Chapter Text
The call comes unexpectedly. As those calls are known to do.
The One-Four-One are sitting outside having dinner together in a rare moment of peace. It’s a lovely mid-September day with a bit of a breeze, and the sun is setting, turning the sky a picturesque pink and orange. Soap is stealing a strawberry from Kyle’s plate when his phone vibrates three times in quick succession, jingling out his older sister’s ringtone.
His heart stops. They don’t contact him first. They wait for him to message or phone because the last thing he needs is an enemy getting hold of his family’s names.
He doesn’t want to answer it. There is nothing good waiting for him on the other end. He knows that, and the three pairs of eyes staring at him in concern know that too. All it would take to live in ignorant bliss would be to just—not pick up. Save it for another day. A rainy, gloomy day that's nowhere near as beautiful as this one.
But he can’t do that.
Ghost lays a comforting hand on his knee, like he already knows Soap’s world is moments away from shattering.
“Heather?” he answers softly, dreading what’s coming. In the back of his mind he knows exactly what she’s about to say. He’s not ready to hear it. He’ll never be fucking ready.
“John.” She sounds so relieved. His stomach twists. “Are ye busy?”
Yes.
“Nah. What’s wrong?”
A moment of silence in which the entire world seems to stop. Even the wind pauses in anticipation.
“Granny’s gone. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” She tries to cover her cries with badly timed coughs.
It shouldn’t knock the breath out of him because he expected it. It’s exactly what he imagined. They’ve all known this was coming with her health deteriorating and her getting up there in age. It’s shouldn’t come as a fucking surprise.
It does.
“What,” he croaks.
“We need you here. I’m sorry, John. I know your job and you cannae just—but we—the funeral, the farm, the babies, it’s—please come home, please. I just need help. I need my brother.”
It’s telling, isn't it? That his sister has to beg him to come home for this. How much he’s missed. How long he’s been away.
“Aye, calm down. ‘S alright.”
Speaking of calming down, he drops his free hand atop the one Simon’s got on his knee. Squeezes. Simon seems to get the message, turning his palm over to lace their fingers together. Soap digs his blunt nails into his skin hard enough that it’s got to be painful—he just needs something to hold on to—something to keep him tethered, and Ghost is always there beside him.
“A fuckin’ stroke, can ye believe?” She hiccups. “Laid there on the floor God only knows how long before William went over and found her. Christ, she’d done gone cold.”
Oh. So, she died alone and probably scared, then. He knew he should've got her one of those alarm necklaces for old people. He fucking knew something like this would happen one day—though he isn’t sure that would've worked in the case of a stroke. She wouldn't have had time or thought to press a button for help, would she? They'll never know. He thinks he might be sick.
“I—How’s Beck? The girls?”
This is a pure tactical maneuver. Talk about something else so he doesn’t have to think about the Other Thing.
“The girls are alright, John. Only weans—they don’t understand it. I was actually gonna ask ye to pick Beck up on your way through Glasgow. Don’t want ‘em traveling alone in this state, and they’d be so happy to spend some time with ye before we have to deal with all this shite.”
Despite it all, a brittle smile pulls at his lips. “Course I’ll deliver 'em. Miss that rocket. Miss you too, Heather. And the wee rascals.”
He doesn't know how long it's been since he actually told her that.
She sniffles, and they say their goodbyes with promises to see each other soon. Much like how their calls always end, only the see you soon line is actually true this time.
Price and Gaz are looking everywhere but at him, trying to seem inconspicuous about eavesdropping. Ghost, on the other hand, stares straight at him.
“Johnny?”
“My granny’s dead. Captain, I need to take leave,” he says in his most level, most professional voice. He will not crumble here.
“Fuck, man. You were pretty close, weren't you?” Gaz asks.
“Mm,” he swallows. Doesn’t elaborate any further. He’s feeling a bit sweaty, a bit nauseous.
“Jesus. I’m sorry, lad. We’ll go down to the office and get the paperwork and I’ll get everything sorted. It’s already approved as far as I’m concerned.”
Ghost doesn’t let go of his hand until he gets up to follow Price.
He spends the next hours in a daze, far away from his own body. On autopilot. Showering, trimming his beard, filing paperwork for a full month’s leave.
He’s not ready to be be gone for that long, but it’s not right to put the burden of all this on his sisters. It’s not even the full time he has saved up—he’s got another whole month that rolled over from last year, but he doesn't think he'll need that long. A month to get everything sorted with a funeral and property and grief, and he’ll be good to go.
Along with a full sadness, there’s a creeping anxiety forming about leaving his team. Which is pitiful. Being away from his family for years at a time is fine, but leaving his coworkers for four weeks is what stirs up ? He ought to be ashamed. He is ashamed.
“Better be comin’ round, ye cunt, or I’ll walk right into that base and kick yer arse,” comes a loud and energetic voice from the speaker, far from Heather’s tired tone. Beck. His heart floods with warmth for his little sister. What a way to answer a bloody phone call.
If anyone ever thought Soap was brash, they’ve never met Beck MacTavish.
“Aye, gettin’ a car in Glasgow tomorrow and draggin’ ye up there with me. What’s your coordin—er, address? So I can write it down.”
“Jesus, are ye a hundred years old? Just let me message it.”
“Cannae do that with addresses. Too—”
“Dangerous,” Beck finishes. It’s not the first time they’ve heard that one.
It’s sad. Beck has lived on their own in Glasgow for nearly three years now and he’s never even been to see their flat. Something about being five years their senior and joining the military straight out of school. That certificate had barely grazed his hands before he was gone.
He and Beck were the same in that way; eager to chase something more than what a picturesque tourist town could ever offer.
