[Hair] Where Do I Go? (2/3)
Jan. 29th, 2010 07:40 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eirenicalFandom: Hair, the new Broadway revival
Pairing: Claude/Berger with hints of Jeanie + Claude and mentions of Claude/Sheila and Berger/Sheila
Rating: Really PG-13 (and only for language) for the first two parts, heading into 'R' territory for the third.
Word Count: Total -- 12,456; ~3500-4500 for each segment.
Warnings: Slash. Erm... Duh? Also, this fic is wildly AU. I'm sure you'll figure that out by halfway through the first part.
Summary: It's been 15 years since the events of the musical. Some have moved on and changed, some remain caught in the tragedies of the past. And now a storm is coming. They'll need all the help they can get to weather it... and may have more help than they ever dreamed was possible.
by Renee-chan
It was almost scary, how easily Claude settled into their lives, how much he felt like he belonged. Every day he would wander the city, relearning its every avenue and street. Every evening he would come home to them: Jeanie and Cloud, who already felt more like family to him than his parents ever had. Every night, once Cloud had settled into bed, Jeanie would curl up with him on the couch and tell him stories -- stories of their lives before the war had stolen his. It was beyond therapeutic, to hear confirmation of what he'd always known in his heart -- he was not the man his father had forced him to be in Kansas. He was never the man who could have loved Allison, settled down with her and the dog and the 2.5 children in the house behind the white picket fence. He was Aquarius... and destined for greatness or madness. And until these last few weeks, he'd been living in madness.
Well, now his eyes were opening. Living in the city, breathing its smells, walking its streets... he would remember things -- flashes only, but his. And at night, Jeanie would spin her stories -- the protests, the be-ins, the burning of the draft cards... the people they'd known. She told him about Woof, about Crissy, about Dionne and Hud, and eventually, almost reluctantly, about Sheila. As she spun her tales and he walked their city, sat in their park and let the atmosphere fill him... he began to remember them. He remembered handing out flowers to the tourists with Crissy. He remembered blasting out music in the park with Hud, remembered Woof's obsession with Mick Jagger and his almost childlike innocence about the world. He remembered Dionne's saucy smile and Sheila's passion for every lost cause... including him. He remembered how very much he'd loved her... how he'd once thought he might want to marry her. But after a little time had passed, and the memories started to settle... just as before, he began to feel like something was missing.
At first it was a passing thought, a moment's brief fancy in a summer wonderland of joy and belonging. Then it became an itch he couldn't scratch, an irritation that jangled against his nerves and prevented him from being part of the easy flow of the life he was building. Finally it became an all-encompassing certainty that brought back with it the leaden weight that pressed him down and choked off his breath. Something was still missing. The memories he had regained, they were partial, incomplete... and Jeanie was keeping something from him.
Two months after his precipitous arrival in New York, he finally decided that he couldn't take it any longer. He waited until a night when Cloud would be spending the night at his friend Zack's house. He wanted the child away in case this confrontation got ugly. Then, when Jeanie settled down on the couch, he walked over and, instead of settling down with her, merely crossed his arms over his chest. Eyes and voice full of disappointment, he accused her, "You've been keeping something from me."
Immediately she tried to deny it. He cut her off with a slicing motion of his hand, "Don't lie to me, Jeanie. I'm more grateful than I can say for everything you've done for me, everything you've given back to me in these last two months, but I can't ignore it anymore." Dropping to his knees in front of her and taking her hands in his, he continued, "I came here, in part, to find myself, and thanks to you, I have. But I came here for another reason, too. Something is missing from my life, Jeanie. Something important, something I can't put a name to, but that I miss with my entire being. Someone." He slumped, looking away, "At first... At first I thought it might be you... but it wasn't. Then... then I was sure it was Sheila. I loved her, I know I did. But it wasn't her, either. It wasn't Crissy or Dionne, or Woof or Hud, or any of the others that you've told me about in such loving detail."
Full of the restless energy of need, he jerked to his feet, "There's someone else. I can feel it. I know it." Whirling back around, he grabbed Jeanie's hands again and pulled her to her feet, "Jeanie, tell me. Please. Who have I forgotten?" That last was a desperate cry.
Jeanie looked into his eyes, searching, like she'd done that first night her son had brought him home. She stared into his eyes for what, again, felt like hours and when she finally found what she was looking for, her face crumbled and she collapsed on the floor, sobbing.
Eyes wide and shocked, Claude dropped down with her. Voice a scared whisper, he said, "Jeanie...? I'm right, aren't I? Please... please, whatever it is, I need to know. I'm sorry..."
