OOM: Beckett's Room

[trigger_man]

 [After this.]

Jack makes a quick pit stop in his room to change into dry clothes, already feeling the burn on his skin as it warms up again.

Heading back out into the hall, he hesitates for a second outside Beckett's door.  After the awkwardness of him falling on top of her--and neither of them moving for a moment--this might not be the best idea.  But then he'd told her he'd be there in a moment, as as much as part of him has misgivings about it, there's part of him that wants to show that whatever that moment outside had been, it was just an aberration; nothing to see here, move along.

Taking a breath, he raps decisively on her door.

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[trigger_man]

He looks down at their hands. For a moment he has a flash of memory of the last time he held someone's hand, but just as quickly he tries to push it away.

"I want you to live. Don't just survive."

"Yeah, I think so. Okay with you?"

[fanofthegenre]

She turns his hand over, her eyes still looking down on them the same way his are.

"Fine," Beckett murmurs.

Her fingertips trace the scar on the outside, barely a light brush.

[trigger_man]

Watching her fingertips dance around the edge of his hand, skirting the scar that covers the back of it, he's starting to feel a little of that familiar tension, deep down. It's the unsettled feeling he gets when people get too close or someone he doesn't know touches him. Just a little though; like a few bubbles forming on the bottom of a pot, nowhere near a boil just yet.

"You can touch the scar, you know," he says softly, after a moment. "I won't be able to feel it."

[fanofthegenre]

She doesn't have to be a mind-reader to know she's treading a very thin line - not just for him, but for them both. And still, there's an odd kind of fascinating as she maps out the shape of his hand under her fingers, looking up at him through the few strands of hair that fall in front of her eyes.

"Not at all?" Beckett asks, genuinely curious.

[trigger_man]

"Not unless you press hard enough to put pressure on the bone. There's still muscle underneath the scar tissue, but a lot of the nerve endings in the lower skin layers are gone," he says, his tone dispassionate.

There's a slight pause before he adds, "I keep thinking I should see if someone here can at least do some cosmetic surgery on it."

[fanofthegenre]

"No chance of that," she replies, to the first part, before adding, "but I wouldn't be surprised if there's at least one doctor in the infirmary who could handle it. Or, if not, they'd know of someone who could.

"You should look into it," Beckett says, voicing encouragement, and squeezes the hand between the both of hers.

[trigger_man]

"Yeah, I just keep putting it off," he says. He's still not sure he'd be able to walk into the infirmary without it triggering a panic attack. "But I should probably do something about it instead of just trying to hide it."

[fanofthegenre]

"It's up to you," she says. "But if you want someone there for you - you know, after - it wouldn't be a problem. Or a burden," she adds, with a quick grin, before her gaze drops again.

"I don't even like to think about what you must have had to endure for these," Beckett whispers, clearing her throat as the words catch.

[trigger_man]

Jack's mouth twists for a moment as she expresses that quick clarification. Instead of getting back into the old argument, however, he simply gives her a soft "thanks."

"I don't either. One reason I've been thinking of having it done."

Not that he has much of a hope of ever forgetting. Most days it feels like he'll never be able to forget those twenty months, even for a minute; like the weight of it will weigh him down forever.

Sometimes, however, he can delude himself into thinking that maybe if he doesn't have to see the scars that he can pretend they're not there.

[fanofthegenre]

She smiles slowly, nodding, and finally let's his hand slip away from her grasp, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. If she was in the precinct, she'd have an excuse to go for coffee, or a call would come in to break the moment.

Here, in the kitchen of her place, in a magical bar at the end of the universe, all she has is a brief smile and the counter behind her to lean against, bracing palms along the edge.

"I could look into it," she offers.

[trigger_man]

As she lets go of his hand, Jack takes a step backward. It's not that the proximity is uncomfortable, really. With the moment over, though, it just feels like he should get even a little distance.

"No, I'll do it. I'm the one that can answer any questions they might have. Anyway, I should probably wait until this contract's finished and I move somewhere else. It'd look pretty weird if the scar was there one day and gone the next."

[fanofthegenre]

When he moves, she remembers the mug still sitting in the sink, and turns to finish where she left off, turning the water on only to a small trickle in order to hear him while he's speaking.

"Of course. I didn't even - you don't want to draw that kind of attention," she agrees, scrubbing out the inside of the mug.

[trigger_man]

"Yeah." He doesn't want to draw any kind of attention for that matter. "I didn't think of it myself until just now. Coming in here for so long and so often, sometimes it's easy to forget that it's only a very small number of people that actually know about this place."

[fanofthegenre]

"Or maybe it's not that small. I mean, think about it. All the people coming in at different times, when you're not here?"

She shrugs, setting the mug aside to dry beside the sink.

"Like the fact that I know for certain a younger version of me wound up here, once."

[trigger_man]

"Yeah, but it's from an infinite number of worlds, so it's still a fairly small percentage. I still haven't met anyone from my world that I didn't know from somewhere."

Or so he thinks.

"A younger version of you? I take it you didn't get to meet her?"

[fanofthegenre]

"No, but - I knew I'd been here, because I had the memory of it. It was like it'd been there the whole time."

Beckett makes a face.

"Yet another one of the ways in which the Bar screws with you."

[trigger_man]

"So like you'd forgotten about it until after the younger you came in here?"

Hello Time Travel Paradox.

"I'm not sure I want to think about that too much either."

[fanofthegenre]

"It's enough to make me want a drink stronger than cocoa, that's for sure," Beckett jokes.

Though, given her track record with alcohol and poor decision-making lately -

"Probably not the best idea," she quickly adds.

[trigger_man]

"Yeah, probably not." Jack's very well aware that he probably drinks too much, but he's still working on figuring out a compelling reason why that's a bad thing.

"Besides, I don't think after a couple drinks that it'll make any more sense than it does now."

[fanofthegenre]

"No. Probably not," Beckett echoes, her tone already wavering.

There is the temptation there - but she does want to wake up without a headache tomorrow, and that's the main deterrent.

"It's still enough to make your head hurt."

[trigger_man]

"Yeah. Most of the time I just try not to think about that kind of stuff. Makes being in here a lot easier. Sometimes it kind of forces itself to the front, though."

Jack gives her a wan smile. "Maybe it's more than the first drink that should be on the house. Either way, it's probably a good thing it's so easy to get a drink here."

[fanofthegenre]

"Probably," she says, smiling easily.

"Or you're just lucky you have a friend who's willing to buy the first round."

[trigger_man]

"Good thing you do, too," Jack says with a slight smile that doesn't lessen the significance of his look. "And yeah, I guess I am lucky in that way."

[fanofthegenre]

"As long as you don't forget that any time soon."

She hides a smile - and, okay, maybe she's willing to take a couple glasses down from the cupboard before reaching for a half-empty bottle.

Because that's what friends do.

[trigger_man]

"I won't, promise," he says, "Especially if it means you buy me drinks."