FIC: Heaven is A Place On Earth 6/6
Headers and such in part 1.
Heaven Is A Place On Earth 6/6
+++
The first thing John did when he got back to the apartment was to start packing.
He brought out the boxes he’d used to move the stuff he’d moved in, putting in clothes and some of the books and papers he’d brought. He emptied the fridge, the cupboards, packed CDs and DVDs.
He came across a picture he’d swiped off Rodney’s room the first time he’d been at the hospital, and left it over the bedside table.
Ronon and Teyla phoned all day, both the phone line at the apartment and John’s cellphone, and both phones were duly ignored.
In the end, they ended up showing up at the apartment, Ronon pounding on the door in a way that made John open it only because he didn’t want to pay it new.
John, quite succinctly, told them Rodney was awake and supposedly fine, and that was that. John tried sending them away, but both of them busied themselves into the apartment, packing things, carrying things. Ronon offered his place for as long as John wanted it, and John produced the first smile in hours.
Teyla made him sit down and eat something after a few hours of packing and cleaning, insisting he’d end up at the hospital if he didn’t put food inside himself. The idea of being in the same hospital as Rodney (or any hospital at all, really) was unwanted to the point of making his frown deepen profoundly, so he sat down on the seats at the corner windows and ate whatever Teyla had put in his hands.
San Francisco was noisy outside, busy with car horns and screaming children, with blinking lights and a setting sun and the apartment was so cold John was starting to hate it more than he’d hated the helicopter after Mitch had gone down.
Rodney was alive, John reminded himself. Rodney was alive, and breathing, and that’s what mattered. Of course.
*
Ronon’s apartment was smaller than Rodney’s had been, but closer to the bay and in an entirely different neighborhood than Rodney’s had been. Rodney’s had been on a hill, Ronon’s was in a low part. Ronon had a view of the bay, a nice enough view.
John found himself missing the rooftop, though. All that space, all that sky, all that city.
One day, he got an idea. He sat on it for a few days, and then he put it into action.
***
Rodney stepped into the apartment, looking around with a judging eye. Madison run past him, launching herself to the sofa and jumping on it.
“Well, except for the jumping midget there, it seems to be in order.”
Jeannie chuckled. “Madison, stopped jumping on your uncle’s couch,” she said, then looked at her brother as he poked at various drawers and cupboards in the kitchen. “I told you, we only rented for about a month or so. A little less.”
“Amazing nothing is broken. Are you sure nothing got stolen?”
Jeannie crossed her arms in a move that made her look scarily alike to Rodney himself. “Mer…”
“Fine, fine,” he said, eyeing with fright as Madison got a book out of his bookcase and opened it. “I’ll have a look myself later. Are you sure nothing is missing?”
Jeannie rested on the back of the couch. “Everything is here, Mer. All of it,” she said. She turned to her daughter. “Okay, Mad, let’s go.”
Madison closed the book and tried to put it back. “Do we have to?” she pouted.
Rodney moved forward to help her with the book before she threw the whole row out of place. Madison ended up latched to his leg. “Yes, honey,” said Jeannie in between chuckles. “Let’s leave your uncle to rest. Rest, I said,” she said, pointing a finger at Rodney. “You better not work.”
Rodney looked vaguely sheepish as he looked down on Madison. “Actually…”
“Mer, you have got to be kidding me!” she said.
“No, no, I mean -” He looked down at Madison, still latched onto his leg, and decided to walk with her like that. “I’m entertaining the thought of, um, selling the company.”
“What?” Jeannie frowned, but she wasn’t exasperated any more. Rodney took that as a good sign.
“Yeah I, um. I don’t know,” he said, Madison on his leg making him limp as he walked to the door. “Crossed my mind.”
Jeannie bent down to pry Madison off his leg. “What are you going to do? I mean, for a living.”
“Well, Radek was at the hospital the other day,” bending down to drop a kiss on Madison’s cheek - she had stuck to him ever since he’d woken up. “He said I missed a job offer while I was… away. I mean a job in physics.”
Jeannie lifted Madison up. “But you don’t have a degree in physics.”
Rodney smiled. “Ah, not yet. Maybe if I get one, I might… you know, genius here, how difficult can it be, I’ve proved half the college’s teachers wrong already.”
