Relations and Realizations

River debated, because no bunk had actually been assigned to Darwhen yet. It was late enough that she could probably sleep most of the night through. But two of the other bunks slept couples, now. Inara's old shuttle still held all her old work-related and delicate items, as well as some general storage – and no bed. The passenger dorm was empty, but it seemed certain to River that the traumatized little girl shouldn't be put in a strange new space alone. Jayne's bunk seemed out of the question. Zoë had already refused.

That left only River's bunk, and that was where she led Jayne. She had to open the hatch one-handed, drop her crutches down, and then hop down the ladder on one foot, but she made it. Jayne, following her, had it easier; he just slung Darwhen over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, leaving his hands free till he reached the bottom. The child stirred and mumbled incoherently and then settled again. He crowded close behind River to get around her in the small area; she absorbed the feel of him there, in her space, breathing him in.

She pulled back the blanket on her thin mattress and watched with absorption as Jayne laid his burden down. She had never seen him like this. He was too awkward to be gentle, she couldn't call it that, but he was careful, even straightening legs and adjusting the broken arm so it lay correctly against the sling. He must have done a passable job, because Darwhen slept throughout the process. Jayne straightened away and River brought the covers back up, tucking them in around small shoulders. For a moment they stood side by side, saying nothing. There was something in the silence that was new, and fragile, and River didn't know how to handle it. So she broke it.

"I have no practical experience, but I believe children of this age generally take a small rest period in the afternoon hours. She slept long this morning because of the drugs. But tomorrow maybe we – I – should institute a naptime?"

Jayne squinted his lower eyelids in a way that wrinkled the skin over his nose. River stared at the lines it made and felt how he dominated the room, taking up more than just space and air.

"Don't know 'bout that," he contradicted her, stepping around her to the exit, "my cousin's kid never took a nap when I was home last. Was runnin' and screamin' the whole day long. Like to made me as moony as you are."

River pursed her lips. "Incorrect simile, Jayne. I am no longer so crazy, or as unbalanced as I was. I am capable of rational choices and decisions and of making a meaningful contribution to this family."

"This family? You talkin' 'bout the crew?"

River nodded impatiently.

"Well, all right. Crazy as ya used to be, then. Happy now?"

"Contented." She grinned at him under the diffuse bunk lighting, feeling sharp and soft at the same time.

"Great. Since we're all shiny, I'll be leavin' now. Moonbrain." Laughing, Jayne suited action to word before she could gainsay his label. He left, leaving her to breath in the absence of him. It left the room hollow.

River thought back over the conversation she'd eavesdropped on in the cargo bay. Although some would judge his explanations theologically inaccurate, she found them a credible attempt to help a child in pain, no matter his ridiculous endeavour to convince River that his motives were otherwise. And he actually believed what he'd said to Darwhen, which differentiated him from the caretakers of her childhood who told her things they knew to be untrue, about Saint Klaus, or all the eligible males who would one day fall in love with her. There was still such resentment in her, when she thought about those past caretakers who had done nothing to prepare her for what would actually come. And the economically successful parents who failed at what should have been their most vital job.

Jayne was nothing like any of those falsified, posturing people. He was genuine and had much more substance than flash. Her past had been full of ready-made pastry-people, sugar and cardboard. Jayne was whole grain bread, a little gritty but nutrient-rich.

It was no difficulty knowing which she preferred.

Late the next day, Darwhen was with Kaylee in the engine room, being shown what was safe to touch and what was not. Simon's wife had taken to the girl the minute she'd met her, and started in cooing and smiling and other things that brought a disgusted expression to Darwhen's face.

There had had been nightmares of water and brokenness and lostness the night before as Serenity sat on her home planet, and Darwhen awakened screaming. River, sleeping on the floor of her bunk, had had the nightmares right along with her and woke at the same time. Having them at one remove allowed her to become oriented more quickly than the little girl. So she'd tried to hold her and sooth her. It took awhile, but she'd gone back to sleep in the middle of a half-remembered, half-spontaneous story about a princess and an ugly duck who was the princess's brother in disguise.

Darwhen had been River's shadow all that day. About mid-morning things had finally gotten the better of her and she'd run to River's bunk, pressed into a corner, and began to sob for her mother. River followed, hesitant at first, but Darwhen didn't object to her approach and they ended up curled around each other crying. Mal was aware and let them be. Some things could only be helped by tears.

