Submitted by RosePaint

May 30, 1991

Absently I fiddled with my collar. It was driving me just a little crazy, the way it wouldn't stay stiffly standing up all round my neck and instead kept wilting somewhat on one side. Not enough starch, probably, I thought passively. Oh, well.

In another time, in another world, I might have raised a small tempest, railed indignantly against whoever the fool was that had pressed my clothes, or at least taken them aside to lend them a few curt words on their sheer incompetence- but here, now, I simply took it in stride.  I hadn't the energy, or the interest, really, to react in any other way.

With a little sigh, I folded my hands, leaned back, and tried to get comfortable in my "director's" chair. I couldn't, of course- over the past year and a half, I had forgotten what it was to feel well, let alone comfortable- but still I made an attempt.  John glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, then looked back at dear Roger as he beat his conga drums to the rhythm of what would be our third single from the new album Innuendo, which we had released around four months before.

Deacy and myself were sitting there behind the camera while Rudi Dolezal stood to the side.  We were currently in the middle of filming the video, which promised to be one of the simplest we had ever made.  Just a gray backdrop like the ones you might see in a photographer's studio, with a simple set of conga drums to the right for Roger.  The three of us were each individually being filmed, taking turns in front of the camera. John had already completed his set, and Brian was out of the country promoting some of his solo material, so after this and maybe another take, it was my turn to go.

Then again, maybe not, that one was nice, I said to myself, when Rudi cut the scene and the music. Roger looked up towards us, then casually clambered down from the stage to watch himself. John stood, but I took my time in pushing myself upright.  I sat there a moment, sliding my thumb back and forth over the ring on my right hand while I waited.

"Was that better?" Roger asked when he reached us, his face straight where once in years past, this question might have been asked through a bit of a smirk.  "I mean, I did that thing you said-"

"Mm," I nodded.  "Looked nice, yes."

He seemed so serious today, I almost didn't recognize him as being the same silly man I had known him to be for almost half my life. With a little inward chuckle, I added, Well, well, if I had known they would listen to me this closely as a result, I would have taken ill that much sooner.

I let myself smile a little at that, but my amusement soon melted into quiet awe.  For if I really thought about it, I had been acquainted with Roger and Brian for twenty-five years, which was a little over half my life- and I had sung for the band Queen for four fifths of all that time.

Twenty years of Queen.  My God.  It makes us sound so ancient- and yet, to think that all of us really had lasted so long together- I couldn't help but feel amazed, and honored.  Never in my wildest imaginings had I assumed we would have made it this far- especially when I remembered how regularly we rowed with each other, fighting tooth and nail over this or that- but in the end, still making it through, united by a common goal: making music.

Very slowly I began to ease myself out of the chair; to move too fast set my body to aching, and I already wasn't feeling my best at the moment.  I saw, but pretended not to see, my friend Dave Clark take a step closer to me, as if he feared I would collapse simply upon standing on my own two feet.  Granted, standing had indeed become something of an effort- but the real chore would be walking to the stage, what with my leg and all. 

For now, I only stood to get a better look at what was showing through the screen, replaying the last thing we shot.  Once more, my idle hands fell to straightening out my waistcoat.  A lovely thing, really; a friend of mine had painted the front of it with pictures of my cats Delilah, Tiffany, Goliath, and Oscar.  I loved my cats so very much; I won't go so far as to say I saw them as my children, the way some might, but they were indeed very dear to me. 

Cats and I have always got on well, more than most other people I think.  Because cats are animals, and they can't hurt you.  Oh, of course, they can make a mess of your things, put out their claws for a scratch or bite down a bit too hard every now and again- but at the same time, they can't hurt you inside, or let you down.  They just eat, sleep, play, and love- like me.  (That was a bit tongue in cheek there, that last part, but I think you know what I mean.) 

Even my wife had eyes like a cat. More like a kitten's eyes, actually, as opposed to a full-grown cat's, because they were rounder, more disarm-

Ahem.  Where was I?  Oh, yes.  The video shoot.  Sorry.

"You ready now, Freddie?" Rudi asked me once we'd gone over Roger's film bits.

I nodded, then tilted my head back a bit and drained a glass of water.  Silently, I turned to the makeup woman, who began blotting at my forehead and cheeks.  There wasn't much she had to do, just a touch-up here and there; I had already endured a good bit of time while they caked layer upon layer of makeup onto my face, ensuring that those lovely little red spots were completely hidden. 

Once she finished, I picked up a hand mirror.  I lowered my head, turned it slightly from side to side, meticulously studying the frightful-looking old man I found staring back, from the hollow cheeks, to the putty-like complexion, to the receding hairline, to the sharper-than-ever chin and fragile neck, to the violet smears around the lids to make the tired eyes pop a little more in monochrome. 

And my stomach turned.

My God, I gasped. Is that me?

