Chapter Text
“I’d be smart to walk away, but you’re quicksand.”
1991, Montana
The first time she meets Dr. Alan Grant, Ellie realizes that he isn’t anything like she’d imagined. He’s practically a legend in the field of paleontology, so of course she’d heard of him. When she’d gotten the news that she’d landed the job at the Montana dig site and that they’d be working alongside one another, she’d been both thrilled and a little apprehensive. Most of the men in their field, especially those with a stellar academic reputation like Dr. Grant’s, tend to let the attention get to their heads. They happily take the credit, slapping their names on a final thesis, but let their students do their research and most of the digging. It’s one of the things Ellie hates most about the world of academia.
And yet, as soon as she’d laid eyes on Dr. Grant, she knew she’d been wrong to assume the same of him.
He’s down in the trenches, hunched over, on his hands and knees, covered in dust from head to toe, presumably from hours of digging. Evidently, he wasn’t one to sit back and let others work in his stead.
“Dr. Grant!” Brian, the assistant who met her when she arrived on site, calls out to catch his attention. “We’ve got reinforcements.”
Grant turns his head at the call of his name, his hat hiding most of his face, but Ellie thinks she sees the hint of a smile when he turns towards them. He climbs up the ladder to meet them on ground level.
“Dr. Grant, this is-“
“Dr. Ellie Sattler,” Ellie interrupts, she hates when people introduce her.
“Glad to have you on board, Dr. Sattler,” Grant says, offering up his hand. Ellie takes it, appreciating the firmness of his handshake. “Apologies for the informal greeting,” he says, plucking at his dirty clothes.
Ellie shakes her head, smiling despite herself. “No apology needed, it’s surprisingly better than I expected,” she admits, and the corner of his lips quirk up in a grin, pleased. She does her best not to notice how handsome he is, even when covered in dirt. It’s entirely irrelevant and unprofessional. Not to mention, she wouldn’t want him to be focused on her appearance, so she banishes the thought to the back of her mind.
Dr. Grant leads her over to the main tent. “I was impressed with your work on serial sectioning to recover morphological details from petrifications ,” he tells her. “We’ve actually made a recent find I’d appreciate your take on.”
Ellie nearly stops dead in her tracks, genuinely surprised that he’s read her work, let alone that he remembered and was impressed by it. She’s just finished her postdoc at 28 and she’s itching to be part of something bigger. She wants to make a real difference, to work in the field and get her hands in the dirt. She loves writing and research but she wants something more tangible right now, after years of listening to lectures and reading books for theory.
The fact that he appears to be even remotely interested in her professional opinion eases her nerves considerably and reassures her that accepting the position was the right call, that this is her shot to make a name for herself. “I’d be more than happy to look at it,” she tells him honestly and promptly ignores the fact that his pleased smile sends a wave of heat through her stomach.
It doesn’t take her very long to settle into life on the dig and in the span of two weeks, she and Dr. Alan Grant quickly become collaborative colleagues and – dare she say - friends. He’s an introvert and he hides in his work, but she’s pleased to find that he’s included her as an integral part of their team from the moment she’d arrived. He doesn’t seem to have any other close friends and most of their team say he prefers working alone, but Ellie has apparently managed to bulldoze past his defenses.
Above all else, it’s clear that he values Ellie’s opinion and respects her: as a woman, as an academic, and as an equal. He enjoys challenging her and she rises to the occasion every time, answering his questions at every turn and pushing right back.
They work well together, seek out each other’s thoughts and validation, and it isn’t rare that they finish each other’s sentences when they both get fired up about something they are equally passionate about. Ellie has never felt this kind of intellectual connection so quickly with anyone else. It’s a bit alarming how quickly and deeply she’s come to care for him. How the thought of working anywhere or with anyone else now sounds preposterous. Maybe it’s a result of working in such proximity every day, or perhaps it’s something else entirely. Either way, she does her best not to question it too much. She just wants to continue enjoying working with him. The last thing she needs is to have things get complicated. This job and their work are too important.
Certain times are harder than others though. Ignoring the pull he has on her: it feels like trying to resist a gravitational force or uprooting her feet from quicksand. Like two nights ago, when they shared a pot of coffee well into the early hours of the morning, discussing his theory that sauropodomorphs must have lived in herds. Their conversation had started as academic, and around half past midnight they took a more personal turn.
