to be alive."
She's been watching him closely throughout his speech, as though parsing his words for a deeper meaning, or maybe evaluating his sincerity…
Finally, she turns from him and begins wandering slowly, silently around the studio. Her eyes and fingers trail over her husband's belongings, the things that remain of him — a stack of blank canvases that will never be filled, a pile of stained and mangled tubes of oil paint, a coffee can stuffed with spiky brushes gathering dust. Her touch slows, her manner grows more contemplative as the minutes pass…
And he waits, feeling suspended. Waits… for what? Permission, absolution…? He doesn't know. He can only watch her, exquisite and utterly transcendent in her grief.
"This place was a sanctuary," she says dreamily, as though lost on another plane. "Not only for him, but for us. Together. Do you remember?" She gently tilts her head toward him.
"How... how would I remember?" he stammers.
She gives him an opaque smile, pauses to lay her delicate hands on the large wooden easel. She strokes it, lovingly. "How did you know about this place?" she says like a lullaby.
"I," he begins… but has no clear answer. He shakes his head, stretches his stiff neck. "I must have seen the address somewhere."
"Hmmm, yes, that must be it," she says, nodding vaguely. She moves from the easel to the counter and pauses beside him, eyes lowered. "And how did you get in?"
He absently shoves his hand into his coat pocket, feels the car keys… but no. The key to the studio is on the counter — she's looking right at it… and now she's looking up at him, a strange light in her indigo eyes.
He doesn't remember using the key. He doesn't remember opening the door or coming in…
"Franco keeps the key on top of the door jamb," she says. "Drew would have no way of knowing that."
He goes cold, overwhelmed by a sensation of sinking, and reaches out for the counter to steady himself… but he finds Elizabeth's hand instead. He urgently twines his fingers with hers and she doesn't pull away — even though she should, even though he deserves it. She stays, anchoring him to this time and this place and this body…
And it's only when he's able to make out her words — reassuring words not meant for him — that he tries, and fails, to pull free of her...
"I see you, Franco," she's saying, low and fierce. "I'm here. I'll never let you go."
Continued in STUDIO, Part 2...
