5
A/N: Just a little tag to Tech, Drugs, and Rock-n-Roll. Yes, I plan to work on The Rooster. This last month was one of the craziest of my professional career. Thanks for reading. Sheila
Sleep
The cool dark of pre-dawn felt good as he slipped into the garage. His super charged intellect couldn't sustain eight hours of sleep, and he liked the solitude of these early hours before Happy came in and started banging on things and Cabe who, with his desperate need for structure, would hover until a job came in. Then Paige would come in like a sunny tornado bringing in breakfast and coffee. Sly would show up at 9 a.m. on the dot, and he would stay pretty quiet until Toby slinked in around 11 a.m. sporting a gambler's hangover and a need to agitate.
He turned on only enough light to see the stairs and started up to his office. He stopped halfway up and sniffed. Human olfactory senses were generally underused in favor of sight and sound, but Walter knew the visceral power of the nose. It was the familiar scent of machine oil and soap and he sighed as he backed down the stairs. It was the 3rd morning in a row and it disrupted his routine. He hit the overhead light to the workroom, and found her hunched over at her worktable, dark hair spilling onto the desk.
The previous two mornings, she'd jumped when the lights came on, and he was surprised when she didn't this time. He felt a twinge of annoyance with her. It had been nearly a week since the event in Elia's building, and there was no reason for this continued disruption of her routine. He touched her shoulder and she erupted out of her sleep, swinging a fist into his gut. Walter yelped and wheeled back into the wall. "What the hell?"
She blinked her eyes awake. "Oh, it's you."
Walter slid to the ground clutching his gut. "Three centimeters lower and I'd be singing soprano."
She tossed her black hair. "And you would've deserved it too."
"What did I do!"
She rubbed at her face. "You killed him."
"Only for a couple of minutes! Come on! He's fine. Back to annoying all of us. Just yesterday, you said you were going to push him out a window."
"You killed him."
"It was the only way."
She narrowed her eyes. "I've come up with three alternatives that would've been at least as effective."
He nodded. "And I've come up with five. But we were in the moment, and we didn't have time to explore all the corners of it. Besides, it worked."
She slammed the table with a nearby wrench. "It didn't work! The doors wouldn't open. What if I hadn't thought of that titanium pen?"
"Undoubtedly, I would have."
"You're an adrenaline junkie, O'Brien. It used to be just annoying, but now you're betting on the lives of people you call friends. You're a worse addict than he is."
His mouth twitched and he looked away. She put the wrench down and sat back in her chair, arms folded.
"Is this why you keep showing up so early? Three days in a row."
"What?"
"I like my alone time- that 2 hours before you show up in the morning."
She screwed up her face. "Who cares what you like?"
"You're irritable- more than usual. Are you sleeping? Are you even going home at night?"
"None of your business."
He frowned. "Nightmares."
She colored. "You don't know anything."
"I was talking about me."
"You?"
"I had one. In it, I didn't think of the pen and the glass wouldn't break. You were yelling at me, and I couldn't fix it."
Her dark eyes were fierce as she stared at him, and then her mouth twitched. "In mine, we get through the glass but he doesn't wake up. Nothing works. He stays dead."
He shrugged. "It's pointless to dwell on it. We have to move forward."
"No!" she said gripping the wrench again. "It's a lesson and we learn from it."
He rubbed his chin for a moment. "I take too many risks. I push the edges of things."
"You want to solve everything immediately, and sometimes, it makes you reckless. What if he hadn't woken? What then?"
"It's pointless to—"
She hit the table again. "It's not pointless! You are not always going to win! One day you're going to lose, and the consequences might be more than we can handle."
"Can you put the wrench down?"
She glared at him. "Will you think about what I said?"
"If I don't, I imagine you're going to bury that thing in my forehead."
"No way. Your noggin is the moneymaker. I'm aiming for your kneecaps."
He winced. "Comforting, Happy. Comforting."
She squinted at the clock. "5:30 a.m. It's going to be a long day."
"I'm sorry I killed him…temporarily."
"Don't apologize to me. I'm not the one you hurt," she said looking down at the table.
He started to walk away and then turned. "I've never seen you like that before. You know, in the control room. You were really freaked out."
"I was not!"
"You…were scared."
Still focused on the table, she nodded.
"You would've been like that for any of us, right?"
She looked up at him, and for once, Walter didn't need to struggle with reading facial expressions.
He cocked his head. "But you keep pushing him away."
She just stared back him, lips pursed.
Behind them, the door swung open, and a familiar voice came. "So, I was driving home from a card game- late night one- won $1600 but lost $1675. All in all, a fairly satisfying night and what do I see when I drive by- Happy Quinn's car parked at the garage. Third night in a row."
She sighed and Walter saw a smile ghost her face briefly before she settled into a look of annoyance.
He turned to Toby who was standing there, curls askew with three coffees in a tray. "One of those for me?"
"Yup."
Walter took one gingerly. "I thought maybe you were still mad at me."
He shrugged. "You were being you. I can't ask you to be someone you aren't. I know I matter to you. That's enough."
Walter nodded. "Thanks pal."
"Gimme one," Happy said as she reached for a coffee.
Toby swung it out of her grasp. "Sorry my little kumquat."
"You brought three coffees!"
"But then I saw your eyes. We will all suffer if you don't get sleep."
She got to her feet, dark eyes glaring. "I will gut you, Doc."
He ignored her and put the coffees up out of her reach as he searched a storage locker. He pulled out a fleece blanket. "The soft green one. The one you like. I'm just going to put it on the couch here. And here's a pillow."
She folded her arms. "I'm not sleeping here."
He spread the blanket on the couch. "Cabe has a seminar this morning so he won't be around. I'll text Paige and Sly and tell them to come in later."
She was still glaring, but Walter noticed that her shoulders had softened.
"I'll just be here reading. Every time you have a nightmare, you can open your eyes and see that I'm here."
She swallowed. "You don't know everything."
"I know what I know," he said softly. "Walt, let's keep the lights off down here. I'll just have my reading lamp on."
Walter nodded and headed for the stairs. He stopped halfway up and watched Toby sit down, turn on a desk lamp, and pick up one of his texts. Happy stood stubbornly on the edge of the darkness for a moment. He waited for her to erupt, but she didn't. Instead, she went over to the leather couch, and curled up, pulling the blanket up over her head. Toby put his book down, leaned back in his chair with his feet up, and slid his hat over his face. Walter waited until the deep breathing of sleep sounded, and then he quietly headed up the stairs.
The End.