In Other Words

Participants:

bf_lynette_icon.gif bf_mateo_icon.gif bf_odessa_icon.gif

Scene Title In Other Words
Synopsis I love you.
Date January 12, 2012

Brooklyn, Rowan Ruiz Home


The Brooklyn apartment overlooks the city street, with wide open windows and even a small patio. The room is well decorated, artful, tasteful. Shifting through the vinyls, Mateo Javier Rowan Ruiz, for he took his wife's name and added it to his own, selects one and sets the record down on the player, lowering the needle into place and letting the record begin to spin. The speakers are strategically placed.

A soft drum beat begins to play over through the room, then a familiar voice begins to sing.

Fly me to the moon

Let me play among the stars

He begins to move away, closing his eyes as he reaches up to scratch at the sideburns that grew down toward his jawline.

"Classic." A feminine voice speaks over the crooning from the record player. When Mateo opens his eyes, there's a small blonde woman standing in the middle of his living room, moving languidly to the beat. "I love this song."

She smiles, but it is not a nice expression. Like a wolf who's scented blood on the wind. This one wears a sheep's skin.

"Hello, Hati."

Let me see what spring is like

On a, Jupiter and Mars

The sudden voice takes him by surprise, apparently, spinning toward it with dark eyes widening. Mateo did not hear her enter, did not hear anything out of the ordinary. No one should be there— even Lynette shouldn't have been home yet.

He's about to ask who she is, how she got inside, all of that. But then she says his name. That name.

The wolf who chased the moon. The wolf who would devour it one day.

Within seconds his hand shifts, the lights begin to flicker.

In other words, hold my hand

In other words, baby, kiss me

"I'd sing along… But a caged Nightingale doesn't sing." It's all she offers for an introduction.

There's a gasp when the lights flicker, but it isn't in surprise or fear. It's delight. "Are you going to show me how you swallow the moon, little wolf?" Blue eyes grow as wide as his did a moment earlier, eager to see the display of power.

Fill my heart with song

And let me sing for ever more

The woman snaps her fingers and suddenly she's gone. — No, not gone. Her breath washes over his ear from behind. "Go on," she whispers, "show me all that power. Show me what he saw in you."

You are all I long for

All I worship and adore

Nightingale. That sounds familiar, but Mateo spins as she vanishes and the voice is heard behind him, but he never quite sees her. She's also too close.

In other words, please be true

The panic in his eyes starts to grow and a hole opens in the air. She would feel her ears pop a little as the air pressure changes as the lights stop flickering. The record skips once.

In other— other words, I love you

The black spiral starts to pull in air, flipping a book on the coffee table open, drawing in dust particles, making the window shake and the pillows on the couch shift.

But it's the noise that comes through the most, drowning out the music. Like the sound of a train roaring into the subway.

Snapping her arm out to one side, the portal—

Doesn't stop exactly, which has her tipping her head as she stands in the stillness of the room. Everything around it is held perfectly still, suspended in mid-air, and it no longer tugs at her - though the pressure in the air still exists in this pretty little paradox - but this beautiful void still calls to her.

The music resumes. The pull of the void resumes. Pain is new.

Fill my heart with song

Let me sing for ever more

There's a knife in Mateo's stomach, plunged in to the hilt. Odessa is done playing with her target. The sooner she puts him down, the sooner she finds herself free of this power of his that she can't control.

You are all I long for

All I worship and adore

She only hopes the screaming she hears so keenly in her head – joined with the whispers and cries in her own mind – dies with him.

One hand still wrapped around her knife, she takes him by the throat and shoves him back against the door to the balcony, red painted nails digging into flesh. The door rattles on its hinges from the force of his back striking against it. "There's no use, Hati."

In other wo— wo— words, please be true.

In other words in oth—

in other words in oth—

The record begins to skip, replaying the same bit over and over as Mateo— as Hati— slams against the balcony door. The pain is new. And he didn't remember her stabbing in. The electric wrapped hole in space screams, sparks and flickers and then just… seems to fall apart.

In other words in oth—

It doesn't collapse in on itself, it just breaks into pieces, a flash of light, a push of energy. The room shakes a little. The book flies off the coffee table. Paintings on the wall fall.

And she gets pushed against him, digging the knife deeper as he lets out a sound, a keening sound.

In other words in oth—

The electricity disperses into the air around them. Any attempt at words seems lost for the moment, as he struggles to regain his ability, to focus, to do something… but her hand against his throat stops the words. He struggles to breath, struggles to stay standing— his hands clawing at her face, the arm holding him in place, anything.

One of his fingers very nearly digs in to her eye. That, it seems, is the last straw. The knife is pulled out roughly and carelessly tossed aside, leaving spots of blood as it skitters across the floor. This is so she can free up her hand to turn the handle on the door at Mateo's back.

In other words in oth—

The two go stumbling when the door gives way until his back is braced against the railing, and she's leaning against him, his blood flowing freely, soaking through the fabric of her dress and feeling hot against the skin of her abdomen underneath.

"Too bad. If you'd done this the right way, it wouldn't have turned out like this." The balance is shifted precariously as she leans forward. "What a waste of all that power. I'd have rather had you with us."

In other worlds in oth—

Odessa leans back again, but keeps him pinned where he is. "Oh well," she says dismissively, then plants her hands on his shoulders and shoves.

in other words in oth—

What way is the right way? Mateo will never know. As she shoves, he falls over the too short balcony, falling from the third floor and landing on the roof of a car that had parked on the side of the row, crunching the windshield slightly and pushing down on the metal.

