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Good To Know That If I Ever Need Attention All I Have To Do Is Die
by Nicola
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: #1.20, 'Do No Harm'
"I wish you'd just DIE!" Shannon yelled.
She threw a book at him. It was Hardy. Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Set text for her 9th grade Lit. class. (She'd never retrieved the book, and had scraped a D in that class by writing an inspired, though haphazard paper about proto-feminism that failed to reference the novel at all.)
The book glanced off Boone's shoulder. He met her glare with one of his own and slammed the living room door, separating them.
Shannon couldn't remember what the fight had been about, but she knew it had been epic and important — because he had betrayed her and/or insulted her and/or upset her. He didn't speak to her for three days. She spat in his morning orange juice and hid his favourite jacket at the bottom of the water-butt.
*
"You don't have to save me," Shannon hissed. "I won't drop down dead if I have a little fun."
Shannon's eyes, narrowed at Boone, were lined with heavy eye-shadow and lots of kohl. She slouched down into an oversize leather jacket (undoubtedly on loan from some prize guy at the party). Someone handed her a drink and she gulped ostentatiously from the plastic cup, still glaring at Boone-the-mighty-gatecrasher.
"I'm not leaving you here," Boone insisted. His eyes did a quick sweep of the cramped house party scene, and he grimaced. He reached out and grabbed her arm, preparing to manhandle her away. "We're going. Home."
Shannon squirmed in his grasp, but he didn't let go. Finally, she stopped trying to shake herself free, choosing instead to continue dancing to the unintelligible rock music that was blaring from the speakers. She shimmied close to him, her free hand snaking around his waist. She felt the warmth of his chest as her breasts pressed briefly against him. A sharp smile appeared on her face. "Loosen up. It won't kill you."
*
"Oh god, I'm gonna die. I'm gonna die, in coach class, with orange juice in my hair." A baby gurgled happily beside Shannon, wielding his bottle of juice as his mother bounced him on her knee. Shannon was speaking through gritted teeth, staring straight ahead, with hands tightly grasping the armrests.
Shannon had always been a bad flyer, but no sleep, a poor judgement call that she wasn't entirely sure she regretted, and the knowledge that she was headed back to the purgatory of LA was only making her nerves worse. The plane shuddered slightly, as they began to taxi down the runway.
Her head whipped around. "I'm going to die, aren't I?" she asked Boone. She moved the death-grip of her left hand from the armrest to Boone's forearm, squeezing so tightly that it began to drain of blood.
Boone gave her a weary sidelong look, although did not remove her hand. "No, Shan, you're not going to die." He paused, and his lips twisted into a sardonic smile. "Only the good die young, remember?"
Shannon smiled in spite of herself. "I guess we're both safe then," she said slyly. She loosened her grip on his arm, twisting her hand so that it rested on his thigh. Her thumb rubbed briefly along the inside seam of his jeans.
*
Shannon leaned over Boone's body, dirtying her knees as she bent down awkwardly. Her fingers dug into the flesh of his arms as she struggled to get a grip on him; her fingernails left faint crescents on the surface of the skin. She looked dumbly at her chipped nail polish and suddenly hated this place with all her heart.
The running water at the caves sounded unnaturally loud; like a plane crash, like the end of the world. It took a moment for Shannon to realize that the noise was the blood rushing in her ears. He was cold — that was what made it wrong. Because Boone was always warm to the touch, hot even; a slight fever at her fingertips as her hand crawled across his chest or her thumb came to rest at the curve of his wrist.
"You weren't supposed to die," she informed him. It started at a whisper and exploded into a scream. She could sense movement at the edge of her vision; she felt the indiscriminate itch of being overheard.
"You weren't supposed to leave me here!"
She kissed him on the lips, long and slow, teasing into his mouth with her tongue. He was cold and unresponsive. She pulled away. "Isn't that what you wanted?" she demanded. "My attention."
She pushed him away. She stood up, unsteady on her feet. With blurred vision and a slow, staggering walk that belonged to a drunk person, she walked away.
"Boone. When we get back to LA. You should just tell your mom that you rescued me. Again. Just like you always do. And then we'll just go back. To what it was."
April 2005
Muse music: 'Good To Know That If I Ever Need Attention All I Have To Do Is Die' by Brand New
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