Don't Leave Me Here
Holder's read somewhere that you are never lonelier than when you're standing in a crowd of strangers. Is that how Linden feels as she checks herself out of the nuthouse and sees that Sonoma's gone? Spoilers for 2.10.
Disclaimer: The Killing belongs to AMC, I just wrote this for fun with no copyright infringement intended.
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"Don't leave me here."
Linden's drugged, desperate words echo around Holder's brain on some kind of sick repeat as he presses his cell to his ear and listens to the dial.
"Don't leave me here."
"Come on, pick up, pick up." He mutters, staring at the scrap of paper with the number on it.
The voice that answers sounds confused and thick with sleep.
"Um … hello?"
Sonoma doesn't sound like Holder expected and for a minute he's rendered speechless.
"Don't leave me here."
Holder speaks the words he hopes will spur Sonoma the way they spur him.
"Linden needs you."
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Sonoma doesn't look how he sounds, and he certainly doesn't look how Holder expected him to.
They meet at a coffee shop around the corner from the institute where Linden's staying, the two men staring at each other over cups of steaming hot coffee that neither intends to drink.
Like him, Sonoma is tall and lean-looking, but there's something about him that sets Holder on edge as much as it puts him at ease. It could be the clothes, the soft, oft-washed shirt, the worn brown leather shoes that look so comfortable, or the nice sports jacket that hides a deceptive bulk. He looks like the kind of guy a woman would want to marry, would want to move to wherever the hell Sonoma is, away from this city with is ghosts and dead girls and secrets that just seem to keep coming. It could be Sonoma's openly worried expression – he's worried for Sarah and, if Holder's instincts are right, he's worried for Holder, too, worried about what Holder will have to deal with if he does what Holder's asking of him.
"I'll get her out, but that's it." He says as they conspire like watches around a caldron. "I can't be a part of her life anymore."
"Don't leave me here."
Holder doesn't want to point out that he doesn't seem to have been a part of Linden's life for quite some time, but decides not to. It's not difficult to see why Linden and Sonoma haven't made it. Being a cop's anything is hard, never mind a spouse. Too many late nights, extra hours, intense working conditions; Holder can see the cogs whirring in Sonoma's mind as they talk, trying to ascertain just what side of the 'partners' bed he and Linden sleep. To be sure, a cop's life is hard but Linden makes it harder. It often makes her a more driven detective, but it makes her harder: harder to be around, harder to talk to, harder to get to know. Just harder.
If Sonoma's unnerved by the nuthouse where they're keeping Linden, he give no indication of it; just stands there with a clinical, cool smile and completes the paperwork necessary to cut her loose while Holder stands with his hands in his pockets and tries not to inhale the smell of crazy, disinfectant and meds that cling to this place's walls.
"Don't leave me here."
Holder's heart breaks as he sees Linden come down those stairs, her clothes wrinkled and twisted as though she's put them on in a hurry. The last time he saw her she was wearing that gown, that pale yellow gown that made her look like a ghost. Without her jacket and sweater she seemed so much frailer, so much more breakable and all he wanted to do was hold her hand and fight her dragons for her.
"Don't leave me here."
Her gaze is so hopeful as she sees Sonoma (what the hell is his name? He introduced himself as something but all Holder saw was Sonoma Sonoma Sonoma), sees him standing there, a saviour in a sports jacket.
She disappears for a few seconds, presumably to collect something or sign something, and Sonoma seizes his chance, no doubt keen to avoid a heartfelt goodbye amid the crazies.
"I can't be here." He says, his gaze flickering to that security door every few seconds, his window of escape growing ever-smaller.
"Yeah. Thanks for coming down."
"Yeah. Well just … just tell her …"
Sonoma stops talking then, no doubt trying to compose himself and at that moment Holder really wishes he could remember Sonoma's name. Watching a grown man visibly break down isn't something he's used to seeing and being able to use the man's real name when he tells him not to sweat it, that he'll take care of Linden seems to be a situation that warrants a real name. But Sonoma's gone before he can say anything and Linden's there, like some horribly orchestrated comedy of errors that relies on strategic exits and entrances.
The smile fades from her lips as her eyes scan the small crowd in front of her, her gaze searching for the man she loved and possibly still did love and finding him gone, their mutual sighting so fleeting that if Linden was so ask Holder if she imagined it, he wouldn't know whether telling the truth was a kindness or not. Holder's read somewhere that you are never lonelier than when you're standing in a crowd of strangers. Is that how Linden feels as she stands in that waiting room and sees that Sonoma's gone?
"Don't leave me here."
Sonoma might be gone, but he was only here because Holder called him.
Sonoma might be gone, but Holder's still here. Maybe that was how it was always meant to be with them, Sonoma gone and Holder still here, determined to make good on that plea whispered against a sterile hospital gown that smelled like bleach and sedatives.
They don't speak until the institution is nothing more than a fading image seen from a rear view mirror.
"Thanks, Holder." Her voice is so quiet that the rain on the windscreen almost drowns her out.
"No problem, Linden."
Her gaze is on the scenery beyond the car when she says, "We were supposed to get married yesterday."
"Don't leave me here."
Holder's foot presses down harder on the gas, willing the car further away from the here, from the institution and forlorn stares and marriages that were meant to be yesterday.
"C'mon, Linden." He says. "Let's finish this."
FIN.