Work Text:
They’ve resurrected the tradition of the Sunday drive.
James has been complacent lately, either between the points of satisfied and bored with his activities and tasks, or ever so slightly stagnated. Steve can’t quite tell which.
From the talk-therapy perspective, James seems as well as can be expected, all things considered. The same traumas come up in the night terrors, and he makes difficult confessions over again in the post-icthal fog after Steve picks his twitching, medicated ass up off the floor. But he remembers people’s names now. Even from back in college. Sometimes he cracks jokes so slyly it takes Steve a second to get them before cracking up.
Sam and Nat report continued progress in the PT and OT departments, but Steve isn’t sure whether he believes them.
“He’s always gonna be, you know. Right?” Clint had weighed in when Steve had asked for a third opinion.
Steve shrugged and tried not to be disappointed.
“Broaden your horizons. Take him to, I don’t know, the Smithsonian?” Clint pointed in the vague direction on the nearest metro station.
“Eh,” Steve replied. “He hates crowds.”
“Other way? We live way out near Big Sky…”
Steve vaguely recognized the name of the National Park, though he wasn’t sure hiking or picnics were what he was after, either.
By Sunday, though, Steve couldn’t take James’s ghostly presence as he hovered in front of the bookshelf, pondering the jigsaw puzzles as the theme for Independent Lens cued on the television. It would be either dinosaurs, the Louvre, or the moon landing, and James would finish it right around the time Alan Cumming introduced tonight’s Masterpiece Mystery.
James makes his requisite humming sound, and Steve puts his foot down.
“No,” Steve says. He reaches for the TV remote.
“Wha?” James looks at him, confused.
Steve immediately softens his face and checks his tone. “I’m sorry. You’re not doing anything wrong.” He takes a breath. “I just want to do something different.”
“Oh.” James steps away from the shelf. He nods. “Like, uh. Umm…” He blinks, then makes a thin smile. “Do you…?”
“Know what to do instead?” Steve finishes.
James nods.
“Not… not exactly,” Steve says honestly. “But a change of scenery? Do you want to go for a drive?”
“I might get carsick.” James looks doubtful.
“It’s nice out. We can roll down the windows.” Steve is already heading for the shoe shelf and the rack where he hangs his keys. “I think I have some CDs in the glove box. Maybe the trunk…”
“This is… different.” James follows him halfway, looking unsure whether he intends to dig in his heels.
“Yeah.” Steve’s voice cracks a little as he bends over to open the folded heel of his boat shoe. “Consider it… field trip therapy. We can talk about it or draw about it or do sit-ups about it when we get back, it it makes you feel better.” Steve grins.
James’s downturned eyebrows neutralize, then he makes the thin-line smile again. “Ok, sure,” he gives in. “But not during Mystery.”
“It’s going to be a rerun,” Steve says.
“How do you know?” James dons his shoes, then stands on his toes to knock his hat down from the top shelf just above his head.
“I can tell the future.”
James glares at him darkly from under his black brim.
“No, ok,” Steve laughs. “Mystery is always a rerun. It’s the dramas that are new this year.”
“But still–how–?”
Steve opens the door and waves James outside into the driveway. “You ever notice the TV guide is missing from the newspaper? Every day?”
“You mean they print a TV guide?” James looks a little dumbstruck.
Steve unlocks the car and they both get in. “Yeah. It’s like a little magazine with celebrity gossip and movie times. I confiscate it. Well, I usually put it in my waiting room, now that you don’t go in there anymore.”
“Why?” James asks earnestly.
“‘Cause you’d never put it down,” Steve teases.
“I only watch PBS.” James defends himself. “Deadliest Catch, sometimes. And… and… the animal channel–”
“Animal Planet,” Steve corrects, “Which you confuse with Discovery and National Geographic.”
“They’re all animal channels. And last time, I let you program the remote.” James crosses his arms and nods decisively.
“I guess I’m caught.” Steve makes it out of the townhouse’s neighborhood gridlock and pulls onto the main drive. “We’re headed into the state, not the city today. Maybe you’ll see some real animals.”
“A pigeon,” James reports sarcastically, nodding to the fat, grey bowling pin of a bird perched atop the nearest stop sign.
It takes just a minute to get to the highway. Steve assumes the crowds are spending their not-quite-noontime enjoying brunch after their choice of worship. Sure enough, the exit to Cracker Barrel gives him a view of American made pickups and families meandering the overflow porch. Not that Steve would’ve ever heeded it, but he’s glad nobody’s yet recommended that he and James try to join them.
