I saw this comment from a popular '70s Show fanfic writer that perfectly summed up the way I write my stories:
"The characters chose what they wanted to do, and I copied it down. They often surprised me – sometimes shocked me – with their actions, but it felt right story-wise, so I didn't force them to behave differently ... So thank you, Hyde, for being such a strong presence in my skull that all I needed to do was watch and listen to you and write down what I saw and heard."
That's essentially exactly what these characters do in my own skull, especially the ones telling their viewpoints in Lethe.
xx
He didn't like to close his eyes. He didn't like to dream.
When he slept, when he dreamt, he dreamt of them.
The two women who had meant more in his life than he could ever adequately express, despite being a man of many words who enjoyed using them in whatever way possible.
He dreamt of Brenda, trapped on a train; only, in Brandon's dreams - or, rather, his nightmares - Brenda never got off. He would get the call, always the same gruff voice, informing him that Brenda's body was to be prepared by the coroner for burial and Brandon would be given the role of pallbearer.
In other nightmares, it was Kelly. Collapsed in a parking lot. Bleeding out, as Brenda had. The same fucking phone call. The same fucking preparation.
Only, he had been there when Kelly had been shot, when her pain had begun.
He hadn't been there for Brenda's.
He'd been across several oceans, reporting on playground politicians' quests for power in fucking Washington D.C., and his nightmares never let him forget it.
The nightmares always ceased when Brenda's screams began, but the memory of what had nearly been tortured Brandon as he went about his daily routine, as he had begun to hate the good days.
The good days meant the bad days were waiting to rear their grotesque heads. He had faced the brunt of those bad days, when he could barely get Brenda to leave the apartment, or when the fatigue in the early stages of her pregnancy had mingled horribly with her then-immensely unstable mindset.
Leaving Australia had helped, but what had helped the most, to Brandon's surprise, was Dylan.
Dylan had always possessed a softer side with Brenda that he had lacked with anyone else, except perhaps Antonia Marchette.
But, having seen Dylan's and Toni's relationship firsthand, Brandon could say that Dylan had never reached the exact level of tenderness and protection with Toni as he had with Brenda.
Seeing Dylan taking care of Brenda reminded Brandon of the way Dylan had been after surgery on Brenda's fibroadenoma, or after Brenda's stickup in the Peach Pit. Brandon didn't know how Dylan had been with Brenda in London before their disastrous split. Perhaps he had been the same. Perhaps it was his default attitude when it came to Brenda.
What Brandon did know was it was difficult to remain infuriated with the man who had become the person Brenda frequently reached towards when the train rolled by.
The man who awoke Brandon with his own screams from a trauma Dylan didn't want to speak of; screams that must have kicked off Valerie's screams, so that three people screamed in the night.
Brandon didn't know why Dylan screamed. He had assumed he knew the source of Val's nightmares, but it had been nothing more than an assumption that he had started to doubt. After rushing to Val's side several times to offer Val comfort from her own nightmares, Brandon realized that whatever Val screamed about went beyond her father's suicide.
Brandon found himself wanting to know about their screams.
He wondered if they heard him scream.
He wondered if he did scream.
Though Brandon's main priorities continued to be Brenda and Valerie, he had begun to lose the war when it came to guarding himself from Dylan.
Against his will, Brandon had started to take care of Dylan, too; perhaps to quiet Dylan's terrors.
He wanted to be infuriated with Dylan, with Kelly. He wanted to be able to shut off that part of his old life and move on with someone new, someone like Alina Kailis.
But it haunted him, the memory of Kelly. The memory of sitting by her bedside unsure if she would live, the memory of working to help her remember him, the memory of the wedding they could have gone through with; the life they could have had and the child they almost did.
Brenda had caught on much too quickly for Brandon's liking.
Steve had proven that when he told Brandon that Brenda had been asking about Kelly, about the events that had occurred between Brandon and Kelly.
Steve had become one of Brenda's drivers on the days when Brandon and Val couldn't; an arrangement that Brandon could tell bothered Dylan, though Dylan tried his best to not show it as he waited for Brenda's renewed permission for drop-offs and pickups.
It had been during a drop-off that Brenda had first questioned Steve. Steve had attempted to distract Brenda. He had at first succeeded, but by the third interrogation, Brenda had worn him down.
"What'd you tell her?" asked Brandon when Steve confessed that he had given in.
"I told her what I myself know, which is next to nothing. Something about you two feeling too platonic or some shit, and that thing about birds. Plus some letter Val wrote."
"Second time I've heard about Val's letter, which I promise you, I never even read. What'd Bren say to that?"
"She wondered what birds had to do with anything and then asked if you normally kiss people, sleep with people, and almost marry people who you love platonically."
"Of course she did. Val asked the same."
"How you and Kel ever thought you could pretend this platonic shit without people questioning it - especially the people who heard you and Kel through the walls while they were trying to get some themselves - is beyond me."
"You've been spending way too much time with Bren."
"I need to spend more time with her, 'cause Clare only stops by when I tell her Bren's around."
"You are not using taking care of my sister to entice Clare back to you."
"Of course not. I'm taking care of Bren 'cause I love her. Having Clare join us is just a perk."
It was, therefore, hardly surprising when Brenda sat down beside Brandon with her usual cuppa, turned his head with a biscuit, and fired off a request to meet Kelly.
All Brandon could think to do was utter a weak Why?
