A/N: So back in December, I wrote my first song fic that followed Sam through Season One. After posting "Kindness Falls Like Rain," several readers asked for a sequel, featuring Sam's perspective through Season Two. This one is a little different, but I hope the parallels make sense.
If you (like me) typically avoid song fics, please feel free to skip the lyrics and focus on the reflection itself. This piece explores various types of distance: There are points when my translation gets quite literal, and other moments when the words are open to interpretation.
"Set the Fire to the Third Bar," Snow Patrol and Martha Wainwright.
DISCLAIMER: I own neither Rookie Blue nor the lyrics below.
I find the map and draw a straight line
Over rivers, farms, and state lines
The distance from 'A' to where you'd be
It's only finger-lengths that I see
Distance is a funny thing.
It can slip up on you, meters to miles in the blink of an eye.
(Things that also happen in the blink of an eye? Fatal gunshots.)
He's spent the morning fixated on moving: Andy, moving in with Callaghan. He, moving to Guns and Gangs. This partnership, eluding their grasp; two coppers moving steadily away from each other until the term "partners" was moot.
Moving leaves him frustrated and uncertain, two things he has never been.
Moving seems like the catalyst for disappointment and regret.
He resists the idea of moving, is hell-bent on decrying it, until…
Until two shots pierce the air.
He'll take moving over motionless any day, the image of Andy spread-eagle on the ground.
The unthinkable possibility that she…
Every waking nerve hangs suspended in the air as his eyes relay the message to his brain.
The scene unfolds in vivid detail, as if he's having an out-of-body experience.
Propelled forward by panic and adrenaline, he moves with the impetus of a man who has nothing [everything] to lose.
Those brief seconds it takes to hop the barricade, the moment when his heart is in his throat and the terror is pure and unmistakable… It'll stay with him. Raw and fresh, it will stay with him; that ragged, shallow release of breath after he determines the bullet hit her vest.
Every type of godforsaken distance is better than the alternative.
Outside the communications truck, his body unintentionally recalls that night; her warm, heady scent and his hands moving of their own volition down her neck, across her jaw, through her hair.
You're okay, they telegraph, You're okay. I've got you.
He wants her to believe it as fervently as he does.
Wants her to slow down, take a deep breath.
Wants her to understand his investment.
Wants her to move closer.
Wants her to know...
Wants her.
I touch the place where I'd find your face
My fingers in creases of distant dark places
It's been months of false starts, penalties on the offense and defense. There's no stopping the clock, unfortunately.
Fast-forward on the play, and she's engaged.
She's engaged, and he's resigned.
We're a good team, you and me, but not good enough.
Publicly? He makes the obligatory remarks, "Good one, copper," and "Congratulations," a round of high-fives and back thumps for sportsmanship. You're a team, his conscience niggles incessantly; Teammates support one another.
Of course, that doesn't stop him from processing anger – irrational anger – first.
He's pissed he let it get this far.
A few broken words, a couple of heated looks? He's not winning any awards for groundbreaking revelations. These layers of buried sentiment, unspoken feeling have been annexed for so long, he couldn't tell you what the walls look like.
Roughly translated, he's pissed at himself.
After the laundromat incident, he vows to bow out, maintain whatever sliver of dignity still remains. Self-preservation in the wake of speed dial #3 and Oliver's transparent attempts at wise counsel. Maybe, he thinks, maybe distance isn't such a bad thing after all.
The game is nearly over when the unthinkable happens.
Callaghan fumbles in the most disastrous way.
He's always thought Callaghan was a moron, two-thirds smarmy arrogance and clownish ignorance; didn't know a good thing when he had it.
Sam expects to feel some shred of satisfaction.
He doesn't. The silence from his cruiser's passenger seat is enough to quash any satisfaction he might glean from Callaghan's idiocy.
Days become weeks, and she makes a slow recovery. She's a fighter, and he recognizes that she needs to hit something - Hands her the gloves and welcomes the frustration, because her smile is worth every blow to the chest.
He starts to hope again. Doesn't want to be the rebound, because he has known from the beginning – far longer than he's comfortable admitting – that this is it. He wants to retire the jersey, count down the clock with her by his side. Wants to acknowledge this thing that's existed in distant, dark places: The you and the me, far beyond coppers and coworkers and veiled allusions to partners.
They've been Swarek and McNally in the field, but the possibility of what they could be… Possibility taunts him at every turn, hidden smiles and pointed teasing, the lingering effects of her studious gaze and infectious laugh.
It's that moment by the ambulance that finally does him in.
If he loses, he wants it to be on his own terms. He can't live with this one-step-forward, three-steps-back routine.
Can't imagine my life without you in it.
Inherently, that's the problem.
