I was secret you, you kept me | Ryland Grace.
pairing: Ryland Grace x reader
summary: 5 times you almost revealed you and Ryland's relationship, plus 1 time you finally did.
wordcount: 4650
warning(s): Ryland punches someone who is being a creep to you (I'm sorry), alcohol? IDK
author's note: I'm really really not sure how I feel about the quality of my writing here. I just know I was excited to write this so I hope you enjoy this!
you can find this fic on my ao3 here as well. If you like this fic, go ahead and read my pinned!
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You and Ryland had made a connection ever since you both arrived on the boat to work on Project Hail Mary. You were a medical doctor researching coma treatment for the mission, but also worked in the boat’s med-bay since you had worked in the emergency room and clinics before being hand picked by Stratt for your research on induced coma’s. And of course Ryland was the charming molecular biologist, researching Astrophage, you just happened to fall for — easily.
From the start, Ryland and you both agreed to keep your newfound relationship ‘under wraps’. It made sense at the time, since your relationship had happened so fast, you had just started dating, why make it public if you weren’t sure where it would go after your time on the project?
Admittedly you were the main one who wanted to keep it secret for your own reasons. And Ryland was happy to oblige.
But as time went on, there were many instances in which you almost came close to revealing your relationship, and one time you finally did reveal it.
The first time you almost revealed your relationship, you were drunk in the bar bathroom.
You swayed on your feet a few feet in front of Ryland, in the dim lighting, music sounded softly in the background, along with cheers from your medical team — doing shots off of the science teams bodies — you smiled at Ryland’s adorable face.
You and Ryland had agreed to arrive separately to the party, so as not to cause any attention. You had gotten a few coolers to pregame before from Ilyukhina, so you were already pretty tipsy when you showed up.
You spotted Ryland at the bar with Carl, he never really socialized much at parties, more of a lab socializer. But you knew Ryland got along with Carl very well. The bartender was cleaning the top of the bar behind them.
You walked up to Dubois who was leaning against a table drinking a beer.
“Hey! You’re here at last!” Dubois cheered, raising his beer at you.
“I’ve been looking forward to it all day.”
“Yea? Med bay not treating you well?” Dubois asked over the music.
You barely registered the question. You pretended to look around, before casually locking eyes with Ryland, who was already checking you out. You looked back at Dubois who was looking at you expectantly.
“Oh, uh yea it’s kinda been a slow shift,” you sighed. Thinking of a way to get out of that conversation. “You know what I need? A drink.”
“Alright, make sure to get something strong then.” Dubois exclaimed.
You nodded, patting his back before turning toward the bar and walking over to Ryland slowly. Casually as if you didn’t expect him to be there.
“Hi Dr. Grace, how’s the research going?” You asked, just as Carl saluted you and walked away, you were attempting to hide your tipsiness.
“It’s going good, I guess,” Ryland mumbled, his eyes following to watch where Carl was headed before turning them back to you.
“I’m about to order a drink, what are you having?” You asked.
“You seem pretty tipsy already, bad day?” Ryland asked.
You expected the question to be playful, but when you finally scanned his eyes, you remembered who he was. Genuine and caring, and genuinely interested in hearing about anything you tell him. Even when you were tipsy, and even in that packed bar with everyone around.
You weren’t unfamiliar with his sweetness. Just unfamiliar with relationships.
You let out a sigh, Ryland’s presence already helping you unfold.
“Do you really wanna hear about my day right now?”
“Yea! I’ve been staring at Astrophage data for hours. Please.”
“Alright.” You said.
“Thank you. Go ahead.” He whispered.
“Well it’s been kind of boring, I mean sure the coma research is interesting I just miss treating people.”
“What do you miss about it?” He asked, his attention fully on you despite the chaos behind you.
Your heart melted at his genuine interest.
You tilted your head to the side, suppressing a smile that would reveal your admiration, and Ryland imitated you playfully, his shoulders lifting adorably.
“I just miss helping people, figuring out what exactly is wrong, things that aren’t immediately obvious. Now it’s head bumps and painkillers for headaches. On top of that, the coma resistance research team has been pretty hard on me lately.” You explained.
“I’ll be sure to be less careful in the lab then, to make your life more interesting..” Ryland teased.
You laughed.
“God no,” you said, “I don’t know what I’d do if you got hurt.” It came out playful, but hit truthfully.
Ryland must’ve seen the worry on your face at his words.
“Hey, I know I was joking.” He said, slipping his hand discreetly to tug the bottom of your shirt.
Ryland began leaning closer to you, he moved his glasses to hang below his chin.
“You’re doing great work, don’t be too hard on yourself.” He reassured.
