Redisourcolour Challenge 'Medicine'
Jun. 28th, 2011 10:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
silkendreammaidTitle: The Providence Patient
Author: silkendreammaid
Disclaimer: I do not and never will own Torchwood or the characters within.
Characters/Pairing: Ianto Jones, Jack Harkness
Rating: PG13
Note: Written for the Redisourcolour Challenge 18: Medicine. Prompts to be used were “creamy, babbling, tightwad” and the phrase "Well then, how about you try it, and see how it goes?"
Author’s Note: I totally fail at title and summary for this one. I’m just pleased to have actually managed to finish it as life has been hectic and interesting in the Chinese proverb/curse kind of way.
On the good side tho' i saw GDL and James Marsters at Supanova on the weekend and they were brilliant. Really really enjoyed myself immensely.
Summary: Ianto Jones has known about Providence Park all his life. The Providence Patient “… then Dr Harper said ‘Well then, how about you try it, and see how it goes?’ and the intern fainted.” Ianto Jones spoke softly and easily as he changed the sheets. “It made the doctor’s day. It always does when he manages to make one of them faint. Or throw up,” he added with a smile to the silent man in the chair by the window. “Of course I don’t think he really would have given the intern ECT, but … well, let’s just say Dr Harper’s reputation is very widely known.” Ianto sighed. “But Doctor Harper’s been like that ever since he came here. And that’s been near on five years now.” Ianto paused in the middle of plumping a pillow. “They say his wife died tragically and he’s never gotten over it. But I think he just likes being miserable and mean to everyone.” Ianto finished with a vigourous shake of the pillow and placed it neatly with the others. He pulled the newly straightened linen down and then turned to face the man in the window. The man watched him with vacant blue eyes. He never spoke and rarely made any kind of noise at all. The doctors said he had severe amnesia but no-one seemed to know what had caused it. The way he stayed almost completely withdrawn from everything around him suggested some great trauma had been suffered but the man had no scars or marks from any injuries. No-one came to visit him. His patient notes had him listed as John Smith. Ianto Jones liked him. Ianto Jones was no stranger to Providence Park and its inhabitants. He’d first come here at the age of four when his mother had been admitted. For four years he’d been a regular visitor and a couple of the older nurses remembered the dark-haired blue eyed boy who’d often offered to help them when he got restless visiting a woman who no longer knew who he was. “Let’s get you back to bed now Sir,” Ianto said with an easy politeness as he approached the seated man. Ianto was always polite with patients, doctors and nurses alike. No matter how difficult or trying they were Ianto moved around them all with an equanimity that never seemed to break. John Smith blinked very slowly before pushing himself upwards. Ianto moved at his side with every slow step he took and as soon as the slightly taller man was seated in the bed and resting against his pillows, Ianto pulled the covers neatly and comfortably to the man’s waist. “You can be free of my babbling for a while,” Ianto said bringing a table closer. A stopwatch sat squarely in the middle and Mr Smith’s eyes focused on it. It was one of only two possessions Mr Smith had. Ianto found himself watching the circling hand. It was rather hypnotic and he stood silent and caught as the seconds ticked by. “I’ll be back shortly with your dinner, Sir,” he eventually said but he didn’t move. Nor did he see the blue eyes watching him. When Ianto was fourteen he returned to Providence Park. This time it was he who was the patient with severe depression following the death of his father. He’d stayed for six months – the first two under a suicide watch - and then he’d been obligated to return for weekly checkups for the next year after his release. The nurses who remembered him persuaded him to help out with other patients and in helping others he found a relief from the depression. When he was arrested for shoplifting two years later, the judge allowed him to do his six month’s community service at the Park. Ianto Jones wondered if he should enjoy bathing a patient as much as he enjoyed bathing Mr Smith. The man was gorgeous as he rested in the bath. The man had virtually no body hair and Ianto felt almost decadent as he massaged the creamy body wash across broad shoulders and smooth chest. The man’s skin was like satin over loose relaxed muscle. The warm water gave the unblemished skin a healthy pink tinge and only the lack of awareness in the vacant blue eyes gave the man away. Ianto had been embarrassed the first times he’d had to give Mr Smith his bath but the man had been calm and completely detached as Ianto had handled and cleaned his most private parts and Ianto’s nervousness had soon faded. Now he felt no self-consciousness