Jeanie shook her head, voice thick with tears, "It's not you, Claude. It's my own fault for falling in love with you all over again." Biting her lip, she struggled to get herself under control. When she finally did, she continued, "You've been so happy here these last two months... with me and my son. We made such a nice little family... And I thought, for sure, when you didn't react to hearing about Sheila any differently than the others that this was it -- it was finally my turn with you. But I guess... maybe it was never about Sheila to begin with." Raising tear-reddened eyes to meet his, she finally said the words he'd needed to hear, "You're right. There was someone else. He was a part of you and you were a part of him, like yin and yang. He was the darkness to your light, the wildness to your calm."
As she spoke, an image started to form -- the one who'd come to mind when Cloud had first greeted him, the one he'd harassed his own share of tourists with... the one he'd spent those nights in Park with, curled around each other like puppies. He started to shake, this time not with fear but anticipation. It was right there, the answer he needed... he just had to reach out and take it. In a moment of sudden revelation it was there and the word trembled on his lips as he breathed it out, as if in prayer, "Berger..."
Jeanie froze in her description, words caught in her throat at the raw emotion in that one whispered word. Failing to catch his eyes as he rose from the floor, Jeanie also stood. For his part, Claude was caught in a veritable maelstrom of memories. Berger... How could he have forgotten Berger? Everything else tied in to him. It was more than just yin and yang. Berger had held the best parts of Claude in his hands -- all of his passion for life, all of his desire to build something better, all of his humor, all of his ability to love... Berger was the key to it all. That was when something Jeanie had said finally caught up to him. Desperation brought him back to her, clutching at her arms like a man drowning as he forced the word past suddenly numb lips, "...Was?"
Breath caught at the full on knowledge and fear in Claude's eyes. She bit at her lip again, finally caved in with an answer, "It would be easier to show you than tell you."
Heart sinking further with each word that she spoke, Claude insisted, "Then we'll go. Now. Please, Jeanie. I have to know."
Head shaking in denial, she whispered, "You won't like it. Claude, you won't like it at all."
Lips firmed with his decision, Claude grabbed Jeanie's keys from the end table and held them out to her, "Let me be the judge of that."
With one last sigh, Jeanie took her key ring from Claude and nodded, "So be it. Bring a coat, we may be out there for a while."
They walked block after block in the chill autumn wind, searching for only-Jeanie-knew-what. Every dirty alley they passed, she would duck in, ask a few questions and duck back out, then with a shake of her head they would move on to the next. As the streets they explored got darker and more dismal, as the people Jeanie spoke to got dirtier and more desperate-looking, Claude again began to feel despair coming to roost. What could Jeanie possibly hope to find out here?
Finally, they stopped at one alley and Jeanie was hidden by its depths for longer than the others. It was cowardly of him that he didn't go with her... but he couldn't. When she finally emerged, her mouth was compressed into a thin, grim line, "I know where he is." She then set off at such a fast clip that Claude was hard-pressed to keep up with her.
After nearly a mile of that ground-eating pace, Claude was bitterly amused by where they'd ended up -- back at Central Park. Claude hadn't been in the Park at night since before he'd been drafted. It was decidedly more sinister in 1982 than it had been in 1967. There were no colorfully clad flower children draped around each other and over the grass like their namesake blooms. Instead there were homeless people, curled up in layer upon layer of grimy, threadbare clothing, drab and pathetic in their despair. This was where they were going to find Berger? Claude's heart began to hammer in something akin to panic.
After nearly an hour of searching the park, a voice called out from the shadows under one of the park's many bridges, "Jeanie? Starshine, is that you? Haven't seen you in ages! Where you been? Missed you." The words were slurred, with drink or something else, Claude couldn't have guessed. The voice, for all its cheerfulness, was dark with a deeper despair than they'd even seen in the alleys -- this was hopelessness... it was death. It made him want to weep, because even in its changed state, he knew that voice like he knew his own -- better, even.
Jeanie's eyes softened with pity, "It's me, sweetheart. I'm sorry I haven't been by. How are you holding up?"
Again that voice emerged, dark with what Claude now recognized as something... not quite sane, "Good, good, can't complain. It was such a nice clear night, thought I'd spend it out under the stars like we used to."
That entire comment jangled false. It wasn't a clear night, there was a storm on the way -- the air had been heavy and overcast with it all day -- and he was hiding under a bridge where you couldn’t possibly see any stars.
Jeanie just shook her head, "Why don't you come out here, baby? It's been so long since I've seen you."
