trinityofone (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
trinityofone) wrote2006-07-01 06:52 pm
trinityofone) wrote2006-07-01 06:52 pm
Entry tags:
First Monday/Black Death Fic: Blow the House Down
I found out that today is both Canada Day and the International Day of Slash. In honor of both these occasions, I wrote fic.
Title: Blow the House Down
Fandoms: First Monday/Black Death
Pairing: Julian Lodge/Nyles Chapman
Rating: R
Length: ~1600 words
Summary: “I didn’t enter politics to be liked,” Julian said.
A/N: Written for the combined occasion of Canada Day and the International Day of Slash. Inspired by an essay by David Rakoff, who is gay, Canadian, and awesome.
A/N2: I figure that not too many people are familiar with Black Death, so here’s all you need to know about Nyles: he’s played by David Hewlett, he’s an investigative reporter in New York City, and in the film, he’s very upset over the death of his male “roommate.” Right.
Blow the House Down
Nyles had figured from the beginning that it was only a matter of time until Julian left him. Their first encounter was a one night stand that surprised Nyles by even lasting the night; Julian had practically developed a tic in the elevator up to Nyles’ suite, and even once he’d made it through the front door he was nervous and unsure, his hands shaking as he undid the buttons on Nyles’ shirt.
But the twitching movements soon smoothed out, became strokes, caresses, and Nyles learned that there was little to match the passion of a repressed Republican law clerk who had finally slipped and allowed himself some gay Canadian cock.
Nyles expected that to be it, though. One fantastic night, and then Julian would wash himself off, button himself up, and return to staring rather desperately at his female co-workers’ asses. Instead Julian stayed with him through a hurried breakfast, then paused in the doorway, looking back. “When can I see you again?”
Nyles was going to be back in a couple weeks to cover another story. They arranged to meet, and right up until the moment Nyles saw Julian step smirking through the door, he never once expected him to show.
Things progressed. When Nyles was in town, he and Julian met, and ate dinner, and fucked (sometimes without the dinner). Then one night Julian surprised him again by inviting Nyles back to his place instead of expectantly waiting to be led up to Nyles’ latest hotel room. Nyles lifted Julian’s legs up over his shoulders and fucked him between his very own sheets; the room was almost as neat and impersonal as the hotel, but not when they got through with it.
When Nyles was offered a job in D.C., he surprised himself by taking it. Julian, of course, had to one up him, shocking them both by asking Nyles to move in.
Julian’s clerkship was of course over by then, but in the few times Nyles had seen him, and in the fewer times they’d talked about it, Julian had shown an odd reluctance to move on, to take one of the high-paying and prestigious jobs the many sleek and kind of scary law firms had offered him. Instead, less than a month after Nyles hauled his two duffel bags worth of stuff down from New York (Nyles believed that an investigative journalist should learn to live and travel light), Julian accepted a position with the Log Cabin Republicans.
Nyles said, “I think we have to break up.”
Julian made his pouty face, which Nyles was sure was cheating. “I thought you were pleased I was out.”
Nyles was pleased. He was very pleased. He had thrown Julian a very special and intimate party to show him exactly how pleased he was.
“I am,” he insisted. “But I still don’t see why you have to throw yourself out in front of the firing squad!”
Julian straightened his tie, then leaned down to get his briefcase from where it rested against the leg of Nyles’ desk. On the way, he “accidentally” rubbed up against Nyles’ calf. “I want to be on the front lines of this fight,” he said, straightening up after one last lingering touch. “The Log Cabin Republicans are on the cutting edge of the gay civil rights movement.”
Nyles turned around, bracing his arm on the back of the chair. It was an antique, but not something that Julian had carefully picked out; like most of Julian’s furniture, it was taken from his family’s enormous home in Connecticut, tossed to their favorite/wayward son when Julian’s mother got sick of it. Or so Nyles had been told; he’d yet to be introduced.
He watched Julian tuck his cell phone into his pocket, where it didn’t even make a bulge. “But you’re going to be working for...”
“The enemy?” Julian asked, raising an eyebrow. “I may be gay, but I’m still a Republican, Nyles.”
As usual, Nyles forced himself to quell his reporter’s instincts, to not ask the essential question. Why?
There were two types of parties Julian dragged him to: the ones with the liberals, in support of gay rights; and the ones with the conservatives, in support of whatever tax cuts or national security boosters they were rallying the troops for that week. Nyles hated the liberal parties more. At those, everyone looked at Julian like he was on drugs, and at Nyles like he must be clinically insane to put up with it, with him. At the conservative parties people just did their best to ignore them, and didn’t start talking about them until after they’d left the room.
