Mia Fidelis, twenty-eight, is a nurse.
Reese meets her on a Tuesday, clad in only boxer briefs. She's wearing bright colored scrubs, her long dark hair pulled into a loose ponytail.
She appraises the various scars across his body. Nods to a thin white line on the flat of his stomach.
"Appendectomy?"
"Yes." He doesn't look down; he's never had an appendectomy.
"Mm." She smiles in a way that says, I don't buy it. "You seem to have a number of scars, but your chart doesn't indicate a single surgery."
She manages smug in a way that's not unlikable. There's a pause as she turns and pulls a blood pressure cuff from the hook on the wall. He watches her with a mild expression. She wraps the velcro around his bicep.
"Was military," he allows. The paper-lined exam table crinkles when he shifts his weight.
"Not anymore?"
He shakes his head, leaning back on his hands. "Not anymore."
"And that one?"
He looks down: a self-stitched stab wound from two weeks prior. He had removed the sutures with scissors and a pair of forceps Finch had once used for assembling and dissembling a motherboard. It's clearly inflamed, and clearly not historical.
"My dojo has, uh, loose limits on sparring techniques."
There is a dry, "Oh really", in his ear and he has to remember there is a third party in the room, visible or not.
"Your dojo," she repeats.
He forces a smile. "I thought you were a nurse," he comments, "not a detective."
"You'd be surprised the overlap." She motions him to sit up straight and collects his blood pressure, his pulse. Jotting in the chart, she pulls apart the cuff and slides it off his arm.
"The doctor will be in shortly… I made a note you might need an antibiotic." A raised brow.
He feels the corner of his mouth quirk.
He likes her.
"Thanks," he says. He bluejacks her phone when she's not looking.
The door shuts.
He senses the silence on the line.
"It's a scratch, Finch."
"Let me guess," comes the measured response. "The Robinson case?"
He doesn't answer. The Robinson case, an attempted murder gone sour and one of the few times he hadn't returned to the Library post-"mediation". Which had not, apparently, gone unnoticed.
He's pulling his pants on, looking down as he tightens his belt, cinching the buckle. He's still barefoot, wrestling a shirt over his head when there's a knock. The door opens and a white jacket enters; he curses under his breath.
The most on-time physician on the face of the planet.
The greeting, "Hi… I'm Dr. Reynolds," is accompanied by a curious look.
"Sorry," Reese says. He lowers his arms. "Thought I was done here."
He swears he hears Finch laugh.
Mia's boyfriend is not a threat.
Reese learns this when he follows them on Wednesday night.
It's a nice enough restaurant. He sits at the bar and orders a whiskey, straight. He has little doubt the sound he hears Finch make is one of passive admonishment; he signals the bartender and makes it a double. There's a sigh in his ear.
He smiles.
"I just… We're young, Ryan." At that moment, Mia's boyfriend is an ex-boyfriend: she's breaking up with him, word by word.
"Exactly," he argues, but she's shaking her head, staring off instead of meeting his eyes.
Reese watches and listens, barely drinking. Crossing Ryan off as a possible threat.
He follows them, afterwards, and watches him when they part. Watches him watch her as she walks away.
Mia's ex-boyfriend is deeply in love.
"Really," Reese says when they find out. He feels a weight sink into him, it settles at his feet. "Does your Machine want us to find a cure or something, Finch?"
There's a pause on the other end of the line, a hesitation.
"John," Finch says finally, and it's more of a sigh.
A minute passes. Reese leans his back against brick, staring at the moon. In the midst of a city, it's not very bright.
"I think," he says, "I'll check into Mia's roommate."
On Thursday morning Reese finds an empty library. He trails through the stacks and lands in Finch's executive chair, staring at a blinking cursor.
He taps out the word 'glioblastoma' with his left hand and hits enter with a heavy index finger; he does it even though he needs a password, a code, first, and isn't anyway certain what he would learn from the prompt.
He clicks to close the denied message and stares a second longer. He looks to the doorway. Empty.
There are three books on the tabletop, he slips out the one in the middle. He reads the title, flips it open to somewhere halfway through.
When Finch comes in, not soon after, Reese doesn't look up. He waggles fingers at his employer in an idle greeting, eyes on the open book, letters and words that seem to have no meaning. He turns the page, because that's what people do when they read.
A hand ghosts his shoulder, a gentle squeeze and then it's gone.
"Do you want tea?"
He doesn't, but he says, "Okay."
Finch disappears and Reese closes the book, vacating the chair.
The Machine does not makes its decisions based upon medical diagnoses.
He follows Mia that night on a run. He thinks, at first, she knows he's trailing: she stops after a half mile, pausing against a storefront, again after another quarter. She turns in his direction, but she doesn't see him. If anything, she looks right through him.
She stops in Foley Square, walks for a few minutes, then pushes to her final destination.
It's busy on the bridge, a common route for runners and cyclists. On a night like this, hundreds of people might cross paths, tiny specks in the city's landscape.
Minutes pass. She stands there and he closes the distance between them.
"Hey," he says softly. Mia turns and eyes him, frowning.
"Eight million people," she says, "and somehow…" She shakes her head. "John, right?" At his nod: "You look different with pants on."
"I get that a lot."
She smiles, just slightly. "Let me guess. You're from the support group, and you just happened to need a physical the other day."
He doesn't answer, not right away, and her eyes go back to the expanse. The city winking at them from across the river.
He's quiet as he follows her gaze; his stomach tightens at the view. He thinks how fate is funny, or cruel: he's touching a rail he'd once balanced his own life on.
