Out Of Control 29 (PG version)

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AnCatKatie

Rock n' Roll Doggie ALL ACCESS
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Sorry this one's effing long...it's to make up for how late it is!

Urhurr, Buttons wasn't happy witnessing what was edited out. Oh and yeah, that whole chunk of story's available by email or PM if requested...

I can't wait to write Ciarán more...I'm impatient for this to get settled out!

And if anything seems suspicious, blame my persistent plot-approving friend who enables waaay too much of what I want to write!

(oh and hey, it's that mysterious black Stetson showing up...totally unnecessarily...)

***

(1986)​

Night of the fire​

“Let me in, Seamus,” the man said, knocking at the door of somewhere Ciarán couldn’t see; his head was facing the ground, and the ground all looked the same in the darkness. The fire didn’t illuminate anything.

Yet, he thought with a little fear, echoing what he’d heard.

There came the sound of a door opening.

“The hell are you carrying, Marcus?” came a different man’s voice, which was in comparison to Marcus’s rough one almost calming. “What have you done now?”

“Jes’ be glad I went and not you.”

“And not me? You were gone for a long time, Marcus. I wouldn’a fecked things up.”

His kidnapper—Marcus—turned away and set Ciarán down hard. Ciarán winced, trying to stop his eyes from watering. It was just as dark inside wherever they were; he could barely see either of the two, though he saw the sparks of Marcus’ eyes and a different shadowy form. He knew by now it would do little if he tried to bring any attention to himself, and there was no way he could run. He wiped away the thoughts I’m cold…I’m scared…what’s happening to everyone in the bar?…what if I’d stayed at home and let daddy have his own time out…why did we leave? and realized something important:

I can try to see all I can, so maybe I can…what? Identify both of them later. I can work out leaving when there’s opportunity.

He set that resolution hard in his mind and then focused around him again.

“You’re not alone,” Seamus stated in question, a warning tone in his voice. Ciarán was confused, assuming he was talking to him—he wouldn’t have answered; he didn’t trust either of them—but no, Seamus was talking to Marcus.

There was a sliding sound and the light clicked on, throwing the room into illumination. Ciarán squinted. It was painfully sudden. He could see the room was small, and he was facing the door, which was heavily bolted. There were spider-thin cracks in the bottom and across the tile of the floor. The walls were faded and bare, and aside from some shapes in the far end Ciarán couldn’t yet see to identify, so was the room.

“Hey,” Marcus warned with his hard voice. Ciarán looked back again. Marcus’s arms were crossed but he didn’t move towards Ciarán. Ciarán glanced at the other man, and then stared a little.

Seamus was old, maybe twice Ciarán’s father’s age, and dark-haired as Marcus was blond, about the opposite of the other man in that and build. He didn’t seem threatening, but that was because that energy was at bay. He could probably easily throw Ciarán across the room. And strangely enough, there was first total surprise and then reluctance in his dark eyes. Marcus’ were hard and blue, and his scar seemed sharp in the sudden light.

Seamus blinked quickly, calming himself and hiding his surprise. He stared at Ciarán and then dragged his eyes away to glare at Marcus. “Why the hell did you kidnap a kid? It was bad enough without this on top of it!” His mouth formed a hard line. “You know I already said there was no point in us being here. I’m past this.”

“Well, it’s not your kid, is it?” The line of Seamus’ mouth tightened even more in response to that comment before he shook his head and sighed in exasperation. Ciarán was confused. They weren’t talking about him, were they? He knew who his father was.

“Sometimes y’have to know when to move on,” Seamus said tightly. “You can lead separate lives.”

“Seems you forgot,” Marcus glared. “I have to do this. He can’t do very much on his own.”

Ciarán hoped he wasn’t talking about him; he could do a lot on his own! He looked at Marcus indignantly, but it seemed the man was talking about someone else.

“Well, you can call it quits. This is idiotic. You have no idea what the law’s like here, how can you even think you can get past it?”

