The Law of Attraction [Chris Beck]

Chapter 33

Alice watched with curious wide eyes as Beck showed her everything in his medical room; the bio lab could be ignored in a worst case scenario, though she had already been helping out enough in there that they hardly had to cover anything. But in his medical lab, there were all sorts of things to go over. While everything was labelled, and everything that was used had to be marked down on the inventory list -although it was seemingly redundant due to the over-packing problem NASA had- there were a few tricks that Beck had up his sleeve when it came to the meds. Luckily, they had not had to use any, but there were perfect combinations that would help some things more.

"You've taken countless first aide courses, I'm sure," Beck said after he had gone over almost everything that he could teach Alice in the day. "That's basically all you'd need. Should anything go wrong and I die at some point, I put my lab in your capable hands."

"Given that I'm the only one who had been wounded so far..." she responded, neglecting that Mark had been wounded, but that didn't count because he was alone on Mars. 

"Yeah, you're screwed if I'm gone." He cracked a smile.

It was a dark joke, because there was a lot that could go wrong and Alice didn't want to imagine losing Beck. Not just as a crew member, losing another would be beyond devastating, but as a part of her life. All the other crew members were friends, like family, but Alice didn't see herself spending a whole lot of time with any of them back on Earth. It was just the way it was; they'd be busy with their own lives, too busy to frequently catch up. Like graduating high school with all the false promises of keeping in touch with friends, it never worked. Alice hoped that they'd go for drinks here and there, run into each other and pause to catch up. But it was Beck that Alice wanted in her life, she was beginning to realize just how badly she wanted to have that relationship with him.

"Did you ever think about trying to contact me after-" She paused, "after the pain I caused settled?"

Beck's smile faded slightly. "I knew why you weren't there in the morning; was I upset? Of course I was. I felt like... I felt like you were the woman I wanted in my life- I'd never felt that before. And then you were gone; I almost called you the next morning. And maybe, maybe that would have changed everything. But would we have been here if that were the case? Would we have made it through the last years of our schooling or our hectic work? Probably not."

Alice took a closer step to Beck, placing her hand on her chest. "So what changed your mind now?"

Beck's smile came back. "I figured I had a shot."

"From the start?"

He shrugged. "When I found out you were part of the crew, I wasn't entirely sure how to react. I knew it wouldn't get messy, we're not really the type of people to let that happen. So I figured I'd see where it went, and..." he put his hand on the back of his head nervously, "I feel slightly responsible for your relationships end."

"No." She shook her head. "If the idea of you scared him, he didn't trust me enough. Truth was, I was so scared of my perfect life falling apart because of the feelings I already had for you that I didn't realize my life was far from perfect. Just this... socially acceptable version of perfect. But life isn't perfect, it's messy, it's chaotic -I mean, we're going back to Mars to save Mark."

Beck was smiling at her.

"What?"

"Life is messy." He agreed. "But what a boring life it would be if it weren't."

Alice felt her heart flutter; nothing Beck had just said was entirely heart warming, but she felt such a strong connection with him. There was something radiating from within her, making her skin prickle and her hair stand on end, and a warmth in her belly grow. She knew in that very moment that she loved Chris Beck, but the time did not seem right for her to say the words. Once they were out there, that was it. She slid her hand that was upon his chest over his shoulder, using his muscular shoulder as leverage to hold herself steady as she got onto her tip-toes. Her other hand shamelessly found his bicep, gripping slightly as she brought her lips to his. His hand slid underneath her hair and gripped at her roots. There was a sudden change of atmosphere in the lab, and Beck stepped forward so that Alice had her back against the cabinets. She arched her back slightly, a soft sound coming from her lips but was cut off through the kiss.

Alice moved her hand down from his bicep to his stomach, running her fingertips along his toned body. There was a spark of retrospect to it all, and it made Alice feel as though they were the only two people in the world. She wanted Beck so badly in that moment, more than she even knew; it was as if all the emotions from their first night together finally were able to be unlocked and freed. They had been hiding in some dark corner of her mind, having been planted there but never given the light to bloom and blossom. But now they had nothing holding them back; and Alice didn't plan on stopping anytime soon. Beck wrapped his arm around her lower back, and his hand slid down to her butt. A playful sound came from her lips, and then she heard something.

"Hey Blake, it's your turn." Johanssen's voice came through the door and Alice had to take a moment to collect herself and realize what she was talking about. Before she had a chance to reply, Johanssen spoke again. "I'm not opening this door, I don't want to know what you two are doing in there."

Beck and Alice looked at each other, wide grins on their faces. Even though Lewis had expressed that she was not going to do anything to stop them, it didn't mean they could flaunt it in front of the other crew members, let it take away from their daily tasks or distract them from the seriousness of the extended mission to save Mark. And so they had to put their foolish behaviour aside for the time being. Beck released Alice, and she slid her hands off of his body with a seductive look in her eyes. She held his gaze for a moment, and then quickly replied to Johanssen. "Yeah, I'll be there in a minute."

"Good call on not opening the door!" Beck called through the door, and Alice shot him a glare. They hadn't done anything, not really, but now Johanssen would suspect they had. Though the Hermes was large, it didn't stop news from travelling fast. Alice didn't think Johanssen cared enough to go telling anyone, but it would still be on her mind here and there.

Alice opened the door and saw Johanssen. "He's lying."

"Uh huh." Johanssen raised an eyebrow. "You know, you really had me believing that you had no feelings for him back when you first told me."

"You told Johanssen?" Beck asked, surprised.

Alice laughed. "It was right after I hurt my ankle, I was upset, I needed to talk to a girl about girl things."

"What else did you talk about...?" Beck asked curiously, almost nervously.

Johanssen smirked. "Oh loads of things. I know every little detail."

"You guys are awful." Beck shook his head, laughing lightly. "I didn't tell anyone."

"That's because you had no one to tell," Alice replied.

"I could have told Mark," Beck defended.

"Mark already knew, we didn't even have to tell him. The second he saw us in the same room together, Mark knew."

"I miss him," Johanssen said suddenly.

"Me too." Alice sighed.

"We'll get him." Beck brought the mood back up.