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The Lives and Loves of Derek Reese
Deslea R. Judd
Copyright 2010
Disclaimer: Characters and situations not mine. Expression
mine.
Fandom: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Characters/Keywords: Sarah/Derek (primary), Derek/Jesse
Rating: Mature. Mid level sexual references.
Spoilers/Timeframe: Set after Desert Cantos, but events up to
This Is The Day Part 2 are assumed to be part of this universe.
Summary: Loves from different timelines collide.
Feedback: deslea at deslea dot com.
More fic: http://fiction.deslea.com
See also the sequel, Somewhere to
Belong
It's a beautiful day in the countryside, and Sarah is driving.
The combination of these two factors means that Derek can sit
there with the breeze on his cheek and the sun on his arm and he
can rest. He can think. It's a rare state of being.
It's also a slightly unsettling one. There are a lot of things
Derek prefers not to think about lately.
A lot of things? Well, one thing, mostly. A whole host of
questions under the general heading of Jesse.
Things about love and loyalty the way they are tied to who a
person is. And what makes a person in the first place. How much
their past needs to change before they are no longer the same
person, before love is just misplaced nostalgia and loyalty is
cancelled out. Whether his Jesse still exists somewhere, or
whether this Jesse, darker and hotter and more secretive, is the
only one left.
And then there's the question of what he will do about her if
she isn't *his*, because she knows a hell of a lot about his
family. Too much, maybe. And speaking of family, there's the
question of what, *who* there is for him if Jesse...isn't.
And when that thought crosses his mind, he glances sidelong at
Sarah and wonders what she would look like with her hair splayed
out on a pillow, and then he tells himself he didn't think it at
all. And if he *did* think it, it was just the way perfectly sane
people will think in passing of jumping off a cliff. It's in the
nature of sane people to eyeball insanity, and of men to eyeball
women, and *shit*, he wishes his brain would just. shut. up.
All of which is why he doesn't like to think.
He'd exchange small talk with Sarah if he could, but they
haven't spoken since they snapped at each other about Kyle at the
funeral the day before. They've talked shop, yes, but no social
niceties of any kind. He could do something about that, but it
would involve an apology, and he doesn't like to apologise,
either.
Like it or not, though, he's going to have to do it sooner or
later. At least this way, there's something in it for him, too.
So he takes a breath, grits his teeth, and turns to look at her.
Injecting as much grace as he can muster, he says, "I was out of
line yesterday. I'm sorry."
She doesn't ask what for, but her grip on the steering wheel
tightens and her jaw sets firmly in aggravation. "I offered to
tell you about your brother. You didn't want to hear it. If you
had, you might understand."
"I understand that you loved him." Please leave it at that, he
thinks; he can't handle hearing about Sarah and Kyle's fated love
affair right now. Not when his own love life is in shambles and
thoughts of her nag at him rather more often than he'd like.
"No, you don't. You think you do because you saw me half-dead
and delirious and talking to him, but you're wrong."
That brings him up short, brings him out of his own
preoccupations. "You didn't love him?" he says slowly. He doesn't
believe that.
"Of course I did," she snaps. "But, what, you think I was
seeing some romantic soft-focus vision of him or something? Are
you that stupid?"
"I hadn't thought about it." And he hadn't, not consciously,
but she's right - that was exactly the idea in his mind,
half-formed and inarticulate and tinged faintly with envy. She
was crying out Kyle's name, smiling and piteous, for Chrissake.
She was in a world with his brother that he would never know.
Her voice is scathing at what she obviously regards as his lack
of insight. "He was telling me to live, you idiot. That's what he
does. It's when I see him. When our son needs me to keep putting
one foot in front of the other. You forget, Reese, that he wasn't
just my lover. He was my soldier. Just like you."
"That name-"
"Wasn't a bed name, so get the fuck over it."
She was right - he hadn't understood. It was a name used in
battle. He understands now that it is a compliment.
"Okay," he says at last. "I'll shut up about it."
The annoyance goes out of her voice and the lines of her body.
