[stream-of-consciousness fanfic] The Forever Kind
This was going to be a drabble for heroes_contest. (The theme is "forever.") But it's too long. So this is basically the extremely truncated version of The Re-Education of Mohinder Suresh, since I don't think I'll end up writing that fic after all. That's OK, I think I can actually do everything I basically wanted to do in a short fic.
Heh.
Mohinder's looking for a certain kind of love. But he doesn't know what to call it.
He's only ever able to characterize an affair after it's over -- this is something that, as a scientist, he feels compelled to do. He avoids determining the taxonomy of love until the animal is good and dead and ready for stuffing.
In a way, this is how he was able to survive what happened with Mira. All the hurt and the confusion, the name spoken in sleep that belonged to a man he'd only met the once, the shouting fights and the disappointed looks, the excuses and the lies. They would have taken him apart if he hadn't been able to look back, once the whole thing was past and declare that this love was the Wrong Kind.
The next love affair he has isn't the Right Kind, but it will do. It's a young, slim, earnest undergraduate student at the university with eyes the color and shape of almonds, and he's eager but so naive and so unsure as to what he wants. As refreshing as it is to feel real attraction and desire for the first time, Mohinder feels after a few months that he's run up against a brick wall. He lets the kid go, feels bad about seeing those almond eyes runny with tears, but dissects the dead relationship and decides this is the Experimental Kind.
It's half a world away that he begins his classification system again. A wild-eyed man with long bangs over his eyes and a twitchy, uneven mouth shows up at his door and Mohinder is captivated. The guy has better than even odds of being a nut, and still he's captivated. If only there wasn't so much going on with his father and this Sylar person and making a fool of himself in front of a cold-eyed politician. If only he weren't suspicious of the far-too-convenient girl next door.
He lets her turn her head when he moves to give her a kiss on the cheek goodbye, lets her think she's stolen a kiss from him. He's far too aware of whom he suspects she works for, and he does not want them following him back to Chennai again. Let her think he's in love with her. Let her tell her boss he's coming back. He needs to buy at least enough time to grieve and find his way.
When he discovers Eden is dead, he declares that love the False Kind. And when he returns to New York and sees a warmth in that politician's cold eyes-- and a stillness in his brother's wild ones-- that they share only with each other, he knows that he has no place within their private, secret circle. He declares that love to be the Untouchable Kind.
There is another man with slightly wild eyes and an earnest expression that he meets, and while the parallels to Peter are just a little too eerie, he's hurting and frightened and this man looks at him like he's God. And even though they go to bed in separate motel rooms, Mohinder's awake thinking about how dangerous this all is and before he knows it he's knocking on the man's door. Zane takes him in without a word and they fall onto the bed together and there is nothing, just relief, just mindlessness, and Mohinder awakens at five a.m. to an empty bed and at nine a.m. to a dead mechanic.
He keeps up the facade for a while, but he's long since classified this dead-man-walking affair as the Dangerous Kind.
Well, for a man who's managed to bed a serial killer, Mohinder figures, he's at least managed to garner something from the process. It's a very nice classification system, certainly. But Mohinder wonders, what's the endgame? What kind of love does he really want?
And then he meets a man who is the opposite of everything he'd thought he wanted. Who's broad where others were slender, solid where others looked like they might melt clean away. He's a serious, bright-eyed, practical man with a soft spot for a redheaded girl and a life he's anxious to begin a new chapter of. And Mohinder falls for him just about as hard as he's ever fallen for anyone, perhaps in spite of the fact that there's no drama, no wide-eyed amazement at the world about him, perhaps because of it. Matt Parkman is simple and real. Even his name is solid. No Victorian twirling of Ps and Ls and Rs, no postmodern funk with Zs and Ys. He's not even Matthew, he's Matt. When they're together Mohinder feels like he's one-half of a yin-yang symbol. Matt is fat where he is thin and trails off where swells up. And where there's a hole in him, Matt rushes to fill it in. And he feels like he's more than he ever has been before.
He ponders what eventual classification Matt will have in his taxonomy of love. The Domestic Kind? The Simple Kind? The Unexpected Kind?
