Nathan's pretty sure it's unconscious (Audrey is many things, but self-aware is not one of them), but ever since the other Audrey Parker came to town (or is it since she discovered she was Lucy Ripley, too? when she realized she was not who her memories made her think she was?), Nathan's watched Parker distance herself bit by bit from her law enforcement background. When she first came to town, she was unorthodox, sure, but she still adhered to the form of the law. Now, nothing is sacrosanct. Everything is an option so long as it saves lives and helps the Troubled.

It bothers Nathan, though he can't quite put his finger on why.

Still, he goes with her anyway because she definitely needs someone watching her back now. It doesn't surprise him that she knows how to pick locks or that she faces the possibility of criminal charges with as much equanimity as a shotgun in her face or a kid breathing water more easily than air. In fact, the only thing that throws her at all is a picture of herself, only this time instead of a blonde or brunette, she's a redhead. She's still beautiful, of course, but Nathan is more concerned by the sadness in this new iteration's eyes…the sadness in Lucy's eyes in that Colorado Kid picture…the sadness beginning to rouse in Parker's gaze.

Once Audrey's pocketed the photo and Nathan's stopped trying to save a kid who doesn't need saving, once everyone's put their guns down (though Nathan hopes Audrey's hand is as close to hers as Cole's is to his), a few things start becoming clearer.

Why the Glendowers isolate themselves. Why Cole took Daniel. What the chief considers 'handling' a situation.

"You're Garland's boy," Cole says when he finally tears his eyes away from Parker. "He was here earlier today with quite a lot to say about keeping a low profile. But I have to protect my family, no matter what it takes."

If Audrey were to put her hand on his arm, Nathan's sure he'd feel goosebumps rising. He doesn't like Cole, or the fact that he has the same tattoo as Nathan, or the way he seems to have an answer for everything. He reminds Nathan of a snake, coiled and concealed but ready to strike and poison the instant your back is turned.

Finding out that Gwen Glendower is Penny Driscoll and that the Rev has a personal stake in this just makes everything worse. Audrey obviously feels bad for Gwen's situation, or at least understands it, but Nathan thinks of a man mourning his wife as dead while she lives unconcernedly with another man, another name, another life. He thinks of Hannah Driscoll crying at her mom's funeral and growing quieter and smaller over the years as she tried to both endure and love her father. With those thoughts in mind, Nathan does not have it in him to pity this woman, who had a choice whether to stay or go, who left a child behind (who makes him feel, even for an instant, any sympathy at all for the Rev).

The situation spirals out of control faster than Nathan can follow. Duke's involved somehow, Evi's there, running some kind of con, the Rev has a flock of armed men ready to go wherever he points, Cole is eager to spill blood, and there are too many secrets, so many that Nathan thinks they've all forgotten Leif and his body washed ashore with an old note clutched in his hand.

"I told you," the chief storms when they surround a barn where a mother made stupid by desperation holds a dozen children captive. "I told you to leave this alone, but you never listen to me, do you? You always have to do things your own way."

Audrey levels him a challenging stare. "Are you talking to Audrey Parker? Or Lucy Ripley?"

Nathan suppresses the urge to groan. They have no time for this right now and by the time they get back to it, the chief will have all his answers prepared and a dozen distractions ready.

But Garland surprises him by laughing. "Took you long enough," he says. "I thought you were going to explode if you held it back any longer."

Nathan looks down at the chief's hands, shaking as he clutches a cigarette, and has to bite back his own comment about repressed explosions.

But Audrey smiles mischievously and says, "Guess I was testing you on how long you'd keep things from me."

"Long as I needed to." The chief looks at Nathan, then takes a deep drag of his cigarette. Audrey just stands there, showing no surprise or curiosity, so Nathan assumes the rumbling is almost imperceptible, but he notices a wobble in his vision. As if the ground tremors ever so slightly.

Another crack?

"There's a lot going on here that I hoped you wouldn't ever have to know," Garland says seriously. "I should have known better, though. This isn't an easy place, and men like Driscoll just make it worse. He's getting ready for war, Audrey, and he'll use anything and everything necessary to win it."

