Fic: Kiss Cam, Prompt

[lilyfarfalla.livejournal.com]

Title: Kiss Cam
Author: lilyfarfalla
Pairing: Teyla/Kanaan, maybe John/Rodney
Words: 662
Warnings: None
Prompt: First
Notes: Inspired by a lovely little incident and a comment by esteefee here.



As she later learned, Rodney and John had colluded to make it happen.

John had his football and Rodney his hockey, so when they suggested that the team plus significant others needed to experience their first basketball game, Teyla should have been suspicious. But all of the activities her friends proposed on Earth had a tinge of unreality to them, so much so that she had become accustomed to ignoring her instincts.

In her first months on Earth, the sheer number of people crowded into the arena would have terrified her, some in-born fear of crowds and Wraith feeding. Her impressions in the fifth month on Earth were mixed. One the one hand, she felt a little awe and envy at the very different lives the people on this planet led, with no fear of monsters in the skies.

On the other hand, this was, she had been told, one of the wealthiest nations on the planet. And the tickets to the game had cost, according to Rodney, an arm and a leg. (Of course, she knew he didn’t literally mean an arm and a leg, but the first time Rodney made this proclamation, she couldn’t help widening her eyes and glancing down at his leg as if to be sure. Teyla was leading Ronon 34: 27 on deliberately misunderstanding Earth metaphors, culture, etc., and she intended to keep it that way.) However, despite all of the currency supposedly flowing around her, the meal options provided were excruciatingly bad.

Nonetheless, Teyla was enjoying the sounds of the crowd, the screech of shoes against the slick floor, and the flow of the game. (The pace of basketball reminded her of hockey, which she did secretly prefer to football, due to the necessity of being truly engaged in order to follow the game. Not something she would ever tell John, but a truth she acknowledged in her heart.)

And then it was time for the “Kiss Cam.” Rodney began loudly explaining the practice when the camera first turned on the crowd and couples began kissing. Teyla starred in horror and attempted to shift slightly away from Kanaan. But, of course, her fate had already been sealed.

The giant screen suddenly showed an image of her dismayed face, Kanaan wearing a similar expression beside her.

“KISS ‘ER!” someone shouted.

The loudspeakers blared, the crowd grew wilder and more agitated, and Teyla turned to Kanaan and grabbed his head and brought it to hers. Their lips mashed together, and Teyla prayed that the crowd who favored the flavorless beer and strange drippy cheese would allow that to act as a kiss and move on. She closed her eyes, not wanting to know if it hadn’t, not wanting to see herself on the screen.

Finally, Kanaan pulled away and said, breathlessly, “It’s alright, it’s moved on.” Teyla breathed a sigh of relief and opened her eyes. She glanced over at John and Rodney, who were looking straight ahead and clearly trying not to laugh.

Oh, they would pay, she thought. She had heard them joke that “the aliens made us do it” after every off world “sleepover” and had rolled her eyes and refrained from commenting. She had convinced local leaders that, in the Lanteans culture, kissing was a form of intimate greeting, done in private and between only those promised to one another. No more! And while the “Kiss Cam” was an ingenious device, Pegasus was filled with more sources of embarrassment for two repressed Earth boys than they could ever imagine. Yes, they would pay dearly.

In the meantime though, she had a lead to maintain. “Does this give us status as legally married citizens, Rodney?” she asked. “I believe you once mentioned witnesses being important to the ceremony…?”

Rodney began a rant about marriage equality that turned John’s ears red, and Teyla nodded with seriousness and thought of temple blessings, and ceremonial greetings, and the practice of kissing between stepping through the Ancestor’s Gates.