Author: redwinter101
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I don't own Moonlight or any of its characters
Note: this is set during the scene at the end of The Mortal Cure when Coraline comes to Mick's apartment.
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For wpgrace
photocollage by Albra
--- Reckoning ---
I don't know how much of what she's told me is true. The cure's real, that much I knew, but temporary. Morgan's gone, a distant memory, and Coraline's back. But who is she now? There was a time I knew when she was lying. Spend every day with someone's secrets and you learn to tell but time and separation have changed all that. It's unsettling; she's a stranger to me now, in so many ways, just as the man I once was is a stranger to the man I see in the mirror.
The time I would have walked through fire for her is long gone. There was a clarity in my want for her and if I'm honest, I miss it. Cold solitude replaced her fire but the memory of longing still has the power to catch me, burn me, turn my head. I've learned to take care, but knowing her danger hasn't stopped me. There's no fool like an old fool, I guess. At least this time I have a chance to get some answers.
She spins her tale and still I can't be sure. Revolution, carnage, royalty and intrigue - they're Josef's hobbies, not mine. Why lie? What does she gain? I can ask all I want, but I'll never know. Not really. But I feel honesty in her words, her touch, her need. Maybe that's what it all comes down to - she's run out of options and landed on the truth. The woman who could topple dynasties and launch an armada, my own Helen of Troy.
I know she's still working an angle, hoping I'll go with her. Even in desperation, even as she walks a dangerous line, her fear palpable, I know she's here for more than a saviour. She doesn't need help - she needs me, and that still has the power to make me waver.
Her heart was always given freely; she could have chosen others, better suited to her life and her love; men who would love her no matter what. Men who would have chosen her. Maybe it's wishful thinking but I believe she accepts our moment is gone, that any chance we had to be each other's true soulmate passed the moment she turned me and everything since then has been a journey to get to this point of acceptance. We've given and taken so much from each other and now, freely, she's giving me back the man I was.
God I want it so much. Nothing else matters - I can taste it.
My chance. My second chance. I can be the man I was, but better. Older and maybe just a little wiser.
Choice rushes at me, gentle whispers of hope rising to a roar, so loud I have to push them away just to hear her words. She knows - just as she's always known. This is more than life or death for me. It's my soul, my longing, my reason. Our circle has turned and it had to be her.
"I took your life. Let me give back what I can." I believe her smile. No time for caution; no time for consequence. This is everything. As I feel the warmth spread from the wound, she knows this is what I want. I was never cut out to be the husband she needed and this gift erases so much. I have my chance to dream again.
It's not healing.
It's working.
The heat of my own blood, resurrected from a deep sleep, an intoxicating thrum, childhood's ache brought fresh and new. As silence draws around me, senses closing off, pulling back behind human boundaries, it's a warmth I've cherished and longed for.
The warmth of me. A man.
Why? Why has she done this? This is the end of one road for us and I feel her pull, the need to be close to her, the only one who can truly understand. The years of anger fade back into our own intimate shorthand. As she presses her lips to mine, her hand soft against my knee, there's no demand, no bargain. The fire that consumed us both for so long has calmed. She knows I'll help her and she knows that she will escape alone. The strangeness of contentment washes through me. Of all the emotions we've shared, this is the one I craved but never felt until now - calm. I feel at ease. I feel like me, not a shadow reflected in her glare. Just me. I want to share this with her, with the woman who knows parts of me no-one else ever will.
More than anything, more than everything, this is what she has given me. I can start to remember her without hate. Our love was true, we just weren't meant to be. Two souls that never quite fit, no matter how hard we tried. Now, here, after the pain, the anger, the hate, the love, the fear and the hope, it's just us. Fifty-five years and we can finally just be.
As I'm savouring the sensations, the shifts in body and blood, she's moving on. She's done what she came for and now it's time. Her need to escape is real and urgent; she's scared of Lance, that much I can tell. I feared him because I felt his power; like Josef, she's afraid because she knows him and without a thought of refusal, I'll help her escape.
We step out together and I can't help but think how we would look to a passer-by - just like any other couple out for an evening stroll. If only they knew. Warmth inside and out; my coat feels heavy and stifling and wonderful. It's all coming back now, cascades of feeling, a strange mix of weight and lightness. My body is full, my skin feels like it might burst, straining to contain the life within.
I want to stop, to describe every feeling, to let the reality sink in, but there's no time. When she laughs it feels like the first time we met, all those years ago but our moment doesn't last. Something's happening and I have no idea what it is. The only thing I can see is the change in her, braced for confrontation. Old habits die hard, I guess, and for a moment I fear that she's betrayed me; but I'm an insignificance in this game and I feel a flush of shame at the truth in her denial. Even through her fear, my easy mistrust wounds her. Of course she still has her secrets, only telling me what she thinks I need to know.
Her beloved family, come to render their own brand of justice - to both of us. I was always a pawn in this game and now I'm starting to understand what that really means.
I feel the adrenaline burn, my heart pounding, temperature rising. The fight, such as it is, is brief and brutal. The pain is a shock and my new body tries to react. Responses honed over the last fifty years are no good to me now but none of that compares to the helplessness. Lance sneers at my weakness - and he's right. I'm powerless to help her now, beaten and bloodied. I can see it in her eyes - her terror. But for me, only for me, she gives herself to him. I always wanted her to feel the weight of consequence but not like this. This is too much, too strong, too terrible. I can't save her. Not now, not like this. In a few brief moments she gave me back my life and in doing so risked her own. She must have known he'd come and I wouldn't be able to fight him. She'd have been better off leaving, trying to get away on her own and we both know it. But she came for me - with her gift and her hope. She gambled; I won.
Coraline. A knot of tears strangles the voice inside that wants to cry out to her.
A last look, fear, longing, regret, love, and she's gone. I am alone with my gift, my pain, my life.
It takes an eternity to gather my strength to stand. I should hate the fierce, sharp pain, every sinew protesting as I move, but I can't. Sure I wish it didn't hurt so damn much but the feel of it is amazing. This body feels how it should. Damaged, imperfect, human, me.
For the first time in over fifty-five years, I have no idea what tomorrow will bring.
Thanks, alle. High praise indeed. 
This is about my favorite scene in the entire series... and oh my!!! A peek inside Mick's thoughts... this is just divine, like Greek God divine!!! And I'm gonna quote too much... but it was just about my favorite scene in the series, you see... 
And this follows from Anniversary, from the truth of that marriage, so perfectly... he always fought her shadow.... but you cannot win against a shadow.
) and I love it too - and I wanted to give it a bit more explanation, especially as a precursor to that "wasn't meant to be" line at the cemetery. Because that irked me just as much as it did you.
