Broken Hope

by: Kadi

Rated K+

Disclaimer: This is not my sandbox, it's just my favorite place to play.

A/N: Episode follow-up to 3x17 Internal Affairs. I thought there was more that needed to be explored, and this is my answer to that. Enjoy!

Andy shook his head. He chuckled as Julio left them. He was a good man. Andy couldn't imagine moving in with his mother at that stage in his life, just to take care of her. He thought it would be good for both of them, though. He wasn't the only one amused by the idea. Andy dropped a file on his desk. "He's a better man than I am."

Provenza pointed at him and opened his mouth. "No, too easy." He shook his head while the others laughed and straightened his desk. "One of these days," he said, ignoring the look and gesture his partner shot at him, "those bozos over at Professional Standards are going to learn that they just can't beat us. Sooner or later, they'll figure out how to just walk in the door, sign the report, and leave again!"

"That might be wishful thinking, Lieutenant." Amy snorted a quiet laugh. "I would think you'd want fewer reasons to bring them up here to start." Her dark eyes glittered with humor and just a bit of mischief. "I mean, you kept the last one that was hanging around all the time…"

There was a moment of silence as they all equated her words with their Captain. Provenza pointed his finger at her and shook it. "That was not by choice!"

Buzz smirked as he walked past him, on his way to his desk. "Not for some of us," he muttered. He glanced at the Lieutenant and then tossed a pointed look at Flynn.

Provenza grunted. "Tell me about it." He slapped his hands on the back of his desk chair. "Okay everyone. This calls for a drink. Let's get our stuff and get out of here. Come on. I'm…" he paused and considered his next words carefully, "not buying, but I will consider chipping in on the tab this time."

"You say that, every time," Andy pointed out. "But you never do it. You have got to be the cheapest drinking partner on the face of the planet, and by cheap, I ain't talking about the size of the tab old man."

"What are you complaining about?" Provenza made a face at him. "Not like you're going to be drinking anyway. You're just going to sit there and look miserable, and probably wish you were somewhere else…" He paused and then he smirked. "With someone else."

Andy's eyes narrowed. He scowled at his partner. "Oh, I don't know, probably because I usually get stuck with your tab." He rolled his eyes. "You know, being sober around you, is costing me a fortune." He folded his arms over his chest and grinned smugly. His partner had just given him the perfect out. "I think I'll pass on this one, but have a good time."

"Uh huh." Provenza snorted. "Nice try. No one here is buying it Flynn." He walked around his desk and headed for the exit. "Not a single person thinks that you are bailing on us to protect your wallet, but go ahead, if that excuse makes you feel better."

"Every person here is just dreading having to cough it up for you, you cheap old goat." Andy leaned against the side of his desk. He clasped his hands in front of him. "I can do this all day, but you ain't getting any younger."

"You know what," Buzz walked over to join Provenza at the exit. "I will buy your drinks if I don't have to listen to you two bicker anymore."

Amy shrugged into her jacket and pulled her purse out of her desk. "You buy," she told Buzz. "I'll make sure he gets home…"

Tao stopped beside Andy. He watched as Provenza shrugged and followed the other two out. The Lieutenant shook his head. "The young ones always fall for it." He looked at Andy and grinned. "You haven't actually bought any of his drinks in a long time."

"Of course not." Andy smirked. "That's what the kids are for." He stood up from the side of the desk and slapped Mike on the shoulder. "Go on, have a good time. Keep him from making a complete ass of himself."

"No," Tao said at length. "That's what the kids are for." He flashed a devious grin and strolled out after them. He sketched out a wave behind him. "Have fun!"

Andy shook his head. "I thought that was supposed to be my line?" He shoved his hands into his pockets and turned toward the Captain's office. She was packing up her things earlier. Through the blinds he had watched as she gathered her jacket and pulled her purse over her shoulder. Andy walked toward her closed door and knocked on it, even as he pushed it open. He leaned into the office, holding the door open with one hand, but his weight was braced against the door frame.

"Hey." There was a grin on his face, but it melted away when he saw her. She was seated on the front edge of her desk, staring at nothing. She still held her jacket in her hands, it was looped over her arm and resting in her lap. The purse was on the desk beside her. It was her face, however, that drew his attention and his concern. It was etched in sadness. Andy stepped more fully into the office and pushed the door closed behind him. "Sharon." He called her name, and waited for her to look at him. She did, but didn't seem to really acknowledge him. He pushed his hands into his pockets again. It wasn't an easy case. It never was when one of their own was involved and FID was sniffing around. He knew from firsthand experience. "You okay? You know," he offered her another smile, this one crooked, and designed to lift her mood. "All said and done, it didn't turn out so bad. So what, Julio has to jump through some hoops." Andy shrugged. "Who hasn't been to anger management a time or two? You sent me plenty of times. It's all going to work out. You did okay, Sharon. I mean, for a minute, we were kind of worried that you were going native again, but luckily, we have managed to fully infect you with our naughty, rule bending ways."

