Snakes and Ladders - Falice

Break The Silence

 Found you out, your weakness. Drown you out, I'm sleepless. So, break the silence. Give me a reason, we had credence, but now we're poisoned.

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Relapse can mean many things. In the complicated case of Alice Cooper and FP Jones, it meant an obscure birthday, a full flask of alcohol, and the need for someone that produced safety. How was it possible that an entire decade could pass and an unnamed tension still persisted between them, perhaps even stronger than before? The truth was actually simple, the complications came from acknowledging it - so they refused to do so.

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She called him once.

The night that their son turned ten. Their son that he, of course, knew next to nothing about. But when Hal had caught her staring solemnly at a sonogram that didn't depict the image of either of his daughters, one of their many fights broke out with this kind of subject matter. It had been a decade, Alice should have gotten over it by now. She shouldn't still be weeping over a mistake that had been thankfully taken care of.

She knew he had to be right. Prestigious mothers living in big houses with stable husbands and strict curfews should never feel heartbroken in any way. This was the life that she had created, this is what she wanted. It was nights such as that one where she continuously had to repeat phrases like that to herself.

She tried to shake it off and go to bed, but she had been trying to leave the past behind in vain for years. For one night and one night only, she let herself forget all about mind over matter. While Hal was likely already asleep upstairs, Alice sat shaking on her couch as she mourned all that could have been and reached for the phone. Tonight would be the night that she finally broke the silence.

Dialing his number didn't even require thought as her fingers traced their familiar path. When it rang four times with no answer, she was microseconds away from hanging up and laughing at herself for even thinking she should contact him. But, at the last second, he pulled through with a gruff answer. Everything about his voice sent chills through her body, and she gasped upon simply hearing it.

Upon catching the gasp that came from the other end of the phone call, FP sat up straight in his chair, knowing immediately who had called him at midnight on a Wednesday like any other. "FP?" Alice finally managed to say, though her voice was shaking for many reasons. She could hear him breathing through the phone and it nearly floored her.

"Alice?" When she heard her name grace his lips for likely the first time in years, she grew lightheaded and while her tears had been light while staring at the picture of her unborn son, it was as if FP Jones had opened up her floodgates. He knew that she was crying, and it shook him to his core to realize that he was right – she was living in her very own personal hell even if it seemed like she had everything she'd ever wanted. He may have been drunk, but he wasn't nearly as drunk as he usually was at this time. "Alice, what's wrong?" He said, almost harshly, needing to make sure that she wasn't in any immediate danger.

She took another wavering breath and let herself sink deeper into the couch that she rested on while she gripped the receiver as if for dear life. "I –" she began, but her confidence betrayed her as more tears suddenly came. "I don't know why I called..." she trailed off, hoping that he would understand her simple need to get as close to him as she possibly could have given the circumstances that shaped their current lives. They had started a war between not only the two of them but between the Northside and the Southside Serpents all of a decade ago – a phone call was as close as they could get to each other.