Sailormoon is not mine.
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Twilight Bastille: Chapter #7 – Dry Bread and Wine
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Rei felt half on the verge of tears, half on the verge of laughter. When did this become so complicated? her thoughts roiled on a hot sea. I have to let go. This is too much. Too fast.
She lifted her hands from his shirt, startled to see how tightly she had been clutching at the cotton as she'd momentarily lost herself, so close to his scent, his skin. There were tight wrinkles in the cloth, gradually releasing in time with Jacen's slow, controlled breathing.
Everything else in the room, including her grandfather, blurred into the background. It was beginning to sink into Rei's consciousness that if she hadn't let go, something…irrevocable…would have certainly occurred.
Would I have stopped it?
She backed out of the cold room silently, biting her lip with sudden fear. The acrid pall of old cigarette smoke stung her eyes to involuntary tears. When she couldn't see his rigid form anymore, she turned and ran out the door.
Jacen heard her soft footsteps, padding out the door and then pounding down the hall, and loathed himself for his immediate, obvious reaction to her touch. The facade was torn down – he couldn't make believe he didn't want her anymore, and she couldn't pretend indifference to his desire. He had to admit, the truth felt good; Jacen wasn't a man used to having to hide his passions. Unfortunately, he would still have to deny them. You have a goal here. Remember that.
Well, it was out on the table now. Rei knew exactly what he wanted from her, what he warned her from. She could deal with it however she liked.
What had she meant by it? Simple comfort? No. Empty, physical gestures weren't in her character; Rei shied from contact, was unused to the reassuring emphasis of flesh and bone. Something else had driven her to touch him, some temptation he didn't exactly know. But I can sure as hell guess. Shit. The doctor ran his hands through his hair, rubbing his scalp in frustration. The feel of her breasts pressed into his spine, her small hands gripping his shirt…the map of her body to his robbed him of all sense.
Jacen wanted to feel it again.
He opened his eyes, refocusing upon his patient. Grandfather slept peacefully, his face unmarred by wrinkles of worry.
Wake up, he urged silently.
Sometimes, sitting here alone, Jacen wanted to throw things. He wanted to rip the needles and wires from the elderly man's skin, shake him back into consciousness, see those eyes blink and reopen. He was a patient man, with years of learned discipline, and yet he still yearned to snap his fingers and see results. In his experience, neurologists had the worst of it – with ailments and accidents quickly diagnosable, rarely curable. If there was one thing Jacen couldn't tolerate about his profession, it was the anticipation, the endless waiting for an outcome that might never come to pass. The doctor pressed his elbows down on the bed rails, leaning over his sleeping patient as though he could impart to him his own strength and youth.
I've done everything right, old man. Everything in my power to keep you with her. So return the goddamn favor.
Jacen dimmed the light and walked out, hands in pockets, brow furrowed in thought.
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Rei turned restlessly for the fourth time in her bed, sheets twisting between her toes, eyes wide open in the moonlight, wakefully dreaming. She tried to concentrate on sleep, but nothing was working.
The moment she'd returned home, Rei had unenthusiastically tried to make herself a snack, despite her lack of hunger. She'd swept the floor and done other myriad chores that didn't need to be done. Finally, she had simply wandered aimlessly around the small barracks, arms wrapped tightly around herself. Her body cried for rest, but Rei knew that sleep would elude her tonight.
She could still feel the texture of his shirt in her hands, the burn of his body to hers. And I was an idiot to think he didn't want me just as much. Fooled by another one of his ever-changing masks. Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever see his true face. What am I going to do? This is completely new to me…I've never…Oh, God, how do I know this isn't what he looks like with every woman he's ever been with?
And even more frightening – Does it matter? Can you refuse him?
An uneasy slumber of about an hour, and she eventually rose at dawn, eyes red and dry, limbs trembling with weariness. Her throat itched a bit, and Rei guessed that she would probably be ill the next morning. She was briefly reminded of Hotaru's worry for her yesterday, and quickly on the heels of that memory came Jacen's perceptive gaze…
Rei steeled herself. It didn't matter. Work was fast becoming her only solace, a distraction from the ever-closed eyes of one man and the too-watchful eyes of the other.
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The day passed quickly, dazedly, choking heat searing papery-thin flesh.
By noon, Rei knew that she was sicker than she had thought. She coughed, leaning on the desk she was cleaning. Her eyes burned and her skin felt hot and tender. I'd better head home and rest… I'll just double up my time tomorrow and see Grandfather the day after. She stood up, suppressing another coughing fit, and made her way out the door, wincing at the dull throb in her throat.
