![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
2784Labyrinth fanfic
Jan. 4th, 2005 10:02 amJan. 4, 2005
http://www.livejournal.com/users/wanderlustlover/840050.html?#cutid1
Unconditional Love - For Earl......it's long over due
Wherein forgiveness is inherent & compassion infinite
02:39 am January 4th, 2005
wanderlustlover
For Earl......it's long over due
I went to The Phantom of the Opera movie tonight. And right after it
I called Earl (emeryll). Same as a week or two ago when he first saw
it he called me. It's not something either of us question at all. We
know who we're going to call, and what to discuss, to laugh and poke
and talk about. Phantom was the first thing we ever bonded over in
that school library, something we sang often in the car, and talked
about extensively even around all of the rest of our lives and
relationship changings. I liked talking to him tonight, and I'm
supposed to talk to him more tomorrow.
And I miss him a lot. A lot, a lot.
I wonder how much a ticket to New York is.
But this is for him. He asked for it in a story plus quote thing I
put out a few months ago. I wrote it up, got sageness to beta it, and
then never got around to doing anything but letting it sit and
gestate in my writing folder. Till he mentioned it again tonight and
I told him I had it, so he could have it by morning. So here's the
file I never got around to posting.
~*~*~
Title: A Labyrinth Requiem
Author: Manda
Rating: M for Mature
Fandom: Labyrinth
AN: My love to Earl. I'd been looking to get into this fandom months
on months ago, maybe even a year, but never did. I read scads of fan
fic for it, but never ended up writing. I let the idea and the
multiple different quotes play around in my head about a day before
writing. This was what came to me last night.....it's a little
different, but I hope you like it.
~~
"It's not fair," Sarah replied, but her voice wasn't that of a temper
tantrum rung child any longer. It was deeper, colder. That of an
older woman who filled her voice with emotions like scorn, hurt, and
betrayal.
"No, it's not," the man at the door replied drearily, the vague light
through the panes of glass catching in his amber colored hair but not
his brown eyes. No, those were dark as mud on a dismal day. He put
down the small brown leather tote on top of the matching large
suitcase and fiddled with his hand. A moment later he held out his
hand to her, continuing, "But it is what it is."
She held her hand out, but she didn't look at what he'd placed in it
till after he'd closed the door behind him. Her fingers uncurled
slowly, watching as the gold was caught by the same sunlight that had
so caught and set on fire his hair. It was a simple thick-banded ring
made of gold. She didn't move it from where it lay on the palm of her
hand, not wanting to admit this was all true, not wanting to see even
apart of the inscription that matched the inside of the ring still on
her finger mere millimeters away.
She felt determined not to let herself lose control, and when her
hand started quivering, she set the ring down on the small lacquered
mahogany table near the door. They'd always used it for mail. Not
they...no, it would only be her now. A gulf of sand filled her throat
and an ocean of salt stung her eyes as she reached out blindly, by
habit, and locked both locks on the front door before leaving the
room. But where she didn't let loose, just as sudden the sky did and
it pounded the house.
Shuffling her feet in fuzzy blue house shoes, Sarah made her way in a
daze to the kitchen. It was a nice spacious place made in whites and
browns, clean and bright when the lights were one. Which was why they
weren't. She got herself a very large wine goblet from a cabinet and
a bottle of wine from the convenience wine rack on the counter.
Filling the glass to the top, she thought that it looked more black
than red in the dark.
Setting the bottle down on the counter, still open, she picked up the
glass, took a small sip and walked out of the kitchen again heedless
of where she was going. They'd lived here six years now, so she
barely felt the need to watch her step as she left the kitchen,
skirted the open doors the made one feel invited into the sitting
room and living room, and started her descent up the polished wooden
stairs.
It'd been a surprise originally. He'd found and signed the paperwork
for it before he'd even asked her to marry him, and he'd shown it to
her as an early wedding present three weeks after she'd said yes. It
was an amazingly huge Victorian house. It was more than she'd ever
hoped or wished for with realism mixed into her plans. Brian had
called it 'their dream house'. They'd been young and so in love. But
they were neither now and the house didn't hold those dreams any
more.
