Breathing Room (14/?)
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vigorliTitle: Breathing Room (14/?)
Author: Rainweaver13
Pairing: Viggo/Orlando
Summary: After the fall: Kaleidoscope
Rating/Warnings: R. ANGST up the wazoo. All made up. Fiction. There's not a lick of truth in it.
Disclaimer: Don't own them; don't know anything about them - they are their own. I mean no disrespect and I'm certainly not profiting from this.
A/N: This chapter probably takes more liberties with "standard" fan tropes than any other, but just a reminder that this is fictional and it's my fiction. Your mileage may vary. Thanks for all the feedback. I'm honored and humbled.
-----------------
Previous Chapters Look under Personal Fics
2004 was a blur.
At some point Exene remarried. Her new husband took an immediate and overwhelming dislike to Viggo. Henry, now 16, was left, for the first time in his life, uncomfortably torn between his parents. To avoid causing Henry pain and to try to avoid his own pain, Viggo booked himself more heavily than he ever had.
-----
At some point Orlando realized he couldn't stand to be in the same room with Kate any more. She was a nice enough person, but she kept pushing him and he was so fucking tired of being pushed he was about ready to explode. It became an ongoing joke that he preferred his dogs to his girlfriend. The joke was that it wasn't a joke.
-----
At some point Viggo realized he hadn't spent more than three consecutive weeks on the same continent in months. He'd always loved to travel, but travel had become insane. Some days he had no idea where he was. He thought maybe he was tired. He knew he was exhausted.
-----
At some point Orlando realized he was at a party and didn't know a single damned person in the room. But they all knew him and they all wanted something - a smile, a kiss, a hug, a good word, a piece of advice, a name to network, a touch of the Orlando magic (ha, he thought, Orlando magic) - and he wondered when was the last time someone gave to him without expecting anything in return. He knew it was Viggo. At that party, he tried coke for the first time.
-----
At some point Viggo signed onto a movie because he liked the idea of working with David Cronenberg, but mostly because he liked the story, about a man trying to live a normal life whose world is destroyed by the media. He felt a crushing identification with that man. Then he signed on to a movie in Spain because it was in Spain, not Hollywood, and yeah, well, fuck them all. That's all. Sometimes it crossed his mind to wonder if he'd begun choosing movies for their value as weapons.
-----
At some point Orlando sat in a bar with some cast and crew people - maybe it was in Kentucky, or was it Spain? wherever - and listened to all the talk and tipsy laughter wash over and around him. For some reason - had it been a bad day filming? had Kate been a bitch? had the dogs thrown up on the floor? - he was in a particularly gloomy mood and so - very unlike him - he just sat and thought. He asked himself the dangerous question, "Am I happy?" It was a dangerous question because the answer tended to erode every bit of the self-confidence he'd tried so hard to build in the past two years. He also asked himself the dangerous question, "Do I have what I wanted?" He couldn't even answer that one, not even with only himself looking on. He just said fuck it and got drunk instead.
-----
At some point Viggo realized he hadn't painted in months.
-----
At some point Orlando started wearing his charm necklaces under his shirts.
-----
At some point Viggo got a visit from his lawyer bringing the news that Exene was taking him to court for increased child support for Henry. Viggo listened calmly and when the lawyer left he broke half the breakables in the kitchen in one giant explosion of furious frustration. She could have just asked. He'd always taken care of Henry: He'd always gotten the first of any money Viggo made, even when it was a struggle to make minimal payments. Now this was public record. Now it would go to the tabloids. Now this... this... humiliation.
Ignoring the broken glass, he grabbed two partial bottles of Jameson's out of the cabinet. Trailing bloody footprints, he wandered out onto the deck and drank and cursed himself absolutely shitfaced and beyond. When a light rain later began to plaster his clothes to his body, he never even twitched.
At some point that day Henry dropped by Dad's house unexpectedly to pick up some CDs and was mildly surprised to find the front door unlocked but no answer when he called, "Dad?"
