MARC FRASER
Werewolf
Posts: 83
Played by:
Ange
Last seen Apr 2, 2024 16:14:23 GMT
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Post by MARC FRASER on Jan 19, 2022 19:50:09 GMT
If it had still just been him the decision would’ve been easy. The pieces had already slotted together in his brain in a way that made sense. Get bitten, finally shrug off everything that had remained shattered in his head and then find Toni to patch the last broken thing in his life back together. It was a perfect picture until the cop had called and now the picture had changed. Marc didn’t recognise it anymore, only see the jagged edges of pieces of that puzzle jammed together where none really seemed to fit anymore. Had they ever or had he just deluded himself into thinking this was his one way out?
He swallowed hard, lips pressing together as he nodded at Toni’s assurance. Ria seeing her dad either of the ways he was turned his stomach, souring the coffee he’d already drunk. Drinking blood or falling to pieces every time a car backfired outside or some guy looked at his kid wrong on the street. Sniffing, he let the cup dangle from his fingers, dark eyes sliding back to his wife – ex-wife. ”I can’t be who I was – who I still am in here sometimes…” He lifted the hand holding the cup and ground his knuckles against his sternum. ”…and be the dad I want to be for her. I know that. Toni, I can’t…” The words stuck tight in a log jam again.
Marc lifted his head as he finally asked for the help that he hadn’t those years ago. He hadn’t give her the room to help then, even if she could’ve read off every textbook definition of everything he was going through, knowing them by heart. The job had been all he’d wanted to get back to, some chance to prove that he was still exactly who he’d been when his team were torn apart. That ‘I can do it’ attitude had crumbled though, the chain of command seeing exactly what Toni had too late. By the time he crawled home, tail between his legs, that was it.
Brow furrowing, he nodded, knuckling his mouth like he could drive that sour taste back. There wasn’t any sort of magic wand. It was all taking work to prove himself, the foundations of which he’d been laying even before he’d heard that the closest thing to that magic wand was in the hands of the Original Hybrid. ”I was shutting myself out,” Marc managed hoarsely. He drew a deep breath in through his nose before he drained the rest of the coffee. ”I didn’t wanna be that guy, not the one who couldn’t sleep a single night through with you.” Hadn’t wanted to see the cracked reflection of himself in her eyes. ”I don’t even know if I can do it now. I figured, if I got … I wouldn’t need to. One bite and it would all be right again.” He’d known though. Miracles just didn’t exist. If they did then surely Ria or Toni or his brother-in-law would’ve deserved one.
Tossing the cup in the trash, he half turned away. Even now he wasn’t sure if he could drag out the details that still plagued his sleep. If you shone just a little light into the darkness those nightmares were revealed and he still didn’t know if he could handle that without those cracks opening up wide. ”Are you picking Ria up from school?” That itch was there to ask if he could. There was nothing he could do to give him all those years back with his kid but he could desperately want to do better now. Could desperately hope that Toni was gonna give him a real chance to here.
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TONI FRASER
Kitsune
Posts: 47
Age:
Forty
Occupation:
FBI Agent
Status:
Married
Partner:
Separated: Marc Fraser
Played by:
Lissa
Last seen May 5, 2024 19:30:51 GMT
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Post by TONI FRASER on Jan 22, 2022 15:18:13 GMT
| Toni was a little surprised to find out why he was here. What he planned on doing, wasn’t exactly natural. Toni never believed that he had to change that drastically to be a father. Though in truth she had no right to talk him out of his decisions, not anymore so if this was what he wanted, she would need to find a way to deal with it, ” If that’s what you want… or need…” Toni’s voice trailed off at the end. She couldn’t throw her entire support behind the idea, but it also indicated she wasn’t going to stop him either.
Toni in a last-ditch attempt to talk him out of his decision told him that his behaviour she could deal with. The mood swings she could deal with. It was the fact that he had shut her out. He wouldn’t talk. He wouldn’t accept help, convinced he was just fine. Then because the army doctors said he was physically fine to go back out and risk his life… never mind about his mental health. They just needed bodies to go out and die for their cause, including her brother.
Thinking those thoughts just made that all too familiar anger rise up again and she squashed it back down. They were having quite a civil conversation and wasn’t about to let past arguments ruin it. She sipped at her coffee, before turning it into a few huge gulps. Swallowing it down and holding the empty cup in her hand, ” You’ll be replacing one problem for another. One thing would be right, but you’ll have something else to deal with.” Toni reminded him not wanting to really talk about the thirst that came with being a vampire… or in his case a hybrid, ” All I’m saying is really make sure its what you want before… please?” Toni asked of him.
