Title: Cold Enough For Snow
Author: Scribere Est Agere
Pairing: Goren/Eames
Spoilers: Post Untethered
Rating: M
Disclaimer: These characters do not belong to me.
Summary: She's not worried that he's going crazy. She's worried he's already gone.
A/N: Thank you Adrienne. Thank you.
/
Insanity is the only sane reaction to an insane society.
Thomas Szas
/
1. Jo/Joe
Six months after Jo Gage drags her from the house she sells it, moves to a condo in the city, closer to work, closer to the pool, closer to…well, everything.
She and Joe bought the house two years after they married and she was so proud, so pleased she could hardly stand it. She remembers the housewarming party they had, and all the people and all the presents, the congratulations, the palpable envy. She remembers the first night they slept in their own bedroom, made love in their own living room, cooked in their own kitchen. She remembers feeling like she was finally a grown-up. At the time it seemed like the most important wonderful thing in all the world.
After Joe died the house became a burden and a constant reminder of the space he no longer occupied, and how little of the space she filled up on her own. The house, while not large in any respect, suddenly seemed cavernous, echoing with her footsteps and her silence and night noises, but she couldn't sell it, she wouldn't, until.
Until.
After Jo came and took her, the house felt like a trap, like constant danger. It was suffocating and it was poison and she couldn't get out fast enough.
/
2. Night/Bobby
She's dreaming and it's a noisy dream. Her dreams are always rather violent, lots of blood and falling bodies. She dreams about drowning a lot, lungs filling up, going down for the third time. But this one is noisy — pounding and yelling. She twists in her sheets and wills herself to wake up.
There is still pounding coming from somewhere. Shit. Her door. She stumbles through the semi-dark and she can hear him before she even checks.
"Eames…s'me…open up, for god's sakes. Eames…"
She does. He falls on her. They land in a heavy, painful tangle on the floor, all knees and elbows.
"Oh god…sorry. Sorry. You all right?" He's trying to move, to roll off her and she can smell it, like he's bathed in it. He's been drinking. He's drunk.
"Bobby—"
He manages to get on his hands and knees. He shakes his head and attempts to stand.
"Here." She grabs his arm and he leans heavily on her. She closes the door and guides him to the couch, where he falls, groans, drops his face in his hands. She remains standing, watching. She has absolutely no idea what to say or do.
"Sorry," he mumbles.
"Yeah. You mentioned that." She sits. "Been making good use of your time off, have you?"
"Yeah…writing a novel, actually."
God, she misses him. And she hates Ross, hates the department, hates Donny and Frank and Frances. Hates Bobby.
And she loves him.
"Well, take off your coat," she says finally. "Lie down."
"Haven't been sleeping too good lately," he mutters, but he does as she says, struggles out of his coat and throws it on the coffee table and kind of falls on his side, feet still on the floor. She spreads a blanket over him and after a moment wrestles his legs up onto the couch. He reaches out and grabs her around the wrist.
"Eames…I am sorry."
She nods in the dark, takes her free hand and touches his hair fleetingly.
"I'm sorry, too." But for what, she isn't quite sure.
/
3. Wednesday/Bobby
The day they find him shivering and incoherent in an alleyway is the day she first starts to seriously question his mental stability.
She gets the call at nine in the morning, just after she's arrived at work, taken a few tentative sips of the office coffee, made a face, pulled out a file and glanced at Bobby's empty chair for the third time.
"Detective Eames." She recognizes the voice. It's Ken Cote, a beat officer she's had two dates with (16 months ago) and he still smiles (too widely) at her and he still asks (too solicitously) about her health every time he sees her. "Alex. It's…about your partner."
"What is it?" she says quickly.
"Well…not quite sure, really." His voice is garbled with static and traffic noises and she stands, moves on numb legs away from the pen, into the hallway. She presses the phone hard to her ear.
"We got a call to an alley beside Niko's Deli…You know where that is?"
She does. It's three blocks away.
"What's happened?"
"Well, I can't really tell you. There was some sort of altercation…between Goren and another man…but, we can't get him to talk."
"Goren…?"
"He won't tell us what happened, he won't come with us…and…he has no socks…or coat."
Time seems to slow then, even as the blood speeds up and rushes through her veins and into her ears.
"Alex?" Ken's voice is low and concerned. "He doesn't seem…I just thought I would call you, you know. If you…wanted to…I don't know."
She doesn't know how to thank him so she hangs up and runs three blocks in the bitter cold.
/
It's almost February and there is no snow. There was snow, for several weeks, but the last rainfall washed it all away and she finds herself missing the dirty piles and slushy gutters.
She sees the cruiser parked at the mouth of the alley, sees Ken and his partner Louis, halos of breath around their heads. She's out of breath. Her lungs hurt.
