(no subject)
a violent yet flammable world
gabe / william, 3539 words (pg13)
at the end of the world, it rains.
william sits on the balcony listening to the steady sound of the thunder rolling. he closes his eyes as flashes of lightning disturb the darkness around him, but he's used to this. it hasn't affected him in two hundred and forty six days and it won't affect him today.
"what are you doing out here?" gabe asks quietly. his voice is barely heard over the loud cracks and bursts of the sky falling down on them, but bill has learned to search for familiar sound among the storm. his eyes open and he looks up, smiling.
"sit with me?" he doesn't have to ask twice. he and gabe have spent most of their days together, curled up in the apartment listening to what's left of the world pass them by. gabe gives him a nod and settles down on the cold floor. it's damp and the tiles are ruined, no longer white and pristine like they were when he moved in. they're chipped in places, broken in others, faded and worn like they've been beaten down for years.
they have good days, and they have bad days.
today seems to be somewhere in between. for the most part, it's just started, but it's hard to keep track of time when the sun is constantly hiding behind rain clouds. the days melt together and william can barely remember if it's tuesday or saturday, the fifth or the eighth. gabe keeps it all written down; someone has to. on good days, he says things like, "it's been raining for a hundred days and my hair still manages to look amazing," to get a laugh out of his boyfriend. on bad days, he says things like, "it won't let up," and they both sit on the balcony with identical frowns on their faces, waiting.
there isn't much to do anymore. nothing works and no one's around. when it started, william stocked up on water and gabe stocked up on cigarettes.
when the television stations were still broadcasting, they sat in the living room holding each other's hands tightly, listening to some woman with too much make up caked on her face describe the events that had occurred. they listened to the details of floods and hurricanes and tornados in parts of the world where that sort of thing just didn't happen. they listened to accounts of looting and murder and watched as the death toll piled up.
gabe slides an arm around william's thin frame-- and boy has he gotten thinner in such a short amount of time; they all have-- and pulls him close, presses a few kisses against his neck and closes his eyes. "i like the way it feels on my toes," he says, stretching his legs out so the water falls down and tickles his feet.
william nods, thinking this day might not be so bad after all. he nudges gabe in the side and says, "they're here."
gabe doesn't say anything, just reaches into his pocket and takes out the small flashlight he's been carrying around since most lights went out. some are still running but for the most part, the water has damaged all major circuits. it makes it difficult to do, well, anything. he passes it over for bill to signal to their friends. it's not a long way up but they'll have to take the stairs. neither one of them wants to move at the moment, but someone needs to open the door and everyone else is still sleeping.
reluctantly, they peel themselves away from the balcony and head to the door to greet their friends. william stops by the linen closet to get towels because everyone will be drenched from head to toe and he knows gabe doesn't like it when people drip all over the carpet.
bill doesn't know whose idea it was to do this here, but he's sort of glad. he likes being the helpful host, putting coats away and making up rooms for people to sleep in. it gives him something to do. most of the people coming will arrive in a few weeks, but everyone that was far away had to make their way over slowly, so they'll be staying. no one was clear on when it would happen but after nearly a year of endless rain and confirmation that nothing will be done to try and rebuild despite the conditions, they've decided to take matters into their own hands.
true to his word, at the end of the world, gabe saporta throws a party.
"jon!" william exclaims, throwing his arms around his long time friend, not caring that his clothes will get wet. he and gabe greet ryan, brendon and spencer and help them inside after they've taken off their shoes, wrung out their clothes and toweled off their hair. they've brought a few bags, things they wanted with them from vegas and chicago. gabe and william would have done the same-- visited bill's apartment and collected tokens of his life, but they decided all they needed at the end was each other. romantic and a little vomit worthy, according to pete, but true. they had called up their parents while phones still worked and left messages for all their friends, but in the end, if and when the waters rose too high for them or anyone to cope with, they'd be together and that was all that mattered.
when they decided to have the party, they got word out slowly, passing messages to whoever was going out of town and hearing back weeks later that old friends would show up. pete and patrick were the first to get there, naturally. though the days were dreary and the nights dragged on, the four of them made the time pass quickly, out sloshing around in the streets of new york, exploring what was left of the city.
now the water's risen too high to walk on the sidewalk and the stairs are flooded up to the fourth floor. the broken windows in the apartments below allow access to the stairwell but other than that, there's no getting in or out. gabe is glad that william was so adamant about rationing their food supply, but even more enthusiastic that he doesn't smoke.
it doesn't pour every day, though there is always rainfall. some days you can barely feel it, but it's there, slowly filling up the world. it's the middle of december but like everywhere else, new york is hot and were it not for the rain and the breeze to cool them off, they would be covered in sweat. it's a good thing the sun rarely shines anymore because the humidity alone is slowly killing them.
