mangacat201 | Turning Tides, 1/1

Title: Turning Tides

Author: Mangacat(201)
Pairing/Characters: Gemma/Clay
Rating: PG
Word Count: ~500

Disclaimer: Sadly, I’m not a shareholder of Samcro and I do not earn any money for this work of fanfiction.

Warnings/Spoilers: general spoilers for the series. Written for the hc_bingo prompt: chronic illness.

Summary: No one handles Clay like Gemma does.

Gemma feels the shock deep in her bones and loath as anyone would be to admit, she’s really getting too old for this. Back in the glory days when nothing could stop them from getting onto the bike and just cooling off with the wind tugging at their clothes and hair there was no thought of ever getting to this point. The point where they have to think about restrictions to their freedom that are not imposed by the law or society or the honour of the club – which is threadbare at best but still more tangible than most values people cherish nowadays.

Well, nothing really has changed about that and yet everything has. The past few years have been a struggle for the club, not only because their very existence has been threatened time and again by the outside world, but also because the new generation’s grown up and they’ve grown old without even noticing that time went by. This is the first thing that always comes to her mind nowadays when she puts away Clay’s cut and strokes over the careworn stitches of ‘First 9’, thinking about how few of them are still alive and how lucky she is that her husband is one of them. The thought is not without regret or irony though.

Gemma sits down at her own table in her own house – relaxed and unafraid for the first time in a long while – and takes her husbands hands with a gentleness none of them would ever admit to liking outright. He’s telling the truth when he says that no one can take care of the treatment for the aching joints better than her it’s never the How that’s important there, but the Why. While she carefully places the needles right to alleviate the pain from that wretched illness that’s crept into his bones where it really has no business, she thinks about how their life used to be so much about holding on – their club, their kids, the power, each other…

Now she realizes how much it has become about letting go. Their way of life is not a nice and democratic, if anything, their name and trade should be enough to clue people in, but even people with no acceptance for the rule of the outside world make rules among themselves and are anxious of change. Still living with her father and then letting him go like that is one of the hardest things she’s done all year, but it taught her that no matter what you want, change is unstoppable.

When Gemma finishes up and withdraws the needle carefully, Clay catches her eye and suddenly she realizes that similar thoughts have been occupying him all along, even though he would have prefered to never face the issue for real. As the pain slowly fades from his features, she realizes that change might be inevitable, but it’s also not as fast as one might perceive from time to time. She’s inclined to let that thought be her comfort, as she lightly grasps the big paws of her Old Man and pretend just for a moment that they’re right back at the beginning with their lives sprawling in front of them and nothing between them and the open road.

Turning Tides, 1/1

no subject

no subject

no subject