Just her.
Padding quietly past closed doors, she went to the tiny bathroom at
the end of the right hall first. Switched on the glaring yellow light
and looked at herself in the small high medicine-cabinet half-mirror.
Her hair was tied back at the nape of her neck and her face looked
like it was full of shadows. No, more like ghosts and phantom images
that her all too creative imagination filled her mind with. Her shirt
for hat she could see of it in the mirror was a peasants blouse with
small sleeves and elastic to make ruffles in black and it
read "Marian House Players Presents" but you couldn't see the rest in
the mirror.
Opening the medicine cabinet with the hand not holding the wine glass
she shuffled things around been looking for. Pulling out a small
orange bottle with a white cap she maneuvered it between her hands
and the wine glass stem till she had opened it and two pills were on
her open palm. Lightening flashed through the window and she shivered
in the cold of the house. The bottle said she was only supposed to
take one, but she'd been taking two ever since they'd started
fighting.
She'd never taken them with alcohol, drug warnings and all, but today
was a particularly horrid day. She swallowed them down.
She returned the bottle to the medicine cabinet, flicked off the
light, and shook her head fiercely. She wouldn't cry. She wouldn't
punch a wall. She hadn't deserved this. No matter what had happened,
she truly couldn't have done something so bad as to deserve this.
Taking another gulp of the robust red wine she wandered back down the
hallway and stopped at the second open door.
She shouldn't.....
She really shouldn't.....
Not today. Today of all days, she shouldn't.
Putting a hand out, Sarah pushed the door open further. It was a
quiet, dark room. Flicking the light switch on added light to
everything. A green couch with a reddish-maroon throw tossed across
it's back. A brown desk with things scattered all across it. Another
padded chair in the same green as the couch, a matching piece of
furniture. And then in the opposite corner a metal filing cabinet
that her eyes landed and stayed on.
She walked toward it as if in a dream. Sitting on the floor she
opened it after setting her glass on the floor next to her, looking
for the things she should be. Her wedding pictures. The pictures of
when they first met. Their first few years. Pictures full of smiling
and laughter and love. She pulled out the first box as she'd only
started seriously photographing her life at the end of her teens.
Opening it, she flipped through till she found the first right folder
of pictures.
The first set was of a group of kids from a play. She'd met Brian
that time for the first time. They hadn't become friends put mutual
playmates for their school. They'd been in the same friends group for
the next few years, losing touch, and then in the second set of their
pictures, meeting up again in college. She shuffled through them
looking for their first year anniversary as a couple, then the trip
to Ireland.
He called her his little dreamer. She'd been deliriously in love with
him from the moment they met again. It was a whirlwind romance and
they had the perfect wedding. They'd had years of perfect marriage.
He worked as a lawyer, while having her stay home and working her few
joys as she wished. She made his work lunch everyday from the moment
they lived together, and he left her for a woman who gave him sex
every noon instead.
Her eyes closed and a deep breath went out at that thought. Groping
for the glass till she opened her eyes and found it, she took a very
long swallow of alcohol and willed the medication to kick in soon.
Hoping that maybe it'd make her heart feel numb, too. Then she
flipped through the box more. Holiday pictures sets with their
families were at the end of the box.
Well, not exactly it seemed.
Her fingers landed on a gossamer cloth wrapped around something
solid. Pulling it out her mouth suddenly formed into a "O". She
hadn't thought-- but of course, she'd saved it. She'd been young and
invulnerable then. Loosening the knots, and turning the cloth over
three times, it revealed a long sliver of glass. It winked almost
blindingly in the bright light above her
She'd kept it because it'd been part of her magical portal to that
world of her dreams. It was the only remaining piece of the broken
glass from that so long-loved, and even longer missed mirror, that
glimmered as if it contained a bright star. She'd thrown a small
party late in her senior year when her parents were gone, and like
most parties, the rumor had gotten out and the party had become
ungodly huge.