The sun beat down mercilessly, scorching her black hair so she could barely stand to touch it. She glanced up, shading her eyes from the light, and was alarmed to see the barracks roofs waver and darken in her vision. Rei hastened home, relieved when she finally stumbled into the relatively cool shade of her room. She yanked her hair out of its bun and stripped off her work clothes, uncaring of where they fell. A quick glass of too-warm water and she fell into bed gratefully, her vision fading to ashes the moment her head fell back onto the pillows.
Unfortunately, the peace of Rei's sleep did not last long.
The dreams began almost immediately. The normal ones, the ones she always remembered when she woke in the morning. Little feet on mossy stone steps. Lime-green grass, comic book colors, chocolate mud, hurting-blue sky. A closed black car and cigarette smoke that stung her eyes. The familiar texture of cotton, bunched in her fists. Now a little bit different. Angry silverblue eyes, like the scales of fish swimming or a moon behind clouds. The moon began to recede, thunderheads and thick fog rolling in over the water, and Rei sobbed for her loss, the ocean of her tears wetting the cotton, dousing the cigarette, widening the sea. Underwater, she could not breathe.
"Don't leave," she pleaded. "Don't leave me."
"Rei."
"Don't leave."
"Wake up, pigeon. I'm here."
The voice was too loud, too commanding to be a fiction of her mind. Rei jerked awake, eyes wide and unfocused before they latched onto his burning blue gaze, less than an inch away. She flung her face away from his, coughing long and hard into her pillow.
The room was dim, a lamp shoved closer to the bed providing a flickering glow. Outside, the sun had just barely set, and a cool desert wind wafted through the open windows. The sweat on her skin chilled, but Rei still felt stifled, breathless.
Jacen occupied the edge of her narrow bed, curling his long frame around hers to make space for himself. She was cradled in his arms, one hand protectively wrapped in her hair, the other beneath her loose nightshirt, supportive. His breath fanned her cracked lips, and she stared at him, wordless. For a moment, the harsh lines of his face softened with relief, and Rei was acutely aware of his warm, strong hand curved around her spine, his smell of sun-skin and leathery aftershave.
Suddenly, an icy pressure between her shoulderblades made her gasp, and she twisted like a cat, trying to see what the object was. When Rei turned back, the doctor's face had smoothed into blankness, a faint smile of habit playing around his lips. The dun-dun of her heartbeat became evident in the silence, and Rei quickly realized it was a stethoscope. He listened briefly, nodded once, lips tight, and pushed her down onto the bed.
Calmly, Jacen proceeded to roll up her nightshirt.
She clutched at it, startled by this new audacity. He brushed the weak flutter of her fingers aside, pulling the fraying cloth up just beneath her breasts. One warm hand rested on her flat belly, and he pressed gently into the milky skin, keenly watching her for any reaction.
"Does that hurt?"
"I – no – what are you doing here?" Rei gasped, not expecting the question and thoroughly distracted by the skin-to-skin contact.
"I expected to see you at the hospital tonight, and I didn't," Jacen answered, features still arranged blandly, pleasantly. "Here?"
His hand strayed beneath her bellybutton, pressing just below her abdomen. Rei's breath hitched. "No."
Jacen rolled her shirt down, much to Rei's relief, and pushed her up completely against the headboard. Since she'd woken up, he hadn't looked her directly in the eye, keeping his gaze fixed almost…beyond her. The doctor did so now, curling his palm around the nape of her neck, watching some invisible thing behind her head, seeming deep in thought.
"What are you doing?"
"Your temperature." Leaning close, Jacen took her hot face between his hands and studied her eyes, turning her one way, then another to let the light catch her irises. She was helplessly aware of his thigh pressed against hers, even through layers of clothing and blankets. Warmth radiated from his face, so close to hers that their lashes brushed.
"Open your mouth."
Still dazed, Rei obeyed. She noticed, somewhat vaguely, that he wasn't calling her Rei or pigeon anymore.
"All right, you can shut it." He pulled a pad out of his bag, along with a small jar of pills that rattled loudly in the pervasive silence.
"Why are you – ? – I don't need medicine. I've had it before, it's just a throat bug, Jacen," she absently used his real name, he noticed, not Doctor.
"It's not a fucking throat bug."
Rei fell into unaccustomed silence. She realized, belatedly – still feeling dull, sluggish – that he was absolutely furious. The only time she'd ever seen him nearly this angry was when she'd barged into his barracks, so long ago. Now, as then, Jacen's eyes hinted – but she hadn't quite caught on until his words like bullets told. He made vicious slashes on the pad.
"J-Jacen?"
Jacen ripped the note out and threw it onto the bed, along with the pills. "Penicillin, three pills a day. I could drag you down to the hospital to X-ray your lungs…but I've seen enough pneumonia to know it. Starving yourself, working all day, sleeping little…it's no wonder."
