The bones of what you believe
Chapter 2: Tether
Earlier that day. 06:25.
He was standing in the yard when she came up the driveway.
'Carrie. You didn't go to Istanbul.'
People tended not to be overjoyed when she showed up on their doorstep in the early hours of the morning, so it was nice to see Quinn smiling. Carrie quickly smiled back before turning towards the passenger seat.
'Let me get...' she mumbled. He peered into the car and noticed the car seat. And in it: the baby.
'You decided to keep her,' he said, unable to keep the surprise out of his voice. Carrie shrugged, busy unlatching all the damn straps that held her daughter. Finally, she was able to pick her up.
'Yeah. Quinn, this is Angie.'
Because travelling with a baby in tow was like carting around a circus, Carrie then reached into the backseat and attempted to haul out a huge, heavy bag one-handed. Quinn smirked, opened the car door and took it out with infuriating ease.
'How's motherhood so far?' he asked, as they walked up the driveway to the cabin. It wasn't so much a driveway as it was a short dirt road. Carrie looked at the yard. It wasn't so much a yard as it was an extension of the forest. It was all very not-Quinn, yet he lived there. Had been living there for months now.
'Isolated,' she answered. Shit, this is too negative, she realised. Quinn frowned, so Carrie told him about giving birth alone.
'I thought your family would be there,' he said, sounding restrained.
'They offered, but, I don't know. I just… At that point, I still thought that I wasn't going to raise the baby. My sister, she had this judgemental look like I didn't even deserve the pain of delivery. And I knew that my father agreed with her. I mean, I got it. But I wasn't up for it at that particular moment in time.'
'I would've come,' Quinn said. He was basically calling her an idiot for doing it alone. Carrie grinned while he held the door open for her.
'I don't want to burden you with my shit,' she admitted. He countered with 'that's what friends are for,' which Carrie decided to ignore. Like her life wasn't hard enough already without having Quinn as a friend.
'How have you been?' she tried, scanning the cabin. It looked absolutely tiny on the inside. No TV or laptop anywhere in sight. He was taking this off the grid, living off the land thing pretty seriously. Quinn pointedly didn't answer her question.
'What did your family say when you decided to keep her?' he asked.
'Oh, they didn't like that either,' Carrie laughed, choosing to remain standing when he motioned for her to sit down. 'Really pissed them off. Can't win, huh? Again, I understand. Even on my meds, I'm not the most stable of people. To them it seemed like just another thing I hadn't thought through. Another last second decision 'cause those always work out great!'
He nodded as if he could see where they were coming from.
'It was kind of frustrating, because it wasn't a last second decision. I had thought about what you'd said. About fucking it up and I realised there were two ways of doing that. By packing it in immediately, which I was planning to do. That would have been like failing without trying. I could at least do that. So, here I am, trying.'
'And how is it?'
'I'm not awful at it. I manage. It's actually pretty great. Wonderful, in fact. Because, Jesus, look at her. But it's also severely limiting. You get into a sort of routine and it's all very familiar. Children: inconvenient. Quite the revelation. Who'd have thought, right?' Carrie said. She presented it with a little hand flourish and a smile, her eyes widened in mock shock.
'Istanbul wouldn't have been familiar,' Quinn pointed out.
'Well, Istanbul has come and gone,' Carrie replied flippantly.
'You're still with the CIA, though.'
'Unlike you.'
'But not out in the field, I'd wager. You miss the excitement.'
He was good at this. Much better than she was at guessing how he felt. Did he miss it? Too soon to ask, probably.
'I do. Plus, it's hard to find someone I can trust with Angie. I don't wanna impose on Maggie all the time. She's busy.'
'You stayed because here you've got a support system and now you don't want to use it,' Quinn deduced. Right again.
'I know, I'm a moron,' Carrie chuckled. The next thing Quinn said came out of left field.
'I could watch her sometimes,' he offered. She raised an eyebrow, studying his face to see whether he was serious. He was. He was offering to babysit. Quinn as a babysitter. It took a while to compute.
'I know you have a son and all, but I can't actually imagine you with a baby,' she admitted.
'You don't have to. Here, let me,' he said, taking Angie from her. 'How does this look?'
Words failed her. Strange, is what she wanted to say. Really strange. Surreal. But also good somehow? In a handsome guy holding a beautiful baby kind of way? Still definitely Twilight Zone-ish.
'I assume you've got more stuff in the car? Unload it and go to work. Unless you plan on taking Angie with you.'
'Are you sure you'll be okay?' Carrie inquired. Quinn rolled his eyes.
'You're worrying about me?'
'You got fucking weepy when we were discussing kids before. So, yeah, I'm worried. Will you be okay?' Carrie repeated. Quinn took his eyes off Angie. She was holding his thumb hostage. He looked at Carrie. His eyes were weirdly tender. Fierce too. Carrie could never decipher that look. It was just how he always looked at her.
'I got teary because I thought you'd make the same mistake I made. You didn't. You're not fucking this up, Carrie. I'm good.'