Rodney - A retelling of Roxanne (RomComDrama) Ch8
Chapter Eight
As John entered his house he decided he would get a steak out of the fridge, he wanted to spoil himself a little. He got his cookware out and started creating. While the steak was cooking, filling the apartment with gorgeous smells, he brought a mirror from the bathroom and fished out the taffeta strewn box of makeup. He didn’t have anything else to do, so he may as well give this a go.
Just as he was about to start the phone rang, he reached over and lifted the receiver from the cradle, bringing it to his ear. Even though he knew that Rodney didn’t have his number, he was still hopeful it might be him by some miracle, to say he was free for the evening. “Hello?”
“John? I was wondering if I could come on over. I’ve written the letter and I’d like you to take a look at it before I send it, also I need his address. You doing anything at the moment?”
“Hi Cameron, no, just cooking dinner. Come on over.” He hung up the phone. Cameron still lived at the station, which was far enough away that he didn’t have to rush. He cleared away the makeup, figuring he could try again later or the next night, making sure he put it well out of the way. No way did he want rumours circling the station that he wore makeup.
He was just turning over the steak and stirring the sauce when there was a knock at the door. He walked over and let Cameron in, who was bouncing with energy. He really was like an overgrown puppy. He brandished the letter, like a proud mother showing of her child. His grin was as infectious as always.
John had smiled as he’d reached out and took the proffered letter, “Hi Cameron. Come on in.” He led Cameron over to the kitchen table, and they sat down together.
Mitchell looked around the room, “Nice place you’ve got here.”
“Thanks,” John said before he looked down at the letter Cameron intended to send to Rodney. Bracing himself for the words he would see, wishing he had the chance to say them himself.
He heard Cameron settle in, his exuberance clear in every move he made, “I think it’s really good,” he said, but John barely heard him. He wanted to send this to Rodney?
“Dear Rodney, how is it going? Do you fancy having a drink sometime? If you do, check this box.” John read out loud. He looked up at Cameron, expecting him to draw out another letter, to admit that this was a joke, but one look at his huge smile told him the guy was for real. Jeez, I reckon Rodney would rather have a Dear John letter than this!
“How long did you work on this?” John asked slowly, starting to wonder if maybe Cameron was a little brain damaged.
“Today, since noon,” Cameron answered smugly, and John could just tell that he’d thought that was a good thing.
“Cameron, that’s a long time. You can’t send him this.”
“Why not?” Mitchell asked with innocent curiosity.
Okay, diplomacy, I can do diplomacy. “I like the concept, but it has to be more interesting.”
Cameron looked at him like he was the idiot. “It is interesting, it has a check box. How many letters do you get that have a checkbox?”
Since I left the playground, exactly zero, thank God. John got up and walked over to his writing desk, he took out a pen and paper and returned to the kitchen table and placed them in front of Cameron, “Let me show you what I mean. If I were to ask you how you felt about him? What do you feel when you see him?” He asked as he took the seat next to him, his mind already replaying the first time he saw Rodney, those eyes of blue like clear water with the reflections of the sun dancing on it.
“Horny,” Cameron said, and then actually proceeded to start writing down that he felt horny.
John shot out his hand, placing it over Cameron’s to stop him writing any more. “Okay, you can’t write that you felt horny, you have to change it,” he stressed as he released Mitchell’s hand. “You have to say something like...’I felt moved’...or ‘alive’ or ‘on fire’.”
Cameron’s looked at him with something akin to awe on his face, “That’s brilliant,” he whispered.
John continued, trying another tack, “How did you feel when you first saw him?”
“Like a dickhead and that I was gonna hurl,” Cameron responded, his hand moving as if he was going to write that down as well, before John stopped him again.
“No, you can’t write that. You have to say, ‘I felt like a child standing in the sun for the first time, feeling only your radiance.”
“Radiance, yeah, I like that. I’ll underline that.”
John doesn’t know quite how to respond to that so he chose to ignore it, carrying on, “What did you do after you saw him?”
Cameron’s face fell, almost sulkily, “I hurled.”
“After seeing you, my only nourishment was you,” John said. “That’s a bit to flowery for Rodney though, so you will have to make it more suitable to his personality. I think he wants the romance but not so much the flowery version,” John suggested. “Let him know that he’s cherished, but respected, make him understand how you feel.”
“John, you write the letter,” Cameron said as he pushed the pad and pen towards John.
“No,” John said adamantly, “you do it.”
“You know how to say what I feel. You write it and I will sign it.”
“No, no,” John said warily as he got up from the table and headed over the cooker to distract himself from the temptation, “That is....dangerous. Very, very dangerous. That’s lying.”
“Not if you write what I feel,” Cameron whined as he walked over and manoeuvred John back to the table, “I sign my name and you write what you imagine I’m feeling. It’ll work.”
