Carol (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} amusingly_fics) wrote,@ 2007-01-01 21:00:00 |
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PRISON BREAK
How Good It Can Be
September 2007
gen, 735 words
(Tag to S2 'Map 1213')
Don’t worry about the customs police, don’t
I’ll tell you just how good it can be, this lazy summer
-The 88, How Good It Can Be
Shoes? Michael smiles, looks over at his brother with the rusted shovel weighing heavy over one shoulder. He’s almost dizzy with happiness, near giddiness, and it takes him a moment to realize that Lincoln’s first wish outside of confinement is alien in its practicality. Michael would have put his money on beer.
“Tacos,” Michael delight in adding, knowing he’d surprise Lincoln and even himself, and then gives Linc an impish grin, realizing that yeah, he would love some tacos right about now. Love anything that fit into his plan of freedom. Couldn’t get across the border fast enough, and then they wouldn’t have to get any shoes, it’d be all sand and azure blue beaches, and it’d be tacos every night for at least a--
“Ice cold beer,” Lincoln says, and Michael sighs contently to himself, because his guess was close enough, and he’d like to think that some things – the few with good memories attached, will never change.
Not that beer brought many good memories to mind. Oh, Lincoln allowing him a sip of his beer when he was eleven, and throwing back a few in college, but it wasn’t exactly a part of Michael’s life. Still, he sighed contently at the thought. Mostly, he could admit now, because Linc had changed, he had changed, and Mexico wasn’t just a place to hide out, it was somewhere they could start over. So there would be no drugs and no drunken phone calls in the middle of the night, and Michael wouldn’t be pulling Lincoln off the sidewalk and hauling him into his apartment, dragging him to the bed and trying desperately to avoid his breath.
Oh. “Toothpaste,” Michael says precisely, his mind half on his thoughts, half still playing this game with Lincoln. It’s so much, it’s too much, that everything has been successful, that Lincoln’s here and not in some chair with a bag over his head about to be electrocuted. Executed. Soon LJ would be free, and they’d be gone together, making the most of a life that they could build from scratch.
Euphoria rushes through Michael and he can’t help the chuckles that escape. It still feels strange to smile so wide, without abandon, with some part of his elaborate plan finally going the right way.
The only thing that would make it even more wonderful would be to have someone to share this with. He thinks about Sara, ignoring the twisting in his heart that just knew something wasn’t right there. Relationships weren’t built on weeks of deception, and he’d taken full advantage of her. He couldn’t fantasize about her – not now, not when he’d taken so much from her already. To do so would be an indulgence, a touch of something he could never have or deserve to, and even if he could get himself past those personal hang-ups, he wonders if they would have anything together beyond simple flirting, shy smiles and one-liners. He wonders if she’d be able to put up with him, how he would be outside prison. In his heart, he genuinely doubts it.
He’d heard that prison changed a man. Michael wonders if he’d been in prison long enough to have changed but quickly disposes of that thought, realizing he’d already had to change before going in. Probably at the very moment he chose to free Lincoln. One decision, one silly, stupid idea that opened his eyes, setting forth a cascade of events he couldn’t foresee. There’d be time later, in Panama, to debate the morality of his choices, to calculate the guilt that’d soon set down on his shoulders. Guilt that, he knew, would be present every waking moment for the rest of his life. His own personal brand of lethal injection, long-lasting.
The guilt will physically hurt, will suffocate him, and he will let it. He’ll pay for leading on Henry Pope, for setting T-Bag free, for deceiving Sara. For stealing plans from his firm, for holding up a bank, for indirectly killing so many just by trying to save his brother. Michael will feel the full scope of his culpability for indirectly hurting, and killing, so many, just to right one wrong.
But Lincoln was free, and talking about shoes and beer (surely ‘loose women’ to follow on this most wanted list), and for now Michael would concentrate on getting the money, getting to Panama, and giving Lincoln the freedom he deserved.
Even if it cost Michael his own.
--
end.
How Good It Can Be
September 2007
gen, 735 words
(Tag to S2 'Map 1213')
I’ll tell you just how good it can be, this lazy summer
-The 88, How Good It Can Be
Shoes? Michael smiles, looks over at his brother with the rusted shovel weighing heavy over one shoulder. He’s almost dizzy with happiness, near giddiness, and it takes him a moment to realize that Lincoln’s first wish outside of confinement is alien in its practicality. Michael would have put his money on beer.
“Tacos,” Michael delight in adding, knowing he’d surprise Lincoln and even himself, and then gives Linc an impish grin, realizing that yeah, he would love some tacos right about now. Love anything that fit into his plan of freedom. Couldn’t get across the border fast enough, and then they wouldn’t have to get any shoes, it’d be all sand and azure blue beaches, and it’d be tacos every night for at least a--
“Ice cold beer,” Lincoln says, and Michael sighs contently to himself, because his guess was close enough, and he’d like to think that some things – the few with good memories attached, will never change.
Not that beer brought many good memories to mind. Oh, Lincoln allowing him a sip of his beer when he was eleven, and throwing back a few in college, but it wasn’t exactly a part of Michael’s life. Still, he sighed contently at the thought. Mostly, he could admit now, because Linc had changed, he had changed, and Mexico wasn’t just a place to hide out, it was somewhere they could start over. So there would be no drugs and no drunken phone calls in the middle of the night, and Michael wouldn’t be pulling Lincoln off the sidewalk and hauling him into his apartment, dragging him to the bed and trying desperately to avoid his breath.
Oh. “Toothpaste,” Michael says precisely, his mind half on his thoughts, half still playing this game with Lincoln. It’s so much, it’s too much, that everything has been successful, that Lincoln’s here and not in some chair with a bag over his head about to be electrocuted. Executed. Soon LJ would be free, and they’d be gone together, making the most of a life that they could build from scratch.
Euphoria rushes through Michael and he can’t help the chuckles that escape. It still feels strange to smile so wide, without abandon, with some part of his elaborate plan finally going the right way.
The only thing that would make it even more wonderful would be to have someone to share this with. He thinks about Sara, ignoring the twisting in his heart that just knew something wasn’t right there. Relationships weren’t built on weeks of deception, and he’d taken full advantage of her. He couldn’t fantasize about her – not now, not when he’d taken so much from her already. To do so would be an indulgence, a touch of something he could never have or deserve to, and even if he could get himself past those personal hang-ups, he wonders if they would have anything together beyond simple flirting, shy smiles and one-liners. He wonders if she’d be able to put up with him, how he would be outside prison. In his heart, he genuinely doubts it.
He’d heard that prison changed a man. Michael wonders if he’d been in prison long enough to have changed but quickly disposes of that thought, realizing he’d already had to change before going in. Probably at the very moment he chose to free Lincoln. One decision, one silly, stupid idea that opened his eyes, setting forth a cascade of events he couldn’t foresee. There’d be time later, in Panama, to debate the morality of his choices, to calculate the guilt that’d soon set down on his shoulders. Guilt that, he knew, would be present every waking moment for the rest of his life. His own personal brand of lethal injection, long-lasting.
The guilt will physically hurt, will suffocate him, and he will let it. He’ll pay for leading on Henry Pope, for setting T-Bag free, for deceiving Sara. For stealing plans from his firm, for holding up a bank, for indirectly killing so many just by trying to save his brother. Michael will feel the full scope of his culpability for indirectly hurting, and killing, so many, just to right one wrong.
But Lincoln was free, and talking about shoes and beer (surely ‘loose women’ to follow on this most wanted list), and for now Michael would concentrate on getting the money, getting to Panama, and giving Lincoln the freedom he deserved.
Even if it cost Michael his own.
--
end.
