They use their hands, mostly, digging their fingers into mounds of damp, cool sand; piling and shaping and smoothing the grains into towers and spires and curving walls that held up much better than they had the last time. Rodney tries scratching patterns into the surface with a thin, brittle branch of tide-smoothed driftwood, but it doesn't look quite right, so he and John erase it with their fingertips, Rodney ducking his head to the side to cover a sudden blush when their fingers slide together in a sandy-rough caress.
When they're done making the castle the foam of the tide is licking against the beach inches from their feet, and Rodney picks up his book and follows when John starts to walk, seemingly aimlessly, across the beach. They don't say much, either one of them; it doesn't seem like they need to.
The heat of the sun batters against their exposed skin and warms Rodney's hair until it feels like it's baking and the scent of his shampoo finds his nostrils every time he turns his head.
They don't walk far. John stops and sits on a rocky outcropping and Rodney flings himself down beside him, almost afraid that standing like a target will mean John will suddenly look at him and see that he's not the kind of person John would usually hang out with. Rodney watches John watching the seabirds, his messy, dark hair flying about in the salty breeze.
"I'm going to fly like that one day."
Rodney can picture it: John, taller and older and impossibly cool, tanned hands on the controls of a plane, guiding it to do whatever he wants.
"I don't know what I'm going to do," Rodney says, his fingers curling around the edges of his text book. For the past year he's been searching for something that makes him feel like music had. His parents have been pushing him to do this, or try that, or for gods sake make a decision about what he wants from life and do something about it, because genius means nothing without focus.
"That's cool," is all John says, his foot swinging back and forth, brushing close to Rodney's leg every so often. Rodney leans back and closes his eyes and lets his spine relax and his sandy foot swing into John's.
Re: This is your fault.
When they're done making the castle the foam of the tide is licking against the beach inches from their feet, and Rodney picks up his book and follows when John starts to walk, seemingly aimlessly, across the beach. They don't say much, either one of them; it doesn't seem like they need to.
The heat of the sun batters against their exposed skin and warms Rodney's hair until it feels like it's baking and the scent of his shampoo finds his nostrils every time he turns his head.
They don't walk far. John stops and sits on a rocky outcropping and Rodney flings himself down beside him, almost afraid that standing like a target will mean John will suddenly look at him and see that he's not the kind of person John would usually hang out with. Rodney watches John watching the seabirds, his messy, dark hair flying about in the salty breeze.
"I'm going to fly like that one day."
Rodney can picture it: John, taller and older and impossibly cool, tanned hands on the controls of a plane, guiding it to do whatever he wants.
"I don't know what I'm going to do," Rodney says, his fingers curling around the edges of his text book. For the past year he's been searching for something that makes him feel like music had. His parents have been pushing him to do this, or try that, or for gods sake make a decision about what he wants from life and do something about it, because genius means nothing without focus.
"That's cool," is all John says, his foot swinging back and forth, brushing close to Rodney's leg every so often. Rodney leans back and closes his eyes and lets his spine relax and his sandy foot swing into John's.