SGA Fic: Four Things Greater Than All Things Are
By lunch hour on Friday, Teyla was already counting the minutes until the last school bell announced the arrival of the weekend. She already had four classes under her belt for the day. American History with Mr. O’Neill was always fun (despite a pop quiz and Rodney’s constant complaints that he shouldn’t have to learn American history since he was actually Canadian). Mr. O’Neill had allowed them to play a form of Jeopardy he’d invented that involved teams running to the blackboard to see who could write the correct answer first. It occasionally became a full contact sport (and it had almost been banned once after Ronon had given Peter Grodin a black eye in his enthusiasm to get to the board first) but Teyla thought the game was one of Mr. O’Neill’s better ideas since it got everyone moving and wore off some of their ‘the weekend can’t come fast enough’ malaise.
Choir had been next (which she enjoyed), then Pre-Calculus with Mr. Lee (which she did not), followed by AP Senior Lit (which she liked every day but Friday when listening to Dr. Jackson’s lectures became more about trying to follow his non-sequiturs than about understanding the material). Those three classes had gone by only slightly faster than a snail’s pace, and she did not have much hope for her last two classes of the day - Physics with Miss Carter and Psychology with Mr. Woolsey.
When the lunch bell rang halting Dr. Jackson’s lecture on the use of euphemisms as adjectives in their papers (“While I’m glad you liked Brave New World, Dylan, calling it ‘the shiznit’ is not the best way to express that.”), she grabbed her lunch from her locker, made her way to the cafeteria, and gratefully collapsed into the chair next to John.
“Killer day, huh?” he said with a sympathetic glance.
She opened her bag of potato chips and popped one in her mouth before she said, “It has been very long, and we are not even halfway through the day.”
Rodney paused in eating, his spork halfway to his mouth, to say, “Hey, are we going to Pegasus Freeze after school today? Zelenka told me they’ve got a new ice cream flurry flavor - a chocolate-covered strawberry one.”
“You’re thinking about eating while you’re eating?” Ronon asked, giving Rodney an incredulous look.
“Hey, we’re talking about flurries here,” Rodney argued. “There is always room for a flurry.” He looked to John and Teyla for support. “Am I right or am I right?” He snorted. “Of course I’m right.”
John turned to Teyla. “Why are we even here if he can hold the conversation by himself?”
Teyla laughed before she answered Rodney’s question. “I cannot. I am babysitting for Kayla and Tessa after school.”
“Ugh,” Rodney said around a mouthful of mashed potatoes. “Babysitting.”
“Babysitting is the reason I can go to the Pegasus Freeze at all,” Teyla told him.
“Still,” Rodney muttered. “Ugh.” He pointed his spork at John. “What about you? Pegasus Freeze?”
“Can’t. I’ve got a thing.”
“A thing? What kind of thing?”
John deliberately moved his Hostess snack cake away from Ronon’s reach before he said, “Just a thing. It’s no big deal.”
“No big deal? Then why won’t you tell us?” He stared at John through narrowed eyes. “You’re being mysterious. What are you hiding?”
John glared at him. “Drop it, McKay.”
“Fine. It’s dropped,” Rodney said with a huffy sigh before going back to his mashed potatoes.
A moment of silence descended before Ronon said, “Aren’t you going to ask me if I can go?”
“You’ve never turned down a trip to Pegasus Freeze,” Rodney replied, his tone making it clear that the question was idiotic and it pained him considerably to have to answer it. It was a tone that Teyla was sure they were all familiar with, to the point where it no longer seemed like an insult, but rather a natural extension of Rodney’s personality.
Ronon thought about that for a moment, shrugged, and said, “True.”
*
Teyla rushed out of school as soon as the last bell rang, stopping only long enough to grab her things from her locker and to promise Rodney that they would go to Pegasus Freeze on Saturday.
She stopped at home to grab her bag of activities for the girls before heading over to the Hammond residence.
After greeting her cheerfully, Mrs. Hammond said, “Teyla, I’m terribly sorry to do this to you, but I forgot that Kayla has her riding lesson this afternoon at 4:00. Would you mind bringing her? It’s only twenty minutes from here and they have a very nice waiting room for the parents if you don’t want to sit and watch.”
“I do not mind,” Teyla assured her.
Mrs. Hammond beamed. “Perfect. I left the directions on the counter for you. And I’ll give you some money for Pegasus Freeze on the way back. How does that sound, girls?”
Seven year-old Tessa and eleven year-old Kayla voiced their approval in octaves that Teyla was sure could only be reached by young girls and, occasionally, Rodney when a bee flew too close to him.
“Thank you again, Teyla,” said Mrs. Hammond once the noise had died down. She gave her daughters quick kisses on her way out the door. “My husband won’t be back until late tonight, but I should be home by eight. Have a good time, girls!”
*
The Atlantis Riding Academy was on the west side of town, an area Teyla had only been to once before but she had no trouble finding the academy - a sprawling complex of stables, paddocks, and grazing pastures.
Teyla glanced at her watch when they got out of the car. “We are a little early. Do you want to show me your horse and where you ride?”
“Yeah!” said Kayla, and quickly led Teyla toward the stables.
An older woman met them at the entrance to one of the barns. She smiled a greeting. “Good afternoon, Kayla. Ready for your lesson?”