Curious, he checked the living room, then the kitchen, where he stood stunned at the floor full of broken glass. Eventually his gaze focused on the bloody footprints and his heart thundered into his throat as he followed them to the glass doors and the sight of this father, curled defensively on the deck, soaking wet and apparently unconscious.
Henry rushed out, dropping to his knees on the wet wood. "Dad? Dad!"
No response.
Shaking with fear, he tried to remember what to do. Check breathing. Right. Okay. Check. He's breathing. Good. Check...um... heartbeat. Henry fumbled for a pulse point, finally finding one on his dad's neck. It seemed like it was an okay heart beat. So he was just...
Drunk. Plastered. Shitfaced.
Henry knew his dad was no saint. He'd seen him tipsy before, even stumbly drunk a couple of times at Christmas parties, but never anything like this. He grabbed his shoulders and shook him as hard as he could. Nothing. Not even a groan. But he couldn't leave him lying out here wet. Suddenly remembering the footprints, he scooted down to look at his dad's feet. Not good. Not terrible, but not good.
What to do?
Up until this year, he'd have called Exene, but now that was a phenomenally bad idea. He was enough of a celebrity's kid to know he couldn't just call 911: He didn't want his dad to end up in another supermarket tabloid. He'd had a bad enough year, what with Orli and now Exene's new dude and all. With another grimace down at his unconscious father, he jumped up and ran back into the house, grabbing the phone from the kitchen wall, careful of broken glass. Dialing by memory, he waited impatiently through the recorded message and navigated to where he needed to go.
"Nowhere Productions. What can I do for ya?
"I need to talk to Jason," Henry said urgently. "Tell him it's Henry."
"Hey, Henry! What's cooking?"
"It's kinda important, okay, Dee?"
"Sure, sure... Hang on." Henry could hear a banging in the background, and Dee's voice yelling for Jason to pick up line 2, it's Henry. A moment's pause, then...
"Henry? How y'doing, buddy?"
"Jason, I kinda need you to come over to Dad's house." Henry realized his voice was shaking slightly and took a deep breath to steady it. This wasn't an emergency, after all. He was just shaken up by the surprise. "Is there any way you could? Now?"
"Right now? I was talking with..." Jason's voice slowed and Henry could almost see him cocking his head the way he always did. "Is something wrong?"
"I just need you to help me with something." Deep breath. "With Dad." Hurriedly. "Don't call Exene, okay? I just need some help for a little while."
"Oooh-kay. Gimme, say, ten minutes. Traffic should be light. I'll be there as soon as I can get there. Can you let me in the gate?"
"Yeah, I'll watch. Thanks, Jase. Dad'll owe ya."
"Uh-huh. Ten minutes."
Grabbing an afghan from the couch, Henry darted back out to the deck only to find that Viggo had thrown up in his absence but still hadn't roused.
"Gag me, Dad," Henry grimaced. "I so didn't need this." He spread the afghan over Viggo and gingerly moved his heavy head slightly away from the mess. "This gets me a car."
The light rain started again, so Henry moved inside, dividing his time between watching the deck for any signs of movement and watching the front door for signs of Jason's old VW at the gate. On one pass, he noticed the spill of papers on the coffee table and paused to pick them up, curious to see if Viggo was reading a new script. Two paragraphs in he hit his own name and suddenly, through the legalese, began to understand what this was. He worked his way through all the jumble, thinking about the numbers, and then wondered why ... why this was a legal thing? Hadn't Dad always taken care of him? Henry didn't understand why this court petition thing was here, but he suddenly thought he might understand why his Dad was passed out drunk on the deck.
Jason Hamilton unfolded himself from the green and gold Bug and arrived at the front door in a flurry of long black hair and brown leather fringe. Of all Viggo's friends, Jason was the one who had most refused to leave the '70, and Henry accused him of looking like somebody out of Scooby Doo. Only cooler, of course. He got two steps inside the door before he wrapped Henry in a rib-crunching hug.
"What's up, little brother? You sounded hinky on the phone."
Henry beat him on the back a little to get free, then hugged him back quickly, before pointing to the deck. "There's what's up."
