Just a few words too many/In my head A few words too many/In this bed A few words too many/Left unsaid Oh, I wish that we were strangers/We could start again
Inspiration
A Few Words is the rewritten version of Poisonous Dreams, written in 2003-04. It’s based a spoiler that began to circulate in April 2003 that Elizabeth was going to become pregnant with Ric’s child. At the time, I could not conceive a way Elizabeth and Ric would reunite in the wake of his kidnapping Courtney, pretending to sleep with Carly, and all that other nonsense. Instead, I decided to write what I thought was the logical conclusion to the Ric storyline. It seemed like they were setting Ric up to be mostly psychotic, but then they changed his character. Rick Hearst is so amazing that I’ve learned to forget most of 2003.
Background
This story begins in April 2003, but nothing that happened in 2003 happened the way it did on the show, particularly Ric’s storyline. So, just assume that Ric has done nothing beyond date Elizabeth, pretend to sleep with Carly and work for her at the club, and defend Jason and Brenda (along with Alexis) during the Alcazar trial in January 2003. Sonny never fired Jason (because dude, stupid) but Jason and Courtney are dating. That asinine confrontation in Kelly’s between the three of them did not happen because…well…no. Emily returned in March as scheduled, but she doesn’t have cancer.
This story is now completed. Thanks to Cora for proofing the last four chapters.
I was obsessed with Faith Roscoe back in the day. Cynthia Preston made you root for this absolutely insane character in ways that boggle the mind. She tried to kill Elizabeth repeatedly, and I still adored her. In 2003, Jason prepared to kill her for the first time, and it was cliffhanger Friday so I put together this episode tag.
I gave Faith a maiden name in this story, and then a blogger writing about GH was searching for her maiden name — came across my story and linked it. It gave me a huge spike in traffic, LOL, so it’s something I’ve always remembered.
Timeline
By April of 2003, Faith Roscoe had annoyed the crap of Jason and Sonny. She’d joined the show in late December 2002 as Roscoe’s widow. I don’t know if Roscoe had an actual first name, but I’ve always called him Mickey in my head. Roscoe was the guy Jason executed in the summer of 2002 and led to Elizabeth’s kidnapping. Faith came for revenge. I honestly can’t remember why Jason was preparing to kill Faith at this point, but the set up here is that he has her in a room and is laying down plastic to prep for the clean up.
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Someone is walking up to the bedroom door.
Hearing him knocking —
She knows what it’s for.
She’s at the window wondering why there is no one to save her.
Raising up her eyes to a brand new sky she knows the truth at last —
She’s never coming back.
— This Is The Day, Ivy
April 23, 2003
She was five the first time her father molested her.
It’s a hazy memory, but even a small little girl is unable to forget the first time her daddy climbs into bed with, slides her cotton nightgown to her waist and touches her in places that only her mother has ever seen.
She was ten the first time her father raped her.
And she was fifteen when she shot him.
She doesn’t remember when it happened, she doesn’t remember pulling the trigger, she’s not even sure where the gun came from.
But the memory of holding the gun in her hands, standing over his fallen form is etched into her memory. She remembers that part clearly.
It was the second that Faith Rasticoff decided that no man would have power over her again. She would never be the victim again.
Which was why the current situation was ironic. She was about to die. At the hands of a man.
She’d made last moment pleas for her life, begged…would have groveled if she weren’t tied up. But it was unnecessary. Jason Morgan had made his career on his lack of mercy.
Tears streaked down her cheeks, smearing her mascara. Her sobs were soundless, thanks to the duct tape.
She was a threat. A threat that had to be removed.
She was seventeen when she met her husband. Mickey Roscoe took good care of her, didn’t push her in the bedroom, dressed her in fine clothing and took her to all the right places. He’d saved her from a life on the streets.
Was it so hard to believe that she’d wanted a little revenge for his death?
She could hear Morgan loading the gun from behind her. Her eyes squeezed shut and she clenched her fists at her side.
She’d wanted children. A little boy for Mickey, and a little girl for her. She would have been a good mother, she knew it. A little girl she could protect from people like her father, from people like Sonny Corinthos. Mickey would get a boy to take over his operation. A perfect life.
She’d been coming home from a doctor’s appointment when one of Mickey’s guards told her. Corinthos had ordered Mickey’s murder.
She’d never been able to tell him she was pregnant, and when she lost the child three months later, she hadn’t been able to tell anyone about that.
Was it so wrong to want Sonny Corinthos to pay for the family he’d ripped from her? Only his family mattered? Only his unborn child was worth anything? What about her? What about the family she’d been creating? What about the love she and her husband had shared? Had it been any different than Sonny and Carly?
She heard the phone ring behind her and steeled herself. Mickey had gone with dignity, she knew it. He hadn’t cried or begged for his life, Mickey was better than that.
She would die like he had. She’d done nothing wrong, nothing that the great Sonny Corinthos wouldn’t had done himself.
She’d seen a threat and she’d sought to remove it.
“It’ll be done.”
His cold voice rang through the room and Faith’s heart began to beat wildly.
She was going to see Mickey again…and her unborn child that had never had a chance to survive.
She’d be free.
She felt the cold nuzzle of the gun at her ear and she squeezed her eyes tighter.
This may be one of the oddest stories I’ve ever written. It retells the storyline of Elizabeth falling at Rice Plaza in 2003, when Faith pushed her and caused her miscarriage. The show wanted to have Ric blame Sonny, which I totally understood, but then there was that ridiculous panic room storyline that would have destroyed any other character, but somehow Rick Hearst was so amazing, even I still love him and he almost killed my favorite character a dozen times.
