A/N: I have no idea where this story came from. I'd written their first few paragraphs on a whim and then suddenly the whole thing just poured out of me in a week. I hope you all enjoy!
Jemma is in the library researching brain injuries when Coulson tells her that Fitz is awake. She stands up so quickly that she very nearly tips her chair over and it offers her a momentary distraction. It's enough that she doesn't notice that Coulson's face is grim until she's slinging her bag over her shoulder and turning toward him.
Her voice cracks when she asks him what's wrong. She can feel the tears already beginning to sting at her eyes as Coulson reaches for her shoulder and says the words she's long feared hearing.
"I'm so sorry, Jemma."
...
She watches nervously from the hall as Fitz's hands shake, the food falling from his fork and onto his plate. She can't bring herself to enter his room and it's Skye who nudges her forward.
When he looks up at her, his smile is tight. It's a familiar look, one that was usually reserved for exams or when he couldn't quite get a part to work. She offers him a smile in return knowing full well that it doesn't reach her eyes.
"Hey," she manages to say, the one simple word a stuttered breath.
Fitz mutters under his breath and stabs a potato with his fork. "Do I know you?"
The question reverberates right through her and she can barely form a sentence in reply. Instead she nods and moves closer, hoping that maybe the light of the room will illuminate her better.
"It's Simmons. You remember her," Skye calls out from the doorway. "You guys are like best friends. Nerds in arms."
But Fitz shakes his head and replies distantly, "Sorry. The doctor said that I might not remember a few things. Were we friends long?"
She nods. "Years."
"Oh."
…
When the decision is made that Fitz should return home to Scotland, Jemma is heartbroken. She thinks she shouldn't be, but she is. He barely gives her a second glance when he disembarks in Glasgow, choosing instead to offer a sheepish wave to the team. His eyes dart quickly past them and before she knows it, his back is turned and he's swallowed up into a black taxi.
Coulson asks her if she wants to pack up Fitz's room and lab equipment. He's uncertain whether she can even bear it, but she agrees anyway. Someone has to do it and she'd rather it be her. She hopes in vain that it will maybe offer her some closure.
It doesn't.
...
There are days that she can't get out of her bed. She lays there crying, mourning for the friendship she once had and the love she missed out on. Everything that surrounds her reminds her of Fitz and she can't help the anger that surfaces.
She doesn't understand why everything reminds her of him but that there's nothing that reminds him of her.
…
Fitz manages to secure a job at Stark Industries as a mechanical engineer. He's a cog in the machine and his fellow employees barely know his name. He doesn't mind the work even if he's just a nameless part of a development team headed by a man his mum tells him is someone he admires.
The memories are a fog. He can see them in his mind but there is a thickness that envelops them, keeping them at bay. In his dreams he reaches for them, can see the faces that he thinks he recognizes and just as he is grabbing hold of the memory, it slips away.
His psychiatrist tells him that the dreams are normal and that it takes time. One day his memories will return, he just needs to have a little patience.
Fitz's eyebrows furrow at the comment. He swears he's been told something similar before.
That night in his dreams he hears a voice calling for him. It's a voice he's certain he's heard a thousand times before but can't quite place.
"You're the most impatient man I've ever met," the voice chastises.
He pushes at the clouds that surround him, desperate to see who owns the words. His actions are to no avail.
When he wakes it's with the gasp of a single word upon his lips:
"Jemma."
…
The months pass and working without Fitz becomes a bit easier. The emotions are less raw and Jemma can at last walk past his bunk without tears stinging her eyes.
None of the replacements that Coulson lines up have half the imagination or talent that Fitz had and most quit before their trial period is even over. When their armoury is almost empty and their tech is desperate for servicing, Coulson grits his teeth and calls up Tony Stark asking for a favour.
Within hours a crate is sent with new materials and a crew arrives to initiate maintenance on their equipment.
Jemma holds her breath as each of the technicians passes her by.
"I told Stark not to send Fitz," Coulson whispers to her and her heart sinks a little. "I figured it would be too hard."
She's not sure whether she wants to kick him or hug him for what he's done. Instead, she nods and returns to the lab to unpack their new supplies.
…
When Jemma logs into her personal email account it's because she's expecting confirmation on her attendance at a conference on Carbon Nanomaterials. What she finds instead is an email from Fitz.
Her hands shake and she can barely breathe. It takes everything within her to gather up her courage and click to read the message.
Simmons,
Question for you:
Did you ever try to take a selfie with a panda bear after climbing the enclosure barrier? I was at the London Zoo and I seemed to remember once having to convince security not to have you arrested.
Is this a thing that really happened? From our short time at the Playground I figured you keen on following the rules.
Cheers,
Fitz
Her hand presses against her mouth as she stares, stunned by the email.
