freevistas

Sat, 20 Jul 2024 11:29:50 GMT

Story: Without Homeland

Colors: Teary-eyed #15: Broken glass

Word Count: 927

Rating/Warnings: PG

Note: Also posted to Rainbowfic

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Sat, 16 Mar 2024 08:39:27 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #14: left laundry in washer
Word Count: 732
Rating/Warnings: PG
Note: Also posted to Rainbowfic

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Sat, 02 Mar 2024 08:41:01 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #13: Forgot charger
Word Count: 1006
Rating/Warnings: T (period-typical racism/xenophobia)
Notes: Alost posted to Rainbowfic
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Sat, 24 Feb 2024 07:59:34 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #12: Bird poop
Word Count: 976
Rating/Warnings: T
Notes: Also posted to Rainbowfic
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Sun, 11 Feb 2024 05:54:21 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #11: Out of gas
Word Count: 1439
Rating/Warnings: T
Notes: Also posted to Rainbowfic

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Fri, 02 Feb 2024 06:39:13 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #10: Broke glasses
Word Count: 840
Rating/Warnings: T (cw: homophobia)

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Wed, 24 Jan 2024 10:40:41 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #9: Overslept
Word Count: 489
Rating/Warning: M (some references to sexy stuff)
Notes: Also posted to Rainbowfic
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Fri, 19 Jan 2024 07:03:49 GMT

Story: Without Homeland

Colors: Teary-eyed #8: Didn't save

Word Count: 1122

Rating/Warning: T (corporal punishment, abuse)

Notes: A bit of Karol's backstory; references the Września school strikes; also posted to Rainbowfic
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Fri, 12 Jan 2024 19:31:54 GMT

Story: Without Homeland

Colors: Teary-eyed #7: Burnt dinner

Word Count: 1598

Rating/Warning: T (alcohol; implied/referenced abuse)

Notes: Also posted to rainbowfic
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Sat, 06 Jan 2024 09:04:20 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #6: Jewelry down the sink
Word Count: 579
Rating/Warning: T (cw: natural disaster, death)
Notes: Without Homeland takes places in New London, Connecticut in the 1910s and 1920s. These fics are short vignettes and character studies and aren't necessarily meant to be read chronologically.
Also posted to rainbowfic

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Fri, 05 Jan 2024 07:31:38 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #5: Dropped keys
Word Count: 808
Rating: PG

Notes: Also posted to rainbowfic.

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Thu, 04 Jan 2024 08:03:50 GMT

Story: Without Homeland
Colors: Teary-eyed #4: Missed a step
Word Count: 400
Rating: T
Notes: Also posted to rainbowfic

“Careful!” Alba was trying to be quiet, but her whisper was somehow louder than her normal speaking voice. “It’s dark!” And more slurred.

Karol propped himself up against the wall of the narrow staircase, following the vague outline of Alba’s body and the sound of her bootheels clattering on the wooden stairs. Just a few more steps, and he’d be in the attic, where he could finally lie down.

With every step, though, the staircase seemed to tilt and sway, like it was bobbing in the waves; Karol felt seasick, the way he had on those first days crossing the ocean. But no, he wasn’t at sea, and he wasn’t seasick. He was just drunk.

A sliver of light emerged ahead of Karol, then widened, as Alba opened the attic door.

Neither of them knew exactly how Karol fell, or how he’d stopped himself from tumbling all the way down the staircase and spilling onto the kitchen floor. But when Alba turned to smile over her shoulder, she saw Karol lying in a contorted heap halfway down the stairs, looking more confused and abashed than hurt.

“Jesus,” Mairead muttered, stepping into the doorframe. “I told you, if you were going to bring him back here, you needed to be quiet.” She pulled her shawl over her nightgown. “If the Fairchilds knew he was here–”

“I know, I know,” Alba said, unable to formulate more of a response to her friend’s reprimand. The twinge of a headache she’d been ignoring for most of the evening had suddenly exploded in full force behind her eyes. She extended her hand as Karol struggled to right himself.

“Drunk as a pair of skunks, the two of you.” Mairead perched on the edge of her bed, watching as Alba and Karol made their way into the apartment, their arms wrapped around each other, both simultaneously aiding and hindering each other’s progress toward Alba’s bed. Neither of them could see the mischievous twinkle in Mairead’s eye that belied her scolding tone. She was proud of the two of them for letting loose for a change–even if, being a couple of teetotaling bookworms, they apparently didn’t quite know how to handle their alcohol.