"it's like being on warped tour," sisky said one day.
the butcher agreed, nodding his head. "like being on warped tour and wearing long sleeves."
"it was fine for us," alex pointed out and ryland, in his button up dress shirt and skinny black jeans just shrugged his shoulders.
william finds jon sitting on the staircase early in the morning, his feet immersed in the water and a cup of bad coffee in his hands. it's a good thing they have so many people passing through lately, bringing them food and clothes and news from other cities. william likes to say he would go crazy without it, but he knows he'd be okay. it is a comfort, a most welcome one, but he would be content to sit and play scrabble with gabe until they drown together.
outside, lightning strikes against the darkened sky and william settles down beside jon. they sit for hours, staring out at the world and what's become of it. through the shards of glass they can see the tops of trees. it's two weeks to the main event and the water levels have risen past another floor. buildings all around have crumbled and jon can't help but wonder when theirs will. will they wake up in the middle of the night to the sounds of breaking beams and shattering glass or will they sleep through it, find each other in some other world and wonder how they got there?
brendon's theory on the afterlife is something like his parent's belief of the degrees of glory. he jokes that they will all reunite in the celestial but gabe and william can't join them because the amount of sex they have will only be tolerated in the telestial.
patrick says, "play-- play uh, classifieds."
william laughs because gabe makes him sing that song every night in bed and they both manage to fuck up the words when they are drunk. he complies, though, because this is all they really have to do. no one can listen to anything new and their supply of batteries is almost nonexistent. ryan curses the day he bought an ipod for its short battery life in a crisis. they might never hear another recorded version of the songs they love so they sing for each other.
unfortunately, the acoustic in bill's hand is ruined. the moisture in the air has warped the wood and the strings don't do what they should. every time he tunes it, it changes pitch mere minutes later. they've learned to laugh at the new sounds and chords created by gentle strumming and to appreciate the rare moments when a song is played perfectly. they sit around in the living room and listen to their lives, wondering vaguely whether they will ever get them back.
they play the entirely of a fever one day, gabe and alex beat-boxing the synthesizers and pete whispering the spoken words in the introduction. they laugh hysterically through the acapella version of while the city sleeps and listen intensely while pete screams out lyrics from infinity on high. for the most part, they sing the songs they wish they had written and make fun of ryan for wanting to start a beatles cover band.
the water reaches ridiculous levels a week before the party.
the floor two beneath theirs is filling up and gabe has been skipping rocks from the window of his ex-neighbours apartment to pass the time. william has been humming the tune to celine dion songs and allowing his touches to linger on gabe's skin because he knows he won't be able to much longer.
when everyone shows up, they only have to walk up one flight of stairs. once again, bill gets to play the host, finding space in closets and arranging snacks and drinks in the dining room. alex has managed to whip them up some pretty impressive hors d'oeuvres but what most people (though not greta and bob because they claim they haven't had food that good for months) are excited about is the goldmine of alcohol that matt, eric and disashi apparently went diving for. travis assures them all he's staying away from it, but it is the end of the world, so no one will blame him if he sneaks a drink or two or ten.
bill isn't sure what time it is or how many drinks he's had but he unfurls himself from tom's hug so he can get back to his conversation with mike and walks over to pete. he's about to make a joke about mikey way and a closet but pete pulls him close and hugs him tightly. it's the same way tom hugged him, like they hadn't seen each other in a while, like things were said a long time ago that don't mean anything now. like this could be the last time they ever get to breathe the same air.
outside the rain is coming down harder than it ever has but they are used to this. it hasn't affected them in two hundred and ninety seven days and it especially won't affect them today. everyone is dancing or talking or eating, drinking, laughing, crying. everyone is happy despite the fact that the world is filling up and they are all about to be swallowed whole by it.
pete says, "thank you." for a moment, william wonders if he is drunk but he doesn't have a drink, just a happy grin on his face and a letter clutched in his hand. "you've given us something," he smiles, his words whispered against william's ear as he stands on his toes, bill leaning down to wrap his arms around his friend's body. "we don't have much anymore but you two have given us a home, at the end of the world, no less. i thought it would be hard to find that, but it's been real easy."
if it were possible for him to form words at the moment, bill would have said thank you as well, instead he just smiles and points to the letter in pete's hand. "what's--" he starts, but pete interrupts him.
