figured we all deserved a little bit of a gentle, breather chapter in between all the madness, real and fictional. sorry it isn't very plot heavy but i think we all needed it. i hope you enjoy! as always, i am on tumblr at altschmerzes.

as always, thanks for your lovely reviews, they really make my day every time!

(chapter title is from radical face's 'doubt')


Morning arrives gently. This in itself is something of a shock, given how waking up has gone for Mac in recent times. His eyes open in a slow drift rather than a sharp snap, chest hitching halfway through a deep inhale and turning it into a jaw-cracking yawn. The light streaming into the room is the heavy gold of late morning, far later than Mac usually gets up, and he's got the kind of slight, foggy headache that comes when you get too much sleep. This is, suffice it to say, not a problem he generally experiences. The whole situation is wildly confusing. He can't even remember, thinking on it, having dreamed at all that night, not after the first few times he woke from a shallow unconsciousness with Riley sitting next to him, telling him to go back to sleep.

Pushing himself slowly upright, Mac yawns again and looks around the room. He's alone now but he clearly hasn't been that way for long, given that he's on the far side of the bed and the empty space next to him is rumpled and slept in. There's also something glinting at the edge of the mattress, and Mac frowns, leaning over to pick it up. It's a chain of linked paperclips, a rather long one. He twists it absently around his fingers and listens hard, a distant sound having alerted him that while he may be alone in his room, he's not alone in the house.

A faint clatter followed by running water says that someone is moving around in the kitchen, which usually means that Bozer is conducting some sort of culinary experiment. However, when Mac listens closer he can make out two voices, one deeper than would be expected from Bozer talking back to whatever podcast he was listening to, and one higher. Jack and Riley.

It sounds like Riley is asking a question and Jack is now answering, and Mac's eyebrows raise. They must have returned first thing in the morning, if they're here already and messing around in the kitchen. Before he can get up and investigate, footsteps break from the rest of the noise and get louder as they approach his room, while the voices stay put. Bozer appears moments later, poking his head around the doorframe and peers in before noticing that Mac is awake and upright.

"Hey!" Bozer greets, walking over and taking a seat at the side of the bed that, if Mac had to guess, he was the one to occupy not too long ago. "You're up! Perfect timing. Jack's making breakfast and I guess Riley's helping, but I'm pretty sure that actually just means she's heckling him."

It's a funny thought and Mac can't help snorting softly, shaking his head. The sounds he was hearing from the kitchen certainly make more sense now.

Silence lapses over the two of them as the brief moment of humor fades quickly, leaving behind it the kind of uncomfortable emptiness that gives meaning to the phrase 'still waters run deep.' The previous night hangs over Mac's shoulders like a fishing net with stones sewn around the edges, and guilt is a smoke that fills his lungs until breathing is a chore. Bozer is thinking about it too. Mac can't explain how he knows but he knows, looking at the faraway, troubled expression on his best friend's face.

"Are you okay?" is what comes out when Mac forces himself to speak.

Bozer's shoulders rise and fall with a deep, sighing breath as he thinks for a moment, then asks in return, "Are either of us?"

It's a fair point, and Mac's chin dips down towards his chest in a nod of acknowledgement. But there's still more he has to say, and so he grits his teeth, steels his resolve, and keeps going. "I'm sorry. I don't know if I actually said that last night," he hopes he did, he'd better have, but the whole evening exists in his memory as an awful, panicked blur and he can't quite remember for sure, "but I really am sorry. You deserve better than being lied to, especially by me."

As he considers what's been said, Bozer's head tilts slowly from side to side like he's weighing something. There's an unhappy downward twist to his mouth, and Mac is starting to feel the nausea of last night returning, right up until he actually speaks, and it's immediately obvious that the person responsible for the growing resentment in his eyes isn't Mac at all.

"Sounds to me like you didn't really have a choice," Bozer says, and suddenly, Mac knows that face. It's the same face he's been seeing on his friend since they were children, almost every time Bozer and James have ended up in one room.

"I'm still sorry," Mac repeats, though the urge to let it go is strong. Much as he wants to let it end there, Bozer deserves better than that, and better than that from him specifically. "Choice or not, I still did it, and I'm still apologizing. Because I am sorry."

