Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, I just like to play with them.
Spoilers: Takes place after 'Olivia. In The Lab. With The Revolver' and before 'Over There: Part One'.
Author's note: Forgive this ficlet in advance. It was something quick I jotted down in twenty minutes when a friend dared me to write something one day. She was convinced the Boom-boom operator and The Dunhamator were already getting the 'big bang for their buck' before season three, and wanted a literary description of such. My muse was to be the song 'Say Goodbye' by DMB. Needless to say, this was a birthday present. I decided to post it after finding it tucked away on my com's hardrive.
Thought maybe I'd 'share the love' since we all need as much POlivia as we can get during the summer hiatus!
Not much new coming up given the current penning of what's become my novel-long fanfic following 4x19 and 4 x22. It's gonna take a while, me thinks.
Anyways, like I said, please forgive this, but I had ta...
Dedication: To my girl, Elialys, you know I love you, chica! You're one in a million! :)
The first time she knew she'd never say goodbye to him, they'd been at a hotel in Winterset, Iowa.
He'd knocked on her door, after he'd showered, his father asleep in the adjoining room, so he'd come over to review the notes on their current case.
Eighteen bottles into the mini bar, and she'd forgotten completely of their mission, the names, picture and facts of the files before them blurring into a haze of Jack Daniel's effect.
For the past two months she'd been use to it, her blood drowning in alcohol as she'd tried to ignore the truth of his origin, his father's words as he'd confessed that Peter wasn't from her world, he didn't belong to this universe.
As much as she wanted to believe otherwise, he was meant to be a stranger on her plane of existence.
But that night, in that hotel room, he was too welcome to her senses, his smell, on the couch beside her, too tantalizing with the brush of mountain spring and whiskey; soap air-dried to his skin while he'd indulged in another swig from a crackle-rock tumbler.
He'd made a joke about something, a glib she didn't hear because his presence was too pressing on her eardrums, his invisible vibrations pulsing under and through her skin to deafen out anything besides his all too realness. Inhebriated or not, every nerve-end, every one of her atoms had been charged by his static, a kinetic energy that seemed to pool in her lower body with an anticipatory heat.
If we had kissed...he'd said to her, in the car, weeks ago,... but we didn't, I don't want to do anything to jeopardize this...
It was too late for that, she'd thought, even then, there was already too much at stake because he didn't belong here, and he didn't know, and she'd swore to never tell him.
And as she'd looked at him that night, while he recounted some childhood memory meant for a different world, she'd felt too strong a desire, too deep a yearning that demanded be exercised, exhausted out, unleashed.
Every part of her wanted under his hands, to be set free from his truth through his body and his touch. If only so she can make believe, in the moment, that she ever could have had him to begin with.
So she'd crushed her mouth to his, there, on that coach, kissed him for the first time, but he'd pulled her back, shock and surprise etched into his face, his eyes, a slate-gray of confusion, a search of hers for rational reason.
But she didn't give it to him, instead she'd pressed her mouth to his again, lifted herself onto his lap, as his taste dizzied her, infused her, and she ignored his tensity, his resistance, until he'd stopped her again, his hand coming to rest on her neck as his lips left hers.
"Olivia-," he'd said, his voice soft, grasping, "this isn't-"
"We're adults, Peter," she'd answered, her breath heavy, we have needs, she'd said sliently, as she'd pressed her forehead to his, her hands coming to tangle in his hair. "It's just sex."
But before she could initiate again, he'd braced her, both hands cupping her face till it forced her to look at him.
"And what if it isn't?"
The words had been soft, like the pale-blue of his stare, everything about him so heartbreakingly harsh with his meaning in that moment, that it sucked her chest into itself, into the black hole caused by the nothingness of his truth.
So she had to close her eyes then, her cranium bombarded with pain because rationale told her she should think, but she'd fought it, wanted instead disjointedness, to know only the cloudy shroud created by alcohol and carnal lust.
It was illogical to convince herself, that in his eyes was the same thing she'd felt overcome her, slowly and un-avoidably, for the past four weeks. She wasn't going to convince herself, there, on that couch, that he was in love with her too.
It would be too much to bear, if he was, too much a twisting knife to her heart when he finds out the secret she kept from him, and resents her for eternity because of it.
Right then, her only focus could be the brimming heat top-siding her flesh, the taste of his flavor exciting every cell to the point of ignition, of overdrive.
Damn the consequences, she only wanted him on that night, they'd be lovers, tangled tongues and bodies, till the morning when she'd go back to her world, and they'd go back to being friends, working beside each other in a place he's not meant for, a place that intends for her to know life without him, and expects her to be okay with it.