Any other time it would have gotten a smile out of her. Instead, Sharon looked down again. She concentrated on her shoes. They were a bit scuffed at the toes," she thought, she would need to do something about that. She drew a thin breath, but it did little to alleviate the ache in her chest, the ache that was spreading to her stomach and causing it to churn painfully. She shook her head at him and let her hair fall forward to obscure her face. He was trying to cheer her up, and she appreciated the effort, but she wasn't feeling it. Not today. Not with everything else that happened.

"It shouldn't have come to that at all," she said quietly, in a voice that was thick with emotion. "It was my fault. I should have handled Julio's anger issues a long time ago. I knew better." Her voice wavered. Sharon's jaw clenched and she stared at a spot on the floor. "I know better," she whispered, her thoughts moving away from Julio. They shifted back to Jack. Her lips pressed into a thin line in an effort to keep from trembling. Her eyes filled, until the floor became a discernible blur of gray. She blinked furiously, hoping to will back the surge of emotion that was pressing down on her. The ache in her chest moved upward, until her throat closed up, throbbing with the force of the tears that she was trying so hard to hold back. It wasn't to be. She covered her eyes with a trembling hand, even as the first, choked sob escaped.

"Sharon." Her name was a murmur on his lips. Andy reached up and flipped the blinds closed. Then he walked slowly toward her. "Hey." He lay a hand on her shoulder, and felt the trembling that was working its way, almost violently through her.

"I can't," she choked out. She let the jacket fall to the floor. Sharon pressed a hand against her stomach and leaned forward, the pain cutting through her like a blade. Her mouth opened again but there was no sound forthcoming. She could hardly breathe against the force of the emotions seizing her, much less speak. Sharon looked away from him. She promised herself she would not break. That this time she would weather the storm in her life that was Hurricane Jack and she would walk away without a single tear shed.

"Okay." Andy drew her toward him. He pulled her against him, without pulling her from the desk, and moved a hand into her hair. His other moved up and down her back, slowly, gently. His brows drew together in a concerned frown. He had never seen her this affected by any of their cases in quite this way, and they'd had some pretty hard ones, especially this last year. "You're okay," he said quietly, soothingly, while still rubbing her back. It couldn't be the situation with Julio. It was hard on all of them, they were wound pretty tight throughout the investigation, but she believed in the system. She trusted the rules. Okay, so she'd bend them a little bit every now and then, but it usually took some work to get her to bend the rules. Andy looked down at the top of her head, which rested against his chest. He lowered his chin against his chest, so that his lips almost brushed against her hair.

Sharon didn't want to break at all, and certainly not here. She hadn't wanted anyone to see her like this, and surely not Andy. She pressed the back of one hand against her mouth and shook her head. The initial wave couldn't be stopped, but as it swept over her, she tried to push it back again, lock it down. Sharon kept her head bowed as she swept at her eyes with her hands. She leaned back, and sniffled helplessly. She gripped the edge of her desk with one hand and continued swiping at the treacherous, still falling tears. "I'm fine."

"Yeah." He sat beside her on the desk. "Sure you are." Andy arched a brow at her. He wasn't buying it. He reached around her to the purse that was barely sitting on the edge of her desk. Andy tugged it back, closer to the center of the desk. He had been out with Sharon enough times. The front pocket was open, and the package of tissues was easily accessible without having to actually delve into her purse… because God only knew that was one place he would never go. Women's purses, dangerous, mysterious places. He held the tissues in front of her. "Wanna tell me about it?"

She took the package out of his hand with a sigh, and then sniffled again. Sharon took a tissue out of it and then let the package drop onto the desk between them. "It's complicated." She took a breath and it shuddered through her. Sharon tipped her head back, and then took another breath. "Jack is drinking again." Another wave of tears stung her eyes. "He's gambling again." She shook her head. "Jack was Rusty's personal emergency. He let himself into the condo, and he was there, drunk, when Rusty got home last night."

Andy frowned at her. "How did he get into the condo? Didn't you change the locks?"

"No!" She threw her hands up in disgust and exasperation. "No, okay, no I did not change the locks. It never really occurred to me that Jack would still have a key, much less that he would use it! We're divorced." Sharon rubbed a hand across her forehead. "I'm sorry, I've never been divorced before, next time, I'll change the locks," she said, sarcasm and bitterness edging into her tone.

