Fan Fiction Recommendation: "Familiar" (Brokeback Mountain)

[flowrs4ophelia]

And so with this rec post I officially add Brokeback Mountain to the fandoms included on this journal. I've found a lot of good fics written for this movie but I was going to wait until I had actually seen the movie myself before doing any BBM-related posts here. But the theatre here that's supposed to show it isn't getting it until much later than I had thought (::scream::), and as the amount of quality stuff I'm finding in this fandom is increasing all the time, I figured I should get on with it. Besides, I have read most of the short story by Annie Proulx that the film is based on, watched a bunch of clips, and read so much about the movie in reviews, interviews, and fan communities that I'm starting to feel like I have seen it. I fully expect to be blown away when I'm finally lucky enough to go to the movie, but until then I just have wonderful fan fiction like this to hold me over and ease my impatience.

This ficlet was written for bbm_weekly, a community which gives a weekly one-word prompt as a challenge for a Brokeback fanfic. The prompt this one was written for was "ache." It really beautifully describes the feeling Ennis lives with all of the time as he lives a life that is essentially a lie. I especially love the way this writer describes Jack in the few words there are about him; she has his more affectionate, soft personality that contrasts with Ennis's down perfectly.

Title: Familiar
Author: buttercupgaud
Rating: R
Summary: "Sometimes he thought he might hate Jack Twist. Hated that he didn’t live except in these mountains; that the rest of the time he was just moving through the days one after the other, just sorta numb apart from the ache...Course, then Jack’d look at him and smile and it seemed like Ennis could reach right out and grab the stars just to hand them over to him if Jack asked."
Link: It wasn't even always painful...