"Where is he?"
Ken points. Alex nods, starts walking down the alley crowded with boxes and garbage.
"Bobby?" she says. Then she sees him, crouched low, back against the wall, head down. He has a cut on one hand. He doesn't even look up as she approaches. She crouches down in front of him.
"Bobby."
He glances up.
"Eames."
"Are you all right?"
He nods.
"What are you doing here?"
"Dunno. I…thought I saw Donny. And he ran. And I…followed him. I just wanted to talk, Eames. That was all. Just…talk…you know?"
"Where's your coat?"
He looks at her, confused.
"My…?"
"Come on. You must be freezing."
She helps him stand and he wavers for a second before finding his footing. She turns around and Ken is standing there.
"Everything okay?" he says but she can see in his eyes exactly what he's thinking.
"We're good. Thanks. I owe you."
"Dinner?" he jokes, but Alex can't manage even a half-hearted retort for that one.
They take a cab back to the precinct. After about 30 seconds he starts shivering violently and she wraps her arms around him and holds on tight. He doesn't seem to notice the shaking, neither his nor hers.
/
She tells Ross she has a small, personal emergency that should be resolved within the hour and drives Bobby home. At one point he rolls his head against the back of the seat and almost looks at her.
"I can't find him, Eames."
"I know. I know. It's okay."
"It's not okay. It's not…"
She pauses. "You still keeping your appointments?" He's supposed to be seeing some shrink in Psych Services regularly. He doesn't talk about it to her, ever.
"Yes."
He falls silent again, looks out the window for awhile. She thinks he must be sleeping, but then his voice, low and gravelly:
"I know what you're thinking."
"No, you don't."
"I do."
"Yeah? Well, I'm thinking you're gonna end up with hypothermia or double pneumonia, the way you're going. That's what I'm thinking."
"I know how to look after myself." He's indignant, which she finds oddly endearing.
"Yeah? I just don't want the next call to be from lockup or the hospital or the—"
The word morgue dies in her throat. She can't say it.
He looks over.
"The what?"
She shakes her head, shakes the word away.
"Nothing."
He looks away again and she keeps driving him home.
/
4. Ross/Bobby
"Talked to your partner lately?"
She shakes her head. "Not for a couple days. Why?" Not that she hasn't tried. Four, five messages? Hopeful, upbeat, encouraging, then, vaguely threatening. Call me, Bobby. I mean it. She feels the faint stirring of panic in her chest.
What now?
"Just got a call from Psych Services. Seems he's missed his last two scheduled appointments."
She blinks at him.
"Mandatory appointments," Ross adds, rather unnecessarily.
Two appointments. Two. He goes twice a week. He's missed two. Which means he's been…possibly, out of commission since…Monday. Today is…Friday. Shit. Alex closes her eyes.
"Look," Ross leans down. He looks tired. They're all tired. "Take the rest of the day, all right? Go…talk to him."
She nods.
/
Where does one go from a world of insanity? Somewhere on the other side of despair.
TS Eliot
/
5. Alex/Bobby
She pounds on his door for a long time before she digs into her bag for his key. There is no sound at all from inside, not a television, not music, not heavy footsteps, not a breath, not a sound. Nothing.
Fuck this, she thinks. Fuck all of this. I'm so tired of this.
She jams the key in the lock, turns, opens, steps inside, lets her eyes adjust.
She takes it all in. The unwashed dishes in the sink. Bottles of liquor — some empty, some half empty — scattered across the counter and small kitchen table. Glasses everywhere, most with sticky dredges of alcohol in them. The smell of neglect and defeat.
Where is he? Where?
Bobby, slumped sideways on his couch, cheek pressed to the cushion, snoring lightly. She moves towards him, then stops, heart hurting.
Gun on the coffee table.
Kick in the gut.
Suddenly she's having a hard time drawing a breath.
"Oh."
She steps closer and looks at him. He looks…so much older than when she first met him. But what the hell, so does she. She picks up the gun. Safety's off. She shakes her head, angry, angry. She slides the safety on, puts it back down. She lowers herself down beside him, puts a hand on his arm. He's warm. He's alive. For now.
"Oh, Bobby."
She shakes him gently, and when he doesn't rouse, doesn't respond in any way, she finds herself growing angrier, shakes him harder and she's going to be pummeling him in a minute if he doesn't fucking wake up—
He opens his eyes, blinks, focuses, sees her, groans, closes his eyes again.
"Eames."
"Yes."
He sighs, seems to be drifting off again, but she's not gonna let that happen, so she shakes him again, hard, harder. He sighs and shifts and sits up, sort of. He scrubs a hand over his face, avoids looking at her.
"Bobby."
"Eames."
