TSCC Fic: Of Uncles and Canned Goods
Title: Of Uncles and Canned Goods
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Derek Reese and John Connor
Summary: John never would have guessed he’d come to understand Derek through cans of baked beans.
Warnings/Spoilers: Season 1 stuff
Word Count: 1600
Disclaimer: Terminator and its characters are not mine in any way. :-(
Author’s Note:
This story takes place some time in the first third of season two after they’ve settled in a bit into the new house and before Jessie comes into the picture. Thanks so much to missnyah for the awesome beta!
Part 1: Of Fathers and Grocery Stores
In his mind, the two looked the same-Derek and Kyle. He knew they didn’t really. He also knew he was being childish, imagining Derek as his father. No, he didn’t really do that. He didn’t cling to the fact that Derek was the closest he’d ever gotten to knowing Kyle. John was tagging along with him because he could learn from him. Derek knew about the resistance, he was a tool in John’s preparation. He wasn’t trying to get some time alone with Derek and pretend at being a normal guy, hanging out with the cool uncle.
Away from Mom and Cameron, Derek was that though: his uncle.
“I thought you had homework or something.” Derek was talking to him, cutting through the radio and the streams of thought in John’s head.
“Since when do you care about my homework?”
“I don’t. I figure you’d have something better than do than tag along on one of your mom’s menial errands.”
“Maybe I could use more “menial” in my life.”
Derek pulled into a parking place at the empty side of the lot.
“Maybe I wanted to get out of the house.”
Derek chuckled. “Can’t blame you on that one.” This, this was the Derek that never came around at home.
Derek grabbed a cart as they walked in.
“I thought Mom just sent you to get more moth balls.”
“Yeah, well, the pantry is getting bare and as much as I enjoy making explosives, you can’t eat the ingredients.”
When it came to shopping, Derek was oddly picky for a guy who seemed happy to eat anything. He was still on edge, he was always on edge. But it was just that he seemed more…content here among a hundred boxes of Rice-a-Roni. He read each box carefully before deciding on what to buy. In produce every piece of fruit was scrutinized.
“You act like you’ve never been to a grocery store before.”
Derek looked at him seriously. “I’ve been shopping. A couple of months ago.” He tossed a package of rice into the cart. This rice must have passed his inspection.
Yeah, John knew that Derek had shopped before. The guy shopped with confidence, efficiency. He insisted on certain standards. John figured he’d be that kind of soldier too, a good guy to have on your team.
But when they got to the canned foods section Derek’s scrutiny ended. He grabbed an armful of tuna in yellow cans and didn’t give the other options a second glance. He took every can they had of that one particular brand. John stood there with his mouth half-open as Derek moved passed tuna and armful after armful of canned goods landed in the cart.
When Derek had finally placed his last armful in he glanced at John for the first time. “What?”
“Uh, I think now I know why Mom never sent you shopping before.”
Derek elected not to respond, but a couple of seconds later made a show of taking a single can of baked beans out of the cart and placing it back on the shelf. “There. Happy now?”
John laughed. “I hate baked beans. Look at this cart, you have about 20 cans of baked beans, more than anything else.”
“Do I?” Derek looked down at the cart. “You know what? I hate them too.”
“Let’s put ‘em back,” John said.
Derek’s grin faded and he watched a lady with a couple of kids hanging out of her cart pass them before he spoke. “You’re right. I should put them back.”
He just stood there, staring at the cans. Finally he took a deep breath and started putting them away, slamming each can back on the shelf.
“We don’t have to put them back. Mom might like them.”
Derek snorted and kept stacking cans.
“Give them to Cameron. She’ll eat anything.”
That earned a glare from Derek. John looked around nervously. For some reason Derek was angry at himself for stocking up on baked beans.
“The beans…you got them for Kyle, didn’t you?”
Derek gripped the edges of the cart, but then shrugged and looked back up as if nothing had happened. “You know,” he said, grinning, “I almost forgot the moth balls.”
