applesaucedream | Blessed are the vagrant, lonely are the static ones [closed]

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Blessed are the vagrant, lonely are the static ones [closed]

Loose change can only take one so far in terms of public transport and it's well past noon and Daniel hasn't even eaten today, so he elects to walk even if it is, as his luck would have it, raining very heavily. The present downpour is a great deal more copious than is fair considering the streak of abysmal events that have led him along to this unremarkable moment in his life.

In an effort to avoid the downpour he ducks into the closest establishment he can find, a cramped-looking café or deli sort of place that probably doesn't appreciate him dripping all over the faded blue tile floors and maneuvering awkwardly around the tables so he can get to the farthest, most out-of-the-way corner booth he can find. Shaking wet hair from his eyes, he shoves his two bags beneath it with less care than is really warranted. Both bags are already battered and falling apart at the corners enough, and they hold every possession Daniel has left in the world.

The sole barista at the counter doesn't look happy to (a) be maintaining an almost empty establishment on a spectacularly rainy late afternoon or (b) have to deal with the colony of puddles steadily collecting beneath Daniel's table as he hunches his shoulders and tries to count out his change to see if he has enough to avoid being thrown out for loitering. It's not looking optimistic. He wilts a little at the realization and shoots a nervous glance at the barista who has ceased her mechanical wiping of the countertop to level a simmering glower at him, fingers drumming, silently daring Daniel to think of a reason for why he should be the least bit welcome here. At the present moment, he's coming up empty. He swallows hard and returns to recounting his change in the blind hope that he's miscalculated.

Five minutes and seven recounts later, Daniel deposits the change onto the booth table with a shower of wet clinks and stares at the little pile of coins miserably. Ladies and gentlemen, we present to the board Dr. Daniel Jackson, thirty-one and already the archaeological hack of the decade, homeless and in debt and probably about to get thrown back out into the rain very soon on account of him being unable to afford even a cup of coffee to alleviate the pounding headache drilling itself into the center of his forehead.

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Startled by Seth's apparent refusal to have them go their separate ways but grateful nonetheless, Daniel returns to following, now tightening his grip on the bags for more than just self-security reasons.

His hair is well and truly plastered to his head and he's blinking rainwater out of his eyes every other minute by the time they stop again.

"Is this it?" he asks, peering curiously past the sheeting rain at the building they've apparently halted in front of.

"Yup," he answers, fumbling with his keys to try and get the front door open quickly so they won't have to be out in the rain any longer. His hood is completely soaked through by now, the water making its way down his neck and shoulders even if his jacket keeps the rain out. His jeans are pretty damp by now too, he'll probably just have to change completely.

"It's not much," he adds as he pushes the door open and leads the way inside, holding the door open for Daniel. Then he heads up two steep and narrow flights of stairs, before finally getting to his apartment door, his cold fingers fumbling a bit with the keys again until he finally gets them inside.

It's pretty cramped, definitely an apartment on a budget, but at least it's warm and dry. It doesn't really have a hall, just an area for shoes and coats, a little living room area with a worn couch, and with a tiny kitchen where the appliances are probably older than Seth himself, and two doors.

"Bathroom's through there," he says, gesturing at one of the doors. "You can drip safely in there."

Navigating with two clunky cases isn't very graceful, but at least Daniel manages to get them both up the narrow little staircases that are entirely too small and cramped to be in any way practical. And he only stumbled once or twice, he notes with an embarrassing amount of pride, though he admittedly almost put a foot through the wall while climbing those last few steps.

"Thanks," he says yet again as he squeezes into Seth's apartment gratefully, quickly edging his way to the indicated door in an effort to avoid dripping over the floor overmuch. He forgets to completely shut the door in his eagerness to change into something that's less liable to make him shiver as uncontrollably as he is now, divesting the waterlogged clothing into a puddled mound on top of his bare-bones luggage. Daniel pulls on a pair of passable jeans fairly quickly, worn and frayed as they are around the edges, but soon finds himself cursing under his breath in Arabic while he stands, shirtless in another man's bathroom, rooting frantically about in search for the tiny pile of shirts that he knows are buried somewhere in his sparse wardrobe.

