Been A While (PG) by Miriel
May. 7th, 2007 02:18 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
mardahin.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
sga_flashficTitle: Been A While
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
miriel
Beta:ladyholder
Rating: PG
Author's Note: Written for the "Scars" challenge over on![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
sga_flashfic. This is a concept that occurred to me while I was getting trained in the electrical trade, and has refused to leave me alone. Also, please note that there is a secondary Author's Note after the story, explaining my take on a certain blurriness in canon. Spoilers for "The Real World" and "The Return Part 1." Roughly 2,200 words.
Summary: Elizabeth didn't want to be there. She didn't want to be on Earth, but that was beside the point. She really didn't want to be sitting in a Starbucks, attempting to make smalltalk with a colleague she hadn't seen in four and a half years while sipping her Chai Latte, heavy on the chai.
He almost didn't recognize her.
Between the longer hair, lack of make-up, and casual clothes, she had very little in common with the Elizabeth Weir who'd co-taught the nightmare that was Freshman Poli-Sci with him for two years. In fact, he wasn't sure what caused him to take a second look at the woman slowly pushing her cart down the tea aisle, but he was glad that he did. "Elizabeth?"
She looked up, confirming his suspicions, and he was startled by how much she had changed up close. She was older than he'd expected, and there was a hunted look in her eyes that didn't belong to the Elizabeth he'd known. After a moment, her expression brightened as she recognized him, and she seemed to shake herself out of whatever fog she'd been in. "Joshua?"
He feigned tipping his hat. "Professor Joshua Pickerton at your service, ma'am. Still going strong after all these years."
She smiled more genuinely at that, and glanced down at the box of tea in her hands, setting it in her cart. It was one of those herbal teas, something he certainly didn't remember her drinking before, but then it had been a while. "It's...it's good to see you again, Josh. It's been a long time."
He grinned, pushing his cart against the aisle ahead of hers. "Almost five years, Professor Weir, and department meetings still aren't the same. Where did you go, anyway? Last thing I'd heard, you'd taken some political appointment to Antarctica of all places and vanished. That was three years ago; I can't believe you haven't been out and about since then. There's just not that much to do on the ice. Been taking a few years off?"
She gave an odd laugh and looked away, resting her elbows on the handle of the cart and folding her hands. He'd loved her hands, back when they'd taught together and there had been the possibility that she'd part ways with Simon; he wondered if she had. She wore no ring, but then she had an odd sense of tradition - when it applied and when it didn't. When she turned her eyes back to him, they were shuttered, dark in a way that concerned him more than her initial fear had. "You could say that." There was a hesitance in her voice that begged for an explanation, because Elizabeth had never been hesitant.
He knew some the things that Elizabeth had seen during her years 'in the field', a direct result of a mid-term grading blitz their first year at Georgetown. She'd seen some horrible things, but she'd never looked like she did now. He also didn't miss the fact that she hadn't actually answered his question, or that she had gone back to avoiding his gaze. He glanced at his watch, confirming that he still had two hours before he had to be anywhere. "Listen, Elizabeth, there's a Starbucks next door. What do you say we get a cup of coffee, for old time's sake?"
She blinked, and looked up sharply. "I, um, I should really be-"
"Good, it's settled. You need anything else here?"
She looked down at her cart, peering at the items in confusion before shrugging. "I guess not."
"Right. After you." He gestured down the aisle, and waited until she had started heading toward the cashiers to adjust his own cart and follow.
* * *
Elizabeth didn't want to be there. She didn't want to be on Earth, but that was beside the point. She really didn't want to be sitting in a Starbucks, attempting to make smalltalk with a colleague she hadn't seen in four and a half years while sipping her Chai Latte, heavy on the chai.
As Elizabeth was well aware, the universe seldom gave you what you wanted. With a sigh, she set her cup down and rubbed at the white line running across her left palm, a remnant of one of dozens of friendship ceremonies she'd taken part in to finalize trade agreements. Sure, Sheppard had weeded out the truly bizarre, but there had been plenty of people willing to come to Atlantis to broker deals that first year, and others in later years who had insisted on meeting with her in person. She looked up, and found her companion staring at her expectantly.
