So, it's after midnight, and I am quite obviously very bored. I was disgraced by the low number of EdenMohinder fics (Though the existing ones are all fantastic!), so I figured I should channel my boredom into something productive. So, this veers AU after the kiss between Eden and Mohinder in 2x06, Better Halves. Eden will not die (I refuse to kill her off in fanfiction, ever.), and this picks up the morning after the kiss, only there's been a little more than kissing going on. Rated T just because.
He wakes up the next morning, and she is curled up next to him, the sheet draped over her naked form. He watches her sleep for several minutes in silence, but he finally decides that he can't stay. He gets up as quietly as possible and gets dressed. She doesn't stir, but he could swear he catches a glimpse of her watching him through half-closed lids once.
And, feeling violent stabs of guilt the entire time, he picks up the bag containing his father's ashes and the few garments he brought to New York and walks out the door, leaving her behind, still asleep.
Throughout his father's funeral and his continuing research in Madras, he still feels the occasional pang of guilt. How could he leave her alone after what had happened? Was he that cruel of a man, that he could simply walk out his own door and abandon her to her life in New York?
Even when he returns to America, knowing this is where he needs to be but also hoping he can somehow make things right while he's here, he feels the guilt lingering. Every time he looks at the now empty cage where Mohinder the lizard previously dwelled, every time he sees the macaroni and cheese pot he never remembered to return to her, every time he lays eyes on the gun from he day he met her, still on a shelf in his bedroom.
And she's disappeared completely. At first he thinks she's just avoiding him, but he knocks on her door every day, never sees her in the halls, never sees her anywhere. And when he finally asks the landlord about her, he says she's gone. For good. Forever.
He carries that burden through so much, nearly a year of troubled adventures. The world is saved from a nuclear holocaust, a deadly virus, and a bloodthirsty killer. And Mohinder watches it all through guilt-veiled eyes, never letting anyone in on his deepest secret: that he was foolish enough to walk out on the only woman he's ever loved.
It's been almost a year since that night when there's a knock at the door of his apartment. He opens the door, not bothering to see who it is, and is stunned to find her standing there. He's so transfixed by her that it takes a full minute for his eyes to travel to the little pink-and-white bundle she's holding.
It takes him another minute to string together a coherent half-sentence. "Is she…" he begins, but he doesn't need to finish. He gently pulls aside the part of the blanket shielding her face, and it's clear this is his daughter: light caramel-colored skin, tiny black curls, and deep brown eyes that stare curiously up at him. His mouth is open in shock for so long that he's not sure it will ever close. Finally, Eden passes her to him carefully, and he's in a daze as he holds his daughter for the first time.
She takes a few steps inside and shuts the door, and he sits down before he falls down, unable to take his eyes off the pair of them. Finally, he looks up.
"I owe you both an apology."
Yeesh, that was short. Ah, well. Any and all feedback is appreciating, excepting flames, of course. Thanks for reading!
-GxK