Cherry Red pt 6

[trash-puppet.livejournal.com]

Title: Cherry Red (Part six)
Rating: R
Summary: Dom's always kept a diary, it was only a matter of time before it was read. PART SIX: I hate summaries Dom wants to meet Alison
Disclaimer: I am fairly sure this didn't happen, and I own nothing.
Author: Trash
Feedback: is muse food
Warning(s): Non really
A/N: Back to Dom's POV. Why is it that I seem to develop Tourette's every time Elijah pops up in this fic. @_@ Hence the 'R'..... Response to secrett's plot bunny.
Part one | Part two | Part three | Part four | Part five



Dom lay on his back on the bed of Billy’s guest room. After the incident downstairs, he and Billy had separated in an attempt to cool down – in more ways than one. Billy was outside, in the front garden probably since there was less sun there. That left Dom with, practically, the run of the house.

He grabbed the phone off of the bedside table and dialled Elijah’s number. He was surprised at how unsurprised he was at hearing Sean answer rather than Elijah.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Seanwise. Where’s the Doodle?” Dom rolled onto his back, resting his feet on the headboard.

There was a long, tired, oh-my-god-why-is-my-life-so-hard kind of sigh. “Do you know how much I had to pay for bail?” Sean asked, not so much angry as slightly worried. “Far too much. He’s got off pretty clean, no thanks to you. He got a caution, and one long night in a cell. Totally shitting his pants, apparently. Doctors at the penitentiary figured he wasn’t totally stable.”

Eh? “Stable?”

“Mentally stable.”

Dom nodded before he realised he couldn’t be seen. “So they thought he was a fruit and figgin’?” Mental images of Elijah at the airport sprung into Dominic’s mind and he tried, and failed, to stifle a snigger.

“What’s so funny Monaghan? They thought he was a head case!” Sean always held a fatherly image, even in the most trying circumstances. So; Dom felt as though he had been caught with his hand in the biscuit tin.

“Sorry, Seanwise. He just…….he didn’t want me to……” deep breath “He thought it was important that I get to Glasgow.” He paused. “I appreciate him, you know. Don’t ever think I don’t know what I’ve got.”

Sean seemed to ponder this for a second. “I know. I know. Just…..he looks up to you, yeah? Like, he loves you and……”

Dom shifted slightly, a little shocked by Sean’s tone. It was frantic and, however slightly, that was a big deal when it was in regards to Sean. “Sean?”

“He’s really worried about you, Sblomie. You know what he’s like when he gets an idea into his head. And when he gets worried….well, it makes me worried too. It’s not very often that he’s wrong about this kind of stuff and….”

“Sean?”

“Yessum?”

“You’re babbling.”

“Oh. Sorry. Be okay?” he asked gently – Sean never did anything that wasn’t gentle.

“Yeah.” Dom murmured. God, he loved his friends.

There was the sound of low muttering, the annoying kind that people always speak in when you’re trying to eavesdrop or something, and that of the phone switching hands.

“Hullo? Dom?”

“Hey, Doodle! Not in the psyche ward then?” Dom grinned unconsciously.

Elijah giggled in a way no other man in the world could do naturally “Nope, I’m all here. Eh?” pause, more low and very annoying muttering. “Ha! Sean says the jury’s still out on that one.”

“I’m sure they are.” Dom answered with an eye roll he was glad Elijah couldn’t see.

“You know what? You could be in a movie. It could be all, you…..”

Dom snorted “Where is this train of thought going?”

Elijah made a high pitched noise which nearly reached the frequency where only dogs can hear. “Will you give me a second, senor asshole?” he cleared his throat briefly “Ok…..so this movie….it’d star you, erm, and Billy. It’d be one of those nice, fluffy, happy-ending type movies. The ones guys take their chicks to.”

Dom felt most of the blood leave his face, leaving him momentarily dizzy. He made a noise down the line which could have really meant anything.

“Whazat?”

Dom shifted, flipping onto his stomach, head near the headboard. He reached under his pillow and fished out his diary. He opened it, pulling the pen from the middle pages, and flicking to the last entry; which was his list of reasons not to love Billy. He clicked the pen on and underlined number twenty eight. “I said,” he enunciated his words. “He. Has. A. Girl. Friend.”

“Zuh?”

“For fucks sake, Elijah!” He began to write underneath his list, not really noticing he was doing so. “He’s heterosexual, het, straight, straight as a very very straight thing.” Breath, scribble. “He likes girls, Lij’ and he has a girlfriend.”

There was silence from L.A. “Dude.”

“Yeah.”

“Did he say that to you?”