He needs to stop imagining and start living in reality.
His decision is clear.
He's going to take that UC op.
I hang my coat up in the first bar
There is no peace that I've found so far
The laughter penetrates my silence
As drunken men find flaws in science
He's been in deep cover for two weeks. Sitting here at this seedy bar, one hand on a warm beer and the other tapping mindlessly on the bartop, he's beginning to question why he went under in the first place.
Separation doesn't broker peace, it merely aggravates the ache in his chest.
He hears her laugh everywhere: At the warehouse, in the dive restaurant around the corner, bouncing and echoing late at night from the rafters of J.D.'s apartment.
Hindsight is 20/20, but if he had to guess, his is 20/15.
He wishes he had thought this plan through, examined what exactly he was running from.
Wishes he could ask Boyd for an update without looking desperate.
Wishes that after all this time, he had tipped his chin down and leaned forward, said with his mouth what was on his mind and heart as the stood in the shadow of Leslie Atkins's car.
McNally? She's always come to him: Followed him into the parking lot of the Penny, showed up at his doorstep the night of the blackout, hunted him down with a million proposals – New leads and alternatives to paperwork and Sam, can we stop by this little café on break? Trace swears their hot chocolate is to die for.
(Shit, here he's been calling Callaghan an idiot, when all this while…)
Well.
20/15, that's all.
Their words mostly noises
Ghosts with just voices
Your words in my memory
Are like music to me
He swirls his beer, a reflection of his turbulent thoughts and the price of silence, as his new 'buddies' from the warehouse regale him with stories. He needs to beg off early tonight; his mind is starting to wander and he can't risk anything less than total immersion in J.D's character. He's not pretending to be J.D., he is J.D.
He's not going to catch Brennan by being spacey.
The door swings closed behind him, a dulled thump that cuts off the din of the bar crowd, clinking glasses and loud peals of laughter and drunken propositions. He breathes a sigh of relief, hails a taxi, and winds up closing his eyes as he rests against the backseat.
He thinks back to the laundromat, that moment when he vowed to bow out. (Which: Really, Sammy? How can you bow out when you haven't declared yourself a competitor?)
He's ignored the facts for a while, the voices of snippy blonde detectives and concerned friends. Tonight, it's not Rosati's jeering tone or Ollie's oblique urging that sticks with him.
The voice is soft, familiar. Cuts him deep.
Hey.
One syllable as he reached out and guided her over the rubble of the laundromat, implicit relief and exhaustion, strains of emotion that he wasn't going to begin to examine, not while on the clock.
(He's examining them now.)
How one word from her was enough to calm the erratic hammering of his heart, one broken syllable enough to make him want to wrap his arms around her and not let go.
He thinks about the weight room, the first time he saw her laugh without reservation after the mess with Callaghan.
Thanks.
A single, breathless whisper when she collapsed on the mat, unstrapping her gloves and tossing them. It was enough to kickstart his heart, give him a little hope that the McNally he knew was returning.
He thinks about the ambulance, the tipping point, the moment that led him here.
Good.
Her response to finding Elliot, the light in her eyes and the joy in her tone as the second-half of good became a laugh. It was a different type of relief, and instead of calming the pounding in his chest, it amplified it until he was leaning in…
Her voice rings in his ears as he silently acknowledges their last exchange. When was the last time one word had swayed him? She exerts a power over him that's impossible to ignore.
He climbs the steps to his apartment, his entire body heavy. The echo of her voice lulls him to sleep.
I'm miles from where you are,
I lay down on the cold ground
I, I pray that something picks me up
And sets me down in your warm arms
He misses her. God, he misses her.
Figurative distance seems laughable, because the literal distance is cutting him to pieces, salt in a wound that refuses to heal. For the first time in his life, he considers not seeing this op through, calling Boyd and risking permanent assignment to a beat and the blues.
(It's ridiculous, is what it is, all this because of a dream last night. Hands on his waist and hands sliding across his chest, the tiny gasps and quiet whimpers in a candlelit bedroom. Her body a slow burn against his, that much he remembers. He woke up to an empty loft and took a cold shower, erasing any lingering traces of memory and sentiment, then fell back into cool sheets an hour later, firmly resolved to finish the op. Buck up, copper; act like the veteran you are.)
He wonders what she's up to tonight, patrolling across town. Wonders who she's partnered with, if she's laughing like they used to on late-night shifts, both of them a little punch-drunk.
He's been seeing her everywhere, the flash of a brown ponytail or the bouncy gait of her step. He chalks it up to the hazards of vivid dreams and patent frustration.
He's at the bar when Brennan calls his name. It takes a moment to realize she's not a figment of his imagination, standing next to Brennan and shuffling nervously, eyes wide.