Jason swerved around him and headed for the glass doors, stepping out to squat beside Viggo appraisingly. "Shit. He really tied one on, huh?"
"I guess so. Cut his feet all up, too."
"No shit?" Jason scooted down and peered under the afghan to check out the foot situation, wrinkling his nose and shaking hair back behind his shoulders as he stood. "Need to get him inside, huh?"
"I couldn't- I can't lift him by myself." Now that somebody else was here, adrenaline crash was starting to hit Henry and the papers in his hand shook before he stuffed his hands under his arms and stared fixedly at the deck.
Jason laid a hand on his shoulder and squeezed gently. "Hey, you got help now. How 'bout you go start some water running in the tub, then come help me."
"Okay." Glad to be away from the uncomfortable scene, Henry vanished into the house. Jason went to the kitchen and surveyed the glass and ceramic holocaust while grabbing a couple of dish towels and wetting them. Back outside he rolled Viggo onto his back and wiped his face clean, still getting no response. Checking his feet next, he gingerly pulled out the largest visible shards of glass, dabbing a towel at the resulting blood.
"Damn hippie," he muttered, glaring up at Viggo. "Wear shoes if you're gonna get shitfaced and wreck your damn house." He moved up to wipe Hidalgo hair out of the pale face. "This is not like you, my friend. 'Specially not in front of Henry. What's going on in ViggoWorld?"
Henry appeared back at the door, minus the child support papers. Jason set to work unbuttoning Viggo's shirt and wiggling it off. He gave it a visual and sniff check to make sure it hadn't been puked on, then tossed it to Henry. "Put that on backwards, dude. Keep the blood off your clothes."
Henry blinked, but did as directed, dragging the damp shirt over his T-shirt. Jason pulled the afghan off Viggo and tossed it to one side, then squatted at his head to start working his arms under the drunk man's shoulders. "You get his feet," he said to Henry. "If his ass bumps the ground now and then, it's his own fault."
Together they managed to mostly lift, partially drag Viggo through the house into the bathroom and dump him into a tub slowly filling with water. That got a response, albeit a slight one.
"Can you find me some tweezers and maybe a flashlight?" Jason asked. "And a first aid kit if y'got one?"
Henry just nodded and rummaged through the medicine cabinet and under the sink to find what was needed, handing it all to Jason, who was busy tying his long black hair back with a strip of leather.
"Okay, dude. You just sit up there and make sure he doesn't slide under the water and drown, and I'll see to his feet. Fair 'nuff?"
"Oh yeah. Hey... I'm really glad- I mean, thanks for coming over. I couldn't think of who else to call."
"Your mother's right out these days, huh?"
"Right out."
Jason wedged the flashlight under one arm and pulled a bloody foot up to work at cleaning out cuts. "Was your dad expecting you today?"
"No." Henry's voice sounded so forlorn that Jason glanced up to catch him staring at Viggo with a painfully adult sadness. "I just happened to drop by. I'm not supposed to be here til the weekend."
Jason kept his attention on the first aid, hauling a towel over his lap to catch any new blood. "Must've been pretty weird, finding your dad like this."
Henry sat on the floor by the tub, fingers now and then stroking Viggo's hair, then stopping as if embarrassed. "I thought he'd had a heart attack or something," he said quietly. "I've never seen- Dad doesn't do this." He looked up at Jason from under a thick fringe of brown hair, searching for confirmation.
"Nah, your dad's a pretty responsible drinker," Jason said lightly, keeping it easy. "From the looks of the kitchen, somebody had a pretty good tantrum."
"Yeah. I guess." Henry frowned, looked over at Viggo again, then went back to studying the floor.
Jason finished with one foot and eased it down into the water, pulling the other one over onto his lap. "Y'know, I'm thinking he never would've done this... whyever he did it ... if he'd had any idea you were coming over. You know that, right?"
"Yeah."
"You don't want me to tell Exene?"
