The Good Guys
Author: Pharo
Disclaimer: 'Alias' belongs to ABC, Bad Robot, and JJ Abrams.
Summary: Sometimes you can't fight change.
Spoilers: "Almost Thirty Years".
Feedback: pharo@newyork.com
'I wanted us to be something that we'd probably never be…'
–The Ataris, San Dimas High School Football RulesShe likes to tell you about who she used to be. You think it helps her remember who she once was so that she can go on being who she now is.
It always starts the same way. She sits down, pours herself some iced tea, and sighs as she looks past the brick walls and the mortar to something that only she can see. Sometimes you like to follow the trail of her stare in the hopes that maybe you'll see what she sees that makes her smile, but you never do.
She never holds her gaze into the secret world for more than ten seconds. You think she's afraid that if she looks at it too long she'll ruin the illusion by finding something wrong with it. And then she'll have nothing to smile about.
You've learned to deal with the fact the she'll never fully be in the here and now. You stopped wishing long ago that she'd just let her pain go and let you help her. Now, you've learned to just live with the little pieces of herself that she offers from time to time in the hopes that it'll all come together one day.
There are days when you get exasperated with the entire situation because you know you deserve better than snippets of a life with her. Times when you get tired of looking into her eyes and not knowing who you're looking at – of realizing that you probably never will – and knowing that you don't want to walk away from her regardless.
So sometimes you scream when she gets that far-off look in her eyes and asks you to sit on the roof with her for awhile.
"No. I'm tired," you say in a voice louder than you ever intend it to be.
"A couple of minutes," she whispers back and you think that maybe you're right in thinking that she's going to break.
She takes your hand and for a second then, you think that maybe it'll be different this time, but you look into her eyes and pull your hand away because it's always the same story of regrets. Sometimes, you just can't take how much it hurts to know that she isn't who she wants to be that you aren't the person she wants to be with.
In the end, it's always the same – you always sit with her, wrapped up in blankets on the plastic lounge chairs on the roof because you're afraid you'll miss some new part to her story – a new part to her.
"There was a time when I thought that I could be on the side of truth," she starts off as if she's doesn't anymore.
"You are."
"No, no, I'm not," she always insists, as if she kicks around puppies and pushes over old people.
It's almost as if she needs to convince you that she's telling you the truth and that she's not leading you on by pretending to be commendable. Sometimes you need her to convince you also.
"I wanted to be one of them – the good guys."
You know how the conversation will end: you'll go out into the cold and walk around for fifteen minutes, angry because the only reason she's with you know is because she messed up her life.
"Is there a league? Did they revoke your membership card or something?" you ask, wanting it to end another way.
You're tired of the ambiguity. She never gives you anything solid to make you believe that they are real and not some figment of her imagination. She never helps you understand why they could hurt her so much.
"You know that's not it."
Her eyes plead with you to stop.
"Who the hell are the good guys? The ones in the perfectly starched suits sipping lattés and fingering the badges in their pockets?"
"Don't—" she warns, but it's far too late for you to stop the words from leaving your mouth.
"Or is it that guy that drowned, the one that didn't know when to run? Vaughn or something right? If someone that stupid—"
"Will!" she yells, automatically shutting you up.
For a second you're afraid that the entire world has heard her and now they're going to come and get you. Paranoia isn't completely unfounded to you anymore. It's what allows you to get up in the morning.
"I – I'm sorry," she fumbles. "I need to go."
In her hurry to get up and leave, she knocks over her glass of iced tea. Both of you are stare at the shards of glass that now litter a section of your roof because you don't know how you're supposed to proceed and you don't think she does either. It's as if staring at the broken glass will rewind everything so that she doesn't have to leave and you don't have to feel like a jerk for speaking the name.
"I'm, I'm really sorry," she finally says, the sound of her voice pervading the mute atmosphere.
She's quick to pick up the pieces of glass, but the hiss that escapes from her makes you aware of the fact that she's cut her hand.
"You ok?" you ask, your position unchanged.
"Yeah, just a little cut. Nothing big."
"I'll go get the first-aid kit," you say, but don't make an attempt to move.
She shakes her head.
"No, really, it's ok."
You nod. As if a spy needs your help putting a Band-Aid on her hand. As if she needs you to pretend to take a look at her hand. As if you even have a first-aid kit in your apartment. You just thought that you should have offered.
"I'm going to go take care of this," she says, holding up her hand.
You expect that you would've followed her before, but things are different now.
"Promise me that we'll never talk about him."
"I think you should talk about it."
"I just can't. Then it'll really be true."
"It is true. He's—"
"Please just promise me that we won't. That we'll never say his name."
"I promise."
"Never?"
"Never."
You are tired of compartmentalizing and questioning everything in your mind. You're tired of the constant fear that you've said something to jeopardize her, afraid that you can say anything to jeopardize her. As you sweep up the glass, you think that, regardless, you're entitled to a slip-up every once in awhile also.
"You don't have to clean it up," she says, making you aware of her presence. The subtlety that comes with her job leaks into her personal life (as if the lines weren't blurred enough). She can't walk into a room without silent footsteps and a need to blend in.
"Syd, we're friends, right?" you ask your back still turned to her. Sometimes you need the reassurance.
She sighs. You know now that you're not going to receive the answer that you want to hear.
"I'm – I don't know how to be a friend anymore, Will," she says quietly.
"There's no book," you say, looking at her.
"I should've never gotten you into this Will. God Will, can't you see that all I ever end up doing is hurting people? This was never fair to you."
You know that she uses you. You've known for awhile now.
"I want to tell you that I don't give a damn about fairness, that I don't care if you hurt me, that I don't mind being the substitute, but—"
"I don't deserve you," she says.
Up until now, you thought like a naïve kid. You were under the impression that no matter how messed up things got, in the end, your friendship with her would be ok. You thought that she'd be your best friend forever – that it was a solid fact where everything else was a lie.
You didn't realize that it was nothing more than wishful thinking. There can't be a friendship. Learning to live with that and accepting it are two different things.
"Bye Will."
You don't stop her from walking out the door this time.