Toni played with the cup in her hands as he turned to put his in the bin. She looked at him when he asked about Ria, if she was picking her up, ” Yeah, but its not for a few more hours yet… No way am I letting her walk anywhere. Not yet.” Toni eventually would lighten up… but right now she needed to know where she was and who she was with. The sheer terror of those months in not knowing she was even alive… would haunt her for a long time to come.
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MARC FRASER
Werewolf
Posts: 83
Played by:
Ange
Last seen Apr 2, 2024 16:14:23 GMT
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Post by MARC FRASER on Apr 1, 2022 17:54:02 GMT
He did want it. He did need it. Even before the call from the station had come through and he’d gone from being a deadbeat veteran to father in just a few minutes flat, Marc had desperately wanted to break out of the mental cell he’d ended up in. Years of beating at the bars, trying to find some way to escape it hadn’t worked. Every avenue had led to nowhere – the nightmares, the panic attacks, the hypervigilance continuing regardless – until being turned into something he’d never imagined had seemed like it was going to be the only way out.
His throat working hard, Marc let his knuckles bite harder into his chest as Toni spoke. Going that day had been a mistake, he knew that now but wishful thinking didn’t do a god damned thing to turn the clock back. You had to live with your decisions and hope you weren’t plagued by memories of them – taking the phone from Toni that night, batting away every single argument that he wasn’t ready, packing his bag and walking out in the end. All mistakes, all chances then for him to turn around and see that he was heading down a bad path. It wasn’t blindness that had stopped him, he knew that now, but a desperate hope that he wasn’t some broken man who was never going to find a way to heal.
Marc’s eyes burned for a second as he bit back a laugh. Talk about self-fulfilling prophecies. In going he’d kept that wound torn wide open, had added others when he’d come home to find Toni gone and his marriage in pieces around him. He hadn’t wanted to talk then and admit to just how damaged he was, now he tried and it was almost as painful. Jaw tightening, Marc closed his fingers around the empty cup until he crumpled. ”I know,” he managed hoarsely. He held both hands up, hefting them back and forth like a set of scales balancing. ”I can’t see a third way. It just feels like it’s a matter of which one’s the lesser evil.” With Toni here, with Ria, the light shining on them to reveal them felt brighter, but that just made the choices all the darker. How the hell could you be the sort of father your kid needed when you were some blood thirsty monster?
Lips pressed together, Marc nodded jerkily. He wouldn’t rush into things the way he’d done out of the house that night. The years might not have taught him as much as they should’ve done but that was a mistake he wasn’t going to repeat with his wife. Ex-wife. He had to keep reminding himself that they weren’t tied to each other like that anymore. ”I won’t do anything yet. I won’t … not without talking to you.” Talk was always the hardest part but even if he had to crack his jaw open manually to do it, he would force himself to now.
It still felt like there was a weight on his chest, but admitting to what he’d come here for had lightened it. There were still admissions to make, battles to fight, but not now. With his cup gone, Marc was slipping his hands into his pockets, needing to keep them occupied. His thumbs tapped against the denim, his gaze sliding back to meet Toni’s as he turned around. ”I wouldn’t either. I didn’t wanna let her out of my sight.” It was a big admission to make, leaving his throat to go raw. ”Maybe I could … pick her up some days. You know, take her out for dinner every now and then. We could … make it a family thing?” His brows hitched slightly as his voice did, hope winding its way through both gestures. They weren’t a family, not the functional sort with both parents and their kid living together in some white picket fence kind of happiness, but Marc wasn’t ready to give up hope that maybe one day they could be again.
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TONI FRASER
Kitsune
Posts: 47
Age:
Forty
Occupation:
FBI Agent
Status:
Married
Partner:
Separated: Marc Fraser
Played by:
Lissa
Last seen May 5, 2024 19:30:51 GMT
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Post by TONI FRASER on Jun 29, 2022 18:12:41 GMT
| Toni didn’t entirely know how to react about his wanting to turn into a hybrid. She knew obviously what it meant. In her eyes it was just replacing one problem with another. Using vampirism to fix level out his emotions, only to have it replaced with ravenous thirst. When Toni mentioned that to him, and he admitted that he knew but didn’t know another way… and that she could understand. It was never his temper or anger, or even his PTSD that she took issue with. It was that he wouldn’t let her help him, wouldn’t talk to him and shut her out so completely that their marriage crumbled around them.
She nodded in her understanding and asked for him to at least be one hundred percent sure it was what he wanted. She smiled a little bit and bowed her head just for a moment before looking back up at him, ” This is your choice. You don’t have to talk to me about it. Just be certain its what you want… “ Toni told him gently. She didn’t have any say in his decisions anymore. That didn’t mean she didn’t care… and wanted to make sure he wasn’t trading one evil for another. Though as he had said… neither option was perfect, but which evil was the lesser of the two?
