A/N: This started as a response to a fanfic contest, but somewhere along the line it took on a soul of it's own. Flashbacks are in italics.
And major series ending spoilers.
Smells like Rain
By Kyra1
She's unsure what she's doing there. Edging towards the door, she feels like a straying cloud in an ocean clear sky. There should be some beacon of light calling her out for even thinking about going in.
Faye doesn't go inside. She hovers at the doorway. Her eyes can't leave the flowers. Their gray petals are like moth wings on the entrance sign of his favorite bar. This causes her to choke on the air. There's too damn much in the room.
And she can't help but wonder about this place with its moth flowers and clean walls lined with the faces of people she knows are dead and gone. They're all dead and gone.
So she watches the faces of the people around her, none of which she knows, and wonders how they met and what's their relation. All this she knows is a simple mathematical equation, really. In her muddled brain she tries to sort it, boiling the faces over until she can see them when she looks away. She gives up after only a few.
Then she notices the tears, and suddenly she's aware of how dry her face is. She wonders about this. Her eyes close and she waits, but there's nothing. This makes her frown in a very childlike way, because now she's so unsure what she's doing there.
When Faye finally steps inside it's waves of warm and cold on her all at once, and she knows they keep it that way to move things along. She stays near the door following the colored threads of the carpet with her eyes. The gold and gray colors swirl across the floor towards the other side.
The other side.
When the curiosity becomes too much and pulls her like some dying animal into a ditch, her eyes stray to that numbered box.
It was wrong.
They got it all wrong.
His hair was never that neat, his skin was paler, and he would never wear anything that particular shade of honey. The color would have reminded him of that woman, Julia. She was dark and light blended together like some apologetic kiss. But it's his lips that are the worst. They were turned up in a soft smile. He never smiled like that. Not unless he was thinking of that woman, and only sometimes when he thought someone was really being an idiot.
She wonders on how he would smile that way forever, a rotting corpse in the ground with gaping teeth and more crust than skin.
It was all wrong.
oOo
When they're out of fuel and floating in a harbor with empty pockets and even emptier stomachs, she finds herself sharing the roof of the ship with him. He's seated on the edge with his lean legs stretched in front of him while he rests back on his straitened arms like a much younger man. She's seated on an old rusted icebox she found in the hanger while scrounging for food, empty she had dragged it outside to throw into the sea, as though it would do some good.
She huffs on a cigarette and watches his back, for lack of anything else she tells herself, and how the ivory shirt he's wearing is too large like one someone buys for a child in the pretense that they will grow into it.
"Is there something you want?" he says without turning to her.
She's surprised, and more than a little embarrassed. There's a slow drag from her cigarette as she recovers. "You to fall in. That'd be a good laugh."
He's puffing gray clouds in the air when he tosses her a look. "I'll keep that in mind, because you know I'm here just for your amusement."
"If that's the case," She taps her shoes against each other for emphasis. "Then you've been doing a lousy job."
This brings him to laugh, and there's a new puff of smoke to match each sound. When he's silent he flicks the last of his cigarette down into the sea, and pulls a leg up to prop his arm on. She's not really aware that she's watching him until he's twisting at the waist to meet her gaze. "That's really starting to bug me."
"Then close your eyes."
He stares at her in the most peculiar poker face. Then he digs in his pocket for another cigarette. When he can't find his lighter she tosses him hers. "You should really work on your people skills."
"And you should work on yours."
This makes him smile. It's a little twitch of the top lip to one side like a lopsided painting. Then he pockets her lighter.
oOo
He'll never stop smiling, and this is strange to know. It's so much easier to picture him growling in the end, the finale, the one time he couldn't come back. She's seen him live, and to see him in a box, a shiny little box is so far from real. Boxes are for pets, the canary when she was eight, and this reminds her of that kid. Ed would know by now. She had to know. Ed knew everything, and yet the kid wasn't here. She wasn't here to see the box.
She thinks it would be easier to cremate him. But there would be an urn. There would be a large pot to hold his ashes, and it's likely that Jet would place him on the shelf in the main hall. This would mean she would have to see him, his shiny trophy for his death. Someone finally succeeded in killing him and she would get the trophy. She would get to keep him on a shelf. This bothers her to know he'd be there, and it bothers her to know that she's bothered.
Her little handbag is clutched tightly to her chest as she backs away one foot a little further from that box. Somehow she manages to find the lamp table with a crack to her thigh. The noise brings several to look at her, and she nearly knocks the lamp off when she starts away again. When she's steadying the lamp, her ragged breathes catch something on the air, and this she feels stir something in her mind.
oOo
She's rolling her heels on the steel of the ship suddenly distracted by the paleness of her skin. This causes her to check the sun; she hasn't forgotten the last time she tried to tan herself.
Then he's above her. His shadow blocks out the light on her legs. "Don't stay too long. It smells like rain."
"The hell's that suppose to mean?" She's searching the sky for clouds. "You can't smell rain."
"You can." He says as though it's the most common knowledge.
She stares at him over the rim of her sunglasses then sniffs the air several times. "Well then it smells like fish." She says wrinkling her nose.
"That's the sea."
There's a pursing of her lips. "Then you can't smell rain."
Again, as though she were confusing her spoon and fork he says, "You can."
There's a moment where she just sits breathing in the air. At first there's nothing, but when she tries again there's something hidden amongst the other smells. It's faint and when she tries to find the name the smell drift away. Though a breeze pushes it towards her and she's narrowing her gaze on Spike.
"When'd you last do your laundry?"
