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Merry Christmas from me and the boys!
Christmas day and much turkey has been eaten. I've been spending the holidays with my family, doing absolutely nothing.
As for John and Rodney in the Entangled Particles 'verse, well, it's Christmas where they are too. Here's a little gift to you, almighty f-list. Thank you for the way you enrich my life. I hope you're all having a nice, calm, stress-free couple of days, whether you celebrate Christmas or not, and I hope that you get to spend them with people you love.
Probability Theory
The problem with John's ideas was that when they worked, they worked really well. However, when they didn't work, 'disaster' was the best word to sum up the result.
This was one of the ideas he didn't want to end in disaster. It was his and Rodney's first Christmas in their new home and John wanted to do it the right way. They were going to visit the Millers in Canada for the holidays, but John had still spent most of December putting up lights and decorations. He might have gone a little overboard with the enormous blinking Rudolph on the front porch - Laura declared it unbearably tacky and Rodney pointedly shut his eyes every time he had to pass it. John took it in stride. He'd never really had anything of his own to decorate for Christmas before, so he figured he was allowed, just this one time.
With the Christmas lights taken care of, there was just one problem left - Rodney's present. John hadn't had a lot of money to spend on Christmas gifts in the previous years. Now that he was Assistant Manager of the youth center and had the corresponding rise in pay, he wanted to do something to make up for the cheap but heartfelt gifts of the past. Rodney always got him the coolest stuff and it was only fair that he got something back that was a little better than a coupon for a week's worth of free blowjobs.
But it was hard to think of something good. What did you get a guy who could afford to buy himself pretty much anything he wanted? John looked at computer games, something that Rodney would definitely appreciate and that John would also get some fun out of, but it felt a bit impersonal. Rodney already had all the latest games anyway. He saw a really cool antique typewriter in the window of a store, but he wanted to get Rodney something he would actually use, something that wouldn't just collect dust in a corner. He thought about something for the house, maybe a new chair for Rodney's study instead of the old sagging thing he'd had since college, but when he furtively asked Rodney what kind of chair he might want instead, the answer was, "You are not getting rid of my chair, over my dead body! I'll chain myself to it if I have to!"
It was a tricky problem and one that took up all John's thoughts as the holidays loomed closer. It wasn't until December 17:th that he finally found what might possibly be the perfect gift.
He saw the ad in the morning paper and quickly tore the page out before Rodney could see it, since Rodney liked mocking the classifieds and always studied them closely. Then he walked around with the folded page tucked into his jeans pocket for the entire morning while thinking about the empty space along the wall in the living room. John had just put up new wallpaper in there and rearranged the furniture a bit, but he hadn't found anything to put in that particular spot yet and it kept nagging at his mind, flickering in the corner of his eye when he walked past, like something was missing there and he couldn't figure out what.
The ad burned a hole in his pocket, and on his lunch break John called the number and got an answer on the second ring.
"Sure mister, the piano's still here," said the elderly gentleman who picked up the phone. "You can come by and have a look if you want."
John hesitated for a moment and then decided that it couldn't hurt to look. "I'll drop by after work," he said.
He spent the rest of the day second-guessing his own second guesses. Rodney loved music and had wanted to be a pianist when he was a kid, but John knew that his dreams had been cruelly crushed many years ago. Since then, he'd never let anyone but John hear him play. Getting Rodney his own piano could be a excellent idea, but it might also be a very bad one.
The elderly gentleman introduced himself as Bill and wouldn't let John call him anything else.
"It's a fine piece," he said, showing John the way into the house and the room where the piano stood in a corner. "No one's played on it since the missus passed away so it'll need some tuning, but it's got a nice sound to it." He pressed down a few keys to demonstrate. John didn't know enough about music to judge, but he smiled and nodded in agreement.
It wasn't a beautiful instrument. There were scuff marks along the edges and the patina was worn thin in some places. It was clearly well-used and also very well-loved. John liked it immediately. The big question was - would Rodney?
In the end, he said he needed a little time to think about it and asked Bill to hold the piano for him until the next day. John had learned to acknowledge when he was in need of advice, and that moment had come now.
