The rhythm of the light drizzle pattering against the window is matched by his fingers drumming on the supple leather of the car seat. The gesture is uncharacteristically nervous, and his awareness of this fact only serves to irk him more.
Three blocks from her East Village apartment, they hit a bout of terrible traffic. Only ominous flashing lights in the distance give any clue of what is causing the delay, and after 8 minutes, Harvey has had enough.
"Ray, let me out here. I'll walk," he says, readying his umbrella.
"You sure?" his driver asks, uncertain. "Call if you need anything-"
Harvey waves him off as he steps out. "Take the rest of the night. Go home, I'll take a cab."
He manages to unfurl is umbrella with minimum damage to his suit, and begins a brisk walk eastward. When he comes upon her building, he knows almost instantly that she is not home. The third floor windows that look into her lounge and bedroom are dark, but he tries the intercom once anyway. As expected, there is no response.
Harvey swears under his breath, immediately regretting his decision to dismiss Ray. But then it hits him. He knows where she is. Fifteen minutes later he's standing in front of Leena's, a swanky but unassuming bar that has been a favorite of Donna's over the decade they have known each other.
After a moment of scanning the dark haze of the lounge, he sees her hunched over a martini, looking all too disinterested in some banker-type who is chatting her up. She snags the olive with the toothpick and pops it into her mouth. Despite himself, he smiles, allowing himself a moment of appreciation. She looks stunning, as usual, in a pleated grey dress that hangs off her frame perfectly, falling just short of the knee.
Steeling himself, Harvey comes to her right and leans against the bar, clearing his throat. She emits and audible sigh and swivels on her seat, unsurprised.
"Hey…" says her prospective companion, all too confused.
Harvey glances at the man once, but pointedly ignores him as he shifts his focus to Donna, who looks severely unimpressed.
"You do not get to do this," she snaps, throwing her martini back in one final gulp.
"Let's go somewhere we can talk," he begins, placing his arm on her pale shoulder. He pulls back as quickly as he makes contact, unsure, but the feeling of the soft skin under his fingers seems to linger.
"Seems like the lady doesn't want to talk," interjects the annoying man, one time too many.
Donna's head snaps towards her would-be-protector, and narrows her eyes dangerously. "Seriously?"
He holds up his hands in surrender, brushes off his suit and marches away, and the word "bitch" is not lost on either her or Harvey. After making a rather rude gesture to the man's back, Donna rises to shrug on her trench coat. Harvey does not stop her, figuring her apartment is as good a place as any to get a moment together without interruption. He is hot on her heels as she steps into what has now become a substantially heavier downpour.
He brings the umbrella up over them as he matches her pace, but he is mindful not to touch her, leaving a just a sliver of space between them. Despite her apparent anger, she doesn't protest his presence, and he is thankful that he had the foresight to bring his umbrella after leaving Pearson Hardman. He's not sure she would tolerate him were he not keeping her dry.
At the doorstep to her building, she shuffles through her purse and pulls out her keys. She nearly drops them in her haste to open the door, but he waits patiently as she pushes it open. She slips inside and he makes his move to follow, but she cleverly knocks her heel against the glass to have it lock in his face.
"Come on, Donna!" he protests, laying his palm against the glass. He sets his jaw, as if to will her to give him entry. Not now. "It's cold out here," he smiles weakly.
As expected, his lame attempt at a joke falls flat, and she watches, her expression revealing nothing. After what seems like an eternity, she pushes against the door, leaving it barely open. He seizes the scant opportunity, knowing there will not be another, and manages to get in. Donna has already made her way past the elevator, and he can hear her stilettos as they hit each step with a resounding click.
They approach apartment 3B, and he can suddenly feel a strange anxiety beginning to build in him. He can usually read people like a book, but her actions have left him utterly confused. He does not know what her intentions are tonight, or if she has any at all.
"Hey Donna," comes the warm voice of her neighbor, who has just come back from the trash chute. The older woman has a knowing smile as her gaze flits between the two of them, and he realizes they look like deer in headlights. "A delivery boy left me a package for you. I can go grab it if you want."
Fortunately, Donna has the wherewithal to flash a dazzling smile, one which he mimics so poorly he is sure it looks like a grimace. "Hey Mrs. Walsh! Late night at the office actually – you know how it goes! I'll get it tomorrow."
Mrs. Walsh gives and unconvinced nod and smiles, shuffling back towards 3C, waving them goodbye.
The squeaking of her opening door alerts him to follow her, as he has this entire night. He is starting to feel like a lap dog, but the scent of her is permeating in the air, and he finds comfort in the familiarity.
She throws her keys on the coffee table and spins to face him. The queen of dramatic flair, if he ever knew one.
"Donna…" he begins. For a moment, he expects her to cut him off, but she raises a brow expectantly, so he begins the only way he knows how: with the truth. "I'm sorry."
She seems to relax slightly at his words. Surprised, perhaps? It is only now in the proper light of her living room lamp that he notices the pretty flush beginning to rise on her cheeks, which he attributes to the Leena's famous cocktails. She's more than one martini deep.
"Harvey-"
"Louis…he went too far. I swear, if Mike or I had any idea about what he was going to do, I never would have asked you to come," he continues, taking a step towards her. "I should have come and checked on you sooner, but as we've already established, I'm an asshole."
