Thursday Evening (2018), Phoenix, Ariz.
May. 8th, 2008 10:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tyler_goneThe apartment was almost bare. Tyler never had much stuff, and Marla, who did, had shipped all her shit back East three weeks ago, when she left the last time. (The fight had been a bad one -- there were still shards from the lamp she'd thrown at his head scattering the floor -- and Tyler had immediately gone out to pick a fight in a bar, just so he didn't have to think about her anymore. That black eye was still fading.)
It wasn't like he wanted to bring much, though. What do you take with you when the place that kicked you out when you were 16, that you thought was just another rotten fruit of your diseased brain, suddenly hires you as a freaking teacher?
A duffel bag of clothes and books. A laptop. No supplies, they wouldn't let him on the plane with them. That was it.
Pacing and looking out the door for the airport shuttle -- he'd sold his car -- Tyler remembered the last time he'd been in Fandom.
April 8, 2007
From the outside, Tyler looked placid as he took his last walk across campus, through town, and onto the causeway. He was a reedy 16-year-old with old eyes wearing jeans and a grey t-shirt, and his satchel appeared to carry no more than he might need for a day of classes. In a town full of students, he was utterly unremarkable.
That is, unless you watched the tiny expressions flit across his face, the way he shoved his hands in his pockets as if he was trying to trap them. Because inside his head, Tyler was fighting with himself.
No. Tyler was brawling with himself.
"We'll be out of here in ten minutes, buddy," his other self taunted, walking beside him with a broad grin on his face. "I love how when I come up with a plan, you jump to make it happen."
"Only because you didn't give me a choice," Tyler protested. "I like it here. I have friends here." He stopped short. "Maybe if I went back and apologized to Principal Washburn –"
"Apologize for what, for trying to fulfill your mission? For wanting to become who you could be? Who you already were?" Other Tyler asked. "C'mon, I let you give most of a year to that place. It's on to bigger and better things."
Tyler glanced vainly back toward campus, half-hoping the Stickbug army would tackle him and stop him from leaving. He felt a stab of regret at not saying more proper goodbyes. "But my friends –"
"Are a bunch of pussies who would never have made Project Mayhem," Other Tyler finished. "Wimps and freaks, man, that's all you're leaving." He walked ahead. "Keep up, dude."
Tyler trudged grimly forward. "So what are we doing to do?"
"I am going to take over, and I am going to remind the wannabes who Tyler Durden really is. You are going to take a very long nap, and then you are probably going to go cry into a punching bag about how your daddy never loved you, or some shit."
"No," Tyler said firmly. "If we're restarting the project, if we're going ahead ... I'm in charge as much as you are." It was safer that way. "Like old times. Unless you want me to check us into a psych ward."
Other Tyler knew a genuine threat, and that was one that worked. "Old times, then. I'll even get us a job waiting tables," he said, putting a little bit of a victory dance in his walk as they hit the causeway. "There's a surprise for you at the other end."
And Tyler didn't even get the chance to ask what the surprise was, because there it was, obscenely big, the dream of a thousand capitalists. A white Hummer limo was parked at the end of the road, and two space monkeys stood beside it to open the door.
"Mr. Durden, sir," one said, and the other finished, "It's good to have you back."
A final glimpse at the island -- and Tyler realized there was nothing for him there, or nothing he would let himself have.
"Good to be back," he said, getting into the limo as Other Tyler faded into nothingness, back to curling up in his brain. "Gentlemen, fill me in on what's happened while I was gone."
They did just that as Tyler Durden -- fighter, student council rep, amateur chemist, and anarchist -- rode that limo back to his destiny.
That had been then.
This was now.
But, looking outside, Tyler couldn't help but take it as some sort of sign that the car service to the airport had sent a limousine.
[OOC: I am going to write out the rest of the 11 missing years, but this timeline should give you some idea what he was up to.]
It wasn't like he wanted to bring much, though. What do you take with you when the place that kicked you out when you were 16, that you thought was just another rotten fruit of your diseased brain, suddenly hires you as a freaking teacher?
A duffel bag of clothes and books. A laptop. No supplies, they wouldn't let him on the plane with them. That was it.
Pacing and looking out the door for the airport shuttle -- he'd sold his car -- Tyler remembered the last time he'd been in Fandom.
April 8, 2007
From the outside, Tyler looked placid as he took his last walk across campus, through town, and onto the causeway. He was a reedy 16-year-old with old eyes wearing jeans and a grey t-shirt, and his satchel appeared to carry no more than he might need for a day of classes. In a town full of students, he was utterly unremarkable.
That is, unless you watched the tiny expressions flit across his face, the way he shoved his hands in his pockets as if he was trying to trap them. Because inside his head, Tyler was fighting with himself.
No. Tyler was brawling with himself.
"We'll be out of here in ten minutes, buddy," his other self taunted, walking beside him with a broad grin on his face. "I love how when I come up with a plan, you jump to make it happen."
"Only because you didn't give me a choice," Tyler protested. "I like it here. I have friends here." He stopped short. "Maybe if I went back and apologized to Principal Washburn –"
"Apologize for what, for trying to fulfill your mission? For wanting to become who you could be? Who you already were?" Other Tyler asked. "C'mon, I let you give most of a year to that place. It's on to bigger and better things."
Tyler glanced vainly back toward campus, half-hoping the Stickbug army would tackle him and stop him from leaving. He felt a stab of regret at not saying more proper goodbyes. "But my friends –"
"Are a bunch of pussies who would never have made Project Mayhem," Other Tyler finished. "Wimps and freaks, man, that's all you're leaving." He walked ahead. "Keep up, dude."
Tyler trudged grimly forward. "So what are we doing to do?"
"I am going to take over, and I am going to remind the wannabes who Tyler Durden really is. You are going to take a very long nap, and then you are probably going to go cry into a punching bag about how your daddy never loved you, or some shit."
"No," Tyler said firmly. "If we're restarting the project, if we're going ahead ... I'm in charge as much as you are." It was safer that way. "Like old times. Unless you want me to check us into a psych ward."
Other Tyler knew a genuine threat, and that was one that worked. "Old times, then. I'll even get us a job waiting tables," he said, putting a little bit of a victory dance in his walk as they hit the causeway. "There's a surprise for you at the other end."
And Tyler didn't even get the chance to ask what the surprise was, because there it was, obscenely big, the dream of a thousand capitalists. A white Hummer limo was parked at the end of the road, and two space monkeys stood beside it to open the door.
"Mr. Durden, sir," one said, and the other finished, "It's good to have you back."
A final glimpse at the island -- and Tyler realized there was nothing for him there, or nothing he would let himself have.
"Good to be back," he said, getting into the limo as Other Tyler faded into nothingness, back to curling up in his brain. "Gentlemen, fill me in on what's happened while I was gone."
They did just that as Tyler Durden -- fighter, student council rep, amateur chemist, and anarchist -- rode that limo back to his destiny.
That had been then.
This was now.
But, looking outside, Tyler couldn't help but take it as some sort of sign that the car service to the airport had sent a limousine.
[OOC: I am going to write out the rest of the 11 missing years, but this timeline should give you some idea what he was up to.]