“I’m telling you, Sattler,” he says. “The evidence that they move in herds is so overwhelmingly convincing, I’d bet our next year of funding on it.”
“Hey, I’m not arguing with you,” she counters, bringing her coffee cup to her lips. “I’m simply saying it’s the kind of theory that can’t be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt. Something we’ll probably never know for certain.”
“Aren’t I supposed to be the cynical one here?” he gives her a side eye and Ellie grins.
“We can’t very well both be undoubting believers. One of us has to ground the other back to reality.”
“I’ll be quoting those words back to you the next time this situation is reversed,” he warns her and she throws the nearest dirty rag in his face.
Grant laughs, and Ellie finds herself smiling back at him. “What about you? You travel in herds Dr. Grant?” She asks, curious to know a bit more about his life outside the dig.
He exhales loudly, shaking his head. “Not particularly. Not if I don’t have to,” he clarifies. Ellie looks at him, lifting a brow in question, hoping he’ll continue. He looks into his coffee cup and then back at her. “I don’t particularly mix well with others. I usually prefer to work alone, others usually slow me down.”
This time, both her brows shoot up, and she gives him an incredulous look. “Present company excluded,” he amends, his lips curling into a soft smile. Her insides twist, a pleasant warmth spreading through her limbs at his words.
“What about family?” she pushes.
“I lost my father when I was in my twenties and my mother three years ago. No siblings. Gotta few aunts and uncles still around, but… small talk isn’t my forte, and we haven’t kept in touch.”
“I’m sorry to hear about your parents,” she tells him, her hand reaching towards him with the intent to comfort before she can think better of it. She squeezes his forearm, his skin warming her fingers before she brings them back to her side. It doesn’t escape her notice that he hadn’t pulled away from her touch, but she dismisses the thought before it can properly take form.
“And you?” He turns the question to her. “I’d also bet next year’s funding that you tend to travel in herds.”
She grins, her cheeks flushing slightly. “You wouldn’t be wrong.”
“Let me guess, big family? I’d wager you have a huge crowd of friends and too many invitations to outings you can’t keep up with.”
“You have a gambling problem I should know about, Dr. Grant?” she teases, hating that he’s right.
“It’s only a problem if I’m wrong, which I rarely am.”
She rolls her eyes, but she’s grinning. “I’ll have you know, smugness isn’t an attractive quality.”
“Wasn’t going for attractive,” he shrugs and Ellie laughs.
“You’re right, I am fortunate to have a large entourage. Sometimes it gets to be a bit much, though. I’m enjoying this time on the dig, with just a small team and far enough away that it’s a convenient excuse to turn down most of the invitations I have no interest in attending anyway.”
“Well, we’re glad to have you here,” he tells her, in an uncharacteristic show of honesty and Ellie thinks she sees a small splash of color in his neck. He takes a large sip of coffee, hiding behind the cup and it might be one of the most endearing things she’s ever seen. A bashfull Alan Grant. Who would have thought? She wants to see more of him like this. And that too, she realizes, is a bit of a dangerous thought.
“The whole team has certainly taken a liking to you,” he tries to recover, and in a flash of reckless courage – probably caffeine induced – she dares to push further than she probably should.
“The team, or just you?”
Alan chokes on his coffee and Ellie bursts out laughing. “I happen to be part of the team,” he concedes, still coughing and trying to clear the liquid in the back of his throat.
“Well, I’m happy to be here, I just so happen to like the whole team too,” she admits, and although it isn’t a lie – she really does like the rest of the team – they both know they aren’t really talking about their colleagues.
He walks her back to her trailer, as any gentleman would. They walk in silence, and though it isn’t awkward, it feels loaded with tension. She can’t help thinking that this feels oddly like a date. How, if he weren’t her colleague, her mentor, and if they’d met under different circumstances, she’d most probably let him kiss her goodnight. She’d want him to.
It’s why she puts space between them immediately when they arrive at her door, giving neither of them the chance to succumb to the temptation.
“Good night, Dr. Grant,” she tells him. “Thanks for the coffee and conversation.”
“Goodnight, Dr. Sattler.” He gives her one of those soft smiles, the one she’s rarely seen him give anyone else and makes her insides melt like butter, before he walks back towards his own trailer. He doesn’t push, doesn’t put her in a position where she’s forced to choose. That too, makes her want him just a little bit more.
It’s a thin and precarious line they’re walking, Ellie knows… but the truth of it is, she kind of likes it.