sapphire_child: (final goodbye; charlie/claire)
[personal profile] sapphire_child
Title: Breathing A Memory
Fandom: RPF, implied Monalilly and hints of Domilie
Words: 2,365
Rating: PG
Summary: as filming for season four of Lost begins, Emilie finds herself in the costume department, reminiscing about Dom’s untimely departure from the show.
Disclaimer: this never happened and probably never will. I am a delusional RP shipper and as such, will probably go to hell or something. Hell, I can’t help it if these two look pretty together! The lyrics in the cut are from “Breathing You In” by The Whitlams

~*~

The costume department was silent and still. Everyone else had already headed out to shoot but due to a mistake in the scheduling however, and a few technical difficulties, Emilie had been granted the rest of the morning off.

She sighed heavily as she perused the racks disinterestedly. She’d already had a look at all of her new costume pieces for the new season and reacquainted herself with her old ones. And it’s not like there was much else for her to do apart from go and hang out in her trailer, maybe go over her lines for the umpteenth time.

Her lack of lines – and air time for that matter – was getting increasingly frustrating. As much as she enjoyed having long breaks from filming and getting to spend time back home with Josh, it frustrated her when she filmed scenes and really put herself into the performance only to find out when the episode aired that her scene had been cut because they weren’t important enough to the main story. It seemed that every single Lost DVD set that had come out there was at least one, if not two or three scenes of hers that had been put into the deleted scenes segment. What was most upsetting was that they didn’t even show all of the deleted scenes – there were many that she’d been in that had never seen the light of day.

One that she knew had never been seen was a scene between Charlie and Claire that had supposed to have been in season three. It had been episode…four? Five? She couldn’t remember now. But it had been a kissing scene and they’d had to do about a million takes because Dominic kept kissing her too hard and then there had been promotional photos taken of the two of them kissing and everyone had been excited about Charlie and Claire finally advancing their relationship to the next level…

But somehow, the scene had just disappeared – much like the relationship had. It had sparked briefly several times throughout the third season and then…it had just seemed to die. Emilie had been appalled to hear that Charlie was going to die – from Dom himself as it transpired. He had merely shrugged it all off, saying that his biggest motivation for leaving the show was the knowledge that he could be doing better projects where his character wasn’t constantly being pushed into the background.

“It’s no big deal,” Dom said bracingly. “I just don’t feel like I’m being used to my full potential on the show anymore and if these guys can’t be bothered challenging me or coming up with decent storylines then…well then I’m not going to hang around and wait for them to pull their fingers out of their arses.”

“At least your character isn’t totally defined by their connection to another character,” Emilie muttered. “I swear, the only reason Claire’s still alive is because she has Aaron – they can’t kill them off or the fans will eat the writers alive.”

“Oh I’m sure there’ll be plenty of outcry about Charlie when he goes,” Dom said grimly. “After Henry’s episode airs there are going to be some very unhappy people. Mind you there’s also a bunch of people who think that Charlie should have died last season when the hatch went boom but whatever.”

“What’s Claire going to do when Charlie dies I wonder?” Emilie mused.

“Huh. Probably grieve for about five seconds and then get on with her life,” Dom said bitterly, flicking back through his script again with an altogether unnecessary force. “Just like everyone else on this bloody show nowadays...”


Emilie paused suddenly, realising that she’d been walking down the racks of costumes as she’d been musing and had reached the selection of jeans and t-shirts that had made up Dom’s “Charlie” wardrobe. She wasn’t surprised that they had kept them all – they still had most of the costumes from Boone and Shannon’s wardrobes in here and they had both died ages ago. She knew from her own experience that packrat tendencies ran rampant in costume departments. It wouldn’t have surprised her at all to learn that her costumes from Roswell were hanging up in a warehouse somewhere now, shrink wrapped to preserve them lest they ever be needed again.

She reached out a tentative hand to touch the hem of a familiar stripy shirt. There was more than a dozen of them on the rack, some with the sleeves cut off and some without. Further along were all the other shirts he’d worn. She recognised the stripy shirt best of all – it was the shirt he had worn on the plane, the one he had crashed in. There was another few that she remembered as she made her way down the rack, a soft brown one, the blue-grey one he’d worn in the latest season finale, the white one with “Bob Dylan” splashed across the front in cartoonish writing…

Finally she came to the cream shirt with the tree design on the front. She remembered Dom wearing it at the end of season two – when they’d had their first scenes together since Charlie’s flashback. The first time she saw him wearing it on set she had stared at the design on the front, amazed at how hypnotic it was, and Dom had teased her about putting her under his spell or something equally stupid.

