Just Crushed
Rating:T
Disclaimer: I don't own anything in any way, shape, or form, related to Eureka.
AN: This takes place at two separate times. The first section takes place at the end of the episode Stoned. The second, after I'll Be Seeing You.
Crush. Just a crush.
Crush or not... she still felt crushed.
Sick. Dizzy. Couldn't breath.
Leave. Flee. Run.
She couldn't think, couldn't function. Just knew she had to get out of there.
Just a crush. Just a crush.
She let Carter's words play over in over in her mind. Some kind of sick comfort, bringing little or no comfort. He was still touching her.
Just a crush...
Or not. What if it wasn't. What if he loved her. What if he needed her. What if...
Panic. Fear. Betrayal.
She had thought it couldn't get any worse.
No possible way.
Please no.
He wasn't hers. They weren't doing anything wrong. But that didn't help. It just made it worse. She couldn't hide behind anger. Couldn't shield herself in feelings of rage. Couldn't hide from the truth.
No, Carter had to be right.
Just a crush. Just a .
Crushed wasn't a strong enough word.
Devastation.
Sheer utter terror. Consuming even the breath in her lungs.
Run. Leave. Flee. Don't let them see.
What if it wasn't? What if he was gone forever?
She couldn't believe it before. Couldn't believe that he was really gone for good.
But now. With Zoe.
She knew that look. Knew that simple sweetness. It was hers. Hers alone. But he was sharing it with another woman.
She was going to vomit. She was going to hyperventilate. She wished death would swallow her whole and burn the memory from her mind.
Jo ran through GD.
What if it wasn't just a crush? What would she do then?
She couldn't think about anything. Couldn't see the questioning faces in front of her. Her confused coworkers darting out of the way. Couldn't care if they saw her panic.
She simply had to flee the scene. Blot it out. Put as much distance between it and her as humanly possible. She could fix it later. Make up some story about an emergency elsewhere needing her immediate attention.
They couldn't see the tears she knew were coming. She wouldn't give him that too.
He had taken everything from her, the least he could leave her was one small shred of dignity.
Oh God.
No.
Not a crush.
Please not that.
She could handle anything but that.
She had known it was a possibility. He had bragged about the other women.
But it had never hurt so much.
She could feel the heat building in her ears, that familiar tingling sensation just before she lost the contents of her stomach. The hollow fear building in her gut, joining the unrest of acid in her stomach. The blurry vision of tears threatening to spill over.
The hurried click of her heels.
Uncomfortable and loud. Drawing more attention than necessary.
She forced herself to slow down.
She missed her shoes. Her uniform. Her ordered life.
She missed him. Missed him so damn much. Felt like her heart was missing.
Needed him.
Needed him so badly.
Just a crush.
Loved him.
Just crushed.
Just... Just... Not a... Not a crush... What if... No... Please no...
Please, make it just a crush.
The cool air rushed up against her face as she pushed through the last door and found herself outside GD. The contents of her stomach rushed passed her lips as she bent over and lost that last bit of control. Stumbled to her knees as tears mixed with saliva and snot.
Everything.
He took everything.
Everything.
He was everything.
And gone.
She sobbed. Wanted to scream.
Wiped at her mouth with the back of her sleeve and stumbled to her feet. Blinded by her tears she pushed her way to her car, fumbled with the door handle.
"Open." She pulled again, fought with the handle franticly, then slid back to the ground. Her back against the car, her knees pulled to her chest. Her right hand tugged at the chain around her neck, pulled his ring free and clutched it so tightly it bit into her skin painfully.
She wept bitterly. For everything they had been. For everything they never would be.
Then she tucked the ring back under her shirt. Wiped her eyes. Picked herself back up and opened the door.
Collected again as she bit back and dug deep. He couldn't hurt her if she didn't let him. She couldn't let him. He wasn't the man she loved.
The man she loved was dead. Gone forever.
Forever.
He was never coming back.
She would leave his memory in the parking lot, with the evidence of her distress.
She could do it.
But her heart ached and that little voice in her head laughed at her.
She would always love him. It would always hurt. But she had to pull herself together. Had to function like his feelings for Zoe meant nothing.
She had no choice.
So she got in the car, started the engine and simply drove away like nothing had happened.
Zane blinked and rewound the clip from a glitchy security drone's hard drives. He had bumped into it on accident, and kept watching from some disturbed fascination.
That same sick feeling tugged at his heart again as he watched her throw open the door and stumble to the ground. His finger hesitating on the mouse button, the cursor hovering over the stop icon.
He didn't understand it. Didn't know what would have made her that upset. He never thought she had it in her to be that upset. That same sinking sensation tugged at his stomach when she reached the car door and her tears fell down her beautiful face accompanied by desperate gasps and pitiful sobbing sounds.
He watched it again.
Fascinated. Disturbed.
Guilty?
It shouldn't affect him.
But it did.
It felt like someone had dropped a ton of bricks on him.
He watched it again.
Like a sucker punch to the gut.
And again.
Like he wanted to go find her. Offer some measure of comfort.
And again.
Then he deleted it. Searched for any other record of her hasty flight from GD.
Looked at the time stamp, traced her footsteps back to the infirmary. Back to Zoe.
Back to that day.
To that moment.
Watched her in rewind as she stumbled back into the infirmary with Carter helping her. Saw the moment when something caught her eye and all the life seemed to go back into it as she walked backwards out of the room with her carefree look.
He didn't dare watch it in real time. Didn't dare look for other camera angles. He didn't want to know what could have hurt her so much. He didn't want to hear the words that Carter offered her in the hallway or the dazed words she offered back.
He had a sick feeling that he already knew them. Already knew it all.
So he deleted them. Every file, every angle. For a twenty minute time frame. If anyone looked, they would find twenty minutes where nothing was captured in that infirmary, and no one would ever find out just what set her off, or that she had even been in there in the first place.
It was already too much that he knew.
Protecting her image was the least he could do. After everything else he had put her through.
It didn't make any sense.
But somehow he had crushed the director of security at Global Dynamics. His arch enemy.
Somehow he had turned her world upside down.
His victory felt hollow. The game, foolish and worthless.
Somehow her downfall was his. Her weakness, her tears, that sick urge to throw up... Somehow all of it seemed to want to transfer through those digital clips and attach to his very soul.
Something connected them.
Something more than just their now shared secret of her desperate flight through GD.
And it scared the shit out of him. More than the ring. Maybe even more than the kiss.
He didn't need this. Didn't need to see just how attached she was. Didn't need to feel like such a dick.
It was her problem, not his.
But that didn't stop the sick feeling in his stomach. It didn't kill his urge to comfort her. It didn't take the empty feeling away. Make him feel like less of a failure.
And it didn't take away the knowledge...
He had crushed her.
It didn't take away that strange, uncalled for and certainly undesired effect that knowledge had on his heart.
Like it was stuck in a vice.
Crushed.