Disclaimer: .... (If you don't get the picture by now, I wash my hands of you.)
Alec slid onto his barstool with a happy sigh. Thrumming his fingers on the beer-sleek countertop merrily, he hummed along to the song blaring over Crash's loudspeakers. Hummed may be a little generous, considering the actual melody was muddled inside the ever-throbbing beat, even to his hypersensitive ears. "Hey Mike," he called out, waving his finger in the tall bartender's direction, "the usual and a pitcher." Nodding briskly, Mike wheeled around and started working diligently on the order.
"Thanks, man," Alec said upon receiving his purchases. Pulling out an extra five, he slapped it down on the counter. "Quick tip for quick service," he quipped. Eyeing Mike's latest hairdo, he added, "Maybe you should go try again at the barbershop. But maybe you should have Mr. Jones put his glasses on before he starts snippin'."
"Ha, ha," Mike retorted. "One of these days I'm gonna..." he halted mid finger shaking, knowing there was no way to complete any viable threat on his part. Alec could have him pinned in a nanosecond.
"Hmm...what was that?"
"...let your wife kick you outta my bar." Alec snorted in response, grabbing his wares and snaking back through the crowd, where O.C. and Sketchy were waiting.
Original Cindy: newly appointed knightess in shining armor and savior. Maybe he didn't stand a chance with Max in the "Love Canal", he knew he didn't deserve it, but her little slip-up had given him something he hadn't really allowed himself to feel in years: hope. He slipped into the seat next to Sketchy, who was in the midst of another one of his nonsensical ramblings.
"...It just doesn't make sense O.C., for something to be as 'dead as a doornail'. It wasn't alive in the first place."
"It means fool, that it shows how dead the thing is because it is being compared to something that was never alive." Judging by the stressed tone of her voice, this was a continued conversation, and O.C. was an unwilling participant in it.
"But if it was never alive how can it be dead? Why would you compare biotic to abiotic? In the end, the living-nonliving shouldn't be compared because they're not on the same scale."
"Whateva, fool. Original Cindy is tired of arguing with your obtuse behind."
"Excuse me, O.C., but my butt is not fat." Unable to control her burning hand, she walloped Sketchy upside the back of his greasy head, giving off a very satisfying "Whack!"
Alec looked back and forth between the two rivals and smirked. Deciding to intervene before Sketchy lost anymore of his scarce brain cells to O.C.'s P.M.S., he asked, "How do these scintillating conversations come about anyway?"
"How else?" O.C. asked. "Smokey ova here got new weed. So pretty soon his starts pestering people with, 'If corn oil comes from corn, where does baby oil come from?' and 'Why are the lines so much longer outside the girls restroom then guys?' and 'Do we move ourselves from place to place, or does the world start spinning very quickly where we are?'" She threw an extra dirty look to the doped-up man in question just for good measure. "But what Original Cindy wants to know is: why does she always get stuck with these questions? Why can't he just bother you or Max?"
"Because the only way to hinder my ramblings is to give me a decent swat upside the head. Between Max and Alec's tampered DNA, I might never wake up," Sketchy gripped, following up his unusually eloquent and weed-induced spiel with a few choice mutterings about black lesbians from broken homes, all the while massaging the back of his head.
"It would only do the world a favor. You might as well stop rubbing your head. All you doin' is rearranging the grease," O.C. snipped, purposefully ignoring Sketchy's sneer in response. Changing tactics, he looked plaintively in Alec's direction. "How come she always gets the last word, huh?"
"Estrogen equals brainpower," she deadpanned.
*****
Slinking her way through hazardous territory, the lioness stalked her prey. She scrutinized his confident stroll, the way he slid back into the comfort levels of being with the rest of his pride. His entire aura exuded confidence, even more so than usual, powerful and potent. His eyes stared unwaveringly into his companions, communicating his control over any situation. Well, almost any situation. Even a lion had an Achilles' Heel, a chink in his sleek and sinewy fur coat.
Coming out slowly from behind an alcove, she moved like a Sahara-born lioness, nimbly parting the grasses, or in this case, masses. Quick deft steps made no sound against the beer-splattered floor. Eyes locked on target, the lines between humanity and animalism blurred. Calls echoed off deaf ears. She was in the zone. The prey was finally within her grasp. One paw shot out, landing on Alec's shoulder.
