“Landon’s Diary: Paris, France. July 1997”

“Landon’s Diary: Paris, France. July 1997”

Acknowledgements

The concept of “Immortals” and “The Game” belongs to Panzer/Davis of Highlander. So it stands to reason that the characters of Richie Ryan, Joe Dawson, Duncan MacLeod, and Adam Pierson are the creation and property of Panzer/Davis. No copyright infringement is intended or implied. Landon belongs to herself and to Rain (me).

Thank you to all my beta readers: Lorenzo, Kim, Miss T., Snowdrop, and my mother as always . . .

God, how pathetic. I just realized I don’t even know what day it is today. And I usually know at least that. But not like it matters. I don’t get any older. Every day looks the same to me. I sleep. I wake up. I eat something somewhere. I keep my head attached to my shoulders. And I fall asleep again. Every day for fifteen years. Exactly half my life. But the thing is, for all that time I’ve looked, to the people around me, and to my own mirror, like a young teenage girl. People say I can be only thirteen but I’ll swear on this spot I am sitting that I was fifteen the night I died the first time. Fifteen by two weeks at least! I used to always keep a journal, if only to write down the date and city I lived in, both before and after I became an Immortal. Of course I often did jot down more than that simple information. I did have lots of time on my hands, first hiding from those who would hurt me, and then from those who sought my head and my Quickening. Well, neither would have what they wanted from me. I’ve always known how to keep to myself. A very wise man taught me the art of running and hiding.

“Live, child,” he told me. “Grow stronger. Fight another day.”

But I’m running off with my thoughts. I didn’t mean to. Back to today. It’s not the weekend. Plenty of people in business suits flood through the streets. Work is done for the day in Paris. Night will fall in a couple of hours and I won’t be able to see to write much longer. Writing is what keeps me sane at the moment, or so I thought before I began. My luck, David Talbot, that odd vampire from the original Watchers who wants all those other vampires to write their life stories, will choose now to reveal himself to me again. But I don’t look forward to another critical assessment by him. I can only imagine how he sees me. My unruly hair, my heavy mascara and eyebrow ring. My tiny, 90 pound, not-quite-womanly body encased in tight black pants and boots. All of that swallowed up in my billowing mauve coat. Tailored for a man in the European style of the early 1700s, a gift from Armand. Wouldn’t David love to know THAT story. Wait. He’s psychic. He probably already does. Damn it.

I am also listening to a CD, my favorite this month. Stabbing Westward. The music is haunting and heavy... depressing and dark. Like me. I’m listening to two songs on repeat now — “Shame” and “What Do I Have To Do?” They have little to do with how I feel today. But they echo how I have felt about him in the past:

“I don’t know if I’m real without you. What is left of me without you? I don’t know what’s real without you. How can I exist without you?”

Did I mention yet where I am? I suppose I didn’t. It seems so obvious to me. I’m in a fucking cemetery. And not merely hiding on the Holy Ground this time.

He died. He was murdered finally, by one of us. I still can’t believe he died before me. I was weaker. I was smaller. I am more rash about everything. He had tempted fate his whole life, first without and then with the sword. And now he is dead. He’d escaped his murderer once already, and just after that was when I we met for the first time. Only a little more than a year ago. And I was in love with him the first moment I felt his Buzz. He looked like a nineteen-year-old kid, with curly strawberry blond hair, a leather coat and blue jeans. He’d stopped dead on his motorcycle when he felt me. I let myself be seen immediately, leaning outside my second story window over Interstate Highway 101 in Oregon. He drew his sword, but I laughed my most natural flirtatious laugh and he put it away, as they almost always do.

Now wait, I know what you’re thinking already. Cute, tiny, helpless Immortal woman. Seduces Immortal men into protecting her then takes their head while they sleep. Well, maybe others do but not me. I don’t want to kill anyone. I don’t like The Game. It’s the older ones usually who insist there must be The Game. Maybe I’m from too young and free minded a generation or I just personally can’t accept its necessity. I think The Game is stupid. I carry a sword but I don’t want to die. But he believed in The Game with all his heart. So why couldn’t The Game have killed him and not his teacher?

