Entry tags:

genre: drama, pairing: jon'n'"stephen", series: fake news

Title: Anger
Series: TDS/TCR
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Two.

For the Report characters: They and their universe are property of Stephen Colbert, the other Report writers, and of course Viacom. Not mine. Sue me not, please.

And for the real people, the poem:
Please, make no mistake:
these people aren't fake,
but what's said here is no more than fiction.
It only was writ
because we like their wit
and wisecracks, and pull-squints, and diction.
We don't mean to quibble,
but this can't be libel;
it's never implied to be real.
No disrespect's meant;
if you disapprove, then,
the back button's right up there. Deal.

Summary: Another depressing ficlet. Jon's lucky he has a helpful friend like Stephen.


Anger


Jon doesn't understand how to deal with anger.

Stephen gets it. Stephen measures anger out in coffee spoons, serving it up in mostly-controlled doses, a volcano on a slow burn. Jon hides it: holds it in and tucks it away, sometimes so well that Stephen almost forgets it's even there.

But then something will happen that makes him truly furious (Stephen thought this would end once the peace-loving hippiecrats got a President who is as much of a pinko commie as Jon is, the one bright spot in this dismal failure of the electoral process, but even that hasn't worked, not yet), and Stephen can see the anger crackling beneath his skin, can see the fear behind his eyes as he begins to recognize that this thing will eat him alive if he doesn't stop it, and he has no idea how.

Lucky for Jon, he has Stephen.

Stephen knows exactly where to needle Jon. He knows which spots are most tender, thanks both to a broad study of the liberal mind and a more intimate association with this one in particular. He knows where the cracks are, and with a few well-aimed phrases (if they didn't want their homes washed away, they shouldn't have lived in New Orleans; you know this city isn't part of the real America; anyone stupid enough to make those investments deserved what they got) he can break them wide open.

If he's fast enough, Jon won't realize what's going on until after he's struck Stephen across the face.

Once the abscess is lanced, that's all it takes to drain the anger away. Of course it's replaced by guilt, because Jon is nothing if not profoundly nice, but this is easily salved. Hurt? Me? Barely even felt it. You'll need to lift a lot more weights before your puny old-man-slap leaves a mark, Stewart.

(Jon always pleads for forgiveness, as though he's done something unspeakably cruel. It's almost laughable. Does he really think Stephen hasn't been through worse?)