mander3_swish (mander3_swish) wrote in qaf_giftxchnge, @ 2012-12-31 15:23:00 |
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TO: gaeln
FROM: cheburashka_2
BETA: Predec2 & mom
TITLE: Exile
GIFT REQUEST: Fic S5, 'What if' fic of the author's choice. Brian/ Justin, psychologically driven, characters thought processes (a little porn is fine, but not as main focus).
Chapter 6
When Carl first told him that Modig and he had no choice but to tell his mother that he was dead, he was angry. But the anger abated once Carl explained that with Craig, Tucker and Brian there, and Jennifer immediately jumping to the wrong conclusion right away made things rather tricky and they took the path of “least resistance” and perpetuated a necessary lie. When the men left for the morgue, Carl stayed behind. Once Jennifer calmed a distraught Molly and helped her to her room to rest, Carl told Jennifer the truth. According to Carl, although she took the whole thing hard and greatly feared for his safety, Jennifer Taylor impressed him with her grace under pressure, with her pride at her son’s bravery, her willingness to help the authorities in any way, including keeping the secret of Justin being alive, and with her conviction that they’ll bring the perpetrators to justice, because with Justin’s testimony on their side they couldn’t possibly lose. Hearing Carl speak with such admiration for his mother melted the remnants of Justin’s anger. So when he said goodbye to Carl in the fancy FBI safe house in the suburb of Pittsburgh, he didn’t just shake his hand, he hugged him tightly, taking comfort in Carl’s awkward, but affectionate embrace, in the old fashioned scent of Old Spice and in his gruff voice promising that everything would be OK.
“Will it, Carl?”
“You just stay strong, son, stay safe and take care of yourself. I’ll keep an eye on everyone here in the Pitts. Agent Modig will give me updates on how you are doing once a month and I’ll update Jennifer. She’s made of strong stock, your mother. She’ll be OK.”
“I know. Take care of…everyone, Carl. Keep them safe. I’m counting on you.”
“I will. Good luck, son.”
By Tuesday morning, a little over 72 hours after the horrific event at Babylon, Agent Modig who accompanied Justin to the safe house in Colorado, presented him with the documents of his brand-new identity – social security card, birth certificate, driver’s license, medical records, even a passport. Justin couldn’t help but be impressed with the efficiency with which the FBI got things moving.
“Randy Harold. Seriously? What kind of a name is Randy, for fuck’s sake?” he asked the FBI agent indignantly. “It sounds like a fucking nickname.”“Of a dick?” Justin suggested with a rueful smirk.
“Trust me when I say that compared to some of the other people I’ve put in protective care, you are all sunshine and flowers. If this is you being a dick and a selfish asshole, then my job of keeping you safe just got a heck of a lot easier. I know this is difficult, but just remember that you are doing a good thing here. An important thing. This investigation needs you, Justin. Or should I say, Randy?”
“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t think this was important. I want those bastards behind bars almost as much as you. I know the people who died in there. I know the people who got hurt. Fuck, Michael nearly died!” Justin fell silent for a second and looked out the window at the pale morning light. “About the name…According to the news Justin Taylor is officially dead. So, yeah…Randy it is.”Since her husband’s passing several years before and since her two grown children and young grandchildren living overseas at present, Mrs. Tincher felt rather lonely and wanted some company on the property. While she wasn’t expecting a 22-year-old young man straight out of college to be her lodger, she didn’t hesitate to rent him the space after talking to him on the phone for about five minutes, a decision she didn’t regret after meeting him in person.
And what a space it was. The stables which used to house six horses years ago, was completely converted into storage areas and a workroom/woodworking shop, a hobby of Mr. Tincher’s before his death. The attic above the stables/woodshop was converted into a huge, fully self-sufficient apartment, with an open floor plan where the kitchen, bedroom, living room and office area shared the same space. Only the bathroom was enclosed for privacy. The apartment had gorgeous hardwood floors, fresh paint on the walls in a warm tone of golden sand and comfortable furniture of real mahogany and leather that looked well used, but lovingly taken care of. The best thing about the space was the abundance of natural light – large windows overlooked the wooded area in the back of the property on one side and the main house on the other; and four large skylights allowed the view of the sky from almost any point in the apartment.