It felt strange to be back here without him. Even though she hadn’t officially started her filming yet, it was odd to know that she was never going to have any scenes with him again. She felt strangely lonely to know that he wasn’t going to be simply shooting scenes without her – he wasn’t even in the show anymore. It reminded her of how she’d felt when Maggie had left. The two of them had been close friends, despite having had barely any scenes together. When Shannon had been killed off Emilie had truly missed having a close girlfriend on set. It wasn’t that she didn’t get on well with Yunjin or Evangeline (or Cynthia and Michelle when they had been on the show) but the hard truth was that she just wasn’t on set enough to make impressionable friendships.

So, because she had the most scenes with him, her closest co-star had become Dom. They didn’t really speak much about their personal lives, Dom especially, but she had always enjoyed gossiping away to him about the show. He was talkative and friendly and he could make her laugh with very little effort. He was a natural comedian, a real show stealer, so she had to work hard to make sure that she kept herself on par with him when they acted together.

Not that she minded. It was nice to have something to aim for, something to work towards. She was naturally a lot more serious than he was so they balanced each other out perfectly. They had an intriguing friendship – one made all the more interesting when at the end of season two they were informed that Charlie and Claire were going to be “getting back together again” and sealing it with a kiss.

Emilie had been incredibly nervous in the lead up to that first kiss – she just wasn’t used to kissing other people anymore after having been with Josh for so long. But after the first take (and a few well worded jibes from Dom) she relaxed into it. The fact that he was a rather excellent kisser was an added bonus that she hadn’t counted on either. More than once after that first time, she had found herself getting too into a kiss with him before remembering that she was being Claire, not Emilie, and Claire didn’t kiss boys “like that”.

Dom had always been greatly amused by her enthusiasm in their romantic scenes, teasing her about his prowess at kissing between takes, becoming more amused at her sulky silences until she finally broke down and smiled with him.

“See? That’s much better,” he said. “You look so much prettier when you’re not sulking.”

“I don’t
sulk.”

“Oh no,” his eyes began to sparkle mischievously at this and he took the opportunity to wink flirtatiously at her. “Not at all. Never.”

“You are a terrible flirt Dominic Monaghan.”

“And apparently a damn good kisser too.”

“Hmmn.”

“You know I’m only teasing you right?”

“Yeah and just as well! What would your girlfriend say I wonder if she could hear us now?”

“She’d probably give me a clip around the ear and then I’d somehow have to convince her that I was just trying to stay in character between takes. She wouldn’t mind terribly if I told her I was just acting. I mean, acting is just acting after all and real life is everything else right?”


But Emilie was sure that he had enjoyed their kissing scenes just as much – if not more so than she had, although she knew he never would have admitted it to her. But then it was no secret that Dom was a very physical person. He could get away with kissing just about anybody on or off set without raising any eyebrows. He was very comfortable with himself and that characteristic tended to rub off on the people around him – it was just the way he was.

He was a puzzling man, she had realised long ago, someone who she would probably never be able to get close enough to truly see behind the mask of his humour. But she’d had enough glimpses over the past three years to know that deep down he was sincere and thoughtful and…

Gone.

The costume room came back into focus again, she was clinging onto the sleeve of one of the numerous black hoodie’s he had worn – Charlie’s signature jacket. This one looked particularly worn out, there was a hole in the cuff from who knows what and a suspicious looking stain just above the hemline. The fabric felt soft and pliant underneath her fingers, well worn, comfortable.

She surprised herself by bringing the sleeve up to her face and pressing it against her cheek, breathing in the faint smells of soap and the distinctive scent that always reminded her of Dom. Having spent three years filming on a tropical island with him, that scent was mainly sweat but there were other, subtler hints in there too, of his shampoo in particular. Emilie shut her eyes and breathed in, prepared to take herself back to another memory when there was the sudden, sobering sound of footsteps. She dropped the sleeve she was clutching, spinning around guiltily as the footsteps came right up to the end of the row.

“Hello?”

“Oh,” she breathed, feigning surprise. In truth she had recognised the voice even before the face that was now peering around the corner at her had come into view. “Evie. Hey.”

Evangeline took a step towards her. She was dressed in her civvies, a dirty t-shirt and pair of jeans folded over her arm and a somewhat glum expression on her face.

“Hey,” Evie returned but then she looked confused. “What are you doing in here? I thought your costumes were all in the next row…?”

