Thank you for the lovely reviews for part one. Part two focuses on Harry and is set during part 2 of The Prodigal.
I thought this part would be easier but actually I've really struggled with it and I'm not entirely sure I'm happy with it. Part 3 should be easier though, hopefully I'll get it finished tomorrow! Then I'm kicking around some ideas for some more stuff, perhaps something a bit longer so watch this space.
As always, all characters belong to the BBC. And as always, thank you for reading.
"Hello, hero of the hour!"
He smiles at Nikki's warm greeting and the mirth that makes her chocolate eyes dance. He is happy of course, that he has found Jack but a part of him resents that death has once again edged in and tarnished the shine on his joy. Still Nikki is happy, and her happiness has the power to light up a room.
He would miss that, were he ever to leave this place. But then, he never really considered it. Yes, the idea of getting away from everything that reminded him of Hungary was appealing, but as soon as that took Nikki and Leo out of his life then it ceased to become an option. In fact the only thing that would have him leave this place would be if her voice no longer greeted him as he meandered through the door.
"You should be getting the MBE, not me!"
"Yep" he replies drolly, smiling slightly as he hears Leo chuckle at his feigned arrogance. Although she was first and foremost in his reasons for staying he also knows that were it just he and Leo, he would still find it tricky. Once all he had wanted from his work was advancement, and his affable boss would have stood in the way of that. Now he has grown older, maybe even grown up, he has realised that he is happy where he is, he loves his work, loves his colleagues, albeit in different ways, and quite frankly has a distaste for paperwork that runs so deep that he would consider turning down a promotion just to avoid writing yet more reports.
"How were the VanBuren's?" Nikki's question halts his progress across the room and he turns to meet her chestnut eyes.
"Mixed" he replies indicating the small skeleton his colleagues are attempting to reassemble. Nikki smiles sympathetically at him, and he turns away. He's not ready to admit how hard he found it, being the harbinger of bad news, especially to parents who have hoped for so long that their child is somewhere else. He won't admit, to her or anyone else, that he spent quarter of an hour earlier in the locker room, thinking about Ana's child, his child, and wondering what, who, they would have looked like. Wondering how his life would have been with a child in it, even if only intermittently.
It seems callous and cruel to admit his feelings, so he has told no-one of them. It seems disrespectful to Ana to admit to anyone, even himself, that he wouldn't have stayed with her. He had liked her of course, perhaps even loved her in some sort of way, but as they had lain on her rooftop terrace and she had asked him what he wanted, all he had been able to think about was the beautiful blonde woman in front of him now, instead of the brunette in his arms then.
He turns away, although he knows that he loves her, has loved her for six years, at that moment he finds he can't look at her. She resurrects all his guilt about everything that happened in Hungary.
"You not thinking about leaving are you?"
Leo's question spins him back round, surprised, and he again meets Nikki's widened eyes. He is confused momentarily about the question. How had Leo even heard about the offer he has received?
"Why do you ask?" he questions cautiously.
Leo returns to his work as he replies and Harry hates that this is clearly upsetting both of them.
"It's just that I've had a request for a reference?"
"For me?"
'surely James can't have been that forward' he thinks to himself. Or that stupid. His rejection of the offer had been clear.
"You haven't been approached by anyone?"
"James Saverson mentioned he might be setting up a new practice" he answers. He doesn't want to tell them about the money involved, he knows that Leo will already know, and he doesn't want them to think that is a consideration.
Nikki jumps in anyway, before he can say anything further.
"What and he offered you a job?"
"I said no."
This doesn't seem to reassure either of them, they are looking at him as though he might go and pack his bags at any moment. For a moment, his confidence in his decision wavers. Maybe they want him to leave? Maybe Nikki is fed up of his presence and Leo is fed up of his pining for her?
"Well somebody thinks you are."
"We talked about it. He said he might put something in writing."
"And that was what the envelope was for?" now he is really confused. What is Nikki talking about?
"What envelope?"
At that moment his phone rings, frustrated, he apologises and leaves the room to answer it.
He returns to the cutting room and finds Nikki stood alone, still working on the small sad skeleton. He has always loved watching her work, her intense focus, that tilt of her head when she is puzzling something out.
The door swings behind him, and she looks up at the noise, her expression is sombre, and she returns her attention immediately to the bones in her hand.
He feels bad for distracting her, but he finds that now, more than ever he wants to hear her opinions. For however else he may feel about her, she is his best friend, and right now that is who he needs.
"What would you do if someone offered you a job like this?"
She doesn't look at him, continues working, but a small, strange smile crosses her face.
"I'm not you," she reminds him. Harry is momentarily disappointed, a part of him wants her to say that she would decline it to stay with the person she loves. But she doesn't feel that way. She only sees her friend Harry, with his silly jokes and appalling taste in music.
Harry knows that really, he should be honest, tell her how he feels, so that he can move on from this purgatory. He is too selfish to do that right now though. Her friendship is that only thing holding him together at the moment and he cannot bear to do anything to jeopardise that. Not right now.
"Leo thinks that if you leave this department will close."
He is surprised by her words and scoffs in response "Rubbish."
They are overrun with students, always have been. One of them could fill his position in a moment. Yes they would need some time to get some experience, but with Leo and Nikki to teach them that would take no time.
"Leo thinks you're irreplaceable." She continues softly.
Harry is struck by a desperate need to know what she thinks of him. If she too, considers him that way. Almost desperately he meets her eyes, looking for a clue in their dark depths. He doesn't know what to say, all that comes to mind is for him to blurt out his feelings to her, let her in on the secret he's been carrying for the last five years. But he can't bear anymore hurt yet, not without her to help him through it. He doesn't want to hear the truth that will shut the door on five years of hope.
He knows that really, he has to tell her sometime. He can't hide forever, and he has wanted to tell her so many times now. He wanted to wrap his arms around her sobbing frame in Hungary and tell her that he'd never leave her again. As he'd brushed her wayward hair out of her face, all he wanted to do was kiss her. But it wasn't the right time.
And she mustn't feel like she is second best, like now that Ana is gone she is the next available option. Because to Harry that has never been the case. She has always been his unattainable dream, and to him, no other woman could ever hold a candle to her beauty. Both inside and out.
One day, he will tell her that he coming back to England for her. Before all the shouting, and the shooting she was his priority. All the time he was running, he imagined he was running to her, because that was the only thing that gave him the strength to keep going. That the hardest thing he's ever had to do was to fight the urge to kiss her and walk away from her at the memorial. And in those horrible, final moments, when they led him out onto the railway and he was sure that they were his final moments, his biggest regret was that he had never told her the truth.
When she appeared there, leaning around Leo's shoulder, he'd thought for a moment he really was dead and she was an angel, she'd always been his angel, sent to take him somewhere. Not heaven. He didn't deserve that, but then, being with Nikki would be heaven enough for him.
One day he'd tell her all that.
He sighs, breaking the spell of the moment, returning them both to the matter at hand.
One day, when he's more certain he can survive her rejection, he'll tell her.
Even if she rejects him, he will finally have been honest to her. Honest to himself.
One day.
Just not yet.