mens rea (PG-13)

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mens rea (PG-13)

Post by Luxe de Luxe »

Title: mens rea

Rating: PG-13

Disclaimer: Not mine, never will be.

A/N: I wrote this a very long time ago and left it sitting in my miscellaneous file thinking that it was nowhere good enough to post. It addresses the question of how Josef and Beth could have gotten away with what they did in Until Next Time. I'm posting it now because that fic has popped back up and reminded me that readers wonder about this question. For those of you who've wondered... this is my answer.

Oh and BTW, for those of you who might not be familiar with it, 'mens rea' is a latin term used in legal settings. If I tell you what it means here, I might give something away.



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

mens rea


He’d only just opened the door, hadn’t yet turned on a light, when the voice addressed him from somewhere in the darkened office beyond.

“There’s something going on, Josef. I know. With Beth.”

There was a click and a cool light glowed from the Eames lamp on his desk and there he was, just as Josef had always known one day that he would be. Mick St John: come to send him straight to hell.

Shame tingled along Josef’s spine and a part of him, a small part, wondered if he could avoid his fate the way he had so many times in his long and sin-filled life before. It wouldn’t take much. He could step back now and close his office door before Mick could speak again. He could walk away, disappear, never, ever to return. Stay and face the shame, go and lose both of those he loved forever. Either one was far too bitter a choice for him to make. So there he stood, mannequin still, skewered to the spot by Mick’s glare. The coward in him urged him to voice any one of the dozen smooth explanations he’d been practicing for the past year and a half, but fifty years of waiting for Sarah to either wake or die had taught him that fate couldn’t be cheated forever. He raised his chin and met Mick’s gaze properly for the first time. He’d known what he and Beth were doing was wrong, Mick deserved his pound of flesh. Josef stepped into his office and closed the door behind him.

Mick’s eyes raked over him from head to toe and he began to pace, running a hand through his hair, turning on his heel to regard Josef from under lowered brows, then blowing out a fevered breath only to turn on his heel again, jaw clenched, both palms beseeching from his friend an answer that Josef knew no response of his could ever satisfy.

“Why, Josef? Why?”

Josef’s lips twisted. What could he possibly say? He’d asked himself the same question a million times over. He just didn’t have an answer. He would have given anything not to have fallen for Mick’s woman, but he had, fallen hard, and now here he was. In love. Helpless. Mick continued to pace, the pain on his face terrible. Whatever happened next, Josef knew with certainty that he had lost his old friend forever. And Beth? When it came to love, it seemed that the only thing the Universe was interested in where he was concerned was even-ing out the score card. Beth had made it clear in the beginning that she would never leave Mick and nothing she’d said since made him believe she had changed her mind in any way.

He took a chance and looked straight into Mick’s eyes. The rims were red and an edge of hysteria gleamed from his friend's normally calm grey irises. The sharp point of a silver dagger between his ribs, that Josef had been prepared for. It’s what he would have done in the circumstances. But this? Watching his best friend fall apart in front of him and knowing he was the one to blame was causing him actual physical pain. He’d never seen Mick look this concerned.

Wait.
Concern.
Not anger.
Apprehension.
Mick was worried.
Worried.

Josef’s mind finally kicked into gear and he took a surreptitious breath. He was right, this wasn’t the righteous fury of a wronged partner, this was anxiety. Josef almost sagged with relief. A light winked on behind his eyes. He’d deal with this the way he always had. He slipped a hand into a pocket and infused his next words with as much sarcasm as he could muster.

“Oh, goody, charades! And here I was thinking it was going to be just one more predictable make-another-million-on-the-market kind of day.”

He smirked, but felt the unfamiliar sensation of the skin crawling between his shoulder blades as he strode past Mick and sat down behind his desk. He queried Mick with the usual impudent raise of his eyebrows.

“There’s something wrong with Beth,” Mick said.

Her name twisted in Josef’s gut and he winced.

“I know this is small stuff to you, Josef,” Mick fumed, misunderstanding the fleeting expression on his friend's face, “What happens with Beth doesn’t matter much to you, but you know how important she is to me.”

So Mick had staked him after all.

Josef’s hands trembled and he pressed his fingertips together with crushing force to still the shakes. “Then why don’t you go ahead and tell Uncle Josef, Mick,” he said.

