A/N- Lalala, it's OOC and I don't care. I understand that this kind of angsty schmoop would never happen on the show, and especially with such a dramatic, AW flare, but I can't help it. I get an idea and then I go with it. Hope you enjoy, y'all!
The sixteen year old leans forward in the leather seat, cocks her head to get a better view. "There's been an accident, I think."
Alicia's nostrils flare, features solemn. "That would explain the hold up. You're going to be tardy," she adds, disapproving.
There's Mrs. Foley first hour, so Grace doesn't mind, really, a small smile upturning her lips. They move more, enough that the flashing lights of an ambulance are apparent, garish. It's pulled up along the sidewalk awkwardly. "Woah."
Something causes Alicia to do a double take. She'll never be able to quite put her finger on what exactly niggled at her, turned her stomach, but something does. Something makes Alicia roll up to the car in front of her, bumper to bumper, and take a good look at the scene. Alicia winces to herself, ignoring the unrest, all empathy. "That really doesn't look good, huh? That's why you wear your seatbelt, Grace."
Grace rolls her eyes at her mother, but swallows thickly at the people standing about on the pavement, tries to put the pieces together. "There's only one car involved, it looks like. Maybe they hit a civilian? A streetlight?" she wonders aloud.
Finally, they pass the scene, but it's still in Alicia's rearview mirror- and she glances up at it once, twice again. She watches the medics pile into the front seat of the emergency vehicles, and when the doors slam she juts forward, focusing hard on her steering wheel. "Mom, go," Grace admonishes, and Alicia snaps to, puts the car into gear.
A street over, Grace says, very softly, "I'm going to pray for those people involved in the accident, that they're all okay."
By now, the sixteen year old knows her mother's likelihood of encouragement, of more than just a noncommittal nod in her direction, a pass off. But, for some reason, Alicia takes a moment to look at her daughter. Takes a moment to regard her with a loving, adoring stare. Proud of the compassion. Such a sweet girl. Alicia murmurs, "I really hope they're okay too."
Means it, sincerely.
/
Alicia runs herself ragged until noon, back to the offices of F&A for a slice of pizza for lunch, a second to catch her breath. The elevator ride up is its usually creaky stir, and Alicia suddenly hopes the maintenance guy, due sometime later in the afternoon, can fix it- mend whatever he can to make it a little less noisy. She nods to the Sarah, their sole secretary, bee lining to her desk, and she's only stopped by the sound of her name. "Alicia," Cary calls out.
And her head snaps up, alert. She is alert because of the tone he uses.
Like ice in her veins, when she meets his eyes. He looks absolutely drained. The first thing she thinks of is Chum Hum, but then she takes it in, stops and notes everybody's quiet. How she hadn't noticed the terse lack of sound before, she'll never know. How everyone is looking at her like a ticking time bomb.
"What's wrong?" Alicia braces herself, inhales deeply and pushes her shoulders back. She sets her purse on her desk and walks over, waits for him to herd her into a corner so that they can talk privately, or if it's about a client, she's waiting for someone to speak up, to speak of L&G or something.
But Cary says nothing, just looks at her like he's lost the ability to communicate, like he's floundering for leash. "Cary," she lowers her voice, hair on the back of her neck pricking. "Cary, what's wrong?"
He smothers a hand over his forehead, shining under the fluorescent bulbs. "You don't know yet," he states blankly.
It takes her back to the shrine of fear from years before, of refrigerators vacant of notes, of eighteen missed calls, and Alicia tries not to shriek at him, tries not to march up to him and shake him. Throws out, "Are my kids okay? Is it- is it Peter? What the hell is going on? What-
"No, Alicia," he cuts her off, mouth slackened at the implication. "No, it's not-
This is the breakthrough moment another associate, Carey, it seems, deems it fit to step forward, to inform her in a somber, yet utterly even tone, "We might not have to worry about Lockart and Gardner anymore."
There's no logical reason to explain why Alicia feels like she's had the wind taken out of her, but she does. Eyes widen, eyelashes fluttering. "What?"
Carey with an E tells her:
"It's Will Gardner."
The way he says it, it's almost as if Will is-
Conclusions are fickle things, and Alicia blurts, "He's-?" and she doesn't recognize her own voice, and she opens her mouth to say something else, to ask, but then she closes it. There's a rock in her windpipe.
