Title: "Clean" 1/1
Author: Mala
E-mail: malisita@yahoo.com
Fandom: "Alias", "The Box pt.2"
Rating/Classification: PG-13, S/V-ish, Syd POV, angst, ficlet.
Disclaimer: J.J. Abrams, et al.
Summary: Just some Sydney musings that sprang from listening to "This Woman's Work" by Kate Bush.
A warm, lazy bath. You treat yourself to it, immersed in the cucumber-y smell of aromatherapy candles and the fragile pink bubbles. You ache. In all the wrong places.
The water is for your peace of mind, you know, not for the livid black bruises on your shins and the searing pain in your arm. For those things, you'll swallow a couple of aspirin, drink a glass of red wine, and save yourself a future of heart disease.
But not heartache.
You wince, tilting your head back and letting the water seep into your skull and weight down your hair until it feels three miles long. Danny used to love climbing into the shower behind you and washing your hair. Sometimes, you can still remember the feel of his fingers combing the apple-scented shampoo through the tangles.
You don't use apple shampoo anymore.
You switched to Head and Shoulders. It gets the grit and blood out just as well as flakes. You think you should e-mail them that bit of news for an ad campaign. "Head and Shoulders, for secret agents on the go!"
You wonder what kind Vaughn uses. Medicinal? Herbal? Man's man? Frou-frou? You wonder if he ever spends forty minutes under the hot spray, trying to clean the filth from his skin...or if that's just you. You wonder...you wonder...and you realize that thinking about him showering means thinking about him naked.
Naked Vaughn. Droplets of water clinging to his flat-hard stomach.
NakedVaughnotDannyohGod.
Suddenly, the bath isn't so warm, so comforting. And you swallow hard, sloshing suds onto the tiles that you will, no doubt, slip on when you climb out. You shiver, roughly scraping the loofah over your chest, your arms, and your thighs, one last time.
Two days ago, you had visions of sitting next to him at a Kings game. Sharing stale popcorn and holding his hand in the middle of a screaming crowd that wouldn't care who you were because you would be two average, normal people just trying to get to know each other better. Stupid visions. Futile visions...because you wound up diffusing C-4 charges together instead. How romantic. How not-average, not-normal. How real.
You could barely even touch him in the Credit Dauphine parking garage.
You can barely even touch him anywhere.
Because someone might see.
Because someone might feel.
Because picturing him naked will get you absolutely nothing and loving him might get him killed.
And you've lost one man too many all ready.
You stand up, dripping, and reach for fluffy terrycloth that doesn't ease the chill from your bones. The tepid bathwater spirals slowly down the drain and you ache.
In all the wrong places.
--end-
February 12, 2002.
Author: Mala
E-mail: malisita@yahoo.com
Fandom: "Alias", "The Box pt.2"
Rating/Classification: PG-13, S/V-ish, Syd POV, angst, ficlet.
Disclaimer: J.J. Abrams, et al.
Summary: Just some Sydney musings that sprang from listening to "This Woman's Work" by Kate Bush.
A warm, lazy bath. You treat yourself to it, immersed in the cucumber-y smell of aromatherapy candles and the fragile pink bubbles. You ache. In all the wrong places.
The water is for your peace of mind, you know, not for the livid black bruises on your shins and the searing pain in your arm. For those things, you'll swallow a couple of aspirin, drink a glass of red wine, and save yourself a future of heart disease.
But not heartache.
You wince, tilting your head back and letting the water seep into your skull and weight down your hair until it feels three miles long. Danny used to love climbing into the shower behind you and washing your hair. Sometimes, you can still remember the feel of his fingers combing the apple-scented shampoo through the tangles.
You don't use apple shampoo anymore.
You switched to Head and Shoulders. It gets the grit and blood out just as well as flakes. You think you should e-mail them that bit of news for an ad campaign. "Head and Shoulders, for secret agents on the go!"
You wonder what kind Vaughn uses. Medicinal? Herbal? Man's man? Frou-frou? You wonder if he ever spends forty minutes under the hot spray, trying to clean the filth from his skin...or if that's just you. You wonder...you wonder...and you realize that thinking about him showering means thinking about him naked.
Naked Vaughn. Droplets of water clinging to his flat-hard stomach.
NakedVaughnotDannyohGod.
Suddenly, the bath isn't so warm, so comforting. And you swallow hard, sloshing suds onto the tiles that you will, no doubt, slip on when you climb out. You shiver, roughly scraping the loofah over your chest, your arms, and your thighs, one last time.
Two days ago, you had visions of sitting next to him at a Kings game. Sharing stale popcorn and holding his hand in the middle of a screaming crowd that wouldn't care who you were because you would be two average, normal people just trying to get to know each other better. Stupid visions. Futile visions...because you wound up diffusing C-4 charges together instead. How romantic. How not-average, not-normal. How real.
You could barely even touch him in the Credit Dauphine parking garage.
You can barely even touch him anywhere.
Because someone might see.
Because someone might feel.
Because picturing him naked will get you absolutely nothing and loving him might get him killed.
And you've lost one man too many all ready.
You stand up, dripping, and reach for fluffy terrycloth that doesn't ease the chill from your bones. The tepid bathwater spirals slowly down the drain and you ache.
In all the wrong places.
--end-
February 12, 2002.