Slashthedrabble Challenge 446 - Buried

[m_findlow]

Title: Buried
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Jack
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 500 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 446 - Emotion(al) at slashthedrabble
Summary: Jack kept his emotions buried, now they threaten to bury him.

Jack stood there, angrily pushing away the tear that had somehow slipped down his cheek. He was so sick of tears lately. The cold wind only reminded him that they were still falling, turning them to tracks of ice on his face.

He'd made up his mind days ago, but for some reason he was still here, standing on the rooftop, looking down over the city's twinkling lights, its citizens tucked up safe inside their homes, probably having already forgotten the events of six months ago. Perhaps a few might still hug their kids close to them before putting them to bed at night, but otherwise life continued on just as it always had.

Not for Jack though. Life had ended that day. Not just ended, it had been crushed, and he only had himself to blame. Perhaps if he'd done things differently...

He'd always prided himself on his ability to stay calm and unemotional in the face of chaos, but somewhere along the way, he'd lost part of himself. The part that remembered just how fleeting and precious life was, the part that should have been more open and honest.

He didn't keep secrets quite so much as in the old days, but nor did he let his emotions get tangled up in the bigger picture of protecting people. What he wouldn't give to take that back now. Had he ever really shown anyone he cared about just how he felt about them? Had he tried a bit harder, might his daughter have seen past the immortality that he couldn't fix, and understood that he cared for her and his grandson. They were flesh and blood. The only family he had. He should have spent more time with them, and shown them that they meant something to him. He'd always turned up, portrayed the lie that kept him on amicable terms, then left, comforted he'd done his duty.

But it didn't hurt nearly as much as the other family he'd lost that day. Ianto wasn't blood but he'd given Jack purpose and meaning in life. He saw past all of the masks, and even thought he'd often held his own masks in place, he'd never left Jack wondering how he felt about him. Right until the bitter end, he'd given all of himself to Jack, and even then, Jack couldn't find it in himself to give back. He'd bitten down on all of the feelings that threatened to consume him whole, holding on to false hope that his lover might survive.

But Ianto was gone now. His family was gone, and there was no longer any reason left to stay. There was no place left for the shell that was Jack, as if he too had died that day. Only his ghost was lingering now, just long enough to say goodbye to Gwen. Even now, he didn't think he could tell her what it meant to be leaving and never coming back. Emotions were better left to the living.