the heart is the only broken instrument that works
Summary: Leonard McCoy meets Jocelyn Darnell for the first time at a high school prom in 2244. My attempt at a pairing/character study. Jocelyn/Leonard, future Jim/Leonard, based vaguely on a picture from the jim-and-bones community on livejournal.
Rating: PG13
Disclaimer: Star Trek and everything affiliated with it belongs to Gene Roddenberry, JJ Abrams, and all those other cool cats who own it. The title is from a quote by T. E. Kalem. All I own is the plot…
Leonard McCoy meets Jocelyn Darnell for the first time at a high school prom in 2244. He's at the dance solely due to his cousin's having invited (read: forced) him to be her date, since she was unable to procure one among the boys at her high school. Leonard himself has been out of high school for several years, in spite of being only seventeen years of age—he is, at this point in his life, a senior in undergraduate school.
His cousin, Marlene, abandons him almost as soon as they get to the dance in favor of hanging out with her friends, who had evidently come to the dance as a small group. As far as Leonard can tell, his aunt was the one to decide he should accompany Marlene to the dance in the first place.
Leonard, of course, doesn't know anyone. He isn't used to being around people his own age, has become accustomed to the in-jokes and interests of college students and honestly has no idea what a high school student is supposed to know and laugh about. He's about to retreat to a safe, uninhabited corner of the room when someone says,
"Home schooled?"
He blinks and jumps a little, looking over at the speaker. She's beautiful—not the comfortable, self-reliant beauty of a college girl, but the careful, self-conscious beauty of someone who is still testing the waters. Her hair, dark blonde or light brown, has been curled and piled on top of her head, a few ringlets artfully framing her face. Her makeup is thick, but doesn't seem to have been self-applied—probably her mother was one of those women who learned how to do makeup when it was stylish to cake it on. Her dress is blue with white rhinestones, no doubt chosen because it is pretty rather than because it makes her look pretty (she would look better in earthier tones).
"Something like that." He finally manages to say when she arches a perfectly plucked eyebrow at him. "I came with my cousin."
"No wonder I haven't seen you around." She says, and holds her hand out in a way that demands he take it and brush his lips across her knuckles like a fine southern gentleman (he does, though he's not sure if it's because she demands it or because he was raised like a fine southern gentleman). "My name is Jocelyn. Jocelyn Darnell."
"Leonard McCoy." He says.
"My boyfriend's being an ass." She tilts her head in the direction of another part of the room; Leonard can see a young man glaring at them, although he is surrounded by other teens (presumably his friends) and talking, making no move toward them as yet. "Dance with me?"
He can't help but smile, and bows low, letting his smile turn into a smirk when his eyes meet the boyfriend's from across the room—he's obviously fuming, and Leonard wonders what's holding the other guy back from storming over and punching him.
"I'd be delighted, Miss Darnell." He says, and lets her lead him out onto the dance floor. Predictably, a slow song has just started playing, so he takes her left hand in his right, and sets his left hand on her hip. She covers that hand with hers, moving it farther back so that it's just this side of scandalous.
"Get your filthy hands off my girlfriend!" Boyfriend says, finally manning up and breaking away from his lackeys.
Leonard, who hasn't really been paying attention to anything but Jocelyn, looks away from her face just in time to get a fist in his.
And, well, pre-Med track or not, he hasn't taken the Hippocratic Oath, yet, and he damned well knows how to defend himself. He's been the youngest person in his class for the majority of his life; has learned how to defend himself out of necessity. So he rears back and punches the guy back with a short jab to his nose followed by a foot to his solar plexus when the guy's head flies backwards.
"Your girlfriend was just bein' nice and askin' me to dance." He snarls at the man's prone form on the ground.
"You shoulda just been smart and said no." Says one of the lackeys as he and several others step out of the crowd that has formed.
"And all y'all are gonna be smart and break it up this instant!" A lanky but authoritative man pushes his way in. "This is a dance, not a barroom! Treadway, I'll see you in my office first thing Monday mornin'. And as for you," he looks at Leonard, "I realize you're just a guest, and you were provoked, but I'm gonna have to ask you to leave."
Leonard nods hesitantly, and blushes when Jocelyn takes his arm.
"I'll let him escort me home, Principal Kelley." She says. "All this excitement has my heart aflutter!"
Kelley arches an eyebrow at her, but waves them both away and turns to take care of the rest of the crowd.
"Mr. McCoy, if you would?" She looks up at him through her eyelashes.
"It'd be my pleasure, Miss Darnell." He says with a lopsided smile, and waves at Marlene as Jocelyn leads him out of the gymnasium.
He drives her home and walks her up to her door, and she kisses his cheek before disappearing into the house.
He wears a goofy grin all the way back to the gym to pick up Marlene, and can hardly suppress it even when she pesters him relentlessly about the entire affair.
(I'MADOCTOR,NOTAPAGEBREAK!)
Lafayette Dresses is a name with which most stars and important persons of the early 23rd century are well acquainted.
Leonard isn't a star or an important person, but he is probably more well acquainted with it than anyone on- or off-planet besides his mother, Eleanora Lafayette McCoy, who owns it.