His landlord told him that her husband wanted to try his hand at painting as a new hobby, so he had converted the space with an art studio in mind, but had died of a heart attack before he could use it. Since she didn’t want the space to go to waste, but had no artistic inclinations herself, she altered her husband’s original plan to add a kitchen and bathroom and make the studio into an apartment. At about 1000 square feet, the space was almost the size of Brian’s loft and five times larger than the one-room hovel that Mikey and Ben had helped him rent back in the Pitts. Since he was able to find space to paint fairly large-scale pieces in a 200-square-feet room, Justin knew he’d have no problem painting in this amazing space. When going into this exile, Justin thought that he would have to abandon his art, as well as his name. Now, however, he realized that he could continue to paint, thus, keeping himself sane.
The alarm on his new cell phone suddenly went off. Noon. Or 3 PM Pittsburgh time.
Justin got up from the couch, poured himself a shot of Beam and walked over towards the east facing windows. He looked at the horizon, where the sky met the tops of the trees in the heavily wooded area of this suburb of Portland, his thoughts flying over towards Pittsburgh, where a body bearing Justin Taylor’s name was being laid to rest at St. Andrew’s Cemetery. Justin raised his shot of Beam high in the air and said, “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Rest in peace, Justin Taylor.”
Randy Harold then drained the glass and turned away from the window.
Chapter 7
He realized that as he watched the coffin bearing Justin’s body while the minister droned on and on about ashes, dust, salvation and the afterlife. It was worse than the years of living with his parent’s abuse, worse than watching a baseball bat swing through the air, worse than the days at the hospital after the bashing, worse than the bombing at Babylon, worse than the morgue. Although, the morgue was pretty fucking bad. He truly didn’t know how he had lived through that…
Brian had ridden shotgun in Agent Modig’s car, while Jennifer’s ex-husband and current boyfriend were sharing the back seat. Again, in any other case, this would have been a humorous situation. Brian would have given absolutely anything, everything he had for it to be any other situation. But it wasn’t, so no one was laughing. The dread at what they were going to see when they reached their destination permeated the car and hung heavy like the smell of old sweat.“Brian, you don’t want to do this. Trust me. You don’t want to do this. Jennifer will understand and so would Justin.”
“No, I don’t. But I’ll stay.” He turned around again and with his back to the body, waited. He heard the whisper of the sheet as it uncovered the body. He heard the harsh, in-drawn breaths of the other men. He heard an “oh, dear God” escape Tucker’s lips. He heard Craig’s “this is not my son, oh God, this can’t be my son” before he collapsed on the floor next to him openly weeping. He heard Modig’s dispassionate and quiet “I think this is enough” and the whisper of the sheet covering the body again.
Brian, who was rarely in touch with his feelings to begin with, preferring to drown them in booze, drugs and men, at the moment stopped feeling anything at all. He was suddenly numb to the core. So numb that he ceased to feel the coldness of the room, or smell its antiseptic scent. Even his hearing seemed affected, for Craig’s weeping began to sound hollow and muted to his ears.
“I need to be alone for a minute. Leave,” he said, and after a brief hesitation Modig and Tucker helped Craig out of the room.
Brian turned around and looked at the sheet-covered body. His hand hovered over the corner of the material as if debating whether or not to lift it off, but didn’t in the end. A few seconds later it moved and settled on the coarse, institutional fabric on the area of the body where a heart used to beat.
“Justin, I…ah…I wish I’d told you that I loved you. Now it’s all moot. I…I won’t forget you. Goodbye.”
He ran his hand along the shrouded body one time, then walked out of the morgue and kept on walking; ignoring Tucker’s echoing “Brian! Brian…”
“…Brian?” The minister’s question brought him back to the present to Justin’s graveside. “You are next. Would you like to say a few words?”
“No. I’ll say them later, in private,” he answered, looking at nothing and no one else but the coffin that contained the love of his life.
He now knew how he had survived the morgue, the horrible week that followed and why he was surviving Justin’s funeral – he was still numb.