Title: Break Down Here
Author: AbbyCadabra
Posted: 07-28-2004
Email: yankeesnabercrombiechick@hotmail.com
Rating: PG
Category: Angst
Content: C/A
Summary: She goes to sleep to dream.
Spoilers: Season three, an indiscernible time. Around the vision madness.
Disclaimer: The characters in the Angelverse were created by Joss Whedon & David Greenwalt. No infringement is intended, no profit is made.
Distribution: Just Fic. Anybody else, just ask.
Notes: This is my first AtS fic in a LONG time, so forgive me if it isn't any good.
Feedback: Certainly makes me happy, yes.
Thanks/Dedication:I made it this far without crying a single tear.
And I'd sure hate to break down here.
Julie Roberts, "Breakdown Here"
i. throw you to the wind
Cordelia Chase dreams that there are stars caught in her hair.
She rides on the backs of dying comets and her hair is honey colored and long, longer than Route 66 and the Nile River, and the rings of forgotten planets circle her head like red and blue halos as she flies aimlessly into the night-cloaked universe. The stars gather in her hair as she passes them, like magnetism or gravity or whatever else has the power to force and compel, and she laughs without restraint, wondering how far, if at all, her laughter will echo.
She sees the silhouette of Hypnos in the dizzying red and gold dust of a supernova and throws her head back and laughs harder, until she can hardly breathe.
She can still feel the stars brushing against her neck after she’s woken, warm and clandestine and reminding her of what happiness there is left. She goes to sleep to dream.
ii. break away from this parade
Angel says, “You’re going to be just fine. We’ll fix it somehow. I’ll find a way. You know that, right?”
She knows that he doesn’t expect an answer, which is good, she thinks, because she honestly doesn’t have one that he would have wanted to hear.
iii. wonderwall came crumbling down
The thing about the visions, as she oh so quickly discovered, is that there’s no certain way to predict when they’ll happen.
The first time there was an itch at the back of her head that felt out of place, as if her brain was trying to sneeze, and then it struck. The next time nothing, just a bolt of pain and knee-collapsing flashes of empathized murder. After the third time, when she began to shiver violently despite the Los Angeles weather and bright-sky heat, she gave up her attempts at expectation and instead settled on waiting, and her everyday thoughts became gray-like and foggy with prospect.
She didn’t go out with friends. She didn’t call back on auditions. She didn’t go home without knowing that Angel’s cell phone was fully charged and tucked safely into the pocket of his pants. What if she were to get another vision?
There has become an ever-aching pain that waits in the corner of Cordelia’s mouth that tastes like bitter saltwater, and wonders, When?
Lately she has found herself hovering over the settee, in hopes of using the cushions as a landing point for the next vision.
iv. be the long awaited answer
She says, to no one, “How much longer can I do this?” which is actually a question, by technical standards, but she says it like it’s a statement, a truth, a hallowed, undeniable golden gospel.
v. in the cold, cold night
The rattle of pills in a small plastic bottle is everything she has come to associate with music. Relief and rhythm and hope and everything.
The pills are a dancing exchange of colors, a spinning and waltzing menagerie of nobleman whites and peasant yellows and royal blues. They are sweet and smooth with pain-relieving promises; small, instant symphonies of rest. She closes her eyes and shakes the bottle and tries to imagine the pills dancing, but can only see their colors swirling behind her eyelids.
She is sorry to have to take the pills before she sleeps. There are no dreams waiting for her inside of those little caplets.
It becomes more and more difficult for Cordelia to wake up in the morning.
vi. let her be
Everyone asks, “How’re you feeling?”
When she shrugs them off, everyone hears, “I’m fine. Just leave me alone.”
So nobody asks anymore.
vii. she always had a pretty face
Without really knowing why, she kisses Angel.
His skin is cold and he flinches in surprise, but he doesn’t pull away, so she leans closer and pulls him forward. Her lips brush just against his, up and then down, before she presses the tip of her tongue against his lower lip and seals her mouth over his. She swirls her tongue around his and tries to place the bitter taste of him, but can’t. He doesn’t remind her of autumn winds or falling snow or any other pretty, poetic phrase she’s heard before, but she doesn’t find herself disappointed.
This is enough. Angel is enough. She never asked for more. Slow, sad, soft. She never wanted more.
His fingers press into the back of her neck and he pulls her impossibly closer. Her lips press almost painfully against her teeth, but she likes the almost desperate hitch of his throat, and the way his scent seems to swallow her entirely, leather and soap and skin; clean, solid. As she pulls away, she suddenly recognizes the taste on her tongue.
Defeat. Acceptance. The knowledge that there is nothing more to this, this melancholy, trembling existence, only past tense and circles and the next vision to knock her down.
She looks at him and he only looks back, and she is gray with storm cloud sadness, and she wants to scream.
viii. stop crying your heart out
She overhears them.
“They could be killing her, these damn visions. We have to do something. I have to—”
“Angel, there’s nothing we can—”
“There has to be. I can find a way. I can…”
She overhears this conversation often.
ix. sad song
Cordelia misses her dreams.
She misses the rush of the sunset-horizon fairytale, the inexplicable perfection of the dream sequence, the liberating sense in making no sense at all. She craves the abstract, the formless and senseless gathering of color and red-hued pleasures, a break from the cold-fisted literal of her life. Something imaginative and new and present tense.
Escape.
She has vague memories of starlight flights and the taste of supernova dust at the corner of her lips. She remembers laughter and happiness, but the silhouette of Hypnos has been replaced by that of his brother, and Thanatos is always grinning at her behind her eyelids when she closes her eyes.
This is how she survives:
Finis