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janie_tangerineSo, the LUAU started and this is my first contribution ;) Queen ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
purestvixen requested for anything Sawyer so here there are some icons (seven) and a ficlet.
Title: Darkness on the Edge of Town
Rating/Warnings: PG13
Characters: Sawyer, some light implied Sawyer/Kate maybe
Word counting: 997
Disclaimer: Lost isn't mine and the title is Springsteen's.
Spoilers: Some for the S4 finale even if it's set in S1 more or less after Confidence Man.
Summary:The interesting bit of the expression is not the darkness, it’s the edge of town. It implies that there’s a town, a divided one; in the center, you have the light, the honest jobs he never even tried to take, the honest life he never pretended to live, the expensive clothes he never bought for a perfect wife he never had.
A/N: for Queenpurestvixen, who requested Sawyer. Thing is, I'm really too much into Springsteen these days, so I have to give him credit for the idea even if I had it in my head for a while. No plot whatsoever and not really of the happy sort though.
Darkness on the edge of town is an expression that Sawyer has always liked. A lot.
It’s not only that he likes how it sounds. He likes the sound, alright, but it isn’t a question of sound only. It’s more about what lies behind it, about the concept of darkness on the edge of town. It’s not a nice concept, but that isn’t the point of the matter. Sawyer was never one for nice concepts anyway.
It’s easy to split it and explain it on a very superficial level; there’s darkness first and that’s a word that doesn’t need much pondering, not for him. It’s where he spent most of his life anyway, isn’t it?
The interesting bit of the expression is not the darkness, it’s the edge of town. It implies that there’s a town, a divided one; in the center, you have the light, the honest jobs he never even tried to take, the honest life he never pretended to live, the expensive clothes he never bought for a perfect wife he never had.
Then there’s the edge where all the dirt comes out, where you don’t have neat roads with shiny shop windows full of pricey clothes, where you don’t have an honest job; you can’t get out from it after that much time spent there and there, you find things that you can’t have anywhere else.
Thing is, revenge ranks pretty much there and not anywhere else and that’s why Sawyer never really left the edge of town. Because he realizes that everything he wants is there; for fifteen years or so, he had realized that there was a high price to pay for wanting that kind of thing, but he had thought he could pay that. He finds out too late that he couldn’t, when he realizes the man he just shot wasn’t who he had been searching for.
Nothing changes when he crashes on the island.
The town is still there, only it isn’t a town but forty people, some caves and some tents; it doesn’t matter because there’s still that division, there’s the center, there’s the edge.
Jack is the center, nothing to say; he’s everything that you can’t find in the darkness of the edge of town. Sawyer knows where he stands; he makes it his mission to fulfill his role best as he can.
He frames all of them nicely in a couple of days; Kate is the closest to him, one that probably was born in the fucking darkness of the edge of town but desperately wants to leave it. Sawyer shakes his head and smirks while thinking about it. He already understood that she was going to try with all of herself. Might as well. For what he knows, it’s a hopeless feat. Sayid seems one that managed it, to get out of that shadow hanging over him, for a while; but it takes less than two weeks for Sawyer to find out on his skin that he was right all along and that no one gets away from it. Charlie and Shannon look like edge of town material, but Sawyer knows how to distinguish a fake from the real deal. They aren’t a real deal; Charlie knows it and Sawyer thinks that after a couple of weeks he didn’t even pretend anymore, while Shannon tries to behave otherwise but doesn’t fool anyone. Or at least not him. At least her brother has the decency of showing himself for what he is, which would be someone that wouldn’t ever believe in something such as the darkness on the edge of town. It isn’t a very liberal conception after all. Michael, his kid, Claire and Hurley are not darkness material, not at all; the Koreans look promising, in that sense, according to him.
Sawyer knows that him, Kate and Sayid are the ones more caught in the web. Or at least, they are caught in the web; Sawyer isn’t because he knows what he’s dealing with and as he’s going to tell Kate one day, he cons, that’s it, even if he maybe tried to be something else for a while and figured it wasn’t ever gonna work.
He still doesn’t know that one day he will try it with more effort, maybe blinded by the lights shining from the center of the town and that he will succeed at it, more or less; he doesn’t know that the darkness of the edge of town will claim him back one last time with an action that will prove his point exactly (once in, you won’t ever get out); as soon as it will be over, he will realize that he has cut loose the thread linking him to a place he should have never set foot in. He will realize that maybe he never was just edge of town material. Maybe not the shiny window shop material either, but not entirely to throw away. He will also realize that he doesn’t want only things to be found there, and then he will be the hero of the day that he never thought he could be; but he doesn’t know anything of this while lightening his last cigarette and throwing away the crumpled pack.
He takes a long drag and watches Jack and Kate talking on the beach, from afar, the ashes falling on the sand, his arm hurting like a bitch and the burning taste of the cigarette making him forget how Kate tasted like one day ago or so. He guesses that if she wants to see him one day (and maybe she won’t ever), he’s the most easily found.
As long as she wants to venture in the darkness on the edge of town, and he is sure that one day she will. He doesn’t even want to think about the option that it’s the first dream he might have had since a long time; usually, in the place he lives, dreams get lost.
