Work Text:
Mark was sitting at the table, absently chewing on the end of a pen as he stared at the blank page of the notebook in front of him, when his roommate burst into the loft, scattering jacket, bags, and papers in his wake as he rushed towards him.
“I did it!” Roger told him excitedly. “I booked a gig! To play the new songs!”
“Amazing!” The filmmaker leapt from his chair to hug his friend. “I’m so proud of you!”
“I’m proud of us. Mark, you know these songs wouldn’t exist without you.”
For a minute, the taller boy pulled Mark closer, and their embrace tightened until they could both feel their hearts beating in sync. Silence fell between them as they awkwardly unravelled from each other’s arms.
“Um…” Mark turned away to hide his reddened cheeks, and attempted to look busy as he sat in front of his blank page again. “But we haven’t finished Track 10.”
“Track 10” was what they called the one song that continued to elude them, the only song in their recent collaborations that remained unfinished and untitled. They had spent two nights debating and arguing about the sequence of the finished songs (“We have to order them like it’s an album,” Roger had explained), and even though half the lyrics were incomplete, the one thing they agreed on right away was that Track 10 was the closer. Neither boy said it out loud, but there was something about the feeling of the bits of the unfinished song that currently existed that felt like a conclusion. Right now, though, it was still an open-ended question that remained unanswered.
“We can finish it,” the songwriter declared. “We have a week before the gig. Let’s do this.”
Mark flipped through his notebook and sighed. “Have you written anything for it since we gave up on Wednesday?”
“Just… some ideas.” Roger looked away from his roommate and fiddled with the pen he’d just picked up from the table. “Fragments. Nothing concrete. Probably nothing useable. You?”
“Can I see?” the filmmaker asked. “Maybe I can do something with whatever you’ve got.”
“Show me what you’ve got.” The taller boy reached for Mark’s notebook, but his friend quickly picked it up and turned the pages, handing it back to Roger opened to a specific page. The songwriter did the same, walking over to the messenger bag he’d tossed on the floor on his way in, extracting his battered notebook, and shoving it across the table at Mark.
Both boys stared at the words scribbled on each other’s pages.
As Mark read Roger’s fragmented bits of lyrics, his heartbeat sped up, and he had to fight to keep the panic in his mind off his face. These words were different from the ones they had spent the last two months writing together. There was something more personal about them, and the filmmaker strongly suspected that the phrases scrawled on the page were not about fictional characters created for the purposes of the song.
Who are you writing about, Rog? the voice inside Mark’s head asked. The words on the page were mostly phrases, detached bits that made no coherent sense, but the filmmaker didn’t like what he was reading. “Your voice is in my head tonight / I’m unsure of what it’s saying”? Whose voice, Roger? Why are you suddenly writing about whoever this is instead of writing about… He had to stop and force himself not to finish the thought. The end of the thought was exactly what he should not be thinking. The end of the thought was the reason why he couldn’t help Roger finish this song.
Who are you writing about, Mark? Roger asked in his mind as he looked at the words written in his roommate’s neat handwriting. “These spellbound looks / This silent yearning”? Who are you yearning for, and how do I not know? I thought we told each other everything. It was the songwriter’s turn to look away to hide the blush that spread through his face. He knew that he hadn’t been telling Mark everything lately, and berated himself for his hypocritical thoughts.
Without looking up from the pages, both boys sighed in unison.
“I hate this fucking song,” the songwriter grumbled, throwing his pen across the room.
His roommate nodded in agreement as he stood up to retrieve the pen. “This song fucking sucks. I don’t know why we can’t finish the damned thing.”
Roger didn’t reply. He knew very well why he couldn’t finish the stupid song, but he also knew that he couldn’t say the reason out loud. What he didn’t know was that Mark also knew exactly why he couldn’t help Roger finish the song, and wasn’t willing to share his reason, either.
“Well, we have a week,” the taller boy said flatly, but in his heart, he knew it was hopeless. Track 10 was not going to be finished in time for the show; in fact, at the rate they were going, Track 10 might never be finished.
“Right,” Mark responded with even less optimism, and with another sigh, he slammed his notebook shut and went into his room, closing the door behind him.
*****
The Cohen-Davis songwriting duo had been realistically pessimistic. The day of Roger’s gig arrived, and Track 10 remained incomplete.
“No big deal,” Mark told his friend, trying to sound nonchalant. Even though he was trying to hide it, the filmmaker knew that Roger was nervous, and didn't want to make things worse. “Just finish with another song. No one’s heard these songs except for me. It won’t matter.”
“But Track 9 doesn’t work as a closer,” the musician replied in frustration, packing up his guitar.
“So play an old song,” his roommate suggested. “You have tons of songs you could end with. It doesn’t have to be one of the new ones.”