"And Cole?" Nathan asks (he tells himself it's because he needs the information, but later, much later, after the dust is cleared and he's standing over a grave, he'll know it's really because he's jealous of Audrey's easiness with the chief; because he feels forgotten, unwanted and ignored).

Garland sucks deeper on smoke, and for a moment, Nathan doesn't think he'll answer. But then he scoffs and drops the cigarette, grinding it down with his heel. "Cole—and others like him—they're set in their ways. They won't take kindly to anyone who tries to make changes to the way things have always been done. Those people will tell you they have a purpose, but just remember, they only have one real goal and that's to survive. They'll hunker down and dig themselves in and fight if they have to, but they'll draw blood and fight wars for the chance to endure."

"Endure until what?" Audrey asks before Nathan can even open his mouth to demand his own answers.

(Why? he wants to shout. Why would you tell me this tattoo means something it if really doesn't? Why would you make me think I was meant for something greater when all this ink stands for is the desire to survive?)

Audrey doesn't get her answers either. The Rev arrives with a smug gleam in his eye, a twist of his mouth whenever he looks at the chief, and a calm refusal to get Mary to let the children go before they die. He has no solution, no cure, but still he would rather the kids die than live Troubled. Nathan feels rage surge within him, but he hangs back, tries not to draw attention his way and make things worse.

"I have an idea," Audrey murmurs to the chief, and before Nathan can tell her he thinks this will backfire horribly, she's calling Gwen and telling her to come down. To reveal herself to the Rev. To stir up his hopes or call up his fears or summon up his wrath, and whichever it ends up being, Nathan knows this will not turn out well.

The Rev's men mill in the background, Cole will be chafing to face down the Rev and protect the woman he calls wife, and time is running out for the Glendower children.

"Audrey," he hisses, "I don't think this is a good idea."

"If he realizes what his prejudice cost him, maybe he'll make a different choice now," she replies, and Nathan can't help but stare at her.

"You really believe that?"

She hesitates. "Not really, but I'm hoping this will work so I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt."

It doesn't work.

When the Rev steps out of the barn with a gun held slackly in his hand, Nathan misses it entirely. In some way, he senses that the ground is trembling again (is it a waver in his vision? some sort of scent or pressure change that affects his ears? He doesn't know, just that he can tell there is something coming that's bigger than the cracks his dad's managed to semi-control). Distracted just when the Rev emerges, Nathan looks down, automatically searching for the spider-webbing pattern he's grown so familiar with—and that's when everything happens at once.

The Rev shouts what sounds like a denial, then gunshots go off and the police are diving for cover all around him. By the time Nathan looks up, everything is danger and chaos.

"I tried to help them!" the Rev shouts. "They took my wife from me and threatened children, but I offered them aid anyway—and you see them reject it! There is no good left in them!"

From the woods behind the barn, the Rev's mob comes pouring out in droves. Smoke clogs the air and the wind sags beneath the potent stench of gunpowder and sweat and fear (and blood).

"They are beyond redemption now! You see them turning against even the law!"

It's strange that for all the cacophony enveloping them, Nathan can still hear the Rev clear as day. What makes it worse is that he is not entirely wrong: the Glendowers are the ones who fired first. Cole is there at Gwen's side like an old and weathered sentinel. A gargoyle crusted with age and barnacles, baked in rage and resentment—faced off against the stark, lean form of the Rev, who refuses to bow before the bullets or the threat inherent in Cole's stare, but gazes back unconcernedly while their pawns battle around them.

How are they both standing so solidly when the ground is shaking Nathan, the whole world rocking around him?

Then his hand floods with sensation. Audrey's grabbed him, tugging and directing, yelling his name, telling him to get down. It's only then that he realizes his dad was trying to get him to cover behind the Bronco's dubious protection, grabbing his arm and pulling so hard Nathan had thought the earth was threatening to topple him.

But the ground is shaking. And he's not the only one who notices it anymore.

Beneath the cops trying to radio in for backup and calling questions about an earthquake, Garland hugs his arms tightly around his chest. "This is what I was afraid of," he growls. "I've been trying to keep it all together, but I knew, I knew, this day was coming. Haven's like a pressure cooker and everyone in it is ready and willing to explode. Last time, Nathan…things changed last time."

