Straight from the workshop:

[hmpf]

He is back in her bed now. (She is back in his.)

At night she listens to his breath. It is soft and ever so slightly irregular: a human sound, not the harsh machine wheeze she remembers. It fills her with a precarious joy as she lies listening, looking up into dark. She feels that she should be able to see it, catch it and cup it in her hands and feel his life in it; fearing, still fearing that any moment it may stop.

Fear softly settles on her as the night progresses by increments. She turns her head to see his peaceful form under the blankets, tousled hair, rim of an ear outlined by blinds-filtered moonlight. Finds her hand spider-crawling towards him, reading the message of his warmth.

Things he never had to waste conscious thought on take effort now. By early evening speech waylays him. He gets lost on his way through a sentence. Words slur. He says he does not want her to pattern her life around his, but it is her own need, (vital), that takes her to his side as he retires at dusk.

She does not ask if he, too, imagines that he will not wake up. She throws him a lifeline of words and touch: in case.

Despite his weariness, sleep does not come easily. Some visceral memory of the undertow of unconsciousness, perhaps, tells his body to resist. When she senses the dark waves finally drawing near - him slipping, ready to be carried away - she stills her hands, her whispers; waits. Then lies awake for three, four, five hours, watching him sleep.

(She still has not managed to turn him back into an adult entirely. As she watched, waiting, the machinery leached something essential from him. In its place grew a lessness. He aged backwards; became soft, undefined. She fought by recalling him: resolve and precision and curiosity, and bloody-mindedness, yes; hands deft and intent on steering wheel, laptop keys, obsessively lining up pens; fingers wandering, softly, down her midriff, circling her navel.)

***

He is back in her bed now. (She is back in his.)

At night she listens to his breath. It is soft and ever so slightly irregular: a human sound, not the harsh machine wheeze she remembers. It fills her with a precarious joy as she lies listening, looking up into dark. She feels that she should be able to see it, catch it and cup it in her hands and feel his life in it; fearing, still fearing that any moment it may stop.

Fear softly settles on her as the night progresses by increments. She turns her head to see his peaceful form under the blankets, tousled hair, rim of an ear outlined by blinds-filtered moonlight. Finds her hand spider-crawling towards him, reading the message of his warmth.

Part removed.Things he never had to waste conscious thought on take effort now. By early evening speech waylays him. He gets lost on his way through a sentence. Words slur. He says he does not want her to pattern her life around his part removed, but it is her own need, (vital), that takes her to his side as he retires at dusk. Part removed.

She does not ask if he, too, imagines that he will not wake up. She throws him a lifeline of words and touch: in case.

Despite his weariness, sleep does not come easily. Some visceral memory of the undertow of unconsciousness, perhaps, tells his body to resist. When she senses the dark waves finally drawing near - him slipping, ready to be carried away - she stills her hands, her whispers; waits. Then lies awake for three, four, five hours, watching him sleep.

(She still has not managed to turn him back into an adult entirely. As she watched, waiting, the machinery leached something essential from him. In its place grew a lessness. He aged backwards; became soft, undefined. She fought part removed by recalling him: resolve and precision and curiosity, and bloody-mindedness, yes; hands deft and intent on steering wheel, laptop keys, obsessively lining up pens; fingers wandering, softly, down her midriff, circling her navel.)

Gah. Still needs a lot of work.

P.S.: Yes, that's my hands and fingers fetish at work there. :D

Comments

Re: Yes, I was.

[loz]

I think what you're forgetting is that people don't always cry because they're upset. Which, perhaps, I should have made more explicit. I think I'll cry, because it will show me something I've never truly accepted, before. But, part of that will be a release, not necessarily a negative reaction.

I think I understand that, too. :-)

[hmpf.livejournal.com]

It's just as I said - difficult to talk about in a form that isn't fiction. Nearly all the words we have for emotions in normal speech are too narrow for the real complexities and contradictions.

It all scares me a bit, of course. I hope the fic will live up to your expectations?/need?/... It's strange to be writing something that kind of consciously goes beyond fanfic, in terms of... hmm, emotional weight?/meaning?/... Oh, arrgh.

Of course, angsty fic rather often is about issues of real weight, so, really, this is actually a responsibility we always deal with... it just gets easily lost in the kink. I think *really* good angst fic always transcends the kink, to some degree. Or maybe transcendence of the kink is part of the kink? What exactly *is* the kink in angst? Ooooh, there's another meta essay in there somewhere, I think.

It's funny:

[hmpf.livejournal.com]

so much has been written about slash, and a good deal about slash's angsty cousin, h/c. But very little has been written, as far as I am aware, about angst, although that, too, is a time-honoured fannish kink of peculiar implications...