Kayla smiled back. “Hi, Mrs. Langford. I wanted to show my babysitter my pony. She’s never been here before.”
“Oh, well, welcome to Atlantis Riding Academy,” Mrs. Langford said to Teyla. “Feel free to look around while I take Kayla back to tack up her pony.” She pointed to a far paddock where a trainer was instructing a rider. “We’ll be over there if you want to sit on the benches to watch the lesson. John is just finishing up over there.” She smiled. “He’s working with one of our more advanced students on her jumping; she has a horse show coming up next weekend, and he’s helping her with her technique. It’s fun to watch.”
“Can we, Teyla?” Tessa said, staring with bright eyes at the distant horse and rider as they sailed over a brightly colored fence.
“All right,” Teyla agreed. She let Tessa drag her a few paces, before she called back to Mrs. Langford. “Excuse me, ma’am. Did you say ‘John’?”
The older woman turned back. “I certainly did. John Sheppard - he was one of my best students before he quit the show circuit. Do you know him?”
“I thought I did,” Teyla said as a slow smile began to blossom.
“Come on, Teyla,” Tessa said. She gave Teyla’s arm a sharp tug. “I want to see the horse jumping.”
“All right,” Teyla said again. She allowed herself to be dragged over to the far paddock, and climbed up on the top bench of the bleachers to watch.
Sure enough, there was John Sheppard standing in the middle of the ring, calling out instructions to the girl on horseback. Teyla didn’t know much about riding but she thought that the girl - a couple years younger than herself - was excellent, and the picture that she and her horse made as they soared over a jump was graceful and confident. John, however, found corrections to make with nearly every jump.
“Keep your eyes forward, Julie,” he called as she cantered towards the next jump. “You look down and you’re gonna bury him in the jump...Ease up on the reins…Good.” Julie cantered her horse once more around the ring before slowing him to a trot and finally halting in front of John.
Teyla turned to her young charge who still look enthralled by the jumping. “I am going to say ‘hello’ to my friend. Do you want to wait here?”
Tessa nodded, and Teyla jumped off the bleachers and walked up to the paddock fence. She could hear John still giving Julie a few tips as he absentmindedly patted her horse’s shoulder.
“And make sure you keep your weight centered at the top of the jump,” he was saying, bringing his hands up like he was going over a jump. He slid his torso slightly to one side. “If you shift your center of balance Garnet’s going to get off-balance, too. You want to fold straight down and back up again,” John said, bending his knees and folding his torso forward to demonstrate the movement. “Got it?”
Julie nodded, and John gave the horse one last pat. “You’ll do fine,” he assured her with a smile. The girl thanked him, dismounted, and led her horse away.
“So this is why you could not go to Pegasus Freeze after school,” Teyla called from the fence.
John turned around slowly. There was a brief look of horror on his face before it slid into an uncomfortable smile. “What are you doing here, Teyla?”
“Babysitting,” she replied. She leaned forward, propping her arms on the top rail of the fence. “Kayla takes lessons here. And you - you are a teacher?”
John walked towards her. “When football season’s over…” He trailed off with a narrowed-eyed look. “I’m not sure I should be telling you this.”
“And why is that?”
“You might use it against me.”
Teyla smirked. “If you had been wearing those tight riding pants, I would do.” She shrugged. “But it is your secret to keep or not as you see fit.”
John sighed. “I teach a class after football season’s done. But I used to compete in show jumping, so they call me in once in a while to give the kids pointers.”
“I did not know you used to ride.”
“That’s kind of the point. No one does.”
Teyla could not fathom why he did not want anyone to know about this side of him. If they found out, Rodney and Ronon would mock him for a while but it would be good-natured ribbing. If this was important to him, they would understand; that’s what friends did, after all. But for some reason that Teyla could not figure out, John seemed to feel that he had a sacred image to uphold for the rest of the school: the macho football captain whom all the boys wanted to be like and all the girls wanted to be with. That image he’d cultivated so carefully was not the John Sheppard she knew, but if he wanted to pretend for a while longer, who was she to point out how ridiculous the charade was? He would figure it out soon enough, and perhaps the lesson would be more valuable for having learned it on his own.
“Well, I hope you will show me your skills someday,” Teyla said with a smile. “Mrs. Langford seemed to think very highly of you.”
“Maybe,” he said, but his tone made it sound like she would have a long time to wait before the ‘someday’ arrived. John bit his lower lip then said, “You’re not going to tell Rodney and Ronon, are you?”
“Tell them what?”
John’s smile was grateful. “Thanks.”
“Do not mention it.”
They both noticed Mrs. Langford leading Kayla into the paddock on a chestnut pony. John climbed over the fence and followed Teyla back up to where Tessa was sitting.
“We’re going to Pegasus Freeze,” Tessa told him when they had sat down.
“Cool,” he said. “Can I come?”
“Okay,” Tessa agreed. “But only if Teyla says it’s all right.”
“It is all right with me,” Teyla said. She exchanged a grin with John. “But it is probably best we do not tell Rodney. He might never forgive us.”
Fin
* The title is taken from a quote by Rudyard Kipling’s The Ballad of the King’s Jest:
‘Four things greater than all things are -
Women and Horses and Power and War’