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kalendraashtar:

Scalpel & Needle (Arc I: Incision), Previously

Scalpel & Needle II

Part IV – Sin-Eater

5 years ago

Jamie half-opened the door, curious about the voice softly humming
inside the locker room. His heart tap-danced on the space between his lungs,
inviting them to breathe joy along with the unsteady rhythm.

In the last few weeks he had noticed a reluctance about her anytime
he was near, as if he had turned contagious and she feared to be mortally
infected. It was a cautiousness of touches and glances, more than open animosity.
He had spent countless nights wondering what might have caused such a rift
between them and, more importantly, how to correct it.

Because when the light coming from the window of the locker room hit
her face, carefree and relaxed singing along a song only she could hear, James
Fraser knew he would love Claire Beauchamp until asystole. He didn’t know the
cause of his death yet, but he already knew who would be on his mind.  He was sure she would be able to make him
smile, even then.

The small earring in her helix, bearing a white stone, glinted in
the sun and Jamie craved to place his mouth on top of it, kissing her there, on
the edge of cartilage and woman. If he opened the door completely he feared he
would become irrevocably inebriated – her creamy skin underneath the blue
scrubs, her soft voice, her quick sharpness – a state made torturous by the
need to disguise it.

“Beauchamp.” Jamie eventually called out, his voice sounding
strangely normal in the warm room. He strolled inside, closing the door behind
him. “Did the surgery went well, then?”

“Ah, Fraser.” Claire
looked at him with raised brows, slightly suspicious, as if defying him to
admit he had been spying on her. “It went very well. Mister Raymond will make a
full recovery.”

“I’m glad.” Jamie rolled his shoulders casually, leaning against the
locker next to hers. Her proximity made him tense sometimes, his body always on
the verge of engaging – on fight, love, storms
between them. “Ye ken what they say about the man, aye? The nurses and
such?”

“I’m not as familiar with
the nurses as you, Fraser.” The female surgeon replied pointedly, neatly
folding her surgical cap. “He is a patient needing my help and that is enough
for me.”

“Ach.” Jamie hawked in his Scottish boom. “They say he is a sin-eater. A verra powerful one at that.”

“A sin-eater?” Claire wrinkled her forehead in confusion. Jamie
longed to brush those lines away with the tip of his fingers, maybe attempt at
drawing them with sharpened pencil, immersed in the shadows of a bedroom.

“Aye.” He nodded sheepishly, offering her a lopsided smile. “A
sin-eater is capable of devouring sins, absolving the soul of another. They
carry them from that point on, so the person can be free and find redemption.”

“Scottish lore, is it?” Claire snorted, amused at this naiveté, quickly
checking her phone for new messages before placing it in her bag.

“Nah.” Jamie shook his head, distractedly playing with the bell of
his stethoscope. “He isna Scottish. But I find it quite interesting, anyway.”

“Yes.” She smiled softly, her eyes the colour of slightly burnt butterscotch,
sweet with just enough bitterness to make it rich. “But isn’t that the role of the people who love us the most? Sharing our sins, helping us bear them, so that in
time we can learn to live with them?” Claire shook her head almost imperceptibly,
a faint – sad – smile still on her
lips. “Not that I would know anything
about that.” She patted his arm in
goodbye – too rushed, too fleeting – and strode towards the door. “Either
way, Mister Raymond is on a liquid diet at the moment, so I wouldn’t go on a
killing spree if I were you. No eating for him until his bowel decides to move
again.”

Present time

Claire knocked on the door, trying to ignore the little whisper of
the key of his apartment inside her small bag. The door between them had
closed, in more ways than one, and using the key was a step she wasn’t prepared
to take.

Silence. Stillness.

She practically banged the second time around,
hearing a small rustle inside the apartment that indicated that either Jamie or
Adso were present and accounted for. As the lock was slowly opening – with
enough hasps for it to look like the gate of a prison – Claire had to admit
that, given the necessity of thumbs for such a task, probably the human
inhabitant was somewhere to be found beyond the door.

Jamie’s appearance hadn’t changed much in the
week that separated them from their last meeting, when he had confessed the real
depth of his brokenness. If anything, he looked very much unkept and battered,
his short hair unpleasantly perspired, his shirt wrinkled to a point where it
would have discouraged even the fiercest iron.