A week after I’d met and — fine, yes, I did do this half of your assumption — seduced my leather clad demi-god, one of those disgusting head greedy Immortals chose to challenge me. The same one incidentally who had managed to murder both me and my mortal boyfriend. I never caught his name, which I found strange since usually Immortals are so very eager to introduce themselves. Anyway, a while back this guy had found me and shot me in the heart. Always hurts like hell but I get over it. I lose more great clothes to bullet holes and bloodstains, well you know how it can be. When I revived, my honey was still gasping his last breaths. He’d fought off the Immortal but died trying. Why I still had my head was beyond me, but I wasn’t about to argue. I told Richie the story even more briefly than what I’ve written here, and as it turned out he couldn’t bear to see me lose the challenge. I let young Richie Ryan fight him to the death instead. Richie won and took his head. That monster MacLeod had taught him well. I’ll give him that tiny bit of goodness, but just that.

Richie shared my bed for two more weeks. It took VERY LITTLE convincing that I was actually twenty-nine years old and not the “playing with Barbie dolls” kid I resembled. I showed him a couple of photographs from the eighties. Yikes, I hadn’t realized how utterly…big my hair was back then! Fashion Police. Please confiscate the hairspray. Richie told me a couple of times how much he liked how I wore my hair now. That’s why I've kept it the same. It’s dark natural hue, plus chunks dyed blonde and chunks of dark mauve or maroon. Soft curls framing my heart-shaped face, hanging almost to my shoulders but never quite reaching them. I loved it when Richie used to run his hands through it. Sending chills across my scalp, down my arms to my fingertips. Along my spine, spreading down my legs...

And then one morning he just packed his bag and told me, “I can’t stay here anymore, Landon. You’re too—. It’s just... not good that I hang around.” I was crushed, obviously. I did love him. How could he leave me? He moved out of the apartment, but not out of town. I know because I followed him. Not close enough that he would ever feel my Buzz, but I followed him. He got a room at a small hotel. No one ever visited him. That was lucky for him. I had been terrified he’d found another girl or had only been cheating on a girl with me. But that wasn’t the case.

I called him on the phone a few times. At first he would answer and talk to me. I tried to set up a date with him for dinner or the movies or something. Just to let him know we could date without cohabitating. He didn’t think it was a good idea. So then I called just to talk to him. I missed him so much. I couldn’t sleep at night without him there beside me. Finally Richie started blowing me off on the phone as well as in person.

Stabbing Westward from my CD player sings:

“What do I have to do to make you happy? What do I have to do to make you understand? What do I have to do to make you want me? And if I can’t make you want me what do I have to do to forget about you?”

I cried for two days; then I was just angry. I decided I didn’t want to be with him anyway. I was fooling myself but it worked for me at the time. I dated a couple of different kids in the neighborhood who were the age I look, but couldn’t stand how silly and young they acted. I finally called Paris a couple of times but I only got Adam Pierson’s answering machine. That guy was NEVER home!

Richie Ryan rode his motorcycle out of town south on Interstate Highway 101 early in the summer. Toward San Francisco the hotel told me. I didn’t follow him. I was still telling myself I hated him and didn't want to be with him. And San Francisco always reminded me of the rock star vampire, Lestat, anyway. I didn’t want to deal.

When the rent bill came due, instead of paying it I moved to Seacouver, almost hoping Richie might come back someday. He did. I managed to run into him at Joe’s bar (which was a feat in itself seeing as how I look only thirteen). The meeting was strained at first, but I tried to act friendly and not say too much. It worked. We spent one more night together. But when I looked into his gorgeous blue eyes the next morning, I knew he would run from me again. So I left first. I stood on my tiptoes for one last sweet kiss before slipping on my comfy mauve coat and leaving HIM this time. I’m really thankful we got that night. No hard feelings left hanging around. Because now he’s gone. And all I have is this:

RICHIE RYAN
22 YEARS
FRIEND

A granite tombstone and granite slab on the ground in the middle of a Paris cemetery. Joe arranged everything about the funeral. I didn’t know when it happened. But I’m here now. Joe was actually here in the cemetery earlier. I spoke with him briefly. He seemed to brighten slightly when he saw that I had come, but he didn’t say much. He did tell me he was relocating to Paris for good. Adam might even still be here; Joe hadn’t heard otherwise. Maybe I’ll try to crash with Adam and stay close too. But I’ve learned one can never be sure with him.

Light’s all gone now. I can’t see to write anymore. I’ll just lay my head here on the cold rough stone and concentrate on Richie below me. If David Tablot shows, he shows. My CD batteries are dead.

first penned October 25, 2000
revised through November 2000

Copyright 2000 Rainofhearts

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