Wowwww...it's been a while since I up-dated this! lmfao
Well thank you very very much to all the lovely reviews and happy holidays, everyone. Hope they're safe & joyous & lovely!
BTW, I still don't own WWRY...anyone wanna give it to me as a late Christmas present?
xxxx 3
I squeezed my eyes shut while the Globalsoft minions rolled me on what could only be a gurney. Whatever anesthetic they'd knocked me out with had worn off a while earlier, as they were finishing wrapping some thick bandages around my head. My eyes had flickered open for just a few seconds, just long enough to understand where I was: in a hospital room. Judging from the white masks and lab coats, and the instruments lying on the cart near me, which were all too sharp for my liking, thank you very much, it was an operating room. I wanted to know what they were doing, but for my own good, I thought it would be better to pretend I'd never woken up. Those sharp little buggers looked like they could do a fair amount of damage. So when the creaky gurney wheels were silenced and I heard the footsteps of people getting further and further from me, I took it to mean they'd rolled me to my final destination. I waited a few seconds. Silence. I figured it was safe to examine my surroundings.
Now, I'd never thought I was a particularly lucky girl. Actually, I'd always thought of myself as particularly unlucky. I just never thought that this luck was bad enough to land me in a dark, humid, and, therefore, smelly, room, lying on a gurney, face-to-face with the greatest of all the idiots I'd ever encountered.
Rubber Band Boy. In the flesh.
I learnt, from trying to converse with him, that though he didn't know who he was, he liked to go by the name "Galileo Figaro". I thought he was joking when he told me. He had to be. Nobody could possibly want to be called that. It was the weirdest name I'd ever heard of, including the names of the couple my parents liked to play Virtual Bridge with: Anselmo and Gigliola. Upon further questioning though, I found that, to my dismay, he was serious about his love for his name. Dead serious.
I also learnt that he's crazy and that he'll happily admit it. I asked him why he was arrested, and this was his answer, a direct quote from the man: "I hear sounds in my head. Words and sounds. I'm mad, you see." However, he doesn't know what the sounds he hears are, precisely.
I rolled my eyes when he said that, "Do you know anything?"
"Yes, I - I know I'm different!" he replied proudly, looking at me expectantly. I wasn't entirely sure what he wanted from me when he said that… applause maybe? Much to his disappointment, all I did was give him an unaffected stare, tacitly telling him to go on, to say something that might just impress me, because evidently being "different" wouldn't cut it. He cleared his throat after a second and added, "That's why the boys in the Boy-Zone hate me."
Point for Figgy, as I'd christened him; I could not bring myself to call him Galileo Figaro. Jaysus Christ, no. Anyhow, he'd struck a chord with that last comment, and I admitted, "The Gaga Girls hate me."
Apparently, he was a curious one, wanting to know why they hated me. I explained to him simply with my standard answer, the one that usually shut people up, which was what I was hoping would happen. "They think I'm a lesbian because I don't wear pastels."
Of course, I should have anticipated that he wouldn't have the usual response. He was after all "different". He didn't shut up. Instead, he looked at me with those huge eyes of his in a way that sent shivers up my spine, "No, they hate you because they're scared of you. Because you're different too - you're an individual." I stared right back him for just a second before looking away. No way was I going to get all emotional with a whackjob.
"What do you think they did to us?" I asked, changing the subject.
"I don't know."
"Of course," I wanted to say, but I bit my tongue. I opted for something less likely to insult him, "Do you think they'll ever give up? And just leave us alone?"
He shook his head furiously, leaning as close to me as he could to explain, "Don't you see? We're a threat! A virus on their hard drive. And they won't give up until they've pointed their little arrow at us…"
"And dragged us to trash," I finished his sentence.
His excitement was contagious, spreading to me quickly, and taking me over even faster. My heart was thumping, my cheeks were flushing and my eyes locked onto his once more. I took a deep breath at the same time he did, and, instinctively, I knew what he was thinking. We both cried out, "Pressure! Pushing down on me, pressing down on you, no man asks for, under pressure!"
He kept singing, that same kind of infectious passion engulfing him like the first time I saw him. And then, he urged me on, to join him.
"It puts people on streets," I sang back to him, enjoying myself, but not quite allowing myself to get as into it as he was. I hummed a little, "Umbababay, umbababay…"
"De-day-oh, eh-day-oh," he grinned at me widely, leaning even further forward.
"That's…that's okay…" I inched away from him, just a tad freaked out.
He took the hint though, and moved away. He kept singing though, kept freaking me out…but just a little…and only at first. Soon though, I found myself joining him in a duet. His voice got to me, the beautiful sound, the beautiful words….dammit! Even he seemed beautiful right then.
"These are the days it never rains but it pours…"
"Pray tomorrow gets me higher…"
"Keep coming up with love, but it's all slashed and torn…"
"Why?" I cried, "Why?"
"Insanity laughs, under pressure we're cracking!"
"Why can't we give ourselves one more chance?" I asked desperately.
"Why can't we give love that one more chance?" he corrected.
"Why can't we give love?" I mused.
"Cause love's such an old-fashioned world," he began.
I smiled sadly as we started walking towards each other, "And love dares you to care for the people on the edge of the night, and loves dares you to change our way of caring about ourselves…this is our last chance…this is our last dance…"
"This is ourselves," he murmured when we were so close together that I could feel his warm breath on my face. He locked his arms around my waist, and though I would have at any other time, I didn't object. I actually found myself sort of liking this closeness…
"Under pressure," I whispered to him.
"Under pressure," I repeated, this time together with him. Something happened right then, when I looked at him once more. It felt like his eyes were on fire, blazing with emotion. What's more was I knew that the look in mine matched his perfectly. He bent his head, the tip of his nose brushing against mine, and I closed my eyes, but then, at the last minute…
I pulled away.
He sighed, "Under pressure…"
"So," I stepped away from him, still blushing, "Where do we go now?"
"Well," he swallowed, then, "Out into the night! Out into the streets! We're rebels now! 'Cause baby, we were born to run!" With that last remark, he struck a pose, and the beautiful soul who'd almost kissed me was gone. Rubber Band Boy was back, and ready for action.
"Don't call me baby," I said curtly, crossing my arms.
"I'm sorry," he blushed too now, "It was just…a phrase…I heard it in my head…"
"Yeah?" I snapped, "Well keep it there!"