"I want to see if she's suitable stepmother material," said Brenda.
Brandon almost choked on his coffee, which scalded his throat in response. "Excuse me?" he asked, perhaps more harshly than intended as he shoved another biscuit into his mouth.
He wasn't sure if he could look at store bought American cookies or crackers the same way after months of European biscuits and Australian Jatz.
But he did plan to move back; eventually.
He didn't think he was suited for a permanent life in Europe the way Brenda and Dylan were.
"It would seem Dylan frequently goes back to this Kelly person," said Brenda. "If that is the case, she's bound to be in my daughter's life, and I would like to meet her to see if she would be a decent stepmother, or one of those evil ones the fairytales like to speak of."
"Have you talked to Dylan about this?" asked Brandon, knowing Dylan would be none too pleased by the idea.
"I tried, but Dylan's method is to distract me with the videotapes any time I even mention Kelly. He's convinced himself that the more I watch them, the more something will spark."
"Has it?"
Brenda told her brother it hadn't.
"But it has made you closer to Dylan, hasn't it?" asked Brandon. "I noticed you've been gravitating toward his lap."
"I just really like his lap," said Brenda. "I can't explain it. Maybe he has a nice lap and maybe he'll be sharing it with Kelly soon enough."
If Brenda brought up Kelly in relation to Dylan one more time, Brandon could not be held responsible for his inevitable retching.
"This isn't about Kelly and I, is it?" asked Brandon.
"I thought there wasn't a Kelly and you," said Brenda cheekily. "Too platonic, right? Steady chandeliers, or whatever?"
"There isn't a Kelly and Dylan, either."
"But there might be."
"Kelly and Dylan? Gonna say that's officially finito, Bren," said Valerie as she entered in with Steve. Brandon silently thanked Val for her unusual impeccable timing. "Besides the fact that those two are a godawful match," she continued, "Dicklyn and the Blonde are barely on speaking terms."
"Why do you call her the Blonde?" asked Brenda.
"Because she is blonde," said Valerie with an unbothered shrug.
"Steve's blond and you don't call him the Blond." Brenda punctured her words by pointing at Steve.
"I could call him the Blond," said Val. "And maybe if he wasn't so hung up on Clare, the Blond and I would get down and dir -"
"Oh my God," said Brenda. "You're worse than Brandon is."
"Hey!" said Brandon.
"Whatever do you mean, Bren?" asked Val.
"I mean, you're clearly in love with David, he's clearly in love with you, Steve's clearly in love with Clare, Clare's clearly in love with him, and Brandon is so obviously not over Kelly that I don't understand why you all are being so obtuse as to continue denying your feelings when your lives could be snatched away at any moment. Any of you could be perfectly healthy one minute and in a life-altering accident the next, so why waste all this time being miserable apart?" Brenda exploded.
Valerie looked at Brandon. Brandon glanced at Steve. Steve stared open-mouthed at Brenda.
"Bren, the relationship between me and David is extremely complicated," said Val.
"Things are only complicated when you make them that way," said Brenda.
"You think Clare's in love with me?" asked Steve. "Did she tell you that?"
"She didn't have to tell me," answered Brenda. "You don't keep a picture in your flat of someone you no longer love, or someone you wish you didn't love. You box it up and put it in the garage."
"But she's with Kai," said Steve, uncertain.
"Is she?" asked Brenda. "I thought Kai's -"
Brandon's eyebrows skyrocketed as Val's hand covered Brenda's mouth.
"Shit." Val quickly removed her hand. "Bren, I'm so sorry. It was habit. We used to do that to each other all the time, and I; it was habit. I won't do it again. Swear."
Brandon braced himself for the normal reaction Brenda had when she was touched without warning, for the bad day that would interrupt her otherwise good day and send her spiraling.
But Brenda didn't respond in her usual way. Instead, she grabbed Brandon's and Val's respective hands and set them against her stomach.
"There's no way you can't feel that," said Brenda.
"Still noth -" Brandon started, and then cut himself off.
He absolutely did feel that.
Brandon stood awed by the indescribable movement against his hand.
Valerie grinned almost as brightly as Brenda.
"You feel it, don't you?" asked Brenda.
"That's amazing," said Brandon and Val at once.
"Can I feel?" Steve jutted out his own hand.
"You better not," said Brenda. "Not until Dylan does."
Shit, thought Brandon.
"I felt her kick before Dylan did?" he asked.
"Oh, this is delicious," said Val.
"Please don't tease him about it," said Brenda. "He was nervous enough about going to therapy today and I think it'll do a lot of good for him."
"Don't know what you're talkin' about," said Val innocently.
Steve snorted. Valerie stuck out her tongue at Steve. Steve eyed her tongue with interest and then shook his head, as if he were mentally reprimanding himself for something or other.
"I have to get laid," he muttered.
"Here's my phone." Brandon held out the phone in question without removing his hand from his athletic niece. "Call Clare."
"Why, so she can tell me how great Kai is?" asked Steve derisively. "Val does that plenty as it is."
As if on cue, the phone began to ring.
Brenda snatched it from her brother's grasp.
"Brandon's phone," she said. "Are you calling to get Steve or Brandon laid? 'Cause Bran really needs it."
"Brenda!" said Brandon, as Steve cackled.
"It's a woman," Brenda told them. "Are you a blonde?" she asked the phone. After a beat, she asked, "Kelly?"