There are multiple cracks crawling toward them, slicing through the soil and grass and whatever else gets in its way. Nathan shifts next to Audrey (ready to grab her and throw her in the Bronco if necessary) but doesn't take his eyes from those cracks. He's never seen more than one form in the same place before.

Incongruously, he finds himself wishing he had a pack of cigarettes to offer the chief.

"We've got to contain this situation!" Audrey says. "Remember that SWAT team I keep asking for? Now would be a really good time to tell me you'd considered it."

But Garland's staring at the cracks and doesn't seem to hear her. Audrey peers over the Bronco's hood, her gun held ready. Nathan leaves her to it. Right now, he thinks that maybe the chief is the bigger concern (and he wants to know, he needs to know, what Garland is talking about).

"What do you mean?" he asks lowly. "'Last time'? Last time what?"

Garland hunches in on himself (it looks so strange, so wrong, to see his dad small and bent over like a frightened child) but locks eyes with Nathan. And Nathan swallows, hard.

There is fear in his dad's eyes. Fear and desperation and (most chilling of all) tired resignation.

"I'm sorry, son. I wanted better for you—maybe I should have fought harder—but I thought this was how it had to go. You'll understand someday."

"Help me understand now," Nathan demands (or maybe he is begging, he doesn't know; there's a ringing in his ears).

But Garland isn't listening. He's staring down at his arm. Or rather, at Nathan's hand on his arm.

Nathan's breath catches audibly in his throat. Both of them stare at the slight contact as if it is happening to other people, everything else fading into a background so distant it no longer matters.

Nathan doesn't reach out. He doesn't touch people. And he absolutely does not keep physical contact for any longer than necessary. (Of all people, Nathan doesn't touch his dad, because his verbal rebuffs already hurt bad enough.)

Still small, still quivering in time with the tremors of the ground, Garland freezes. Nathan doesn't move. Around them, under them, the ground stills. And gradually, suddenly (it doesn't matter and Nathan can't look away from his hand on his dad to figure out what speed the rest of the world is moving at), the air falls silent. The gunfire tapers off, the yelling eases, the smoke clears. All that's left, like the rise of a violin straining for the peak of the sky while the orchestra is left far behind, is the sobbing, keening cries of a woman.

Parker's the first to stand, her body tense but her face calculatedly open. As soon as she's upright (vulnerable and, as always, in so much danger), Nathan has to jump up too (has to position himself to take any bullet aimed her way), and his hand is ripped away from his dad's as if it was never there. The chief is right behind him, though, moving to flank Audrey.

Whether his reasons are good ones or not, Nathan didn't like Cole or Penny or the way any of the Glendowers have handled any part of this situation. But that does not in any way prepare him for the sight of Cole slumped among the grass with blood boiling sluggishly out of three holes in his solid chest, or Gwen huddled over him, keening and desolate.

"We just wanted to live!" she shrieks. "We didn't hurt anyone! This is Haven." Her voice quiets, hoarse, juddering. "This is Haven. We're supposed to be able to live."

The Glendowers array themselves seamlessly around her, grim and unflinching as a few of them lift the body of their fallen patriarch. He is not the only one stained with blood (physically or, Nathan's certain, metaphorically).

In the quiet, the Rev strides forward from among his own ranks. He's commanding, imperious, and Nathan wonders if he is completely oblivious to the sneer that belies the compassionate hand he holds out toward the woman who was once his wife.

"It's a new day, Penny," he proclaims. "But there's still a chance for you." He looks up to the audience of stunned cops and frigid Glendowers and Audrey (his eyes, of course, skip right over Nathan). "There's a chance for everyone who repents and comes to the right side. It's time to make Haven a haven again in the only way that will last."

Gwen rises to her feet. She is shaky and stained with tears, her dress covered in Cole's blood, but there is fire in her eyes and when she speaks, Nathan hears the echo of Cole threatening to drown the beaches in blood. "We're not evil, Edmund. We're just people. But you…you're a monster. And we will never give into you."

