Addicted to Love

By Silk


i have a picture
pinned to my wall
an image of you and of me
we were laughing with love in it all

look at our life now
tattered and torn
fussing and fighting
delighting
with tears that we cry until dawn

Hold Me Now-Thompson Twins



*****

The room was so fucking white that it hurt his eyes. Curt paced back and forth angrily like a jungle cat whose tail had been caught in a trap. He reached for the bottle of Scotch and upended it, managing to swig half of it by the time he was through. He wasn't drunk enough yet.

Not nearly enough.

He swiped a hand across his mouth and set the bottle down unsteadily. All of that alcohol hitting his system at once had an alarming effect on his nerves. He slammed into the Plexiglas window with both hands, his face so contorted it was barely recognizable as human, much less as him. "Fuck you! Fuck you!"

Brian winced and turned away, but Curt's eyes followed him hungrily. He sobbed and he swore, but he never left the recording booth. It was as if he knew that to confront the source of his pain would be the end of him. "Fucking motherfucker! You fucking space queen on your fucking high horse! Fuck you and your fucking henchmen!"

"I was never part of you! You were never part of me! You f-fucked-up bitch!" With those words, Curt denied his entire two-year relationship with Brian Slade. He sank to his knees behind the glass, his forehead pressed hard against the cold pane. Now he was drunk enough to do it.

Now it could be over.

The recording studio had emptied out rapidly once Curt began his drunken tirade, leaving the two former lovers alone. Curt prayed for the strength to get to his feet, but it did him little good. He clung to the wall, sliding along the too-bright interior till he reached the door. Only to be knocked down by the man he loved.

"You stupid git! What the fuck's the matter with you? First you fuck up the song...over and over and over...till I can't fucking stand it anymore. Then you fuck me over like we never meant a goddamn thing to each other!" Brian screamed, but his voice went no further than Curt's ears because of the quality of the soundproofing.

"Get up! Get up so I can hit you again!" Brian shouted, unshed tears sparkling in his light blue eyes.

Curt refused to make eye contact with him. He wasn't that good an actor. He couldn't help but whimper piteously, even though he couldn't utter a single word now if his life depended on it. But it didn't. Brian's life depended on it. So he gritted his teeth and made it convincing. A thin trickle of blood seeped from the corner of Curt's mouth. His lip was cut up. Probably by the ring that Brian wore. The one Curt gave him a year ago.

When they were still happily unaware that anything could go wrong.

He was wrong. There wasn't enough alcohol in the fucking universe to dull the pain in his heart. Curt stifled the urge to scream back at Brian. What good would it do? It would make it harder to leave him. Oh, God.

Curt managed to stagger to his feet, but he still couldn't look at Brian. He knew he would lose what little resolve he had left. Keeping his dark gray eyes fixed on the floor, he muttered, "Have a nice life, you fucking asshole."

Brian blinked. He was momentarily confused by the way Curt's voice dropped to its usual sensual growl, his wounded senses struggling to make him aware that the epithet had sounded more like...an endearment.

Curt shambled down the narrow corridor, shrugging into his long black leather coat. The metal doors protested with a loud screech as they opened to admit him to the alleyway behind the building.

"Curt!" Brian shrieked out the window. "Piss off then! Go on! Back to your wolves! Your junkie twerps! Your bloody shock treatment! And fuck you, too!"

But Curt was gone, his bootheels raggedly marking the steps he was taking away from Brian. His long blond hair streamed behind him like a tattered banner as he clung ferociously to his plan. It was the only way to ensure Brian's safety.

It was the only way to keep Brian alive.

*****

you say i'm a dreamer
we're two of a kind
both of us searching for
some perfect world
we know we'll never find

so perhaps i should leave here
yeah go far away
but you know that
there's nowhere that
i'd rather be than
with you here today

Hold Me Now-Thompson Twins


Curt barely made it around the corner and out of Brian's sight before he went down. He collapsed in a heap, his only thought never to come up for air again.

"You did well," the voice from his nightmares praised. "Better than I expected, actually." There was an indefinable laugh. "He's really quite broken up about you, you know. Pity the two of you couldn't...make it work."

Get out, get out, get out, he chanted silently, rocking back and forth. He wrapped his arms so tightly around his chest, he could barely breathe.

A hand touched the top of his head gently and Curt flinched. "Please..." he whispered, not even knowing what he was pleading for.

"Now don't forget. Your flight leaves for Berlin in the morning."

As if he sensed when his tormentor had left, Curt slumped forward till he was on all fours. He dragged in breath after shuddery breath, desperately fighting tears. If he gave in, he was lost.

He hadn't done well. He was falling apart. He couldn't hold on for very much longer. He wasn't that strong. No one was.

You never deserved love, Curt told himself. Not when you were a hopelessly fucked-up kid. Not now.

Especially not now.

Not with the taste of betrayal so fresh on his lips.

*****

Brian stared out the window at Curt's departing figure till he couldn't see him anymore. Hurt throbbed throughout his body like a raging infection. Suddenly he felt someone's eyes on him. He looked down to see his wife Mandy studying him.

With a muffled curse, he banged the window shut. He refused to let her see him cry. Not over Curt. Not over the only fucking thing that still meant anything to him.

*****

It was a long night. Sleep never came. Maybe it never would again. Near dawn, Brian stumbled to the window and splayed one hand across the dirty glass. With a gasp, he realized that he wasn't dreaming. Curt was down there, standing next to the back door of the limo.

It was clear that Curt had been there for some time. The evidence was everywhere. Cigarette butts, some long, most short, were strewn around him like pathetic castoffs, and still he continued to chain-smoke. Even as Brian watched him.

His eyes were reddened, but that could easily have been due to lack of sleep. Brian's heart clenched at the sight of him. Curt's lips visibly trembled as he pursed them around yet another cigarette, a puff away from passing out. He shouldn't have been able to see that. He had a feeling that he wasn't meant to see that, but he could feel Curt pulling away from him with a noticeable effort.

Don't go, Brian thought, his palm pressed so hard against the glass that it ached.

I can't stay, Curt responded without saying a word. He didn't have to. His tragic, kohl-smudged eyes begged for mercy where there was none. I shouldn't even be here. I'm risking everything for one last look.

Suddenly Curt threw down his cigarette and stomped it out with the heel of his boot. He disappeared inside the backseat of the limo with an uncharacteristically graceless motion.

Brian held his breath, uncertain what he was searching for, but unable to take his eyes off the long white car as it faded into the distance.

*****

tbc