When the Storm Breaks
By Hazelmist
Summary: She probably hates him, and maybe she should. He reaches for her anyway. Slight Alec/Ellie.
A/N: Spoiler Alert: Don't read unless you've seen the last episode. Obviously, none of this belongs to me.
The storm starts just hours before their first face to face encounter, but it had been brewing in Broadchurch for months.
Ellie Miller loathes Alec Hardy even before she meets him on the beach on that fateful day. He took her fucking job. Of course she hates him. And Alec Hardy isn't exactly charmed by her either. He wanted peace, quiet, and to be left alone. Instead he's interrogated, harassed, and smothered by this little rural D.S. that's so adamant about protecting the innocence of her small town that she might ruin his entire investigation before it can even begin.
They're so different that it's amazing they get anything done together that first week. She strikes him as far too warm, naïve and stubborn, and he's so cold, bitter, and aloof. He infuriates her. She annoys him. But they're driven by the same desperate need to solve this crime and catch the bloody bastard that killed Danny Latimer. She knew and cared for the boy, and he needs to clear his conscious with this crime before his time runs out. Somehow, united by their mutual desire to get justice at whatever cost, she learns to bite her tongue and open her eyes to the darker truths of humanity, and he begins to listen to her and share the burdens he carries with her. Gradually, their hostility towards one another evolves into tolerance, respect, and even a fragile trust.
Fifty-nine days later the storm that ripped through that sleepy town finally takes its last victim, as the exhausted killer is beaten down by his own conscious and steps forward to confess to Alec everything he needs to hear.
The case is closed and Alec finally gets his closure. His heart should be able to rest easy now that his penance is done. He loses his job and he almost sacrifices his life in the process, but at least it's over. The moment he saw Danny's body on the beach, he knew he would give everything he had left just to bring this crime to its horrific conclusion. But he never expected that it would hurt this much or that he had anything else left to lose.
Breaking the news to Ellie nearly fucking kills him. She worked so hard and had done so well and yet all along the cold-blooded killer was sleeping in the same bed as her. While Hardy had foreseen his own tragic demise, Ellie had not and had never had any reason to. In a matter minutes, her husband is exposed and severed from her forever, her heart is broken, her family is destroyed, and the entire town that knew and loved her, the whole damn community that she had once fought so hard to protect from him and the very killer that slept under her own roof, has turned its back on her forever. Her whole world is shattered with three revealing words.
"It was Joe."
She cracks right there in the interrogation room and Alec knows that nothing he or anyone else does or says will ever be able to put her back together again. That's what destroys him.
The storm of Danny Latimer's murder threatened to demolish the little community of Broadchurch, but from a distance Alec watches the entire town coming together on the beach to heal in the aftermath. They hold hands and grieve side by side, lighting fires and remembering the life of one of their own. And Alec knows that though they're hurting now, Broadchurch will survive this and continue to go on, perhaps stronger and closer than ever. He hates them just a little bit for it, because she'll never be a part of it.
The storm breaks, and Alec is left adrift in its aftermath, an outsider once more. And this time Ellie is there with him, ostracized, devastated and so very alone. He knows she can't look back, because it hurts too much. And he can't look at her directly because he recognizes the storm simmering in her eyes. The anger at her husband's betrayal still seethes inside her and he can't bear to see it, because one day it'll be gone, and she'll only find herself to blame. And he'll hate to see her so empty, so alone, and so much like himself.
She tells him she'll move on, give the boys a fresh start, and he knows she will try her hardest for the sake of her two kids. He realizes now that he underestimated her when they first met and that she can handle a lot more than he ever expected. He thinks that maybe if anyone can move past this, it'll be Ellie.
But when he finally turns to look at her again, she's twisted around and gazing at everything she just said she was leaving behind.
"We can never go back to the way things were," she whispers disbelievingly and her voice cracks. She brings her hand to her mouth, but she can't hold the sobs back any longer. She's miles away from him now, wrapped up in her own private hell that she'll live in long after Danny Latimer's story is buried. He's not even sure if she's aware he's still sitting on the bench beside her, and he probably should let her alone to grieve. But he stays.
She probably hates him, and maybe she should. He shifts closer to her on the bench. She flinches when his shoulder brushes hers. He reaches for her anyway. She lashes out at him, calls him some nasty names, and he thinks that this is the last time they'll see each other and that maybe she really does blame him for everything. But then she collapses against him and drags him down with her into that dark spiraling storm and he knows that she wasn't yelling at him. He's the only thing she has left to hang onto.
Now, he feels how much she's hurting because she's hurting him. He can feel her nails snagging on his coat, tearing at the seams as she clings to him. Her tears are so hot that they sear his skin as they soak through the fabric of his shirt. Each and every sob rips through him like the storm that tore through this town, and he knows now that Ellie Miller is not just something that was washed up like a piece of driftwood in the wake of the storm, she is still trapped in the center of that storm. And now so is he.
He holds her closer and they try to ride out the storm together.
He doesn't know when she finally cried herself out and fell asleep on his shoulder. But he does remember rubbing his face only to have his fingers come back wet and salty with tears that may or may not have been his own. Exhausted, he leans back on the bench, noticing for the first time that the skies are clear. Shivering, he huddles closer to her warmth before closing his own eyes and shutting out the constellations above.
He opens his eyes again to the brightness of a new day dawning in the aftermath of a storm. He can hear the distant roar of the waves from here. The sea's calmer today and though the fires burned out hours ago, the smell of smoke still lingers in the air. Danny's death will always linger here even if they did manage to lay the case to rest.
"Tell me it was all a bad dream."
More than anything he wants to tell the broken woman curled against his side that it was nothing more than a nightmare. But it's the one thing he'll never be able to do for her.
"I'm sorry," he apologizes. Her face falls as that last spark of hope burns out, and he's reminded again of what he never thought he had left to lose. He reassures himself that though the storm is far from over for her, she doesn't have to weather it alone. He'll make sure of that.
"Come on," he says, nudging her. He gets up from the bench and holds out a hand to her. She takes it automatically, allowing him to pull her to her feet.
She's drawn back one last time and they drink in the sight of that slumbering coastal town together.
"I don't know where to go from here," she admits helplessly.
"I don't think any of us do," he agrees, but it's a lie. When she leaves, he knows he'll follow her. Because he's already decided that he's going with her, wherever she chooses to go, until he's certain that the storm is truly over and Ellie will be okay.
A/N: I LOVED Broadchurch, even if it did nearly kill me because it was SO sad and so tragically beautiful in its own way. I fell in love with the whole cast of characters, but Ellie and Alec are the two I'm going to miss the most. I'll probably continue this or write more oneshots because I can't bring myself to say goodbye to these two just yet. Sorry if it's OOC.