"That sounds fantastic!" Megan exclaimed when John called her to wish her and Hawk a happy Christmas and ask what she thought of the idea. He didn't know a lot about pianos but Meg was a music teacher so she should be able to tell him what he ought to look out for.
"You really think so?" John asked.
"Of course! I think it's a wonderful idea!"
"It might backfire," John warned.
"Why in the world would it do that? He'll love it!"
John still had his doubts. Meg sometimes had a tendency to be overly enthusiastic and while she and Rodney had quickly become fast friends, she hadn't known him that long and John was fairly sure that she didn't know all the details about Rodney's childhood.
He thanked Meg for her input, talked to Hawk for a while, and then they said goodbye and John sat down to think. He came to the conclusion that he needed a second opinion and grabbed his phone again.
"I don't know, John," Jeannie said when she picked up and John had explained his dilemma. "It might not be a great idea."
"Why not?" John asked. "I've heard him play, he's really good at it."
Jeannie's sigh came out tinny and frustrated through the phone line. "It's complicated," she said. "Our dad was... well, you know what he was like."
Yes, John knew. He'd had to drag the story out of Rodney a little at the time, but the bits and pieces had formed a picture of a grim and overbearing man, more interested in his children's success than their happiness. Rodney's father had made him give up the piano because he was, according to his teacher, 'not concert pianist material'.
If John had a dollar for every time he'd wanted to go back in time and punch the old bastard in the face, he'd be a rich man.
"So you don't think I should do it," he said instead.
Jeannie was quiet for a long time. "I don't know," she said eventually. "I wouldn't. But it might be different if it's from you."
John didn't feel much wiser when they said good bye and hung up. He had seen and heard Rodney play, seen how his love for music was clear in every fiber of his being. He wanted Rodney to have that, to be able to just sit down and play whenever he felt like it.
But on the other hand, Rodney hated being reminded of his failures. Bringing a piano into the house might do just that. It was possible the instrument would open up old wounds, make them start bleeding again.
"What do you guys think?" he asked Lady and Newton, who had made him company in the living room when he got home from work. Rodney was still at the University, finishing up for the holidays, so it was just John and the pets. Lady was sleeping on the rug in front of the TV and Newton had curled up on John's knee, pointedly digging sharp claws into his thigh every time he thought about moving.
Neither of them had anything useful to contribute. John sighed and turned his head to look at that empty space along the wall. He thought about how the piano had looked in Bill's house, the small forest of framed family pictures on top of it, the way the keys had been yellowed and worn with age and use. He could imagine it here, in their own home, could imagine Rodney sitting in front of the instrument, putting his own fingerprints on it.
John's gut feeling had gotten him through a lot of tricky situations and while it had betrayed him on a few occasions, it tended to be mostly right.
"Okay," he told Lady and Newton. "You had your chance to help. If he hates it, I'll blame you two."
Then he picked up the phone again and called Bill back.
Getting the piano into the house without Rodney noticing was a covert operation in itself and John had to use all his cunning to complete the mission. He borrowed the youth center van and paid Allen Hernandez a hundred bucks to help him move the heavy piece (Allen offered to do it for free, but John figured the kid could use a little extra Christmas money). It was the 22:nd. Rodney was at a faculty party that afternoon and wouldn't be home until later in the evening. Their suitcases were packed and they were ready to head up to Vancouver the next day.
The piano looked just as perfect against the wall as John had imagined. He drove Allen home, returned the van to the youth center and then went back home to prepare for Rodney's arrival. He puttered about the house, cleaned up a little and rounded up Rodney's army of used coffee mugs and put them in the dishwasher. Then he dusted off the piano and, on a whim, moved the picture of Jeannie and her family and the one of Laura and Carson from the bookshelf to the top of the piano. As an afterthought he added the Christmas card with the photo of little Anna that Hawk and Megan had sent. It looked good, he thought, like the instrument had always been there, fitting into the room like it was made for that space.
After that, he just couldn't think of anything else to do, so he sat down on the couch and waited anxiously for Rodney to come home. He felt restless and nervous and couldn't stop picking at the hem of his t-shirt. What if Rodney didn't like the gift? What if he'd take it the wrong way? What if Jeannie had been right, that it had been a bad idea?