She glares.
"What are you doing here?" he mumbles. He still won't look at her.
"Ross…Ross said you've missed some appointments. He…he was worried."
Bobby makes a noise that sounds like a chuckle, but isn't.
"Ross was worried."
Fuck you, she thinks.
"Yes."
She looks around at the mess, the utter mess in front of her, takes it all in, then she looks at the mess of a man sitting next to her and his worn flannel shirt and his stubble and his mind and his gun and something inside her breaks, something she's been holding together in one piece for so long she can't remember when it all started. She only knows the shape and feel and weight of it and she knows this man is on the verge of being lost to her completely and she won't — she can't — let that happen.
"Where'd you get the gun?"
"Huh?"
"The gun, Bobby. Where'd you get it?"
"Oh. Bought it. Gotta have protection, you know? They took mine…"
He shrugs.
"Safety was off," she says.
"Hmm…was?"
"Yeah."
He smiles.
"Lucky you came along when you did, then."
She smiles, but there is no humour holding it up and she could happily shoot him herself, right then and there.
"I want…I need to know…what…what your intentions are here, Bobby."
And, holy shit, she's hearing her father's voice in her head, her father's voice talking to Joe, so long ago, asking about his goddamn intentions with his daughter. She almost laughs.
"My…intentions?" His words are slurred but he's coming around, he's focusing on her, finally. He looks a little bit wary, actually.
"Yeah. Yeah. Your intentions, Bobby. I need to know. I mean, if you're gonna…if you're…" Her voice cracks a bit here and she's very close to crying but she's not gonna fucking cry, she's not she's not. "…if you're gonna drink yourself to death…or…blow…blow your brains out, I mean. I should know, right? I should know. I'm your…I'm still your fucking partner, right?"
"I don't know," he says and his voice is so cold. "Are you?"
She grabs his gun then, and that gets his attention oh boy, does it. He makes a feeble grab for it and she holds it up, not recognizing herself at all, at all.
"Don't…"
"I mean, I've been there before, right? Right? What the hell? I've already lost one…man…what's another, right? Is that what you think?"
She gets down on the floor in front of him, close to him, but holds the gun away and his eyes are haggard and ragged and his breath stinks of whiskey and something else…something she can't quite define yet. She wants to slap him, she wants to kill him, she wants to fucking kiss him.
"But this time…this time, I won't be the widow, right? I won't even be the…the fucking girlfriend! I'll be the partner, and what the hell? I'll get sympathy, right? Sure. I'll get the cards and the kind respects and the looks…oh, I remember the looks. And the hugs and the pats on the back and the…shit. And then, it'll be over. It'll be over, and I move on, because we're partners and nothing more, right? Right? That's all we are. Right?"
She puts the gun down, far enough away that she can grab it first, if it comes to that.
He notices.
She gets right in his face then and he can't look at her, but he can't look away either. He's getting really sober really fast.
She claps her hands then, hard like she's just thought of something, and the sound is loud and he jumps a bit, startled.
"I know!" she shouts. "I know. This is a good story. Listen!"
She kneels and leans back a bit, her eyes unusually bright. She might be almost crying but he's not sure and he's not about to ask.
"This time…this time, I don't get over it. Because this time, I'm not in my 20s, right? I'm not some wide-eyed 20-something girl with a bright future ahead. I'm a 40-something widower. Get that? I'm middle-aged. Plus! I'm tainted. Tainted, by association with you. Remember? Where am I gonna go? What am I gonna do? And this time, I've fallen hard. I'm so in love this time I can't get out and move on. How's that? Well, I was in love with Joe. Desperately in love, as in love as I could be with someone when I was young and untainted. Are you listening? Are you?"
She grabs his face between her hands not at all gently and makes him look at her and he does and he sees her and she is crying and he might be, too.
"This time, I don't bounce back. Because this time…I'm so in love…so…" She stops and takes a breath and it sounds like her throat is full of glass and he's listening but can't quite believe what he's hearing. She shakes her head. "This time…yeah! This time I start drinking maybe. In the beginning, just to ease the pain of losing my partner, who isn't really my partner, but no one knows that. It's this big fucking secret, right? So. I'm drinking. And it doesn't help. Does it help you? Does it?"
He shakes his head no no no and she smiles, but it looks like it hurts her to do so. She lets go of him and moves back.
"So I slip. I start…not showing up for work, just once in awhile. Oh wait. I get a new partner. Right. I get a new partner and he…it's a he, I think. Yeah. He tries…he tries hard, but he's not you. He's not…you."
She releases one sob and the glass is still there so she bites back the rest and he reaches out but she moves back and …she slaps his hands away, which startles him but not so very much.