"No!" Henry jerked his head up, alarmed. "No, don't do that. Please. Ratman's giving her all kinds of ideas. Dad- well-" He scrubbed his face, suddenly not wanting to be involved in this. It was all adult trouble, and he was sorry if it was over him but it wasn't like he asked for it. "She just doesn't need to know."
"Good enough, Hen. You know I'll respect that."
"Thanks, man."
Jason finished up the second foot, which wasn't as bad, and slid it into the water. "Okay, dude. You step outside for a little and I'm gonna hose your dad down. See if that rouses him. If it doesn't, I'll need you to help me get him to bed. You turn down his bed, okay?"
"Okay."
"Hey, Henry-"
"Yeah?"
"You know your dad loves you more than anything, right?"
"Yeah. I know that."
At some point Viggo awoke in his own bed, as hungover as he'd ever been in his life and with his feet bandaged. It took him almost two weeks to track down the full story of what happened, and when he finally got it straight he had a long cry for the first time probably since Henry was born. He gave Exene no grief about her ridiculous demands: There was never any question about that. And Henry seemed to spend more time with him than he had for a couple of years. Viggo counted himself a fool, and blessed.
-----
At some point Orlando spent an early evening in London desperately partying with a group of old friends from school, then showed up heinously hungover to the premeire of Kate's fucking movie about fucking singing and fucking dancing Bobby Darren. She hadn't even known who Sandra Dee was when she got the part, for Christ's sake. It apparently never occured to her that she could look it up. Orlando wasn't exactly a Rhodes Scholar, but he understood the concept of researching a character. He'd understood the basics even before he took the Viggo Master Course. He'd bitten his tongue the whole time she worked on the fucking movie, and she never had a clue. Fucking bimbo.
-----
At some point Viggo lost his interest in taking pictures. Something had gone out of him; it was as if he couldn't see any more. He tried to frame a photo and a little voice in the back of his head said this is nothing special this is a snapshot anybody could do this who do you think you're fooling? And he couldn't see the truth in anything any more, only the reality. Eventually he became leery of looking, for fear of what he might not see, although he never admitted that to anyone, not even himself. He said he was taking a creative break. Yeah, that's it.
-----
At some point Orlando stopped wearing his charms at all. He stuffed them in a side pocket of his main travel suitcase and there they stayed, pieces of his past, locked away and almost forgotten. He bought more expensive clothes, in more sophisticated, subdued colors. He stopped wearing crazy hats and gave up scarves for ties. He fit in.
-----
At some point Viggo stood, trembling with passion, in front of the White House and read his heartfelt anti-war poem Back to Babylon to a huge crowd of people on a cold day. Passion for the anti-war movement, for the movement to unseat the Bush Administration, had taken over the emptinesses in his life and he poured all he had into it. The defeat, when it came, was devastating. He went to Canada to work on a film about a man whose life is destroyed by the media, and thought long and hard about this wretched year.
------------------------------------------------------------
The boy who cried wolf is
the man who can't decide.
Can't lie; never gets away
with it, saves feathers
he finds, believing
they come from
dreamers' wings.
Wishing so hard, he
starts looking like
others, absorbs them.
Wishing like that
wears him out
after a while
and then he feels
sorry for himself
and takes it out
on anyone that seems
weak.
- Viggo Mortensen
From "Recent Forgeries." Used without permission but with utmost respect
Author: Rainweaver13
Pairing: Viggo/Orlando
Summary: After the fall: Kaleidoscope
Rating/Warnings: R. ANGST up the wazoo. All made up. Fiction. There's not a lick of truth in it.
Disclaimer: Don't own them; don't know anything about them - they are their own. I mean no disrespect and I'm certainly not profiting from this.
A/N: This chapter probably takes more liberties with "standard" fan tropes than any other, but just a reminder that this is fictional and it's my fiction. Your mileage may vary. Thanks for all the feedback. I'm honored and humbled.
-----------------
Previous Chapters Look under Personal Fics
2004 was a blur.
