I Loved You First

After his wife's funeral, Opie gets an unexpected visitor. Opie/OFC.

One-Shot.

She loved him first.

Before Donna, though they saw him at the same time - the fresh faced bag boy at the Charming Market, all brown eyed and pink cheeked, and she loved him as soon as he smiled. She loved him as she stood in line, with her sister and the milk and the eggs and the bread that she realized too late that she was clutching too tight. She loved him first, and she kissed him first, and he was inside of her first, but it didn't matter, because he didn't love her back.

And she still loved him as he loved Donna, even after the wedding and the house and their first kid, until she realized she had been standing in line for too long, and the waiting had begun to get unbearable and she left.

And she loved him even then.

She loved him years later, as she sat in her car in front of his house, swathed in all black, though she couldn't find it in herself to actually go to her sister's funeral. And as he pulled into the driveway on his bike, her breath hitched and her heart pounded and she realized too late that she was clutching the envelope too tight.

She stepped out of her car as he stepped off his bike and he turned and for a moment, they didn't recognize each other. And then they did, and despite himself, he smiled, and she remembered why she spent all that time standing in line, loving him, waiting until he loved her back.

"I'm surprised to see you here," Opie said and his voice cracked and her heart did a little too. He placed his helmet under his arm as he walked towards her. "Were you at the service?"

"No," she replied, though she didn't explain why. She didn't explain that she hated Donna as she loved him; hated her for taking him and claiming him and being the one that he loved. And she hated her because she was her sister, and she loved her because of it, too.

They stared at each other in silence and she held the letter in her trembling hand and she wished she would have left in back in the car, or back at her house, or back to that day all those years ago when she wrote it.

"I didn't think you would come," he finally said and his stomach fluttered with suppressed guilt or fond recollection or maybe something else -

She shook her head and almost laughed. "Donna and I had a lot of bad blood, but she was still my sister."

Opie nodded, then motioned towards the house and she obliged, following him to the door that he unlocked with shaking hands. And she wished that she could take the pain from him; take it and feel it for herself and bear it alone, because she knew she could. She had endured so much already and for so long that it had become a seasoned strength of hers and Opie just wasn't used to the pain.

The inside of the house was the same - the wallpaper was the same, the furniture was the same, and everything else was the same except for the two people that sat down on the couch, and maybe they were, too.

"How are you doing?" she asked, not knowing what else to say, and he sighed, digging the heels of his palms into his closed eyes and leaning back further into the cushions. He pulled his hands away and looked around the room, his gaze landing on a picture of him and Donna when they were still so young.

"I keep thinkin' -." He turned to her and thoughtlessly pulled at his beard. "I keep thinkin', what would've happened if I was the one in the car, or what if we would've stayed at the party a little longer, or what if I was never in the MC, or..."

What if you loved me back? she wanted to ask, since he was considering all the scenarios, but she didn't. It wouldn't have been fair to him, or to her, or the kids, or even Donna, to think about a life that would have been different. So, instead, she rubbed circles in his back with her fingertips to comfort him, likewise comforting herself too because he was alive; he was alive and real and sitting there next to her, and not just the recurring dream that she had been having since she left Charming.

The questions finally overwhelmed him, and he stopped talking. He stared at the woman that he had not seen in over a decade, who was sitting on his couch with her fingers now on the back of his neck, like all that time didn't pass. Opie wanted to cry, and he wanted to smile, and he wanted to curse whatever God there was that was so cruel, and he also wanted to praise him. Because some endings are just that, and some beginnings lead no further, but some endings are new beginnings and bring people back who should have been there all along. "Thank you for coming," he said. "Even if it wasn't for Donna. Even if it wasn't for me. For whatever reason, thank you."

And with just those words, she was standing back in line, loving him, waiting until he loved her back, but she knew that time would never come. Because some endings are just that, and some beginnings lead no further, and some things would never change.

She reached over and brought him to her, embracing him as he laid his head on her chest, and she tried to take the pain from him. But she couldn't. Because maybe the pain was meant to be his, or maybe she already had so much of her own that no more could fit, or maybe the pain she already felt was for losing Donna, and she pulled away and sat her hands back in her lap.

"What's that?" he asked, referring to the almost balled up envelope that she held and she shook her head.

"Something I should have left behind," she replied, because really, all that she was able to write was I loved you first. But it didn't matter, because he didn't love her back. Not in the way she wanted, so she closed her eyes as the tears fell, and Opie's hand wiped them away with a silent question. "I loved Donna," she answered in a whisper, unable to express herself in any other way than sharing the pain with the man she loved.

He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close, almost burying her body under the weight of that one limb and she melted into his chest. He nuzzled his face into her hair, trying to find the words to say, and when he did he hoped that she would understand. "I loved her, too," he told her. And his breath hitched and his heart pounded and he held her tighter, because he loved Donna, but he loved her first.

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