Seth carefully peels off his jacket and hangs it, so it can just drip a pool right there where he's not likely to step in it, and then takes off his trainers too, before going to check on Daniel. What's that language? Sounds like something he's heard while out getting fast food.

Once he reaches the bathroom, he can't... quite manage to make himself announce his presence right away, distracted for the moment by the sight of Daniel's back. He finds himself stuck, studying the tense muscles in his back, his shoulder blades, his arms, all glistening slightly with rain... For a poor homeless guy, he's in pretty good shape, Seth notes distantly.

Then he realises he's staring, and shakes himself back to the present, clearing his throat a little. "Feel free to use the shower, get yourself warmed up. I'm not letting you go back out there until the rain's stopped, so you might as well," he says, with a smile that's much more awkward now than it is cocky.

He triumphantly extricates a shirt at the same time he hears a faint cough behind him. Daniel freezes, unwilling to turn around and face the sight he knows is directly behind him because he stupidly, stupidly forgot to close the door, who even does that. Also his face is burning, so. Yes. He is very adamantly not going to turn around in this case.

"Um, right. Okay," says Daniel, as steadily as he can despite the mild thrill of alarm and self-consciousness that's currently pulling all his blood flow to his ears, still refusing to turn around. He is terrified to turn around, ridiculous as it is. "I will. Thanks."

Seth can't be entirely sure, but he is watching pretty closely at the moment, and he thinks Daniel's ears may have taken a turn for the redder, in a way that has nothing to do with the cold. This realisation somehow makes his stomach squirm a little bit.

"Good," he answers, unable to keep the smile completely out of his voice. And then he decides to give Daniel a break and some obviously wanted privacy, and he closes the door for him.

Seth's still smiling to himself as he goes to his bedroom to get changed himself, stopping only on the way to put on some coffee. He ends up changing into more or less the same sort of thing he was already wearing, except with a nicer shirt, a bit too tight and rolled up at the sleeves. He feels a bit ridiculous doing so, but whatever.

All his hair stuff is in his currently occupied bathroom, so his hair will just have to kinda wetly flop into his forehead for now. It could look a lot worse, he decides, and goes to pour two cups of coffee.

Even after he hears the snap of the door, Daniel waits a solid minute before actually going through with showering. It does warm him up, and he is definitely not going to think about how long it's been since he last took one. Even when he actually had access to an apartment with running water, showering was far too often relegated to an afterthought along with eating and shaving and pretty much anything besides regular caffeination. He would simply get so caught up in his work that -

His work. Right.

The work he no longer has.

Once the shower is off Daniel towels his hair with an almost vicious resolve, a doomed attempt to purge those gloomy reminders of his general failure to accomplish anything from his head. And then he does his best to flatten the half-dried disarray for reasons he can't quantify, though no amount of smoothing or tousling will get the entirety of the mess to organize itself. Daniel gives it up as a lost cause, carefully folding the towel and leaving it next to the sink before packing his sopping clothes in with the rest of his luggage. It might soak through the entirety of his wardrobe by tomorrow, but there really isn't much to be done about that.

He exits the bathroom at last, warm and clean and dry for what feels like the first time in weeks. It probably has been weeks.

"Thanks," he says, feeling a lot more confident now that his appearance isn't reminiscent of a wet dog. And, hey, he can even smell coffee. The day that had begun so horribly is starting to improve, which gives Daniel enough of a reason to smile faintly at Seth in gratitude.

Edited 2014-11-13 02:22 (UTC)

Seth looks up as Daniel rejoins him, looking a lot less miserable than he had when he'd first caught Seth's eye. He looks a lot better like this, even with the birds nest of a hairstyle he's ended up with. His face just seems a lot better suited for smiling, and Seth decides for as long as he's got Daniel around, he's going to do his best to make sure he does smile more often. He seems like he needs it.

"Coffee," he says, somewhat unnecessarily, and gestures at the cup that's even had a little time to cool off, so Daniel won't immediately scald himself by drinking it.