"I'll give you a free pass on that one, Derek, but only because
you lost him months ago and for me it's been seventeen years. You
don't know what it's like over time. Not yet."
"Why don't you tell me, then?" He isn't just distracting
himself from his own troubles anymore. He really wants to know.
She shoots him a look, as though suddenly uncertain. He doesn't
think he's ever seen her unsure. But she nods after a moment, and
says, "It's like a little box that you carry around. Most of the
time it's closed. That's why you can go on. It's why you can be
happy again without feeling guilty about it, or why you can find
another partner, or whatever. But if something happens to open
the box, the love is still there like it was yesterday. It
doesn't stop your life, but just for a moment here and there, it
stops you in your tracks."
He asks before he can consider the wisdom of the question. "Do
I open the box?"
"No. But I don't think you believe that." She's right, he
doesn't, but before he can answer, she suddenly pulls over to the
side of the road, tyres screeching on gravel, and flicks off the
ignition. She clambers out of the SUV, almost in a run.
Baffled, he follows her as she ducks through a wire fence and
walks into the field beside the road. She must have seen
something, he thinks. Something about Kaliba. He can't think of
any other explanation for her actions. Tramping through the long
grass, he calls, "What? What have you seen?"
She keeps on walking away from him in long strides, then stops
suddenly. Looks up into the sky with her head back and her
shoulders slumped in an unmistakeable look of surrender.
"Nothing," she says, turning to face him, gazing into his eyes in
weary resignation. "Except maybe you." With this inexplicable
statement she drops down onto the ground, pulling her knees up to
her chest.
He stares at her. "Fuck, Connor, stop being so goddamned
cryptic."
She looks up at him with something like sympathy. "I didn't
know you knew about Kyle and me - not until you weren't surprised
that day. I've been wracking my brain all these months to
understand why you wouldn't touch me when we both knew you wanted
to. But it all makes sense now. It's some 'shalt not covet thy
brother's wife' thing. Because you don't understand about the
box."
Shit. SHIT.
All this time he's been operating out of his own conflicts,
never realising how it might look to her.
Shit.
He drops down heavily on the ground, taking his place beside
her. Doesn't even bother to deny the truth she's put out there so
baldly. "It's not that. I mean, partly. But there's something
else. Jesus."
A dark shadow spreads over her face as she begins to
understand, maybe, that there's something she doesn't know. And
if there's something Sarah Connor doesn't like, it's not knowing.
"Derek?" she says. Half question. Half warning.
There's no easy way to say it. Softly, he admits, "I have a
wife. At least," he amends, "as close to a wife as you get when
there's no law and no church and not much of anything else."
The softness, the naked honesty in her face visibly retreats as
she absorbs this. "In the future," she says carefully. It isn't a
question, but it isn't a statement, either.
He wonders if she'll deck him - or worse. "She was in the
future. She came back."
"With you?"
"No. Since then. But I've seen her."
He can almost see her mind ticking over. When. How long. What
does she know. "Did she follow you?"
"No. She's on a mission."
She thinks silently on that for a minute. "So," she says at
last, "she's here, and you love her, but you want me." Her voice
is totally neutral, like she just wants to get her facts clear.
Like she wasn't talking about wracking her brain about him just
minutes ago.
He laughs bitterly. "It would be easy, if it were that simple."
He looks away. "Her history has changed because of the things you
and I have done. And now - she's not the same. We're not the
same. And I don't even know who I'm trying to be faithful to
anymore."
Slowly, she nods. Choosing her words with obvious care, she
says, "There are a lot of questions that I could ask, but I'm
going keep it to one. Are you doing, and will you always do the
right thing by John?"
He meets her gaze, and says gravely, "I have and I will."
She wraps her arms around her knees for a moment, hugging
herself and rocking a little, frowning. "All right," she says at
last, rising up on her knees as though to get up. She might as
well be closing the shutters. "Then that will be enough."
On an impulse he doesn't stop to question, he rises up too and
grasps her wrist. "No," he says in a low, bruised voice. "It's
really not."
