Viggo gazed up at the star studded night sky and stood very still, though his heart pounded. He looked up and knew all that he saw up there, and all that he didn't, was moving, spinning further away. The universe was expanding they said, not compacting but spreading out until one far away day earth, if she still existed, would be truly alone and everything else would be forever out of reach.
Viggo tilted his face skywards and remembered another night crowded with stars. He remembered the night when he and Sean had sat together in the New Zealand grass, close enough that their shoulders brushed, and talked of distances and orbits and the possibility of intelligent life elsewhere. He remembered when they'd sat and talked of everything except the one thing that Viggo had been really thinking about.
Viggo remembered how Sean's voice had sounded in the darkness, and he wondered now if Sean on occasion had thought of that conversation, of them sitting together in the darkness all those months ago...but what did it matter really, though, in the grand scheme of things? It didn't, not when the planets spun uncaring along their curving invisible orbits, not when the stars were fanning out and becoming even more lonely. Not when he'd let so many chances drift by.
Viggo had held his feelings for Sean secret for some time and he thought now, as he looked up at the dark, star specked sky, that his yearnings meant less than nothing compared to the whole of things, as if one person could even comprehend such a thing. A blink of time and he would be less than dust and Sean with him and no one would live that remembered them. The earth would one day spin herself out, after the freeze as her sun burned cold, and in the time from now until then, what did it really matter, if Viggo let Sean drift away, if he let the fire die out.
Viggo gazed upwards and knew: it meant everything, and that was the beauty of impermanence. He didn't have to worry about the big picture. He gave meaning to what he chose, and Viggo gave the place that Sean held in his heart true, expansive meaning, as expansive as the fields of stars above him. As expansive, varied and beautiful as all the strange mysterious places he knew existed out there, and would never see or touch, except perhaps with his brush, or his paints, or his words.
With that thought Viggo said his goodnights to the dark sky with its winking stars, left them to expand and hurtle away from him and everything else. He walked across the lawn, soles of his bare feet prickled by the dew damp grass, back to his empty house where all was quiet and still, where his blank canvas that had driven him outside still stared expectantly. The sight of the unmarked square threatened to shake his confidence, but the lights were on in the kitchen and the varnished wooden bones of his home glowed warm and welcoming beneath them, and the phone mounted on the wall beside the refrigerator seemed less threatening than it had yesterday.
It was easier than he'd imagined to pick up the handset and dial the number. Sean's voice promptly answered on the other end, despite the time difference, and without seeing Sean's face Viggo knew that he was smiling. Viggo could hear it in Sean's voice and he found himself itching to know what had brought the smile, or who. Viggo knew too, suddenly, that his orbit had been fixed all along and now was the rare, anticipated time where he was finally aligning with Sean, who was on the other side of the world, because when Viggo said hello the smile in Sean's voice sounded brighter.
Viggo blurted the invitation to Idaho without thinking, heart pounding. Sean laughed abruptly, then accepted the invite and his voice sounded so very warm that Viggo shivered. Then time might as well not have passed as they talked quietly with one another. They talked contentedly about matching up insane schedules and what had been happening in one another's lives, about everything except stars and planets and impossibly empty distances.
It was much, much later when Viggo slid into bed, eyes heavy and lips smiling. He lay still and listened to the quiet night, imagined that through the white noise of silence he could hear the stars wheeling above his home, expanding, flying apart, saying their good-byes with wordless, cosmic celestial music.
Soon he slept and dreamed, not of starfields, beautiful and terrible with their mysteries and loneliness, or of sorrowful suns and moons singing farewells. Instead he dreamed of green eyes and a familiar, brilliant smile, of fair hair dark with sweat, of fair skin flushed from his kisses.
Viggo fell asleep to thoughts of Sean and slept peacefully, cradled in warm dreams as the dawn broke golden over the mountains, flooded the sky with sunlight that blinded the stars, washed back the night, and began a new day.
Summary: Viggo stargazes.
Rated: PG
Categories: Actor RPS Pairing: Sean/Viggo
Warnings: NoneChallenges:
Series: NoneChapters: 1 Completed: Yes
Word count: 850 Read: 800
Published: 30 Jul 2009 Updated: 30 Jul 2009