Before I let myself dwell too long on my haggard looks, I set the mirror back down and set my mind back on work.  

Now was not the time to bemoan my condition.  It was difficult enough to hear this song play over and over again as we mimed along to it, and not let myself slip emotionally.  I remembered becoming a bit misty in the studio when we were recording the damn thing in the first place, God forbid that should happen now when the cameras would capture every look, every gesture, every thought that might accidentally flicker through my mind. There were things going on inside myself I didn't want anyone to know about. So, as always, I fought them back, hid them away.It required a great deal of effort, especially now, but I had to do it.  

I drew a deep breath, started making my way to the front.  Every step took real, conscious thought, as I put one foot carefully in front of the other, heel-toeing toward the stage.  My right hand clenched quietly, while I prayed my body wouldn't suddenly give out on me mid-stride.  Not that it had happened to me yet, but I didn't want to take any chances; John was already watching me like a hawk, I could feel his gaze boring two holes into my spine even as I moved forward now.  I didn't look back, though; I couldn't bear that quiet concern in his eyes, in everyone's eyes.  I just wanted to work, to get this done, sans pity and sans the wondering, uncertain, "Do you think he's got it?" glances behind my back.  

Taking the one step up to the platform, I felt myself wobble.  On reflex, my fist tightened even more, feeling the hard metal of the ring on my finger press into my palm.

I didn't fall, of course, in fact I don't think anyone even saw me come close, thank God.  I breathed a deep sigh of relief.  Thank you, darling.

With somewhat renewed confidence, I stepped onto the stage and stood, hands on hips, waiting for Rudi's cue.

To sort of warm up, I began singing the first lines of the song under my breath, "Sometimes I get to feelin'... I was back in the old days, long ago/ When we were kids, when we were young, things seemed so perfect..."

Already I could feel that same old tightness in my throat.  The rest I took to humming quietly, before I just stopped altogether. I'd be hearing the actual track many times over again in a matter of minutes anyway.

But the memories remained.  Memories of an easier time, when it wasn't such a struggle to move.  Memories of fun, and laughter, and tears, and madness, and music, and fun, and love-

And loneliness.  A lot of loneliness.

I never felt lonely in the studio, though, or on stage.  Here I had either the boys or Mack to keep me company, and there, thousands of ecstatic faces grinning and screaming back at me. 

I only really felt lonely at home.  Perhaps that's why I worked so much through the years, why so many of my nights were spent out and away from home during that crazier era of my life.  In fact, most of my happiest days were the ones I spent at work, whether that meant I was recording songs or on tour.  I had purpose.  They gave me purpose, just like my wife gave m-

Once more, I brought my train of thought to a screeching halt.  Now was not the time to reminisce, let alone over that- subject.  My makeup would surely suffer.

I had to be strong, while I still could be.

At last Rudi was prepared.  The set hushed, the lights shone.  It was time.

"Take One."

The music played.  I took a deep breath, looked straight into the camera, and with a dramatic sweep of the arms, I began, "Sometimes I get to feelin'..."

***********************************************************************************************

Not ten seconds into reviewing my last take, I had already decided we needed to do another.

"I did too many movements," I told Rudi.  He didn't seem to agree with me, of course, beginning to say that I had done just fine, but I insisted, saying it didn't look natural in several places. 

Of course, it would have been just as easy to simply leave the takes as they were, for DoRo were a marvelous team with a knack for super editing. What was more, there were people from the press who were coming round very soon to give Roger and John an interview, something for which I had every intention of being absent.

And to be honest, on a more selfish note, I was completely exhausted. Since I had been standing for so long a time, my leg had started hurting about fifteen minutes ago, the pain growing steadily worse- and getting off my feet and settling in for a nice long nap sounded more and more delicious. In short, it felt extremely tempting to just call it a day on the spot, and head for home.

Still, I wanted to go round again for good measure.  For all I knew, this could have been my last video (not to be morbid or anything, that was just the truth); if nothing else, this had to come out perfect.  So I had Rudi set up the cameras and such once more while I ambled back to the grey backdrop.

  About halfway there, my leg flared up.  It took me by complete surprise; I had to stop walking a moment, gritting my teeth against a scream.  Fortunately the spasm didn't last too long, and I was able to move fairly soon after, but not without someone trotting up behind me to ask if I was all right.  I only nodded, while all the while I was saying to myself, Just a little longer.  A couple more takes and I'll head out. 

I wasn't interested in redoing anything in the first verse.  Those shots seemed fine.  It was the first repetition of the chorus I wanted to fix, as well as a few areas elsewhere.

"And that's the closer angle, right?" I called.  "It's closer, um- on my face?"

"You want it close up?" Rudi asked, almost like he didn't believe me.

"That's what I said, dear," I sighed.  Someone chuckled somewhere; they thought I was giving him attitude I suppose.  But I was tired and in pain; I just wanted to get on with it.

Roger peered over his shoulder.  "It's zoomed in, like before."

