The Space Between
Series: Finding
Title: The Space Between
Authors: razycrandomgirl and ceslas
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Post-BDM
Characters: Jayne/River
Disclaimer: Firefly owns me, I own words
Notes: A gift from
razycrandomgirl in the form of a page of beautiful Rain Dancing, and a conversation about playing the guitar led to this... we hope you like it... comments are like air... makes life easier... Please go comment on her page as well since this would not have been breathed to life without her! Razy's journal entry
All Jayne/River stories are in the same storyline, even if seen out of order...
Organizational Post
The Space Between
She planted flowers in the rain. Just when it happened, just when it started raining. She seemed to dance with the thunder; actually taking it by the hand and twirling herself in its arms. Harsh winds came and tore at garments. Soaked and wild just like the rest of her. She danced and danced and danced until she collapsed.
Then only would he venture out to collect her. Sore, her body throbbed with the dance. She looked as a wild creature keeping the rhythm only she felt.
Whenever he came near her while she was dancing she started out whirling just out of reach and evading any attempt at being caught. She was good at it, made it look easy and natural. She could make him look like he had joined her in the dance.
Once by pure luck he caught her and she froze petrified like stone. Only thing moving on her was whatever was light enough to be carried on the wind. She wasn’t finished but the hand on hers beckoned.
Then there was another tune, another note. This one subdued and sad, her attention melted into him and he had her wholly and not just but the hand. She stared confused and like a child, she reached for his face. He pulled her along and she felt scolded. He said nothing but his grip tightened.
He wondered what happened to this woman to make her so … He had never known her any other way. He guessed it was what she’d experienced; made her no longer a stranger to such things. Those hands had been different, she had lost a piece of herself. Lost them until she found a man who had his pieces to keep her whole. Until she thought she lost him so suddenly it seemed unreal. After it happened something turned in her, spoiled then grew into something strange and beautiful. He had betrayed her and in doing so had allowed her to find that center of resilience she had feared lost.
Taking her through the cargo bay to the common room where he dumped her unceremoniously on one of the couches and began to pace forth and back, to and fro. Frustrated, tired, sad, and worried. She was weary and lucid, back to herself. Wet all over; hair clothes skin.
He tore at his damp hair, trying to pull the lost pieces she was looking for into his own consciousness. She silently followed him with her eyes, no longer reaching past the silent walls of fog that billowed around his thoughts. Rested there in that warm silence that cradled her own raw emotions in cushioned safety.
When he passed near enough for her to touch in his irregular pacing, she would reach out and skim her fingers over his cargo pants where they clung wetly to his thigh. Ached to ease his worry.
She was no longer fearful of the dancing to unheard tunes, no longer looked for a reason to slow their whirl of feelings uncontrolled. She only slipped into the spell when it rained hard enough, when the wind would dance with her. He let her. He fell into the flow. He followed her.
~*~ ~*~
A late night planetside, Serenity resting in the lee of a rise. Hillside covered in softly glowing blossoms. Iridescence in the darkest hour of the night. Rain blew down dampening the open ramp of the hold.
He had been there for a while, waiting for her to appear. It was nights such as these that she would pad on silent feet through the sleeping Firefly to come and dance. He waited in stillness, years of tracking and watching having taught him the patience required to vanish into the background. Despite his usually large life and physical presence, he could blend back into a shadow and disappear.
The sigh of a passing breeze covered her approach so that she was simply there. Soft blue silken cotton brushed around her legs, drifted up from the lift of her light steps. Toes leading, she stepped elegantly off the ramp to sink her bare feet into the moss-like wet grasses. Pale light of glowing blooms cast a surreal light over all.
Fingers lightly stroke across strings, notes faintly stirred to life under the touch of calloused hands. A curtain draws up in his mind, access to innermost feelings becomes possible around waves of watery distortion. He has been waiting in the rain shadow under the long neck of Serenity.
She swirls by him, skirts brushing his knee as she passes. Notes haunt the air between them. Gently she seeks to see where the notes are born, feel the memories they evoke in him. He allows her to see, to feel the words he can’t speak. A life lays presented before her eyes. Hard, cruel, gross in its lack of elegance or light. A brutish life of carnal pleasures and no moderation. Only living to make the most of it. He is laid bare; lets her read past the surface to the inner layers he hides even from himself.
