Chapter Text
September 1946
John closes the door with a soft click and drops his weight against it heavily. He’s tired in a way that makes his bones feel weighed down and his movements slow and syrupy. But, he’s home now.
Despite the warnings from a well meaning realtor, he’d bought this house and now it’s his. And, with the door shut firmly behind him and keys in hand he can—well. Relax, he supposes
He had come here, to the godforsaken middle of nowhere, to disappear. To try to distance himself from the memories, and the eyes he could always feel on him, and the disappointment that inevitably appears on people’s faces if he sticks around long enough.
John hasn’t bothered to pick up any food and he’s too tired to unpack his belongings from the back of his truck. Really, he doesn’t need much other than the bottle of whiskey clutched in one hand and the pack of cigarettes in his jacket pocket.
The house didn’t come with much in the way of furniture, but there’s a single armchair in the otherwise empty front room. With nothing better to do, he shuffles over to it and slumps down.
It’s dark, aside from the moonlight filtering in through the open front window, and entirely silent. He scrapes a hand down his face tiredly, stubble catching on his skin, and sits for a few minutes, face cradled in his hands and elbows on his knees.
John spares a thought to the warnings of strange noises and items disappearing without a trace, but in the still darkness he finds it hard to imagine any sort of noise or movement in this place. And isn’t that what he’s looking for? A quiet place where no one will bother him or expect anything from him at all.
He settles back in the chair and cracks open the bottle, not bothering with a glass. Not that he has one anyway. But it feels better to pretend that it’s a decision he’s making and not something that most would see as yet another failure to adapt. To start a life.
The more he drinks, the less that weighs on him—expectations slipping away. Feeling pleasantly floaty, he places the bottle on the floor and drops his head back, closing his eyes. For a second, he thinks he hears soft footsteps scraping gently on the hardwood, but that’s ridiculous. He is alone, and he’s so tired.
What feels like no time passes before he’s jerking awake, covered in cold sweat. His legs are tangled in something and he starts to panic before looking down, his eyes catching on a knit throw blanket tucked around his legs. It’s still dark outside, but there’s no mistaking it even in the dim light. He’s not entirely sure how much of the whiskey he’d had, but he’s still sure that he’s never seen this blanket before. And even more sure that it hadn’t been there when he fell asleep. So.
He doesn’t really want to entertain the rumors about the house, but the alternative is that he’d completely blacked out and somehow found this blanket in the empty house. And that…isn’t something he’s willing to consider. He knows he isn’t doing well, but he’d like to think he still has some semblance of control.
But, this doesn’t quite fit in with the stories he’d been told in hushed tones. John had already been set on the house—it was cheap and secluded and the owner was willing to part with it quickly. And anyway, the efforts to warn him away had seemed half-hearted at best—as if at this point they were so desperate to be rid of the place that it didn’t really matter what sort of person was buying it.
But this? If it isn’t the product of his slipping grasp on reality, it’s oddly sweet. Or maybe he’s still drunk. Deciding to untangle his thoughts about it later, he leans back in the chair and lets himself drift again.
John wakes again to harsh sunlight slanting through the window directly into his eyes. His mouth feels like it’s full of cotton and his head is pounding. With a groan, he gets up and stumbles to the bathroom. Not willing to bother with the shower yet, he twists the cold tap and shoves his head into the sink. It doesn’t help his headache, but it makes him feel slightly more alert. As he stares at himself in the mirror over the sink, curly hair dripping water into his eyes, he catches a flash of a face behind him. Blue eyes and a strong jaw and—Fuck. He’s losing it.
Okay. Okay. So the blanket is still there but his whiskey is nowhere to be found. Given the headache still pounding behind his eyes and the lingering nausea, the whiskey had definitely been there last night. And even if he’d finished it without remembering that he had, the empty bottle should still be somewhere.
John looks around the mostly empty room hoping to see that he’d just kicked it across the floor, but there’s nothing. He wonders again if maybe he’d just blacked out last night. Could he have left it somewhere else?
The house is a single floor with only a handful of rooms so he quickly takes a look around, but there’s no sign of it and also no indication of where the blanket could have come from.
John feels like he should be scared. Scared that either he’s starting to have strange gaps in his memory, or that he’s somehow not alone in his house.
Or perhaps scared that if his house is haunted, apparently the best way to scare him off is to try to keep him warm and hide his whiskey. Maybe his house is onto something.
He runs his fingers through his damp hair and decides that he isn’t going to worry about it. He needs to shower, and unpack his truck, and head into town for more whiskey. And food—he probably should take care of that too.
John sits in the armchair again, unopened bottle of whiskey on the floor beside him in an almost perfect replica of the previous night. He’d managed to take care of unloading his truck and setting up the bedroom, and he’s picked up enough groceries to last him at least a few days.
He lets the satisfaction of completing a task, even a small one, wash over him. It feels good for a brief moment, but with food in the house, a bed set up to sleep in, and no real responsibilities, he doesn’t have anything left to focus on.
He feels the things he’s been avoiding thinking about start to creep in on the periphery of his mind and moves to reach for the whiskey.
Just as his hand starts to twitch upwards, the bottle next to his feet shatters. Dark liquid flows outward from the pile of glass and he stares dumbfounded, his mouth open slightly.
Completely shocked, he isn’t sure what he should be feeling. Scared? Maybe, but the tiny flicker of fear he can feel trying to build is slippery and he isn’t able to latch onto it. Angry? But he hasn’t really been able to feel anger in a long time. Defeated. Yeah—he has absolutely no idea what had just happened or how to make sense of it, but it doesn’t really matter, does it? He’s here, sitting alone in the dark, and now he doesn't have anything to drink.
John fumbles in his pockets for his cigarettes and pulls one out, lighting it quickly and shoving it between his lips. He rests his chin in his palm, leaning onto one thigh and staring into the corner of the room.
He keeps breathing and deliberately avoiding thinking about anything until he feels something touch his shoulder gently. He jerks his head to the side, but there’s nothing there. He closes his eyes and breathes and avoids and lets the night slip away.