He remembered.
He remembers her.
Before she loses her nerve, she types her reply and does her best not to allow her emotions to get the better of her.
Hey Fitz!
Yes, you've remembered correctly! But there is one part I must remind you of: I was dared by a certain someone (namely, you!) to climb the enclosure.
I'd argue that you owed me.
;-)
J.
…
One day when he returns home from work there are three boxes sitting on his bed with a note attached.
Sort it or toss it. I'd like my garage back.
- Mum
His fingers pull at the top flaps of the first box and he finds within it moth eaten clothing and various objects that he doesn't recognize. He figures they must be from his room on the plane as he can't think of where else such things could've come from. His mum must've put them in storage when he'd first returned.
As he pulls out a tattered argyle sweater, a wooden photo frame clatters to the floor. He picks it up by its triangular cardboard stand and flips it over in his hand.
The photo is unfamiliar to him, but much of his life is. It's a candid image of he and Jemma, sitting arm in arm on a bench in what looks to be a garden. There is laughter upon their faces and Fitz wishes for the thousandth time that he could remember. He thinks that the part of his life that is missing must have been very full. He can only imagine the laughter and friendship that seems to emate from the photograph and, if he dares to admit, love.
But he feels none of it. It's like a darkness that envelops part of him.
Likely the very best part of him.
…
Jemma's session on optoelectronics at the conference on Carbon Nanomaterials barely keeps her awake and she's instantly reminded as to why Fitz was always the one that went to the workshops on photonics. It's certainly not her specialty. But as the Bus' only certified SciTech specialist it's up to her to brush up on the science that the session provides.
The break that the session offers can't come soon enough as it feels as though her body is being partially held up by the tea trolley she leans against as a yawn thickens in her throat. She reaches for a paper cup and places it under the tea carafe.
"I'm finished with the sugar, if ye want it?"
She shakes her head and reaches for the milk. "No thanks, I just-" Her words stall at her lips when her eyes meet those of the person standing next to her.
It's Fitz.
Her mouth opens and closes and then opens again, words failing her. He smiles and envelops her in a shallow, awkward hug. They're unpracticed and she knows he barely considers her a friend but she appreciates the gesture just the same.
She asks after his health and he shrugs, telling her that there's been improvement; it's just all so very slow and frustrating.
"You were never very patient," she teases and he laughs. Her lip quivers ever so slightly as she realizes how much she's missed him.
How much she continues to miss him.
When he motions toward his session room and bids her farewell, her heart screams for her to not let him leave. Her brain wins out however, and she bites at her lip instead, silencing herself.
…
The clouds thicken around him and Fitz can feel himself gasping for breath, desperate for help, calling out into the fog. Only disembodied voices reply, seemingly ignorant of his pleas.
The fog swirls around him, taunting him. He pushes it away and moves forward, the voices growing in volume.
I'm getting closer; he thinks. He can finally make out what they are saying.
"There you are!" A voice calls out cheerily and he can feel his heart tug at the sound. Someone reaches through the fog and takes his hand and says, "We've been waiting for you."
...
Coulson summons Jemma into his office and reminds her that they need another restock. Stark's offered and he can't decline, his technicians are the best and it's the only option he has.
She nods, knowing that he's implicitly asking for her permission.
They're going send Fitz.
When the Stark team arrives Jemma tries to hide in her bunk but she can't sit still. She's both nervous and anxious, partly afraid of seeing him. She's tried emailing him and the responses that he sends are stilted, so unlike the longtime friend she'd once had.
She decides to press her luck and heads to her lab, figuring that at the very least she can pass the time by sorting the new amory.
Just as she's rounding the corner, enlivened by the fact that she's managed to wonder undetected, her body slams into the very person she'd been hoping to avoid.
He smiles at her and for the first time since his injury she notices that the smile actually reaches his eyes. A lump in her throat grows tenfold and she can barely manage to choke out his name even in surprise.
"I've missed you," Fitz says brightly. "Seeing you, that is," he corrects, his face turning crimson.
"Coulson said the lab was off limits." Her words are a little too cutting and she cringes. "I mean, no one was supposed to be in here."
"Come," he says waving her to follow him and he moves about the lab as though he'd never left it. Jemma's heart clenches at the sight, yet she says nothing, allowing him to momentarily have the run of the space.
He points at the D.W.A.R.F.S., their innards splayed across the lab table and babbles about wavelengths and energy and the maximum intensity the drones can absorb in the field. She hears very little as she's stunned by how at home he seems.
"Why are you here?" She interrupts.
"I'm meant to help with the tech upgrade. Coulson said you'd been having issues with the D.W.A.R.F.S. and-"
"No. I meant why are you here," she repeats, motioning at the lab space around her. "This was supposed to be off limits."