She thinks if she goes to say something else, if she hears it confirmed, if he's, if he's really, if-
Alicia thinks she might start screaming, any moment, and her vision blurs wildly, all whites and greys- but Cary- Cary knows when to intervene, and Cary goes, "No. No, there's just been an accident."
She sucks in an agonizingly sharp breath, and she knows everyone in the room has seen her reaction, even as she sways slightly, and she's trying to get ahold of herself until Cary is finally next to her, finally clenching a hand around her forearm to ground her, to show her that they are in their firm and Will Gardner is not dead, and none of it makes any sense. None of it except for truths, and Will Gardner is not dead.
"That's good," she whispers, weightless.
"It was a car accident," Susie explains, but then breaks off, flustered. "Well, we think it was. Our contacts have only said so much, and it's not really certain yet, but we think Mr. Gardner was running and the car hit him. We're betting the driver was drunk, from what Robyn's friends up at Chicago PD are saying."
Alicia realizes, in an instant, that she has to pull herself together right there and then, no matter the screeching of her heart, the grinding gears, no matter the ache in her stomach like she can't sate a discomfort, squirming.
It's strange, to put her face back on right.
"Alright, well," Alicia clears her throat, grasps the dwindling sanity and redirects. "We all need to stop worrying about L&G anyway. Let's get back to work."
Cary, Carey, and every other associate in the room eye her like she's cellophane, like they can see right through her and her play pretend. But this is her life, her firm that she's given up her morals to obtain, fought tooth and nail and love to fight for.
"Come on," she half growls, bones trembling.
She feels like she's been wrung, but Will Gardner isn't anything to her, anymore.
It doesn't make any difference. (It shouldn't.)
She mentally repeats this to herself until she almost physically says it.
"Let's get back to work," she tells everyone, using her managing partner that's uncannily similar to her mom voice.
After a moment, life begins again.
/
When she'd awoken that morning, hair sweaty and stuck to her forehead, rubbing her thighs together from a dream, a memory, really, of him between her legs- when she'd awoken, she'd been panting. Needy. The alarm was set to go off in thirteen minutes, and she'd had the time to slip a hand down her body, underneath the waistband of her flannel pants. Alicia Florrick remembers things in little flashes.
It had been a remembrance, in memoriam of the way the edge of her kitchen counter had dug into her lower back uncomfortably. He'd hoisted her up onto the cool surface and knelt down level. Sucked and bit like she was a meal, like she was all he'd ever need. As if he'd die if he didn't get another taste. After, he'd kissed her like he was drunk, untucked himself from his slacks and made her moan and writhe.
Will Gardner had told her how it struck him, to hear her being pleasured. It didn't matter if it was by his tongue, by his fingers, by his cock. That all it took was a single sigh to get him going, breathy and alto and Alicia. She'd tested that theory, in his ear.
All tease.
Can recall that he'd twitched in her palm, the weight perfect, the way she'd stroke and twist-
Cautious of rampant dwelling, Alicia closes her eyes and flicks her wrist in steady, strong movements. She's a grown woman, and she knows when to put away torrid affairs, knows that the Will Gardner who faces her off in court isn't the same man he was before she took him and drug him through the mud. Or maybe he was. Maybe she just turned the part of him she never saw before on herself, on full blast. Maybe she's never known him at all, and maybe she dodged the proverbial bullet at Georgetown. Maybe those bold sins were safety nets, and maybe, maybe this is all for the best.
Because whatever it was, it wasn't love.
It was mutual attraction and sweet kisses at Georgetown Law, before the haze of lust threw her brain through a loop, made her someone she isn't, the kind of woman who goes out to lunch with her boss and picks up an orgasm for takeout. Doesn't matter that she and Peter were separated, because facts are facts, and Will was never absolute. Will was never a long term thing.
That's the definition of bad timing, and that's how she's justifying the mess she's making, that's how she's justifying the blood and the tears and the hate. It wasn't love, and yet-
Every time Alicia Florrick deliberately refers to exceptional moments as banging, little pieces of herself shrivel, break like brittle bones. They're fragile, like hope.
