Bingo Fic: Stages Of Life - Part 1 - Beginnings
Okay, this is my first ever totally AU Torchwood story, so naturally I chose to write about something I know next to nothing about. Hopefully that won’t show too much.
Title: Beginnings
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Jack, Ianto, Andy, OFC Miss Barton
Rating: G
Word Count: 681
Summary: Jack is the new boy at a Cardiff school, where he meets another little boy…
Spoilers: Nada.
Warnings: Completely AU, set in a universe where Torchwood doesn’t exist.
Written For: My
cottoncandy_bingo square First Meeting.
Beta: The wonderful zazajb, my advisor in all things school related. Thanks so much, your advice and assistance have been invaluable!
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood or any of the characters. Which is sad.
A/N: This is the first in a series of AU stories for different prompts on my bingo card, following Jack and Ianto through their school years and beyond. There are seven in total, of wildly varying lengths.
Miss Barton sighed and shook her head. The annual Nativity play was proving even more of a headache this year than it usually did, and all because of one small six-year-old American boy, who’d started at the school just a week ago after moving to Cardiff.
“No, Jack dear, you can’t be Mary. That’s a part for a little girl.”
Jack looked up at her with wide, innocent blue eyes.
“But why?”
“Because Mary was a lady, not a man. Look, how would you like to be an Angel, like Andy and Ianto? You get to wear a halo and wings, wouldn’t that be fun?” Miss Barton crossed her fingers behind her back. The last thing she wanted to deal with right now was a tantrum.
Jack considered the teacher’s suggestion, looking thoughtfully at the other two boys. One of them, dark haired and with eyes as blue as Jack’s, turned a rather nice shade of pink as Jack stared at him. Jack thought he was pretty. Making up his mind, he turned to Miss Barton and smiled.
“Okay.”
Relieved to have averted disaster, Miss Barton ushered Jack over to sit with the other two boys and started sorting out who would play the shepherds.
“Hi, I’m Jack,” Jack whispered to the blue-eyed boy beside him. “Are you in Miss Barton’s class?” The boy nodded, eyes fixed on the ground in front of him, ears glowing pink. “I’m in Mr Hodges’ class. What’s your name?”
“Ianto.”
“That’s a funny name.”
Ianto looked up, frowning.
“Is not! It’s Welsh.”
“Oh. Well, I’m from Chicago, that’s in America. We had to move here ‘cause my dad got a new job. I like it here.”
Ianto looked at him with wide eyes.
“Is America far away?”
“Uh huh! It’s almost on the other side of the world. We had to fly in a plane. I didn’t like that much, it was scary; the ground was so far away we were up in the clouds!”
Ianto looked impressed.
“I’ve never been on a plane. Don’t know if I’d want to if it’s scary though. What’s Chicago like?”
“Sort of like Cardiff, but the buildings are bigger, they go up for miles!”
“Wow!” said Ianto in an awed voice.
“I could tell you all about it. Maybe we could play together at lunch. You know, if you wanted to,” Jack said, chewing on his bottom lip, suddenly feeling a bit shy. He really wanted Ianto to like him. “We could practice being angels.”
Ianto turned pink again and it made Jack’s tummy feel funny, like he’d swallowed a butterfly and it was fluttering around inside him. It made him want to giggle.
“Yeah, okay,” Ianto whispered back, glancing sideways at him and smiling shyly.
Jack beamed at him, happy to have made a friend. He reached for Ianto’s hand and held it and the butterfly inside him fluttered even more when Ianto’s fingers curled around his own.
After that, they played together every break time and sat together at lunch, sharing each other’s sandwiches. Jack told Ianto all about what it was like to live in America, and in return, Ianto told him more about Wales. They practised hard at being angels and sometimes even let Andy practice with them, determined the three of them would be the best angels ever.
OoOoOoOoO
To Miss Barton’s relief, the Nativity play went beautifully. Well, mostly. The head fell off baby Jesus, one of the Wise Men fell off the stage when his crown slipped over his eyes and a fight broke out among the shepherds because they only had four sheep between the five of them and they all wanted to hold one. Miss Barton fixed that by giving one of the shepherds a teddy bear to hold. It looked a bit odd, but none of the parents seemed to mind. The three angels were perfect though, getting all their lines right and standing where they were supposed to. If two of the angels held hands the entire time, what did it matter? No one said anything about it.
TBC in ‘ Part 2 - Getting Creative’