Chapter 1: The Truth of the Matter
You try to live your life from day to day
But seeing you across the room tonight
Just gives me away
'Cause the heart won't lie
Sometimes life gets in the way
But there's one thing that won't change
I know I've tried
The heart won't lie
You can live your alibi
Who can see you're lost inside a foolish disguise
The heart won't lie
The Heart Won't Lie -Reba McEntire & Vince Gill
Sitting at her desk in the new offices of Florrick/ Agos and Associates, finally, Alicia pulls herself back to reality. She's due in court a few minutes and she doesn't have time for the drama that fills that hidden part of her mind.
The good part about life right now is that less and less she finds herself drifting to her and Will.
It's easy during the day to direct her mind to another place. During the day she's busy making decisions with Cary, little things like the color of the walls and carpets, what kind of coffee maker to buy, and whether or not they can afford to have a paperless office. When she's not acting as a managing partner she's clocking billable hours and acting as a litigator in Chicago courtrooms. She's heard rumors that Lockhart/Gardner or LG as the pompous ass Will calls it, is trying to expand to LA and New York. But Alicia doesn't have the time to care or worry about it during her days. Her evenings aren't any less hectic, but her evenings are happy. They are full of her daughter, Grace, and her Son, Zach. Zach is getting ready to head off to college and when he's home he's working on applications and essays. Grace is setting her eyes on the summer. It's hard for Alicia to think how grown her kids are and how much has changed in the past few months. She tries to make sure she has dinner with the kids every evening and when he's not in Springfield or fulfilling his duties as the Governor of Illinois, Peter joins them too. For those few moments around the table it seems like the unseen forces in the universe are finally pulling for the Florrick family but only during the day and only before the sun goes down.
When the sun goes down and the night settles around Chicago, that's when it catches up to Alicia. That's when there is nowhere left to hide. When all the hustle and bustle rests, when the house falls quiet and the voices that fill her days no longer speak, the images that Alicia spends her days fighting overwhelm her. When she closes her eyes the vivid images overtake her. The images of Will's hands sliding over her bare stomach, the almost tangible feeling of his teeth as he nibbles on that secret spot on her neck. The smiles that her and Will shared when it all reached the pinnacle. She wakes from her dreams wet between her legs and a pillow wrapped in her arms a poor substitute for the man she wishes were there. But the hardest part, the part that a vibrator or a romp in sheets with her husband can't fix is the tears. There's nothing to stop the tears. If she's lucky the wine before bed helps her stay asleep, but it doesn't change the truth, the wet pillow case and puffy eyes in the morning tell her that truth. That truth is simple. She misses that morally ambiguous, baseball loving, basketball playing lawyer. No the truth is that no matter how hard she tries. Alicia misses Will.
His days are easy too. He's a heartbroken warlord on the path to revenge. He's determined to take his firm Lockhart/Gardner or LG to the top. He's going to take Chicago first, he's going to take that pathetic excuse for a law firm Florrick/Agos and Associates and run them into the ground. When he's wiped her off the map he's going to take New York and Los Angeles by storm.
He takes a sick pleasure in planning the ruin of the woman he considered the love of his life. He feeds the little monster that lives inside of him like a gremlin, the little monster that fuels his desire to fuck with her in the courtroom. When he objects just to object to throw her off her game; to make her jumpy waiting for the inevitable objection and derail her thought process. Yes he knows how she works and his secret is she thinks she knows him.
When he leaves the courtroom and he leaves his office on the 28th floor it's a whole other ball game. That's when he needs her when his hate reaches its boiling point. And that's when he calls her, that tattooed blonde that makes him forget Alicia, for at least a few minutes. That's when he needs Isabel. But just like Alicia it doesn't matter who they're with or where they are when the night falls. It always loops back to secret lunches in his apartment, romantic moments in hotel rooms, and stolen moments in the bathrooms and elevators. But unlike Alicia he doesn't cry, no unlike Alicia he lets its fill him up and he uses it as fuel. He's going to destroy her and everything she has. His only hope is that when he's done the hole that was her smile will be gone, the sound of her laughter will leave him in the quiet moments. Will hopes when he's done that what is the truth now won't be the truth later, it won't be true that he misses the woman who betrayed him in every sense of the word, he hopes it won't be true that Will misses Alicia.