Mick sighed and sat down. “There’s something wrong with Beth. She’s distracted all the time, she’s preoccupied. I have to repeat things constantly. I mean, she’s lost the remote to my loft twice in the past two months and her flash drive - and that thing’s more precious to her than I am! I can hardly get a smile out of her these days, it’s like she doesn’t want to look at me, and she’s tired all the time. She either goes to bed as soon as she gets home or drinks coffee after coffee and stays up working every night til almost dawn. And when we do have sex…,” he stopped, shook his head, looked off at nothing in the distance. “Josef, I think Beth’s getting sick.”

Josef shuddered, grateful that Mick had stopped at the point he did. Keeping the images of Mick’s hands on Beth out of his mind was hard enough of at the best of times, but to hear the actual details…

Mick was looking at him, waiting for a response.

“It sounds like she’s just working too hard, Mick,” Josef said carefully.

Mick shook his head. “It’s not just that, Josef. It’s not just her being distracted all the time or not getting enough sleep. She’s losing weight,” Mick regarded Josef meaningfully, a small but welcome hint of humor in his eyes, “- and you know how Beth loves her food.”

Josef did as required, joined in the feeble joke about Beth’s appetite with a smile, but the bitter irony wasn’t lost on him. What Mick had said was true. Josef himself had noticed how angular Beth’s body was becoming, her shoulder blades as sharp as their namesakes against his chest whenever he curved an arm around her belly and pulled her close.

“Something’s wrong, Josef, really wrong, I know it.” Mick’s eyes dropped and he looked away. The silence stretched until he finally spoke again. “I’ve never told you this, but after Beth’s kidnapping, her mother spent some time in a psychiatric facility.”

Josef’s stomach lurched, the full agony of Mick’s misapprehension finally clear to him. This, at least, was something he could do for his friend. Josef sat up straighter in his seat, his tone sharp as he said, “Beth’s not going mad, Mick. Put that thought right out of your head.” Then more gently, “Come on, you know how driven the girl is. I tell you, she’s just working too hard.”

“You don’t understand, she’s, she’s…” Mick slumped in the chair, elbows on his thighs, hands hanging loosely between his knees, an expression of utter defeat on his face. When he finally raised his head, a punishing look of guilt was on his face. “I swore to her, Josef… I swore I’d never hurt her, that I’d never disappoint her. I hate to violate her privacy by telling you all this, but God help me, I can live with being a failure as a man and as her lover, but not as her guardian and protector. Not that. I just hope that one day she’ll forgive me for breaking her trust and talking to you about this.” His tongue moistened his lower lip. “Last night I finished the surveillance I was working on a little earlier than I expected. When I let myself into her apartment she was in the shower,” his voice dropped to a hoarse whisper, “ - and she screamed, she screamed, Josef, when she saw me.”

Josef dropped his eyelids for a second. It was Beth who had made the call to him last night - three weeks, six days and nineteen hours after he’d watched her step into an elevator and descend into their own mutual hell.

He hadn’t hesitated when the phone rang, dismissing his office with a decisive snap of his fingers. She was the only one who had that number and he was aware of the cell’s location every waking moment, almost as if invisible threads of spider silk connected him to the device, countless tiny protrusions tugging outward from his skin whenever he stepped too far from the precious, despised contraption. Jesus, he was a walking bruise. He answered and noticed with annoyance the tremble in his fingers as he pressed the phone to his ear, saying nothing, waiting for her to speak. Why should he make it easy, damn her? After last time he’d vowed to himself that he was done. He was finished doing all the chasing. If she wanted it, she would have to come to him. She had to admit that she wanted him at some point.

The sound of a clock ticking in her apartment filled the void between them, then he heard a single indrawn breath. If it were possible for an intonation of such brevity to convey regret, hers did. She was going to hang up, Goddammit.

“When?” he snapped, before she lost her nerve and left them both suspended on the wire.

There was an anguished silence.

“Now,” she whispered.


In the end it didn’t matter who made the call, one of them always did. Josef could feel his body responding to the memory of the things they had done to one another in the penthouse apartment that no one knew about. Last night when she got home she would have stunk of him. He looked up. Mick’s face was a mask of agony.

