Y&R Fic: the leaving kind (ronan, ronan/christine)
Title: the leaving kind
Character: Ronan (past Ronan/Christine)
Rating: R
Words:962
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Summary: He named himself Ronan Malloy.
He wants to ask Nina what she would have named him. She must have thought about it. Maybe she even kept a list written in untidy, teenage scrawl: George, Scott, Aaron. Jimmy. She probably wouldn’t have named him Jimmy. His mother named him Aiden, and sometimes right before he falls asleep at night he can still hear her voice calling him in from the yard, tsking at the mud caking the knees of his jeans, the dirt under his nails, but she would smile, always-- it’ll come clean, Aiden. It’s just a memory, an echo of a memory really.
He misses his mother.
*
He named himself Ronan Malloy. Ronan was his grandfather, Malloy his mother’s maiden name. As aliases go, it’s not a bad one. It’s easy to be Ronan. He’s a cowboy; quick on the draw, drifting in and out of lives wreaking havoc just as often as he sets them straight. The name carries him through Quantico, up through the ranks of the FBI; it carries him to Genoa City, there and back again.
Ronan is cold. Ronan is hard. Ronan is a son of a bitch.
Maybe. Maybe, he is. Maybe Aiden was too.
*
He meets Christine when he’s still green. Cocksure and stupid, he fumbles his gun during a drug bust. Shoots the guy in the chest instead of the leg. He’s carrying this with him when he first sees her. She’s older than him, a woman in every sense of the word. Long blonde hair trailing down her back, a glint of loss in her eyes, or maybe it was hope. He’s never been able to tell with her.
She was just starting out herself. Right off the bus from Wisconsin and eager for a fresh start, she was sent to represent him, just in case, but no one pursued charges, no one came after his badge, no one called him out as a fraud. Christine made it all go away.
She fought for him.
Then she fucked him on a lazy Saturday afternoon, the only day off either one of them had that week. She played her hand after, leaning against his chest, one thumb running over his lips, Aiden.
She knew. She knew and she fucked him anyway.
Ronan will always love her for that.
*
He thought Genoa City was just a blur in his memory, but it swung back into sharp focus the first time he returned.
He was four when they left, all of their belongings packed into the back of the station wagon, his best friend standing on the corner waving frantically as they moved further and further away until she disappeared into nothing. He cried until they crossed the city limits and his mother made his father stop for ice cream.
The taste of vanilla on his tongue and the smell of his father chain-smoking Marlboros in a McDonald’s parking lot came rushing back to him when he walked into the station the first time.
His father used to work there. He served on the force and kept right on wearing his badge even after he brought Ronan home to his wife; a small, squirming bundle of joy bought and paid for.
It was a mistake to come back the first time.
But he’s not so sure about the third.
The station is familiar ground now. He worked there. He has slept on the ugly orange couch, drank the crappy coffee, flirted with the woman stuck working the front desk. He looks around and he doesn’t see his father’s ghost.
He sees himself.
*
There is a dog-eared copy of the book in the bottom drawer of his dresser back in the apartment he rarely ever sleeps in.
There’s a picture of Nina on the back-flap of the cover. He can see some of himself in her and it startles him every time. It’s in the eyes, the color of his hair.
She didn’t give him up. He knows this. He was taken, stolen (he hates that word). Turned into a commodity, but letting himself give a damn about her feels like a betrayal. Because he loves his parents, that never stopped, not once. They gave him a good childhood, maybe not a perfect one, but who the hell has one of those?
He’s got it in his head that loving Nina would hurt them somehow. You can’t hurt the dead though, not really. And he can’t stop loving her either. That doesn’t mean he’ll let himself get too close. He knows better than that.
He's been running since the day he was born. He didn’t always know what from, but he knew deep down there was a reason why they moved around, a reason why they never got too chummy with the neighbors, a reason why his father told him to never trust anyone who asked too many questions. Now that he knows the why nothing has changed. He still moves around, always volunteering for the jobs that are the farthest away. Still prefers bars where no one knows your name frequented by women who won't ask.
Maybe it’s in the DNA, right alongside the fucking disease that tried to kill him. Maybe he’s just not the stayin’ kind.
*
A disappearance in Genoa City is what buys him a one way ticket back. You know the beat, right Malloy? his boss asked.
Ronan knows it. Knows it too well.
He didn’t even bother fighting it. The truth is he’s glad to have an excuse to see Nina, to check on Delia and Chloe and Phyllis-all the people he cares about in a purely unofficial capacity. He tells himself it won’t be so bad going back.