Whereas Soap ended up in the military right out of school, Beck ended up in and out of jail right out of school—petty shite like stealing and vandalism and, in one instance, fancying becoming a dealer. He reckons Beck was just taking a page out of dear old Mum’s book for that one. They were just trying to figure themself out. And they did, eventually. With very little help from him.
He only blinked and years passed.
Between the two of them, they’d nearly put Granny in an early grave. He cringes at the thought that lands somewhere between too soon and way too fucking soon.
He’ll never forgive himself for not being there. Even if Heather never really left, was only down the street from the farm—Beck was always closer to him. Queer solidarity and all that, probably.
Well. He’ll be there tomorrow, making amends under the worst of circumstances. So it fucking goes.
After round two of miles-away goodbyes in a single day, he books the train ticket for 0500. In seven hours, he’ll be on his way…home. The word feels wrong. Maybe it was home once, but nowadays the word doesn’t really apply to him. That two storey farmhouse outside town hasn’t been his home in years. He’s pretty sure not even the SAS base in Hereford qualifies as a home.
In seven hours, he’ll be on his way to the place where he spent most of his childhood—the farm where Granny and Grandad raised the MacTavish siblings like their very own, after their daughter, his mum, went and got herself killed over fucking drug money.
She was troubled in a way you or me or no one else can ever understand, his granny always said with a solemn, faraway look in her eyes. He never cared to understand it.
A young Heather had been the one to find the body. There'd been a break in, but the children were left alone. It was only his mother meant to pay the price, and that she did. He vividly remembers Heather shielding the scene from his wee eyes, a baby Beck scream-crying from another room. It’s one of his earliest memories. How fucking sweet.
The last time he was at the farm was for the Christmas before last. Almost two years ago. Before he’d left, Granny had pulled him down by the ear to kiss his cheek and whisper words he’ll never forget:
I’m so proud of you, m’eudail. Gu sìorraidh is gu bràth.
As far as goodbyes go, it was a good one. He just hadn’t realised it would be the last.
Tears streak down his cheeks before he even notices his eyes are wet. This is it. This is the moment where it hits. After a day full of information and planning and thinking—this is the part where all of it sinks into the deepest depths of his bones, brain, and heart.
His granny is dead. His genius, beast of a woman, accepting, grandmother. He’s never going to hear the lenition of those Gaelic consonants reproduced quite the way she was able to. He's never going to hear her nagging about how he doesn't use enough of what she fought so hard to teach them. He’s never going to eat her tattie scones for breakfast, never going to feel her small but so fucking strong frame hugging him for all he’s worth, never going to hear another story about what her wild students did that day. Never going to give her the biggest eye-roll, as she headed out in her leather trousers. Ageing gracefully as ever. Never going to buy her that replacement ring his mum pawned off before he was ever born.
Granny wasn’t a material person by any means but the way she always talked about that bleeding gold ring with the ruby stone Grandad had saved and saved for…
It was all the more sour after Grandad died when Soap was a child. He barely remembers the funeral but he will always remember overhearing Granny tell Heather the story of the pretty ring and the daughter desperate for money. He’d promised himself he’d buy her one just like it because she’d given them so much when she didn’t have to.
He never did. He never will.
There’s so much that’s just gone in an instant.
His chest hurts and he can’t fucking sit still. He just needs to walk, run, sprint, anything to get out of his head.
Naturally, his feet take him straight to his lieutenant’s door. It’s almost laughable how predictable he’s become. Happy? He’s got to tell Ghost about it immediately. Nervous? Needs reassurance from Ghost. Spitting mad? He’s on his way to the sparring mat to take it out on Ghost, because Ghost gives just as good as he gets and nobody else will commit like him. Depressed as hell? Well, Ghost makes him feel alive like nothing else, not even a good drum solo or C4 could compare, so being around him is the only real option.
Feeling everything all at once? Ghost.
It’s when he’s finally settled in Simon’s room, soft blanket thrown around his shoulders, water in hand and ridiculously gentle fingers tracing idle shapes on his back, that he realises why he always seeks this man out. It’s because he takes care of him. By simply being a presence at his side, Simon takes such good fucking care. No matter what.
And maybe that’s why the stupid question wants to slip out in his half-asleep, half-crazed state:
Come with me? I need you.
He doesn’t know how to ask. It’s not a normal request. Hey, Ghost, I know ye have work to do here but the closest thing I ever had to a mother just kicked the bucket and I’m to go home to siblings I haven’t seen in almost two years, and then plan a funeral around extended family I haven’t seen in even longer. Not really sure how to operate in civilian spaces anymore, especially without you there to keep me grounded, so wanna come with? Jesus fucking Christ. Sergeants don’t bring their lieutenants home to meet the family and play house, but they’ve never been just Sergeant MacTavish and Lieutenant Riley to each other, have they? Not since Las Almas.
On the field, Ghost is his lieutenant and a soldier he’d die for without question, knowing the other would do exactly the same. Off the field, Simon Riley is the best mate he’s ever had and the only person he could ever imagine sharing the rest of his life with. His great big bloody unrequited love story.
It’s been a real fucking predicament.
It’s going on three years since Las Almas. Two since the threat of Makarov was put to rest. Three years is a lifetime in this line of work. Long enough to learn all the little intricacies about Simon Ghost Riley that the rest of the world could only wish to know: his favorite tea (Yorkshire Red with a splash of milk and sugar,) his middle name (Rhys,) how exactly he got those scars around his mouth (something Soap would rather not think about.) After a lifetime, when is the right time to love him?
“Any better, Johnny?”
He is a wee better. Feeling less like a trapped mutt and more like a human again, thanks to the one and only Simon Riley.
It’s all over for his pride when they lock eyes.
“Still have all that leave time saved up?”