Alec jumped at the contact of a demanding hand gripping his shoulder. He whirled around to face his assailant, calming when his saw it was just his wife. His eyes clutched hers, refusing to let go. But it wasn't Max. Just a Max-shell, filled with fury, irritation, and an all-consuming vortex of emotions better left unclear, all stirred up with a splash of lemon, to reveal a Max he was completely unprepared to deal with in his present state of unusual giddiness.
What had he done this time?
"Hey Max," he started honestly. If there was one thing he'd learned over the last 16 months it was that the normal fabrication of smooth, sly confidence never got him out of her doghouse. If anything, it just pushed him back further inside an already too-tight corner.
Alec watched surreptitiously as Max slowly regained herself from whatever whirlwind she had mysteriously found herself ambushed by, as the storm slowly cleared. For the time being anyway. Her breathing evened out, her pulse slowed dramatically, and the feral gleam lost its hold on her eyes. Shaking her head smartly, she pushed the last of the demons under the rug inside her mind, but the cobwebs were still there. Old fears still held a hard-handed and unmerciful grip on her. Only when most of the fog cleared did Alec dare remove his eyes from hers.
*****
Somewhere over the past six years in their pseudo-friendship, Alec found himself giving Max a once over every time he saw her. Partly for concern for her well being - because quite frankly, she had the higher tendency for getting herself into trouble than he did. Alec only messed with pond scum for fun; she was the one always trying to catch the big fish, alone, in the name of Eyes Only and his holy idealism - and partly for the sake of natural curiosity. He was unconcerned by the realization at first, for it was quite obvious that she was a beautiful woman, even for a transgenic. The way she carried herself caught everybody's eye; her confident vulnerability. The epitome of walking contradictions gracing their disciplined midst. Half of the former citizens of Terminal City couldn't always decide whether to hug her or really throttle her, not unlike the husband himself.
So partway through his split second, traditional inspection he found his eyes shooting from her knees back up to her shoulders and retracing her upper torso a bit more meticulously in re-examination. Max was wearing his jacket. The one he left at Minette's place. Not that he really owned any other jacket, but for his inner sake of drama, that sorry fact stood out on the tip of his mind, waiting to fall over the brink.
Somebody kill him now.
He tensed for an attack...
He could see the headlines now: "Transgenic meets unfortunate end when infidelity shown bare," "Pathetic partner pays price for prior pretenses," and "Stupid spouse stuck in cement shoes." It's amazing how lyrical the transgenic mind gets under pressure, severe pressure. Alec would rather take a good beating and a year in isolation than one of Max's long-time-coming-intolerance-coiled-oh-so-tightly-Jesus-take-me-home rampages.
...but the attack never came.
Unnerved by Alec's cold stare at her chest, Max glanced down, half expecting to find the words "Kill Alec" scrawled across her breasts in permanent red ink. "Oh," she said. She took off the jacket with classic - and more importantly, nonviolent - ease. She handed it off to Alec with a noncommittal shrug, who took it, dumbfounded and amazingly forlorn by her lack of...anything.
"I had a run over by Minette's today," she said casually. "Apparently you forgot it after your date last night." She rolled her eyes in Cindy's direction, who reciprocated the motion, noticing the sheen of unshed tears in Max's eyes. "I'm bushed," she informed Cindy. "I'm heading home." With a sharp turn she strolled towards the neon orange exit sign - her North Star to sweet freedom -, begging her ragged emotions to hold out for a few more precious moments.
Unfortunately, the powers that be had other plans...
Alec's voice rang out behind her. "Hey Max, I'll come with you." She stopped in the middle of the bar floor, swore back the tears biting her eyelids, and beseeched the rafters of Crash to send down some lightening bolts to kill her now, or even better, the bastard standing right behind her.
*****
Not only was the tension thick, but it was one of those really uncomfortable types, the reverberating kind. The reverberating in silence kind. It was smothering. Each footfall echoed in shrill agony. The age-smoothed handrails were gravel-like under Max's graceful fingers. Finally the pair reached their floor.
"Well, that had to be the longest two stories in my life," Alec quipped, ill met by the stony silence. Nothing quite thickens the tension between two parties like a good wisecrack gone sour. Something about that quick flick of light only made the darkness seem more consuming.
He dared a glance across his shoulder towards Max...well where Max had been. Obviously seeing the finish line sparked the last wind in her. She made a beeline for their door, whipping out her key. Slamming it into the deadbolt, she made quick work of opening the door, and practically blurred into bathroom - the only room in the apartment with a lock. The jingle of a hot running shower rang in Alec's ears when he arrived at the breach of their oh-so-humble abode half a minute later.