They crack the windows at the next mile marker, and the breeze is perfect. James’s hair takes flight at the ends, rippling up to his ears and turning gentle waves until the length is trapped beneath his cap.
Steve steals glimpses at him; he can’t help himself. At least he does until James catches him, loosing a toothy, undignified snigger that makes him look raw and sexy and absolutely ridiculous.
A bubble of laughter builds in Steve’s chest, but he’s afraid he’ll completely lose it, so he pops the center console and points at the messy array of junk inside.
“I forgot to look for CDs,” he tells James. “There may be some in here. Hell, there might be cassette tapes.”
James nods. He digs his seatbelt out of his neck, then turns so he can reach and rummage. Once he’s down a layer of napkins and thoroughly un-sticky sticky notes, James come up with two shiny red cases rubber-banded together.
“The Civil War-abridged. Narrated by Ken Burns?” James reads, after blowing off some dust. “Cassettes.” He raises his eyebrows, then flips the package over in his hand. “Oh–library copy–” He looks hurriedly to Steve. “These have a campus bar code. Do you owe money?”
Steve thinks quickly. “Um, probably not?” He cocks his head. “I no longer have a student account. No debt, as far as I know. Full ride for grad school.” He shrugs. “I don’t think so.”
“Ok…” James sounds doubtful.
“We don’t have to keep it, if it makes you feel weird.”
Steve thinks about tossing the tapes in the trash next chance he gets; the sound quality has to be terribly scratched and warped.
“Like, mail it back?” James asks.
“Uh…” Steve isn’t inclined to waste the postage. The cassettes are probably worth less. But he’s also inclined to humor James’s every inclination. “Maybe.”
There’s a gas station at the next exit. It’s the kind with a corner store, plentiful with drinks and snacks and souvenir shot glasses. They probably sell car electronics and the like. Hopefully they’re just outdated enough to have a few music CDs in stock among the chargers and adapters.
It’s also a good change of conversation. “Hey, Buck,” Steve poses. “D'you want to stop for a coke or something?”
“I know how to get lids off,” James replies, annoyingly moving to an adjacent topic instead of answering.
“Yeah, bottled drinks. I bet they have glass bottles, too.” Steve points down the approaching turn lane. “If we’re going to stop, I have to turn now. Shall we?”
James is quiet for a second. He turns his head slightly to watch the road. Then he looks to Steve. “Sure,” he says. It comes out a little oddly, though. As if he’s reading out his Scrabble play instead of saying something with meaning.
He’ll have to pay postage on the cassettes, Steve knows it. Rush shipping, probably. But he dusts off a grin and eases into the turn lane.
There’s another bird clinging to the top of the traffic light, some little ugly brown unidentifiable thing that would require an expert and a magnifying glass to name properly. Steve’s about to point it out to James, but James is already staring at it, his eyes big and blank. The light turns, and the bird ruffles it’s wings, seeming affronted.
James sniffs. Steve isn’t sure if it’s a reaction to the bird, or just one of his sounds of existence. There’s a pothole in the driveway to the gas station, and the car wobbles a bit. James’s body ebbs and flows in his seat, his torso flexing whilst staying strong and upright. One muscle in his neck stands out, then disappears. He tips his head back, and Steve can just see the lines at the corner of his eye.
Steve turns the steering wheel and navigates into a parking spot. He steals a nervous glance at James, who has resumed his stoic stare into space. If Steve touches him, he might melt. So, of course, the best thing to do is rush the space between them and plant a startling kiss on James’s cheek.
“Ah,” James breathes, surprised. Pleased? Steve can’t quite tell.
All he can take in is the burn of James’s stubble left on the tip of his nose, like a child’s tender knee bitten by sidewalk. Teenagers making love on cheap carpet.
Steve throws open his door and gets out of the car. He doesn’t look at James, but doesn’t actively look away, either. He can feel him walking at the same pace, right behind his shoulder. James’s breathing is off. Flustered, perhaps. That would match Steve’s inner workings, trying to maintain all normal processes with just a touch of what the fuuuccckkk…
The corner store is empty, so Steve takes his time glancing around. A case of overwhelmingly sweet-smelling doughnuts overtakes one side of the room, so he turns toward the soda fountain and coffee machines on the opposite wall.