"I said, when did you stop drinking coffee?" At least he seemed amused, rather than annoyed with her lack of attention.
"I haven't stopped, per se, I've just cut down." He waved his hand, and it took a moment for her to realize that he wanted her to elaborate. "I, uh, was developing an ulcer. It was cut out the coffee, or start on medication; the coffee went."
He nodded sagely, but thankfully he let the matter drop. She fidgeted as the silence grew, picking up her paper cup again, and playing with the cardboard sleeve. "Are you all right, Elizabeth?"
The question took her by surprise, and she almost dropped the cup. Shaken, she set it down on the table and folded her hands, only to look down and notice a hangnail on her index finger. She hadn't remembered seeing that before...
* * *
Josh resisted the urge to sigh; Elizabeth had spent almost all of the forty minutes they'd been sitting in the coffeehouse avoiding his gaze; every question he asked was redirected back on himself. Regardless of anything else, she was still a damn good negotiator. About the only thing that he'd managed to learn was that she had, indeed, broken things off with Simon. She hadn't gone into detail, and he hadn't asked; the two had been together the entire time she'd been at Georgetown. The break-up couldn't have been anything but unpleasant, and it wasn't like he wanted to discuss his own history in that particular department; two ex-wives in three years wasn't exactly anything to brag about.
"So...how long you in town for, this time?" It was a safe, innocuous question; he seemed to be running out of those at an alarming rate where she was concerned.
"I, uh, I don't know. A while, maybe." She was rubbing her hands again; she'd been doing that since they sat down. She seemed to have a pattern, rotating through a number of old aches and pains like an arthritic grandmother. First, she would dig her right thumb into the palm of her left hand, a back and forth motion. Then, she would rub at the fingers on her right hand, the slow and outward motions common to the first day after the January Thaw, when no one remembered their gloves. She would conclude with worrying a hangnail on her left index finger, before realizing what she was doing and turning her attention back to her paper cup, clasping and unclasping her hands as if unsure what to do with them.
The fidgeting drew his attention to her hands, and once he'd started watching, he found that he couldn't look away. Elizabeth had always had expressive hands, but before, they'd never said things she didn't want them to say. They'd also never been as unkempt as they were now. Except, unkempt wasn't the word, because they were still neat; they just weren't beautiful in the way that they had been. When they had worked together, her hands had been smooth and soft, with delicately polished nails and unblemished skin. Now, the more he studied them, the more flaws he found.
They were darker than before, tanned and tough in a way he would never associate with a diplomat, and certainly not Elizabeth. She'd been wonderful at the negotiating table, but she'd had no interest in outdoor recreation - not gardening, and not rock-climbing. They were still soft, but there had been calluses in her handshake that shouldn't have been there; people like Elizabeth had assistants to do the heavy lifting for them. The most shocking aspect, however, was the scars. They weren't noticeable, at a glance, but they were there - dozens of small scars, ranging in size from barely a speck to over a centimeter in length. Some looked to be from burns, some were obviously cuts, and a few he couldn't even venture a guess.
When she cleared her throat, he realized that this time he had been the one to grow silent. He knew he shouldn't ask, not something so direct, but he couldn't help himself. "What happened to you, Elizabeth?"
She looked away, and he knew it had been the wrong thing to do. She'd been carefully avoiding anything to do with her last few years, and now he'd crossed that line. He wasn't surprised when she stood, or when she crossed to throw her cup away in the nearby trash. When she picked up her jacket, shrugging it on, he stood as well. "Look, I'm sorry. I don't know what you were doing, but I knew it was top secret clearance. I shouldn't have asked."
