Title: Keeping Up with the Harkness-Joneses
Fandoms: Torchwood/Glee
Pairings: Mostly Jack/Ianto and Quinn/Finn, with grautitious mentions of many Doctor Who, Torchwood and Glee ships.
Rating: PG-13, and a sound PG-13 at that
Warning: Lots of fluff, lots of sad chapters, implications and mentions of domestic abuse, occasional violent chapters and Jack and Ianto like to kiss...a lot.
Beta:I don't have one at the moment, but if you'd like to, I'd be more than appreciative!
Summary:After discovering that Ianto is immortal, Jack is able to rebuild his life with the other man. They become Ianto and Jack Harkness-Jones, and are dropped off in Lima, Ohio by the Doctor. Why Lima? The Rift is like a window, with Cardiff on one side, and Lima on the other side. They expect the craziness that comes with the Rift. What they don't expect? Needing to adopt a six year old: Quinn Fabray. And they discover that life doesn't always turn out like they planned.
Notes: Sorry, I meant to update yesterday but a lot of crazy things happened...anyway, here's your chapter! This one's a little (very) short. Sorry...
Chapter 9-
Jack can admit, guiltily, that he can remember what it is like to walk out on a family and why he has done it in the past: it was just a lack of emotional attachment and the antsy feeling that he gets when he's tied down. But now that he is attached to Quinn and Ianto, it makes him feel so guilty that he could ever do that to anyone in the first place. He remembers, with a flush of shame, that one time he left Ianto. But he's never going to do it again. He swears to every God that will listen that he's never going to leave Ianto again.
This thought process is triggered on a cold, rainy, July afternoon. A shivering Santana is currently sitting on their couch, wrapped up in a blanket and Quinn's arms, and in a change of Quinn's clothes. She had run all the way from her house to the Harkness-Jones doorstep after finding out that her dad just up and left their family. It had been raining and abnormally cold for July, due to the aftermath of some Rift activity.
Santana showed up on their doorstep, dripping and shivering. Jack and Ianto immediately brought her inside, and Quinn had taken her upstairs to put on a change of clothes. When the girls had come back down, Jack already had the fire going, and Ianto wraps Santana in a blanket and sets her on the couch. The moment Quinn sits beside her, she wraps her best friend up in her arms and doesn't let go.
Ianto brings the twelve year old girls a mug of hot chocolate, whipped cream and marshmallows. He kneels down and asks Santana, "Are you warming up, Santana?" She nods, sitting up and gratefully accepting the mug of hot chocolate from Ianto. He presses the back of his hand to her forehead, and calls back to Jack, "She doesn't seem feverish. I'm not Owen, but I reckon that she's not gonna get sick. We can keep an eye on it, though." Then he turns back to Santana and says gently, "If you're starting to feel sick or uncomfortable or if you need anything, you just yell for me or Jack, all right?" He kisses Quinn's forehead, then Santana's forehead and walks over to Jack, who is on the phone. "Any response?" he asks lowly. Jack shakes his head and hangs up the phone.
"Santana, does your mother know that you're here?" Jack calls out to her, going back into the living room. Santana shakes her head. "Is your mother home?" She shakes her head again, her mouth twisting into a grimace. Jack's heart breaks a little bit. He's not used to the little girl being so completely silent. He presses a gentle kiss to her forehead, and she smiles sadly at him. Jack presses a kiss to Quinn's forehead, and smiles when his little angel gives him a small smile.
"I hope you know that I love you so much, Daddy," Quinn whispers, linking her arms around Jack's neck and kissing Jack's cheek. "You and Daddy Ianto aren't going to leave me like my mom did, are you?"
"Never," he murmurs, giving her a gentle squeeze. Then he offers a free arm to Santana who gladly wraps her arms around him and he closes his arm around the other girl. "I'm not going anywhere, all right, and neither is Ianto. We'll be here for you always." For a moment, Jack just stands there with the two little girls hugging him tightly. They both need him for support, and Jack wants to keep them feeling safe and loved.
Then Spongebob comes on and both the girls let him go and go back to cuddling on the couch. Jack walks back to the kitchen and straight into Ianto's arms. He noses Ianto's shoulder, and grumbles angrily, "How can her mother not care know where she is? Right after her husband leaves? I'm calling again. This isn't right, Ianto,"
Ianto strokes his hair lovingly and presses a kiss against Jack's forehead in an attempt to cool Jack's temper. Jack can say without a doubt that he finds Ianto's presence extremely reassuring, and he can tell that the two girls on the couch do too. To be honest, he still has nightmares of Ianto dying and leaving him again. At the thought, he buries his face into Ianto's shoulder and wrapping his arms around Ianto's neck.
"Jack," Ianto says softly. He squeezes Jack firmly to remind his lovely, but sometimes insecure, Boeshanian that he isn't going anywhere. "She'll call for her daughter when she's ready to face that her husband is gone and he's not coming back. Right now, Santana actually needs our attention more than her mother hypothetically does." They look back into the living room where Quinn and Santana are sitting in absolute silence. Quinn is braiding Santana's hair: she's gotten good at it over the last few years.
"Quinn?" Santana asks quietly, once the braid is finished. It swings around when Santana turns her head. "Can I tell you something?" Quinn sits up and listens with rapt attention as Santana says, "Whenever I come here, your dads have always treated me like they treat you. They always ask me about my day and if I'm having any problems with anything and they always tell me that I can talk to them, no matter what. And…sometimes I can't help but think that your dads love me more than my real dad ever did."
