One-shot: Motherless Boys
Title: Motherless Boys
Author: lookninjas
Characters: Jack/Ianto
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: "From Out of the Rain," and "Adrift"
Summary: Ianto doesn't ask about Jack's family, so Jack doesn't ask about Ianto's.
Notes: Much, much love to seize and ffarff for all their assistance with this fic.
Ianto never asked Jack about his family, so Jack never asked about Ianto's. It wasn't that he didn't care, only that he knew what it was like to want to keep the past in the past, to bury some things past the reach of memory. And pushing Ianto to talk would only result in an even more obdurate silence. Patience had never really been one of Jack's strong suits, but there were some things worth waiting for.
Eventually, Ianto started to share little things, crumbs of information, always about his father. "My father was a master tailor." "My father taught me not to speak ill of the dead." "My father used to take me to the Electro." He never said anything about his mother, and Jack knew that silence, knew what it meant. But Ianto hadn't asked about Jack's mother, so Jack couldn't, in good conscience, ask about Ianto's. He could only wait.
Then Jack found himself standing in a hospital room, Ianto at his side, two small children laying fragile and pale in their hospital beds. For some reason, it made him think of his brother, of Grey. He wasn't sure why. "Those words," one of the nurses was saying. "'From out of the rain.' I'm sure I've heard them before."
Jack glanced at Ianto, whose eyebrows were raised slightly in interest. It was the slightest of leads, but it was still a lead. "Oh! I remember. It was Christina. She was a patient."
"Here?" Jack asked, feeling his pulse speed up a bit. If she was still here, they could go and find her, question her. Even if she couldn't tell them much, it might help. The case had been dragging on too long, and too many had died. They needed something.
"No, at Providence Park. It's a psychiatric hospital."
"I know it," Ianto said, quickly. Too quickly. He glanced at Jack for just a moment before his gaze skittered away.
Most of Ianto's personnel records had survived the battle of Canary Wharf -- not all of them, but most. His medical history, certainly, was complete. So Jack knew that Ianto had never been to Providence Park as anything more than a visitor. But someone else had been there, someone close to him.
"She was a full-time patient," the nurse was saying, and Jack forced himself to attend. "Been there since she was a child." He reminded himself that Ianto would talk when he was ready to talk. "She was a strange one." There wasn't any point in pressing him. "Whenever anything, any kind of entertainment show was laid on, she became scared." But the air in the room had changed, subtly. There was a weight on Ianto's shoulders that hadn't been there before. "She'd run away and hide."
The case came first. He couldn't worry about Ianto right now. "Did she say why?" he asked, and didn't look at Ianto anymore.
*
Ianto was leaning against the wall as Jack entered the ward, PDA in his hands, working away. The lines between his eyes were deeper than usual, and his eyes were dark-circled; Jack wished briefly, intensely, that he'd never got Ianto mixed up in this. Too late, though. "What have we got?" he asked, drawing near.
When Ianto glanced up from the little screen, his eyes were troubled. "Police brought the man in about an hour ago. He looks to be about fifty or so, but it's hard to say -- he's covered over with old burn scars. No way of knowing how old he is or what he might have looked like before." Ianto took a breath, a little pause, before adding, "He was screaming when they found him. Kept right on screaming until they got him in a room and sedated him. The nurses I spoke to were still pretty shaken; apparently they could hear him three floors up. Never heard anything like it."
The nurses weren't the only ones shaken; there was a slight tremor in Ianto's voice, the barest hint of strain. "Did he say what had happened to him?" Jack asked. "Give a name? Anything?"
"Just the screaming." Ianto reached into his pocket, pulled out a battered bit of plastic on a string, and handed it to Jack. "But he had this tied around his neck."
It was a library card, yellowed with age, melted and scorched around the edges, bent and broken but somehow intact. Someone had punched a hole through it and worn it like a good luck charm, a talisman, a relic from a previous life. Jack peered at it, trying to read the name. "Jonah Bevan?" he asked.
Ianto nodded. "Disappeared two weeks ago, on his way home from football practice. Fifteen years old. His mother's been all over trying to get him back." He sighed, looking up at Jack again. "The police think it's possible our patient might have been involved in the disappearance, or at least know something. He had to have gotten the library card somehow."
Jack looked at the library card again. It looked like it had spent forty years at the far edge of the universe, through war and fire and destruction. It looked like it had seen hell. "The police who found him -- are they still here?"
"They're hoping he'll be more coherent when he comes out from the sedatives," Ianto said. "So they're waiting." He studied Jack for a while. "That's Jonah, isn't it? That man, our patient. That's Jonah Bevan."
Jack produced a little bottle of pills from his pocket, and Ianto took it. "Standard amnesia protocol, for everyone who might have seen the patient," Jack said. "I'll call Helen. Let her know that we're bringing him in."
Ianto turned as if to leave, but then stopped, looking back over his shoulder. "You should probably..." For a moment, he looked as if he didn't know what to say. "Tell her he's... he's in a bad way. She needs to be ready for it."