“They’ll be delighted to hold your future in their hands, I’m sure,” she grinned.
“Oh, haha,” he said, leaning against the door frame. “Meanwhile, Radek says I can work at the college with him. We had an idea before I had the accident, about wormholes for time travel, he’s been working on it, but he’s, rather correctly, admitted he needs my help.”
Jeannie rolled her eyes. “Well, you’re right about something, you already know the stuff, getting the degree will be a piece of cake.”
“I’m, you know, thinking about it.”
“Well, I think it’s wonderful. I also think you need to not think about it now. You need to rest.”
Rodney crossed his arms. “My brain has been asleep for the past three months, I need to exercise it. Do you have any idea how many neuronal paths have died in that time?”
Jeannie waved a hand. “Oh, two, not even.”
“Oh my side, your slay me,” he deadpanned.
Jeannie opened the door and stepped out into the hallway. “Caleb is coming this Friday and then we’ll go back home. You will have dinner with us, right?”
“Yes, yes, I will,” he said, rolling his eyes. It was the third time she reminded him. “And I promise not to crash against anything,” he grinned.
“That’s not funny,” she said, and the proceeded to squeeze the life out of him with a hug, Madison giggling between them.
Rodney waved goodbye as they left, finally alone in his apartment.
He walked around, poking everything, opening and checking everything. It’s not he didn’t believe Jeannie, he just - he liked doing things himself.
The door to the roof was opened, he noticed, and he climbed up the steps with a frown.
John heard the steps and the voices long before Rodney climbed to the roof. He finished fixing the base for the telescope he’d bought Rodney, setting its carrying case on one side.
He turned to find Rodney staring at him, frowning deeply. John stood up, letting the telescope’s remote control sway freely. It was strange, seeing Rodney with clothing other than the one he’d always seen him in. He was wearing a t-shirt and dark grey pants, and John had to shake himself from staring at his arms.
“Hi,” he said. “Don’t worry, I’m just leaving this stuff here,” he said, pointing behind him. He turned, making sure he’d left the whole thing properly set up. He checked the inside of the carrying case, smiling slightly at the college leaflets he’d left in there - Rodney might think he was a byproduct of a bad decision he’d made years ago, but John was a firm believer in that fact that it was never too late. Especially if it concerned smart people like Rodney.
“That stuff?” Rodney said, getting closer to the telescope, looking at it like a hungry man watches a slice of pie.
“Yours,” said John, gathering the toolbox he’d brought along.
“How did you get in?” Rodney asked, looking at the telescope, at the case, one step away from salivating at it.
John grinned at Rodney’s back. “Oh, I forgot to return my keys. I’m the one who sublet your apartment last month.”
Rodney shook himself, turned to him and put his arms on his hips. Then, of all things, he looked mad at John. “You're an idiot,” he said.
John frowned. “What?”
Rodney crossed his arms, angry eyes fixed on John’s. “For someone who's supposedly mildly smart you're an utter idiot!”
John placed the toolbox on the floor. “What are you on about?”
“I had no way of contacting you, John.”
The air left John’s lungs. “What?”
“After you left the apartment,” he said, waving an arm in the direction of the stairs, as if visual aid was necessary. “You didn't leave a number, anything. Did you ever think how Jeannie was supposed to contact you if something happened to me?” he said, crossing his arms. “Or if I suddenly, oh I don't know, remembered everything?”
John walked to him slowly, fearing he’d fuck it all up royally. “Rodney, you, do you, how do you -?”
Eloquent, thought Rodney. Instead, he said: “Jeannie organized a field trip with Madison. A trip to Oakland,” he said, and John smiled. “Let's say it jogged my memory,” he said, grinning.
John poked him in the shoulder, fearing his hand would go right through it, like so many other times before. Instead he found flesh, warm and firm flesh, with pulsing blood beneath.
Rodney rolled his eyes. “Yes, you idiot, I’m real.”
The next thing he knew John had taken his face between his hands and was kissing him, holding his face as if Rodney was about to escape any moment. Rodney held John’s waist, pressing him to himself, needing his hands to touch, to be sure both of them were real.
