More Wikipedia-based drabbles

[noelleleithe.livejournal.com]

1. Superstar

Luke tried, he really did, to be a good boyfriend and send Noah off to Los Angeles without a second thought. Noah had this amazing opportunity, and what kind of person would he be if he didn't support Noah's dreams? It was only one day out of many, and he'd be surrounded by his family the whole time.

None of that kept him from missing Noah desperately. Or, truth be told, from resenting his decision to go.


2. Trial

Noah never told Luke that he went to the courthouse the day the colonel was sentenced for his mother's murder. He sat in the back of the room, quiet and still, careful to stay out of his father's line of sight. When the jury foreman announced life without parole, Noah slipped out, never once looking back.

He had his own sentence to serve.


3. Trek

Luke dreamed of mountains the night Noah moved out of the farmhouse. He wandered among craggy rocks and outcroppings, lost and tired, not sure where he was or what he was searching for.

He woke with his hands reaching out, grasping for something that wasn't there any more.


4. Review

Noah's finished film was a winner in Luke's eyes, even if the critics didn't entirely agree. One film festival did give him an honorable mention in the first-time director category, and he got a congratulatory note from Jude Law.

Luke's congratulations were different, and given in private. It was the best award Noah ever received.


5. Logical

Noah's mind was built on rules and regulations. After 18 years with the colonel, he thought in straight lines and absolutes, reason over emotion, black and white.

Then he met Luke, and he began to understand the joys to be found in shades of gray.


6. Calling

Luke gasped into the phone, his free hand clutching at the sheets, Noah's soft, rough-edged voice in his ear from halfway around the world.

"Don't touch yourself," Noah ordered. "Not until I tell you to."

Luke moaned. Half of him wished Noah were there to do the things he was in the process of describing. The other half wanted Noah to never, ever stop talking.


7. Lakeshore

Luke was shocked to find that Noah has never been to the beach. Lake Michigan might not be an ocean, but they went anyway. Luke knew of a quiet spot, and made plans for sand castles and a picnic.

Instead, they found themselves re-enacting From Here to Eternity in the gentle waves lapping at the water's edge. It turned out they didn't mind the sand all that much.


8. Healed

The camping trip left Noah's psyche as bruised and broken as Luke's body. His father was a liar and a killer, and Luke was hurt because of him. If he'd never come to Oakdale, none of this would have happened.

Then Luke reached out his hand and asked him to stay, and he realized that if he'd never come to Oakdale, neither of them would be able to learn how to do more with their lives than just survive.


9. Sportsmen

Luke's an athlete, Noah had reminded him, among the other definitions he listed. Luke hadn't played basketball in a while, but he still went swimming a lot. He especially liked to swim with Noah, sneaking down to Snyder Pond in the middle of the night in the middle of the summer, swimsuits discarded on the grassy bank, getting more than one kind of workout.


10. Flying

The trip back from New York on Lucinda's jet ranked among the top five in Noah's lifetime memory bank. Not surprisingly, all five involved Luke, but that was the only one of those times when they weren't alone. They curled together in their seats, armrest shoved out of the way, talking softly and kissing lightly, listening to Luke's parents do the same nearby.

Even after all their months together, it was the first time Noah really knew what it meant to have a family.



The 10 pages:

1. Deutschland sucht den Superstar
2. Wayne L. Morse United States Courthouse
3. Basantpur, Parsa (in Nepal, next to the Himalayas)
4. Ian Hamilton (a critic)
5. Second-order logic
6. Area code 858
7. Castle of Maizeret
8. Yankee Doodle Doctor
9. Donald Thomas (athlete)
10. Tokhaapsalu (an aircraft base in Estonia)