With a weighty sigh Alec stood at the entrance, noting that Max had forgotten to close the door in her rush for privacy. How typical of their relationship and of Max. She rushes through life, barges through a door, but never bothers to close it. She opened Pandora's box and instead of sticking it out, she ran away. Or maybe she opened the door, and now it was his responsibility to walk through, and deal with the chaos.
Whatever the philosophical implication, he needed another drink. Pronto. Crossing himself derisively, he stepped into Hell's fury, closing the door behind him, mind you. By God he should be canonized. St. Alec: patron saint of alcoholics, cat burglars, and failed marriages. What was the address to the Vatican again?
More importantly, where was his emergency stash of bourbon? He'd need all the liquid courage he had to finish his dreaded task. But mid-step towards his emergency stash, he swerved violently towards the kitchen counter.
Cursing those deities responsible, Alec heaved out a countertop drawer in the kitchen and flipped it over; heedless to the shrill protestations of the silverware's plunge being broken by the unforgiving tile floor. With single-minded sobriety, he gently fingered the folder trapped in the hinge underneath the drawer. He extracted the folder from its hideout, and hauled it to the countertop as if it weighed a metric ton. Staring at the crisp but dusty folder, Alec's eyes blurred between aspiration and misery, each battling for dominance neither could have, but the irony never wavered.
An alpha-male transgenic's doom or emancipation teetered on the edge of a manila folder.
Go figure.
*****
Max stepped out of the shower, feeling completely unrefreshed but very despondent. Not even towel drying, she threw on an old pair of sweatpants and a Mardi Gras T-shirt she had so unselfishly rescued from the mildew in the bottom of Alec's drawers. Summoning her senses from the corners of the globe, she swiped the condensation from the bathroom mirror.
The face that stared back at her wasn't her own. The cheeks were too pale, the eyes too red and puffy from crying under the shower's heated spray. She leaned forward slightly, her breath collecting on the already watery surface. Some small element inside her wanted desperately to memorize every detail of her face, the emotion it masked. The withdrawn eyes, the ugly compression of her lips.
The fear of the unknown was the worst. Even now, Max couldn't place a finger on her jealousy of the luscious Minette, or why she felt like Alec had betrayed her. The emotions swirling in the pit of her stomach and breaking her heart from the inside out went unnamed.
But there was one thing she knew. She didn't know how she knew it or even why it applied. But deep down in the rock bottom of her defeated heart, the three words echoed from the depths, crescendoing as they rose closer to the unnamed motive. The words mocked her in an unrelenting upsurge, until the only relief from their taunts was to voice the three words she never thought she would use with Alec:
"You blew it."
Go figure.
*****
"What is that?" Max asked with forced nonchalance, breaking Alec out of his trance. His head snapped up, momentarily confused. Of course, even in the direst of times he couldn't help but notice how sexy his clothes looked on her, under the flickering fluorescent light of the kitchen bulbs.
"A manila folder," he replied dryly before taking down another gulp of his bourbon. It was almost time for a refill he noticed, peering at the low meniscus in his glass. Max said something in reply, probably one of her oh-so-witty comebacks, but Alec was far too engrossed in his alcohol. Or rather, he was far to engrossed in what the alcohol was supposed to be chasing away. Pity it wasn't doing its job. "You're fired," Alec mumbled under his breath, placing the glass on the countertop. He walked across the room and glared out the window, all too conscious of Max's eyes boring into his every step.
Alec tried counting to ten. He tried taking deep breaths. He had tried drinking. Nothing was giving him the nerve to finish out his mission. If only he'd tried harder. If only he'd apologized when he should've. If only he hadn't been so damn cocky. If only...
"Hello!" Max's impatient voice pierced the silence, coming from right behind him. With transgenic grace, albeit startled grace, Alec whirled around and fell back against the wall.
The naked expression on his face made Max think twice and soften her tone. "Are you alright Alec? You seem kind of distracted."
Alec searched Max's eyes for some sign of hope but all he found was multi-layered confusion. It wasn't going to be enough. A sweet, pained look flashed across his face. It would be easier once it was over, he thought. It was far worse being right next to someone you couldn't touch than letting them drift away.
