The Man Who Was December
Title: The Man Who Was December
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Sam/Jimmy
Warnings: N/A.
Word Count: ~5000
Summary: Wherein a jaded rock artist meets a forgotten childhood friend who pops up every Christmas. Vaguely connected to my 'verse Tell Me Who I Am which you really don't have to read to understand.
~~~
I don't know when it had begun, or whether there had always been a clear path set before me where all I had to do was move and breathe and live. I lean all my weight against the wall and turn to look at Nick who has been waving around this month's PopRox issue in the air for a full minute, raving like some poor schmuck who just got his hit of ecstasy and needs the world to know it.
"They love us!"
"Lose your voice and it'll be like you never even existed."
"That's cold, Sam."
"People are cold."
I hold the new lyric sheets in my hands that Nick had jotted down the night before. It's alright; Nick knows what makes the general public tick. The notes twang and prickle my brain until finally I find a satisfying chord that flows with the words. Stay simple and commercial. Move and breathe and live. Everything eventually finds its place; I don't have to do anything.
"We've just signed a contract with a major label," Nick starts to fuss again, pinching his brow in irritated disbelief, "and you're gonna sit there and mourn our careers' death already? Talk about a major buzz kill."
He rubs the back of his neck and yawns, reaching for a refreshment on the low table at our disposal in the studio.
"Aw, who cares about what you think, anyway. You're only the guitarist. Besides, the 'band' is called Nick; I can change guitarist whenever I want and no-one would even notice."
"That's cold, Nick," I say, a smile tucked in a corner of my lips.
Nick glances at me over his shoulder for a second, then shrugs and chugs down a bottle of chemically enhanced vitamin juice.
I don't care. The money's good, and the job lets me survive on a hobby. Even if I do get fired, I still have my law degree to fall on. That was mom's idea. If I was going to dick around, might as well dick around smart. Not that the job market is brimming with offers right now anyway. So I thought I'd team up with little Nicky just for the hell of it, at least until things looked up. Nick is just one of those souls who've entered the world suffering from a congenital affliction - that of an overdeveloped sense of entitlement that naturally comes with excess money, only without the money. He has more of a thirst for fame and immortality than for the earthly aspirations money had to offer. I suspect he's reaching out for the love of the audience to make up for some loving he didn't get as a child. Something as Freudian as that undoubtedly suited him. I would pity him if he didn't amuse me so much.
"If you're gonna ruin the celebration party like this, you might as well go home," Nick mutters.
"Nick!" our manager, Kim, interjects.
He knows how much I dislike those parties anyway, so this is really his way of showing thanks. I fold the lyric sheet away and get up.
"It's okay. I'm gonna try turn this crap into crusty gold-coated crap, anyway. See you tomorrow." I hoist my guitar over my shoulder and leave the building. Nick will be fine.
You could hardly guess the exact time just by stepping out into the ever-bustling streets of New York, unless you were a true third generation New Yorker that bled mortar. Of course, having a watch also helps things along, but who had time to look at a wrist? Time was simply imprinted in the working man's brain; if you lost track of that, you lost track of your purpose in life. One in the morning could have easily been ten at night; I still can't tell the difference, though, since I never cared to try. In any case, it isn't any less cold than if it were earlier. And it isn't even snowing. Winters are the worst. But at least tomorrow is Christmas Eve; not that that means much anyway.
I breathe in frozen air and sigh, hugging my jacket closer for maximum warmth and thinking, Long live the day when science finally invents climate control. Ah, people are roaming the streets to find an open bar or supermarket. Several taxi-drivers stop in the hope of picking up a passenger. It's Christmas Eve and still nothing has really changed save the adverts that have now temporarily adapted their slogans to the season. I open and close my fingers, trying to rub and stretch feeling back into the long stalks and find myself ordering my brain to finally get some new gloves. I'm always losing my gloves for some reason.
The park I pass by on the way to my apartment is almost empty now. Its emptiness gives off a pleasant feeling of solitude, but not the kind that makes you lonely. A small band of oblivious teenage drunkards loiter around one of the benches, high from their youth and unbroken dreams. They're invincible.
