Sommerchallenge: Reguläre Challenge

[leviathans-moon.livejournal.com]

Titel: The crying is silence
Genre: Drama, Original
Challenge: Geständnisse (reguläre Challenge)
Team: Chopin (I'm back and writing, bitches*g*)
Warning:Auf Englisch.




“Marry me!”

It wasn’t exactly how he’d originally planned it. It wasn’t exactly flattering or romantic. She had her hands in the dirty dish water, scrubbing away at a pan. He was leaning against the fridge, wearing his most comfortable, but quite honestly also his most ugly jogging trousers, and a slightly torn shirt.

She sighed and laughed sharply and looked at him with that exasperated expression. “Jack!”

“I’m sorry, but I’m serious. Marry me.” He stood up straighter, moving towards her, his brain battling with the decision to go down on one knee. At least that he should do.

So he did, and she dumped the pan in the water quite unceremoniously. “Jack?”

“Lisa, will you please marry me?”

“When?” It rang through the kitchen, penetrating his every fiber. Her eyes were fixed on him, demanding that he stop this nonsense.

“In three weeks.” He had to fight hard to keep eye contact, fight the urge to hang his head in shame. He would have never thought he’d consider doing his job shameful.

She sank to the floor, leaving a wet trail on the kitchen cupboard as her hand slid alongside it to the ground.

“The Captain said no missions overseas anymore, only desk jobs, commanding groups in training. He swore it.” She sounded close to tears, but there was no sign of them in her eyes. She had them in check, she’d had enough practice.

“I know he did.” He paused, not yet daring to confirm what she probably already suspected. “Marry me, so this time you’re insured. So that this time I have a wife to come home to. Please. I want that more than anything.”

“Coming home more than staying home?” She practically hit him with that, and he had to shift position to cover up the retreat, settling down with crossed legs.

“No. God, no. Lisa..”

“Why? You already did two tours. You don’t have to do a third. You don’t have to. I don’t get it.” She sounded so desperate.

“It’s my job.” He would never tell her that he needed redemption. She wouldn’t understand.

“I don’t get it.”

“I’m sorry.” He hung his head now, not out of shame. They sat in silence for a few minutes. His fingers touched her knee, but she didn’t reciprocate the need for touch. Her head was leaning against the cupboard heavily, wearily.

In the end it was not so much a confession as a confirmation. And she gave him the ultimatum he might have needed.

“It’s the last time you sign up for a tour. If you do it again, I’m gone.”

“Yes.” It was an order, he could follow orders.

“There’s only so much I can deal with. I want you here. I want you a… alive… unharmed.”

“Yes.” He’s managed twice to come home unharmed, he could do it again.

“I’ll marry you when you come back.” That he hadn’t expected.

“No, Lisa, I want you to be insured, I want you to be safe and secure for the rest of your life. Get my pension. Get the money.” He had grabbed her by the shoulder, trying to make her see.

“And I don’t want to be a widow within two months. When you come back home.” She stood up stoically, unrelentingly. When he got up, she pushed him out of the kitchen, closed the door, locked it. He heard her slide down on the other side, but apart from that no sound came. She’d always been good at that. Silent crying was what she was trained in.

He turned and marched into the living room. Letting the colours of the TV pass by his eyes was the best way to ignore the world.