Jason Compson IV (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
whatisay) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thecapitol2015-08-03 09:50 am
whatisay) wrote in thecapitol2015-08-03 09:50 am
Entry tags:
Shame Can't Be the Home Where You Live [Open]
WHO| Jason and semi-open
WHAT| Caroline Compson dies and Jason exists in the aftermath.
WHEN| At least a week prior to reaping for the mini-Arena.
WHERE| Compson Manor
WARNINGS| Death, grief, emotional repression.
Jason stops coming to work on Monday, with no more warning than a text to Swann saying can't drive you today and a text to Peggy home from work. After that he lets his phone battery run down, and the few messages that get in before it dies pile up in his voicemail or inbox. He doesn't contact his coworkers, nor does he cancel the meetings with Sponsors he was supposed to be present for.
The servants are all fired. Jason tells them to vacate the premises but they don't, for two main reasons: the first being that they doubt, validly, that Jason would keep Benjamin and the horses fed and cared for, even for a few days, and the second being that Jason doesn't even seem to notice that they're there. He grabs a whole pack of caps for his vaporizer and takes up a sort of vigil on the couch in the moldy, once-beautiful living room, and smokes, at first with a kind of furious intensity and then out of a mechanical inertia, as if it's easier to just keep refilling the cap and staying where he is than to get up and perform any of the many tasks that have laid themselves out at his feet.
When night falls he doesn't even get up to turn on the light, just sitting there on the couch until sleep ambushes him and then retreats in the morning. Freedom is a ball and chain that keeps him stuck here. A few times he feels something like a fist twisting in his gut and he gets up, paces, runs his hands through his hair (which has gotten greasy and lank), and actually putting his body in motion helps to release that tension. His eyes sting and so he smokes more and tries to sleep again, passing between waking and resting with little acknowledgment for when he crosses each border.
Outside the gate stays closed, accessible only by fingerprint or intercomming to the house. The potholes and rotten belongings in the yard stay where they are, leaving patches of brown, muddy, dead grass underneath them if removed. The whole building sags a bit, as if it were sighing.
Jason's out of work for five days.
-/-
In the news, there's an obituary with ebullient recitations of the virtues no one who knew Caroline would ever say she had. It goes on to say that she's survived by her one son, Jason, as if Benjamin were shuffled out of reality when he was corralled up on the property, excised from the collective memory of the public.
WHAT| Caroline Compson dies and Jason exists in the aftermath.
WHEN| At least a week prior to reaping for the mini-Arena.
WHERE| Compson Manor
WARNINGS| Death, grief, emotional repression.
Jason stops coming to work on Monday, with no more warning than a text to Swann saying can't drive you today and a text to Peggy home from work. After that he lets his phone battery run down, and the few messages that get in before it dies pile up in his voicemail or inbox. He doesn't contact his coworkers, nor does he cancel the meetings with Sponsors he was supposed to be present for.
The servants are all fired. Jason tells them to vacate the premises but they don't, for two main reasons: the first being that they doubt, validly, that Jason would keep Benjamin and the horses fed and cared for, even for a few days, and the second being that Jason doesn't even seem to notice that they're there. He grabs a whole pack of caps for his vaporizer and takes up a sort of vigil on the couch in the moldy, once-beautiful living room, and smokes, at first with a kind of furious intensity and then out of a mechanical inertia, as if it's easier to just keep refilling the cap and staying where he is than to get up and perform any of the many tasks that have laid themselves out at his feet.
When night falls he doesn't even get up to turn on the light, just sitting there on the couch until sleep ambushes him and then retreats in the morning. Freedom is a ball and chain that keeps him stuck here. A few times he feels something like a fist twisting in his gut and he gets up, paces, runs his hands through his hair (which has gotten greasy and lank), and actually putting his body in motion helps to release that tension. His eyes sting and so he smokes more and tries to sleep again, passing between waking and resting with little acknowledgment for when he crosses each border.
Outside the gate stays closed, accessible only by fingerprint or intercomming to the house. The potholes and rotten belongings in the yard stay where they are, leaving patches of brown, muddy, dead grass underneath them if removed. The whole building sags a bit, as if it were sighing.
Jason's out of work for five days.
-/-
In the news, there's an obituary with ebullient recitations of the virtues no one who knew Caroline would ever say she had. It goes on to say that she's survived by her one son, Jason, as if Benjamin were shuffled out of reality when he was corralled up on the property, excised from the collective memory of the public.
no subject
"I'm not doing anything." She says it calmly, almost dull, and rubs at the corner of her eye, pushing hard at the bone under her skin. "It's fine. I don't know why we're still thinking about it. No kids, no marriage, whatever. It's fine. We're both too busy anyway."
no subject
"No, I mean the shutting down and being sad. Please, Swann. I didn't mean it. I was just running my mouth. These are things we can talk about in a few years. Don't shut down on me right now." He started out this morning feeling alive for the first time in a week, ready to go fly kites with her and not spend the entire day holed up in his decaying house staring at the vapor trails of his cigarette against a water-stained wall.
He's not the type to plead, but he's already relinquished pride to her a hundred times.
"Please, Swann."
no subject
"I'm not... can I just have a minute, Jason?" she asks, squeezing her eyes shut for a moment. "I know you didn't mean it, but I kind of just need to recoup, okay? That's all."
no subject
He rubs at the bridge of his nose and then at his temple.
no subject
She'll never understand him, never understand how a man who's so perpetually upset and angry at everything can be so bad at empathizing when other people have those same feelings. How he doesn't get that she can't just instantly flick back like a switch right now.
no subject
"Alright. Fine. Feel better."
It's less a suggestion than nearly a command. He takes a deep, shaky breath and chews at his tongue. They continue in silence until they reach that part of the mountain on which they first kissed, where they'll fly the kites now.
no subject
"All right!"
no subject
"I thought the weather would be better."
no subject
Swann reaches for her kite, flashes him a smile. "And it's still early."
no subject
Pascal starts clawing up a tree and Marcel retrieves a small stick he wants Swann to throw. Jason takes it from him and tosses it aside, and Marcel fetches it, bumping against Jason's ankles for more attention.
no subject
Swann takes her kite and runs with it, bodily lifted when it catches the wind, and then it's in the air, sailing above her and glinting gold in the sunlight that weakly creeps through the clouds.
no subject
He thinks of going with that kite, up into the air, free from all of mortal suffering, and something in him lightens again. He realizes, not consciously but on some level beneath thinking, that he has so much less to tie him here than he used to.
The slightest smile comes to his face, and he goes out with his own kite to join Swann.