Now Bozer looks at him, away from where he'd been staring absently at the spots of light dappled across Mac's bedroom wall. He still doesn't look happy, but the resentment is gone. The lines around his eyes have gone from anger to something softer but still pained, and he says, "Okay. Thank you." Then, after a pause, quieter, "I forgive you. I'm not… Okay with it. And I don't know how long it'll take me before I can wrap my head around the whole thing but. I forgive you."

With a throat too tight to say anything, Mac nods and looks down. The paperclip chain he'd found on the mattress when he woke up is still twisted around one hand and he stares at it to give himself something to focus on, something other than the relief and fierce affection gashing at his lungs from the inside out.

By the time he's able to lift his eyes back to the room's other occupant, after who knows how long of keeping his head bowed and breathing with a deliberate steadiness, he's started to feel it. The attention focused on him so hard it's like a physical sensation prickling over his skin. Bozer is looking at him alright, wearing the third variation on an odd frown that he's had this morning like he's trying to build an entire language out of them. To be more specific, Bozer is looking not at Mac's face but down and to the side a bit, at where the relaxed collar of the old, overwashed t-shirt he sleeps in hangs wide enough that his scar is more visible than usual.

"What?" Mac asks after several moments pass and Bozer is still staring.

"Is it alright if I…" The question trails off at the same time that Bozer's hand lifts, moving just far enough that Mac gets the idea of his intention, and then stops.

Mac swallows past a dry throat, and nods. "Go ahead."

With fingers so cautious it's almost comical, Bozer gently moves the collar of the shirt even farther to the side, just enough that the scar is fully visible, exposed to the air in all its ugliness. Mac shivers lightly, feeling suddenly cold and very exposed, but holds still and doesn't pull away.

"This didn't happen in an accident, did it." It's flat, not quite a question, but Mac answers it anyway.

"No." It takes a moment to come up with what to tell him about it, how to put the truth in sparing enough detail that it won't be the entire brutal story but also won't sound anything like a cover-up or a lie. If Bozer asks, Mac knows he'll tell him everything. He can't keep telling half truths. But if he doesn't ask, there's no reason he needs to hear this. "I got shot. On a mission in Sweden. It was pretty bad."

Instead of replying out loud, Bozer does something else instead. He flattens his hand out, letting go of the collar of Mac's shirt to press down over the scar, covering it entirely with his palm. His touch is warm and solid and Mac finds himself reaching up, putting his own hand over Bozer's and leaving it there, the two of them shielding the wound, and the truth, together. The thought flits, light and fast as a spark down a wire, through Mac's mind, that there are three people in the world he wouldn't absolutely lay out on the floor for even trying to touch him there, that vulnerable skin of his neck and shoulder that has already been the site of so much violence. And right now, this morning, they're all here together in this house.

For a long, laden stretch of silence, Mac and Bozer sit there on his bed together, pressure between them growing heavier as they both lean on each other as they have done for years. It's almost unbelievable, now, that just last night- hell, just a few minutes ago, Mac had been afraid he'd ruined this.

Eventually they wander back out into the rest of the house. Mac snags the Dallas Stars hoodie on the way out of his room, shrugging it on and zipping it up, stuffing his hands into his pockets and telling himself he'd only grabbed it because they tend to keep the house on the cooler side. Bozer doesn't call him on it, and upon entering the open floor plan of the living room and kitchen, Mac discovers he's far from the only person who's made interesting clothing choices today.

It is immediately clear, when he sees Jack and Riley, that they didn't come back early at all. They never left in the first place, if what they're wearing is anything to go by. Jack is dressed from the go bag he keeps in his car, which is nothing out of the ordinary, but Riley is another matter entirely. Riley is wearing charcoal grey sweatpants that are cuffed several times and a red long-sleeved shirt that hangs off her like she'd got it from the wrong section of the clothing department, which makes sense, given it's not hers.

As Mac looks at her, mystified and taking in the fact that she's wearing his clothes, he thinks he remembers vaguely, earlier that morning, having had some sense that someone had come into his room. He'd drifted almost all the way back to awareness, only to be spoken to softly by a voice he knew, and then he'd gone right back asleep. It's an unnerving thought, that he was able to sleep through someone coming into his room and stealing clothing out of his dresser, someone else starting up breakfast in the kitchen, all of this happening around him. Usually, sleep is an elusive goal, and not waking up at someone entering your space is a dangerous failure of instinct.