"I'll take that," said Brandon, grabbing the phone from her. "Kel?"
"No, it's Donna. Wanna tell me why Bren thinks I'm Kel?" asked Donna.
Brandon cringed.
"Bad connection?" he tried. "Too much static? International phone lines gone haywire? How often do you call internationally? Maybe it's a problem with your phone company." He dissolved into nervous laughter. "How 'bout you give them a ca -"
"Brandon Walsh," Donna cut him off, "you tell me what's going on right this instant!"
"Didn't you call for a reason?" he tried to divert.
"I was going to ask your advice on something, but it's no longer important."
"My advice about what?"
"Noah and D'Shawn and; oh, it doesn't matter. What the heck is going on?" Donna shrieked. "And don't try to blame it on issues with my phone service, Brandon! I had no problem when my parents called from Ireland the other day."
"We're a bit farther than Ireland."
"Brandon!"
Brandon held the phone away from his ear.
"Bren, do you want to talk to Donna?" he asked.
Brenda looked at Val.
"Do I want to talk to Donna?" asked Brenda.
"Up to you, Bren," said Val from her spot under Steve's arm. "Just know that if Donna finds out about everything, Kelly won't be far behind. They're inseparable."
Brenda grabbed at the phone.
"You're Donna?" she asked.
Steve, Brandon, and Valerie all crowded around Brenda, listening as closely as they could to the conversation.
"Bren," said Donna, "I'm going to ask you a question and I'd like you to answer, okay?"
"Okay," said Brenda.
"When me and you were in Paris, what were you desperate to find?"
"Uh, I'm not sure." Brenda mulled it over. "The Louvre?"
"Let's try this," said Donna. "I told you something I've never told anyone, not even Kel, Clare, or David. I specifically told you I'd never said it to anyone else. What did I say?"
"An embarrassing moment?" guessed Brenda.
"Last one," said Donna. "Before you left for London, me and you did something with Celeste to distract that sleazy John Sears so Steve could beat him. What did we do?"
"Who's Celeste?" asked Brenda.
"Celeste," said Steve dreamily.
"Clare," said Val.
"Clare and Celeste," said Steve without changing his tone.
Donna commanded Brenda to give the phone back to Brandon, who once more held it away from his ear as Donna screamed out, "Tell me now, Brandon!"
"Can I tell her, Bren?" asked Brandon.
"It's fine with me," Brenda shrugged before asking Steve if he would watch television with her.
Val joined them. Brandon excused himself.
"Brandon!" Donna said again.
"Donna, you knew Brenda had been in the hospital."
"I did," said Donna. "I went straight to Dylan when we got back to LA to hint at it."
"Why didn't you tell him outright?"
"I would've, if he hadn't lied."
"Is that also why you didn't tell him about the pregnancy?"
"I wasn't sure he deserved to know, but I also wasn't sure he didn't deserve to know."
"He knows it all now. What you don't know is exactly how badly Bren was hurt."
"She thought she was talking to Kelly," said Donna. "I think I have some idea." Donna poorly attempted to stifle a sob. "Bran, does Bren know who I am?"
"She knows of you."
"Does that mean Bren has amn - amnesia?" Donna asked, the last word coming out in a strangled whisper.
Brandon had never been too great with hearing Donna cry and that moment was no different.
Hearing the recognizable gasp, Brandon hit his head against the wall.
"Brenda has amnesia?" shrieked a second blonde.
Next thing Brandon knew, Kelly's voice sounded clearly against his ear.
"Bren?" she asked.
"Brandon," he said.
"Brandon! Are you serious? Brenda has amnesia? What the hell happened?"
"It - it was bad, Kel." After months of emotional buildup, months of remaining the strong one as his family battled their upsetting memories, Brandon finally allowed himself to break. His shoulders rumbled. "Really bad. I came so close to losing her."
"Oh, Bran." A tenderness snuck into Kelly's voice, one Brandon had come to know well during their romance. "Is there any way I can help?"
"You want to help?"
"It wasn't that long ago that I had amnesia myself, you know."
"I remember."
"So maybe I can use that experience to help Bren somehow. I've been searching for a way to be better, Bran. Maybe this is it. Maybe this is the way. Maybe this is how I can try to repair things between Bren and I. It won't erase what I said to her, about her, the things I did to her. It can't erase it. I can't make up for it, but I do really wanna help, Bran. Bren must be so scared. I know I was."
"What about Matt?" asked Brandon. "I doubt he'll take too kindly to his girlfriend jetting off, and sorry Kel, but I'd rather have a run-in with a ravenous shark than invite Matt out here, to my place."
"What about Matt?" Kelly echoed.
"There's no Matt?"
"I came to tell Donna that Matt told me he's attracted to her."
"He did?" asked Brandon, flabbergasted. "How did that go?"
"It's probably better that way," said Kelly. "I tried to feel something for Matt, but it just wasn't happening and he's too nice of a guy to pretend to have feelings for. Don isn't about to get with him or anything since she's currently torn over Noah and D'Shawn - although I'm pretty sure Noah's cheating on her with Gina, who I'm pretty damn sure likes Matt - but -"
"D'Shawn? My D'Shawn?"
"Oh yeah, he ran into Donna and he's been stopping into the store every chance he gets," said Kelly. "But anyway, back to Brenda. Don and I can clear our schedule to go out to London and visit her."
