Chapter Text
July
The sun has long since set as you gaze at the red rock formations West of camp, but one spotlight remains lit in the distance. The graduate students are packed into trailers and tents around you, fast asleep, and as you stare at that faraway light, your heart sinks. It’s Alan. It’s always Alan.
You sigh, inhaling the scent of sun-warmed sand and juniper, and head into your trailer to pack some essentials into a backpack before setting out across the high desert toward that eerie light. It’s a ten-minute trek, and your fears are confirmed when you crest the edge of the dig site and see a familiar figure sitting in the dust. You and the students abandoned the site for dinner and free time at 17:00, and you knew when you glanced over your shoulder and saw Alan watching you go, hands on his hips and a distant smile on his face, that he wasn’t going to come back to camp until he’d worked himself into the ground.
Now, it’s almost 23:00, and you’re scrambling down the side of the dig pit to reach him. The noise startles him, and he turns his upper body toward you with a pencil in his hand, wielding it like a knife. He relaxes and lets out an exasperated huff when he recognizes you, and you smile apologetically as you approach him. You plop down a few feet away from him and unsling your bag. As you unzip it, you risk tiny glances at the man while he returns to his earlier task. He’s sketching out another survey grid for this particular section of the pit, and under the harsh lights, you can see the weight in his shoulders, the heavy eyelids.
You don’t comment on it- Alan Grant accepts neither advice nor pity. Instead, you unload all of the leftovers from tonight’s dinner and silently divide it onto two paper plates. The cans of fruit punch at the bottom of your bag are still cold from your trailer’s fridge, and you crack one of them open before holding it out to Alan. His pencil stops scratching on his notepad, and he looks at you out of the corner of his eye with a slight distrust that you’re unfortunately used to. You continue to hold the can out to him anyway, and after a few more seconds, his shoulders sag as he seems to realize that you’re not going to leave anytime soon, and he shoots you a tired smile.
This is how it always goes. Even before Isla Nublar, Grant kept to himself. Worked ridiculous hours; hid in his office; put on an amiable but distant persona for you and the students. Over your ten years of working with him, your initial frustration at the lack of connection between the two of you lessened into a begrudging understanding and, eventually, a sort of pity. You watched him shine while interacting with and nurturing students and still turn down opportunities to grow truly close to any of them; spent countless days watching his figure grow smaller in the distance, claiming that all he wanted was to stay behind and keep working, while the sadness in his eyes betrayed something deeper that you could never wheedle out of him.
Getting to really know him started with nights like this. It didn’t matter if he was outdoors, in his trailer, or holed up in his office, you’d take it upon yourself to feed him or keep him company somehow. At first, he kept up the exasperated persona, waving you off with a smile and insisting that he didn’t need any help, but when you made it abundantly clear that you weren’t doing any of it for him (a terrible lie, but a necessary one), he opened up to the idea of having you around a bit more. Caring for him feels a lot like tending to a skittish animal- you have to move slowly, and you can’t let him know your deeper intent lest you scare him away.
Now, he’s setting his notepad aside to face you and take the proffered fruit punch. You cross your legs and balance your plate on them. In truth, you already ate dinner, but you had a feeling that he wouldn’t eat if you didn’t bring something for yourself. Instead of asking him how he’s doing, you ask him about his ideas for the next survey grid. Alan takes up his own plate and explains his thought process between bites of steak and potatoes, and you chime in every once in a while to contribute ideas when he seems unsure.
“I think your floodplain theory’s right,” He comments, laughing tiredly, ”I wish this grid wasn’t so sloppy- You could probably just point to where the rest of this damned elasmosaur is, and you’d probably be right.”
You shrug, “We’ll find it eventually. You know what they say- ‘Where there’s a will, there’s a marine reptile somewhere within a fifty yard radius.’”
For a moment, Grant looks at you like you’ve grown a second head, but when your face breaks into a mischievous grin, his own lips stretch into an unwillingly amused smile.
“I think you need to go back to your trailer and get some sleep.”
“I think you need to walk me back.” You quip, taking his now empty plate and folding it up with yours.
“Couldn’t hurt, I s’pose.” He mutters, more to himself than to you.
He frowns confusedly at you when you reshoulder your backpack and reach for the generator switch to turn off the lights, “Might as well leave them on- I’m coming right back.”
“Remember what happened last time we left the lights on and came back later?”
