Work Text:
George isn’t sure when, exactly, they start living together. Not in the same house – but lives wrapped around each other, inhale and exhale.
When it becomes natural for her papers to be in neat piles next to Jill’s scrawling heap on the desk in the sitting room of her tiny flat or on the kitchen table in George’s even smaller one. When the cats know George by step and Jill knows the trick to getting the cranky stove-top to work and they both know exactly which cupboard everything belongs in, no matter which house they’re in.
When she starts saying ‘I’m off home’ as she leaves a lecture, a study session, an afternoon helping at the soup kitchen, and means I’m going to see Jill.
It’s been a long time since George was so paired with someone, but it’s different than it was, back when it was Jack-and-George, the Dragon Slayer and the Giantkiller, two halves of a whole who both thought they were the tag along. hey aren’t two halves of a whole; they are both whole, these women who spent a lifetime with the world on their shoulders, even if there are jagged edges and cold hollows buried beneath their ribs, memories that still don’t sit right and scars both visible and not.
It is different; George-and-Jill. It’s letters on torn out notebook pages and impromptu lectures at 3 am on the life cycle of the southern spotted roc, taking turns to cook dinner and wash the dishes, feeding the cats and talking idly about the dogs they both want to have, one day.
It’s knowing that one day is both certain and unpressured, on its way towards them but unhurried, a destination not a duty.
It’s warm quilts in winter and grumbling about the muggy heat in summer, windows wide open and debating whether they could just move to the mountains for the season. It’s sitting at Mari’s table with soft biscuits in hand, and at Bea’s counter in the inn with snow cookies spilling sugar over their fingers, and crowding around the rickety table in the flat the baby Rangers occupy in Rivertown with packs of sticky dates from the desert and mini blueberry pies, mismatched furniture and old friends, hedgewitch spelled blankets and favourite teas kept ready in the cupboard.
It’s reciting her thesis defence and tearing poorly written articles in two sets of journals apart; planning field trips together and apart, porting out to new skies with Laney or trudging along dirt tracks. It’s waking after nightmares and curling closer to the steady rise and fall of the other’s chest, letting their heartbeat fill the world until the echoes of old sorrows fade away. It’s laughing when they forget to buy milk and burning bread because they got too engrossed in their books and watching the stars on clear nights, mapping stories into the sky.
It’s academic debates and cheerful banter and comfortable silences, curled on either end of a sofa with their ankles thoughtlessly tangled, quiet broken only by the flick of pages and their breathing in tangent, inhale and exhale.
“Hey,” says George eventually, and when there’s an answering murmur that suggests Jill is now only 37% focused on her page, “saw a nice empty cottage on my field trip last week. Had a garden and everything. Could definitely fit the cats and a few dogs. If you were interested.”
Jill hums thoughtfully, and puts her book aside, smile soft and warm.
“Can I pick what colour we paint the door?”
“Sure, but I get to choose the name of the first dog.”
“Deal.”