Her voice catches and she latches onto Quinn whispering, "It hurts, Q. It hurts so much. What did I do wrong? I know I get to trouble a lot, and sometimes I'm kind of sassy but he just never seemed to do anything about it. It was your dads who yelled at me when I made that one kid eat grass…did my dad leave cuz I'm a bad kid?"
"You're not a bad person, San," Quinn says quietly. "You're my best friend, and you're always looking out for me when I need you. You always help Brittany when she can't remember how to open her lunchbox, and when people are mean to Artie and Kurt you always stand up for them."
Santana lets out a watery chuckle at that and Quinn strokes her hair gently, saying, "Those things make you a good person, San. And I don't know why your dad was dumb enough to leave you and your mom but…we can share my dads. I have two, after all." Santana smiles at Quinn, and hugs her. They go back to watching television, but are asleep soon after.
Jack takes Quinn in his arms and Ianto takes Santana and they carry the two girls upstairs. Ianto has an air mattress set up in Quinn's room, and he puts Santana gently on the air mattress, drawing the blankets up around her. Ianto kisses her forehead, and whispers a gentle, "Good night." Then he goes over to Quinn's bed and kisses her forehead. "Good night, annwyl."
"Night, Daddy," Quinn mumbles sleepily. Jack kisses her forehead, and then goes over to kiss Santana's forehead too. He looks fondly at the two little girls before closing the door quietly behind him.
Jack and Ianto go downstairs to sit on the couch, where Jack tiredly lays his head against Ianto's chest. Ianto runs a calming hand down Jack's arm. Jack takes one of Ianto's arms and wraps it securely over himself. "Yan, I am so sorry," Jack whispers, staring blankly at the wall. "When I left with The Doctor. I shouldn't have. I should've never left you and Torchwood and…"
"Jack," Ianto says softly, but sternly. It is a tone that is both meant to soothe Jack and demand that he listen to the man he loves more than anything. "Jack, you need to stop beating yourself up over what happened. Wasn't what happened on the Valiant enough punishment for you?" His voice catches and he adds, keeping Jack close enough to him. "It is for me. When you wake up in the middle of the night screaming because you remember and I can't do anything to help you but hold you…I feel so useless and I hate it. I feel like nothing I can do will stop you remembering what they did to you, and I feel like...I feel like I'm failing you and that I can't help you."
"You shouldn't," Jack says instantly, rolling over so he can look Ianto in the eye. He strokes Ianto's hair and presses a kiss against Ianto's lips. "You help more than you think you do. You calm me down, you ground me, you anchor me, you keep me safe, you love me…Ianto, I could go on for a billion years about all the things you do for me and I still wouldn't be done."
"It's a good thing we have a billion years, then," Ianto says playfully and kisses Jack tenderly. Jack wraps his arms around Ianto's middle and they kiss one more time. "I'm glad you're there too...when I have my nightmares about Canary Wharf. But look at us Jack. Look how far we've come together. Who would've guessed that our relationship would get this far? Who would've guessed that we as people would come so far? I'm glad I get to be with you until time itself runs out."
Ianto adds, growling possessively, "And I'm also glad that nobody gets to have you but me." They kiss tenderly for a few minutes before Jack stops, putting his hand in the air between his mouth and Ianto's. "What?" Ianto asks, frustrated.
"It's July 21st 2006," Jack realizes, sitting up and grinning like the Cheshire cat. "Do you know what this means?" Ianto shakes his head, confused more than ever by Jack, and Jack says impatiently, "This is the day that we first met! When you helped me kill that Weevil!" Jack's eyes glimmer at the memory, and he looks back down at Ianto, seeing the man look at him fondly. "What?" he asks affectionately, headbutting Ianto.
"You remembered, Jack," Ianto says breathlessly, and he honestly can't stop smiling. Really, he's so happy he could cry. He brings in Jack in for another kiss. "You remembered the day we met. Jack, even I didn't remember the exact date. I knew it was in July but I hadn't thought about it in so long…and you remembered."
"Of course I did. I'd never met anyone who was so persistent to work at Torchwood of all places, and you looked absolutely delicious that night," Jack says, rolling his eyes, kissing his favorite Welshman again. He buries his face in Ianto's neck, whispering, "I told you that you'd be more than a blip in time to me. I knew before we were going to be together forever that I never was going to forget you, or anything about you. Do you know how terrified I was to think about forgetting what you looked like or what you smelled like? Do you know how horrible July 21st was for me when you were dead? Do you know how horrible every day was for me when you were dead?"
"I can never know how horrible it was for you, Jack," Ianto whispers softly, kissing Jack's forehead. He tightens his arms around Jack so that Jack knows that he is right there. "Although, when we were reunited, you didn't remove your arm from around my waist for three days. Not that I minded." He tilts Jack's chin upwards and says, "I'm not going anywhere, cariad. You're stuck with me until the end of time, I'm afraid."
"Good," Jack whispers, kissing him. He smiles and adds, "Then, I'm afraid you're stuck with me too. I'm not leaving you ever again and there's nothing you can do about it." They both know that neither of them wants to change this fact. "All the same, happy anniversary, Ianto." Ianto opens his mouth to ask a question, but Jack cuts him off, "We're not married officially in this time…I know our marriage ceremony won't be recognized for another twenty years at least on other planets, and we may never be married in the legal sense if this country can't get its act together. But I'm counting the day we met our anniversary. You've…you've been at my side ever since. So, it's only fitting that this is our anniversary."
Ianto nods in agreement, smiling brightly at his husband. "Anniversary it is then. Happy anniversary, Jack," he whispers, kissing Jack again.
Enjoy the rest of your weekend!
-LBP