Heathrow Airport, September 2007
There was a special kind of hatred that Viggo had for press junkets and promotions for movies. A lumpy, bitter, heavy thing that liked to sit at the back of his throat and seeped into his lungs and poison his blood whenever he was rushed from place to place by publicists and agents and journalists, asked the same questions over and over again. It was something that nearly choked the breath out of him when he looked out of a car and saw the beautiful sights of Madrid-Paris-Prague-London-whatever and he couldn't get out and take pictures because he needed to be somewhere five minutes ago or something as asinine as that.
But it was a part of life. There were many things that were part of life that Viggo disliked and held a grudge towards, beginning with the odd sensation that time was slipping like sand through his hands all the damn time, and ending with the stronger irritation about rude and selfish people who couldn't see past their own noses and who were paid too much for their own egos. Things like that. It wasted time thinking about it, but it wasn't as if Viggo didn't have far too much time to waste.
He was sitting in Heathrow, waiting for a twice-delayed plane that would take him to LAX, and looking out of the floor-length windows to the dark and grey London city.
Sean lived here, Viggo thought suddenly. Somewhere, within the grey-darkness, was Sean's home. Viggo had never been there. They had made plans, in New Zealand. Viggo made his promises to let Sean ride his horses at the ranch. Sean had offered to let him see his garden and taste the vegetables and herbs that grew in them. Viggo still remembered the way Sean's eyes lit up, his eyes like green will-o'-the-wisp underneath the unpolluted, bright New Zealand skies, his hands waving around and splashing beer on their laps and on the ground. Sean had rattled off names that Viggo didn't remember now; herbs like rosemary and dill and parsley and flowers like roses. He had gone and on for ages, and Viggo had eventually stopped paying attention to his words and focused only on the cadence of his voice. On his lips.
Viggo didn't take a picture of that night. But that was fine. He remembered it perfectly.
Sean's home couldn't be more than an hour away from here. A whole hour away, and yet Viggo was trapped here, behind this glass waiting for a plane to take him further away. There was something frankly bitter and ironic about this, but Viggo had been lingering for too long on unproductive thoughts--
"Vig?"
So long that he was starting to hallucinate Sean's voice. Viggo blinked, peeling himself away from the window. He almost turned around, but it couldn't be. What would Sean be doing in the airport lounge at this time? It was ridiculously late; late enough that Vincent and David had both gone to bed at the adjacent hotel. There was no reason for Sean to be here. Viggo had to be dreaming.
"Viggo? Viggo Mortensen, is that you, you wanker?"
Now the voice had gotten a little rough, a little rude. Viggo blinked, finally turning around and- there Sean was. There Sean was, standing in the cold sterility of Heathrow's airport, his skin unnaturally white underneath the stark lighting. His hair was in that awkward stage between 'cropped short' and 'normal, I guess', and a few strands fell into his eyes. Sean brushed them away impatiently, and Viggo finally noticed that he was standing behind a trolley loaded with a couple of bags. He blinked again, and for a single moment, he felt curiously displaced.
He felt like Aragorn, stumbled into a strange land, looking at a dead man's face.
"My Steward."
The words stumbled out of him, and Sean's face seemed to- shift. Change, suddenly, brows coming together into a frown. His hands clenched into fists before he relaxed them, and he shook his head a little.
"Crazy bugger," he muttered, but there was something in his eyes that Viggo couldn't understand completely. It wasn't the same thing that was there during that scene, when Boromir was splayed out on the forest floor with arrows sticking out of his body, looking up at Viggo with his lips blue and his eyes pleading for a promise, for some sort of assurance that only Aragorn could give. But it was similar, nonetheless. As if it was Boromir asking, rather than Sean.
Viggo took a deep breath and shook his head, hard. Rubbed a hand across his eyes slightly, dragged it down his face. Maybe he hadn't slept for too long.
"What are you doing here?"
"Waiting for a plane," Sean said, and his smile was a little lopsided. There were secrets hidden at the edges, because Sean had never been particularly good at hiding. Whenever he had secrets, he broadcasted the fact with every smile, every shrug, every look in his eyes.
Viggo didn't ask.
"I- have a hotel room," he said instead, and waved a hand slightly to the right. The hotel's to the left, so his hand froze in mid-air and he changed hands, and did that gesture again. It wasn't his fault. He wasn't planning on going up anyway-- "Mine won't be here until the morning, so if you have to wait as long--"
"I'll come up," Sean said, there now there was an invitation in his voice and his eyes. Maybe Viggo had hallucinated it. Maybe he was still stuck to the window, watching all this unfold behind the back of his eyelids in an attempt to not stare at his own reflection. Or maybe it was real, and his thoughts had summoned Sean somehow, as if he was a distorted sort of a genie.
Viggo didn't remember bringing Sean back to the hotel room. If pressed, he would admit that he didn't even realise that he knew the way. His senses were fixed onto Sean: on the look of him, on his smell - musk that was slightly tainted by the sour smell of sweat and the aftershave of the air-conditioner, of far too many hours spent on a plane - of the sound of his footsteps, of the briefest touch of him and his clothes that brushed against Viggo as he trudged his way beside Sean. If he stuck his tongue out, he knew he could taste Sean. He didn't.
