Thanksgiving was almost gone when Alex finally slipped the last of the finished paper work on the stack to the left side of her desk. The case solved, the real murderer caught and just one more holiday lost as a casualty to her job.
It was times like this that she found comfort in the fact that Joe was gone. The pain was still there, muted and usually in the back of her heart, but knowing that there was nobody at home still up waiting for her made it somehow easier to give in to the call of work. She'd grown used to that seldom mentioned requirement of the job. Lives were lost and detectives were needed no matter what holiday the living still celebrated.
She would've been saved from spending the latter part of the holiday alone if not for Bobby's abrupt behavior. Part of her hoped she wouldn't be getting a new partner and the other part of her wanted to find him to kick his ass herself. She hurt for him and that just pissed her off more because she'd found the pain but he'd refused to give her anything to hope for.
It was the unspoken rule he'd set down from day one: his personal life was off-limits. They could talk and laugh about her family's mishaps and those moments she'd chosen to share with him, but she could never ask about his without him clamming up and going cold. Her partner had admitted more in the course of an interrogation than he'd ever even hinted at with her.
Not that she hadn't already noticed a subtle difference in his behavior. His eyes had seemed tired lately, and not the type of tired that a lack of sleep would make them. It was the type of fatigue that came from watching something terrible happen while knowing that there was nothing that could be done.
And although he hadn't said it, she knew that with his mother, there was little left that could be done. If there was hope, his eyes would've shown it, even if he'd never dare speak the words aloud. Bobby was losing his mother, and Alex could only hope selfishly that that would mean she wouldn't also lose her partner.
As she stood and tried to work out the crick in her back, her eyes fell on his leather binder that had fallen haphazardly across the center of his desk. He'd never left that part of him behind before.
Moving to his side of their joined desks, she traced her finger down the stitched edges slowly. The leather had become soft and worn in several spots toward the spine. It was unzipped as usual and Bobby's slanted writing dotted down the first page. And as her eyes traveled down the words, she realized just how off her partner had been all day.
His typical notes could get to novel length on a good case, with paragraphs filled with observations and possible further things to check on. They served more of a purpose for him as a map to find out where his mind had been when he'd first seen the hidden clue or suspicious angle. And on the occasions he'd given her a chance to look over his notes; it'd been an insight into his mind for her.
But the notes from that day were short and to the point, growing slowly darker as his pen stabbed further into the paper with unexpressed frustration. She hadn't lost her partner's help halfway through the day as she'd thought. She'd never had him completely there in the first place.
The binder seemed almost empty now, void of the usual multiple case files Bobby carried with him. A few single sheets cushioned the legal pad of paper and as Alex shifted everything to close the binder again, a wrinkled half sheet peeked out from the bottom. In hurried scratches, her partner had written down the names of several medical research labs. None of their recent cases touched that area of medicine, so she knew it wasn't work related. But it was possibly something he needed.
If there was one thing she'd learned about Bobby over the past years, it was that he was best off with something to research, something to run with. Instead of reacting with the despair he so blatantly felt about his mom's illness, her partner had found another outlet for his attention. And she just hoped there was something there that could help him.
Running her finger down the zipper of the binder again, Alex sighed. She tore a piece of paper from the back of the legal pad. Just because her partner had chosen to walk away, didn't mean she had to make the same choice. Laying the finished note on top of everything, she zipped the binder closed, fighting the stiffness of the rarely used zipper at the corners.
He'd need his notes, even if he hadn't realized it yet. Slipping on her coat, she held the binder against her chest and braced herself against the cold as she reached the parking garage.
The music she'd blasted managed to only distract her a little as she steered through the evening holiday traffic to his apartment and the coil of nerves in her belly contracted a little more with each step she made toward his building. What if he was there? And what if he wasn't?
Alex was tired, still pissed and there was nothing more she wanted to do than just to go home and relax. But she still found herself in front of his door, her hand pausing for a long moment before she knocked. The seconds ticked by with the beat of blood rushing through her ears and with a half sigh, she knocked again. Still no answer.
Digging out her keys, she pounded her knuckles against the wood grain one last time. After a long moment of silence, Alex slid her copy of his key into the lock and opened the door to a dark apartment. It wasn't the use the key had been intended for, but she'd figured that eventually he'd understand. It wasn't an emergency situation, but it didn't mean his mental balance was any less threatened.
His apartment wasn't welcoming without his presence. It seemed smaller, sadder and in it she felt much more alone. Releasing the binder a little reluctantly, she set it on the corner of his counter where he'd be sure of seeing it. It had been the one piece of Bobby she'd been able to hold onto today but she knew it was more important for him to have it. With that in mind, Alex closed the door to the apartment and locked the deadbolt.
She'd already decided that tomorrow would be a sick day. A day where she could pretend that all the troubles in her own life were actually important in the whole scheme of things. And maybe a day where she could imagine that her partner hadn't started changing and would still be there the next day with his seemingly endless array of information and small smiles just for her.
After that she could face reality. And she could prepare for whatever was next.
It was after midnight when Bobby finally got home. The tension and stress of the day still clung to him and he only hoped that somewhere inside he could find a distraction to free him from everything. It was times like these that he sometimes wished he could find his comfort in the bottom of the bottle like both his dad and brother seemed to.
He slipped his shoes off and hung his coat up before his eyes found the binder on the counter. He couldn't remember bringing it home and it look a long worrisome moment before he realized he hadn't.
Glancing around the apartment, he saw no other signs that anything had been touched so he stepped toward it slowly. As his hand brushed against the leather, he remembered that he'd left it at work, thrown it on his desk before stalking out. And there was only one person who would've cared enough to bring it back to him.
He'd hurt her today, more than once and she'd only hesitated slightly before letting him know it. They were out of step with each other and the blame was on him for that. And yet, she'd still gone out of the way to bring him this.
Finding it zipped, he got it open slowly and glanced down at the sheets of paper. Her writing was on the one on top.
You may have given up, but I never will.
The offer of a drink and an ear still stands.
-Alex
Simple, firmly stated and a slap upside the head. It was completely like his partner and it only made him love her more. She was the only person he knew that could knock him down a few pegs and offer support in the same sentence.
And yet he knew he still wouldn't take her up on that. Not yet, not until he could say the words aloud without choking on them. Not until he knew that he could talk about it like a man. And as tears slipped past his closed eyelids and the lump in his throat doubled inside, he knew he was far from ready.
His partner being the wonderful person she was, had let him know she'd wait for him. That gave him a splinter of hope that maybe he could survive this. Maybe he wouldn't always end up being alone.