new fic: chin up, cheer up
Title: Chin Up, Cheer Up
Author: breakthecitysky
Rating: PG
Pairing: Kirk/McCoy
Notes: With thanks to northatlantic for the awesome beta. All other errors are mine. From this prompt.
One.
The first time he almost says it he’s lying sprawled out drunk on the dorm floor, the room tilting and whirling like a carnival ride. He’s failed the Kobayashi Maru, and Jim Kirk doesn’t fail anything, so the hit his pride has taken feels like it could darn well be fatal. He’s shaken to his core and nothing feels right, in the moments after, all slow motion dreamscape weird as people avoid his eyes and scurry out of his way.
Except for Bones, who just sighs exasperatedly and steers him toward the dive bar that Jim likes but McCoy can’t stand, which just goes to show how great a guy he is. They don’t talk much, but they throw back shots like water. Bones never seems to get quite plastered, genteel Southern bastard that he is, and he has a sixth sense about just when to cut Jim off before things get well and truly ugly, which is how he ended up back in the dorm with Bones instead of face down in the gutter, getting the shit kicked out of him for running his mouth at someone, or some combination of both.
Bones hands him some water, eyes dark and bemused and he looks hot like that, shaking his head at Kirk squinting up at him. He goes to put on some of his godawful classic music, muttering about how he knows just the tune and only Bones would be preoccupied about the soundtrack at a time like this. Some guy is crooning about broken blues and Jim’s about to crack wise about Bones’ excellent taste in ancient music except the look on McCoy’s face makes him swallow, instead.
Bones sprawls out next to him, big gentle hand coming up to run over his head, fingers making slow circles on Jim’s temples and that feels like the next closest thing to heaven. “You’ll get ‘em next time, kid,” Bones murmurs.
He almost says it, then, isn’t even sure where it comes from, and maybe that’s why he just sighs instead, murmurs, “Damn right,” before passing out with his head on Bones’ thigh.
Two.
McCoy looks something close to incredulous when Kirk assumes command of the Enterprise and that stings a little, especially since he’s already smarting from being dumped out in the middle of nowhere, left to freeze or be eaten by creatures he hopes never to encounter again. Bones has never quite understood the strange mixture of luck and will that propels Jim Kirk both into and out of every sticky situation, and the steely determination that ensures he ends up on top. It’s okay, though. Bones already gets him better than anyone else ever has, he’s allowed this one weakness.
He pushes it aside because he has to, he’s headed to confront Nero on his own ground and that requires that he keep his head in the game. He tells himself there’ll be time for this. Later.
“You’re aware that you’re walking into pretty much certain death, aren’t you?” Bones asks as Jim makes his way to the transporter room, Spock somewhere in front of him.
“I’m too pretty to die.” His cocky grin only widens at the grumbling that gets from Bones.
Bones stops just outside and gives Jim one of those looks that makes his stomach clench, like Bones is seeing all the things Jim isn’t ready to admit to himself or anyone else. Jim does the only thing he can under the circumstances, deflect. “I promise to be careful, Mom.”
Bones rolls his eyes. “See that you do, kid,” he mumbles, waving a hand off towards where Scotty’s waiting and Jim really kind of wants to say it then, because maybe he won’t come back from this one. His dad didn’t. He bites his lip, thinks, Bones, man, you are it, you are the one, leave a light on for me, but he salutes instead. Regrets it maybe a little as he stands there awkwardly through Uhura and Spock’s goodbye.
Okay, maybe a lot.
Three.
He has officially been captain of the Enterprise for one week, three days, and four hours. Not that he’s keeping track. To say he feels on top of the world is something of an understatement, but there’s something melancholy about it, late at night, when he’s alone in his quarters and thinking too hard. He’s thinking in particular about what Spock said about that other universe, the one where his dad got to see him get his bars, where he gets to hear his old man tell him he’s proud somewhere other than his dreams.
He doesn’t get to wallow for too long, though. Per the usual on these occasions, the chime above his door rings and Bones walks in like he owns the place. He glances over, smiles lopsidedly and goes back to staring out the window as Bones goes to the cabinet, gets out a couple of glasses and pours some Earth whiskey, wanders over and hands him a glass. It’s the sweetest burn, going down, reminds him not even a little of the swill he used to drink in Iowa dive bars and he wonders again how it is he managed to get from there to here.
“Stop thinking so hard,” Bones says and Kirk smiles.
“Why? If I hurt myself you’re here to fix me,” he winks.
“Always,” Bones sighs, “but that’s not the point.”
“Oh?” Kirk looks over at him, taken again by those dark eyes that seem to know him without even trying.
“He’d be proud of you,” McCoy says gruffly.
Kirk blinks.
“Dammit, Jim,” he laughs softly, “I’m a doctor, not a mind reader. You’re doing that frowning thing with your eyebrows that means you’re thinking about family, good or bad.”
He has to smile at that, at just how well they know one another, the many and varied ways in which they anticipate what the other one needs. “You think?” he asks, voice catching a little.
“Yeah,” McCoy says. “I do.”
His glass is empty, so he takes McCoy’s, drains it in a gulp but that’s still not enough liquid courage to make him say what’s right there, hanging in between them.
He goes for refills, instead.
Four.
