CSI: New York
Let Me Be Your Anchor
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Summary: I know that he is not 'fine', he is not 'okay', but how do I reach him? How can I tell him that I am here for him; here to be his strength, his rock, his anchor? He needs to know that he does not have to grieve alone.
MPOV
As I pull up to the cabin, I cannot help expelling a sigh of relief. This place is my sanctuary, my refuge, my safe haven, my cocoon. It is the place I come to center myself, to reconnect with myself and to think. As I enter and lock the door behind me, I peruse the spartan nature of the place and feel myself relax. I drop the few things that I had brought with me by the front door; groceries, books and an overnight bag and then shed my clothing and head to the shower. It is always the first thing I do when I get here. I rid myself of the City and my job and prepare to just be in this place. After the refreshing shower, I dry myself and dress in a pair of boxers and a t-shirt. I enter the kitchen and begin putting away the few groceries and supplies that I had brought with me. As there weren't many, it takes me all of 5 minutes. I pour myself a glass of apple juice and sit on the threadbare sofa.
As I lay back to relax, my eyes automatically land on the photos on the bookshelf across from the sofa. There was a picture of me and Claire on our wedding day. I chuckle, looking at the smiling young people, all teeth and huge smiles for the camera. We were so happy, so in love, so eager to start our lives together. I was still in the Corps and she understood that. She understood my need to serve my country. She understood that I did it to honor my country, but she also understood that I did it to honor my hero, my father.
Thinking of my father causes my gaze to move to the next photo. The picture is of me and my Dad the day I joined the Marines. I could see the pride and love in his eyes as we hugged one another in front of the tree in our backyard. I remember that my Mom was the one who took the picture and I remembering seeing the pride tinged with a hint of sadness as she told us to smile and say 'wiener schnitzel'. This was our inside joke; she would always say something different and out of left field when she wanted us to pose for a photo so that she could capture our genuine emotions when we reacted to whatever weird thing she yelled out.
The next photo is of me and my Mom. We are sitting on the sofa in the living room of their house, the house I grew up in, on the same sofa that I had spilled grape juice on when I was 10. My mother was hugging me to her and we were looking at the camera and laughing. We looked so happy and carefree. That picture was taken just after I had told them that I had proposed to Claire and that she had said yes. I remember how happy they were that Claire and I had found each other. They loved her from the moment I introduced her to them as my girlfriend. Looking at this picture reminds me of the way my mother always hugged me. She would just envelope me and hold me close to her. She had told me once that no matter how old I got, that I would always be her baby. She said that it was hard to let go after having carried me, cocooned me and kept me safe for 9 months; sometimes she just had to hold 'her baby' close to her now and then. Scattered along the shelves were pictures of the three of us over the years and then they stopped after I lost my Dad and my Mom and then Claire on 9/11. I feel the familiar pang in my chest as I think about Claire and my parents being gone. Once upon a time the ache I felt when thinking of them was a physical pain that would literally bring me to my knees, but over the years and with the help of my Counselor, that pain had been tempered until it was little more than a twinge in my chest. What had not been tempered was the depth of my love for them or how much I missed then in my life every single day.
For a long time there was nothing, but then in the past 6 years there had been new additions to the shelf. The first was Stella, then Sid and then bit by bit the entire Team. The last picture I have is of all of us at the 'Team Picnic' that Stella and I had arranged last year. We had it on a Sunday afternoon at a park in Brooklyn and the picture was of all of us hugging and laughing as we posed on a picnic table as a stranger in the park took the picture for us. We were all huddled in close to one another, hugging and laughing everyone is happy and smiling and I realize that we are a toothy bunch of people! Little did we know that this was the calm before the storm that would tear our family asunder.
This is why I am here; I am worried about my Family. Sometimes I still cannot believe all that has happened in the past 6 weeks. Jess is dead. Killed in the line of duty. I felt that twinge in my chest and soon it unfurls into a dull ache. I let the tears come. I had not had the chance to grieve for her yet, but I could allow it here in my sanctuary. This was the catharsis I needed. I let out my grief, my frustration, my guilt, my fear and my helplessness. Her funeral had been hard. We were all shell-shocked; the solemnity of the mournful bagpipes heralding her service and her status as a fallen comrade was devastating to be a part of. I remember looking at the Team and wondering how we would get past this. But I knew we would. The same way we did when we lost Aiden. We had to. Then within two days of her funeral, while honoring her memory, we had been shot at in a brazen drive-by. No-one had been killed, but Danny had been shot and is now paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair. Still, I had to remain in my role as the Leader of The Team; stoic and in control and always professional.
But, I watched them, this family that I love, deal with the aftermath of the death and then the carnage of the shooting. I watched as Sid retreated into the solace of his family; leaving punctually every day to rush home to them. I watched as Sheldon volunteered his medical service at night to deal with the chronic insomnia he was now experiencing. I watched Adam and Stella cling to one another, wondering if I was the only one who realized that they had turned to each other in the aftermath of our tragedy to assuage their grief. I trusted Stella's judgment on this enough to look the other way for now. I watched Danny; bright, vivacious, energetic, almost frenetic at times, struggle to come to terms with being confined to a wheel chair unable to walk. I watched as Lindsay becomes his strength and his most stalwart supporter; encouraging him and loving him unconditionally even as the two juggled being newlyweds and new parents at the same time.