“Well, I just have, haven’t I? And y’know what, Seamus, I don’t bloody care what you think you’re past or not. You came with me. You could’ve just stayed. Now, why in hell did you do that for?”

Seamus didn’t answer. He pushed himself up from his crouching position and moved away, with another indecipherable glance towards Ciarán.

“Maybe I’m the one keeping you out of trouble,” he told Marcus calmly, and then sat on the floor and accepted the bottle Marcus gave him from his coat pocket, opening it, sniffing, and then looking at Marcus unhappily.

“Water?”

“Keeping you out of trouble,” Marcus said. “You need your wits about you. It’s been, what, years, hasn’t it? You’re staying sober.”

Seamus nodded. “I know.”

Ciarán let out the breath he’d been going when Marcus moved towards the shadows in the room and spoke, presumably to someone else, who Ciarán couldn’t see.

Seamus offered Ciarán water, and Ciarán looked dubiously at it.

“Don’t worry, that man’s not letting me anywhere near alcohol. And there’s nothing else in it.” Seamus looked at the bottle just as dubiously then. “Unless he wants rid of me.”

Ciarán took it in both hands and gulped it down, spilling a lot over the floor.

“Sorry,” he whispered. “I think I had the rest.”

Seamus opened his mouth, looked like he was about to say something, but was distracted by the other side of the room.

There came an unhappy groan and some mumbled response, and whoever was there stirred and stilled.

Marcus muttered something angrily, walking back, and looked between Ciarán and Seamus. Ciarán shrank into the wall. Marcus began to say something, but Seamus cut him off. “He’s not going anywhere, Marcus. Calm your arse down.” He jerked his head over to where Marcus had came from. “He’s likely not going to be very happy when he finds out in the morning. An’ the police come knocking at our door.”

“They have no reason to do that.”

“Oh, come on.”

“Threw the lighter in a bin on the way back. There’s no evidence in a fire. This bugger was the only witness, and who knows how long he’ll be with us. He certainly won’t be able to say anything to them.” Marcus grinned. “Will he? Damn whatever use he has.”

“We’ll have to leave,” Seamus said. “As I said, he’s not going anywhere. Shut up and think of some other place we can go.” He folded his arms and lay along the floor, still glaring at Marcus. “Another reason I came along—you’ve got the common sense to not get caught but not much else.”

No-one was paying attention to Ciarán, thankfully. He huddled his arms, and closed his eyes, leaning against the wall and trying to believe he could will himself out of this: he’d wake up somewhere else. His parents hadn’t been yelling, there hadn’t been a fire, he hadn’t been carried off, and he would wake up somewhere he could see daylight, without the sound of other mens’ breathing or yelling echoing through his ears.

***

Ruth thought to herself tightly as her arms were wrapped around Oisín there was absolutely no reason for her to have reacted to Larry like she was still seventeen. In fact, she realized, she didn’t know anything about him; she’d almost automatically felt attached to him compared to Isaac, back eight years ago.

Oisín, however, genuinely cared about her. And he’d been there when things were terrible. Ruth had needed that. She’d needed her life to suddenly fall back into place again; she’d been looking at things all wrong.

She blinked the ghost of a tear away, her eyelashes brushing his bare shoulder; he turned his head a little and asked what was wrong. She shook her head. His silence was acceptance. She settled back against him, and forgot anything was wrong, for a short while, as she fell into sleep. When she woke up his hand held hers, and she gazed at their entwined fingers for a while, his thin freckled arm around her shoulderblades in a sleep-loosened embrace. His hair tickled her when he breathed in and out and she bit her lip to keep from giggling, then stilled. Dreams cast long shadows over his face, as they hadn’t a few days before. He too must have something on his mind.

She brushed her thumb across his cheek; he stirred a little, made a funny little hitch in his breath, then curved his body closer, still asleep. He looked very vulnerable in that moment, the light scratching across his shoulders and spilling over to mark his face in an open state.

