E-MAIL: [email protected]
RATING: G
SUMMARY: Sometimes the night brings forth thoughts
kept secret in the daytime....
CATEGORY: Daniel&Janet, POV
SPOILERS: Minor for FiaD, RoP
SEASON/SEQUEL: S5
STATUS: Complete
DISCLAIMER: "All publicly recognisable characters and
places are the property of MGM, World Gekko Corp and
Double Secret productions. This piece of fan fiction
was created for entertainment not monetary purposes
and no infringement on copyrights or trademarks was
intended. Previously unrecognised characters and
places, and this story, are copyrighted to the
author. Any similarity to real persons, living or
dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author."
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Don't ask me where this came from, it
made sense at the time ;)
Huge thanks and admiration to beta-goddess Kat.
"velevt" indeed
FEEDBACK: I get feedback -> I write more -> I post
more often -> list gets more 'Stranded'
DEDICATION:
For Saz. �.���`�.�.�.<�))))><.�. �.���`�.� The fish
still haunt me.
The room is dark as I lie awake in bed; shrouded in impenetrable midnight shadows, and blanketed in heavy silence. No streetlamp, no starlight penetrates the thick curtains shielding the world outside from view and no voices, no sounds of passing traffic float upwards from the streets below. The only noises I can hear are the soft whispers of my own breath and the steady echo of my heart, unusually loud in the encompassing stillness.
Abandoning all pretense of sleep, I throw back the covers and swing my legs frustratedly over the side of the bed. Standing slowly, stretching tired muscles wound too tight to allow me the oblivion of sleep, I make my way with easy familiarity through the blackness to the furthest cloaked window, stopping before the cushioned window-seat. Carefully I ease myself onto it, relying solely on touch to guide me. Kneeling on the padded surface, I reach up and pull the curtains aside just a fraction, and they finally relinquish the view outside to my tired eyes.
Below, the back garden is bathed in silver moonlight, dancing along the hedges and glittering among the tree leaves. Shadows skulk in corners, distorting shapes and creating eerie illusions on the ground. And above, clouds dyed deep blues and purples and greys drift across the face of the moon, fleeting and insubstantial as ghosts. The pale, shimmering orb itself hangs motionless in the sky, nestled comfortably amidst a blanket of stars, and my gaze is instinctively drawn to its gleaming face. As a child, like so many other children, I took comfort in the moon, in its presence. It represented something magical, something wondrous...stretching arms of light down from so far above my own little world, chasing the night away in its path. I loved the moon, loved the magic of it, loved the times when my mother would sit with me by the window in the darkness, and tell me stories. Even now, my eyes drifting half-shut, for a moment I can see the 'face' of the Man in the Moon...but it dissipates as quickly as it appeared. I smile a little, drawing my knees up to my chest and wrapping my arms around them, and lean back against the window frame. I stay like that for a few moments, before the silence surrounding me becomes too suffocating. I kneel up, grasp the handle, turn it slightly and push open the top half of the window, resting against the lower pane. Immediately the room is filled with the rustling whispers of the leaves in the breeze, and the sigh of the wind in the rooftops. The moon shines brighter than ever down upon me, no longer dulled by the reflections of the glass.
Sighing, I let my gaze drift beyond to the stars, glittering like shattered diamonds against the inky sky. The sight of them reminds me of my reason for being awake at such an hour, the reason sleep has evaded me for so long. Charting each recognisable constellation with my eyes, I can't help but marvel at the sheer number of them. Infinite stars; each star with a system of planets; billions of worlds. Some unexplored, forgotten, dead; others thriving with life and civilisations both familiar and unimaginably alien; a handful, somewhere, out there, playing host to teams of scientists and soldiers from Earth. And one, indistinguishable from those countless billions, on which four people sleep, or explore, or likely-as-not bicker. I smile again, thinking of my friends, immeasurably far away, yet virtually only a few seconds journey from home. My smile fades a little, becomes more wistful, as inevitably my thoughts turn to him. As they do, more and more frequently these days.
I'm not sure when it began, when I first noticed the attraction. Don't get me wrong, I liked him from the first moment I met him, even if my preliminary impression was that he was slightly...flaky. A little bemused, highly-strung, terribly accident-prone - he wasn't my usual type. Add to that the fact he was married and I was recently divorced, I wasn't looking for any kind of relationship beyond the standard doctor-patient. He was, I had supposed, a nice guy. He frequented the infirmary with alarming regularity, but, unlike most of the soldiers now entrusted to my medical care, he didn't complain about it constantly, or whine at every needle, or assume because I was female he was entitled to make every lewd comment he could come up with and not expect me to be *slightly* less delicate than normal during post-mission physicals. Gradually, I even began to look forward to seeing him, after he'd been patched up or regained consciousness, of course. He was remarkably good company, never out of a conversation topic, and genuinely friendly. It was he, I think, who made the original effort to integrate me partway into SG-1's tight-knit friendship. We spent so much time together that he naturally brought me further into his own circle.
With our fledgling friendship, however, I began to notice a subtle change in my own way of looking at him. He's an extremely attractive man, with the most brilliant, piercing blue eyes I've ever seen, and a gentle but strong manner under his initial 'geekish' appearance; and even that began to fade noticeably with time. I started to anticipate his visits to the infirmary, catch myself checking my hair or make-up briefly before I talked to him. Several times one of the nurses would startle me out of a daydream or fantasy, and I'd have to work hard to cover up the guilty blush I felt creeping across my face. I tried, I really did try, to pass it off as a brief crush or a phase...but crushes are for schoolgirls and a grown woman but me had no excuses. It was difficult, to hide from the truth, when I saw him so often. Occasionally, I'd swear I saw him glance at me, almost scrutinisingly, or with a dark hint in those eyes. But, I reminded myself that he was a married man, and fought against my own growing confusion of feelings. When his wife died, that all changed. He grieved for a long time...but I think part of him had already known that she wouldn't be coming back to him. And, eventually, with the support of his friends, the support of the SGC, he continued.
Things are different, though, and I think we both sense it. Or perhaps it is just me. Perhaps I'm just being overly sensitive, reading too much into something that's barely there. Yet...somehow, I know I'm not. I know that there *is* something; something in the way he looks at me, the way he talks to me, the way he took my hand when my daughter was ill...I *know* there's *something*...
I also know that it's far too late to be thinking these thoughts.
Yawning, I drag my heavy eyes from the twinkling stars and their invisible worlds, tear my thoughts away from him. And as I do, my gaze once again come to rest on the moon, dipping lower in the deep velvet blue of the sky now, so long have I sat here thinking. And I smile again. Out there, in the vast heavens above me, he might wander strange stars; but for now I have the moon to watch over me and dispel the shadows, and that's enough.
I rise from my place by the window and stretch, feeling sleep approaching to overtake me. Stepping away from the window, I gently pull it shut, and reach for the curtains to again wrap the room in darkness. But I pause, let the material fall from my hands and stand, bathed in pale moonlight for a few moments longer; before turning away and walking along the silvery trail of light, cast upon my floor, to bed.
~Finis~
Copyright 2002 Nike A. Johnston
E-MAIL: [email protected]
Back