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"Light on the Stage"Written By: Impish Rating: R Pairings: 1x2x1 Category: AU, Drama/Romance (but not in a "hearts
and flowers" way) Warnings: AU, some angst, things teenagers do
that they're not supposed to (smoking and drinking), general reckless
behavior. Additional warnings will be doled out chapter to chapter. Summary: Two messed up kids in a small country
town are drawn to each other, and together, form a brand of music
from the old. Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing or the songs
used to inspire this piece. I will give a shout out to any inspirations
found within. Notes: I decided to try something pretty different
from the Darkest Reflection. The idea was inspired by Cory Morrow's
"The Light on the Stage (Sing With Me)," and a whole bunch
of other Texas Country music- all the songs I've used in influence
will be acknowledged at the end. The story's a bit of an homage to
the rise of that genre of music; a fictional idea of how it could
have come to be, and very slightly based on the friendship between
singers Pat Green and Cory Morrow. It's not at all accurate in any
sense, more like a re-invention of a genre's creation.
CHAPTER 1: A Natural Disaster
It wasn't Heero's face that was familiar to Duo; he'd never really gotten a good look at that before. It was that casual lean against a wall, a half-forgotten cigarette burning slow between two lax fingers and an unruly fall of hair. Duo had seen that exact pose, the vast shoulders that folded down to narrow hips and fitted jeans, casual and careless against the wall outside of school. Seen it enough times, in fact, that he'd wondered if that tall Marlboro Man shadow actually ever went to class- not that he went enough himself to know anything about it. But the first time he really noticed him, they weren't at school, or even in their own town, but outside a restaurant in the Stockyards. Set in downtown Ft. Worth, the Stockyards used to be where all the cattle trails met, and the stock loaded on to trains to be shipped all over the country for butchering and distribution. These days, people herded to the Stockyards for a different reason. Now, it was a historic site made up of restaurants, shops, bars, clubs, and a rodeo arena, but you could still see where the tracks ran through. In fact, the old tracks ran right by the restaurant in mention. That night, like so many others, Duo was running. One of his friends was a step in front, the other a step behind as they ran past the smoker in the alley. When Duo spotted him, he yanked his pal in front down and the one behind halted immediately. "Cut to the right and go straight to the truck, boys. I've got this." Duo winked, eyes shining feverishly in the muggy light, and the smoker took a vague interest. "Duo, the cops-" one of the boys started, but Duo shook his head. "I've got this." He repeated firmly and pulled a long braid out from under his t-shirt. "Your fuckin' funeral, man." The boy mumbled, and the both of them took off round the side of the restaurant, disappearing just as uniformed officers came running down the alleyway, flashlights in hand. Heero didn't have the time to figure out this braided kid's game plan before "this braided kid" was pressed up against him, slipping a hand into his back pocket. "Mind if I bum a smoke?" Duo asked, pulling out Heero's pack and fishing out a cigarette and lighter. Heero didn't have time to answer, as in the next second, one of the cop's hands was coming down hard on Duo's shoulder, ripping him around. "Knock it off." He growled. "You see some boys run down this way?" "Uh, no." The boy with the braid and suddenly bright eyes said, looking appropriately pink in the cheeks, but not lifting his face to the light. "Sorry, officer, we just found the pack…" Heero, who suddenly found himself in a situation he would rather have gone to hell than ever have been presented with, found himself saying for an unknown reason, "Someone might have gone down that way," and nodded left at the end of the alley. "All right." The cop stared him down, the other already giving chase down to the left. "Hand those over and I'll let you go this time. Don't screw around out here. You kids go home or something." "Sure," Duo murmured, that same embarrassed face looking pointedly away. "Yessir." Heero said, draping a casual arm over the boy he didn't know's shoulder. The cop took the pack of cigarettes, and with one lasting stern look, he followed his partner. The second the cops were out of sight, Heero shoved Duo away and cold-cocked him in the gut. Duo doubled over, but managed to stay on his feet, staggering out to brace a hand on the wall. "Fu-uck!" he gasped out when he had the breath to. Curiously, he didn't ask what the hell Heero had done that for, and he didn't reciprocate the gesture. Instead, Duo looked up at Heero with a wide grin on his face, the light catching him fully for the first time. A cut glistened on his lower lip, and those eyes that had somehow drawn Heero earlier, before he'd even had a real look at them, were blue. Blue like bruises deepening to purple. Like bruises, they seemed angry because they were hurt. But unlike bruises, neither the color nor the pain would ever fade. They sparkled up at him with a glitter that was nothing more or less than amused. The boy sucked in enough air to stand