All these months, she functioned on auto pilot. Taking care of Franny was her number one priority. She forced her vision in a pipe, working, being responsible, and generally stable. She tried not to let the thought of him seep inside but it couldn't be helped once in a while. She'd done this before, she tried to remind herself. She was no stranger to grief. She woke up every morning with the hope that he would come back and it would be like nothing had happened in between. But since the time passed, the certainty waned a little. The letter didn't help. She refused to read it, thinking she could not give in until she saw him dead with her eyes; he was a survivor like no other. He would find a way. She also didn't want to read it, some part of her brain not wanting it to be the closure, the final call. So she moved on ahead with her life, taking in stride, the guilt and regret and anger he left her with.
She opened the door without any expectation of what was to meet her.
"Hey", he said, his voice almost a whisper.
He looked thinner than when she last saw him, his eyes darker than usual, and a raw scar on the left side of his face highlighting his already prominent cheekbone.
She couldn't respond for a minute, no voice coming out of her throat, thinking she wouldn't be able to stop the emotion even if she could speak.
"They told me you were dead." She said in an even tone.
"Yeah, that's why I came."
That opened the floodgates.
"That is why you came?"
He understood what she meant at once, as she turned her back to him and he followed her in.
"Carrie, I am sorry for the misunderstanding, but I am not sorry for lea—"
"You should have left without a word."
"What?" he asked surprised.
"You shouldn't have left a letter", she turned back to look him dead in the eyes.
He lost track of whatever he going to say, his carefully guarded face not quite able to hide his shock.
"That was the most selfish you've ever been with me."
"How so", he was angry now.
"The letter was only to come to me if you were not coming back, and that gave you closure but not me, did you ever think of what I would go through for the rest of my life with that thing always with me? She asked, incredulous.
"Yeah, you're right Carrie, yes you're right." His eyes were focused on her now, with conviction. "That was selfish, asking you to be with me was selfish, believing we could leave together was selfish, too much to ask for, calling you and expecting a yes was selfish. It's been the most selfish I've ever been in my entire life."
She was about to speak but he cut her off. "Let me finish."
"But I really am not sorry. I am not. Because even if it is totally screwed up to make up my entire existence about you, it is the truth. Because that's how it has been for almost two years now Carrie. I've had no anchor whatsoever in my life before you showed up, and I was even losing faith in my job even before you..But what else had I left? I have no family, I gave up on that a long while ago, I am a soldier, expendable, I've never had a normal life and the hope of one until you came. I always cared about you.
And I know that it's tough for you to make that kind of commitment and I know that's putting a lot of pressure on you, but that's the truth and I am putting it out there now. You are the only gravity I have in my life. The only thing that keeps me from going adrift and I let it happen without even asking for your consent. So I needed a yes, not a "I'm too scared, or I'm not ready" but a yes, because I was giving up on everything that I worked for my entire life only to know I couldn't have it with you too, what was I supposed to cling on to then? "And I'm sorry for how screwed up this is, or how many possible ways this could go wrong, how unhealthy it may already be, but I am too far gone now.."
"And I had to say to you how I felt, if it were to happen that I'm dead.." he sighed to catch his breath, "I had to tell you that I lo—"
"Shhhh", she said, immediately closing the distance between them. "Shut up, just shut up for a while, stop talking."
Her anger had somewhat melted, if not completely, at his blatant honestly. He had honestly ripped his heart out of his chest and offered it to her, and it was really all he had left to give. She understood what being adrift meant, as much as he did.
"Let's try and do this right, for once."
She kissed him then, like it was going to be the only time. She kissed him like the past four months had never happened. She kissed him like she fell in love with him, slowly but as with as much finality to it that she knew deep inside her that it was more right than it had ever felt in her life. The kiss was as she expected it to be, harsh and bruising.
He returned her gesture with equal measure. He kissed her like his life depended on it, like it was destroying him too. He kissed her like he loved her, absolutely, irrevocably, like her lips were the only real existence he knew of.
He pushed her against the wall, letting her take the weight of his body on her. Hell broke loose for her as a tear escaped her eye because it felt so good. She was so fragile against his large frame. He was so big and so warm, like she'd always imagined him to be in those dreams of her, few and far between, where he was with her in her bed. When she didn't wake up alone in the morning.