“She was afraid of me, Josef. Why would she be afraid of me?” Mick's voice had risen and his face dropped into his palm. “Oh God, why wouldn’t she? I used to eat girls like her for breakfast. I knew one day this would be too much for her.”

“Nonsense, Mick. You came upon the lady unexpectedly in her shower. Sheesh, does any horror movie not have that scene in it these days? You just startled her.” The guilt made his tone harsher than he’d intended.

“No, Josef,” Mick looked as lost as he’d ever seen him, “it wasn’t that. She screamed when she saw that it was me. Me.” Mick buried his face in his hands and rested it there for a long, long time and when he spoke again his voice was hollow. “There’s more. She washed her hair five times. Five, I counted and,” he ignored the tear rolling down his cheekbone, “she made me leave the bathroom before she got out, almost as if she was afraid I was going to attack her.” He leaned forward in his seat, “Josef, she put the washing machine on at two in the morning. And then she cleaned..” Mick’s voice broke, “This has being going on for a long time now Josef. At least eighteen months. She cleans everything she touches three and four times over, in her place and in mine. She’ll be fine for a little while and then she cleans in a frenzy for weeks until out of the blue it stops. And then it starts all over again. I’ve watched over her for twenty-three years and I’ve never seen her like this. Ever. I’m frightened for her, Josef. I think she’s having the same sort of breakdown her mother did and I don’t know what to do to help her. Josef, what do I do to help her?”

Josef felt ill. He had no idea of the toll that hiding their affair had been taking on Beth, and neither of them ever thought of Mick, deliberately pushing him out of their minds whenever they were together. He loved Beth, knew that with the same certainty that he knew the sun would set tomorrow, but he couldn’t do this to Mick any more. He and Beth were over. He’d leave L.A., go back to Europe for a decade if that’s what it took to end this thing, to tear the terrible temptation from his heart before he did any further harm to the people he loved.

He swung his chair around until all he could see were the bright city lights outside his window. “I’ll tell you what you’re going to do, Mick. You’re going to go straight home to Beth’s, put her and a suitcase into the Mercedes and head straight for Davis airfield. If she even looks like quibbling, don’t argue, just put her over your shoulder and carry her out. The Gulfstream will be fuelled and ready to go and extra clothing will be on board. All you need to do is give the pilot a location. My P.A. will sort out anything else that’s necessary from here and I’ll speak to the D.A.’s office myself tomorrow. And Mick,” Josef said, “Don’t come back until the two of you are fully right.”

Mick looked sceptical. “This time away together… do you really think it will make a difference?”

Josef swung his chair back around to face Mick. “I know it will.”

The relief in Mick’s eyes was palpable and for a moment he couldn’t speak. He thrust out his hand. “Thank you, Brother.”

Mick wasted no time, heading toward the door with his old leonine grace. Halfway there he stopped and turned toward Josef with an apologetic expression on his face. “I know I shouldn't, but, for what it’s worth… you’ve waited too long for Sarah. Find yourself a woman like Beth and fall in love again."

Josef watched the door swing shut behind Mick. A fingertip, moving at the pace a very old man’s might, reached forward and depressed the button on his desk lamp and he sat there alone for a very long time in the dark.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Last edited by Luxe de Luxe on Sun May 12, 2019 2:30 am, edited 11 times in total.
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jen
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by jen »

Yay!

You did it!
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by allegrita »

I can't understand why you hung onto this for so long. It's devastatingly good. And you're right--it does a lot to explain how Josef and Beth could have gotten away with their deception. But it also does a great deal to crumple up your readers' hearts. What a horrible dilemma. What a terrible, terrible situation for everyone. :Mickangel:
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by librarian_7 »

Umm.

As with all your writing, this is so...devastating. (And I mean that in a good way.)

And it's as good as any writing I've seen. Pretty much ever.

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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by MickLifeCrisis »

That put my tummy all in knots.
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by Lucy »

Is it too ungrateful to ask for more?????? :heart: :heart: :heart:
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by Marigold »

Luxe de Luxe wrote: I wrote this a very long time ago and left it sitting in my miscellaneous file thinking that it was nowhere good enough to post.