There was moaning as Rodney opened John’s mouth with his own, and John thought he might go weak in the knees for the first time in his life because it couldn’t get much more real than Rodney in him, his tongue on John’s, lips hot, wet and slick, Rodney’s big hand on his hips.
Rodney pulled away to look at John. “I thought you'd been a dream, one of those coma-induced hallucinations where everything is odd and impossible or perfect, too perfect.”
John shook his head. “It wasn't a dream.”
“I was flying, and going through stuff, can you see how I might've confused it with a dream?”
John nodded, but said, “It wasn't.”
“I know,” he said, smiling. “I remember. John, I remember!”
And John kissed him again, in the daylight of San Francisco, fog rolling in the bay, the Golden Gate bridge only peeking out from it. The idea of heaven entered the minds of tourists who watched the bridge for the first time in their lives; it installed itself on John’s mind, and refused to leave for a long, long time.
***
Caleb came to San Francisco to find things changed to the core.
His wife was happy again, Madison was happy as a four-year-old should be, clinging to his uncle in a way that really was no use to try and pry her off. She could be swayed a little with the idea of games or sweets (The last ones made Caleb wince, but at least he understood that tiny hands covered in chocolate were an important part of growing up.)
Rodney made John come with him to the dinner on Friday, claiming that, since Caleb was a vegetarian, he’d never allow anything that actually tasted like food to be on the same table as he was. Now, if John was there, Caleb had to be polite and pretend he was okay with John ordering a steak, chicken or something.
That’s what Rodney said, of course. The reality was that ever since meeting in the roof, neither of the two had really left each other’s side, and neither was very willing to do so anytime soon. Rodney had even stolen John’s cellphone and called Ronon himself, telling him he’d need John’s stuff at his apartment as soon as he could bring them.
They ate at a little restaurant with bay view, which Madison left restless after sitting down like a lady for too long.
“We’re taking Madison to the games,” said Jeannie, pointing to the place annexed to the restaurant, which had games worthy of every parent’s nightmare.
“We’ll be out here,” Rodney said, looking at the game room with something akin to fear as he heard the kids shout.
“Don’t go far,” she said, pointing her finger at the both of them.
“Yes, mom,” said Rodney, rolling his eyes. Jeannie only hugged him before leaving.
They walked along the waterline for a while, always staying in view of the games. They weren’t the sort to walk hand in hand, but after a while of walking, they leaned against the rail, one John’s arms going around Rodney’s shoulders in a loose embrace.
The night was warm but the breeze was cool. There was a moon out which made Rodney vaguely wish he was on his rooftop playing with his telescope.
“You know,” said John suddenly, “about three months ago, I was contacted by a General. He wanted me to go with them on some secret mission out of the country.”
Rodney could already see where John’s line of thought was going. “And I’m sure your government has dozens like that.”
“Yes, but this one special enough to contact me after ‘retirement’,” Rodney frowned at that and turned his head towards John. “He said they were time pressed, that once I said no I couldn't think about it later.”
“Once in a lifetime,” frowned Rodney, remembering what Radek had told him about the job offer he’d missed when he’d been in a coma.
John nodded. “I said no, obviously. I mean, it may not have been the same mission, but…”
Rodney was already on a roll. “What if it was?” he said, grabbing John’s arm. “What if we were going to meet on that mission, on that place, and because of my accident and because you said no, it didn't happen? You became my, oh they have this phrase…” he snapped his fingers, making John grin, “pending business! You were my pending business. Maybe that’s why I didn’t die.”
John tightened the arm he had around Rodney’s shoulders. “So... what, we were bound to meet, no matter what?”
Rodney shrugged. “I'm saying.”
John actually thought about it. “That's almost romantic.”
Rodney turned to him, looking vaguely offended. “Almost? Excuse me, I just made the universe revolve around us, how is that almost romantic?”
John laughed and dropped a kiss on Rodney’s temple, reveling in the idea of touch, of smell, of taste, of hand meeting flesh, of flesh rubbing against flesh, the idea of sweat and breath and a grin he could kiss. “You’re a piece of work, McKay.”
Rodney grinned slightly in agreement, almost proud about it, his arm going around John’s waist, his head turning to meet John’s, both their grins widening.