She pursed her lips, and for a moment he thought she would just sweep it under the rug like they'd done so many other minor faux pas in their time. "You're right; you shouldn't have." Her words seemed to surprise her, and she sighed, shoulders slumping. "I...I'm not going to say I'm sorry, but it's been a long few weeks. I just got out of meetings and back in town few days ago. I'm...not at my best right now, and I'm taking it out on you. I shouldn't."
He shrugged; he'd figured out that much already. "Can I at least give you a ride?"
She shook her head. "I'm going to walk, maybe clear my head a bit. It's only a few miles."
He almost protested, but there was something in her expression that told him he was treading on thin ice as it was. "Can I call you? If you're going to be in town for a while...?"
Her face went through an odd series of expressions, finally settling on resigned. "Why not? Everyone else seems to feel free doing so."
"I...right. So, I guess I'll see you around?"
"Maybe. It was...good, seeing you again. I'm glad things are going well for you." He blinked, and wondered exactly how much of the conversation she'd really heard, because aside from making tenure-track, his life was somewhere around hell-in-a-handbasket.
"Good seeing you as well."
With a small wave, she turned and disappeared through the crowd and out the door. He sat back down with his now-cold cappuccino, wondering how much of a reflection on her life Elizabeth's hands had become, and if she would ever be the woman he had known.
* * *
Elizabeth didn't run all the way back to her townhouse, but it was a near thing. When she arrived, she stepped inside, and proceeded to close and bolt the door. At least there, in the house that reminded her of the waking nightmare the Asurans had inflicted upon her, she had a prayer of one day waking up.
One day.
~ Finis ~
Secondary Author's Note: In "The Real World", Elizabeth's home is shown as a townhouse in /near Washington, DC. In "The Return Part 1", she's shown somewhere that may or may not be the same location. While logistically it would make sense for her to be in an apartment in Colorado Springs (given Carson's visit and her subsequent attendance at a CS located dinner), at the same time - this is Stargate. None of the command staff are above a little strategic use of Asgard Beaming Technology if the Odyssey happened to be in orbit. It worked better, for the sake of my piece, to have her run back to DC after debriefing for 2.5 weeks at SGC. Take it, leave it, canon doesn't really give a clear indication if that's AU or not.
Author:
mirielBeta:
ladyholderRating: PG
Author's Note: Written for the "Scars" challenge over on
sga_flashfic. This is a concept that occurred to me while I was getting trained in the electrical trade, and has refused to leave me alone. Also, please note that there is a secondary Author's Note after the story, explaining my take on a certain blurriness in canon. Spoilers for "The Real World" and "The Return Part 1." Roughly 2,200 words.Summary: Elizabeth didn't want to be there. She didn't want to be on Earth, but that was beside the point. She really didn't want to be sitting in a Starbucks, attempting to make smalltalk with a colleague she hadn't seen in four and a half years while sipping her Chai Latte, heavy on the chai.
He almost didn't recognize her.
Between the longer hair, lack of make-up, and casual clothes, she had very little in common with the Elizabeth Weir who'd co-taught the nightmare that was Freshman Poli-Sci with him for two years. In fact, he wasn't sure what caused him to take a second look at the woman slowly pushing her cart down the tea aisle, but he was glad that he did. "Elizabeth?"
She looked up, confirming his suspicions, and he was startled by how much she had changed up close. She was older than he'd expected, and there was a hunted look in her eyes that didn't belong to the Elizabeth he'd known. After a moment, her expression brightened as she recognized him, and she seemed to shake herself out of whatever fog she'd been in. "Joshua?"
He feigned tipping his hat. "Professor Joshua Pickerton at your service, ma'am. Still going strong after all these years."
She smiled more genuinely at that, and glanced down at the box of tea in her hands, setting it in her cart. It was one of those herbal teas, something he certainly didn't remember her drinking before, but then it had been a while. "It's...it's good to see you again, Josh. It's been a long time."
