Comfort
Comfort by sheafrotherdon
~ 355 words, John/Rodney.
Physics, as a discipline is, Rodney knows, predicated on a lie. For every pattern enshrined as a law, for every hypothesis known as a rule, there are a thousand shifting ripples of energy that will not listen to reason, there is gravity's unknown cause, there is dark matter, there is pi tumbling out beyond the confines of memory, unbound, untrammeled, world without end.
So he counts on little, considers nothing certain. To trust in anything, he'll briskly tell anyone who sparks his fury, is to deny the intrinsic character of the universe, the fragile promise of the whole. Sureity is for numbskulls, rejects, and idiots; his faith is in the answers that he still does not have.
But then John slides into his life, curls through his days, ends up in his bed, and Rodney didn't know to count on this - that on days when people die, when the shields fail for fourteen seconds, when the generators fluctuate and the gate threatens to implode; when he runs himself ragged across the breadth of the city, with his face is smeared with soot and his hands torn raw; when he shuts down the virus and reboots life-support; when he sends John to the Chair; when he slips and falls in the blood on stairway seven; when he throws up coffee and danish and bile; that on those days someone else's hands will smooth over his body as he rinses ash from his hair, from his mouth; that on those days he will - without question - crawl into John's willing arms, press his face to warm skin; that on those days he will shake, or forget the art of breathing; that on those days John will kiss his temple and say, "it's okay, you did it," and assure him he's home.
He didn't know to count on this, that comfort waited in the body of another; that comfort wouldn't laugh, wouldn't point out he's a guy, wouldn't say he's too old, wouldn't say, you don't need this.
John kisses his temple, says, "It's okay, you did it."
Rodney burrows into comfort, says, "Yeah. All right."
~ 355 words, John/Rodney.
Physics, as a discipline is, Rodney knows, predicated on a lie. For every pattern enshrined as a law, for every hypothesis known as a rule, there are a thousand shifting ripples of energy that will not listen to reason, there is gravity's unknown cause, there is dark matter, there is pi tumbling out beyond the confines of memory, unbound, untrammeled, world without end.
So he counts on little, considers nothing certain. To trust in anything, he'll briskly tell anyone who sparks his fury, is to deny the intrinsic character of the universe, the fragile promise of the whole. Sureity is for numbskulls, rejects, and idiots; his faith is in the answers that he still does not have.
But then John slides into his life, curls through his days, ends up in his bed, and Rodney didn't know to count on this - that on days when people die, when the shields fail for fourteen seconds, when the generators fluctuate and the gate threatens to implode; when he runs himself ragged across the breadth of the city, with his face is smeared with soot and his hands torn raw; when he shuts down the virus and reboots life-support; when he sends John to the Chair; when he slips and falls in the blood on stairway seven; when he throws up coffee and danish and bile; that on those days someone else's hands will smooth over his body as he rinses ash from his hair, from his mouth; that on those days he will - without question - crawl into John's willing arms, press his face to warm skin; that on those days he will shake, or forget the art of breathing; that on those days John will kiss his temple and say, "it's okay, you did it," and assure him he's home.
He didn't know to count on this, that comfort waited in the body of another; that comfort wouldn't laugh, wouldn't point out he's a guy, wouldn't say he's too old, wouldn't say, you don't need this.
John kisses his temple, says, "It's okay, you did it."
Rodney burrows into comfort, says, "Yeah. All right."