She loved him. It was so hard to explain, but it was simple as that. It was just the fragments of herself from eight years ago, which had survived the fire, the move to America, and Isaac, that couldn’t help but make a small part of her remember that time…when she’d been convinced she might love someone else…

Different tactics, Ruth, she told herself, trying to obliterate that part away. She began to methodically go through why she and Lar were wrong for each other.

This was hard.

He’s too young…well, what did that matter? She was three years younger than Oisín. It didn’t matter a thing. Isaac had been older than her by far…though their relationship hadn’t entirely been chosen.

He didn’t finish teaching me to drum…she learned on her own when she came to America. It was a little difficult, but it worked out. On buckets and boxes, she accidentally broke a lot of what she practiced on, unable to separate the part of her mind drumming and the one afraid and angry. It was probably the phonecall that changed that…Oisín…

He might still think I want to see him at all. Wait…she’d been thinking of why she should avoid him…Ruth, you eejit!

And they just…they fit wrong. Something about their personalities didn’t mix closely. She had a sudden, wrong vision of stopping his occasional fits of temper, too close to see the sparks in his eyes as she leaned forward and…NO. In her mind’s eye she saw a different man in that image, and shrank back.

They did not go together. At best…she allowed her mind to go down that path briefly…if things had been different, she could have stayed in Dublin, and told him everything. And he wouldn’t have been able to help it—he would have gone, rage-fed, and yelled at Isaac or worse. And that would have been wrong…the wrong solution. Larry would have been too soon. He didn’t seem finished, back then, and now he had a sort of stillness, a pause to him that was almost worse…

She looked through half-open eyes at Oisín again, her heart still beating wildly, and her thoughts grew a little more formless as the morning spilled through the window and showed the face of her lover, but left any answers still unrevealed.

When he yawned awake, everything that had been going through her mind seemed by then a little nudge on the periphery of her mind, or a long-forgotten bad dream.

“Morning, ‘Sheen,” she whispered, and the corner of his mouth lifted.

Haigh,” he said with amusement in his voice, and stretched out of bed. She followed him downstairs and distracted him while he made breakfast, setting the cat on top of his head and laughing like hell at his expression.

“Sorry,” she managed to say through the laughter, setting an irritated Buttons down. Buttons yowled and Oisín raised his eyebrows at Ruth. “Are you now?” he asked, turning off the burner for the eggs and going across to the sink, rinsing out two glasses and then looking over at her evilly. She ducked, but not fast enough; the water droplets tricked down her face. She couldn’t move to evade his halfhearted attempts to get back, she was laughing so hard.

“Not where I meant it to go,” he said.

“Really? Where did you?”

He nodded and looked at her intently, brushing her hair away from her face and leaning her against the wall, trailing wet fingers to her lips.

“There,” he explained.

“That wouldn’t have done much if I was thirsty, mister.”

He didn’t answer, but placed a burning kiss on her mouth, his other hand in her hair as his leg nudged in between hers. She kissed him back, practically collapsing against the wall, but he broke away.

“Not done yet,” he said with a hint of laughter. She couldn’t have replied if she tried. His hand trailed water down her body under her nightclothes, and she shivered. He grinned, and kissed the water away where it had been, then stopped, looking up at her.

She was speechless, but found her voice, stepping away. “Oisín,” Ruth said, extending her hand, “come here.”

“Hmm?”

“And lose the clothes.” She grinned.

Breakfast was forgotten for a while.

*

“Ruth, love,” Oisín began reluctantly. They were back where they began, eating breakfast that had gone cold, though Ruth was practically falling against Oisín, and he had one arm wrapped around her, his hand brushing her thigh beneath the large shirt she’d slept in. Buttons looked at them both in suspicion.

“Mm?” she asked, downing a glass of water with innate amusement.

“I don’t really want to now, but I’ve got to tell Bono we didn’t find anything.”

“Imagine if we had,” she whispered, and shuddered. His arm around her tightened.