“Maybe,” Roger mumbled, running his hand through his recently-styled hair. “I’ll figure something out.”
“It’s going to be great,” Mark said encouragingly. “You always are.”
The songwriter looked up at his friend’s words, and… Was Mark blushing? he wondered. His best friend had always been a bad liar. Were his red cheeks an indication that he wasn’t as sure of the night’s success as he purported to be, or could it be… something else? No, he told himself. Don’t read imaginary meanings into everything he says and does. Just because I want it to mean something else, it doesn’t mean it’s actually real.
The filmmaker felt the heat rising in his cheeks and cursed himself for saying too much. I can’t do this anymore, he screamed internally. I have to tell him how I feel. I don’t know how, but I have to. Hiding from him is just too fucking hard.
If I want it to ever be real, I have to tell him, Roger was thinking at the same time. I have to figure out some way of saying everything I haven’t been able to write into that fucking song. And I have to find a way to close this show with something that feels the same way as Track 10…
Suddenly, the idea hit him, and his eyes widened in realization.
“What is it?” Mark asked, seeing his change of expression.
“Nothing,” Roger answered quickly. “I was just thinking that… maybe I’ll end with a cover.”
“Okay?” Mark looked bemused. “You had this eureka! look on your face. I thought it was something more exciting.”
The songwriter shook his head. “Nah. Anyhow, we should get going. C’mon.”
*****
Mark beamed and rewound his camera as he listened to the crash of applause around him after Roger had played his penultimate song of the evening. So far, the show had been a triumph. What had started out as a distracted, semi-drunken bar crowd had started to pay attention midway through the guitarist’s first song, and by the end of the second, they had grown silent and attentive, cheering loudly after each new tune. The filmmaker was always proud of his best friend’s talent, but this show, with songs that were partly his creations, felt extra-special.
The ninth new song they had written together was now over, and given that Track 10 still remained in a state of semi-existence, Mark was curious about how Roger would end the show. Would he ride the crowd’s appreciation and finish with another song of his own, one from the old days, or would he end with a cover as he’d been contemplating when they’d left the loft? As his roommate stepped back to the mic, Mark clutched his camera and waited.
On stage, Roger was vibrating with nerves, but he knew that he had to trust his instincts. Do it, he told himself. You can’t be a fucking coward forever. You have to do it, now.
“All the songs you heard tonight were written with someone I love very much,” the songwriter told the audience, his voice breaking slightly on the last words. “But there was this one song that we couldn’t finish. I had hoped to end with that one, but instead, I’m going to close with a cover that reminds me of all the reasons why we were able to write these songs for you, and all the reasons why I couldn’t finish the last one.”
He looked into the audience, directly at Mark, and when the filmmaker started to lift his camera, Roger stopped him with a slight shake of his head. The blond boy’s hand that had been raising the camera dropped to his side, and he looked back at his friend with complete focus.
“Mark,” Roger said into the mic, “this one’s for you.”
Switching to acoustic guitar, the musician began to strum a simple melody, and as he locked eyes with his best friend and co-songwriter, he sang the words to “Never Saw Blue Like That” by Shawn Colvin.
When he reached the first chorus, the chattering and noise in the crowd had quieted to a general silence, with many in the audience following Roger’s gaze to glance curiously at Mark.
“I never saw blue like that before / Across the sky / Around the world…”
As Roger sang, his mind scrolled through memories of him and the filmmaker together over the years. He still remembered the first time Mark had looked at him with those blue eyes, and how he had been momentarily startled by their clarity and intense blueness, a shade of blue he had rarely seen before and would, henceforth, always associate with the boy who was now the man he loved.
“You're giving me all you have and more / And no one else has ever shown me how / To see the world the way I see it now / Oh, I… I never saw blue like that…”
Mark, by his side over the years, in the best times and the very worst, the only thing he really remembered about the terrible months between losing April and getting through withdrawal. Mark, with his arm around Roger at three different gravesites, holding him up, physically and emotionally. Mark, shaping all the truths of the songwriter’s life.
“And some things are the way they are / And words just can't explain…”
Mark and Roger in the loft, sprawled on the sofa together in comfortable, companionable silence. Mark and Roger sitting on the windowsill, telling each other everything. Mark and Roger sharing an amused glance over the heads of all their friends, understanding each other without words. Mark and Roger, the one constant, always, never needing an explanation.
“And it feels like now / And it feels always / And it feels like coming home…”
The first time they had written together, after Roger had suffered from writer’s block for months, and how the words and the notes had flowed so easily, how quickly the first piece of art they had created together had formed. The filmmaker and the songwriter with their heads together over a sheet of paper, two pens scrawling words that matched like puzzle pieces and became a song. Mark’s voice, steadying him. Mark’s touch, grounding him. Mark’s eyes, and how looking into them, he would always feel like he was home, no matter where they were.