"We're not in London." Brandon hesitated and told Kelly to hold on.
He thought Steve would throw the remote at him when he stood between Steve and the television to catch Brenda's attention.
"Bren, they want to visit you," said Brandon.
"Shocker," said Val.
"Perfect," said Brenda. "Tell them to come."
"We've been holding off the family and your London friends," Brandon protested.
"I think I'd like Donna," said Brenda, "and I want to meet Kelly."
"I know you do, but -"
"If you don't invite her, I'm gonna assume it's because you're admitting you still love her," Brenda sassed.
Brandon glared and handed her the phone. "You want to invite them, then you do it."
"Make sure Kel knows I'm here," said Val. "That'll put her off."
It did not put Kelly off, especially when she heard Clare's voice when Clare dropped in to check on Brenda.
And when David stopped in to add more CD's to the wobbling pile on the table, only to deal with his sister and ex-girlfriend yelling at him from across the world.
Then it was Steve's turn to get yelled at, whilst Brenda leant against Val and watched with a detached, amused air.
Brandon knew of at least one person who wouldn't be so amused.
xx
He wondered if she secretly thought her bed lonely.
He wondered if she somehow knew, perhaps purely by instinct, how it had felt when they had shared a bed together.
He wondered if she would ever let him share her bed again.
He hoped for it. He continued to cling to that hope, to that dream of their future.
He had to. It was the only thing that eased the pain of once more being friendzoned in Brenda Walsh's life.
The first time she had declared there was no going back for them and friendship was their way forward, he had reluctantly accepted it. He had cheated on her, had chosen another, had seemingly lost their relationship for good. He had to accept it, or he would lose her friendship, too.
This time, Dylan refused to accept it.
The train haunted him almost as much as it haunted Brenda, knowing how close he had come to having another ghost in his life, the ghost of the woman he had loved above all the rest.
He never liked to compare his relationships with Brenda and Toni. He believed he held a responsibility for Toni's murder. He believed that if he hadn't married her, or if she hadn't been in his car, Toni may have still been alive and perhaps found love with someone more suitable like Brandon or David. Toni's death had destroyed Dylan, but he had found the will to keep living.
That will had been found in Brenda.
Had Brenda been killed on that train, Dylan knew that he would never have been able to go on. He would have forced himself to do so, for Brenda's sake, but he would have been dead inside, as if he had become a ghost himself.
He didn't want to know whether he would have heard of her death, or whether he would have heard that Brenda had died with their child in her belly.
He didn't want to think of Brenda's death at all.
Instead, he wanted to plan out their future, uncaring that he was the only one who would be planning it out.
He knew Brenda knew that they belonged together.
She would simply need reminding, as Dylan had needed himself.
Brenda had shut herself off from him without shutting him out, though she had asked him if she had ever hurt him the way he had hurt her. Dylan had insisted that the situations weren't comparable. Brenda had persisted until Dylan had caved and told her about Rick the Wisconsinite. That led to telling Brenda about Sarah the surfer, which resulted in Brenda learning about Tim the cardio funk guy.
"I guess I just don't get it," said Brenda. She had taken to consistently playing with Dylan's fingers since their initial viewing of the tapes, and had allowed Dylan to once more hold her hand.
Sitting on his lap was slowly becoming more frequent, too; albeit inconsistently. He thought Brenda may have started thinking of his lap as a safety net. She had attended an AA meeting with Dylan, accompanied by David and Valerie. Brenda had ended up becoming overwhelmed by the crowd. She had ordered Dylan to stay put whilst she relocated to an empty room with Val as they waited for the boys, but just having Brenda's presence close by had spurred on Dylan's discussion.
He had gone into the classroom following the meeting. He had sat on a chair and waited until Brenda found refuge in his lap. He had buried his face in her hair as he had asked if she would like to meet the man who had become his sponsor.
They had gotten on well; a bit too well, Dylan thought. He hadn't considered the physique of his sponsor until Brenda turned a fond eye on the man. Dylan had politely excused himself and Brenda and had whisked her off towards the others.
Brenda had spent the rest of the night on Dylan's lap, her hand securely tucked in his as Dylan read to her a favorite novel from Brenda's childhood.
It had, however, been impressed upon Dylan that any other shows of affection would continue to be denied.
Dylan had never loved his lap or Brenda's hands more. He had to closely watch Brenda. Her instinct, when she felt a pain of any kind unrelated to their child, was to remain mum unless Brandon or Val were around.
Luckily, Dylan had begun to read Brenda's tiniest movement. If Brenda so much as winced, if her head pounded or her leg ached, Dylan knew.
If Dylan noticed Brenda feeling faint, he immediately checked her blood pressure.
To his surprise and immense gratitude, Brenda hadn't removed Dylan's permissions to discuss updates with her doctor or therapists. Dylan expected that was due more to their pregnancy than Brenda trusting him with her health.
Dylan knew it was more generosity than he deserved. He didn't take that lightly.
The important thing, Dylan continuously told himself, was that Brenda was letting him be involved in her life. What she may have considered the smallest offering gave to Dylan the beginnings of wealth.
He would not be truly wealthy until Brenda had again accepted him into her heart.
And his ring.
He thought the tapes may have helped speed up the process.
If sloths could speed.
"What don't you get?" asked Dylan, throat closing as it often did when Brenda was close enough for their lips to touch and Dylan hadn't yet been granted permission to make the attempt.
