SAVE THE DAY -- PG
[title] Save the Day
[author] kissontheneck [a.k.a. fieryrogue]
[pairing] Cookleta
[beta] Um, in a way, slashophile.
[rating] PG, language
[word count] 1320
[summary] We'll just say Archie gets found out by the church.
[disclaimer] Surely, I have nothing to do with either of these fine young men, no matter how much I wish I did.
[warnings] Angst. Treading in religious waters, but hopefully not too badly. Also, my only vague understanding of the topic, and a little Mormon bashy. A... little?
[author's notes] Absolutely for slashophile, because I orginally set out to write this little drabbly thing just for her, but then two sentences in, iTunes decided to play "Save the Day" and this happened and. Yeah. ALSO -- if you are religion!fic sensitive, you probably don't want to read this, even though it is not super!attacking or anything. I hope. *bites nails*
SAVE THE DAY
He checks his watch again. It's been over an hour and David Cook is getting impatient. His car is parked on what he is sure is the loneliest street in America. The most hopeless, empty, emotionless street he's ever seen, even in the driest expanses of Oklahoma and Kansas and Missouri.
And Utah. Let's not forget Utah.
Utah, the only place on earth that makes Cook feel like an alien, and strange and ashamed just for existing. Especially now. Especially today. Today he feels like the eyes of every citizen of Salt Lake City are piercing through him, even though the street is nearly empty and there are only the cars of the council members parked along the dreary building before him and no one even fucking knows he's there anyway. Not even David.
He made the decision at the last possible second. Nine hours and fifty-seven minutes before the disciplinary council was to gather here at this... whatever this place was and... He had very calmly stood up form his couch, put on his jacket, picked up his keys and called Andy on the way out the door, asking him to come take care of Dublin and to water his lone dying plant. That was it. And before he knew it he was driving along this street, catching the coattails of dour looking men dressed in black closing the door behind them as they entered the building. He didn't even get to see him go in, let alone give him a word of comfort before doing so.
Not that he'd know what the fuck to say anyway.
This was an experience that, even after asking about a million questions, and reading up at the library and searching desperately on the Internet for information -- he couldn't wrap his head around. He couldn't understand how a group of people, seemingly so community-oriented and supportive -- how they could turn around and do this to someone. Stab him in the back before pushing him into Hell. It wasn't fair. He didn't get it. He didn't get it at all.
And he knew David wasn't going to get a chance -- not one chance to speak. Because maybe the clips from films he'd come across were dramatizations, but they all emphasized the total lack of control an individual has in that court. You just sit and take it and wait for the sentence to be read to you.
Seventy-eight minutes now. Seventy-eight minutes of droning noise from the freeway, seventy-eight minutes of staring at the building and putting a crick in the neck, and seventy-eight minutes of the hot, Utah summer sun beating into his car, reflecting into his eyes, giving him a headache, making him sweat like a pig. His car has air conditioning, but he'd rather suffer. He'd rather sit in this hell out here as long as David had to sit in that hell in there. But he still feels guilty for being more comfortable.
What the fuck is taking so long anyway? How long does it take to say, "You're a fucking disgrace and severed from Heaven for all of eternity"? They're abusing him, Cook thinks. They're abusing him because it's so easy to do so. Attacking David is easy, because he is quiet and doesn't fight back, and any sick bastard who wants to feel some sort of selfish controlling power over someone else only needs to pick David Archuleta as his target because he will lay down and take it, merely praying for the moment to be over.
They're fucking torturing him.
Suddenly, there is a movement on the dead street. Cook looks up to find the door to the building has finally opened, and an army of conservatively dressed men parade out, none speaking nor looking at one another, and making beelines for their own cars. Cook sits up eagerly, his hand on the car door, anticipating that familiar form. That small, dark body, with jet black hair and sorrowful eyes. He waits. And waits.
And waits.
And the men are leaving slowly and the door hasn't opened for a minute and a half now, though it seems like forty, and the street is slowly emptying of the few streaks of life that it possessed for the last eighty minutes. And he's about to just explode from the car and race inside because he can't even handle this anymore when slowly... ever so slowly... the door swings open again, and as if in slow motion, the small, young figure of David Archuleta appears, head down, eyes squinting against the sun, which probably feels like all the shame of Heaven beating down on him, seeping into his black hair and jacket and pants and burning him straight through to Hell.
Cook pushes open the car door and hovers in midair. David is taking the steps down the front of the building like it is a death march to a burning stake, and when the tip of his shining black loafer hits the starkly dry sidewalk, Cook slams the car door shut, jolting David out of his reverence and making him stop dead in his tracks. He looks up, eyes wide as saucers, and he stops breathing.
