The title of this piece is appropriate. Shattered, stunned, disbelieving. I still don't know how to process last's night episode. Writing about it seems the best therapy….
For those who have asked about "The Formal" and my other Will and Alicia stories, I do plan to continue. I am working on a young adult novel, but hope to finish that soon.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. If I did I would not kill off beloved characters!
She had gotten through the memorial service only due to a Valium and alcohol induced haze. She was polite and courteous to everyone, greeting Will's mother and sisters and giving each of them a heartfelt hug.
She had asked Will once if he thought love transcended death. It had been during law school, after they'd watched "Ghost" together. Will said he'd never known her to become mawkish or overly emotional over a movie like that. His answer to her question was no, it did not.
He always joked that he wouldn't have made it through Georgetown without Alicia's help. The truth was, she couldn't have survived it without Will.
He was always the one providing the laughter along with the pizza and beer. He was much less serious and easygoing than Alicia back then. Without Will's levity, she might have become a studious grind who never laughed or had any fun at all.
He loved her. He had told her so during that long ago phone conversation. She had sloughed it off. Twisting the perennial knife in his heart.
She woke up from another fitful sleep. Grace was standing in the bedroom doorway, holding Alicia's phone in hand.
"Mom, its Cary. He wants to know if you plan on coming to work today."
"Tell him I'm not feeling well. I'll be in later today."
She stumbled out of bed and went into the kitchen, grabbing the half-empty bottle of wine from the fridge.
Grace was standing to the side watching her with a disapproving look.
"You're drinking already? It's eight o'clock in the morning, Mom."
Alicia had enough of her daughter's preaching. Was this what happened? The adult becomes the child and the child the adult. Her relationship with her own mother mirrored that same dynamic.
"Grace just take your self-righteous attitude and get yourself to school and leave me alone, okay?"
"Are you going to drive me? Considering you're already on your second glass of wine, it's probably not a good idea," Grace intoned.
They had recently purchased a car for Grace. But Alicia still did not like the idea of her newly licensed daughter driving through city traffic and then getting on the expressway out to Highland Park.
Alicia grabbed Grace's car keys from the counter and tossed them to her.
"Here. Please be careful."
She finished off the wine, started on another bottle and then passed out on the couch. There was no amount of alcohol that could ever erase the constant sense of pain and loss. The façade that she had worked so long and hard to create was cracking. She could no longer plaster on the phony smile and pretend to be the perfect wife, mother, daughter, sister, or friend.
He had loved her. And she had never done anything except betray him.
When she woke up it was pitch black outside and rain pelted the apartment windows. Her phone rang and at first she hesitated to answer, thinking it was Cary badgering her about work.
"Mrs Florrick? This is Northwestern Hospital. Your daughter has been in a car accident."
She raced out of the house without makeup, still wearing her wrinkled sweats. She frantically flagged a cab, and barked at the driver to take her to Northwestern Hospital.
Peter and Zach were already there, waiting for her outside the trauma unit. She fell into Peter's arms sobbing. He may have been an evil bastard, but legally at least, he was still her husband. And they would always be inexorably linked through Zach and Grace.
"She's going to be fine. She skidded off the road in the rain and hit a light pole. She has a collapsed lung, a broken arm, and broken ribs," Peter said.
There was an accusing tone in his voice. As though Alicia was somehow responsible.
"Can we see her?" Alicia asked him.
"The doctor said you can go in for a few minutes. She's pretty out of it from all the meds," Zach told his mother.
You would be ashamed of me, Will. At the person I've become since you… left this world.
Grace opened her eyes for just a minute when Alicia entered her hospital room. She was conscious, but groggy.
"Grace, sweetheart. I am so sorry," Alicia said as the tears fell.
"It's not your fault, Mom," Grace mumbled.
Two weeks later, Alicia Florrick sat on a folding chair in the basement of a Chicago church. There were twelve other people there. A few of them spoke, told their stories. Alicia was afraid to do so at first. She had never been afraid of speaking in public. She was a lawyer after all. But she had never spoken in this kind of setting before. Finally after listening awhile, she got the courage.
"Hello. My name is Alicia. And I'm an alcoholic."