NOTES: Teyla/Lorne is my backup pairing for Teyla, although a friend is trying to convert me to John/Teyla/Cameron. It's a tempting thought.
Boundaries Marked In Oils
The silence on the other side of the room is louder than an explosion.
Mark turns to find Sheppard paused in the act of flipping through the paintings he's piled in the corner.
Oh, shit.
It could be any portrait, any scene, any subject that the colonel's looking at. It could be, but it isn't.
Mark's first instinct is to cross the room and seize it back from the other man. Instead, he waits for the other man to speak - because this isn't something Sheppard's going to let pass by.
But it's a long moment before the other man speaks, lifting the painting up so the light falls over it more clearly, the warm tans and golds warming the room as surely as the subject's affection warmed the two men looking at her painting.
"Did you paint it from life?" It's a casual question, but dark currents lurk beneath.
"Yes."
He's sorry to do this to a man he respects; but all's fair in love and war. Mark asked, Sheppard didn't; Teyla said yes.
"It's beautiful." Sheppard turns enough that Mark can catch the line of cheekbone and brow, an oddly arrested pose for a man who's rarely still.
She was beautiful.
It was painted in one sitting - a two hour session when there were no interruptions, no duties, no emergencies over their earpieces. He lost himself in the painting, discussing…something with her. He's still not sure what. But she was smiling through most of it, so it can't have been that bad.
Teyla laughs out of the painting, looking over her shoulder at the viewer, the sheets of the bed in disarray around her. And the broad, satisfied smile on her lips leaves no doubt as to what Mark did to make her smile like that.
He made her laugh again, later. She welcomed him back into the bed, paint-stained fingertips and all.
But he won't tell the other man that.
Just like he won't offer Sheppard the painting, and Sheppard won't ask for it.
There are always boundaries between professional men, however personal the subject.
- fin -