Title: When the Rain Comes
Author: Courtney
Disclaimer: Not mine. Not even a little.
Rating: PG
Pairing: Mac/Stella
Summary: No one loves you like I do.
Author's notes: The title, lyrics and even the summary are from the song 'When the Rain Comes' by Third Day. Just a sappy little MacStella angst-fest that you can blame them for.
When the rain comes it seems that everyone has gone away
When the night falls you wonder if you shouldn't find someplace
To run and hide, Escape the pain
But hiding's such a lonely thing to do
Rain. The streets were soaked with it, streaming down the gutters and filling the city's sewers as it ran through the streets unchecked. He'd heard people say that the city felt cleaner after a good rain storm, that the water washed over everything and made it new again.
Mac didn't feel that way at all.
He thought that the rain brought sorrow; the cities sins too vast to be purged by a little bit of water, would still be there tomorrow. Nothing would be cleaner, nothing would have changed. The rainfall was just a reminder of this, the city crying for its lack of forgiveness.
The window that he sat in front of was nearly impossible to see out of. The rain poured down in sheets, streams of it finding their way to his window to run down the glass. He hadn't even noticed that his face mirrored the window; tears sliding down his cheeks like so many raindrops over the smooth glass.
Claire had always loved the rain.
I can't stop the rain, From falling down on you again
I can't stop the rain, But I will hold you 'til it goes away
Stella had called at least a dozen times without getting an answer. She knew that Mac had a tendency to shut himself off from the world at times, but he always at least answered his work pager; even that had garnered no response. Now, worried, Stella knocked on his door and prayed to a God she wasn't sure she even trusted anymore that he would be safe inside.
No answer and she wondered if it was a violation to use the key that he had forgotten to get back from her when he'd gone to that forensics conference in Dallas all those months ago, the one that she'd used to gather his mail and water his plants for a week in the summer. Deciding to call on desperate times and all that, she slid the key into the lock only to find that the door wasn't even locked in the first place. Her heart jumped at this realization, knowing that it was very unlike Mac to leave his apartment unlocked, home or not.
She pushed the door opened with one hand, the other falling to her side to grip her service revolver. "Mac?" she called tentatively. Nothing.
"Mac! Are you here?" 'Please answer, please answer, please answer . . .'
She entered the bedroom and that's when she saw him. Sitting in front of the window in the dark, his face reflected back to her in the darkened glass. She couldn't tell the rain tracks from the tear tracks until she was standing right behind him.
"Oh Mac . . ." she said softly, no longer concerned about intruders or any other outside force. This was internal, all coming from Mac himself.
"She used to sit here and watch the rain for hours," he said blankly, his voice surprisingly free from emotion considering the topic as well as the obvious emotion radiating from within him.
"She wouldn't want you to do this to yourself, Mac," Stella urged as she knelt next to him, her hand resting on his knee. She'd known Mac forever and she'd known Claire, as well. He'd taken her death pretty hard, but she really thought that lately, over three years after the tragedy, Mac was finally starting to move on with things. Now, though, she wasn't so sure about that.
"I stayed at the hospital tonight for hours," he admitted.
Stella sighed and shook her head sadly, "That poor woman. But Mac, Claire didn't go through that. I know it's hard but . . ." she trailed off, not wanting to launch into some cliché about being in a better place, but also not sure what else to say.
"Is that was has you thinking about Claire? That poor woman, trapped inside of her own head? I know that you realize that there was nothing we could have done to save her. Nothing you could have done, Mac. It was too late even before we got the case."
He was still staring out the window, still hadn't even looked at Stella. He hadn't made a move, not even to wipe away the tears.
"I'm starting to forget the sound of her voice," he said softly, his voice nearly a whisper and Stella had to strain to hear his words above the rain.
She didn't know what to say, how to make him feel better. There probably wasn't a way. All she could do was wrap his hands in hers and squeeze reassuringly, letting him know that she was there, if he needed her.
She sat down in the floor beside his chair and rested her head against his knee, her hands still holding both of his and both of them sitting silent. They stayed that way for hours, letting the rain fill the silence around them.
When the rain comes you blame it on the things that you have done
When the storm fades you know that rain must fall on everyone
Rest awhile, it'll be alright
No one loves you like I do
It was nearly midnight and the rain hadn't stopped. The streets would be flooded tomorrow and their jobs would be that much harder, but neither Mac nor Stella seemed to be giving this a second thought. They were still sitting in silence, Mac battling his demons and Stella just there, ever his strength.
"I feel like I'm letting her down by moving on."
They were the first words spoken between them in hours and Stella almost jumped in surprise when he spoke them.
"You're not," she said simply.
"It's worse than losing her," he said sadly.
"What is?" she asked.
She saw fresh tears tumble down his cheeks as he said, "Letting her go."
Finally, after hours of remaining eerily still, Mac's face crumbled and his body shook as he allowed himself to sob. Stella was there in an instant, her arms wrapped around him and pulling him to her. He accepted the embrace, wrapping his arms around her slender frame and burying his face in the crook of her neck.
"I can't see her when I close my eyes anymore," he whispered. "She's gone, Stella. Claire's gone."
It probably should have seemed strange to hear those words about a woman who had died over three years before, but somehow, coming from Mac, it made perfect sense to Stella. She knew him well enough to know how his mind worked and this all seemed to fit to her. Looking back, she was surprised that she hadn't predicted it herself.
After he'd calmed down, Stella managed to guide Mac over to the bed and got him to lie down. She meant to pull the chair up beside the bed to stay by his side, but he refused to let her go. Instead, Mac pulled her onto the bed as well, hugging her to him as soon as she was at his side.
He didn't cry anymore. They didn't speak. They just breathed together . . . and listened to the rain.
When the rain comes, I will hold you
The End
March 19, 2005