Someone had punched her mirror in a fight over a girl in her bedroom.
She'd kicked everyone out over it.
Running her fingers across the piece of glass she frowned slightly.
In her mind the mirror had been her connection to that world. She'd
gotten other mirrors since then but nothing was ever the same after
that one broke. A sharp pain ran through her and picking up her
finger she watched the blood drip down her finger. Sharper than she
remembered even after all these years.
Her Adventures in the Labyrinth were over....not that they ever
started mind you.
She had years of therapy to cover that part of her childhood.
Labyrinth and everything about it was just her fantasy escape from
her troubles, they'd told her.
Jareth was a cross between her father issues and her budding
realization of the sexual world. He symbolized her thoughts on men in
general. Ludo was the symbolism of herself. Large and unable to
communicate, with only the ability really to throw large objects and
grunt her thoughts. Sir Didimus was her mother issues. Her first
mother being gone and her step-mother being in charge and telling her
life was always amazing and good when it wasn't.
Hoggle was her example of what friendship was. Something to be
forever doubted, that could be gained or lost with bargaining chips,
but that might eventually win out with loyalty. Her peers and the
changes of herself into growing up were shown through the creatures
who partied, lost and switched their limbs, talked about having
nothing to worry about, as when growing up you had to change and
sometimes you tried to deny the true things of yourself for those
around you.
Her undertaking to rescue her lost brother was her need to be the
center of attention, need to be seen as noble and worthwhile in her
parents' eyes. The up and down battle was the proof that she was
worth being in the world, and that there was a place to be accepted
when she couldn't brave her way through the real world.
It'd taken years but she'd finally accepted it. After all, she
couldn't ever prove them wrong. They'd even encouraged her to do
something with her creative imagination. She created a series of
children's books and it had sky rocketed for several years. It was
called The Adventures in the Labyrinth. It had a small but dedicated
following, but she'd lost her passion for it years ago.
Everyone has to grow up and let go of his or her fantasies sometime.
She'd chosen Brian and her perfect romance.
And now she had neither.
She had nothing.
Curling her hand up, trying to get the blood to stop, she closed her
eyes tight, barely registering it when the tears started falling and
wouldn't stop. The gossamer cloth filled like a lake and tiny jewels
dripped and rippled across the reflective surface below her. She was
alone.
"It's not fair," she sobbed into the silence, wanting someone to hear
her. Her eyes scorned the glass beneath her when her memory rippled
at that statement and threw words back at her from the past.
"You say that so often, I wonder what your basis for comparison is?"
So alone and nothing made sense. She hadn't done anything wrong. She
hadn't been the perfect wife, but she'd always tried her hardest same
as him. So why was she alone, when he'd cheated on her, and why even
though he'd done the wronging, was he with some woman he now claimed
to be in love with?
"You're not real," she sobbed, still focused on Brian, but now
mingling it with something old and broken and long hidden away, as
she looked at the glass shard in her lap. Her tears kept falling
hard, making her feel like her heart was being pounded with the
ferocity of her tears the way the rain thundered her home.
"I wish you were real," Sarah cried as she tossed the shard across
the room. Thunder shook the house. "But you're not."
She dissolved into tears again, missing the flare of light inside the
glass as it arced through the air, only looking up when the glass
shard connected with the floor and shattered. And looking at it only
made her cry harder. She was lost and alone beyond everything. She
cried on and on for what felt like hours and when the tears finally
died, she shoved all the pictures away, leaving them a mess on the
floor.
Grabbing her wine glass she fled the room. She'd known she shouldn't
have come in here. Not this night. She shouldn't be torturing herself
with their good memories on the day he'd signed the divorce papers
and left her for good. She staggered up the hall to her bedroom,
wavered, and caught herself on the door frame to her bedroom. The
medicine was kicking in.
