The air sitting between them is unbelievably tense. Lindy taps her fingers nervously against the arm of the couch. Tommy just sits there, silently, impassively. She can't read him at all.
"Tommy?" She asks. He looks up. His eyes are different. Impossibly old. She doesn't really know what to say, but she has to say something. "I…" She doesn't even know where to start. She thought this would be easier. It seems childish now, the notion that she could show up here and he would sweep her into his arms and everything could go back to the way it was before. She had underestimated how much had changed between them.
"Are you back?" Tommy asks, when Lindy just lets the silence hang between them. She knows he means for good. She nods. If she expected that to please him she's disappointed. He just continues to stare at her.
"I know you probably have questions." She says tentatively. It's an offer. He raises an eyebrow.
"I had questions." Past tense. That hits Lindy harder than any of the rest of it. It suddenly occurs to her that he doesn't really care anymore. About Sara, about her, about any of it. Six months is a long time.
"Had." She echoes him. When he doesn't answer the air around her becomes thin. She can't catch her breath. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have come." She stands clumsily, hand closing around the scarf she'd unwound and placed beside her. This was supposed to be her safe place, Tommy was supposed to be her safe place. But it's awkward and painful and she feels so incredibly wrongfooted that a flush is beginning to spread across her cheeks. She gets to the door before he stops her.
"Wait." She turns around, slowly. Tommy stands, scrubbing his hand tiredly across his face. Lindy can't quite get over how exhausted he looks. "Just-don't go." His voice isn't flat anymore, but it isn't warm either. She hesitates. As her eyes take in the tense set of his jaw something clicks into place. Her mouth drops open, the o of surprise eliciting a frown from him.
"You…. You're mad at me." She feels so stupid. It hadn't even occurred to her but looking at him now, remembering the shock on his face when he opened his door morphing quickly into a surliness she didn't recognize, it's so obvious. "Oh." She sighs. This is so much messier than she'd predicted. She makes her way back to the couch, sitting down with a huff of annoyance.
Tommy doesn't look at her.
"I'm not." He says. Lindy rolls her eyes.
"Yes you are. Which is ridiculous, considering." His eyebrows shoot up nearly to his hairline.
"Considering that I lied to you?" He asks, voice strained. He looks as though he's about to burst. Lindy's curious, so she pokes at that.
"And used me." She reminds him. A vein in his temple twitches.
"Lindy-"
"So what I did really doesn't even compare."
"Lindy-"
"I mean I'm sorry, I am but-"
"Oh my god." He mutters, and then suddenly he's lunged across the couch and his hands are on her face and he's kissing her. It's angry, the way he drags her into his lap, teeth scraping against hers, fingers digging into her hips. But she doesn't care. She gasps as he bites her bottom lip, hips rocking against his, his mouth travelling south long enough for her to catch her breath.
"Wait." She sits back, leaning just out of reach of that mouth, the one that could apparently dismiss all rational thought from her brain. He groans. She tries to form a cohesive sentence. It takes a couple seconds. "What are we doing?" She asks. He shrugs.
"Fighting?"
She frowns.
"I'm serious. We obviously have some stuff to talk about." He sighs.
"Look, are you leaving again?" He asks. She shakes her head. "Are you going to tell me what the hell you've been doing?" She nods. "Do you want this?" He gestures to the two of them. She smiles.
"Yeah."
"Then," he says, tugging down the zipper on Lindy's hoodie, "we can talk tomorrow."
It takes a few days for them keep their clothes on long enough to actually have that conversation.