At some point Exene remarried. Her new husband took an immediate and overwhelming dislike to Viggo. Henry, now 16, was left, for the first time in his life, uncomfortably torn between his parents. To avoid causing Henry pain and to try to avoid his own pain, Viggo booked himself more heavily than he ever had.
-----
At some point Orlando realized he couldn't stand to be in the same room with Kate any more. She was a nice enough person, but she kept pushing him and he was so fucking tired of being pushed he was about ready to explode. It became an ongoing joke that he preferred his dogs to his girlfriend. The joke was that it wasn't a joke.
-----
At some point Viggo realized he hadn't spent more than three consecutive weeks on the same continent in months. He'd always loved to travel, but travel had become insane. Some days he had no idea where he was. He thought maybe he was tired. He knew he was exhausted.
-----
At some point Orlando realized he was at a party and didn't know a single damned person in the room. But they all knew him and they all wanted something - a smile, a kiss, a hug, a good word, a piece of advice, a name to network, a touch of the Orlando magic (ha, he thought, Orlando magic) - and he wondered when was the last time someone gave to him without expecting anything in return. He knew it was Viggo. At that party, he tried coke for the first time.
-----
At some point Viggo signed onto a movie because he liked the idea of working with David Cronenberg, but mostly because he liked the story, about a man trying to live a normal life whose world is destroyed by the media. He felt a crushing identification with that man. Then he signed on to a movie in Spain because it was in Spain, not Hollywood, and yeah, well, fuck them all. That's all. Sometimes it crossed his mind to wonder if he'd begun choosing movies for their value as weapons.
-----
At some point Orlando sat in a bar with some cast and crew people - maybe it was in Kentucky, or was it Spain? wherever - and listened to all the talk and tipsy laughter wash over and around him. For some reason - had it been a bad day filming? had Kate been a bitch? had the dogs thrown up on the floor? - he was in a particularly gloomy mood and so - very unlike him - he just sat and thought. He asked himself the dangerous question, "Am I happy?" It was a dangerous question because the answer tended to erode every bit of the self-confidence he'd tried so hard to build in the past two years. He also asked himself the dangerous question, "Do I have what I wanted?" He couldn't even answer that one, not even with only himself looking on. He just said fuck it and got drunk instead.
-----
At some point Viggo realized he hadn't painted in months.
-----
At some point Orlando started wearing his charm necklaces under his shirts.
-----
At some point Viggo got a visit from his lawyer bringing the news that Exene was taking him to court for increased child support for Henry. Viggo listened calmly and when the lawyer left he broke half the breakables in the kitchen in one giant explosion of furious frustration. She could have just asked. He'd always taken care of Henry: He'd always gotten the first of any money Viggo made, even when it was a struggle to make minimal payments. Now this was public record. Now it would go to the tabloids. Now this... this... humiliation.
Ignoring the broken glass, he grabbed two partial bottles of Jameson's out of the cabinet. Trailing bloody footprints, he wandered out onto the deck and drank and cursed himself absolutely shitfaced and beyond. When a light rain later began to plaster his clothes to his body, he never even twitched.
At some point that day Henry dropped by Dad's house unexpectedly to pick up some CDs and was mildly surprised to find the front door unlocked but no answer when he called, "Dad?"
Curious, he checked the living room, then the kitchen, where he stood stunned at the floor full of broken glass. Eventually his gaze focused on the bloody footprints and his heart thundered into his throat as he followed them to the glass doors and the sight of this father, curled defensively on the deck, soaking wet and apparently unconscious.
Henry rushed out, dropping to his knees on the wet wood. "Dad? Dad!"
No response.
Shaking with fear, he tried to remember what to do. Check breathing. Right. Okay. Check. He's breathing. Good. Check...um... heartbeat. Henry fumbled for a pulse point, finally finding one on his dad's neck. It seemed like it was an okay heart beat. So he was just...
Drunk. Plastered. Shitfaced.
Henry knew his dad was no saint. He'd seen him tipsy before, even stumbly drunk a couple of times at Christmas parties, but never anything like this. He grabbed his shoulders and shook him as hard as he could. Nothing. Not even a groan. But he couldn't leave him lying out here wet. Suddenly remembering the footprints, he scooted down to look at his dad's feet. Not good. Not terrible, but not good.