To keep from breaking in that moment, she adhered to self-distraction, a temporary obliviousness that distanced her from reality, made her not think of repercussion, of loss. So her lips found his jaw, trailed over his neck, and as she pressed into him, he groaned her name in warning, swallowed hard as he'd held onto his resistance. Then her fingers found the hem of his T-shirt, lifted it up while under it, they coasted over warm flesh and lean muscle.
"Liv, wait-" he'd whispered, "Just-ugh, jesus, just stop."
And when he'd grabbed her wrists, she'd bit her lip, despising him already, for not giving into her, for not wanting her back, and almost, almost she'd felt like crying, and it wasn't like her, and it wasn't sensible because dammit, she kicked weakness in the ass on a daily basis.
But he wasn't mere weakness, he was so much more then something she couldn't live without, and the way he'd looked at her then, the way he'd brushed his thumb across her chin as his eyes grew dark, obsidian, only augmented the ache throbbing in her lower abdomen, shot it straight up and outward till she clenched it back with tight fists.
"What happens tomorrow?" he'd whispered, as his thick-lashed gaze roamed over her collarbone, her neck, her lips, until he found hers. "If we do this, then what?"
He wanted some kind of validation, some kind of confirmation that she wasn't doing this solely out of need, primal lust, that she didn't want him simply because she was intoxicated, illucid, horny from a two year stretch of not having a man in her bed.
He'd had no way to understand then, that if she didn't have him, on that night, she may never get the chance to know what he felt like in every way that she craved him.
Truth is, she knew then, that when his father tells him, comes clean of his lie, Peter would hate them both for their betrayal, so none of it would matter anyway.
None of what they were about to do, really happened. It would be a veridical hallucination, something beautifully real that never was.
Her pounding heart was bound to crack, no matter what the morning would bring.
"I don't want to think about tomorrow," she told him, "I just want this, Peter. Just tonight, I want this."
Before he could object, she'd braced her arms behind his head, above his shoulders, dug her fingers into the back cushion as she'd kissed him again, hotly, ardently, the sweetness spiraling her every ion out of control, every sensitive facet of her body enticed, burning by his electricity, his taste, and when she pushed into him hard, pressed herself against him, he cursed from the thrill, hot-gold shooting up her body, melting into her bones with swift abandon, and it'd made her grip the couch threads so tight from the pleasure, she wore them thin in her grasp.
"What if I want more then this?" he'd asked, as he'd forced his mouth away, his breath heavy, labored with hers. "What if I want more then one night?"
So much, so much his eyes had told her then, as they tore her soul out, shook it up from the inside, had made her realize the truth she couldn't figure out how to handle.
What if I love you, Olivia? What if this is more for me then a one night stand?
And she had to close her eyes then, bite back the sudden nausea that came with his silent confession, his own, buried secret, the one he wouldn't admit aloud in fear she'd retreat to her solider's corner, hide from him and any open sleeve of emotion. He'd had no idea then, of knowing how badly she wanted to cry from life's injustice, how badly she wanted to tear up her reality, replace it with a fantasy where she could love him freely, and he'd let her because he was never from somewhere else.
Seeing it in his face there, as he looked into her, only grieved her.
Of all nights, on that one, she knew she couldn't bear to hear it, for some sick reason, she didn't want to hear aloud that he loved her because she knew, somehow, in some deep part of her, she knew he'd take it back.
The moment he found out, he'd take it back. It's impossible to love a traitor.
"Why would you?" she'd questioned him anyway, her hands digging into his arms, angry almost that he dared feel for her, when she couldn't even be honest with him. "Why would you want more then this?"
He wasn't offended, or taken-back by her question, and it only made her more unnerved, more unstable inside. Too intimately, he knew her, could ascertain the side of her that dared to ask something so raw, so inviting.
And his pupils had dialated, as his mouth curved, slowly, sexily, his eyes had darkened even more, to an almost blue-black under the hotel room's dim light, and from below her, he rose up, made her slide further onto him till the friction itself could kill her.
"You already know why."
There was nothing she could do anymore, to hold her patience, and when she kissed him again, searched for his tongue, he was pliable under her fingers, willing then, and able because as much as she, he wanted it, had wanted what they'd created there, in that room, for longer than he'll ever come to admit.
And she drilled him back with her body, pushed him into the couch with the force of her ferver, and when his hands came to her waist, she groaned against his mouth, was so malliable under his fingers, that his touch burned right through her. Slowly, his hands had glided under her T-shirt, trailed up her ribs with a thrill that knocked her breath away, so in kind, she tugged at his shirt, had slipped it over his head the moment he pulled back, grasping for air.
Then his lips found her neck, his stubble scratching her skin as he wounded her capillaries, his mouth leaving its mark on the hollow of her throat, and her back had arched from the tickle, from the low pulse of pleasure that was left in the damp welt he'd been leaving.
