[Nathan Barley] Ficlet: The Caustic Ticking of the Clock
I wrote this for booshbattle and I figured I'd pop it up here for posterity. The original with 3% more typos is here.
Rated PG for language and minor drug references. 777 words.
Original prompt was Nathan Barley, Dan/Jones, Jones POV in which he snuggles/makes out with unconscious-in-hospital!Dan.
The Caustic Ticking of the Clock
Once upon another lifetime, Jones took something bad cut with something worse and the NHS started trying to ring up his dead gran, only to finally arrive at an aunt on the other side who didn't even know he existed. Afterward, Dan had agreed to be put down as next of kin on one condition: 'Promise me, you colossal shit, that they'll never call me for anything like this.'
This isn't even in the same league. He's going to tear Dan a new one with his bare fucking hands. If Dan would only wake up, that is.
There's no reason he shouldn't have already, they say. But there he is, too still. Dan's never still. He doesn't fidget and wiggle the way Jones does, so he may look blank if you're not paying attention, but Jones can always see him thinking. Even in sleep, he grunts and mutters and furrows his brows. This, this is all wrong. Like someone's taken Dan away and just left a body.
Jones orders everyone out, not that he's got the authority to, but he manages it and Claire doesn't protest. He thinks, maybe, if it's just for him, Dan will wake up. Know it's safe to.
"'s just us now, you bastard," he tries. Nothing. "It's really serious," he singsongs, because Dan cannot hear a single bar of that song without pissing himself. It's not very funny now, though. Actually, it's really serious. But when (not if, because he will and must) Dan wakes up and Jones is done calling him every name in the book and Dan's hobbling about on crutches and in pain, Jones will tell him about doing that and Dan will laugh.
Jones untangles the headphones round his neck and clamps them over Dan's ears. The track is one he's been working on but is missing something, and as he plays it over in his head while it spills silently into Dan's ears, that something might be the steady bleep of the ECG. He imagines speeding and slowing Dan's heartbeat with a pitch knob. He lays a hand on Dan's chest so he can feel it. Just to check the machine isn't keeping time with something else; it's a perfect beat match to the new track, after all, and he wouldn't want to confuse it. (He knows that's not possible.)
He takes away the headphones and lays his ear next to his hand. Still the same. Dan smells of antiseptic and stale sweat. All wrong. It ought to be Marlboros and booze and cedar, failing deodorant and careless coffee. If Jones closes his eyes and inhales deeply enough, he can almost catch it. If he can do something enough, Dan will wake up. There's got to be something. He slides his hand down to Dan's stomach, which at least feels the way it should, warm and a little squashy, but Dan should be kicking and swearing because it's ticklish, and he doesn't so much as twitch. Heartbeat steady, waiting for somebody to let the other record spin.
This isn't a fairytale, and Jones doesn't believe in them no matter how many he invents with turntables and mangled toys. Dan doesn't believe in them either; he doesn't even believe in the magic of whispering and will loudly, contrarily say 'what!' even to Jones. (Jones thinks Dan secretly wants to believe but is afraid to.) So it can't work, but Jones sits up anyway and presses his lips to Dan's, which are dry as the desert. He fishes lip balm from his pocket and it's like putting makeup on a child who doesn't understand what to do. Like prettying up a corpse, something in the back of his mind says, but he pushes that away and leans back down. He kisses and kisses, just lips slipping over limp lips, and even though it's not working and his eyes are stinging and he's holding onto Dan's shoulder so hard it'll probably bruise, he can't make himself stop, not until he hears footsteps outside the curtain and jerks back.
"Sometimes talking to them helps," the nurse says as she changes the IV bag, too appropriately subdued and sympathetic.
So Jones lays his head back on Dan's heart and rubs circles over Dan's belly and whispers, 'Dan. Dan? Dan,' until it works. It works and it's a moment of pure magic because Dan whispers back something that might be 'Jones' or just a generalised croak. It's wonderful for about three seconds. Then Jones lets himself be angry.
He stays that way for a long time and Dan never says he's sorry, but finally Jones decides that they're even, and they go on.
the end.
Additional apologies to Sylvia Plath (title thieved from her 'Cinderella'), Noel Fielding (the whispering-magic bit) and Morrissey (because I made fun of 'Girlfriend in a Coma') for this one.