"Um. We've got a washer and drier in the basement. I was gonna do some of my laundry, but I don't have a full load," he says. "Do you wanna throw some of yours in, at least the wet ones you just got out of? Feels a bit wasteful to run a half load."

There's absolutely no need for Seth to do laundry right now, and he could absolutely wait till he has a full load. He might even have a full load already, he hasn't checked. But if Daniel can't even pay for a coffee, Seth doubts he's got enough for to go to a laundromat, and Seth just wants to offer some help in a way least hurtful to Daniel's pride.

"Oh. Oh, okay. Sure." That solves the problem of the damp wardrobe. With considerably more cheer than he's moved with all day, Daniel pulls the slightly crumpled, wet garments out from his luggage. "Do you, uh, have a basket or anything? Or should I just...?" He trails off. He doesn't know if that sentence actually had a destiny in mind when it embarked. At least it didn't ramble as so many of his sentences tend to do. Used to tend to do. When he had things to ramble about.

Well, so much for not thinking about his failures.

"Oh, yeah," he answers, disappearing into his bedroom to fetch the basket. He's relieved to see that it DOES have about half a load, so he doesn't have to look like he's just blatantly lying. He returns to the bathroom with the basket, setting it on the floor.

"Just dump all your stuff in there, I'll fit in what I can," he says. Chances are if it doesn't all fit, it's his own clothes that will have to wait, but he doesn't mention that.

"Okay." He deposits the wet bundle into the basket with more care than is particularly necessary - really, he is handling a small pile of wet clothes, not a priceless Ancient Egyptian artifact - and stacks his luggage carefully in one corner of the room, pausing to swipe at the wet bangs that have already begun to flop in front of his eyes.

The smell of coffee demands Daniel's attention. Now that he's no longer preoccupied, he can sip at the mug and sigh appreciatively. This is much better than the café stuff.

"Thank you." Despite all the times he's already said it to Seth today, he feels like it's necessary. This is the most kindness anyone's showed him in days, weeks even.

While Daniel's adding his clothes to the basket, Seth digs into one of the bathroom drawers. As he comes to pick up the basket and carry it off to the basement, he shoves a hairbrush at Daniel with a slightly teasing smile.

"I'll be right back. Make yourself at home," he says, disappears out the door and down the stairs. The entire load does fit in, since Daniel didn't seem to get the hint he could throw some non-wet clothes in there as well. He wonders if he can figure out some other way to help Daniel. He's already more or less decided to give Daniel a place to spend the night, he just needs to bring it up in a way that doesn't make Daniel feel like he's taking advantage.

He's a little breathless by the time he returns a few minutes later, since those stairs really do a number on you. They're probably most of the reason he's decently in shape. "You alright?" he asks, finally getting to continue drinking his own coffee.

He accepts the brush with a small, slightly self-conscious smile but waits until Seth has left the room before he starts attacking the hair that's begun to dry in awkward clumps. Daniel's been told he should get it cut, at least trim it to a more manageable length, but he simply never got around to it. And now, well. Haircuts are the least of his problems.

He's managed to get it into a less chaotic order by the time Seth's returned, now able to return to sipping absently at his coffee.

"Yeah, um," Daniel says, looking up as his impromptu savior re-enters the room. "I am now. Thanks. Well, again. You know." He offers a tiny shrug that doesn't really know what it wants to be.

"It's no problem, really," he assures him, dropping down onto the couch at last. "Besides, my plans for the day got spoiled by the rain. Nice to get something useful done, and stop me from sitting here on me own."

Besides, Daniel is really - well, as jarring as it might seem compared to his height and the broadness of his shoulders, Daniel is, well, cute. If all he'd seen of him was him in the bathroom earlier, he might've described him as right fit, but with his mild-mannered and gentle attitude, not to mention his self-consciousness, there's really no other way to describe him at the moment.

"Well, just. You, you really didn't have to and you, yeah." Mr. Articulate over here, graduated with a PhD in philology of all things, but with the way he's stumbling over his words - his monosyllabic words, god - one would never know it. Yeah, no wonder Seth took pity on him. Daniel can't imagine he cuts a very impressive figure just now.