Too quickly, she'd become abherrent, sound thought trading itself for her acutely tuned nerve-ends, her on-fire synapisis that were scorching her skin with the bare feel of his, and too selfishly, she'd wanted more of it, more of him, so she'd pressed her palms to his warm chest, pushed him back till she savored his swollen lips again with hers, tasted her sweat on the surface of his thin flesh.
His hands had snaked up her rib-cage then, found the underside of her bra and skillfully, he'd breeched it, found the swell of her bare breast underneath and it made her tense against him, the electricity of his body bouncing off of her with hot eagerness, raw want, chemical desire, and there'd been too many barricades between them, too much cotton then she'd perferred, but her aching body didn't have the time to rid them of their clothes.
No longer, were they denied the animal in the other.
The first time they'd made love, was on a couch, half-dressed, half-drunk and fully alive in the hands of the other.
The second time was on that same night, on a rented out-bed, after she'd slid off him, grasping for breath on the couch as he did the same. It'd been too good, too color-blindingly, toe-curling for reasons he wouldn't admit, and she wouldn't let herself consider in fear of breaking down completely.
Then he'd rose beside her, held out his hand to her as she'd brushed hair from her face, unstuck the strands sweat had adhered to her cheeks, her neck.
With a question, she'd looked up at him, unsure of his intent as she tried to find feeling again, in her middle, between her thighs, he'd made her so gloriously numb, she couldn't move in that moment. She'd been pretty sure she'd swore, in the middle of it, a curse provoked from the mind-numbing high she'd embarked on when he scratched a sensitive surface she didn't know could be found.
"There's still six hours till morning," he'd said, his eyes dangerous, delicate, his hair tussled and face flushed with a lover's visage, "If this night is all we have, I say we make good use of it."
And when she'd pressed her hand in his, he'd flung her up, kissed her breathless again till the back of her knees hit the mattress.
And when morning did come, he'd have left, and she'd be alone, and they won't speak again of what happened, three times, in a modest mid-west town on the outskirts of highway eighty-seven.
They won't have the time to reminisce of that night because within the next three he'll leave, be gone without a trace after truth and his anger took him to the world that had bore him.
And she stares at herself now, in the government-building bathroom mirror, her red-rimmed eyes a sign of a vulnerability she won't dare show anyone. Determined, she pushes her hair back, flattens it, impeccable now and neat like her job-issue facade. By gripping the sink, she wills back more tears, braces herself for the dangerous road that lies ahead of her now.
She's going to get him back, going to chase him down in a universe she knows nothing about, has to blindly cross into.
If only to tell him, that she heard him that morning, that she wasn't asleep when he'd whispered in her ear what she'd been to heart-wrenched to hear then.
I love you, he'd said, gently, quietly, breathing her in before he'd kissed her cheek, left the faintest of butterfly kisses against her bare shoulder, I love you, Olivia, but I don't know if you'll ever be ready to hear it. I don't know if you want to be.
Then he'd left her alone, in a bed still warm from the physical role of his words, and he'd have no idea she'd cried then, into the pillow, wetting the feathers with the tears she'd held in that night.
He'd been right, it wasn't just sex, it wasn't just biological release, needs met on a heart-racing scale several times in eight hours, what she'd felt that night was connectivity, synchronicity, the feel of him threatening to break her everytime she'd melded herself to his skin, took in the real feel of his body because if she'd let go, he'd leave her hollow, wounded, dying from the emptiness of what could be his real-world absence.
Everything she feels now, she feared on that night.
It's why she has to find him, has to chase him down in enemy territory, if only to tell him that he was wrong, that she is ready, that she doesn't want only one night either, but a countless number more.
She has to tell him that she needs him here, with her, that her veins still hum from the taste he left in her body, her skin still burns from the fingerprints on the inside of her hips.
That morning, she wanted to pull him back in that bed, into her, and she wants him to know it.
She won't accept this farewell, refuses to.
No matter what he believes, he belongs here, with her.
Because she loves him, and she's ready to tell him.
And she prays to god, he'll listen, gives her the time of day even though she kept such a lie, lived for months with such a secret.
If not, then this is the end.
And she'd rather be buried alive then say goodbye. If he rejects her, it'll be a slow death anyway, killing her from the inside out with her own consequence, making her a silhoutte in his history, somone he used to know... long ago... once.
There is nothing left to lose now. No battle to win besides her own.
She can't be afraid, anymore, to let him know how she feels.
Her heart is the only thing she can risk anymore, the only hope she has to bring him back home.
Just like the empty spot in her bed, it belongs to him anyway.
This isn't how she'll say goodbye.
Not without a fight.