Originally posted to AO3 on August 31, 2022. Or was September 1st then already? Can't remember, was inebriated.
10 PM.
Nathan's in the twilight of his room, the only light provided by his bedside lamp. There's a half-drunk bottle of whiskey on his table and a lit cig in his hands.
Nathan is just starting to swim and it feels good. It's one of those rare, oh-so welcome days where he doesn't feel like he might snap like a dry twig in a hydraulic press. There are no medications in him either – only the sweet, relaxing breeze of tobacco on his brain's surface.
He doesn't really partake in booze outside of parties, but when he does, it's a special occasion every time - a slow, subtle rush no other drug can give.
For once, Nathan feels at the top of the world, like a Prescott is supposed to feel; how his father probably feels and how he thinks Nathan should feel. All anxieties, uncertainties, memories, voices – all drown under then sweet liquor.
(Not all – there a tiny, small, insignificant voice that, once in a while, rears its' ugly fucking head and drills, begs, orders him to take his meds and drown then down with whiskey. Wouldn't it be fun. It'll be quick. You'll succeed this time. Nathan doesn't listen, not today. Today, he is, for once, Nathan Prescott, the God-King of this hickhole called Arcadia Bay.)
Nathan's working a digital photograph on his computer, running it through a myriad of filters, palettes, through everything the editor has to offer. It's a masterpiece in the making, if only he can just get it right. It's not even for Jefferson – FUCK Jefferson, the collective ethanol in his blood cries out as one; no, this is for Nathan, and Nathan only. Not quite his Magnum Opus, but a stepping stone to it. Like Jefferson, like Blackwell, like this entire fucking town.
Nathan's head and thoughts are unreasonably clear. So is his hearing, as he hears rapid footsteps approaching his dorm room. Not a second later, as Prescott turns around in his chair, in barges Rachel Amber – the treasure of Blackwell, the Second Sun of Arcadia Bay, Grade-A Hypocritical Bitch and a dozen other sickly-sweet nicknames follow her inside. Same old fashionably ripped jeans, same old red plaid skirt, same old giant blue earring that shakes and hums with the energy of its' owner.
That's Rachel Amber alright, and the look in her eyes in something Nathan can't really recognize.
"The fuck you want?" he slurs ever so slightly.
"He-fucking-llo to you too, Prescott," Rachel snipes back and jumps on his bed like it's hers, "I need a hit. You got any?"
Nathan thinks for a second, then picks up his bottle of whiskey, drags it over to Rachel and offers it. Without a word but with a slightly exasperated headshake, she accepts the bottle and starts drinking.
And drinking.
And drinking.
Before long, Prescott in his alcohol fueled frustration grabs the bottle just as Rachel is about to get to the last quarter of it, spraying the liquid all over her clothes and making her hack and cough.
"Th' fuck- you bitch!" she spews whiskey all over the carpet.
Her boldness to call him a bitch in his own room, her mannerisms – hell her entire presence – all send Nathan into a white-hot rage for only just a second, but enough to ignite him from within. "Who the fuck died and made you God, whore? Be fucking grateful I didn't bash your fucking head in with the bottle soon as you came in."
"Whatthefuckever," Rachel mimics him. Nathan burns even harder. There's an itch in the back of his brain now – a fuse that's just begging to be lit. The currents of alcohol send his brain swimming in a certain direction. He wants her to piss him off. "I asked you for a hit, not some cheap-ass whiskey."
"You accepted it," Nathan drawls.
"I'd be a bigger idiot than Icky Vicky to refuse free booze," Rachel smiles sweetly, her voice full of hidden malice. An insult to Victoria almost makes him violent.
"Don't got any on me now. Fuck right back off," he waves at her, suppressing the rage for now, then goes to sit back in the chair and takes a hearty swig. The bottle holds a faint taste of her perfume, of her lipstick. Fuck, whiskey's ruined.
"Aww, you're telling me Nathan Prescott, the biggest junkie on campus, doesn't have anything at all in his room besides some lousy booze and prescription?"
The fuse in the back of his mind has been lit. Amber's going down today. He lets it burn, calmly building up the rage. "Even if I had, I'd share fuck-all with you, cunt," he dismissively drops, slurring more evident. "You wanna hit? Hayden's and Trevor's rooms are down the hall. Go and use your," Nathan shakes his hands, "feminine charms, little Miss Perfect. Pretty sure you'll both get a hit and get to smash. Maybe call your blue-haired fucktoy tag-along too, so you can," a cough and a quick drag of his cigarette, "persuade them better."