“Thank you.” You sighed.
He shrugged like it was nothing at all.
“Also, you look really good when you’re not in scrubs.” Ryland spoke quietly. “Not that- not that you don’t look good in scrubs.” Ryland cleared his throat.
You blushed in response, biting your lip to suppress the laughter at his clarification.
“Thank you. No need for clarification I got it Ry. Not like you haven’t seen me out of scrubs before.”
“Just wanted to remind you.” Ryland stated.
You discreetly placed your hand on the bottom of his blazer. Your tipsiness pulling your guard down. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad — people knowing. But what you did know was that Ryland could leave you at any minute, you could be pulled off the project. There were so many reasons your relationship with Ryland could end. Keeping it to yourself, kept you safe.
“Nice blazer.” You whispered. “Keep the glasses on please?”
He smiled, and pulled his glasses back up to his eyes.
“I was given the blazer by my high school science teacher, he was like a mentor to me, I wanted to be exactly like him when I was a teacher.”
“I’m sure he’d think you were just as good of a teacher as he was.” You said.
He nodded proudly and you reached out to grab Ryland’s hand, feeling for the first time like you didn’t necessarily care about your guard coming down in front of him. Were you opening up? In a way you had never felt safe to do before?
Ryland blushed, pulling his hand from yours.
“People are looking.” He reminded you.
“Alright, alright.” You chuckled.
You resisted the urge to run your fingers through his hair.
Ryland blushed again, looking around the room shyly. You loved how awkward he got when he was flustered, you had so much warmth in your heart for him, he was so sweet. You knew exactly what you needed, to kiss him.
“I miss kissing your face.” You whispered, pouting. “God you’re adorable when you blush.”
“Well, why don’t you follow me into the bathroom in a minute.” He said, smirking.
“Really?”
Ryland bit his lip shyly and nodded.
“Wow. Okay I didn’t know you were so risky.”
You didn’t get to hear his response because he pushed himself off the bar and headed toward the bar bathroom. You asked the bartender for a shot of vodka to stall, swung it back with a wince, and headed toward the bathroom too.
The bathroom door swung open as you pushed the door, and you stepped into the empty bathroom. There were rows of about five stalls, and you smiled as you saw Ryland standing in front of the bathroom sink. When you stood in front of him, he automatically placed his hands on your waist, and your arms swung around his shoulders naturally. Sometimes, you couldn’t believe he had chosen you, he was so goddamn attractive, and so smart. He practically led the project. Then you remembered how awkward he was around you, and how you practically had to make the first move because he was so oblivious.
Ryland leaned forward so your noses brushed.
“I’ve been thinking about you all day.” He murmured.
You had only heard people say things like that, in that specific deep tone, in romance books. You couldn’t believe how much he seemed to care about you. Or even think of you.
You shivered and pressed your lips against his. A singular kiss, long and hard, before you pulled back and dove in to deepen the kiss, latching onto his bottom lip. You pressed him against the bathroom sink, and just as he was about to put his hand up your shirt you heard footsteps approaching the bathroom door.
You jumped, grabbing Ryland’s hand and pulling him into the bathroom stall on the end. You reached out to lock the stall, and you both looked around as you heard the bathroom door swing open. Ryland’s hands still grasped tightly onto your waist, and he leaned in again to kiss you, but you yelped away as you heard the footsteps approaching the bathroom stalls, and quickly stepped on top of the toilet seat, and kept your head low.
“What are you doing?!” Ryland half hissed half whispered.
“I don’t know!” You whispered back.
You both patiently waited for the individual — who ever they were — to finish peeing, you holding onto Ryland’s blazer for dear life, your knees shaking from crouching. And when they left the bathroom after they washed their hands, you let out a sigh of relief.
“So…any other plans tonight?” Ryland quipped.
You smacked him on the arm.
“Shut up.”
You stepped off of the toilet, using Ryland to balance yourself.
“I will admit, that was a little fun.” Ryland sheepishly mumbled.
“Yea?”
“Yea really.”
“Meet me in my room in ten then.” You said.
You sent Ryland a wink as you unlocked the stall and left the bathroom stall, then out back into the party passing the bar and past Dubois into the corridor.
The second time you almost got caught was when you woke up in Ryland’s room.
You and Ryland had not planned to spend the night. But when you had mentioned you had a headache the night before, and when you didn’t really feel like going to your room on the opposite side of the boat, you inevitably ended up sleeping over.
You woke up to the sound of your alarm, it was 5:30am, the supposed start of your shift in med-bay. Your eyes shot open and you groaned as you felt Ryland’s biceps wrap tighter around you, pulling you closer to his bare chest. You turned in his arms to look at his sleepy face.