It's unsettling, but Mac can't say it's exactly bad, and if he tried to assert that he was bothered by the fact that Riley was borrowing his things, he'd be both a liar and a hypocrite. So instead he greets both her and Jack with a sheepish smile, acutely aware that he is the last person up by a significant measure, and settles in to watch the meal preparations.

Jack is making a skillet fry breakfast that looks like it could feed a small army, while Riley alternates between poking fun at the apron he's wearing and sneaking in to steal things out of the pan. She grins when he chastises her for it, rebukes that hold not an ounce of actual heat, and Bozer laughs. Mac sits at the kitchen island and lets his eyes drift shut as it all washes over him, the sound of their voices and the smell of the oil sizzling on the stove.

It's nice. A person could get used to this sort of thing.

After breakfast, Matty arrives. She's come in order to formally brief Bozer on what's going on, and ensure that he understands how important it is to keep everything under wraps. It's a necessary but truly uncomfortable and stilted conversation, one Mac spends most of hovering in the doorway, unsure if he should step away fully or participate. By the time she's gone, the easy feeling of the morning is gone with her, and Mac feels the weight of unasked questions and years of deception begin to drift down, drifting the way the snow in Minnesota had, back in January.

Riley is standing at the kitchen sink, washing dishes for something to occupy her hands, and Mac has been taking apart and putting back together the locking fob for his car so many times he's surprised he hasn't actually damaged it by now. Bozer is sitting on the couch where Matty left him, looking tired, his expression distant and hard to read. Mac doesn't know what to do. For once, no matter how hard he searches through his brain, runs over the options, he can't find the answer.

As it turns out, he doesn't have to.

Jack stands by the fridge near the hallway, arms folded and a frown lightly creasing his forehead. He looks around from Mac, to Riley, to Bozer, and back again in a triptych circuit of calculating analysis, put off by what he sees. These kids, these painfully young people who not that long ago were enjoying a lazy morning - the first time he's actually known Mac to sleep in since meeting him - have aged again before his eyes, growing quiet and cracked.

In an instant, Jack makes a decision. That feeling of not so long ago, the one they'd lost when Matty arrived to formally bring Bozer into the loop, they need that back. They do, and Jack is willing to admit that maybe he does too, which is why he straightens up, clapping his hands and announcing, "Right! Okay! I'm giving you all fifteen minutes to be in the car, ready, set, go."

Absolutely nobody moves. If this were a cartoon, there would be crickets.

"Sorry, maybe you didn't hear me," he says, meeting three sets of dull, confused eyes with bright determination. "Fifteen minutes, chop chop."

"Jack, what are you talking about?" Riley is looking at him like he's completely cracked, hands still soapy from the dish water, and Mac and Bozer are wearing similar expressions, but at least it means he's got everybody's attention.

Sighing, Jack turns and points. "Boze, you don't work today, do you?"

"Uh, no? Why…"

"Great!" he says instead of answering or indeed allowing him to finish the question. "Neither do we. We're totally in the clear, all four of us, and you three look like you're about to worry yourselves into a set of early graves, and as our designated responsible adult, I just can't let that happen. So. Fifteen minutes. Let's go."

Not seeming to have recieved the memo, still nobody moves.

"Where are we going?" It's Mac that asks this time, and Jack sighs again.

"It's a surprise," he tells them. This is mostly to cover up for the fact that the fifteen minute deadline is less for them to get ready and more for him to figure out where exactly it is he plans on taking them. Thankfully, nobody pushes the matter again, taking him at his word when he raises his eyebrows and says, "Trust me, it'll be fun," and then he's left alone with the rest of the breakfast clean up and fifteen minutes in which to figure out where to take three extremely acutely stressed early-twenties kids with entirely too much responsibility and no idea how to relax.

It ends up taking him just over the allotted time to come up with a plan, but Jack makes the decision right as he's turning the key to start his car. Before he takes off, though, he spares a moment to ensure everybody is appropriately dressed - the pilfered sweatpants Riley had been wearing, while cutting an endearing image, were big enough on her that they would definitely pose a safety hazard. Luckily, Riley is back wearing yesterday's jeans, so while she still had Mac's red shirt on, they should be in the clear.

When Jack pulls up outside their destination, everybody seems just as deeply confused as they'd been back at the house, if not maybe more so.