This show is not specifically one couple or another, and surprisingly, it’s more Jason/Courtney and Ric/Elizabeth than I had intended, but I still liked the way it worked out so I can’t complain too much. I had intially intended on a whole other second part of this that might have explained the title, but I ended up dropping it, so don’t try and figure it out too much. It doesn’t fit the story whatsoever 😛 There’s always maybe the possibility of a sequel, but with my list of stuff to write, it’s unlikely.
This story includes Amy Adams as Robyn Nicholas, and Holly Marie Combs as Jessica Mitchell.
As with my other Faith short, I was obsessed with her character on the show. I wrote this after she pushed Elizabeth down the stairs, sparing us a LiRic baby.
Timeline
This is set in late May 2003 after Faith pushed Elizabeth down the stairs, leading to her miscarriage. Faith targeted Elizabeth on several occasions, hoping to win Ric for herself.
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All alone I didn’t like the feeling
All alone I sat and cried
For the first time since her husband died, she thought she might have found someone.
Someone who challenged her. Who felt the same burning need she did.
To take what Sonny Corinthos held dear and destroy it. Because he’d destroyed both their worlds without a second glance.
He’d taken Ric’s mother from him.
He’d taken her husband from her.
Mickey Roscoe had been her whole world. Her entire reason for breathing, for waking in the morning.
The reason she wasn’t another statistic.
All alone I had to find some meaning
In the center of the pain I felt inside
He’d saved her from a life on the streets at age seventeen Until the moment she’d met Michael “Mickey” Roscoe, her life had been a series of bad dreams and nightmarish events.
From her molesting and rapist father—whom she’d killed at age fifteen—to the mother who’d never really seen her, never really cared about her.
She didn’t remember pulling the trigger when she’d killed her father. She just remembered he’d come to her bedroom and she knew he wanted to rape her. Again.
Like he had for the past five years.
And she couldn’t take it anymore.
She’d shot him. And she’d decided that no man had the right to tell her what to do and would never hold that power again.
All alone I came into this world
All alone I will someday die
Mickey had understood that and she’d thought Ric had, too. She thought Ric understood why Sonny had to pay. He’d stolen their families, their worlds.
She’d been pregnant when Sonny had Mickey killed and she’d lost the child only months later. There’d been no one tell—no one to help her grieve. She’d channeled all her anger, all her misery into one goal.
Destroying Sonny.
And Ric should have seen that. He should have understood.
But he didn’t, not anymore. Not since that excruciatingly lame waitress had managed to trap him into a marriage.
But she needed Ric back. And she’d only begun to understand why.
Solid stone is just sand and water, baby
Sand and water, and a million years gone by
For the first time since Mickey had died, she’d been able to envision the future. She’d seen a good one, too. When Sonny was gone, she and Ric would have his empire and they’re rule with an iron fist.
It was a dream she’d cultivated for months, and now she understood why she needed Ric with her.
Because she’d fallen in love with him.
And when she loved someone, it was with her whole entire body and soul. And she’d been unable to accept the fact that he didn’t love her back.
I will see you in the light of a thousand suns
I will hear you in the sound of the waves
Sex was cheap. Sex was easy. She had the looks, the body, the charm. She could get it when she wanted it. She’d been able to goad Ric into one night, hadn’t she?
But Ric was hung up on that twit—especially now that she was pregnant. He’d never leave her now. Not while he had the chance at a family.
Mickey had always told her to go after what she wanted and to make no apologies for her methods. Mickey had been a wonderful person with potential—someone who could have run Port Charles far better than Sonny ever could.
I will know you when I come, as we all will come
Through the doors beyond the grave
So she felt no remorse for tossing the little Webber angel down the steps. The girl had survived, hadn’t she?
She’d seen a threat and sought to remove it. Elizabeth’s pregnancy threatened her dream, her fantasy.
And threats were removed. That was the first rule in this business. Threats couldn’t be tolerated.
All alone I heal this heart of sorrow
All alone I raise this child
Sometimes she compared Ric and Mickey, and Ric always came up short. Not because he didn’t love her—she thought that maybe even if he did, it would never measure up to Mickey.
Mickey had known her—known her inside and out and he’d loved her anyway. He knew her father had molested her—that he’d worked his way up to rape. He knew she’d killed him and had sold her body to survive.
He’d known the deepest darkest blackest parts of her heart and he’d loved her anyway. Unconditional love was new to her, something she’d never experienced before.
Something she’d never have again.
Flesh and bone, he’s just
Bursting towards tomorrow
Ric, even if she could convince him to love her, would never know her like that. He could ask where the scars came from and maybe she’d be able to tell him, but she’d never cry herself to sleep in his arms because of it.
She’d never let him see one of her tantrums, one of her breakdowns. She’d never let him see one of her nightmares, where she woke up sweating, feeling dirty and clammy hands covering her body.
Because even if he did love her, she had a feeling that her past wouldn’t be good enough for him. And even if it was, he’d never really understand.
And his laughter fills my world and wears your smile
All alone I came into this world
But he was the first man since Mickey that she’d even considered a future with. And that had to mean something. Didn’t it?
He’d leave the little girl eventually when he started to feel suffocated by having to suppress his feelings of rage.
He’d come back to her and together, they’d finally destroy Sonny.
Ric would do it for his father, for the mother he’d never known.
And she would do it for the family that’d been ripped from her and the dreams that Sonny had crushed.
All alone I will someday die
Solid stone is just sand and water, baby
And maybe when she finally had Ric, she could stop missing her husband.
