Prompt from Anon (sentence meme): "I wish you could see yourself the way I see you" and/or "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have kissed you."
Once again, I decided to combine both of the prompts AND I also used the same AU from Chapter 4, so it picks up almost right after where I left that drabble off. Happy reading!
Two hours and a couple of glasses of champagne later, Jemma was relaxing in a ratty pink lawn chair while Fitz fiddled with the lens on the telescope. The midnight sky loomed above them, black speckled with tiny bursts of lights glittering above the glass ceiling of the planetarium's observatory. Wisps of grey occasionally blocked Fitz's view through the telescope, making him grumble as he continued to try and focus the lenses, positioning and re-positioning the instrument so that they could have a clear, uninterrupted view of the constellations as they waited.
"I'm telling you, it says right here that the meteor shower is going to start in approximately ten minutes!" Jemma tapped her astronomy pamphlet excitedly with her index finger.
"I know, you've been telling me about it ever since we left the park," Fitz replied, and Jemma swore she detected a slight eye-roll in his tone. "You know, if you had told me earlier, we could've watched it from the park bench together."
"It's so peaceful up here though! No bothersome, unnecessary light pollution, no drunk people clamoring outside the club…" Her voice trailed off into the distance and she smiled. "It's just the two of us up here, looking at the stars."
"Yeah, you're even lucky I could get us up here in the first place," Fitz chuckled. "Phil doesn't let just anyone use his telescope, especially after-hours when the planetarium is closed. He gave me full access to his lab and the observatory ever since I started helping him with his research."
"How is that going, by the way?" Jemma asked, pouring herself yet another flute of champagne. She knew she was probably over her limit by now, but after the hell of a night she just had…she deserved it. Or, that's what she had cemented in her head before buying the bottle in the first place.
"Pretty good, actually." Fitz peeked into the telescope again and growled in frustration when he saw that yet another cloud had obstructed his view. "Professor Coulson said he might've had a breakthrough. Like he might be able to prove that gravitational waves actually exist."
"Seriously?" She took a sip from her glass before setting it down beside the chair and standing up to join him. "That's huge! It could prove what Einstein was theorizing before about them being transports of gravitational radiation!"
Fitz paused his tinkering to raise his eyebrow at Jemma. "You've been reading my aerospace magazines again, haven't you?"
"Well, biology isn't always what it's cracked up to be!" Jemma huffed. "Is it so wrong to be curious about other scientific phenomena?"
"Of course it isn't!" Fitz exclaimed. "I was just surprised, that's all. We've been living together for three years now and you never told me you were interested in astronomy."
Not exactly, until you and your brilliant aerospace engineering mind waltzed into my life.
Jemma shrugged her shoulders. "I've always had a fascination for things that lie outside our reach. I had scoliosis surgery when I was a child and while I was healing, my dad used to wheel me out of the hospital at night to look at the stars. He would point out all the constellations for me and he even gave me a book all about them when I was released from the hospital."
Fitz stared at the wonderment that filled her eyes as she gazed at the sky above, and he couldn't help but marvel at her yellow dress flowing gracefully around her figure and the stunning gold earrings bringing out the dirty-blonde highlights in her wavy brown hair, which she had taken out of her bobby pins before arriving at the planetarium. "That must've been really nice," he mumbled, looking away before she noticed his stare.
Knowing that his father had left him and his mum when he was only nine years old, she rested a sympathetic hand on his. "It was. I still have the book in my book shelf back at home."
Jemma attempted to wipe away the downcast look that had appeared on Fitz's face by sliding her fingers though the spaces of his free hand. "But what you're doing is so much cooler!" she chirped. "You're building a satellite, for crying out loud. And you're being funded by NASA to complete your design! While I'm…"
Her figure appeared to deflate, as if someone had just punched her in the stomach, as her excitement suddenly dissipated. "While my adviser doesn't even seem to remember that I exist."
A burst of warmth flooded through her chest as Fitz's hand squeezed hers gently. "Are you sure you can't switch advisers?" he asked. "You don't deserve to be helped by someone that doesn't respect you."
Jemma sighed. "The other professor that specializes in cancer biology is on sabbatical until we graduate and I thought John Garrett would be the only person that understood my work. He's one of the most famous oncologists in the U.S."
"Yeah, a famous scientist who's a misogynist pig that thinks every woman he takes under his wing is eventually going to cry and quit on him," Fitz muttered. She looked at him, surprised, and he shrugged his shoulders. "Or at least that's what I've heard from some of the other students."
"Leopold Fitz, I never thought I'd see the day where you actually listened to other people's gossip," Jemma teased, nudging his shoulder.
"Only when it concerns you," he replied, prompting a faint blush to rise in her cheeks.
She let go of his hand and crossed her arms in front of her as she leaned against the metal railing that prevented them from lifting the telescope off of its pedestal. "I know he doesn't have a personal issue with me, but still…I feel like my work isn't good enough for him. Or anyone, for that matter."
"Hey…" Fitz's voice trailed off as he saw a lone tear run down her cheek, and he used his thumb to wipe it away. "It's okay. Someone will recognize your work someday. It takes time for geniuses to be discovered."
A soft laugh escaped her through the tears. "You really think I'm a genius?"
"Of course. This is the second Ph.D. you're going for, isn't it?"
She nodded. "I just wish you could see yourself the way I see you," he said as he tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
"Oh yeah?" Her blush deepened and she was suddenly too self-conscious to even look at his expression of utter adoration. "How do you see me?"
"You're…a star." His eyes fell once again upon her dress. "A tiny but important contributor to the composition of the universe."
Jemma followed his eyes and her face lit up in understanding. "Ohh, I see where you're going with this," she laughed. "Astronomy pun, I got it. Because I look like a star."
He grinned and shook his head. "Hey, we're in a planetarium, I couldn't help myself." Acting on the gravitational attraction pulling him towards her, he stepped closer until he could feel the tips of their toes touching. "But I'm not taking the metaphor back."
Jemma shifted nervously in place and was about to respond when Fitz closed the gap between them. Startled, she inhaled through her nose sharply before relaxing into the kiss, instinctively moving her hand to stroke the stubble on his face.
When they broke apart, Fitz's eyes widened and he froze. "I-I'm sorry, I shouldn't have kissed you," he stammered. "This is barely even a date and I got caught in the moment and-"
She cut off his excuses with a kiss of her own. "I think if I promote you from 'pretend boyfriend' to 'actual boyfriend,' this definitely counts as a date."
This caused Fitz to grin widely and he nuzzled his nose against hers in his excitement. "Well, let's make it one, then. As soon as I can find the right spot to position the telescope…"
He barely even got the sentence out of his mouth when a bright light flashed over their heads. "Fitz!" Jemma gasped. "It's starting! Let's go!"
She grabbed his hand and dragged him towards the staircase. "Wait, what happened to watching the shower from here?" Fitz protested.
"What's more romantic, sitting here on ratty lawn chairs or making out underneath a meteor shower?"
Oh…so that's where this is going.
"You've got a good point," he agreed quickly, deciding to forgive her for her hypocrisy for the time being as they rushed down the stairs together.
I'm still in college and know nothing about graduate school yet (even though I will start applying to some in about six months or so), so apologies if I got any of those details wrong!