Dom stopped writing and his face, he knew, was one of utter disbelief. “Jesus. Are you deliberately being a fuckwit?”

“Dom, listen. Did Billy tell you, ‘I am ruling out half of the earth’s population and getting a girlfriend’?” Elijah asked genuinely enough.

“Erm….no, but-”

“Shutthefuckup. If he didn’t say it then……you know. Doesn’t mean it’s true.”

Elijah’s responses to problems were always logical and fair. This time, however, Dom recognised logical and fair as incorrect and depressing. “Her name is Alison. I wonder if you spell it A-L-I or A-L-L-Y or maybe A-L-L-I-E. Not like it matters though……Ally with a double ‘L’ and a ‘Y’ sounds like a cheerleader. Billy wouldn’t ever settle for an airhead who flaunted their air-headed-ness openly. Ali with one ‘L’ and an ‘I’ sounds like a librarian or some shit. She’s a dancer. Blonde hair.”

“Well there’s a useful piece of information. Are you writing?” Elijah asked after a moment of silence.

Dom put the pen down on the page, “Nope.”

“Whatthefuck are you writing? Your journal?”

“Nope.”

Elijah chuckled. “Don’t lie to me, you assfuck.”

Dom heaved an involuntary sigh, letting his head fall to the mattress still holding the phone to his ear. “I’m such an idiot.”

Elijah didn’t say anything. He was waiting, because he couldn’t really say that Dom wasn’t an idiot if he didn’t know why Dom had said it in the first place.

“I thought I could come here and just have what I want. Like, a story with the middle taken out. I thought I could make it go from beginning straight to the happy ending with us living happily-ever-after.” He breathed away from the mouth piece, because there isn’t anything more annoying than heavy breathing down the line. “I’m coming home soon.”

Elijah must have jumped because Dom could hear the scattering of something and small curses muttered under breath. “No! No. You are not coming home. No way. I did not spend a night with my back against the wall for fucking nothing. ”

Dom laughed, really laughed, for the first time in……a while. “Sorry Doodle.” He ran a hand through his hair and glanced down at the double page of his diary which was now full of writing. He read a few lines back to himself silently, gasping a little at the fact that he couldn’t remember writing any of it.

“Dom?” Elijah asked, his voice slightly worried. “I have to go, but like…..don’t give up, yeah?”

Dom nodded, his eyes scanning the page again. Shit. “Yeah.” He breathed. “Yeah, I’ll….I’ll try. Love ya.”

“Gay!”

Normally, Dom would have at least cracked a grin at Elijah’s stupid jokes, but right now, he was worried about what he’d written down.

She doesn’t deserve him. They aren’t in love, I know it. It’ll be one of those flings. She sounds like a totally whore anyway, a real floozy. I bet he knows hardly anything about her. He’ll see eventually, that she just isn’t right for him.

He realised that what he had said to Elijah, about the spelling of Alison’s name, had all been written down.

Where the fuck had that come from? Dominic would openly admit that when Billy had told him about Ali/Allie/Ally in the car on the way from the airport, it had hurt. However, he didn’t think he felt jealous. Apparently he was wrong about that.

His spiteful words filled a double page and a half. “Fuck!” he cursed loudly, tearing the pages from his diary hastily, crumpling them up and throwing them across the room.

He curled up on his side, hands buried deep in his hair, cradling his skull. Dom just could get his head around this. He didn’t hate Alison; by no means did he hate her. He hadn’t even met her yet. She was just a blurry image with blonde hair and a Scottish accent and a dancer’s poise. He knew it was fucked to blame his emotions on someone he didn’t even know yet, but he wasn’t really ready to blame it on Billy.

Dom sighed deeply before shifting and sitting up, staring resolutely ahead. He took a deep breath and let it go slowly, he knew very well how to slow his heart rate and breathing; yoga does that to you.

It was very clear that whatever Dom was feeling was something akin to jealousy; as much as Dom hated to admit that.

“Shit.”

He climbed off the bed, wavering slightly as he got to his feet. Turning slightly to inspect the room, he noticed his diary lying open on the bed near the pillow. Dominic leaned over and slid it under the covers, which he then pulled to the top of the bed. Right.

He knew that he had to say something (anything) to Billy, he just wasn’t sure what since Oh by the way, I fucking despise this Alison even though I’ve never met her and am madly in love with you didn’t really have the desired effect.

He pulled open the door and blinked, at some point Billy must have opened the landing curtains. For a second Dom panicked silently -Ohmygoddidhehearmyphonecall? “No.” he told himself firmly. “He wouldn’t have eavesdropped, Billy isn’t like that.” Which, he supposed, was true. In all the time they had filmed ‘Rings, they had been stuck together – all of the hobbits. There wasn’t a day that they didn’t see each other, really, but despite the close proximity of their living, Billy never pried into anything if Dom didn’t practically invite him to.