“And no one else has ever shown me how / To see the world the way I see it now / Oh, I never saw blue like that before.”
Mark had helped shape these songs in the same way he had helped shape Roger’s life - with patience, careful attention, sustained effort, and all of his heart. And Roger, too, was like the songs he had sung tonight - infused and intermingled with Mark, incomplete without him. At least half the songs belonged to the filmmaker, but the musician knew that it wasn’t half his heart that belonged to Mark; it was all of it, and more. Eyes still glued to the blond boy near the front of the audience, he strummed the last chords and finished the song.
There was a moment of frozen stillness in the crowd, and then loud applause erupted. But the performer on stage barely heard the clapping and cheers; instead, he watched as Mark made his way through the crowd towards the stage, and finally stopped in front of him.
For a long minute, Mark just stood there, and though he didn’t speak, his roommate could see the tangle of emotions in his eyes.
Roger reached out and took both of Mark’s hands in his.
“The last song,” he said softly, “I couldn’t finish it without telling you that it was about you.”
Mark shook his head, and when he looked up, his expression was a strange combination of affection, exasperation, and elation. “And I couldn’t finish it because I thought you were writing about someone else… and I didn’t want you to write about anyone else.”
A sudden hush fell over the crowd, and Mark blushed bright red when he realized that all eyes were suddenly on him and Roger, standing on stage with hands clasped as they gazed into each other’s eyes.
“Just kiss him already!” a voice in the crowd shouted out, and as laughter broke out in the audience, it was the musician’s turn to feel heat flood into his face. He looked at his filmmaker, a question in his eyes.
“Well, you heard the woman, didn’t you?” Mark grinned and stepped closer to his friend, and though he was still blushing, he had that Look in his eyes, the same wicked gleam Roger remembered seeing right before his legendary jump onto the table at the Life Cafe. “Better give them what they want.”
That was all the encouragement the songwriter needed. He yanked Mark towards him with both arms and crushed their lips together forcefully; after a small noise of surprise escaped his roommate, he responded with just as much heat. They were both so absorbed in the kiss that they barely noticed the crowd going wild around them, cheers, hoots and hollers filling the small room with noise.
When they finally pulled away from each other, the smaller boy hid his blazing cheeks against Roger’s shoulder.
“Well… that happened,” he murmured sheepishly. “In all the times I imagined it, I never thought it would be this… public.”
They both laughed, and Roger wrapped his arms around Mark tightly before drawing back slightly to kiss him again.
“Let’s get out of here,” he whispered against the filmmaker’s ear, and then with a final wave to the crowd, he took his friend’s hand and led him backstage.
As soon as they were in the backstage room alone, the songwriter pushed Mark against the nearest wall and kissed him with even more intensity than he had on stage. The smaller boy reached up to thread his fingers into Roger’s hair and his mouth willingly opened against his, deepening the kiss. For the next several minutes, the new lovers gave in to long, breathless, exploratory kisses, hands roaming over each other’s bodies as they tried to press even closer, eliminating all the space between them.
“Rog,” Mark gasped as the taller boy’s lips brushed against his neck. “We should… we should–” Whatever he was going to say dissolved into a moan as Roger bit gently at his shoulder. “Roger… c’mon, not here, we should…”
“Stop, I know,” Roger said regretfully, dropping one last kiss against Mark’s collarbone before taking a tiny step away with a sigh.
With an echoing sigh, the filmmaker briefly rested his head against his taller friend’s shoulder before lifting his head to whisper into his ear.
“The faster we get home,” he murmured, “the faster we won’t have to stop.”
As Roger instantly scrambled to grab his jacket, pack up his guitar and throw his other belongings into his bag, seemingly at the same time, Mark couldn’t hold back a chuckle.
“I’ve never seen you pack up so fast before,” he teased. “Why such a rush?”
“Shut the fuck up, Cohen,” the songwriter retorted, grinning. “Actually… why don’t I make you?” Yanking Mark towards him, he kissed the smaller boy soundly, effectively silencing him.
“Let’s go,” Mark said breathlessly as he pulled away, and laughing, Roger took his hand and followed him out the back door.
*****
At 5:43 AM, after several hours of eager, heated exploration in Mark’s bed interspersed with lovestruck confessions that had been held back for weeks, the filmmaker reached across his lover’s spent, naked body to snag his notebook from the bedside table. Understanding his motive instantly, the songwriter switched on the lamp, fumbled for a pen in the drawer, and sat up, leaning against Mark as he opened the notebook to a blank page.
By 5:55, before falling into an exhausted sleep in each other’s arms, the two boys had completed the lyrics to the elusive Track 10. They titled it, simply, “Us”.
–END–