Work Text:
You've got my devotion, but man, I can hate you sometimes. I don't want to fight you, and I don't wanna sleep in the dirt.
We'll be a fine line.
Life was simple, days on Erid passed like the world outside of a car window, and Simon and Ryland were in a good place. Ryland still had gaps in his memory, and Simon still had his moments, his episodes as they called them, but other than that, things were slow, easy, good. For once, Ryland slept soundly, wrapped up in his quilt from the Hail Mary. The quilt that he’d wrapped around Simon when he’d waited for him to wake up. When they found him in the submarine, in the SM-13 as Si called it, he’d been halfway dead, more than halfway even, but with some help from Ryland and Armando, he’d made a full recovery. Getting used to having one arm was an adjustment, and being around another human was… something Ryland had to get used to, but they did it. Their bedrooms were near each other in case one of them had a nightmare, and everything, god, everything, was good.
Until Ryland woke up one morning, and Simon was standing in the doorframe, the hallway light illuminating him from behind. It made him look… ominous, and Ryland sat up, confused and sleep-ruffled.
“Si? What’s wrong?”
Simon didn’t respond for a long time, just stood there, shaking like a scared dog, with its tail between its legs, terrified of whatever it was seeing. Shoot, Simon was probably seeing-
“Where am I?” Simon whispered, his voice deep, gravely, and Ryland didn’t curse in his head, but he definitely considered it. For one moment, one long, drawn-out moment, Simon didn’t say anything else, just took a step further into Ryland’s room. “Who are you?”
“My name is Ryland Grace. I rescued you from the SM-13 two years ago, and we’ve been living here ever since.” Ryland reached to the side to turn on the lamp beside his bed, and Simon flinched. Ryland paused, and held up his hands carefully, a show of peace. “You know me, Simon, and I know you. We’ve been best friends since you stopped being rude to me.” Yikes, probably not the best thing to say to him. Especially right now.
“Ryland… Ryland… I-I know that name.”
Ryland didn’t know what was happening, if Simon was in some sort of amnesic episode, something like transient global amnesia. Ryland had read up on all kinds of amnesia when he’d woken up from the coma. He’d just never thought it would happen to Simon. Simon’s problem was that he did remember, too well, too vividly.
“That’s right, you know me. We’re friends, I promise you.” Ryland continued to hold out his hands, and eventually Simon took another step forward. This time, he didn’t flinch when Ryland moved and turned on the lamp. In the light, Ryland could see the stump of Simon’s missing arm, could see the skin on his friend’s mouth where the mutations had started. The black veins that traveled down his neck and disappeared under his shirt. Ryland didn’t know how far they went… he’d never know… He shook his head, trying to get his brain out of that way of thinking. It never did him any good to think about the ‘what ifs?’
“Friends…?” Simon shook his head back and forth, and his shadow on the wall behind him transformed with every small movement. Ryland’s eyebrows dipped in the middle.
“No, we’re… we’re friends.” Ryland nodded as he said it too, if that counted for anything. “Your memory isn’t working very well right now, there was an accident."
“I’m missing an arm.” Simon whispered, and Ryland’s head dipped down again, confirming Simon’s words, his memory, his observation, whatever it was. He validated it, because he knew that with one arm, Simon could still overpower him and there were a lot of things in this house that could be used as a weapon. Even the potted plant on the windowsill could be smashed over his skull and Ryland never stopped being aware of that, even as Simon’s good days outweighed the bad.
“Your seedling is on your wrist, everything you know is still true, except here, the stars are saved. The quiet rapture happened to your planet, but this is a different one. Do you want to see?”
Simon nodded, just a small tip of the head, but Ryland slowly got out of bed, went to the window and pulled it open. He set Ferny on the floor so that Simon could look outside, and when he did, tears sprang softly to his eyes.
“Y-you’re telling the truth.” He whispered, but when he turned to Ryland, he was sad. “I don’t know who you are though. What’s wrong with me?”
“Nothing is wrong with you, there was just an accident, your memory isn’t that good. Neither is mine.” Ryland picked up Ferny and placed her on the bedside table, patting her leaves softly. Simon tracked the motion while also never taking his eyes off of Ryland’s face.
“You’re sure we’re just friends?”
“Uhm, did you say ‘just’?”
“This can’t be right, I-I’m in love with you, I know that. I know that.” Simon’s breath started slipping faster in and out and Ryland raised his arms up again.
“Hey, hey, it’s alright. You do love me, I know that. I love you too, but right now, you don’t remember me, or who you are. So how about we get some rest, okay?” Ryland ushered toward the door, back next door to Simon’s bedroom, but Simon shook his head.
“I want to stay with you.”
“O-okay, that’s alright too, it’s a big bed.”
So together, they crawled into bed, and Ryland didn’t sleep, just sat awake staring at the ceiling, thinking about what had just happened, and in the morning, when he awoke, Simon was gone. Ryland’s mind was pounding from the lack of sleep, but at some point, he must have fallen asleep because he didn’t remember seeing Simon slip away. He wandered the house for a while looking, until he happened to glance outside and saw Simon sitting on the shoreline.
Ryland pulled on his shoes and slipped outside, sitting down beside Simon.
“Do you-?”
“Remember?” Simon murmured, turning back to look at Ryland, and when Ryland nodded, so did Simon, copying the movement with more hesitation. “I do, I remember the Hail Mary, I remember you and Rocky saving me… I remember telling you I loved you.”
“We don’t have to-”
“But we do…” Simon blinked, his brown eyes filled with so much emotion it scared Ryland. The last time he’d done this, she’d left for Mark, Ryland never tried again. “We have to, Ry… I can’t keep doing this, waking up without you.”
“Can I just say something first?” Ryland asked, and Simon nodded, “yes, that’s alright.”
“Okay, let me just say that… I’m not very good at this. You know my history, how I functioned without Rocky, how well I do on my own. If we try this, and it doesn’t work, there’s no one else. We’re just… we’re stuck here with each other.” Ryland was rambling, probably sounding terrified, like he was, but worse, sounding terrified of something more with Simon. Sweet, loving, Simon. “And if we do try this, and it works, you’ll see that I’m just… I’m just me.”
“What’s wrong with that? I want to do this with you Ryland, not anyone else. Even if I had my pick of human’s, if we were on Earth and not Erid, I would still want this, still want you.” Simon sounded so sure, not at all like the person Ryland had been talking to last night. “It’ll be hard, yes, there will be moments where we choke, but there will be love. You know that, you said it last night.”
Simon glanced down at Ryland’s hand and took it, threaded their fingers together and it was like Ryland could breathe again. “Let’s just try.”
“Okay…” Ryland whispered, flipping their hands over gently, resting them on the soft pebbled sand that Adrian had designed. “Let’s try… together.”
Life was simple, days on Erid passed like the world outside of a car window, and Simon and Ryland were in a good place. Ryland still had gaps in his memory, and Simon still had his moments, his episodes as they called them, but other than that, things were slow, easy, good. For once, Ryland slept soundly, wrapped up in his quilt from the Hail Mary and Simon, who slept on top of Ryland most nights, keeping them both warm during the colder days in the biodome. Simon’s bedroom wasn’t used much anymore, and sort of became an office for Ryland, and a greenhouse for Simon. Where they both worked near each other and when they slept, it was always together in case one of them had a nightmare, and everything, god, everything, was good.
Test of my patience, there's things that we'll never know. You sunshine, you temptress. My hand's at risk, I fold.
Crisp trepidation, spreading you open is the only way of knowing you.