longerthanwedo

Title: Unfinished (With Fear in Your Smile) [Epilogue]
Author: longerthanwedo
Beta: melody_so_sweet
Pairing: Brendon/Ryan for now.
Rating: PG-13
POV: 3^rd, Brendon centric.
Summary: He’s writing in blood; a feeble attempt to finish the story. The story of his life, of him and him and him. It’s a story of life, of love, of
lions and fireworks and years gone by. It’s a story of blood, plenty of blood.
Disclaimer: I don’t own the characters. Title and inspiration from Something Corporate.
Author’s Note: The end. ♥

Prologue I Chapter 1 I Chapter 2 I Chapter 3 I Chapter 4 I Chapter 5 I Chapter 6 I Chapter 7

He’s writing in blood.

Staining the page, frantically scrawling, draining his veins with the effort. The effort to finish something broken, something long gone, done, over. He’s adding the credits to an unfinished movie, leaving the audience unsatisfied, leaving the creator unhappy, empty.

He’s breaking open his skin in an attempt to sew shut the edges of this story. Using all his strength, the string of his words to patch together something fragmented, stomped underfoot and left to glimmer, broken glass in the sun.

He doesn’t understand, he doesn’t understand why their story broke, ended prematurely. He doesn’t know how the cracks came to be, so he can’t see how to fit the pieces back together.

He thinks, if I could just find you, show you my pale skin and the blood on the page, the blood I’ve spilt to fill the lines you left blank.

If I could just ask you why.

Maybe, maybe then he could let his blood dry.

The tears on his cheeks are dry, used up, and he wishes he could just stop his heart. If it didn’t beat, it wouldn’t scream with every thump. Finish, finish, finish the story, give me something, make the bleeding stop.

But it keeps going, thump, and he keeps writing, smearing, draining, until his hand can’t move anymore. There’s no circulation, and more than that there’s no inspiration.

How can you finish a story that has no ending? No events, nothing else but blank lines. You can fill it, fill it with blood, with tears, but there’s no happily ever after. Not with a heart still beating.

He can hardly read his handwriting now, and when his brain slows he realizes he can’t keep going. He can’t keep chasing the lines like this, watching the blood run down his arm and out the tip of his pen. He can’t keep pretending, fabricating. He has to sit back, he has to let his veins fill again, and he has to wait, wait and see if maybe the lines fill on their own.

He sets down his pen and watches the blood disintegrate. As the red fades to black, he finally takes a breath. He takes a breath, takes a moment, and listens to his heart beating. Thump. Pumping blood.

The words, the string he tried so desperately to thread into the story, he stuffs it back into his body, into his muscle and bone, stuffing the holes in his chest. He lets his eyes slip closed, smells blood in the air.

He reaches out, and closes the book, letting his story end.