Cook forces himself into the street, crossing without a care as to whether a bus might suddenly run him down in his tracks, and David, his shoulders falling as if in defeat, meets him halfway, falling weakly into Cook's arms, face buried into his chest, and breathing out as if all the angels of Heaven sighed along with him. His brow is sticky with sweat and his hair glistens in the hellish sun and Cook pulls him tightly to his chest and buries his own face into David's scalp, tasting the salty perspiration on his lips and practically feeling the shame radiating off his frail body.
Out of the corner of his eye, there is a slight silhouette, just there, at the end of the block. Cook sneaks his eyes in that direction and finds the figure of a diminutive woman, olive-skinned and dark-haired. She is wearing a sundress and flat-bottomed shoes. She is paused there, a block away, her hand on her chest, surely holding back her breath at the sight she is beholding. Cook lifts his chin, only enough to barely leave David's head, and looks at her, a woman he has always loved and doesn't blame in the slightest for this happening. She didn't want it to happen either. He turns his head more, but she puts up her hand, as if telling him no, don't say a word. It's all right. There is an awkward beat, and Cook feels David shift against him, still soundless, still buried. The woman watches them for one more second before she brings her fingers to her mouth, presses her lips to them and then releases the kiss into the air, sending it to fight the heavy, humid, unmoving air.
Cook blinks and she is gone.
He can't really decide if she was really there, an angel, or just a figment of his heat-addled imagination -- but in the end he settles that whatever the case, she was there to look over her boy. He presses the kiss into David's scalp, squeezing his eyes against the tears that are now fighting to escape them. He pushes David to arms length and with one hand lifts up the boy's chin so he can look him in the face. David's eyes are raw with redness, unable to cry anymore. His brow is wrinkled; he looks suddenly older. Older and ragged and beaten by the heat of a thousand days of working a Utah farm field.
David looks wearily up at him, almost as if he is about to die at any moment.
"What do I do now?" His voice is weak, cracked from disuse.
Cook swallows hard and squeezes his shoulders. "Keep breathing."
~~~♥~~~
"So keep breathing
I said that I'll always be there
Now I mean it more than ever before
There's a future worth fighting for
So don't be scared
I know how you must be feeling
No one to help you carry the pain
I'm coming to save the day."
-- David Archuleta, "Save the Day"
~~~♥~~~
=====
[author] kissontheneck [a.k.a. fieryrogue]
[pairing] Cookleta
[beta] Um, in a way, slashophile.
[rating] PG, language
[word count] 1320
[summary] We'll just say Archie gets found out by the church.
[disclaimer] Surely, I have nothing to do with either of these fine young men, no matter how much I wish I did.
[warnings] Angst. Treading in religious waters, but hopefully not too badly. Also, my only vague understanding of the topic, and a little Mormon bashy. A... little?
[author's notes] Absolutely for slashophile, because I orginally set out to write this little drabbly thing just for her, but then two sentences in, iTunes decided to play "Save the Day" and this happened and. Yeah. ALSO -- if you are religion!fic sensitive, you probably don't want to read this, even though it is not super!attacking or anything. I hope. *bites nails*
SAVE THE DAY
He checks his watch again. It's been over an hour and David Cook is getting impatient. His car is parked on what he is sure is the loneliest street in America. The most hopeless, empty, emotionless street he's ever seen, even in the driest expanses of Oklahoma and Kansas and Missouri.
And Utah. Let's not forget Utah.
Utah, the only place on earth that makes Cook feel like an alien, and strange and ashamed just for existing. Especially now. Especially today. Today he feels like the eyes of every citizen of Salt Lake City are piercing through him, even though the street is nearly empty and there are only the cars of the council members parked along the dreary building before him and no one even fucking knows he's there anyway. Not even David.
He made the decision at the last possible second. Nine hours and fifty-seven minutes before the disciplinary council was to gather here at this... whatever this place was and... He had very calmly stood up form his couch, put on his jacket, picked up his keys and called Andy on the way out the door, asking him to come take care of Dublin and to water his lone dying plant. That was it. And before he knew it he was driving along this street, catching the coattails of dour looking men dressed in black closing the door behind them as they entered the building. He didn't even get to see him go in, let alone give him a word of comfort before doing so.
Not that he'd know what the fuck to say anyway.
This was an experience that, even after asking about a million questions, and reading up at the library and searching desperately on the Internet for information -- he couldn't wrap his head around. He couldn't understand how a group of people, seemingly so community-oriented and supportive -- how they could turn around and do this to someone. Stab him in the back before pushing him into Hell. It wasn't fair. He didn't get it. He didn't get it at all.
