So I don't know how I, one of the biggest CZ fans in the world, could have survived so long and not watched The Pain in the Heart properly yet! It's the episode with the most canon CZ moment in it! But this fic is set after that episode, as best I know it, with all the girls' reactions to Zach leaving. Hope you enjoy.
Disclaimer: If it were mine…damn, I'd quit University.
She locked the door, leaned on it, and let them fall. The tears she had pent up all day. They had been there at the brink ever since she had heard the truth.
How could he do this? How could he? She slid down the length of her door as the sobs shook her shoulders.
Why was she crying? Zach was a grown man. He could do whatever he wanted, and if that included becoming a murderer, then that was all on him. She had meant it when she told Dr. Brennan that he should be locked up for the rest of his life for what he did. He was a killer, and killers belonged behind bars…even if they really too cute to go to jail. Or if they were the best employee in the world.
She might love him, but that didn't detract from the fact that he should be punished for what he did.
And it didn't stop the hurt either.
Cam buried her face in her hands and let the tears flow.
………………………………………..
She couldn't cry anymore. All the moisture was gone from her eyes. But she still wanted to cry more. Cry until this ugly mess was over. Cry until it brought Zach back.
Sitting in her office, Angela focused her red eyes on nothing in particular. A plant. The scarf she had hanging over a chair. The floor.
A dry sob escaped from her throat.
She had been shocked, along with everybody else, when they found out about Zach. But for some reason, she didn't think anybody felt as bad as she did right now.
How could she have missed the signs? If he had been lonely, withdrawn, angry, acting weird(er than usual), she should have picked up on it. She knew her friends, could pick up on the slightest changes in their behaviour. Why did she miss this?
She didn't talk to him enough. Didn't hug him enough. Didn't compliment him enough. Didn't take the time out to ask him how he was. Didn't make him soup, didn't kiss him on the cheek, didn't just say hi nearly as often as she should have.
She felt horrible.
One last tear formed and fell down her cheek.
……………………………………………..
She had been lying in a pool of her own tears for about five minutes.
Although it was illogical to think so, she felt her whole world had turned upside-down. The best intern she had ever had is instead and apprentice for a deviant psychotic murderer. It didn't seem right. It didn't seem real.
Booth had made her feel better earlier, but as soon as he left her, the doubts came back. Had she really done all she could for Zach?
All these memories came flashing back to her. Zach when she had first met him. Zach in the lab. Zach when he got his doctorate. Zach when he came back from Iraq. Zach when…
He looked so scared. Those beautiful hands of his, destroyed, irreparable damage that would probably be lasting.
But that had been okay. He had gone to the hospital. The important thing had been that he would recover.
When she and Booth had come back, with all the knowledge of what Zach had done, she had felt numb. It wasn't real, it wasn't happening. Her conscious mind didn't want to process what was going on. When she watched the play of emotions on Cam's face, how it had turned from bright and happy, all the way to hurt and confused all in a space of minutes, that is when her conscious mind woke up. This was real…
She didn't want it to be real…
Tears continued to soak into the fabric of her couch.