Choices he had and ones taken away. She brushes her mind past the darkness, peers around the walls of recrimination and hubris to find the honor hidden behind walls almost impenetrable. This is what she draws on, this is the center that she can reach for even when she cannot see anything else. That center of quiet is what keeps them both from imploding and pulling everyone around them into a descending spiral of destruction.
Shuddering to a halt before him, her hand reaches out to imperceptibly touch the back of his as his fingers smoothly shifted chords. The tune almost unheard under the drip of water from countless rivulets, breeze rustling the leaves of trees nearby adding a shushing percussion to the music.
He lifted his eyes from their barely touching hands, her fingers stroking with birdlike grace the veins and ridges that stood out in the play of light and dark. He could feel the coolness of her touch, trails of wetness leaving paths where the heat was lessened.
She saw him look up to her, startlingly clear blue eyes flickered with internal flames reflecting the luminescence of the night flowering grasses outside. The tips of her fingers warmed as they brushed across his hand, feeling the calloused knuckles broken countless times, skin toughened on the raised surfaces of bone. Hands that had broken more than they created.
He shivered slightly from the cool touch of her hand; reacting to the feather touch with goosebumps raising the hair on his forearms. Heat poured off his skin, evaporating the sheen of water her fingers had trailed across his hand. He drew breath, air feeling choked and trapped under her appraisal. The notes stilled. Only the rain and rustle of leaves accompanied her when she leapt back to swirl away into the blanket of blue flowers glowing.
A smile grew across her features, eyes twinkling with a new thought. Her dance calmed to a peaceful wave of hips and shoulders, body flowing in motion like a reed under water.
He played, his fingers bringing life to the notes of her dance, touching into her grace and giving it sound. She twined her body around, reaching into herself for the feelings his music blew life into.
This was their peace, their silence, the place that wasn’t overwhelmed with fire and glacial colds. She could see him more clearly here than anywhere else, contact bare and fleeting, not the surrounding flames of passion, but the pulse of embers banked. In this space between the fire and fights she loved him most. Felt the past that made him the future she had thought impossible when they made her ice, when they tore and ripped from her the flame that sparked freedom.
~*~ ~*~
Title: The Space Between
Authors: razycrandomgirl and ceslas
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Post-BDM
Characters: Jayne/River
Disclaimer: Firefly owns me, I own words
Notes: A gift from
razycrandomgirl in the form of a page of beautiful Rain Dancing, and a conversation about playing the guitar led to this... we hope you like it... comments are like air... makes life easier... Please go comment on her page as well since this would not have been breathed to life without her! Razy's journal entry
All Jayne/River stories are in the same storyline, even if seen out of order...
Organizational Post
The Space Between
She planted flowers in the rain. Just when it happened, just when it started raining. She seemed to dance with the thunder; actually taking it by the hand and twirling herself in its arms. Harsh winds came and tore at garments. Soaked and wild just like the rest of her. She danced and danced and danced until she collapsed.
Then only would he venture out to collect her. Sore, her body throbbed with the dance. She looked as a wild creature keeping the rhythm only she felt.
Whenever he came near her while she was dancing she started out whirling just out of reach and evading any attempt at being caught. She was good at it, made it look easy and natural. She could make him look like he had joined her in the dance.
Once by pure luck he caught her and she froze petrified like stone. Only thing moving on her was whatever was light enough to be carried on the wind. She wasn’t finished but the hand on hers beckoned.
Then there was another tune, another note. This one subdued and sad, her attention melted into him and he had her wholly and not just but the hand. She stared confused and like a child, she reached for his face. He pulled her along and she felt scolded. He said nothing but his grip tightened.
He wondered what happened to this woman to make her so … He had never known her any other way. He guessed it was what she’d experienced; made her no longer a stranger to such things. Those hands had been different, she had lost a piece of herself. Lost them until she found a man who had his pieces to keep her whole. Until she thought she lost him so suddenly it seemed unreal. After it happened something turned in her, spoiled then grew into something strange and beautiful. He had betrayed her and in doing so had allowed her to find that center of resilience she had feared lost.
Taking her through the cargo bay to the common room where he dumped her unceremoniously on one of the couches and began to pace forth and back, to and fro. Frustrated, tired, sad, and worried. She was weary and lucid, back to herself. Wet all over; hair clothes skin.