The Rev's eyes are cold as always and the loss of his sneer makes him seem, somehow, even more dangerous. "I'm sorry for you, then. But your family will be leaving Haven, and there isn't a single thing you can do to stop them. So take the cursed children with you. Flee to the oceans. But I would think twice before coming back. Haven will no longer shelter the wicked."

"Hey!" Audrey calls out, stepping forward and moving to stand between the two parties (Nathan's surprised it's taken her so long). "Enough! Don't you both think that enough people have died today? Gwen, take the children. Get all the Glendowers back to the compound—if you come after the Rev, I won't protect you. And you," she turns to the Rev, "what you did going into that barn was brave, but what you did when you came out? These deaths are all on your hands."

"No," he says flatly. "They are on yours."

Audrey actually recoils. "What?"

"You think you're helping, but all you do is prolong their pain. Better to end things once and for all and wipe the Troubles from the earth."

"They're not the problem—they're people!" she hisses.

"They're damned." The Rev's thin lips stretch in a thin smile. It's not his usual sneer, colder and more sinister, as if he is no longer hiding beneath a polite veneer. "And none more so than the one that's made himself your shadow."

Audrey's already moving to place herself between the Rev and Nathan, already opening her mouth, but the chief is there. Suddenly. Abruptly. Standing as tall as he can, solid and immovable. There's a smirk on his lips and something almost carefree in his eyes.

"Careful what you say there, Driscoll. I don't think you're ready for open warfare just yet, and that's what you're going to get if you make one move toward my son."

"Your son is the reason the Troubles are still here," the Rev says. "And you know it."

The ground is shaking. Or Nathan is. Or maybe the entire world, all of Haven and the oceans and the lands far away that have never affected Nathan one way or the other. All of it trembling and coming apart at the seams. He can't move. He can't think. (He cannot, above all, look at Audrey.)

"I think you have that the wrong way around," Garland says, then he turns to look straight at Nathan. "You need to get out of here. I'm done holding things together. It's time to end this."

"End what?" Nathan asks. He's surprised to hear his own voice (surprised that it sounds steady and unaffected). He's surprised that he can take anything in besides the Rev's accusation, reverberating inside his head.

"Audrey, get everyone out of here."

"No," Nathan says because he understands now. He gets it. I'm done holding things together, his dad said, and Nathan's seen the cracks. He put it all together, realized that his dad is Troubled and that no one knows. That whenever Garland Wuornos is worried about something, the earth itself tremors for him, stress and pressure emerging by proxy.

And the field around him is splitting apart at the seams, contracted with painful rumbles.

The Glendowers are ushering away their children. The Rev's men are watching as the cops take Mary into custody. The Rev himself observes Garland dispassionately.

(Nathan still cannot bring himself to look at Audrey.)

"You've kept this secret a long time, Garland," the Rev says, almost conversationally. "You were right never to have children."

"I have a son," Garland spits. The Rev's cold eyes move to Nathan, then to Audrey, then back to Nathan, and he forms that sinister smile again.

"Yes, you do," the Rev says (a threat) before he turns and walks away.

Around them, the field empties, and Nathan hates it. He wants to call everyone back. He wants to grab them and plant them in place and force the chief to look at them (because the chief would never hurt anyone; he would have to hold it in if there were lives depending on him).

"I'm sorry, son," Garland says. "I didn't want it to end this way. But this is on you now. Maybe it always was. Don't listen to the Rev, but watch him. He's ready to end everything no matter what the cost and I don't think that's a good idea."

"Chief, you can't…you can control it." Nathan steps closer, heedless of the fractures riddling the ground beneath the dying grass. "You've controlled it this long. You can keep doing it."

Garland smiles at him. "No, I can't. It's all coming apart and the only thing I can do is make sure no one else goes down with me. Audrey, you need to get him back. Don't let him get caught up in this."

"No!" Nathan shakes his whole body in case she really has put a hand on him to draw him away. "No, I'm not going to let you do this."

"Not really a choice anymore."

There are cracks opening along the lines of his dad's face. Seams that glow and tear while his body shakes in a way impossible anywhere other than Haven. Nathan's being pulled back. He can't feel Audrey's hands (she must only be touching where there's clothing) but he can see his dad dwindling with distance.