“The next time you two decide to have a wild night on the town,” she said, turning out the oil lamp on the little desk beside her bed, “how about you invite me along?”

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Wed, 03 Jan 2024 07:21:11 GMT

Story: Without Homeland

Colors: Teary-eyed #3: Dead battery

Word Count: 500

Rating: T

Notes: Content warning: animal death
Also posted on rainbowfic

After it happened, Karol spent the rest of the day reciting rosaries. He clicked the beads between his fingers as he pushed his cart up Bradley Street, onto Main Street, and finally back down Bank Street to Mr. Jaronczyk’s print shop. The cart was no lighter than it had been when he’d left that morning, full of dozens of copies of the bootleg pulp novels and prayer books Karol and Mr. Jaronczyk churned out, and which Karol hardly ever managed to sell.

Karol spent the bulk of the day praying, but the words of the prayers hardly registered in his mind or his heart as he said them; they just passed through his lips like breath, involuntary and unacknowledged.

But praying was just what he did in moments like this, when his mind felt like a magic lantern flashing images of his worst memories and his worst fears across the inside of his skull. The simple act of repeating those familiar words had always calmed him down, helped him feel like there was blood flowing in his veins again instead of electrical currents. He knew that if he repeated the prayers long enough, his whispered words would grow louder than the voice in his head screaming Run! Hide!

But today, even after countless Hail Marys, he still wanted to run. Not to some hiding spot, the kind of nook or cranny where he used to hide from the schoolboys–or the teachers, or his father–back in Września.

He wanted to run to Alba.

He wanted to tell her what he’d seen: the horse struggling to pull a cart over the hardened slush coating Bradley Street. The jitney cab skidding on the ice as it turned the corner. The horse rearing up, its eyes wide in mute terror, its back feet scrambling on the frozen pavement before its legs gave out from under it. The man in the cart tumbling to the ground and springing to his feet in a flurry of Polish curses.

Karol wanted to tell Alba that he’d tried to help–tried to lift the horse to its feet, tried to sooth the cart-driver’s sorrow and rage as they watched the animal’s implacable suffering.

He wanted to tell Alba that he hadn’t looked away when the police officer finally shot the horse, that he’d borne witness to that beautiful creature’s suffering until the last.

But he couldn’t. Both he and Alba still had hours to go until their shifts were over; and even then, how could Karol just show up at the Fairchilds’ door, his cheeks marked with the tracks of half-frozen tears, and ask if he could talk to one of their servants? And even then–would Alba want to see him? To see him like this? And over an animal, no less? For all the time they’d spent together working on her paper in recent weeks, he still hardly knew her.

No–he’d stick to the rosary. He’d pray to the Virgin until she felt that he deserved her comfort.

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Tue, 02 Jan 2024 07:40:00 GMT

Story: Without Homeland

Colors: Teary-eyed #2: Stabbed by a thorn

Word Count: 500

Rating: G

Notes: Also posted on rainbowfic.

Mairead noticed the little brownish stains on the dishrag before Alba did.

“Are you…bleeding?” Mairead lifted Alba’s hand to take a closer look, noting a small bead of blood rising from the pad of Alba’s thumb.

Alba pulled her hand away and pressed her thumb between her lips. “Damn roses,” she murmured, striding across the kitchen to grab a new towel. She’d been so preoccupied all day, her mind rushing from one task to the next; when Mairead had told her to throw away the wilted roses on the Fairchilds’ dinner table, she’d just grabbed the bouquet without thinking of the thorns. “Anyway–what were you saying?”

“Just that it’s so much quieter here than at Brainerd ‘n’ Armstrong, right?” Mairead asked, handing Alba a serving spoon to dry.

Alba nodded, trying to look grateful. After all, it was Mairead who’d gotten her the job at the Fairchilds’. And Mairead was right–it was quieter here. At the silk mill, the incessant rattle and clatter of machinery made most conversation impossible–not that that stopped some people from trying, yelling their voices hoarse just to pass on some gossip to help pass the time.

But for Alba, there had been something comforting about that noise, and about the monotony of the work: she had been able to shut off entire parts of her brain and withdraw into herself for hours at a time. She’d spent entire shifts lost in her own thoughts, her brain busy composing essays, poems, and speeches while her fingers seemed to work independently. Somehow, for all the noise of the mill, the inside of Alba’s head had always felt so quiet for the hours she spent at the loom.

