Homeward Bound
Chapter One: Shades of Mediocrity
Burning Tyger

Disclaimer: Luhrmann is amazing! He owns it all, except the song that inspired the title, which is owned by Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel. :) No infringement is, of course, intended.

Author's note: I tried really hard not to overuse the French in here, but they *were* in France. It's only in conversation once or twice, and it's fairly well-known. I also tried to follow the slightly more complicated things with translations.

On the other hand: I take French currently, but considering our teacher's IQ (approximately that of pickle relish) I might be wrong in any number of ways. If I am, my apologies. Flame her, not me. ;-) Also, sorry about the lack of accent marks, as they don't seem to work in text files.

~~

Homeward Bound

But all my words come back to me
In shades of mediocrity
Like emptiness in harmony
I need someone to comfort me...

--Simon and Garfunkel, "Homeward Bound"


He was tired of the typewriter. The harsh clicking noise it made jarred his mind and set his head aching. And whenever he began to get one of the headaches, he reached for a bottle of absinthe, which diluted the headache but often made his typing indecipherable. It hindered him, rather than helping, but he'd reached the point where he didn't care. The writing wasn't even that good when he was sober.

Sometimes Satine's memory didn't hurt so badly when he was drunk, though. He could for an instant recall her smile without seeing the blood trailing from her lips, occasionally remember holding her in bed rather than on that stark, cold stage. Then other times, her face haunted him, cool beneath the veiled hat. She would tell him that the duke had offered her all she ever dreamed of, and that she was going with him. And whenever he saw her that way, she didn't come back.

Christian often wondered if it would not have been better for him to have closed the door behind her that night. Then maybe he wouldn't be living from drink to drink, even if it *did* rid him of his headaches.

But in the morning (and this was entirely the fault of the absinthe) the headache would return, and he would be no better off than where he had begun. Eventually, the solution had come clear: if he stopped writing, he would no longer get the headaches that he drank to escape.

Was it really the headaches he was escaping? Or the memories that he was trying to commit to paper?

It was perhaps three weeks after Satine's death when he realized he could no longer stay in Montmartre. He had to get out of this cramped and dirty hotel room, out of this gray, desperate city, out of France altogether. And he could only go one place.

"Home," he muttered, only slightly slurring the word: he wasn't *that* drunk yet. It would mean crawling back on his belly, as it were, but there was nowhere else to go.

"Fuck pride," he said casually to himself, looking out from the balcony across the dull, lifeless streets. "Don' need it. And I can't...can't stay here." His eyes had fallen on her elephant, so he took another drink. Why not? How about playing a little drinking game: every time he thought about Satine, he'd take another sip.

Fifteen minutes later, the bottle was empty. He sighed, stumbled drunkenly in from the balcony, and flopped down on the bed.

~~

He had considered chucking the typewriter from the window, but instead he packaged it up as gently as he had when he had come. This room looked different in sunlight, he noticed. It looked like it had on any of the days when Satine had come, and he had by turns read her his poetry and made love to her. She said the poetry was beautiful, but he had rather liked the latter more.

He sighed, remembering that he'd never awake again with her curled against him. And as he thought that, a cloud seemed to come over the sun (although the weather wasn't really cued directly to his mood) and the room was again bathed in the shabby dimness of the underworld.

He carefully examined his reflection in the small mirror by the bed. Hm...the beard would have to go. He didn't really like it anyway -- it made him look older and somewhat scruffy. It had only happened in the first place because he had been too apathetic to shave.

A moment later, Toulouse popped his head down through the hole in Christian's ceiling. "What are you *doing?*" the dwarf shouted.

Christian jumped, jerking the razor and swearing loudly. "Toulouse, what the *hell* did you have to do that for?" He rubbed the back of his hand over a spot on his jaw that was now bleeding rather copiously. "Damn it!"

Toulouse had managed to climb down the ladder and was staring curiously around the room. "What ees zis? You aren't *leaving,* are you, Chreestian?"

"Yes, I am," he asserted quietly, rinsing off the razor and jamming it back in his pocket.

"But - but you can't!"

"Who the hell told you that?" He pulled on his coat and grabbed his hat off of the rack by the door.

"What happened to Bohemian ideals? Twuth, beauty, fweedom -- *love*?"

He laughed harshly and picked up his two suitcases. "Let's just say I've lost my faith in at least one of those. Hazard a guess which one?"

Toulouse gaped at him, his speech impediment seeming more pronounced. "Love? You don't bewieve in *love* anymowe?"

"I have no reason to."

"She loved you! Satine loved you!"

Christian spun on his heel. "Don't talk about her!" he shouted. The little man stumbled backwards and ended up sitting on the bed. Christian stood there, practically in the doorway, fuming. Then he shook his head. "*Je suis desole* -- I am sorry, my friend. Being here is just...too much."

"Ah, I see. Bad feelings for ze good memowies, *non*?"

"Something like that."

Toulouse nodded. "Au revoir, mon ami."

Christian nodded. "Goodbye, Toulouse. May the Diamonds always sparkle for you," he offered fervently.

From anyone else, it would have sounded crazy, but coming from Christian it was just another poem.

Toulouse stared after his retreating friend for another instant, then turned back to the ladder. In turning, he spied a half-full bottle of what appeared to be magnolia wine on the nightstand. Grinning, he grabbed it by the neck, toasted Christian, and took a long swig. Then he clambered back up the ladder and out of sight.

TBC...whether you want it or not. ;-)