A/N: Set during 3x03, after their conversation in his office.
Work Text:
A drink sounded good. Maybe more than one. Cary had work in the morning, but after the day he had, it didn't seem to matter much. A few months ago he'd of said things are great, now he felt like he was turning into this pathetic angst mess that no one should ever be reduced to.
All over a stupid girl.
If only she was a normal girl. She never was. Not from the moment he met her at Lockhart & Gardner. Not from all of the moments when he would test the waters to have her snark meet him, words that only caused a smile to spread over his fair features.
It's not her who makes him smile anymore. There's no smiling tonight.
Instead it's an after work drink, it's him swirling the scotch, nothing else seemed right, around his glass. Looking down into the liquid as if it was going to give him the answers to the million questions he tried desperately to answer. He never had the answers.
Why couldn't he get her out of his head? Why the hell couldn't she pick up his calls?
The tension rose with her and Alicia. It wasn't his doing. The avoidance made it feel like it was.
The once empty seat becomes occupied. Cary doesn't need to turn his head to see that it's her. The woman who plagues his thoughts when they aren't focused on a case, or when he's a little too far gone with his distraction of choice.
"Whatever you want you'll have to wait until morning. Not going back to the office now, and not a pillar of information for you." He talks directly into his drink, not bothering to look at her, not wanting to, not even wanting to stay.
She's quiet, it's not surprising. "I don't want anything."
A scoff comes. He's not in a mood to play nice. "Skip the small talk." It'd be easier on both of them if she just said what she wanted, or maybe just easier on him. Definitely easier on him.
He's an angst ridden mess. All over her.
"Cary..."
The last of his drink flows down his throat, ordering another, listening as she quietly gets something for herself. In his mind, he might've imagined this differently.
Her voice carrying his name does nothing for him. That's a lie. It does everything for him. His eyes focus on something else, anything else. A blonde on the other side of the bar, the very one he knew was staring for most of the night. She's not of much interest, not as much as others that have come through Cary's life.
The objection is to forget Kalinda, to pretend that whatever they had didn't exist. Even if they never had anything at all. He might've thought they were friends, but with her freezing him out that was clearly wrong. They weren't even friends. She just used him to get whatever she wanted.
It makes him wish he could regret everything he'd done for her. All the favors he extended, his desire to protect her, but none of it ever came with regret. His actions weren't done so she would sleep with him, or so he could find some way to get under her skin. He did them because he was friend. He might've been an enemy of the law firm she worked at, but he was never her enemy.
"I didn't do all that because I wanted to sleep with you."
He doesn't bother to nurse the next drink like he had before. It all slides down his throat as quickly as he can manage, slamming the glass down on the counter. He can't do this, he won't do this.
Earlier the excuse had been him needing to get back to work. Now he doesn't even care what it is, or what she thinks.
"Some people actually care, Kalinda. My mistake in thinking it was more than just me."
He's sure she has something to say but he doesn't stick around to hear it. Money falls onto the bar top before he's walking in the other direction, not daring to look back at her.
Maybe it won't always be like this, but she's stuck in his head, and there's no way out.