Fitz nods, understanding her claim to the room. "I'd just remembered there was a speeder handle in the cabinet." His voice lowers as if realizing his mistake. "I'll leave you; you're right I shouldn't be in here." He gathers up his equipment quickly, piling it into his case.
Jemma is afraid to move, afraid to even breathe as she watches him clear out his belongings. Her arms cross at her chest and she pinches her skin trying to keep her emotions in check. She has to remind herself that the man before her isn't her Fitz, that her Fitz is lost somewhere at the bottom of the Atlantic.
She tells herself to ignore the familiar actions: the tapping of his finger against his nose, the pressing of his hands against his back. The man before her barely knows who she is and has forgotten what they were to each other.
As he's about to sling the case over his shoulder he stops and reaches inside it, pulling out a small photo frame. "I think this is yours," he says sliding it across the table.
She reaches for it and recognizes it immediately. "How do you know it's mine?" She asks as he moves past her and toward the sliding doors.
"It's from your sister's wedding," he replies simply. "We were out in the garden and your dad snapped it. That photo sat on the shelf in your bunk. It's yours."
Jemma reaches for his arm, stopping him. "How do you know it's mine?" She repeats with more force in her voice. He turns, allowing her to search his face for the confirmation she needs.
Her resolve cracks and her hand flies to her mouth, her eyes asking the question she already knows the answer to.
Fitz nods.
"How much?" She asks, tears falling freely against her face. "How much do you remember?"
"Enough. Some parts are hazy but most of it's there."
If he says anything next, Jemma hears none of it as her arms encircle his neck and pull him close. Her hug practically cuts off his circulation, but he doesn't care. He's just happy to be back, to have her back.
"It's enough," she whispers into his shoulder and he can't help but wonder what she means by it.
…
She barely has to ask Coulson to hire Fitz back on, he's agreeing before the words are fully out of her mouth. The team has been desperate for months to find his replacement and there's no one better to replace Fitz, than Fitz.
His bunk is empty, devoid of the clutter that had made it his before he'd left. The sheets are clean and pressed and he thinks there's even a faint smell of paint. When he puts his small TARDIS figurine back onto the shelf, Jemma remarks that it finally looks like he's home again. Her arm wraps at his shoulder and her lips press against his cheek. He's happy to be back and every indication tells him that Jemma is equally so.
They fall back into their usual banter arguing over quantum vacuum fluctuations and energy density and in no time Jemma is calling out his name with an exasperated sigh.
It's as if everything is back to normal.
As though they haven't missed a beat.
When she scurries around the lab analyzing or discovering active compounds, Fitz can only watch, biting his tongue. He wants to tell her about the feelings that have surfaced, how he's hopelessly in love with her and that he's fairly certain that he's felt that way long before his injury.
But when he tries, pushing down the anxiety and fear that overwhelms him to do so, she interrupts. Her kindly smile silences him when she says for the hundredth time, "I'm so happy to have you back."
...
Jemma wants desperately to ask if he still feels the same way he did about her before his accident, but she's afraid of his answer. She knows he has no knowledge of the events surrounding their almost drowning, but she wonders if his feelings remain.
There are days when she attempts to ask him, when the words sit on her tongue itching to be released. She opens her mouth, begins with his name and then…
Silence.
Usually he'll raise an eyebrow or two, pushing her to say what's on her mind. And time and time again, she blathers on about something she'd read in a scientific journal. Never once saying what she's meaning to say.
She risks telling Skye about her predicament, knows that the hacker will react with joyful abandon at the news. But she needs advice and if it comes with five minutes of teasing, Jemma thinks it's worth the aggravation.
Skye surprises her when, after sitting silently and listening to Jemma's confession, she says calmly, "I don't understand what your problem is."
It's as though the dam breaks and the words she's bottled up spill everywhere.
What if he doesn't feel the same way?
What if he sees her only as a friend?
What if everything is ruined because of her confession?
She's afraid of losing him all over again.
Skye cocks the corner of her lip up as if she's containing her laughter and says with surety, "take the risk. I think you'll be surprised by the results."
…
Fitz is not sure what possesses him to ask for Skye's advice but he does so anyway. Her response is exactly what he'd feared: she pinches his cheeks, ruffles his hair and says in a high pitched voice that the "FitzSimmons babies will be the cutest babies ever."
His face is a deep shade of red as he bats her hand away muttering for her to forget that he even said anything.
"You know what I don't understand, Fitz?" She asks, a smirk upon her lips as he makes his escape. "How can two people who are so smart be so dumb?"
