[That's the easy part. The happy part. The rest isn't very happy. Things are different--the ruined hand isn't the worst of the damage done to him, but it's the one she can do the most for. It's why she's in a supply room in the hospital, hands shaking, feeling sick to her stomach, texting John. He's a doctor, a modern one, so he must know much more than she and her nine months of studying here in the city. Apparently she knew enough to force the bones back into place and sew his fingers, but she wants to talk to John about it.
Or maybe she just wants to talk to him for her own sake.
She's mentioned to people that she was here to save her husband. He's been saved, they're reunited, but all her suspicions of what he's suffered are looking to be true. Randall made sure to scar Jamie deeper than flesh and bone and Claire hates that it was in part because of her.]
I could use your advice on a hand brace. He's recently had hand surgery, but he needs a brace to keep his fingers still. I have a few but I don't know which is best. I can send you pictures of them.
[Except that's not even that difficult to do, is it?]
[ ...oh! that's not news he's even thought to expect, but it's good news (that's the sort of news that really ought to be good, isn't it, even if they've never much discussed her marriage for him to know one way or the other) and he's about to send back a pleased sort of a text but
then, just as he's got himself together on that notion, she sends through the next.
... hn. congratulation falls to the wayside temporarily. she hadn't given him the time for it, meaning that one of those things is currently more important than the other. ]
Happily. I'll need an idea of the surgery required along with a look at the braces. [ a beat ] Do you want me to come over?
I'm at the hospital, currently. That supply room next to the vending machine that always drops an extra bottle. I'd very much appreciate it if you came here.
[The best vending machine in all the land. Better than the other one downstairs that likes to steal money.]
[It's a good plan. Claire spends five minutes pacing around the room before she goes to stare at the vending machine. Eudio brand ginger ale it is, and she retreats back into the supply room to sit on a box of paper towels. If she was smart, she would have taken a picture of Jamie's hand, but explaining that seems like so much right now. He doesn't know pictures. She doesn't even know how the surgery went, even though she's apparently the one that did it.
Timelines are a pain. She'll be pondering all the possibilities of forked and alternate timelines by the time John arrives, bottles sitting next to her.]
[ it's around the twenty minute mark when John arrives, lets himself into the supply room and turns to look for Claire— who really doesn't seem the sort of happy you'd expect her to be, all things considered. ]
[She's happy, ecstatic really, but none of it manages to make it into her body language or expression right now. When she stands, she sort of freezes in place, teetering on the edge of sitting back down or stepping forward. Both options will lead to something awful and so she chooses the selfish one, the one that involves stepping over to John and grabbing him for a hug.]
I don't want to cry on you.
[It's a warning and a very small attempt at humor that falls flat.]
John's arms come up quickly, settling first, then squeezing. he's not used to this, not by any means, people don't come to John Watson for this sort of comfort, but holding a person doesn't take much consideration when they've already done half the work and Claire is someone he very much wants to see safe. there's worry, sharp and acute, but for her sake also the tick of a smile she can't see but might be able to get the gist of from the humoured huff of breath he lets out where he's hooked his chin over her shoulder. ]
You might as well. I've done fire this week, thought I'd make my way through the elements.
[ it's an it's alright, one way or the other, out or in. he's here. they're in a supply cupboard, the world isn't watching. do what you need to do. ]
[He's awful. There's a quarter of a muffled laugh before it dissolves into tears, one hand reaching around John in an attempt to hastily wipe them away. The merit of being alone is that (for the most part) your crying is private. There's been a lot of that over these many months, but now with Jamie sitting on her sofa she can't do it. She can't cry about what's happened to him right before his eyes. It's unfair, especially when he's trying so hard to keep it together for the both of them.
There's a few heaving sobs in there, ones that shake her slender body, but the whole ordeal is over in a matter of a minute. That's enough. It has to be enough.]
Sorry, thanks. [Gently pulling away, she turns around so her tear-smudged face isn't visible as she rubs her eyes, sniffling all the while. He's a good sport, this John Watson.] Didn't mean to be so dramatic.