Dylan would not force his lips upon Brenda. He would wait until she would gladly accept his kiss, but fuck, her lips tempted him.
Every zeptosecond he was with Brenda, he yearned to throw caution to the wind and kiss her.
If they lived in a fairytale, his kiss would fix everything.
But this wasn't a fairytale, he wasn't a prince, and the complexities of Brenda's injury couldn't be solved by a single touch of their lips.
"I don't get why you're determined to not give up on us if all our relationship is is cheating on each other," said Brenda. "At least you and Val; you'd make sense. She's attractive, you're attractive, you'd be attractive together."
"I thought you said for me to not hook up with Val." Dylan would have gloated over Brenda's compliment and obvious attraction to him, if his pleasure hadn't been stamped out by Brenda continuing to push Dylan towards Valerie. He had thought Brenda had discarded that notion with the more time they spent with David and Val.
It had been just the other afternoon when Dylan had seen Brenda watching the subtle interaction between David and Val as their hands touched when the two went to switch out CD's. Dylan had been distracted speaking with van rental companies to arrange a truck for their move, and even he had noticed.
David had glanced at Val, who had acted indifferent as she focused on choosing the next CD. Brenda had turned her frustrated expression to Dylan, whose scrunched nose towards Val had elicited the kind of smile in Brenda which hid an inner laugh.
"If I didn't think you'd hurt her, you would have my full blessing to go for it with Val," said Brenda. "Val I know would make a good stepmom."
"I don't want our kid to have a stepmom," said Dylan.
"Are you really gonna be a bachelor your entire life?"
"If I have to be."
"That's silly."
Dylan nearly commented on the true silliness of the situation, but refrained.
"It's true that our relationship has had its bad times," he said, "moments that could be considered abysmal. It's true that I've been a dick to you, that I've cheated. It's true that there's also been other cheating. Longer. It's true that I've often let my pride control my actions, and I'm sorry for it. God, Bren; I can't begin to tell you how sorry I am." He was underwater, swarmed by a shiver of Great White sharks that kept working to part him from his love whilst he sought to fight them off. "But what we've been to each other over the years," he continued, "what we've meant to each other; there's a whole lot more to us than that. Let me show you," he pleaded. "Let me remind you of how we were."
"How do you propose to do that?" she asked.
"I'd like to take you out for a night," he said. "I'd like to take you over to the hotel while you're wearing the panda dress." He hurried to clarify upon her confusion. "The newspaper dress."
"I was spilling out of that dress," said Brenda. "I couldn't get it zipped at all, and you want me to wear it in public?"
"Private," said Dylan. "I'll book us a private conference room or something. We'll cover your backside up with a jacket."
Nothing could mar Brenda's features, but uncertainty and hesitation now frequently aimed at Dylan certainly attempted.
He tried another route.
"Here." He rested his hand on his second favored spot. "May I ask you something?"
"Sure," she said.
"When you -" his voice held a tremor, the words nearly impossible to utter, "when you were in the hospital and they told you you were pregnant from a passionate, all-consuming love affair you didn't remember and a man whose face was unknown to you, why did you decide to keep our baby?"
"Because I felt it in my heart that I wanted her," answered Brenda. "Instantly. It wasn't even a question."
"You felt it in your heart," Dylan echoed. He tenderly cupped Brenda's wrist and gingerly moved her hand to lay against the right side of his chest. "Do you feel that?" he breathed. He didn't dare to unlock his eyes from hers.
"Yes," she smiled. "You also feel love for our daughter in your heart."
"Infinitely," he said. "The most love I'd have ever felt for anyone, and I mean anyone, if it weren't for - if it weren't for -"
"If it weren't for what?" Brenda's eyes were stretched with inquiry.
"If it weren't for this." Dylan shifted his palm from Brenda's stomach to the right side of her own chest.
An indiscernible emotion crossed through Brenda's eyes, though Dylan tried to discern it nevertheless.
"Your heart's beating fast," she said simply. "Wickedly fast. Like you're on a treadmill, dancing to an eighties pop song."
"It always does when you're around," he said.
"Does it make that music for anyone else?" she asked.
"Our daughter," he answered. "You. And our daughter. That's it, Bren. The only people who get my heart sprinting like this. My family."
"We aren't supposed to sprint," she said playfully.
"This is a rare exception."
They lapsed into a tense, yet simultaneously tranquil silence as Brenda looked from Dylan's chest to his face and back to his chest.
"Okay," she said, returning her gaze to his face.
"Okay?"
"Okay, I'll wear the dress and we can go to the hotel. But don't get any ideas."
"I won't," he promised as he dropped his lips to her hand. "Thank you."
Brenda fingered the chain of the necklace that she had begun wearing almost daily. "Wasn't there one heart in the box?" she asked.
Dylan was surprised it had taken her that long to ask.
"Yes," he said.
"Then why are there two on the necklace?"
"I had the other in my possession."
"You just happened to have the other in your possession?" Brenda didn't bother to conceal her skepticism.
"If I tell you something, you have to promise to not laugh."
"I'm not sure that's a promise I can keep."
Dylan told her regardless.
"I used to keep it on a keychain clipped to my board cover," he said. "Then when I travelled, I'd keep it in my suitcase so I'd," he palmed the necklace, "so I'd always have you with me. But now that we're making plans to live together, I can give it back to you, reattached. I'm guessing you like it?"
