Disclaimer: Jonathan Larson owns Rent and all of its characters. I, however, have the privilege to own all the unnamed characters and Ralph Wellerstein, Mathieu. Yay?
A/N: Now I'm changing tenses. Greeeeeeeeaaaaat. Haha… French… yeah. Thanks to Kris again for the names (Mathieu and Ralph Wellerstein.) This is a strange chapter. Yeah… ok. **Chapter 7, revised** because I needed to change the ending do chapter 8 will work. No, I won't tell you!
Chapter 7: Observance and Discovery
Here I sit, on a cold, half-empty bus to Quebec. I'm doing the only thing I can do at least halfway decently, filming. The red bulb shines faintly, competing with the sunlight shining through my window.
"January 16, 3:03 PM, Eastern Standard Time. On a bus to a town of separatists who speak a language I can't understand. Why?" I flick off the power switch. Why am I going? Because I'm a coward, a fucking coward. I'm afraid of being loved. Afraid someone might just love me and I won't be alone anymore. Alone. That's what I've grown used to. Humans adapt to their surroundings, no matter how awful they are. I didn't mind being alone as much as I thought I did. And then suddenly, Christmas Eve, it always seems to be on Christmas, everything flipped. I wasn't alone anymore, and I was enjoying it, to a certain extent.
I'm such a coward! And what had I yelled at Roger for when he left? Escaping his pain. Practice what you preach, Mark. I'm doing exactly the same thing, running from someone who loves me. All because I haven't re-adapted.
There's snow falling outside. We've reached the Canadian border, no maple trees yet, but a few customs officials in parkas who want to see my passport. I dig it out of the small suitcase sitting at my feet and hand it to the officials who say something in French. I turn my camera on again as the officials walk down the aisle of the bus.
"January 16, 7 PM, eastern standard time." I film the snow, the lack of maple trees, the other people on the bus, each with their own story. Some are chatting quietly in Franglish, some are sleeping; some are just staring aimlessly into space. To my camera, I wonder how may of them are communists. The officials leave the bus, and we continue across the border. Some of the occupants of the bus seem to relax a little as we leave the U.S. I notice a little boy, maybe six or seven years old staring at me with awe.
"Qu'est-ce que tu fait, monsieur?" he asks me. I shrug and smile uncomfortably.
"Uh… Je.ne…parlez? no… parle pas… Français" Hopefully he'll catch my accent. He giggles and repeats himself in heavily accented English. I can tell he's having trouble trying to figure out what to say.
"What are you doing, mister?"
"I'm filming things." I reply.
"Qu'est-ce que…eh…what're you filming?" The lady sitting next to him, presumably his mother, looks up at me and smiles.
"I'm filming the things I see. Freedom, truth, beauty, love." He laughs and says,
"You're silly, mister. You can't see that stuff." He comes over and sits next to me.
"Sure you can. What's your name?"
"Mathieu. And I'm SEVEN!" He holds up seven fingers to illustrate his point.
"I'm Mark, and I'm 23." I try to hold up 23 fingers, and that makes him laugh. "You can see anything, you just have to look at in the right way. It's all in the way you see stuff." I point to the toy dinosaur he's holding, "who's that?"
"Ralph Wellerstein. He's my bestest friend!" I laugh.
"What's his story?" Mathieu's eyes almost glow with excitement.
"Well, he was lonely, and I found him in a gutter, and he needed a friend so I said I'd be his friend. And he told me how he got in the gutter. His mum was teaching him how to fly and he fell and…" he starts babbling in Franglish, explaining the story with his hands. I film.
"What's your story?" he asks suddenly, startling me. No one has ever asked me that. Ever.
"What?" I reply, just to make sure I heard him right.
"What's your story? Why are you going to Canada? You don't even speak the right language!" I tell him my story, omitting about half of it, as I didn't think his mother would be too terribly happy if I told him about suicide and drugs. I tell him about Roger, April, Maureen and Collins. Everything that's happened, shortened and censored, he'll find out about that stuff soon enough. I tell him about Liz, and reach the end of the story.
"You should go back to her. I see it!"
"See what?" His mom asks
"Love. I see love."
I knock on the door of the loft 28 hours later. Please, please forgive me, Liz, please. There's no answer. I knock again, louder. This time, I hear footsteps coming to the door. The door swings open and Liz stands in the doorway. She's obviously been crying.
"Mark?" She hugs me and pulls me inside. I see the back of a familiar head.
"What's wrong? Why's Roger here?" She grabs my arm gently.
"Get some sleep. A lot happens in 48 hours."