Strong Enough to Bend
By: Stacy L.
CATEGORY: Angst, Established Relationship, POV
TABLE FIC PROMPT: 084. He
COMPLETED:
AUTHOR’S NOTES: This story serves as a response to a table fic prompt from the LiveJournal challenge community stargatefic100.
Jack’s POV
Moments like these are what I hope for…time when I can relax and think about all the blessings I have been given. There’s the blessing of being alive, of being stronger than I was before, of having had a family, of having been given another family and then there’s the blessing that I’m most thankful for: Daniel Jackson.
Daniel. A man who is the complete opposite of me, a man who knows what is right and goes after it regardless of the consequences…a man who will face any challenge no matter how impossible it may seem and is willing to walk through the very fires of hell to save a complete stranger.
Through the years I have watched him change. I have seen his innocence destroyed, his faith crushed, his heart broken, his life shattered and I have seen him get right back up, brush off his sorrow, shake off his despair, throw his rage away and charge forward with more resolve, more determination than even I can sometimes muster. Each time life deals him a crippling blow he shudders, he bends but he never breaks. Instead he continues onward stronger than before and more head strong than ever. How he does it I’ll never know. He’s an enigma to me. He’s a complicated puzzle, a mass of contradiction, a kaleidoscope of mystery. He’s the man I love with all my heart.
He’s resting now, peacefully at the moment. There are no dreams to disturb his quiet slumber, no nightmares to dance before his closed eyelids. No frowns mar his beautiful face, no lines crease his forehead. All is calm and quiet.
I smile softly finding calm in hearing his steady breathing. It’s when he sleeps that I catch a tiny glimpse of the innocence he has lost. It’s when he sleeps that I see the man he was before I entered into his life. He was a peaceful man, a scholar and a teacher. When we first met he had never known what it was like to take a life, or watch one being taken. He had never known how to fight, or that he had to fight sometimes to the death to survive. He hadn’t known the cruelty a human being is capable of inflicting upon another. He hadn’t known what it was like to look death straight in the eyes, or even what it felt like TO die.
Through the years he had to learn those things. He had to adapt. He had to change. He had to become a seasoned warrior, one capable of taking a life without a second thought, one capable of fighting an opponent to the death and winning the fight, one capable of inducing pain on another… He had to change and in so doing sacrificed his innocence, his keen sense of awe and of wonder. He had to sacrifice his one chance at happiness, his one chance at a family…
I nearly lost him several times, but he has always come back to me, and together we have faced unbearable odds, survived impossible situations and found true love in the arms of one another. I became his chance at happiness, his one chance at a family…
Apart we clash and snap like lightening but together, together we cause insurmountable friction that creates a powerful explosion. We are opposites, yet one cannot survive without the other. We’re two halves of a whole when separate we create tension, but when we’re together we create harmony, one beautifully complimenting the other.
As he softly mumbles I return my focus to him and frown as I notice the crease in his brow return. His dreams have returned to haunt and torment him. Reaching out I gently cup his cheek and instantly he calms, settling once more as his lips form words so quiet, so soft that they are barely audible. As he speaks those words I smile and lean in pressing a soft kiss to his supple lips before whispering back, “I love you too.”
It’s moments like these I treasure. Time when I can count my blessings, time when I can release a quiet thank you to the one who chose Daniel Jackson for me, for without him in my life I would now be lost.
And with him I will always be found…
There’s a tree out in
the backyard
That never has been
broken by the wind
And the reason it’s
still standing
It was strong enough
to bend
For years, we have
stayed together
As lover’s and as
friends
What we have will last
forever
If we’re strong enough
to bend
--Strong Enough to Bend
by Tanya Tucker
** The End **
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