FanFic100: #097 Sensibility (Writer's Choice)
This just isn't how she pictured life. Okay, yes, she’d known it for a while now… about a year, to be precise. A year ago… her life had been turned upside down when Jennifer told her she was pregnant. After that things just hadn't seemed to smooth out. Then just when she’d thought everything would be okay after she found a university where she could do research for her thesis, they’d told her she was expecting twins and when she had finally come to terms with that shock a certain USAF Major had knocked on her door.
She sighs and runs a hand through her unruly hair. Three months she’d tried everything to make herself realize that they’d not be more than friends, ever, and suddenly Evan goes and kisses her, just like that. Granted, she’d just suffered a birth that had lasted several hours and he’d been the one to coax her through it all, but still… a kiss. And after that… other kisses, every time he came to visit her on the maternity ward, until she’d finally realized that he meant it. She’d left the hospital with the strange, but great feeling that she wouldn’t be a single mom with a friend to help her bring up the kids… but part of a couple raising them together.
Another sigh, this time a little too close for comfort to a sob. It’s been three months since Aislinn and Christopher’s birth and she can’t shake the feeling that she’s royally screwing up. They’d agreed that he would keep the posting at the SGC for the time being and that she would take up working on her thesis as soon as possible. She didn’t really like this solution but there had been no other postings available for him in Colorado Springs and they hadn't wanted to move again so soon.
She’d thought she would manage it because she’d managed everything before… but the feeling of being overwhelmed with too many things happening at once was starting to get to her. There are, first and foremost, the twins of course, keeping her running all day and sometimes even at night, although he’s really giving his best to relieve her of the nightly stress when he’s at home.
Then there’s the thesis which is giving her major headaches. Every time she gets a little sliver of time to work on it… she’s not able to write at least a few paragraphs or do some calculations or even only do some proof-reading on the stuff that’s already written. All she ever wants to do in these precious minutes is sit down and breathe, not to mention sleep.
Also there’s the whole keeping house thing. It had been easy with only herself… but now there are four people and so much laundry and dirty dishes and a hundred other things. Evan really does his best to help her but… that doesn’t make the feeling that she’s screwing this up way beyond possible disappear. Instead… it even increases the feeling.
The first tears start to spill over and she tries to ignore them bravely, like she has ignored all the other tears that had started to spill over since the birth. Because all these things… they aren’t even the worst. The worst thing is that… Evan hasn’t touched her. Sure, he kisses her and takes her in his arms at night but he doesn’t… go further. And usually… usually she’d just take the initiative but usually she also doesn’t feel like an utter screw-up and an ugly fat… something. That he’s not touching her… doesn’t do much to help her overcome the issues with her body she’s developed since Aislinn and Christopher have been born.
And to top it all she has become extremely sensitive every time the phone rings while he’s on duty. She even caught herself at being afraid to answer it at times, always afraid it might be someone from the SGC telling her the unthinkable. Every time the phone rings, worst case scenarios start to run in her mind and it makes her angry at herself. She never was like that, whiny and afraid and clingy.
At least she hasn’t gone as far as articulating these fears in front of him… yet. Instead her ironclad self-discipline has made her able to act as if everything was okay, at least while in the company of other people and most of all in Evan’s company. The last thing she wants is that he sees her as weak and unable to take care of his children. With all her heart she wants to show him how well she can cope with everything and that he didn’t fall in love with a woman who doesn’t deserve him… if he fell in love with her at all, that is.
God, no. There they are the tears. Streaming down her face and they just won’t stop, as hard as she tries. It makes her angry at herself and that only makes them flow harder. An angry sob escapes her throat and she props her elbows up on her thighs and buries her face in her hands. If the kids start crying again now…
But instead… instead she hears the front door open and that sound is even worse than the kids’ crying. He wasn’t supposed to be home this early. He wasn’t supposed to see her like this. He wasn’t supposed… “Laura?” Dammit, he didn’t even give her time to regain at least a little of her composure. It catches her so by surprise that at first she doesn’t answer and so she hears him asking again, “Laura? Is everything okay?”
He’s standing close to her now… and then she feels him sitting down on the couch beside her. Taking a deep breath, she wipes her hand over her eyes and gets up, trying to avoid his eyes without him actually noticing it. “Yeah, sure. I just… I had…”
Before she can finish whatever lie she’d wanted to tell him, he’s up again and eyes her critically. “Really? Because it doesn’t look like it, you know.” Embarrassed that he sees her like this she turns away but he’s too fast for her and touches her cheek. “Laura, just tell me about it.”