Rated PG for language and minor drug references. 777 words.
Original prompt was Nathan Barley, Dan/Jones, Jones POV in which he snuggles/makes out with unconscious-in-hospital!Dan.
The Caustic Ticking of the Clock
Once upon another lifetime, Jones took something bad cut with something worse and the NHS started trying to ring up his dead gran, only to finally arrive at an aunt on the other side who didn't even know he existed. Afterward, Dan had agreed to be put down as next of kin on one condition: 'Promise me, you colossal shit, that they'll never call me for anything like this.'
This isn't even in the same league. He's going to tear Dan a new one with his bare fucking hands. If Dan would only wake up, that is.
There's no reason he shouldn't have already, they say. But there he is, too still. Dan's never still. He doesn't fidget and wiggle the way Jones does, so he may look blank if you're not paying attention, but Jones can always see him thinking. Even in sleep, he grunts and mutters and furrows his brows. This, this is all wrong. Like someone's taken Dan away and just left a body.
Jones orders everyone out, not that he's got the authority to, but he manages it and Claire doesn't protest. He thinks, maybe, if it's just for him, Dan will wake up. Know it's safe to.
"'s just us now, you bastard," he tries. Nothing. "It's really serious," he singsongs, because Dan cannot hear a single bar of that song without pissing himself. It's not very funny now, though. Actually, it's really serious. But when (not if, because he will and must) Dan wakes up and Jones is done calling him every name in the book and Dan's hobbling about on crutches and in pain, Jones will tell him about doing that and Dan will laugh.
Jones untangles the headphones round his neck and clamps them over Dan's ears. The track is one he's been working on but is missing something, and as he plays it over in his head while it spills silently into Dan's ears, that something might be the steady bleep of the ECG. He imagines speeding and slowing Dan's heartbeat with a pitch knob. He lays a hand on Dan's chest so he can feel it. Just to check the machine isn't keeping time with something else; it's a perfect beat match to the new track, after all, and he wouldn't want to confuse it. (He knows that's not possible.)
He takes away the headphones and lays his ear next to his hand. Still the same. Dan smells of antiseptic and stale sweat. All wrong. It ought to be Marlboros and booze and cedar, failing deodorant and careless coffee. If Jones closes his eyes and inhales deeply enough, he can almost catch it. If he can do something enough, Dan will wake up. There's got to be something. He slides his hand down to Dan's stomach, which at least feels the way it should, warm and a little squashy, but Dan should be kicking and swearing because it's ticklish, and he doesn't so much as twitch. Heartbeat steady, waiting for somebody to let the other record spin.
This isn't a fairytale, and Jones doesn't believe in them no matter how many he invents with turntables and mangled toys. Dan doesn't believe in them either; he doesn't even believe in the magic of whispering and will loudly, contrarily say 'what!' even to Jones. (Jones thinks Dan secretly wants to believe but is afraid to.) So it can't work, but Jones sits up anyway and presses his lips to Dan's, which are dry as the desert. He fishes lip balm from his pocket and it's like putting makeup on a child who doesn't understand what to do. Like prettying up a corpse, something in the back of his mind says, but he pushes that away and leans back down. He kisses and kisses, just lips slipping over limp lips, and even though it's not working and his eyes are stinging and he's holding onto Dan's shoulder so hard it'll probably bruise, he can't make himself stop, not until he hears footsteps outside the curtain and jerks back.
"Sometimes talking to them helps," the nurse says as she changes the IV bag, too appropriately subdued and sympathetic.
So Jones lays his head back on Dan's heart and rubs circles over Dan's belly and whispers, 'Dan. Dan? Dan,' until it works. It works and it's a moment of pure magic because Dan whispers back something that might be 'Jones' or just a generalised croak. It's wonderful for about three seconds. Then Jones lets himself be angry.
He stays that way for a long time and Dan never says he's sorry, but finally Jones decides that they're even, and they go on.
the end.
Additional apologies to Sylvia Plath (title thieved from her 'Cinderella'), Noel Fielding (the whispering-magic bit) and Morrissey (because I made fun of 'Girlfriend in a Coma') for this one.