“I didn’t enter politics to be liked,” Julian said.
Nyles hadn’t entered journalism to be liked, either, but after a while he had reached a point where he was able to excel in his field and still like himself. He remembered what it was like to be closeted, and afraid, and he still felt he owed it to David, who had gone to his grave as Nyles’ “roommate,” to never be that way again. But he couldn’t control how Julian felt, or what he did.
“I’m trying to persuade the Republican Party to do better,” Julian said. “I want a more tolerant America, too, but we’re not going to get there by completely abandoning one political party. I need to stay and fight this battle. If I leave, who’s going to do it?”
Someone else, Nyles thought, and he was perfectly happy with that answer. “We could move to Canada and get married,” he sometimes joked, but they both knew it was just that: a joke. If for no other reason than the fact that Nyles had lived and worked in America for almost twenty years, and after 9/11 had been just paranoid enough to finally give up his Canadian citizenship. Privately, he’d regretted it almost immediately after. But he wasn’t going to tell Julian that.
Instead Nyles would watch Julian work a room. Nyles was good at watching: he’d gotten his best stories just by being a fly on the wall—in the right place, at the right time. He watched Julian schmooze and charm and even, on occasion, cut people down—razor-sharp; witty; dark-eyed and grinning in his immaculately pressed suit. Nyles knew that Julian had put a lot of time and a lot of work into being this good. Give him ten more years, Nyles thought, and I bet he’ll make a fantastic Democrat.
In the early part of 2004, Nyles had reversed his original position and started thinking that he was going to be the one to leave Julian. This was after President Bush had called unequivocally for a constitutional amendment “for the protection of marriage.” The day after it was announced, Nyles wrote a scathing editorial, blasting Bush and the amendment both, then walked over to Dupont Circle to meet Julian for lunch.
Julian always turned heads when he left the LCR headquarters. Nyles was never sure if the stares he got were because he was seen as a traitor just for entering that building, or because he was Julian, and he was cocky and brilliant and beautiful. That afternoon they were having lunch at a Mexican restaurant; Nyles licked salsa off his lips and grinned as Julian slid into the seat across from him.
Then Julian said, “I’m still voting for him,” and Nyles stopped smiling.
Julian threw a lot of words around. “Inclusive” and “Big Tent” and “loyalty.” Nyles gritted his teeth and only just stopped himself from storming out of the restaurant.
He still wasn’t sure what stopped him from storming out of the relationship entirely. In his own head he sometimes likened it to wives who stayed with their abusive husbands—only it was Julian who stayed with them, who again and again was allowing himself to be hit. Someday, Nyles told himself. Someday Julian was going to get sick of it, and leave.
The election was in November; in September, the LCR—and Julian with them, leading them—officially withheld their endorsement from George W. Bush.
Nyles didn’t ask Julian what had made him change his mind. They had stopped talking about politics.
On election day, Nyles of course couldn’t follow Julian into the voting booth to see which button he pressed. But that night when he got home, he found Julian bent over the hot oven, sautéing peppers and onions to make fajitas. He looked up, brow just a little bit sweaty, his collar open and his clothes, for once, just a little bit out of place.
“I voted Republican the rest of the way down the ticket,” he said.
Nyles kissed him and tasted new spices on his lips.
They lost the election, but Nyles tried to look at it as only a battle lost, and not the war. He wrote more excoriating editorials and raised enough hell to ensure that he was never going to get invited to a White House Press Conference.
Julian went on CNN and told a member of the radical right that if she felt gay relationships were threatening her marriage, he would suggest that she seek counseling.
Nyles watched him in front of the camera, confident and poised, defending his cause. He imagined them ten years from now, laughing as they looked back on the bad Bush years and on Julian’s brief, misguided period under the employ of Satan. Nyles could see it, clear as anything; he didn’t see why Julian couldn’t be brought to see it, too.
On screen, Julian reminded the American people that there were gays and lesbians who believed in the Republican Party. Nyles stared up at the TV and thought, I can change him.
NOTES:
1. This is heavily inspired by David Rakoff’s book Don’t Get Too Comfortable, especially the essays “Beat Me, Daddy” and “Love It or Leave It.” Some of the things Julian says in this story were quoted or paraphrased from the actual Log Cabin Republicans Rakoff spoke to.
2. Okay, there’s nothing in Black Death that says that Nyles is Canadian, but there’s nothing that says he isn’t, either, and it took Rodney joining the Atlantis mission to get him to show his true colors, so. Nyles’ “roommate” in Black Death really is named David, however. Just to confuse us further!