What to do?
Up until this year, he'd have called Exene, but now that was a phenomenally bad idea. He was enough of a celebrity's kid to know he couldn't just call 911: He didn't want his dad to end up in another supermarket tabloid. He'd had a bad enough year, what with Orli and now Exene's new dude and all. With another grimace down at his unconscious father, he jumped up and ran back into the house, grabbing the phone from the kitchen wall, careful of broken glass. Dialing by memory, he waited impatiently through the recorded message and navigated to where he needed to go.
"Nowhere Productions. What can I do for ya?
"I need to talk to Jason," Henry said urgently. "Tell him it's Henry."
"Hey, Henry! What's cooking?"
"It's kinda important, okay, Dee?"
"Sure, sure... Hang on." Henry could hear a banging in the background, and Dee's voice yelling for Jason to pick up line 2, it's Henry. A moment's pause, then...
"Henry? How y'doing, buddy?"
"Jason, I kinda need you to come over to Dad's house." Henry realized his voice was shaking slightly and took a deep breath to steady it. This wasn't an emergency, after all. He was just shaken up by the surprise. "Is there any way you could? Now?"
"Right now? I was talking with..." Jason's voice slowed and Henry could almost see him cocking his head the way he always did. "Is something wrong?"
"I just need you to help me with something." Deep breath. "With Dad." Hurriedly. "Don't call Exene, okay? I just need some help for a little while."
"Oooh-kay. Gimme, say, ten minutes. Traffic should be light. I'll be there as soon as I can get there. Can you let me in the gate?"
"Yeah, I'll watch. Thanks, Jase. Dad'll owe ya."
"Uh-huh. Ten minutes."
Grabbing an afghan from the couch, Henry darted back out to the deck only to find that Viggo had thrown up in his absence but still hadn't roused.
"Gag me, Dad," Henry grimaced. "I so didn't need this." He spread the afghan over Viggo and gingerly moved his heavy head slightly away from the mess. "This gets me a car."
The light rain started again, so Henry moved inside, dividing his time between watching the deck for any signs of movement and watching the front door for signs of Jason's old VW at the gate. On one pass, he noticed the spill of papers on the coffee table and paused to pick them up, curious to see if Viggo was reading a new script. Two paragraphs in he hit his own name and suddenly, through the legalese, began to understand what this was. He worked his way through all the jumble, thinking about the numbers, and then wondered why ... why this was a legal thing? Hadn't Dad always taken care of him? Henry didn't understand why this court petition thing was here, but he suddenly thought he might understand why his Dad was passed out drunk on the deck.
Jason Hamilton unfolded himself from the green and gold Bug and arrived at the front door in a flurry of long black hair and brown leather fringe. Of all Viggo's friends, Jason was the one who had most refused to leave the '70, and Henry accused him of looking like somebody out of Scooby Doo. Only cooler, of course. He got two steps inside the door before he wrapped Henry in a rib-crunching hug.
"What's up, little brother? You sounded hinky on the phone."
Henry beat him on the back a little to get free, then hugged him back quickly, before pointing to the deck. "There's what's up."
Jason swerved around him and headed for the glass doors, stepping out to squat beside Viggo appraisingly. "Shit. He really tied one on, huh?"
"I guess so. Cut his feet all up, too."
"No shit?" Jason scooted down and peered under the afghan to check out the foot situation, wrinkling his nose and shaking hair back behind his shoulders as he stood. "Need to get him inside, huh?"
"I couldn't- I can't lift him by myself." Now that somebody else was here, adrenaline crash was starting to hit Henry and the papers in his hand shook before he stuffed his hands under his arms and stared fixedly at the deck.
Jason laid a hand on his shoulder and squeezed gently. "Hey, you got help now. How 'bout you go start some water running in the tub, then come help me."
