(no subject)
Title: Resonance
Fandom: Hard Core Logo
Characters: Billie, Billy Tallent
Length: 1200 words
Rating: PG-13
Notes: This is a sequel to Echoes (postfilm, and Joe's still messing about with Billy's things) Billy's just marking time with little candles on birthday cakes.
He found out her birthday, at least. Lights her a little candle on the day, watches it burn down as cigarette after cigarette is breathed down to embers and ash. When he gets money from a session recording, or as a stand-in, then he throws some at his lawyer, gets him to write a letter, to try at least, but…nothing happens, and he wonders if that doesn’t mean things are how he wanted. He sits out on the porch and smokes, runs whole chord sequences through his head, humming them just on the edge of his breath, so it’s not quite a sound but it’s enough for him to measure the melody by.
He counts eighteen one candle, and decides he’ll stop counting. Doesn’t know what he’ll do with the recording money now. Buy a limosine to piss Joe off. Not that he…he doesn’t live for that. That’s not why he hasn’t…he just doesn’t want to, and if that’s fear, at least he’s alive. Another deep inhalation, the smoke curling its way into his lungs. He narrows his eyes, breathes out as slowly as possible, so the mist of it hangs on the night air, half illuminated by the dim light from the house.
“Smoking’s bad for you, you know.”
“Says the walking billboard,” he murmurs, looks up.
A girl in cutoff jeans, a plaid shirt, walking boots. Scruffy. Looking at him like she expects recognition. “You want one?” he offers. She takes it, sits on the railing of the porch and smokes it, slowly. Once she’s finished it, she walks off. He shakes his head, stands up and shuffles inside, falls on the bed and sleeps deeply. He dreams of running after a figure that’s always around the next corner, whispers Joe into the empty room.
*
He has a twelve string acoustic, tries out classical, jazz, mixes them up so it’s more complex than the driving thrash of chords, music meant to do more than shock, scare, thrill. The guitar sings on its own, without the tinny sound an unplugged electric always has. He listens to the shimmer of it, of two strings responding, and finds he’s slipped into China White without noticing. Briefly, he wishes he hadn’t tipped away his whiskey stash. Still, he tries to mend it, make it so he’s finger-picking, splitting up the chords into something more complicated, until it’s too intricate for Joe, too intricate for the messy brutality of when he was alive.
“That’s not punk,” she says. She’s leaning against one of the pillars, face slightly pinched. She looks tired, hair lanker than before, mouth with more of a bitter twist to it.
“I’m playing,” he says, goes back to looking at the strings. She walks over, picks up the packet of cigarettes, takes out one for herself and strikes a match on the rough wood where he lashed out, punched something that wouldn’t shoot itself or laugh at him. She’s watching his hands; he senses it even when his head is down. Watching them like she’s trying to learn his every movement. He moves faster, plays a few ninth chords, just to fuck with her, and she sighs, suddenly not looking any more.
“Why did you come?” he asks, as tired as she looks.
“I’m eighteen. I saw the tape. Wanted to…you’re a real bastard, you know that?”
He doesn’t answer, just waits for her to finish smoking, then listens to her retreating footsteps as she trudges back to wherever she came from.
*
The next time, he doesn’t have any cigarettes. He discovers he doesn’t like to see her smoke, but tells her it’s because he gave up. She sits there without anything to mark the time by, tapping the side of her foot against the wood of the balcony.
“I need money. For the hotel.”
He hands it to her, watches her face crumple, knows he offered what she asked for, not what she wanted. He can wait for her to find the right words.
*
A jug of lemonade, this time. Probably too sour; he’s forgotten how his ma used to make it. She drinks it, though, tense and angry initially, but quieter after.
“How did you find me?” he asks, when there’s half an inch left in the glass. She looks him straight in the eye.
“You know.”
He nods, and watches her leave.
*
Mary phones, tearful, angry. He listens to her rant for a few minutes. Learns more about his daughter from that spew of words than he’s learnt through eight years of lawyers. He doesn’t speak, just lets her talk. She gets tired of silence, puts the phone down. Silence is more effective than shouting. Silence is just…nothing, a slippery glass wall without weaknesses, without handholds. Silence lets the other person imagine what you’re thinking, imagine something far worse than the reality. Silence is how he’s survived for this long on so little.
He bakes cookies that afternoon, burnt slightly around the edges, uneven in size and shape. Half makes up the recipe. Puts them out with the lemonade, wonders if he’ll always think of Billie as eight years younger than she is.
“You want a room?” he asks her. She takes a cookie, bites into it, nods.
“Phone your mother,” he tells her, then goes back to playing. She stands there, silent. “She’s worried. I don’t give a- don’t care if you’re eighteen. You call her and tell her you’re alive.”
“Don’t know why you couldn’t,” she says, cold. He looks up at her, almost makes a buzzing noise, grins at her, not caring how nasty he looks.
“It’s your mess. You’re eighteen. Grow up a bit.”
She stomps in to the house. He picks out a song his ma used to sing him, hums the melody under his breath. She stopped singing, of course, started looking tireder and tireder, her voice getting shriller and shriller. A French song, a fucking stupid one at that, about an emperor and a little prince, but he can’t remember the words, not properly. He takes a sip of the lemonade, sour, almost too sour, but cold, refreshing, evocative.
A door slams inside, and when she comes out, her face is blotchy, tearstained. He jerks his head to indicate the handkerchief on the table. She takes it, wipes her face, seems to gather herself until she’s as quiet and self contained as she was before. “She ever sing to you?” he asks.
“She sang your songs, actually. Only the nice ones, and she’d mumble when it got to swearwords. I think…did she want me to know about you?”
“She’s your mother. I don’t know.”
He smiles slightly as she huffs again. “You’re never going to tell me anything,” she says, petulant. Still such a kid, in spite of…of running away. No, kids run away. He ran away, and kept on running.
“You’re quick, I’ll give you that. You need any help carrying your cases?”
She shakes her head, turns and walks away. He takes a biscuit, leans back, guitar resting on his lap, and waits for her to come back to him.
Lundi matin,
L’emp’reur, sa femme et le p’tit prince,
Sont venus chez moi
Pour me serrer la pince.
Mais comme j’étais parti,
Le p’tit prince a dit:
Puisque c’est ainsi,
Nous reviendrons mardi…
(Monday morning,
The emperor, his woman (wife), and the little prince,
Visited my house,
to shake my hand.
But because I was at a party,
the little prince said
Because of this (not exact, not sure of this)
We will visit on Tuesday)
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