.ficlet: Hands-On Learning (John/Rodney) PG13
.Hands-On Learning (PG13) John/Rodney
Part of the Restoration Hardware AU, and takes place at some indeterminate time before More Temperate. Written as part of a small "it's Sunday morning, pick a body part" exchange with siriaeve, dogeared, and sheafrotherdon; my part is "hands" :D
Hands-on Learning
“You’re going to have to wait for me; I have lecture today,” Rodney had grunted. The hood of the car had slammed down, almost on Rodney’s grease-smeared fingers, and Rodney yelped. John had thought about pointing out how he also had a job, and did actually need to do it, but Rodney was glaring murder at the car, which had so far resisted Rodney’s tinkering and pleas and shouted reminders that he had a PhD in mechanical engineering, you stupid fucking Volvo what the hell is wrong with you? and John kept his mouth shut.
Now they’re on the far end of a very long Monday, and John doesn’t need to know that Rodney’s car is broken to know that Rodney’s spent the entire day fuming, a low, rolling boil of irritation that has probably traumatized the department secretary, his TA, and the freshman cashier at the university convenience store. It’s evident in the fearful stillness that’s taken over the lecture hall, carried on whispers about how Bobby Walker had been deballed earlier for forgetting Professor McKay’s stringent attitude toward office hours. Everyone, even the collection of kids who are normally too earnestly eager to be frightened of Rodney, has moved back a row, and the slackers congregating along the rear wall are now rubbing elbows with bespectacled, pocket-protected geeks and their laptops.
The door handle turns sharply; thirty heads snap around as the door flies open and Rodney shoulders his way through it, glowering as though the door should have opened itself. John suppresses a grin; Rodney’s on the very edge of composure, red-faced and crazy-haired, one hand strangling the strap of his laptop bag and a thousand words already pent up behind a mouth thinned shut in annoyance.
“Okay,” Rodney says tightly. He dumps his bag in a chair and stalks over to the projection station, his back turned to the class and John wants to rub away the tension that runs across Rodney’s shoulders. Something in Rodney seems to settle, though, as his hands run quickly across the keyboard, bringing up the display on the screen and then the lecture for the day; the second the lecture title comes up, the kids hurl themselves at pens and notebooks and start to write, and Rodney, who has turned around, smiles a grimly satisfied smile and begins to lecture, swift tumble of words John half-understands, laced, woven, brought into some kind of shape as though Rodney’s hands pull them out of the air and into sense.
So, yeah, John might have fallen a bit for Rodney’s hands that day, looking down from three stories up and seeing orange fleece and hands describing irritated arcs and admonitory jabs at him for making a racket, bright sounds and gestures in a day otherwise grey. And then, John supposes, fallen a bit more for Rodney’s hands tracing out a circle and dividing it into quadrants to illustrate, for the benefit of the kid on the other end of the line, how he wants the toppings on his pizza distributed, steadying a level for John as they put their house back together; sometimes during sex, when it’s too dark in their room to see anything, John imagines what Rodney’s hands look like on his body, and shudders at the contour of Rodney’s fingers and the bones in his knuckles and wrists and the scrape of his nails, soft palms that mold themselves to John’s thighs or hip or any other part of him.
Rodney’s hands talk too, a subtext of synthesis and coming apart, and the immense scale of galaxies and the subatomic particles in the Standard Model, come on, pay attention, idiot in the back, flickering, tugging strands of thought, making the students look up despite their desperation to keep up with the notes and the PowerPoint Rodney’s forgotten: it’s really kind of amazing, isn’t it?
“So,” Rodney says at the end, hands settling as he folds his arms across his chest. “Any questions?”
The students all shake their heads. By this point, two minutes past class ending, most of them would have had their books packed away and be poised to launch themselves out the door, but none of them move until Rodney grunts, tells them they have lab on Friday and they had better have pre-labs done or there will be hell, and yes, yes, you can go now, for God’s sake.
By the time John unfolds himself, the last student is probably halfway down the quad, and it’s only him and Rodney. Rodney seems to have calmed down a bit, humming as he packs up his books and papers and blinks in surprise at the screen, then at John when he realizes John’s still there.
“You know, half of them are convinced the two of us get up to nefarious, unspeakable things in here whenever they see you stop by,” Rodney says. He clicks the mouse to shut off the computer, drums his fingers on the podium thoughtfully.
“We could,” John says, and shifts closer. “It’s very…”
“High school movie?” Rodney asks dryly, but turns, and his hands clasp around John’s wrists when John’s own hands settle on his hips.
“I was going to say pornographic.” John leans in, brush of lips, breath on Rodney’s neck; Rodney’s fingers stutter like John’s pulse does, feeling that, a day of stubble because Rodney had forgotten to shave, and he’s warm from pacing and reaching out to grasp the universe and bring it into his classroom. “Kinky, even. I could call you ‘Professor.’”
Rodney makes a small incoherent sound, hands sliding into John’s jeans pockets now, close, close, and yeah, this is good.
“Did I tell you Miriam replaced all the chocolate candy with Starburst?” he asks, shuddery and unsteady, and John grunts something that means ‘you wrote me a three-page email about it, yeah.’ “It’s just cruel,” Rodney adds, but is with it enough to get his hands up under John’s shirt and to shift so John can lean into him, with it enough to trace something mysterious on John’s back, to pull him along with skilful hands into some other kind of amazing thing.
