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Yellow
by Nicola
Rating: PG
Spoilers: #2.01, 'The Enemy Walks In'
Will sat on the bed, in a clumsy approximation of a lotus, trying to feel calm and content. He had never been very good at being thankful (there were always petty discrepancies and casual petulance to fill up his quota on feeling vaguely maligned by life), but he had decided now was a pretty good time to start trying. He was alive, and that wasn't nothing.
The bed was a Spartan single, with a spare 3 foot gap separating it from the far wall. It was freshly made — neatly, if missing the hospital corners his mother had always been so fanatical about. Will could make his bed. It was something he could do. His life since Taipei felt hollow; its centre scooped out with a grapefruit spoon. He'd always thought his job fairly important — sitting up there in his tower block, printing the news; telling people what to think, how to feel. But he hadn't realised until he was fired just how much it meant. Not a reporter anymore, not a part of anything; just another junkie without a job. His sudden interest in domesticity made Francie laugh and Sydney smile wistfully. Taking out the trash, washing the dishes in the sink — the sudden, almost effortlessly achieved sense of accomplishment. For a few minutes at least, as he folded the clothes from the dryer, he was productive, a worthwhile member of society again.
The room was painted yellow, a murky mustard colour that seemed to seep down from the ceiling. It wasn't a room that Sydney and Francie had ever planned to use, and so they had never bothered to redecorate. It was a box room, for storage or some other non-specific purpose — right at the end of the house, and easily forgotten. His abrupt homelessness, this unexpected veer into drifting, made Will feel (in the darker hours, like these) that this little yellow room must have been made for him, perhaps waiting here all along for his downfall. Its very colour was squalid apartment blocks in bad neighbourhoods, cheap dentists' waiting rooms, cheerless charity-funded children's hospital wards.
His sleeping patterns had skewed dramatically since Taipei and his own personal End Of The World. The nightmarish taunts of Mr. Sark were beginning to drain from his dreams, but their residue (dark shapes and a pervading sense of bleakness) remained, leaving his sleep continually unsettled. Additionally, his daytime hours were haunted by concerned stares of a well-meaning Francie. The way she watched his every move, tracing his actions, put him permanently on edge. (No beer, because he was in recovery; no weed, because that was a slippery slope, and god Will, don't you want to get better? we all want you to get better so badly.) The easiest way to avoid Francie was to sleep late (broken pieces of slumber that still left him weary and aching), until she left to run her daily errands. Consequently, he would regularly find himself wide awake at 2am or later (earlier), faced with the lurid prospect of insomnia, and a whole lot of nothing to think about.
His self-inflicted fugue state — yellow incited violence in drug addicts, as he knew from the first-hand experience of trying to interview a street junkie whilst brandishing a bright yellow clipboard during his first year at the newspaper — prevented him from hearing the soft footsteps leading to his door. He was surprised when the door was pushed ajar, and Sydney appeared in the gap. Her hair fell forward, hiding what he could instinctively tell were tired eyes.
"Hi," said Will, his lips barely forming the word. "Come in," he continued, in the same barely audible croak.
She slipped inside the room, closing the door softly behind her and leaning wraithlike against it. She was wearing a suit, although with the jacket removed. The first few buttons of her shirt had been hastily unbuttoned (unbidden, empathy for her strangulation sprang to Will's mind; he felt the same hands at his neck).
"Are you just getting home?" His voice was gaining strength, although he still couldn't help but whisper, wasn't quite comfortable enough with the strange little room to risk disturbing the air too strongly. "How was your trip?"
"Boring." Her voice was low, unexpectedly harsh. "The Japanese weren't willing to negotiate on the target figures for the coming fiscal year," she said expressionlessly, although he saw her eyes grow wide and sad. He hadn't been able to recognise that sort of weariness before; a worn-down wretchedness that was previously beyond his spectrum of comprehension.
"You'll figure it out," he said. "You're good at your job."
His mindless encouragement made her smile weakly. She sat down on the bed, pulling her feet up into a cross-legged position, so that she was facing Will.