"No! Audrey, let me go! Don't let him do this! Parker, talk to him!"

"There's nothing you could have done, Nathan. Just...look out for her. Take care of her."

"Dad!" Nathan screams (echo, reflection, faded shadow of Gwen's cries before him, and he remembers the Rev calling him Parker's shadow, remembers the shadow man who'd killed, all the darkest, scariest parts of a man peeled off and sent out into the world for bloody justice, and Nathan wants that for himself but he has no shadow, he has no recourse, has nothing but eyes that watch his dad fall to pieces and a nose that smells only dust where there should be sweat and brine and nicotine and ears that flinch away from the boom of rock pieces exploding everywhere).

"I love you, son," Garland says, and then it's done.

Dave and Vince come. Dave tries to hover over him, but Vince pulls him away (to collect the pieces that were once flesh). It's a crime scene and there should be cops milling everywhere. It's empty (of everyone, but particularly of the gruff man who took him in and loved him in his crusty old way and died right in front of him). Audrey sits next to him and talks (he can't hear her over the ringing in his ears and the ceaseless echo of his dad's last words).

He feels empty. (He always feels empty, but never like this. He does not think he will ever feel any other way again.)

Eventually, Nathan is able to stand to his feet. Audrey's right at his side, a step behind (his own shadow, but no, she's not dark or murderous, and vengeance isn't her style, so maybe he's just messing up his own shadow part, the role he should be playing).

Nathan can't help it. He picks up one of the pieces. It's heavy. It's cold. It's stone. There's nothing of his dad in it. Not the man who enveloped him in his arms to fill his remaining four senses. Not the man who shut him out and stopped talking to him. Not the man who was always disappointed but never gave up on loving him.

It's just rock.

But something's hanging from it. A chain, half-caught in a crevice. Nathan pulls it out (careless, heedless until he realizes he might break it and maybe it's important, maybe it's the last thing he will ever have of his dad). There's a ring dangling from the end of the chain, a gold ring with tiny white jewels (diamonds? he's no gem expert) centered on it. A man's ring. Maybe a wedding ring (except his dad's ring was a plain gold band).

Suddenly it hits him that he will never be able to ask the chief about it. This will be a mystery forever because the chief is gone. His dad is gone. No more words, no more laters, no more answers. Just an endless void sucking in all the what-ifs and draining away memories and giving back nothing but emptiness.

Nathan pockets the ring and locks his grief away.

"Nathan?"

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Audrey's hand reaching for him. He flinches. It's involuntary (he can't stand for her to touch him now, to make this moment real; he doesn't want her to touch him just because she feels sorry for him), just a small movement, but Audrey takes a whole step away from him.

There's a chasm opening up between them (not a real one, though, because the chief's gone and there won't be any more cracks, not ever).

Nathan wants to bridge it. But he can't. He's empty.

"Nathan," Audrey says again, her voice small. "I think we should get back to town. The Teagues have…everything. It's in the blue cooler. Do you want help…burying it?"

"No," he finally says. "No, I'll do it."

(She already sees him as Troubled. He does not want her to see him broken too.)

Duke comes.

It's strange. Nathan doesn't even know where Duke's been lately, though he always seems to be with Evi when Nathan does see him. How odd, that he thought not so long ago Duke was in the same boat as him, but he must not have been, not if he has left Audrey alone all this time, forsaken her warmth and smiles and sunshine hair for another woman.

Nathan waits. For the taunt. The jibe. The joke about both his dads dying right in front of him and how the world must be testing his numbness. Or maybe a warning couched in cruelty.

But Duke says nothing. Just brings his own shovel and begins digging right beside him.

A part of Nathan tenses, waiting (always waiting for the inevitable, for the other shoe to drop, like it has so many times before). But Duke only helps him.

It's strange.

Strange, but eventually, Nathan realizes he doesn't feel quite as empty as before.

"Nathan," Audrey says one morning as he drives her to the station. "Are we okay?"

He looks over at her, notices her clutching her coffee cup with both hands, as if she needs the warmth, and bumps up the heater. "Yeah. We're fine."

