Andy/Alfie!! Omg!!
Mar. 25th, 2005 12:38 amI did not see much of the early Andy/Alfie stuff because omg, I had not seen the glorious shining light of the fandom back then. But I saw odd clips of the two of them occasionally, I think the first one in which Andy came to the bar after Alfie was trying to warn Kat off him, and o m g. The calm menacing-ness of Andy, like a snake, and the way Alfie sort of stiffened (not cowered - he has done far too much of that recently, except omg where is he?), like a deer caught in the headlights. He was sexy then and wore loose shirts, and Andy was fresh enough to not be a bit rubbish (but in his lovely I-don't-want-to-be-a-gangster-I-just-want-respect way!). Alfie was perhaps the one person to give him the type of reaction he wanted from people, and he just smoothed himself over it like oil, and it was omg ::falls over::. And I knew.
Time went on, and anger was there more than fear, but when Alfie really got angry there was nobody who could match him better, because he wasn't afraid to be human about it, and call Andy for not letting himself be human. Kat was going to be Andy's trophy-wife, his 'safe house' - Alfie was the one he was really fighting. Because maybe it was a part of himself he didn't want to acknowledge - or a part of humanity he didn't want to want. To be accepted by. As just one of the lads. The high point of their little rivalry, the fight behind the bar when Alfie returned from 'running away', Andy really loses it, and spits the worst possible things he can think of at him, and at his wife, and Alfie - asks him if he's lonely. Utters the immortal line 'if you wanted a cuddle, you only had to say'. And then takes his money and does something Andy could never do with it - gets him something he'll never be able to get on his own - acceptance as a human being. And that's it.
Because back before Alfie just got tired, I think, and Andy y'know, died - Alfie at his best seemed like the one person on the square who could or would bother to try to see the good parts of Andy, the humanity. And I honestly think enough of that, enough of someone being there for him, could have pulled him back into the 'light', as it were - we saw enough of that with Pat, for God's sake. And he could have put his marvellous brain and instincts into helping good people that are sadly without them, like, say...Alfie. But Andy's dead. And Alfie is nowhere to be seen. And my OTP is no more :(
This is way more than a hundred words. Almost a mini manifesto. Clearly I do not get to squee about it enough :)