Title: Cloud Blood
Fandom: RPF
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Johnny/Keira
Disclaimer: Ok, because I am so very paranoid about posting this, let me make it clear that I don't own any of the characters, nor do I make money out of writing this. I do not intent to speculate on their personal life, this is entirely fictional stuff and I am aware that it will never happen nor do I want it to happen. It's just my twisted little brain coming up with ideas it really shouldn't. So, don't sue me! (Other than that all you'll get from me is a rusty old computer and 20 bucks).
Summary: Everything changes when the sun goes down.
Feedback:!!! Hehe.

Cross-posted to keirafanfiction and johnnyfanfic



Cloud Blood

I’ve been wondering what you meant when you asked: “Do you have a light?”
I’ve been wondering where you went when you left that party last night
Cloud blood smudge smeared on the sky, it’s dawns roadkill
I’ve been driving since midnight and I am driving still
--Ani Difranco - Cloud Blood

It was the wind that kept her pondering, thinking about his flexed fingers on the sword. They were old bones, he had old skin, and she still couldn’t figure out what it was about the old and rustiness of his appearance that was so appealing to her.
In fact, when the wind picked up and he had to tighten his grip on the steer, just to keep himself standing, it came to her that getting old really was something. It was something that you couldn’t stop and when she thought this, she sighed to herself trying to keep the terrifying thoughts behind a mental wall.
She was young now, and just because a huge wind got him out of balance didn’t mean he got out of balance in everything. The sudden smile took her by surprise and she had to turn around in order for him to stay oblivious to her inner joke.

There had been that one time, she remembered, when she had talked to him about his life. He had talked and talked, and she had been surprised by it, but later she’d realized he hadn’t really said anything at all. It was one of those magical things about him. He could captivate you just by his voice and you wouldn’t even notice that all he had said was “fame isn’t really what it seems”. She remembered she hadn’t even noticed when he’d stopped talking and after a while his deep throated laugh had caused her to blink and get back down to earth. She had blushed but he hadn’t said anything. And she was still grateful for that.

After that she’d had trouble acting normal towards him. It was like she felt she had to be feeling something for him, just because she could very well see he was a special person.

Again she was caught off guard when the wind now tried to throw her overboard and when she grabbed him by his pirate outfit, his face didn’t show any sign of effort in keeping himself on his feet and with that, her too.

“Okay everybody, I guess that’s a wrap for now. With this wind bothering us we’d better save ourselves a lot of trouble and just stop taping right this moment.”

He threw her a casual smile and she felt like he did that all the time, just to try and make her relax around him. But she couldn’t help herself; only until he was out of sight she laughed without thinking about how it sounded and at the end of each day it took her at least an hour in a hot tub to relax her muscles and clear her head for the next day.

It were his eyes mostly, which caught her off guard.

There were people who looked anywhere but in your eyes when they talked to you. Then there were the people who let their eyes roam over your face, occasionally taking in your whole appearance, trying to make up how you felt from observing your body language. And then there were those people who just looked you straight in the eye, that it made you, usually so relaxed and self confident, feel so small and uncomfortable, that you couldn’t handle the piercing look anymore, gave up on the silent battle going on between two pairs of eyes, and were the first to look away. And when you did that, you knew that they knew they had the upper hand on you. It was decided in that very first conversation with a stranger. And it would influence your further relationship with them. Until you were able to change the situation. But there were no rules.

Well, with him it was that way. His eyes were so piercing, so full of wisdom, that she felt like they looked right through her. Right through her youth, her self-confidence and even right through the desire that managed to undo her every time she spoke to him. Oh, she was so afraid he would see and be repelled. But somehow she also knew that she was blowing things out of proportion. Of course, it wasn’t like he would try to look into everybody’s soul the minute he met them. So what was she so worried about, anyway?

“Can I get you a cup of coffee, too, or do you dare and wait for your pirate mates to move their lazy asses and come up to have a bag of water drenched in brown with us? Of course, that could easily enough take an hour. But hey, who says I haven’t got hours? Hell, I’ve even got as long as the sun is willing to shine down upon me unworthy head!”

Again someone shook her out of her reverie. But it was not him this time. No, it was Jack. Johnny was never one for staying in character longer than the duration of the scene, but since they were shooting the two movies back to back, it was getting harder for him to switch just like that. So people around him accepted. It would only take him just a moment longer to lose Jack and they were willing to give him that moment.