Here at the Fairchilds’ house, though, it felt like the opposite: the house was all but silent, but Alba’s mind was in a constant uproar. Instead of just having one thing to do all day, Alba suddenly had dozens of small chores, each of which needed to be done in a particular way, in a particular order–an order that the Fairchilds themselves frequently interrupted with new requests. Alba could hardly keep it all straight. Today, her first day on the job, she’d only stabbed herself with a thorn; but what blunder would she make tomorrow? And when would she have time to think–to really think, about something besides cooking and ironing and polishing and scrubbing and…

“We’re done,” Mairead announced, surveying the kitchen with her hands on her hips. Alba watched in a daze as Mairead untied her apron; it took her a moment to realize that she should untie her own, too.

“Thanks for your help today,” Alba sighed. “I would have been lost without you.” She snuck another look at the little prick-mark on her thumb.

“Don’t mention it,” Mairead chirped, leading the way up the narrow stairway to the attic apartment. “So. Now that we’ve finally got some time to ourselves…what do you want to do tonight?”

For the first time all day, Alba’s find felt blank.

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Mon, 01 Jan 2024 09:15:17 GMT

Story: Without Homeland

Colors: Teary-eyed #1: Misheard

Word Count: 200

Rating: G
Notes: Also posted on rainbowfic.

“You probably just misheard him,” Mairead said, holding the Fairchilds’ bedroom rug aloft. “Besides, what’s a…reactionary anyway?”

“A counterrevolutionary,” Alba said, giving the rug a firm whack with the rattan carpet-beater. She winced remembering the fragments of conversation she’d caught at the Dramatic Club the night before. She’d been sitting alone, as usual, trying to concentrate on the lecturer on stage–some Galleanist from Chicago–when Angelo and a few of his friends stopped to chat right next to her table on their way to the bar. It had to have been deliberate.

Mairead coughed as the cloud of dust began to settle into the grass at their feet. “And that’s…an insult?”

“Yes!” Alba gave the rug another whack. “Ever since we broke up, Angelo has done everything in his power to drive me out of Fort Trumbull.”

Whack.

“But the thing is, he’s the reactionary. All he’s ever wanted is to become one of those prominenti jerks.”

Whack!

Mairead gripped the rug a little more tightly; Alba’s pummeling was causing her to lose her grip. “What’s that?”

“You know–a big-shot. Businessman. Tycoon.”

“And that’s an insult?”

Alba gave the rug one last whack before turning on her heel and marching inside.

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Sun, 31 Dec 2023 07:28:55 GMT

Title: Twinkle
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Alba, Mairead, and Karol walk home on New Year's morning

Mairead surveyed the dark storefronts and apartment windows with a frown. The colorful lights, globes, and tinsel had all disappeared. The only traces of holiday decorations left were the firecracker wrappers that littered the street.

Karol didn’t mind; after dancing well into the wee hours of the new year with Alba and Mairead, he was grateful for the lack of stimulation around him.

Alba took Karol’s hand, then Mairead’s. They followed her eyes to the stars still twinkling through the dawn’s light, the same stars that had hung over them in their home countries, that they now gazed at together.

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Sat, 30 Dec 2023 06:35:03 GMT

Title: Hope
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Alba and Karol have been planning this event for weeks; Alba just hopes people will actually come. Note: this entry references this fic

A half hour before their event was supposed to start, the hall they’d rented was still empty. Alba’s eyes kept darting to the clock mounted above the stage until Karol gently led her to the window that looked out onto Bank Street.

“Look,” he said, his arms wrapped around her waist.

Alba lifted a hand to her brow and squinted through the glass, which was little more than a black mirror. “Are there people coming? What am I looking at?”

“Yourself,” Karol said, smiling over Alba’s shoulder. “You did this.”

“We did this,” Alba corrected, and smiled at their reflection.

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Fri, 29 Dec 2023 06:43:40 GMT

Title: Snowball
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Karol is in too good a mood to let a snowball ruin his morning

The day after Christmas, the streets were teeming with kids chasing bakers’ carts, tipping over ashbins, building snowmen in empty lots, peering in shop windows. Some of them leered at the covers of the pulp novels in Karol’s cart, but tossed them back when they saw that they were in Polish.

Even as an adult, Karol felt nervous around groups of kids. Especially groups of kids making snowballs, like the ones he saw crouching behind a fence next to the Mission.