With that out of the way Toni finished her own coffee and held the empty cup in her hands rolling it between her fingers. As they passed a bin she tossed the cup in, moving her bag onto the crook of her arm and held her hands together in front of her. He asked if she was picking Ria up from school and she admitted that she was. She was sixteen and more than old enough to walk home alone… but considering what happened it would be a while before Toni let her go anywhere alone.
She smiled when he agreed that he hadn’t wanted to let her out of his sight. Toni was still finding it rough to let her go to school. Even now she wanted to check up, make sure she was still there. Hell, she hadn’t slept much since she had gotten Ria back, always getting up to make sure she was still in her bed. Standing in her doorway just watching her sleep, afraid that it was all a dream, and she would wake up to what had been her horrifying realty of her daughter going missing, ” That is actually what I wanted to talk to you about. I’m not a hundred percent sure of a schedule yet, though as I said I’m not going to keep her from you. So, if you want to do the pickup, you can. Just obviously have her home in time to complete any homework and stuff on school nights.” Toni told him. She would leave him to judge an appropriate time, first real fatherly decision, ” You take your time with her. You have plenty of dinners to catch up on. I’m not going to interrupt your time.” Toni told him almost politely. Letting him down easy on the offer of a family dinner. One day perhaps… but right now far to soon.
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MARC FRASER
Werewolf
Posts: 83
Played by:
Ange
Last seen Apr 2, 2024 16:14:23 GMT
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Post by MARC FRASER on Jul 30, 2022 15:13:15 GMT
Years ago his marriage had crumbled because he hadn’t come clean. Toni had been able to see all those surface signs of how screwed up the slaughter of his team had left him, but he hadn’t let her see the whole of the writhing ball of panic beneath, the part of him he scared and ashamed of all at the same time. Maybe that had part had shrunk in the years since, at least enough that he’d admitted to what he was trying to do to get rid of it now. It didn’t mean the shame was gone though, or all those doubts that threatened to eat him alive.
Marc’s gut roiled as he finished his coffee and weighed up the choices he’d just admitted he was considering. Did damning himself to a hunger that was supposedly never satisfied seem like the best option? Never in a million years, he almost couldn’t imagine having to … hell, the smell of blood was usually enough to turn his stomach anyway. Drinking it to survive was going to be one of the hardest things he’d ever done. Walking away from his marriage was still top of that pile and he could feel the pit in his stomach, huge and aching as Toni coaxed him gently into looking at them again. ”It was my choice, it’s not just mine anymore though.” Not with Ria in the picture, and what remained of his marriage right there at his fingertips. He nodded though, agreeing to be certain, wanting to talk for the first time in as long as he could remember.
The vanishing of the coffee cups was slowly driving the nails into the coffin of the conversation. When they were done Toni would head to pick their daughter up from school – he wasn’t ready to let Ria wander too far on his own and doubted Toni was either – and he’d head back to his apartment. Plans for another kitchen remodel spread across the chipped formica four top in the kitchen, that tricky section around the existing built in pantry still blank, waiting for the logical part of his mind to fix the problem. Some part of his brain counting down the seconds until he could spend time with his daughter again … his family.
That was still something all three of them had to get their head around. Marc felt that band tighten around his chest as the hope swelled far enough in there to choke him. After Toni had arrived he hadn’t wanted to ask for too much. He hadn’t been what anyone would’ve called a father for the first sixteen years of Ria’s life, that meant almost all the balls were in Toni’s court. Marc swallowed hard, nodding as his shoulders tightened up. ”I can do that. I’m not gonna screw up her schooling, or anything that is in your schedule or hers.” His was the most flexible of all three, after years of being beholden to the army every moment of the day. It had ended up higher in the pecking order of his life than his marriage, something he never should’ve happened.
Offering to make the dinners a family thing had been his attempt at showing how that had changed now but Toni pulled that plug, gently letting the air out. Lips pressed together, Marc nodded again, his dark eyes cutting away from hers. ”I wouldn’t call it an interruption but … alright. I’ll get her tomorrow from school, if that’s OK. You can let her know tonight, it gives her the time to say no, if it’s not good for her.” And him the time to handle the let down if this didn’t work out the way he hoped it would.
There was still hope in his chest as he stepped in to kiss Toni’s cheek, although that bubble had shrunk from the almost breathless fullness of a moment ago. ”Thanks … for this. For working with me. Take care, OK?” The ‘I love you’ that once would’ve slipped easily out of his mouth hung in the air as he stepped back. ”I’ll see you and Ria tomorrow.” Marc raised his hand in a wave as he stepped back, that hollow only starting to open up again as he turned away, leaving his wife behind in the park.
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