The view outside her window is suddenly fascinating. Her knuckles go white, her fingertips pink where they rest against the hot cup. "I'm sorry I couldn't save your dad."

What can he say to that? He never knows what to say, but this seems like an important moment, one he needs to get right or everything between them will shatter into a thousand pieces. And he has no idea what she wants him to say. What she wants him to do. What he wants to say or do.

(He wonders what his dad would have done. But that's stupid. He's not like the chief. He never has been and he doesn't think he could be even if he tried.)

"Parker," Nathan finally says (because he likes saying her name), "He knew you couldn't. You didn't give him false hope."

"But maybe if I'd—"

"No." Nathan clears his throat. "No, Audrey. You did what he asked you to." He pauses (but it doesn't feel like enough). "I'm sorry you didn't get your answers."

She flinches. "That's not…don't worry about it. He was your dad. That's much more important."

"I didn't even know him," Nathan volunteers. A quiet admission that finally puts into words everything that has been keeping him up night after night, staring up at his ceiling and trying to make sense of everything he knew about Garland Wuornos (which isn't, apparently, very much). "And now I never will."

"He loved you," Audrey says softly. "You know that, right?"

After a moment, Nathan tips his chin in agreement.

"Then everything else doesn't matter. Just remember that he loved you."

His chest doesn't feel quite so cavernous when he drops her off. (He doesn't flinch at all when she brushes her hot, hot fingertips over the back of his hand, light as a molten butterfly.)

He does not ask her about what the Rev said (accused him of, really, an accusation vast enough to topple everything left in Nathan's world).

Audrey never brings it up.

They both (the one who fixes Troubles and the one who maybe possibly might have caused them) pretend they have forgotten it.

(Neither has.)

They pretend they pay it no mind.

(Both do.)

"I think Cole killed Leif," Nathan tells her one morning while they're heading to Haven Joe's for lunch. Nathan likes their pancakes, and ever since Audrey befriended Nathan, Joe seems more than happy to serve him even at an outside table where anyone can see him.

"Yeah," Audrey says. She sounds tired, and Nathan knows that she isn't as eager to be dropped off at the station each morning. The official story Vince and Dave put out is that Garland was lost at sea, so the selectmen have been waiting for the required amount of time for search and rescue to be completed. Nathan wishes he had been able to find his dad's badge so he could give it to Audrey, let her know that he at least has chosen his nomination.

"His own son," Nathan says. "He killed his own son so the secret of the Rev's wife wouldn't get out."

"He was desperate," Audrey says halfheartedly.

"Doesn't make it right."

"No," she agrees. "It was cold-blooded murder. He chose the woman he loved over his own son. That's cold."

"And she didn't seem to care," he adds. "I know Leif wasn't her flesh and blood, but shouldn't it have bothered her? Shouldn't she have tried to protect her son?"

"She didn't say a word about that. Though she did say that Lucy and Garland did work together, solving Troubles, helping people. I guess she didn't think her husband needed help for being a murderer, though."

"Strange, when she left the Rev because he wanted to get rid of the Troubled."

Audrey laughs (not her usual laugh, more ironic than happy, but Nathan drinks in the sound of it anyway, lets it fill him up and relieve the gaping chasm inside him). "Haven," she says. "You know, before I got to town—when I still thought I was just Audrey Parker, before the Troubles—I was used to criminals being…well, criminals. I expected to find people that I wouldn't want to be alone in a room with. But now, I just expect the 'culprits' to be scared, confused people who most of the time don't even know what they've caused."

"Isn't that better?"

Her shrug is slow and uncertain. "Maybe. I don't know. I think in a way it's a lot sadder."

"Except the Troubled have you," he points out. "Criminals can't always be helped, but you fix the Troubled."

Her silence is absolute. He doesn't think she's even breathing, knows she wasn't when she finally pulls in a sharp gasp as he parks in front of the restaurant.

"You still think that?" she asks quietly. She meets his eyes almost timidly, as if afraid of what she will see there. "Even after your dad?"

"You fix people," he says firmly. And then, because the moment is close and quiet and she is looking at him with wide, open eyes, he is brave. He looks at her and says, "You fixed me."