straight on his own, and then, with the same, open grin spread on his face, leaned in, and pressed his lips to the corner of Heero's mouth. "Thanks. I owe you a pack." He sighed as he pulled back, then threw Heero a wink over his shoulder as he ran down the alley into the dark as quickly as he'd come. Of its own volition, Heero's hand tentatively lifted to his mouth where the other boy had kissed him. Drawing his fingers back to where he could see them in the half-light, he found the tips barely smudged with blood. They were supposed to be in class, but Duo was running again. This time, it was a careless jog out to the parking lot. Summer had given spring a bitch-slap and sent it on its way, and the days were prematurely hot. The effect left him in no mood to sit in an un-air-conditioned room with a bunch of sweaty stoners and overly-tanned Small Town Barbies (™). Thus, he decided it was as good a time to leave as any. As Duo jumped down from the curb, he noticed the cigarette boy in that familiar lean against a fairly new black truck. Slowing a little, Duo studied him for a moment before the jog faded and he switched directions to walk up to the dark-haired boy. From a distance, the first thing Duo noticed beyond the pose was his clothes. He wore dark-washed jeans and a western plaid over-shirt that hung loose and open over a thin black t-shirt. The sleeves of the over-shirt were rolled up, accentuating bronze, strongly defined forearms and giving the wearer a look that was both clean and rumpled. The closer he came, the more Duo began to think the heat was getting to him more than he'd thought, and that the boy before him had to be a mirage. Nobody could look that cool on a day this hot. And nobody could be that impossibly beautiful. Ever. To say he was like a work of art just didn't seem enough to describe him. His body seemed carved from stone, smooth and hard. And his face… it was as if he'd been made of porcelain and then painted dark. Something in the angles of his eyes and the ragged fall of hair over them lent him a look of hostility, Duo thought, but the brilliant, stark blue of them were enough to knock the breath out of a person. "So… you're idea of skipping is staring into space and not smoking a cigarette." Duo cocked his head to the side as he came to a halt. "You do realize that this same feat can be accomplished *in* class." The other boy flicked the end of his cigarette, the specks of embers drifting to the pavement slowly, as if they were hesitant to reach the ground. His eyes rose to look at Duo. He studied him like he was trying to remember him, not from the alley outside the restaurant, or at school, but from some other moment, so long ago that it might have been another lifetime altogether. Duo had an interesting face, with features most girls would kill for. The tight angles of his bone structure were softened by the roundness in his cheeks, the large shape and compelling color of his eyes, the generous curve of his mouth and his perfectly upturned nose. Any vestige of femininity found in these, however, was ruined by the rest of his appearance. His undeniable masculinity wasn't just the recent markings of a fight, which decorated him with a small cut to a lightly swollen lip and skinned bruises to his knuckles. It was more than the way he looked. It was his presence, his bearing, his demeanor, and it was one of a hitchhiker on an endless desert road, ambling over pavement that was so hot it sizzled, the heat passing over him in rolling waves. He was used to people slowing down to look and then passing him by, and it had left him frayed. He was rough denim on skin, tough leather soles of boots against the rock hard ground, a glistening tan over sinewy lines of muscle, and a fierce shine in the eye from the blinding sun. His scent was mesquite, earth and dust. His hair, plaited back in a messy braid, was tousled and a color that should have been a deep amber brown but had been bleached flaxen by the sun. Like a twister in the distance, his silhouette was ropey, thin and elongated, with wide, angled shoulders that locked in an agile strength. The look in his eyes was just as dangerous. Untamable and… promising. It was that look that drew people to him, and it was that look that scared them away. Duo's full mouth smirked invitingly, drawing the other boy's eye back to the nick on his lower lip. "C'mon, Marlboro. If you're gonna cut, you might as well really make it worth it." The cigarette dropped from the boy's hand to the pavement, where it rolled over like a dog presenting its belly. "My name is Heero." He said, stomping the cigarette out. "And these aren't Marlboros." "I can see that. But you don't look like a camel." With a tilt of his head, Duo fished out a brand new pack of cigarettes and handed them over. Heero stared at the offering for a long moment, and then took it with a marked lack of enthusiasm. Still smirking, Duo gestured with his head to a beaten, almost white El Camino. "Come on, Heero." Heero looked past Duo to the car, one hand reaching up over his bangs to shade the sun from his eyes. Duo's smirk broadened. He turned around and walked away, casual and forgetful enough that Heero found himself compelled to follow. Pocketing the pack of cigarettes, he opened the car door and slid into the El Camino while Duo went around to the driver's side. Slamming the door tightly