End.
purestvixen requested for anything Sawyer so here there are some icons (seven) and a ficlet.| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
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Title: Darkness on the Edge of Town
Rating/Warnings: PG13
Characters: Sawyer, some light implied Sawyer/Kate maybe
Word counting: 997
Disclaimer: Lost isn't mine and the title is Springsteen's.
Spoilers: Some for the S4 finale even if it's set in S1 more or less after Confidence Man.
Summary:The interesting bit of the expression is not the darkness, it’s the edge of town. It implies that there’s a town, a divided one; in the center, you have the light, the honest jobs he never even tried to take, the honest life he never pretended to live, the expensive clothes he never bought for a perfect wife he never had.
A/N: for Queen
purestvixen, who requested Sawyer. Thing is, I'm really too much into Springsteen these days, so I have to give him credit for the idea even if I had it in my head for a while. No plot whatsoever and not really of the happy sort though.Darkness on the edge of town is an expression that Sawyer has always liked. A lot.
It’s not only that he likes how it sounds. He likes the sound, alright, but it isn’t a question of sound only. It’s more about what lies behind it, about the concept of darkness on the edge of town. It’s not a nice concept, but that isn’t the point of the matter. Sawyer was never one for nice concepts anyway.
It’s easy to split it and explain it on a very superficial level; there’s darkness first and that’s a word that doesn’t need much pondering, not for him. It’s where he spent most of his life anyway, isn’t it?
The interesting bit of the expression is not the darkness, it’s the edge of town. It implies that there’s a town, a divided one; in the center, you have the light, the honest jobs he never even tried to take, the honest life he never pretended to live, the expensive clothes he never bought for a perfect wife he never had.
Then there’s the edge where all the dirt comes out, where you don’t have neat roads with shiny shop windows full of pricey clothes, where you don’t have an honest job; you can’t get out from it after that much time spent there and there, you find things that you can’t have anywhere else.
Thing is, revenge ranks pretty much there and not anywhere else and that’s why Sawyer never really left the edge of town. Because he realizes that everything he wants is there; for fifteen years or so, he had realized that there was a high price to pay for wanting that kind of thing, but he had thought he could pay that. He finds out too late that he couldn’t, when he realizes the man he just shot wasn’t who he had been searching for.
Nothing changes when he crashes on the island.
The town is still there, only it isn’t a town but forty people, some caves and some tents; it doesn’t matter because there’s still that division, there’s the center, there’s the edge.
Jack is the center, nothing to say; he’s everything that you can’t find in the darkness of the edge of town. Sawyer knows where he stands; he makes it his mission to fulfill his role best as he can.
He frames all of them nicely in a couple of days; Kate is the closest to him, one that probably was born in the fucking darkness of the edge of town but desperately wants to leave it. Sawyer shakes his head and smirks while thinking about it. He already understood that she was going to try with all of herself. Might as well. For what he knows, it’s a hopeless feat. Sayid seems one that managed it, to get out of that shadow hanging over him, for a while; but it takes less than two weeks for Sawyer to find out on his skin that he was right all along and that no one gets away from it. Charlie and Shannon look like edge of town material, but Sawyer knows how to distinguish a fake from the real deal. They aren’t a real deal; Charlie knows it and Sawyer thinks that after a couple of weeks he didn’t even pretend anymore, while Shannon tries to behave otherwise but doesn’t fool anyone. Or at least not him. At least her brother has the decency of showing himself for what he is, which would be someone that wouldn’t ever believe in something such as the darkness on the edge of town. It isn’t a very liberal conception after all. Michael, his kid, Claire and Hurley are not darkness material, not at all; the Koreans look promising, in that sense, according to him.
Sawyer knows that him, Kate and Sayid are the ones more caught in the web. Or at least, they are caught in the web; Sawyer isn’t because he knows what he’s dealing with and as he’s going to tell Kate one day, he cons, that’s it, even if he maybe tried to be something else for a while and figured it wasn’t ever gonna work.
He still doesn’t know that one day he will try it with more effort, maybe blinded by the lights shining from the center of the town and that he will succeed at it, more or less; he doesn’t know that the darkness of the edge of town will claim him back one last time with an action that will prove his point exactly (once in, you won’t ever get out); as soon as it will be over, he will realize that he has cut loose the thread linking him to a place he should have never set foot in. He will realize that maybe he never was just edge of town material. Maybe not the shiny window shop material either, but not entirely to throw away. He will also realize that he doesn’t want only things to be found there, and then he will be the hero of the day that he never thought he could be; but he doesn’t know anything of this while lightening his last cigarette and throwing away the crumpled pack.
He takes a long drag and watches Jack and Kate talking on the beach, from afar, the ashes falling on the sand, his arm hurting like a bitch and the burning taste of the cigarette making him forget how Kate tasted like one day ago or so. He guesses that if she wants to see him one day (and maybe she won’t ever), he’s the most easily found.
As long as she wants to venture in the darkness on the edge of town, and he is sure that one day she will. He doesn’t even want to think about the option that it’s the first dream he might have had since a long time; usually, in the place he lives, dreams get lost.
End.
