Author's Note: I'm not dead. Stop making that face. I've been a little tied up lately. For one, school is kicking my ass. Whoever said senior year is easy should be shot in the face immediately. It's a lie. So, this story is a little old and has been chilling in my docx folder. My beta is also tied up and hasn't edited anything in a while, so I figured I would just edit this myself and post it for you all. So, because of that, excuse any random errors. I hope it can hold you over until I get my rear in gear on my other projects. Like Honor. No, it has not been abandoned, promise! Thank you for your patience as always.
Dedication: To harrypotter202abc, for being my CA-obsessing, fluff-loving, humor-inducing, parody-making authoress friend. To Yuki's Adorable Girlfriend, for being my most loyal friend and reader since before the dawn of time. To cotedepablo911, for being my amazing beta and putting up with my constant obsessing over television shows. I adore you three!
Disclaimer: I don't own Covert Affairs.
Good Enough
She cried until she was physically sick, and then she cried some more. In all her years of life, she had never felt so utterly worthless. It seemed no matter how hard she tried, she'd never be good enough in her sister's eyes.
She picked up her cell phone and, without thinking her actions through, made a desperate call.
"A-auggie?" Her voice cracked with his name.
"Annie? What's wrong? Are you crying?" There was the sound of rustling sheets as he presumably sat up in bed with a stifled yawn.
"No. I'm…ok." She hiccupped between words, knowing how terribly fake her lies sounded.
"What happened?" He disregarded her lame attempt to say she was alright.
"Everything," she let the tears flow, holding herself tightly as sobs racked her body. She squeezed her eyes shut, "Sh—She, she—"
"Your sister again?" Auggie sighed loudly from the other end of the line, "Annie, I keep telling you not to listen to her, she doesn't know what she's talking about! Are you alright? Do you want me to come over?"
Annie shook her head and buried her face in her palms, "I'm sorry, Auggie! I'm a failure! I'm a fuck up! I'm sorry!" She hung up, heaving the cell phone across her bathroom, wondering why she had called him in the first place.
"I try," she stated out loud, her voice echoing softly in the tiled blue bathroom, "I try and try, but it's never good enough. I'm never good enough."
Her voice cracked again under her own painful words.
"I try, dammit!"
She coughed, and sobbed before getting sick again, her head hanging shamefully over the porcelain toilet bowl.
Her cell phone rang, the cracked screen lighting up as the phone vibrated across the tiled floor. Annie sighed loudly as she slowly pulled herself to her feet, swaying slightly when she walked across the bathroom to retrieve her cell phone. She picked up the phone and held herself steady up against the wall before answering.
"Hello?"
She sounded like shit. Fitting to what she felt like.
"Annie?" It was Auggie again, his voice sounding exasperated and strained and laced with the final hints of sleepiness, "Be quiet and don't argue. I'm coming over alright? I'm worried about you. Need me to bring anything?"
Annie used her free hand and wiped at her face, raw from tears and hot with fever.
"You don't need to Auggie, don't worry."
She tried (and failed) to sound convincing.
"Apparently, I do."
"August! I don't need your help. I can handle this!" Augie was silent, "Aug.. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm just—I'm just such a screw up. I'm sorry."
She started crying again.
"You are not, Annie! Stop saying that!" Auggie told her sternly. Annie had never heard him use that tone with her before.
"I'm sorry," Annie managed weakly, fresh tears carrying her makeup from her eyelids down her cheeks and into small puddles on the bathroom floor.
"And that, too. Don't be sorry. You didn't do anything wrong. I'm coming over, and that's final."
"Oh, I look horrible, Auggie."
"I'll be there in five." She hung up quickly, and Annie hung up with a soft sigh. Her chest hurt, her head ached, and she was freezing. Carefully, she walked from her bathroom and into the bedroom. She nearly collapsed onto her bed, pulling a blanket up over her shoulders, balling it in her fist under her chin.
Sleep was starting to take grip, her hypnagogic state keeping her mind from anything.
"Annie?"
His booming voice made Annie wince slightly. She opened her eyes to see Auggie standing in the doorway, green laser cane silently sweeping the room before him.
"Hey, Aug."
At the sound of her voice, Auggie's head turned in her general direction, a concerned voice gracing his handsome features as he walked toward her.
"Annie, are you alright?" Auggie reached the bed, sitting down next to Annie and gathering her in a tight hug. Annie hiccupped in return.
"I'm useless."
"You have a fever, Annie, and you're certainly not useless."
"Yes I am. My sister thinks so." Annie sat back from Auggie, pulling her knees to her chest with a loud, very stressed-sounding sigh.
"How long have you had a fever? And who cares what she thinks?"
One of Auggie's large hand's came to rest on her forehead for a moment, his face morphing into a concerned scowl as he felt the temperature of her skin.
"Um, I don't know. Since I got home after work, I guess."
She left the second question alone. She did. She wanted her older sister's approval. She wanted her sister to be proud of her and not see her as a disappointment.
"Did you take anything for your fever?" Auggie was clearly more concerned with her fever than her tears at the moment.
"No."
"Where do you keep your medicine?"
Annie sighed, "The cabinet in the bathroom. Above the sink."
Auggie stoop up from the bed and walked across the room and into the bathroom, large hands roaming along the wall until he felt the mirror and cabinet. He opened the cabinet, fumbling around with the many medicine bottles before retrieving a bottle of aspirin and closing the cabinet door.
"Do you want to tell me what happened?" he asked when he sat back down on the bed, handing Annie the pills. Annie shook her head as she took them, taking a sip of water from the glass by her bedside table.
"Are you mad?"
"Annie, stop it," Auggie's voice was suddenly very demanding again, "Right this very instant. I'm not mad. You just scared the life out of me. I'm worried about you."
Annie began to cry again. She was sick and upset and exhausted.
"Aren't you supposed to be at one of those dinner parties tonight? At your sister's?"
"I got kicked out," Annie sighed loudly before continuing, "She's sick of having to explain my cuts and bruises to everyone, so she told me not to come. When I showed up, she told me to leave."
Auggie nodded, understanding at once.
"Why don't you get some sleep?" he asked. Annie nodded slowly, stifling a long-overdue yawn as she leaned back into bed.
"I should drive you home first, Aug."
"I'm not going anywhere," Auggie shrugged off his jacket and kicked off his shoes, moving to lie next to Annie on her bed with a sigh, "I'll stay here with you tonight. Now go to bed."
Annie coughed in return, rolling over to hold her ribs and place her head on Auggie's broad shoulder.
"Why can't I be good enough, Auggie?" Was Annie's last groggy question as she gave in to a fitful sleep.
"You're more than good enough for me," Auggie whispered, pulling the blankets up over them and wrapping his arms around Annie with a soft smile, "You're perfect to me, and you'll never see it because you're too wrapped up in what your family thinks."
He scowled at the wall, whishing full heartedly that Annie could see the truth, "You may not be good enough for your sister, but you're more than good enough for me, Annie."