"Okay." Glad to be away from the uncomfortable scene, Henry vanished into the house. Jason went to the kitchen and surveyed the glass and ceramic holocaust while grabbing a couple of dish towels and wetting them. Back outside he rolled Viggo onto his back and wiped his face clean, still getting no response. Checking his feet next, he gingerly pulled out the largest visible shards of glass, dabbing a towel at the resulting blood.
"Damn hippie," he muttered, glaring up at Viggo. "Wear shoes if you're gonna get shitfaced and wreck your damn house." He moved up to wipe Hidalgo hair out of the pale face. "This is not like you, my friend. 'Specially not in front of Henry. What's going on in ViggoWorld?"
Henry appeared back at the door, minus the child support papers. Jason set to work unbuttoning Viggo's shirt and wiggling it off. He gave it a visual and sniff check to make sure it hadn't been puked on, then tossed it to Henry. "Put that on backwards, dude. Keep the blood off your clothes."
Henry blinked, but did as directed, dragging the damp shirt over his T-shirt. Jason pulled the afghan off Viggo and tossed it to one side, then squatted at his head to start working his arms under the drunk man's shoulders. "You get his feet," he said to Henry. "If his ass bumps the ground now and then, it's his own fault."
Together they managed to mostly lift, partially drag Viggo through the house into the bathroom and dump him into a tub slowly filling with water. That got a response, albeit a slight one.
"Can you find me some tweezers and maybe a flashlight?" Jason asked. "And a first aid kit if y'got one?"
Henry just nodded and rummaged through the medicine cabinet and under the sink to find what was needed, handing it all to Jason, who was busy tying his long black hair back with a strip of leather.
"Okay, dude. You just sit up there and make sure he doesn't slide under the water and drown, and I'll see to his feet. Fair 'nuff?"
"Oh yeah. Hey... I'm really glad- I mean, thanks for coming over. I couldn't think of who else to call."
"Your mother's right out these days, huh?"
"Right out."
Jason wedged the flashlight under one arm and pulled a bloody foot up to work at cleaning out cuts. "Was your dad expecting you today?"
"No." Henry's voice sounded so forlorn that Jason glanced up to catch him staring at Viggo with a painfully adult sadness. "I just happened to drop by. I'm not supposed to be here til the weekend."
Jason kept his attention on the first aid, hauling a towel over his lap to catch any new blood. "Must've been pretty weird, finding your dad like this."
Henry sat on the floor by the tub, fingers now and then stroking Viggo's hair, then stopping as if embarrassed. "I thought he'd had a heart attack or something," he said quietly. "I've never seen- Dad doesn't do this." He looked up at Jason from under a thick fringe of brown hair, searching for confirmation.
"Nah, your dad's a pretty responsible drinker," Jason said lightly, keeping it easy. "From the looks of the kitchen, somebody had a pretty good tantrum."
"Yeah. I guess." Henry frowned, looked over at Viggo again, then went back to studying the floor.
Jason finished with one foot and eased it down into the water, pulling the other one over onto his lap. "Y'know, I'm thinking he never would've done this... whyever he did it ... if he'd had any idea you were coming over. You know that, right?"
"Yeah."
"You don't want me to tell Exene?"
"No!" Henry jerked his head up, alarmed. "No, don't do that. Please. Ratman's giving her all kinds of ideas. Dad- well-" He scrubbed his face, suddenly not wanting to be involved in this. It was all adult trouble, and he was sorry if it was over him but it wasn't like he asked for it. "She just doesn't need to know."
"Good enough, Hen. You know I'll respect that."
"Thanks, man."
Jason finished up the second foot, which wasn't as bad, and slid it into the water. "Okay, dude. You step outside for a little and I'm gonna hose your dad down. See if that rouses him. If it doesn't, I'll need you to help me get him to bed. You turn down his bed, okay?"
"Okay."
"Hey, Henry-"
"Yeah?"
"You know your dad loves you more than anything, right?"
"Yeah. I know that."