3. You don’t know how badly I would like Julian to make an about-face and suddenly become a Democrat. But is it really in character? I don’t know; I don’t think so. Hence this fic.
4. I really do consider moving to Canada sometimes. *sigh*
Title: Blow the House Down
Fandoms: First Monday/Black Death
Pairing: Julian Lodge/Nyles Chapman
Rating: R
Length: ~1600 words
Summary: “I didn’t enter politics to be liked,” Julian said.
A/N: Written for the combined occasion of Canada Day and the International Day of Slash. Inspired by an essay by David Rakoff, who is gay, Canadian, and awesome.
A/N2: I figure that not too many people are familiar with Black Death, so here’s all you need to know about Nyles: he’s played by David Hewlett, he’s an investigative reporter in New York City, and in the film, he’s very upset over the death of his male “roommate.” Right.
Blow the House Down
Nyles had figured from the beginning that it was only a matter of time until Julian left him. Their first encounter was a one night stand that surprised Nyles by even lasting the night; Julian had practically developed a tic in the elevator up to Nyles’ suite, and even once he’d made it through the front door he was nervous and unsure, his hands shaking as he undid the buttons on Nyles’ shirt.
But the twitching movements soon smoothed out, became strokes, caresses, and Nyles learned that there was little to match the passion of a repressed Republican law clerk who had finally slipped and allowed himself some gay Canadian cock.
Nyles expected that to be it, though. One fantastic night, and then Julian would wash himself off, button himself up, and return to staring rather desperately at his female co-workers’ asses. Instead Julian stayed with him through a hurried breakfast, then paused in the doorway, looking back. “When can I see you again?”
Nyles was going to be back in a couple weeks to cover another story. They arranged to meet, and right up until the moment Nyles saw Julian step smirking through the door, he never once expected him to show.
Things progressed. When Nyles was in town, he and Julian met, and ate dinner, and fucked (sometimes without the dinner). Then one night Julian surprised him again by inviting Nyles back to his place instead of expectantly waiting to be led up to Nyles’ latest hotel room. Nyles lifted Julian’s legs up over his shoulders and fucked him between his very own sheets; the room was almost as neat and impersonal as the hotel, but not when they got through with it.
When Nyles was offered a job in D.C., he surprised himself by taking it. Julian, of course, had to one up him, shocking them both by asking Nyles to move in.
Julian’s clerkship was of course over by then, but in the few times Nyles had seen him, and in the fewer times they’d talked about it, Julian had shown an odd reluctance to move on, to take one of the high-paying and prestigious jobs the many sleek and kind of scary law firms had offered him. Instead, less than a month after Nyles hauled his two duffel bags worth of stuff down from New York (Nyles believed that an investigative journalist should learn to live and travel light), Julian accepted a position with the Log Cabin Republicans.
Nyles said, “I think we have to break up.”
Julian made his pouty face, which Nyles was sure was cheating. “I thought you were pleased I was out.”
Nyles was pleased. He was very pleased. He had thrown Julian a very special and intimate party to show him exactly how pleased he was.
“I am,” he insisted. “But I still don’t see why you have to throw yourself out in front of the firing squad!”
Julian straightened his tie, then leaned down to get his briefcase from where it rested against the leg of Nyles’ desk. On the way, he “accidentally” rubbed up against Nyles’ calf. “I want to be on the front lines of this fight,” he said, straightening up after one last lingering touch. “The Log Cabin Republicans are on the cutting edge of the gay civil rights movement.”
Nyles turned around, bracing his arm on the back of the chair. It was an antique, but not something that Julian had carefully picked out; like most of Julian’s furniture, it was taken from his family’s enormous home in Connecticut, tossed to their favorite/wayward son when Julian’s mother got sick of it. Or so Nyles had been told; he’d yet to be introduced.
He watched Julian tuck his cell phone into his pocket, where it didn’t even make a bulge. “But you’re going to be working for...”
“The enemy?” Julian asked, raising an eyebrow. “I may be gay, but I’m still a Republican, Nyles.”
As usual, Nyles forced himself to quell his reporter’s instincts, to not ask the essential question. Why?
There were two types of parties Julian dragged him to: the ones with the liberals, in support of gay rights; and the ones with the conservatives, in support of whatever tax cuts or national security boosters they were rallying the troops for that week. Nyles hated the liberal parties more. At those, everyone looked at Julian like he was on drugs, and at Nyles like he must be clinically insane to put up with it, with him. At the conservative parties people just did their best to ignore them, and didn’t start talking about them until after they’d left the room.