Dominic tip-toed down the stairs, afraid to disturb the complete silence of the house. The only sounds to be heard were the ticking of some random clock and cars in the distance. The living room curtains had been pulled open too, but the position of the sun allowed very little light in through the windows anyway. Dom took a deep breath when he approached the white PVC door. Why the fuck was he nervous? He wondered.

He pulled down the black handle and stepped back, opening the door. The sun wasn’t as blinding as earlier, but was still harsh on unaware eyes. He squinted and stepped down, bare feet touching the cool stone steps which led down to the path. Billy was sitting on the very last step, his knees drawn up to his chest with his hands entwined in front of them and his chin resting on his knees.

“Hey, Bills.” Dom murmured, his throat still a little sore. He cocked his head slightly, bring his hands up to shield his eyes when he realised Billy was ignoring him.

He stepped down so he was directly behind his friend and grinned “Come on you git, is this about the water?” there was silence. “Okay……you drove me to this…” Dom took a deep breath and started to sing “Charlie had a pigeon, a pigeon, a pigeon. Charlie had a pigeon, a pigeon he had.” Billy said nothing. Dom smirked, sing slightly louder. “It flew out one morning, it flew out one night. It came back th’ next morning all covered in…..Charlie had a pigeon, a pigeon, a pigeon.”

By this time he was singing directly in Billy’s ear, and not only that, but he was singing the most annoying song in the history of the world. Normally, this would serve has pure torture.

Dom stepped around Billy so he was standing in front of him and began to sing louder. “Charlie had a pigeon, a pigeon he had!”

Billy looked up suddenly as if he’d been slapped. He removed something from around his neck and glowered at Dominic. “I hate that song, Dom, why are you singing it?”

“You were ignoring me.” Dom crossed his arms across the front of his chest. “You deserved it.”

Billy laughed. “I wasn’t ignoring you, you tosser.” He gestured at what Dom could now see was a pair of headphones and pointed to the I-pod pinned to his t-shirt collar. “Maroon 5.” He explained, putting the headphones down and pressing a button on the mini disk player.

Dom sat down, crossing his legs. “They’re OK, I guess.” He picked at the loose stones at his feet. “Hey, Bills?”

“Mmm?” Billy watched him with those intense green eyes as he picked at the ground.

“Can I meet Alison?”

Billy’s eyes lit up slightly but he looked a little cautious. “Sure. You’ll really like her, she’s……I can’t explain. She’s so much like you. You’ll get along really well, I hope.” He paused, still watching Dom. “Why?”

“To put a face to the name.” he replied, far too quickly.

“Oh.” Billy said simply. “Okay then.”

Dom clasped his hands, which were shaking ever-so-slightly, in his lap. “You love her then?”

Billy, who had been looking off into the distance, glanced back at him curiously. “I…..” his eyes fell to the ground where the headphones rested. “I really don’t know. I’d like to think so. But it’s like I said…..”

“Takes two to tango. Yeah. But like, she’s not just a FANTA, right?”

“Wha’?” Billy frowned.

Dom smirked to himself. “FANTA. As in, fuck and never touch again.”

Their eyes met for a second and the silence hung in the air comfortably, before they both cracked up laughing.

“Trust you to come up with something like that, Dominic Monaghan” Billy grinned, shaking his head fondly.

“Ha! It was Elijah that I heard it from. I’d say it’s always the quiet ones…..but…”

Only Billy laughed this time, and Dom watched with a smile on his face. Billy looked so innocent when he laughed, like he hadn’t yet been touched by the hand of hurt and loss even though Dom knew his friend had felt that touch far too early. Losing your parents at the age of seventeen must be pretty harsh. However, Billy didn’t seem to let it get in the way of his life. If anything, it had made him stronger.

“Whatever happened to Lighe at the airport? Or are you too afraid to tell me?” Billy asked, his head tilted back so he was looking at Dom down his nose.

Dom replayed exactly what had happened at the airport, missing out the fact that Elijah was desperate for Dom to get to Glasgow and exaggerating Elijah’s drunkenness slightly. He managed a fair impression of the young man’s slaughtering of the Smashing Pumpkins song, which proved to tickle Billy more than anything.

Dom sat on his best friend’s front path with his best friend, just having a laugh. It was that it came so easy that made Dom forget about Ali/Allie/Ally and think only about Billy, which was exactly how it should be.

****