slashthedrabble | Six Months (Brokeback Mountain RPS; Jake/Heath; PG-13; #327 Echo(es)) (Reply)

Title: Six Months
Author:

ultrageekery
Fandom: Brokeback Mountain RPS
Pairing: Jake Gyllenhaal/Heath Ledger
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 500
Challenge: #327: Echo(es)
Summary: Jake is grieving.
Disclaimer: Not real.
Notes: Discusses Heath's death. This is really just for my own personal catharsis relating to his passing. First try at writing Brokeback RPF, so hopefully it's not awful. Will probably be crossposted to

wranglers at some point. Also, mods, if I could have a tag for this pairing I'd appreciate it.

When Jake gets the call, he doesn’t feel anything. Not at first, anyway.

He’s still standing there, listening to Michelle breathe (they’re both just trying to breathe) on the other end of the line, when Maggie walks in.

Jake would speak to Michelle, he would say something, anything in response to the bomb that has just been dropped, but what is there to say? Eventually Michelle shakily tells him she has more phone calls to make, and Jake nods, forgetting that she can’t see him as he hangs up and begins to cry.

Maggie taps Jake on the shoulder and he turns around, tears still coursing down his cheeks.

He doesn’t blame Maggie for looking alarmed; it’s rare for Jake to cry unless a scene requires it.

“Jake? Jake, what’s wrong?” Maggie pulls him into an embrace. Jake stands on shaky legs, immediately letting his full weight rest against his sister’s body as he sobs with abandon.

He sounds like he’s choking when he finally answers Maggie’s frantic question.

“Heath’s dead, Maggie.”

“What?” Maggie steps away from Jake in shock, lifting her hands and staring around the room. “That’s fucking crazy, Jake, are you sure—“

Jake draws in a quivering breath. He feels like his lungs have shrunk and rendered themselves entirely useless.

“Michelle called.”

It’s all he needs to say for Maggie to understand. She sinks to the floor with her hands over her mouth.

For a few minutes, they sit in shocked silence, still crying without making noise.

“This isn’t happening.” Maggie’s voice is strung tight with disbelief, with a complete lack of acceptance, like she’s trying to force an alteration to what they both know is true.

Jake doesn’t say anything. He just sobs, right there on the nice linoleum he helped Maggie and Peter pick out when they moved in together. He looks up after a minute and through the blur of tears, he can see Maggie crawling towards him. She wipes her eyes and sits next to Jake, wrapping her arms around him.

“Breathe.”

But Jake can’t; the pain of loss overwhelms everything. He has forgotten how to do anything but exist and gasp for air.

He has memories that Maggie does not share, ones he can never revisit aloud.

Every day after that is a learning process. Jake has to wake up each morning and know Heath will never again do the same.

Reminders of their passionate, too-brief love are everywhere Jake looks. He sees Heath, of course, in Matilda; the little girl has her father’s eyes. Other, seemingly little things catch him by surprise – Jake is cleaning out his closet one afternoon and finds a photo he and Heath had taken after sex; they were naked except for their boxers, wrapped in the sheets and each other’s arms.

It’s the smallest of reminders but hits Jake like a slap all the same.

Echoes of Heath, of those smoldering six months, are everywhere, and tears come unbidden with every new discovery made.