They're close, very close. Too close. The sun streams down,
drenching her features with yellow light, and her eyes are
brilliant with colour and he can feel her breath on his face as
she tilts hers up towards him. They move at the same moment,
leaning in, her breath hitching as their lips meet.
She lets out a sigh as she softens and opens beneath his lips.
Her body is yielding and defenceless, as though accepting
something inevitable. Troubled thoughts flicker across his mind -
complications, guilt - but they leave as fast as they arrive.
He's missed this, he thinks irrationally, as if they've done this
in another time and part of him remembers her scent and her skin
and that sound (what sound?) she makes when he's just about to
thrust into her.
Tentatively, she lifts her hands to his chest. Slides them up
into his hair. Then, more certain, she kisses him harder and
presses against him, whispering that name, Reese, and he finds
that he likes it.
He has to stop, he thinks, or he'll take her right here in the
grass, and he doesn't know if he should do that. And she
obviously thinks it too, because she pulls back a little, letting
out a shuddering breath as she gently disengages herself from his
arms.
She looks away, awkwardly, and repositions herself to rest her
knees, putting distance between them in the process. She seats
herself cross-legged beside him. "Sorry," she says with forced
casualness, staring out ahead of her, like she bumped into him in
a corridor instead of kissing him like she'd been waiting all her
life to do it. "I shouldn't have done that."
He follows her lead, sinking back onto the grass. "It was
mutual. Don't beat yourself up." He thinks he'll do plenty of
that all by himself.
"I don't do the other woman thing. I don't believe in it and I
don't have time for it." Always the pragmatist.
"Neither do I," he says. "I just wish-"
She looks at him once more. Eyes alert with sudden curiosity.
"What? You wish what?"
Shrugging a little, he looks away, back at the road in the
distance. He starts to speak once or twice, then stops, at a
loss. Finally, he says, "I told John once that you had a pure
soul. I think I could meet you in a thousand lifetimes and you'd
still be you."
"And she isn't?"
Somehow that cuts through it all. He doesn't know what he feels
about who she's become, or what he owes her. But he knows his
wife and he knows this Jesse, and no, they're not the same. His
eyes sting and she's seen him cry before but damn if he's putting
that on her now. Bad enough that he's opened this door at all.
"No." It comes out as a whisper. An acknowledgement of
something he's always known.
She takes his hand and squeezes it a little. "I'm sorry,
Derek."
He nods, swallowing hard, blinking against the sun. Changes the
subject. "You can call me Reese, if you want."
She gives a short, sharp, bittersweet sound of mirth. "And to
think I thought that was the problem. Jesus, Derek, what a mess."
"Well, Kyle didn't help. But it would take more than that." And
then he shuts up, because he's already given away much more than
he should.
"Reese..." The name catches in her throat.
That sound, that aching half-moan derails him somehow, unravels
any resolve he might have had. Suddenly his whole body is
responding to hers and he is reaching for her, leaning over her
to kiss her.
She brings her palms up to his face and cradles him as he finds
her again, soft and eager under his mouth. Threading his fingers
through her hair, he suddenly knows why he hasn't been home much
lately. What he was afraid of - the door he was afraid to open.
He understands that he has started a slow-moving train that will
ultimately lead to a choice.
But he thinks the choice might already be made.
With that thought, his kiss grows stronger. More possessive. He
murmurs her name against her lips, tugging her body against his.
She comes willingly, pressing her torso hard against him, and he
can feel the fast, shallow rise and fall of her breasts and the
rapid beat of her heart.
There are few preliminaries. She sinks back into the grass,
arching her breasts against him as he follows, finding his mouth
again as their bodies find each other. She slides her palms up
under his shirt and splays them out searchingly over the planes
of his back, and he runs his hands down over her hips and thighs,
dragging her zipper down with trembling fingers. He rolls on to
his back, taking her with him, and strokes down into the curve of
her buttocks. Her flesh is firm beneath denim and he presses
hard, cupping her between his hand and his hips. Rubbing hard
against him, she gasps out a sound of longing that is even hotter
than the friction between their thighs.
