Title: Urban Solitude

Rating: G

Summery: Michael's musings on people-watching, happiness, Sara, etc. just after escape. More or less.

Spoilers: Very small ones for Ep. 9, "Tweener"

Disclaimer: Paul Scheuring and a whole lot of other people who aren't me own Prison Break and its characters

I started thinking about this right before the most recent episode, and then "Tweener" aired and added a lot to Michael's character, and this came out from there. It's longer than I meant it to be originally, so it might be a little too long for a wordy fic, or too wordy for a long fic, but it evolved on its own, so there you go.

(The title, by the way, comes from Anouk's "Urban Solitude," which I've been listening to constantly the last few days after watching Nemisis' awesome Prison Break music video – you can find it on fanforum)

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He likes to watch other people. Even people he doesn't know he'll watch, quietly studying their faces, movements, taking in their expressions, the way they speak, how they touch.

His brother used to get mad at him for it. Lincoln would tell him it was rude to stare at other people and he'd usually fire back that it was rude to steal other people's bikes, but that never stopped Lincoln, and then his brother would punch him. He thinks Lincoln found it unnerving, the icy stare he knows he can fix upon people, but eventually his brother seemed to get used to it and realize that he wasn't always coldly calculating like a serial killer when he quietly stared at everything around him, but watching people, taking in their lives.

Before prison he found it comforting to watch others. There were always people around who were happy, and somehow it made him happy, whatever was going on in his life. He'd watch people on the train or in a restaurant or at the park, going about their lives, and imagine them happy, excited, doing things in their lives that he couldn't. He'd smile when he saw someone laugh or hug or flirt or joke, and though he knew he was seeing only a small piece of their lives, he liked seeing it and knowing that people were generally pretty good. And happy. Veronica used to call him a romantic, always trying to see good things around him, even when others treated him like crap or ignored him completely. But he didn't mind being ignored most of the time, especially when he could watch other being happy, because most of the time just that was enough for him.

In prison everything was different. The ugly ache of fear and sadness was magnified almost unbearably when he'd look at the people around him. He tried to separate himself from the other prisoners, reminded himself that they're not the same as him, that he was there because he wanted to be; that he's smarter, sharper, better than everyone else, because they're supposed to be there and he wasn't. And it was easy at first to see everyone else as a little less than human, a little less than him; as pieces on a chessboard, acceptable to manipulate because they've hurt other people and his brother was in trouble.

But he can't always shut things out around him, especially not when he's stressed and scared and sad and surrounded constantly by hundreds of other people who are just as scared and sad and angry as he is, no matter what they did to end up there. It hurt to watch other people in prison, especially knowing that there was only a very select few that he could help, and not all of them deserving of it.

He found that he liked going to the infirmary daily not only because it was a vital part of his plan, but because it was the only calm, relatively peaceful place in such a sea of anger and despair that troubled him to watch. The doctor's office was almost always quiet, not quite as hopeless as the rest of the prison, and occupied by people who wanted to help rather than hurt. It was an oasis where he could sometimes feel the comforting sensation of blending in and going relatively unnoticed, and where he unintentionally found a kindred spirit in the doctor.

He remembers her telling him that it's in her nature to want to help people, that she thought was in his too. At the time he'd thought he was loosing that part of himself, maybe loosing himself entirely in there, but later he wished he could've told her that he was helping someone.

But he knows that his silence, his pushing her away is why they are now on a plane leaving that place behind, so he can live with having let some things go, including her.

He's content watching others live their lives and be happy, excited, loving and in love, having experiences that he can't. So he doesn't ever regret what could've been. He does his best not to imagine what it would've been like to meet her years ago, before prison, before everything, but he's not bitter when those kinds of thoughts creep into his head; thoughts of running into her in a bookstore or a coffee shop, smiling hesitantly at her, timidly asking her to dinner, though he knows he probably wouldn't make the first move as he's usually more shy that that around people in the real world. He was never resentful when he'd look at her and know that it'll never happen, but resigned. There are many sacrifices he's made, many things he's had to give up, and he knows that there will be many more, for the rest of his life.

But the relief on his brother's face as they speed away from Chicago, his nephew clutching Lincoln's arm, is more than enough to make it worth it. Sucre's bouncing excitement as he talks about getting married on the beach at sunset is enough for him, enough so that he won't be angry at missed chances. His foot still hurts, will probably always hurt, but it hurts a little less knowing that Abruzzi's children are eagerly awaiting their father's return to them.

He's used to watching life from the outside, always feeling like something's missing despite all of the opportunities and successes he's had that others, he knows, never get. There's something that makes him never quite fit in with the rest of the world, though he's never been able to quite figure out what. Feelings of isolation and loneliness have abated over the years as he came to understand his place in the world, and so most of the time he lives on the happiness of others without much regret.

He'd never really had much of a chance to touch her, and for that he might've been sorry. He'd held onto her, gripped her waist, laid a hand on her back in the midst of the riot, but the chaos, fear, and urgency at the time had made it impossible to revel in the touches as he might've liked. He can't really remember what she felt like, but he'll convince himself that he does, and he'll hold onto that imaginary feeling because it's enough.

With Lincoln and LJ alive, sitting here breathing and talking and staring and alive next to him, on their way to freedom, it's enough.

There's a distant hope that perhaps someday he'll see her again. That maybe she'll pick up what he was saying to her week ago while hiding out from the riot in the air ducts and come looking for him in Baja; that she'll realize Lincoln's innocence and understand his actions and know that not everything was a lie or an attempt at manipulation. Maybe he'll come walking down the beach someday, he lets himself imagine, and he'll spot her standing in the sand, smiling with her head tilted and hair whipping about.

The rational part of him knows that the likelihood of her coming after him, of him being able to see her again anywhere outside of prison is ridiculously small. As much as he trusted her, cared about her, simply liked her, he still really doesn't know much about her, and vice-versa. He's never been particularly vain, but he thinks she may have a crush on hi, or a least some kind of interest in him that goes beyond doctor/patient that lead her to delve so deeply into his personal life. But he's only known her for a month, and it's probably absurd to think that there was ever anything more than friendship between them, and even that may be a stretch. Their relationship was based on lies, existed only because he needed access to the infirmary, despite how much he may have grown to like her, how much she surprised him with her genuine respect and desire to help. He knows he has a crush on her, and maybe she does have one for him, and crushes never have to be rational or logical. Anything more than that, however, would probably require the past to be changed, because he knows too much has happened and he'll always be a prisoner and she his doctor, regardless, with that chain-link fence between them.

But the romantic side of him, or what's left of it now, clutches at the dim hope that none of that will matter, and he lets linger in his head the possibility that that she felt the same connection, tension between them that he did. He'll continue to let himself imagine meeting her again someday, and he can live with that faint hope of someday because the others are happy and his brother's alive and that's enough.