5Jack POV
He pulled up a chair beside Gwen and sat down. The first thing he noticed were the tear streaks on her face and the redness surrounding her eyes.
"You okay?" He said
"I'm okay, rough week that's all."
"But if something wasn't okay you'd tell me, right? He pried.
For instance, if a cannibalistic psychopath tried to eat you and maybe whispered something in your ear, that maybe you were having a hard time accepting."
That gave Gwen a smile , he loved when she smiled, especially when he caused it. He was kind a surprised she was here though, he would've thought she'd be at home with Rhys or had taken-up Owens invitation to drink them-selves into oblivion, but he was also glad she had instead chosen to come back to the hub, back to him.
"I guess I just needed some space to clear my head."
"Well I'm glad you came here"
An emotion he couldn't quite catch flitted across her face, he wondered why it had been there at all.
"Got any vodka?" She asked, her head looking around, as if expecting it to be in sight.
"Sure, I like to keep my options open!"
He gave her a smile and stood while offering her his hand fully knowing she'd accept , he kept hold of it until they reached his office and Jack had to let go so he could retrieve the wanted bottle from where he'd stashed it. When Gwen saw where it was she raised her eyebrows at him.
"If I don't hide it, Owen fleeces it while I'm not looking." He explained
He grabbed two shot glasses from his desk draw and sat down on the couch beside Gwen. He dutifully un-screwed the lid and poured till it was at the very brim and Gwen raised her glass as he did.
"To our sanity, may we always remember what's right and never think of what we found in the countryside while where eating. Cheers!" He said with wistful smile.
"I will drink to that."
2 hours later…
Gwen POV
Gwen was laughing hysterically at some joke she couldn't quite remember Jack telling but still knowing it must have been funny, as all his previous ones had been. They'd eventually graduated to the floor at some point and were sprawled out next to one another, the bottle of Vodka long since gone, lay abandon a few feet from them.
As their hysterics died down and there breathing became normal once again Jack turned on his side so he was facing her. He had a look in his eye for a moment and stared at her but at the same time wasn't really seeing her.
She recognised this look as he had done it numerous times before, it was like he was remembering something he'd forgotten, but as usual it fled and left behind a sombre looking Captain, watching it happen reminded her of the ghost machine. One minute you were there, then you weren't, but after a few minutes you returned to reality and everything dawned on you once again.
"Don't know about you but I'm knackered. Actually what is the time, you don't have a clock in here?" She asked as she yawned tiredly
"Hang on, let me see." He replied as he reached into his waistcoat to pull out his stopwatch and check for her.
"It's about, oh its 4:17." She could hear the surprise in his voice
"What! Oh shit Rhys is going to be pissed. I told him I'd be home by midnight."
She resigned herself to the fact she was going to have face an angry Rhys and if she was honest with herself she didn't care. That was a problem in its self, but she put it to the back of her mind like she did so often with things these days and promised herself she'd think it over tomorrow, when the hangover she was sure to have cleared.
"Are you even sober enough to drive me home Captain?" She said, eyeing him up and down
"Are, the beauty of not being from around here. I assure you I'm quite decent" As he said this, he sent her a cocky grin to go with the insinuation he'd just thrown her way.
Not giving him the satisfaction of making her blush she slowly pushed herself up from the ground, not realising she'd just given Jack a perfect view of her backside as she did so.
"Well you better get me home then."
With grace a man his size shouldn't posse's he jumped up from the ground and grabbed his grey military coat off the hook.
"You right to go?" He asked her as he put his coat around his shoulders.
"Yeah just let me go grab my bag." She told him
As they rode the invisible left together up the water tower she wondered exactly where he parked the SUV. She got her answer though when he casually waltzed across the sidewalk and pressed the beeper to unlock the alarms on the SUV and got in. She should've been surprised that he would park it not 10 yards away from the water tower on the footpath, she should've been appalled that he just casually pulled the parking tickets off the window and dumped them in the trash can he'd parked next too. But she wasn't, she did idly wonder if they did that where he came from though. Wherever that was, but she knew wasn't likely they (the team) would ever find out. Not that it made a difference, they couldn't exactly get 'their' if they wanted to. At least she didn't think they could, she thought wryly. With Torchwood you never knew.
As she got in the passenger seat she thought that maybe while he was slightly inhibited, she might be able to perhaps catch him off guard for once and thought maybe tonight she would get lucky. She knew she would have to be careful with what she asked him or he would clam up and not say anything, which was easier said than done in her own inhibited state.