as he gently wiped the flaccid cock and ran the flannel along the folds of Mr Smith’s groin and then down the long legs to his feet and back again with circular massaging movements. Mr Smith suddenly hummed and Ianto shot him a quick look. “You like that, don’t you, Sir,” he said softly. “You only make that sound when I bath you. Although I think Cook would like it if you did that at dinner time. She likes it when people appreciate her food, and the food here is good. Cook says that’s because the Director’s not a tightwad.” Ianto gave a small laugh as he massaged down Mr Smith’s arm and began to manipulate the lax fingers. “And hearing her use American slang in her Scottish accent is quite something. She often comes out with them. The Director’s American and I hear that when he visits he deliberately teaches her more. That’s what Mike the orderly says anyway.” Ianto worked his way back up the sleek arm and down the other one. Mr Smith hummed again and Ianto smiled. When Ianto was twenty he met Lisa Hallett in a hallway of Torchwood One. Two cups of coffee sat beside the stopwatch when Ianto helped Mr Smith settle back in his bed after his bath. The unblinking blue eyes followed him as he went to the cupboard and brought out the other possession of Mr Smith. An Air Force greatcoat. Ianto sat in the chair by the bed and brushed the coat. His fingers smoothed rough edges on the cuffs and worried at the loose threads until they were worked back into the heavy fabric. Sunset colours seeped through the window and the room was silent except for the soft slide of material as Ianto shifted the coat in his lap. He drank his coffee while his fingers kept moving over the coat. As the room grew darker his fingers slowed and his head slipped sideways as his eyes closed. Blue eyes blinked, cleared and Mr Smith left his bed and untouched coffee. With careful movements he slowly lifted the young man and placed him on the bed. He removed his coat from Ianto’s loose grasp before pulling the blankets up. “…love the coat…” The murmured words had Mr Smith pausing and leaning forward to press a kiss to Ianto’s forehead. “I know,” he whispered to the unconscious man before straightening up and putting his coat on over the pyjamas Ianto had dressed him in. He left the room quietly closing the door behind him. “All ok?” The sharp Cockney accent of Dr Owen Harper had him checking to make sure the door was closed and Ianto remained undisturbed. “Yes, it’s still holding,” the man Ianto now knew only as Mr Smith replied. “I’ll just change and we can return to the Hub.” “You can’t keep on doing this, Jack,” Owen said carefully. “Something will trigger eventually and then he’ll end up as psychotic as Suzie’s Max was.” “We’re not using anymore retcon on him and you said that these other drugs would be enough to ensure he never remembers,” Captain Jack Harkness pointed out almost defensively. “And they’re working! But Jack, I'm here every other week and you’re here every week and while he fits that into his little mindset now, sooner or later something is going to give. It’s time to leave him be.” When Ianto was twenty he came back to Providence Park. He wanted to get a carer’s degree. Four years later and he is content to work and live with the other staff although he still says that he will get that degree one day.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-28 03:13 pm (UTC)What a beautiful web you have woven.
It's just impossible to put my feelings into words. I will put this in my memories, take it home and feed it cookies!
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-28 04:26 pm (UTC)it went into a different direction to what i'd planned so i'm glad it probably had more sense than i... :)
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-28 06:37 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-28 11:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-28 07:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-28 11:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-28 09:36 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-29 12:00 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-29 07:03 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-29 11:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-29 10:24 pm (UTC)Jack can't seem to completely let go.
I'm not entirely sure if Ianto is a nurse or a patient, but this is so sad and sweet that it really doesn't matter.
And there are those little flickers of memory... Jack's tempting fate by repeatedly visiting!
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-29 11:56 pm (UTC)he is the nurse... i just couldn't see ianto not needing to do things for others in a post-reticonned state...
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-30 11:08 am (UTC)I only hope Jack hasn't tempted fate once too often/much ...
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-30 02:29 pm (UTC)i had a more AU idea at first but then it twisted on me ...:)
(no subject)
Date: 2011-07-03 03:10 pm (UTC)