What are you talking about??? This was amazing, and so upsetting (that is a compliment - only extremely well-written pieces can evoke a real emotional response). In my opinion, Mick's worry and naïvety (in that he does not even suspect Beth's infidelity) are far worse than his anger would have been had he found out the truth. Mick never doubted his partner's loyalty nor his best friend's loyalty. Little did he know the truth... :Mickangel:

I think that Josef is doing the right thing by removing himself from the situation, but I can't help but think that it is too little, too late. Does the future make up for the past? On one hand, I hope that Mick never finds out about the affair, but on the other hand, I don't want him to live with the wool pulled over his eyes. I wonder how Beth will deal with her guilt...
Luxe de Luxe wrote:She was the only one who had that number and he was aware of the cell’s location every waking moment, almost as if invisible threads of spider silk connected him to the device, countless tiny protrusions tugging outward from his skin whenever he stepped too far from the precious, despised contraption.
This was one of my favorite lines of your story. I can't get over the vivid imagery and the diction.

Thank you so much for posting this, Luxe! :rose: :hearts: :flowers:

P.S. The title is SO fitting! :heart:
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by jen »

Luxe

After thinking about this, and you know you have a good fic when you continue to think about it days after you read it, I think that Mick will understand. Oh, I don't think she should tell him right away but eventually she will and he will react with the anger and hurt that any guy would, but then he would think about it and he would understand--all because of Coraline.

Remember when he asked Beth if she had ever had an intense affair? He said it was like an infection. It burns you up. This affair with Josef was tearing her apart. He watched her psyche splinter into phobias. It was burning her up.

Josef sent them away together to fix what was wrong. To reconnect.

Yes, there would be hurt feelings for a while, but I think Mick and Beth would come out the other end of this stronger for having gone through it. Now, Beth can understand from first hand experience what an intense affair can mean to a person's sanity.

Well done!

Thank you!
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by darkstarrising »

I'll echo the others, Luxe - why in the world did you not think this was postworthy?

This is one of the best takes on the triangle I've read. You present us with two very different men, each of whom means the world to the other. The woman they both love has brought about this confrontation, but it's not the confrontation Josef expected.

What I really loved about this was the emotional shifting Josef experiences as he first perceives Mick knows about the affair, then realizes his best friend is clueless and is worried about Beth's emotional stability. Josef shifts from fear of retribution
Josef’s lips twisted. What could he possibly say? He’d asked himself the same question a million times over. He just didn’t have an answer. He would have given anything not to have fallen for Mick’s woman, but he had - fallen hard - and now he was in love. Helpless......The sharp point of a silver dagger between his ribs, that Josef had been prepared for. It’s what he would have done in the circumstances. But this? Watching his best friend fall apart in front of him and knowing he was the one to blame was causing him actual physical pain. He’d never seen Mick look this concerned.
to finding a way of easing out of a trap he thought he was in.
Josef’s mind finally kicked into gear and he took a surreptitious breath. He was right, this wasn’t the righteous fury of a wronged partner, this was anxiety. Josef almost sagged with relief. A light winked on behind his eyes. He’d deal with this the way he always had. He slipped a hand into a pocket and infused his next words with as much sarcasm as he could muster.
And all in the blink of an eye.....

Yet the Josef you present us with loves the anguished man before him. He'd do anything to ease his pain and keep his friendship, even if it means giving up a woman he loves.

And it all comes full circle - Mick sitting behind the desk in the dark at the beginning of the story, lost and desperate. When the light comes on and during the course of the conversation his anxiety eases, it is Josef who ultimately finds himself changing places with his best friend, and turning the light off, finds himself alone and desperate.

Lovely, lovely story :rose:
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by allegrita »

Unless, of course, Mick went off in a rage and tried (or succeeded) to murder Josef. :gasp: :chair:
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by nutmegger911 »

:thud: You're killing me, you know. You are absolutely killing me. This is... it's... it's... gripping, terrifying, heartbreaking, stop-you-in-your-tracks beautiful. You have that rare ability to elicit a physical reaction with your stories. Sorry, but it's going to take some time to recover enough to give you a coherent comment.
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by Luxe de Luxe »

thank you all for reading. compared to 'until next time' I felt this completely lacked emotional resonance (hence the reason for it being shelved in the misc file for so long). I've been really surprised by comments about this having an impact. I just don't see it, myself.

thanks, Alle. you're always so moved by the awful messes I make my characters experience. Just for you... :flowers:

Thank you, Lucky. :phew: I know jo/be isn't your thing.