"Oh, Nathan." Her smile is big and genuine, all her tiredness washed away. "No one can fix you." (He tenses, wounded and ready to withdraw). Her eyes strip away the façade he's erected as armor, peer down past the numbness he's enveloped himself in, down to the core of him where he sits hunched in on himself, isolated and broken.

"There's nothing to fix," she says.

And fixes him all over again.

Audrey throws a Christmas party in July. It's…weird, but so was blinking to find himself in a toy store wearing clothes he doesn't remember putting on, looking up to find Audrey's face peering down at him from the washed-clean sky.

In small consolation, Duke seems just as confused as Nathan, though Evi seems determined to cheer him before the night is over. Duke looks like he needs the distraction after Audrey laughs her way through giving him and Nathan a shared present (one Nathan decides he will never mention again; there's a lot of things that need to stay in the past and sledding with Duke is near the top of the list).

Nathan finds a corner far away from the mistletoe to spend the evening and devotes himself to figuring out what kind of Trouble spurred all of this. He's confident Audrey's immunity protected her from whatever wiped his memory, so he plays a game with himself where he gets a sip of eggnog every time he comes up with a plausible Christmas Trouble (sadly, he comes up with enough that he resolves never to drink eggnog in July again).

After the caroling portion of the evening ends, Stan comes to say hello in his friendly but awkward way. Nathan actually manages to dredge up a smile for him. He's always liked Stan. Better, Stan has always seemed to like him, oblivious to the town's undercurrents ripping at Nathan. Best of all, Stan doesn't say a word about Garland, either in sympathy or reminiscence, and Nathan appreciates the respite.

Dave keeps trying to talk to him, but Vince keeps dragging him away. Ordinarily, Nathan actually likes Dave and endures Vince. Since his dad died, though, Nathan's been doing his best to avoid them both. Dave is overly sympathetic, Vince coldly curious, and Nathan just wants to be left alone.

Especially now. With a Christmas tree in the corner and Christmas music playing and the Christmas spirit unleashed around him, Nathan can't afford to think of his dad. He's just barely managed to get to where he can think of him all without being devoured by emptiness that swallows him whole. Thinking of him in the context of this? No. Nathan's not ready for that.

"You doing okay?" Audrey asks him at one point, leaning against the wall next to him.

"Just thinking," Nathan says. "Must have been quite the Trouble to bring all this on."

"Yes." Duke's there suddenly, one eye on Evi, who seems a bit more than tipsy and keeps stumbling into him, the other on Audrey. "I've been wondering the same thing. Particularly now that you've got me completely surrounded by cops."

"Christmas in July?" Evi says while the drink sloshes in her cup. "Whatever you're struggling with must be a doozy."

"Maybe I just wanted to remind myself that I have friends," Audrey says playfully, and slips away to stop Stan dipping his mug into the punch.

"Definitely not," Duke mutters before letting Evi pull him into an impromptu dance. Nathan quits his drinking game and sets his eggnog aside before he starts dancing too.

Eventually, the party wraps up. When everyone else trickles out (Duke leaves only after extracting a promise from Audrey that she will explain the Santa suit), Nathan sets about collecting all the mugs left scattered over Audrey's things.

He's seen her apartment plenty of times before, usually from his place in the doorway while Audrey tugs on her shoes or finishes tying up her hair, but it's nice having a chance to really look around. To see what she surrounds herself with (Audrey Parker's chimes and Lucy Ripley's piano; knickknacks from Duke and mementos from Eleanor and paperwork from the chief; the hat and boots Nathan gave her when she first decided to stay hanging near the door). To smell her on everything in the room. To feel invited, included, and not just allowed because it's convenient.

"You don't have to do that," Audrey says when she's closed the door behind Duke and Evi and sees him cleaning.

Nathan smirks at her. "You're saying you'd tell me what happened without any incentive?"

"Cupcakes work better as bribes," she says with a laugh, slipping off her shoes (Nathan hurriedly looks away, the action striking him as strangely intimate).

"You only say that because you didn't see where Lucassi spilled eggnog."

"You're right. I'd rather not know."

They clean for a few moments in silence before she says, "I was always going to tell you, Nathan."