“No?”
“A cougar happened. A very angry mama cougar.”
“Ah,” Alan sighs, shoulders sagging, “Better turn it off, then.”
With no spotlight to guide you, you pull a headlamp out of your backpack’s cupholder and put it on, sticking close to Alan to share the light. The uneven terrain means that one of you bumps shoulders with the other fairly often, and after Alan’s fifth mumbled, “Sorry,” in a row, you take a deep breath and say, “I don’t mind it.”
He doesn’t respond, but he doesn’t create any distance between you, either, and the apologies stop. It’s almost midnight when you make it back to camp, and instead of heading for your own trailer, you subtly steer toward his. Alan doesn’t notice until he’s face to face with his own front door. He turns to you and sighs at you like you’re a toddler who just won’t listen.
“I told you- I’m going back out there-”
“Six hours from now, yeah?” You finish for him, nodding and pretending like you don’t understand what he's saying, “After I make us breakfast and we walk out there together and fix that grid before the kids are up.”
“I can-”
“Not a question.” You deadpan, knowing your attempted threat is probably undermined by how ridiculous you look with your hands on your hips and your headlamp slightly askew.
Under the interrogative glow of your headlamp, the paleontologist sputters frustratedly and throws his hands up, “Well, what are you making?”
“Chicken fried steak.” It comes out almost immediately, and you see the internal war on Alan’s face as he’s tempted with one of his favorite breakfasts, “Six a.m. at my place. Set an alarm if you really want to.”
“Set an alarm… You think you’re so clever, don’t you?” He grumbles, opening his trailer door and stepping up into it.
He continues to grumble as he closes the door on you, and you maintain your position outside. The bathroom light comes on after a moment, and you call, “Goodnight, Alan,” with an expectant grin. You hear an exclamation before the tiny window is thrown open and Grant’s face appears behind the screen.
“Oh- goodnight. Sorry.”
You laugh softly before turning on your heel and heading for your home-away-from-home.
Forcing yourself to get up earlier than Grant was rough, to say the least, but after splashing your face with icy water and downing a fresh cup of coffee, you’re functioning. It’s barely light out when you start cooking, and you’ve propped your trailer door open both to fumigate the kitchen as you fry the steak and to pose a silent invitation to your grumpy coworker. The only light in your trailer is the bare bulb under the stove hood, and the cold morning air feels good against your back in contrast to the hot stove. As you’re pulling the second steak out of the fry bath, you hear heavy footsteps trudge past your door, and your ears perk up at the sound. It sounds like Alan has passed your trailer in favor of sneaking out to the site alone. You force yourself to remain at the stove and continue plating the steaks instead of turning to look out the door, and after a few tense seconds, you hear a tired sigh before the footsteps return and ascend your front steps.
Your trailer has the same layout as his, and you hear him plop into one of the barstools at your kitchen island while you pour fresh gravy over the steaks. There are still bags under his eyes when you turn around to give him his plate, and his hair is a mess, but he looks more well-rested than he has for the last week. Probably the first night he’s actually slept since we got here.
You plate yourself up and make him a cup of coffee before rounding the island and taking the stool to his right. He tenses when you take your seat, but he also leans imperceptably into your space. You feel the warmth radiating off of him and try to remain casual as you reach up and push the second mug of coffee toward him with the back of your left hand. You eat in silence that starts out awkward and evolves into something that feels comfortable, edging on intimate. Neither of you make space between yourselves, and when Grant moves to plant his hands on the edge of the counter to stand, the feeling of his silly flannel brushing against your arm is almost electric.
“I… need to head to the site before it gets too late.” He mutters, giving you an awkward half-smile as he takes his plate over to your tiny sink.
“Oh, yeah,” You exclaim, pulling yourself out of your mini daze to bring your own dishes over, “I’ll do these and meet you there, then?”
“I-” Grant turns to face you and startles when you’re right there, and you can see his internal struggle between staying put and stepping backward.
There’s a moment where he sways toward you, and some sort of hope lights up in your chest. Hope that this will be the time when he invites you to accompany him- that your efforts aren’t entirely in vain. And then, he shuffles a half foot away and clears his throat before continuing, “I want to have some… some quiet. Don’t rush yourself.”
You try to ignore the sinking disappointment in your gut and keep your voice carefully neutral when you say, “Alright. Good luck with the grid.”
