Insomnia - challenge #127 (PG)
Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 2:29 am
Title: Insomnia
Author: redwinter101
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don't own Moonlight or any of its characters
A/N: written for champagne challenge #127, incorporating the words wire, uniform and heat. Not all sleepless nights are unwanted.
***************************************************************************************************************
--- Insomnia ---
It won't be long now.
A slow glance at the clock: 2:43 a.m.
The luminous points circle too fast, ticking away my breath, my life. Stifling heat broken by a cool whisper of breeze against my parchment skin. Remembrances, lost and recovered, cherished now in the safety of my ending. I can pause, take my time this final night.
They think I don't know. The hushed conversations just outside my door, the judicious doctors and nurses who no longer meet my eye, the platitudes they think will fool an old woman into slipping away quietly. A hot tear trickles across my cheek at the realisation that at some point, I ceased to be a person. I became a vigil.
I don't blame them; no-one can deny I've lived a long life. There's no tragedy here, or so they think. I can sense their expectation of some great pronouncement of my joy at meeting my lost husband in the afterlife. Tears turns to a giggle I can barely hold in. Of all the ridiculous notions I've heard in my lifetime, that just about takes the cake. Only the desperate, the rapt and the foolish long for death and I'm none of those. The guilty carry their secrets and prepare to settle their accounts. My account isn't with God but with Ray and with Mick.
All the years and all the sleepless nights Ray and I shared, alone now, this one I have longed for and long-planned. Still, calm, welcome, yet it ticks by so fast. A sharp stab of pain across my belly tempts me to reach for the week's supply of morphine saved up and stashed away, but I need to think, to settle my debts, to be ready. The curtain flutters, disturbed by the breeze and I can hear the soft drizzle soothing away the grime of another day.
The memory of his cool touch stirs, still with the power to bring flame to my cheeks after all these years. It isn't Ray's gentle care that floods my thoughts now.
"Mick."
It's the first time I've said his name out loud in over fifty years. So much hush in this room these last, long weeks and his name sounds soft and loud against the darkness. The warmth and light of youth peeks in, gently at first then stronger, kinder. In memory, the sun always shines but never burns.
A wisp of blossom-scented air. I know it's my imagination, sense memory's kindest trick, but it staves off the nausea that lingers in the clear-eyed night.
It was a lifetime ago. God, we were so young. The three of us, united against the world. Unbreakable, or so we thought. Child to man in the blink of memory's too-fast show, there they stand, Ray and Mick. Uniforms pristine, starchy, unbroken. Smiling bravely, hiding their fear, confident in their invincibility. We were all afraid, in our own ways. I for them, they for me and, most of all, for each other. Even now, after all these years, it still clutches at my heart to think of them that day. The last day of our dream life before the rest of the world intervened and screwed everything up.
But that's not really true. I wish I could blame it all on war, on fate, on foreign generals who would never know our names, but as my last hours tick by, it's time to accept my part. Apportioning blame always seemed like a waste of energy when there was work to be done and life to be lived. As my living draws to its end, now, its allure is inexorable.
That day was the first time Ray and I ever argued. It was all I could think of when I got the news he'd been killed in action - that the last day we'd spent together was marred by a stupid argument.
"Mick St. John - a medic," I'd teased. "Always-first-into-a-fight, heart-worn-on-his-sleeve, never-lay-down, don't-know-how-to-get-beat Mick St. John - a medic." And I'd laughed. Mick, too. It was the first joke we shared without Ray.
"Leave him be, Lilah. You don't know what you're talking about. Medics carry the heaviest burden." He had no way of knowing that, not then, but his instinctive protection shouldn't have surprised me. They were a secret society with a membership of two; their own rules, their own rituals. And they let me join. I'd seen so many foolish girls try to pull their sweethearts closer, away from their buddies while I got to enjoy the secret thrill of being welcomed inside.
As I lay here now, surrounded by my past, neatly framed and presented for inspection, I yearn for the girl I was then, even as I relish the woman I became. I found strength I never thought possible but it's that day, sharp and clear that marked the end of our beginning.
After so long together, the three of us, inseparable, unbreakable, it was me who tore us apart. I told myself it was luck, or God's will, or just the bloody unfairness of war but I know in my heart, as I knew then, that I'd broken us all in different, irreparable ways. Hard on the heels of the darkest battle of his life, Ray should have come home to unbridled joy. Instead he found unanswered questions and painful adjustment to a life he'd never planned.
The first two years were the toughest, his sorrow and his pain, wrapped tight as razor wire around our lives, refusing to let go, choking, struggling for breath. The life we'd imagined was gone forever and we were adrift. The empty space where Mick should have been, the silent, constant reminder that nothing would ever be the same again. I think that hurt Ray more than any of the damage of war; he'd lived through hell but losing Mick nearly ended him. Deflated, crumpled, desperate to understand, all the while closing his ears to the whispers he refused to hear.
