He leaned closer to the windshield, the foggy stem that reappeared each time he cleared it caused him to curse under his breath. The drive had seemed almost endless tonight as he'd had to slow, almost to crawl in an effort to ensure he'd arrive in one piece.
As the small grouping of trees that always signaled the turn off finally came into view, a momentary surge of panic went through him. What if she wasn't here? He'd driven all the way up here, totally on instinct as if somehow he had this cosmic connection to her - as if he knew her so well that he'd be able to predict what she'd do, what she'd need, and where'd she'd go in her search for reverie. Maybe that used to be true, but things were very different now. He was no longer the person she turned to. It wasn't his arms that she lay in at night.
The sad realization settled over him, much like the now thick, blowing snow that blanketed the walk leading up to the cabin. It wasn't until he'd almost reached the front door that he saw it - the light filtering out through the curtains of the living room window and then, as he looked past the house towards the back entrance, he saw her car. Maybe he did still know her. Maybe there was still that connection ... at least there was for him.
Billy reached into his pocket, his cold fingertips clumsy as he tried to find the correct key. "Damn," he hissed as they slipped from his hand and fell to the snow and sleet covered ground.
Phyllis stilled inside the cabin. She'd been sitting on the sofa, her body wrapped in every blanket she could find for nearly three hours now. The heat has been running non stop and if it was doing anything to warm the room, she hadn't felt it yet. Part of her had considered going out to look at the unit, though she knew she'd have no idea what she was looking at. The other part of her remembered Jack's warnings about bears that lived in the nearby wooded area. She'd much rather be cold inside than a frozen bedtime snack for forest dwellers and she'd certainly rather be here than on the road right now.
Still the sound outside unnerved her and she pulled the blankets tight around her shoulder as she shuffled to the door. The glass panes on the door were almost entirely iced over and though it was clearly dark out, she'd swear there was movement and ...
The door opened suddenly and she found herself almost hurtling backwards. His hand reached out quickly to catch her.
"Billy." It took her a moment to regain her footing and another moment still to process the fact that he was here, standing in front of her.
"Are you okay?" He turned to close the door behind him, the biting wind already whipping in the room.
"I'm ..." she shook her head. "What are you doing here? How did you even know I was up here?"
"I didn't," he admitted. "Not for sure anyway. I knew you were upset and I knew you didn't go home. I checked everywhere I could think of in town and then ?I started trying to think of somewhere you'd go if you wanted time alone." He shrugged slightly. "That's when I thought of here."
He waited a moment as the silence settled over the room. "So It looks like I guessed right." He smiled nervously as he looked at her. He needed her to break, to scream, to cry, to do something. Phyllis wasn't silent ... ever.
"Congratulations." The word sliced through him as she turned her back towards him and moved to walk away.
"Hey." He reached for her, his hand wrapping around her shoulder and turning her back to face him. "Look, I know you didn't expect me to show up here, but ..."
"No, Billy. I didn't want you here. I didn't want anyone here. You said it yourself. I came here because I wanted to be alone. You knew that and yet you still took it upon yourself to come up here."
"I just want to help, Phyllis. I don't think you really want to be by yourself right now. I just think you ..."
"Who the hell are you to tell me what I want?!" She screamed the words at him, the months of anger and frustration finally reaching the surface.
"I'm someone that knows you, Phyllis and yeah, I do think I know what you want even if you're not being honest with yourself about that right now. You're just running because that's your instinct. It's what you always try to do. You try to run and if that doesn't work you try to avoid and if that doesn't work you try to deny and if that doesn't work you try to forget. The problem with all of your default solutions is none of them work. You can't run away. You can't avoid. You can't deny. You can't forget."
"I was." She couldn't admit that he was right. Not now. Not when she here, alone, with him. She needed time to think, needed time to think. "I had put this all behind me and ..."
"It was never behind you," he said softly. "It was just pushed aside for a while. I know what that's like. When you go through something like you did, it's never gonna go away. It's always gonna come back. But you don't have to deal with it alone. That's what I'm trying to tell you."
"You might want to tell some other people that." Her mind flashed back to the courtroom, to the way Nick had avoided her eyes, to the way he'd talked to her, the almost dismissive sound of his voice.
"Forget about Nick." The look of surprise in her eyes would have normally been cause for a cease fire, but not tonight. Tonight he was putting all his cards on the table.
"I don't want to talk about Nick with you. It's none of your business. Our relationship is none of ..."
"I don't want to talk about Nick either. I just want to talk about you, what you need, what you want. That's the only thing that's important to me. That's the only thing I care about."
"That's not why I came up here, Billy. I wasn't looking for a therapy session."
"Guess its a good thing I showed up then, huh cause it seems like you could use one and I'm volunteering my services tonight - free of charge."
"Billy." She huffed and crossed her arms across her chest.
"What?" He flashed another coy smile. "You're not honestly gonna kick me out of my own family cabin, are you? Especially when the roads are turning into giant sheets of ice?" He could see her softening a bit. "I can even go light the pilot light so the furnace starts working again." He laughed a little at the look that shot across her face. "And I'll get a fire going so we won't freeze while we wait for the house to heat up."
A slight sigh escaped her lips. "Alright," she conceded, "I guess, since you're already here, there's no point in leaving and the fire ..." The bemused, satisfied expression on his face was more than she could take and she felt her own lips curving into a smile of their own. "It sounds nice, " she admitted.
"Great." He gestured to the sofa. "Just go sit down and bundle up. I'll take care of everything else. Alright? And then, we'll figure the rest of this out."
She nodded as she moved over to the sofa and watched him head towards the door. He made it all sound so simple and, even though she knew it wouldn't be, somehow having him here with her did make it seem possible.