Something dims in Alan’s eyes, like he was hoping you’d push back. He eyes you with an all too familiar mixture of longing and trepidation as your brain screams at you to say something, anything, but you’re too slow. He gives you a curt nod and breathes, “Right,” as he brushes past you to tromp down your front steps. You’re left alone and feeling colder than ever, and you curse to yourself as you watch his figure retreating through your open door.
August
You’ve been counting yourself lucky that neither you nor your students have been caught in a summer thunderstorm, and it seems that your luck is still holding. The first one of the summer waited until all of you were settled in your tents and trailers for the night before fully letting loose. You’re still awake at midnight, curled up on your trailer’s tiny couch and reading by lamplight as rain and thunder create a natural symphony outside your door. Every few minutes, lightning casts an eerie light into your trailer, highlighting your furniture and creating stark shadows in the living area.
As the second loudest thunderclap in the last half hour rings out above you, your trailer door is thrown open and rain spills into the kitchen. You start and drop your book, not daring to breathe as every muscle in your body tenses for action, and your fear only worsens when a familiar figure scrambles into your trailer on hands and knees and slams the door behind them. Alan is soaked through, shivering and panting as he collapses on your floor and braces himself against your front door like he’s hiding from something.
“Alan?”
Your voice is low, but you might as well be screaming into a bullhorn with how harshly Grant jumps. He whips his head around to look in your direction, and fear makes a tight fist around your heart when you realize that he isn’t really seeing you. Moving slowly and doing your best to telegraph your every action, you stand up from the couch and approach him slowly, bent at the waist with your arms out in front of you like you’re approaching a wild animal. He doesn’t really register your presence until you squat down in front of him and put a hand on his knee. His frantic gaze snaps to your hand before it trails up your arm and your eyes finally meet.
He’s just opening his mouth to say something when another thunderclap rings out, and you’re pulled off balance as he shouts and grapples the front of your shirt, wet boots scrabbling uselessly on your kitchen’s linoleum. You have to plant a hand on the floor to either side of him to keep from falling. His eyes are desperate as they bore into yours, and you can’t pull away because of the iron grip he has on your clothing, so you settle for the next best thing and keep your voice low and level as you coo, “Come on. Let’s get you to the couch. It’s- it’s safer there.”
“It is?” He breathes, eyes frantically darting between your face and the rest of your trailer.
You swallow hard and nod, leaning back a little to take hold of Grant’s elbows and coax him to stand. He does so on wobbly legs, and you have to walk backward toward the couch because he refuses to let go of you. He keeps looking over his shoulder at the door like he’s afraid of something breaking in, and after a moment of convincing, he lets you go long enough for you to go and lock it. Your tiny closet is right next to the couch, and you take the opportunity to grab one of your biggest band shirts and a pair of flannel pajama pants out of it along with a towel. Grant is standing in the middle of your living room like he’s never seen it before, hugging himself and shivering as he drips rainwater onto the shitty carpet. You hold the items out to him, but he doesn’t seem to notice them- just focuses on you with a desperation that makes your stomach feel sour. So, for the first time in your ten years of knowing him, you ask the question that you’ve always danced around but never voiced, “Do you want me to help?”
His shaky, whispered, “Please,” feels like a punch to your stomach. You take a deep breath and gesture to the couch, but Alan sinks to the floor instead and sits with his back to it, watching the door as lightning streaks across the sky. He’s silent as you slip his boots off of him. They’re not laced, and you’re half grateful and half afraid of the idea that his first instinct when in distress was to come to you. You help him peel his socks and wet flannel off next, and it doesn’t even cross your mind to feel embarrassed when you help him shimmy out of his soaked cargo pants. You quickly mop up most of the water on his chest and legs before you pull the band shirt over his head and help him into the pajama pants. He’s still shaking as you use the towel to squish some of the water out of his hair.
Your timing is impeccable- you’re just finishing with the towel when another wave of thunder rumbles the trailer, and Alan blindly reaches for you again, eyes glued to the door as he whisper-yells, “Get down!” and cowers against you. He ends up hooking your right shoulder with one hand, and you sit down hard when it pulls you off balance. He’s quick to curl into your side and rest his head on your collarbone, gaze a thousand miles away as he fists the material of your shirt and mumbles something about movement-based eyesight that you don’t fully understand.
