*          *          *

He slammed the door behind him and tossed his keys and laptop case on the kitchen counter.

Collapsing on his couch, Rodney reached for the remote and toed his shoes off at the same time.

Reaching up to his neck, he carefully felt the outline of the chain and the two small metal rectangles beneath his shirt, making sure they were still hidden beneath his shirt.

He’d been fiddling with them as he mulled his way through some calculations. It had become an unconscious habit of his, one which he hadn’t really noticed until a few weeks ago, and by then, he’d probably been doing it for the whole four months that he’d been wearing them, so he didn’t really care. It helped him concentrate.

It was just his bad luck that one of his new idiotic minions had wandered in, stared at him in surprise and asked him why he was wearing tags.

Rodney had hurriedly stuffed them under his shirt, glaring at the supposed innocent question and snarling at the idiot to mind his own damn business and do his work.

Jen Keller was one of the few people at the SGC who knew he wore those tags, and only because Rodney refused to take them off during his monthly physicals that he still insisted on, even though he hadn’t been offworld since they had been recalled from Atlantis six months ago.

She always pressed her lips together, stared at him sadly and asked him if it wasn’t time to take them off. Rodney would snarl at her to mind her own business and to quit treating him like a grieving widow, because damn it, it wasn’t like John was dead.

She’d back off, only to ask him the same question a month later.

Rodney made a mental note to be more careful with them and to keep them out of sight. Too many people didn’t understand why he still wore them, especially because it reminded him of the worst week in his life.

John had warned him over and over that he didn’t know how to do relationships. Rodney had ignored him, mostly because he thought that John’s love for him would override the urges for the pilot to do something stupid.

The day he walked into one of the unused labs, looking for a box of spare parts and saw Vala up against the wall, eyes closed, head thrown back and gasping and John with his pants around his ankles, breathing harshly, Rodney knew he’d made a mistake.

He’d left the lab, not wanting to make a scene while John had his dick in someone else. He kept his mouth shut for three days, watching John acting completely normal.

When John came home with his hair smelling like Vala, Rodney finally snapped. He didn’t remember what he’d screamed, what he’d thrown, only that John had stood there, gaping at him and looking so utterly confused. He hadn’t heard a word John had said, mostly because it didn’t matter. At the end, John had left, not taking anything with him.

What Rodney did remember after days spent crying on his kitchen floor, was that John never denied it.

They avoided each other for a week at the SGC, John going on missions with his team and Rodney in the lab. He waited for John to come and make some noise about wanting his things, but he never did.

So Rodney finally boxed it all up—all the while marveling over the fact that a man who had never had a real home in his entire life could have accumulated so much stuff over a two month period—and leaving John a message on his cell, telling him to come get his stuff or he was throwing it out.

John never came, and after spending another week tripping over the boxes on his way to the bathroom, he opened his window and threw them out the back. After next Tuesday’s garbage collecting day, they were gone.

He was in such pain and was exerting so much energy on trying to keep his working life normal, that he never noticed John going downhill until it was too late.

Not that Rodney felt inclined to do anything about it at the time.

He never remembered why he was passing by the general’s office that day, but he could hear Landry and John screaming at each other, Landry using that voice that was supposed to make a soldier shut his mouth and snap to attention, and John using that insolent, cocky voice of his that plainly said he didn’t fucking feel like it. Then he heard something being thrown, and then the marines were called in, and John spent a week in the brig.

Rodney tried to ignore it, he really did, but he loved him and still worried about him, no matter how much he had hurt him. So he was still filled him with curiosity when he heard how O’Neill had come in and talked to John while he was in the brig.

The general spent twenty minutes patiently telling John he either start shaping up or he was going to be looking at a discharge pretty soon. They didn’t have room for malcontents at the SGC, especially ones John’s age and rank, who had people looking up to them to lead as examples.

John had sat there, staring at the general with that cool, indifferent smirk on his face, and then shrugged and said, he guessed he was done then.

One of Rodney’s minions came running up to him later that day, handing him a white envelope. Rodney had opened it and stared at the dog tags that had slid out into his hands, still warm from having touched John’s skin for nearly twenty years.

The entire mountain was buzzing with the gossip for days afterwards, how John had gotten out of the brig, gone to Landry and told him he was resigning. Landry could have fought it, could have forced John to stay and court martialed him when he left anyway, as they knew he would.

But John had been Atlantis’ military commander for four years and had been a damn good soldier during that time, so Landry did John one last favor and let him go.

Rodney had watched the security feeds as John walked out of the mountain, getting into his rental car and peeling out of the parking lot, the weight of the tags heavy in his hands.

He’d tried to move on, put the past behind him, but the more he tried, the more he remained stuck. He hacked into John’s bank account and watched as all the money in it disappeared over the first month and a half that he was gone. When the bank closed the account, Rodney stopped watching it, hating the scenarios that flew through his head at all hours of the day.

He spent his days working and ignoring the looks he was still getting after all these months, and his nights sleeping on his couch, since his bed still smelled like John.