He grinned, pushing his cart against the aisle ahead of hers. "Almost five years, Professor Weir, and department meetings still aren't the same. Where did you go, anyway? Last thing I'd heard, you'd taken some political appointment to Antarctica of all places and vanished. That was three years ago; I can't believe you haven't been out and about since then. There's just not that much to do on the ice. Been taking a few years off?"
She gave an odd laugh and looked away, resting her elbows on the handle of the cart and folding her hands. He'd loved her hands, back when they'd taught together and there had been the possibility that she'd part ways with Simon; he wondered if she had. She wore no ring, but then she had an odd sense of tradition - when it applied and when it didn't. When she turned her eyes back to him, they were shuttered, dark in a way that concerned him more than her initial fear had. "You could say that." There was a hesitance in her voice that begged for an explanation, because Elizabeth had never been hesitant.
He knew some the things that Elizabeth had seen during her years 'in the field', a direct result of a mid-term grading blitz their first year at Georgetown. She'd seen some horrible things, but she'd never looked like she did now. He also didn't miss the fact that she hadn't actually answered his question, or that she had gone back to avoiding his gaze. He glanced at his watch, confirming that he still had two hours before he had to be anywhere. "Listen, Elizabeth, there's a Starbucks next door. What do you say we get a cup of coffee, for old time's sake?"
She blinked, and looked up sharply. "I, um, I should really be-"
"Good, it's settled. You need anything else here?"
She looked down at her cart, peering at the items in confusion before shrugging. "I guess not."
"Right. After you." He gestured down the aisle, and waited until she had started heading toward the cashiers to adjust his own cart and follow.
Elizabeth didn't want to be there. She didn't want to be on Earth, but that was beside the point. She really didn't want to be sitting in a Starbucks, attempting to make smalltalk with a colleague she hadn't seen in four and a half years while sipping her Chai Latte, heavy on the chai.
As Elizabeth was well aware, the universe seldom gave you what you wanted. With a sigh, she set her cup down and rubbed at the white line running across her left palm, a remnant of one of dozens of friendship ceremonies she'd taken part in to finalize trade agreements. Sure, Sheppard had weeded out the truly bizarre, but there had been plenty of people willing to come to Atlantis to broker deals that first year, and others in later years who had insisted on meeting with her in person. She looked up, and found her companion staring at her expectantly.
"I said, when did you stop drinking coffee?" At least he seemed amused, rather than annoyed with her lack of attention.
"I haven't stopped, per se, I've just cut down." He waved his hand, and it took a moment for her to realize that he wanted her to elaborate. "I, uh, was developing an ulcer. It was cut out the coffee, or start on medication; the coffee went."
He nodded sagely, but thankfully he let the matter drop. She fidgeted as the silence grew, picking up her paper cup again, and playing with the cardboard sleeve. "Are you all right, Elizabeth?"
The question took her by surprise, and she almost dropped the cup. Shaken, she set it down on the table and folded her hands, only to look down and notice a hangnail on her index finger. She hadn't remembered seeing that before...
Josh resisted the urge to sigh; Elizabeth had spent almost all of the forty minutes they'd been sitting in the coffeehouse avoiding his gaze; every question he asked was redirected back on himself. Regardless of anything else, she was still a damn good negotiator. About the only thing that he'd managed to learn was that she had, indeed, broken things off with Simon. She hadn't gone into detail, and he hadn't asked; the two had been together the entire time she'd been at Georgetown. The break-up couldn't have been anything but unpleasant, and it wasn't like he wanted to discuss his own history in that particular department; two ex-wives in three years wasn't exactly anything to brag about.
"So...how long you in town for, this time?" It was a safe, innocuous question; he seemed to be running out of those at an alarming rate where she was concerned.
"I, uh, I don't know. A while, maybe." She was rubbing her hands again; she'd been doing that since they sat down. She seemed to have a pattern, rotating through a number of old aches and pains like an arthritic grandmother. First, she would dig her right thumb into the palm of her left hand, a back and forth motion. Then, she would rub at the fingers on her right hand, the slow and outward motions common to the first day after the January Thaw, when no one remembered their gloves. She would conclude with worrying a hangnail on her left index finger, before realizing what she was doing and turning her attention back to her paper cup, clasping and unclasping her hands as if unsure what to do with them.