His blonde hair was a mop of messy, and his glasses-less face was groggy. He groaned as your alarm continued to go off.
“Ry, they’re gonna wonder why I’m late.” You mumbled.
He shook his head silently, his eyes still closed from sleep. He leaned forward and kissed your mouth softly and barely, as if he was too tired to fully latch on. You sighed into the kiss, and kissed him deeper, eliciting a soft moan from his lips.
“God, you’re so perfect.” He whispered.
You whined as he began sleepily kissing up your neck. Sucking perfectly along your neck, biting gently at your jaw, before he kissed behind your ear. Your hands tugged at his hair, as you moaned softly. Your alarm was still sounding, but Ryland had you in a dangerous position.
“I want to show you off so bad.” He whined.
“Not yet.” You sighed.
It had been a month since you and Ryland had decided to keep your relationship a secret. You weren’t ashamed of Ryland, far from it. You were scared of sharing your relationship with everyone if you and Ryland were just going to be separated by the end. You were from different cities, with different professions, you just didn’t know where this was going. You were thankful that Ryland was so patient.
“I know, I’m just realizing how lucky I am that you chose me, I’d like to rub it in everyone’s faces when the time is right.” He mumbled, still half asleep.
You imagined what that would be like, realizing that if you really did want him in your future, if you really wanted pure love, then you’d have to open up a little bit more. You were working on it to say the least.
“I gotta go.”
He gave in and slumped back into his pillow. He loosened his grip on you.
You slid off of Ryland’s bed out from under the blanket, and hurried to pull your scrubs on, and grab your pager and phone, you turned off your alarm. When you turned toward the bed, Ryland’s eyes were closed. You walked toward him and pulled the blanket over him.
You grinned, and checked your pockets, making sure your pen was still in there.
“Lunch with me at 2:00pm?” You whispered, planting a kiss on his head.
Ryland just nodded.
You made sure to run your hand over your messy hair before you hurried out the door, and as you pulled the door shut, you ran into Carl walking by.
“Oh sorry.”
“All good.” Carl said, he looked at you then at Ryland’s door number. He squinted his eyes at you. “You came out of Ryland’s room?”
“Uh, yea I was just grabbing some…papers from him.” You fumbled over your words, it was 5:30am in your defense.
Carl nodded.
“At 5:30 in the morning?”
You knew what Ryland really wanted finally, was for you both to tell the truth. But you also knew Ryland would never say anything if you weren’t ready to. So you decided to keep going on the train of thought you were going.
“What can I say, work never ends.” You laughed awkwardly.
“So where are the papers?”
Damn. You forgot about the logistics of this argument. You thought for a moment.
“Oh-yeah, it turns out he didn’t have what I needed, said he left them at the lab and he’ll grab them as soon as he starts shift.”
“Huh, I guess that makes sense,” Carl mused. “Well, cheers.” Carl waves slightly, before continuing down his path past you.
That was a close one. You let out a sigh of relief and hurried back to med-bay.
The third time you almost revealed your relationship was in the lunch hall.
You and Ryland were sitting at a long table, next to Ilyukhina, and Dubois and Carl. Your lunch trays all lined up. You were sitting across from Ryland, and beside Carl. You were all eating the soup of the day.
The food on board the boat wasn’t good to say the least. But it was edible and filled you up. That was when you weren’t feeling especially motion sick that day.
You glanced down at your bowl of orange gloop, and twirled your spoon around before resuming your glance on Ryland — who was talking about who knows what.
Ryland moved his hands, spoon in one of them, deep in conversation with Carl.
“So then I ended up drawing up the data on these data analysis sheets that y/n showed me, and they fit information so perfectly right–” Ryland explained.
You were proud that you had offered him a good piece of advice. You had been using specific data analysis sheets you found on an online website for your coma resistance research, and thought they would be equally perfect for Astrophage data. You had been spending a lot of time in the lab with him, of course after hours. It was becoming easier to integrate yourself in those parts of his life. It made you begin to think maybe your relationship wasn’t so doomed.
“Did you figure out the miscalculation you were talking about?” Carl asked.
Ryland nodded absentmindedly, you watched as he scooped up soup with his spoon and fed it to himself. A little bit of it dripped onto his chin, Carl laughed at the sight.
“You’ve got–” Carl began, gesturing to Ryland’s chin.
But before he could finish, you were already leaning forward and wiping off the orange soup from Ryland’s chin with a napkin. You hadn’t even realized you were doing it until the rest of the table went quiet, you turned your head to the rest of the table and pulled back from Ryland who’s eyes were slightly wider than before.
