Disclaimer: I own nothing. This is just for fun.
AN: Please don't hate me for the original character. She's a plot device, that's it! Honest! She serves a purpose, nothing more. Please don't hate me for her!
Mark worked an extra half-shift. He saw no downside, just the occupation of a few hours, mindless work to keep Mark from his depression, his attraction, his dreary freezing loft. He told himself the time thinking about himself instead of Roger would do him good. He would think instead of how to heal his own life.
Yet Mark thought of his wages not as dollars, but as pill bottles. He worked not in terms of hours but of little capsules of AZT. He left not with the promise of a paycheck, but a few more healthy days. He didn't earn money. He earned Roger.
By the time Mark returned to the loft, eight o'clock had rolled around. He locked the door, clicked on a light, but the motions felt empty. There was no inspiration. The day-to-day habits, logical little things Mark's analytical brain understood, were just that, just habits. He needed more. Mark needed to know that he locked the door for safety. He needed to know that he lit the room for work or vision. He needed to feel something.
"Rog, you up?" Mark called, knocking on Roger's door. He wandered into the room without awaiting a response, because no response was coming. "Roger." Mark reached out one hand and touched Roger's bare shoulder. The connection made his heart race. Close. He needed that, the closeness. He felt it; it hurt. "Roger." Mark shook.
"What is it?" Roger muttered into his pillow.
"Um… I guess just hi," Mark admitted. "I'm home. Thought you might be worried, so I called. You got the message?"
Roger nodded. "Yeah. Extra shift."
"Okay. Well… I'm going to take a shower… you need one, too," he added, gently tugging at Roger's hair. "Your hair's disgusting. You can go first if you want to." It was the nicest gesture Mark had the energy to conjure up.
"I'd just use up all the hot water. If you're gonna whack off you need the heat."
"I--what?" Mark considered himself fairly accustomed to the things that came out of Roger's mouth, but this had him floored.
Roger explained, "It's like tenth grade biology, Mark. Cold makes your balls shrink."
"Well-- I-- okay."
"Still think about Maureen when you do it?" Roger asked.
No, I think about you. "No, I think about cars." Without a word further, Mark rose and left the room. He thought he heard Roger giggling into his pillow, but surely that was a figment of desire. Shaking his head, Mark locked the bathroom door then reached into the shower and twisted the farthest knob. Pipes ground and protested from deep within the walls, whined and wailed and at last spat.
Waiting for the water to warm up, Mark folded his clothes. It was an old habit, but a comfortable one. It made sense to him. The neat, organized garments perched on the back of the toilet, safe from spray and overflow, sure to be dry when he emerged from the shower.
He folded his shirt carefully and thought about the coming day. Maybe he would film in Times' Square. But no, that couldn't be. It was winter, the tourists were crawling from the woodwork. Mark needed someplace true.
Just as he was stepping out of his trousers, there came a knock at the door. "You had your chance!" Mark snapped crossly.
"Take off your star," Roger replied.
"What?"
Raising his voice to be heard over the waterfall, Roger insisted, "Don't forget to take off your Star of David."
Mark's hand flew to his neck. Sure enough, the thin gold chain hung against his skin, warm enough to go unnoticed. He had nearly showered in it. "Thanks." He finished folding his clothes, then let the necklace crumple grandly atop the pile and stepped into the steam. Droplets of water pounded against his skin, burning like acid. "Thank G-d." Mark's nerves awoke. He felt. It hurt, and he loved it.
Mark emerged from the bathroom warm, damp and grinning. "It's a nice feeling," Roger said. Mark raised his eyes and blinked in disbelief; there stood Roger, at the sink, pouring soup powder into the milk-and-water mixture in the pot. "Being clean," Roger elaborated. His hair clung to his skull, soaked into a felted mess. "That's a joke. Get it? Because I used to be a junkie. Now I'm clean. You just had a shower, so now you're clean."
"You… washed… cooked… You're out of your room!" Mark cried. "You're up!"
Roger grinned. He looked something like a vampire, with his skin so pale and smudges around sunken eyes. "You said, 'you're up,'" he informed Mark with a wicked look on his face.
"Yeah, right. Glad to know you're feeling better," Mark commented sarcastically.
Ignoring him, Roger asked, "Have you ever been camping?"
"What?"
"Camping. You know, you pitch a tent, roll out your sleeping bag, store food in a tree, have a campfire…"
"No. What are you talking about?" As pleased as Mark was that Roger had emerged from his bedroom, this random conversation worried him. What if Roger had left more than the bedroom? "Are you high?"
Roger bit down his first impulse, to stalk into his bedroom and shut the door. His head hurt from the effort. I thought you meant it, Mark. I thought you weren't just saying that you knew I'd be all right, because you made me believe it, too. "Of course not," Roger replied. Stop it, he told himself. You're supposed to be used to this. You fucked up. You're paying the price.
What could easily have become catastrophe melted to nothingness at the sound of a knock on the door. Roger bit his lip. "You want me to…" He could not even ask the question.
"Are you ready for… people?" Mark asked. "You know it's not Collins or Maureen."
"Do you mind if I…" Roger vaguely indicated his room.
Mark shook his head. "No, but you'd better not stay in there." Roger nodded and disappeared. Mark took a deep breath, crossed the room and hauled open the door.
