To Love/Hate the Spotlight

Frank's POV:

The short trip back from the bar was an uneventful one. It's important to make sure the occasional booked hotel on tour had to be within walking distance of decent grub and pub. Only downside was it was summer, and I am not the shorts-wearing type. Knobby knees.

Humidity slicked my skin. A shower wouldn't be remiss at this point if not for sanitary reasons -rubbing my I eye, I stumbled against a parked car- than definitely to clear my head. Bob had abandoned me hours ago with a tired wave and a yawned, "Good luck." That might have had something to do with the redhead dead set on crawling into my lap majority of the night. She was pretty, just... not my type. I left before she did something damning, like tell me her name.

Rounding the corner to the front entrance -my fingers skimming along the hedge-sandwiched gate surrounding the outdoor pool- I heard splashing. Curious, I parted the leaves. This wasn't creeping. It was nearing two in the morning after all, civic duty and all that. The view allotted to me through a tangle of green stunned my fuzzy brain and sucked all the moisture from my mouth. Maybe after a moment of avid observation, I was racing inside and through the lobby to the raised brow of the night clerk and shoving open the glass door. I finally skidded to a stop at the pool's edge.

Floating lazily atop the slow swirling current, stripped down to a black bra and a red piece of lacy fabric that masqueraded as underwear, Becky coasted along on her back. Hair, an oil spill rippling around her serene face. Unfortunately my gaze kept straying down to all the exposed glowing blue skin. When it reluctantly tore away from her chest -the water must be pretty cold- glittering eyes stared back from under a fan of long lashes and red lips curled, revealing a glinting white fang.

"See something you like?" she said slowly.

"What?" I squeaked--- but in a very masculine way.

Eying each other -my eyes wide and hers narrowed in speculative amusement- she broke it with a water-sloshing shrug and launched into a backstroke. "Oooh no-othing," she sing-songed.

Putting a rein on my alcohol-aided imagination, I tracked her movement with my own measured steps. "How'd you manage to get out here? Thought they locked all this up---"

"At nine, mhmm."

"Then how...?"

"Would you believe I sucked off the manager?" She ducked underwater and came up laughing till she abruptly frowned, flexing her jaw as if she wasn't quite sure whether or not it was a joke.

Then, like a wisp of smoke the focus in her eyes dissolved and she smiled dreamily up at the stars. "... wanted to swim, didn't have a suit though..." Fingers absently played with her bra strap. "I usually hate swimming --like a cat-- hate getting wet." The toyed with strap slipped off her shoulder, black falling across a shining clavicle. My eyes zeroed in and forgot how to blink. "I think it has something to do with almost ---almost--- drowning at four." Her crescent smile beamed back at the moon she gazed at. "The lifeguard was cute."

"Er..." I gulped hastily. One moment my mouth was dry as a desert and the next saliva was pooling between my gums. Avert your eyes. Avert your damn eyes.

"The shower was too hot, think I burned myself," she slurred, standing now. The water lapped at her mid-section. Her eye make up had ran into streaked black pits. "Melted the flesh right off my bones," she giggled, drawing impossible doodles into the water.

"How much have you had to drink?"

A crinkled, watery grin was the only response.

"Then let's get you out of there, yeah?" Sliding to be parallel, I crouched down as close as I could and reached out. She looked up at my slightly swaying hand -my balance at the moment not at its peak- and quirked a sharply arched eyebrow.

"And then what happens?" she crooned, purposefully drifting to the other side of the pool. Her make up made her look like a dizzy harlequin with danger lurking behind her mischievous grin. "... get me out of these wet clothes?"

She giggled when the underwater lights turned my blush into an unflattering plum.

Honestly I should be used to girls and guys throwing themselves at me... except when the obvious flirting was confusing like now.

When I tuned back in, her back was to me and her fingers were prancing along the edge, nails scratching concrete, then stopped to trace the row of small bottles standing in a line. Walking around to the other side, I watched as she shotgun one and knocked the other empties down in the process. Amber liquid dribbled from the corner of her grin and drip dropped into the water.