"Okay." He held up his hands. "Point taken. I'm sorry." Andy shrugged at her. "That was the first thing the ex-wife did when she kicked me out. She changed the locks so I couldn't get back in." He nudged her shoulder with his. "You're a lot nicer than she is."

She used the tissue to dab at her eyes. "Or a little more pathetic?" Sharon sighed, and the sound trembled through her. "I just left him there. He was passed out and snoring on my couch, and I just left him laying there. I just left Rusty there…" She looked at him, miserable at the thought, tears threatening to start anew. "I couldn't think of anything else to do. It didn't even matter that Rusty wanted to help, I just couldn't think of doing anything but getting out of there. I just had to get away from him." She folded the tissue in her hand and wiped at her nose. "All of a sudden he was the same old Jack again, passed out on the couch while Emily and Ricky were sleeping down the hall. I just couldn't… so I ran." Sharon shook her head again. "Jack isn't dangerous, he's pathetic, but the most horrible thing he'll do to Rusty while he's drunk is try to serenade him."

"Oh…" Andy made a face at the memory. "Yes, I remember." His nose screwed up. He suddenly had a clear image of just how horrifying Jack's singing could be. Andy was lost in a memory of one such occasion when, the both of them, had been so drunk they could hardly speak much less sing. They had managed a bit of a duet, singing to Sharon because she had come to the bar to drag Jack's pathetically drunk self home late one night. Andy couldn't remember her being very amused by it. He slanted a look at her. "You promised to never mention that night again," he deadpanned.

Sharon snorted. She covered her face again. "If I have to live with that memory, then you have to live with it. Although I doubt either of you really remember it. Jack definitely drew a blank the next morning. He still swears it never happened." Sharon sniffed again and shook her hair back. She looked at the ceiling and blinked several times before dabbing at her eyes again. "He offered me money." She looked at him. "First from his gambling winnings, and then today, from some settlement he won. He's sorry, he wants to do better." Her voice shook and she closed her eyes. "He says he'll go back to AA and… God. How many times have I heard that? How many times did he promise me that he would never touch another drink, or that he would never place another bet. But it doesn't matter. Nothing that I did mattered. Here we are, twenty years later, and I finally have the divorce papers, and it's still the same old story. Jack is sorry, but I have to go home and apologize to another child for having to witness that. It's not even really about me this time. It's just hard letting go. Not of the marriage, that's long gone. It's the hope. For Ricky and Emily." She was long over Jack, but perhaps this event had given her a sense of closure. She was finally able to walk away from him. "I just thought that maybe someday he would be a decent father. Then there's Rusty. He's supposed to be safe with me. He shouldn't be dealing with this, not after everything he's been through."

"Rusty is a strong kid. He is safe with you, and he feels safe with you. He's going to be okay. You should be more worried about whether or not Jack actually sang to him or not," Andy drawled. He shook his head at her. "Sharon, it happens. Guys like Jack…" He shrugged. "They think they've got a handle on it, and that's when it gets away from them. It's a hard road. He has to do the work. It's on him that he hasn't. It has nothing to do with you. It doesn't," he stressed, when she opened her mouth to respond. "He's an addict. We can manipulate with the best of them. It's what we do. It's how we get away with it until it bites us on the ass. Jack showed up at your place last night because he thought that he had something to prove."

"You're not like him." She stared at the tissue in her hands. "You're not," she said again, when he just scoffed. "Andy you work at staying sober every day. You're still picking up the pieces of the life you broke while you were drinking, and Jack…" Sharon looked up at him. "Jack runs away when it gets tough. Or he places a bet, to prove that he's a winner, and then he takes a drink to celebrate when he wins, or to make himself numb when he loses. That's not you."

"Don't." He stared back at her. "Don't put me on a pedestal, Sharon. I work at it, yeah, but it's hard. Being sober a long time doesn't make it any easier. Yeah, I might know what I stand to lose if I go down that road again, but it could happen. Tonight, tomorrow, next week… it doesn't matter, I could end up taking that drink that will blow my life to hell again. That's why I don't think about it in terms of time. I think about right now. Right now I don't want a drink, and that's what I hold on to. That gets me into the next five minutes, and the five minutes after that. When that stops working, my butt is in a chair at a meeting. If that doesn't work, I find another one. I keep finding them until it works again. Everyone is different, how they handle it, but one thing stays the same. It's hard. Every minute of every day it is hard. It's there. It never stops." Andy smiled a little sadly at her. "It's always going to be with me. It's always going to be part of who I am. I'm an alcoholic. My first instinct is to manipulate, and I can slip and lose it without warning."