A lilting tune emerges almost inaudibly from the clutter of car motors and thump-thumping of feet on pavement. It's faint, almost as obscure as the park itself. I don't know why I need to find its source. Maybe it's out of human curiosity, or maybe it's because the tune feels somehow familiar. Well, not the air itself, but what it's saying. The music is growing stronger now as I near its source. In a small alcove made of bushes and a single lamppost, a middle-aged man stands sheathed in bulky streaks of light and shadows, playing a violin through holed gloves. A homeless person, it would seem. I stand a little to his left, unhidden, but neither am I obvious. I am a spectator listening to an old man's song as it rustles and breathes its story amongst the leaves. The entire man's lank body moves and flows with a jarring vivacity. His face folds in concentration as he attacks the strings and the music gushes out violently into the winter nighttime. It's beautiful.
Wait a minute... I know this air. Isn't this... Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody?
The music dies down and I feel the urge to clap my hands, to offer at least the sentiment of appreciation. Someone else beats me to it. Three dry claps snap in the air. My head swivels in search of the source, narrowing my eyes to see through the obscurity. There, a man clad in a black coat is sitting on a bench close to the older man. I wonder how I could have missed him earlier. Under the lamppost's orange light, I can see the newcomer has slicked back light hair - possibly platinum blond, but looks red in this light. He looks smartly dressed too, and is wearing frameless glasses. An office worker? No, he looks classier than that.
He mutters something, and the man plays another song. When he finally finishes, his body is sagging and shivering. This time, the young man stands up and hands over a fistful of bills.
The older man quietly gives his thanks and puts his violin back in its worn and dirty case. It's hard to believe such a beautiful instrument is kept in a banged up piece of junk. I unconsciously pat my own guitar case. The younger man watches the other wrap his spindly fingers around the bills and stow them away in a secret compartment hidden upon his body. A brief look of pity crosses the young man's face. Or was it a look of disappointment? It's hard to tell from where I stand. He then wordlessly turns his heels and walks away until the obscurity has eaten him entirely.
Before this man disappears too, I feel, as a fellow musician myself, that I have to commend his skill. But I see his body no longer shivers from the cold - it has passed that stage and is now stiff from something like rigor mortis. I decide not to keep him any longer and let him scurry back to a home invisible to me. I find myself wondering what events could have made this man wash up in this park at one in the morning playing the violin until his fingers dropped.
That night, I dream that I am the one playing my guitar in the park. My fingers are red and numb, anaesthetised by the cold, and yet I am ordered to play by a fair-haired child dressed in the robes of a king. "Play!" He laughs, bringing his hands together in glee. His eyes are filled with nothing but me and the guitar; he sees nothing beyond that.
Sallow light creases over his face and reveals a smile that glints like a knife. I want to stop; I want to lay myself down and fill my head with another dream. But the child screeches and cheers, like he knows he has me tied down like a puppet.
"Indeed, violins are too sad," he says with revulsion. "A guitar does suit you better."
I look up and see that he is gone. The drab light from the single lamppost flickers and wanes, and I find myself unable to stop plucking at the strings. It seems I will go on until my fingers are not much more than bloody stumps. I keep playing, hoping the boy king will return and give me my pittance.
- - -
Nick's hangover from the other night prevents him from acting too difficult today; he even overlooks my not finishing the work on his new lyrics. He says that if people get wind of what happened at the party our careers will die before he'd got the chance to get laid by groupies.
"Nipped in the bud." He moans. "All our hard work. Gone." He raises a limp hand and covers his eyes with the back of it.
He lies on his couch in loose-fitting jeans that are torn at the knees, and sports a ringer shirt; he is the living tableau of the jaded rock artist. Or maybe a parody of one. I ask him if he'd told me to come over just to make him coffee and listen to him gripe. He frowns and blinks at me like a squinting baby would at obnoxious colours, and calls me heartless. I tell him my doctor assures me that I am not, and hand him his coffee. Tonight I will try and see if the violinist will be back.
He is not. I'd made sure to come by at the same hour, and I linger for longer than planned. I'd even bought extra gloves and a coffee. But no-one is here, and I'm starting to feel rather silly for coming out in the middle of the freezing night on Christmas. Oh, that's right. It's Christmas now. I wonder if that was why Nick had called me over and insisted I stay for some beers. I dismiss the thought with a chuckle. Yeah, right. When Hell freezes over, maybe. I look by the bench and see the young man from the night before sitting there. Again, I wonder how I keep missing him, or was he already here before me?
He stares at the empty spot under the lamppost, as if mesmerised by the illuminated motes of dust under the light. It's Christmas, and yet here we both are waiting for our musical vagabond to take the stage. He does not. After a while, my legs thrum with a dull ache that is pleading for relief. I guess the old man has something better to do than play for a single man on Christmas in an almost empty park. I wonder if the young man is still waiting for him. I look at him once more and notice that his face is not as foreign as it had seemed at first. With the extra Christmas lights adorning the whole park, I can see him more clearly now. His brow furrows as if something has offended him, but he is not sure what, and the uncertainty irritates him.