"But you must know where he's gone," he'd ask most days, always hoping my silent, sad denial would change. But it never did. My sins were of omission, the truths I never told him and I'm content I did right. It took a long time for him to stop asking; I still don't know what he came to accept as the truth, but thankfully, it was a truth he could live with.
I never tried to find Mick. I folded him up and tucked him away in a secret corner deep inside. I knew he was there, safe and untouched in memory, so small, so hidden. My secret shame and my secret joy. It was the only thing to do.
Ray and I lived a good life, all in all. I made sure of it. It was the least and the most I could do. He was a good man; my companion, my husband, my lover and my friend. We raised a child together; we built a home and family, made friends and even a few enemies along the way; we did the thousands of everyday things that go to make up a life. And we mourned together when the news came about Mick's disappearance - the lurid stories, the pictures in the paper, his family's inconsolable grief.
That was the moment our lives began again. I never intended it that way and I still nurture my most secret guilt that it was the finite, tragic confirmation Mick wasn't coming back that allowed us to start over, to look forward, and to see each other as the man and woman we'd become.
I never told Ray I went there. To that hotel. To see for myself. To be sure.
But my courage deserted me. Or maybe I finally realised I didn't need to see a bloodstained bed to know our story was over. It had ended the day the telegram arrived announcing Ray was coming home. Mick knew it instantly and he was the one with the courage to act. For a long time I hated him for that strength, mistaking it for ease but now I know he was the bravest man I ever met. He gave us back our lives and asked for nothing in return. All those years, mostly happy, luckier than a lot of folks and probably more than I had any right to expect, and now, here, as the night draws to a close I can finally let the memories come and say my prayer of thanks to him.
4:08am.
This blessed, insomniac night is nearly over, but it isn't sleep that beckons. I know it's just my fading strength playing tricks but I swear he's here, a face in the shadows, drawing closer, his warm, wistful smile unchanged by time and age. His trained hands, a carer's hands, a lover's hands. Ever-young in memory I can almost feel his fingers through my hair, cool and calm. He's come to hold my hand as my breath fades to silence. I close my eyes, a final smile, a brush of his lips against my cheek.
It's time for me to go. To go to Ray.
Finally I can release my burden and say the words denied me for so long.
"Goodbye, Mick."
Author: redwinter101
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don't own Moonlight or any of its characters
A/N: written for champagne challenge #127, incorporating the words wire, uniform and heat. Not all sleepless nights are unwanted.
***************************************************************************************************************
--- Insomnia ---
It won't be long now.
A slow glance at the clock: 2:43 a.m.
The luminous points circle too fast, ticking away my breath, my life. Stifling heat broken by a cool whisper of breeze against my parchment skin. Remembrances, lost and recovered, cherished now in the safety of my ending. I can pause, take my time this final night.
They think I don't know. The hushed conversations just outside my door, the judicious doctors and nurses who no longer meet my eye, the platitudes they think will fool an old woman into slipping away quietly. A hot tear trickles across my cheek at the realisation that at some point, I ceased to be a person. I became a vigil.
I don't blame them; no-one can deny I've lived a long life. There's no tragedy here, or so they think. I can sense their expectation of some great pronouncement of my joy at meeting my lost husband in the afterlife. Tears turns to a giggle I can barely hold in. Of all the ridiculous notions I've heard in my lifetime, that just about takes the cake. Only the desperate, the rapt and the foolish long for death and I'm none of those. The guilty carry their secrets and prepare to settle their accounts. My account isn't with God but with Ray and with Mick.
All the years and all the sleepless nights Ray and I shared, alone now, this one I have longed for and long-planned. Still, calm, welcome, yet it ticks by so fast. A sharp stab of pain across my belly tempts me to reach for the week's supply of morphine saved up and stashed away, but I need to think, to settle my debts, to be ready. The curtain flutters, disturbed by the breeze and I can hear the soft drizzle soothing away the grime of another day.
The memory of his cool touch stirs, still with the power to bring flame to my cheeks after all these years. It isn't Ray's gentle care that floods my thoughts now.
"Mick."
It's the first time I've said his name out loud in over fifty years. So much hush in this room these last, long weeks and his name sounds soft and loud against the darkness. The warmth and light of youth peeks in, gently at first then stronger, kinder. In memory, the sun always shines but never burns.
A wisp of blossom-scented air. I know it's my imagination, sense memory's kindest trick, but it staves off the nausea that lingers in the clear-eyed night.
It was a lifetime ago. God, we were so young. The three of us, united against the world. Unbreakable, or so we thought. Child to man in the blink of memory's too-fast show, there they stand, Ray and Mick. Uniforms pristine, starchy, unbroken. Smiling bravely, hiding their fear, confident in their invincibility. We were all afraid, in our own ways. I for them, they for me and, most of all, for each other. Even now, after all these years, it still clutches at my heart to think of them that day. The last day of our dream life before the rest of the world intervened and screwed everything up.
