Disclaimers:  Sadness, they all belong to Alliance...but I'm still working
on the whole "can't keep horsemen in a cage" conundrum. Rating:  R for
some minor violence and language
Warnings:  M/M slashy overtones, angst factor, teeny violence
Pairing:  Fraser/Kowalski
Notes:  Hot damn, finished one.  Ray K's P.O.V.

Down Time
Cythera

"And you can't fight the tears that ain't coming
Or the moment of truth in your lies
When everything feels like the movies
And you bleed just to know you're alive..."
Iris, John Rzeznik

It's not home.  It's no home.  It's all empty and dark and I don't turn
on the lights 'cause that'd just show me that there's no way to make
this place look awake no matter what I try to do to it, it's just all
cold and dead.  

I move to the middle of the floor because I have to, then, why'd I do
that?  The room looks the same, only I'm deeper in it.  I kind of blend
in.  Like, if someone came in through that door right now, it'd be all
gray and blue and there's the couch and the lamp and Ray and the TV.
No one's coming in through that door.  

Move.  

I go down the hall into the bathroom, bump the light.  Now it's all cold
yellows and whites, and I shut the door, from habit and because it's
nice and small in here, don't need anymore ice caves around.  Just some
place to huddle up in.  Here's nice.  I'm good.  Just get set up for
down time, find the toothbrush, find the paste...I'm staring at them,
too tired to think what to do with them.  

Fuck it.  I look up at the mirror, this dragged, used-up face, holdin'
toothbrush and paste and this is not the way it's supposed to end.  It
ends with an us, not just me.  I'd have a girl, someone like my Gold
Coast girl, only I don't think much about Stell anymore then, and there'd
be my kid mad he can't stay up for some bad-for-him late night TV...

...No.  Fuck.  I put down the damn dental care kit.  It's not even that.
It ends with Fraser.  Begins and ends and everything in between, it's
Fraser.  It's like, Fraser hits the lights.  Pops his head in with his
funny Canadian vowels and that look he's got just for me when he knows
more'n he's saying and just plugs me in.  I'm good to go, let's fly,
you say what bizarre way you wanna try to die today, I'm right there.
Benton-buddy.  Show me I'm not dead in a thousand ways, that there's
life after gettin' your temple punched in by a high heel.  Take me off
to do something stupid, only it's duty and rightness, so you feel good
about it after.  Great about it.  And I'm feelin' better than I ever
have, throwing myself through plate glass windows so you can write somethin'
happy back to the queen mum. 

Only this isn't part of that.  This is after everyone stops looking,
game over, when that rush slips out with the crowd.  With company.  With
Fraser.  And I'm standing over the bathroom sink and this is what's real,
this is what's real.  No fucking mountie to shake me up, just...nothing.
Underwater, can't breathe, don't care.  I reach out my hand and there's
a clink lets me know I picked up the plastic razor and I'm looking at
it, kinda close.  Why is there no sound and no air and can't feel nothing
if this is real?  Cold, cold skin on my arm, trace the little veins.

Mountie said he liked my fingers.  Said they're artistic.

I pinch a little skin, don't feel nothin', leave little half-moons. 

I said something back like I'd crochet him a tea cozy soon as I got home.
Got home, sat down, couldn't move. 

Sorry, Frase.

I put the little razor blade on my arm, just to feel it.  Kinda cold.
Can't really tell. 

You awake, Frase?  You thinking about me?

And suddenly I can't tell if I'm even here, if maybe no one's here and
Fraser is busy with more important Canadian dreams, there is no Ray.
He was never here. 

I push down on the razor, pull it sideways so I can see good, red, coming
out, and it stings, god it stings like hell and I can breathe again.
Little blood slides off me and down into the sink, I set down the razor
and just hold my arm, watch all that blood just follow down from me to
the tiny red-speckled porcelain, down the black drain.  It's okay, it's
good.  My heart's going and can't be about the blood 'cause it's not
that much down there, just me feeling like I'm still here, not dead,
not yet.  Keep pushing on my arm, keep it dripping.  Lips are getting
chapped from breathin' through my mouth all shallow.  Can't pull my eyes
off that living red line. 

I kind of wonder why Fraser didn't stop me.

____________________________________________________

It's my first fic, tell me I'm pretty.  SphinxEyes@aol.com