I step forward and make myself known. The man does not care to look up; I myself do not know why I bother to intrude. I guess something about him rubs me the wrong way. I break the silence:
"You waiting for someone?" I ask.
The man does not respond and acts as if the question were not directed at him. He is probably one of those people who need an intermediary to talk to strangers. I really think I should leave him alone, but his dismissive attitude does not sit right with me. I can usually disregard petty things like this, what with dealing with Nick and all, but this guy is something else. It's like he won't even acknowledge my existence, to the point where if I decide to punch him in the face he'll only look around dumbstruck at the air.
"Hey, you." In the silence, my voice resonates loudly in my own ears. He doesn't move. I swallow and try again. "I mean..." I shift my weight uneasily from foot to foot, putting the awkwardness on equal footing. "You look like you could use a drink."
In the faint light around us, I make out a composed sneer. It's a grating smile, the kind that tells you it knows what you want before you yourself know what it is. I'm thinking this was a bad idea and start to turn back, mumbling a faint, "Never mind."
"Okay." I hear the word in my back. I turn around and find the man smiling like he's humouring me. "Okay," he says.
I smile back as if to say, "Alright, then." And we walk the bright streets of New York at one thirty on Christmas night, the anticipative magic of the festivity long used up on the night before. I wonder what we must look like; then again, not many people are around to paint their impressions for me.
- - -
He covers his mouth and lights a cigarette. The little orange pinpoint warms up his lungs with exotic plumes of chemicals. The few people in this bar stare half-heartedly at their season's drinks, attempting to reconnect with each other through an induced joviality. I look back at the man over my Porto; he doesn't look at me. I am a nonentity, a persistent spirit knocking on his world. Even though I haven't noticed anything outstanding about him - the man looks like he's constantly disappointed with the world, bored and jaded and safe in his fancy navy double-breasted coat - I somehow still feel like I need his eyes on me, like he'll give me some sort of validation I didn't know I was waiting for. Even now those eyes are staring ahead, glassy and impenetrable. I think, Won't you let me haunt you a little while longer?
"You must be pretty desperate," the man mumbles to the assorted rows of bottles across the bar top. "Picking a random guy in some shady park to spend Christmas with." His voice is low and derisive, like he's laughing quietly to himself about something I can't possibly understand.
I say he must be a little desperate, too, if he accepted to come along with me. A dry smile graces his lips and quickly disappears behind the clinking of glass against his teeth.
"What's wrong with your family?" he asks the glass.
"My family has their own family," I say, swirling the amber alcohol in my glass before downing it.
"You don't say."
Neither of us give any more details about our backgrounds; neither of us care to go that far. It's not as if we'll be seeing each other after tonight. Instead, I ask him about the old man and the violin. He orders another drink.
- - -
I have a feeling the guy just doesn't want to go back home yet, which would explain why he's still hanging around me half-inebriated. Turns out he's one clingy drunk. Quite the opposite of what I'd made him out to be. It would be kind of comical, cute even, if he weren't tugging on my arm and breathing heavily in my face, asking me where the toilet is. I gently push him away and tell him where it is as I enter my apartment. It's nothing fancy. Kind of cramped, actually. The couch alone takes up half the living room space, and the living room itself is also a kitchen. It's a good thing the guy is too pressed to relieve his bladder to notice the rather humble abode. Of course I keep it clean enough, so it should be alright.
I slump down on the scruffy sofa and exhale through my teeth. What am I thinking? Bringing a random half-drunk stranger to my place... Still, his face carries an uncanny familiarity, like I'd already seen it from afar somewhere, a long time ago, and then forgotten it in a dream. That still isn't reason enough to have gone and invited him over.
"You play the guitar?" a dry voice cuts through from my bedroom.
I'm surprised that I didn't hear him finish up and walk into my room. He really doesn't have any sense of respecting others' privacy; I guess it's because I don't count as a real person to him.
"Some. I'm in a band," I say it like it's a necessary qualification to have in my line of business.
"Oh," he says painfully, as though he's trying to rid a bad taste from his mouth. "Musicians are such a pain." He keeps the same vein of impressive loftiness coupled with a disdainful childishness.
"Arrogant bastards, aren't we?" I say.