He can no longer hear the record skipping, just the honking of horns and the cursing and yelling and gawking.

No, really he doesn't hear that either.

But he also doesn't die. He rolls off, blood pouring from the wound, his body beaten, but still moving. In his shock, he doesn't even think to stop, and the person on the street doesn't bodily stop them, even as they get their phone out to call for an ambulance.

Blood drips down his leg as he climbs the stairs. Bloody footprints leading up to their door. The door he finds already open.

in other words, in oth—

He falters, falls, hand hitting the floor. He tries to push himself back up.

By the time he finds his way back inside, the cleaner has already gone. A perky blonde walks down the street in a fresh sundress with a gym bag slung over one shoulder, heedless of the chaos left in her wake. She holds a cell phone to one ear. "Heeey. — Yeah, it went okay, I guess. — Can I get a ride? — Mmhm. Brooklyn."

She smiles. "Thanks, sweetheart. See you soon."

In other words, in oth—

The record continues to skip, replaying those words over and over, half aborted sound at the end looping back a few seconds. Mateo drags himself deeper into the apartment, as if trying to find something, reach something. Something he can no longer see. The cold of the air outside carries in, but he doesn't feel it. Even though he does feel very cold.

In other words, in oth—

He makes it to a wall, manages to sit up against it, hands going to the wound on his stomach— but he knows it's too late. Blood rolls from his forehead down his face, it smears on his hand. He leans his head back against the wall and closes his eyes.

In other words, in oth—

And it is chaos. A taxi pulls up and an entirely different blonde steps out of the back seat. She grabs her bags, tips the driver, and turns to see people on the street in panicked action. Shouting, running, gesturing wildly at one recently dented car.

Lynette furrows her brow as she looks up the sidewalk, to the car, and up to her own balcony. It's worryingly well positioned.

And that's when she runs. Ignoring the people trying to warn her, she yanks the door open to the building and follows bloody footprints, hoping with every step that they won't lead to their door.

But they do.

Still, she hopes. Rushing into the apartment, she hopes it's not bad, that he'll be alright. Until she sees him. Her bags drop, tumbling over and spilling out onto the bloodied floor. And Lynette drops, too, onto her knees next to him. Her hands reach for his face, tears already falling.

"My darling," she says, the words coming out in a croak, emotions making it impossible to hide the panic in her voice. "Oh god. Okay, it's going to be okay. I'm here." Action comes a moment later, as she lets go of him to pull her phone out of her pocket to cling to.

That last thread of hope.

A thread of hope that pulls tight under pressure.

Tired dark eyes, open to meet hers, even as his breath comes unsteady. There's a lot wrong with him. Bruising on his neck, a deep wound in his slide that punctured a kidney. And that didn't even count the fall and whatever internal injuries that might have caused. But somehow, Mateo looks relieved, reaching for her hand. They can already hear the sirens in the distance as he pulls it closer and presses it against his chest.

That blood is no longer being held back at all. It hadn't mattered anyway.

"I'm sorry," he whispers hoarsely, voice breathy and drawn out. "I tried— i tried to leave it."

Whatever that means.

"I tried…" he repeats again, as the record continues to skip. The same words over and over.

Lynette looks back to him when he takes her hand. Her phone clatters to the floor and she takes his other hand in hers as well. "Shh shh, Javi. You never need to say sorry. Not to me." When he starts to repeat himself, she leans forward to press a kiss to his forehead before she rests her own against it. She closes her eyes, trying to keep it together and failing. He can tell in the tremble of her lips, in the tightness of her grip.

"I love you," comes out as if she's trying to comfort him, but a sob follows her words. "This is too soon. We haven't had enough time." The words fall out of her, a plea to anyone who could be listening. "Please don't leave me."

It skips, it skips, it skips.

Mateo wants to say it again, because as soon as she finishes her words he can't help but try to breath, but his whole body just feels cold, weak. "I— " he doesn't get further than that, a gurgling sound in his throat. There's blood on his lips. Whatever he wanted to say doesn't seem to make it, as he grasps at her.

He can feel the something pulling away, dying out, even before he looks up at her in a way that doesn't quite seem to see her. So much he wanted to say.

In other words, in oth—

He breaths in. He breaths out.

His hand falls off from where he grasped on her clothes, smearing blood. His shoulders slump. All the tension holding him together like strings break.

In other words, in other words

Somehow, the record stops skipping.

In other words

I love you

Holding onto him, Lynette feels that moment more than sees it. The moment when he's gone. She doesn't let go of him. If she lets go, then it's real. Then this is real. Her eyes open when the record finds its way forward again. There's no reason not to cry now, not as she settles onto the floor and slides her arms around him, holding him like he might have just fallen asleep against her shoulder.

Across the room, blood soaks into her bags, into her purse, into the paper envelope under a card. The front promises good news. She had hoped he would think it was good news. The past few days, she'd been nervous that he wouldn't.

She stares at that card as paramedics come in, as police come in. She only notices when people try to separate them and she ends up curled up against the wall, bloody hands in her hair, tears dampening her face, eyes fixed on that card. Not alone, but more alone than she's ever felt before. When she speaks again, she's not even sure anyone is there to hear her.

"He was going to be a father."


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