He pretty sure, almost certain, he's not going to be good at this.
"I'm not going to jump." She speaks first, turning her head slightly toward him.
"Oh," he says and she gives him a curious look.
"Did you think?" She laughs then and he feels relieved.
Okay.
There's a soft breeze. A siren in the distance.
"Mr. Reese." Finch's voice breaks his silence. "The browser history on Ms. Fidelis' computer indicates that while a bridge may not be her final exit, she certainly has one planned."
He closes his eyes.
If he could shoot something, steal something, drive a car into something, maybe.
"You have options..." he says finally. He'd read some, online. There were new drugs, clinical trials.
"You are from the support group." Mia's head tilts, she looks at him more seriously. "Did my mom put you up to this? Ryan?"
He's quiet again, and there's a long pause. He feels unarmed. Two joggers pass by, girls around her age in leggings and t-shirts.
"I stood here once," he says after a hesitation. Not long ago. He shifts his weight across the rail. He doesn't look at her but he can feel her gaze shift his way.
"What changed your mind?"
He stares at the river, raising his eyebrows. He rubs a hand across his mouth absently.
What changed his mind was a job that, if it didn't give him a reason enough to live, would most certainly be an efficient way to die.
"Someone gave me a purpose," he says finally.
She's giving him a curious look.
"Look," he says softly. "You don't know what's going to happen."
"I'm a nurse, John. I do. I've seen how it goes. I just-" She shook her head. "You talk about purpose.. Soon, I won't even be able to do my job. When it's not seizures, or headaches…"
She looks back to the river.
"It's my memory, my thoughts." She gives the city a wistful smile. "I'm losing my thoughts."
He hears a breath on the line and for a minute waits for Finch to say something.
Anything.
Nothing comes and he shifts again, turning to face her. "Mia."
"I've had a great life, John. Maybe I'll never get married, or have children… But I don't regret anything."
She looks at him and gives a small smile.
She doesn't want to die, she tells him later, walking from the bridge. But she already is.
That night he runs his own loop, driving miles into the pavement. When he stops, his breaths are gasped, his hands are heavy on his knees.
He walks then, slowly. He has no place to be.
"Finch," he tries later. It's after midnight. He sits on the edge of a thin mattress, listening to the city: it's loud and quiet, all at the same time.
"Mr. Reese."
A television hums through the walls. He can hear typing in his ear and wonders if Finch sleeps; he is yet to find a place the man resides.
"I think I'm better at shooting people," he says. "For future reference." He lays back, his feet still on the floor, and stares at the ceiling. There's a water stain the shape of the People's Republic of China.
There's a long pause, and he begins to think he shouldn't admit these types of things to his boss.
"I think," Finch says finally, "you underestimate yourself."
I don't, he thinks.
He studies China.
"Mr. Reese."
"Mm."
"Get some sleep."
He taps the com, the typing silences. He continues to stare at the water stain. Finds Ordos in its shape.
The first joggers are beginning their orbit as the sun comes up, the skyline bathed in the pink of dawn.
It's Sunday.
Mia is gone.
Reese had traced a path from her apartment to the river and he stands there, leaning forward on the rail.
Well, he thinks.
Then, Shit.
His phone vibrates a minute later. He taps the com in his ear, staring at the skyline.
"Morning, Finch," he says, and his voice doesn't break.
"Mr. Reese."
He turns from the view. "What's on the docket for today?"
There's a pause. There's no background noise, no typing.
"Finch?"
"Breakfast."
He shifts his weight against the rail.
"Breakfast," he repeats.
"The first meal of the day, Mr. Reese. I imagine you've heard of it?"
The tone is flat but he can hear a subtle change in cadence: Finch is teasing him.
"I've heard of it."
"Excellent." There's another pause. "I trust you know where to find me," Finch says, and the line disconnects.
Reese is still a moment longer.
He blinks when a bicyclist chimes by, then pushes himself off the rail and tries to ground himself as he walks.
For a man devout to paranoia, Harold Finch allows himself some habits. Breakfast is one of two places, and Reese's first guess is correct (it's known for their Sunday specials, so he takes the chance).
He finds Finch sitting in a back booth. Three-piece suit, green tie. He's reading a newspaper that masks the bottom half of his face and when Reese sits across, he doesn't look up. He does, however, raise his eyebrows.
Ah.
"Closest diner to the library," Reese offers lamely.
Finch's mouth quirks slightly. "Is it."
It's not.
There's a mug of coffee waiting for him and Reese steeples his fingers around it. He scans the room and lands back on Finch.
"Do you always sit facing the door?" he asks.
Finch lowers the paper and studies him. "Do you always stalk your employers?"
Reese blinks innocently. "Stalk is a strong word, Harold." Finch gives him a hard stare he's not yet immune to and he shrugs, hoping he looks smug.
The waitress rescues him. Reese charms her with a quick smile, an order for an orange juice he doesn't want. She looks to Finch, who pulls his eyes from Reese and shakes his head.
There's a moment of silence then, and Reese feels the solemnness sink back in. He pushes the menu to the side and unfolds the napkin, separates the knife and fork on the table.
He's balancing the jams back in the bowl when Finch speaks.
"We tried," he says, and Reese looks up.
He rubs the side of his face, the stubble on his cheek.
He scans the room again, habit, and when he looks back, Finch is still watching him.
"Why do you do it, Finch? The machine, the numbers. All of it."
"I told you, Mr. Reese." Finch takes the menu next to him and pushes it forward. "I have my reasons."