He pulled a tray that she hadn't noticed off the small nightstand, full of cut fruit, along with some water. "So if you don't shove all this down your skinny throat, I swear to God I'll snap it for you." The doctor nodded toward the plate. "Go ahead. Eat it. I'll watch."
"Wait a minute – " Rei began, irritated at his highhandedness, and was interrupted by another coughing fit.
Jacen stood abruptly and began to pace. The room was dim now, the lamplight feeble, but she could just make out his hand, coming up to rub at his face in what? Frustration? Disgust? Finally, he stopped near the door, features invisible in the dark.
"You think you're some kind of martyr? That if you don't eat and don't sleep and work all day, God will feel sorry for poor little you and wake Grandpappy up?"
"How can you – "
"It doesn't work that way, Rei. So if you think playing saint is going to do him any good, you're wrong. Maybe dead wrong, in fact, if I hadn't come by."
"Listen," Rei said abruptly, shoving aside the food. "I won't take this shit from you just because you think you know better. I refuse to owe you any more than I already do. I can take care of myself."
"Owe?" Jacen repeated coolly. "You think I'm here to take something from you? Use your cash to feed your own skinny little ass," he gestured to her gaunt frame. "I don't want anything from you. More to the point, I think it's pretty damn obvious you have no idea how to take care of yourself. Look at you! If your grandfather saw – God!" He broke off, looked out the window. "I expected better of you, Rei."
"I'm not a little girl," she countered, stung by his scorn. "I promise, you have no responsibility for my person or my choices. My grandfather understands what it means to sacrifice things, even if you don't."
"Oh, I know something about sacrifice," his gaze on her was black with something Rei didn't want to name, and she swallowed. "Your grandfather would never have asked this sacrifice of you," Jacen finished softly.
I was so wrapped up in the old man…if I'd just given her another look, if I'd just connected the dots…
Jacen stepped forward, placing his hands on either side of the girl and leaning in to face her. His words came like blows. "From now on, you damn well listen to what I say. I tell you when you get up, when you eat, when you work, and trust me, that's not anytime soon."
"Hell, no," Rei spat, trying to ignore the cold rain of his stare. "If I want to be up and working tomorrow, I'll do it." She didn't plan on it…but Rei couldn't stand his bullying. "God, why do you care so much, anyway?"
Rei regretted her words the moment they slipped from her mouth. Jacen's eyes were those of an animal's, and she could feel the sheets beneath her bunching in his fists. She didn't move but to squeeze her eyes shut, her breath labored. Involuntarily, he leaned closer, as though drawn by a magnet. Agonizing hours seemed to pass before her lashes fluttered open on their own.
He was gone.
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Rei took only a few small, thoughtful nibbles of her meal and a couple sips of water before sleep took her again, a welcoming black blanket. Her exhausted mind simply gave out, too weakened to plague her with dreams.
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"Why do I care so much, anyway?" Jacen repeated the question derisively, turning in his hands a full bottle of excellent vintage, a gift from a RAF buddy and patient. No, that was the good stuff. He put it away, reaching for the half-full handle in his cabinet instead. Better to get shitfaced with cheap, familiar friends when you're in love.
Love. You're a fool, Jacen, to not put together this simplest of puzzles sooner.
Jacen recalled with a shudder the stench of illness in her barracks, disturbingly familiar. How she lay on her cot, still as death but for her sudden bouts of delirium. Lips going blue as she struggled for breath in her nightmares. He'd dropped by her side, called her name in fear. Fear led to anger and he'd never been angrier with anybody in his life. Pneumonia…sure, manageable, but he'd seen too many boys – pilots, their medics – succumb to it before. The Air Force wasn't so short on penicillin, but Manzanar was. He was glad of his private stash of supplies. His mind gladly rambled over the technical aspects of treatment, and Jacen was conscious of his avoidance of the subject at hand.
He wondered, rather detachedly, when it had happened. When he had crossed the line between want and need.
So you love her. What the hell are you going to do about it?
He needed a cig, but he was still out. So Jacen drained the amber fluid in the tumbler, and refilled. Again. You haven't got a hope in hell, buddy, he jeered at himself. The girl's like stone. No, that wasn't right. Rei was just the opposite of unfeeling; if anything, she was too hot to touch. Her emotions burned so close to the surface that she forced them away, worked to maintain that stubbornly reserved veneer. But under it, Jacen knew, there was life. Hadn't that been the first thing he noticed about her? Rei had never been anything he expected her to be; she was perceptive, spirited, proud…
It seemed that the more comfortably muddled his mind became, the louder the hurt in his chest grew, a gaping wound of unanswerable questions.
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