Jack caught Ianto's wrist, rubbed his thumb up under the cuff of his shirt to stroke the soft skin over his pulse. It was the closest he could come to apologizing. "I'll warn her," he said, quietly.
"Thank you," Ianto said, and the lines between his eyes didn't seem so deep anymore. Then he pulled away, and went to start the cleanup.
*
Ianto drove them to Providence Park without speaking. Jack's mind was buzzing with questions, and the silence stretched between them, frayed, pushed to the breaking point. It dug into Jack's skin until he could hardly sit still. But he waited, waited until Ianto pulled the SUV into a parking spot, turned off the engine, and took a deep breath. Both his hands rested on the steering wheel -- not clutching, just holding, and when he spoke, his voice was almost normal. "My mother," he said. "Been in and out of hospital since I was just a boy. She hasn't been here for ages, though." The slightest emphasis on the word here, just enough that Jack got the hint. Maybe Ianto's mother hadn't been to Providence Park for a while, but that didn't mean she'd gotten better. Ianto took another deep breath, kept his eyes focused on the windscreen. "Don't feel sorry for me, Jack."
"Never," Jack said, and rested his hand over one of Ianto's. It was a relief when Ianto's fingers interlaced with his. He wasn't being shut out. He could work with that.
For a few moments, they sat there, together, and the silence was comfortable now. Then Ianto straightened his shoulders, let go of Jack's hand, and slid out of the SUV. Jack could only follow him, and hope the conversation wasn't over.
*
"He keeps asking for his mother," Ianto said, his voice hushed and strained. There was a strange sadness in his eyes, one Jack was becoming increasingly familiar with. "Jack, can't we --"
"No." Ianto turned his face away quickly, but not quickly enough to hide that flash of hurt, and Jack relented a bit, resting his hand on Ianto's shoulder. "She wouldn't understand, Ianto. It's not..." He trailed off for a moment, lost in memories, and returned to find Ianto looking at him with something akin to worry. "It'd be too much for her to take in. It's better this way, believe me."
A nurse brushed past them with an armload of fresh linen, and they broke apart. Ianto leaned against the rough-hewn wall of their underground clinic and closed his eyes. "He asked me if he was home yet," he murmured, hands deep in his pockets, shoulders slumped. "According to Helen, he asks everyone if he's home. He thinks he's still wandering out there, lost. Can't blame him, really. Sometimes this place is an awful lot like a prison." Jack bristled a bit, and Ianto held out a soothing hand. "I'm not... You do the best you can. I'm not arguing that. But nothing here is familiar to him. If he could just see his mother..."
"And what if she refuses to believe that it's really him? What if she looks him right in the eye and says 'You're not my son?'" Jack's breath caught in his throat unexpectedly, and he had to look away for a moment to prevent Ianto seeing anything he shouldn't. "He's hurt enough, Ianto. I won't make it worse."
"She's his mother, Jack," Ianto protested. As if biology trumped all else. As if there really were such a thing as unconditional love.
But there wasn't. Jack had learned that as a boy. "No, Ianto. And that's final."
Ianto stared at him a bit longer, then turned on his heel and strode briskly away, back up towards the surface of Flat Holm. Jack watched him go with a sigh.
*
Ianto insisted on wheeling Christina back to her room when they were done speaking, and Jack trailed along after them, watching. Things must have changed a bit since Ianto had last visited; he paused from time to time, frowning at hallways and staircases, until Christina, laughing, pointed him in the right direction.
Someone had made a sign for Christina's door, her name written in bright colors, with flowers and butterflies drawn around it. It made Jack think of Flat Holm, of the little chalkboards on the doors, and he swallowed hard. Ianto was already pushing Christina into her room, helping her out of her chair and walking her the few steps to the bed. When she sat down, he knelt in front of her and started to unlace her heavy orthopaedic shoes. She looked down at his dark head with curiosity and a strange sort of affection. "You don't belong here," she said again.
Ianto glanced up at her; Jack couldn't see the expression on his face. For a moment, her shaking hand rested on his cheek. "So old," she murmured, and Jack swallowed hard.
Ianto's shoulders tensed under his suit jacket, his whole body going rigid. But then Christina's hand fell away, and Ianto took a deep breath and stood. "Shall I take your coat, or would you rather go to sleep with it on?" he asked, his voice gentle, teasing just a little. Christina flushed and smiled at him, the moment forgotten.
He took her coat and the heavy sweater she wore underneath, handing them to Jack to be hung up, then put her to bed, tucking the covers over her. "Thank you," he said, crouching by the bed, his hand over hers. "Thank you for talking to us, Christina."
"You'll stop them, won't you?" she asked. "You won't let them steal my breath."
"I promise," Ianto said. "Sleep well." Then he drew back, returning to Jack's side. Jack switched the lights off as they left the room, and closed the door behind them.
The tension returned to Ianto's shoulders as soon as they were in the hallway, the line of his back unnaturally straight. He didn't look at Jack once, but marched briskly through the halls, as if he couldn't get out of Providence Park fast enough. Jack could only wait and watch and follow.
Ianto stopped when he'd gotten out to the carpark, put his hands on his hips, let his head drop down. Jack rested a hand on his shoulder. "All right?" he asked, squeezing slightly.