Part 2: Of Brothers and Tuna Fish
After the baked beans incident and they came back home with enough food to feed an army…or survive a nuclear holocaust, Mom started sending Derek to the store more often. It seemed everyone was a lot happier with a fully-stocked fridge. Not that Mom had kept the cupboards bare, she just had other things to do and wasn’t used to feeding a sixteen-year-old, a cyborg, and a half-starved soldier from the future. Besides, her priorities at the store were always bomb-making supplies first, easiest thing for dinner second.
John tagged along whenever he could. Derek didn’t seem to mind. They developed a routine: go to target practice or shopping for ammo or occasionally have some ice cream at a park, then get groceries. Derek still stocked up on ridiculous amounts of canned goods every single time they shopped. It seemed he was running out of places to store it all because John had recently discovered a case of cans under his bed.
Most of the time, these outings were when Derek was at his most peaceful. He’d joke and occasionally tell John stories about the future, about Kyle. Some days, though, Derek was somewhere else. He’d be quiet and irritable the whole time, if he let John tag along at all. Those were the days he bought the most cans.
This was one of those days. Cameron was off following some dead-end lead on the Turk, which would normally put Derek in a better mood simply by nature of her absence, but John heard Mom and Derek yelling, fighting over God knows what.
A half an hour later John heard the front door slam and the truck start. He ran out just as Derek was pulling out.
“Can I come with you? We’re out of shampoo.”
Derek gestured with his head toward the passenger side and John hopped in.
They drove in silence but John didn’t mind. He pictured the people in the other cars seeing them and assuming they were father and son. It was beyond stupid, but he did it anyway. Sometimes stupid things feel good.
Derek finally broke the silence in the store when he said, “Do you think red or green peppers are healthier?”
John felt like cracking up but restrained himself. “Buy both.”
Derek nodded and placed the veggies in a bag.
At the canned foods section Derek went into auto-pilot again. This time instead of letting him do his own thing, John grabbed a can of tuna out of his hand and placed it back on the shelf.
“What’re you doing?”
John grabbed a can for different brand of tuna. He liked this brand better than those damned yellow cans Derek kept buying, but that wasn’t really the reason he did it. “I like these better.”
“Oh yeah? Try it in 10 years and see how you like it.”
“I’m planning on eating it a bit sooner than that.”
“That kind’s no good. They cheaped out on it and it doesn’t last.”
“But I’m eating it tomorrow.”
“Damn it, Kyle! You want to get sick?”
Kyle?
Recognition hit Derek’s face. He looked around anxiously, but also, John thought, with realization of where he was, when he was. Derek turned and stormed off.
John found him outside later, after putting back the un-bought groceries they didn’t need anyway. Derek was sitting in front of the store, looking up at the sky. John stood next to him, unsure what to say.
“I’m sorry, John. For that.” Derek kept squinting towards the sun.
“You ready to drive me home?”
In the car Derek said, “we didn’t get that shampoo.”
“Yeah, that’s okay. I figure we can steal Mom’s.”
And that made Derek smile.
Part 3: Of Uncles and Canned Goods
A couple of weeks later Derek was showing John around the tunnels under the city, helping him become familiar with the layout and discussing the logistics of defending an attack.
They came across one spot, some kind of old utilities access box where Derek stopped mid-sentence and stared at the box. He ran his hands over it and looked around.
“What?”
“I remember this. I found a stash of food here when I was a kid.”
“Really? Here?”
“Yeah, it was good timing, too. We wouldn’t have made it much longer going without it.” Derek pried off the door. It was empty. No utilities and definitely no food.
“Someone probably stashed it there after judgment day,” said John.
“Yeah.”
“Or some homeless guy will.”
“Yeah.”
Derek snapped the door back on the box and went back to talking about tunnels as if the incident had never happened.
The next morning John woke up to the smell of waffles-Mom was expanding her breakfast repertoire.
“Oh, so you decided not to sleep all day?” Mom said.
John just grumbled and sat at the table. A certain someone who could always be counted on to show up whenever food was cooking was missing. “Where’s Derek?”
“Not here.” Mom and her damned non-answers.
Halfway through second helpings it dawned on John where Derek may be. He checked and his hunch was correct-a couple of cases of cans were missing.
When Derek got home, an empty baked beans case in hand, John said, “What if someone else was going to stash it there?”
Derek pulled a beer out of the fridge and took a swig. “I’d rather not risk it.”
End