When John heard the door opening and Rodney come inside, he jumped up from the couch like it had bitten him. He heard Rodney hanging up his coat and throwing his keys in the bowl on the little dresser in the hall, heard his steps coming toward the living room, heard him shout, "John? Are you home?"
"In here," John answered, surprised to note that his voice wasn't trembling even though it felt like the rest of him was. The next moment, Rodney showed up in the doorway.
"How long is that blinking monstrosity going to be on our front porch because I... Oh..." Rodney's voice trailed off and he froze, staring past John, at the piano.
John could hear his own pulse pounding in his ears as he cleared his throat. "Um. Merry Christmas? I wasn't sure if..."
Rodney's mouth opened and closed a couple of times. "I... I'm... I don't..." Then he swallowed hard and blinked and said, "I'll be right back."
Before John knew it, Rodney had fled into his study and shut the door. John sank back down onto the couch. Okay, that had not gone as planned. It looked like Jeannie had been right after all and that John should've known better than to try to dredge up a past he knew next to nothing about.
He waited for ten minutes, and then he couldn't stand the suspense anymore. He had to get out, try to get his thoughts in order again.
"Come on, girl," he said to Lady, and the dog sat up, looking hopeful. "Yeah, let's go for a walk."
John was gone for longer than he'd planned, trying to do his best to convince himself that he wasn't nervous to return home, but it wasn't like he could stay away forever. The best thing to do was to go back, apologise to Rodney, and do his best to make everything right again, however he was going to do that.
As John neared the house, he could see a folded piece of paper taped to the front door, illuminated by the red and green glow of the Christmas lights. His stomach turned and he felt a little bit nauseous, wondering for a short fearful moment if the note held the order to pack his bags and get out. He couldn't have screwed up that badly, could he?
His fingers weren't shaking when he reached out for the note and unfolded it, but it felt as if they should be.
John,
Every time I think I couldn't possibly love you more, you go and do something to prove me wrong. You find all the pieces of me that's been missing, and you put them right. You make me whole.
Thank you.
R
A smile spread over John's face as he read and re-read the words. He carefully folded the note again and tucked into his pocket. Then he opened the door and he and Lady stepped inside, to be met by the sound of music, slightly out of tune, but still the most wondrous sound John could think of.
- fin -
As for John and Rodney in the Entangled Particles 'verse, well, it's Christmas where they are too. Here's a little gift to you, almighty f-list. Thank you for the way you enrich my life. I hope you're all having a nice, calm, stress-free couple of days, whether you celebrate Christmas or not, and I hope that you get to spend them with people you love.
Probability Theory
The problem with John's ideas was that when they worked, they worked really well. However, when they didn't work, 'disaster' was the best word to sum up the result.
This was one of the ideas he didn't want to end in disaster. It was his and Rodney's first Christmas in their new home and John wanted to do it the right way. They were going to visit the Millers in Canada for the holidays, but John had still spent most of December putting up lights and decorations. He might have gone a little overboard with the enormous blinking Rudolph on the front porch - Laura declared it unbearably tacky and Rodney pointedly shut his eyes every time he had to pass it. John took it in stride. He'd never really had anything of his own to decorate for Christmas before, so he figured he was allowed, just this one time.
With the Christmas lights taken care of, there was just one problem left - Rodney's present. John hadn't had a lot of money to spend on Christmas gifts in the previous years. Now that he was Assistant Manager of the youth center and had the corresponding rise in pay, he wanted to do something to make up for the cheap but heartfelt gifts of the past. Rodney always got him the coolest stuff and it was only fair that he got something back that was a little better than a coupon for a week's worth of free blowjobs.
But it was hard to think of something good. What did you get a guy who could afford to buy himself pretty much anything he wanted? John looked at computer games, something that Rodney would definitely appreciate and that John would also get some fun out of, but it felt a bit impersonal. Rodney already had all the latest games anyway. He saw a really cool antique typewriter in the window of a store, but he wanted to get Rodney something he would actually use, something that wouldn't just collect dust in a corner. He thought about something for the house, maybe a new chair for Rodney's study instead of the old sagging thing he'd had since college, but when he furtively asked Rodney what kind of chair he might want instead, the answer was, "You are not getting rid of my chair, over my dead body! I'll chain myself to it if I have to!"