She moved to kiss his neck, his ear, to the corner of his eyes, as if believing just now that he was here after all and it wasn't a dream. The intimacy was so painful for both of them that it brought peace to their souls for just a moment in their lives because of the reality of it all.
The clouds cascaded on the sun, dulling the brightness in the room just as he stopped and looked her in the eyes to see his love reflected in her own the same way. God, how could she have missed this before, there was really no explanation for the way he looked at her. There were going to be no words from now on, hell knew they were so bad at it. He slowly undressed her, taking her shirt off her head, while his hands and lips never left her body. The feel of his touch on her naked body felt like pieces of her body that were till now missing. She breathed in his scent, mixed with her own, and there was nothing more she wanted right now than to be his, to have him inside her, claim her.
They forgot about pretty much everything when they came together as one. Their lives, past, work, scars, fears, and unspoken love, to capture the moment together with each other because they knew even in their safest places they couldn't be more themselves as they were now, no words as honest and inhibitions down as they were now.
He made love to her right against the wall, never moving, slow and tenacious, his lips never leaving hers. They were relatively quiet even for the pleasure. No one spoke even as he carried her to the bedroom and they made love again, and again, till they were both exhausted enough to sleep.
It was the most nightmare-less sleep that had ever come to him, and the most hours she got since forever.
She woke up first, checking right away whether he was still there, and he was, as warm as ever. She turned her face to watch him sleep.
He stirred after a while, opened his eyes to look at the ceiling, knowing she had been looking. And neither said a word for a good number of minutes.
The silence wrapped them comfortably, the intimacy of the previous day had not left them yet, but even more so now, that words couldn't do justice to.
"I watched you, you know." He broke the silence after a while, eyes still looking up.
"What do you mean?" Her tone was as soft, as non-hesitant as he had ever heard her.
"After we got Nazir, I saw you and Brody at the cabin.."
She was so startled to even speak, so he continued to explain.
"That's why Estes gave me the operation, I was meant to take him out after we got the information out of him. So that he could cover his ass."
"But watching you two together, it was the most intimate that I'd ever seen anyone, most intimate I'd felt..to you..till then. His voice was so soft and deep, it felt like she would bleed dry listening to it.
And I just couldn't take that away, from you, I had never seen you so happy..so I couldn't, take his life, because it meant destroying yours."
"I think that was the beginning of.. that's how I fell for you.." he finally looked at her.
Her eyes were swimming with water, as they were already big from the revelation that was huge.
But more than that, it was a sense of déjà vu, it brought back not only Brody, but how she first fell for him, watching a person broken and without love, or any guards, somehow had shifted her mind to a place where she couldn't remember the things he had done, the weight of his pain was so much. It was how she loved him too.
And the emotion of it all, as if she could even feel any more than she already did, was topped off by just how much kindness radiated off of Quinn, that he had loved her for so long, and in all the right ways that could possibly be, as pure as the newly fell snow capping mountains, descending from heaven.
And she knew this wasn't close to what she felt with Brody, this was something different, not the fire, the obsession, and the recklessness and abandon of their love. This was safety, harbor, trust, and most of all, peace. She'd never felt more at peace in her life before than she did now, with him beside her. This was as real and life sealing as it could be.
And she'd somehow missed it before. She feared so badly now that she couldn't love him back with equal measure, it made her sad to no extent. And the tears started to come hard and fast now; she still couldn't meet his eyes. He saw her, and closed the distance between them slowly, put his arms around her, and kissed her temple. His lips kept moving from the corner of her eyes, to the hollows under them, and her forehead, in a pattern, comforting her in a manner only he could to her. He knew she didn't want him to speak, he knew she didn't want him to watch her, so he kept his eyes above her hair staring at nowhere but holding her pieces together that she was sure would fall apart if he didn't.
And she was grateful, for his presence and his love, his comfort, and knew now that she had a real chance of happiness with him, if she tried. For gratefulness had been the beginning of her feelings for him, his faith in her, even when she doubted herself, caring for enough to drag her back from the edge she would have fallen off, she was dismantling her life, when he picked up the pieces and waited for her to come around. She knew then that she could learn to love him like he did her, because she did love him, because he deserved it and needed it. Because she'd heal him too. Because they were the only ones.