3:36 a.m.
There was a knock at her door and it startled her awake, glimpses of the dream she was having--where she disappeared inside the building full of people--blending with the loud rapping and she woke up with a start, heart pounding.
She looked through the peephole, but it was not Peter. It was a police officer opening his badge. Now she was greatly worried. She opened the door.
"Agent Dunham?"
She wrapped her arms around herself against the chill and nodded, "Yes?" No, this was not happening...
"Officer Parker with Boston P.D. Do you know Peter Bishop?"
"Yes, yes, is everything alright? Is he okay?" No, this was not happening...
"Yeah, we found him wandering around near the harbor, said he'd been robbed. We took a statement from him and wanted to take him to a hospital just to be safe, but he refused treatment."
She sighed as he motioned to the car and another officer stepped out of the passenger seat, opening the back door. Olivia sighed again in relief when Peter stepped out. She couldn't take her eyes off of him. The glimmer was distracting, even more so in the dark of night than the bar they were at earlier and the drinks they had shared amiably. The drinks in her system had almost made it seem normal...
"Peter, stop moving around!" she had told him loudly and grabbed his arm as the second Irish car bomb they'd downed hit her fast and high. He'd looked at her funny and she couldn't believe she had said that out loud, she must have been losing her tolerance for strong drink. But he only nervously laughed it off and kept talking. She'd stopped drinking at that point, not wanting to drunkenly blurt out any more of her secret...
She didn't hear most of what the officer was saying to her.
"--a copy of the incident report." He handed it to her.
"Thank you, Officer." She took it from him.
"Good night, ma'am."
Peter climbed the steps slowly, hands in the pockets of his peacoat, and appeared under the porch light. His nose was bloody and his lip and cheek were swollen and about to turn six shades of purple. He looked at her guardedly for a few moments.
"I'm sorry to wake you, Olivia."
"Peter, are you okay? The police said you were robbed," she reached out to him not wanting to touch his face, but really just needing to touch him, to keep him still. So she put her hand on his arm.
"I think the term is 'sucker punched'," he tried to grin, but judging by the grimace he wore, it obviously hurt.
She tugged him inside and shut the door behind him.
"Walter is worried."
Peter said nothing, just shrugged off his jacket gingerly.
"And so was I. Come with me," she said.
He followed her into the bathroom and she took out some peroxide and cotton balls and tried to clean the bloody scrapes on his cheek and chin. He didn't flinch when she dabbed at them, just watched her out of the corner of his eye. She wondered if he was even going to mention the earlier fight or she would have to drag it out of him.
"What did he have to say?" he finally asked her. She saw anger flash in his eyes.
"He said you were upset and angry about something." He stared at her in the mirror, it was easier than looking into her eyes.
"I am angry about something. Something that's been kept from me for too long." He spoke quietly and evenly as if his voice might betray more than he wanted it to.
Olivia did not speak, just waited for him to ask. Or not. She looked into his eyes and there was a darkness there that she hadn't seen before. Maybe once when she'd first met him, but not since then. She finished dabbing at the scrapes and threw the cotton balls away when he held up his bloody knuckles, palm down, with a quirky smile.
"I got in a few good ones, before they took off." he explained.
"What exactly happened tonight? I thought you walked home." She grabbed some more cotton balls from under the sink and held his right hand still as she dabbed at the knuckles.
"I did. But I needed to think, so I went some place familiar. I guess a little too familiar..." he trailed off leaving her hanging about what he really meant, not meeting her eyes.
"What about between you and Walter? I talked to him earlier, he said you were arguing."
With the glimmer, his eyes were contrasting pools of darkness, hurt, sadness, and anger. She knew she was not the best at giving comfort or finding the right words to make the hurt stop, she was a rational, take-charge, no-nonsense type of gal on the outside, but she did not feel that way on the inside. On the inside, she felt too much and perhaps that is where the need to so closely guard her emotions came from. But she felt she needed to say something or he would be lost to her.
"There's not much to say. I argued. He was silent and that said enough."