"And we go on this way for awhile and I see a counselor, you know, it's protocol…and…and…"
"Eames…
She's in her own world now and he can't quite reach her. Fuck. Fuck. He's totally fucking sober now, more sober than he's ever been in his life and she's gone, she's far gone and she hasn't had a single fucking drink and he can't touch her—
"One day…I've got it…one day I just don't show up for work. Or the next. You know? I just…don't. And they call and they call and…people get worried, after a while…
"Eames—"
"And my partner, who really is my partner and doesn't give two shits about me outside the job, doesn't clue in. He doesn't get it, like you would get it, if something was not right with me. You know?"
He does. He does.
"And they finally come around and they ask the landlord, and they ask the neighbours—"
"Eames, stop—"
"And they get the key, because my new fucking partner, well, I haven't given it to him—"
"Fuck. Stop this—"
"And they open the door and they can smell it. They can smell the blood—"
"Stop it, Alex! Stop it right now!" He yells at her and he grabs her then, hands on her shoulders hard and he's shaking her and she snaps out of whatever world she's been inhabiting and she's still crying and he is, too, so it seems.
"Let's do it, okay?" She swipes at her eyes with her sleeve. "You wanna…you wanna die? Fine. I'm here. I'm with you. Let's go."
"That's not…it's not what I want. I don't…don't want to die."
"Then what the fuck do you want?"
And he's never seen her this angry, ever, ever. The anger is rolling off her but there's something else beneath, something she won't let him touch yet.
He stares at her. For the first time in his life he's scared of his partner, his little partner, and he's scared for her too, and scared for them, because what if he really has gone and fucked it all up once and for all this time?
"I want…I just want to not feel. Not fucking feel anything anymore."
She continues to stare at him, but he can feel the anger receding and what was underneath — a sort of bone weariness and a sad desperation — replacing it. Later she will remember only bits and pieces of the conversation that follows:
"Do you feel this?"
(Her hand on his cheek and he leans into it)
He nods.
"Does it feel good?"
He nods.
"Do you feel this?"
(Her arms around his neck and her breath against his neck)
"How does it feel?"
He nods.
"And this? How does this feel?"
(His hand under her sweater on her bare breast and he quivers)
"Alex…god…"
"How about this?"
(Her mouth on his mouth and god he loves her and then)
They both remember everything after that, but choose not to talk about it, to anyone.
/
The insane, on occasion, are not without their charms.
Kurt Vonnegut
/
6. Joe/Bobby/Alex
Later:
He's lying with his head on her chest, arm thrown across her, his hand tracing small circles on her ribs. She can feel his breath, steady and warm, blowing across her shoulder. Hang on to this, she thinks. Hang on and don't let go. She tightens her arm across his back.
"Did I ever tell you I cheated on Joe once?"
Even in the dark she can tell he's smiling.
"I don't believe you."
"My 30th birthday party. Joe threw this big…thing at the house. I had too much to drink and his friend Tom kissed me in the kitchen."
Bobby laughs. Alex has never heard such a wonderful sound.
"That's not cheating."
"You don't get it. I wanted him to. I let him. And I would have…gone much further, if he'd pressed it."
"Alex…"
"Joe and I were, I don't know. Fighting a lot. Work stress, mortgage stress. I needed an outlet. I needed….something else."
"But, you didn't…"
She laughs. "Only because he stopped. He stopped."
Bobby's circles slow and she misses the movement. He begins again and she sighs.
"It doesn't matter, Alex. It doesn't mean anything."
She shakes her head.
"I don't know. Sometimes I think it does."
/
7. Eames/Bobby
Later:
"Eames."
She laughs in the dark.
"What?"
"Do…do you think I'm going crazy?"
His tone is light but his arm across her back tenses as he waits for her answer.
"Bobby—"
"Hang on. I changed my mind."
"What?"
"I don't want to know."
"Bobby—"
"I'm serious. Really, okay? I…I don't want to know after all." He clears his throat. "Just keep talking though, okay? Keep talking. Tell me another story. I like to hear your voice."
But, she doesn't know what to say because she's not worried that he's going crazy; she's worried that he's already gone.
/
8. Night/Snow
And later, still:
He awakes to find her gone, the bed cool and empty and he thinks, Yeah. Yeah.
But he sees her then, her silhouette at the window. She has a blue blanket wrapped around her shoulders and her hair is messed and she's watching something. He watches her.
"It's snowing," she says.
"Is it?"
"Yeah."
She turns to him and she's smiling, a big wide smile and he almost cries because of it. Her smile.
"You have to see this," she says.
But he doesn't move. He can't. He keeps watching her. Everything inside is still breaking, but for now it's all right.
"I like the snow," she says.
He swallows. He gets up.
"And they think I'm crazy," is all he can say.
/
Fin