Scar Tissue
Title: Scar Tissue
Fandom: RPS; MLB; Toronto Blue Jays/St. Louis Cardinals
Pairing: David Eckstein/Scott Rolen
Rating: R for shady man sex
Disclaimer: This is not true and is not meant to offend. I made no money.
x-posted to theboysofsummer, baseball_slash, and sports_slash.
His arm was tucked under Scott’s impressive frame, going painfully numb. He didn’t want to wake him up because that would imply facing what he had done. He had planned on disappearing, heading back to his empty apartment with his tail between his legs, reprimanding himself with his own brand of mental torture, but Rolen had unwittingly trapped him sometime in the night. Rolen had a way of doing that. He considered chewing off his own arm, but only in the shadowy part of his mind that didn’t have a name.
He just gently head butted Rolen in between his shoulder blades. Rolen moaned, but didn’t move.
“Scott,” he whispered sharply, wiggling his fingers in punctuation. “Scott, come on, you’re on my arm.”
Rolen yawned, perhaps melodramatically, and rolled over, freeing his arm.
“Thanks,” he said quickly as he dressed. He wasn’t sure if it was for his freedom or the fact that Rolen didn’t seem interested in waking up and making him an honest man. It didn’t really matter either way.
*
You had a way of making an unmarried man think about why he was unmarried. So I got married. During the off-season. When I came back the next year, you just shook your head. And smiled this way that made me want to punch you or maybe just pat you on the cheek. I didn’t think you knew then- but maybe because I didn’t know you. Or myself.
Getting out of St. Louis had to do with you. Everything to do with you. But you wouldn’t let it end like that. All the time we spent together taught me just one predictable thing about you. You never let me get away with anything, even a free agent signing.
You told me the first night I was in St. Louis that baseball left scars. It took me until Toronto to realize you hadn’t meant on the field.
*
Scott avoided him in the clubhouse in a sick- perhaps well thought out and planned- déjà vu. He had thought himself above the Rolen allure, especially his more immature tactics and sexual ploys.
He went through his pre-game motions and avoided Rolen just as artfully. The stolen glances- a thing of the past. He didn’t look at him unless he happened to pass directly in front of his field of vision. The careful but deliberate hand touches- buried with Old Busch. He didn’t stand within two feet of Rolen because there had been no reason to.
As he took the field to the cheers of the Canadian fans, hopping over the line more out of habit than superstition, he tried to convince himself he hadn’t been playing the game. That stupid ass game Rolen had ensnared him in since the first day he turned those turbulent blue eyes on David. But he had been convincing himself he hadn’t been playing the game for the better part of 3 years. The fans, the uniform, the league… They change more frequently than he thought. But some things just never changed.
*
I don’t know what happened to you in Philadelphia. And honestly, I don’t want to know what happened to you here. I don’t know where all that fury came from, how you could feel so underhanded when you showed me nothing but a thoughtful confidence. I don’t understand how you could let yourself feel so displaced. But that mysterious shell you built so effortlessly is hard to crack. And sometimes I wonder if I even want to get at what’s in there at all.
You know about the scars, though. Somehow, I doubt they happened in St. Louis. Maybe they got deeper or turned that permanent purple like they do on arms, but they weren’t scratched on there. It was scar tissue by then. But, as uncurious as I am about your days in Philadelphia, I wonder if the scars we now share were made just the same way. I don’t know how you could do it otherwise, not as well as you did it to me. And I know it’s not sadistic, even if in the darkest and deepest of nights, it’s easiest to just blame you. I know that it’s some unspoken chain. The game is too cruel for me to escape unscathed, you said. The game isn’t what it was about, though. It was about the chain.
But I won’t do it. I won’t pass it on. It’s not because I think I’m any better than you. It’s because you scarred me too well.
*
The shower made him shiver. He reached to turn the knob, but Rolen batted his hand away.
“I’ll warm you up,” he remedied, wrapping his arms around his chest and pulling David against him in one motion. His body was impossibly warm, even as the ice water pouring out of the shower started soaking them both. David shivered again, holding his bottom lip between his teeth, but the shiver had nothing to do with the water temperature this time.
Rolen’s hands started touching, gently, perhaps in consideration of David’s obvious skittishness. Memory served them both well and before long, touching turned into rubbing and rubbing into stroking and stroking into lathering.
David shut his eyes, shivering only when the water poured unprotected down his back as Rolen started bracing him. But they both knew he didn’t need much. It felt like a while since they’d gone through the motions, but the off-season was not as long as it felt, despite its distance from the dog days of summer. And he hadn’t been that tight the first time- the mistake time- in Toronto.
Rolen slid in, too gently for David’s taste because he didn’t feel as fragile as he was being treated. Besides, denial worked better when everything was quick and dirty and phantoms didn’t have time to come back.
