Eh. Just want to say thank you to everyone who's reviewed any of my stories!
I know the majority (if not all) of you will probably never even read this blurb, but yeah. Thank you anyway?
Written.
Havoc was sure he could see Roy everywhere, even if he hadn't been anywhere near them for far too long. Still, Roy was everywhere. "Hawkeye, could you pass me those files?" he says, and he lifts a finger, indicating the little pile of paperwork hovering beside Hawkeye's desk. "Mhm." She stands up, purposefully circling around what used to be Roy's desk, walking around to pass in front of the desk, when she could have easily walked behind the desk, the shorter route to Havoc's own. Still, he knew why she did, he supposes. When Roy'd left for the north, she'd never faltered; never once shed a tear, never once looked wistful, simply lived on as if nothing had changed.
Of course, they knew better than to believe her illusion. He was everything for her, the one she protected, the one, that they would go as far as to say, that she loved. Typically of her, she was as strong as ever, never once faltering. Havoc saw all the little things, the way she would, as she had just done, not walk through the space that Roy once occupied, as if he were still there.
She hands him the files, passing, once again, in front of Roy's desk. Brushing by, she disturbs a piece of paper, and one of Roy's pens. Bending down, she picks up what appears to be a sheet of paperwork that probably will never get completed. Placing the paper back where it is, and taking the pen, then putting it beside the paper, as if he were there to read her indication that he should get a head start on his paperwork.
The day passes on slowly, lacking of the merry debates that used to echo in their department, and devoid of the occasional crash and bang that, invariably, was probably created by the bang of Hawkeye's gun, or Roy's own flames, or at times, Fuery walking into a desk.
Still, as Havoc watches her, he realizes just how much the Colonel had influenced his Lieutenant. He was there. Her voice always had the gently scolding tone it had when she reprimanded him for not completing his paperwork, and how her eyes flickered every few minutes, as if to ensure he not plotting something, and how she still kept her gun a mere second from her hand, as if she still expected some terrorist to burst through the door and threaten his non-existent form.
"Well, that's it for me, tonight." Fuery states with weakly composed merriment. It goes mostly unnoticed, and she looks up from her dedicated working, giving him a brisk nod. Havoc lingers for half an hour more, admiring the way he's written into her every movement, the way she keeps her hair clipped the way he likes it, with her bangs falling the way he'd once tugged them down to frame her face when she'd first stated clipping her hair up, the way she breathed deep and gentle just like him, the way she walked with meaning in every step, as if she still dedicated herself to protecting him, though he was not there.
Finally, she stands up, sliding her chair silently back, he knows, because she knows how he hates the scraping of the chair against the floor. "I'm going too, goodnight, Havoc." He almost expects her to bid her non-present Colonel goodnight as she walks over to his desk, bringing his jacket from the hook so close to her desk and rest it on the top of Roy's chair, as if to remind him to keep safe, despite the night janitor's determination to return the jacket to its hook every night after she'd left. And, of course, despite his not being there.
She steps and is half out the door when he calls her back, "Hawkeye, wait."
She turns back, amber eyes that Havoc knew Roy so loved watching him without the slightest bit of remorse at Roy's not being there, "Don't you.. don't you miss him?"
"Who?" she asks stoically, as if she doesn't know.
Two could play at that game, "Roy. Don't you miss him?" he questions, and he watches expectantly, for a flicker of her eyes, at the very least. Of course, her face is emotionless, as always. "Yes. Yes, I do miss him." she says, and he is surprised, he expected more of a 'No. He's just another casualty' reply from her.
"But he.." she continues, and he wonders what it is that goes through her mind, "Maybe one day you'll understand, find someone like that for you, but.. he can run as far and fast as he likes, but he'll still come back to me." He turns his eyes to her, mind contemplating her answer.
"But what if he doesn't come back?" he mutters quietly, almost, no, definitely, afraid to face her wrath if she is angry at him. "Haven't you.. haven't you ever tried to let go of him?" He watches her again, and notices the way her answers are always so sure, so definite, just like when he speaks of her loaylty to him.
She smiles. "I.. I've tried. Multiple times. Of course, he saw through me, like he does always; and he said to me, 'Maybe one day, you'll run as far and fast as you like, and still come back to me.' And he.. he's everything. I don't think I could stand knowing, if he didn't need me anymore. But I don't think I'd have the strength to even think of the possibility that he doesn't need me. I couldn't."
He is silent, as is she; a hesitant silence like that of the moment of utter beauty before the storm arrives.
She lets go of the breathe still in her throat, and leaves the room, silent. He has no reasons, and if he does, they are ones he does not yet know, but as she leaves, he cries. Quiet, gentle tears that roll down his face serenely. He does not understand it, and he tries not to think of the sympathetic sadness, and pity that stirs within him as he watches her leave, crippled by Roy.
She is out the door, and he can't see her face, as she says, "Don't pity me, Jean." her voice is gentle, and fond as it is only whens he speaks of him, "I hurt. I hurt, now that he's gone, but.. I don't regret him. I never will. He'll come back to me, I trust him. He saved me, and I owe him that much, at least, to believe in him." And then she is gone, and he curls into himself, arms wrapping around his chest, and it's hard to breathe.
Her eyes, so beautifully strong, so defiant, filled with all the sadness of the world that came with loving Roy. The saddest thing he's ever seen; the way she needs him so damn much, the way he's taken off her wings, and chained her to himself, always calling her back to his heart, even when he's gone, "Come back, Roy."
"If anything, come back for her. She's waiting for you. And I.. I don't think I can stand seeing how breakable she really is. How you've caged her, no the way she willingly walked into that cage, locked herself in there and threw the key to places no one will find."
Still, he can't help but admire the way every one of her footsteps are an echo of Roy, and how he's strewn into every breathe she takes, and the way he's still and always will be written into her every reason for living.
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Eh. I don't think that was the best thing I've ever written but, what the heck.