Healing by tatsumaki (first aid challenge)
Title: Healing
Author: tatsumaki
Characters: Rodney, McKays; gen
Rating: PG
Words: ~270
Notes: Backstory, last minute and unbetaed. Yeah, I'm all about the great first impressions.
Rodney's father is an important man. No one has ever said this to Rodney, but he hears it anyway.
He's on call tonight, his mother says. He's too valuable to leave, Rodney hears.
He's getting an award, his mother says. He's brilliant, Rodney hears.
There was a horrible accident on the highway, his mother says. People will die without him, Rodney hears.
Being important, though, means being busy. His father's regard is tired and brittle. Rodney has long ago learned to hoard any brief, quicksilver flashes of interest.
Jeannie, resourceful as she is, finds something more. Rodney's a little bit ashamed of himself for the resentment he feels once the fear has passed. Jeannie is pale and excited when she tells him, leaning forward in the cradle of her hospital bed. Seizures, she says reverently. Epilepsy, as if it's more important than the swimming lessons their mother will cancel or the driver's license she won't get until she's twenty-seven. As if she loves it more than the careless certainty of youthful health.
He makes a living of fixing the living, Rodney's grandmother once said of her son. Be something he can fix, and he'll love you forever.
It's a terrified sort of joy that greets Rodney when he awakens in hospital to the murmurs of a nurse and the steady pulse of a distant heart monitor. His father is standing at his bedside.
Meredith, he says, the full weight of his attention fixed on his son. How are you feeling?
Yes-yes-yes, the heart monitor beeps.
Rodney looks up at his father and tries to love him more than breathing.
Author: tatsumaki
Characters: Rodney, McKays; gen
Rating: PG
Words: ~270
Notes: Backstory, last minute and unbetaed. Yeah, I'm all about the great first impressions.
Rodney's father is an important man. No one has ever said this to Rodney, but he hears it anyway.
He's on call tonight, his mother says. He's too valuable to leave, Rodney hears.
He's getting an award, his mother says. He's brilliant, Rodney hears.
There was a horrible accident on the highway, his mother says. People will die without him, Rodney hears.
Being important, though, means being busy. His father's regard is tired and brittle. Rodney has long ago learned to hoard any brief, quicksilver flashes of interest.
Jeannie, resourceful as she is, finds something more. Rodney's a little bit ashamed of himself for the resentment he feels once the fear has passed. Jeannie is pale and excited when she tells him, leaning forward in the cradle of her hospital bed. Seizures, she says reverently. Epilepsy, as if it's more important than the swimming lessons their mother will cancel or the driver's license she won't get until she's twenty-seven. As if she loves it more than the careless certainty of youthful health.
He makes a living of fixing the living, Rodney's grandmother once said of her son. Be something he can fix, and he'll love you forever.
It's a terrified sort of joy that greets Rodney when he awakens in hospital to the murmurs of a nurse and the steady pulse of a distant heart monitor. His father is standing at his bedside.
Meredith, he says, the full weight of his attention fixed on his son. How are you feeling?
Yes-yes-yes, the heart monitor beeps.
Rodney looks up at his father and tries to love him more than breathing.