That voice raised in a bitter chuckle, "You can't have me, Jeanie. I'm taken. Staying right here."
Jeanie's voice caught, "I know, sweetheart, but he wouldn't want you out here with a storm coming. Why don't you let me take you somewhere warm and safe?"
Again that edge of insanity, "No. I'm staying right here, right here in our spot, until he comes back. He is coming back, you know. He promised me so. So, I'm staying right here, so he'll know where to find me. You can't make me leave him again!"
As his voice raised in intensity, it suddenly broke off into a fit of harsh coughing and Claude couldn't take it anymore. It was him. Berger was talking about waiting for him, had been waiting for him for almost 16 years... Choking on a sob, Claude called into the darkness, "Berger, it's me! It's Claude... I've come back for you. Please come out!"
The silence that followed was brittle. He could feel the man under the bridge weighing his every word, every inflection in his voice. Finally that bitter voice came again, "Tricky, tricky, tricky, Jeanie-meanie, but you can't fool me. I may be mad, but I'm not stupid. When Claude comes back to me it will be with a choir of angels at his back, to take me home... home..." With a deranged cackle, the voice burst into song, "...Home on the Range! Where the deer and the antelope play! Where seldom is heard, a discouraging word and the skies are not cloudy all day!"
As if those words were a summons and this some Greek tragedy come to life, there was a crash of thunder, a jagged flash of lightning and the storm that had been threatening all day released its fury. Claude and Jeanie yelped and dove under the one shelter that was available -- Berger's bridge.
For a moment they huddled in the darkness, a primal fear of the power of the lightning keeping them from noticing anything else. After two more flashes, however, Claude finally came back to himself and turned towards the shadows, looking for the source of that beloved voice. The fourth lightning flash revealed a form, huddled in the darkness, gazing fearfully at the pair of interlopers. Claude couldn't see much from this angle, just a general outline, a blurred shape... but Berger could see them.
With the fifth flash of lighting Berger lunged out of the shadows, knocking Claude onto his back and straddling him. Claude's heart lurched into a trip hammer of rapid beating, unsure if, in this state, Berger meant him ill or good. Once he'd gotten there, however, Berger seemed disinclined to do anything else. His eyes locked with Claude's and seemed to get stuck there, gazing down into the face of the man he'd waited for for 15 years.
For his part, Claude was drinking in those features like a man dying of thirst. He was at once overjoyed and dismayed by what he saw. The once shining and thick mane of ebony curls was now dirty and lackluster, tangled and greasy. The skin was pale, yet wind-burned, flushed as though with fever. And his eyes... Those bright, warm green eyes, once seething with intelligence and mischief were now shuttered, glazed, almost unseeing in their insanity. The sob caught in Claude's throat as he mindlessly reached out a hand to touch that beloved, though terribly changed face.
Before he could, Berger knocked his hand away, pinning it and Claude's other hand over his head. The look in his eyes was fierce, angry... desperate. He stared down into Claude's eyes, searching him even more thoroughly than Jeanie had, his face a mask of pure grief. Finally, he flung himself off Claude with a cry, again huddling in his corner in the shadows, "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry... I tried to keep you here -- should have tried harder! Should have tied you down, sat on you so you couldn't go! Always so cursed stubborn, so self-sacrificing... Should have gone after you, protected you... died in your place! Died with you... Should have died..." The voice drifted off into mumbles for a minute before resuming, a little stronger, with a desperate plea, "Have... Have you come to kill me? Please... Please kill me. I don't want to be alone anymore..." The voice devolved into keening sobs interspersed with more of those hacking coughs.
Claude sat up, silent tears of his own tracking down his face as he stared into the darkness. Jeanie's hand on his shoulder nearly caused him to scream -- he'd entirely forgotten that she was even there. Her words were quiet, sad, "So, now you know."
Claude nodded, grief almost choking the words in this throat, "How... how long has he been like this?"
"He held it together for almost three years until we got the news that you'd died. Then... he started doing more and more drugs. Anything new that came out, he had to try. Eventually, he overdosed. It... it was bad, Claude. He almost died. When he woke up in the hospital he was inconsolable. Kept screaming at us that we should have left well enough alone, should have let him go to you," Jeanie paused in this, her last story, to pull him down to rest on her shoulder and started rubbing soothing circles around his back, "Sheila was almost mindless with her own grief -- between losing you and the fact that she was slowly losing Berger... she couldn't handle it. Their break-up... it was bad. The worst... and it was the final straw. After that, he disappeared into the city. He'd resurface once every few months to find one of us to bum some money off of or to crash for a few days and for a while we thought he was OK, you know? Just being Berger to the nth degree. But each time, he was a little more fragmented, a little more lost. Now, me and Crissy are the only two he'll let find him, and only every now and then. And he's like this. More dead than alive." Leaning back, she looked down into Claude's eyes, "Now do you see why I kept this from you?"
