Title: The Goddess On The Bed.
Author: Bernie
Pairing Marek Malik / Brendan Morrison
And Nic Wallin / Marek Malik and Nic Wallin / Ron Francis
Rating, um R maybe
Disclaimer: this touch of magic and Marek and Markus is for
Camille is sadly totally fiction.
A million thank you's to Mae for editing and making this
make sense.
A/N's Marek's nickname is "Harry'.
Marek planned for things. He did this methodically, but he
felt, not obsessively. He had early in his career discovered the value of
statistics; you can usually pick who will lead the league and who the favourite
for the Art Ross trophy will be. But at the same time Marek understood the
truth of statistical anomalies – the enforcer eventually always gets his
hat trick.
Marek had also realised early in his career that planning worked, and prepared players made it through training camps
and onto their teams. The one constant of his life had always been that he
wanted to play hockey.
Marek is self-contained, somewhat self absorbed, but never
selfish. He is a little blind perhaps. A little too focused. What he does not
understand, not yet - not for a while - is that fate trumps all scheduling;
chance plays her part, and Cupid - Cupid will always sail in when least
expected.
His last lover, a very attractive woman named Lena, had
teased him about his habit of scheduling "you would try to schedule
spontaneity Marek dear." She had smiled and told him.
"No." Marek had responded, "but I can plan a
free day, and let that take us where ever it will."
Lena laughed, a sweet musical sound that matched her
personality. "Only you Marek." She teased. "Only you."
"Get a coat," he had replied, making sure the
doors were all locked and the neighbour's cat had not snuck into the house.
"But it is a beautiful day!"
Marek kissed Lena's hand. "Even when it looks bright it
can be cold outside."
"Pessimist." She trilled.
"Realist." He countered.
"You would give me your coat anyway." Lena cooed
in sweet triumph.
Marek rolled his eyes but did not reply. He would indeed;
give you the jacket off his back. But then he could afford to, he would be
wearing a warm sweater underneath.
Lena's constant cheerfulness, at first a fresh breeze after
Julia's relentlessness cloudiness, began to grate. Her musical laugh sounded
tinny, her sweet voice squeaky, their break-up was fairly amicable. Lena could
well accept that is was Marek and not her.
What she had never told him is that she would wake up, late
at night or early in the morning when he had slipped out of bed. She would walk
quietly to the lounge door and watch him, not disturbing his concentration as
he read books about Zen Buddhism, tried to understand the Tao of living, the
arrangement of furniture, and the existence of Ley Lines.
She had caught him, looking at the horizon as it divided the
sky and the land, checking the cost of flights out of the country. Marek had
never in his life let his drivers licence lapse, or let his passport expire.
"I don't know what you are looking for Marek." She
said sadly when they broke up. And her sweetness and happiness was muted for
the first time that Marek had known her.
He had gestured awkwardly around the room, "to fit, or
believe, existingÉ" he waved his hands a bit more and stopped talking.
Then Lena left and Marek found himself, as he usually did, spilling his
dissatisfaction with relationships to Nic. Who sighed and offered - as he
always - did his body, as his means of comfort. And it was good - it was always
good - but it was not enough and had not been enough for a long time.
"Is it women? Or is it me?" Marek asked Nic before
the other man could fall asleep.
"It's you Marek, sorry." Nic spoke with brutal
honesty only because he was only half awake, otherwise he would have lied. He
cared about Marek even if he had been told once in his life as well that 'it
was not him, it was Marek' that was wrong in their relationship.
Marek scowls at the back of Nic's head on the pillow beside
him, but instead of being angry he falls asleep.
Sprinkled with fairy dust by a passing cherub Marek begins
to dream.
Is the grass greener; was the sky bluer outside of North
Carolina? Is winning sweeter? Are the people friendlier? Will he get a Stanley
Cup somewhere else?
Nic, who caught a fair amount of the dust as well sleeping
beside Marek, falls in love off to the side when he is not looking, when his
thoughts are caught up with going west; with blue water and acres of parkland.
Van-cou-ver. Marek pronounces the word in all manner of ways
trying to understand the taste of the letters. He lets the letters drip off his
tongue, in Brit-ish Coe-lum-bee-a. He tries to work out the number of
syllables, the worth of the letters when they are transformed into numbers.
Vancouver's soul number is six. He calculates its life number as four. He finds
his numbers are seven and two and tries to puzzle out how these fit together.
He spends hours making the names shapes, words done in different fonts on his
computer, and how they looked when hand written, in fancy cursive writing.