The fidgeting drew his attention to her hands, and once he'd started watching, he found that he couldn't look away. Elizabeth had always had expressive hands, but before, they'd never said things she didn't want them to say. They'd also never been as unkempt as they were now. Except, unkempt wasn't the word, because they were still neat; they just weren't beautiful in the way that they had been. When they had worked together, her hands had been smooth and soft, with delicately polished nails and unblemished skin. Now, the more he studied them, the more flaws he found.
They were darker than before, tanned and tough in a way he would never associate with a diplomat, and certainly not Elizabeth. She'd been wonderful at the negotiating table, but she'd had no interest in outdoor recreation - not gardening, and not rock-climbing. They were still soft, but there had been calluses in her handshake that shouldn't have been there; people like Elizabeth had assistants to do the heavy lifting for them. The most shocking aspect, however, was the scars. They weren't noticeable, at a glance, but they were there - dozens of small scars, ranging in size from barely a speck to over a centimeter in length. Some looked to be from burns, some were obviously cuts, and a few he couldn't even venture a guess.
When she cleared her throat, he realized that this time he had been the one to grow silent. He knew he shouldn't ask, not something so direct, but he couldn't help himself. "What happened to you, Elizabeth?"
She looked away, and he knew it had been the wrong thing to do. She'd been carefully avoiding anything to do with her last few years, and now he'd crossed that line. He wasn't surprised when she stood, or when she crossed to throw her cup away in the nearby trash. When she picked up her jacket, shrugging it on, he stood as well. "Look, I'm sorry. I don't know what you were doing, but I knew it was top secret clearance. I shouldn't have asked."
She pursed her lips, and for a moment he thought she would just sweep it under the rug like they'd done so many other minor faux pas in their time. "You're right; you shouldn't have." Her words seemed to surprise her, and she sighed, shoulders slumping. "I...I'm not going to say I'm sorry, but it's been a long few weeks. I just got out of meetings and back in town few days ago. I'm...not at my best right now, and I'm taking it out on you. I shouldn't."
He shrugged; he'd figured out that much already. "Can I at least give you a ride?"
She shook her head. "I'm going to walk, maybe clear my head a bit. It's only a few miles."
He almost protested, but there was something in her expression that told him he was treading on thin ice as it was. "Can I call you? If you're going to be in town for a while...?"
Her face went through an odd series of expressions, finally settling on resigned. "Why not? Everyone else seems to feel free doing so."
"I...right. So, I guess I'll see you around?"
"Maybe. It was...good, seeing you again. I'm glad things are going well for you." He blinked, and wondered exactly how much of the conversation she'd really heard, because aside from making tenure-track, his life was somewhere around hell-in-a-handbasket.
"Good seeing you as well."
With a small wave, she turned and disappeared through the crowd and out the door. He sat back down with his now-cold cappuccino, wondering how much of a reflection on her life Elizabeth's hands had become, and if she would ever be the woman he had known.
Elizabeth didn't run all the way back to her townhouse, but it was a near thing. When she arrived, she stepped inside, and proceeded to close and bolt the door. At least there, in the house that reminded her of the waking nightmare the Asurans had inflicted upon her, she had a prayer of one day waking up.
One day.