At some point Viggo awoke in his own bed, as hungover as he'd ever been in his life and with his feet bandaged. It took him almost two weeks to track down the full story of what happened, and when he finally got it straight he had a long cry for the first time probably since Henry was born. He gave Exene no grief about her ridiculous demands: There was never any question about that. And Henry seemed to spend more time with him than he had for a couple of years. Viggo counted himself a fool, and blessed.
-----
At some point Orlando spent an early evening in London desperately partying with a group of old friends from school, then showed up heinously hungover to the premeire of Kate's fucking movie about fucking singing and fucking dancing Bobby Darren. She hadn't even known who Sandra Dee was when she got the part, for Christ's sake. It apparently never occured to her that she could look it up. Orlando wasn't exactly a Rhodes Scholar, but he understood the concept of researching a character. He'd understood the basics even before he took the Viggo Master Course. He'd bitten his tongue the whole time she worked on the fucking movie, and she never had a clue. Fucking bimbo.
-----
At some point Viggo lost his interest in taking pictures. Something had gone out of him; it was as if he couldn't see any more. He tried to frame a photo and a little voice in the back of his head said this is nothing special this is a snapshot anybody could do this who do you think you're fooling? And he couldn't see the truth in anything any more, only the reality. Eventually he became leery of looking, for fear of what he might not see, although he never admitted that to anyone, not even himself. He said he was taking a creative break. Yeah, that's it.
-----
At some point Orlando stopped wearing his charms at all. He stuffed them in a side pocket of his main travel suitcase and there they stayed, pieces of his past, locked away and almost forgotten. He bought more expensive clothes, in more sophisticated, subdued colors. He stopped wearing crazy hats and gave up scarves for ties. He fit in.
-----
At some point Viggo stood, trembling with passion, in front of the White House and read his heartfelt anti-war poem Back to Babylon to a huge crowd of people on a cold day. Passion for the anti-war movement, for the movement to unseat the Bush Administration, had taken over the emptinesses in his life and he poured all he had into it. The defeat, when it came, was devastating. He went to Canada to work on a film about a man whose life is destroyed by the media, and thought long and hard about this wretched year.
------------------------------------------------------------
The boy who cried wolf is
the man who can't decide.
Can't lie; never gets away
with it, saves feathers
he finds, believing
they come from
dreamers' wings.
Wishing so hard, he
starts looking like
others, absorbs them.
Wishing like that
wears him out
after a while
and then he feels
sorry for himself
and takes it out
on anyone that seems
weak.
- Viggo Mortensen
From "Recent Forgeries." Used without permission but with utmost respect
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no subject
Date: 2005-02-03 09:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-03 10:53 pm (UTC)Oh man.....
Date: 2005-02-04 03:01 am (UTC)THE saddest thing I think I've ever read.
Was really sad reading about the decline in Orlando's life... doing coke and not having any true friends around him anymore.
*sigh*
no subject
Date: 2005-02-04 04:00 am (UTC)How can i do if i want to read them? :)
*hugs*
no subject
Date: 2005-02-04 04:30 am (UTC)Rain
no subject
Date: 2005-02-06 03:17 am (UTC)I wonder if i'd be able to read chapter one, hehe :P
no subject
Date: 2005-02-04 05:28 am (UTC)I immensely enjoy your fic! Sorry I've never leave any comment til now.
Your Viggo has such a distinct personality. I adore that.
May I friend you?
I don't know why they're protected. :/
I think it's because you mark your posts to
If you mark a Friends-Only post as a Public memory, people who are not authorized to read that post will see that you have marked it as a memory and the description you have given it, but they will still not be able to read it.
(Livejournal FAQ Question #47)
I suggest you mark the posts to
no subject
Date: 2005-02-04 05:50 am (UTC)Friend away. The more the merrier...especially for people who actually know something about how this puppy works. ::grin:: Welcome on board!
Rain
Less befuddled that earlier
no subject
Date: 2005-02-04 10:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-04 11:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-02-04 06:57 pm (UTC)I may be looking pretty unaffected on the outside atm but inside my heart is aching, I'd hate to see Vig like that. Poor Hen :(
Beautiful chapter