[ John lets her cry, and he lets her go. god knows he understands what it's like to need privacy in this sort of thing and he won't force it all into attention - not the lapse of control, anyway. which doesn't mean he's necessarily going to leave her to sweep it under the carpet ]
Something happen, Claire? [ obviously, yes. her husband's here. he needs a brace for a hand recently fixed. somewhere, in all that, comes an outpouring of emotion that didn't read all that much like relief. ]
Jamie's here. But he's--hurt, more than just a smashed hand. He's been tortured, it's awful, and I--[but it's not really about her, and she stops with a hard swallow.]
[ oh God. John stills, a new sort of steadiness coming over him. memory of stripes across a back, or never asking, not really. of knowing, through the tone of silences and the vast stretches of unsaid things, that the scars aren't the worst part. gentle, but not any weaker in intent for it: ]
Does he need checking over? [ not that Claire isn't perfectly capable of that herself, not that having a stranger anywhere near him would necessarily be the best, but it's an offer all the same if she needs it. John'll do what he can to take off pressure from Claire, including removing the need for her to ask. quietly, John's sensitivity to her expands to make room for a husband recently tortured and everything that entails. ]
[She doesn't take any offense at the suggestion. In fact, it seems to calm her, a shuddery sigh exhaled before she makes another wipe at her eyes. She's no surgeon, no doctor.]
Perhaps in a day or two. He needs to settle, I think, before I throw something like that at him. Fraser's are stubborn as mules sometimes.
[ a small smile, Frasers are stubborn as mules sometimes, and John fishes into his jeans pocket to pull out a mostly empty packet of tissues he'd forgotten about before, fish one out and hand it out to Claire. ]
If he needs to talk to me before he meets me, he's welcome to call.
It's a long story, a very long one actually, but I found myself a few hundred years in the past in Scotland and... that's where I was, before I came here. It's just always easier to say where I was before that--1945.
[She takes another steadying breath, an apologetic smile on her lips. Sorry, John.]
That's one way of putting it. [This sort of calm acceptance is a little funny, and she hides her smile by pretending to dab at her mostly-dry face.] It's probably a good time to mention that I'm pregnant, at home. Just to get it all out there.
[So it's even worse that you didn't get her flowers, John.]
Explains the weeping into my drink situation when we first met.
[ well, this is a lot in one go. John stops. stares at her. pregnant, at home. so this place is capable of suspending pregnancy, too.
it's none of it anything she's ever been obliged to tell him. with a huff, he nods, small and slight and drawing an underline. grateful to know, no need to comment. ]
It does a bit. [ he'd laugh, but... probably not the time ] ... Hand brace, then?
Hand brace. [She appreciates the lack of commentary. Claire, independent as she is, very much worries about the people she cares about thinking she's insane. She sometimes thinks she is.]
It's his left. His middle and ring finger were set and sewn. [So they need to be kept still. Claire grabs the two braces she'd found. Really, either would do--she knows it, and he can probably guess as much once he sees how similar they are. She just needs the reassurance, the talking to someone that isn't Jamie, and that brief cry.]
What he's got now is... wood and cloth, basically. It does the job but it's massive. He can't go about like that.
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[That's the easy part. The happy part. The rest isn't very happy. Things are different--the ruined hand isn't the worst of the damage done to him, but it's the one she can do the most for. It's why she's in a supply room in the hospital, hands shaking, feeling sick to her stomach, texting John. He's a doctor, a modern one, so he must know much more than she and her nine months of studying here in the city. Apparently she knew enough to force the bones back into place and sew his fingers, but she wants to talk to John about it.
Or maybe she just wants to talk to him for her own sake.
She's mentioned to people that she was here to save her husband. He's been saved, they're reunited, but all her suspicions of what he's suffered are looking to be true. Randall made sure to scar Jamie deeper than flesh and bone and Claire hates that it was in part because of her.]
I could use your advice on a hand brace. He's recently had hand surgery, but he needs a brace to keep his fingers still. I have a few but I don't know which is best. I can send you pictures of them.
[Except that's not even that difficult to do, is it?]
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then, just as he's got himself together on that notion, she sends through the next.