"Jack." Mac is the first one to say anything, voice flatly apprehensive. "I've never…"

The bright marquee sign of the Roller Garden blinks cheerily at them over the set of double doors leading into the building. A mural depicting an artist's rendition of the tortoise and the hare, both wearing rollerblades and flowered helmets, stretches across the entirety of the exterior wall.

"What, you've never gone roller skating before?"

Nodding wordlessly, Mac looks more than a little dubious about the whole thing. Jack puts aside exactly how that piece of information makes him feel - not that it's at all shocking to imagine James MacGyver isn't the kind of father who'd take his kid to the rink on weekends, probably had him building Rube Goldberg machines in his basement or memorizing Latin or something - and focuses on the moment. On a good day. A fun day.

"Well, never fear, we've got our very own expert here with us." Looking in the rearview mirror, Jack makes eye contact with her, asking, "How many years did you do derby, Ri?"

"Four." Riley looks more excited now than Jack has seen her in a long time, and it takes him right back to years ago to see.

It had only taken one trip to see a bout one of Diane's friends was skating in for Riley to fall in love with the sport. She'd been hooked right from the go, and had proceeded to spend every spare moment she had not in school or messing with electronics on wheels, flying up and down the street or around the rink a few minutes from Diane's house. Jack never quite got over the jolt of nerves he felt when she took off so fast it was hardly possible to believe she could be in control of where she was going, but she'd loved it so much he never said a word. It's nice to see that same spark in her now, her glinting eyes the same as when they'd sat and watched those women fly around and around that track.

"Think you're up to teaching Mac here a thing or two?"

"We'll have you skating in no time," she tells him, clapping his arm and giving it a little shake, face broken out into a wide grin. Looking up towards the passenger seat, she asks, "How about you, Bozer, do you skate?"

"I do okay, not as good as you, though, I'd bet. Derby? Wow, I wish I couldn't seen that."

Riley just smiles wider, throwing the door open and already climbing out of the car by the time her answer floats over her shoulder. "Yeah, I was pretty great."

It's early in the operating hours of the rink, and there aren't many people there. Jack skates along easily, keeping pace with Bozer, who's sticking pretty close to the rink wall and doing okay, though wobbling every now and then. Ahead of them, Riley is doing the thing parents do with small children, skating backwards in front of Mac effortlessly, his hands held in hers as he teeters precariously along.

At first it took some convincing to get him to let her help, stubborn embarrassment coloring his cheeks, until Riley had made a pointed reference to the fact that he's a little tall for the cheese-triangle shaped PVC pipe walker-style aids they hand out to little kids. Mac caved then, allowing her to pull him out onto the varnished floor, going slow and giving patient pointers while he tried to figure out this new, unnatural kind of movement.

It's nice to see, both the encouraging smile on Riley's face and the determined frown on Mac's, the way their hands are locked together in the air between them as she guides him forward and he goes easily along and lets her. They've picked up a little speed by now, at least compared to where they'd started, and despite his initial reluctance, it's clear Mac is having fun.

"This was a good idea."

Apropos of nothing, Bozer's statement comes out of the clear blue sky. Jack turns his attention towards him and notes that he looks relaxed and happy. The tension is gone from his shoulders and Jack is reminded abruptly of the night before, of how Bozer had stood by the railing out on his back porch, hand pressed to his side and shook like he was moments from falling apart. He looks lightyears away from that upset, frightened young man now, and Jack allows himself a moment of indulgent, self-satisfied warmth at having played any part in pulling him away from that, dulling the pain of their impossible lives even for a few hours.

"Yeah," he agrees. "It was."

After a while, Jack starts to be able to tell that, while she displays absolutely no impatience with Mac and his slow but steady progress, Riley is absolutely itching to turn loose. He remembers watching her soar around the rink when she was younger, and knows how much she must want to now, and decides to step in and give her a break. With a nod to Bozer, he turns and skates over to them, coming smoothly to a stop next to where they've paused, Riley telling Mac something about the toe stop at the front of his skate.

"Why don't you let me take over for a while," he says, keeping his voice light and casual. "Show everybody here how a real pro does it."