"How was your day?" she asked, still whispering, as if they were children, up past their bedtime.
"I took out the trash," he said ruefully, truthfully.
She smiled, wider, and it made him feel good. Every one of her smiles made the knots inside of him loosen a little. It was a feeling he'd always had (some stupid and naive notion that he could save her, and in doing so, save himself), and it had only been intensified by his recent experience.
"You're the best houseguest we've ever had," she said wryly. She reached out her arms, her fingers finding his hands — not quite holding them, instead rubbing gently around his wrists and over the rough skin of the back of his hands.
"That tickles," he said, unable to let her touching go un-remarked-upon. Her movements slowed in response. Feeling oddly bold in this tight little room at this unearthly hour, he laced his fingers through hers, trapping them still.
Sydney's eyes were floating, entranced, across the walls. Yellow. Will's journalistic brain provided yet more facts: mentally ill people will most often name yellow as their favourite colour. His hands squeezed tighter, and he heard her sharpened intake of breath.
"We should redecorate this room," she said distractedly. "The colour is awful. It makes me feel like I'm choking."
"I could repaint it," Will offered, feeling strangely hopeful. "We could do it together. Remember that place I rented senior year of college?"
"That sty, all the way out of town," Sydney spluttered, her eyes suddenly refocused on him.
"It was cheap. It wasn't a sty. And it looked fine after a bit of paint."
"And you convinced me to help you out!"
"It was one day!" he protested, grinning.
"It was five days, and you made me help you every single one of them. Forget journalism, you should be a used car salesman!"
The buoyant mood sagged abruptly. Will attempted to revive his grin — "hey, it could be a definite career option!" — but Sydney's face had sunk back into blank tiredness.
"I should go to bed," she said at last. She pulled her hands gently away from his, and stood up. "This room really is horrible," she continued. "You shouldn't have to sleep here."
She stood over him, and he was reminded idiotically of a kindly angel bestowing her light upon him. Her left hand still hovered over his, although she did not move to take it. "You could sleep in my room. Big bed. Plenty of room."
It should have been a come-on or a joke, but it was neither. It was just the truth. Her lonely bed; too big and unfilled. She should be married by now, Will thought dimly. Spring wedding, that's what Danny had said. It should be a loving husband in her bed; maybe even children, burrowing sleepily into mother's arms — normalcy; it was what Sydney wanted and deserved.
Will thought of he and Sydney, in whatever ill-defined sense, sleeping together; waiting for the darkness to recede, the yellow of his mind to fade to something better. He had always thought that the perfect time for them would arrive one day (the crescendo of music; the movie-perfect first kiss); in the beginning it was with almost giddy certainty, then later with a more resigned doggedness. He had waited so long for her that the waiting had hardened into real need; he could imagine spending his whole life waiting.
The kiss was rushed and clumsy; entirely imperfect. He strained upwards, hands fumbling at her shoulders, and she half-fell on top of him. The sudden, aching warmth of her mouth, matched by the soft pressure of breasts; her sharp, catching breaths swelling against his heart. Moments passed. He felt the numbness of the past few weeks diminishing; the knots inside of him slowly unravelling.
"We shouldn't," she murmured, rubbing her face into the curve of his neck. They were still tied together, a jumble of limbs — but the mood had shifted. "I'm sorry," she said even more softly.
"I know," he said, and he did: he knew that she was sorry, he knew the reasons why they shouldn't (he knew all the reasons why they should as well); he knew Sydney.
She sighed, a soft, slow exhalation of breath, and shifted her body, curling more comfortably around him. He felt her warmth, a heavy weight against his chest, and felt inexplicably calmer, more content.
"I'll buy some paint in the morning," he said. "We'll redecorate. Make it . . . better."
"The colour's not so bad if you close your eyes," she said softly.
Will felt the warm lull of real sleep. He kissed her temple gently and felt her smile. He closed his eyes and hoped for dreams.
September 2004
Note: Yes! It is in fact a clumsy reworking of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper!
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