“Claire.
Ye’re here.” He said with surprise at the sight of her, his blue red-rimmed
eyes dilating like the pupils of a cat in the dark. His speech was a tad
slurred, rolling the syllables with a gusto that couldn’t entirely be
attributed to his proud Scottishness. He smelled of stale sweat, something
salty like algae exposed on the low tide and spilled whiskey. Stinking drunk, indeed.

“So it seems, Fraser.” Claire replied dryly, raising her brows. Fraser was safe, whereas Jamie was not. Jamie was a name that meant something else, visible only when her
barriers were down, when their breathings synched in the dead of night and the
world seemed to sigh along.

Adso appeared at the door, peeking from behind
Jamie’s significantly skinnier legs, with big pleading orbs. Claire could have
sworn he was about to smack his owner’s calves and roll his eyes in protest for
being abandoned to deal with such a reprehensive human being.

“I tried to call first.” She hesitantly strode
inside the apartment, after Jamie had signalled for her to enter. “But you
didn’t pick up your phone and your house number seems to be disconnected.” Her
observant eyes noticed several broken pieces of furniture and pottery, shards
like lines of ants travelling on the floor, and the landline had been ripped
from the plug – from the hole on the wall, she would say it had been quite a
violent affair. Claire conjectured if Jamie simply felt more at ease amidst
chaos in those days. Familiar. “Redecorating are you?” She joked,
carefully pushing aside some wreckage with the tip of her foot.

“Something like it. Went minimalist.” Jamie
replied faintly. He was watching her intently, as if expecting her to vanish in
the next few seconds. There were at least four empty beer bottles in the coffee
table and probably other testaments of liquor nestling in the garbage bin.
Sobriety was a state in which ghosts tended to dwell.

“I’m not here as your – your lover.” She said the word harshly, with
fresh resentment prickling her tongue. “I’m here as a friend – and as your Chief.” Claire pursed her full lips,
fixing a point slightly above his right shoulder, that would give a
satisfactory impression of looking straight at him. “Besides, I was worried
about Adso.”

“I take good care of the wee cheetie.” Jamie protested,
although the assertion of his capacities for pet-parenting wasn’t particularly
enhanced by the fact that he could barely stand up straight without stumbling.

“Well, he bathes himself at least.” Claire retorted, crossing her arms. “Your
vacation time ends the day after tomorrow. If you want to step inside my
surgical department again, I’m advising that you seek therapy.” She inhaled
sharply. “Mandatory therapy, to be
more accurate.”

“I dinna need therapy.” Jamie glared at her, his eyelids partially closed,
wakefulness weighing heavily on him. She could sense the pull of him, like a
magnet or a black hole, pulling her to a place with no gravity, no rules. “I just need –“

“Don’t.”
Claire hissed, raising a warning finger. She knew what he was about to say, as
if he had drummed it with his fingers, his tongue, his blood, deep into her eardrum. You. I just need you. “You
need to heal yourself, so I can be properly angry at you. You need to come back while you still can.”

“I dinna have a map, Claire.” He whispered
drunkenly, although the words resonated as honest between them. A man lost
between the debris of his old life; trying to navigate backwards against the
roaring surge that stubbornly propelled him towards the abyss.  

“Fortunately for you, I have an excellent sense
of direction – and therapy is the way forward.” Claire assured, more softly
than she intended. “You need to take a shower while I pack you a bag and
accommodate Adso to go as well. You’ll both stay at my place for some time.”

“Yer place?” Jamie furrowed his brow, his face
the colour of overnight oats. “I canna. It’s no’ fair to ye.”

“I’m not inviting you to my bed.” Claire explained haltingly, grabbing a couple of bottles
to carry to the trash. “Things between us have
changed. You’ll stay in the guest room. Besides, I have to save the entire city
of Edinburgh – we’re in danger of an alcohol drought very soon, if you keep
this up.”

“Why are ye doing this? Ye should be far away
from me.” The male surgeon leaned against the wall, incapable of remaining
firmly grounded on the floor without an aid. “I betrayed ye. Betrayed yer trust. My weakness – disgusts me.” If Jamie could crawl out
of his skin, Claire unquestionably believed he would in that moment. He would
march around, skinless, exhibiting
the frail thing within.