His breath was furnace when he angled his head downward, an inferno against his neck. He rocked slowly, his hands firm on David’s waist, pulling and angling him back with each careful thrust forward. The slow pace let tension build like an unfurling coil. Sharp breaths and suppressed moans became gradually wilder. Rolen reached around and stroked him to help it all along. That made it quicker and Scott finished up just a bit before David. He washed up, patting David affectionately when all of his evidence made it down the drain. As soon as he ducked out and started dressing, David turned the hot water on.
*
You definitely didn’t do her any favors. I wasn’t living a lie until you. And maybe it was the same for you and Nicki before Philly and that just made it that much easier this time around for you and her.
It wasn’t like that for Ashley. All the nights I couldn’t touch her because my head was so full of you. All the resentment I carried with me that became much simpler to hand to her. All the secrets that she eventually just stopped wondering about. All the times you came first.
I could see the hardness grow there. She was building scar tissue, too. You hadn’t told me that part. And when I met Nicki and Raine for the first time, I knew it was because you missed it happening. It was because you didn’t know.
I wanted to tell you, but Ashley picked up Raine and I knew better. You can hide scars if you really want to.
*
His eyes were closed. Scott leaned over, wrapping his arm around him loosely, more out of obligation than a desire for closeness, and kissed him. It was little more than a lip touch, but it calmed his nerves.
“Do you miss it?” He didn’t open his eyes, deciding the Rolen pictured behind his eyelids was probably less of a challenge.
“St. Louis?” Rolen said it like a swear word. Hushed so one would hear him and take offense.
“Yeah.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Tony.”
“You’re going to let that ruin everything.”
“There’s nothing there now.”
“There’s us.”
“No, you and I are in Toronto. We’re on a good club. We escaped together.”
“That’s what you think.”
*
They just itch now. That’s all. I used to think they’d always burn red, just like the first time. But I was wrong, just like I was wrong about most of it. I can deal with an itch. Especially since you’re always there to scratch it, the same annoyingly brilliant smile on your face.
I don’t take for granted that you’re here, even if I wished you away so hard when I was informed of the trade. I smiled at Ricciardi because he made it sound like a favor, but I threw a fit at home. I bet Ashley knew why when she read the paper the next day.
But I can handle it now. Because I realized something when your breathing slowed last night. You didn’t make the scars. They’d been there all along. Everything you did to me- showed me, said to me, taught me- had been about exposing those scars.
I wonder if we’re both better men for it.
Fandom: RPS; MLB; Toronto Blue Jays/St. Louis Cardinals
Pairing: David Eckstein/Scott Rolen
Rating: R for shady man sex
Disclaimer: This is not true and is not meant to offend. I made no money.
x-posted to theboysofsummer, baseball_slash, and sports_slash.
His arm was tucked under Scott’s impressive frame, going painfully numb. He didn’t want to wake him up because that would imply facing what he had done. He had planned on disappearing, heading back to his empty apartment with his tail between his legs, reprimanding himself with his own brand of mental torture, but Rolen had unwittingly trapped him sometime in the night. Rolen had a way of doing that. He considered chewing off his own arm, but only in the shadowy part of his mind that didn’t have a name.
He just gently head butted Rolen in between his shoulder blades. Rolen moaned, but didn’t move.
“Scott,” he whispered sharply, wiggling his fingers in punctuation. “Scott, come on, you’re on my arm.”
Rolen yawned, perhaps melodramatically, and rolled over, freeing his arm.
“Thanks,” he said quickly as he dressed. He wasn’t sure if it was for his freedom or the fact that Rolen didn’t seem interested in waking up and making him an honest man. It didn’t really matter either way.
*
You had a way of making an unmarried man think about why he was unmarried. So I got married. During the off-season. When I came back the next year, you just shook your head. And smiled this way that made me want to punch you or maybe just pat you on the cheek. I didn’t think you knew then- but maybe because I didn’t know you. Or myself.
Getting out of St. Louis had to do with you. Everything to do with you. But you wouldn’t let it end like that. All the time we spent together taught me just one predictable thing about you. You never let me get away with anything, even a free agent signing.
You told me the first night I was in St. Louis that baseball left scars. It took me until Toronto to realize you hadn’t meant on the field.
*
Scott avoided him in the clubhouse in a sick- perhaps well thought out and planned- déjà vu. He had thought himself above the Rolen allure, especially his more immature tactics and sexual ploys.
He went through his pre-game motions and avoided Rolen just as artfully. The stolen glances- a thing of the past. He didn’t look at him unless he happened to pass directly in front of his field of vision. The careful but deliberate hand touches- buried with Old Busch. He didn’t stand within two feet of Rolen because there had been no reason to.