She took his left hand in hers, it was worse than the right, and he flinched when she grabbed it a little too tightly. "Peter, I want you to know that whatever is said--whatever you find out from Walter, I don't want you to run away from it. I don't want it to drive a wedge between you and him again. The Bureau cannot afford to lose you. And...and I can't afford to lose you." She looked up to meet his eyes then, to make sure he understood the importance of what she was saying. "You stood by me even when I didn't think I needed anyone there. And I can't say that about a lot of people."
Something softened in his look. He took her hand in his and looked at her seriously. "Olivia, would you please just tell me. What did you see earlier, when you came over? I think I know, I'm not stupid, but I want to hear a straight answer from someone tonight. I even asked the cops if they really liked donuts and they just laughed at me." The cynicism and defeat in his words were heavy and his eyes pleaded with her. And she thought he probably did ask the cops that question.
She fought the war within herself, with Walter, who did not want his despicable actions to ever come out. But it was too late for naïve flights of fancy. Too late for Peter, who said he knew, too late for Olivia, too late in the grand scheme of things. Maybe it was better to hear it first from her. "You glimmer."
He blinked and she saw his jaw clench and unclench many times. As he processed it all.
"So does that mean what I think it means? That I'm from the other side?" He shook his head in disbelief. "What did Walter do? What did he do!?" he said in anger.
"Walter said you were sick. You wouldn't be here if he hadn't gone to get you."
"Maybe I'd been better off. Maybe we all would've been better off," he looked away from her.
"You can't think like that, you aren't responsible for any of this. Your father..."
He looked at her so severely that she stopped speaking. "If you think about it, that man is not my father! This door he opened up has caused all of the things we've been frantically trying to mop up! He is directly responsible for all of it! And therefore, so am I." He erupted at her and scrubbed at his face, wincing as he forgot about the bruises. "I'm sorry, I'm not mad at you and I shouldn't take it out on you--"
"And you shouldn't take it out on yourself!"
"I'm a kid on a milk carton in another universe, which, in its ridiculousness, is a normal day in this reality," he laughed like a mad man, a crazed look in his eyes that reminded her of Walter so much it was scary. And for the first time, she considered whether hearing this type of news could drive a person insane.
He bent down and grabbed some toilet paper, wet it, and looked in the mirror to try and scrub some of the dried blood from his nose and lip.
"What did you mean when you said you went to a familiar place?"
"I ran into some people that, unfortunately for me, knew me from before. When I wasn't such an upstanding citizen. Small world, this one is, isn't it?" he tried to laugh at his own bad joke, the wild notes in his voice growing. And when Olivia didn't join in to have a good laugh with him, he scrubbed his face harder.
"It's late, you should try and get some sleep. I've got some blankets, you can stay here on the couch." Olivia touched his arm again lightly, if only to get him to stop scrubbing. The blood was mostly gone and his skin was getting redder by the moment. For reasons she couldn't fathom--probably the relief of knowing a wild and crazy Peter Bishop was not roaming the Boston streets itching for trouble--the idea of him sleeping here was comforting to her.
"Walter wanted me to call him if you showed up, but that can wait until morning. Astrid is there, I'll text her and let her know you're okay. Maybe Walter needs to worry just a little."
Peter only nodded, suddenly very tired of the world crashing against him and wanting to forget it all. Forget this night ever happened and that his head felt like a quantum tectonic event (a gold-plated Dr Walter Bishop garbage word, if he'd ever heard one) had taken place inside of it. If only he'd kissed Olivia, maybe that would've made him forget...
Olivia returned--he hadn't even seen her leave—with a pillow and some blankets and she led him out to the couch where she started tucking them in this way and that and arranging them into a cozy bed.
"Walter did tell me something tonight. He said you were sick and that you were taken away from him. And he was only taking what was his."
"It's why I never remembered being sick. Because I was never sick," he said quietly. "I was a perfectly healthy kid, it never happened to me. He has memories of me that aren't me." He grew agitated again and then the exhaustion crept back. "I don't want to think about it any more, my head is pounding." He sounded so lost that she didn't know what else to say. Maybe she shouldn't have told him that last part. She stood up and turned around to find that he had moved very close to her and she looked into his eyes.
And he was right there with her, studying her back, exhaustion etched all over his face. She studied him too, the cuts and bruises standing out more against his shimmering, shimmying unnatural glow. She wondered if it changed with his moods...