"I love it," Brenda enthused. "Did I give it to you initially?"
"Actually," Dylan's tone took on a wistful note, "I gave it to you."
He told Brenda of their first Christmas together, and how he had wanted to get her a present that signified how she had snatched his heart in a way no one had then and no one but their daughter had since.
"But why is it split?" asked Brenda, who had sat enraptured by the story.
To Dylan's chagrin, that was all it remained to Brenda. A story. A fraction of their past that Brenda could only start to picture as he told it to her.
Each day, Brenda had begun recalling a little bit more of her past with Valerie. She had had the makings of a second memory of Bobby.
But not Dylan.
Never Dylan, or anyone from Brenda's life outside of Minneapolis.
As a consolation, Dylan told himself that there were plenty of more stories for them to create that Brenda would retain.
He supposed he should be satisfied that she could retain stories, or new memories, or that she could even visualize what he told her.
Perhaps he had read up a bit too much on brain injuries.
"Because I figured while we were still kids and forced to separate each night by things like curfews and bedtimes - on your end - that we could both carry a part of each other," said Dylan as he interlaced their fingers. "You're carrying my child, b -" he resisted the baby that sat on the tip of his tongue, "Brenda," he covered, "and you're also carrying three hearts. Mine. Yours. And hers. For now, this symbolizes our two hearts having merged into one to create her, the child we both wanted with infinite love as soon as we knew she existed."
He spotted Brenda's conflicting feelings, even if she didn't.
"If she didn't exist," said Brenda carefully, "would you still be here?"
Dylan responded with an immediate and resounding yes.
He told her that learning of Brenda's accident had unquestionably been the worst moment of his life, that he detested himself for not being around when she had first been recovering.
Brenda then asked the question Dylan had dreaded, but which he ensured to answer.
"Why weren't you there?" she asked. "I don't mean why were you in Beverly Hills or why were you chasing after Kelly. I mean, why did we break up again if your heart is seemingly full to bursting when I'm around?"
"What's between us is intense, Bren. It's always been, and that intensity can lead to regrets."
"Regrets?"
"So many regrets. K2's one of them."
"What's K2?" asked Brenda.
Dylan answered in a defeated deadpan. "A mountain so dangerous that Everest pales in comparison. A mountain that haunts me in my sleep."
"Like the train?" Brenda reached out to stroke Dylan's arm.
"Exactly like the train." He commanded himself to not move in on Brenda.
"Were you on it?" asked Brenda. "The mountain?"
"I took an assignment for work," said Dylan. "Guess that's what happens when you exaggerate on your resumé. I wanted to impress corporate so badly, I didn't even check out what I'd be getting into, or that the fallout would make corporate act like they'd never sent anyone."
Dylan told Brenda about returning to London. He told her that he still had issues speaking to anyone about the details of K2.
Including his therapist, who had gotten Dylan to open up about other matters mostly related to his parents.
He didn't tell Brenda about K2 itself, yet the pressure lifted from his body solely from telling Brenda of their fight in London and the reason he had declined to join her tour.
That was it. She knew everything, all the bad.
He waited with bated breath to see how Brenda would react. He imagined her turning away. Yelling at him. Telling him she didn't want him around. Demanding he go back to LA and leave her alone. Reiterating her words from the night she had sprinted in the rain.
Dylan braced himself for the worst.
Tears dangled in Brenda's eyes as she moved to Dylan's lap.
Her reaction initiated tears in Dylan's own eyes.
"I walked away from you?" asked Brenda, girding her hand around his fingers.
"Only because I'd mentally walked away from you," Dylan rushed to defend Brenda from herself. "I should've gotten help after coming back from K2, but it was much easier to get help by more, ah, therapeutic methods."
"That weren't therapeutic," said Brenda.
"Not in the least," said Dylan. "If anything, the drugs just made everything a zillion times worse. Especially with us. If you hadn't found them when you did, you would've found them eventually."
"I broke up with you because you were using?"
"You offered your help. I didn't want to take it. You gave me an ultimatum: you, or the drugs."
"Like when Kelly and I gave you an ultimatum between us and you chose Kelly."
He still found it strange, Brenda's apathetic tone about the fucking Bermuda Triangle that was their adolescent Tilt-a-Whirl. She spoke about it as if it that time had happened to another person entirely, which he supposed in Brenda's mind, it had.
He wished he could touch her mind, bandage it, nurse it back to health with a gentle massage. Shower love upon Brenda's wound until their stories weren't just stories.
Until Brenda thought of the tapes as something other than movies created by another's imagination.
"This was different," Dylan earnestly replied. "I wanted to choose you. I really did. I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. I was all set for it, ready to propose and everything, and then," his hands waved about without clear intention, "K2."
"Fufrickin' K2," said Brenda.
"Fufrickin' K2," Dylan echoed as he smiled at her. "The drugs, at the time; they were the only thing that blocked out K2," he elucidated, "and I really didn't want to let go of that distraction. I didn't wanna let go of you, either. It was an impossible choice, one I never should've given you cause to pose."
"So we let go of each other."
"I asked if we could move past it. You were really hurt when I chose to not go with you and left without answering. Long-distance had never been our thing, but I still had my fingers crossed that we could move past it. In the meantime, I kept snorting coke and - and then I went back to beer."
"What would've happened to our baby if I'd snogged you while you were using?" asked Brenda worriedly.