You laughed nervously, and shrugged your shoulders, you didn’t know how to cover this one up, so you went for,
“Hey, crewmates helping crewmates, am I right?” You asked.
The whole table burst out laughing, and you and Ryland both let out a sigh of relief.
“Try not spill soup below the neck region.” Ikyukhina exclaimed, her euphemism making everyone laugh, except for you and Ryland, who were mortified.
Carl laughed before jabbing you in the side with his elbow playfully, and Ryland’s thigh grazed against yours under the table.
The fourth time was when you fell asleep in med bay.
Ryland had been ready to see you when he walked into med-bay. Your almost daily visits were the highlight of Ryland’s time on the boat. Yes he loved spending time studying Astrophage, it had felt like he had been given a research opportunity he hadn’t been given in a long time. But seeing you was also a plus.
So when Ryland walked into the empty med-bay to find you asleep at your desk, he was a little disappointed. Although he was happy to see you sleeping for the first time in three days. The coma research was finally almost done, and you had been supervising the whole project — since Stratt promoted you.
You were slumped in your chair with your head on the desk, your face to the side and your mouth open. Ryland found you so adorable like that. Even more adorable than when you fell asleep in his bed, most of the time when you didn’t mean to.
He walked closer to your desk, and when he spotted yellow post-it notes beside you, it was like a lightbulb appeared over his head. He chuckled to himself, at his nerdy little prank he was about to pull on you.
He grabbed a sharpie, and started writing a few suggestive, and flirty notes, and walked around you before gently placing the sticky notes on your back. He leaned down and kissed the back of your head before heading out of the med-bay door. Satisfied with his work.
You were woken up by a shake of your shoulder, you groaned when you opened your eyes to see Stratt standing in front of you holding two massive binders. You sat up and Stratt placed the binders on the desk, you crumpled your nose.
“No time for sleep now, okay? I need these filled out tonight.”
You sighed, rubbing your hand over your face.
“Why tonight?”
“Because we don’t have time to work slow.”
You groaned again, that was the answer she gave for almost everything.
You opened the first binder to the first page as Stratt walked around you to grab something from one of the stations. Suddenly you felt her touch your back, you gasped as you jumped, before realizing she had pulled something off of your shirt.
You turned around and saw her holding two sticky notes in her hands. Those were on your back?
“‘Came to see you, saw you were sleeping, come back to mine and I’ll help you relax’ winky face.” Stratt said, reading the sticky note.
Your eyebrows furrowed in sleepy confusion, and you yanked the sticky note from her hand, instantly recognizing Ryland’s hand writing. A blush rushed to your face.
“‘I think I might be Astrophage, cuz I’d eat your star anyday’–”
You grabbed the last one from her hand.
“I don’t even—what are these—I—no need to even continue—” You fumbled.
Stratt did not even laugh, just looked at you seriously.
“I did not know you were ‘seeing someone’ as they say.”
“I’m not. I’m not!”
“Funny. I saw Ryland come in here a few minutes ago.” Stratt pondered.
“He was borrowing some—” You started.
“Not important. Less talk, more work, thank you.” Stratt said, as she headed out the door.
You slumped your head in your hands, swearing you were going to get Ryland back.
The fifth was when a newly recruited scientist was flirting with you in front of Ryland.
You had been feeling much more confident about you and Ryland’s relationship. You had begun the next couple steps into completing the project and there were only a few months until launch day.
You and Ryland had talked privately about what you were going to do. You felt vulnerable enough to explain to him how much you cared about him and didn’t want to have to let him go. So you both decided to make plans to visit each other frequently outside of the project. You weren’t entirely sure how much you expected, or whether you were less afraid or less unsure than you were before. But again, you were working on it.
The next step was introducing the technology to scientists who were added to the crew for additional supervision during launch, just to make sure everything went as smoothly as possible.
So there you stood beside one of the new scientists in the lab — Dr. Cox. He was very clearly attempting to flirt with you, and at first it was enough to just shrug off. This astonished you, as you couldn’t believe this guy was more interested in flirting with you then paying attention to this planet saving information.
Stratt stood on the sidelines chatting with the astronauts, and Ryland was preparing the Astrophage for the final test of the tour of the lab — melting the cubic ton of metal. Ryland was preparing the Astrophage with Carl on one end of the spindrive.
“So what is your specific involvement in this project?” Dr. Cox asked, folding his arms over his chest.
Your mouth formed into an unimpressed line, maybe now he’d finally catch a hint.