“You hurt me – yes.” Her voice quivered, as she scooped Adso to place him in the
carrier. Her back was blissfully turned away from Jamie, so he couldn’t see her
face. Like boiling water, parting and swelling with emotion, so close to becoming
mist only to pour down again. “I won’t pretend that I fully understand what you
went through and how you bonded with people who shared the same journey. This
is not forgiveness.” She breathed
deeply, air hitching inside her airway. “But I meant what I’ve told you, that
last night together before you were gone. I might have told it only once; but
for me it was the same as if I’ve said it forever. And that makes me responsible
in seeing you safe.”

I love
you.

“I have broken
yer heart.” Jamie whispered, his head tilted back. “And I dinna know how to
mend it, in spite of what I promised ye.”

“You can start by going into the shower.” Claire
gulped, swallowing the tears that formed in the corners of her eyes, that left
her so willing to open her heart and cradle him inside.

She busied herself around the living room and
bedroom, discarding garbage and collecting items he might need while he stayed
with her, overhearing the distant noise of the shower running. Claire
stubbornly closed the eye of her mind against the vision of his body, former or
present. It had been a vessel to come together – tenderly, playfully, lovingly, entirely – but now was just another
vehicle for Jamie to punish himself.

A loud racket coming from the bathroom caused
her to run to the door like an arrow, ignoring Adso who meowed in outrage from
his closed carrier.  

In his altered state Jamie had lost his balance
while trying to reach the towel and – amidst a rainfall of soap, shampoo
bottles and foamy water – had fallen against the tiled floor, cutting his bottom
lip which bled profusely.  

“Fuck.”
Claire swore, kneeling next to him on the floor. She expediently examined his
pupils and searched his scalp for any further damages.

“Couldna have said it better myself.” Jamie
stammered, looking dazed. His lip was swelling visibly.

Within moments, Claire had managed to prop Jamie
up into a sited position against the sink, scavenging the first aid kit to tend
to his mouth. She had preserved both of their modesties by placing a towel on
his lap, but their eyes were still disturbingly close as she worked. With a fluffy
clean towel, Claire dabbed the open wound, trying to ignore his bottomless blue
eyes, exuding love and pain enough to make her hands tremble.

“How many
times?” Claire asked eventually, applying disinfectant on the wound. He
hissed in discomfort and she touched his forehead in gentleness. “How many
times did you kiss her?”

“Just the once.” Jamie looked at the ceiling. Claire
bit her bottom lip, applying steri-strips to the wound – there wasn’t a suture
kit around, so it would have to do.

“Why did you keep the photo?” Her fingertips
brushed the side of his cheek. “Of Mary?”

“I have a tenderness for her.” He answered slowly,
searching her eyes. “Mary really was a good friend. But I kept it in case ye wanted
to see it – I think that most times imagining something is worse than truly knowing,
aye? I kept it so ye wouldna have to imagine.”

“I see.” Claire glanced at him under her lashes.
“You told me you thought of never coming back. Why did you?”

“I’m selfish,
Claire. I’m not brave enough not to see ye again. To touch ye, to kiss ye.” Jamie
whispered, tasting his admission and his own blood. “I’m not brave enough not
to want ye. And I’ve brought home hell for it.”

wyattabernathyus:

“If you wanna die, okay. But die for something that you love.“ 

– Shaw, “Person of interest”: If-Then-Else

notevenjokingfic:

the-sassynach:

jamesandclairefraser:

ow my heart

I miss this 

This was the night I boarded all things SamCait. Look at them. Just look at him.

Thanks for your comments, anon. You raise an important dilemma: either Sam’s (and Cait’s) behaviors are not appropriate and therefore they’re not upstanding people (you are what you repeatedly do), or their behaviors toward one another are perfectly appropriate, and they both maintain their integrity. But in order for the latter to be true, what we’re being sold must be false. Re Tony, I say let’s put aside bankruptcies and families and lackluster resumes. At the end of the day, if C/T possess a vibrant love toward one another, who cares! My issue is that I see nothing, absolutely nothing, that suggests equality, warmth, respect, and rich love between them. Vibrant love is LOUD, even among private, demure individuals. And thus, I don’t buy C/T. Either they are selling a lie to us or living a lie to themselves. I think there is more evidence for the former.

wehadfacesthen:

A fashion photo by Nina Leen, Paris, 1948, for LIFE magazine