"I don't know, Bren," Dylan puffed out. "Not sure I want to know."
"I guess I can't blame you for not sticking around if I didn't give you reason to."
"It's not that. I assumed. Kept using. Kept drinking, almost a six-pack a day. Kept spiraling, alone in our flat. Longer. About a month went by, with no response to any of my messages. I figured that was it. We were done. Maybe we were. Maybe we weren't. But I couldn't wait around for you to come home and tell me to get lost. I couldn't bear to be one of your regrets. So I packed up my things and left. I was pretty convinced by that point I'd never hear from you again and honestly, I couldn't blame you. You had too much going for you in life to constantly be dealing with my shit."
"So until you called Brandon, we hadn't communicated at all," said Brenda.
Perhaps subconsciously, Dylan began to run his fingers through Brenda's hair.
"I'd thought so," he said. "As usual, I was wrong. You left me a message about two months later, but it took me a while to realize it."
"How long of a while?"
"The first day we went house hunting."
"Wow." Brenda looked at Dylan's phone resting on the coffee table beside Dylan's untouched mug of cold coffee. "Can I listen to it?" she asked.
"You sure?" he hesitated. "Might be hard for you."
"I'd like to listen to it," Brenda affirmed.
Dylan played the message he could almost quote by heart.
When the message finished and Brenda's reaction was imperceptible, the next message began to play.
Dylan immediately reached out to cut it off, but Brenda's hand shot out to lay on his.
"Did I leave you another one?" she asked.
He said she had, adding, "but you really don't want to hear this one, Bren. Trust me."
"Why is that?"
"Because you called me right before the accident. Literally right before."
Brenda nodded and removed her hand, agreeing for Dylan to stop the playback.
She asked that he instead tell her what had been said.
He did as requested.
"So I wanted to forget you," she said. "Do you think I willed myself to forget?"
"If that were the case, you would've only forgotten me," he said. "You wouldn't've forgotten Bobby, Val, Mina, or anyone else you were close with. It was just a freaky coincidence that you said that when you did."
Brenda mulled it over and then asked Dylan something he had never expected to hear.
She asked if he would attend a session of her cognitive training. He told her he absolutely would.
Brenda decided that was enough stories for the moment and they instead began to discuss their birth plan for the homebirth Brenda had been leaning towards.
Dylan said he would prefer to have a trained midwife on hand in case Brenda needed one during delivery. He thanked Brenda for her consideration in including him and was hit with an outpouring of love when Brenda asked if Dylan would hold her if she decided on a water birth.
"I'd be honored," he said. "It wouldn't be too uncomfortable for you?"
"It's labor," said Brenda. "I'm sure it will be uncomfortable."
Dylan gave a sheepish smile. "I mean, me holding you during it won't be uncomfortable?"
"It's you or Brandon and I think he'd prefer if you did it," joked Brenda.
"Thanks for not saying Steve," joked Dylan right back.
"Think he'd do it?" she asked.
Dylan couldn't tell if Brenda was being serious, and promptly switched topics back to their date.
Dylan didn't label it a date, but the implication was there.
He sat with Brenda tucked between his legs as Brenda requested that Brandon and Valerie be present for the birth. Brandon gave his approval, a strange mix of enthusiasm and discomfiture. Val said she would've barged her way in if it hadn't been an option, as her niece would absolutely not be born without her aunt around.
"That's not really something you can control, Val," Brenda laughed.
"Oh, I can certainly try," said Val. "Up 'til high school, you and I were there for each other during all our biggest milestones. No way am I missing this, especially after getting to be part of your latest milestone."
Brenda stiffened against Dylan and released a harsh shushing sound to Valerie.
"Latest milestone?" asked Dylan.
"She probably means the ultrasound," said Brandon.
"Does she mean the ultrasound, Bren?" asked Dylan.
"Oh, look at the time!" said Brenda. "We really oughta start packing for the move." She stood from Dylan's lap. "Val? Help me?"
"Sure, Bren," said Val.
"Brenda," said Dylan, hurrying to stand before her.
Brenda wouldn't look at him.
"Bren?" Dylan shifted his laser focus to Brandon. "Boy Scouts don't lie, isn't that right?" asked Dylan.
"My Scout days are behind me," said Brandon.
"Nah," said Dylan. "Once a Scout, always a Scout."
Brandon sighed. "Bren, just tell him."
"Don't get upset," said Brenda.
"Why would I get upset?" Dylan started to worry that the three of them knew a terrifying update on Brenda's health that they were keeping from him.
"Val and Bran felt her kicking." Brenda released a long breath with her sentence.
"You guys felt her kick?" Dylan tried to not be overcome with jealousy. "When?"
"When you were at therapy," said Brandon.
"Alright, I'm not going to therapy -"
"You have to go to therapy," said Brenda. "Your sponsor encouraged it."
"- without Brenda," Dylan finished.
"Can I go to your sessions?" asked Brenda.
"If you can, will you go?"
"I'll consider it."
"I can't believe I missed her kicking."
"You still have time to feel it."
"Bren, B and V both felt it."
"Steve was there, too," said Val.
Fucking hell.
"Sanders felt her kick before I did?" Dylan struggled to not raise his voice.
"Val." Brenda gave their friend a stern look. "He was there and asked if he could, but I told him to wait until you did."
"Is she kicking now?"
