Disclaimer: Not mine, no pay.

Thanks: To Jacqui, for friendship, great beta and encouragement, to Josh the Paramedic for medical info and to Rion, my own personal BDH. You guys are the greatest.

Rating: NC-15 this section, for adult references. A bit of angst, violence later on.

Remarks: I continue to explore the challenges faced by Jayne and Kaylee as they struggle to define their relationship. Set following my most recent story “The Birthday Gift”, after “Objects in Space”. Inara has departed from Serenity and things on board ship are getting more difficult.

Feedback: Better'n a hot fudge sundae. Lord knows I'm not doing this for money. Note the "No Pay" sign above. Catch the back-story by clicking on my name above.

Leaps of Faith

Chapter Three

Kaylee’s in her bunk, tossing and turning, unable to fall asleep. Ever since Early’s invasion of Serenity, she’s had nightmares, can’t seem to recapture the sense of safety she felt before within the ship.

Serenity’s artificial day and night cycles often don’t mesh with her own waking and sleeping, so she’s learned to read, do quiet maintenance, wander down to the galley to see if Jayne’s up late, even sneak down into his bunk from time to time.

The pleasure and release from his lovin’ has been good an’ he’s shown her more’n a trick or two. Sometimes she just wants the comfort of curling up next to his big, warm body, the sense of safety he gives her. She hungers for the strength of him, how he shelters her from the fears, the bad dreams, shelters her from the loneliness of the Black.

She thought that once she’d ended her pursuit of Simon, told him she’d made her choice, that she’d feel easier. One less complication in an already complex relationship.

The doctor took her declaration quietly. He’s distant now, more formal with her, polite but purely business-like. If he hurts, he doesn’t let it show, just focuses even more on his work, on River. She misses the playful friendship they previously shared but her declaration has made that impossible. How can she blame him?

She feared he’d tell Mal about her an’ Jayne, just outta spite, but there’s no indication he’s done so. She’s grateful for that kindness, at least.

Kaylee thinks about Jayne, recalls the day Mal hired him and how he declared them both off limits to one another. She wonders if the Captain realizes they’ve ignored him, wonders who else on Serenity knows.

She and the big merc have been lovers for almost three months now, and he’s still a cipher to her. How can it be, she thinks, that two people can share each other’s bodies, and still know so little about each other’s pasts, each other’s hearts?

Jayne’s not an easy one to talk to. He jokes around with her, talks trash, whispers in her ear as he moves within her, yet she realizes just how little she really does know about him, about his past, about where their relationship is headed.

With Inara gone, she’s had no one to turn to for guidance, no wise female confidante. The Companion never really did fully explain her decision to leave Serenity, but Kaylee knows it was because of Mal, his inability to allow himself to be loved, to love. She can only turn for comfort to the ship that carries them all through the Black.

She lays her hand against the bulkhead, the subtle hum and throb of Serenity like the beat of her own heart. “Where’s this all goin’, girl?” She asks.

+++

River whimpers in her sleep, surges upright, eyes wide but blank as she cries out, flings her arms up to push away whatever haunts her dreams.

Simon rushes to her bed. He knows her nightmares often disturb the others and calms her as quickly as he can. “Shhh, mei-mei. It’s just a dream. I’m here now. You’re safe now.” This is the litany he says over and over, as if by saying it, he makes it so.

Some nights he must resort to sedation, but this night he is fortunate, and she curls up small and vulnerable in his arms and soon her breathing is even, innocent.

He’s afraid that if he gets up to return to his own bed, she’ll awaken, so he carefully wiggles them into a slightly more comfortable position and pulls River’s bedspread around the two of them.

In the months of his residency, and then as a trauma surgeon, he was often abruptly awakened. He quickly learned how to snag the sleep his body craved whenever and wherever possible.

That gift now eludes him. He listens to his sister’s sonorous breathing and thinks about Kaylee. He is still as bewildered as he has been for the past several weeks. He tries to tell himself that it’s better this way, that he needs to concentrate on River, that Kaylee’s expectations were overwhelming, his own response inept.

Round and round in his mind he turns it, as if reviewing the whole debacle from the right perspective will allow him to let it go, make some peace with Kaylee’s choice. But every way he turns it, the dead end is the same: Jayne Cobb. Crude, untrustworthy, explosive, self-serving, impulsive Jayne.

Kaylee has chosen this thug over him. He is no closer to comprehending the why of her choice than he was the day she informed him. And having acknowledged that, he is also no closer to sleep.

(To be continued...)