Mac seems hesitant at the idea, eyes flicking back and forth between them, but any reluctance melts away from his face when he sees the way Riley's lights up at the idea. Jack holds out an arm towards him and Mac, though he pauses for a second when Riley starts to let go, eventually latches onto him, fingers digging into Jack's bicep while his other hand comes to clutch the sleeve at his forearm.

Once she's handed her charge off and is reasonably sure that Mac isn't about to topple over at any second, waiting for both he and Jack to giver her encouraging nods, Riley is gone. She's off like she was fired from a rocket, plastic wheels clacking against the floor as she gains momentum. It's a little dizzying to watch her go, hair flying out behind her and too-big shirt billowing in the wind generated by her quick acceleration, and the echo of her delighted laugh is like music in Jack's ears.

Back to their right somewhere, Bozer's deadpan, "Damn," expresses what Jack would assume they're all thinking, and Mac lets out a low whistle.

That's my girl, Jack thinks, happier in this moment than he thinks he has been in a long time.

After the switch, Bozer pulls on ahead of them while Jack takes it slow and easy, careful not to try and get Mac to go faster than he's able to. They're not even up to the speed Mac and Riley had reached, because while Jack is good he's not that good, and there's no way he'd be able to pull off skating backwards. He figures it's better to let them both find their equilibrium, taking it one moment at a time.

Not a minute later, Jack is distracted from the warm glow of watching Riley zoom around the far bend when Mac almost falls. There's a heart-stopping moment when the grip on his arm gets abruptly much tighter, Mac's legs nearly going out from under him in a sudden, panicked flail. Jack stops and uses the hand not currently seized in a vice grip to catch Mac easily by the wildly flapping elbow, steadying him and giving him a moment to calm. They're close enough now that Jack can feel the way he's breathing, quick and shallow. Startled, maybe even scared.

"It's okay," Jack says, keeping his voice carefully calm and steady. Reassuring. "I've got you. Not gonna let you fall, okay? Promise. I've got you."

The promise is about this particular moment, is about roller skating, but it's also not about roller skating at all. And Jack hopes that, when Mac briefly closes his eyes and nods, grip relaxing just slightly, his agreement is about something more than roller skating too.

When he makes eye contact with a striped-shirt wearing rink employee who gives him the universal raised eyebrow of 'do you need help,' Jack shakes his head slightly. It takes them just a few more moments of standing there, still, for Mac to get his bearings about him once more, hand slipping back away from Jack's to its original position at his sleeve. The flush on his face looks ashamed, maybe of the near-fall, or maybe of the adrenaline spike of panic it induced in him and how instinct led him to grab onto Jack's hand. Either way, Jack decides the best course of action is to breeze past it like nothing happened at all.

"Ready to keep going?" he asks, then thinks better of it, and tacks on, "You don't have to, you know. You can go sit down if you want. I'll go with you, we can count how many times Riley laps Bozer."

Even as he says it they're able to watch it happen. Riley slows as she rounds another curve, coming up behind Bozer to pull his sweatshirt hood over his head and half his face as she passes him. His indignant squawk and waving arms nearly send him crashing to the ground, but he keeps his balance and yanks the hood back down. Though it's obviously not possible, Bozer tries to catch up to her to enact some kind of retaliation, and Riley's laugh echoes as she easily evades him.

Watching this unfold, Mac chuckles, and then stands up a little straighter. He only sways slightly on his skates before steadying, his face determined again like Jack had seen before, when Riley had him by the hands, leading him around the rink.

"No," he says firmly. "Let's keep going."

By the time they're all tired out, milling around the collection of tables off the rink itself, Mac is actually doing pretty well. There's nothing, Jack would hazard a guess, watching he and Bozer walk over to return their skates, that Mac couldn't pick up if he put his mind to it.

From his left, doing up the laces of her street shoes, cheeks still bright and reddened from exercise and excitement, what Riley says in the moments they're left alone takes Jack by surprise.

"Do you remember the Pizza Palace?"

He looks down at her, absolutely no clue in his mind as to where she's going with this. "Remember it? Of course I remember it."

"It's right by here," Riley says, finishing doing up her shoe and standing up straight, meeting his eyes head-on with an expression that just barely fails to completely mask the vulnerability behind it. "And it's open. I checked."

"Are you…" What she's suggesting is obvious, but Jack still has a hard time believing it, and so he asks, "Are you sure?"

"Yes." Her voice is firm, like she's already had this conversation before in her head, already decided what she was going to say. "I'm sure."