He can tell he must be bleeding pretty good by the way Scotty pales when he shows up on the pad in the transporter room, feels bad in a far off way for messing up that pristine floor. His knees start to buckle, but before Scotty can so much as move to catch him Bones is there. He’s frowning, which is hardly unusual, that little scolding tone to his voice that Jim knows so well except this time it’s covering something else, something that sounds like fear. “’s okay, Bones,” he slurs. “Just a flesh wound.”
He can hear Bones roll his eyes, then, and that’s reassuring, at least, that it’s not so bad that he’s beyond aggravating the man. He’ll know he’s in trouble when Bones can’t muster up honest to God exasperation.
He’s hustled into Sick Bay and there’s a flurry of activity, enough tight lines on faces that he gets a little worried again, thinks maybe he ought to say something. Just in case. “Bones?” he calls out, just as one of the nurses injects him with something and even though Bones is back at his side in a matter of seconds he’s already loopy, high as a kite. “I…”
He means to tell him, really he does, but he throws up instead. He thinks, muzzily, before he passes out, that at least he managed to only get McCoy‘s shoes.
Five.
They have a week’s leave, and he drags Bones along with him back to Iowa because Bones really doesn’t have any other place to be and Jim’s a pit bull when he gets an idea in his head. In this case, the idea is that Bones really is better off spending his leave bumming around Jim’s old haunts, and it doesn’t take long to wear Bones down and get him to agree.
It’s winter, so Bones is even crabbier than usual and no matter how many layers of clothing he’s wearing he always seems to be cold. This, of course, results in an hourly back-and-forth between the two in which one calls the other a pussy, there are insults related to lineage exchanged, and one of them elbows the other and they both smile and shake their heads. It feels downright cozy, if you get right down to it.
He catches Sam watching them the night before they’re scheduled to head back. They’re both on the couch, Bones engrossed in some medical literature and Jim trying to find something worth watching on the vidscreen. He’s curious, because he’s never seen that look on Sam’s face before, so he gets up and goes to bug him about what exactly is amusing him so much.
“Pretty domestic, the two of you,” Sam says and Jim punches him out of habit. “Ass,” Sam wrinkles his nose at him. “Tell him sometime in this lifetime, huh?”
Jim rolls his eyes and ignores the way Sam clicks his tongue like Jim’s an idiot. He doesn’t need his brother to tell him that; he’s been in love with Bones in one form or another since they shared that flask on the damn shuttle to the Academy. However, love in anything other than the theoretical sense is decidedly out of Jim’s comfort zone. He never quite gets to the point where he can say it, not out loud.
He takes a long shower that night, writes it in the fogged up mirror, kind of mortified at how teenage girl the act is but Jim Kirk isn’t always smooth.
They both oversleep the next morning, and Bones doesn’t end up having time to shower before they go to grab their shuttle. Jim forgets about it until he gets an email from his brother thanking him for enough material to tease him for ten lifetimes.
Dammit.
The One That Counts.
He has officially been captain of the Enterprise for one year, three months, twelve days and six hours. He’s sitting in his quarters contemplating this when the chime sounds and Bones comes in, lines of exhaustion on his face and Kirk sighs, goes to get the good booze out of his cabinet.
“That bad?” Jim asks, and Bones just grumbles something under his breath.
He snags two glasses, the bottle, wanders back over in McCoy’s direction. He stops for a minute, contemplates the tired set of those shoulders, the way Bones is sitting slumped in his chair and it’s clear the other man should be in bed but this has become their nightly routine, and it has to mean something that no matter how bad the day they choose to close it out with each other, right?
He laughs at himself, because no one would ever accuse him of overthinking anything and yet here he is. Bones looks up, curious, and Jim shakes his head, filling the glasses. Bones reaches for his and Jim’s hand closes over those long fingers, lips quirking as expectant eyes find his.
“Jim?“
Jim sighs. “Has there been a night we’ve both been on this ship that we haven’t shut the door on the day together?”
Bones makes a face at him. “You getting sentimental on me? Did you start without me?”
“Has there?”
“No,” Bones says, and there’s something uncertain there that Kirk doesn’t think he’s ever seen before. His knee jerk reaction is to tease, because he could, but if he does, he knows this will be another chance lost.
“I think maybe we should see what greeting the morning together looks like,” Jim says, staring down at his drink.
Bones doesn’t say anything, just watches him, waits him out like he knows Kirk isn’t going to be able to sit there in silence and of course he’s right, because he knows Jim better than himself. “I’m thinking,” Jim goes on, “that you should stay tonight. Because really, we’re in each other’s pockets already practically and you may be a cranky bastard but you’re my cranky bastard and I’ve been in love with you for longer than I care to analyze and I think it’s time maybe I owned up to that, so think about it maybe and - “
“Okay.”
Jim stutters to a stop, looks over at the shit-eating grin on Bones’ face and just sighs, scrubbing a hand over his own. “That’s it?”
“You’re the one who talks pretty,” Bones smiles, something warm and indulgent there. “Me, I was just waiting for you to ask.”
“I take it back. I hate you.”
“I get the left side of the bed,” Bones says, stretching, and all Jim can do is grin helplessly, get up and clear glasses.
“Kid?”
He pauses, glancing over his shoulder at Bones.
“I love you, too.”