"I appreciate it," he concludes lamely, now staring at his coffee because he's fairly certain it won't be judging him anywhere near as harshly. "All of it. Kind of a lot."

Seth smiles, almost a little sad. He seems so entirely unused to being helped, to something actually going right, and Seth is intimately familiar with what that's like. And Daniel just seems like a guy who deserves so much more. Not that Seth can really know that, but he usually trusts his gut with these things, and Daniel's given him no reason to think otherwise. He's definitely not regretting helping him.

"I'm glad," he answers, more softly than he intended to. He clears his throat a little, somewhat awkwardly. "So. What's your story, Daniel Jackson?" he asks, one arm leaned on the back of the couch, taking a sip of his coffee.

"Uh." He coughs, acutely aware of just how obviously, pathetically downtrodden he is at the moment. "My story. Well."

Does he want the abridged version? Daniel is going to give him the abridged version. He doubts Seth will want much of the additional baggage, really, the abridged version is quite enough.

"I'm an archaeologist - er, I was, anyway, until very recently." He winces. A little more brutally honest than he'd intended. "Long story short, I just screwed up any chance I might've had to be much of anything in the archaeological community other than the world's foremost idiot expert in absurd hack theories that no one in their right mind would believe."

And also a little less abridged than he'd intended. Well all right then, so Seth is just going to know a lot more about Daniel than either of them are comfortable with, probably, and Daniel quickly sits down on the couch because it gives him the vague impression of being able to sink into the earth and let him completely vanish off its face, because that would suit him just fine.

"You're an archeologist?" Seth asks in surprise, lowering his cup a little. "Don't you need like.. lots of degrees for that or something?"

That's not exactly what he would've pegged him for. Not that he really has any idea what exactly he would've pegged him for. Sure, there's definitely a certain nerdiness there, Seth just... wouldn't imagine someone that well educated to be wandering the streets homelessly. He's always had the impression that those who've actually had access to that kind of education and prospects don't end up with the kind of lives Seth and his mates live.

"Sorry, I mean... That sucks," he adds awkwardly, realising that probably wasn't the most sensitive way to respond.

Daniel doesn't laugh so much as he just exhales sharply, a bitter huff of air full of concentrated resentment and irony and frustration and not the slightest ounce of humor.

"Hah, yeah," he mutters, now giving his coffee an intense look of concentration that its inaction hasn't fully warranted. "Lots of degrees and lots of debt and absolutely no fallback because you don't even have parents to -"

He breaks the sentence off, biting his lip. He is - not going to think about that. He really does not need to think about that. That is the last thing he needs right now. Daniel lets his head drop to his chest, giving into the weight of gravity and his numbing mental exhaustion and the sum of his failures, academic and otherwise, and breathes a weary, defeated sigh and hopes that they can just leave it at that.

Seth kind of feels like he's put his foot in it, but he doesn't even have time to be embarrassed, because he's too busy with feeling the sharp jab of sympathy for Daniel.

Even with his mam always working, he's always known she'd be there someone who'd be there if things got too bad. Just some small sense of security. Hell, his dad's still alive, Seth knows how to find him even if they haven't really spoken in years. If things were that desperate, he could've surely guilted something out of him.

He doesn't know what to say, because even if Seth is familiar with what it's like to be broke and homeless and with no prospects, he doesn't think he's ever had it that bad, to be so alone. There's just no way to offer proper sympathies for that, and Daniel doesn't exactly look like he'd be comfortable talking about it to a near stranger.

"Stay here tonight," he says suddenly, saying fuck it to the idea of finding a way to work that in smoothly. "You can have the couch. I'll order in some food. And I won't take no for an answer."

He doesn't mind the protracted silence; he welcomes the time to organize his thoughts, shuffle the blinding early childhood memories and the frustration aimed at academic institutions in general quietly under the proverbial table, reorder everything so he can just be grateful for the quiet and the coffee and the company of a guy who didn't have to be this generous and share his own space but did regardless.

