Our Broken Forever
By Damion Starr
Author's Note: First fic I've written in four months. Review, but please, be gentle!
Disclaimer: SGA, not mine...and perhaps, that's for the best...
"And all I can taste is this moment
And all I can breathe is your life
And sooner or later it's over
I just don't want to miss you tonight"
"Iris" by Goo Goo Dolls
"...It's not that you don't want to be drawn to him. It's that you're scared. Scared you'll fall head over heels for him and have to own up to everything you are..."
Dr. Weir's sage words from long ago come back to me as I lay, dying, in the infirmary, staring up into his handsome, somber face. "Stop," I rasp. God, I hate this, this feeling of being open, vulnerable; weak. Then again, he's always had that effect on me. Perhaps that's why I left in the first place.
"Stop what?" He continues examining my face, and I have to divert my eyes.
"Stop looking at me like that." I finally answer, staring at the simple blanket tucked in around me.
"Aiden,"
I wince. Stop it. "Don't do that," Tears burn my eyes and I vehemently fight them off. "Don't say my name like that."
"Why?" I hear him move, trying to enter my gaze, and I stubbornly turn my head to stare at the wall.
"Things have changed," I'm blinking too much, I know it.
"What's changed?"
Struck by the simple stupidity of that question, I look up at him...and, for a moment, am struck speechless. "I-I've changed,"
"No, you haven't," He sits in the chair beside my bed, and anger wells up within me from a hidden reservoir. What I'm mad about, I'm not sure.
"Yes, I have!" I state, yelling into his face. He does not look at me, but at my hand, resting beside me. "Where were you when I fled the city, threatening everyone here! Or when I massacred Wraith to get my enzyme? Or when I pulled my gun on y-" His hand covers mine, and I am suddenly silent. How does he do that?
"If you had really changed," His intense eyes hold mine, and I can feel myself shaking. "then you wouldn't feel bad about any of that. You probably wouldn't even be here...and neither would I. You probably would've killed me a long time ago."
"John," That simple word slips off my tongue before I can stop it. That one word that I haven't said in a long time, but have missed oh, so much. His name; his first name. The word that had defined our relationship from moment to moment. In battle, side by side, as commanding officer and subordinate, it was last names and ranks. On Atlantis, however, in those tender moments I still treasure and miss dearly; as lovers, it had been 'John' and 'Aiden'. The first time he had called me that...
"You are still Aiden," He leans in closer, still holding my hand, and gently touches the side of my face. I sigh at the contact. "You are still the man I love."
My tears win over, and I close my eyes as they roll down my cheeks. It was one thing to have those I care about take me in and care for me as though nothing had happened, it was another to hear his soft voice say that nothing had changed. That everything we'd had before was still there.
I just needed him to say that he loved me.
"John," I sob. I feel the mattress shift as he sits beside me and pulls me into his arms. I cling to him; my lifeline.
"Shh. It's okay, Aiden." He murmurs to me soothingly.
"...I'm scared," I find myself confessing, like I have so many times before. Before...
"I know, baby. Me, too."