Darwhen fell asleep with tear tracks on her cheeks, and River called Jayne to come and carry her up out of her bunk. She had him place her on the common room couch so that she wouldn't wake up alone. She wasn't sure if it was human intuition or Reading that told her the aloneness wouldn't be a good thing, but whatever it was she trusted it. Jayne and River sat quietly discussing the merits of different oil viscosities and doing part of a scheduled gear check while Darwhen slept. River's mind was running on more than one track, though, and Jayne could tell. Her eyes kept straying to the waif on the couch.

"She wouldn't talk," River said suddenly, not startling him because he knew that whatever was bothering her would come out eventually. "She was just a fountain of tears. Humans need to talk, explain, exchange. How can she have comfort if she won't communicate? She's little, for a human, but … a human's a human, no matter how small."

Jayne smirked, recognizing the skewed quote from an ancient kid's book his mother used to read him, one he'd dug up on the cortex a time that River had been lamenting her lack of childhood.

"There's small comfort to be had from strangers," he said to her now. "Might be you remember that. Give her time to get to know us, before expectin' her to open up wide an' let everybody see her secrets."

At one point it wouldn't have occurred to River that Jayne would understand about secrets, he being such a seemingly open person with his thoughts. Now she just nodded and catalogued the wisdom under 'Jayne's Truths'. It was a surprisingly large file.

Later, only the curious mysteries of the engine room were enough to steal Darwhen from River's side. River found herself oddly restless, alone in her bunk. She couldn't identify the reason, at first, until she turned to show the drawing she'd just finished to Darwhen and realized the little girl wasn't there. She frowned sightlessly at the space where she should have been. Then she left the drawing lying on the bed while she padded out into the corridor.

Her feet followed an inclination she didn't want to inspect too closely, one based on the time of day. Some people were quite predictable in their routines, although his were confined to the premises of Serenity. Dirtside, she'd heard him say more than once, routine could get you killed.

He was there, as she'd known he would be, lifting himself up and down in a mind-free exertion of the type he liked. Though at one time she'd tried not to, she'd long since given in to liking it too; always an intensely physical man, Jayne was most purely elemental in these times. Much of his mental activity was focused on what his body was doing; this muscle, that one, heart rate and breathing. He did keep his awareness, of the open hatchways and material space around him. But he could almost completely shut down everything else. She envied him that and reveled in the peace of it. He became vitally corporeal and basic and sometimes she yearned to be that with him.

A gust of breath, a sigh, ghosted over the hair on the backs of Jayne's hands and they clenched a little, at that proof of River's nearness. She was prone on the grating above him, staring like she did, watching him.

Since they'd been partnering, they'd both developed senses about where the other was on jobs. They had to know what direction to provide cover for, where to lay down fire. But that had recently evolved into something more for Jayne. He'd known she was there, had known every time she watched him work out for the past few weeks. He'd become so aware of her he didn't have to see or hear a thing when she entered a room. He'd know, and if he turned, there she'd be. Today she'd crept in silent as ever, and he'd traced every step as she climbed, came nearer and nearer, then stretched herself out right above him.

"Mountain man," she breathed. "Man mountain." He frowned. She could still spout the oddest things, when she wanted to.

River breathed. She noticed it wasn't in rhythm with his. She wondered what his chest would feel like, rising and falling against the movement of hers, unsyncopated; doing just that, no sparring or practicing. Just breathing, together. Heat spiraled through her at the thought and she had to leave, had to get away from its source. She got up abruptly and headed for the engine room to collect Darwhen.

Jayne let himself watch her leave, her orange skirt drifting about and behind, the last part of her that he saw. When she was fully gone, he was still looking after, staring at that empty patch in the doorway.

-------

It took until midway through the next day to locate the nearest village, for it was well hidden from fly-overs. Even then, they didn't really locate it, just its remains. It had been situated in a side canyon from Darwhen's, but the water had still reached it, and it and was apparently even smaller and less equipped to deal with the deluge that had swept over it. It was in a widened out-bend, though, and the water had receded into its original course in the time they took to find it. They buried what bodies they could find, and salvaged what few goods there were.

Dinner that night was rather subdued. There were too many images of pulverized buildings and brokenness for anyone to be able to make light talk.