The room is swimming now, blurred, almost surreal in its' practically black-and-white appearance. There's a symbolism to it – like it's one of Nathan's signature monochrome pictures. A moment to be captured. A moment that will forever be remembered by all who see it. Distantly, a fleeting thought passes and Nathan wishes he'd had a third arm on his back so he could grab his camera and capture this moment. A bitch Rachel Amber may be, but that she is a born model is undeniable.
How would she look like in black and white?
Nathan's not paying any attention to Amber, looking at his own reflection in the man-sized mirror when there's a presence that suddenly materializes by his chair that grabs his shirt and drags the boy up.
Rachel's enraged face is looking up at him. Her eyes are beautiful in the dim light and so fierce, like a raging wildfire, that Nathan himself would probably take a few steps back. But not today. The liquid courage's keeping him up.
"Don't you dare," she hisses and it's like a cobra ready to strike, "bring Chloe into this. Don't you fucking dare."
Nathan stares at her with indifference, with superiority, but inside, he's white hot already, the fuse's about to end. Rachel, at his silence, explodes herself, "She is the best fucking thing to walk this Earth," she crashes her words into him, already slightly slurring herself, "You don't know shit about me. I would never betray her. We are happy. That is something you will never feel, you bitch."
"I know," Nathan says simply, like saying "Hello" or "Fuck". There's a certain alcohol induced calmness, about the admittance. He figured out that much ages ago. His dear old dad made sure of it. Victoria was one good constant in his life (as he was in hers), but he knew even she couldn't do shit about the absolute garbage dump Sean Prescott left behind in Nathan's soul.
The fuse has reached its' destination. Nathan seethes. It isn't a volcanic, explosive kind of rage. It's the calm one, the scary one.
"I don't need to know you Rachel. I can see exactly what you are."
Lightly pushing Rachel away, Nathan walks up to his mirror and smashes it with his fist. The crack of it is like a wake-up signal to his brain, the cracks on the mirror a metaphor for this entire situation. The pain from impact is rolled over by a tide of alcohol high, like a warm blanket over his eternally cold body.
He turns to Rachel, who stares at him, wide-eyed, in fright. He walks back, causing her to take a few steps back in fear.
"This," he speaks with heaviness in his voice, pointing and the fractured mirror, "is what you are. Come, take a look at yourself."
Without waiting for her reply, he grabs Rachel by her hands and drags her towards the mirror.
Rachel screams. "Let go, you bitch! Let fucking g-"
Before she knows it, Nathan places her in front of the mirror and lets her look. Her visage is distorted, destroyed, wrong. It doesn't look like Rachel Amber.
"This is you," Nathan says once again, pointing at the mirror. "And these," he gently touches the cracks that divide the mirror, "are the fucking masks you wear for others."
"This is Dana Ward."
With force, he grabs at one of the cracks and pulls, dropping a mirror fragment on the carpet. His hand's bleeding from a cut, but he doesn't feel, nor notice it. Rachel watches him with shocked eyes, unable to tear her eyes away.
"This is Juliet whateverthefuckherlastnameis"
Another shard falls down violently. More cuts on his hand.
"Hayden."
"Trevor."
"Justin"
The fragments fall down, one by one, like raindrops in a squall, littering the floor. They're marred with Nathan's blood as he furiously rips them from the mirror.
Nathan's drunk, but, for once, he feels clear as ice.
"Stella."
"Alyssa."
"That fag Graham."
"Zack."
The names keep rolling, the pieces keep falling. Nathan's hand is entirely red and Rachel cannot stop staring at what he is doing. Finally, he gets to the largest unfractured piece left of the mirror.
"Finally," Nathan breathes out exhaustedly, "your Chloe," he says with contempt. Grabbing the piece with both hands, he bloodies it and knocks it to the ground.
Nothing is left of the mirror. Nothing but gaping darkness where something should be.
"And this," Prescott announces, pointing at that same darkness, at that void, "is you, Rachel Amber. This is what you see when you close your eyes. This is what's left of you when all the masks are gone."
Rachel stares at him, her expression gradually shifting from shock to something he can't read; something akin to horrified anger, maybe? He looks her back in the eyes, his own anger spent, his hand already starting to ache pretty bad, and he swears he sees the beginnings of tears in them.
Before he can react, Nathan's is pushed back into the space previously occupied by the mirror, and Rachel sprints out of his room. Her footsteps quiet and disappear quickly.
She's gone now. Good riddance.
Nathan reaches for his whiskey with the bloodied hand, thinks better of it, reaches out with his less-injured hand, grabs the bottle and downs it in mere seconds, then looks back.
Nathan looks back at the broken mirror pieces on the floor, blood stains on the carpet and the shards themselves, at his heavily distorted reflection of himself in those shards, and freezes. A few seconds later, he crosses the room for his monochrome camera, comes back, finds the exact position he was in, and takes the shot.