Ianto nodded without looking up. "Gave me a bit of a turn when she said that, about me having old eyes." He might have sounded calm if Jack hadn't known him so well. "Only my mother used to say that all the time. That my eyes were too old. I never quite knew what she meant by it." He looked back at the buildings; the sun had peeked out from behind the clouds for a moment, and Providence Park looked almost beautiful, all red brick and green grass, shade trees and flowers. There were, Jack supposed, worse places to end up. "She doesn't talk anymore," Ianto added, his voice very flat.
He pulled away from Jack's touch and hurried to the SUV without another word.
*
He wasn't surprised that Ianto was the one to follow him out of the conference room after Gwen's little lecture. For just a moment, he hated both of them, for always agreeing with each other, always arguing with him. He hated them for being so innocent, and he hated them for blindly charging into situations that would take that innocence away from them. He hated them for not understanding, and he hated them for trying to understand. "No," he snapped, before Ianto even opened his mouth.
Ianto blinked twice, startled, but he recovered fast, brave as always. "You heard Gwen. That woman is desperate to find her son. We can help her."
"She only thinks she wants the truth," Jack said, feeling a muscle twitch in his jaw. "If she had the slightest idea what had really happened --"
"She would still want to know!" Ianto's voice rose dangerously, and he visibly checked himself. "You're a bloody hypocrite, Jack Harkness, do you know that?"
Jack's eyes narrowed. "Excuse me?"
There was no intimidating Ianto, though, not now. "If Hart walked into the Hub right now, and said he would take you to Grey, you'd be after him without a second's thought. Even if it killed you, you'd go. Because you want answers. It's not any different for Jonah's mother."
That hit home, and Jack felt the blood drain from his face. "You don't know anything about it," he muttered, before turning to leave. There was the barest pause before he heard Ianto following him, his tread measured, steady, relentless.
He hated Ianto, then, for his refusal to give up, let go. He hated Ianto for being such a fighter.
*
Ianto lay stiffly in Jack's arms for a long time, long enough that Jack wondered if he would ever relax. All he could do was run light fingers over Ianto's shoulder and down his arm, brush his lips against the back of Ianto's neck, cradle him close and wait as Ianto took one deep breath after another, as if willing himself to calm down.
"They wouldn't let me visit her," he said, finally, his voice so soft that Jack could barely hear it over the quiet humming of the Hub's machinery. "My dad just told me she was in the hospital, and that I'd be able to see her when she got better. But she was gone so long, I thought... I didn't understand it. I thought she was dying."
Jack draped his arm around Ianto's chest, just holding him.
"Then they finally said I could see her. I'd missed her... you've no idea how much." Jack flinched inwardly at that, but didn't say anything. "I'm not sure what I was expecting. Maybe that she'd have a cast on her leg or something. Or that she'd be bald, like when Idris Hopper's mum had cancer and lost her hair. But she looked the same as she always had, mostly. It was just..." His breath caught in his throat. Jack kissed his shoulder. "It was her eyes. There was something... something missing in her eyes."
Jack squeezed his eyes tight closed, and buried his face in Ianto's hair. He remembered that look all too well.
"I'd thought that she'd smile or something, you know, that she'd be so happy to see me. But then she turned away, went back to staring out the window. She wouldn't even say anything. I couldn't understand what I'd done wrong. They gave me a little chair to sit in, and Dad talked to her, just simple things, how the shop was doing and how I was in school, ordinary things. She wouldn't look at him either. And she didn't say anything. He talked and talked until they told us it was time to go, and she didn't say anything."
Jack remembered that, too, the silence that he tried so hard to fill, the quiet indifference he could never crack. It hurt, knowing that Ianto went through the same.
"Afterwards, Dad told me that it had done her good to see me, that I'd have to come in as often as I could, that she was better for having me around. And they did let her come home eventually, so I thought he must have been right. But then she'd get bad again, and they'd put her in hospital, and she wouldn't say anything to anyone. I'd visit, and they'd tell me I'd helped her. But I didn't, obviously, or it wouldn't have kept happening."
He blamed himself for not being able to save her. Jack knew the feeling. "Do you still visit her?"
"Sometimes." Ianto sighed, relaxing into Jack's arms. "Not as often as I should. I know... It's not just me. She doesn't talk to anyone. It's just... It's stupid, I suppose."
Jack kissed his hair again. "It's not stupid at all."
"I thought someday I'd get used to it," Ianto admitted. "That it wouldn't bother me anymore. I mean, it isn't anything new. My whole life has been this way. But it hasn't gotten any easier."
The words were out before Jack could stop them. "It never does."
Ianto shifted slightly in Jack's hold, turning to look up at him.
Jack closed his eyes, took a deep breath in, let it out slowly. "Not now. Later, maybe."
They were tense and silent together for a moment. "All right," Ianto said. He reached up, found Jack's hand draped over his belly, and laced their fingers together. Jack held him tightly.
They didn't say anything else, and eventually, Ianto fell asleep.