Brenda gave a sluggish shake of her head, as if she would prefer to ignore the question.
"Figures," said Dylan.
"It'll happen, babes," said Brenda. "When you least expect it, you'll feel her and when you do, you'll know love."
Dylan's jaw dropped. Val gawped. Brandon was left nonplussed.
"What?" asked Brenda.
"You just called Dylan 'babes,'" said Val.
"Did I?" asked Brenda.
"You - you did," Dylan stammered. "You started calling me that in London. You picked it up from a friend of ours."
"How interesting," said Brenda. "I didn't think about it. I guess it just slipped out."
"Would seem so." Dylan took her hand. "Feel free to call me it again. In fact, call me it as many times as you want."
Brenda's smile pierced his soul, which was stuck on the thought that if Brenda had begun calling him babes again, perhaps her favored endearment of love would return sooner than Dylan had thought.
What he wouldn't give to hear that word spoken from her lips.
Dylan was enjoying a televised theatrical production with Brenda when David came into the room.
"Hey man." Dylan reached over Brenda to clap David's hand. "Did you get to the airport in time to meet that guy from the label and introduce him to our plans?"
David said he had, and then glanced nervously behind him.
Brenda, who had been on the edge of sleep, suddenly stood. "David, are they here?"
"Are who here?" Dylan looked between his girl and their friend.
"Didn't know if I should bring them here, so I took them over to Clare's," said David.
"Took who to Clare's?" asked Dylan.
"I'll get Brandon," said Brenda, and ran off to do just that.
"Silver, what's going on?" asked Dylan.
"Let's just say Bren invited some people out this way," said David.
"Oh good," said Dylan. "Hope they brought her diaries."
"Why would they have Bren's diaries?"
"You're talking about the Brits, right? Finally. Maybe Dawn will stop sending me angry emails about not getting to visit Bren."
"Take Dawn and add an extra syllable to it," said David.
"Donna's here?" asked Dylan. Dread seeped in; not because of Donna, but because what should have been a her had been a them. "Don't tell me that -"
"Let's go," said Brenda, tugging Brandon out of his room.
"Bren, I don't want to go."
"You're going," said Brenda.
"Bren, look, I respect that you want to meet her, but I really think you're doing it for all the wrong reasons."
"Meet who?" asked Dylan, certain he knew, but needing to hear it directly from Brenda.
"Kelly Taylor." Affirming Dylan's dread, Brenda looked straight at him. "I want to know if she'd be a decent stepmother to our daughter, so I invited her out here to get to know her. Or, get to know her again, I guess."
All the jubilation Dylan had built from Brenda's renewed term of endearment, from Brenda requesting his support during her labor, from Brenda's agreement to their non-date, from the tender moments that had been piling up between them, deflated in the way of a balloon trapped amongst brambles.
It didn't matter that Kelly had appeared. He didn't care one way or the other about that. She was too entwined in the gang's lives for Dylan to assume he could move to a new country and never see her again.
What he cared about was Brenda's reason for inviting Kelly.
After everything, Brenda still didn't believe their daughter wouldn't have a stepmother, which meant that perhaps Brenda wanted Dylan to consider a stepmother so that he would be accepting of a stepfather.
What's more, Brenda thought that Kelly would be that stepmother.
Thought it, and seemed almost approving of it.
As she had previously approved of a romantic reunion between him and Valerie.
A reunion Dylan didn't want with either Kelly or Val.
Dylan once more scrambled to keep his dreams from scattering in the typhoon known as his life, a typhoon he fully comprehended he alone held responsibility for creating.
A typhoon in which his biggest nightmare - Brenda slipping from his universe - continued to taunt him.
-x
I have thought long and hard about how I wanted Kel portrayed in Lethe. It would be easy to eviscerate her character, to continue the regression the writers did to Kelly as they made her a continuous victim who reflexively turned to hypocrisy and judgment. I, however, want her to grow, to be better than she was. If Val can grow, then I believe Kelly can, as well. The simple fact is that Kelly does know what it is like to live with amnesia and she is the only person who can relate even a smidgen to Bren in that regard. I also don't see Brandon discarding his feelings for Kelly so easily after how he felt when he left in the ninth season, and after everything they went through in the eighth. If this was the beginning of the seventh and he was still hung up on Susan, then perhaps he could move on to someone new without hesitation. Unlike the writers, I will not write a character to forget their pairings. It would be just as easy for Dylan to never see Kelly again, but it would be too easy. Bren needs to see for herself that Dylan is indeed uninterested in Kelly, that his words have meaning. The writers and production did everything they could in the later seasons to pretend BD never happened. I won't do that. I won't erase DK or DT from Dylan's story, despite the fact that I do firmly believe his feelings for Bren surpassed his alleged feelings *cough*obsession*cough* for Kelly and I loathe the lack of development with the rushed DT storyline. I will, however, grind romantic-DK into the dust they should have become, with both Dyl and Kel acknowledging that their toxic relationship has hurt a plethora of others, instead of reveling in that fact like they did canonically. I am uninterested in continuing the rivalry between Bren and Kel, though the chances of me ending it between Val and Kel are slim to none because that is far too entertaining to write.
If you haven't yet seen them, new-ish DV and BD vids up on YouTube at WISH UPON A DREAM and WISHUPONAMILLIONDREAMS on Instagram. Look for me on FB: wish upon a dream (Bren icon.)
Thanks a million! x