A/N: I thought I posted this days ago, but I guess it didn't go through. So since the episode already happened and I still haven't seen it yet, I guess you can think of it as AU. Just…something.
Disclaimer: I don't own shite. Errors are my own.
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The pure unadulterated rage that flowed through her was making it nearly impossible for her to breathe. She dropped her belongings in the foyer of her home, and headed straight for the mini bar. She didn't bother looking for anything specific. She grabbed the first bottle and poured into one of the tumblers Louis gave her when he was attempting to kiss her ass for one reason or another. The glass shook in her hand as she drained the alcohol, the burn flaring up in her chest before reaching her unsettled stomach. She bowed forward, dark hair falling over her shoulders as she kicked off her Manolos and commenced to pacing back and forth across her plush white carpet.
The shadowy figure on her couch caught her eye and she exhaled slowly. She knew he was there the moment she stepped through the door. She could feel him. Feel his presence, as if she was hyperaware, attune, and hypersensitive when it came to him. She didn't stop her pacing, but rubbed her temples before running her fingers through her hair.
"Jess..." Harvey's voice was low and cautious. It was enough to make her laugh if she weren't so angry. He picked a fine time to decide he wanted to be cautious.
"No!" She hissed. She narrowed her eyes at him. "You, don't get to call me Jess right now." She cringed at the way her voice came out as a growl. She preferred calm and low. She always thought that was more effective. More intimidating. Barely managing to get words out through gritted teeth was always a sign that she wasn't in control. She liked being in control. She needed control. She raked slender fingers through her hair and clutched at her head. She stopped mid-pace and exhaled.
"What the hell are you doing here Harvey? I told you to go!" Her voice came out cold and steely and she could see that her overall demeanor was affecting him. He seemed anxious, wringing his hands together, tie askew, jacket abandoned on the couch, his hair looked as though he had been running his hands through it from the time he left the office to the time he got there.
"You told me to leave the office." He said quietly, his dark eyes piercing and guarded.
"I told you to go, Harvey." She snapped back. "As in home." The ire she felt while facing him was unlike anything she felt towards him before. She could tell he noticed. The way he shifted on the couch, and couldn't meet her gaze for longer than a couple of seconds. He studied her though, her body language, her voice, the way that she stood behind a love seat ten feet away from him, her fist clutching onto the throw draped over it as if it were her lifeline. She couldn't be near him. She wouldn't be near him. She needed to distance herself as much as she could because...wasn't that the reason they were in a mess to begin with? She could never really distance herself from him. She was a goddamn moth to his flame, and in the end she always got burnt. Harvey was a wildfire, untamed and powerful. But he consumed everything and everyone around him, engulfed them in his bullshit and took them down, leaving nothing but ashes as he continued to burn brightly.
The silence between them was long and charged. The tension was unbearable. His lips were pursed, jaw tense, and she could tell he wanted to say more but he was holding back, biting his tongue, too aware of just how close to the edge she was, or maybe not quite aware of how close she was to snapping, so he decided his best option was to feel her out before really engaging. She turned away from him to take a breather. A dull throbbing has formed in her head and his mere presence only made it that much worse.
"Do you love me?" She inquired her voice dangerously low. She turned around to face him, her fists punching into the back of the love seat as she leaned forward. It was a power pose, her standing above him. Her eyes bored into his and with a slight shake of her head she silently warned him not to look away.
He seemed genuinely flabbergasted. He opened his mouth, but shut it just as quickly, his brow furrowed, unsure of how to best respond. "Do you care about me at all?" She snapped hotly.
A long moment passed as she waited for him to process the question, or his response, she wasn't sure which.
"You know how I feel about you Jessica," he whispered quietly, carefully. "You know I care about you."
" Bull. Shit." She spat out. A bubble of hysterical laughter rose up in her throat but she swallowed it back. "You don't give a damn about me, Harvey. You don't give a damn about anyone but yourself."
"That's not true Jessica, "he shot back firmly, defensively. He sighed, clearly aggravated that it was something he even had to prove. "You're. . ." He gave a half shrug but didn't break eye contact with her. "You're my family."
She scoffed, rolling her eyes before standing upright. "You say that word like you know what it means when you don't.
"If I'm your family you wouldn't keep..." She swallowed thickly her voice breaking off "…hurting me. You wouldn't keep putting me in positions like this." She exhaled slowly, shakily.
"Look. Louis came into my office and I tried Jess, I really tried-"
"I don't give a shit" she all but shrieked. "You hit him. A friend. A co-worker. I don't care what the hell he did; you don't lay hands on a single one of my people! Ever!" She squeezed her eyes shut and breathed through the frustration. "I just, I don't care. I can't care anymore. Because clearly you don't."