+++
Fin
Heaven Is A Place On Earth 6/6
+++
The first thing John did when he got back to the apartment was to start packing.
He brought out the boxes he’d used to move the stuff he’d moved in, putting in clothes and some of the books and papers he’d brought. He emptied the fridge, the cupboards, packed CDs and DVDs.
He came across a picture he’d swiped off Rodney’s room the first time he’d been at the hospital, and left it over the bedside table.
Ronon and Teyla phoned all day, both the phone line at the apartment and John’s cellphone, and both phones were duly ignored.
In the end, they ended up showing up at the apartment, Ronon pounding on the door in a way that made John open it only because he didn’t want to pay it new.
John, quite succinctly, told them Rodney was awake and supposedly fine, and that was that. John tried sending them away, but both of them busied themselves into the apartment, packing things, carrying things. Ronon offered his place for as long as John wanted it, and John produced the first smile in hours.
Teyla made him sit down and eat something after a few hours of packing and cleaning, insisting he’d end up at the hospital if he didn’t put food inside himself. The idea of being in the same hospital as Rodney (or any hospital at all, really) was unwanted to the point of making his frown deepen profoundly, so he sat down on the seats at the corner windows and ate whatever Teyla had put in his hands.
San Francisco was noisy outside, busy with car horns and screaming children, with blinking lights and a setting sun and the apartment was so cold John was starting to hate it more than he’d hated the helicopter after Mitch had gone down.
Rodney was alive, John reminded himself. Rodney was alive, and breathing, and that’s what mattered. Of course.
*
Ronon’s apartment was smaller than Rodney’s had been, but closer to the bay and in an entirely different neighborhood than Rodney’s had been. Rodney’s had been on a hill, Ronon’s was in a low part. Ronon had a view of the bay, a nice enough view.
John found himself missing the rooftop, though. All that space, all that sky, all that city.
One day, he got an idea. He sat on it for a few days, and then he put it into action.
***
Rodney stepped into the apartment, looking around with a judging eye. Madison run past him, launching herself to the sofa and jumping on it.
“Well, except for the jumping midget there, it seems to be in order.”
Jeannie chuckled. “Madison, stopped jumping on your uncle’s couch,” she said, then looked at her brother as he poked at various drawers and cupboards in the kitchen. “I told you, we only rented for about a month or so. A little less.”
“Amazing nothing is broken. Are you sure nothing got stolen?”
Jeannie crossed her arms in a move that made her look scarily alike to Rodney himself. “Mer…”
“Fine, fine,” he said, eyeing with fright as Madison got a book out of his bookcase and opened it. “I’ll have a look myself later. Are you sure nothing is missing?”
Jeannie rested on the back of the couch. “Everything is here, Mer. All of it,” she said. She turned to her daughter. “Okay, Mad, let’s go.”
Madison closed the book and tried to put it back. “Do we have to?” she pouted.
Rodney moved forward to help her with the book before she threw the whole row out of place. Madison ended up latched to his leg. “Yes, honey,” said Jeannie in between chuckles. “Let’s leave your uncle to rest. Rest, I said,” she said, pointing a finger at Rodney. “You better not work.”
Rodney looked vaguely sheepish as he looked down on Madison. “Actually…”
“Mer, you have got to be kidding me!” she said.
“No, no, I mean -” He looked down at Madison, still latched onto his leg, and decided to walk with her like that. “I’m entertaining the thought of, um, selling the company.”
“What?” Jeannie frowned, but she wasn’t exasperated any more. Rodney took that as a good sign.
“Yeah I, um. I don’t know,” he said, Madison on his leg making him limp as he walked to the door. “Crossed my mind.”
Jeannie bent down to pry Madison off his leg. “What are you going to do? I mean, for a living.”
“Well, Radek was at the hospital the other day,” bending down to drop a kiss on Madison’s cheek - she had stuck to him ever since he’d woken up. “He said I missed a job offer while I was… away. I mean a job in physics.”
Jeannie lifted Madison up. “But you don’t have a degree in physics.”
Rodney smiled. “Ah, not yet. Maybe if I get one, I might… you know, genius here, how difficult can it be, I’ve proved half the college’s teachers wrong already.”
