"You and Me"
A/N: I always find inspiration for stories, especially Broadchurch ones. And I normally don't write romance between Alec and Ellie—I still view them as a thoroughly platonic relationship while watching the show. Sometimes I get struck by an idea and sometimes the two of them have to end up together.
Enjoy!
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Part 1
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It started, though Ellie didn't know it, when Fred asked her for a bedtime story.
Ellie, caught off-guard, began to tell him the first thing that came to mind: a story of a young woman who wanted to solve the world's problems whose son was captured by big bad men.
But Fred, like all little children, grew bored of the story and fell asleep quickly that night, and the tale went unfinished.
Ellie, busy with daily event of life, soon forgot about the story that she had begun for her son. She was still struggling to back into the peaceful setting of Broadchurch's idyllic coast-life and working on fully repairing the still-tender wounds of her friendship with Beth. Danny's death still casted a shadow on all of them, however, and Joe was a threat still in the back of everyone's minds. Ellie found, too, that she had changed too much to ever go back to the way she had been. Danny's murder, Joe's betrayal, his subsequent trial, solving Sandbrook—they had all left their marks and scars and she couldn't be the same Ellie Miller she had been.
Time passed. Fall passed and winter blew in and then spring rushed in, and Ellie continued on her path, raising Tom and Fred as a single mother. She spared a thought now and again for the old life she had shared with Joe but she had worked hard to remove him and physically it had worked. The rooms he had left cluttered and unfinished had been painted (or repainted); Ellie had replaced the bed and mattress and had long ago thrown away his clothes and belongings. Ellie wasn't going to give away a pedophile's belongings to innocent people. So she threw them out and ignored the still-prevalent stares and whispers of 'murderer's wife' and continued on because there really was no other way to go.
Then came the sentencing of the Sandbrook Three—Lee Ashworth, Claire Ripley, and Ricky Gillipsie—for the murders of Pippa Gillipsie and Lisa Newberrie.
And Fred asked her while going to bed about the young woman who wanted to help the world whose son was stolen away by big bad men. He sat there so innocently amongst his bedsheets and smiled up at her, all big blue eyes and flyaway brown curls, and Ellie wondered what else the little boy perhaps remembered.
Without thought she continued her tale, telling him of two people who the young woman asked to help find her son. And despite their differences the two people—one man, one woman—found the young woman's son and everything was a happily ever after.
She didn't give the story a second thought.
Until, that is, the Sandbrook Three and she met up again with the familiar face of Alec Hardy. She hadn't seen him since he had left Broadchurch and hadn't heard from him for about four months—there had been the odd random text sent from one phone to another if something about Sandbrook came up in the news but eventually those had dropped off as well. He was a bit better groomed then when she had seen him last, his clothes not so wrinkled and his tie not so crooked, but the evident distaste for courtrooms and barristers in general was so familiar that it set Ellie strangely at ease. They barely spoke throughout it all, listening instead to the pleas of 'guilty' for all three convicted.
Claire sat without expression but her eyes were dark and unfathomable and Ellie was abruptly reminded of 'big bad men' from her story to Fred. Hardy looked over at her in subtle concern when she shivered where she sat.
He asked her about it afterwards.
"Big bad men," she answered cryptically and she turned away before she caught his surprised (and thoughtful) look. Awkwardly she asked him how he had been getting along.
She asked him to dinner along the way.
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"Bloody hell, Ellie."
Beth nearly dropped the plate she was putting away when Ellie told her. Catching it before it could shatter against the edge of the cupboard she stared at Ellie with wide eyes.
"I didn't mean anything by it, Beth," Ellie explained calmly, placing her own stack of dishes away. "Just catching up."
"You're hardly friends with Hardy," Beth told her, very confidant in her claim. It annoyed Ellie for some reason, although it had not occurred to her yet. "You hated him, and I'm sorry but he really wasn't the nicest to you either while you two were working together—"
"He was there for me when no one else was." The reply was sharper than she had intended and included no room for argument. "And he nearly killed himself to find out who had killed Danny."