The bags were in the room, dropped off by the porter. The door was locked, the boy tipped, and Sean had his hands in his pockets, watching Viggo. And Viggo had a single second to remember that he was a brief, short year away from his half-century before Sean had slammed him against the door. The door knob caused a sharp spike of pain to explode at the base of his spine, but Viggo ignored it, his eyes wide as he looked at Sean. No-
"Aragorn," Boromir said, his voice low, breath ghosting against the skin of Viggo's jaw. This felt wrong, Viggo felt, dizzily. They were both clean-shaven, and that was wrong. Wrong, but he ignored it, slipping back into Aragorn's mind and body. After this long, Aragorn had become like a second skin. He had dreamt Aragorn's dreams, and spoken his thoughts without need of a script. Aragorn lived inside him, and Viggo ceded himself.
"My Steward," he said again, and his voice almost trembled. He cupped his face against Boromir- against Sean, and he kissed him hard. Felt their skin brushed against each other and ignored that sensation, that reminder. Swallowed Boromir's My King with a smile before he pushed him away with both hands, and started nudging him towards the bed.
There was something that Sean needed here, and that was why he was Boromir. Viggo looked at him and he couldn't be Aragorn, not entirely- because Aragorn didn't want this. Not Boromir in his bed. Just Boromir alive, standing and fighting by his side. Aragorn had too much to think about to ever want Boromir- or Viggo simply thought that because he didn't want his own want for Sean to mix in with the character. It had been nearly ten years since they had made those movies and yet the tangle within Viggo's thoughts still had not straightened themselves out.
Maybe it was because he was afraid of what he might find beneath that particular tangled ball of yarn. Maybe he was simply thinking too much.
He sank his hands into Sean's hair, and pressed him into the bed. There was another part of him that didn't want this; didn't want to be able to kiss Sean and to touch him and make love- to fuck him as someone else. But Sean was kissing him back, his mouth hot against his own, arching up underneath him and the spread of his legs was commanding and insistent, and Viggo couldn't help but give in.
Gave in.
The look in Sean's eyes was Boromir's throughout, and he let loose with his voice, roaring like a warrior as he came, his legs wrapped around Viggo's waist, bucking underneath him. Crashing their lips together until their mouths were bruised. (There would be cameras tomorrow.) But Viggo- Viggo, who was so famous for disappearing into his roles, couldn't keep hold of Aragorn. He couldn't let go of himself, not when he had to watch Sean. Watch and remember each and every sight of him, like photographs stored in his mind:
Sean with gritted teeth, the tendons on his neck standing out. His legs shaved and spread and hot beneath Viggo's hands, and he was tight around Viggo's fingers. There was a flush to his skin, and his nipples were tight, small buds, standing out sharply against the pink-paleness of his chest.
A hand pressed over Sean's mouth, with his back arched upwards. Caught in a middle of a gasp, the sound hovering in the air, full of desperation that Boromir would never voice. Viggo was seated deep inside him. The first thrust. Sean's fingers were leaving red marks on Viggo's arms. His eyes were so green. So very, very green.
Sean's lips parted, almost as if forming a name. It might start with a C, or a V, or an S, or something else entirely. It didn't matter. Despite Boromir's previous roars, the shout was soundless. Sean's stomach muscles jumped under Viggo's hand. Viggo's eyes were fixated on the jump of the pulse on his throat, and Sean's heartbeat was roaring underneath his own hand. Trembling skin. Sean's eyes were closed, and Viggo ached to see them.
When Sean opened his eyes, he was Sean again. They kissed, and it was almost perfunctory as Viggo pulled out and fell to the side. His breath was loud in the empty room. Sean's smile was kind, and Viggo felt like he had failed a test somehow. Did he reveal more than he should? Was Sean repulsed by what he saw- no. No, that wasn't it, was it? The answer was much simpler.
It wasn't Viggo Sean had wanted. It was Aragorn, and Viggo couldn't find him. He didn't manage to sink himself into Aragorn's character and give Boromir what he wanted.
Sean was making to move off the bed, and Viggo grabbed onto his wrist.
"Stay," he said. Or he thought he said, because his mouth moved but he could not make a sound. There was a tightness around his chest that stopped his voice within his lungs.
Sean's hand curved against his cheek.
"I'm just headin' ta the bathroom," he said, and there was a little amusement in his eyes. Viggo kissed him again, and it took everything he had to keep the kiss chaste. Soft against Sean's lips, instead of delving in and claiming every corner again like he had barely five minutes ago. He knew now it didn't work.
Viggo didn't know when he fell asleep. But when he woke, he had twelve text messages from David, the flight was arriving in an hour, and Sean was gone.
The bed was cold.
The next time they met, it was during the Empire Awards. Sean clapped him on the back and smiled and they laughed like nothing had changed. Viggo tried to make-believe the same, but he hadn't painted since then. The reason was simple.
He just couldn't find a shade that could do justice to the colour of Sean's eyes.
Summary: Viggo should never have a chance to be thankful that a flight was delayed. But he was. He was, and that's how fate was.
Rated: R
Categories: Actor RPS Pairing: Sean/Viggo
Warnings: NoneChallenges:
Series: NoneChapters: 1 Completed: Yes
Word count: 2085 Read: 901
Published: 01 Mar 2012 Updated: 01 Mar 2012