Hourglass challenge

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

I couldn't let another week go by. The first scene was an orphan left over from a different story. I don't know where the hell the second scene came from. I'm stumped for a title. Anyway, before I chicken out...



"You can't be jealous because I was married. That makes no sense. I mean, I was different. She was different. Things," I wave my hand between us, "were different."

"I didn’t say jealous. I said envious,” Fraser corrects, the old snippy thing he does when he’s bugged but doesn’t want to admit it. “It’s only that... “

He breaks off and lets out a little huff of breath, looks past me, toward I don’t know what, the cars across the street, the entrance to the park, the skyline behind us. “We'll be in our sixties before I've been with you as long as she was."

Then suddenly he blinks and he’s back, returning his attention to me, and his eyes are so lost, I don’t even know what to say. It's hard to remember sometimes that for as smart a guy as Fraser is, he's like a babe in the woods when it comes to this stuff.

"Look, Fraser, you want to be the love of my life? It's simple. Just stick around. You got nothing else to worry about."

"Ray--"

I don’t know how else to reassure him, so I give his shoulder a squeeze. "You've got nothing else to worry about."

"All right."

He lets out a dissatisfied sigh, but I know he gets it. Yeah, this is scary, and there's no way around it, gotta go through it, same as you do with a fire or a hail of bullets sometimes.


***

Most things don’t last, but I could never tell the age of some of Fraser's stuff. Might as well all be antiques, got that same love-worn feel. Trunk lid opens easily, without a squeak, and the scent of the cabin -- pine, coffee, neatsfoot oil, woodsmoke -- wafts out and haunts the air with a special kind of warmth I haven't felt since we left.

If I close my eyes and breathe it deep, I can almost get there.

Almost. But not quite.

Open my eyes again and look down into the trunk. Neat stacks of journals from our first years together. Chicago, the quest, all that insanity. Books filled with pages and pages of his thoughts that my eyesight is too shitty now to make out, even with my good glasses. If I’d known, maybe I’d have been a better snoop back then.

One lift out tray compartment for RCMP crap, brass buttons, uniform patches, stupid pins they gave him way too late. Assholes. But he loved being a Mountie, so... Next to those, Dief’s last set of immunization tags for Customs. I run my fingers over the embossed silver like I could read the serial number as Braille, and think about that crazy old wolf until the third step from the bottom groans, and suddenly I realize what a sentimental old idiot I must look like sitting here like this.

I try to jam the tags back into place quickly, but my finger gets caught on a pin sticking off one of those damned RCMP ceremonial doohickeys and I can’t keep in a yelp of, “Shit!” as I yank my hand back and send half the stuff in the tray compartment skittering across the attic floor.

“Ray? Are you all right?”

“Yeah,” I say, turning to face Fraser and trying hard not to sound like a twelve-year-old caught with porn. But since I’m going to need his help even finding all these little pieces of crap, I might as well accept getting busted. “I was just, uh...” Ah, fuck it. “Thinking about the old days.”

Fraser looks over my shoulder toward the open trunk, and I swear I hear him sniffing at the air a little bit. “We’ve had a lot of fine adventures, hm?”

“The best, Benton buddy, the absolute best.”

He looks back at me then, and an odd smile crosses his face.

***

Comments

[bluster.livejournal.com]

For someone who tends to be romantically sentimental, I have to admit it's rare for me to get weepy over a story. I got weepy reading this one. The idea of Fraser feeling regret and vaguely jealous of the years that Stella had with Ray got me started, but it was Ray looking through the trunk of memories that clinched it. Older, poor eyesight even worse, and looking back on their time together with his own sense of regret at not being able to read Fraser's journals. *sniffle* It was one of those rare, "happy sniffles" and I thank you for that.

Also, I know you said you wrote the first part previously, but let me just give a big *Woo Hoo* that you were able to write something fan fiction-y again.

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Aww, thanks B! Yeah, this is the first DS I've posted in like a year and a half, so it's a big relief! I'm so happy you enjoyed it.

Re: Hourglass challenge

[yeungmaisu.livejournal.com]

Ro, since I'm still too choked up by this to make any rational statement, I'm simply going to point to bluster's entry and add, "what she said." Sob.

Re: Hourglass challenge

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Beth! Wow, I didn't realize this little piece would resonate with people so much. I'm glad it did!

[shayheyred.livejournal.com]

THIS is how the series should have ended.

Maybe for the reunion movie in 2028.

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

There you go, Shay! Better than some of the ideas for a DS movie I've read about. *g* Thanks, and I'm glad you liked it.

