Triptych

Author's Note: A triptych is a set of three pictures that somehow associate together to tell a story. This triptych-like arc focuses on the start, middle and aftermath of the relationship of Jack Driscoll and Ann Darrow, my latest pairing obsession.

I do not own. I merely write.

1. Inspiration

Jack's hooked, and he knows it.

He's never thought something could replace writing for the theatre in his obsessions, but it has.

Vividly he remembers the previous scene. He'd finished with the script for the latest scenes, and he'd wandered up onto the deck looking for Carl. They were filming at the prow of the ship. He'd gone over to deliver the pages.

He had caught up with Carl and the camera, when the sight struck him – and there was Ann, silhouetted against a flaming sky of red and wine, her dress glittering in the setting sun, the wind playing havoc with her curls. And her expression – the tears staining her beautiful face, the desperation in her movement, the sorrow in her eyes.

It's the way she can take his dialogue, his words, and make it her own. But even more so, it's in the way she can carry an entire scene empty of his dialogue, act it without speaking a word, and drive the whole film crew to tears.

He's never seen anyone act sad like Ann Darrow.

He shuts his eyes and keeps the image in his brain, the memory of how her gaze, with its unspoken tragedy, turned from the distant horizon, swept the deck, and then, haltingly, met his. And moved no further.

It's her eyes. They are eyes that need no script. They are eyes that can break a man's heart.

And they looked into his, and there was nothing but her, her and sunset all around.

Carl broke the spell, because it was interfering with his filming. Jack was suddenly aware of how the entire film crew was staring at him, and he fled the deck, fled down to his dark little enclosure in the ship's hold where he could be alone with the memories.

He sees her face before him now as he types, her face swimming with tears, staining her cheeks like sunsets stain ice. He sees her eyes of grief, and with the rhythm of his fingers the words come quick and easy, flowing into the form of a script, his play for her, because words are the only thing he can give.

But it's so much more than the words.