Not that most people know it's his mother who owns the line and the tiny shop located in Atlanta, Georgia that goes by the same name.
That is probably why Jocelyn Darnell does something of a double take when he steps out of the back of the shop to answer her hesitant ringing of the countertop bell.
"Miss Darnell." Leonard says, a smile instantly taking over his face at the sight of her. He hasn't seen her since the prom one month prior, and had rather given up hope of seeing her again.
She's even prettier than he remembers, now that she only has a modest sprinkling of makeup on and with her hair up in a simple braid at the nape of her neck.
"Mr. McCoy." She says a little breathlessly. "You…you work here?"
"Mom's the owner." He explains with a shrug, waving his hand at the portrait hanging behind him, which depicts his mother in all her finery. Most people say he's the male version of her, possessing her most prominent features—hazel eyes, thick hair, strong cheekbones, and, often to his chagrin, lean body build. Although he has managed to bulk up a little in recent months, praise be to God, so he no longer looked like some teeny tiny bully-magnet.
"Your mother owns Lafayette Dresses?" She asks, eyes going wide.
"Eleanora Lafayette McCoy." He nods, chuckling a little at her star struck expression. "I work here most summers."
"Oh, wow. You are so lucky." She sighs, leaning against the counter. "Do you design any clothes, yourself?"
He laughs. "Naw, I'm hopeless when it comes to that sort of thing. But I sew, some; I've done some work on all of the dresses in the windows and most of the others you see." He points to one a few yards away, a bright green and brown paisley sundress. "I made that one by myself."
"It's so pretty." She breathes, going over to it and running her fingers across the ruffles reverently.
"You want to try it on?" He asks, stepping out from behind the counter.
She flushes, shaking her head vigorously. "I can't. I mean, I don't have a job or anything, so there's no way I could afford it. I'm just here to pick up my sister's wedding dress—my grandma's making all of the bridesmaids dresses and the dress for the reception, but Lisa insisted on having a Lafayette wedding dress."
"Don't mean you can't try it on." He says, taking the dress down. "The changing rooms are over there; I'll get your order while you change. Is it under Darnell?"
She nods, taking the dress from him like it's made of porcelain. "Thank you."
"Just let me see you in it and we'll call it even." He says, and grins when her faces turns an even deeper shade of red before shooing her to the dressing room and fetching the wedding dress for which he vaguely remembers attaching an inordinate amount of beads.
When he returns to the front of the store, she is standing there in front of the counter in the dress, feet shuffling together as she twiddles her thumbs. He'd known she was more suited to earthy colors, but damn is she pretty.
"That jerk boyfriend of yours is a lucky man." He says.
She shakes her head. "I broke up with him after the dance."
"And no one else has snatched you up?" He asks.
"No." She laughs, ducking her head and tucking a rogue strand of hair behind her ear.
"In that case…y'know, there's a discount for dating the owner's son." He says. "What's say you wear that out with me to lunch?"
"I don't want to date you for a dress." She says.
"So just date me." He shrugs. "Call the dress a graduation present."
"I'm not graduating 'til next year." She says.
"But I just did. It's my present to myself." He replies. "'Cuz I get to see you being gorgeous in something I made."
"You're so weird." She says, slapping his shoulder lightly.
"Too weird to take to lunch?"
She giggles, but shakes her head.
He pats the package holding the wedding dress. "We'll leave this here 'til we get back."
"Will you get in trouble for leaving the shop?" She asks.
He's already switching the sign on the door to day 'Closed for Lunch.' "Nope. Perks of being the owner's brat. Will you get in trouble for taking too long with your sister's dress?"
She shakes her head. "I told Mom I was gonna get lunch after. Besides, if Lisa wanted her dress quick she should've gotten it herself."
"Well…" He pauses for a moment, worrying his bottom lip before continuing, "I'm glad she didn't."
"Me, too." She says, and, on a whim, grabs his hand as he's stepping out of the door.
His face turns cherry red, but he doesn't let go.
(I'MADOCTOR,NOTAPAGEBREAK!)
She cries when he leaves for Med school; six hours is a long ways away, and she's convinced he's gonna fall in love with some pretty college girl even though to be honest he'd never really taken much notice of girls before meeting her, college girls or not.
He doesn't, but when she graduates from high school a year later he proposes to her (she's walking across stage and he hops up and gets down on one knee right there in front of everyone, and she cries and he can't stop smiling because even in that stupid graduation gown she's the prettiest thing he's ever laid eyes on). And they get married, even though everyone tells them it's too soon and they're too young.
It's not and they aren't, Leonard tells them, and means it.
Jocelyn follows him to the University of Mississippi, majoring in business and minoring in fashion design (his mother is thrilled, because she likes Jocelyn even if she does think they ought to wait a while longer before they get hitched). They get a small apartment off-campus, and if maybe he doesn't always make it home to dinner, and maybe sometimes she goes out with friends instead of waiting up for him, it's just because he's busy.