…
When Jemma presents her research on hypoxia and acidosis to what's left of the medical team at Triskelion via video conference, Fitz watches on in amazement. He's impressed at how much she's learned about his condition in such a short time and he wonders where she found the time to even put that much effort into the investigation.
"In one subject," she says, her attention focused on the camera. "The retrograde amnesia affected a significant portion of his life, specifically time spent in the service of S.H.I.E.L.D and its subsidiaries. The memories did eventually return, but they are a bit like a puzzle: the chronology is muddled, some parts are missing. And for this patient the time in advance of the actual incident is entirely forgotten." Jemma pauses and her eyes dart toward Fitz who stands off camera. "No matter how significant the event is to the victim, it seems the resultant cardiac arrest caused the brain to essentially delete the information." She looks away and back to her papers, her voice dropping as if she's softening the impending blow. "The memories are likely never to be recovered."
Fitz reaches for the wall to steady himself as Jemma continues. She's coming to the final results of her study but he's stopped paying attention. He knows that her conclusions are based off of the events surrounding his submersion, but there's a truth hidden in her words that he's never previously acknowledged.
He remembers nothing of their time in the medical pod.
The screen goes black and the sudden silence of the room rouses Fitz from his thoughts.
"I think it went well," she says without looking up as she shuffles through her notes.
Fitz steps toward the lab table and smiles. "You did better than just 'well.' It was brilliant. Really. Even I didn't know about half the things you mentioned and it was my brain you were talkin' about."
She laughs and nudges him with the back of her hand. "Thanks for being here. It made me feel a bit less nervous."
He shrugs his shoulders. "I can't imagine being anywhere else."
Jemma smiles, her face reddening slightly and she hugs her papers to her chest. "I should go and put these away-"
He reaches for her as she passes, catching her wrist. Her eyebrows raise, questioning.
"I'm afraid of th' darkness."
She sniggers at his statement. "We lived together, remember? You insisted we get that lil' light for the hallway-"
"That's not what I meant."
His face is serious and it sobers her response. "I don't understand. What'd'ya mean then?" She searches his face for clarity but his eyes can't meet her own. "Tell me, Fitz. What is it?"
There are words that he has rehearsed over and over again in his head. They are words that speak of love; love not just for a friend, but for a woman he thinks he would move heaven and earth for.
His heart beats into his throat and his stomach turns in such a way that he thinks he could be sick, but she's there waiting in the silence for him. Her hands clutch at papers, her eyes are soft and inviting.
"Say it," she whispers and it's like a note that hangs in the wind. He's certain it's his mind playing tricks on him, but it encourages him just the same.
"What happened in the medpod?"
…
Her confession is fraught; the papers tighten in her hands so much that Fitz reaches for the stack and places it on the lab table.
The words pool out of her and as she speaks she's afraid to look at him. She's not exactly sure why, she supposes that some part of her thinks he won't believe her. But he does. And when she tells him how he saved her life she hopes that it's enough.
It's not.
"What else?" He asks, his hands pressing at the sides of his neck. "There's more isn't there? Tell me."
Jemma swallows hard and looks down at her fingers which pick nervously at a corner of one of her papers. "You told me that you had feelings for me," she whispers at last.
There it is, she thinks and when he replies with a simple "oh," disappointment racks her body. Tears immediately spill from her eyes and she pushes past him, desperate to escape.
He's quicker than she'd figured and he grabs her elbow, turning her back toward him.
"Was that such a terrible thing?" He asks panicked and she can't help the uncertainty that crosses her face.
"What?"
"Why is it such a bad thing that I have feelings for you?"
She shakes her head, not really registering what he's saying. "It's not," she replies honestly and just as panicked. "It's that you don't anymore."
Fitz stares at her for a moment, confusion and clarity both gripping him almost simultaneously. "I never said that."
…
Their first kiss is messy and desperate and there are hands everywhere. Noses clash and there are fits of laughter that mingle in between their connected lips. It's less poetic than either imagined, but it's their moment.
When they break, there are shy smiles playing upon both their lips. It is Fitz who steps back first, extending his hand out toward her. With a happy heart, she takes it unaware that it is the very thing she did for him in the myriad of dreams he struggled to make sense of.
There are many more words stuck in the back of Fitz's throat and fears that hang heavily in his chest. When her fingers interlace his own and she tucks herself against his side he thinks, One day.
One day he'll tell her.
(When that day comes Jemma will surprise him by lunging herself at him and she'll pepper his face with kisses. He'll wonder why and she'll confess that she'd had the same words stuck in the back of her throat and the same fears that hung heavily in her own chest.)
For now, however, both are satisfied with the understanding that it's enough. It's enough that they know that each is more than that. It's enough that their actions speak the words that they can't and it's enough that they're together.
Not forgotten.
.:FIN:.
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