A tall ship and a star to steer her by (starwreck) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2012-04-17 13:14:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, frodo baggins, james kirk |
“What’s... up?”
Who: Kirk and Frodo
What: Confrontations over womens
When: EarlY? Late? Kirk has lost all sense of time!
Where: Beach
Rating: pg-13 for language
Status: Complete.
There were things that tended to grab Kirk and take hold of them. Isabela being missing was one of them. Not that she’d up and left - he could respect that. But why, and how, and if she was at least safe, those were the questions he wanted answered the most.
He hadn’t gone to sleep, instead cruising up and down the coast for hours, as if that could accomplish anything. The only certainty he had was that she’d gone to sea, and even that was only based on a gut feeling.
He wasn’t even sure it was entirely about their relationship at this point. He just needed to know.
He just needed to know.
For Frodo, discovering Isabela had “up and left” was more of a slow burn. It had taken a while to sink in, as though he didn’t quite believe it at first, as if he half-expected her to turn up under a sofa cushion. The pain--what else could he call it?--was also a slow burn, building from numbness. He hadn’t noticed it at first. His head felt fuzzy. He blamed the anti-anxiety medication. So, this morning he hadn’t taken any.
He decided that meant he could have a few more drinks than usual.
He nursed the pain--again, what else could he call it? It wasn’t something he’d expected to feel. After all, they were only friends, she “belonged” to another man. But what Isabela had proven was that she didn’t “belong” to anyone, or any place.
It was late, and he hadn’t yet gone to bed. He’d been on his private beach for hours, his only companions had been a few empty cans of beer. They were the closest things he had to a friend.
Jim pulled off the road, resting his face on the steering wheel. He was out of answers, at least tonight. He put his brain to work. He needed to talk to Jack. He’d already grilled Arishok. Bela’s face was plastered across a dozen ports - and he snerked as his mind went there. Bela would have enjoyed that joke.
Frodo! Frodo knew her, maybe she’d left a message, or something. He pulled out his phone and searched for Frodo’s number, then dialed it!
Frodo found his phone difficult to handle, as it slipped from his hands and into the sand. With a grunt, he picked it back up, falling into a neat little pile himself as he lost his balance. He brushed the screen clean. Kirk, he raised an eyebrow. He had the number programed in there weeks ago, from when they’d met at the dojo. “Hello?” he slurred.
It was a slurring that Kirk was all too familiar with, from many a long night. He grimaced in sympathy with the hangover that Frodo was certain to have in the morning. Or afternoon, what time was it? Evening? He’d lost track, “Hello, Frodo? Its me, Jim Kirk.”
More than a few questions crossed his mind, but he was already in a state where it was difficult to differentiate reality from imagination, so there was no way to know for sure which of the questions was actually articulated. Where are you? Why are you calling me? Where the hell is Isabela? What actually came out was, “What’s... up?”
"Nothing much, I haven't slept in about 48 hours." He rubbed at the bridge of his nose. Maybe Frodo had the right idea and getting smashed was the way to go. Though why Frodo was drunk was anyone’s guess. Where the hell is Isabela, indeed.
What was likely Kirk’s genuine heartache was lost on Frodo. The last “conversation” they’d had--about Isabela, in fact--had rubbed him the wrong way. Losing sleep over a woman? Kirk didn’t seem the type. “Do I hear... the ocean, in the background?” He was commenting on a strange echo over the line, and already he was looking over his shoulder.
“Yeah. I’m...” How to phrase this and not sound completely like a lost puppy? “I figure she went sailing. I’m running out of places to look. Even put up flyers. Like she’s some kind of missing pet.” Her voice came unbidden to his mind do I get a collar, tell me I get a collar. Maybe he chased her away. Maybe if she hadn’t run, he would. Maybe she hadn’t wanted him to make that choice.
Frodo stood up. He narrowed his eyes. He spotted the Corvette, the red paint bright beneath a street lamp. “I see you,” Frodo said, attempting to cut the line and stuffed the phone into his pocket. He didn’t do the former so well, though, so what Kirk likely heard was a lot of blustery muffled fabric swipes. He was marching toward the car, leaving his beer can litter and shoes behind.
Kirk looked at his phone as if to say ‘really?’ The coincidence was great. Maybe it meant something. Maybe he'd bring beer. Jim climbed out of his car and looked towards the ocean. Frodo looked like a man on a mission, and sadly that mission didn't look like it included beer.
Frodo halted at the gate, watching Kirk exit the car. He didn’t open it right away. He was having too much trouble remembering how to work the lock. “I take it you know Isabela’s gone,” he said. He was still slurring, but less so. Somewhat. His eyes were still narrow. Unfortunately for Kirk, he had the sort of face Frodo found difficult to feel very sorry for.
Why do people immediately assume he did something? He was a playboy, not a serial killer. He nodded his head, "She just up and left. Phone off... I was hoping you'd know something."