He considers changing his playing number, he considers
changing his life; changing his clothes. He buys a book about this mystical
far-off place called Vancouver. He expects to see castles dotted on the
down-town streets, tells himself not be surprised at the playful fairies he is
bound to see at the bottom of the garden.
Marek watches the horizon and the sun setting. Do fairies
gambol he wonders? Or is that lambs? Marek imagines the floating leaves; falls
fading colours are fairies fluttering and flying. Floating and free. Marek
touches the glass where the horizon divides what is above and what is below.
As he packs in Raleigh-North-Carolina, he thinks of
Vancouver-British-Columbia, books, from earlier obsessions, literature, church
architecture, world history, world wars, are nestled reverently into boxes like
the totem objects to his past life that they are.
Clothes are folded and arranged and thrown out and given to
charity. Closets are cleaned, dust is swept up, and old fashions are laughed
over. Marek cannot imagine why he brought gold shirts and orange shirts and
thinks that they hardly suit the person he is now.
It is a blue mood he is in for clothes. Blue not meaning
unhappy, but like the sea and the sky and the flowers that will sprout up in
happy formation for his new home's garden. The future is unfurling like a flag
in the wind, like a banner proclaiming victory; all is possible.
Sunday, the last day that he is in Raleigh, he wears his
oldest pair of jeans that he has owned for so long they fit him like a second
skin. They are one of the few items to survive all his purges and this time he
vows to throw them out. They are faded but the hint of blue still surrounds
them.
He spends the night with Nic one last time, but is surprised
when Nic ends the evening after dinner and does not stay the night.
Marek believes that he has severed all ties. The mail has
been re-directed, his addresses are changed; his bank accounts are closed and
the house has been sold. And yet things sneak onto the plane with him. Sitting
in his chair, that even in first class always seems too small for his long
legs, the blue jeans having escaped the garbage, and dreaming of his day with
the Cup Marek's fate is unchanged.
Eye of newt and toe of frog have also been secreted onto the
plane and fed (but only in tiny doses) to Marek so he will see a taste of his
future.
The wheel of fortune has simply moved him to another
country. The classical nymphs and gods are now animal familiars and the
medicine wheel has a feather in the middle. If he were paying attention to the
people in his dreams, instead of staring at the bright shiny Cup, Marek would
see their faces were all fuzzed over but one.
Fate can throw your future in your face, but she can't make
you pay attention.
Marek dreams on the plane of his day with Cup. A party in
Vancouver? A party at home? A trip to a local hockey rink? A day of quiet
meditation? Strip clubs? What would he do?
In Vancouver it is raining, which delights Marek as he
imagines that when he awakens the city is clean and shining and laid out like a
jewel before him. In his rented condo, which he will quickly ditch for a house
as soon as he finds one he likes, Marek sleeps with the window open and slides
into the arms of Morpheus with the sound of rain in his ears.
Silvery Venus slides from her perch on the stars and sneaks
in the open window. She brushes the hair off his face and decides to allow him
to adjust to his new home before she springs the surprise of his soul mate on
him.
Losing was unexpected - a shot straight the gut. In his head
Marek turns over the angles, tries to see the reasons, fails to calculate into
his equations the connections between destiny and JS Guiguire and Scott
Stevens. He does not recognize the finer spider web of destiny and redemption
and true love that are tied around who won and who lost. One rises, (Giguere),
one leaves (Daneyko), others (Teemu and Paul) are reunited, Scott and Larry
reconnect, Dom coming home to his lover, Cujo's redemption in another city far
away. Perhaps given this information Marek could have accepted what happened,
but as he was still the young player who always over-prepared, defeat burned.
But given the information above (if he could see Paul and
Teemu kiss in the mist of San Fransisco) he could have compartmentalised and
understood. A game is never just a game: far too many hearts are at stake. More
fates than his have to be decided with this game.
And some have to be briefly broken for the good of others.
But of course he just had to accept what had happened without this information.
Looking at the hill behind his house, Marek misses the
horizon. He misses the farmland of Raleigh but does not want to go back. He
imagines what it would be like living in a huge anonymous city in a modern
condo. He thinks of the places he could go in the NHL that are like that.
Marek has to learn to accept that there is a spinning wheel
determining his fate, he also needs faith. He is a good person there is a plan
for him. But if fate has a plan it is one that spins at it's own rate. As Marek
will see, or perhaps not see as he is not on the bed with her, Aphrodite -
Goddess of Love - has been concerned with one player in particular, and,
delicately put, forgot about him.