"Do it," she whispers. As if there was any doubt.
Shivering all over, he pushes her jeans and her knickers down
over her hips and manages to work one of her legs free. She
doesn't help - too busy kissing him and opening her shirt with
one shaking hand, his zip with the other. He feels the sudden wet
warmth of her against his stomach, and then she abruptly sinks
down onto him in a single stroke. He gasps out her name - she
shocks it out of him - and arches his back, thrusting deep up
into her. She whimpers, seizing around him then opening wider,
and he remembers how long it's been for her. He wonders if he
should ease up, but she's rocking hard against him, drawing him
into her, gasping as he touches her there with gently probing
fingertips. She comes hard and fast and recovers just as quickly,
nowhere near finished with him yet.
He grips her hip with one hand, hard enough to leave a mark,
and she kisses him hard, whimpering in response. He doesn't so
much thrust into her as hold her there and shudder and grind. He
finds her breast with the other and holds her there, massaging
and grasping just a little harder than he probably should, but
she begins to shiver all over and moan and sweet Jesus, he misses
this. Misses it as though he's had it before and is coming home,
although he's never touched her before in his life.
"I love you," he whispers. He didn't know he was going to say
it until he said it. "You know I love you."
She pauses, posied over him, and nods, her face pale and damp
with sweat. She looks like a winter's day and cold chills and
English beauty. Nothing like the sun beating down on them and the
fire between her thighs. "I know that, Derek." He feels her
sudden, involuntary tightening around him, and he knows that she
won't say it back - not now - and he knows she loves him anyway.
"Do it," she says again, still pale and trembling with lightly
suppressed need.
He doesn't need any more encouragement than that. Sitting up,
he draws her against his torso, his arms across her back and his
hands in her hair, and thrusts hard up into her, possessively,
the way she wants him. She winds her legs around him, spreading
to receive every inch of him. She gasps out his name through
parted lips as she shudders out her orgasm, and he lets go of his
own, filling her with his warmth and drooping his head against
her shoulder.
They come to rest at last, sinking back together in the grass.
Awkwardly, she straightens and rolls off him, pulling her jeans
up and buttoning them as they lay there, side by side in the sun.
He does the same, feeling the walls come up again, at least part
of the way.
As though by mutual agreement, they turn their heads to meet
each other's gaze. The light dances brilliantly on her hair and
her eyes, but there is something bittersweet in the look she
gives him, as well.
"We shouldn't do this again," she says, implacable and
resolute. "Not while you have things to figure out."
"No," he agrees. Then, more quietly, "You know, Sarah, I don't
regret this, but I hope - I really hope I haven't done the wrong
thing by you."
She looks away, back up at the sky. Sighs. "We both have a job
to do, Reese. I'm used to nothing being really mine."
If anything can break him, he thinks, it's that. Hearing her
say that, so matter-of-fact.
He props himself up on one elbow and leans over her. "Hey. I'm
yours, Sarah. Yours and John's. No matter what. We're family."
She looks up at him, lashes suddenly wet. Strokes his cheek and
nods.
"We should keep going," she says at last, nodding towards the
SUV. Slowly, diffidently, she pulls away from him and rises.
He follows, and it hurts him to watch her, still shivering
lightly from what they just shared, yet walking alone a little
ahead. Somehow her carriage is lighter and heavier at the same
time. He wishes he had an easy solution. For her and for him.
He catches up with her at the SUV and takes her arm. "Hey," he
says.
She turns, and it seems to take a lifetime. Her smile is gentle
and sad. She touches his mouth, stroking it with her thumb.
Caress and instruction, in equal measure. "I know, Reese. I
know."
They kiss one more time, and then they break apart, and they
get in the car and keep on going.
END
NOTE: This one was written while I was struggling with writers'
block on another variation on the same Sarah/Derek/Jesse triangle
theme. That one is from a quite different angle, so hopefully
it'll be back on track soon.