“They’ll be delighted to hold your future in their hands, I’m sure,” she grinned.
“Oh, haha,” he said, leaning against the door frame. “Meanwhile, Radek says I can work at the college with him. We had an idea before I had the accident, about wormholes for time travel, he’s been working on it, but he’s, rather correctly, admitted he needs my help.”
Jeannie rolled her eyes. “Well, you’re right about something, you already know the stuff, getting the degree will be a piece of cake.”
“I’m, you know, thinking about it.”
“Well, I think it’s wonderful. I also think you need to not think about it now. You need to rest.”
Rodney crossed his arms. “My brain has been asleep for the past three months, I need to exercise it. Do you have any idea how many neuronal paths have died in that time?”
Jeannie waved a hand. “Oh, two, not even.”
“Oh my side, your slay me,” he deadpanned.
Jeannie opened the door and stepped out into the hallway. “Caleb is coming this Friday and then we’ll go back home. You will have dinner with us, right?”
“Yes, yes, I will,” he said, rolling his eyes. It was the third time she reminded him. “And I promise not to crash against anything,” he grinned.
“That’s not funny,” she said, and the proceeded to squeeze the life out of him with a hug, Madison giggling between them.
Rodney waved goodbye as they left, finally alone in his apartment.
He walked around, poking everything, opening and checking everything. It’s not he didn’t believe Jeannie, he just - he liked doing things himself.
The door to the roof was opened, he noticed, and he climbed up the steps with a frown.
John heard the steps and the voices long before Rodney climbed to the roof. He finished fixing the base for the telescope he’d bought Rodney, setting its carrying case on one side.
He turned to find Rodney staring at him, frowning deeply. John stood up, letting the telescope’s remote control sway freely. It was strange, seeing Rodney with clothing other than the one he’d always seen him in. He was wearing a t-shirt and dark grey pants, and John had to shake himself from staring at his arms.
“Hi,” he said. “Don’t worry, I’m just leaving this stuff here,” he said, pointing behind him. He turned, making sure he’d left the whole thing properly set up. He checked the inside of the carrying case, smiling slightly at the college leaflets he’d left in there - Rodney might think he was a byproduct of a bad decision he’d made years ago, but John was a firm believer in that fact that it was never too late. Especially if it concerned smart people like Rodney.
“That stuff?” Rodney said, getting closer to the telescope, looking at it like a hungry man watches a slice of pie.
“Yours,” said John, gathering the toolbox he’d brought along.
“How did you get in?” Rodney asked, looking at the telescope, at the case, one step away from salivating at it.
John grinned at Rodney’s back. “Oh, I forgot to return my keys. I’m the one who sublet your apartment last month.”
Rodney shook himself, turned to him and put his arms on his hips. Then, of all things, he looked mad at John. “You're an idiot,” he said.
John frowned. “What?”
Rodney crossed his arms, angry eyes fixed on John’s. “For someone who's supposedly mildly smart you're an utter idiot!”
John placed the toolbox on the floor. “What are you on about?”
“I had no way of contacting you, John.”
The air left John’s lungs. “What?”
“After you left the apartment,” he said, waving an arm in the direction of the stairs, as if visual aid was necessary. “You didn't leave a number, anything. Did you ever think how Jeannie was supposed to contact you if something happened to me?” he said, crossing his arms. “Or if I suddenly, oh I don't know, remembered everything?”
John walked to him slowly, fearing he’d fuck it all up royally. “Rodney, you, do you, how do you -?”
Eloquent, thought Rodney. Instead, he said: “Jeannie organized a field trip with Madison. A trip to Oakland,” he said, and John smiled. “Let's say it jogged my memory,” he said, grinning.
John poked him in the shoulder, fearing his hand would go right through it, like so many other times before. Instead he found flesh, warm and firm flesh, with pulsing blood beneath.
Rodney rolled his eyes. “Yes, you idiot, I’m real.”
The next thing he knew John had taken his face between his hands and was kissing him, holding his face as if Rodney was about to escape any moment. Rodney held John’s waist, pressing him to himself, needing his hands to touch, to be sure both of them were real.