He's looking around the room now, barely seeing or standing straight. After a few unsteady steps forward, he flops onto my bed like a used marionette. I somehow doubt he really is as intoxicated as he acts. I am now waiting for the sky to fall and drag him into the next day, back to the park where I picked him up, like the stray cat he is. He's fallen into drunken coma now, even though his face is still furrowed in that same comfortable disdain. I have to wonder what made him wander out so late in a park on Christmas, and what kind of solace he was looking for in a beggarman's song.
I have a feeling that even if I tried to jolt him awake or shove him off the bed, he still wouldn't wake up. I take off his shoes (I don't want them muddying the bed) and his glasses then cover him with a sheet so his highness can sleep it off. It occurs to me that I still don't know his name. I decide to give him one. One befitting a smug cat.
The young man mutters something almost inaudibly from his comatose slumber, but his eyes are still shut. I'm not sure whether it was actually the winter wind beating against the windows or my imagination. Even so, I still don't know what to do with myself; there's a hibernating stranger in my bed and I'm too exhausted to sleep. I go grab my guitar and try to busy my mind coming up with a tune for Nick's lyrics.
Miles. Yeah. Miles will do perfectly. Miles sighs in his sleep.
- - -
The apartment is empty. There's a bed, there's a cup of fresh coffee on the kitchen counter, and there's me drinking the coffee. The apartment is empty. The sun is up, the air is cold, and Miles is gone. He'd never existed in the first place. My phone rings. It's Nick. He's asking me if I'm alright since he's already called three times. I look at my watch: it's noon.
"I've got the song ready," I say, because it's the only thing I can think of saying.
"Forget about the song," Nick snaps. "Geez, you could've at least started off with a 'Merry Christmas'." He pauses and sighs. "Anyway, get your Sasquatch ass over to the studio. We're gonna negotiate a sweet gig for New Year's with the owner of Hi-Jinx."
"You mean the hot new night club on Tenth Avenue?"
"You know the one."
"Sweet."
I hang up and gather my stuff. Just before I leave, I throw one last glance at my room. It's the same as ever. It's hard to believe there was ever a drunkard napping in my bed a short while ago. Maybe it really was a dream, only the boy king had turned into a stray cat for a brief night.
- - -
A year has crawled by since last I saw Miles. For a few days after we met, I had kept going back to the park every night at the same hour, if only to see if he really did exist. Truth was, I myself didn't know what I'd do even if I did see him. In the end, I needed only a week or two to assure me the encounter was no different than a misplaced dream.
In the meantime, business has been good; Nick's pretty twenty-something face has finally made it in an interview in a pop magazine - which he insisted on framing and hanging on his new apartment's toilet door. And for some reason, the more success he heaps, the more his paranoia about disbandment spectacularly increases, going so far as calling me a back-stabber and accusing me of going solo whenever I go out to meet a nice lady friend. This is him being less jealous than possessive of his 'things'. I have the distinct impression he thinks that now that I've successfully used him to further my career, I can now move on and find my own path with better talented singers.
But I don't. I'm in a perfect stasis that won't allow me to see beyond next month's rent, and I'm just content playing my guitar (electric or acoustic) to the mixed sounds of chatter and cheer, or sometimes only the clinking of glasses and soft murmurs of private conversations that use my music as a comfortable background to lean against.
Tonight is one of those solo nights that Nick grudgingly lets me have, as long as it's in a high-end lounge with stuffy rich people who wouldn't care to mingle with the musician on display (I don't tell him about the more than affectionate looks that are sent my way during these times). It's Christmas Eve; important people are here to form important bonds with other important people. Once the season's cake is cut and diplomatic niceties are exchanged, I let the piano man take over and I take my leave. Exit the guitarist.
On my the way back to my apartment, I stop to get my umbrella out. It's snowing again, and the cold certainly isn't letting up any, at least not until it's managed to gnaw off half my face. I look up ahead and immediately regret it as air tentacles shove themselves full tilt down a fortunate opening between my scarf and neck. As I narrow my eyes, I notice a solid figure is standing stock-still by the overpass. I puff a warm cloud into the air and shake my head.
As I pass him by, I mutter, "If you're thinking of jumping, I suggest you wait for dawn. There's nothing like a splattered corpse on Christmas morning to get the ink flowing."
The man rolls the butt of his unlit cigarette between his teeth and turns his head to me, chewing out a thin smile.