He’d lie awake, staring at the ceiling, remembering falling asleep in each other’s arms, hearing John laughing in his ear as he complained about his day, and hearing John whispering words into his hair that John only felt brave enough to say in the dark.

He changed the channel on the television, not even knowing why he bothered turning the thing on when he didn’t really watch it.

Leaning his head back, he closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. He was debating whether to put in an old Star Trek DVD or play chess on his computer, when he heard the faint knock on the door.

He frowned and glanced at his door, thinking he was hearing things, but when he heard a soft knock again, he pushed himself up. In the six months he’d lived here, he’d never had any of his neighbors stopping by and he couldn’t think of any reason for them to do so now at—he checked his watch—quarter past midnight. He winced briefly, not having realized how long he had worked, but then growing even more curious as to who was on the other side of the door. If it was an emergency, the person wouldn’t be knocking on the door like a timid mouse.

He clenched his jaw, not wanting to see anybody right now. He wanted to curl up on his couch and watch Star Trek and try to forget how John had lain with his head in Rodney’s lap, laughing and quoting the lines along with the movie.

He flicked back the dead bolt and yanked open the door, opening his mouth to tell the person to fuck off and leave him alone, when he saw a person crouching before his door, one arm hiding a face buried in their knees while the other arm was still outstretched, obviously having done the mouse knocking.

Rodney’s first thought was that it was one of his neighbors and they’d had a heart attack or something.

“Oh, my god, are you alright? Of course not, what a dumb question. Do you need me to call the ambulance? I have—I have some nitroglycerin in the bathroom.” He turned half way to go and get it—you really never knew when one would need such medication, did you?—when the person lifted his head and Rodney nearly fell over.

It was John.

But not the John he remembered. This was a broken shell of a person who wore John’s face.

Rodney stared, his mouth partially open and not capable of forming a single word.

The hundreds of times he had imagined John showing up on his doorstep to ask for forgiveness had never been like this.

John was staring up at him, eyes huge and ringed with dark circles, the rest of his face deathly pale. His hair had grown longer in the past four months, filthy, greasy strands sticking to his forehead and curling over his ears and neck. He was wearing an oversized sweater which stank as bad as the dumpster behind his apartment did, but after breathing in a few times, Rodney knew it was unfair to blame the smell entirely on the filthy clothes. Most of it was probably John.

But what really made him want to take a step back was the overwhelming smell of alcohol that permeated the hallway. Rodney didn’t need to recognize the glazed, sleepy look in John’s eyes to know he was drunk.

They stared at each other for an eternity, neither moving nor saying a word. Then John started mouthing a word, at first so quietly that Rodney couldn’t hear him until he concentrated, and finally heard his own name.

Rodney wanted nothing more than to fall to the floor and pull John into his arms and pretend none of the past five months had ever happened, but he locked his knees and stayed standing.

“If you wanted money, all you had to do was call. I could have put some straight into your account.”

John stared at him, pausing in the endless whispered repetition of his name long enough to shake his head. “No. No money,” he whispered.

Rodney crossed his arms. He knew it would be a useless defense where John was concerned, but he had no idea what John wanted. Clothes? His stuff? Food?

“What the hell do you want, John? I’m tired and I have nothing to say to you.”

John was still gaping up at him. Rodney sighed in irritation. As usual, John had probably allowed his body to walk him over here without the foggiest idea of why and Rodney didn’t have the time nor the patience to work it out. Seeing John like this was hard enough and Rodney didn’t need anymore pain.

Rodney stared down at him for another minute while John stared back from his crouch on the floor. Clenching his jaw, Rodney took a step back to slam his door, when John suddenly looked panicked.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice barely above the broken whisper he’d been using but loud enough for Rodney to hear.

Rodney stared back, keeping his face blank. “That’s nice.” He took another step back and put his hand on the door.

John suddenly pushed himself half up and lunged at Rodney, grabbing him around the legs and nearly sending them both flying across the room.

Rodney just managed to grab his door to keep from falling and he glared down at the dirty body clinging to his legs.

“John, let go.”

He could feel John shaking and knew he was crying, but the whole situation was too damn strange and painful for Rodney to deal with.

“John, let go. You’re drunk, you have no idea why you’re here and you’re cutting off the circulation in my legs. Let go and get out of my apartment or I’ll call the cops.”

John’s grasp didn’t loosen up and he was mumbling broken words into Rodney’s legs, hot tears seeping into Rodney’s pants. Swallowing back his own tears, Rodney resolved to see this through and leaned down to start prying John’s arms off his legs.

John was weak as a kitten from the alcohol but the minute he felt his arms being pulled loose, he lifted his head, face covered in tears and snot from a runny nose and started crying harder.

“Please, Rodney. Please. I’m sorry. I need—I’m sorry. I hurt, Rodney.”

Anger raced through Rodney and he yanked himself out of John’s grasp and glared down at him. “You think I don’t?”

John stared up at him, sobbing.