“I raised that kid when he was a baby,” Oisín said in a strained voice. “I forgot for a while he wasn’t my own, he was my sister’s and Bon had likely run off or something. I didn’t know he had no idea Ciarán was alive. But when máthair left, it was just us.” Oisín stared off into the distance briefly, setting down his fork. “And as bad as I feel, it’s worse for him. Bono. I can’t imagine losing a child.”

Ruth shook her head. “If I’d had the baby,” she said quietly, “he or she would’ve been about Ciarán’s age. And it would have been the same.” He looked at her in question, feeling infinitely terrible he’d inadvertently brought it up. Oisín had a sudden strong vision of what that child may have looked like…he wished Isaac hadn’t existed, and maybe, just maybe, if anything like that had happened, the only problems Ruth would have would be getting married or not. To him, perhaps.

He pushed his plate away, lost for a moment.

“I wouldn’t have been able to do it,” Ruth said. “I would have hated that baby. I would feel terrible, but I wouldn’t be able to help it…it’s worse, not having love.”

Oisín wondered…

“Ruth, do you think someday, we might…” His hand fell open as his voice trailed off. She looked up at him in sudden sad attachment.

“I can’t have children, Oisín. That’s what it did to me. I have a big scar inside my body now. Nothing would survive.”

He kissed her cheek, his face pressed to the side of hers. “I don’t mind, Ruth. I don’t give a…well…I think I get what Bono was talking about right before Cath died. I care about you.”

She smiled sideways, speechless, something easing within her warmly, and then abruptly began to cry. She bit her lip, trying to make the tears cease.

“Ruth?”

She smiled again shakily, wiping the tears away. “It’s just…Isaac would have never said that to me. Never. I can’t believe you, Oisín Fairleigh,” she said softly, looking at him. “You are such a good man. Despite everything.”

Everything. Isaac. Hs glanced down for a moment, wondering just how fast she would be gone from him if she knew what he’d done. He was not a good man. Or somewhere, the line blurred…and you were always afraid you might go back, hard as you resolved that wasn’t the you you knew.

“Sometimes I’m not so sure,” he said so quietly she could hardly hear it but for the silence all around.

“Oisín,” Ruth stated, rising, “I’ll come with you.”

“You don’t have to, Ruth, if you don’t want to…”

“Well, Buttons’ll scratch me silly when you’re away. I’ve stolen her man,” she grinned.

“Alright then.” He smiled. “I’ll be glad of the company.”

And it would be just Bono, and maybe Eve, wouldn’t it? Surely everyone else had places to go, or had gone somewhere else to sleep. Ruth was certain she could avoid Larry. Not that it mattered. Oisín’s presence hummed like sunlight through her body, almost obliterating past. And yes, it was almost sunlike, the way she felt practically pulled towards him now. They’d grown together so fast…

*


She was wrong. She was so wrong. Oisín kissed her on the cheek, before walking over to Bono, for she tried very hard right around then to shrink into the shadows—except it was a police office, for Christ’s sake. That was impossible.

“Hey, Ruth,” Bono called, looking up when he saw Oisín and then seeing her. “Rest of the band’s about to leave. Tell Ad he’s not hallucinating and he really saw you passing by the other day? You’ve been gone for years!” When she protested, he was already back to speaking with Oisín. Ruth sighed and headed outside, thinking maybe she’d continue being hidden. Oisín winked and called brightly, “Now don’t run off with the rest of the band, Ruth!”

She rolled her eyes, thinking that was about the last thing she had on her mind. Oh god, did Oisín know she’d once had a thing for Larry? Shite.

She caught Bono’s expression as she walked out the door. Oh, he knew, all right.

Unfortunately Oisín’s comment made her presence obvious to the three men outside the police office, looking for all the world like ne’er-do-wells who should probably be in there explaining something; she laughed, despite herself, and a much less poofy-haired Adam cried out, “Aha! I was right! Ruth’s been in America all along.” Edge commented amusedly as she had no choice to near them, “Of course she has. She certainly wasn’t in Ireland. Ruth, how are you?” Edge was certainly still the same, but had gone from a quiet boy to a quiet man, rather confident now, with a smile under unbelievably long hair and a cowboy hat.

