He's presented it to her – given her all the answers, he's laid all his cards on the table. She just wishes it were enough. She wishes her questions about him were the only thing holding her back, guarding her, protecting her from the harsh light of day and the reality of a life of being more. If only it were that simple. It never is. She doesn't falter, doesn't flinch, when he tells her he's here, has been for four years, loving her and waiting for her. She's afraid that if she does flinch, she will come undone and she can't afford that right now – not with what's at stake here. She's worked too hard and for too long for this. Truth conquers all. People sacrifice for justice. Her mother sacrificed her life. Who is she to refuse to sacrifice her heart when her mother gave up so much more?
.:.
The look on his face, eyes brimming with tears, face ridden with concern, love, fury, everything she feels but cant say, everything she won't dare put words to, tells her that he's had enough. For her, it's too much and too little all at once. It's not enough – not enough to undo all the doesn'ts. Doesn't trust her, not completely. Doesn't love her, not enough to be honest with her about the most important thing in her life. Doesn't support her, not enough to help her put this thing to rest. Doesn't respect her, not enough to let her make her own decisions. She knows, if she's honest with herself, how ridiculous these notions are as she recounts all the ways in which he's proven to her, time and time again, that these doesn'ts are unwarranted, but they're all she has to keep that wall standing, so she allows her mind to flood with them, fueling her mind towards her mother's killer. She has to keep focused, can't afford to lose sight now. Her mind spins as he tells her in so many words how he loves her, saying all the things she wishes she could, but cant, say back. It's too much to process. It's too confusing. She shuts down.
.:.
His cards may be out on the table, but she keeps hers close to her chest, not willing to let go of what little she can hold, manipulate, control. She's unsure, unwilling to risk her heart and his for something more, when she's not sure if she would be able to fully ever walk away from the thing that has defined her for so long. She needs to end this and she knows if she goes to her grave trying to find justice for her mother justice with him by her side, he'll willingly go down with her. He'll go down to save her. She can't let another man do that for her, especially not him.
.:.
He gives her so much, and she gives back so little, and she knows it's not fair and it's not right but she's so dependent on him, leans on him so heavily that she's not sure she'll stand up-right on her own anymore, as she watches him walk away. She figures she's about to find out where she truly stands. He gives and gives and she takes it all with greedy hands, never willing to give back in any sort of justified equivalence. She knows he loves him, she sees it every day in all the things he does and says, all the things he doesn't say. She sees it in all the ways he knows her, cares for her, and she lets him revel in her daily, because he kept coming back. She knew this couldn't last forever. She should have started giving back long ago. But nobody can wait forever and she can't fault him for that. It's not his fault – he doesn't ask for more, never really has before tonight.
You give me miles and miles of mountains, and I'll ask for the sea.
.:.
She can't help but be scared because she knows that within him is the thing that will break her - his entire, all encompassing heart, filled with so much love it could crush them both. If she let him, now, he could tear down that wall. But to do that would mean to trust each other, to give him her heart, and worse, to hold his. And she knows her unsure nature and her clumsy hands will, inevitably, crush it. She's never been good at keeping beautiful things. As a young girl she caught a butterfly in a net, running through the park. So desperate to see, to explore, to get a better look, she removed it. So overwhelmed by it's captivating beauty, she fumbled and crushed it. One wing fallen, she realized it would never fly again. She can appreciate the symbolism of that – she guesses she got that from him. She knows him well enough to know that he loves her in a way that spans in every direction, consuming them both in a deep and huge and forever and always kind of way and that if she hurts him, if she can't truly let everything go, he'll be crushed. He'll never fly again. Like an addict and their drug of choice, she can't walk away from her past. So she watches as he walks away from their future.
.:.
She's hanging off a building – not the way she'd expected to go. Not like this, nothing like this. Falling to her death seems so tragic and undignified for a cop. The heights making her dizzy, the heartbeat racing in her ears, and the weight of her flailing body pulling too hard against her thin arms prove to be too much. The pads of her fingers start to wear and slip and soon, she's falling and the grip of steady hands is pulling her back from the edge. She wishes it hadn't taken going over the edge of that wall to knock down the remaining bricks in hers.
It's not until she see's his face – not the him she had wanted to see – that she realizes what it had meant when he'd walked away, when she'd let him walk away. He offered her anything, everything, and she refused him to go blindly at the man who would, in all likeliness, kill her like he had her mother and so many others. Thoughts of him, his face, their life, the future they could have had, flooded her mind in the seconds before she falls. She was so sure it was him, it had always been him saving the day, and saving her. Since before they were partners, with his books, with his words. He was always the one pulling her back from the edge. But this time, it wasn't. And in that moment she knew that there really were no words to put to it, nothing she could say would ever be enough, nothing would tell him all the ways in which she's grown and changed and strengthened because of him, for him. She was a shell of a woman – now she is whole. Now she would show him.
.:.
Despite the revelations in the rain, the cleansing of sins, of past, of mistakes, as she sat in the rain, she couldn't find the words to put to it. Words were never her strong suit – they were his, and she simply reveled in them. But to the man who loved her, all of her, and knows her best, words weren't important. But he needed to be sure.
You…. I just want you.
His kisses are burning, searing each part of her skin, never touching enough of her, never close enough to her. Her legs weaken, overwhelmed by the loss of everything she's given up and the realization of what she's gained in doing so. Her mind is lost in the moment, they're here, together, and that's enough. She kisses and touches and feels and burns up in his arms as his hot mouth devours the trickles and rivers of water that fall from her hair, pool across her bones and her body. She'd always been in control, and she revels in the fact that she doesn't want it, doesn't need it, not when she can open herself up now and dive in. Together, they're on fire, a slow burn but a hot, never-ending blaze, embers burning into the long hours of the night. Too hot to touch but too consuming to stop.
.:.
One thing was clear to her now: A beautiful life holds no meaning if not shared. Even if she had one day found redemption and justice for her mother, would that be the sum of her life's work? She wanted to be more, and with him, she was. She was better, stronger. She was whole. She knows that now, and as hard as it is to close this chapter of her life, she's opening a new one - a better, brighter one. She may not have the words yet, the three words she's all too sure he longs to hear, but she knows this much – when they do come, I love you, they will never hear the end of them.
This story will never end.
The story of them, beating the odds,
Always.