-end-
Part of the Restoration Hardware AU, and takes place at some indeterminate time before More Temperate. Written as part of a small "it's Sunday morning, pick a body part" exchange with siriaeve, dogeared, and sheafrotherdon; my part is "hands" :D
Hands-on Learning
“You’re going to have to wait for me; I have lecture today,” Rodney had grunted. The hood of the car had slammed down, almost on Rodney’s grease-smeared fingers, and Rodney yelped. John had thought about pointing out how he also had a job, and did actually need to do it, but Rodney was glaring murder at the car, which had so far resisted Rodney’s tinkering and pleas and shouted reminders that he had a PhD in mechanical engineering, you stupid fucking Volvo what the hell is wrong with you? and John kept his mouth shut.
Now they’re on the far end of a very long Monday, and John doesn’t need to know that Rodney’s car is broken to know that Rodney’s spent the entire day fuming, a low, rolling boil of irritation that has probably traumatized the department secretary, his TA, and the freshman cashier at the university convenience store. It’s evident in the fearful stillness that’s taken over the lecture hall, carried on whispers about how Bobby Walker had been deballed earlier for forgetting Professor McKay’s stringent attitude toward office hours. Everyone, even the collection of kids who are normally too earnestly eager to be frightened of Rodney, has moved back a row, and the slackers congregating along the rear wall are now rubbing elbows with bespectacled, pocket-protected geeks and their laptops.
The door handle turns sharply; thirty heads snap around as the door flies open and Rodney shoulders his way through it, glowering as though the door should have opened itself. John suppresses a grin; Rodney’s on the very edge of composure, red-faced and crazy-haired, one hand strangling the strap of his laptop bag and a thousand words already pent up behind a mouth thinned shut in annoyance.
“Okay,” Rodney says tightly. He dumps his bag in a chair and stalks over to the projection station, his back turned to the class and John wants to rub away the tension that runs across Rodney’s shoulders. Something in Rodney seems to settle, though, as his hands run quickly across the keyboard, bringing up the display on the screen and then the lecture for the day; the second the lecture title comes up, the kids hurl themselves at pens and notebooks and start to write, and Rodney, who has turned around, smiles a grimly satisfied smile and begins to lecture, swift tumble of words John half-understands, laced, woven, brought into some kind of shape as though Rodney’s hands pull them out of the air and into sense.
So, yeah, John might have fallen a bit for Rodney’s hands that day, looking down from three stories up and seeing orange fleece and hands describing irritated arcs and admonitory jabs at him for making a racket, bright sounds and gestures in a day otherwise grey. And then, John supposes, fallen a bit more for Rodney’s hands tracing out a circle and dividing it into quadrants to illustrate, for the benefit of the kid on the other end of the line, how he wants the toppings on his pizza distributed, steadying a level for John as they put their house back together; sometimes during sex, when it’s too dark in their room to see anything, John imagines what Rodney’s hands look like on his body, and shudders at the contour of Rodney’s fingers and the bones in his knuckles and wrists and the scrape of his nails, soft palms that mold themselves to John’s thighs or hip or any other part of him.
Rodney’s hands talk too, a subtext of synthesis and coming apart, and the immense scale of galaxies and the subatomic particles in the Standard Model, come on, pay attention, idiot in the back, flickering, tugging strands of thought, making the students look up despite their desperation to keep up with the notes and the PowerPoint Rodney’s forgotten: it’s really kind of amazing, isn’t it?
“So,” Rodney says at the end, hands settling as he folds his arms across his chest. “Any questions?”
The students all shake their heads. By this point, two minutes past class ending, most of them would have had their books packed away and be poised to launch themselves out the door, but none of them move until Rodney grunts, tells them they have lab on Friday and they had better have pre-labs done or there will be hell, and yes, yes, you can go now, for God’s sake.
By the time John unfolds himself, the last student is probably halfway down the quad, and it’s only him and Rodney. Rodney seems to have calmed down a bit, humming as he packs up his books and papers and blinks in surprise at the screen, then at John when he realizes John’s still there.
“You know, half of them are convinced the two of us get up to nefarious, unspeakable things in here whenever they see you stop by,” Rodney says. He clicks the mouse to shut off the computer, drums his fingers on the podium thoughtfully.
“We could,” John says, and shifts closer. “It’s very…”
“High school movie?” Rodney asks dryly, but turns, and his hands clasp around John’s wrists when John’s own hands settle on his hips.
“I was going to say pornographic.” John leans in, brush of lips, breath on Rodney’s neck; Rodney’s fingers stutter like John’s pulse does, feeling that, a day of stubble because Rodney had forgotten to shave, and he’s warm from pacing and reaching out to grasp the universe and bring it into his classroom. “Kinky, even. I could call you ‘Professor.’”
Rodney makes a small incoherent sound, hands sliding into John’s jeans pockets now, close, close, and yeah, this is good.
“Did I tell you Miriam replaced all the chocolate candy with Starburst?” he asks, shuddery and unsteady, and John grunts something that means ‘you wrote me a three-page email about it, yeah.’ “It’s just cruel,” Rodney adds, but is with it enough to get his hands up under John’s shirt and to shift so John can lean into him, with it enough to trace something mysterious on John’s back, to pull him along with skilful hands into some other kind of amazing thing.
-end-