Maybe William Paul Gardner was her hope, and maybe he was also her demise, her Achilles heel. It's possible that he never mattered to her at all, all just some cataclysmic paradox, and she knows that none of this matters, knows that speeches given at the Bar Association with him giving her looks and telling her unimaginable things were all just things that happened. They didn't mean anything.
He's her secret keeper, too.
She doesn't know why he sheltered she and Peter from the scandal of the fraud, doesn't particularly care to know why. Likely his own selfish reasons, though she can't blame him. Likely because if they would have gone down, Will would have gone down too. If there's another reason, well. These aren't things Alicia thinks about if she can help it.
But then, hours and hours later, a world she has worked so hard to construct with stilts and dignity and logic, crumbles in an instant. And she doesn't know why.
She doesn't know how.
/
It's like she's laying in a bathtub and the water- or lies and deceits and regrets- are filling up around her, up to her ears, smothering her mouth, her nostrils.
All white noise.
She's drowning and she can't do a damn thing about it.
Can only go to court that afternoon, find David Lee filling in for Diane, as if it's a knock on her door, some painful truth. It's real. Will's really been in an accident, and there's no telling how bad it is, no telling what's left in the wreckage. If Diane is missing court it must be serious enough. It must be terrible. Instinctually knows the habit of coffee at three, but she knows she won't be staying later, knows her frayed patience won't allow for that.
Alicia is leaned up against a wall in the courthouse, glancing over her notes, rereading a line for the fifty second time, that she still doesn't know the meaning of, when out of her peripheral, she sees Kalinda.
Here's the thing: Kalinda Sharma is not her friend.
She was, once. Alicia isn't the kind of person to have girlfriends, just acquaintances, but after Peter, there was Kalinda. A confidante. Someone she could rely on to be there when the foundations grew shaky. Someone to have a shot of tequila with. Someone who saw through her facade, tugged away her layers and layers of excuses- but then Kalinda turned into Leela, and-
No, no. That's not what this is about.
She looks at Kalinda. Knows that Kalinda would know. Trepidation in her every step, Alicia strides forward. Calls out the woman's name, and Kalinda swivels like she's been shocked by a Taser. Maybe this is a bad idea. Maybe it is. There is a part of Alicia Florrick that does not give a damn.
"Kalinda," she lowers her voice, doesn't bother glancing around to see who can hear. "Do you know what happened?"
Slowly, the woman nods. Alicia can't put a finger on her expression. "Can you tell me-
"Alicia," Kalinda cuts her off, shakes her head. "No."
With that, she turns, leather boots and a mini skirt, but something in Alicia pushes, fights. Something in Alicia, in all her married way, in all her civil war, in all her gunfire heart, something makes her heave one, short syllable.
"Please."
Seems like Kalinda actually freezes, the way she physically stops.
Alicia doesn't recognize her own voice, goes to clasp a hand over her mouth again because she can't believe she just sounded so torn, so begging, so—
So heartbroken. Weak.
She's tried these past few months, to never, ever be weak.
And now it's all out the window, all because-
"Please," Alicia repeats, trying to get a grip, even as Kalinda walks back toward her, pulls her by the arm to a place they won't be as seen.
"Okay," Kalinda relents in a whisper, visibly deflating. That thing she couldn't understand in Kalinda's mannerisms- it's sadness. Kalinda is sad. Kalinda is shaken.
Somewhere, pigs are doing aerial ballet.
/
Once upon a time, Alicia thought there was such thing as good people. She prided herself on being a good person, silly and black and white as it might have been. Knew that the decisions she made were something she could be proud of, could logically explain.
Alicia gets in her car, that afternoon. The sun is going down and traffic is starting to wane, and Grace and Zach are probably already off doing what they usually do on Monday mornings. Cary probably needs her back at the office for a few more hours, sorting out some things for tomorrow's depo, but-
Alicia takes a moment. It's similar to how once upon a time, Alicia would sit with a wine glass, stew in the silence. Except this is different, a world away, because she's not a stay at home mother anymore. She's this person with her walls, and all the foundations are going to hell. And Alicia is a grown woman, but in that moment, knowing that Will Gardner is currently in a medically induced coma, and there is absolutely nothing anyone can do, nothing she can do to take back all the words said in spite, how they've stared in vicious rages, hated each other. She feels like a child.