Despite his best effort at a smile, she sees through him (as usual). She exhales slowly, glancing at the Les Miserables calendar on the far wall and she knows. "You went upstate this week." She brings her palm to her forehead groans lightly.
For a moment, her dark eyes soften, the self-righteous indignation seeming to ebb away. "How is he?"
He takes the opportunity to sit down on the cream love seat, and meet her gaze. "Same place I left him," he replies with an almost imperceptible shrug.
After some hesitation, she joins him, angling her legs so that they are inches apart. "Five years, huh?" she probes gently.
Harvey nods. "Yes…a milestone, I suppose."
Her tongue darts out to wet her lower lip and she averts his steady gaze. "Whatever you need, Harvey, for the trial, all of it. I'll do it."
Harvey's lip quirks slightly, happy he will finally be able to give her some good news. News that they have both been hoping for.
"You don't-"
She slips her heels off and massages the arch of her right foot with deft fingers. "Please, Harvey, let me say my piece."
He blinks, and concedes, shrugging out of his suit jacket to lay it carefully across the back of the arm chair.
"It was my name on the memo – it was my fault."
He gets up and strolls towards her meagre liquor cabinet that sits beneath the window sill. He grabs the single malt, two glasses and begins to pour.
She swallows, and begins tentatively, so very unlike Donna. "I really didn't want to have this conversation three drinks deep…"
A sense of foreboding anchors itself in the pit of his stomach, but he waits, leaving the whiskey on the glass top in front of her, brushing her knee as his hand pulls back. But we need you back at the firm. I told Jessica. She doesn't seem against the prospect of re-hiring you. I'll do whatever it takes.
I'll fight for you.
"Whatever you need- for the trial, for the suit, I'll give it," she murmurs again, her voice warm from the alcohol. "But I need you to do something for me." Her hands have fallen to rest demurely on her knees and she finds the next words, but he's had enough.
"We settled. There is no trial. I can get you your job back," he says sharply, though a part of him knows this is not what she is fishing for. "Jessica knows. We can probably start you back next week, if you want it. But if you need more time-"
"I need a recommendation from you before my interview on Thursday," she says smoothly.
The silence is maddening, and she is certain she can hear the dull grinding of his teeth. Finally, she garners enough courage to look upon his face, which is as inscrutable as ever. She decides seeing Harvey Specter, all $5000 dollar suit, couture haircut, in her less-than-ostentatious abode is as strange a sight as ever. They really have been worlds apart all these years, though she is loath to admit it.
She wishes she had cracked a window open.
"If Daniel has anything to say about you coming back to the firm, he can kiss my ass," he continues, seemingly deaf to her request.
Two can play at that game. "I'll forward the paperwork over to Cameron…that's his name right?"
"I fired him," Harvey says easily. Well, really, he relinquished control of the temp, who had simply meandered to the front of another senior partner's office.
She laughs lightly, though it does nothing to break the tension in the air. "What did he do – touch the balls?"
"No. He wasn't you," he replies without a moment's hesitation, and downs what is left of his two fingers of whiskey. He meets Donna's gaze and the finality of this is breaking her heart. She needs him to leave.
"Will you do it?" she presses, not about to let his moment of apparent candor get in the way of her resolve.
"Why?"
Puzzled, she takes a sip, relishing the feeling of the warm liquid spreading down throat and pooling in her belly. She watches him from behind the glass. "Because it's hard enough to get an interview in this crappy economy-"
"After all these years? Why leave now?" he asks again. The ice clinks against the glass as he swirls the dregs of the drink in a steady circle. "Aren't….weren't you happy?"
Oh, you're on a slippery slope now, Paulsen. She doesn't owe him any explanation (he would give none to her), she knows that (she's convinced herself), but the words come forth anyway, thanks to a tongue loosened by whiskey and vodka. "I thought I was," she replies softly.
She can see his Adam's apple work against his throat as he swallows some newly poured whiskey. He refuses to look at her as a single word leaves his mouth, laced with venom, "Louis."
Then a familiar anger rises in her gut and she places her glass on the table resolutely. "Don't go blaming this on him," she warns.
"If I hadn't called you for that trial you wouldn't even be thinking about leaving," he shoots back at her.
"You thought I'd just come running back?" she laughs in disbelief and buries her face in her hands. "You know what? I'm glad you called me. And I'm glad Louis humiliated me in front of all my peers. I'm glad he asked those hard questions because then I never would have known."
"Known what?" he asks, his tone softer. He is scared now, and she knows it. A sadistic part of her wants to make him squirm. But the disappointment she has felt over the last month has finally reached an apex.
"That I'm stuck, Harvey," she says, her voice taking an edge of desperation.
She offers no further explanation, because he doesn't need one. He knows exactly what she means. He's holding her back. Not professionally…that has never been a problem. The problem has always been everything else.
The unspoken words linger between them, and she feel moisture starting to prick at the corner of her eyes. Really, she wants to thank Louis, for making her see the childish fantasies she had been entertaining for nearly half of her adult years as just that: fantasies. It was time to move on.
"Donna…whatever I did-"
She shakes her head. "You didn't do anything," she replies, honestly.
He stands slowly, suddenly looking very tired. "You can call Norma to get me the paperwork," he says evenly.
She swipes the back of her hand against her eyes to catch the errant tears and she says nothing as he opens the door and walks out.
TBC? Maybe.