It was said thoughtlessly and Beth's ever-so-slight flinch showed that, but Ellie was not sorry for her words. She was not the same Ellie Miller she had been, after all, and that included her opinion of the boss hat, yes, she had once hated and even now could be exasperated by. Hearing Beth's words hurt her on some small level because acknowledging their cold callousness all she could recall was Hardy's pleading with her that he couldn't let the Latimers down, the way his voice had broken telling her of the horror of finding Pippa's body.
All along you said don't trust.
I really wanted to be wrong.
"I didn't know," Beth murmured softly.
"You never asked." None of them had, Ellie included in the beginning. She dropped the subject, and Beth was careful not to bring it up again.
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Tom was a bit more vocal about his opinions.
"Mum, why did you invite him over for dinner?"
Ellie sighed where she was stirring the pasta on the stove. "Honestly, Tom, you'd think I'd invited the Grim Reaper over. Hardy isn't all that bad."
Her son's nose wrinkled. "I know that he solved Danny's case," he admitted, nervously ticking his fingers against the countertop, "and I know he was over here a couple times while you guys were solving Sandbrook, but…"
His embarrassed silence told her exactly what he was thinking. She gave the pasta one last stir before placing the lid on the pan. "He can be intimidating, I know," she agreed, and surprised Tom by leaning forward with a conspiratorial smirk, "but I'll tell you a secret about Hardy. He's terrified of socializing."
Tom had not really heard about an adult afraid of hanging out with other people. The possibility intrigued him. "So he's like Ed, in my class? Ed doesn't even like talking to us at school."
"He's probably worse than that," Ellie told him with another slight grin. "I bet you anything that he's going to have more trouble talking to you than you will him." She turned back to the stove trying to keep the sauce from burning. "And no, that doesn't mean that you deliberately pick out the most awkward topic to talk with him about."
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Hardy showed up a couple of minutes before six on the given night, windswept and a bit dishleveled from his trek to the Miller household, but Ellie noticed that he was not so tired and clearly out of breath as he had been before his pacemaker surgery.
"Physical therapy," he answered simply in response to her question about it. He had been having regular sessions of it over the past few months in order to build up his stamina and strengthen his heart and it showed. He said nothing more about it but it was clear he felt better physically than he had in years.
"Well, I hope you can eat regular food now," she told him, only half-jokingly, "rather than salad."
"What's wrong with salad?" he retorted easily. "It's better for you than all of that sugar and crap you put in your coffee."
"Since when did you notice what I put in my coffee?"
One eyebrow sidled upwards in an expression that drove her spare during Danny's case. "Detective Inspector."
"Oh, right," she replied sarcastically, "which doesn't explain why all of your detective skills can't help you find a razor." It was merely a tease on her part and she was taken aback when he suddenly flushed. "What?"
"My daughter," he muttered. "She said I looked strange without a beard, always has in fact. So I grew it back."
Ellie hummed. "Don't tell me you were one of those blokes who used to go clean-shaven through the summer and then grow a beard in the winter."
"Yeah. It was funny, actually—every year it would take her awhile to notice it. It could be so late as December or January before she would realize. Kind of a joke between us."
Joe had never grown facial hair, having started balding at a young age. He didn't care for the messiness of a beard, either, or so he had told Ellie. In their fourteen years together he had always been clean-shaven. She studied Hardy for a moment. In true Ellie Miller fashion she blurted out what she thought. "It would be weird seeing you without your beard."
"Tess and daisy thought so, too."
"Tom! Dinner's ready!" Ellie called to her oldest son. "How is Tess?"
Hardy's expression darkened ever so slightly. "Still with Dave and still living in Sandbrook. She's asked me when I'm planning on moving back already."
Ellie's brow rose, taken aback by the callousness of Hardy's ex-wife. "Where does she expect you to go once you're there? Back into her house?"
