Pictures of you - 3/?

[ancabell.livejournal.com]

TITLE: Pictures of you - 3/?
AUTHOR: Anca Bell
PAIRING: V/O
DISCLAIMER: This really happened. except not.
NOTES: The title is taken from the amazing Cure song by the same name.

Liv and Viggo come into the house, laughing, but the laughing stops abruptly the minute they see Orlando holding the receiver as if it’s his worst enemy. Viggo walks over to Orlando on the couch and softly puts the receiver down. Orlando blinks, once, twice.

Liv thinks, if he isn’t going to cry now, he wont ever. It’s just the way he is. She sits by him, pets his leg. He looks down, at the coffee table, at the carpet, anything inanimate. Viggo feels strange and completely awkward in his own house. Liv looks up at him, and he shrugs.

Suddenly Orlando lunges himself at her, holding her forcefully in his arms. He says “thank you” softly, and closes his eyes.

Viggo kneels by the both of them and caresses his hair. He watches Orlando and thinks he’s become too fragile for his own good. He was never quite like this.

Time passes and Viggo sits on the couch next to Orlando, switches the TV on, anything to take his mind of this mess. They watch TV in silence, until Orlando falls asleep on Liv’s shoulder. She doesn’t want to wake him up. He looks so peaceful. She watches Viggo carefully, the way his eyes are glued to the TV set, but his hand is rubbing soft circles on Orlando’s shoulder.

“How long?”
He startles at her voice.
“What?”
“How long?”
He watches her, she watches Orlando.

“Oh…5 years I guess.” He tries to be nonchalant about it. For a minute there, he almost succeeds.
“You’re crazy.” Her brows furrow in sympathy.
“I know.” He smiles.

Orlando wakes up. The lights are still on, and for a minute he tries to figure out on whose couch he’s sleeping. Then, oh, it’s all coming back.

He gets up from the couch and watches through the windows, at the people partying on the beach. He wonders if he’s alone in this house. He decides to call for Viggo or Liv and he hears a muffled answer that they’re in the room down the hall.

They’re sitting on the floor, a large box in front of them, and Liv is thumbing through numerous pictures.

Viggo looks up, asks if he's feeling better. Orlando doesn’t answer, just sits with them on the floor. He starts to look at some of the pictures. They are all from the filming. Some are funny pictures, some really rude, some just groups of people huddled together for group shots, smiles on their faces as if the camera caught them while on holiday.

Liv says, “Oh look, we made him smile.” And Orlando looks up at them and sticks his tongue out.
“Why are all these here?” he asks.
“I just thought it would be nice to bring some of these photographs to the reunion. Memories.”

“Great idea”, he becomes enthusiastic before he gets a chance to stop himself. And it’s so good. “You could, bring these along tomorrow, people will love them!”

Viggo and Liv smile wide at him and he feels proud. Viggo asks if they want coffee and they say yes, so Liv and Viggo get up to make it.

Orlando keeps thumbing through pictures, takes some out of the large box, and studies each one carefully as if he is looking through his own history. And he is.
He spots a sizable amount of pictures, bound with gray paper, on which it says “Orli”.

He doesn’t quite understand what on earth possesses him, but he takes the bundle and puts it in his jeans pocket. He’s only borrowing, he’ll give them back tomorrow.

But he wants to look at them alone.