Secondary Author's Note: In "The Real World", Elizabeth's home is shown as a townhouse in /near Washington, DC. In "The Return Part 1", she's shown somewhere that may or may not be the same location. While logistically it would make sense for her to be in an apartment in Colorado Springs (given Carson's visit and her subsequent attendance at a CS located dinner), at the same time - this is Stargate. None of the command staff are above a little strategic use of Asgard Beaming Technology if the Odyssey happened to be in orbit. It worked better, for the sake of my piece, to have her run back to DC after debriefing for 2.5 weeks at SGC. Take it, leave it, canon doesn't really give a clear indication if that's AU or not.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-07 01:18 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-07 01:31 pm (UTC)Sixty people, a hundred people, there would still never be enough warm bodies to go around; that's just a fact, and it's only exacerbated by the fact that the city is the size of Manhattan. My other theory on Elizabeth & "manual labor" is that she's too smart and too savvy not to have been going out to the mainland once a week and helping out, in an effort to restore the bridges that were broken in "Suspicion" as well as to insure a willingness to trade for food should the issue ever arise. You have to work at good trade relations, even with allies. Then, of course, there's the logic of mandating that everyone do 4-6 hours of work outside their own field as a form of stress relief - it's still stress, but it's a different kind of stress (whether it be KP, cleaning, farming, construction, etc), and gives the mind a chance to relax and step outside of the work environment in a city where everything is the work environment.
*Meep* So I went a little overboard there. Sorry! Glad you liked it!
Of course, the irony is that I published a flashfic titled "Fibrosis" during the "Masks & Masquerade" challenge; fibrosis is the technical term for scar tissue
(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-10 07:20 pm (UTC)I loved the details. Her hands, and the motions she makes--and how Joshua remembered them and how they've changed. Beautiful. That the scars are scattered like pieces of a memory across the flesh just seemed poignant and illuminating on the character.
Okay, the dialogue? With the right hestitancy, and the voice--I admit it, I read most of this story out loud, just so I could hear the candance and the pitch and the tone of how it would play out. Oh my god.
And, okay, the first sentence--just enough to grab your attention and draw you in, wondering who saw Elizabeth and how they remembered her. I liked your use of an original character (at least, I assume it was an original character, I haven't seen most of SGA) and hwo his view of her changed.
Again, I can't stress enough how much I loved the hesitancy in the piece, the tone of the uncertain. It fits in so well with teh Elizabeth that trapped herself in her apartment because she didn't understand or know how to enter back into life on Earth. So much of who she currently is was defined by experiences that she can't share with the majority of people. She's had the weight of so much responsibility on her shoulders for so long, that she isn't sure how to act with it not present. She isn't sure how to connect with people, and if they really want to connect with her.
I want to rec this everywhere I possibly can, but I'll settle for my journal (if you don't mind). Not a lot of people actually read my journal, but still. I absolutely adore adn love this piece, and want to read more of your writing. THANK YOU.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-11 10:46 pm (UTC)Second, I'm sorry it took me so long to respond to your comment, but I was completely floored by your enthusiasm. I'm thrilled that you liked this so much! I love Elizabeth, and I wanted to look at what it was that drove her to pull away from the outside world so completely in such a short timespan.
I'll probably go through and do a light proof on this at some point, but again - I'm so incredibly thrilled that you enjoyed this. And thank you so much for taking the time both to tell me that you did, and also why you did.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-14 04:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-14 11:39 pm (UTC)And I shall endeavor to ponder about the history of those scars...
I am a sucker for requests, so they'll probably pop up eventually
(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-18 04:58 pm (UTC)Poor Elizabeth. I hadn't really thought about how "The Real World" would inform her behavior in "The Return" before; but yes, situations have consequences.
And yes -- it's amazing how quickly you learn not to pay attention to normal wear and tear except, perhaps, to note its absence.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-19 03:40 am (UTC)See, and that's one of the things that always fascinated/intrigued me about how close Real World and Return were - both her personal decline in the latter, and her decision to stay in as opposed to running away. I realized that arguably, she is running away being 'in', because it was the fiction of her waking nightmare; if she goes outside, that means acknowledging that she's not going home. Well, or something like that. I've toyed around with it before, specifically in terms of her interactions (or lack thereof) with her mother during & after "The Return" in some of my fic, but this just seemed like a perfect opportunity.
*Nods* I worked electrical for two weeks, and came away with countless scars and abrasions that are going to be around for quite some time to come. Thanks for reading ^_^