“What I imagine you’re feeling,” John repeated sardonically, not that Mitchell noticed.
“It’s half written already,” Cameron added as he pushed the pad and pen in front of John,
“You have to change that poetic baloney,” John said, distractedly, already organising prose and words into sentences that would touch the heart of Rodney, words that would touch deeper than anything Rodney had known. His words.
“This is beautiful,” Cameron commented.
“No, for Rodney you need something startling, something so strange it would make him incapable of being reasonable,” says John. Capable of making him see past the ugly scars and into the heart beneath, he thought as he walked over to his desk and picked up his favourite pen and the good quality paper that made even a note to the milkman look like a royal invitation.
“Can you do that?” Cameron asked with doubt in his voice.
“It’s definitely a challenge,” John replied with a smirk, as he’d sat down at the table again, just as the pan spat reminding him of his dinner on the hob, “Oh, the food!” he exclaimed startled that he forgotten.
“No, I’ll take care of it,” Cameron crooned softly as he pushed him back down into the chair and rushed over to check the steaks, turning down the heat. “I’ll take care of it, don’t worry. You just take your time.”
And John did, caught up in his own feelings, of the excitement that Rodney would read this. Surely, he’ll know it’s from John, deep down he has to know these words are his, from his own heart to Rodney’s.
xXx
On the upper floor of the station, surrounding the pole, the guys were jumbled in a group, those at the back pushing, each and every one of them eager and excited. This is where they got to prove themselves and they obviously couldn’t wait. John was pleased with their eagerness, and Lorne reported that the night shift was also the same.
“Just take your time,” he said soothingly, like he was talking to a bucking horse, “Now line up boys,” he said as he picked up the whistle and stop watch off his chest as he watched them jostle for position like school kids in the line at the sweet shop. He waited till they were as close to a line as they were going get and blew his whistle as he simultaneously pushed down the button on his stop watch.
He’d watched them all make their way down the pole and move to their allotted positions within the station, following them down. He waited till everyone was in place before he blew the whistle a second time and stopped the watch and everyone fidgeted in their place, looking at him eagerly. “Six and a half minutes, not bad,” he said, not really having the heart to tell them it should be half that by now. They were all congratulating each other when he swept a hand up and over his shoulder. “Let’s get into our gear,” he shouted over the top of their cheers, which they all responded to with broad grins, it really was like directing children.
He waited patiently while they’d gotten into their gear, he hadn’t timed this yet because it was just way too depressing. When they were finally done he tried to get the excitement back, “Let’s go boys. Its operation Snowball,” he said with a punch in the air.
They all reacted with big grins again, yelling, “Snowball!” and punched the air themselves as they all ran past him, obviously too excited to remember they had a big red gleaming fire truck.
“Guys!” he shouted after them, getting even more depressed when they all turned back to him without a clue, “take the truck?” he suggested in his best ‘Doh’ voice. They filed past him again, a lot more sheepish this time as they all piled into the truck one by one. There was still one or two that needed help getting into the truck. Operation Snowball! He repeated in his head again with false cheer, trying to cheer himself up now as he watched the truck pull away without him. He should call them back but he’d been thinking a nice walk to the location might put him in a better mood so he put his hands in his pockets and wandered there under his own steam.
He walked up the final hill, wondering where the lads were. He’d been expecting them to pick him up on the way back, but they still hadn’t been by yet. As he neared the crescent of the hill, he could see why. He stopped to take it in, even as bad as they were, he never expected this.
Earl had his arms out in front of him, bent over and leaning against the waist high wall, hyperventilating slightly, and as red as an English post box. Above the wall was the raised garden of Mrs Nocromer who rang them, and above Earl stretched the branches of the tree in which her little cat Snowball got herself stuck. Hung from one of the branches by his braces was Fred, no longer bouncing which just really showed how long he’d been hanging there, but he was still rotating in lazy circles, taking in the scene before him. There were a hundred calls for Snowball from six of the guys. Jacob was trying to claw his way along the branch above Snowball, while Geoff and Toby were holding a ladder, with Tony at its apex, stretching for Snowball the kitten, which was currently backed to the end of the branch and hissing at the huge fireman’s gloves that were trying to reach for her. Deebs was talking to Mrs Nocromer, more likely about her votes than about the kitten.
John shook his head and walked up to the base of the tree, just as Jacob fell out of it and landed with a loud “ooof!” in front of him, followed by a groan as he rolled onto his side and looked up at John with a depressed frown on his face. Fred was still circling lazily above him. John took out a tin of tuna from his pocket, then a can opener and he felt the eyes of every fireman on him as he calmly opened the tin and tipped it out onto the wall. He tapped the tin opener next to the pile of tuna, making a sharp bell sound, as he called out, “Here, kitty kitty kitty. Here kitty.”