*
They waited in a corner of the room until the members of the support group drifted back out into the night, huddled in groups of two or three. Nikki Bevan was left alone, clearing up the remainder of the food and drink. She didn't look up as they approached, but she knew they were there; her hands trembled on the punch bowl. "I've nothing to say to your lot," she muttered.
"Ms. Bevan," Ianto said, his hands clasped behind his back, knuckles white. "My name is Ianto Jones. I'm here to talk to you about Jonah."
"And I've nothing to say to you," she repeated, her voice louder now. "Haven't you done enough?"
Ianto took a half-step back, and Jack itched to just pull him out of the room. But he couldn't. Ianto would never forgive him. "Ms. Bevan," Ianto said, his voice softer. "Please. I know it's hard..."
"Do you now?" She finally turned to look at him, face flushed with anger and eyes tear-filled. "What could you possibly know about any of it?"
Ianto went pale at that, and didn't answer.
Nikki softened. "I can't do it. I'm sorry. I can't look at those scars and hear that screaming... There's nothing I can do to help him. If I thought I could, if I thought there was anything..."
"Of course," Ianto said, a bit stiffly. "I'm sorry to have intruded. It won't happen again." He nodded his head, and retreated to the door.
It was Jack's turn to approach, hand wrapped around the bottle of pills in his pocket. "You don't have to remember what you've seen, Ms. Bevan. You can remember Jonah how he was before. If you want."
She shook her head, unsmiling. "And then what? Go back to searching? Sooner or later, I'll find my way back to that bloody island and we'll be back where we started. Thank you, but no. I'll manage."
"Of course." Jack let go of the bottle of pills, and nodded to her. "I am sorry, Ms. Bevan."
She turned back to her tidying.
Jack wrapped a hand around Ianto's elbow and guided him out into the dark, drizzly Cardiff night.
*
She looked almost exactly as Jack had pictured her -- long dark hair streaked with silver, pulled back into a tidy braid. High cheekbones, the nose rounded at the tip, almond-shaped eyes with a bit of a tilt to them. She didn't stir as he entered the room, didn't acknowledge his presence at all. She just sat there, looking out the window, her hands folded in her lap. Jack wondered if she'd sat there of her own volition, or if she'd been posed like a doll.
"Mrs. Jones," he said, quietly, and then cleared his throat, feeling strangely awkward. She didn't move; she didn't even really seem to blink. "My name is Jack Harkness. I'm Ianto's..." But he couldn't find the words, not really. "Anyway. Mind if I sit down?"
There was a chair just across from hers; he lowered himself into it, looked around the room. There were flowers in a vase on her bedside table, a stack of books on the desk. And the shawl draped around her shoulders was one that Jack had watched Ianto knit, struggling over the lacy stitchwork in his free hours. Jack had to take a deep breath, remembering it. "You know, he'd kill me if he knew I'd come here. Not that he's ashamed of you; he's just... you know how he is. Private.
"But I wanted to come and meet you, sort of... introduce myself, I guess. I just... I know how important you are to him."
He only realized that he'd been hoping for a response when it failed to come.
"I don't know how he does this," Jack said, more to himself than to her. "I really don't. But that's Ianto, isn't it? He doesn't give up on anyone he loves. No matter what happens, no matter what they do. I wish I had half his faith."
Mrs. Jones continued to stare out the window. Jack wondered if she could hear him, if she cared, if she was so lost in her own mind that nothing could register anymore. She could be completely aware and cognizant, desperate to reach out but unable to do so. Or she might not even know there was another person in the room. He wasn't sure which thought was more painful, and realized then that he couldn't last another moment in that room, confronted with her silence.
He pushed his chair back, stood up quickly. "Anyway, I just hope you know... I hope you're proud of him. He's a good man, one of the best I've ever met. And I've been around a long time. Longer than you'd think."
Jack found himself waiting again, for a smile, some trick of the light that would make it look as though she'd heard him. But he'd been around for too long to really believe it would happen. "I suppose it isn't your fault," he said, with a sigh. "You'd come back for him if you could." He rested his hand on her shoulder, just for a moment. Then he pulled away.
Maybe she said something to the empty room, when the door was closed and no one could hear her. Maybe she smiled, or maybe she cried. But Jack knew better than to really believe any of that. He couldn't change the way things were. He couldn't make it better again.
*
That night, Ianto curled into Jack's warmth like a child seeking comfort, no words and no tears, just one deep shuddering breath after another. Jack stroked his hair and clung to him and waited. After a time, Ianto's breathing evened out, as though he'd finally fallen asleep.
"When I was a child, we lived under the threat of invasion," Jack said, his voice soft. "One day, it happened. They came. My father told me to take my little brother's hand and run to safety. But I let go, somehow. I don't know how it happened. All I remember is realizing he was gone. I looked everywhere, but I couldn't find him.
"I went home, eventually, and my father was dead. My mother was so relieved to see me. Then she asked me where Grey was. I told her what had happened..." For a moment, he couldn't force the words out. Ianto pressed closer to him, and Jack closed his eyes. "It was never the same, after that."
"I'm sorry," Ianto murmured, his lips grazing Jack's shoulder.
