Ficlet - The Way. PG.
A sort of a followup to Annoyance. I don't want to tie kahvi's lovely story arc into this angsty thing, though, so maybe think of it as an AU? It's just that Stoke Me A Clipper tugged at my sleeve and cleared its throat after I wrote Annoyance. Thanks to her for one of the images.
Crit is always good. Written for fanfic100. Little Damn Table.
All right, you smegger. If that's the way yeh want it.
I tried, I did. I put up with yer neuroses, yer meanness, yer snidiness, yer stupid smegging anal-retentive ways. I even cleaned up a bit, myself, throwing out the clothes that was too stained to ever get clean. I lost a little weight, since you was always callin' me fat. Who knows why I did, after all. Did I expect yeh to change, if I did? Be a better person, be a real man instead of a steaming, smeggy pile of hangups? Ya showed me but good. I woulda been better off hunting down frog-GELFs and seeing if smooching one of them would turn it inno a prince. You sure didn't turn into anything good after I kissed ya.
There were times, ya know, when I thought you had. When you would come back and lie in bed after you thought I was asleep. You coulda walked out and slept in yer own too-clean bunk - you sterilized it every morning, I swear ya did. But you'd climb into my bunk and hold me close, and it felt so warm and comfortable, like I belonged in the crook of yer arm. I thought I might be happy doin' that for the rest of my life. Yeah, hunt down Red Dwarf, get back to Earth, and I could have all sorts of animals. I'm guessin' you don't like 'em, so I woulda tended 'em, and you coulda rode a horse wearing - I dunno, a white suit or summit. And we coulda slept close at night, when it got cold. Not a bad life, eh?
I shoulda seen it even back then, though. The way you'd get up before I did, not wakin' me - maybe you went to soft-light so I wouldn't. I'd wake up with a dent in the bunk next to me, and when I went to the midsection for brekkie, you'd be there, all snarky and nasty. Actin' like we didn't spend the night before shaggin' each others' brains out. I'd try to catch yer eye and see a little of that, but you'd never look right at me.
And then you stopped comin'.
I came by yer room a few times - you must have heard me knock. And I slowly got the idea that you was sitting on your bunk every time I did, not sayin' nothin', just wishing as hard as you could for me to go away. So what was all of this, eh, Rimmer? Just a lapse? Just a little not-enough-sex bit of frustration you got out, then didn't need anymore? Did you think about alla the stuff your crazy family used to say, and convinced yerself that it was just a hologrammatic glitch? Well, whatever it was, I got the idea. I got the smegging idea. If you could just sit there in yer bunk while the pipes rotutted and squeenookled their way through another cold shower of mine, me tryin' to forget that I was a man with a man's needs, and that you had a body that could satisfy those so well - yeah, if you could just sit there countin' your toes through that, I guess it never really meant nothin' to you at all.
So fecking what. I don't care. I have my AR - yeah, Ahhhnold, my smegging AR. You can go back to Rachel. I have my programs and my cheat codes. Who needs ya, anyway?
Still. I wish I coulda made you change. Sometimes I wonder what it would take to make ya change. For the better, and all. Sometimes, I would see something come through, when we was kissin', before we got to the main event (as it were). Somethin' good. Hell, somethin' lovely. Somethin'... almost like Ace. I couldn't pull that out, but man - I wish I could find what would.
It'd be worth all this heartache, it would.
Crit is always good. Written for fanfic100. Little Damn Table.
All right, you smegger. If that's the way yeh want it.
I tried, I did. I put up with yer neuroses, yer meanness, yer snidiness, yer stupid smegging anal-retentive ways. I even cleaned up a bit, myself, throwing out the clothes that was too stained to ever get clean. I lost a little weight, since you was always callin' me fat. Who knows why I did, after all. Did I expect yeh to change, if I did? Be a better person, be a real man instead of a steaming, smeggy pile of hangups? Ya showed me but good. I woulda been better off hunting down frog-GELFs and seeing if smooching one of them would turn it inno a prince. You sure didn't turn into anything good after I kissed ya.
There were times, ya know, when I thought you had. When you would come back and lie in bed after you thought I was asleep. You coulda walked out and slept in yer own too-clean bunk - you sterilized it every morning, I swear ya did. But you'd climb into my bunk and hold me close, and it felt so warm and comfortable, like I belonged in the crook of yer arm. I thought I might be happy doin' that for the rest of my life. Yeah, hunt down Red Dwarf, get back to Earth, and I could have all sorts of animals. I'm guessin' you don't like 'em, so I woulda tended 'em, and you coulda rode a horse wearing - I dunno, a white suit or summit. And we coulda slept close at night, when it got cold. Not a bad life, eh?
I shoulda seen it even back then, though. The way you'd get up before I did, not wakin' me - maybe you went to soft-light so I wouldn't. I'd wake up with a dent in the bunk next to me, and when I went to the midsection for brekkie, you'd be there, all snarky and nasty. Actin' like we didn't spend the night before shaggin' each others' brains out. I'd try to catch yer eye and see a little of that, but you'd never look right at me.
And then you stopped comin'.
I came by yer room a few times - you must have heard me knock. And I slowly got the idea that you was sitting on your bunk every time I did, not sayin' nothin', just wishing as hard as you could for me to go away. So what was all of this, eh, Rimmer? Just a lapse? Just a little not-enough-sex bit of frustration you got out, then didn't need anymore? Did you think about alla the stuff your crazy family used to say, and convinced yerself that it was just a hologrammatic glitch? Well, whatever it was, I got the idea. I got the smegging idea. If you could just sit there in yer bunk while the pipes rotutted and squeenookled their way through another cold shower of mine, me tryin' to forget that I was a man with a man's needs, and that you had a body that could satisfy those so well - yeah, if you could just sit there countin' your toes through that, I guess it never really meant nothin' to you at all.
So fecking what. I don't care. I have my AR - yeah, Ahhhnold, my smegging AR. You can go back to Rachel. I have my programs and my cheat codes. Who needs ya, anyway?
Still. I wish I coulda made you change. Sometimes I wonder what it would take to make ya change. For the better, and all. Sometimes, I would see something come through, when we was kissin', before we got to the main event (as it were). Somethin' good. Hell, somethin' lovely. Somethin'... almost like Ace. I couldn't pull that out, but man - I wish I could find what would.
It'd be worth all this heartache, it would.