There was a combined moan from every fireman when Snowball dodged past the fireman on the ladder and rushed down the tree to sit peaceably in front of John and eat the tuna with a loud purr.
Her owner gave a squeal of delight.
He ordered the lads back into the truck and picked up the thankful Snowball in his arms. He took her up the steps and into the garden to put her into the arms of her owner who was smiling widely and there may even have been a tear in her eye which John had studiously ignored as the lads loaded themselves onto the truck behind him. She was still thanking him when he heard the truck start up behind him, “I have to go now Mrs Nocromer. I’m sure Snowball will be none the worse after her ordeal. Goodbye, Mrs Nocromer.”
As he turned he’d seen the truck pull away and he rolled his eyes, so he guessed he’d be walking back to the station as well. Then he saw it and he started running, “Guys?!.....Guys!....The ladder is up!...Hey! ....The...Ladder....Is....UP!!!!” But he’d been too late and soon the truck had travelled out of view. He raced back to the station but when he arrived the firetruck was parked up fine, that is until he rounded the corner and stopped dead because the ladder had been sticking out the side of the building! He went back to the deceptively well parked truck and then returned to the outside wall again, he had no idea how they had managed that. He went off in search of the crew to discuss the failure of operation Snowball and maybe suggest they took the afternoon off from training and get some pizza’s in. He wasn’t sure how much more of this he could take.
xXx
They were at the rear of Rodney’s house, himself, Teyla and Rodney, all huddled around the telescope. It was dusk and the view from up here was amazing. Not to mention he was spending time with Rodney, which was always a good thing, he was very wary of Teyla’s attention though, hadn’t wanted to give anything away. Rodney leant over the telescope, rotating and focusing the lens as he said, “Let me show you a double binary, just focus with this.”
John jostled in front of Teyla to look first, and maybe he’d got to the pathetic point where he wanted to place his hand where Rodney had and hopefully still feel the warmth left there. He was officially sad. He heard Teyla’s huff, “You’ll see it,” he said to her, “I’m on a schedule.”
He could hear Teyla’s smirk when she responded, “Rodney, what is a light year?”
John couldn’t help himself and answered before Rodney did, “Same as a regular year, it just has less calories.”
He straightened up and grinned at her. She shook her head at him with a smile but didn’t respond as she bent over the telescope to see the nebula for herself, “What is it?”
“It is two pairs of stars revolving around each other,...but so far away from us, that they look like one,” Rodney answered, the gleam in his eye that he always got when he talked about the stars.
“What keeps them together?”
“Mutual attraction,” Rodney responded and there had been something in his voice that made John look at him, something that made him smile.
“That is fairly romantic,” Teyla commented innocently.
“Rodney isn’t a romantic,” John challenged, “are you Rodney?”
Rodney actually blushed, “I think I might be persuaded,” he replied before he continued, quoting, “...the light of a thousand galaxies blinking out and burning in rebirth, this is the light I see sparkling in your eyes, brighter than the sun. It’s bright enough to capture my heart and hold it captive amongst the stars, where no other mortal but you can reach it.”
Teyla just frowned at him in curiosity, “Is that a quote? Who said that?”
“I want to repeat each word like a passionate kiss that I will whisper against your lips,” Rodney continued.
“Rodney?” Teyla questioned again.
Rodney actually blushed and looked away, “Sorry, it’s something from a letter I recieved...an amazing letter.”
“You liked it?” John asked as warmth spread through him, his words had touched Rodney just as he’d hoped.
“No, I loved it,” Rodney enthused.
“Whose letter?” Teyla asked, frowning between the two of them now.
“Cameron,” Rodney answered simply, but the smile on his face and the sparkle in his eyes had said so much more.
“He can write?” Teyla asked and John’s not sure if she’d meant, ‘He can write?’ or ‘He can write words like that?’ but he’d been too busy falling back down with a bump because Cameron was getting the credit for making Rodney feel like that when it was all him.
“Oh, yeah. He can really write,” Rodney replied, still blushing profusely and then seemed to get flustered and distracted himself by turning back to his trusted telescope. “Let me show you that dumbbell nebula.” Rodney said as he leant over the telescope, rotating and refocusing, speaking as he went, face buried in the lens of the telescope with one hand waving in the air. “There is something I don’t get...The guy dodges me for days, so I think, okay, he’s not interested. Then John tells me of the letter...so I figure it’s about why he won’t talk to me. But it’s not. It was strange and... Intelligent... and sexual.”
“Why is he writing? He only lives a block and a half away.” Teyla asked suspiciously.
Rodney shrugged and they both turned to him as Rodney asked, “John?”
“Do you want me to ask him out for you?” John responded jokingly, but the blood froze in his veins when Rodney just smiled and nodded affirmative.
Oh hell! John thought.
TBC... Chapter Nine