“Sure, Johnny, that would be quite fine. Drinking alone with you isn’t the torture it seems, you know.” The use of his name wasn’t lost on him and in a fraction of a second she saw Jack disappear and Johnny return. She smiled at him and for the first time since she met him she felt he was finally getting a glimpse of the real her. The one who was witty, and fast. But most of all she wanted to show him she was not as immature as she was afraid she might have seemed when she looked away or stopped herself mid-sentence when she was painfully aware she had been, again, talking bollocks.

He grinned back at her, one side of his mouth curling up more than the other. It was his trademark smile. The, yeah-that-was-quite-amusing one, the, yeah-I’m-unaware-of-my-sex-appeal-right-now. But she wasn’t. Unaware, that was.

He handed her a cup and for a moment their fingers brushed, and she felt the electricity. But she knew she had been the only one for when she looked up, she saw he’d already lifted his cup to his mouth as he slowly took a sip of his coffee.

There wasn’t a reason for her to talk to him about how she felt. She knew it would make no sense to him. There was an age difference, but far more important, there was that thing that he was, in fact, very much taken.

As she stared off into the sky, where the sun was setting behind the horizon, she felt she was being watched. It was a most private moment, she felt, because she was sure he was unaware of it. Still she couldn’t help but turn in his direction and meet his thoughtful gaze.

It took her all of her will to break the silence, to make an end to the precious moment, but she felt she had to if she didn’t want things to get awkward between them. So she forced a smile upon her lips.

“What are you looking at?”

She saw him blink in a joking fashion, immediately ready with his answer.

“Can’t an old man admire a pretty girl for a moment?” There was that grin again.

Never stare at a face for too long. It was something she always convinced herself of. People always got the wrong idea when you did that, and even now, though she knew Johnny wasn’t the shallow type, she didn’t want him to remember her as some star-struck lovesick teenager just dying to spend a second with her favorite actor.

She forced herself to smile and turn her head, to pretend she was watching the sea, though she could still feel his eyes upon her. Why did that make her so uncomfortable?

“So,” She heard him clear his throat and in the corner of her eye she saw the small flicker of a flame enlighten his face for a split second, before it went out again and she heard the familiar sound of someone lighting a cigarette.

“Are you nervous about tomorrow?”

She really hadn’t expected this question and the casualness with which it was asked almost made her choke on her last sip of coffee. There was no use in denying the force of his gaze right now, she felt she had to meet it in order to keep her credibility. But no matter how hard she tried to force herself to look at him, it was like his eyes were on fire and burning a hole right where she was the most weak.

A smile graced her features when she answered him. “Oh, no! No, really I’m not. I mean, why would I be? It’s not my first on-screen kiss, you know.” She said this in the hope he would mistake the high tone of her voice for arrogance instead of the insecurity she really felt.

“That’s good.”
Again a smile tugged at his lips but his eyes finally left her face and concentrated on the scenery before them. Keira sighed in relief.

The fingers of his right hand slowly curled around the cigarette, giving it a slight tap so that the ash drifted away on the strong wind that had made them stop the filming for the day. She turned her head to look at the action, just to have something to look at, when she realized they were now the only ones on the back of the ship. The rest of the crew was finishing up getting their gear and was already transferring the material to the boat next to them.

“Don’t you think we should go back as well?”

Johnny turned to her once again, one hand leaning on the railing of the boat while the other was still holding the now burned out cigarette.

It was hard to think of him as Johnny right now, since he obviously looked so much like Jack in his costume and in the way he was leaning against the railing. It was hard to think of herself as Keira right now, self-confident and fearless, always ready with an answer, when she was standing before him in her most fragile Elizabeth dress.

“No.”

The uneasiness she felt increased when he kept his eyes on her the whole time she tried to come up with some witty retort.

“Well, I don’t know about you but I’m sure that my incessant ranting and talking will be missed over there. So, if you don’t mind…”

She’d taken two steps before she felt the hand on her underarm, keeping a tight grip and pulling her towards the body that belonged to it. Yet again it wasn’t his hand on her arm that made her react so immediately, but more the closeness of his face and eyes when she stumbled backwards against the railing.

“So, still not nervous about tomorrow?”

But she wasn’t about to let this get out of hand, yet. She was willing to put up a fight. For his and for her sake. But the closer he got, the more she felt like a deer caught in headlights trying at a fruitless attempt to escape. She wanted to get a grip but all of this around them, the blood red sky, the pirate before her, the smell of the sea, it was too much.

“I won’t be nervous—“

It took him only one more step.

“All evidence to the contrary, Keira.”

Her name was said in a slowly exhaled breath and right after that the bleeding horizon was a witness to their sin.

She’d lost the fight.