... hn. congratulation falls to the wayside temporarily. she hadn't given him the time for it, meaning that one of those things is currently more important than the other. ]
Happily. I'll need an idea of the surgery required along with a look at the braces. [ a beat ] Do you want me to come over?
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[The best vending machine in all the land. Better than the other one downstairs that likes to steal money.]
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[ aaaand he's going to tug some shoes on and get in a taxi ]
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[It's a good plan. Claire spends five minutes pacing around the room before she goes to stare at the vending machine. Eudio brand ginger ale it is, and she retreats back into the supply room to sit on a box of paper towels. If she was smart, she would have taken a picture of Jamie's hand, but explaining that seems like so much right now. He doesn't know pictures. She doesn't even know how the surgery went, even though she's apparently the one that did it.
Timelines are a pain. She'll be pondering all the possibilities of forked and alternate timelines by the time John arrives, bottles sitting next to her.]
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Good choice. [ the ginger ale ] Alright?
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I don't want to cry on you.
[It's a warning and a very small attempt at humor that falls flat.]
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John's arms come up quickly, settling first, then squeezing. he's not used to this, not by any means, people don't come to John Watson for this sort of comfort, but holding a person doesn't take much consideration when they've already done half the work and Claire is someone he very much wants to see safe. there's worry, sharp and acute, but for her sake also the tick of a smile she can't see but might be able to get the gist of from the humoured huff of breath he lets out where he's hooked his chin over her shoulder. ]
You might as well. I've done fire this week, thought I'd make my way through the elements.
[ it's an it's alright, one way or the other, out or in. he's here. they're in a supply cupboard, the world isn't watching. do what you need to do. ]
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There's a few heaving sobs in there, ones that shake her slender body, but the whole ordeal is over in a matter of a minute. That's enough. It has to be enough.]
Sorry, thanks. [Gently pulling away, she turns around so her tear-smudged face isn't visible as she rubs her eyes, sniffling all the while. He's a good sport, this John Watson.] Didn't mean to be so dramatic.
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Something happen, Claire? [ obviously, yes. her husband's here. he needs a brace for a hand recently fixed. somewhere, in all that, comes an outpouring of emotion that didn't read all that much like relief. ]
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It's just... a lot. I didn't expect this.
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Does he need checking over? [ not that Claire isn't perfectly capable of that herself, not that having a stranger anywhere near him would necessarily be the best, but it's an offer all the same if she needs it. John'll do what he can to take off pressure from Claire, including removing the need for her to ask. quietly, John's sensitivity to her expands to make room for a husband recently tortured and everything that entails. ]
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Perhaps in a day or two. He needs to settle, I think, before I throw something like that at him. Fraser's are stubborn as mules sometimes.
[Explains her a little.]
I trust you. He'll trust you, too.
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If he needs to talk to me before he meets me, he's welcome to call.
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After I teach him how to use the thing. Have I mentioned [she wipes at her eyes and nose], that he's from 1744?
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1744.
[ you neglected to share that tidbit actually claire ]
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At least she almost laughs.]
It's a long story, a very long one actually, but I found myself a few hundred years in the past in Scotland and... that's where I was, before I came here. It's just always easier to say where I was before that--1945.
[She takes another steadying breath, an apologetic smile on her lips. Sorry, John.]
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[ Claire. but it's alright. by this point, he's used to pretending he's not had his worldview tipped on its axis. ]
So you've travelled about a lot then. [ through time ]
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[So it's even worse that you didn't get her flowers, John.]
Explains the weeping into my drink situation when we first met.
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it's none of it anything she's ever been obliged to tell him. with a huff, he nods, small and slight and drawing an underline. grateful to know, no need to comment. ]
It does a bit. [ he'd laugh, but... probably not the time ] ... Hand brace, then?
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It's his left. His middle and ring finger were set and sewn. [So they need to be kept still. Claire grabs the two braces she'd found. Really, either would do--she knows it, and he can probably guess as much once he sees how similar they are. She just needs the reassurance, the talking to someone that isn't Jamie, and that brief cry.]
What he's got now is... wood and cloth, basically. It does the job but it's massive. He can't go about like that.