*snif*

[thete1.livejournal.com]

Oh, this was so *sweet* and sniffy and yeah. The only thing I would change is to make the last line a little more obvious, something to show that Fraser is realizing how long it's been, to show that he's still the sort of man that numbers matter to. That is, if I'm reading it right.

Re: *snif*

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Te. You know, I really wrestled with that last line. Ultimately, I decided it would be better to err on the side of too understated than risk conking people over the head with it. But I probably could have gone with something a little stronger. Eh, write and learn. *g*

[dsudis.livejournal.com]

Can't even be original about being inarticulate, so... what they said. ;) A lovely happily-ever-after for the guys.

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Glad it worked for you. Boy, you guys sure are nice!

[jack-pride.livejournal.com]

Love it, love it, love it. :)

(*checks abacus* Yep, 111 words exactly. ;) )

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know! Haha. It's not even a multiple of 111. I'll try to do better with the math the next time. ;-)

[moxie-brown.livejournal.com]

Old guys in love! Adore that, and I think a good aspect to point out in the dynamics of a potential RayK/Fraser relationship. Ray was with Stella for a hell of a long time, and in many ways, she could be the love of his life. How would Fraser feel?

(I might write about that in a not-so-happy-ending way later on, but yours left me so warm and lovey inside, now I don't want to torture the poor guys.)

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Well, actually... my original version had Fraser dead in the second part, but... I couldn't do it to them either, and I brought him up the stairs. *g* Glad you liked it!

::big sigh::

[theodosia.livejournal.com]

I swear, they're the OTP most likely to grow gracefully old together....

Thank you!

Re: ::big sigh::

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I don't have too much trouble imagining them just going on the way they are indefinitely. It's a nice thought, anyway! Thanks!

[ardent-muses.livejournal.com]

For me, it wasn't the second part that got me. Okay, the Dief thing made me weepy, but other than that I think they're damned lucky. Your attention to all the sense details and to Ray's voice is, as always, awesome. "Doohickeys" could not *be* more of a Ray word. *G*

This is the line that made me go "awwwww":

"Look, Fraser, you want to be the love of my life? It's simple. Just stick around. You got nothing else to worry about."

Awww!

:::blowing kisses:::

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

That's the line that gets to me too (even though I wrote it. *g*) Thanks, and :::kisses::: back. :-)

[helvirago]

Waaaah!

Yes, I too am rendered inarticulate. It's weird, actually; I generally don't feel much for "many-years-later" stories (I have nothing against them, they just don't do much for me), but I've got the pricking in the backs of my eyes for this one. Maybe just because you kept it so simple -- no "the years have been" this or that, no details at all, just the kind of sad reminiscing we all do at any age, but more so as there's more to remember. And I like the way the parts fit together without pressing the issue.

So... subtly and deftly done. Thank you. Sniff.

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I'm glad this worked for you. I'm not big on 'ever after' stories either, actually -- partially because I think it's too easy to wind up going overboard on sentimentality. I tried hard to avoid that here, so I'll take your comment as high praise! *g*

[laurakaye.livejournal.com]

“We'll be in our sixties before I've been with you as long as she was."


::sniff:: Oh, my sweet woobie.

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, Fraser is the woobiest. *g* Thanks, Laura.

[jenboo.livejournal.com]

“We’ve had a lot of fine adventures, hm?”

“The best, Benton buddy, the absolute best.”

You know, there's something sort of Peter Pan-like about this. Like they were lost boys who found each other and then grew old having adventures.

I'm all warm and fuzzy and sniffly now. Thank you!

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad you said that! Yay! That's really kind of exactly how I was envisioning their life together: a neverending Jack London novel. *g* :::happydance::: Thanks!

[bethbethbeth.livejournal.com]

Lovely, hon. I've always loved that first part (...glad you finally got a chance to put it to such good use), and the second part works perfectly with it.

Of course, true to form, *my* sniffles came from thinking about Dief.

-Beth

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Bethski! I'm glad I finally found a home for that first bit too. I hope the Dief stuff wasn't too brutally manipulative. Dog people are easy. *g*

[bethbethbeth.livejournal.com]

Heh. You say 'manipulative' like it's a bad thing. *g*

[the-star-fish.livejournal.com]

I ... I ...

::sighs deeply::

Yeah, that's how it's done. That right there.

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Aw, thanks Deb. Glad you liked it.

[tobyfan.livejournal.com]

Very touching. It got me all heart-clenchy and shit. *g*

And your first new DS in a year and a half? Woo-hoo! Congrats!

[rowanfairchild.livejournal.com]

Heart clenchy and shit, huh? LOL. Thanks! Glad you liked it. And yeah, it was a relief to know these guys haven't deserted me after all these years. *g*
-R