You’ve never seen him like this- it’s like he doesn’t even know where he is. In your desperation to help, you quickly pull the comforter over the both of you and wrap an arm around his shoulders. As a last-ditch effort to distract him, you hold him a little bit tighter and start to tell him about your high school years. It’s the first thing that comes to mind, so you run with it. As you describe your abominable fashion experiments, your first kiss, failing the driving test twice in one week, his breathing slows. An hour later, you’re raking a hand through his hair as his eyes start to flutter closed. You’re halfway through a story about shoplifting, and you give yourself a mental point when you notice that he’s not startling awake at each thunderclap anymore. You jolt when you feel his body sag against yours and start to topple, and you quickly reach behind yourself to snag a throw pillow off of your couch and place it in your lap. Alan slides forward to lay in your lap, arms loosely draped around your hips, and you stop talking for a moment just to look at him.
He’s breathing softly through his mouth, face turned toward your stomach, and even asleep he looks unbelievably tired. You watch him drift off, and a deep ache pulls at your chest. You don’t want to fall asleep because you know you’ll wake up alone and have to pretend like you don’t care for him so deeply that it hurts- to pretend like this never happened. Fate has other plans, however, and you find yourself tipping your head backward to rest on the couch cushions as the world fades away.
Sure enough, he’s gone when you awake to stiff pain in your neck and pins and needles in your legs. He avoids eye contact and keeps his distance for the next three days, but when the next storm hits, you find yourself holding him against your chest once again as you describe bits of your life to him. It happens four more times that month, and each time you wake the next morning, the only evidence that he was even there is a damp spot on the carpet and a still-steaming mug of coffee on your counter.
September
Camp doesn’t feel the same without the sight of your student’s tents and trailers littering the dusty landscape. As you set out from the open doorway of your trailer, coffee in hand, you already miss the sound of their conversation and the tired shuffling that would normally fill the air at this time in the morning.
You trek toward the empty dig site under a purple-streaked sky, foggy breath pluming out in front of you. You’re still dressed for summer, and the cold air feels good against your skin. Instead of going down into the pit, you bypass it in favor of a rusty red boulder on the far side. You’ve seen the kids take their lunches up there, and after circling it once, you find the trail of handholds they’ve been using to climb it. It’s fifteen feet tall and about ten feet wide. The climb is a little difficult, considering that you have to hold a travel mug in one hand the whole time, but you manage to get to the top. The kids were onto something- the rock is mostly flat with two three-foot deep steps on one side of it, and you’re able to sit with your lower back propped up against one of these ridges. You stretch your legs out and set your mug next to you on your makeshift bench. There are coffee rings dotted along the top of the rock, half-smeared by the latest storm, and you vaguely wonder how long it will be before the rain washes away every trace of your presence here.
You’re half finished with your coffee and watching a roadrunner hunt in the predawn light when your ears perk up at the sound of footfalls around the base of the rock. There’s the sound of pebbles cascading into the dirt and then a familiar hat comes into view at your feet.
“Little help, here?” Alan asks as his face appears over the edge of the rock.
You move forward to rest on your knees and offer him a hand, and instead of taking it, his right hand appears with a gigantic thermos in it which he slaps into your hand before heaving himself up onto your little platform.
“Thought you might… want a refill.” He pants as he sits with his feet dangling over the edge of the rock.
You know that’s bullshit, but you thank him anyway and reclaim your original spot to top off your mug. Alan stands after catching his breath and trudges over to you, removing his hat and running a nervous hand through his hair as he eyes the spot that isn’t being taken up by both of your travel mugs. You reach over and pat said spot without looking at him, still tending to the coffee, and there’s a soft grunt from behind you as he takes a seat.
With ten feet of rock to spread out on, it’s safe to say that you’re more than a little surprised when you turn around to give him his coffee and find that your entire side is brushing up against his. You school your face into a small smile and try to ignore the butterflies in your stomach. He usually finds an excuse to sit closer to you than normal or brush shoulders with you, but it’s always in passing and never so intentional. He side-eyes you as he takes the first few sips of his coffee, and when you stretch your legs out to lean back against the rock instead of moving away, he visibly relaxes.
As the sun rises, the desert comes to life around you, and you delight in pointing out the local wildlife to him as it passes by. He listens to you ramble with visible interest, and when there’s finally a gap in the conversation, he asks, “Where does all of this modern wildlife knowledge come from?”