“I’m fine,” she said, crossing her arms against the cold. “I’ve been here for eight years, it’s not like I’ve just arrived. I know my way around. I’m doing great, actua—“

She was interrupted, and as she turned to the side towards the sound of the voice, stared into Larry’s blue eyes.

“How’s your drumming been, Ruth?” he asked, and grinned.

“Well, Larry Mullen,” she said deliberately, and the others snickered behind her—was she missing something?—“—I’m a drummer now, so I guess not bad.”

Edge and Adam by now had erupted into laughter. She heard Edge tried to quiet Adam but to no avail, he was laughing his own ass off.

“So you didn’t even ask that I was gone?” she asked him as his surprise left him momentarily defenseless. She didn’t know why she suddenly felt so angry towards him; it must have been years of disappointment that, say, he hadn’t followed her to America or something. “You could’a figured it out from—“

She was cut off quite suddenly when he put a finger against her lips, unexpectedly. Ruth fell silent.

“I’m not that much of a bastard,” Larry said. “Done with that, yelling? Good.” His finger was suddenly gone and so was he; he went off to the edge of the street and leaned against the crosswalk sign, his back to them.

“Ah,” Adam said. “Sullen Mullen, he is. Y’got him to walk off and stop bothering us! Score one for you, Ruth.”

Edge shrugged, “He does it all the time. Glad that Adam was right and you exist, though. It’s nice to come across you again.”

“What the feck is taking Bon so long?” Adam growled. “Is he coming with us or isn’t he?”

Edge looked at him in surprise, from under his Stetson. “He’s still looking for Ciarán. Why would he go back with us?”

“Well, I don’t know, but it seemed we were working on an album…maybe we can just make one without vocals, call it ‘U2: The Forgettable Album’ or something. ‘With Or Without Bono’?”

“I’ll ask,” Edge said, rolling his eyes. “Go talk some sense into Lawrence.”

Adam looked unhappily over at Larry. “No thanks. Coming with you. Nice seeing you again, Ruth.” They both entered the building, leaving Ruth outside trying to look anywhere but at the figure leaning against the pole just ahead. It didn’t work. Eventually his silence caught at her and she walked over, blowing on her fingers. Man, it was cold lately, and that was strange in Santa Barbara…

He looked over at her, almost dismissively, but at least he didn’t turn away.

“You didn’t give any explanation for leaving, did you, Ruth,” Larry said, to Ruth’s surprise; she thought irrationally he’d stay silent forever. She came to stand next to him, but didn’t answer.

“I wondered why you were gone. What had happened. I didn’t know where to ask, who to call. I’m sorry. If you’d said something…if things had gone differently…” She was stuck inside his eyes again. Damn it. She couldn’t stay angry at him for long. Ruth shivered, tearing her eyes away. He blinked, seeing her, and said in exasperation, “Ruth, you don’t have a coat?”

“I was kind of distracted leaving the house, actually…the thought didn’t cross my mind.”

He shook his head at her silliness and grabbed her hands, rubbing them between his. Well, her hands were warmer now…

“What—“

“Warming you up, you eejit. Feck, that’s not working, is it.” His hands rubbed along her arms this time, and Ruth was shaking, but not from the cold. It was so, so strange, that the girl she was eight years ago would have wanted this…and it might have meant something, eight years ago. It didn’t now, of course it didn’t.

“Better?”

She nodded, mute. His hand lingered in hers for a moment like a spark; he was looking at her fingertips. “You are a drummer, then,” Larry said, grinning. “I t’ought you were just trying to get me mad that I wasn’t able to finish teaching you. You’re in a band, Ruth?”

She nodded again, and abruptly tore away and headed for back inside, leaving a very confused Larry by the signpost. Her arms were still very very warm but she felt odd.

She stood just outside the doorway, glancing in; she didn’t really want to talk to Bono after that; he’d probably guess…a lot more than had happened. And Oisín looked so happy, talking to old friends.