But that's not really true. I wish I could blame it all on war, on fate, on foreign generals who would never know our names, but as my last hours tick by, it's time to accept my part. Apportioning blame always seemed like a waste of energy when there was work to be done and life to be lived. As my living draws to its end, now, its allure is inexorable.
That day was the first time Ray and I ever argued. It was all I could think of when I got the news he'd been killed in action - that the last day we'd spent together was marred by a stupid argument.
"Mick St. John - a medic," I'd teased. "Always-first-into-a-fight, heart-worn-on-his-sleeve, never-lay-down, don't-know-how-to-get-beat Mick St. John - a medic." And I'd laughed. Mick, too. It was the first joke we shared without Ray.
"Leave him be, Lilah. You don't know what you're talking about. Medics carry the heaviest burden." He had no way of knowing that, not then, but his instinctive protection shouldn't have surprised me. They were a secret society with a membership of two; their own rules, their own rituals. And they let me join. I'd seen so many foolish girls try to pull their sweethearts closer, away from their buddies while I got to enjoy the secret thrill of being welcomed inside.
As I lay here now, surrounded by my past, neatly framed and presented for inspection, I yearn for the girl I was then, even as I relish the woman I became. I found strength I never thought possible but it's that day, sharp and clear that marked the end of our beginning.
After so long together, the three of us, inseparable, unbreakable, it was me who tore us apart. I told myself it was luck, or God's will, or just the bloody unfairness of war but I know in my heart, as I knew then, that I'd broken us all in different, irreparable ways. Hard on the heels of the darkest battle of his life, Ray should have come home to unbridled joy. Instead he found unanswered questions and painful adjustment to a life he'd never planned.
The first two years were the toughest, his sorrow and his pain, wrapped tight as razor wire around our lives, refusing to let go, choking, struggling for breath. The life we'd imagined was gone forever and we were adrift. The empty space where Mick should have been, the silent, constant reminder that nothing would ever be the same again. I think that hurt Ray more than any of the damage of war; he'd lived through hell but losing Mick nearly ended him. Deflated, crumpled, desperate to understand, all the while closing his ears to the whispers he refused to hear.
"But you must know where he's gone," he'd ask most days, always hoping my silent, sad denial would change. But it never did. My sins were of omission, the truths I never told him and I'm content I did right. It took a long time for him to stop asking; I still don't know what he came to accept as the truth, but thankfully, it was a truth he could live with.
I never tried to find Mick. I folded him up and tucked him away in a secret corner deep inside. I knew he was there, safe and untouched in memory, so small, so hidden. My secret shame and my secret joy. It was the only thing to do.
Ray and I lived a good life, all in all. I made sure of it. It was the least and the most I could do. He was a good man; my companion, my husband, my lover and my friend. We raised a child together; we built a home and family, made friends and even a few enemies along the way; we did the thousands of everyday things that go to make up a life. And we mourned together when the news came about Mick's disappearance - the lurid stories, the pictures in the paper, his family's inconsolable grief.
That was the moment our lives began again. I never intended it that way and I still nurture my most secret guilt that it was the finite, tragic confirmation Mick wasn't coming back that allowed us to start over, to look forward, and to see each other as the man and woman we'd become.
I never told Ray I went there. To that hotel. To see for myself. To be sure.
But my courage deserted me. Or maybe I finally realised I didn't need to see a bloodstained bed to know our story was over. It had ended the day the telegram arrived announcing Ray was coming home. Mick knew it instantly and he was the one with the courage to act. For a long time I hated him for that strength, mistaking it for ease but now I know he was the bravest man I ever met. He gave us back our lives and asked for nothing in return. All those years, mostly happy, luckier than a lot of folks and probably more than I had any right to expect, and now, here, as the night draws to a close I can finally let the memories come and say my prayer of thanks to him.
4:08am.
This blessed, insomniac night is nearly over, but it isn't sleep that beckons. I know it's just my fading strength playing tricks but I swear he's here, a face in the shadows, drawing closer, his warm, wistful smile unchanged by time and age. His trained hands, a carer's hands, a lover's hands. Ever-young in memory I can almost feel his fingers through my hair, cool and calm. He's come to hold my hand as my breath fades to silence. I close my eyes, a final smile, a brush of his lips against my cheek.
It's time for me to go. To go to Ray.
Finally I can release my burden and say the words denied me for so long.
"Goodbye, Mick."
thanks, honey.
It's so wonderful to know that a story has moved you - because it means I'm being true to these amazing characters, who still never fail to move me. 
I'm sorry for the heartbreak and very grateful that you stopped by to read. 
and heartfelt thanks to MLC for the recommendation. As you say we all walk the last bit alone. I think it's Mick's tragedy that so much of the rest of his path has been walked alone, too.
