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Apr. 7th, 2005 05:55 amwelll finished Valley of the Dolls last night, and in honor of that...A new fic! Yes I know, I've been writing enough as it is, but I can't help myself
Disclaimer: Not mine. Inspired by the gorgeous book 'Valley of the Dolls' by Jacqueline Susann, which I just finished reading for the first time. Not really a RP-version of 'Valley' more just taking many main themes from the book and the roleplay and amplifying them in this setting. You'll see when you start.
Title: It Was More Fun When You Started
Rating: R
Reasons: Drug use/sexual content/language
Genre: Drama/Angst/Romance
Feedback: axebichick@yahoo.com
~You've got to climb to the top of Mount Everest
to reach the Valley of the Dolls.
It's a brutal climb to reach that peak,
which so few have seen.
You never knew what was really up there,
but the last thing you expected to find
was the Valley of the Dolls.
You stand there, waiting for
the rush of exhilaration
you thought you'd feel-but
it doesn't come.
You're too far away to hear the applause
and take your bows.
And there's no place left to climb.
You're alone, and
the feeling of loneliness is overpowering.
The air is so thin you can scarcely breathe.
You've made it-and the world says
you're a hero.
But it was more fun at the bottom
when you started,
with nothing more than hope and
the dream of fulfillment.
All you saw was the top of that mountain-
there was no one to tell you
about the Valley of the Dolls.
But it's different
when you reach the summit.
The elements have left you battered,
defened, sightless-and too weary
to enjoy your victory.~
-Jacqueline Susann, poem at the beginning of Valley of the Dolls
Prologue-New York, 1984
Sometimes she wondered how what had started as a gorgeous dream, something she had won, had suddenly become not enough.
It wasn't sudden though, was it? It was the slow realization that all the riches and the groupies and the cameras didn't fill the holes. In fact, neither did her husband. That's why she'd ran. At least from the first one.
The second? She wasn't sure. All kinds of fear, she thought. Fear of his death. Fear of domestication and being a normal housewife. Fear of his infidelities.
That had been it, hadn't it? Though it wasn't multiple people. Just one. The one who had helped her first marriage end. What was it about him? He was nice looking, she gave him that. Tough, intimidating, even a little dangerous. Sexy, but how could you build a relationship around it? She was real. At least she thought she was real. Of course that blonde bitch lounging on the couch spouting off witty quotes, she hadn't been real. But she was real away from the cameras. Too damned real at times.
Anyway, if didn't matter why fame and love hadn't been enough. Because there was something that had always been enough. Something that had chased away the painful reality of the first marriage and had certainly helped destroy the second one. Something that was always there for her whenever she needed it.
The dolls.
Those pretty dolls were always there. Red, green, blue, white. Every colour you could think of, all for different things. To make her peppier to the world, the ones Brian had suggested, along with those nice green ones that helped melt away the pounds she gained before the abortions and from the depression binging after them. Then of course the red ones. Oh those lovely red dolls, the ones that took her off to that pretty land where there were no slaps, no yells, no tears. Even with James, the one man she thought could save her, they had helped. They had taken away the reality of his disease, his irrational jealousy and the cheating he had promised not to do. For all that she used to mock the faded girls there, after Curt Wild appeared, Mandy had found herself tiptoeing in and then swiftly running head long into and rolling in the grass of the Valley of the Dolls.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Inspired by the gorgeous book 'Valley of the Dolls' by Jacqueline Susann, which I just finished reading for the first time. Not really a RP-version of 'Valley' more just taking many main themes from the book and the roleplay and amplifying them in this setting. You'll see when you start.
Title: It Was More Fun When You Started
Rating: R
Reasons: Drug use/sexual content/language
Genre: Drama/Angst/Romance
Feedback: axebichick@yahoo.com
~You've got to climb to the top of Mount Everest
to reach the Valley of the Dolls.
It's a brutal climb to reach that peak,
which so few have seen.
You never knew what was really up there,
but the last thing you expected to find
was the Valley of the Dolls.
You stand there, waiting for
the rush of exhilaration
you thought you'd feel-but
it doesn't come.
You're too far away to hear the applause
and take your bows.
And there's no place left to climb.
You're alone, and
the feeling of loneliness is overpowering.
The air is so thin you can scarcely breathe.
You've made it-and the world says
you're a hero.
But it was more fun at the bottom
when you started,
with nothing more than hope and
the dream of fulfillment.
All you saw was the top of that mountain-
there was no one to tell you
about the Valley of the Dolls.
But it's different
when you reach the summit.
The elements have left you battered,
defened, sightless-and too weary
to enjoy your victory.~
-Jacqueline Susann, poem at the beginning of Valley of the Dolls
Prologue-New York, 1984
Sometimes she wondered how what had started as a gorgeous dream, something she had won, had suddenly become not enough.
It wasn't sudden though, was it? It was the slow realization that all the riches and the groupies and the cameras didn't fill the holes. In fact, neither did her husband. That's why she'd ran. At least from the first one.
The second? She wasn't sure. All kinds of fear, she thought. Fear of his death. Fear of domestication and being a normal housewife. Fear of his infidelities.
That had been it, hadn't it? Though it wasn't multiple people. Just one. The one who had helped her first marriage end. What was it about him? He was nice looking, she gave him that. Tough, intimidating, even a little dangerous. Sexy, but how could you build a relationship around it? She was real. At least she thought she was real. Of course that blonde bitch lounging on the couch spouting off witty quotes, she hadn't been real. But she was real away from the cameras. Too damned real at times.
Anyway, if didn't matter why fame and love hadn't been enough. Because there was something that had always been enough. Something that had chased away the painful reality of the first marriage and had certainly helped destroy the second one. Something that was always there for her whenever she needed it.
The dolls.
Those pretty dolls were always there. Red, green, blue, white. Every colour you could think of, all for different things. To make her peppier to the world, the ones Brian had suggested, along with those nice green ones that helped melt away the pounds she gained before the abortions and from the depression binging after them. Then of course the red ones. Oh those lovely red dolls, the ones that took her off to that pretty land where there were no slaps, no yells, no tears. Even with James, the one man she thought could save her, they had helped. They had taken away the reality of his disease, his irrational jealousy and the cheating he had promised not to do. For all that she used to mock the faded girls there, after Curt Wild appeared, Mandy had found herself tiptoeing in and then swiftly running head long into and rolling in the grass of the Valley of the Dolls.