behind him, Heero eyed the seatbelt with unease. It didn't appear to have been used in quite a while, and he wasn't sure that if fastened, it could be unbuckled again. He left the seatbelt undone and where it was, staring hotly at him from the side. The car started smoothly and without protest, a feat Heero hadn't been too sure it could manage. "Where are your friends?" he found himself asking, wondering that a boy like Duo, who seemed to be the type that, as a rule, was always with two or three other people, was leaving the school grounds on his own. Or would have been, had he not picked up Heero. "Where are yours?" Duo asked in reply. His tone was loose and un-accusing, and his glance heavy as it slid over Heero when he twisted around to look behind them in order to back the car out. His arm draped over the bench seat, hand resting just over Heero's shoulder. Heero didn't respond, eyes flicking to the hand almost touching him, then away to the window. Duo's arm dropped back down to shift out of reverse, a small smile curling in one corner of his mouth for a fleeting moment before he shifted again and turned the wheel, taking them away from town. Heero found right away that Duo drove too fast, and didn't look around, or even pay attention to the road most of the time, but seemed to have some kind of sixth sense when it came to knowing when another car was coming out of nowhere or if there was a cop ahead. Duo's body was relaxed, pressed deep in the corner of the seat, and the pose emphasized the lanky reach of his limbs. His jeans were shredded from mid thigh to just below his knees in horizontal, wildly frayed slashes. The muscles, smoothly tanned under the ragged threads of material, flexed slightly as he levered over the pedals. Under normal circumstances, Heero wasn't a person who experienced uncomfortable silences. His mind never raced to think of something to say, and he could care less if the conversation went flat. But there was something more than feeling, something beyond discomfort and dialogue in this silence. It wasn't an actual quiet. There was the rumbling of the engine, the wind passing through; the shifting of fabric against skin and upholstery, the low, unintelligible buzz of the radio, but it was silent none the less. It was the way the scorching fever of the sun suddenly became a pleasing warmth on his skin. The way the sweaty stillness outside became a cooling wind through the rolled-down windows. There were more than words in the moment, and Heero realized it wasn't really that there were none spoken, but that there were none thought. He hadn't thought not to be where he was, or not to do what he'd done. "It matter to you where we go?" Duo asked. His voice was quiet but intense, and curiously complementary to the edgeless heat and the low growl of the engine. "That's a pretty strange question," Heero answered, as they turned onto an unkempt back road that seemed not to have seen much recent traffic, "since you seem to already have a destination in mind." Duo chuckled. "I very rarely have any sort of destination in mind." "Then where are we going?" Heero asked. The scattered buildings and houses of the small town were shrinking behind them and the road was stretching out into a flat nothing. Duo shifted slightly to look at him, "Like I said, does it matter?" The question was obviously rhetorical this time. Heero thought to ask if Duo even knew where this road led to, but had a feeling the answer would be no. Or at least Duo's ambiguous equivalent of no. "What does matter?" he asked instead. "The way you feel getting there." Duo said as he shifted gears. The car jumped smoothly forward and a wave of something swept through Heero. It was that same feeling the silence had brought; an alteration of senses. It was a rush, and it filled him like it was stretching him out. He looked to Duo, who grinned cannily and accelerated even further. They sped out on a long-untouched road and left a cloud of dust behind them as a mark of their passage. The sky seemed distended above them, like it had suddenly swelled and doubled in size. Heero rested his arm out the window, soft air surging over his skin and through his hair. He thought then how strange it was to feel free and wondered if this was what Duo chased after when he ran. Duo's fingers flicked out to turn up the volume of the radio and the shifty, garbled noise rose into actual music. Country, Heero identified it. But old country, the kind that put him in mind of dirt roads and wranglers. Duo's music was just like him. "This is the good stuff." Duo said, the glint of the sun catching the lines of the muscles in his forearm as his hand moved back to the gear-shift. "Not like what passes now days. Pop with an accent…" he nodded to the radio, "What do you like?" Heero shrugged and stretched his fingers out to catch the wind as it passed. "Rock, mostly. Punk, the old stuff." "Rebel, huh?" Duo's slow grin returned. "Or is your taste in music as serious as your idea of cutting class?" "I got both habits from my old brother." Heero heard himself say. He shook his head and brought his hand back inside the car. "My older brother." He corrected. Duo gave him a halfway glance and his smile turned thoughtful. "No… you really meant old, didn't you?" "He was my older brother. Old works, too." "Ah," Duo said, knowingly. "The past tense. What happened to him?" "He's