Alicia slams her hands against her steering wheel.
It's bruising her knuckles, but she keeps going until she's shuddering all over, skin the color of milk, and she looks at her sore hands like foreign objects.
Proof, she thinks, that good people do terrible things.
/
She said, "Please don't hate me."
He said, "You're awful."
/
Grace knows what's wrong the moment she drags her feet in the door, heels sliding with uneven steps. Alicia put back up the floodgates, reassembled her façade. It's on the news, she's been told. Someone had a camera phone at the scene.
At bible study, Sam had the television on and Grace had caught a glimpse of it, remembered Will Gardner on the phone with her a few months ago, heart heavy in her chest. It's weird, because isn't Will Gardner the man her mom was going to date-slash- did date? Isn't it weird that Will Gardner could have been, like, her step father?
Still, the newscaster had warned about graphic imagery in the video taken, and Grace had realized 'disturbing to some viewers' meant either blood, splayed bones, or guts- and Grace, even if Will was nothing to her- Grace knew two things. One, she didn't really have any desire to see the video. Two, her mom probably didn't need to see the video.
Zach's at a friend's house, which is for the best, because when her mother strolls through the door earlier than usual, a quarter til nine, Grace leans up against the kitchen counters and prepares.
"Grace," her mom greets, half there. "What are you doing in here? Did you already have pizza, or-
"Mom," she catches her attention firmly. "You've heard about the accident, right?"
Her mother's eyebrows shoot to her hairline, something crooked in her disbelief. "Yes. How did you?"
These days, it's difficult to have a conversation with her mother that doesn't include rolling her eyes. It's a struggle.
"Mom, it was on at six. And eight. And online. But do you know anything else?"
Her mother swallows, setting down her purse and stepping out of her heels. "No. He's not my boss anymore, honey."
"I know that," Grace amends, not fooled in the slightest by her mother's nonchalance. Her mother is fighting to quell it, and all the sixteen year old can do is stand there in watch. She doesn't know why it matters to her so much, anyway. Months ago, she hated the sight of her mother even getting into the same car as the man, but this is different. It just is. "But, you liked him as a friend, before. Right? You-
She's struggling for how to put it, and it's strange how suddenly she wants her mother to be honest with her, of all people. Her mother has never spoken about it, and maybe that's for the best, but still. Grace knows it's not because there's nothing to tell.
Suddenly, the secrets seem like lies to Grace. Dirty little things.
"You cared about Will," Grace mutters, and her mother's eyes widen exponentially.
"Grace," she mouths, and Grace watches her mother's face crumple, and then go back to normal, all in the same second. Makes a weird comparison of those childhood toys that had the ability to shrink, but could still stay expanded, but could still retain normality. "Grace, you don't know-
"Mom," she cuts Alicia off, puffing up her chest. "He could die."
Alicia's mouth goes slack of whatever it was she was going to say, and-
And Grace Florrick could count on her hands the number of times she's seen her mother cry, she really could. It's not that her mother is a cold person, but her mom also always thinks she has to be okay, has to keep it together. It's strange to watch her mother's eyes fill with tears, right there in the kitchen, the pizza gone cold.
Usually there's some big discussion, some break in communication that leads to her mother crying, generally holding Grace, but instead, it's Grace that steps forward, juts out her chin. She's not exactly a child anymore, and her mother-
Her mother is hurting.
Grace wraps her arms around her mother, and her mother pulls her in, clings to her. Caramel hair wets with tears, and she hears her mother sniffle once, twice, before letting go. Then her mother laughs. "When did you become the parent, huh? I'm okay, Grace, really."
Grace frowns, still hugging her mother. "No, you're not, Mom."
Finally, some of the surety in Alicia's demeanor fades, and Alicia has always been a realist, but not always around her kids. Finally, Alicia frowns too. Honest.
"You're right," Alicia relents gravely, reaching up to pat Grace's hair.
"Could he really die?" Grace asks, cautious. The reports had only said so much, really. Just traumatic injuries, critical conditions. Critical means death, doesn't it?
Alicia looks haggard, staring off into space when she answers, numb. "That's what they're saying."
Grace doesn't respond, but tights her grip around her mother's waist. Holding her together in the best way she can, the best way her mom would probably allow.