“I didn’t enter politics to be liked,” Julian said.
Nyles hadn’t entered journalism to be liked, either, but after a while he had reached a point where he was able to excel in his field and still like himself. He remembered what it was like to be closeted, and afraid, and he still felt he owed it to David, who had gone to his grave as Nyles’ “roommate,” to never be that way again. But he couldn’t control how Julian felt, or what he did.
“I’m trying to persuade the Republican Party to do better,” Julian said. “I want a more tolerant America, too, but we’re not going to get there by completely abandoning one political party. I need to stay and fight this battle. If I leave, who’s going to do it?”
Someone else, Nyles thought, and he was perfectly happy with that answer. “We could move to Canada and get married,” he sometimes joked, but they both knew it was just that: a joke. If for no other reason than the fact that Nyles had lived and worked in America for almost twenty years, and after 9/11 had been just paranoid enough to finally give up his Canadian citizenship. Privately, he’d regretted it almost immediately after. But he wasn’t going to tell Julian that.
Instead Nyles would watch Julian work a room. Nyles was good at watching: he’d gotten his best stories just by being a fly on the wall—in the right place, at the right time. He watched Julian schmooze and charm and even, on occasion, cut people down—razor-sharp; witty; dark-eyed and grinning in his immaculately pressed suit. Nyles knew that Julian had put a lot of time and a lot of work into being this good. Give him ten more years, Nyles thought, and I bet he’ll make a fantastic Democrat.
In the early part of 2004, Nyles had reversed his original position and started thinking that he was going to be the one to leave Julian. This was after President Bush had called unequivocally for a constitutional amendment “for the protection of marriage.” The day after it was announced, Nyles wrote a scathing editorial, blasting Bush and the amendment both, then walked over to Dupont Circle to meet Julian for lunch.
Julian always turned heads when he left the LCR headquarters. Nyles was never sure if the stares he got were because he was seen as a traitor just for entering that building, or because he was Julian, and he was cocky and brilliant and beautiful. That afternoon they were having lunch at a Mexican restaurant; Nyles licked salsa off his lips and grinned as Julian slid into the seat across from him.
Then Julian said, “I’m still voting for him,” and Nyles stopped smiling.
Julian threw a lot of words around. “Inclusive” and “Big Tent” and “loyalty.” Nyles gritted his teeth and only just stopped himself from storming out of the restaurant.
He still wasn’t sure what stopped him from storming out of the relationship entirely. In his own head he sometimes likened it to wives who stayed with their abusive husbands—only it was Julian who stayed with them, who again and again was allowing himself to be hit. Someday, Nyles told himself. Someday Julian was going to get sick of it, and leave.
The election was in November; in September, the LCR—and Julian with them, leading them—officially withheld their endorsement from George W. Bush.
Nyles didn’t ask Julian what had made him change his mind. They had stopped talking about politics.
On election day, Nyles of course couldn’t follow Julian into the voting booth to see which button he pressed. But that night when he got home, he found Julian bent over the hot oven, sautéing peppers and onions to make fajitas. He looked up, brow just a little bit sweaty, his collar open and his clothes, for once, just a little bit out of place.
“I voted Republican the rest of the way down the ticket,” he said.
Nyles kissed him and tasted new spices on his lips.
They lost the election, but Nyles tried to look at it as only a battle lost, and not the war. He wrote more excoriating editorials and raised enough hell to ensure that he was never going to get invited to a White House Press Conference.
Julian went on CNN and told a member of the radical right that if she felt gay relationships were threatening her marriage, he would suggest that she seek counseling.
Nyles watched him in front of the camera, confident and poised, defending his cause. He imagined them ten years from now, laughing as they looked back on the bad Bush years and on Julian’s brief, misguided period under the employ of Satan. Nyles could see it, clear as anything; he didn’t see why Julian couldn’t be brought to see it, too.
On screen, Julian reminded the American people that there were gays and lesbians who believed in the Republican Party. Nyles stared up at the TV and thought, I can change him.
NOTES:
1. This is heavily inspired by David Rakoff’s book Don’t Get Too Comfortable, especially the essays “Beat Me, Daddy” and “Love It or Leave It.” Some of the things Julian says in this story were quoted or paraphrased from the actual Log Cabin Republicans Rakoff spoke to.
2. Okay, there’s nothing in Black Death that says that Nyles is Canadian, but there’s nothing that says he isn’t, either, and it took Rodney joining the Atlantis mission to get him to show his true colors, so. Nyles’ “roommate” in Black Death really is named David, however. Just to confuse us further!