not dead, if that's what you mean." Heero said, not knowing why he was telling him this. "But he might as well be." "One of those…" Duo muttered. "So… you listen to rock and you're not actually a Marlboro Man. There's something Country about you though. You like this song?" Heero paused to listen to it. The beat was nothing special, but it was an unhurried rhythm that made the song easy to listen to. The guitar was a longing twang against the strains of a fiddle, and the voice of the singer was a kind of dark harmony, deep and rustic. The overall sound and the tinny hum of the radio made him feel like it had all been bagged up, tossed over a saddle, and delivered from another century. "There's something about it, something…" "Familiar?" Duo finished for him, and their eyes met. "Very familiar." Heero agreed in a murmur, studying that strange, bruised color. "Nostalgic, almost." "That's the beauty of it." Duo said and shifted down slowly, bringing the car down to a rolling pause at a stop sign—the first sign of any kind they'd seen since they first turned onto this road. Duo looked around, getting his bearings. "I think I know what street this is, and as much as I'd like to continue on the road less traveled," he nodded straight ahead, where the pavement dissolved into gravel, "I'm getting hungry, and there's a diner not too far from here." Duo palmed the steering wheel to the right to take them back to charted territory, and about two and a half songs later, the El Camino was parked out front of a roadside diner, and Duo and Heero were slamming the car doors shut behind them. Duo twirled the keys on his finger as he ambled inside, holding the door open behind him with one hand for Heero. A distracted-looking waitress with a fifty-year-old hair style and an alarmingly bright shade of lipstick, that seemed to be doubling as blush, snatched up two menus and led the pair to a corner booth. It wasn't until they were seated that she realized who she was serving. "Duo! How are ya, sugar?" She asked, in a congested voice that marked her as a life-long smoker, and gave Duo a sharp pat on the cheek. "Haven't seen you in a while, you had me in a tiz, hon!" "Despite popular belief, I am capable of feeding myself, Barb." "Not very well, by the look of you." She admonished, hands on hips, her grotesquely long, red-painted nails quivering as she looked Heero over. "Who's your new friend?" "He prefers the term 'unwilling captive.'" Duo said with a wink to Heero, then introduced suavely, "Barbara Jo, this is Heero. He doesn't smoke Marlboros, pretends to smoke Camels, and has a fondness for spaghetti westerns and the Clash. Heero, this is Barb. She has a daughter named Jolene, and an unnatural love of Dolly Parton." Heero wondered that Duo had gleaned all that out of a half-hour car ride, but Barb, well-used to Duo's mannerisms, grinned dotingly and said, "Well, it's nice to meet you, Heero." "It's a pleasure." Heero responded automatically. Barb's eyes glittered somewhere underneath wrinkled blue eye-shadow. "I'll be! You must be the last polite young man left on the planet." she beamed and nodded, causing the branch-like clumps of her eyelashes to bob disturbingly. "What's it gonna be, boys?" "The usual, ma'am." Duo stretched back and pushed the menu towards her. "I'll have whatever he gets." Heero said, not caring to look over the choices and feeling that most diners had the same menu anyways. "And a water, please." Barb looked back to Duo expectantly. "Coke, no ice?" she guessed. He nodded, drumming his fingers on the table. "Coming up, then." she said, and whisked away with the menus under her arm. It was a couple of quiet seconds before Heero noticed Duo wasn't talking. Duo rested his arms on the table and leaned his weight towards Heero. "I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say you're not a very social person." Heero shrugged. "I never got in the habit of making friends, I guess. I never had the time to, my-" he hesitated, the rest of the thought trailing off into a frown. Duo smiled, but this time it was small and oddly sensitive. "Look, I'll make you a deal…" he said, "You don't talk about your family, and I won't talk about mine. That sound good?" Heero studied Duo through the mess of his bangs, toying with his fork. "Okay," he said, sitting up a little. "All right, sounds good." "Okay then." Duo's grin erupted in full force. "…Yeah." Heero paused. "What are you thinking?" Duo asked. "That song… seemed so familiar," Heero said pensively, "but I'm sure I've never heard it before." "That's just the music." Heero raised an eyebrow. "It's like that for some people. It just grabs a hold of you, locks you in. Reminds you of things you had no idea you remembered, or needed to. It's the music of… everything and nothing. It can be about the land and its history, the old days, the Young West. It can be about going out and drinkin' with your friends." Duo shrugged. "It's the music. You know?" Heero wondered if he should be worried that such a strange explanation had him actually nodding in response, but didn't have too much time to think on it, as Barb had returned with their drinks. "Thanks, doll." Duo barely had the time to call after her, as she was there and gone before the words were able to hit the air. Barb hummed some sort of response behind her as she whisked away back to the kitchen, the sound