They have a row the day Helen goes missing.
If someone were to ask (which they have, usually in the form of some thinly-veiled conversation insinuation), he couldn't really tell them what it was about, specifically, just that they had one. She left angry, he stayed mad, and forty-eight hours later, he reported her missing.
He goes into work that day, the day he files the report. It's past noon before he gets in, so he's already missed two of his three lectures that day, and he can already predict he won't be in the mood to give the third. He's fielded enough questions for one day, thanks.
But it's better than the alternative. Going home to an empty house, sleeping in an empty bed ... no, he'd rather not. And at least here, he has something to do. Papers that need marking, dissertations that need putting off until the last possible minute.
Who knows? Maybe he'll actually read them. He could use a good laugh. Or growl. Or snort. He doesn't care which, really; he just wants to feel something that isn't the hollow, gnawing rawness in his chest, like someone's scraped out his insides and filled him with ice and lead. He wants a distraction.
What he gets is a knock on his door.
"No office hours today," he calls out, probably more sharply than he ought to. It's not as if he's posted anything on his door. Maybe he should. But that would mean moving, and that seems like too much effort.
Besides, he thinks he's scared them off a moment.
Then the door opens.
He's got his nose buried in a paper he's only pretending to read, and he doesn't look up when he hears someone walk in. They're moving slowly, hesitantly. He doesn't recognize the gait, and he's thinking that maybe they'll go away if he pretends they aren't there.
"Is it true?"
Or maybe not.
Nick does look up, then, because he knows the voice. Stephen's standing there, and for a single surreal moment, Nick doesn't know if he's happy to see him or if he isn't. But then the moment passes, and he realizes he really, really isn't.
"Not now, Stephen," he says, because the more he thinks about it, the more Stephen's the last person he wants to see right now. The question's still there, reflected in his riverbed eyes that are mercifully dry, if a little bloodshot.
It's been almost a year since Nick's old research assistant had to drop out of classes to have a baby. Stephen was signed on with Nick in the interim, a temporary arrangement until they could find a suitable replacement.
They still haven't.
Still, he's not really Nick's assistant. Helen is his thesis advisor. She's his primary. She's his boss. He doesn't know him well enough for this, to have the conversation that he knows Stephen's looking to start.
Nick's lost his wife (she's not dead; he just doesn't know where to find her). But at twenty three-years-old, Stephen's at that age where it doesn't matter that his relationship with Helen was only a working one. Everything seems more important at that age. Everything is the end of the world, even to someone as level-headed and reserved as Stephen.
He just doesn't show it the same way most people his age do. But it's there. It's there in the way he stands, shifting his weight from foot to foot. Stephen's always got this energy to him, but it's always so still. Predatory, like a cat ready to pound. It's not like this. And Nick doesn't know if he's got it in him to deal with him right now.
Scratch that. He knows he doesn't.
"Cutter, is it true?"
Damn him, he's persistent. Nick swallows thickly. He's not getting out of this without giving him something; Stephen's stubborn that way. Maybe he wouldn't physically block his way, but then again, he wouldn't put it past him. And the sad truth of it is, on next to no hours of sleep (as if it matters how much sleep he's had), there probably wouldn't be much Nick could do in the way of a fight. Stephen's all corded muscle and athleticism. Nick's got him on weight and maybe brute strength, but he's not even sure on the last one.
And why the hell is he thinking so hard about this?
He needs Stephen out of there. He needs Stephen gone, and then he needs to be gone, preferably to the tune of a bottle of whisky and a dim-lit room. Maybe his own, maybe not. A pub could serve the purpose just as well, and he's beyond being picky.
"I'm not talking about this with you, Stephen. Talk to the Dean." He's sure they've got a statement prepared by now.
Stephen crosses his arms, jaw setting. "No."
"No?"
Stephen's lips press into a firm line. The message is clear.
No.
Nick bites back a groan. He can't do this right now. He really, really can't do this right now. "You're acting like a child."
"You're not the only one who cared about her, you know." It's not quite a non-sequitur, but it's not the response Nick was expecting, nor is it said the way he thinks something like that ought to be. It's not a big declaration; he's not indignant. He just says it like it's fact and that's it.
"She was your teacher," Nick says. His chest is getting tight. He's getting frustrated, and Stephen's calm persistence isn't helping. "She was my wife. Clearly, there's a difference."
"I never said there wasn't."
"Then what the hell are you trying to say?" he snaps.
Stephen, damn him, looks more or less unperturbed. "I'm trying to say I understand. As much as anyone, at any rate. Didn't exactly see a queue lining up outside your office to check in."
"You say that like it's a bad thing."
"You'd rather sit in here and pretend to read papers?"
Nick has to put his pen down before he breaks it. "As opposed to what?" The words are ground like oil through his clenched teeth. He's not got the patience for this. After this morning, after heaps of paperwork and interrogations, he's not got the patience for much of anything.
"As opposed to this." Stephen reaches into his satchel and pulls out a brown bag. Nick knows immediately what it is, even before Stephen pulls the bottle out. Scotch. He had a fresh bottle of Scotch, unopened, and sat it on the table. "Cancelled your last lecture. Told everyone you'd be out the rest of the day."
"You can't just do that," Nick sputters, for lack of any better protest. Truth be told, he's sort of blown away. That bottle of scotch is the best news he's had all day. All week, really. But he can't just go along with it.
"I just did."
Well, in that case.
He reaches for the bottle. And he tries really hard not to be too pissed off when Stephen grabs it first and slides it out of reach. All traces of humour are gone from his face when Nick looks up at him, and he realizes for all the levity, that twenty three-year-old that just lost his mentor is still standing in front of him. He's hurting in a way only younger people like him know how to hurt; he's just coping the only way he knows how.
"Can you tell me?"
Not 'will you tell me' or 'tell me.' He's genuinely asking, not only if Nick is willing to have that conversation with him, but if he's even able to.
It's too raw. He still remembers the look on the constable's face as he finished filling out his paperwork. Forty-eight hours. They're past the mark where, statistically, most people are found. Another twenty-four, the chances decrease exponentially.
It's the not knowing that's the worst, though. Not knowing if she's dead, if she's alive. Not knowing if something stopped her from coming back, or if she just didn't want to. He doesn't have answers, and that's a fucking miserable place to be.
He doesn't know if he can talk about it. But, "Pour me a glass, and we'll see." It's not a great answer. It's noncommittal, it's vague, and it's maybe a bit manipulative.
But Stephen just smiles a smile that doesn't even begin to reach his eyes. "Okay," he says in that funny way of his. Stephen accepts things, rolls with punches that would knock lesser men (arguably saner men) flat on their asses. He just takes it, deals with it, and moves on.
In this case, moving on is twisting open the bottle of scotch and pouring them both drinks.