I smoothed my unbuttoned sleeves a bit, fiddled once more with my floppy collar, and nodded.  The lights burned even more brightly than before,  flooding me with white heat.  When I was ready, Rudi held the clapperboard in front of the lens and called for action.  The track jumped right to the first chorus. 

I sang, putting my arms in the air.  "Those were the days of our lives-"

And then, from out of nowhere, her face flashed before my eyes.  It was a strain not to react; however bad the timing of this memory happened to be, I set my expression, my eyes fixed on a spot just above the camera on the wall behind.  I tried to dismiss the image, save her for later when I returned to Garden Lodge, but she wouldn't leave my mind, and distracted me so much that I ended up on auto-pilot for at least the next full minute that followed. 

Not to say I froze up and stopped singing, because I didn't.  I simply kept throwing my arms in the air over and over again (I suppose that's my auto-pilot move when I don't have a microphone in my hands; funny, but I never noticed up till now), and lip-syncing like normal.

But now all I could think about was my wife.  Especially once I went past the line that goes, "You can't turn back the clock, you can't turn back the time..."

That's bollocks, I said to myself a bit flippantly.  She did.

In the past few years I had come to find it increasingly more difficult to suppress thoughts of my wife.  I was never fully free of her, of course, not since I met her fourteen years before.  Of course, during the early eighties I could cite numerous occasions when I went days or even weeks without thinking of her, or being reminded of her- but on my thirty-ninth birthday, even these breaths of fresh air were stripped from me.

I don't know exactly what happened that night.  All I know is, I saw a woman and a child whom I followed to the back alleyway, and when I seized her, something happened.  Again, I couldn't ever begin to tell you what- but I saw something.  Something that still seems real to me, nothing I could possibly have ever imagined.

I saw myself in another life, in another world- a living incarnation of one of my most heartbreaking what-ifs.

Was it real?  I don't know.  No one saw the couple except for me- and I asked around.  Believe me. And for quite some time I managed to sweep even this strange happening under the rug.

But since 1987, my mind seemed to absolutely explode with new yet uncomfortably familiar images- like memories I did not remember making.  I saw green mountains rolling past, as if I was in a car staring out the window; I remembered standing on a bridge, watching people skate around an outdoor ice rink of all things; I felt something fine and white between my fingers- something like either snow or sand. 

I remembered much more than this, naturally- but nearly everything else was terribly personal to me, so much so that I couldn't bear to think of it, even if it wasn't real after all. 

As my condition progressed, however, she occupied more and more of my thoughts, sort of a reverse effect of what had happened up till 1985- and I found I dreamed of her more frequently at night.  The weaker I became, the less adept I grew at avoiding her- and, really, the less I wanted to avoid her.  As much as it cut me to think of her, picturing her eyes behind my lids, imagining her smile and the touch of her hand, comforted me at the same time.  It doesn't make much sense I know- but I really don't expect it to in the first place.  It's just me, and the way I feel.

What was funny, and yet quite tragic, was shortly after I received the bad news, I had this wild idea that perhaps if I stopped everything that I was doing, and started behaving myself, I could live long enough to see the day she was born, at the very least.  1997.  I would have been fifty-one that year.

But I suppose it wasn't meant to be- just like us.

That didn't mean I didn't still feel the way I felt for her. 

"Those were the days of our lives," my recorded harmonies sang.  "The bad things in life were so few..."

Someday, my love, I told her silently. Someday, somewhere, somehow, you will see this video of ours- but you won't see me. You will see something that used to be me. You will see a frail skeleton wearing a painted waistcoat and layers of makeup- someone who was once, but is no more, a force to be reckoned with. But all the pride, the tantrums, the moods, the misconduct- they have wasted away to nothing like the rest of myself. All that's left is this pale, fragile shell- and it isn't much, I know. But here it is. Here I am.

Can you care for me, darling, now that I'm like this? Can you bring yourself to feel the same way for me, a man thoroughly trapped in his plague of weakness? Do you, my stray kitten- do you still love me?

I hope and pray that you do.

Because I still love you.

I threw my arms into the air, turned my face toward the light, miming those last four words- when suddenly I came back down to Earth, realized once again where I was, and what I was doing.  There was a camera in my face, light beating down into my scalp, and every pair of eyes in the room focusing on me and me alone while my mind wandered.  Very slowly I lowered my head, looked into the camera for a moment before I turned my head down and smiled bashfully at my feet.

Behind my eyes, I saw her smile back.

This was my last chance to tell her, and my only one to ensure that she knew, the very truth I had tried for so long to deny.

Without even thinking about it, then, I glanced back into the camera and repeated the words one last time, words I knew she would hear well, yet never understand, words for one person only in this great big mad world: my dear wife.

"I still love you," I whispered.

And walked off the stage, feeling completely drained. 

Rudi cleared his throat.  "Cut."