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no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 09:50 am (UTC)And the ficlet is great too, so melancholy.
But in the end, He will realize that maybe he never was just edge of town material. Maybe not the shiny window shop material either, but not entirely to throw away.
I'm so happy that you gave him this hopeful thought - even if in the future.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 01:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 11:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 01:39 pm (UTC)I could just see Sawyer explaining to someone, maybe Boone, about how this edge of darkness stuff works. He might even reference Bruce. Of course this could never happen in real life because your heart would explode
Damn right. If it ever happened I'd have probably ended it right there. Too much for me to handle ;)
I'm really glad that ficlet worked, I just took the title and ran away with it, but I guess that it's the Sawyer muse. He still cooperates ;) I've always had that idea regarding Kate, it came one of the few times I was actually thinking about her in meta-ing terms, so good to know it feels right. Thanks again, I'm really glad you liked it!
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 12:07 pm (UTC)Sono l'amore!!!!!
P.S. verso la fine della settimana ti messaggio con e ti do il mio numero di cell! ;D
*hugs*
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 01:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 01:31 pm (UTC)I swear Sawyer just evokes so many feelings, like DEEP feelings, I don't know how to put this, but it's like it's easy to think of him feeling as an outsider but then feeling like he really wasn't all that outsiderish..and that if luck had been different, he would have been a different person all together because underneath it all, he's James, not Sawyer.
I hope that made some sense, it's just when Sawyer is written like the way you wrote him here, it just makes me want to respond like that, because I totally appreciate when the layers of the character and the emotions are explored.
VERY VERY well done!
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 01:43 pm (UTC)and that if luck had been different, he would have been a different person all together
That's the thing about him that I love. It's something I really like to work on that. And such a response absolutely pleases me ;) thanks so much again, I'm really glad you liked it! ♥
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 02:07 pm (UTC)Thank you so much!
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 05:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 03:51 pm (UTC)Eek. I love that line. How can someone be lost and found at the same time? Awesome!
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 05:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 05:02 pm (UTC)awww, Sawyer. he sure was on that edge for most of his life, but I think he's slowly finding his way to the center. he might not escape it totally, but there is a shining light in that man, I firmly believe it.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 05:39 pm (UTC)I completely agree with the shining light remark. Hey, he's almost the only one in which I can see it right now *sigh*. Thank you, I'm really glad you liked it! Now I shall be back on yours ;)
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 06:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 08:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 06:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 08:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 09:20 pm (UTC)I like how you used that line and explored it, based the whole fic around it. It works great with Sawyer, and you wind up with a very introspective piece, not only with him but with the others, how everyone else fits into this whole concept.
Awesome fic!
no subject
Date: 2008-07-07 09:28 pm (UTC)I have kind of a ridiculous love for that line and thought that dwelling into it wasn't going to be a bad idea. Then it grew way out of what I thought but I think I'm satisfied with how it came out. Thank you again, I'm really glad you liked it! ♥
no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 01:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 06:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 04:56 am (UTC)Love the icons, as well. I might have to snag 7, if that's all right - and I'm sorely tempted by 4 and 5, too.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 07:26 am (UTC)And snag away, it only makes me glad! ;) I'm really happy you liked both, thank you! ♥
no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 06:05 pm (UTC)This is perfect, perfect, perfect Sawyer. It is so him - he so would see it that way and feel it that way. The darkness at the edge, right? Perfect! I've missed your fic! :D:D:D
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Date: 2008-07-08 06:12 pm (UTC)Thank you so much, you're totally too sweet to me! I'm so glad you liked it really! Yeah, darkness on the edge of town -> Sawyer in my book. ♥
no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 08:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 08:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 09:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-08 09:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-07-18 08:23 pm (UTC)I'm so glad I'm finally doing some catching up - that was what I had been missing!
I love how you took that one phrase and spun the fic around it - gorgeous!
♥
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Date: 2008-07-18 10:37 pm (UTC)And I'm really glad you liked this rambling here, that sentence always felt so Sawyer to me and I had to do something about that ;) thanks so much again! ♥
no subject
Date: 2008-08-20 07:29 pm (UTC)(and let's see if I still remember how to code, hmmm?) ;)
I loved the feel of this. It almost had a Wild West flavor -- the "white hats" in the respectable center, the "black hats" on the outskirts, and this really reinforced that feel:
Jack is the center, nothing to say; he’s everything that you can’t find in the darkness of the edge of town. Sawyer knows where he stands; he makes it his mission to fulfill his role best as he can.
I love how you've divided the survivors according to place, and put them in their places so accurately. The paragraph that finishes with this
but he doesn’t know anything of this while lightening his last cigarette and throwing away the crumpled pack is poignant and a bit ominous, as if when Sawyer finally gets his secret's heart's desire, that's when he'll truly be lost. It leaves me with a sense of foreboding for future canon!
Powerful job! ♥
no subject
Date: 2008-08-20 08:45 pm (UTC)Seriously, I'm really glad you liked this one. I've probably metaed on that title too much for my own sanity but it's great to hear that the whole dividing and placing worked here as the foreboding thing which I was really trying to get across. Thanks so much again! ♥