fic: the mechanics of a smile (kaylee; firefly; rating:pg13)
Title: The Mechanics of a Smile
Author: lily_268
Pairing: KAYLEE (Kaylee/Simon, Kaylee/OMC)
Rating: PG13
Summary: He began to split into someone new everyday until there weren't any letters left to label all the shades of Simon.
Spoilers: BDM
Word Count: 900
Author's Notes: I really hope I didn't go overboard with the accent. I've never written Kaylee before and I tried to sound it all out in my head and read it aloud, but I never know how much a reader wants of the voice to be left in and how much they can add on their own. Concrit is appreciated.
Just 'cause it stopped don't mean she can't 'member:
Hot fingers over slick skin, moving with surgical precision that unspooled her nerves like a busted coil.
It was limited from the beginning; they can't stitch up time. When he wasn't tending to his sister, he was playing a child's game of dress up:
Look, Father. I'm a real doctor.
---
After Miranda, he began to split into someone new everyday until there weren't any letters left for her to label all the shades of Simon that she found.
She liked that his brain was wired to piece together broken bits and make them function again; he had the training to recognise when a part couldn't do its job anymore.
When Serenity was singin' to her like a whine, she listened for the squeaky wheel that's hurtin' for oil. In the Cold and Dark, new parts didn't exactly grow from the grates but the ship still had to keep runnin'.
So she took what she could from the sparse offerings and she found ways to stick up holes with spirit gum and run the containment field's meter with parts of old spoons.
What doomed them: his instinct is to amputate when something is infected.
---
One day, River returned from the dust with Zoe's scarf drippin' from her neck and her face more pale than usual. Kaylee learned that there was a cut dangerously close to some important artery that had a fancy name. But when she visited to cheer up the patient, both Tams averted their eyes from her smile.
After that, he lost any pretense of having a bedside manner. His new cut-and-dry diagnoses grated on her skin and when they docked, there were matching scratches on the hull.
She told herself that he's just doin' what he can to keep everyone running in the Cold and Dark. It was easier to put it in terms she understood.
She finds it odd that after seein' the damage done, it don't seem to deter him none from damaging folk hisself. At least, not when it comes to protecting the crew. She was once taken and tied up for three days while bearded men taunted her. All she 'members is how they liked when her tears stained the blindfold darker and how her skin would warn her when one was gettin' closer, hairs standing to attention like soldiers. Only it t'weren't soldiers that silenced those men's ugly laughter forever with three swift shots before kneeling by her side.
After that day, he started creating more bullet holes than he was mendin'.
---
Somedays she took River out to the market to giggle over boys without vests and hard-to-eat snacks. They returned with their arms awkwardly looped because River'd just recited what the infant mortality rate was outside the Core and Kaylee still didn't know how to handle stuff like that yet. Obviously worried, he hurried down to inspect if River had any new wounds. (He never got to Kaylee.)
Other days, he simply lost patience for her naivety and the fresh paint she used to cover the blood. How she refused to see that it was a hard life out here where things didn't always end with strawberries. He's running out of anasthetic.
The worst was when he teased her for the thousandth time about something from the Core, talking to her like she's deaf and she must be, because she's leavin' the room.
She never blamed him, she oughta known those things, read more as a kid, gone to museums. Maybe then...
---
It's for the best that her bed holds one now because her Pa never would've understood. He woulda been standing bowlegged and slouched on the faded porch as he silently judged Simon's suit. Her brothers woulda beat on him until his hair didn't shine no more or until their mother opened those pursed lips that made everyone within a ten mile radius quake with fear. Then Ma woulda most likely had called him closer for an inspection and waved Simon in to the kitchen with a heavy sigh.
---
No one on the ship talks about it now, even Jayne, which means that it must have been a pretty noticeable change. It's another subject to add to the list of things to avoid. She thinks it might be easier if they all became mimes - more's said in a look anyways.
The way eyes strayed a second too long at the glistening Alliance-approved display in the market. Lingering on the girl giving the demonstration, who pointed with spotless fingernails and had hair so straight it was like it aint never been tossed by atmo turbulence.
---
She gave up searching for all the bits that he had been shedding 'cross the 'verse. Near the end, she only had enough strength to clutch at her knees in a ball on her bed, wondering how to replace the burnt out cuff that had begun to crack.
The thing that saved her: when somethin's broke, her instinct is to keep trying 'til she can't.
---
One day she'll meet a broad-shouldered boy with a face that's seen too much sun and he'll show off a gap-toothed smile when he shakes her hand a bit too rough from excitement.