There was moaning as Rodney opened John’s mouth with his own, and John thought he might go weak in the knees for the first time in his life because it couldn’t get much more real than Rodney in him, his tongue on John’s, lips hot, wet and slick, Rodney’s big hand on his hips.
Rodney pulled away to look at John. “I thought you'd been a dream, one of those coma-induced hallucinations where everything is odd and impossible or perfect, too perfect.”
John shook his head. “It wasn't a dream.”
“I was flying, and going through stuff, can you see how I might've confused it with a dream?”
John nodded, but said, “It wasn't.”
“I know,” he said, smiling. “I remember. John, I remember!”
And John kissed him again, in the daylight of San Francisco, fog rolling in the bay, the Golden Gate bridge only peeking out from it. The idea of heaven entered the minds of tourists who watched the bridge for the first time in their lives; it installed itself on John’s mind, and refused to leave for a long, long time.
***
Caleb came to San Francisco to find things changed to the core.
His wife was happy again, Madison was happy as a four-year-old should be, clinging to his uncle in a way that really was no use to try and pry her off. She could be swayed a little with the idea of games or sweets (The last ones made Caleb wince, but at least he understood that tiny hands covered in chocolate were an important part of growing up.)
Rodney made John come with him to the dinner on Friday, claiming that, since Caleb was a vegetarian, he’d never allow anything that actually tasted like food to be on the same table as he was. Now, if John was there, Caleb had to be polite and pretend he was okay with John ordering a steak, chicken or something.
That’s what Rodney said, of course. The reality was that ever since meeting in the roof, neither of the two had really left each other’s side, and neither was very willing to do so anytime soon. Rodney had even stolen John’s cellphone and called Ronon himself, telling him he’d need John’s stuff at his apartment as soon as he could bring them.
They ate at a little restaurant with bay view, which Madison left restless after sitting down like a lady for too long.
“We’re taking Madison to the games,” said Jeannie, pointing to the place annexed to the restaurant, which had games worthy of every parent’s nightmare.
“We’ll be out here,” Rodney said, looking at the game room with something akin to fear as he heard the kids shout.
“Don’t go far,” she said, pointing her finger at the both of them.
“Yes, mom,” said Rodney, rolling his eyes. Jeannie only hugged him before leaving.
They walked along the waterline for a while, always staying in view of the games. They weren’t the sort to walk hand in hand, but after a while of walking, they leaned against the rail, one John’s arms going around Rodney’s shoulders in a loose embrace.
The night was warm but the breeze was cool. There was a moon out which made Rodney vaguely wish he was on his rooftop playing with his telescope.
“You know,” said John suddenly, “about three months ago, I was contacted by a General. He wanted me to go with them on some secret mission out of the country.”
Rodney could already see where John’s line of thought was going. “And I’m sure your government has dozens like that.”
“Yes, but this one special enough to contact me after ‘retirement’,” Rodney frowned at that and turned his head towards John. “He said they were time pressed, that once I said no I couldn't think about it later.”
“Once in a lifetime,” frowned Rodney, remembering what Radek had told him about the job offer he’d missed when he’d been in a coma.
John nodded. “I said no, obviously. I mean, it may not have been the same mission, but…”
Rodney was already on a roll. “What if it was?” he said, grabbing John’s arm. “What if we were going to meet on that mission, on that place, and because of my accident and because you said no, it didn't happen? You became my, oh they have this phrase…” he snapped his fingers, making John grin, “pending business! You were my pending business. Maybe that’s why I didn’t die.”
John tightened the arm he had around Rodney’s shoulders. “So... what, we were bound to meet, no matter what?”
Rodney shrugged. “I'm saying.”
John actually thought about it. “That's almost romantic.”
Rodney turned to him, looking vaguely offended. “Almost? Excuse me, I just made the universe revolve around us, how is that almost romantic?”
John laughed and dropped a kiss on Rodney’s temple, reveling in the idea of touch, of smell, of taste, of hand meeting flesh, of flesh rubbing against flesh, the idea of sweat and breath and a grin he could kiss. “You’re a piece of work, McKay.”
Rodney grinned slightly in agreement, almost proud about it, his arm going around John’s waist, his head turning to meet John’s, both their grins widening.
+++
Fin