"If she's looking for a three way she's not getting it," he said instantly.
Ellie laughed, caught off-guard by his dirty joke. But he really did have a twisted sense of humor, if 'Dirty Brian' was any indication. "Not to mention you'd have to like blokes," she added. "That might make it a bit awkward if you didn't."
The year past had done wonders to restoring his sense of truly wicked humor. "Well, there was one time in the Academy…"
She gaped at him. "No." When his smirk merely widened she shook her head. "No," she repeated, "no no no, I don't believe that at all. No." She hesitated. "Was there?"
"Not really."
"Not really?"
"He liked me," he clarified, just as vague as he always was, "but he couldn't tell anyone that. Homosexuality was a bit looked down upon then."
This was really something she had never expected him to say. Ever. Her disbelieving smile widened. "That can't be all. C'mon, there's got to be more than that. Did he ever tell you?"
He flushed again, quite red, and Ellie's mouth fell open.
"Hardy!"
"He didn't do anything, he just…"
"Kissed you?" Ellie asked him laughingly.
He shuffled from foot to foot, nodding. "I was nineteen. Haven't seen him since then."
Ellie held a hand to her mouth to hide her laughter, incredulous now beyond disbelief. "Oh my god. Who knew you were so adventurous?"
"Does that make you bisexual?"
Tom's curious voice made both adults turn towards the kitchen doorway at the same time, Ellie nearly doubled over in a silent fit. Tom himself was standing quite innocently looking at them both, having heard the tail end of their conversation and in true thirteen-year-old fashion was fascinated by it.
Ellie's second reaction was a mix of horror and humor. In her mind, this was definitely the epitome of 'awkward conversation'—she really wasn't sure what Hardy's reaction was going to be. But he surprised her. With barely any hesitation he replied quite simply:
"I don't think so. I think you've got to like it first."
"Oh." Leave it to her son to sound disappointed about the answer.
"Since when have you been curious about homosexuality?" Ellie demanded, equally taken aback by Tom's question.
"Braydon." Tom sounded for all the world a weary teenager speaking to a slow parent, telling Ellie she should already know this. "He's gay."
"Dear god," Ellie muttered, thoroughly put off by the direction the conversation was taking. She could safely say she had never imagined that her former stick-up-his-ass boss and eldest son would be having a conversation about sexual preference in her kitchen. At least she could say that it had already been an interesting evening.
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It was indeed an interesting evening.
She invited Hardy over to dinner again. This time she considered how to ask him.
He agreed. Somehow he and Tom had become the best of friends within the two hours of dinner. Their senses of humor were disturbingly similar.
Ellie was just trying to fathom that Hardy could really smile at all.
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As small towns did, Broadchurch found out that Ellie Miller had had Alec Hardy over for dinner. The rumors started a whirlwind of whispers and looks, glances sent Ellie's way when they thought she wasn't looking.
She was.
"I thought you said that it was a one-time thing, Ellie." It was Beth who called her out on it, her tone not quite accusing as they walked the beach together.
"Yeah, and then Hardy and Tom became—well, what do teens these days call it? BFFs? Whatever the hell that means, that's what they are now. I interrupted a conversation they were having about—get this—who was created first, the Six Million Dollar Man or Iron Man, and Tom nearly threw daggers at me."
"Who's the Six Million Dollar Man?"
"Telly character. I think Hardy's the only one who knows anything about the show, anyway. I dunno, I think he's a bit of a geek but he refuses to admit it, he mentioned Star Trek during their discussion."
Beth smirked slightly. "Weird."
"Well, both shows were a bit before your time, dear." It was becoming easier to joke again with Beth, and their rather large gap of age between them was one of their oldest. "Didn't even know the bloody wanker was familiar with anything pop culture related but I guess he can still surprise me."
"You still call him names."
"Well, he is a wanker," Ellie explained, wondering at the same time why she felt she had to explain anything in the first place, "but he has his moments sometimes."
Beth looked dubious. "I suppose so."