It was a tricky problem and one that took up all John's thoughts as the holidays loomed closer. It wasn't until December 17:th that he finally found what might possibly be the perfect gift.
He saw the ad in the morning paper and quickly tore the page out before Rodney could see it, since Rodney liked mocking the classifieds and always studied them closely. Then he walked around with the folded page tucked into his jeans pocket for the entire morning while thinking about the empty space along the wall in the living room. John had just put up new wallpaper in there and rearranged the furniture a bit, but he hadn't found anything to put in that particular spot yet and it kept nagging at his mind, flickering in the corner of his eye when he walked past, like something was missing there and he couldn't figure out what.
The ad burned a hole in his pocket, and on his lunch break John called the number and got an answer on the second ring.
"Sure mister, the piano's still here," said the elderly gentleman who picked up the phone. "You can come by and have a look if you want."
John hesitated for a moment and then decided that it couldn't hurt to look. "I'll drop by after work," he said.
He spent the rest of the day second-guessing his own second guesses. Rodney loved music and had wanted to be a pianist when he was a kid, but John knew that his dreams had been cruelly crushed many years ago. Since then, he'd never let anyone but John hear him play. Getting Rodney his own piano could be a excellent idea, but it might also be a very bad one.
The elderly gentleman introduced himself as Bill and wouldn't let John call him anything else.
"It's a fine piece," he said, showing John the way into the house and the room where the piano stood in a corner. "No one's played on it since the missus passed away so it'll need some tuning, but it's got a nice sound to it." He pressed down a few keys to demonstrate. John didn't know enough about music to judge, but he smiled and nodded in agreement.
It wasn't a beautiful instrument. There were scuff marks along the edges and the patina was worn thin in some places. It was clearly well-used and also very well-loved. John liked it immediately. The big question was - would Rodney?
In the end, he said he needed a little time to think about it and asked Bill to hold the piano for him until the next day. John had learned to acknowledge when he was in need of advice, and that moment had come now.
"That sounds fantastic!" Megan exclaimed when John called her to wish her and Hawk a happy Christmas and ask what she thought of the idea. He didn't know a lot about pianos but Meg was a music teacher so she should be able to tell him what he ought to look out for.
"You really think so?" John asked.
"Of course! I think it's a wonderful idea!"
"It might backfire," John warned.
"Why in the world would it do that? He'll love it!"
John still had his doubts. Meg sometimes had a tendency to be overly enthusiastic and while she and Rodney had quickly become fast friends, she hadn't known him that long and John was fairly sure that she didn't know all the details about Rodney's childhood.
He thanked Meg for her input, talked to Hawk for a while, and then they said goodbye and John sat down to think. He came to the conclusion that he needed a second opinion and grabbed his phone again.
"I don't know, John," Jeannie said when she picked up and John had explained his dilemma. "It might not be a great idea."
"Why not?" John asked. "I've heard him play, he's really good at it."
Jeannie's sigh came out tinny and frustrated through the phone line. "It's complicated," she said. "Our dad was... well, you know what he was like."
Yes, John knew. He'd had to drag the story out of Rodney a little at the time, but the bits and pieces had formed a picture of a grim and overbearing man, more interested in his children's success than their happiness. Rodney's father had made him give up the piano because he was, according to his teacher, 'not concert pianist material'.
If John had a dollar for every time he'd wanted to go back in time and punch the old bastard in the face, he'd be a rich man.
"So you don't think I should do it," he said instead.
Jeannie was quiet for a long time. "I don't know," she said eventually. "I wouldn't. But it might be different if it's from you."
John didn't feel much wiser when they said good bye and hung up. He had seen and heard Rodney play, seen how his love for music was clear in every fiber of his being. He wanted Rodney to have that, to be able to just sit down and play whenever he felt like it.
But on the other hand, Rodney hated being reminded of his failures. Bringing a piano into the house might do just that. It was possible the instrument would open up old wounds, make them start bleeding again.
"What do you guys think?" he asked Lady and Newton, who had made him company in the living room when he got home from work. Rodney was still at the University, finishing up for the holidays, so it was just John and the pets. Lady was sleeping on the rug in front of the TV and Newton had curled up on John's knee, pointedly digging sharp claws into his thigh every time he thought about moving.