But then one night as they watch their little girl fall asleep and hold hands, Mohinder realizes he'll never find out. Because he only ever classifies love affairs once they're over, and this love is the forever kind.
Heh.
Mohinder's looking for a certain kind of love. But he doesn't know what to call it.
He's only ever able to characterize an affair after it's over -- this is something that, as a scientist, he feels compelled to do. He avoids determining the taxonomy of love until the animal is good and dead and ready for stuffing.
In a way, this is how he was able to survive what happened with Mira. All the hurt and the confusion, the name spoken in sleep that belonged to a man he'd only met the once, the shouting fights and the disappointed looks, the excuses and the lies. They would have taken him apart if he hadn't been able to look back, once the whole thing was past and declare that this love was the Wrong Kind.
The next love affair he has isn't the Right Kind, but it will do. It's a young, slim, earnest undergraduate student at the university with eyes the color and shape of almonds, and he's eager but so naive and so unsure as to what he wants. As refreshing as it is to feel real attraction and desire for the first time, Mohinder feels after a few months that he's run up against a brick wall. He lets the kid go, feels bad about seeing those almond eyes runny with tears, but dissects the dead relationship and decides this is the Experimental Kind.
It's half a world away that he begins his classification system again. A wild-eyed man with long bangs over his eyes and a twitchy, uneven mouth shows up at his door and Mohinder is captivated. The guy has better than even odds of being a nut, and still he's captivated. If only there wasn't so much going on with his father and this Sylar person and making a fool of himself in front of a cold-eyed politician. If only he weren't suspicious of the far-too-convenient girl next door.
He lets her turn her head when he moves to give her a kiss on the cheek goodbye, lets her think she's stolen a kiss from him. He's far too aware of whom he suspects she works for, and he does not want them following him back to Chennai again. Let her think he's in love with her. Let her tell her boss he's coming back. He needs to buy at least enough time to grieve and find his way.
When he discovers Eden is dead, he declares that love the False Kind. And when he returns to New York and sees a warmth in that politician's cold eyes-- and a stillness in his brother's wild ones-- that they share only with each other, he knows that he has no place within their private, secret circle. He declares that love to be the Untouchable Kind.
There is another man with slightly wild eyes and an earnest expression that he meets, and while the parallels to Peter are just a little too eerie, he's hurting and frightened and this man looks at him like he's God. And even though they go to bed in separate motel rooms, Mohinder's awake thinking about how dangerous this all is and before he knows it he's knocking on the man's door. Zane takes him in without a word and they fall onto the bed together and there is nothing, just relief, just mindlessness, and Mohinder awakens at five a.m. to an empty bed and at nine a.m. to a dead mechanic.
He keeps up the facade for a while, but he's long since classified this dead-man-walking affair as the Dangerous Kind.
Well, for a man who's managed to bed a serial killer, Mohinder figures, he's at least managed to garner something from the process. It's a very nice classification system, certainly. But Mohinder wonders, what's the endgame? What kind of love does he really want?
And then he meets a man who is the opposite of everything he'd thought he wanted. Who's broad where others were slender, solid where others looked like they might melt clean away. He's a serious, bright-eyed, practical man with a soft spot for a redheaded girl and a life he's anxious to begin a new chapter of. And Mohinder falls for him just about as hard as he's ever fallen for anyone, perhaps in spite of the fact that there's no drama, no wide-eyed amazement at the world about him, perhaps because of it. Matt Parkman is simple and real. Even his name is solid. No Victorian twirling of Ps and Ls and Rs, no postmodern funk with Zs and Ys. He's not even Matthew, he's Matt. When they're together Mohinder feels like he's one-half of a yin-yang symbol. Matt is fat where he is thin and trails off where swells up. And where there's a hole in him, Matt rushes to fill it in. And he feels like he's more than he ever has been before.
He ponders what eventual classification Matt will have in his taxonomy of love. The Domestic Kind? The Simple Kind? The Unexpected Kind?
But then one night as they watch their little girl fall asleep and hold hands, Mohinder realizes he'll never find out. Because he only ever classifies love affairs once they're over, and this love is the forever kind.