3. You don’t know how badly I would like Julian to make an about-face and suddenly become a Democrat. But is it really in character? I don’t know; I don’t think so. Hence this fic.
4. I really do consider moving to Canada sometimes. *sigh*
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That totally made me smile. Lovely story, nicely done. Really complicated issues.
I would like Julian to make an about-face and suddenly become a Democrat. But is it really in character? I don’t know; I don’t think so.
I don't think so either - to me, he seems very committed to his beliefs. It's kind of his saving grace. He's a weasel, but he's a committed weasel.
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I don't know if Julian's commitment makes it better; if you're committed to something wrong, you're still, well, wrong. But I empathize with both him and Nyles in this scenario; there's no easy answer, that's for sure.
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I'm so glad that my story gave you ideas... I love it when we all feed off of one another.
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Having seen neither the movie nor the series I lack the background to these characters, and still you tell a story I can understand and love. Thanks!
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On screen, Julian reminded the American people that there were gays and lesbians who believed in the Republican Party. Nyles stared up at the TV and thought, I can change him.
The one Log Cabin Republican I know will never switch, and I have to say it confuses the hell out of me. The reason he stays loyal has nothing to do with social issues, but because he clings to the idea of small government like a lifeboat in a storm. I have never been a fan of small government, especially seeing how now it's getting small enough to fit in your phone line, and your bank account, and more importantly, your bedroom.
That and abortion. The abortion part I will *never* be able to understand, becaue he's a gay man and I don't see how it's any of his business, but that's a whole other argument.
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How would Julian change? Hmm. This Julian will probably either genuinely change the Republican Party (unlikely) or give up on them and focus on legal movements toward gay rights. I don't know that he'd become a Democrat, but when global warming becomes just a little more undeniable even Julian might join the Green Party.
The Julian in the show will either a)committ suicide when his inner and outer lives make him too uncomfortable to bear, possibly after marrying a woman he doesn't love to bear his children b)lose any sense of idealism he ever had and essentially become one of the sort of guys who are running America right now c)fall in love and change a lot, but not enough and get dumped, leading to a or b or d)come out of the closet, get gay-bashed, and go through a period of self-discovery followed by a determined and sinister overthrow of the Democratic Party.
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I did, however, live for DC for 7 years which is maybe why I utterly ADORE this story.
Sometimes I swear it feels like all the really cute guys in DC are republicans, it can be quite disheartening *g*
I sincerely love the slow, gradual turn around here, bit by bit Julian turning away from the dark side and Nyles just standing back and letting him go at his own pace.
I really do consider moving to Canada sometimes. *sigh*
Don't we all, don't we all. I even have a hot Canadian girlfriend to add to the temptation. If only it were that easy. (Seriously. Immigrating to Canada is expensive! I've checked.)
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I felt kind of bad for Nyles, giving up his Canadian citizenship, for some reason.
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So, no way in hell would I get involved with somone on the other side. Only badness could come of it.
So..yeah. Tricky.
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Also: 4. I really do consider moving to Canada sometimes. *sigh*
I feel you there. Why do you think I've moved to the UK? I'm just waiting until Bush is out of power, that's all.
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BUT. Fanfic writers can give him better and more consistent treatment, yes? And we can also get him laid!
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How bad is Black Death? I'm always curious.
The one thing I didn't believe was Nyles giving up his citizenship -- the Canadians I know who got paranoid post-9/11 solidified their green-card status if need be, but were adamant about maintaining their citizenship back home. And that includes a couple of journalists. (You don't need to move to Canada to get married there, either! But whether Julian would consider it a legally binding marriage is another issue altogether.)
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canonreal life: Rakoff did it, and it's the subject of his essay "Love It or Leave It." It's heartbreaking, actually--I spent most of the time I was reading it going, "No, David, no!"Black Death is...pretty awful, but DH the intrepid reporter is fun, and he has a nice little victorious moment at the end. He's also given the awful task of having to run through a hospital, pounding on doors, screaming, "It's the PLAGUE!" But, um. Intrepid reporter?
First Monday was physically painful a lot of the time (the abortion episode? omg, gag) but Julian...I don't know, man. He fascinates me.
Thanks for the feedback!
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also, this was great. mmm, politics and julian and repression and david hewlett. mmm.
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And, to be honest, I do understand it. If you're fundamentally a Republican in economic and foreign policy matters, frinstance, you're not going to cross the floor just because of who you sleep with.
Well, I understand it as well as I understand anyone voting Republican.
Yay trinityfic! :):):) This was cool. Yay!
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This fic is very good. Painful like my favorite XMen fic, but more hopeful.