Ignorance and faking worked just fine...until Zoom took Caitlin. Was he supposed to act optimistic?
"Barry!" Cisco said. Barry didn't so much as twitch.
"Allen, you need to get your head in the game!" That was Dr. Wells, who couldn't draw an ounce of focus out of him either.
"Barr," Joe said, placing a hand on the boy's back. But Barry didn't even stir.
"Barry, come on, man!" Wally tried convincing him. He couldn't help but feel like it was all his fault...so-called Jay had taken Caitlin, and the brilliant people in front of him were at a loss to figure out how to get her back without Barry's speed.
"Barry, you're really starting to worry me," Iris said, stepping closer to him.
Barry simply stood up, his head lifted now to show bloodshot eyes. He didn't say a word or make a sound that showed he acknowledged them as he left the room. No one dared to follow him.
"Great; now we scared him off," Cisco said, shaking his head.
*TIME SKIP*
"Um, guys? You might want to see this," Cisco said, leading the others.
"Caitlin!"
Barry had to fight the urge to run over, hug her as if she might slip away. He was reminded of the fact that they were just friends, that she didn't reciprocate what he felt. But that didn't change the fact that he did care, maybe a little too much, and he still wanted to reassure her, and himself, that she was okay. But he just stood there.
"She's a little dehydrated and a little malnourished, but she'll be okay," Henry told the group.
"I'm okay, Barry," Caitlin said, seeing Barry watching her with a worried expression.
"Dammit, hug her!" Cisco said through the silence.
And for once, Caitlin listened to Cisco and wrapped her arms around Barry. He was shocked by how abruptly she stood, and at first he thought she was going to run away. The shock settled down, and Barry wrapped his arms around her too. She had a slight tremble that wasn't there before Jay took her, and that only motivated Barry more to stop him and hug her tighter.
"There we go, now we're getting somewhere!" Cisco said, putting his hands behind his head and sitting down.
The "somewhere" they had gotten to had been elusive. They had hugged, yes, but that could very well have been another of Caitlin's "rash decisions". After that exchange, seventy five percent of their conversations were strictly business. Any personal conversations held...those were the times when Caitlin's hands wouldn't stop trembling, or Zoom's face seemed to be lurking in every reflection she saw. Barry hated Zoom for that.
And he hated him even more for murdering his father.
Caitlin noticed this, and had taken careful note of it that particular evening. STAR Labs was closed for the night, and everyone had slid on their coats and left. Not Caitlin, though, who wasn't fond of the idea of walking home when the sun set before she could leave; and Barry, who didn't want to move from his chair, let alone go anywhere when everything in the town seemed to find a way to relate back to his father.
"Barry?" Caitlin said timidly as she stepped into the room -which was Cisco's "thinking room". She leaned against the wall beside his chair.
Barry didn't reply; he only looked at some bizarre poster that he couldn't quite pinpoint the subject of. His face remained vacant of emotion, but his eyes showed that that wasn't the case. There was a lot of grief to go around, and Barry had gotten hit hard. Caitlin had too, and she knew that sometimes, you made across like you wanted to be alone. And maybe he did, but she didn't get any better with the Ronnie ordeal by herself. She had Barry and Cisco with her through it all. She wasn't going to let him suffer alone.
She didn't say anything as she moved her hand in one swift motion and rubbed his back, and neither did he. But Barry could only pose emotionless for so long, and he stopped trying to hold it in. At first, one or two tears rolled down his cheeks, which he promptly wiped off with his sweater sleeve. As the silence only kept giving him more time to think, they began to increase in number. Caitlin moved from her spot on the wall and kneeled down beside him. Barry took the hint and turned to her, burying his face in her sweater sleeve. She held him for once while he cried, instead of him trying to comfort her for once.
And it was this twenty five percent of their encounters that they loved the most, where they weren't being stiff and formal, where they could just be friends who cared for one another.
Triumph only bubbled up inside him for a moment. It was there for a total of twenty seconds, and then it was replaced by grief and something Barry could only describe as emptiness. He wasn't going back home...memories of his father seemed to hang in the atmosphere there, too. He was going to stay at STAR Labs until the sun came up if he could. He was going to sulk and mope in peace.
That had been his plans, but he figured he could make an exception when Caitlin found him in Cisco's thinking room.
"Hey," He said, not wanting the silence to allow him to brood.
"Hey," Caitlin said quietly. She moved and leaned against the wall where she had the last time they had an encounter there.
The room was quiet, and Caitlin was about to give up and turn to leave when Barry said, "We won,"
"Yeah, we did," Caitlin said, not exactly sure where he was going with this, or if he was going anywhere at all.
"But -it doesn't feel like we did. Zoom's gone, but there's so much else that's gone...it just doesn't make you proud, or triumphant or -"
Caitlin cut him off. She could've just tapped him on the shoulder and said "hey", or thumped him over the forehead. Instead, she chose to press her lips to his (which he definitely wasn't complaining about). She pulled back, but only slightly, and whispered,
"It's gonna be okay, Barry. You're going to have to trust me, alright?"
Barry didn't answer; he closed the gap between them once more. And this time, he had no intentions of pulling away so soon.