"Oh my, do I really look that desperate?" His voice thrums dully in the air like a breathless clarinet.
That same platinum blond-dyed, slicked back hair, those same square glasses and smart get-up. It's like I'm living that day again from a year ago, but in an alternate time line. I decide to talk to him like he's a figment of myself. A very dark figment I like to think I've repressed.
"Out barhopping on Christmas again?"
"I thought you'd have forgotten by now," he says, following the trail of little lights that pass under us.
"I've got some of the good stuff at my place, if you want."
It's not as if I'll be seeing him again in the morning. I suppose I could use the company of a stray cat for one night. And if that doesn't sound sad... . The young man smiles and tucks his cigarette away in a pocket.
Once inside my apartment, he looks around and remarks that I haven't changed anything at all. He asks me if I'm waiting for something. I don't know what he means by that, so I give him a vague answer, some crap about waiting for the right opportunity.
He giggles after his tenth shot of Tequila and tells me that I've gotten so, so big. I still don't make any sense of what he's saying and let him empty as many bottles as he wants. Chances are, the bottles will reappear in the morning, uncapped and full. His pastel pink shirt is rumpled and untucked, a testament to how undone he was allowing himself to get.
"Play a song," he slurs contentedly. "One you've written."
I feel the alcohol pumping hotly through my body, dragging my limbs at an indolent pace, like I'm moving through a heavy daydream that won't let me out. I unzip my guitar case and slowly rummage through my mind for an acoustic song that won't be too hard on my hazy brain. I start playing the first chords, trying hard to get the notes right. I've never had to concentrate this hard since my first try-outs. But it doesn't matter anymore, since my audience has apparently already dosed off on the couch. I grunt as I lump my guitar to the side.
"See you next year," I mutter, as I throw a blanket over him.
Yet I find myself wishing that he would stay a little longer. Did this man usually get drunk and sleep at strangers' places? What kind of world does he live in that he believes he was immune to harm? I want to be part of that world. I don't want him to go just yet.
I take his glasses off and place them on the low table next to the couch. The man's eyelids flutter open as he stirs from his drunken stupor. He sees me leaning heavily against his chest, and I wonder if I am not choking him when his bitter breath wheezes against my cheek. Two blue stones gaze smugly at me like he's known for more than a year what I would be thinking at this moment. But I'm too hot and dizzy to feel cheated or bothered by it right now.
"Who are you?" I manage to utter with all the syllables quasi intact.
His lips twist into a grin. "The ghost of Christmas Past."
I narrow my eyes at him. "You're a riot," I say dryly and lean in to shut him up before his words scramble my brain any further.
His lips are rough from having stayed in the cold for so long, and yet smooth out easily under mine. I run a hand through his hair and dishevel his neat and pretentious hair-do; the man's former impervious composition is entirely wrecked under my eager hands. And yet he doesn't seem to mind at all - in fact, I'd even say he's planned this all along. The alcohol burns through my veins, and I want to bruise him. I want to leave him dead and bloodied with a look of utter shock framing his face until it decayed.
The man leans forward and says softly into my ear, his hand on the nape of my neck, "The guitar really suits you."
The words send violent tremors down my spine, like my body has been craving them for longer than I care to remember. And I can't. I can't remember a thing. Why did I ever choose music over a career in law? I sigh and lick a trail from his ear to the hollow at the base of his throat. The man moans and arches into my touch as my hand slides under his shirt like he's allowing me to have him for this one night. It's almost maddening.
Why is it that I play? I'm looking for someone in the crowd, hoping they will hear my call and come back to me. Maybe I am waiting. But it's been so long, I've forgotten who I'm looking for.
- - -
The bottles are gone, and with them every trace of evidence to prove last night's debauchery. And yet my body thrums with a pleasant ache, while my face feels completely drained, as though it's cried rivers. Echoes of last night's words still resonate feebly in some residual corner of my mind, like a fuzzy, broken-down tape recorder.
I wonder how long you will take to forget me now.
I remember a boy. A young boy, barely seventeen, playing a violin like he's murmuring secrets into its strings. He looks up and smiles. But he's not smiling at me, he's smiling to himself. He's lost in his own little world, where not even he can escape. And he's smiling because he knows this, and he knows I want to break his world. But he will never let me have him. He will never let me forget him. He's a vicious child. But if that's the way he wants to play this, then I'll make sure he won't forget me either.
Until next year, Jimmy.
~~~
A/N: And bring your own beer.
If you know what the title references, then you're a bigger nerd than I.
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