There was such acceptance in his gaze, along with the sadness. Sharon reached up and touched the tips of her fingers to his jaw. "That's how you're different," she murmured. "You know who you are. You know what you are. You aren't running from it. You would rather stand and fight it than run, even if that means losing. It makes all the difference, Andy." She tilted her head at him and offered a small smile. "It's not a pedestal. I simply appreciate the strength it takes to walk into the fire rather than away from it. Even if that means getting burned," she finished, voice barely a whisper.

He hummed quietly. Andy sometimes thought that her faith in him was misplaced, but he would accept it. He wrapped his hand around hers and lifted it. His lips brushed against her fingertips before he drew it to his chest. "Come on," he spoke quietly. "You're tired. I'll take you home."

Sharon reached behind her for her purse and let him pull her up. "I have my car," she told him. She reached for her jacket, which had, at some point, fallen. "I can drive myself, you don't have to worry about me."

"I always worry about you." He shrugged. "But I'm still not letting you drive home. You're exhausted, Sharon, and you're upset. I can pick you up in the morning, or you can have Rusty drop you by."

"You're stubborn," she told him. "Have I ever mentioned that? On top of being a lousy duettist, you can be absolutely muleheaded. I am perfectly capable of driving myself home."

"Yeah?" Andy picked up the package of tissues that was left on her desk and placed it in her hand. "Well, it takes one to know one, if you ask me. You're not exactly always a bed of roses, sweetheart. Not unless they've got thorns."

Her jaw dropped open. "Take that back!" Sharon sniffed at him. "I am perfectly agreeable…. sometimes." She walked past him when he opened the door for her.

"Uh huh. Like I said. Thorns." Andy smirked as he followed her out. "Go ahead and keep complaining. I'm still driving."

Sharon rolled her eyes at him. "I will concede to allow it, but only because I don't feel like arguing with you at the moment. I'm liking you too much right now to ruin it with an unnecessary debate that you will lose."

"That I would win," he pointed out. "It's my turn." Andy walked her through the empty Murder Room and it was not until they reached the hall that he let his hand move to the small of her back. "I even started writing them down. Mainly because you cheat. This one is definitely mine."

"You're insane," she decided. "I refuse to keep track of who is going to win an argument based entirely upon timing and score. That's preposterous." At the elevator, she turned to look at him, still holding her jacket in front of her. "I'm not doing it."

"That's not what you said when it was your turn." Andy shook his finger at her. "In fact, I seem to recall, this was all your idea." He hit the button to call the elevator car and then folded his arms across his chest. "You thought it was fair and equitable when it was working in your favor."

"I really have no idea what you're talking about." She smiled sweetly at him. "I do not recall the terms of this so-called negotiation."

"Uh huh." The elevator doors opened. Andy held them while she stepped in ahead of him. "You never do, Sharon." He stepped in beside her. "Just so you know, I gotta make a stop on our way to your place."

"Oh?" Her brows rose into her hairline. "What is so important that you're delaying my arrival home after so strenuously arguing for the opportunity to provide my transportation?"

Andy rolled his eyes and looked toward the elevator's roof. "I need to stop and pick up some hardware. My girlfriend is a nut job and doesn't know how to change the locks on her door. I'm going to have to install a new deadbolt."

Her lips pursed. Sharon waited for the elevator doors to close. Then she reached out and smacked his arm. "Bad singer and you're not very funny either."

"Yeah." He grinned as he slanted a look at her from the corner of his eye. "But you like me anyway."

"Hm." She hummed. Sharon stared straight ahead. "Sometimes." A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. Finally she looked at him. Sharon leaned toward him, let her shoulder rest against his. "Most of the time," she added, in a much gentler tone. "Thank you," she whispered. "You're always here. Even when I don't know that I need it. Even when it hurts us both." Sharon looked up at him, eyes moist, but glittering with emotion that was very much unlike her earlier sadness. "It's another very big difference."

He lay his hand against her back and let it slide down the length of her spine. It was as close to holding her as he could get while they were still at work. Andy would take it, at least until he could do better. "It's not gonna change anytime soon. I guess you'll just have to get used to it."

"I'm working on that." It was still new, this thing with them. At least to them it was new. She was still learning to trust him in that manner. Sharon smiled as the elevator doors opened on the lobby floor. She stepped through them and moved a few steps. Earlier she was able to walk away from a man who had broken any number of promises to her over the years, all without looking back. This time she turned. She offered a smile to the man who made no promises, save the one. To try to be there for her when she needed. She tilted her head at him. "Coming?"

Andy shook his head as he stepped out of the elevator. A crooked grin tugged at his lips. He lay a hand against her back again and fell instep with her. If she walked a little closer tonight than was absolutely necessary, and if his hand settled more firmly against her back than was technically required… they both pretended not to notice. His answer rumbled quietly toward her. Another promise he would try to keep. "Always."

~FIN