AN: This just kinda happened after last night's episode. Enjoy and please review!
It's past midnight when he knocks on her door.
She flinches at the sound, isn't expecting any guests, but there's a creeping suspicion, the only explanation really, though she is uncertain she wants him here.
When she turns the handle and his tired eyes stare back at her, something shatters.
She has seen him despondent before, desperate, but the hurt in his expression is so deep, so visceral, that she steps aside without giving it a second thought. She doesn't say anything, there's no need. He moves past her rather quickly, maybe afraid that she will change her mind if he hesitates a little too long, and he wouldn't dare to take that risk. Not tonight.
Things are different tonight. The pain has become unbearable. He wouldn't be here if he had a choice.
He returns to the spot on the couch he occupied earlier but his demeanor is different, she thinks, he appears small and exhausted and achingly sad. She doesn't know what happened, what sudden twist led him to her door at this hour, but she can't shake the feeling that they will be crossing a line tonight, whatever its nature. This seems frighteningly intimate and she doesn't understand why, but the man before her needs comfort, needs help, needs her, and she has known this for a long time, of course she has, but things are never easy between them. Things are rarely completely honest. Things are always just a bit too complicated.
Her anger, her behavior towards him, the way she has treated him, it's nothing more than a defense mechanism. It's such a simple fear really, to fall in love and then what, the criminal, there's no future there, but she wants him, god, he might be the only one who can save her.
And she has suffered so badly. And he won't leave her. So many things. And never that.
Their relationship had changed so dramatically in these weeks on the run, their bond unbreakable and their closeness irreversible, and then it had all come to an end. She was to blame for it, surely, but if only he would talk to her, just once, openly telling her what he wants, what he imagines them to be, what he needs. Make her believe that this could work, that she has every right to be hopeful, that there's a reason he looks at her the way he does. The way he marvels at her whenever she enters a room. If he would only be brave enough to verbalize it.
But nothing.
Wherever I am, whatever I'm doing.
And now he is here.
I will be there.
It's her turn now. She can keep promises, too.
She won't leave, either.
She sits down next to him, their legs touching, and she doesn't care if it's too much or if she should keep her distance because it was he who made the choice of coming to her tonight. If he is surprised by the contact, he doesn't show it, but he can't seem to look at her as she watches his profile, can't seem to even give her a hint for his reasoning. His body is a little too stiff, the lines on his face a little too deep.
She wants to say something but she doesn't know where to start. Red, she whispers softly, an incentive, an offer, and he leans forward suddenly, his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped tightly, his gaze fixed on the wooden floor.
He's not wearing his hat, she notices, he might have forgotten it in the car, and he looks strangely incomplete without it, no shade to hide his grief, all out in the open space of her living room.
Her hand reaches for him, positions itself on his right shoulder and stays there, lends him warmth and a pulse, a sign of life, reassurance that he's not alone. She watches how he closes his eyes, and her fingers move over the back of his head, slowly, very slowly, she just wants to feel him, she just wants for him to feel, maybe this is how they end their suffering, two lonely people yearning for some kind of response.
Her fingertips trace lines over his back, nonsensical patterns, the pressure increasingly stronger against his thick wool coat.
"What happened to you, Red?" she asks carefully. "Who broke you?"
And then he turns and looks back at her.
And suddenly he is an open book.
A man who has tried so hard to hold it together, to not let the world dismantle him, a man who has been destroyed and haunted by his memories, a man who has desired and a man who has hated, a man who is good despite it all. Who is good and loyal and faithful.
A man who loves deeply. A man who loves her deeply.
She just wants him to be okay. It's all she has wanted for a long, long time.
She's no longer afraid. And he hasn't moved.
"I miss you, Lizzie" he tells her quietly.
Come back to me. That's what he is trying to say.
Come back to me and things will work out just fine. And we will protect each other and care for each other because that's what we were meant to do, because we fit, because we are extraordinary together.
Because I love you.
That's what he means. And she understands.
Maybe she kisses him then as confirmation. Maybe as proof. Maybe as a promise. Maybe because she is tired of waiting and because the choice had always been hers.
Something so incredibly pure and real, something she had tried so hard to deny. A way of healing.
The tenderness of it, the reality of it, it's everything, flawless and beautiful and right. Finally honest. Finally brave.
"Will you tell me about it, Red? Will you tell me what happened?" she whispers and he nods. She wants to learn about his secrets, his past, his broken heart. She wants to help him like he has helped her.
Because she loves him, too.