/
It's ten thirty when Alicia is sitting up in bed, still wide awake. Her eyes burn the mental and emotional exhaustion, but she's still wired with a thousand possibilities. It's silly. She has other things. It's silly that Grace saw any of that, that Grace even had the opportunity to catch Alicia's unease, but still, Alicia stays awake and she knows what she could do. Knows what she wants to do.
Now, all that's left is to make herself move. To garner the courage.
The last time she'd seen Will was four days ago.
They had been in the same room three hours, feet away, and never spoken directly to one another. Hardly even looked at each other.
Alicia doesn't know why that realization makes her want to cry more than knowing he died on the scene, only came back because the medics revived him, knowing that he was gone and that he could still be going and-
Alicia picks up her phone and scrolls through the contacts.
"Hello?" a voice on the other end of the line answers, a woman still as wide awake as she is.
"Diane," she says, and she focuses on making sure her tone is even. "Hi."
/
She's still up at three in the morning, sitting on the couch, knees pulled up to her chest. Doesn't really think about anything in particular, and it's funny in a not so funny way, how she really has no idea why she's acting the way she is. She knows, but she doesn't. She should know better than to act like this.
For some reason, even through all of this, the memory that sticks with her most is the smell of him, how he'd be above her, she underneath him, her hands clenched around his biceps, his mouth buried in her bossom, and she would inhale the spice of his cologne, the scent of something inexplicably Will. And he hates her, something awful. He hates her and even now, even if he were to somehow wake up, internal bleeding and everything wiped clean, even now, if they were in the same room, it's likely he wouldn't want to look at her.
She would give into the temptation of staring at him, anyway.
She'd do it in a heartbeat. Just to know he was okay.
Alicia whimpers.
/
She calls Cary, and Cary understands. Says he's sending flowers on behalf of Florrick, Agos, even if it won't be received in the cleanest light. Northwestern Memorial Hospital is already teaming with life at nine in the morning. Visiting hours began fifteen minutes ago, and Alicia moves to the front desk, gives the lady at the front desk the very same number Diane had given her the night before.
Alicia had begged Diane like she had begged Kalinda, and she's not ashamed.
Doesn't give a damn. Doesn't give a damn.
The ride up to the floor makes her track back, makes her think of Will pushing up against her in that elevator, his mouth and hands everywhere, and her heart aches in her chest like a pulsing bruise. Alicia fastens her mouth and clenches her fists, steps out of the elevator and pushes her shoulders back.
There's a girl of barely thirty, just outside his room.
Aubrey has Will's eyes.
"You're Alicia," Aubrey acknowledges hesitantly, as if trying to feel around for the proper placement of the name. "Will has talked about you before, I think. Hi. I'm-
"Aubrey," Alicia finishes, lips curling despite the discomfort unfurling it's ugly hands in her stomach, despite the angst. "Aubrey, yes. Will has talked about you."
Aubrey pushes a lock of hair behind her ear, cocking her head. This time, her smile wavers. "You're here to see-
"Yes. If you'll," Alicia looks down, mouth suddenly dry. "If you'll let me."
"We're still waiting for him to wake up," Aubrey tells Alicia. "There was a lot of damage, you know, and even though they've lifted the drugs since last night at seven, he's still out because maybe his mind still needs time to heal, so-
"Will is a very strong person," Alicia murmurs quietly, tries to reassure Aubrey by reaching out and squeezing her shoulder. "He'll be alright."
"We can only hope," Aubrey responds, nodding.
As Alicia moves to pass, enter with shaky legs, Aubrey stops her with a hand on her arm. A tug. "You left him, I know. Diane, his partner, had called Sara earlier to inform her you'd be here, and Sara called me, but Alicia-
Aubrey inclines her head. "I like you better than his side piece, Isabel. So. Could you maybe, I don't know, stick around?"
"Do you think Will would let me?" Alicia questions, half joking.
"I think he would," Alicia hears, just as Aubrey walks away. "Bye, Alicia."
/
She grips her purse's strap for dear life.
It's cold, in the room. Smells like antiseptic and cleaning fluid, smells like a hospital. Alicia hates it, has since she rushed to her father's bedside to find him already gone. She hates this place, but mostly she hates what it represents.