"I know," he replies. "I was always going to help clean up."

Turns out he hadn't guessed anywhere near the right Trouble, but then, it'd be hard to imagine Haven as a snowglobe and everyone in town vanishing one at a time if Audrey didn't look so serious as she relays what happened. Not for the first time Nathan thinks how hard it must be for her, to always know when something's wrong but to be alone in that understanding. It sounds lonely. Terrifying. To have to trust herself more than what everyone around her believes, what all her senses tell her is true.

(But she is strong enough to do it unflinchingly, he knows that with complete certainty.)

"I'm sorry," he offers when the room is mostly clean again.

She blinks at him. "You couldn't help vanishing, Nathan. In fact, you were one of the very last to go. You told me that I couldn't get rid of you so easily, and then…then you just disappeared. I was all alone."

A shudder rolls through Nathan's soul at the mere thought of being stranded liked that, abandoned, alone amid the wreckage, bereft of everything he cares for. He's seized by the sudden urge to hug Parker, but luckily manages to stop himself when he remembers they're alone and she's hurting and he's weak and anyway, he's not sure exactly why Chris Brody left town, but he's pretty sure the marine biologist plans on coming back to Audrey.

"I'm sorry," he says again. "I wish I could have stayed for you."

She gives him an odd look, then, soft and gentle and exasperated and…fond? Touched? He can't quite pin it down. "I got you back," she says. "That's what matters."

When the moment stretches to the point of being uncomfortable, Nathan shifts. He thinks he should probably go. Everyone else is long gone and the last thing he wants to do is overstay his welcome.

"Thanks for telling me," he says with a shy nod.

"Of course." She seems surprised, but then smirks, one of those lightning-fast transitions he's come to expect from her. "I'll even let you off the hook for not getting me a Christmas present."

"In July," he deadpans, pointedly not thinking of the gift-wrapped box he found stowed in a drawer of his desk at the Herald. He hasn't quite worked up the nerve to open it yet, but he already knows it's for Audrey.

"Hey, you should always be prepared."

"Maybe I'll get you a gift card for coffee, then keep it with me for all those morning cups I bring you."

"Sure," she agrees without blinking. "Nothing says 'I care' like a gift card."

"I thought all the coffees and chauffeuring did that," he says, then freezes. He can't believe he said that. It sounded…it sounded like flirting. Like an admission that he does care. And of course, he does. As a sort-of partner. As a friend. There's nothing wrong with that. Those are both labels she's agreed with.

(But it meant more than that. He cares more than friends. More than just partners. More.)

Audrey squints up at him (Nathan's bones are made of lead; he knows because he cannot get any of his limbs to move), tilts her head (his brain has turned to mush; he knows because he cannot think of anything to say to make this moment innocent), then lets out a chuckle. "You Mainers and your grand gestures. All right, I guess that works then."

(Nathan breathes out a sigh of relief and doesn't allow himself to read any double-meanings in her words. He can give her the same favor she is giving him.)

"Well," he says quickly. "I'd better go. See you in the morning?"

"Yeah. With a cup of coffee." She smiles up at him as she holds the door open for him. "Good night, Nathan."

"Night, Parker."

He walks down the steps (already missing the scent of her), across the parking lot toward his Bronco, closing a hand over the jingle of keys in his pocket. The light fades behind him as he crosses into shadows, though out of habit, Nathan realizes he's watching the ground, searching for a familiar crack that will never appear again.

When he looks up, there are men emerging from the dark. One tall, lean form stands directly in his path.

"Nathan," Reverend Driscoll says. "I think it's time for us to talk."

A/N: All right, so I know I kind of tweaked a few of the episodes in the timeline - and I just guessed at 'Silent Night' - but hopefully that's a minor enough thing it doesn't make anyone upset. It just worked better to have the build up to the Rev/Glendower showdown without having 'Friend Or Faux' in between. Also, yeah, I've never liked the Glendowers - but for all that I didn't mind seeing them die, hopefully I kept it true enough to their characterizations. It's a lot of fun to imagine slightly different ways these things could go if the timing was just a bit different! Hope you all enjoy!