He leaned into her and she hoped maybe they were going to complete what had both been on their minds yesterday right before she had broken the spell.
And he kissed her deeply on the lips. And she savored the tenderness of it, felt his breath go in and out. Yes, he was real and here, on this side, and so was she. In the moment. Before everything spiraled out of control they would have this moment, together.
He broke away and spoke into her ear. "Thanks," he said, not his usual sarcastic self. "I've been wanting to do that all night."
She smiled up at him and did something very uncharacteristic for Olivia Dunham. She reached out and gave him a hug. He looked like he really needed it. He wrapped his arms around her and into her hair he murmured, "Thanks."
They broke apart finally and she rounded the corner of the hallway,"Good night, Peter," she called, taking one last look before shutting off the light.
"'Night," he answered back and started to pull off his shoes.
He kept falling asleep and waking himself up until finally, the sun started breaking through the windows. He hadn't wanted a nightmare here, at this moment, in Olivia's apartment, they were so close to the surface he could feel them brewing, and jerked himself awake once more. They were not nightmares, he now knew, but memories, trapped away and hidden out of sight. Walter's cure for them suddenly taking on a whole new meaning.
When he told Olivia he hadn't had a nightmare from the age of 8 to 19, that had been true. What he conveniently hadn't mentioned at the time was that they had come back with a vengeance after that. Most of the time he didn't remember any specifics, just one moment happiness, then confusion, then extreme terror and waking up.
It was the winter of his sophomore year, during finals. He'd been living in the dorms at college like any normal kid, drinking a little too much, writing term papers, studying for tests and stressed about a twenty page chem paper he was supposed to be writing, when he'd had a "major freak out" as his roommate liked to call it.
He'd woken up screaming one night, ran outside in the snow in just his pajamas and after waking half the campus, found himself surrounded and tackled by campus security. They'd referred him to the school psychologist for counseling. He went, but with Walter in St Claire's, he was doubly worried he would end up there, too, if he let them know too much about the inner workings of his mind. So he gave them all the answers they wanted to hear and they discharged him after a few sessions. And after that semester, he dropped out and never looked back...
Next thing he knew, he heard the teakettle in the kitchen whistle briefly and gingerly he got up. He turned on his phone and checked the time. It was 8:30. He was thankful to have gotten a little sleep.
"Morning," she told him as she poured the water from the kettle into her mug. "Would you like some tea? I have coffee, too. Sorry about the tea kettle."
He sat on a stool at the breakfast bar. "It's okay, Some tea would be good," he said.
She poured water into a second mug and added a tea bag. "Did you get any sleep?"
"No. Not really. Did you?"
"A little. Astrid was very glad to hear you were okay. But I think she thought maybe you were over here for...other reasons."
Peter smiled, "I would've hoped I was here for other reasons, too."
Olivia blushed and snuck a look at him and turned around to busy herself putting some toast in the toaster.
"Olivia, I'm sor-- I didn't mean-- I meant that with all that's gone on-- Well, you know what I meant. I'm just going to stop talking now."
"It's okay, Peter. I'd hoped it was for other reasons, too."
An awkward silence filled the kitchen. Peter wondered if Olivia really felt that way about him, he knew they were becoming closer, but she was so guarded with her feelings sometimes and so hard to read. And with everything blowing up in his face, he was not a perfect catch by any standard. But he'd still gotten that kiss from her in the end and it did make him forget some of it.
Olivia set the mug in front of him. "I'd like to come with you when you talk to Walter today." She paused to clarify, "That is, if you are going to talk to Walter today."
"That's a big 'if'," he said simply. "At some point, I will have to go back, I can't leave Astrid babysitting forever," he said gripping the warmth of the tea and searching for answers at the bottom of the mug. "No matter what every cell in my body is telling me exactly what to do."
Olivia was happy inside her heart, in a place she hadn't used in awhile, to hear that his fight or flight instinct was telling him to fight.
At that moment, Peter's phone rang. He glanced down at the screen. It was Walter. "And so it begins," he mumbled to himself. Awake for five minutes and he was going to have deal with all of this. He hesitated in answering it and Olivia saw his hesitance.
"Just let it go to voice mail," she said.
He thought about it, but finally made up his mind and hit the answer button.
Gruffly, he answered, "What."