Adam opened the door, leaning out and missing entirely that Ruth was a couple feet away. “Lar, y’got to convince this man he’s coming back to the desert!”

“Convince him yourself,” Larry yelled back, and Adam chuckled, closing the door behind himself. Larry actually did come inside right about then, seeming not to see Ruth either—was she really that invisible?—and spoke with Bono quickly. Adam glared at Larry as Larry walked out the door. Larry almost turned and went back, but caught sight of Ruth. There was a strange look in his eyes, an almost indecisiveness.

“You should go back inside, it’s warmer in there. You’re such an idiot,” he said softly, as if he meant to say something else, and he was suddenly quite near. Ruth couldn’t turn and head inside, for a mind-dizzying moment came, so fast she almost thought it didn’t happen. Larry…he just…kissed her, in a rush of unspoken things.

Her eyes were huge. What the hell had that been about?

“Hmm. I wondered,” Larry said without explanation, stepping away abruptly. She still felt a ghost of the heat of his body.

It was all so strange…

He went back in, and she stood outside in the cold, not really cold at this point, her head awhirl. She could freeze, damn the consequences. She sure as hell was not going back in there until the betraying heat across her face went away.

Oh god, what had he just done…Ruth bit her lip angrily. She didn’t give a feck about Larry. She didn’t. Right now, actually, she kind of wanted to punch him.

Oisín’s coat across her shoulders was about as thick as her confusion, as they walked back. She hid it well, and pressed against him, as if to lose all memory of that…other. She could make those few seconds go away, couldn’t she?

“So, did they convince Bon to leave or is he going to irritate law enforcement more?” she said, hiding her dazed state, her pounding heart.

“He’s staying. Ciarán’s gone, Ruth. He can’t just abandon his child.”

She leaned her head against his shoulder, and something made him look down and ask what she was thinking.

“What if he had been yours? What if there’d been no Isaac and something silly—oh, well, say we’d had a kid. This wouldn’t have happened. None of this.”

“But I wouldn’t have found you, Ruth…”

She nodded, realizing. “Oh.” Her chest tightened. “And if we’d never met…”

That, that would have been unbearable.
 
I kind of like everyone's interactions in this... especially the way Ruth and Larry are acting, it was quite neat the way she's fine with Oisin, but with Larry around she gets all confused. Maybe they should just avoid each other? That entire scene when they were having breakfast was really, really sweet. And funny. (Poor Buttons! :laugh: )
These men are confusing me. Who can they possibly be connected to? And how in the world will Ciaran be found now? :(
 
Thanks :lol: Poor Ruth! Larry's a problem. Also, you should be wondering what on earth Eve's doing...usually they're stuck together like glue...

:giggle: Buttons. Should've been let outside.

Ah, believe me, the reason there are so many characters at once (it's so confusing for me to write! I accidentally call Oisín Ciarán for some reason, and accidentally mix up all of Eve, Ruth, and Phoenix...and then accidentally call Larry Oisín...fortunately I find out and fix it when I edit o_O) is they need to all be there at once to figure this out. And actually, Ali's probably coming up to Santa Barbara because she's pretty integral to what comes in a few chapters...

MAN, this story's longer than I planned!
 
All the women are a bit confusing since they're all such strong characters. Eve... now I was going to ask what happened to her, but I figured she knows so it doesn't matter. :lol: I think Phoenix makes things complicated! I was wondering if Larry's sudden attraction to Ruth was the same as Bono's sudden attraction to Phoenix?
 
Heh. I'm taking that as a compliment to my writing skill XD but—sorry they're confusing! It's because there are so many at once! (to be fair, there are a bunch of men now too...good lord.)

Larry knew Ruth; Bono didn't know Phoenix...if I could do what I want with the plot, all the characters would make more sense—but I'm trying to make the plot make sense instead. All I'm going to say is, Bono and Phoenix are kind of stuck being the way they were in their dreams, when they meet up. It may make more sense later.
 
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