“Last time we spoke,” Frodo replied, “She told me she was waiting for me to pick up the motorcycle I’d purchased. And I was planning to drop off a gift for her.” He was feeling rather gutsy, despite the fact that Kirk had already proven he could leave him in a whimpering heap on the floor--so maybe he was just feeling rather stupid. His point, though, was that he cared about Isabela--maybe even cared for her--and that maybe he wondered how just much Kirk deserved to be affected at all by this.
Jim watched Frodo approach, half expecting him to roll his sleeves up and present arms for old tyme fisticuffs. He held up his hands, “Easy there. She mentioned something about that, but that’s all I know. I haven’t seen her in two days.” He waved a hand around at...everything, “One day she was here, then..gone.”
“Right...” Frodo said, probably sounding rather incredulous. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe Kirk, but those things were all after the fact. What concerned Frodo was what had pushed her away. Or who. “And why would she leave without telling anyone?” he asked. By now, he’d figured out the lock. “Not even her boyfriend.” He wasn’t sure what he was insinuating, but he sure was insinuating something.
“Just what do you think you’re insinuating?” Lack of sleep and self-pity didn’t do much to help Kirk’s temper. He didn’t have to put up with this shit, “I don’t know, okay! I don’t know!” And that pissed him off more than anything else. That he didn’t know. Everything else would be okay if he knew. He threw up his hands, “Maybe I pushed her away somehow! Maybe she left so she wouldn’t have to push me away. Maybe neither of us were cut out for it!”
Frodo had taken a step forward, but something had halted him yet again. This time, however, it was not a gate or a missing shoe. He had stilled himself. Maybe he was beginning to sober up, but a little bit of Kirk’s pain had made it through to him. But Frodo scowled, at himself, perhaps. “I never tried...” he said. “Maybe I should have tried. I... I don’t know.”
He lifted hand and pulled it through his curly hair. Sand trickled down his face. “I didn’t realize...”
“I don’t think either of us knew her as well as we would have liked,” Jim admitted. He walked over towards Frodo, “I wanted to do right, for once. Maybe she wasn’t ready. I’m mostly just guessing here. If I knew which direction to go I’d go after her.”
Frodo sighed. He wanted to believe Kirk. At least he felt he was quite capable of tracking her down. He was still hurting a little too much. “I guess Isabela had some magic ability to get through to men with rocks for brains.” He tried to smile. He shook his head. “Can’t remember the last time I really cared. Now I’m remembering why I stopped in the first place.”
“Rocks? Try concrete in my case.” Jim nodded his head and folded his arms, “Its not wrong to care. And I’m pretty sure this was my fault.” He held up three fingers, “Three women I’ve been serious enough about to consider settling down. And each time they left. And each time I realize I’d been too slow in considering, at least until Isabela. I wonder if I was too fast this time.”
“You were faster than I was,” Frodo replied. “Then again, I didn’t even try. You know, I’m not even sure I realized until now, now that she’s gone.” He sighed again, “God, don’t end up like me, Jim.” He was almost sober now. Almost. “I’m fifty-five, fat, and alone.” Truthfully, he was only two of the three. But his point was that men get old, and there was no avoiding it. “And I imagine I’ll die alone...” Right. Not quite sober, but close enough.
“I knew a guy once,” Jim replied thoughtfully. “He was like, eighty. He met a sixty year old woman at bingo. They got married a year later and they’re stll alive, kicking and happy. Sometimes you don’t meet the right person until later in life. Besides, you have a lot more to offer a woman than me. Like stability.”
Frodo rolled his eyes. “You obviosuly don’t know me.”
“No, but I’d like to. Isabel some some good in you. She had her flaws but she knew a good person when she saw one.”
Frodo shrugged. “Yes, but...” He paused. A moment passed. He lifted both hands and unfastened the collar of his shirt. The other buttons followed. He pulled the fabric aside, like a parting curtain, exposing the scars and the jagged gashes. “Self-inflicted, apparently. I can’t remember any of it. Stable, I am not.” And he set back to the work of buttening his shirt back up.
Jim stared for a moment, his expression unreadable, until his eyebrows raised, and he grinned good naturedly, “Well now, Frodo, I’m flattered, but McCoy would kill you if you tried anything.” He reached over, planting a hand on Frodo’s shoulder, and squeezing.
He was still just buzzed enough not to know quite out to take that. Frodo raised an eyebrow. Oh. A joke! He even chuckled a bit and realized he was grateful something had finally broken the tension. “Ah, but you get my point. There’s a reason why I keep my distance.”
“Someday a woman won’t care. And even then, that’s not the end all be all.” so sayeth Kirk the playboy. He nodded his head, “Really. Women are too much trouble. We’ve got one making us chase her all up and down the coast!”
Frodo agreed. “And I imagine we won’t find her until she wants to be found.”
Kirk turned and looked out to see, “Well let it not be said that we didn’t try. I actually hired someone last night to help organize the search.” He laughed, “I’m not sure what I was thinking. It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“I’d put more faith in them over the police,” Frodo replied. He sighed. Again, also turning to look back to the ocean. “I know I should sleep. But that feels like quitting. Mind if I ride around with you for a while?”
"Yeah. I'd like that."