And he knew David wasn't going to get a chance -- not one chance to speak. Because maybe the clips from films he'd come across were dramatizations, but they all emphasized the total lack of control an individual has in that court. You just sit and take it and wait for the sentence to be read to you.
Seventy-eight minutes now. Seventy-eight minutes of droning noise from the freeway, seventy-eight minutes of staring at the building and putting a crick in the neck, and seventy-eight minutes of the hot, Utah summer sun beating into his car, reflecting into his eyes, giving him a headache, making him sweat like a pig. His car has air conditioning, but he'd rather suffer. He'd rather sit in this hell out here as long as David had to sit in that hell in there. But he still feels guilty for being more comfortable.
What the fuck is taking so long anyway? How long does it take to say, "You're a fucking disgrace and severed from Heaven for all of eternity"? They're abusing him, Cook thinks. They're abusing him because it's so easy to do so. Attacking David is easy, because he is quiet and doesn't fight back, and any sick bastard who wants to feel some sort of selfish controlling power over someone else only needs to pick David Archuleta as his target because he will lay down and take it, merely praying for the moment to be over.
They're fucking torturing him.
Suddenly, there is a movement on the dead street. Cook looks up to find the door to the building has finally opened, and an army of conservatively dressed men parade out, none speaking nor looking at one another, and making beelines for their own cars. Cook sits up eagerly, his hand on the car door, anticipating that familiar form. That small, dark body, with jet black hair and sorrowful eyes. He waits. And waits.
And waits.
And the men are leaving slowly and the door hasn't opened for a minute and a half now, though it seems like forty, and the street is slowly emptying of the few streaks of life that it possessed for the last eighty minutes. And he's about to just explode from the car and race inside because he can't even handle this anymore when slowly... ever so slowly... the door swings open again, and as if in slow motion, the small, young figure of David Archuleta appears, head down, eyes squinting against the sun, which probably feels like all the shame of Heaven beating down on him, seeping into his black hair and jacket and pants and burning him straight through to Hell.
Cook pushes open the car door and hovers in midair. David is taking the steps down the front of the building like it is a death march to a burning stake, and when the tip of his shining black loafer hits the starkly dry sidewalk, Cook slams the car door shut, jolting David out of his reverence and making him stop dead in his tracks. He looks up, eyes wide as saucers, and he stops breathing.
Cook forces himself into the street, crossing without a care as to whether a bus might suddenly run him down in his tracks, and David, his shoulders falling as if in defeat, meets him halfway, falling weakly into Cook's arms, face buried into his chest, and breathing out as if all the angels of Heaven sighed along with him. His brow is sticky with sweat and his hair glistens in the hellish sun and Cook pulls him tightly to his chest and buries his own face into David's scalp, tasting the salty perspiration on his lips and practically feeling the shame radiating off his frail body.
Out of the corner of his eye, there is a slight silhouette, just there, at the end of the block. Cook sneaks his eyes in that direction and finds the figure of a diminutive woman, olive-skinned and dark-haired. She is wearing a sundress and flat-bottomed shoes. She is paused there, a block away, her hand on her chest, surely holding back her breath at the sight she is beholding. Cook lifts his chin, only enough to barely leave David's head, and looks at her, a woman he has always loved and doesn't blame in the slightest for this happening. She didn't want it to happen either. He turns his head more, but she puts up her hand, as if telling him no, don't say a word. It's all right. There is an awkward beat, and Cook feels David shift against him, still soundless, still buried. The woman watches them for one more second before she brings her fingers to her mouth, presses her lips to them and then releases the kiss into the air, sending it to fight the heavy, humid, unmoving air.
Cook blinks and she is gone.
He can't really decide if she was really there, an angel, or just a figment of his heat-addled imagination -- but in the end he settles that whatever the case, she was there to look over her boy. He presses the kiss into David's scalp, squeezing his eyes against the tears that are now fighting to escape them. He pushes David to arms length and with one hand lifts up the boy's chin so he can look him in the face. David's eyes are raw with redness, unable to cry anymore. His brow is wrinkled; he looks suddenly older. Older and ragged and beaten by the heat of a thousand days of working a Utah farm field.
David looks wearily up at him, almost as if he is about to die at any moment.
"What do I do now?" His voice is weak, cracked from disuse.
Cook swallows hard and squeezes his shoulders. "Keep breathing."
~~~♥~~~
"So keep breathing
I said that I'll always be there
Now I mean it more than ever before
There's a future worth fighting for
So don't be scared
I know how you must be feeling
No one to help you carry the pain
I'm coming to save the day."
-- David Archuleta, "Save the Day"
~~~♥~~~
=====