Jack kissed Ianto's forehead. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, me too."
Author: lookninjas
Characters: Jack/Ianto
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: "From Out of the Rain," and "Adrift"
Summary: Ianto doesn't ask about Jack's family, so Jack doesn't ask about Ianto's.
Notes: Much, much love to seize and ffarff for all their assistance with this fic.
Ianto never asked Jack about his family, so Jack never asked about Ianto's. It wasn't that he didn't care, only that he knew what it was like to want to keep the past in the past, to bury some things past the reach of memory. And pushing Ianto to talk would only result in an even more obdurate silence. Patience had never really been one of Jack's strong suits, but there were some things worth waiting for.
Eventually, Ianto started to share little things, crumbs of information, always about his father. "My father was a master tailor." "My father taught me not to speak ill of the dead." "My father used to take me to the Electro." He never said anything about his mother, and Jack knew that silence, knew what it meant. But Ianto hadn't asked about Jack's mother, so Jack couldn't, in good conscience, ask about Ianto's. He could only wait.
Then Jack found himself standing in a hospital room, Ianto at his side, two small children laying fragile and pale in their hospital beds. For some reason, it made him think of his brother, of Grey. He wasn't sure why. "Those words," one of the nurses was saying. "'From out of the rain.' I'm sure I've heard them before."
Jack glanced at Ianto, whose eyebrows were raised slightly in interest. It was the slightest of leads, but it was still a lead. "Oh! I remember. It was Christina. She was a patient."
"Here?" Jack asked, feeling his pulse speed up a bit. If she was still here, they could go and find her, question her. Even if she couldn't tell them much, it might help. The case had been dragging on too long, and too many had died. They needed something.
"No, at Providence Park. It's a psychiatric hospital."
"I know it," Ianto said, quickly. Too quickly. He glanced at Jack for just a moment before his gaze skittered away.
Most of Ianto's personnel records had survived the battle of Canary Wharf -- not all of them, but most. His medical history, certainly, was complete. So Jack knew that Ianto had never been to Providence Park as anything more than a visitor. But someone else had been there, someone close to him.
"She was a full-time patient," the nurse was saying, and Jack forced himself to attend. "Been there since she was a child." He reminded himself that Ianto would talk when he was ready to talk. "She was a strange one." There wasn't any point in pressing him. "Whenever anything, any kind of entertainment show was laid on, she became scared." But the air in the room had changed, subtly. There was a weight on Ianto's shoulders that hadn't been there before. "She'd run away and hide."
The case came first. He couldn't worry about Ianto right now. "Did she say why?" he asked, and didn't look at Ianto anymore.
*
Ianto was leaning against the wall as Jack entered the ward, PDA in his hands, working away. The lines between his eyes were deeper than usual, and his eyes were dark-circled; Jack wished briefly, intensely, that he'd never got Ianto mixed up in this. Too late, though. "What have we got?" he asked, drawing near.
When Ianto glanced up from the little screen, his eyes were troubled. "Police brought the man in about an hour ago. He looks to be about fifty or so, but it's hard to say -- he's covered over with old burn scars. No way of knowing how old he is or what he might have looked like before." Ianto took a breath, a little pause, before adding, "He was screaming when they found him. Kept right on screaming until they got him in a room and sedated him. The nurses I spoke to were still pretty shaken; apparently they could hear him three floors up. Never heard anything like it."
The nurses weren't the only ones shaken; there was a slight tremor in Ianto's voice, the barest hint of strain. "Did he say what had happened to him?" Jack asked. "Give a name? Anything?"
"Just the screaming." Ianto reached into his pocket, pulled out a battered bit of plastic on a string, and handed it to Jack. "But he had this tied around his neck."
It was a library card, yellowed with age, melted and scorched around the edges, bent and broken but somehow intact. Someone had punched a hole through it and worn it like a good luck charm, a talisman, a relic from a previous life. Jack peered at it, trying to read the name. "Jonah Bevan?" he asked.
Ianto nodded. "Disappeared two weeks ago, on his way home from football practice. Fifteen years old. His mother's been all over trying to get him back." He sighed, looking up at Jack again. "The police think it's possible our patient might have been involved in the disappearance, or at least know something. He had to have gotten the library card somehow."
Jack looked at the library card again. It looked like it had spent forty years at the far edge of the universe, through war and fire and destruction. It looked like it had seen hell. "The police who found him -- are they still here?"
"They're hoping he'll be more coherent when he comes out from the sedatives," Ianto said. "So they're waiting." He studied Jack for a while. "That's Jonah, isn't it? That man, our patient. That's Jonah Bevan."
Jack produced a little bottle of pills from his pocket, and Ianto took it. "Standard amnesia protocol, for everyone who might have seen the patient," Jack said. "I'll call Helen. Let her know that we're bringing him in."
Ianto turned as if to leave, but then stopped, looking back over his shoulder. "You should probably..." For a moment, he looked as if he didn't know what to say. "Tell her he's... he's in a bad way. She needs to be ready for it."
Jack caught Ianto's wrist, rubbed his thumb up under the cuff of his shirt to stroke the soft skin over his pulse. It was the closest he could come to apologizing. "I'll warn her," he said, quietly.