Marek stared out his window. Losing had been unexpected he
thought again. He thought of Todd, crying without making any sound at all, and
Marcus his hands pale white and fluttering in the air, trying to find the crack
in the invisible wall between him and Todd. Vancouver once so sunny and open
and so full of possibilities was now tarnished.
Through the water dripping off the eaves over his kitchen
window, Marek looks at, but does not see the green algal mould creeping up the
legs of the white metal furniture in the garden. He images that the condo would
have a doorman, who would hail cabs. It rains continually as he stands there,
his coffee growing cold and the kitchen getting darker, a steady drizzle that
drenches everything around him.
Marek then contemplates proper flight, following the exodus
of players out of the city. A journey by road, or rail, or plane? A flight home
to Europe, or simply digging a hole in the garden and hiding? A sailing ship
taking him around the bottom of the world to the everlasting ice?
Someone had told Marek once that if a plague that could
destroy all life were ever unleashed on the planet that is would be the life
trapped in the ice of Antarctica that would be the last to succumb. That or the
albatross sailing in the air above the bottom of the world.
Puzzled by what to do next, frustrated by the lack of
chances he thought he had had, stumped by who to call, he phones Nic, who at
least will understand losing, having had a nightmare campaign of his own.
Nic sighs, rolling away from the warm body that had been the
one bright spot of his own frustrating season; he had passed on Marek's
complaints to the person lying with him.
"Tell him to get laid." Ron said scrunched face
down into the pillow. "Harry has always thought too damn much."
Aphrodite nods at this pronouncement from her position at
the end of the bed. Smiling she tickles the bottoms of Ron's feet so he will
squirm closer to Nic and pounce on his younger teammate. She smiles
delightedly; Ron has been alone to long since Mario and has been her special
project.
"I can't tell him that." Nic says, poking him.
"Well tell him to fish or play gold or get a cat, just
to get out of his house."
Nic passes these thoughts along the phone line.
Marek instead asks how long the two of them have been
together.
"How did I not notice?" Marek asks in shock.
"Was it a secret?"
Nic pauses and decides upon honesty. "You were too
caught up in your own things Marek, it was here for everyone to see."
Marek thinks. "I hate cats." He finally says.
"And I hate fishing."
"Go golfing then." Nic says.
"Goodbye Marek." Ronnie says, taking the phone out
of Nic's hand and kissing the younger man senseless. Aphrodite claps her hands,
giggling, and settles down to watch. As an afterthought - feeling guilty it has
taken her so long - she sends Cupid off to catch up with Marek.
Marek calls Brendan and invites himself to a golf game.
Half way through he decides it was a bad idea. If the
excessive cuddling and canoodling weren't enough, the sickening lovers
nicknames would do him in.
"When they start talking in baby talk like that,"
Brendan confides to Marek, "I pretend it is Swedish."
Marek stares at Markus and Todd. "Did Todd just call
MarkusÉ?"
"See, you think too much about that and your head
explodes. Pretend it is Swedish and it will all be good."
But the adoration of that couple, and the whisper of a
breeze, and Marek plays very badly on the golf course, even worse than Marcus
who clearly doesn't even play and is
just there to keep Todd company.
When Marek swears softly about missing an easy putt, as the
ball sits one inch from the hole, and with the two lovebirds cooing in the
shade and the wind and Nic's comments running though his head, he considers
proper flight this time.
Brendan kicks the ball in the hole.
"It's not like they will notice." Brendan smiles
and inclines his head to the two kissing on the golf cart.
Marek smiles back. He can feel the sun on the back of his
neck, and clouds of love spin like candy floss from Todd and Marcus and settle
around Marek and Brendan. Cupid skims by, shooting off random darts, getting
all four of them and accidentally hitting the waiter in the club who
immediately goes home and falls in love with his plumber.
Marek and Brendan agree to have dinner, and Marek finds
himself ignoring the skyline behinds Mo's shoulder to focus on the person in
front of him. They have first date conversation over things they should know
already: where they are from, what they do, what their dreams are –
things they already half-know but seen fresh and new anyway.
They walk home together when they find that Marek's car,
which he was amazed to find had run out of petrol despite the fact that he
always keeps the tank above half full, and they walk back to Marek's house
which was closer.
Of course it rains, as Thor, doing a favour for Aphrodite,
throws some thunder around forcing the two of them to run for shelter under
some trees. The rain trails off as Marek and Brendan step closer together under
the wet leaves of the tree. Marek leans forward and kisses Brendan softly. The
rain stops, and the clouds part, the sun shines and somewhere the enforcer gets
his hat trick. In double overtime. Forcing game seven.
End