Stepping around a still bemused Max, he made his way for the folder, each step accompanied by a memory. Their first meeting at Manticore. The rehashing of Ben. The stand off at Jam Pony. Max being sick. Max taking care of him while he was sick. He arrived in front of the folder and picked it up carefully. A sigh rang out from him. Where to begin?
"I fell in love with you." Okay so that was roughly the middle, or maybe even towards the end.
This was never the scenario he played out in his head. Though a mere male and a soldier, even he had conjured up more "romantic" declarations of love. He'd always pictured it to be more like their first kiss, him practically having to throw her into a wall and yell it into her face. But that when he thought he was going to have to fight. This scenario was incredibly anti-climatic. Now he knew that he'd lost, he blew it. From the moment Max didn't rip him a new one for supposedly sleeping with Minette, he knew he'd lost. She didn't even care. The fight was over. She didn't love him.
Plunging ahead in his jumbled and incredibly "unromantic" speech, he dropped the airs, continuing on in defeated monotone. "I didn't sleep with Minette. I had every intention, but never went through with it. Another thing I failed at, huh Maxie?" He laughed in self-derision, staring at the folder, losing his nerve to look up at Max. He didn't want to see her disgust, or even worse, her pity. She loved Logan, deal with it. "So I'm in bed with this gorgeous woman, and all I could feel was your sick breath on my neck from that bug you caught. Or your fist smacking into my bicep. Or even your army tailored boot kicking me in my stomach from over six years ago.
"I am distracted. I have been distracted for over six years now. You really have this talent, Maxie, for getting under a guy's skin. You make me want to scratch my arm until it bleeds. And I have been scratching, for six years. But you know what? The itch doesn't subside; it only grows until I'm so frenzied I can't think straight. I'm ready to give up scratchin' and let my wounds heal."
He picked up the folder and tossed it to her like a frisbee. Max caught it out of reflex, but other than that her body was solid stone, frozen ice.
"They're the divorce papers. I managed to talk the authorities down a couple months; all you have to do is sign them. I already did. You can run them down by the court house tomorrow after you sign them and you can go live your happily ever after with Logan. Original Cindy has most of your stuff back over at her place; you can go back tonight." Under his breath, so soft that Max knew she wasn't supposed to have heard it, he continued.
"I'm tired of being married to a woman who's in love with another man."
Silence. Max glanced down at the folder, her ticket to sweet freedom.
Silence. Her fingertips traced to paper corners suspiciously before opening it up and glancing through it.
Silence. She closed the folder with a soft "whish".
Max regained her senses and stepped towards her husband slowly, as if afraid to startle him. He seemed no longer aware of her presence, lost in his own little world. An eerie wave of deja vu washed over her. Her hand reached out towards his shoulder but was intercepted by his own chiseled palm. "I don't want your pity," he sighed. Painstakingly slow, his head turned towards her, his eyes tracing her face. The wounded orbs started at her chin, weaving bit by bit up her jaw line, across her cheek, up the arc of her nose, and finally into her own pained eyes. He looked so vulnerable, ready to fall into her arms. His heart was on his sleeve. But she wasn't going to accept it. His eyes hardened in resolve, and he tossed her hand back to her, returning to his forgotten drink.
"Just go."
And Max did go. She made it all the way to her ninja before stopping.
It was feeling the rubber grips that made realize her first love - her baby, the extension of her soul -, was no longer her ninja.
It was Alec.
She spotted several "address-challenged" people gathered around a burning trashcan. Briskly crossing the distance between them she sidled up next to them, adding her offering to the stoked flames. The papers burned brightly, Max could feel her whole face alight in its glow. The ash remains drifted merrily through the air, as if they were pleased to have been burnt to a crisp. A woman next to her eyed her curiously. She turned a blazed a smile on the wary woman, the smile of a war torn soldier finally finding her way home. "I feel warmer already," she quipped. The woman managed a gap-toothed smile in return.
Blurring the distance, Max flew across the parking lot, through the abandoned lobby, up two flights of stairs and towards his door. Stopping short at the doorway, she knocked impatiently. The scuffle of feet crossing a tile floor was music to Max's ears. As the door cracked open, that tiny shred of light shining through, and Max knew the tidbit of information she'd been fighting for almost six years. She knew Its name.
She was at Home with Alec. She Loved him.
Go Figure.
The end.
God bless each and every one of you who reviewed and even those who didn't review but might have enjoyed the story. I fell in love with you all.
God bless (again),
Kricket.