But today, when a snowball landed at his feet, he just laughed and tossed it back over the fence.

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Thu, 28 Dec 2023 05:43:37 GMT

Title: Scarf
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Alba lends Karol her scarf

Karol could feel the draft blowing through the door leading from the Trumbulls’ kitchen to their backyard. “Are you sure you won’t be cold?”

Alba wrapped her scarf around Karol’s neck, knotting it a little more forcefully than she might have if he hadn’t asked her that question a hundred times already. “I told you,” she said, returning to the stove, “We’ve got enough work to do here today. We’re not going out.”

Karol thanked her with a kiss.

It wasn’t until he was around the corner that he lifted the scarf to his nose to breathe in Alba’s scent.

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Wed, 27 Dec 2023 08:11:12 GMT

Title: Love
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Karol feels his love for Alba deepening

Something had changed about the way he loved her: when he looked at her now, he saw her as she was, and he loved that version of her. But he had started to be able to see other versions of her: to imagine her in her youth, or at the end of a long life. He didn’t know these versions of her, couldn’t see them or hold them, but he felt that he loved them nonetheless.

“What are you staring at?” Alba asked, placing the last pin in her hair and turning from the little mirror on her desk.

“Just…you.”

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Tue, 26 Dec 2023 06:32:05 GMT

Title: Unity
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Alba and Karol prepare for their big event

They’d done everything they could: they’d distributed the paper–with Italian, Polish, and English translations–in social clubs, union halls, and saloons. They’d saved up money to rent a hall on Bank Street. They’d even taken out an advertisement in the Day. They’d secured a few speakers, singers, and a band. Now all they had to do was wait and hope that people showed up. It would be the city’s first attempt at building an anarchist movement that extended beyond ethnic and neighborhood boundaries.

Karol wasn’t sure if God would approve of Alba’s plan, but he still prayed it would work.

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Mon, 25 Dec 2023 06:08:22 GMT

Title: Jolly
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Karol performs for Alba and Mairead

Alba and Mairead rose to their feet and clapped as Karol took a low bow at the end of his performance. He’d serenaded them with a series of Polish carols, followed by an attempt at a traditional dance–lots of hat-lifting and unsteady high-stepping across the kitchen floor–during which the girls had struggled not to laugh.

“I’ve never seen him this…jolly,” Mairead whispered to her friend as Karol leaned out the window to get some fresh air.

Alba sloshed the last drops of wine around the bottom of one of the bottles on the table. “This might explain it,” she smiled.

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Sun, 24 Dec 2023 08:30:29 GMT

Title: Saint Nicholas
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Saint Nicholas visits Alba and Karol

Karol climbed out of bed as quietly as he could and crept across the attic floor. He was happy Alba hadn’t noticed the orange in his coat pocket when she’d clung to his side on the slippery walk home from the hall last night; now he retrieved the little fruit and tiptoed to the door where Alba’s boots were standing in a small puddle of melted snow. He rolled the orange into one of the shoes and turned to slink back to bed…but not before noticing the wrapping paper peeking out from the mouth of one of his own boots.

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Sat, 23 Dec 2023 06:55:53 GMT

Title: Friendmas
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: G
Word Count: 100
Summary: Alba compares Christmases past and present

A few years ago, Alba had celebrated Christmas on Fort Trumbull, in an apartment full of the familiar faces of local anarchists. She had let the conversations at the table wash over her: strong waves coming from every direction, jokes and gossip and opinions about the issues of the day. She hadn’t said much. But she had told herself she was happy to be there, surrounded by like-minded people, Angelo’s massive hand on her knee.

Sitting in Karol’s kitchen, though, with Mairead next to her and Karol across from her, she realized that she was much happier at this table.

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Fri, 22 Dec 2023 05:55:35 GMT

Title: Blaze
Fandom: Original Work
Rating/Warnings: PG
Word Count: 100
Summary: A new issue of Alba and Karol's paper is hot off the press

Karol pulled a chair in front of the little wood-stove in the corner of the print shop; Alba lowered herself into the seat without taking her eyes off the paper in her hands.

“Everything look alright?” Karol asked, crouching beside her. He watched her lips move, pursing and parting, silently mouthing the words she’d written, that he’d printed. He wanted to kiss her, to touch her as gently as the shadows of the flames dancing on her skin.

He watched her lips curve into a smile as she lowered the paper onto her lap, her eyes glistening in the firelight.

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