Jayne took a huge bite of protein and regarded the kid who was seated across from him while he chewed it. She looked up and swallowed her own bite.

"How come you gots a girl's name?" she asked.

Jayne grunted. Beside him, River giggled. He glared sideways at her, with no effect.

Simon laughed. "Now … where have I heard that before?"

Jayne shifted the focal point of his glare. When no answer seemed forthcoming, Darwhen chewed and swallowed and was on to her next question.

"Are you forgived?"

Now Jayne just stared.

"What?"

"Are you forgived," Darwhen emphasized impatiently. "Like you said before."

"Forgived for what?"

"For the bad things you do. If I do get to go to heaven will you be there?" Her eyes were bright and earnest. The kid was obsessed with heaven. 'Course, considering what she'd just been through, he didn't suppose that was terribly odd.

Beside him, Jayne could feel River quivering with laughter. Wo de ma, he wished he'd never started on the heaven thing at all. Religion was all well and good, but it could get you into trouble too, sure enough.

"How d' ya know I do bad things?" he challenged Darwhen. Mal snorted. Heads shook all around the table. Even Inara rolled her eyes. The oppressive air in the room had suddenly lightened.

"You said," Darwhen asserted. "Everybody does." Oh, yeah. He had told her everybody did wrong. River was still laughing.

He pushed his leg against hers to send a message to shut up. It seemed to work; she was instantly still. "If I ask for it, I'm as forgiven as anyone else," Jayne told Darwhen belligerently. He left his leg where it was. Felt good. "'n I have done some right bad things."

"Never doubt it," Mal advised Darwhen solemnly. Her return nod was just as grave. Inara had to duck her head to hide her smile.

Darwhen's face looked worried, though. Jayne shifted in his seat. His thigh slid along River's smaller one. He thought he heard a quiet gasp from her.

"If I can get forgiveness, it's sure that you can." He was continuing, after a nasty face at Mal. "So you ain't gotta worry none 'bout yer own. You listenin' t' me, girl?"

Darwhen nodded, her face thoughtful.

Mal leaned over to Inara, to speak in a stage whisper. "Is our mercenary channeling Shepherd Book?"

There was bemusement in the air over the rest of the crew. Kaylee broke it with a laugh. Simon shook his head and stared around the table as if looking for anyone else was having reality issues. Zoë's brows were up. Inara tilted her head speculatively, her hand on Mal's arm.

Simon's sister was looking rather fixedly at Darwhen. Simon probably supposed that she was trying to Read whatever it was in the child that inspired Jayne to such heights.

He was wrong, of course.

River was too busy trying to keep her head above the sensations spilling in from where Jayne touched her. The side of him was hard and warm. Just skin just bone just muscle she told herself. Felt them before. She stared at her own hand clenched just a bit too tightly around her water glass. The mere touch of his leg shouldn't batter at her so.

River had known she reacted to Jayne's touch in a singular fashion. Touch was a tricky and intimate, complicated and awkward thing, for her. And she'd always found Jayne's to be the most so. Therefore it was good it hardly ever happened … mostly when she was hurt and needed his support, or he was and needed hers. A time or two, there'd been a hand on her shoulder. She could count them all up, every instance over a four-year period.

This was new, though. His leg was just there, touching, and he didn't move it away. Two layers of cloth, then skin and skin, muscle against muscle. She drew in a long breath and took a bite. Why didn't he move it? It was greatly disturbing to her equilibrium.

" … River?"

She suddenly realized Mal had asked her a question and she had no idea what it was.

"Please repeat the question," she asked. There was heat in her cheeks. "I was distracted."

"Yeah, well, Jayne did the same thing to the rest of us," Mal allowed.

Oh, I don't think so. In that instant more than ever before River was grateful for the control she'd gained over what her brain sent out her mouth.

Jayne's leg shifted against hers again, quite deliberately this time. Her fingers clamped on her spoon. He took a bite of his food. She swallowed. His pants-covered calf slid over too, and rubbed. River twitched in her seat. Jayne's hand descended from the table and landed on her thigh. River shot to her feet.

Now she was the focus of all eyes. She ignored them, trying to still her frantic heart. Frowning, she collected her still half-full plate and utensils, deliberately; deposited them in the sink, slowly; and exited the room without hearing Simon's call after her.

Jayne narrowed his eyes at his plate. Now, that had been all kinds of interesting.

Mother of God