“Coffee?” Steve offers, pointing it out to James. “Recyclable cups, even.”
“Mm.” James nods.
Steve himself opts for the soda fountain, where he won’t be judged if he adds a little root beer and lemonade to his plain cola. After watching James choose his coffee cup and stoop his neck to read the flavors, he depresses the handles over his own chosen beverages and watches the bubbles flow.
Steve adds the final splash of A & W to fill his cup to the brim and watches intently as the foam fades away. Suddenly something heavy drops onto his shoulder, and his drink dribbles over the edges.
“What?” Steve tries not to move, though it only takes him a fraction of a second to recognize the shape and sound and smell of James having come up behind him and laid his head on Steve’s shoulder.
“Hm.” James stump is extended to its fullest and perched on the outside of Steve’s arm, right where his sleeve cuts off. His chest is practically on Steve’s back, though he’s cockeyed slightly, and he’s caught Steve’s hipbone with his at a sloppy T.
“Hey, Buck,” Steve murmurs. “What’s up?”
James exhales another humming sound. The bowl of his pelvis conforms to Steve’s gluteus, his groin wrapping just below. His body feels muscular and toned, and his breath is hot on the side of Steve’s face.
“This, uh, isn’t the time…” Steve tries to hiss at him.
“Hm.” James’s right leg hitches, as if he’s trying to ride Steve’s ass by only hinging his knee, the toe of his shoe squeaking against the floor.
“Stop,” Steve groans. “We don’t do this in public.”
“Uh. Uh.” It’s only when James collapses at the beltline and gives Steve an uppercut in the chest three times over that the situation becomes clear.
“Fuck.” It’s, perhaps coincidentally, the only word Steve has at the moment. The fountain drink falls victim to somebody’s elbow, splashing the back of Steve’s jeans and becoming a puddle on the floor. Swearing again and checking his footing, Steve wraps James’s waist with one arm and his shoulders with the other, suspending him mid-fall as the seizure takes hold of his body.
“Ok, ok.” Steve starts his usual grounding murmurs as he looks for a dry spot to place James’s legs. He swipes at the soda spill with the side of his foot, but all that does is invite wetness under his foot and into this insole. Maybe it’s all for naught; James is halfway likely to leak from one or more orifice, anyway.
“I’ve got you,” Steve says as he’s forced to sit heavily and roll James to his side. His breathing is gurgly, and his body twitches spasmodically in a dead bug sort of way. James makes a retching sound that seems to resonate from deep in his ribcage, but all it produces is a trace of clear saliva.
“Yeah, get it up.” Steve pats James’s back.
“Is he sick? Do you need an ambulance?” A hairnet and a hillbilly drawl come out from behind the doughnuts, the curly cord of an landline stretching several feet overhead from a bright red wall-mount.
“No, he does this,” Steve says, finding himself gasping as well. “I mean, he’s a disabled veteran. Epileptic. I have his meds. Or he does. Somewhere.”
“Ok, sweetie. Tell me if you change your mind.” The hairnet puts down the handset and noisily changes gloves.
“Buck, sorry,” Steve says, stroking James’s hair. Then he collects James’s hat, which has fallen off, and buttons it to his own belt loop for safekeeping. “I gotta feel you up.”
James makes a guttural sound, which may or may not have been voluntary. He does see to take ahold of his flickering eyelids, though, and jam them together in a single, hard blink.
“Ok. Good.” Steve tries to stick his hand in James’s pocket without fondling him. “We got this.” There’s nothing in the upward-facing one. James must be lying on his emergency syringe. He can’t imagine that’s very comfortable. Not that seizing in the middle of a gas station store is very comfortable to begin with.
“Ok, it’s under you,” Steve tries to explain. “Your Versed. Your mouth. meds? That make you go to sleep?”
“Uh,” James forces out. But then his chest and arms go jerking again. So does the side of his face. That part always scares Steve most, filling him with fear he’ll start stroking, start disappearing, and they’ll have to start all over.
He can’t perseverate. Hell, five minutes ago he thought James was going all youngblood on him. When he wakes up from this round of medically-induced drowse, James will owe him. They’ll owe each other.
Steve hoists James’s waist an inch off the floor and explores his rumpled pocket. Sure enough, the syringe is rolled in the lining, covered in lint, and the label is all but worn off. He should probably check the expiration date, but Steve is too eager to get the goods into James’s body to wait even a moment longer than necessary. He discards the cap and jams the tip under James’s lower lip. It makes friction along the lower gum line, and Steve groans in apology. The syringe seems to depress for an ungodly amount of time.