"Thank you," Ianto said, and the lines between his eyes didn't seem so deep anymore. Then he pulled away, and went to start the cleanup.
*
Ianto drove them to Providence Park without speaking. Jack's mind was buzzing with questions, and the silence stretched between them, frayed, pushed to the breaking point. It dug into Jack's skin until he could hardly sit still. But he waited, waited until Ianto pulled the SUV into a parking spot, turned off the engine, and took a deep breath. Both his hands rested on the steering wheel -- not clutching, just holding, and when he spoke, his voice was almost normal. "My mother," he said. "Been in and out of hospital since I was just a boy. She hasn't been here for ages, though." The slightest emphasis on the word here, just enough that Jack got the hint. Maybe Ianto's mother hadn't been to Providence Park for a while, but that didn't mean she'd gotten better. Ianto took another deep breath, kept his eyes focused on the windscreen. "Don't feel sorry for me, Jack."
"Never," Jack said, and rested his hand over one of Ianto's. It was a relief when Ianto's fingers interlaced with his. He wasn't being shut out. He could work with that.
For a few moments, they sat there, together, and the silence was comfortable now. Then Ianto straightened his shoulders, let go of Jack's hand, and slid out of the SUV. Jack could only follow him, and hope the conversation wasn't over.
*
"He keeps asking for his mother," Ianto said, his voice hushed and strained. There was a strange sadness in his eyes, one Jack was becoming increasingly familiar with. "Jack, can't we --"
"No." Ianto turned his face away quickly, but not quickly enough to hide that flash of hurt, and Jack relented a bit, resting his hand on Ianto's shoulder. "She wouldn't understand, Ianto. It's not..." He trailed off for a moment, lost in memories, and returned to find Ianto looking at him with something akin to worry. "It'd be too much for her to take in. It's better this way, believe me."
A nurse brushed past them with an armload of fresh linen, and they broke apart. Ianto leaned against the rough-hewn wall of their underground clinic and closed his eyes. "He asked me if he was home yet," he murmured, hands deep in his pockets, shoulders slumped. "According to Helen, he asks everyone if he's home. He thinks he's still wandering out there, lost. Can't blame him, really. Sometimes this place is an awful lot like a prison." Jack bristled a bit, and Ianto held out a soothing hand. "I'm not... You do the best you can. I'm not arguing that. But nothing here is familiar to him. If he could just see his mother..."
"And what if she refuses to believe that it's really him? What if she looks him right in the eye and says 'You're not my son?'" Jack's breath caught in his throat unexpectedly, and he had to look away for a moment to prevent Ianto seeing anything he shouldn't. "He's hurt enough, Ianto. I won't make it worse."
"She's his mother, Jack," Ianto protested. As if biology trumped all else. As if there really were such a thing as unconditional love.
But there wasn't. Jack had learned that as a boy. "No, Ianto. And that's final."
Ianto stared at him a bit longer, then turned on his heel and strode briskly away, back up towards the surface of Flat Holm. Jack watched him go with a sigh.
*
Ianto insisted on wheeling Christina back to her room when they were done speaking, and Jack trailed along after them, watching. Things must have changed a bit since Ianto had last visited; he paused from time to time, frowning at hallways and staircases, until Christina, laughing, pointed him in the right direction.
Someone had made a sign for Christina's door, her name written in bright colors, with flowers and butterflies drawn around it. It made Jack think of Flat Holm, of the little chalkboards on the doors, and he swallowed hard. Ianto was already pushing Christina into her room, helping her out of her chair and walking her the few steps to the bed. When she sat down, he knelt in front of her and started to unlace her heavy orthopaedic shoes. She looked down at his dark head with curiosity and a strange sort of affection. "You don't belong here," she said again.
Ianto glanced up at her; Jack couldn't see the expression on his face. For a moment, her shaking hand rested on his cheek. "So old," she murmured, and Jack swallowed hard.
Ianto's shoulders tensed under his suit jacket, his whole body going rigid. But then Christina's hand fell away, and Ianto took a deep breath and stood. "Shall I take your coat, or would you rather go to sleep with it on?" he asked, his voice gentle, teasing just a little. Christina flushed and smiled at him, the moment forgotten.
He took her coat and the heavy sweater she wore underneath, handing them to Jack to be hung up, then put her to bed, tucking the covers over her. "Thank you," he said, crouching by the bed, his hand over hers. "Thank you for talking to us, Christina."
"You'll stop them, won't you?" she asked. "You won't let them steal my breath."
"I promise," Ianto said. "Sleep well." Then he drew back, returning to Jack's side. Jack switched the lights off as they left the room, and closed the door behind them.
The tension returned to Ianto's shoulders as soon as they were in the hallway, the line of his back unnaturally straight. He didn't look at Jack once, but marched briskly through the halls, as if he couldn't get out of Providence Park fast enough. Jack could only wait and watch and follow.
Ianto stopped when he'd gotten out to the carpark, put his hands on his hips, let his head drop down. Jack rested a hand on his shoulder. "All right?" he asked, squeezing slightly.