Finally pulling himself together, Claude nodded, "I think I do, but it doesn't change the fact that I need him."
Releasing him from her arms, Jeanie wrapped them around herself, "You need who he was. Can you handle who he is?"
Eyes firming with resolved, Claude simply said, "Yes."
Crawling slowly forward into the darkness, Claude stopped in front of where Berger was huddling on the ground, face buried in his arms. He inched forward until he could pull Berger up to rest on his lap. Once there, the distraught man latched his arms tightly around Claude's waist, as though he were a suddenly discovered life raft and Berger was lost at sea. Claude curled over him, sheltering him as best he could with his own body and started carding his fingers through Berger's unkempt nest of hair, brushing cool hands against his fever-flushed cheeks. After a few minutes of those ministrations, Berger started to calm. Into the silence, Claude spoke these words, "I'm not here to kill you George Berger. I'm here to save you, whether you want to be saved or not. I won't lose you a second time, not when I've finally found you again."
Exhausted and overwhelmed by the events of the night, Berger simply nestled closer and said, "All right..." Then, at the end of his endurance at last, he fell asleep.
When the storm finally spent itself, it took Claude and Jeanie the rest of the night and half the morning to get Berger back to her apartment. He was full on feverish and delusional by the time they did. Cloud met them at the door, a worried frown on his face, "Where the hell have you two been? I've been calling everyone we know since I got home! Leave a note next time, will ya?"
Jeanie pushed past him without a word, dragging her half of Berger's semi-conscious body through the door. At the sight the three of them presented, Cloud's mouth dropped open and he hurried to take his mother's half of Berger's weight from her. The minute he did, Jeanie turned around, closed and locked the door, then ran to the bathroom and started the water running in the bathtub, "Bring him in here!"
It took all three of them to get him stripped down and into the tub. Mostly he was lost in his own mind, but he would occasionally have a lucid moment and panic at the crowd of people around him and the fact that he was immersed in water. Claude stayed where Berger could see him, gripping his hand tightly and speaking whatever soothing nonsense he could think of. More often than not, to his and Jeanie's surprise, it worked and Berger would calm. It took nearly an hour to get him clean -- the most time of which was devoted to his hair. Cloud suggested they just shave it off and Claude rounded on him with such an angry glare that Jeanie had to calm him. She sent Cloud out to go pull out the couch and make it up.
When Berger was finally groomed to their satisfaction, they got him back out of the tub, dried him off and dressed him in a spare pair of Claude's pajamas. Berger had always been shorter than Claude, but it was never more noticeable than in this moment. He'd always been so much larger than life... you never noticed that he was actually a little short. Now, with all that vitality and force of personality gone, he looked as small as he was -- even smaller, the way he huddled in on himself. Claude lifted him in his arms and moved to carry him to the pull-out couch. A small hand on his arm stopped him. Jeanie shook her head, "You two can take my bed -- it's more comfortable and he'll need the quiet." When Claude started to protest, she offered him a sad smile, "It's the least I can do."
With a grateful look, he turned to walk down the hall to Jeanie's bedroom. He laid Berger down in the bed and moved to leave. A small whimper and a hand clutching the hem of his shirt prevented it. Completely undone by the look on his one-time lover's face, Claude kicked off his shoes and climbed under the covers with him. Berger immediately wrapped around him like an octopus, giving no indication that he ever planned on letting go. That was just fine with Claude, because now that he had Berger back... he didn't plan on letting go, either.
A/N:
Yes... yes, I'm mean. What's your point? I loves me my angst bunnies, yes I do. ^_^ Though I'll readily confess... the scene under the bridge still makes me cry when I read it. -.-;;;
Berger: O_O
Claude: ;_;
R-chan: *twitch* Suck it up.
Nuriko: Ano... Renee-san... I think you might actually be being meaner to them than you are to me... @_@;;;
R-chan: *rae* You want I should change that?
Nuriko: O_O No. *eyes Claude and Berger* Eh-heh... Sorry guys. You're on your own.
Coming soon: Claude may have Berger back... but does he really? It's a long, bumpy road to recovery...
Questions, comments, pineapples?
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3