She bites her lip and for some reason the soft touch of his thumb against her cheek makes her tell him something she’d never wanted to tell him. “I… it’s just… I feel like…”
Seeing that she won’t give him a coherent sentence - another point on the rapidly growing list of things that start to make it impossible for her to look him in the eye - he chimes in, “Is it the kids? God, I’m sorry I’m leaving you alone with them so often…”
Hurriedly, she shakes her head and withdraws a little from him, to get away from his touch that for some reason suddenly feels like mere pity to her and she doesn’t want pity. “No, don’t worry. It’s not your fault, Evan. It’s… it’s me.”
Damn, she shouldn’t have said that. Of course it doesn’t serve to keep him from digging deeper…. yeah, there’s the frown increasing already. “Uh… I think you lost me here. What is you? And don’t try to give me some lame excuses… I know there’s been something going on with you, Laura.”
Crap. Crapcrapcrap. He noticed something was wrong… which means that she can’t even appear strong and capable anymore. Angry at herself that the tears start flowing again she sits down on the couch again. Since there’s no use in trying to pretend anymore anyway, she says, “I’m sorry, Evan. It’s just that… this is… it’s getting too much. I feel so… weak.” And ugly and stupid and like a screw up, she adds in her mind.
To her chagrin it seems like she doesn’t even have to say it aloud since he seems to have seen it anyway. But… what the hell is that smile doing on his face? He’s trying hard to suppress it but it’s definitely there. He isn't going to mock her, right? Because if he is… so help him God! “Whatever you think you are, Laura, you’re not weak. How could you ever… what the hell gave you the idea you’re weak?”
He is mocking her. There’s just no other reason why else he would say that. She slips into her favorite weapon - biting sarcasm - far too easily. “Maybe the fact that I haven’t written a word for my thesis in at least a month? Or maybe that the place looks like someone threw a hand grenade in? Or maybe that you and I… I mean… you know… we didn’t… you never touch me. I mean, I can understand that. I wouldn’t… want…” She falters and that irritates her to no end. Dammit, she hadn't wanted to bring up this. He really doesn’t have to know about the stupid and unimportant issues she has with herself.
However, she didn’t have to spell it out, anyway. On his face she can see realization dawning… and a slight blush. Sheepishly, he rubs his neck. “Look, Laura, I just thought that…”
“That I don’t look particularly attractive right now, anyway?” she interrupts him with an astonishing and shocking amount of acid to her voice.
It actually startles him and he needs a moment to get his act together. Then he replies rather fiercely, “Good God, no! You… Laura, you’re still as beautiful as ever.” She really has a hard time believing that. “And you’re strong and doing a wonderful job… look, I don’t care about stuff lying around or the dishes not having been done when I get home.” Maybe he doesn’t… but she does. She’s about to tell him that but he’s on a roll now. “All I care about are the kids… and you. I just… wish you’d see that.”
She does. She really, really does. But that doesn’t make the feelings of inadequacy and unattractiveness go away. She shakes her head, close to tears again. “I’m doing a terrible job. And I look like… there’s not even a word for it. Seriously, don’t you dare lie to me just to appease me…”
“Goddammit, woman, why do you always have to make me use my last resort?” he almost growls furiously and before she can counter this, she feels his lips on hers but this time it’s much, much different from all the last times.
Usually, his kisses are tender, good-natured… a little restrained. There’s no restraint in this kiss, though, but a kind of hunger she hasn’t felt from him for a long time… a year, to be precise. She’d been drunk, yes, but not drunk enough not to remember it afterwards and while up until now that had always been the worst part about what had happened, suddenly it feels like the best. It’s all there again; the passion, the excitement, the desire. It’s the most natural thing in the world to give in and so she does, temporarily forgetting about feeling unattractive and incapable, as she feels one of his hands wander downwards and his body press her down on the couch.
However… in a corner of her mind… a snippet registers when he breaks for air and she blinks. Then she says, “Wait… sleeping with me was your last resort? What the hell…”
“Not now, Laura,” he interrupts her, the feelings he’d expressed in the kiss now evident in his voice as well but dammit, she wants to know what that is about.
Cursing herself for her inability to just let it go, she still says, “Yes, now, Evan. You keep me waiting for three damn months and then suddenly you go and…”
A kiss seals her mouth again and after some - rather feeble - protest she gives in to it. When he breaks for air this time there’s an almost feral look on his face and he growls, “Listen because I’ll only say this once. Next time I hear something coming out of your mouth, it better be my name. In a scream.”
Oh… God. How the hell could he live three months with all of that obviously boiling just under the surface? This time it’s her who initiates the kiss and she even takes it a little further, somehow still aware of the fact that Aislinn and Christopher won’t stay asleep forever. But still… “We really need to talk…”
“My name, Laura. In a scream.” Right.
“Then do something to earn it, flyboy.” At that… he only gives her a grin that serves to intensify the feelings he stirred with all this kissing and his hands under her t-shirt and… all the other stuff… and then he finally sets to do as she just told him, making her feel like life might really not be what she pictured it to be… but better than what she always imagined.
~*~
TBC in You Got Careless