"Dammit Jessica that's not fucking true!" His voice rose another octave.
"Really Harvey? Here's what's true. You physically assaulted a colleague, a member of our family" she growled. "And over some bullshit. Because it's always bullshit with you isn't it Harvey? You know how I know you don't understand family? Because you broke a promise to Louis and lied about it. And when he called you out on it, and defended his family, protected his family, you couldn't take that shit to the chin, you couldn't respect a man who behaved no differently than you would have if it was your family, you assaulted him!"
"That's not fair," he bolted out of his seat and pointed at her.
"Oh look, how defensive he gets," she muttered. "No," she started coolly, taking him in, the tension in his posture, the way he loomed over the coffee table and glared at her. "No, what's not fair is that we all have goddamn demons but yours haunt the rest of us every single day. What's not fair is how everyone you come into contact with has to pay for Her mistakes!
Harvey gritted his teeth, the pulsing of the vein in his forehead giving his anger away.
"You spend so much time trying to avoid anyone who reminds you of her. You spend all your time trying not to be taken advantage of like your father, trying not to be like her, and yet here you are, constantly hurting the people who actually give a damn about you. Constantly screwing them…screwing me over. You go through women like you go through hair gel. You admire them from afar, appreciate what they have to offer you, but you're incapable of really loving them, accepting them, respecting them, because deep down no matter who they are, no matter what they do for you, no matter how close you get to them, you only see them as her!"
Harvey's fists clenched and he took a step forward towards her, his face turning red. His breathing heavy. His eyes narrowed and the anger radiating off of him was a force of its own.
"What Harvey?" She took a step from around the love seat and stood toe to toe with him. "Are you going to hit me now?" She shouted. "Because I can take a hit, boy, but I will lay your ass out." The wild look in his eyes surely was a reflection of her own as she stood in front of him solid and unmoving, glaring at him, a heavy silence filling the space between them.
"I would never hit a woman," he ground out through gritted teeth. The look on his face a mixture of anger and hurt. His fists were clenched so tightly his knuckles were white.
"You can hate us though, right? No matter how much you love us or care about us you can still hate us. Hold us to impossible standards, take advantage of us, take us for granted, me, Scottie, Esther, the hundreds of women I've seen you with over the years, Donna..."her voice was quieter as she took in the tension in his body, the sheen forming on his forehead, the measured breaths he took. He stumbled past her and headed to the bar. He shakily filled a glass with water, gulped it down before falling on the couch.
"Oh my God, "she laughed bitterly. She ran her hands through her hair. "It's not fair," she repeated. A sense of hysteria was kicking in and she knew she was on edge. She was just so tired. Of everything.
"What's not fair?" He asked quietly once he got control over himself. His shirt was clinging to him from sweating so much, so he unbuttoned and removed it without looking at her. He was either too angry or too embarrassed to bother.
"You're not fair!" She scoffed. She sunk into the nearest seat and looked at him dubiously. "I-I..." a bubble of laughter cold and bitter escaped her throat and she didn't even bother stifling it. "I can't even have an honest conversation with you for once. I can't even vent, truly vent, without you having an anxiety attack. Even when it isn't..." She sighed. "It always goes back to you." A familiar warmth flooded her chest and she eyed him speculatively. "Are you...are you okay now?" She asked the question genuinely concerned but it still made her angry.
"You knew?" he mumbled, guarded dark and eyes meeting hers.
"I suspected, "she confirmed. He was angry with her still; she could see it in his eyes. "I had Rachel keeping an eye on you."
He exhaled and sat back, as if distancing himself as much as he could from her. "Why didn't you say anything? Why didn't you look after me?" He regarded her with an indecipherable look and her face flushed. So many feelings were warring inside of her that she couldn't come up with a name for all of them.
She squeezed her eyes shut tightly and tried to stop the shaking of her own hands. "Because my concern for you, my feelings, my relationship with you....you, you are my demon." She replied truthfully. He studied her but said nothing, and the urge to vent even more, to school him more took hold of her.
"You, you are my cross to bear, the goddamn monkey on my back. You're the scarlet H on my lapel. You're the weight on my shoulders, the burden. You're the anchor holding me down. You're my exposed nerve. You, my relationship with you is my weakness. It's my most obvious weakness. It's the one easily exploited, easily utilized, in every game that's played, in every move that's made. It's you. It's always you. Even when it's not about you it's you."
He averted his eyes, processing what she was saying, rubbing hands across his face and resting his elbows on his knees before looking back up.