“Oh, I worked on the coma resistance gene research to select our very inspiring astronauts, and I worked to perfect the coma inducing drugs, also I helped make sure the ship was fully stocked with medical supplies before it launches.” You declared proudly. “I don’t know how I even had time to socialize on board.” You laughed, at your own thoughts, not Dr. Cox’s.
Dr. Cox nodded, his eyes drifting up and down your body, you didn’t like the way he was looking at you.
“Oh nice. That all means you're single right?” He asked.
His directness surprised you, but you saw no regret in his face at asking.
“Uh, no it means that I’m the most qualified in this field.”
Dr. Cox nodded, like he didn’t even hear a word you said.
You shifted slightly as you stood next to him, looking at Ryland, who very clearly was overhearing this conversation. His back was turned to you as he started to load the Astrophage inside of the spindrive. But his back was tense enough for you to understand what he was feeling and that he had heard every second of the interaction.
Dr. Cox shrugged his shoulders and said,
“I’m surprised a doctor like you has a body like that, I’d be all over you myself.”
He must’ve spoken just loud enough for everyone to hear, because just as his words finished, Stratt turned around at the same time as Ryland did. Both with strong expressions of shock on their faces.
Ryland turned to Carl, whose face was in an angry expression directed entirely at Dr. Cox. Ryland handed Carl the vial of Astrophage and his glasses.
“Sorry, can you hold these?” He asked.
Carl nodded without a word, taking the vial and glasses in his hands.
Ryland smiled politely as he walked across the floor away from the spindrive and toward you and Dr. Cox.
Dr. Cox held out his hand expectantly, and Ryland took off his gloves slowly. Once they were off, he lifted his right fist and punched Dr. Cox square in the jaw. Your hands went to your mouth in shock.
Dr. Cox dropped to the ground, and you held back a laugh, and simultaneously a scream, as you stepped away from him.
Ryland sent you a fiery look, and you were overcome with this feeling of safety for the first time in a long time.
Ilyukhina gasped, realization spreading across her face.
“You and Ryland are–”
Before Ilyukhina could finish her sentence Stratt chimed in.
“What exactly were you thinking when you did that?” Stratt asked, pretending to be annoyed, sending you a wink.
You were thankful Ilyukhina’s thoughts were interrupted.
Ryland straightened his back.
“I was thinking that I felt very strongly about our sexual harassment policies.” Ryland grumbled, the sexiest you’ve ever heard a statement like that be said. You didn’t even know that was possible.
It was like his protectiveness over you had finally convinced you that you were allowed to be less afraid. Less afraid of being hurt, less afraid of losing him.
“Let’s start the demonstration!” Ryland exclaimed, like nothing had happened at all.
+1. When you finally revealed you and Ryland were together, it was an accident.
You and Ryland had been walking toward a conference room, where Stratt had asked to meet with Ryland. You walked side by side, your hands subtly brushing each other, but not intertwined, you finally reached the door. You were there to deliver the final pages of your coma resistance research to her.
You opened the door following Ryland inside, Stratt was sitting at a long table, staring out into the ocean as the boat moved. She smiled a little when she saw you both enter, Carl stood on the far end of the room.
“Hey guys, let's try to make this quick.” Ryland groaned.
Carl laughed in response, you rolled your eyes carrying your papers to the table.
“The meeting will be as long as is efficient, Dr. Grace.” Stratt said pointedly.
You had to admit, sometimes you liked how effectively she carried her authority.
“So this is the research summary, I think it needs some tweaking in the graph areas, since I didn’t update them since we last talked, but I will today.” You explained, placing the stack in front of her.
She nodded.
“Very good. Will you be joining Dr. Grace and I for the meeting?” She asked.
You shook your head.
“Just dropping him off.” You said with a grin, patting Ryland on the shoulder as he sat down.
Ryland grinned back up at you shyly.
“Alright, I’ll let you all get to it.” You said.
And the next thing you did surprised Ryland, and yourself. You leaned down and kissed his mouth absentmindedly, before pulling back. Ryland blushed and you wondered why he was so flustered, it was just a kiss? Until you realized that that was the very first time you had kissed him publicly.
After your initial shock, you realized how right it felt. How stupid it was that you were keeping this a secret. You cleared your throat awkwardly and were about to speak when Stratt let out a sigh.
“Thank god, now we can stop pretending we did not know.” She grumbled. “American idiots.”
You and Ryland gasped.
“You knew?” Ryland inquired.
“Man, we all knew.” Carl chimed in.
You groaned in embarrassment, and when Ryland’s hand found yours for the first time publicly, you felt sure that you were less afraid, that you knew who he was — the person who would protect you from anything, and love you as much as you loved him.