of rattling and hissing audible for only the moment the door was swung open, the noise then disappearing into the quiet sound of a diner during odd hours. The music that played faintly against the clatter of silverware seemed to be of the same brand that they had been speaking of, and Heero found himself increasingly fond of it. There were only two other seats occupied, and both other patrons sat alone. One, an older, stout man with a trucker's hat stuffed over his bristly grey hair, was seated at the counter, drinking black coffee and looking steadily straight ahead, as though he were trying to make a point of ignoring anyone who might happen to try to gain his attention. Across the room and in front of the windows sat another man, this one reedy and middle-aged with a mullet peaking out from under his hunting cap, chewing his food with a great determination. "This town," Duo said, shaking his head with a chuckle. "For how close to Ft. Worth we are—not even fifteen minutes away—you'd think it would grow up some. But it seems like it's bound and determined to stay as small as it can." "What were you doing in the Stockyards the other night, anyway?" Heero took the opportunity to ask. "That's a good story, actually." Duo said brightly. "There's a pool hall down the street from Neon Moon. You know, the saloon? Whenever I'm short for cash, I just head down there and can make a couple hundred playing straight, easy. But this guy my buddy Walker played turned out to be something of a sore loser…" Barb appeared again with two platters of chicken-fried steak that were nearly spilling over with mashed potatoes and gravy, and was off again before either boy had time to thank her. "Anyway," Duo continued as he began to cut his food, "The guy started hassling him when we got outside. There were a couple punches thrown, but we just thought he was talking shit, of course, 'till he lifted his shirt up to show a piece in his jeans." Duo laughed. "Everyone sort of backed away, but I got this stupid idea right out of 'Tombstone and grabbed the gun right out of the guys own pants and clocked him with it." "You grabbed the gun out of his pants?" "I know, dumb, right?" Duo said, taking a moment to chew and swallow some of his food. "But it worked. It was crazy- the guy was laid out cold, and the rest of us just kind of looked at each other for a second, and took off, not having any idea that there were a couple of cops around the corner heading over to find out what the commotion was all about." "Why not just tell them the guy pulled on you, and you managed to get the gun away from him?" Duo shrugged. "Well, Walker and I are still minors, but Maiser's eighteen, and he's had too many close calls for them to have let him go with nothing on his record." Duo continued to tell stories with vivid gestures, mostly of close encounters and amusing altercations, somehow managing to remember to eat between tales. Heero listened on with great interest, finding that Duo had a wonderful way with words. There was something in the way he spoke, in the lilt of his voice and his suspenseful timing that made a tale as comical or dramatic as he liked. It wasn't just the way he spoke, either. It was in the words he used, the way he set a scene and drew the listener in. By the time their plates were cleared away, Duo had managed to coax a lasting smile out of Heero. Duo, of course, was careful not to mention this, in case Heero noticed and returned his expression to its usual state of indifference. After paying and leaving Barb a sizable tip, the pair made their way outside. The sun was noticeably lower in the sky, and it wouldn't be too much longer before it rested on the horizon. The light that stretched shadows over the pavement was a strange, golden pink that colored everything over in pure warmth. The drive back was filled only with the sound of buffeting wind, the melancholy, dusky tune over the radio, and the fainter sound of droning night insects that strained to be heard over all the rest. When Duo dropped Heero off back at his own car, still in the school parking lot, it was with the understanding that they would soon see more of each other. Heero found his drive home unusually lonely. He searched the radio stations for whatever Duo had played, but couldn't find anything that matched his recollection of that sound. For a while, he made do with an old mixed tape that had been gifted to him years ago, but found after skipping through a few songs that it just didn't fill up the quiet in the right way. Frustrated, he flicked the stereo off entirely, and finished the drive listening to the hollow sound of his truck passing lonely fields and darkened houses in the night. The Yuy house was on a slight rise of land, and the driveway that led to it was long and curling. Heero parked in the driveway in front of the open garage. Both spaces were occupied, one by a small SUV, the other by a sleek luxury sedan. Frowning at the sight of them, Heero's gaze flickered up to the windows around the front. The lights were on. Slowly, he eased out of the truck, swung his backpack over a shoulder and closed the door gently and firmly behind him. From inside he could just hear the fain sound of a crash, and yelling. Sighing heavily, he went inside and just hoped they would be too busy fighting to notice he was home.
Additional notes: Nod to the inspiring songs: |