Then there was Don. Whenever he was asked, he would reassure everyone that he was 'fine', that he was 'okay'. These were such trite words and they could not come close to describing what he was. He was the one I watched the most, he was the one that I worried about the most. As someone who has dealt with my own share of grief, I know what to look for, I know the signs and I know that Donnie is in a bad place. As the Leader of this Team, I wear many hats; I was The Boss, The Negotiator, The Counselor, The Advice-giver, The Arbitrator, and sometimes The Bad Guy when I had to call them out on something they did or didn't do. In this Family, I was The Father, The Brother, The Uncle, The Godfather and now the Grandfather to little Lucy. I wish that I could reach out to Don the way a father could, to pull him to me and comfort him. To let him know that things will get better. To let him know that I knew how much he had loved Jess. To let him know that the pain he is feeling now will eventually ease. I wish that I can share the benefit of my own experiences with him. To let him know that he is not alone. But, my professional role as the Leader of this Team precludes my role as The Father of this Family. I watched the relationship between Jess and Don blossom. I saw their initial attraction, their camaraderie, their teasing, their flirting, their mutual admiration and then their realization that they liked one another. Over the months I saw them fall in love. I knew that they would be good for each other. I saw how they grounded and complemented one another. I saw them making it together. I knew that Don's days as a 'playboy' were officially over. I saw the way they gravitated towards one another when they were in the same room; it was as if their bodies called out to one another. I saw the soft loving looks they shared when they thought no-one was looking. It reminded me of the looks Claire and I would share when we were dating and even after we were married. Then shots rang out and she was gone from him, in the blink of an eye his future was gone. He had gone through the denial stage; I knew from his reaction to Sid, asking him to take care of Jess' body that he had finally gotten past denying that she was gone. The day of her funeral, I stood at his side and ached to hold him as he bit his lip in an effort to stave back the sobs that were threatening to overwhelm his body. All I could do was place a hand on his shoulder and hope that my presence could buoy his spirits.
The night of the shooting, I saw something that scared me. As the shots rang out, I saw this look on his face as he popped his head up with his gun drawn from where we had all dropped to the floor after the sound and impact of the initial shots. I saw a myriad of emotions; determination, acceptance, resignation, then anticipation and then finally, joy. With that last emotion, I knew exactly what he was going to do. He was going to join his Angel. He looked over at me and our eyes locked and I tried to convey all of the love that I have for him into the gaze to let him know not to do what he was thinking. I could see the indecision in his eyes. I could see that he didn't want to hurt those that he would leave behind, but he loved Jess so much and he ached from how much he was missing her. Thankfully the shots stopped and in the ensuing silence, he closed his eyes briefly and when he opened them again he came back to us. He was here. Then the screaming started and we all moved to Lindsay when she screamed for me telling us that Danny was hit.
I had seen his cold rage when he had killed the man that was responsible for Jess' death. How I had wanted to tell him that vengeance doesn't make you feel better and it just adds to your guilt. But it wasn't my place as the Leader of this Team to tell him and it wasn't the right time.
He had come back to duty so soon; too soon after everything had happened, but I knew that his excuse was somewhat valid. Sitting at home alone where he did nothing but miss Jess and think about her was painful and he felt that he could be of more use at work. I understood what he was going to do; he was going to bury himself in his work in an effort to help him cope. I called it the 'Avoidance Strategy'. Whenever I saw him thereafter, I asked him how he was doing and I saw the false smile he gave me when he said that he was 'fine'. The smile that didn't reach those blue eyes. The smile that was a little tight around his mouth. He was wearing a mask, but the mask didn't fool me. I knew that mask. I had worn that mask after Claire had died. I had worn it through countless memorial services after 9/11. I had worn it as people came up to me at Claire's memorial service and told me what a beautiful kind soul she had been and said all of those other expected trite phrases you say to be people on those types of occasions. I wore it up until the day that I found the beach ball in the back of our closet and realized that it held the last living thing of my wife's. I sank to my knees and howled and that fucking mask finally cracked. It was in that moment that it finally hit me that she was really gone and that I was utterly alone. I lay on the floor of our bedroom clutching that ball to me knowing that I would never deflate it as it had Claire's breath, her very essence in it. I stayed on the floor that entire weekend, never moving, just reliving all of our times together, crying over my loss, buckling under the enormity of the realization that I was now utterly alone in this world. I grieved for her, for the life that we would never have. I grieved for all the dreams we had that would now go unfulfilled; traveling and experiencing the world together, having children, moving to the suburbs and building a life together.
I wanted to be there when Don's mask cracked. I wanted to be his anchor in the sea of raging, volatile emotions that I knew he was swimming in right now. I wanted him to know that he was not alone.
A/N: Thanks for reading. I'd appreciate it if you would take the time to review and let me know what you think of the story. Thanks!