As he took the field to the cheers of the Canadian fans, hopping over the line more out of habit than superstition, he tried to convince himself he hadn’t been playing the game. That stupid ass game Rolen had ensnared him in since the first day he turned those turbulent blue eyes on David. But he had been convincing himself he hadn’t been playing the game for the better part of 3 years. The fans, the uniform, the league… They change more frequently than he thought. But some things just never changed.
*
I don’t know what happened to you in Philadelphia. And honestly, I don’t want to know what happened to you here. I don’t know where all that fury came from, how you could feel so underhanded when you showed me nothing but a thoughtful confidence. I don’t understand how you could let yourself feel so displaced. But that mysterious shell you built so effortlessly is hard to crack. And sometimes I wonder if I even want to get at what’s in there at all.
You know about the scars, though. Somehow, I doubt they happened in St. Louis. Maybe they got deeper or turned that permanent purple like they do on arms, but they weren’t scratched on there. It was scar tissue by then. But, as uncurious as I am about your days in Philadelphia, I wonder if the scars we now share were made just the same way. I don’t know how you could do it otherwise, not as well as you did it to me. And I know it’s not sadistic, even if in the darkest and deepest of nights, it’s easiest to just blame you. I know that it’s some unspoken chain. The game is too cruel for me to escape unscathed, you said. The game isn’t what it was about, though. It was about the chain.
But I won’t do it. I won’t pass it on. It’s not because I think I’m any better than you. It’s because you scarred me too well.
*
The shower made him shiver. He reached to turn the knob, but Rolen batted his hand away.
“I’ll warm you up,” he remedied, wrapping his arms around his chest and pulling David against him in one motion. His body was impossibly warm, even as the ice water pouring out of the shower started soaking them both. David shivered again, holding his bottom lip between his teeth, but the shiver had nothing to do with the water temperature this time.
Rolen’s hands started touching, gently, perhaps in consideration of David’s obvious skittishness. Memory served them both well and before long, touching turned into rubbing and rubbing into stroking and stroking into lathering.
David shut his eyes, shivering only when the water poured unprotected down his back as Rolen started bracing him. But they both knew he didn’t need much. It felt like a while since they’d gone through the motions, but the off-season was not as long as it felt, despite its distance from the dog days of summer. And he hadn’t been that tight the first time- the mistake time- in Toronto.
Rolen slid in, too gently for David’s taste because he didn’t feel as fragile as he was being treated. Besides, denial worked better when everything was quick and dirty and phantoms didn’t have time to come back.
His breath was furnace when he angled his head downward, an inferno against his neck. He rocked slowly, his hands firm on David’s waist, pulling and angling him back with each careful thrust forward. The slow pace let tension build like an unfurling coil. Sharp breaths and suppressed moans became gradually wilder. Rolen reached around and stroked him to help it all along. That made it quicker and Scott finished up just a bit before David. He washed up, patting David affectionately when all of his evidence made it down the drain. As soon as he ducked out and started dressing, David turned the hot water on.
*
You definitely didn’t do her any favors. I wasn’t living a lie until you. And maybe it was the same for you and Nicki before Philly and that just made it that much easier this time around for you and her.
It wasn’t like that for Ashley. All the nights I couldn’t touch her because my head was so full of you. All the resentment I carried with me that became much simpler to hand to her. All the secrets that she eventually just stopped wondering about. All the times you came first.
I could see the hardness grow there. She was building scar tissue, too. You hadn’t told me that part. And when I met Nicki and Raine for the first time, I knew it was because you missed it happening. It was because you didn’t know.
I wanted to tell you, but Ashley picked up Raine and I knew better. You can hide scars if you really want to.
*
His eyes were closed. Scott leaned over, wrapping his arm around him loosely, more out of obligation than a desire for closeness, and kissed him. It was little more than a lip touch, but it calmed his nerves.
“Do you miss it?” He didn’t open his eyes, deciding the Rolen pictured behind his eyelids was probably less of a challenge.
“St. Louis?” Rolen said it like a swear word. Hushed so one would hear him and take offense.
“Yeah.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Tony.”
“You’re going to let that ruin everything.”
“There’s nothing there now.”
“There’s us.”
“No, you and I are in Toronto. We’re on a good club. We escaped together.”
“That’s what you think.”
*
They just itch now. That’s all. I used to think they’d always burn red, just like the first time. But I was wrong, just like I was wrong about most of it. I can deal with an itch. Especially since you’re always there to scratch it, the same annoyingly brilliant smile on your face.
I don’t take for granted that you’re here, even if I wished you away so hard when I was informed of the trade. I smiled at Ricciardi because he made it sound like a favor, but I threw a fit at home. I bet Ashley knew why when she read the paper the next day.
But I can handle it now. Because I realized something when your breathing slowed last night. You didn’t make the scars. They’d been there all along. Everything you did to me- showed me, said to me, taught me- had been about exposing those scars.
I wonder if we’re both better men for it.