When Seth speaks again, making less of a proposal so much as a firm declaration, Daniel jolts up to look at him, startled. For a moment he has trouble responding to that - how does he respond to that exactly, when it came so completely out of nowhere?

"Er - thanks," he manages after a few failed, inaudible attempts to protest, because he'd frankly be an idiot to refuse. Okay, so he is an idiot according to some of the more prominent archaeological minds and even the less prominent ones, himself included -

Daniel is getting off track. It'd be rude to refuse the hospitality when it's being so willingly given, and Seth seems genuinely determined for him to stay the night regardless. Daniel isn't about to go up against that sort of resolve when he's so tired and choiceless, especially when it's so obviously an offer in good faith.

Then his shoulders drop a little.

"I can't - pay you," he begins haltingly. Back to staring at the coffee. Coffee doesn't feel disappointment. Coffee just is. "Er, I can't, I don't know how to repay you, I mean. I wish - you don't have to do any of this."

"But I want to," he answers immediately, honestly. That should be reason enough, shouldn't it? Seth avoids doing anything he doesn't want to, he's not the sort to let himself be bullied into anything. If he helps someone out, it's because he genuinely feels like they deserve it, that it's worth his time. And he definitely feels that with Daniel. He wishes that Daniel wouldn't have to feel like he's putting Seth out, like he somehow has to earn his stay or that he's undeserving or just having someone do him a favour.

But Seth can't really do anything about that, so all he can do is insist on letting Daniel help him, and that will have to be enough. Seth doesn't have that much to give, but when you've got nothing, a little goes a long way.

"Which reminds me, I'm getting hungry," he powers on, setting down the mug and leaning over to a side table to fish out a small stack of menus of nearby places that deliver. "Do you like Thai?"

"Um. Sure." Seth is being insistent, so Daniel swallows all of his remaining objections with the rest of his coffee and smiles faintly at the empty mug. "Thai's fine."

Thai is more than fine. He's warm and dry and caffeinated and, all right, he'll admit it - he feels safe. It's not a feeling Daniel has any great familiarity with, but he finds he doesn't mind it. He'd be content with just this but now Seth is offering food on top of it, and he hasn't eaten in something like twelve hours though he's long since lost track, and if this is the universe finally giving him a break then Daniel is going to be intensely grateful and hold onto this break for as long as he can.

Seth grabs his phone and calls up one of the local places, ordering them both some food. He gets Daniel some basic, unintimidating chicken curry in case he's not used to that kind of food, giving him a look to make sure that sounds alright, before hanging up again.

"Food's on its way," he says, perhaps unnecessarily. Even if he already feels pretty familiar and comfortable with Daniel, he doesn't really know what to talk about. He could ask more about his past, about his work, about what kind of ridiculous theories it is he's been having, but he doesn't want to dig into anything painful.

He nods, unwilling to relinquish the mug due to it being the only object he has to occupy his hands. So he sits and stares at it, thumb running absently up and down the curved handle, studying the material of the mug's design without much interest in defining what it happens to be comprised of.

Were Daniel in a state of more self-confidence in his oratory abilities he's certain he would be a fantastic conversationalist, but as it is he currently has very little faith in his capability to maintain a discussion that won't inevitably steer itself to one of two polarities, the first being yet another "thank you," words he's certain Seth is tired of hearing, and the second being, bizarrely, "sorry about all this". Also the previous, oh, dozen or so attempts he's made in engaging in excitable scholarly discourse resulted in him being glared out of the room, or everyone else leaving the room, or him being asked to leave the room in case the glaring was too subtle, and his hands have really tightened around this mug, haven't they?

Daniel hastily forces himself to relax his grip with a small start. Well. Whoops. What a wonderful, talkative guest he is.

"So," he says, a desperate attempt to put effort into words and talking as is polite and socially expected from most people, a reciprocation of discussion about one's personal life, sure, let's go with that since that seems to be the people's choice of popular topic today. "Um, what about you? In terms of, um, you know? Personal life?"

Oh, for want of a halfway decent segue. Spectacular, truly. Didn't he take a class, several classes even, on oral communications?

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trash.

such trash.

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