"patrick," he starts, and his smile grows wider than bill's ever seen it. "thought it was about time he said a few things."
around midnight, william feels an arm around his waist. he doesn't need to open his eyes (they were slowly closing anyway) to know who it belongs to, and he doesn't need to try and stop the smile from reaching his lips. there was a time when he would pretend that gabe's touches didn't affect him, when he would brush it off and say they were just friends. he doesn't remember when or how he fell in love with gabe saporta, just that it was gradual, over several months or several years and that it filled him up the way the water is filling up new york, that it took over his life. after a while, he started to wonder what his world had been like without it.
gabe pulls him away from the crowd and leads him down the hall that will take them to the master bedroom. unlike the other rooms which will fill with their guests when they decide to end the party, gabe has strictly forbidden anyone to invade his and william's personal area, wanting some much needed uninterrupted time for the two of them.
"i miss you," william sighs, tugging at gabe's shirt and leaning forward to press a few kisses to his boyfriend's lips. "i'll miss you."
gabe frowns, pulling away only to pull the shirt over his body but returns to william's kisses as his hands fumble with the buttons on bill's shirt. "shh," he whispers, "don't talk like that. we're all going out at the same time," he reminds bill, sounding proud of the fact though he is really scared, "and we're going out with one hell of a bang."
he pushes the fabric off of william's shoulders, distracting his bad thoughts with deep kisses; his tongue laps over the skin at bill's bottom lip, pulling it into his mouth and scraping teeth over the pout that is slowly forming. gabe turns him around and kisses his shoulder, paying close attention to the cluster of freckles on his left side, closer to his arm than they are to his neck. he calls the top left section where they are all bunched together his personal island, says that if he could be in any place at any time he would be there, proudly clinging to william beckett's skin.
william falls gracefully onto the bed, smoothing the sheets out under him as he turns on his back and grabs at the air between them, desperately wanting it to disappear. "i love you," he mumbles against gabe's lips. he pulls back and looks serious when he says, "i don't think i've said it enough, i don't think i've done a good job of showing you how much you mean to me."
"you've shown me every day," gabe assures him, holding bill's face in hands that are rough but gentle and caring. gabe kisses him passionately, intent on proving to him that if it were all to end this very second, their love would remain as it is-- deep and intense and unfailing.
bill nods and pulls him close, praying for the first time in a long time that somehow they will live past the night. the storm raging outside seems like it will never end and a few hours ago the apartment below was half full. he can only imagine what it looks like now and whether or not they will wake up with their own floors filling up.
"when the rain stops," gabe whispers into his ear as they lose their jeans and william loses the ability to breathe for a moment. "when the rain stops, i'm gonna marry you, boy. we'll marry in the sun, against the stone of ruined buildings, with the washed out city and the water receding as we say our vows."
he takes a moment to kiss bill's neck but he's pulled away so william can look at him, just look at him and wonder how on earth he got so lucky.
he takes the entire moment in and knows that this is the way he will remember them, always. this will be his last thought: gabe and him, lying in bed with nothing but skin between them and the promise of something bigger than the room they are in, bigger than the city and the state and the whole water world they are barely living in.
when he wakes up, gabe is tugging on his hair and pulling him out of bed though he is not fully awake yet. "i'm naked," he mumbles, but gabe doesn't care.
outside, the sky is no longer dark, the rain is no longer falling. gabe has the window thrown open and there isn't a drop to be seen splashing into the water below. the thunder has stopped completely, it seems, no longer distant and sounding ominous and foreboding. the sounds of the party have died down and bill's not sure if they are all sleeping or if they are pressed against the window staring out into the world.
for the first time in almost a year, william can see the sun. it rises steadily beneath clouds of purple and red and deep oranges, peaks over the treetops and settles in the sky. if he looked over to the right he could see tom snapping pictures as the city brightens up. pete is wrapped up in patrick's arms and staring in awe. greta is enjoying the last of the bruschetta.
he doesn't see them though, but he glances back at the figure behind him, coming up and putting a head on his shoulder. gabe wraps his arms around william's waist, holds him at the hips and kisses his neck. "so," he grins, and bill can feel teeth against his skin. "will you marry me?"
at the end of the world, william beckett smiles.
--
listen to i can barely breathe by manchester orchestra and dusting down the stars by mobile. they both make me think apocalypse, though in completely different ways.
it rains a lot here. i woke up a few days ago to heavy (northern) downpour and i thought the streets would flood and i'd have to find a rowboat and someone willing to paddle for me. the first thing that popped into my mind was this, though. at the moment, there is thunder but no rain and it looks like night despite being early in the morning. a few wednesdays ago it rained for hours and after, the sky lit up red and orange with clouds of bright pink. i saw the biggest rainbow against a backdrop of failing light. it was the most beautiful thing i've ever seen, second only to william beckett and his freckles.
(in other news, i can't believe i wrote a gabe/william fic that is not nc17. O.O how did this happen?!)