Still, Jack wants to give her an out, and so he tries again, saying, "That's where we went…"

"Yeah." Nothing wavers in her words, though something goes softer in her expression, around her mouth and her eyes, and she looks younger now than she has since she stepped out of that car in Brazil. "I know. And I want to go there again, y'know. As a family."

If there had been a question before about their relationship, about whether the shift Jack was feeling was all in his head or if things really were getting easier between them, smoothing out into something like what he remembered and never dreamed he'd ever get back, that answered it completely. So he smiles at her, reaching up to take ahold of her shoulder, squeezing gently saying, "Okay. That sounds really nice."

When they get there, Jack doesn't really do much aside from stand back and watch. He doesn't know that he could if he tried, with so many memories washing over him, old and new. The feeling he'd felt that morning is back, the one from when he'd watched Mac walk out into the kitchen, haze of sleep still clinging to him. It's the feeling that for once, things were simple and easy and right.

Stood there at the stove, Jack had needed to look away sharply, overwhelmed in a sudden rush by the sound of Riley's teasing voice and Bozer's answering chuckle, the way the light had caught off Mac's blond hair and lit it up gold. He'd found himself thinking then, spatula in his hand and his eyes stinging in a way that had nothing to do with onions, of a job offer and a park, of Matty Webber handing him a cup of coffee and a folder.

What did you do to me, Matty? What did you get me into? Jack had thought, and he thinks it again now, watching Riley stand at the food counter with Mac and Bozer jostling each other behind her. What did you do to my life, and how can I ever repay you for that kind of gift?

They wave him over then, and he walks at a quick pace to join them, settling down in the seat left open next to Mac. Riley and Mac are locked in a debate across the table over whether it was possible to cheat at some game Jack hadn't even caught the name of, with Bozer acting as something of a referee who was taking turns ganging up on one or the other of them. It's a pointless, silly argument, exactly the kind of thing you should be getting into with your friends over a table littered with pizza and pop in dinged up plastic cups.

While their voices wash over him, Riley's rising abruptly into an indignant pitch when Mac flicks an ice cube at her, Jack gets a little distracted, attention sweeping out past their table and over the rest of the room. He does a scan in a force of habit, clocking exits and other patrons, making sure there's nothing going on around them that shouldn't be. Everything seems clear and he settles again, field instincts quieted for the moment. It's probably overly paranoid, but experience and a couple of different therapists have taught Jack by now that sometimes it's better to give in to some smaller impulses, if it helps preserve one's overall peace of mind.

From somewhere over to Jack's left there's a bright, happy sound, one that causes him to turn his head and look for the source. It's Mac. He's laughing, shoulders jerking unevenly and dimples etched into his grinning face. His eyes are shut closed, wrinkled at the corners with laughter lines, and suddenly, Jack can see it as clear as if it were right in front of him. The kid Mac had been, once upon a time, what he must have been like at three, seven, fourteen, nineteen years old. This thought turns into another like the pages of a novel, Jack indulging himself in a moment of vindictive, aching fantasy.

He looks over at the door across the room that leads out back onto the street and imagines opening it and stepping through into another decade, into a grief-empty house. He imagines looking at the child sitting alone on the couch, the little boy who'd just lost his mother, and deciding, Not this time. I'm not going to let this happen to you. Jack can see himself picking the child up and putting him in the backseat of the car, driving for the Canadian border and never looking back, stealing the kid he hadn't remotely known about back then into a different future, one where Jack wasn't so surprised to hear him laugh, loud and uninhibited, that for a moment he'd not even recognized the sound.

"Something on the wall over there, Jack?" The words are unsteady with the leftover trembling of breathless mirth, voice unmistakable.

Jack looks back and there's Mac, twenty-four years old, terrible scar carved into the side of his neck, the edge of it visible creeping up past his collar, worse damage still raw and exposed-nerve fresh invisible somewhere buried down inside him. Sitting across from Riley and Bozer, looking his age for once, he's everything he deserves the chance to be, young and happy, wearing Jack's bright green Stars hoodie and that bright dimpled smile.

"No," he says, smiling back at his partner and softly quelling the pang he feels as he dismisses the version of Mac he'd never known in favor of focusing on the one in front of him, the one he still might be able to help. "Nothing at all."