He tore at his damp hair, trying to pull the lost pieces she was looking for into his own consciousness. She silently followed him with her eyes, no longer reaching past the silent walls of fog that billowed around his thoughts. Rested there in that warm silence that cradled her own raw emotions in cushioned safety.
When he passed near enough for her to touch in his irregular pacing, she would reach out and skim her fingers over his cargo pants where they clung wetly to his thigh. Ached to ease his worry.
She was no longer fearful of the dancing to unheard tunes, no longer looked for a reason to slow their whirl of feelings uncontrolled. She only slipped into the spell when it rained hard enough, when the wind would dance with her. He let her. He fell into the flow. He followed her.
~*~ ~*~
A late night planetside, Serenity resting in the lee of a rise. Hillside covered in softly glowing blossoms. Iridescence in the darkest hour of the night. Rain blew down dampening the open ramp of the hold.
He had been there for a while, waiting for her to appear. It was nights such as these that she would pad on silent feet through the sleeping Firefly to come and dance. He waited in stillness, years of tracking and watching having taught him the patience required to vanish into the background. Despite his usually large life and physical presence, he could blend back into a shadow and disappear.
The sigh of a passing breeze covered her approach so that she was simply there. Soft blue silken cotton brushed around her legs, drifted up from the lift of her light steps. Toes leading, she stepped elegantly off the ramp to sink her bare feet into the moss-like wet grasses. Pale light of glowing blooms cast a surreal light over all.
Fingers lightly stroke across strings, notes faintly stirred to life under the touch of calloused hands. A curtain draws up in his mind, access to innermost feelings becomes possible around waves of watery distortion. He has been waiting in the rain shadow under the long neck of Serenity.
She swirls by him, skirts brushing his knee as she passes. Notes haunt the air between them. Gently she seeks to see where the notes are born, feel the memories they evoke in him. He allows her to see, to feel the words he can’t speak. A life lays presented before her eyes. Hard, cruel, gross in its lack of elegance or light. A brutish life of carnal pleasures and no moderation. Only living to make the most of it. He is laid bare; lets her read past the surface to the inner layers he hides even from himself.
Choices he had and ones taken away. She brushes her mind past the darkness, peers around the walls of recrimination and hubris to find the honor hidden behind walls almost impenetrable. This is what she draws on, this is the center that she can reach for even when she cannot see anything else. That center of quiet is what keeps them both from imploding and pulling everyone around them into a descending spiral of destruction.
Shuddering to a halt before him, her hand reaches out to imperceptibly touch the back of his as his fingers smoothly shifted chords. The tune almost unheard under the drip of water from countless rivulets, breeze rustling the leaves of trees nearby adding a shushing percussion to the music.
He lifted his eyes from their barely touching hands, her fingers stroking with birdlike grace the veins and ridges that stood out in the play of light and dark. He could feel the coolness of her touch, trails of wetness leaving paths where the heat was lessened.
She saw him look up to her, startlingly clear blue eyes flickered with internal flames reflecting the luminescence of the night flowering grasses outside. The tips of her fingers warmed as they brushed across his hand, feeling the calloused knuckles broken countless times, skin toughened on the raised surfaces of bone. Hands that had broken more than they created.
He shivered slightly from the cool touch of her hand; reacting to the feather touch with goosebumps raising the hair on his forearms. Heat poured off his skin, evaporating the sheen of water her fingers had trailed across his hand. He drew breath, air feeling choked and trapped under her appraisal. The notes stilled. Only the rain and rustle of leaves accompanied her when she leapt back to swirl away into the blanket of blue flowers glowing.
A smile grew across her features, eyes twinkling with a new thought. Her dance calmed to a peaceful wave of hips and shoulders, body flowing in motion like a reed under water.
He played, his fingers bringing life to the notes of her dance, touching into her grace and giving it sound. She twined her body around, reaching into herself for the feelings his music blew life into.
This was their peace, their silence, the place that wasn’t overwhelmed with fire and glacial colds. She could see him more clearly here than anywhere else, contact bare and fleeting, not the surrounding flames of passion, but the pulse of embers banked. In this space between the fire and fights she loved him most. Felt the past that made him the future she had thought impossible when they made her ice, when they tore and ripped from her the flame that sparked freedom.
~*~ ~*~