Correction: the medicine had probably kicked in a while ago. She'd
been too busy crying to notice much of anything. She set down her
glass, pulled off her clothes and left them in a pile by the door
before closing it and walking to the dresser. Hunting through night
clothes passing up pants and tank top suits and moving into lingerie.
She shouldn't, but she was good at shouldn't right now, too. Pulling
out the long white nightgown he'd bought her on their third wedding
anniversary she held it close to her body.
The silk was soft against her bare skin, giving her goose bumps.
Slipping it over her shoulders she shivered against the feeling of it
all over her body again. Picking up her glass of wine she moved to
their...her bed in the darkness that was only occasionally broken
with light from the sky outside. She took a long drink of her wine
realizing it was slowing becoming less than even a third full, but it
was a very large goblet wine glass after all.
Slipping into her bed, she set it away from her again this time on
her bed table. She curled up against the cotton pillow cover and
dissolved into tears again. The bed was empty now. Not just for a
trip, a few days or a week, but forever. So empty. Like her body now.
She tried for sleep but nothing came except intermittent bouts of
tears and the continuous sound of the storm.
Sarah stilled at a sound, worried first someone had broken into her
house. But there it came again. Softer and closer than downstairs.
Pushing herself up she looked around her room. It was empty of
movement, but there came the sound again. Soft, almost like a
whisper, but also frantic. Moving the duvet off, she picked up her
wine glass again, and walked across her room, stopping when the
fluttering shadows from outside her double balcony doors finally
caught her eyes.
Edging toward the wall, she moved toward the window slowly, trying to
find anything in her room she could hit an intruder with. Except the
moment she thought that, she felt like laughing. It was preposterous
for an intruder to be breaking into her home from her front facing,
second floor balcony. She peeked around the curtain and was back by
the wild fluttering of a white bird, which darted back from her face
just as fast.
Standing entranced in front of the pane of glass she watched the
white bird - no, no, it was a white, snowy owl- till it came to perch
on her balcony rail. The rain poured all around it, but it didn't
seem to be touching the bird, where it stood cocking its head in her
direction. Lightning flashed, momentarily blinding her and causing
her to stumble back our of surprise, and when her sight cleared, she
took another step back from the glass .
"You're...." she whispered to herself, staring at the figure that was
now leaning leisurely against her scrolling iron work of balcony
railing. A man with wild blond hair and mis-matched eyes, she knew,
though she could not see them from here. He wore a cloak of light
grey, but it was thrown back behind him and his body was painted in a
shirt matching the cloak, black pants snug against every part of his
lower body, but his hand was thrown out.....
Beckoning to her?
"Not," she continued, but she'd taken a step forward and her hands
were on the doorknobs, and throwing the doors wide open. Rain
drenched her suddenly in torrents, plastering the white gown against
her flesh and her hair across her face. But she couldn't get herself
to stop. It was like she was compelled.
"Sarah, Sarah, Sarah..." he whispered, mouth barely moving, an
arrogant smirk twisting his beautiful lips.
'Everything! Everything that you wanted I have done. You asked that
the child be taken. I took him. You cowered before me. I was
frightening. I have reordered time. I have turned the world upside
down and I have done it all for you! I am exhausted from living up to
your expectations of me. Isn't that generous?'
The name found her ears, even though the storm was deafening. It was
like a completely different language spoken with that voice, that
way. The voiced wrapped around her whole body, touching her in places
it shouldn't, promising things it couldn't possibly. Shocking her so
that she dropped the wine glass and it broke apart next to where she
stood, staining her gown and splashing across the tiles.
'Stop! Wait! Look, Sarah. Look what I'm offering you -- Your Dreams.'
Her next step sliced into her foot with a piece of glass, and she
swore, her eyes finally breaking from his. Blood mingled with water
and wine as she bent down to see her foot. It was a messy red river,
merged with pelting rain. The chunk of glass was large enough to feel
and she thought she had all if not most of it out with the first tug.