Neither of them had anything useful to contribute. John sighed and turned his head to look at that empty space along the wall. He thought about how the piano had looked in Bill's house, the small forest of framed family pictures on top of it, the way the keys had been yellowed and worn with age and use. He could imagine it here, in their own home, could imagine Rodney sitting in front of the instrument, putting his own fingerprints on it.
John's gut feeling had gotten him through a lot of tricky situations and while it had betrayed him on a few occasions, it tended to be mostly right.
"Okay," he told Lady and Newton. "You had your chance to help. If he hates it, I'll blame you two."
Then he picked up the phone again and called Bill back.
Getting the piano into the house without Rodney noticing was a covert operation in itself and John had to use all his cunning to complete the mission. He borrowed the youth center van and paid Allen Hernandez a hundred bucks to help him move the heavy piece (Allen offered to do it for free, but John figured the kid could use a little extra Christmas money). It was the 22:nd. Rodney was at a faculty party that afternoon and wouldn't be home until later in the evening. Their suitcases were packed and they were ready to head up to Vancouver the next day.
The piano looked just as perfect against the wall as John had imagined. He drove Allen home, returned the van to the youth center and then went back home to prepare for Rodney's arrival. He puttered about the house, cleaned up a little and rounded up Rodney's army of used coffee mugs and put them in the dishwasher. Then he dusted off the piano and, on a whim, moved the picture of Jeannie and her family and the one of Laura and Carson from the bookshelf to the top of the piano. As an afterthought he added the Christmas card with the photo of little Anna that Hawk and Megan had sent. It looked good, he thought, like the instrument had always been there, fitting into the room like it was made for that space.
After that, he just couldn't think of anything else to do, so he sat down on the couch and waited anxiously for Rodney to come home. He felt restless and nervous and couldn't stop picking at the hem of his t-shirt. What if Rodney didn't like the gift? What if he'd take it the wrong way? What if Jeannie had been right, that it had been a bad idea?
When John heard the door opening and Rodney come inside, he jumped up from the couch like it had bitten him. He heard Rodney hanging up his coat and throwing his keys in the bowl on the little dresser in the hall, heard his steps coming toward the living room, heard him shout, "John? Are you home?"
"In here," John answered, surprised to note that his voice wasn't trembling even though it felt like the rest of him was. The next moment, Rodney showed up in the doorway.
"How long is that blinking monstrosity going to be on our front porch because I... Oh..." Rodney's voice trailed off and he froze, staring past John, at the piano.
John could hear his own pulse pounding in his ears as he cleared his throat. "Um. Merry Christmas? I wasn't sure if..."
Rodney's mouth opened and closed a couple of times. "I... I'm... I don't..." Then he swallowed hard and blinked and said, "I'll be right back."
Before John knew it, Rodney had fled into his study and shut the door. John sank back down onto the couch. Okay, that had not gone as planned. It looked like Jeannie had been right after all and that John should've known better than to try to dredge up a past he knew next to nothing about.
He waited for ten minutes, and then he couldn't stand the suspense anymore. He had to get out, try to get his thoughts in order again.
"Come on, girl," he said to Lady, and the dog sat up, looking hopeful. "Yeah, let's go for a walk."
John was gone for longer than he'd planned, trying to do his best to convince himself that he wasn't nervous to return home, but it wasn't like he could stay away forever. The best thing to do was to go back, apologise to Rodney, and do his best to make everything right again, however he was going to do that.
As John neared the house, he could see a folded piece of paper taped to the front door, illuminated by the red and green glow of the Christmas lights. His stomach turned and he felt a little bit nauseous, wondering for a short fearful moment if the note held the order to pack his bags and get out. He couldn't have screwed up that badly, could he?
His fingers weren't shaking when he reached out for the note and unfolded it, but it felt as if they should be.
John,
Every time I think I couldn't possibly love you more, you go and do something to prove me wrong. You find all the pieces of me that's been missing, and you put them right. You make me whole.
Thank you.
R
A smile spread over John's face as he read and re-read the words. He carefully folded the note again and tucked into his pocket. Then he opened the door and he and Lady stepped inside, to be met by the sound of music, slightly out of tune, but still the most wondrous sound John could think of.
- fin -