What’s the dose? Is it always this dose? Does it always take this long? Steve’s the one trembling when he finally removes the empty syringe and drops it at James’s side. “Ok?” he whispers. “Ok. It’s ok.”
James takes a shuddering breath. His body stills. Then he resumes a normal, though slightly quickened chest rise.
Steve sighs in relief. He hovers the back of his fingers hear James’s forehead, which is warm and glistening with slight perspiration. He’s got to have burned, what, a thousand calories, at least? Four hundred a minute, or something like that.
“Ok…” Time to get his brain back on track. James is stable. That’s the most important thing. But… backtracking. Why’d they stop? Where even are they?
“You sure you don’t need help, sweetie?” The hairnet is behind the ice cream counter now, waving the phone beside its wall mount.
“Um…” Steve gives his pockets a glance. Sure enough, his phone is in the car. “Actually, yeah. Can I call somebody?”
“Even I know the Fire Department.” The glove doesn’t quite tap the hairnet in the motion of acknowledgement.
“No, a person. Like, a house.” Steve presses up to his knees. “Will your cord stretch?”
“Every dern corner of this place.” Bouncy Dr. Scholls come at a clip, and the gloves change again as soon as the receiver is in Steve’s hand.
“Thanks.” Steve looks at the number pad set into the center of the receiver. The phone feels like a toy, but for now, it’s a lifeline. He shuts his eyes and envisions the piece of paper taped above the computer monitor in his office. Clint office. No, next one down. Clint cell.
Steve dials the number, including the 1 and area code, just in case they’re across the county line. Then he tucks the receiver behind his ear and waits.
It rings twice, then picks up. “Why does my caller ID say 'Gas-n-Go?’” An annoyed-yet-curious voice asks. “Is this a phone booth? Or a hijacked number?”
“No, Clint, it’s me,” Steve says quickly. “Steve, from the office.”
“Ok?” There’s definitely skepticism.
Steve hastens to explain. “I’m at a gas station, that’s why the phone number is odd. I’m with Bucky– James, I mean–”
“Yeah, I know you live together. You’re calling me on a weekend on a personal number, so professional isn’t, like, a thing anymore.”
“Ok, I’m sorry, so, we were driving, and we stopped and he had a seizure, and he’s had medication and he’s passed out now–”
“Where did you say you were?” Clint interrupts.
“You said to go places and stuff.”
“You’re at a gas station? What exit?”
“Uh.” Steve can’t remember the number. He isn’t sure he even looked at the number. “The one with the dippy bird on the traffic light?”
“The fuck?”
“After Cracker Barrel.”
“Ok,” Clint pauses. “And you haven’t seen the diner inside the giant silver Airstream yet?”
“There’s a–” Steve stops short. “No. Definitely no.”
“Yeah, so you’re like, halfway.”
“To what?”
“Big Sky, dipshit.” Clint laughs. “That’s where you were going, right?”
“Uh… We got…really sidetracked.” Steve rubs his hand up his forehead, making his bangs stand on end.
“Yeah, well. We’re the other fork.”
“I don’t follow,” Steve sighs. “Buck is passed out, and if you live near here, I really don’t want to put upon, but if you could, like meet me–”
“Steve, hey, it’s fine. That’s what I’m telling you,” Clint says. “You’re halfway there. Big Sky National Park is one fork in the road. Our driveway is basically the other one.”
“Oh.”
“I think we’re an hour apart, ish? Forty-five, if I take my car instead of the van?”
“That would be.. Oh my god. Thank you.” Steve trips over his words.
“My wife wants to turn one wing of the house into an Air BnB. Says I’m on business trips too often, and she needs more people to cook for.” Clint laughs. “She’d love you guys.”
“I don’t want to be a burden. He’ll wake up by tonight–”
“No. Stay,” Clint insists. “Play hooky with me tomorrow. I have leave to burn. Laura has a double oven. Strawberries are blooming…”
“You’re being way too kind. I’m so out of line, doing this–”
“Steve. Stop.” Clint puts on a gentle, yet firm tone. “We treat each other like family. Always. Ok?”
Steve takes a moment to breathe. He nods to himself. To James. Then he murmurs, “Ok. See you soon.”