Because Mary managed to make me. Thanks sunshine.
He isn't supposed to see her but he does.
It's a quiet Sunday morning in the noisy city of New York and she's sipping coffee, nibbling on a blueberry muffin as she reads a newspaper.
The coffee shop itself is not quite buzzing yet, but the coffee machine is, preparing a favorable brew for all of the people who enjoy it. Which is, today of all days, not a lot. Sleep is a priority on Sunday.
Not for her. She was always a morning person. Always at her best in the morning, her mind sharp, her eyes fresh, not yet stilled by the drag of the day. In their time together, he became one, too, a morning person. When they parted, he never stopped.
A flash of pain surges through his chest. It's only been four months. He's just picking up his life. Without her. Because she left and he let her. She didn't understand that he was scared, too.
He stands there, espresso in hand, iPad tucked under his arm. And he watches.
Her hair is shorter, just past her shoulders, shiny strands in delicate ringlets. She's tapping a pen against her cheek, biting her lip in thought. The light is drawing shadows on her face, the protrusion of her cheekbones odd against the soft skin he knows is there. But she's still so gorgeous it makes his lungs squeeze and his limbs squeeze.
He decides not to disturb her, sits down in another corner and pretends to type on his iPad.
She knows he's there. She knows he has seen her.
This morning when she woke up, she had the strangest desire to cry. But she didn't. Instead she dressed, went for a run in the cold April morning, and ended up drinking coffee at a shop she had never been before.
Of course, of all places, that's where she would see him.
Now that he seems occupied - she had started to like his iPad, too - she dares to glance up. His hair is unruly, his jaw and cheeks covered in a stubble, his eyes a blazing blue. It's not boyishly attractive. It's devastating and hurtful. She swallows. That's her fault. Because she left. And he didn't stop her. And that's when they last thought.
They didn't even break up properly, if there's even a criteria for break ups. It just ended. They ended. And she wished she wasn't in love with him because it hurt so, so much. She coped, of course, by avoiding the issue. Told Lanie they decided to give their relationship a break. Told Ryan and Esposito he had to work. Left it at that.
(Of course they didn't believe it.)
They had been fighting. He made her come over after work, even though it was nearing midnight and she was exhausted, and he tried to make her smile through exhaustion but she had been in such a bad mood she snapped at him. And... yeah.
They both fucked up. Badly.
That's when he looks up - meets her eyes across the room. And they're empty.
She once told him that his eyes spoke more than the few words he told her to make her feel at home.
Now there's nothing. She doesn't know whether it's because there is really nothing there - God, let it please not be that - or because he's hiding it. He still is.
Because she called him out on his shit and he deflected it by calling her out on her past and they were both just so angry they ended up saying some very untruthful things. Or, well, partly truthful.
She blinks and suddenly he's not sitting anymore.
"Hey Kate," his soft voice says next to her. She looks up, finds him looking down at her coolly. "How are you doing?"
She swallows, nods quickly. "I'm alright. Yourself?"
He grins like himself but the twinkle in his eyes misses. It's incomplete. Much like she is without him. "Swell," he replies. "How's work?"
"Oddly quiet," she mutters, pointing across from her. "You could sit, if you have time."
He studies her, lips pursed, and puts his iPad down, sitting down. "I've got time."
The first ten minutes are, to say in the least, incredibly awkward.
He didn't mean to walk up to her but she had been staring, staring with those observant hazel eyes as if he were a piece of evidence that she needed to put into the investigation properly. That's where she went wrong.
And that's where he went wrong, too.
"So, uh," she starts, fiddling with the pen in her hands. "How are Martha and Alexis?"
"Good," he replies, his eyes not once faltering from her face. She's not looking at him, avoiding. He hasn't seen her do that in a while. He always thought she was done avoiding. "How's work?"
"You asked me that already," she says with a tiny smile, one that doesn't quite reach her eyes. He misses up waking up to that full toothy smile, kissing her soft lips and feeling the upturned curve of her mouth against his. He would smile, too.
But she's watching him with raised eyebrows, expectant, and at first he doesn't understand. "Oh, I asked you that already," he mutters. "Well, eh -"
"Didn't know we'd ever reach the point of having nothing to talk about.' He knows she goes for light and joking but it doesn't quite make it, her voice too heavy and thick with bitterness. (He thinks it's bitterness, anyway.)
He laces his fingers together to keep himself from reaching for her delicate, pale hand. "Well, things kind of changed."
Kind of. Totally. Same difference.
She's biting her lip pensively, looking down at the pen and newspaper under her hand, words she scribbled. He looks at it, too, tries to distract herself from her before he says something stupid. Something about his bed and his daily life being lonely.
Sure, he had Alexis and his mother, but they weren't Kate. Kate, who he loved more every single because she opened up more and more. Kate, who brightened his day even when there was no sunshine. Kate, who he hoped would be his wife, one day. He still wants to run out and buy her a ring but it's too soon, too fragile, and this stupid fight proves just how not far along the road they are.
"I miss you," he blurts out. He finds her eyes, wide and twinkling but still empty, so he continues talking like a moron. "The bed is empty and it's lonely and I really miss you, and Kate, really, I don't even remember what we fought about but it was probably fucked up shit and God, it doesn't even matter to me anymore. I'm miserable. Without you, Kate."
She's not talking and that's what scares him most. The hollow, almost shocked look on her face is a close second. Like she's looking through him, or trying to comprehend that he caved in after their game of avoiding the subject. Something they will always remain good it.
Her lips part. He waits. But then she presses them together, doesn't talk. He wants to accuse her of being a coward but he can't. Instead he rises from his chair, gathers his things and says, "I have to go." Without looking at her, he turns on his heel and races out of the shop, onto the sidewalk. Away from her.
She sits there, mostly dumbfounded, partly shocked. That he had actually blurted it out. They used subtext to say these things. He wasn't all that direct either, ever. This is new. It's new and all she gave him was her silence.
Her fingertips reach onto the place where his hand was, touch it tentatively, but there's no warmth. He's missing from the spot he was at just a few seconds ago. His smell only faintly lingers in the air. And she lifts her eyes, looks around, finally comprehends that he isn't there. So she grabs her coat, throws it on and runs out after him, coffee and newspaper completely forgotten.
Looking around, she almost doesn't spot him, but then she sees his back as he rounds a corner, takes a sprint after him. She's fast on heels, but she's even faster on flat sneakers, so she grabs his shoulder as soon as he is within reach. Fingers curling around it, he stops walking, turns around to look at her. His blue eyes are cold and she misses the sparkle in them almost as fiercely as she misses him.
"People say we're not alike," she says quietly. "But we're both impulsive. We don't think things through when we're trying to prove our right. Even if we're wrong."
"I think that's called piggery," he replies. "Used as a shadow for insecurity."
She can't help but smile. Of course he'd use the word 'piggery'.
"I miss you too, you know?" His eyes search hers, looking for a lie, lighting up when finding none. He'd know if she was lying. But she can't lie to him, not anymore, not after all the fuck ups.
"You do?" he asks, reaching out to cup her cheek, pressing his thumb to the corner of her eye as if stopping a tear that isn't quite there. She's reigning it in. Normally he'd protest, tell her to stop hiding, but would it be any help for her to cry now?
"I do. Insecurities and all." She grins, tilts her head to kiss his palm. "So how about we stop the piggery, huh?"
He grins too, and it lights up his face in the way she's wanted to see again for so long. "Pretty sexy to hear you use such a word."