"So got any advice on the relationship front about what to say; to angry boyfriends when you promised them one tiny thing, and instead, did the exact opposite?"
"Well you could always try the 'I lost track of time'."
"Yeah… I think I've done that a few to many times already." She sighed and pushed her fringe out of her face.
"You know I once had a boyfriend who never asked me a single question. You wanna know why?"
"No actually I don't because I don't want to hear another story about your…"
"Okay, okay. But I had really good punch line to follow, you would've loved it.!" He swore with a big smile on his handsome face.
"Have you ever had a serious relationship?" She exclaimed
"Sure, I mean; there was Adele and..." His brow suddenly furrowed
"And?" She enquired
He cleared his throat before answering her. She sensed that his mind had retreated to the past and wondered if he'd ever share with her what he was thinking about when it happened. But even in her intoxicated state, she knew this conversation was over before it had even started.
Jack POV
"There have been others." He grunted in response
"Of course there have." She replied condescendingly
He didn't know why, but he suddenly felt the need to defend himself. And in the morning that's exactly what he would tell himself.
"You know, I was married once. He practically yelled
"In fact, I'm technically, probably, still am."
Obviously surprised her head whipped around towards him.
"You are, too who?" She exclaimed surprised and a little too loud for her liking.
"Well, no one around here. I don't know it was a long time ago. Just forget I said anything."
But he knew that wouldn't stop her, he'd already caught her interest. This was the exact reason he never told them anything. You tell them one insignificant thing, a small detail that doesn't really even compare with the rest of his past, and all of sudden they expect you to tell them everything. Or at least that was what he told himself. That was how he 'slept at night', or didn't in his case.
"Oh come on Jack, you said she wasn't from around here. Who's it going to hurt; I promise I won't tell the others!" She said hurriedly, afraid she'd lose her opportunity
Sighing to him-self, he turned it over in his head and came to the conclusion she had, it wasn't going to hurt anyone. Except him! Well, what's another mistake in a long life of many he thought? He steeled himself for the conversation that was to come and took a deep breath; all the while Gwen was sitting there waiting patiently for him to begin.
"It's been over a hundred years and I can still see her face as clearly as I did then. God, she was beautiful, but not in the supermodel kind of way. She just was, everything she did, everything she touched had beauty surrounding it. Though I admit, I did spend an awful long time staring at her arse, before we got together of course and sometimes after.
What do you humans say? Oh right, 'the girl next door'." He said, already getting lost in his memory
"Yep, that was her. It wasn't love at first sight, she thought I was a pretty boy used to getting my own way. We'd lived as neighbours for over five years, before I even had the courage to ask her out and boy was I surprised.
"She said; what took you so long?"
We were together for a few years but something... happened and I changed. She said she didn't recognise me anymore and that was that. We went our separate ways.
It had been about three years when we met up again. She joined the tim… the are travel agency I was with, scared the hell out of me too. I was so surprised to see her, hmm it was like universe had brought us together again.
"You know, I never did ask her how she ended up there, guess I got side tracked.
"We just sorta picked up where we left off. I asked her to marry me only a year after we got back together, everyone was so shocked. People, where I'm… from, don't get married very often like they do here. It was a rare thing indeed, but that's just how it was."
He was getting to the hard bit now and it was difficult to tell her the rest because he was going to have to sensor a lot, not needing her to know about the time agency and everything that came with it. But he had a feeling he would tell her one day, but this was enough for now.
"We… we had a daughter. She was everything to us. We'd both come from not pleasent pasts and wanted her to have everything we never did. So we moved to a secluded 'country' type place; it had lake and wildlife, fruit trees, apple grass…"
"_"
"I know it must be hard, but please don't ask." He said without pause
"Go ahead" she said timidly
He paused mid breath, and took a deeper one instead.
"When she was six I went away on a job and left her and her mother at home. But when I got back there wasn't a home left to go too." He whispered with his voice thick with emotion. He really shouldn't have had that last drink, he was starting to lose his focus after all.
"You don't have to continue!" Gwen said hurriedly, suddenly regretting asking in the first place, because she was fairly certain she knew how this story ended, it would explain a lot.
"May as well tell you the ending now. Nobody likes a cliff hanger." He said, almost sounding angry at her.
TO be continued… TTFN
Next chapter will be up soon. Reviews make me smile!