Besides it’s not like it’s for forever.
Nothing ever is.
Character: Ronan (past Ronan/Christine)
Rating: R
Words:962
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Summary: He named himself Ronan Malloy.
He wants to ask Nina what she would have named him. She must have thought about it. Maybe she even kept a list written in untidy, teenage scrawl: George, Scott, Aaron. Jimmy. She probably wouldn’t have named him Jimmy. His mother named him Aiden, and sometimes right before he falls asleep at night he can still hear her voice calling him in from the yard, tsking at the mud caking the knees of his jeans, the dirt under his nails, but she would smile, always-- it’ll come clean, Aiden. It’s just a memory, an echo of a memory really.
He misses his mother.
*
He named himself Ronan Malloy. Ronan was his grandfather, Malloy his mother’s maiden name. As aliases go, it’s not a bad one. It’s easy to be Ronan. He’s a cowboy; quick on the draw, drifting in and out of lives wreaking havoc just as often as he sets them straight. The name carries him through Quantico, up through the ranks of the FBI; it carries him to Genoa City, there and back again.
Ronan is cold. Ronan is hard. Ronan is a son of a bitch.
Maybe. Maybe, he is. Maybe Aiden was too.
*
He meets Christine when he’s still green. Cocksure and stupid, he fumbles his gun during a drug bust. Shoots the guy in the chest instead of the leg. He’s carrying this with him when he first sees her. She’s older than him, a woman in every sense of the word. Long blonde hair trailing down her back, a glint of loss in her eyes, or maybe it was hope. He’s never been able to tell with her.
She was just starting out herself. Right off the bus from Wisconsin and eager for a fresh start, she was sent to represent him, just in case, but no one pursued charges, no one came after his badge, no one called him out as a fraud. Christine made it all go away.
She fought for him.
Then she fucked him on a lazy Saturday afternoon, the only day off either one of them had that week. She played her hand after, leaning against his chest, one thumb running over his lips, Aiden.
She knew. She knew and she fucked him anyway.
Ronan will always love her for that.
*
He thought Genoa City was just a blur in his memory, but it swung back into sharp focus the first time he returned.
He was four when they left, all of their belongings packed into the back of the station wagon, his best friend standing on the corner waving frantically as they moved further and further away until she disappeared into nothing. He cried until they crossed the city limits and his mother made his father stop for ice cream.
The taste of vanilla on his tongue and the smell of his father chain-smoking Marlboros in a McDonald’s parking lot came rushing back to him when he walked into the station the first time.
His father used to work there. He served on the force and kept right on wearing his badge even after he brought Ronan home to his wife; a small, squirming bundle of joy bought and paid for.
It was a mistake to come back the first time.
But he’s not so sure about the third.
The station is familiar ground now. He worked there. He has slept on the ugly orange couch, drank the crappy coffee, flirted with the woman stuck working the front desk. He looks around and he doesn’t see his father’s ghost.
He sees himself.
*
There is a dog-eared copy of the book in the bottom drawer of his dresser back in the apartment he rarely ever sleeps in.
There’s a picture of Nina on the back-flap of the cover. He can see some of himself in her and it startles him every time. It’s in the eyes, the color of his hair.
She didn’t give him up. He knows this. He was taken, stolen (he hates that word). Turned into a commodity, but letting himself give a damn about her feels like a betrayal. Because he loves his parents, that never stopped, not once. They gave him a good childhood, maybe not a perfect one, but who the hell has one of those?
He’s got it in his head that loving Nina would hurt them somehow. You can’t hurt the dead though, not really. And he can’t stop loving her either. That doesn’t mean he’ll let himself get too close. He knows better than that.
He's been running since the day he was born. He didn’t always know what from, but he knew deep down there was a reason why they moved around, a reason why they never got too chummy with the neighbors, a reason why his father told him to never trust anyone who asked too many questions. Now that he knows the why nothing has changed. He still moves around, always volunteering for the jobs that are the farthest away. Still prefers bars where no one knows your name frequented by women who won't ask.
Maybe it’s in the DNA, right alongside the fucking disease that tried to kill him. Maybe he’s just not the stayin’ kind.
*
A disappearance in Genoa City is what buys him a one way ticket back. You know the beat, right Malloy? his boss asked.
Ronan knows it. Knows it too well.
He didn’t even bother fighting it. The truth is he’s glad to have an excuse to see Nina, to check on Delia and Chloe and Phyllis-all the people he cares about in a purely unofficial capacity. He tells himself it won’t be so bad going back.
Besides it’s not like it’s for forever.
Nothing ever is.