BDL #59 - Labyrinth
Jan. 27th, 2006 04:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kittydesadeTitle: The Real World
Fandom: Labyrinth
Characters: Sarah and Jareth
Word Count: 550
Rating: PG
Summary: College isn't exactly the real world, but it's still too Real for Sarah.
Years later the magic age wasn’t fifteen but twenty one, and she had celebrated her birthday with a bottle of wine and a gazebo lost to the depths of the college campus. She had only gone to college, she felt, because it was expected of her. All that knowledge gained and here she was still doing what was expected.
Sarah took another drink from the bottle and felt decadent. She swigged it, because she could and because it made her feel like some sort of bohemian artiste in a movie suffering in the throes of angst for some as-yet undiscovered purpose. Fantasy was becoming infinitely better than her dull reality, and while she knew that wasn’t the least bit uncommon she wanted to be special. She had been special, once. Maybe that was what differentiated her from all the other spoiled young men and women out there who wanted to be the only one in the world who could do, or say, or be one thing.
“You had the chance, you stupid girl,” she told herself. The bottle crossed over from one side to the other, strangled by the neck although not yet dead, and her arms wrapped her knees close to her chest. “You had your chance to be special and you blew it.”
Well, she hadn’t blown it, precisely. She had traded it away for home and safety and her baby brother. Two of them she now realized she could have done without, but she didn’t regret Toby.
Well, not much.
Toby was seven, now. Old enough for her to be glad she spent most of her time at college, young enough to be adorable when she went home for visits. He wouldn’t have grown up that way if she’d left him with the Goblin King.
She wouldn’t be spending thousands of dollars on a useless education that bored her to tears if she’d left with the Goblin King.
It wasn’t useless. She had to remind herself that a good education would get her a better job someday. That was the way it was supposed to work. Except things only worked the way they were supposed to in fantasy-land, she’d learned. Be good, do well, and you will be rewarded. Don’t stray off the path, say the magic words. In real life things weren’t so simple.
The magic words had worked for Toby. Would they work for her? Did it work that way?
“I wish the Goblin King would come and take me away,” she whispered, looking up at the sky as though she’d neglected her homework for it.
“Right now.”
“Why, Sarah.”
She turned. He was standing as he’d always stood, with his arms loosely folded over his chest and that amused, annoying smirk on his lips. His hair slipped through the breeze as he cocked his head at her, examining.
“All you ever had to do was ask.”
Her hand fit in his, as though it had been prearranged. She looked up at her prince, her King. And she was his Queen, she realized, with no giddiness but a sense of something falling into place. That’s what she should have been, always. Well, now she’d fix it.
“Well?” she asked, after a moment. “What are you waiting for?”
He smiled, and whisked her into the dance.
Fandom: Labyrinth
Characters: Sarah and Jareth
Word Count: 550
Rating: PG
Summary: College isn't exactly the real world, but it's still too Real for Sarah.
Years later the magic age wasn’t fifteen but twenty one, and she had celebrated her birthday with a bottle of wine and a gazebo lost to the depths of the college campus. She had only gone to college, she felt, because it was expected of her. All that knowledge gained and here she was still doing what was expected.
Sarah took another drink from the bottle and felt decadent. She swigged it, because she could and because it made her feel like some sort of bohemian artiste in a movie suffering in the throes of angst for some as-yet undiscovered purpose. Fantasy was becoming infinitely better than her dull reality, and while she knew that wasn’t the least bit uncommon she wanted to be special. She had been special, once. Maybe that was what differentiated her from all the other spoiled young men and women out there who wanted to be the only one in the world who could do, or say, or be one thing.
“You had the chance, you stupid girl,” she told herself. The bottle crossed over from one side to the other, strangled by the neck although not yet dead, and her arms wrapped her knees close to her chest. “You had your chance to be special and you blew it.”
Well, she hadn’t blown it, precisely. She had traded it away for home and safety and her baby brother. Two of them she now realized she could have done without, but she didn’t regret Toby.
Well, not much.
Toby was seven, now. Old enough for her to be glad she spent most of her time at college, young enough to be adorable when she went home for visits. He wouldn’t have grown up that way if she’d left him with the Goblin King.
She wouldn’t be spending thousands of dollars on a useless education that bored her to tears if she’d left with the Goblin King.
It wasn’t useless. She had to remind herself that a good education would get her a better job someday. That was the way it was supposed to work. Except things only worked the way they were supposed to in fantasy-land, she’d learned. Be good, do well, and you will be rewarded. Don’t stray off the path, say the magic words. In real life things weren’t so simple.
The magic words had worked for Toby. Would they work for her? Did it work that way?
“I wish the Goblin King would come and take me away,” she whispered, looking up at the sky as though she’d neglected her homework for it.
“Right now.”
“Why, Sarah.”
She turned. He was standing as he’d always stood, with his arms loosely folded over his chest and that amused, annoying smirk on his lips. His hair slipped through the breeze as he cocked his head at her, examining.
“All you ever had to do was ask.”
Her hand fit in his, as though it had been prearranged. She looked up at her prince, her King. And she was his Queen, she realized, with no giddiness but a sense of something falling into place. That’s what she should have been, always. Well, now she’d fix it.
“Well?” she asked, after a moment. “What are you waiting for?”
He smiled, and whisked her into the dance.