"And you know that, and you use it whenever it suits you. You throw it up in people's faces, that your "mom's favorite". You manipulate people with it, you manipulate me with it. You take advantage of it, and you take me for granted. You test our relationship to the max...to the limit, and you don't think it can break. I don't think you think it can break. But you have to be smarter than that, so do you just not care if it does? Is it that you're that self-destructive, or you just really don't give a shit? "
He jerked as if she had slapped him. He remained speechless.
"I have become a joke. Because of you I'm a walking punchline. I keep bending for you and accommodating for you. I keep having to adapt to your choices and your decisions. I have to fix your problems, because you have become some extension of me. I keep compromising for you, and I've been doing it so long and it keeps putting me at risk, putting my firm at risk...all your shit with Mike, your shit with Louis, Donna. Your stunts that almost always put my business at risk regularly. I keep compromising myself for you and you don't even bother to spare me. You don't make anything easy for me. You don't think about anything, because you just know that I'll have your back. But do you think about what you cost me?
"Where's the reciprocity, Harvey?" She could feel herself getting winded as she cradled her head in her hands before looking back up at him. "I cover for you, I lie for you, I bend for you, I break for you, I fall on my sword for you and I'll probably die for you at this rate, because God knows I'm not getting any younger. But what am I really getting back here? Can you ever just...try?" Her head fell back on the couch but she didn't break her eyes away from his. "You work me up, give me just enough to hold me over, then you work me over again."
"Jessica, I have always been loyal to you. I have always looked out for you," Harvey stated evenly.
"Don't," she laughed bitterly. "Don't you sit there and lie to me like that. We both deserve better than that."
He furrowed his brow, processing what he said that rang untrue, and the moment it dawned on him what his error was he sighed. "I don't mean to disappoint you. I don't intend to hurt you."
"Yeah," she let out a puff of air. "I believe that. I believe you believe that. But your intent doesn't mean shit if the result is the same."
"What do you want from me?" He was agitated and exasperated, his fingers steepled beneath his chin and his knee bounced up in down trying to contain his raw energy.
"I haven't decided yet. But, you know, I'll come up with something. I always have to come up with something." She sighed.
"I thought having a partner would mean I'd have someone, people to help me carry the load. I thought I wouldn't have to be a fixer, or a goddamn referee. But apparently I was wrong. My partners are like two insubordinate children and I spend more time cleaning up their messes and demanding them to play nice than I do dealing with anything else...
"How the hell am I supposed to save you this time, Harvey? Huh? How am I supposed to get you out of this jam without it costing me? My integrity is on the line, has been for years, but this might be the last straw. How am I supposed to send a message without firing you? Did you even think about that? What this will look like to everyone who thinks that you always end up being the exception to the rule because you think you're above them? Have you even thought about the thin ice I skate on daily because of my loyalty to you? Do you even..." her voice broke off and she eyed her empty glass on the table afraid she might need a refill.
"Jessica," Harvey's voice was uncharacteristically strangled and she wondered if this time he may have really heard her enough for it to make a difference. "What can I do?" He repeated the question again, an eerie conviction in his voice that gave her some hope that maybe they'd break the vicious cycle they were in.
"What can you do..."She put her feet up on the coffee table, studied him thoroughly before sighing, and too drained to get worked up all over again.
"You can polish your armor and sharpen your sword, Harvey. You're going to war. Louis is filing charges. I can't say that I blame him. And I'm dragged along for the ride." Dark chuckles escaped her lips, as she looked up at the ceiling.
"He started that shit first!" Harvey's angry yelling was expected, so she didn't flinch. "This is bullshit!" His fist came down on something, she wasn't sure. Her eyes were still trained on the ceiling.
"This is bullshit. And yet, it's the consequences, the fallout of whatever the hell part you played."
"I'm going to give that weasel a piece of my mind!" He stood up suddenly and gathered his belongings.
"You don't go anywhere near him and don't you dare defy me on this! So help me..." She hissed icily, she shot daggers at him with her eyes and she could see that defiant look in his eyes and the anger evident by the set of his jaw.
"Empty threats," he shot back venomously.
The pang she felt in her chest was like she had been stabbed. She recoiled from his words but recovered quickly.
He on the other hand was instantly apologetic. His face fell and he closed his eyes before taking a measured step towards her. "I'm...Jessica-"
"Get out." She said evenly. She refused to look at him but could feel him his heated stare burning into her face for a long moment before he respected her wishes for a change and quietly headed out the door. She let out a long and loud sigh, and blinked back the tears forming behind her lids.
The vibration near her leg caused her to look down. There was a text message from Harvey. "I'm sorry."
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