But that realization led her to other, more terrible things thoughts.
'I ask for so little. Just let me rule you and you can have
everything that you want.'
She was standing on her balcony in the rain. She was hallucinating.
She was wearing a white gown that was now utterly see-through.
'Just fear me, love me, do as I say, and I will be your slave.'
And worst of all, she trembled before the idea of looking up to meet
those eyes again. And yet she did just what she feared, feeling like
a child all over again, looking up into that face. Arching brows,
wicked lips, and that hand still held out to hers, fingers moving
just barely, in invitation.
"You..." Sarah started, and another sentence from long ago filled her
mouth and her mind, but that was not the one on her lips at that
moment. It was not the feeling that flooded her chest or thundered
through her the same as the rumbling sky. Reaching out, her fingers
grazed his; somehow warm even in this frigid rain. Her fingers slid
into his, and she felt his grip tighten around her and all the pain
inside her vanished.
"...aren't..." her voice seemed to follow her sluggishly in her mind.
So slow and everything else around her was moving so fast. The world
shimmered around them and warmth slowly flooded her body. No, not
warmth. Magic. There was a feeling that came with magic that those
who'd never been touched by it would never understand. It went
through a person's body to the tip of every single hair.
"....real." The nightgown had transformed itself into a gown she'd
drawn a million times in art classes and sketched in the margins of
notebooks. Somehow, she was entirely dry. And he was still staring
into her eyes, into her soul with that piercing gaze, so filled with
want and need. And at her third word, his grip on one part of her
waist had tightened. When had he gotten so close to her? When had
this become a dance?
And yet everything whirled around them and just when she had time to
question it's happening, he spun her and pulled her close again. He
was a warmth flooding through her. A delirium she had little want to
release. And yet she struggled against him, to look back behind her.
It was fading from her vision almost completely but she could see it
for a moment.
A balcony under siege by thunder and rain with a river of red over a
large section of it. But wasn't it too large a splash of red for the
wine she'd spilled or the cut that had been on the bottom of her
foot? Far too much red.
"Sarah...." the voice came again, and she looked over her shoulder.
Her breath caught in her chest, drying out her lungs, as his face was
merely inches from hers. His eyes pierced her through again. She
could feel his breath against her skin, the weight of words
unsaid. "Sarah, stay with me."
Thoughts flooded through her. Doctors. Delirium. Alcohol. Medication.
Brian. And the first shard of pain stabbed it's way into her precious
moment, but she was looking up at that same moment thinking about the
thing she'd always said to him and almost always only to him, and
that she'd said childishly to Brian today.
"Yes," she said at last, the word flying from her lips. There was a
surprise that registered in his eyes, completely unaware and then
arrogant, but neither had time to stay because she turned her cheek
till her lips found his, for the first time doing what she'd always
dreamed of.
A soft gasp escaped his lips before his arms pressed harder, molding
her body to his, deepening the kiss. Light struck from the sky not
far from where they were, but neither noticed as that world shimmered
and then completely faded away.
Current Mood: & sleepy
4 Lovers & Just Love
Comments
Thread started by Scarlet
From: scarletdragon Date: January 4th, 2005 - 01:17 pm (Link)
The icon... makes me think White Witch from one of the Narnia
movies... I am probably not correct... Who is it? Pwease?
(Reply to this) (Thread)
From: wanderlustlover Date: January 4th, 2005 - 04:08 pm (Link)
Sydney from the tv show Alias
(Reply to this) (Parent)
Thread started by Spark in the Dark
From: magikfanfic Date: January 4th, 2005 - 05:07 pm (Link)
I do so love The Labyrinth. I'm so glad that you wrote a piece. I
used to read Sarah/Jarith fic somewhere. I don't recall where it is
now, though.
This is lovely even though a bit melancholy.
From: wanderlustlover Date: January 4th, 2005 - 05:10 pm (Link)
*grins* Thanks!