“You think I’ve been sitting here all these months and having a celebration that I was finally rid of you? I love you! I love you, you idiot, and you ruined it! We had the best thing I’ve ever had and I was happier than I had any right being and you ruined it!”

John’s face crumbled and he buried his face in his hands, rocking back and forth and barely able to stay upright while on his knees.

Rodney swiped at the tears brimming his own eyes. “John, I have never been in such pain as I’ve been since I saw you and Vala and then you act like it was okay! You act like it was no big deal for you to be fucking someone else!”

John’s hands came down and he sniffed and few times. “It’s always okay before! You need a variety of—of pretty boys and same thing gets bored—boring. But it’s not okay with Rodney and I didn’t know!” He sobbed. “I didn’t know! I’m sorry.”

Rodney stared at him, trying to make sense of something that would make any English teacher have a stroke. When he finally thought he understood, he stared down at John incredulously.

“You’ve never had a monogamous relationship before, have you?”

John sniffed and wiped his face with his sleeve and shook his head.

“Even your ex-wife?”

John laughed a harsh, bitter laugh. “She was screwing the entire base here and I was screwing the—the whole country wherever the fuck I was.”

Suddenly, things made more sense. John hadn’t had sex with Vala because he was sick of Rodney or because Vala would give him something Rodney wouldn’t. And he really didn’t do it to hurt Rodney, which Rodney had always had trouble believing anyway.

He had really thought that he and Rodney were having an open relationship and that Rodney wouldn’t care. When he thought about it, Rodney realized he was partially to blame too, since they had never discussed it despite John’s numerous warnings that he didn’t know how real relationships worked.

Rodney stared down at the broken, sobbing man kneeling on the floor before him.

Leaning down, Rodney gently grasped John’s chin and lifted his face up until they were looking at each other.

“You’re really sorry?”

John nodded frantically, looking so miserable that Rodney knew it was the truth.

“You gonna do it again?”

John’s frantic nodding turned into frantic head shaking.

Slowly, Rodney nodded. “Okay. I forgive you.”

John was still staring at him as if Rodney hadn’t spoken English, so Rodney knelt down before him and simply pulled John into his arms, not caring about the smell or the greasy hair tickling his nose.

It took John a second before he let out a sob and clung to Rodney, burying his face in his neck.

Rodney gently rubbed his neck, rocking them back and forth. “It’s okay. Everything’s okay. I forgive you. You’re an idiot, but I forgive you.”

Rodney felt his own tears streaming down his face, feeling such unbelievable relief from having John back in his arms. He didn’t know how long they stayed there, clinging to each other on the floor, until Rodney’s knees started seriously complaining and John’s smell started seeping into the rest of the apartment.

“Okay. Come on. You need a bath. And new clothes. Seriously.”

When Rodney tried to untangle himself, John whimpered and clung on tighter so Rodney pulled John’s face up and kissed him on the cheeks and the forehead, thumbs gently rubbing circles into his cheeks. “It’s okay. I’m not going anywhere. We have to go to the bathroom so you can have a bath, okay?”

John looked terrified so Rodney leaned his forehead against his. “I’m not leaving, okay? I promise.”

They struggled upwards, John refusing to let go of the death grip he had in Rodney’s shirt and his balance being worse than usual due to him being drunk. They looked like a drunken dancing team, stumbling around the hallway and into the bathroom.

Rodney managed to get John out of his clothes and into the tub, and eventually just gave up and climbed in too since John refused to let go of him anyway.

Once they were clean, Rodney sat John down on the toilet lid while he dried him off, John trying to help but being too uncoordinated to do much but get in the way.

Not bothering to find them clothes to sleep in, Rodney pulled John up and they stumbled to the sink where Rodney helped John brush his teeth with Rodney’s toothbrush before doing his own, only smiling faintly at John’s murmur of ‘Rodney germs’. Then Rodney filled cup after cup with water and forced John to drink it, before finally stumbling their way into bed.

They fell into bed, John immediately draping himself over Rodney and digging his leg between both of his and his face into Rodney’s neck, the same way they had spent every night they had shared a bed.

John had gotten even slower after they had gotten out of the bath, so Rodney was unsurprised to see his eyes flutter closed and to hear him start to quietly snore within two minutes of burrowing into Rodney’s warmth.

Rodney smiled into the still wet strands of his hair. Make up sex tomorrow then.

He wrapped his arms around John, feeling like this five month nightmare was finally over. He didn’t care that John wasn’t military anymore and didn’t have a job. Rodney had more than enough money for both of them for five lifetimes.

But what he did need was John in his life, no matter how much of a moron he sometimes was.

He fell asleep, knowing he was about to make up for months of half broken sleep.

He didn’t know how many hours later he woke to feel gentle fingers running through his hair and soft kisses covering his face along with salty tears which weren’t his own.

Before he fell back asleep, he swore he heard a hushed “I love you,” being whispered into his ear. Smiling and not bothering to open his eyes, he reached up and pulled him down against him and whispered the words back.