MLC, oh no! :comfort2:

marigold, Yay, you got the title!! Also, I am so glad you think Mick reacting this way was worse! I hoped it would be. Would Mick be better off with the 'wool over his eyes' or not? I don't know. I think there can definitely be something to the ignorance is bliss thing.

jen, thanks as always. Two things: firstly, I totally agree that Beth will confess at some point. Despite the affair, I think at heart she's an honest person and won't be able to go on with Mick without laying it all out on the table. I think she will let a bit of time go by before she does and, well, I'm not sure how Mick would react. I'm not sure he'd go as far as Alle fears. The big question for him would be the 'why' and has anything changed - you know, the whole if you did it once, why wouldn't you do it again thing. He'd really have to question for himself the basis of their relationship. The answer to that would inform whether he'd stay or go, I think. And there would definitely at the least be some harsh words with Josef I'm sure. I also agree that his 'amour fou' experience with Coraline would anchor him and provide a basis for his ultimate forgiveness of them both. Although.... given his own experience, he'd also be sweating waiting on a second or third outbreak of 'crazy love' between them. The second thing I wanted to pick up was your comment about the reason for Beth's odd behaviour. I think maybe the fic isn't as clear as it should be. In my head, Beth's behaviour as described by Mick is about covering up their affair by making sure there is absolutely no Josef scent on her when she's around Mick. Mick notices this behaviour those times when Josef and Beth are 'on' again. She's 'normal' again when they haven't been seeing one another. Maybe I haven't explained it well enough or assumed too much back knowledge of the reader.

dsr, I'm really impressed. the whole coming-full-circle thing didn't even occur to me until I re-read this piece the day after I posted it. then I felt pretty smug about my unconscious or whatever it is that supplies all the material. It definitely wasn't planned. So glad Josef's reactions were understandable, too.

thanks for reading, nm. your encouragement means a lot. :rose:
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by allegrita »

Dear darling, difficult dangerous and complicated Luxe,

I just threw that possibility out there--I'm not sure how Mick would react. I guess it depends on how soon Beth tells him, because yes, I agree that she'd eventually tell him. I got the fact that Beth's "crazy" actions were all intended to disguise Josef's scent... that was very clever of you, especially since it would work to confuse and worry Mick, drawing him closer to her rather than making him realize what was going on. :Mickangel:

I've got to say at this point that I had to do a big willing suspension of disbelief at the outset of "Until Next Time," since I don't see Josef falling into the trap of such a desperate, damned, and doomed relationship as this. But given the basic premise, I am astounded at the brilliance with which you've portrayed it to us. I believe every word you write once I accept that basic premise. (And note that I said I don't believe it of Josef; I do believe Beth could be swept up in such a thing, although I prefer to believe it would be Mick who did the sweeping.)

As for whether it was emotionally resonant, I think the responses you've gotten speak volumes. :notworthy:
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by francis »

The guilt is eating Beth up, and she's frantic to get Josef's scent out of herself. I'm glad that Mick told Josef, because she shouldn't be the one to suffer, and now that Josef knows what it takes from her and from his friend he is taking himself away. It's for the best, probably. Except that now Mick won't know what happened and I'm not sure a little retreat will be enough to mend what Beth had with Mick and has destroyed now. Even without Mick knowing she has changed. It takes a toll. I agree with others that she will tell him one day. I would love to hear your take on how this continues.
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Re: mens rea (PG-13)

Post by Luxe de Luxe »

Thank you, Alle. :smooch: ... and I agree, it does take a HUGE suspension of disbelief to have Josef and Beth together in the way that prompted this fic. ( I can remember curling into a foetal ball the 1st time I ever inadvertently read a fic that had some jo/be inclinations). I think it says a lot about our reading of Beth's character that so far all of us believe that she would someday tell Mick. She does take risks, but that also means she really loves him I think, to allow him the ultimate say in whether or not he'd stay.

Thanks, francis. Yes, it is an interesting question about what happens to the quality of a relationship after infidelity. Is it cracked forever like a china plate or does it strengthen like a broken bone? I've written a Mick finding out about the affair fic. Very hard going. Not sure I want to go back into those woods, but I really appreciate the encouragement.
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