On a cold night like tonight, he wonders if she's as warm as he remembers.
After I have travelled so far
We'd set the fire to the third bar
We'd share each other like an island
Until exhausted, close our eyelids
And dreaming, pick up from
The last place we left off
Your soft skin is weeping
A joy you can't keep in
She's here.
Two years, two beers, and two identities later, they're here.
He knows they can't fall asleep; she's due back at the barn and he for a morning shift.
His fingers trace the slope of her spine, his knuckles grazing the soft skin. I missed you, he thinks silently, I'm glad you're here.
It's the memory of her sleepy weight and fluttering eyelashes that make him dial the phone a week later.
The fireplace flickers, and she pulls him closer, laughing quietly into his neck before her face becomes drawn and serious.
Ask me to stay.
His mouth finds hers, and he looks. Looks, and really sees her. He wants this feeling to last, and the word simply falls from his lips.
Stay.
His heart stutters for half a beat as he stares into her eyes.
Of all her single-word replies, this one means the most.
Okay.
I'm miles from where you are,
I lay down on the cold ground
And I, I pray that something picks me up
and sets me down in your warm arms
His first thought is her.
A gust of wind sweeps through the room, and he sucks in a breath through his nose, the smell of musty cotton filling his nostrils. The cold air bites at his exposed flesh, a temporary reprieve from the harsh sting of tied wrists and ankles.
Where the hell is Andy?
He fights the bonds, all the while fearing the worst. If something happened to her… If she had been hurt… If Brennan had made her…
He hears Brennan's slow, soft chuckle, the undercurrent of something dark and sinister.
His choices are limited.
If she's alive, he's finding a way back to her.
If she's –
No.
The terror is crippling, but Brennan's not walking, not now.
He fades in and out of consciousness, the sharp slap of water hitting his face, forcing his throat to close. Spots dance before his eyes, but he embraces the pain. Pain means he's still alive.
In the recesses of his mind, he thinks about catalysts: What brought Andy to that shitty apartment door on her first day. What brought her to the Alpine last week. What happened during that time to change everything – His mindset, his feelings, his plans for the future.
If the universe really has orchestrated this thing, he can only pray that same universe has kept Andy safe.
His focus is single-minded, prompted by the memories of yesterday morning: Her smile, her teasing voice, the demands for juice and the thick weight of her hair, the warmth of her arms as they tightened around his neck and his waist.
Survive.
I'm miles from where you are,
I lay down on the cold ground
And I, I pray that something picks me up
and sets me down in your warm arms
Distance is a funny thing.
She's five feet from his truck, but he can see her attempts to move away steadily, quietly. The intention with which she uttered his name is crystal-clear.
Sam…
She's feeling guilty, and he's familiar with her track record: Run before anyone else gets hurt; run before the fallout is more than you can bear.
He wants to ask what she's running from. Why she's hell-bent on thinking this won't work, ignorant to the possibility of good becoming great. He's not giving up at the first sign of resistance, that's for damn sure.
If ever there were a sign from the universe, a call to seize the day, tonight was it. The proverbial burst of clarity amidst the worst kind of darkness. He was fighting Brennan, sure, but when Brennan's arm wrapped around his neck, he thought it was over. As his grip tightened and Sam desperately clawed for breath, three images flashed before his eyes.
Sarah and the kids, shrieking and laughing, as they made their way through the sprinkler in her front yard. The knowledge that his sister was happy in this motherly role, that she had found love.
His mother, the soft murmur of her voice as she read aloud to him in his childhood bedroom. The question of life beyond this one. If he would see her, if she was at peace.
Andy, turning to wave as she exited the apartment, cheeks flushed and a brilliant smile on her face. Her own admission before she pressed her lips to his and bounded down the steps. I'll miss you too, you know. Don't let any more girls bust you, alright?
(It might be too soon to tell her, but the truth of the matter? When he thought the end was near, he thought of her. She's got remarkably firm footing in his life, is far more entrenched than any woman has ever been, family notwithstanding.)
He doesn't see that changing anytime soon, and after everything…
He wants to tell her that he'll follow her, run side by side until she realizes she doesn't need to run. Tighten his laces and stretch his calves, he's in it for the long haul.
He ran once, and it landed him in this UC mess. He thought he was escaping, and by escaping, solving the problem. He didn't realize until tonight –
(You can't escape something that burns inside you.)
He has no idea how to be normal, what normal even is for people like him and McNally, but the thud of his heart drowns out all measure of impossibility, leaving only whispers of promise and commitment.
Take a chance. Take a chance. Take a chance.
Two years of waiting is nothing compared to the anticipation of her answer.
The corners of her mouth tug.
It seems like a pretty good start.