Ianto nodded without looking up. "Gave me a bit of a turn when she said that, about me having old eyes." He might have sounded calm if Jack hadn't known him so well. "Only my mother used to say that all the time. That my eyes were too old. I never quite knew what she meant by it." He looked back at the buildings; the sun had peeked out from behind the clouds for a moment, and Providence Park looked almost beautiful, all red brick and green grass, shade trees and flowers. There were, Jack supposed, worse places to end up. "She doesn't talk anymore," Ianto added, his voice very flat.
He pulled away from Jack's touch and hurried to the SUV without another word.
*
He wasn't surprised that Ianto was the one to follow him out of the conference room after Gwen's little lecture. For just a moment, he hated both of them, for always agreeing with each other, always arguing with him. He hated them for being so innocent, and he hated them for blindly charging into situations that would take that innocence away from them. He hated them for not understanding, and he hated them for trying to understand. "No," he snapped, before Ianto even opened his mouth.
Ianto blinked twice, startled, but he recovered fast, brave as always. "You heard Gwen. That woman is desperate to find her son. We can help her."
"She only thinks she wants the truth," Jack said, feeling a muscle twitch in his jaw. "If she had the slightest idea what had really happened --"
"She would still want to know!" Ianto's voice rose dangerously, and he visibly checked himself. "You're a bloody hypocrite, Jack Harkness, do you know that?"
Jack's eyes narrowed. "Excuse me?"
There was no intimidating Ianto, though, not now. "If Hart walked into the Hub right now, and said he would take you to Grey, you'd be after him without a second's thought. Even if it killed you, you'd go. Because you want answers. It's not any different for Jonah's mother."
That hit home, and Jack felt the blood drain from his face. "You don't know anything about it," he muttered, before turning to leave. There was the barest pause before he heard Ianto following him, his tread measured, steady, relentless.
He hated Ianto, then, for his refusal to give up, let go. He hated Ianto for being such a fighter.
*
Ianto lay stiffly in Jack's arms for a long time, long enough that Jack wondered if he would ever relax. All he could do was run light fingers over Ianto's shoulder and down his arm, brush his lips against the back of Ianto's neck, cradle him close and wait as Ianto took one deep breath after another, as if willing himself to calm down.
"They wouldn't let me visit her," he said, finally, his voice so soft that Jack could barely hear it over the quiet humming of the Hub's machinery. "My dad just told me she was in the hospital, and that I'd be able to see her when she got better. But she was gone so long, I thought... I didn't understand it. I thought she was dying."
Jack draped his arm around Ianto's chest, just holding him.
"Then they finally said I could see her. I'd missed her... you've no idea how much." Jack flinched inwardly at that, but didn't say anything. "I'm not sure what I was expecting. Maybe that she'd have a cast on her leg or something. Or that she'd be bald, like when Idris Hopper's mum had cancer and lost her hair. But she looked the same as she always had, mostly. It was just..." His breath caught in his throat. Jack kissed his shoulder. "It was her eyes. There was something... something missing in her eyes."
Jack squeezed his eyes tight closed, and buried his face in Ianto's hair. He remembered that look all too well.
"I'd thought that she'd smile or something, you know, that she'd be so happy to see me. But then she turned away, went back to staring out the window. She wouldn't even say anything. I couldn't understand what I'd done wrong. They gave me a little chair to sit in, and Dad talked to her, just simple things, how the shop was doing and how I was in school, ordinary things. She wouldn't look at him either. And she didn't say anything. He talked and talked until they told us it was time to go, and she didn't say anything."
Jack remembered that, too, the silence that he tried so hard to fill, the quiet indifference he could never crack. It hurt, knowing that Ianto went through the same.
"Afterwards, Dad told me that it had done her good to see me, that I'd have to come in as often as I could, that she was better for having me around. And they did let her come home eventually, so I thought he must have been right. But then she'd get bad again, and they'd put her in hospital, and she wouldn't say anything to anyone. I'd visit, and they'd tell me I'd helped her. But I didn't, obviously, or it wouldn't have kept happening."
He blamed himself for not being able to save her. Jack knew the feeling. "Do you still visit her?"
"Sometimes." Ianto sighed, relaxing into Jack's arms. "Not as often as I should. I know... It's not just me. She doesn't talk to anyone. It's just... It's stupid, I suppose."
Jack kissed his hair again. "It's not stupid at all."
"I thought someday I'd get used to it," Ianto admitted. "That it wouldn't bother me anymore. I mean, it isn't anything new. My whole life has been this way. But it hasn't gotten any easier."
The words were out before Jack could stop them. "It never does."
Ianto shifted slightly in Jack's hold, turning to look up at him.
Jack closed his eyes, took a deep breath in, let it out slowly. "Not now. Later, maybe."
They were tense and silent together for a moment. "All right," Ianto said. He reached up, found Jack's hand draped over his belly, and laced their fingers together. Jack held him tightly.
They didn't say anything else, and eventually, Ianto fell asleep.