Cap'n said somethin' bout needing a new pair o'legs to haul cargo anyways.
Author: lily_268
Pairing: KAYLEE (Kaylee/Simon, Kaylee/OMC)
Rating: PG13
Summary: He began to split into someone new everyday until there weren't any letters left to label all the shades of Simon.
Spoilers: BDM
Word Count: 900
Author's Notes: I really hope I didn't go overboard with the accent. I've never written Kaylee before and I tried to sound it all out in my head and read it aloud, but I never know how much a reader wants of the voice to be left in and how much they can add on their own. Concrit is appreciated.
Just 'cause it stopped don't mean she can't 'member:
Hot fingers over slick skin, moving with surgical precision that unspooled her nerves like a busted coil.
It was limited from the beginning; they can't stitch up time. When he wasn't tending to his sister, he was playing a child's game of dress up:
Look, Father. I'm a real doctor.
---
After Miranda, he began to split into someone new everyday until there weren't any letters left for her to label all the shades of Simon that she found.
She liked that his brain was wired to piece together broken bits and make them function again; he had the training to recognise when a part couldn't do its job anymore.
When Serenity was singin' to her like a whine, she listened for the squeaky wheel that's hurtin' for oil. In the Cold and Dark, new parts didn't exactly grow from the grates but the ship still had to keep runnin'.
So she took what she could from the sparse offerings and she found ways to stick up holes with spirit gum and run the containment field's meter with parts of old spoons.
What doomed them: his instinct is to amputate when something is infected.
---
One day, River returned from the dust with Zoe's scarf drippin' from her neck and her face more pale than usual. Kaylee learned that there was a cut dangerously close to some important artery that had a fancy name. But when she visited to cheer up the patient, both Tams averted their eyes from her smile.
After that, he lost any pretense of having a bedside manner. His new cut-and-dry diagnoses grated on her skin and when they docked, there were matching scratches on the hull.
She told herself that he's just doin' what he can to keep everyone running in the Cold and Dark. It was easier to put it in terms she understood.
She finds it odd that after seein' the damage done, it don't seem to deter him none from damaging folk hisself. At least, not when it comes to protecting the crew. She was once taken and tied up for three days while bearded men taunted her. All she 'members is how they liked when her tears stained the blindfold darker and how her skin would warn her when one was gettin' closer, hairs standing to attention like soldiers. Only it t'weren't soldiers that silenced those men's ugly laughter forever with three swift shots before kneeling by her side.
After that day, he started creating more bullet holes than he was mendin'.
---
Somedays she took River out to the market to giggle over boys without vests and hard-to-eat snacks. They returned with their arms awkwardly looped because River'd just recited what the infant mortality rate was outside the Core and Kaylee still didn't know how to handle stuff like that yet. Obviously worried, he hurried down to inspect if River had any new wounds. (He never got to Kaylee.)
Other days, he simply lost patience for her naivety and the fresh paint she used to cover the blood. How she refused to see that it was a hard life out here where things didn't always end with strawberries. He's running out of anasthetic.
The worst was when he teased her for the thousandth time about something from the Core, talking to her like she's deaf and she must be, because she's leavin' the room.
She never blamed him, she oughta known those things, read more as a kid, gone to museums. Maybe then...
---
It's for the best that her bed holds one now because her Pa never would've understood. He woulda been standing bowlegged and slouched on the faded porch as he silently judged Simon's suit. Her brothers woulda beat on him until his hair didn't shine no more or until their mother opened those pursed lips that made everyone within a ten mile radius quake with fear. Then Ma woulda most likely had called him closer for an inspection and waved Simon in to the kitchen with a heavy sigh.
---
No one on the ship talks about it now, even Jayne, which means that it must have been a pretty noticeable change. It's another subject to add to the list of things to avoid. She thinks it might be easier if they all became mimes - more's said in a look anyways.
The way eyes strayed a second too long at the glistening Alliance-approved display in the market. Lingering on the girl giving the demonstration, who pointed with spotless fingernails and had hair so straight it was like it aint never been tossed by atmo turbulence.
---
She gave up searching for all the bits that he had been shedding 'cross the 'verse. Near the end, she only had enough strength to clutch at her knees in a ball on her bed, wondering how to replace the burnt out cuff that had begun to crack.
The thing that saved her: when somethin's broke, her instinct is to keep trying 'til she can't.
---
One day she'll meet a broad-shouldered boy with a face that's seen too much sun and he'll show off a gap-toothed smile when he shakes her hand a bit too rough from excitement.
Cap'n said somethin' bout needing a new pair o'legs to haul cargo anyways.