Heart a fluttering bird, listening to the machines are beeping, the wires connecting bright in her vision, whir of some kind of contraption. She sits down and she can't bring herself to, but she does. She allows herself to move her eyes across him, study what she sees. Take it in.
He looks like he's asleep.
It's a good memory, one that comes quick, of him that first night, how he'd fallen asleep and she'd stayed awake to watch his features relax. He looks like a little boy when he sleeps. Innocent. Just as handsome, but something gentle in the curve of his mouth. The only things that mars it now is the cut stitched up on his temple.
The ghastly paleness of his skin, with the slight stubble on his cheeks.
Alicia bites her tongue so hard she tastes copper.
A nurse startles her, comes in to fiddle with the bags hanging on metal poles. The woman has white hair, a stern exterior, but she glances at Alicia for just a moment. "You can talk to him, hun," she tells Alicia off handedly. "People like that can hear, sometimes."
The nurse leaves, and Alicia doesn't move from the uncomfortable chair she finds herself in. Alicia reaches out, then pulls her hand back.
Doesn't know what to do.
"Hey," she murmurs, but she's looking at the tray table, the beaten plastic of the surface. "Hey, Will."
Will doesn't make any movement that signifies he's heard her, and Alicia feels stupid. She feels old, and she feels stupid. She says so.
"I told you going for runs early in the morning was a bad idea twenty years ago," Alicia says suddenly, even if she's talking to herself. "You didn't listen to me then, did you? I always said we should go together. I miss it. I miss our runs."
Alicia stops, and then continues.
"After I had Grace, I started running again. But then it wasn't the same, and I stopped. Grace knows," Alicia inhales, turns her head. "Grace knows there was something and-
"There's not, though," Alicia mutters, remembering a diner, with Will and his hard eyes. God, she just wants to see his eyes open. Looking at her. "You said I was up for it, and I didn't know if I was at the time, but I am now. I'm up for you being mad at me."
Like moving through sand, she reaches her hand out. Touches the flesh of his palm, and then jerks away like she's been burned. He's cold, and it hurts. It hurts.
"Will, I didn't mean to hurt you," she confesses to the lull of beeping, tears blurring her vision. "I never wanted you hurt. I never wanted any of this. And I'm sorry."
Alicia breaks off, reaches out and touches his palm wholly, despite the frigid skin, she allows her own manicured hand to span out over his, takes it in her own. He wouldn't be holding her hand, if he was awake. But now he's hurt, and he needs someone to hold on, and she's here. She wasn't here before, hasn't had the ability within her, but she's here right now. She's here, and he's still here, and that is what matters.
"I'm right here. I'm right here, and when you wake up, we're going to talk. If you want to talk to me, I'm going to be here. Because I need-
Alicia's leans her head down to touch the hospital sheets, uncaring that her makeup is smearing when she buries her face to muffle the noises of crying. Weakness, she's being weak, and it's too much. It's too much to think that she-
"I tried to stop it by leaving, but it didn't just stop, and I'm sorry that I did this to us. And I'm staying this time. In whatever way you want, I'm going to stay. So, please, please, wake-
His hand moves.
Curls.
It's so quick she gasps, but doesn't pull away, just trails her eyes up to realize his head is positioned upward, straining to get a good view of her. Will's eyes are only partially opened, but they're brown and warm and Will. And she's stuck there, just looking at him, until he moves his hand again, against her cheek.
He caresses her cheek, and then she realizes-
He's wiping away her tears.
And she's mortified. And she's happy.
Alicia is like a balloon losing all its air when she leans into his hand, doesn't ever, ever look away from his gaze that sears her. She knows he must need water, must be thirsty, but they aren't communicating like that right now. They don't need it.
Only for him to hear, only for him, she tells him,
"I love you."
She says it and she looks right at him. She says it, and then she presses her mouth to his palm in a kiss. Will's eyes are more alert, and they crinkle suddenly. He doesn't say anything, but he makes this sound in the back of his throat.
Will's mouth crumples, like he's going to cry, or he's in pain, and Alicia nods, understands. He's okay. He's okay.
"I love you," she repeats. The only truth.
Then she barks out a laugh, the joy expanding in her core. Will's trying to smile through the tears too, uncontrollable.
Alicia kisses his palm again, and closes her eyes to savor it all.