Spike only chuckles and turns to leave. "You're hopeless, Faye."
oOo
When she backs herself out the front doors her fingers are burning from their grip on her bag. She's white faced and round eyed as she steps out into the night air. Shivering with each footfall down the street, she knows the chill isn't from the air on her skin.
She's unsure what brought her here. They weren't a family. They weren't a pair, and to know this hurts somehow.
There's a figure moving towards her, and when the man is near enough for her to make out she's stalking towards him. The hem of her dress is collecting grim with each step, but she's locked onto the eldest and last remaining ship mate. Jet's wearing that suit of his, the white one from another century. He's solemn faced and a little stiff around the edges.
Long before she ever reaches him she's already accusing. "You let him leave!"
The call causes the crowd to hush and each is settling themselves for a show until Jet turns to them and growls. "These matters don't concern you." They whisper to each and slowly one by one they turn and head down the street.
Faye's on him all at once. All nails and fists hammering his chest. "You let him leave! You let him go meet that woman, Julia! You let him know she was waiting! Didn't you know it would end like this?"
He doesn't move to shield himself, just clenches his jaw and lets her land the blows. When she slows and he wraps his arms around her she's only gasps and incoherent mumblings. "I know." He says, and then she's pounding his back with her wrists. There's jerks and tugs with her body, but he holds her, pulling her closer, and finally she sags against him.
"You should have tried harder." She whispers over his shoulder, and even she knows it wasn't really Jet that she was accusing.
Never a father, nor any sort of uncle or relative, but he's surprisingly gentle as he holds her on the sidewalk. "Maybe, but he made his choice." And this is all she hears in the bustle of her thoughts.
oOo
Sometime when it is nearing four – and there is no makeup – she's pressing her hands to the glass window of the eastern hall while pulling memories from the space outside. There's a no named pilot that has small eyes and large teeth with glasses slipped in between. He was in a tiny hiccupping ship. Then she's aware of Spike stirring the air behind her. "I couldn't sleep," she says.
This must have taken him by surprise, because there's a pause before he grumbles. "What do you want me to do about it?"
"Nothing." She mumbles, then shakes her head and starts again. "I just, I…"
He actually waits for her to continue, and this time she's the one caught by surprise, so she glances over her shoulder at him. He's yawning, which would offend her if it weren't for the time. When he's still again he screws up his face.
She tries again, but she's not sure what to say. "That kid…"
"What about him?" He asks while setting himself up against the glass beside her.
"That's just it Spike." She growls, though there's no real force behind it. "He was just a kid."
"You're not growing a conscience on us now are you?"
She knows he's trying to bait her. He never was the sort for this type of conversation. "That's not fair."
He sighs. "I'm no good at this sort of thing Faye." When she doesn't soften the look she's pinned him with he shakes his head. "Look there's nothing to think about."
"Easy for you to say." Faye's moves chin to chin with him. "You didn't ask him to..."
"It doesn't matter!" He pauses long enough for it to set in. "It doesn't matter, because he made the choice. That's all there is to it. He chose to follow through and it ended like this."
"But..."
"It was his choice."
She stares at her toes and listens to the hum of the ship. He's still beside her when she lifts her head. "Spike I…" There's something churning up within her. "For what it's worth…"
And she knows that he's aware of how personal things have turned when he growls at her. "That's pretty selfish to think you're the only one responsible for all this." He stretches his arms over his head. "Not everything is about you."
This time though, she's grateful and takes the bait. "And you're saying you had a part? You're just as selfish as I am!"
There's something akin to a smile on his face. "Well I never denied it." And then the ship is awake with the shouts of the two.
oOo
When their floating in a harbor with empty pockets and there's something empty about her, she finds herself in an old lounge chair on the ship's hull staring at the sea. Jet's with a fishing line and an old pail in front of her. He had been saving it all for an afternoon when he needed some time alone.
And she wonders about everything.
"Staring isn't good for your eyes." He calls over a shoulder. Something hurts from the familiarity. She's suddenly in need of a cigarette and she's already drawn one when she reaches for her lighter. Her pockets aren't hiding it, and this makes her sit back on her hands.
The whole sorry mess makes her lips twitch. "Lunkhead."
"You say somethin?" Jet calls as he's reeling in the line.
"Yeah. Actually I did." This time she smiles the first in days and motions to the door. "Come on. It's startin' to smell like rain out here."
He groans and gathers the rest of the materials. Then a little delayed he looks at her. "Rain doesn't have a smell." There's a grin on her face now, as he passes her for the door. "You and that kid. Always talking like lunatics."
She doesn't know what brings it, or why Julia's voice is suddenly so clear in her memory, but that awful moment is whistling through her ears.
"Tell him."
"Tell him I'll be waiting there."
"He'll know where."
Faye's weaker again at the thought of the voice, and she's so certain that moment when she heard them from Julia would remain etched in her memory. It takes her a moment to remember where she's at. She's not shotgun in a topless with the wind in her hair. She can't pretend she didn't hear what the other woman asked of her. She's six days later and no amount of pretending can fix this, and to know this hurts.
"Tell him."
There's no doing things different
When she finally makes to go inside she knows what took her there. They weren't really family. They weren't even a pair, but they were linked through choices.
She had relayed the message, and he had gone to her. He had gone with her to his grave. Faye steps inside the bay doors and doesn't look back as she whispers, "If I had known it would like this, I never would have told you."
This is sort of my play with a different writing style. I've been on a break from writing for awhile and was ready to try and get back into the swing of things. Also, I was trying to take a look at how Faye would react knowing that she might have sent him to his death.
As always constructive criticism is always welcomed and muchly appreciated!