When she looked up at my approach, the light had to be playing tricks because unfocused brown eyes were twinkling. After a beat she made a move to climb out to which I promptly helped. Unsteady on her feet, with my hand wrapped around her elbow in a bruising grip neither of us seemed to mind; my extra squeeze, sad to admit, came from the up close view of mostly everything and it was form-fitted and dripping. The scars on her arms and neck stood out in stark contrast against her cerulean-shaded skin. Uneven lines of shimmering silver traced from her sharp clavicle down to disappear in the safe cover of her bra. My heavy gulp was audible amongst the rhythmic slapping of water.

"D'you want to fuck me?"

I barely heard the softly-spoken words, so distracted that I was with so much skin and blurry from the alcohol in my system to curse having consumed it; but once they processed, a sharp slap of disbelief halted my thinking and a shiver of primal want triumphed the rest. Her expression was so innocent, so earnest that it left me tongue-tied.

"Becky, I--"

An irate hiss aborted my weak start.

The angelic features twisted into something dark and insulted. "Don't--- call me that." She wrenched her arm from my grasp, made easy by my shock.

Wet slapping feet stalked towards the door. A wall of glass: Anyone could have walked by, watched, seen us.

I forced my eyes away when she bent over to snatch a small pile of clothing dumped beside the exit. When she straightened, she threw the dirtiest look over her pale shoulder -sharp fangs trapped in a sneer- and staggered out. She never looked back. I took a step to chase after -apologize for whatever I did (the sneaky, evil part of me hoping to get back to the talk of Sex) and make sure she got back to her room okay- but my balance wobbled.

I best wait until morning.

So I headed back into my room -spying no traces of her- feeling dumbfounded and slightly insulted at the fact when she flat-out refused my offer to come out to a night on the town, getting wasted poolside was what she rather do.

*

My POV:

The idiot that claimed that light was all cleansing, wonderful, Lord I have seen the light---- should be fucking drawn and quartered. If they're already dead, well then simple, piss on their remains.

Those were my first coherent thoughts of the day. The ones before it had been garbled one/two word exclamations and pained cries while searing hot pokers skewered my retinas. It took forever to work up the nerve to brave it and blink my way to immunity of the solid sun light flowing from the windows. I could have sworn I closed those...

A set of Tre banging on the drums while on a sugar rush battered the inside of my skull. A skunk might have died in my mouth since my tongue felt like it had sprouted fur and subsequently died. I laid in the damp cocoon of blankets wreaking of chlorine, because the slightest twitch of a muscle sent my stomach on a lurching, topsy-turvy rage that had me whimpering and squeezing my eyes shut so tight the lids ached to meld into each other.

I suppose I deserved this: Letting my emotions allow my impulses to rampage and raid the mini-bar. The imagined taste of alcohol I had so craved last night made me gag and shiver now.

stupidstupidstupid

Wait, when did I go swimming?

There was the dream and then... nothing.

A blur.

Great.

That horrific, vivid, blind-siding, fucking, brilliant dream.

The shock felt less today, not as debilitating but more awe-ing. I know I shouldn't beat myself up over this to the point of say, insanity and internal bleeding. It was in the past--- a dream, so that could have easily been fabricated. I jumped to conclusions. Conclusions I can't do anything to change them. Sure it'll most likely haunt me, make me wonder, prevent me from ever holding eye contact or a conversation with The Original, but... I'm not even sure where I was going with that.

The scars were enough. The emptiness of Little Jimmy was closing over slowly more and more each day. Those were enough to remember.

I grinned, feeling a touch better and considering myself marginally matured. Precarious, but there all the same. Nothing like a hangover to force you in one spot and reflect. Now all I had to do was wait out the weekend till Billie comes back.

It was a good plan --a fantastic plan-- up until my cell rang.

"Get. Home. Now."

"Mom?" I readjusted the phone against my ear.

Her voice trembled with barely controlled restraint. "Just get home."

In my nest of sheets, I sat ramrod straight up. Nausea pushed to the side and replaced with concern. "Why? Are you okay? What happened? What's wrong?"

She didn't respond as fast as my patience would like. Her talking heard but muffled, her palm pressed over the mouthpiece.

"Mom?"

"I'm here. Just come. We--- I need to talk to you. See you."

"You're ah, you're scarin' me. What's this about?"

"Rebecca Brittany, please." That pleading tone.

"Fine, fine, okay. I'll be there as soon as I can." At her breathed, "Thank you," I folded my phone closed and just sat there for minutes. My mind raced, a frown marring my face.