Title: Freezing Air (1/1)
Author: Rhiannon Langly (fmacgirl@yahoo.com)
Rating: PG (one little bit of language)
Summary: Another Byers vignette, after "Amor Ausente."
Archive: Countermeasures, Gossamer, e-mail anywhere
else.
Spoilers: The Darkness Within series...Do read it
first, or this will make no sense.
Disclaimer: You know the Chris Carter/1013 drill by
now.

-----
He's up there again.  On the roof. 

It's been like this ever since the night we got back
from North Carolina.  hen we got in, Ringo couldn't sleep.  
Again.  So he stayed up all night, and I sat with him.  No one should be
alone, not when they're the way he was feeling.

She sent him an e-mail around midnight.

The alarm went off, and I asked him if he was going to
track her.

He said he wasn't going to bother.  Understandable,
since following this woman only breeds heartache.
So he sat there, just staring into space, with the
alarm *still* going off, until the noise got to me and I turned it
off.

"Aren't you going to open it?" I asked.

He sighed, then nodded slowly.  He rubbed his eyes,
then reached for the mouse.

A click.

There were no words in the mail, only an attachment of
about seven megs or so.  An MP3 file.  After scanning, he
opened it.

We listened closely.  It was a song, about seven and a
quarter minutes long.  Obviously recorded from an analog
source...it was of less than stellar quality.

When it was done, he played it again.  And again, and
again.

Forwards, then backwards and then bits over again,
like the hippies looking for "Paul is dead."

He was trying to get some meaning from it.

I knew that Melinda would be more straight-forward, so
I copied a line of the lyrics and entered them into a search
engine.

And then I read the rest of them and was...scared, as
I realized what she was trying to say.

Langly read them too and his face turned white.  In
his words, he was "freaked shitless."

But like a man hypnotized, he couldn't stop listening
to the song.

-----

The whole experience in North Carolina made me think. 
Maybe I've been trying *too* hard to forget Susanne.  Maybe I'm
wrong about love...it'll come to me, instead of me to it.  Right
now, all I'm doing is breaking my own heart with these women that I
find in the coffee shop.

Right now, I'll stop...I'll help Langly get through
this.  Just not the way I tried to get through my issues.

Maybe, even though he's young, he knows better.
He listens to the song non-stop now, even when
working.  And then Frohike tells him to turn it off or he'll delete the
file. 

So Langly takes his laptop and the long extension
cord, and he climbs up to the roof and listens.  And he stares out
at the night sky.

He's so afraid of what will happen when she comes
back.

Because she will.  That's what the song said...

It's just a matter of *when.*

-----

You may not be as strong as me
And I may not care to teach you
It may be hard to keep up with me
But I'll always be able to reach you

refrain: And if you go forward, I'll meet you there
And if you climb up through the cold freezing air
Look down below you, search out above
And cry out to life for a frozen love

Life gave me you; the change was made
And there's no beginning over
You are not happy, but what is love?
Hate gave you me for a lover...

(refrain)

-----

FIN

-----

Author's Notes: The lyrics to "Frozen Love" are
copyright 1973 by Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham.
I normally dislike songfic.  Music plays a part in my
stories, but subtly.  However, this worked out nicely, I think.

-Rhi

http://www.envy.nu/langlified