Whatever he had expected, this was not it. Mark would not, in his wildest dreams, have imagined that he would throw open the door to reveal a girl about his height with two dark braids and a bright smile. She clicked off her flashlight when Mark opened the door. "Hi!"
"Um… hi. Do I know you? You're familiar somehow, but…" but I don't have you on film.
"We spoke earlier," the girl explained, "on the telephone. I'm from the clinic. Can I come in?"
Mark stepped back, and the girl stepped inside. Shit! He remembered suddenly when Roger loved castles. For pointless hours, Roger would ramble on about medieval lords, defense, about sieges and never letting in anyone who was not a friend. "My name's Kathryn Brennan," she said. "I want to talk to Roger, if that's okay."
Without a thought, Mark found himself nodding. "I'll just go… see if Roger's awake," he said. "Wait here."
Roger sat cross-legged on the bed, shaking his head purposefully. Before Mark had the question out, Roger told him, "I'm asleep. I don't want to see anyone from the clinic, Mark."
Mark nodded. "Okay." Somehow it didn't seem completely important to him that this might be good for Roger. The clinic helped Roger ease off the drugs, but Roger kept himself clean, not the clinic. Mark had never known a grown man to chafe at the bit as Roger did.
"Sorry," he told the girl from the clinic. "Roger's asleep."
"Look, this isn't what you think it is," she assured Mark, shaking her head slightly. "I'm not here to check up on him. I just want to see if he's okay."
"Okay, well… how is that different?"
She sighed. "I'm from the clinic, the clinic didn't send me," she explained. "I'm here… just me. Just to see if Roger's okay. Like a friend."
Mark chewed the inside of his cheek. She could be lying, easily, but he identified too strongly with her perspective to want her to be. In her situation, he probably would do the same. "Wait right here," he said, and slipped into Roger's room.
"She's lying," Roger decreed baldly. "I don't know her--"
Before he could finish, there was a slamming knock on his door. The boys jumped. "Roger?" It was the girl. "Roger, it's Katie. Please let me in."
Roger looked at Mark, who only shrugged. He sighed. "All right." Roger stood, shaking pins from his left leg, and shuffled to the door. He opened it a few inches; Katie stood before him, her shoulders squared but considerably lower than his, anyway. "Go home," Roger told her. "Okay? You've seen me, you got what you came for, so go home." With that he turned and slammed the door on her, leaving Katie open-mouthed.
Mark gaped. He had known Roger to be callous, but never without purpose. Before Mark had the chance to say as much, Katie knocked again and called out, "Roger! I just want to help--"
"Katie, go home! Your parents are worried about you."
"My parents are dead!"
Mark asked quietly, "You just shouted at an orphan?"
Roger shook his head. "I didn't know…"
"I know you can hear me," Katie continued. "Roger, I like you a lot. You're a really good person and a really good musician. And your boyfriend seems really nice, too." Roger looked at Mark, his eyes widening, but Mark shook his head. I never told her that! "I don't want him to go through what I went through… what you went through…. My mom overdosed," she offered. "And I found her dead from it. Roger, please, I just don't want… you to die."
Mark looked at Roger and raised his eyebrows, asking, Aren't you going to do anything?
Roger swallowed and called, "I have AIDS, Katie."
"You're HIV positive," Katie replied. "You do not have AIDS."
Well, Mark seemed to say, staring at Roger. Roger took a step towards the door, then took a step back. He shook his head, crossed the room and flung open the door. Katie hadn't moved at inch: she was glaring at Roger, her eyes hard and hurt. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'm sorry about your mom."
Katie shrugged. "I liked you," she said, "because you knew what it was like. Because you found April. And you were good, and smart, and… well… You take your AZT, don't you? Because you know, it counteracts the virus. It could help you live for years. I've read the reports. Please take your AZT."
Mark felt a fist clench his stomach. He knew all too well the pain of perpetuating an unwanted life. But to his surprise, Roger only swallowed hard and nodded. "Yeah," he promised.
What? Mark thought angrily. He knew it was a stupid, selfish thing to be angry about, but he couldn't help himself. He spent weeks cajoling, coaxing, crying, trying to convince Roger to continue living, then with only five minutes this girl achieves just that. It wasn't fair. Yeah, he told himself, but I have parents and I have Cindy, and, for what it's worth Roger. I'm not jealous of this girl.
But he was. He was jealous of her sway over Roger. Despairing of his own goodness, Mark turned to Roger and sighed with relief. Roger was a liar. Mark saw it in his eyes. Roger was placating this girl, telling her what she needed to hear because he pitied her. Disgusted with the smile tugging at his lips, Mark thought, At least he's honest with me.
"Okay," Katie said. "Look, I just needed to be sure. I'm sorry to barge in on you like this; I'll go. Bye. Take your AZT, Roger."
"I will," Roger lied.
Why doesn't he ever want to protect me? Why doesn't he--no. No! I can't do this. I can't rely on him, can't need him. But, I do. No! Mark clenched his fist, letting his nails bite into the soft flesh of his palm.
"Nice meeting you, Mark."
Mark found himself volunteering, "I'll walk you to the subway." What?
But already she was smiling. "Thank you."
Damn.
TO BE CONTINUED