“Well yeah they are,” Emilie paused, unsure as to how to answer the first part of the question. “I was just sort of wandering through. Around. Something like that. I have nothing to do till after lunch so I was just killing time really. Yeah.”

The other woman’s gaze fell on the rack next to her and an unusual expression flitted across her face. “I thought that were going to put most of Dom’s stuff into storage,” she said quietly. Emilie was silent, unsure of what to say. “Now that he’s not – you know – on the show anymore. I must’ve misunderstood them.”

Emilie remained silent as Evie sighed heavily and pushed a hand through her long dark curls.

“Are you…okay?” Emilie asked eventually, feeling somewhat awkward. “You look…” upset she thought. Aggrieved, somewhat pissed off… “Tired.”

“I’m okay,” Evie insisted. “But I am a bit tired though. Time zones you know? I’ve been calling Dom a lot since he went back to L.A.”

“Yeah I know what you mean,” Emilie nodded, instantly sympathetic. She remembered all too well the first time she’d been away from Josh, filming the pilot. Now it seemed she wasn’t the only one whose sweetheart was half a world away.

“Yeah, well,” Evie tousled her hair again. “No use crying over spilt milk you know? It’s what he wanted so…I mean I’m happy that he’s finding new projects but…”

“It’s hard,” Emilie supplied. “And it’s a long way from here to there and you miss him.”

“Exactly!” Evie said, pleased that Emilie was catching on so quickly. “And I’ve got so many scenes that I can’t do that whole two weeks on, two weeks off, four weeks on one week off thing that you do.” She shook her head. “I don’t know how you and Josh did it all these years Emilie, I really don’t.”

“Sometimes I’m not entirely sure either,” Emilie murmured, fingering her wedding band. When they’d informed her that she wasn’t needed for her scenes that morning she had hastened to put it back on again – her hand always felt so naked without her rings on now. “You guys’ll be okay though. You’re both tough. And you’ve been through worse right?”

“Yeah,” Evie sighed for the umpteenth time. “But the bad stuff we went through was always together, not hundreds of miles and an ocean apart.”

Emilie bit her lip, hesitantly reaching out to the other woman. Evie accepted the hug briefly but then pulled back.

“I’d better go,” she said apologetically. “I have to go get this costume malfunction sorted before lunch is over or my jeans are going to fall off me in the afternoon shoot.”

“Sure,” Emilie said distractedly. “Listen, Evie, I’m going back to Los Angeles in two weeks so if there’s anything you wanted to pass on to Dom I’d be more than happy to drop it off to him.”

For a moment she was certain that she’d said the absolute wrong thing – Evangeline’s face seemed to crumble under the weight of her emotions and she looked close to tears. But then she composed herself and even managed to smile.

“Thanks Emilie,” she said, genuinely touched. “If I think of anything I’ll let you know. Thank you for offering, that’s really sweet of you.”

“It’s no problem,” Emilie shrugged. “It’d be nice to see him again anyway.”

Evie watched her carefully for a moment, her eyes flickering briefly over to Dom’s old costumes and then she nodded in understanding. “You miss him a bit too huh?” Emilie flushed, giving herself away and Evie laughed. “It’s okay, I don’t mind or anything. You guys always had tons of scenes together – it makes sense that you’d both miss each other.”

“Both?”

“Yeah,” Evie said vaguely as she turned to make her leave. “I just remembered then actually, he asked me to say hello when I saw you. Well he asked me to say hello to everyone really but you in particular. He also asked me to tease you about the possibilities of Desmond and Claire getting together this season in order to get over Charlie’s death but I’m pretty sure he was joking.”

“Desmond and Claire? Haha yeah that sounds like Dom,” Emilie gave a half-hearted laugh as Evie waved from the end of the rack and disappeared from sight. “I wouldn’t be so sure that he was joking though.” Emilie muttered as soon as the other woman was out of sight.

With a final glance back at the sad collection of t-shirts, Emilie let herself out of the costume department.

Date: 2007-10-18 12:53 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lostwitoutdom.livejournal.com
This was really cute, I love Domilie!! I thought it would be cute if Emilie stole one of Dom's sweatshirts. Please write more Domilie your're amazing at it.

Date: 2007-10-18 03:00 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] sapphire-child.livejournal.com
You and me both. It's a shame really, they're so pretty together...but they're not together. Oh well!

I plan to write more Domilie in the future don't you worry. My muse is bouncing around quite happily at the moment giving me insipration so there's bound to be some Domilie in there somewhere.

Date: 2007-10-21 02:28 pm (UTC)

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