*
They waited in a corner of the room until the members of the support group drifted back out into the night, huddled in groups of two or three. Nikki Bevan was left alone, clearing up the remainder of the food and drink. She didn't look up as they approached, but she knew they were there; her hands trembled on the punch bowl. "I've nothing to say to your lot," she muttered.
"Ms. Bevan," Ianto said, his hands clasped behind his back, knuckles white. "My name is Ianto Jones. I'm here to talk to you about Jonah."
"And I've nothing to say to you," she repeated, her voice louder now. "Haven't you done enough?"
Ianto took a half-step back, and Jack itched to just pull him out of the room. But he couldn't. Ianto would never forgive him. "Ms. Bevan," Ianto said, his voice softer. "Please. I know it's hard..."
"Do you now?" She finally turned to look at him, face flushed with anger and eyes tear-filled. "What could you possibly know about any of it?"
Ianto went pale at that, and didn't answer.
Nikki softened. "I can't do it. I'm sorry. I can't look at those scars and hear that screaming... There's nothing I can do to help him. If I thought I could, if I thought there was anything..."
"Of course," Ianto said, a bit stiffly. "I'm sorry to have intruded. It won't happen again." He nodded his head, and retreated to the door.
It was Jack's turn to approach, hand wrapped around the bottle of pills in his pocket. "You don't have to remember what you've seen, Ms. Bevan. You can remember Jonah how he was before. If you want."
She shook her head, unsmiling. "And then what? Go back to searching? Sooner or later, I'll find my way back to that bloody island and we'll be back where we started. Thank you, but no. I'll manage."
"Of course." Jack let go of the bottle of pills, and nodded to her. "I am sorry, Ms. Bevan."
She turned back to her tidying.
Jack wrapped a hand around Ianto's elbow and guided him out into the dark, drizzly Cardiff night.
*
She looked almost exactly as Jack had pictured her -- long dark hair streaked with silver, pulled back into a tidy braid. High cheekbones, the nose rounded at the tip, almond-shaped eyes with a bit of a tilt to them. She didn't stir as he entered the room, didn't acknowledge his presence at all. She just sat there, looking out the window, her hands folded in her lap. Jack wondered if she'd sat there of her own volition, or if she'd been posed like a doll.
"Mrs. Jones," he said, quietly, and then cleared his throat, feeling strangely awkward. She didn't move; she didn't even really seem to blink. "My name is Jack Harkness. I'm Ianto's..." But he couldn't find the words, not really. "Anyway. Mind if I sit down?"
There was a chair just across from hers; he lowered himself into it, looked around the room. There were flowers in a vase on her bedside table, a stack of books on the desk. And the shawl draped around her shoulders was one that Jack had watched Ianto knit, struggling over the lacy stitchwork in his free hours. Jack had to take a deep breath, remembering it. "You know, he'd kill me if he knew I'd come here. Not that he's ashamed of you; he's just... you know how he is. Private.
"But I wanted to come and meet you, sort of... introduce myself, I guess. I just... I know how important you are to him."
He only realized that he'd been hoping for a response when it failed to come.
"I don't know how he does this," Jack said, more to himself than to her. "I really don't. But that's Ianto, isn't it? He doesn't give up on anyone he loves. No matter what happens, no matter what they do. I wish I had half his faith."
Mrs. Jones continued to stare out the window. Jack wondered if she could hear him, if she cared, if she was so lost in her own mind that nothing could register anymore. She could be completely aware and cognizant, desperate to reach out but unable to do so. Or she might not even know there was another person in the room. He wasn't sure which thought was more painful, and realized then that he couldn't last another moment in that room, confronted with her silence.
He pushed his chair back, stood up quickly. "Anyway, I just hope you know... I hope you're proud of him. He's a good man, one of the best I've ever met. And I've been around a long time. Longer than you'd think."
Jack found himself waiting again, for a smile, some trick of the light that would make it look as though she'd heard him. But he'd been around for too long to really believe it would happen. "I suppose it isn't your fault," he said, with a sigh. "You'd come back for him if you could." He rested his hand on her shoulder, just for a moment. Then he pulled away.
Maybe she said something to the empty room, when the door was closed and no one could hear her. Maybe she smiled, or maybe she cried. But Jack knew better than to really believe any of that. He couldn't change the way things were. He couldn't make it better again.
*
That night, Ianto curled into Jack's warmth like a child seeking comfort, no words and no tears, just one deep shuddering breath after another. Jack stroked his hair and clung to him and waited. After a time, Ianto's breathing evened out, as though he'd finally fallen asleep.
"When I was a child, we lived under the threat of invasion," Jack said, his voice soft. "One day, it happened. They came. My father told me to take my little brother's hand and run to safety. But I let go, somehow. I don't know how it happened. All I remember is realizing he was gone. I looked everywhere, but I couldn't find him.
"I went home, eventually, and my father was dead. My mother was so relieved to see me. Then she asked me where Grey was. I told her what had happened..." For a moment, he couldn't force the words out. Ianto pressed closer to him, and Jack closed his eyes. "It was never the same, after that."
"I'm sorry," Ianto murmured, his lips grazing Jack's shoulder.
Jack kissed Ianto's forehead. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, me too."