Something I Would Like to See
Fandom: Angels in America
Characters: Prior, Harper, Louis, Hannah
Rating: PG-13
Prompt: Threshold of Revelation
Notes: written for the Coming Out Day Ficathon
Scene One
Dream scene. Prior enters in a floor-length Balenciaga gown and a blonde wig. Corridor, vanity, the spring collection from Clinique. Prior sits in front of the mirror.
"I'm ready for my closeup, Mr. DeMille." He pauses, lips pursed, transformed. "Ugh, deja vu," he mutters, pouting with bright red lips. His face in the mirror seems wrong somehow.
It's been too long--he's past this. He's started to remember his dreams, mostly, the nights he isn't so sick.
He misses her. Not the angel. Oh God no. The Marlboro Man's wife. Harper. He remembers her the way she was here, soft and unhappy and frightened.
"Oh, fuck," he gasps, and then he begins to cry. "Fuck."
He wakes up wiping imaginary mascara tracks from his cheeks.
Scene Two
She thinks, plane safely on the tarmac, emptying, that she might like to stay. That maybe she should close her eyes and sink down in the seat. Wait for the plane to refill itself and fly.
She doesn’t want another home. She doesn’t like the word ‘home’ much, anymore. She knows the water here is salty.
She knows, and maybe that’s why. Gets up and takes her bag, her only bag, Joe’s credit card tucked safe in her pocket, walks down the aisle. And maybe it’s because she’s got nowhere else to go, but maybe it’s also because his words are still echoing in her head and the ocean is so much bigger than some stupid, salty lake in the desert.
Scene Three
One month later. Prior’s apartment. Prior, Louis and Hannah are talking. The telephone rings. Hannah gets up to get it.
“Prior,” Hannah says from the doorway, phone clutched in stiff, white-knuckled hands. “Telephone.”
His hand presses into the armrest-it’s still hard to do this, sometimes, without the cane. Louis gets up, puts a tentative hand on Prior’s arm. He’s so timid with Prior these days, so much quieter. It’s not something he’s used to.
He stands, and he has to press one hand to the wall to balance, but he stands by himself and goes to get the phone.
Prior leans against the counter in the kitchen, twirling the phone cord around the fingers of his left hand. “Hello?”
“Unspeakable beauty.”
“Harper?” It might not be-really, he has to remind himself, and he didn’t know her, only met once, dream/hallucinations don’t count. Besides, she sounds different. But then-“You made it,” he says, a whisper, and there’s a smile on his face.
“I did,” she says, and he can almost hear the smile on hers. “I was on Castro Street this morning. I thought of you.”
“Threshold of revelation,” he says. “I’m really happy for you, Harper, honestly.”
“Yes. Threshold of revelation.” She pauses, and he can hear the sound of cars going by and maybe, if he closes his eyes and focuses really hard, the sound of music. “You know,” she continues, in that dreamy way she always had, “that part of you, the clean part? It’s starting to come out a little. I can hear it.”
Something closes in Prior’s throat, then. Something cynical and sad that denies it, still. But maybe there’s something to this stuff. Stranger things and all that.
“Thank you,” he says, before he even realizes she’s hung up.