You shrug and look at him out of the corner of your eye, embarrassed, “I, uh… Don’t actually have a paleontology degree.”
Grant’s face is frozen for a moment before his eyebrows slowly raise, and he blinks at you confusedly.
“Zoology doctorate with a taxonomy specialization,” You hurry to add, gesturing vaguely, “I... remade most of the modern phylogenetic trees as my Master’s project and made my board view them blind against the originals. Most of them agreed that mine were the standardized trees and the originals were the fakes. The point of it was to show how even the most widely accepted, 'standardized' forms of organization are still a result of personal bias and, therefore, entirely fallible.”
“I’d like to see those trees sometime. And look at how far you’ve come,” Alan quips, smiling faintly as he gazes out toward the desert, “Ten years of venturing out to the middle of nowhere to work with America's most famous curmudgeon.”
“I wouldn’t change it for the world.” You laugh, tipping to your right to bump shoulders with him.
It’s not very effective, considering you’re already touching, but it still draws a disbelieving scoff from the professor, “You don’t mean that.”
“Don’t I?”
His head snaps to the left to look at you, and his eyes hold a mixture of hope and fear as they scan your face for any sign of a lie. You know he won’t find one. You give him a smile that you hope is reassuring, and he lets out a quiet hmph before he looks contemplatively into his coffee mug. You lean against him a little more deliberately as you go back to watching roadrunners, and to your surprise, he lets it happen.
October
“At least come to my place tomorrow night. It’ll be all of the paleo faculty that you actually like, and I’m making one of those ridiculous English teatime spreads.”
“I told you- I have work to do.”
“On Friday night of midterm week when there’s no homework to grade, and I know you got all of your student’s tests back to them this morning because you spent all night grading them instead of going to that faculty party like I know you wanted to?”
“Stop it.” He grits out, glaring at you from behind his desk.
“Stop what?”
You feign ignorance, crossing your arms and refusing to shrink under his gaze. He scoffs and pushes his chair back from his desk to snap, “I like being alone. I don’t need you to… to feed me and visit with me and make sure I get enough sleep and make sure I go outside- I’m an adult man, not some… some animal at the zoo. I can take care of myself.”
“I know that-”
“Then stop wasting time and effort on me with th-the meals, the walks, the invites. I can function just fine on my own-”
“You could have said no,” You interrupt, unable to hold back the dangerous waver in your voice, “Every time I brought you food; every invite to spend the evening with me; every late night spent helping you with your work, you could have said no to, and you chose not to. Did that thought ever cross your mind?”
In less than a second, the prestigious Alan Grant is brought to his metaphorical knees. The color drains from his face, and all of the strength seems to leave him as he slumps into his chair. His head falls forward, and his eyes dart around his desk like he’s frantically trying to collect himself, mouth opening and closing as he tries to summon the strength to deny your accusations.
“You’ve had hundreds of opportunities to let me down gently, and you never took them because you like being wanted, whether you want to admit it or not. But letting someone care about you means you’d have to give up on the idea that you’re unloveable, doesn’t it?” You seethe, your eyes boring holes into the top of Grant’s head, “The next time someone gets close and you try to shove them aside, just like this, I want you to think about all of the times that you didn’t say no to me.”
You try to take a deep breath, but your body won’t let you. You shudder with the effort, and at the sound of your suffering, Alan’s hands clench into fists where they’re resting on top of his knees. He remains frozen in his chair, jaw ticking as he refuses to look at you.
“You wanna know the worst part?” You breathe, hot tears finally spilling over and tracking down your cheeks as you take another shuddering breath, “I’m going to come back next week and I’m still going to bring an extra thermos of coffee for you; and sit in that stupid chair to keep you company while you grade; and invite you to things even though I know you’re going to say no just to torture yourself. Because I’m the world’s biggest idiot, and I love wasting time and effort on you.”
You don’t say exactly what you mean, but the implication isn’t lost on the professor. He jolts like your words sent a bolt of electricity through him, but when he looks up, you’re already gone. By the time you’ve made it most of the way down the hall, you hear the screech of a chair being shoved backward, shoes squeaking on the floor. Grant only makes it a few feet out of his door before you disappear around the corner, and instead of chasing after you like he knows he should, he freezes and remains standing in the middle of the hall, one hand outstretched like he could still reach out and stop you.