She understands, really, and she knows it's just until he graduates. And he doesn't mind her going out because he remembers how lonely his mama used to get when his dad worked late at the hospital, until she took up designing clothes.
It doesn't get better after he graduates; in fact, it gets worse. He stops calling when he's not going to make it home for dinner, because before it was just a study group, and now a two minute phone call could mean someone bleeds out on the table, and he's too goddamned young with too goddamned much to prove to the world to make any mistakes. He certainly isn't going to make any mistakes when it comes to saving someone's life.
When he tells her that, late one night (practically morning) after long stint in surgery where he nearly lost a little girl because her parents didn't want to leave her side even though he was trying to get her somewhere safe to operate, she gets real quiet and won't quite meet his eyes.
"What about my life, Len?" She asks. "What about our life?"
"You won't die if I don't call you, Joss." He says, and doesn't understand why she can't understand. "They might die if I do."
"People die from loneliness all the time." She says.
He snorts, then sighs and puts his arms around her when she gives him a hurt look. "You've got friends, Joss. They've just got me."
"There are other doctors." She says. "Other surgeons. If they can spare you long enough for you to come home and sleep, surely you can come home earlier and eat with me. I miss you, Len. I want you, not just my friends."
"Just remember that I love you, Joss."
She doesn't say anything.
"I'll try, okay?" He says. "I'll try."
He doesn't try hard enough.
And maybe he shouldn't be surprised when he comes home one night and she's in bed with another man—with the man she left to be with him—but he is, and if she'd just stabbed him in the heart he figures that would've been more merciful than this.
He tries marriage counseling, forces himself to take shorter shifts at the hospital, makes dinner for her—tries to woo her all over again.
It almost seems to work, but just when he thinks things are going to be okay he catches her holding hands with Clay fucking Treadway at a café down the street from the hospital.
He doesn't say anything about it, because maybe if he tries just a little bit harder…
Three years later, he loses his father to pyrrhoneuritis. A few months after that—after finding out that they discovered a cure a scant three weeks after he put his father to rest; after turning to alcohol because he can't turn to his wife and he can't turn to his mom (or, God, his dad, because Dad is dead, dead, dead) and he can't turn to work; after nine fucking years together—Jocelyn hands him a stack of papers with the heading: 'Report of Divorce, Annulment, or Dissolution of Marriage.'
And, Christ, was it so much to ask for her to just fucking be there for him? He knows she stopped loving him a long time ago, and maybe he wasn't always around as much as he should have been, but she couldn't even be bothered to go to his father's funeral. And when he came home, she was on the comm with someone—her lawyer, he finds out later—and she just gave him this annoyed look, like 'why are you interrupting my call, you selfish bastard?'
All he wanted was to come home and maybe feel her arms wrap around him, feel a light kiss to the top of his head, feel loved by her for just a few moments even if she was just faking it.
He's coming to understand that there's no such thing as a love like that, and no one warned him that growing up was gonna continue on for this long or hurt this goddamn much.
(I'MADOCTOR,NOTAPAGEBREAK!)
He puts up a token fight, but it comes as no surprise to anyone when she cleans him out. He ends up in some hole in the wall apartment on the completely wrong side of town, less because it's all he can afford and more because it's as far away from her as he can get without quitting his job and leaving Atlanta.
It isn't far enough.
Turns out, no part of Georgia is far enough—he sees her in every city he goes to, even the ones in the middle of Bumfuck that she'd never deign to look at on a map, much less visit.
It's the same in every state he goes to (Mississippi, Kentucky, Illinois), and when he finally ends up in Riverside, Iowa, he finds himself in a hotel next to a fucking Starfleet port. And he gets drunk, but even so, he knows this is a bad idea.
He knows that, but he goes and signs up anyhow; what in the fuck else does he have to lose? His medical license? His life? His sanity? Because, honestly, those are all tied together, and he's just as likely to lose them in the bottom of a bottle as he is out there in that giant shithole they call space.
He's got a chance, though, in that time right in between when his hangover starts wearing off and his aviaphobia starts kicking in, when he could back out. They aren't technically supposed to force a man to uphold an enlistment he'd signed up for when he was three sheets to the wind; he could make a case and get out of it.
But, hell, if Jocelyn hadn't shoved those divorce papers in his face, he'd not have made a move to get out of that miserable bit of hell on Earth. So…why not? Space could get him killed, but even the slowest death up there has gotta be faster than how he's dying, now.
Any number of years later, he's still not sure if he was right about that.
He is sure that he doesn't regret it.
See, he meets Jim Kirk when he's halfway between hung over and drunk, but even at his bitchiest he can't quite run the guy off—doesn't quite care to try.
Being near Jim is addictive. It's like being next to a star you know is about to go supernova, but sticking around anyhow to watch the light show.
It's crazy.
It's the best thing that's ever happened to him.
The End...?
A/N: This started as a way for me to try to figure out McCoy's relationship with Jocelyn, and how it went wrong. At some point or other it twisted itself into this. I'm not sure if it's what I wanted it to be, and I might try to explore it farther in the future, but for now it is what it is.
Hope you enjoy!