Olivia sat at her kitchen table, numb. She gazed absently into the dregs of her third glass of whiskey. She swirled it lightly, admiring the golden color as she wondered for the hundredth time how she'd gotten here, alone and not-quite-drunk in her half-lit apartment. Taking another swig of the beverage, she corrected herself: alone and not quite drunk enough in her half-lit apartment.
The yawning emptiness of the apartment was suffocating. It gave her mind too much leave to wander, and she couldn't bear the form of torture it chose to inflict. All she could see was Peter's face. Peter's smile. Peter's frown. Peter's confusion as he'd stood in the doorway of the lab… Reaching for the bottle, she poured herself another glass, hesitated, then tipped in a little more. After everything she'd learned in the past few days, she wasn't sure she'd ever be drunk enough, and she didn't bother to fight the tears when they came. What was the point?
Peter was probably gone by now. Walter must have told him, and Peter would have left. She wondered where he'd go. Iraq? Somewhere else entirely? Somewhere he hadn't made a name for himself yet, where he hadn't left anyone still burning from the impression he'd made? No matter where he ran though, she knew that he would never be able to outrun the truth that now haunted them. Neither could she. But she also knew they'd both try to anyway, at least briefly. It was who they were: stubborn to a fault.
She should have stayed, she berated herself brutally as she took another sip. She should have stayed while Walter told him. She could have kept him here, kept him from running again… but it didn't really matter, she supposed. In the end, he would have left her one way or another. Either he would have left by choice or he would have been taken from her, another victim of the coming storm that she couldn't seem to understand or prevent. Some guardian of the doorway, she was. She laughed bitterly and took another swig.
If she was really the best they had, then clearly someone had goofed.
A hesitant knocking suddenly echoed from the other room, and she frowned. She glanced at the clock. 12:35AM? Must be someone for one of the neighbors, she thought, willing them to stop their knocking and just leave her alone. After all, who would be visiting her? Rachel had her own apartment and was no doubt asleep right now – not that Olivia could talk to her sister about this anyway. It couldn't be Charlie – Charlie was dead. It couldn't be Peter… Peter was gone.
The knocking sounded more firmly, and Olivia was forced to admit that the sound was, in fact, coming from her own front door. Placing her glass on the table, she got up to look through the peephole, not believing what she saw. She quickly unlocked her door and swung it open, staring at the man in front of her through her tears. They studied each other in silence for a moment before she found her voice. "Peter?"
He let out a short, broken laugh, looking miserable. "Olivia… are you drunk?" The laugh was a shadow of what it should have been, completely mirthless, and the realization pierced her heart. Sadness and confusion dripped off him like the droplets of rain that had drenched his clothes. She noticed he wasn't wearing a coat.
"Not quite," she replied, still confused by his presence even as she moved to let him inside. Shutting and locking the door behind him, she shook her head and stared at him as if he were a ghost. Maybe he was. Maybe she was actually a little too drunk, she thought. In truth she knew that she was just tipsy, but how else was it possible that he was here, except as some sort of hallucination an intoxicated mind had conjured up for some devious purpose of its own? Reaching out, however, she touched her hand to his soaking wet shirt and instantly knew this was real. She felt the tears returning as she turned her gaze up to his. "Peter?"
He shook his head, clearly unable to speak, and gently pulled her into an embrace. They buried their faces in each other, clinging desperately in their confusion and pain. "I don't understand," she whispered into his chest.
He laughed that empty shadow laugh again. "Join the club. To be honest… I'm not sure I understand anything anymore."
Pulling away but still holding to him tightly, she held his grief-stricken gaze with hers. She understood. None of this made sense. In fact, things hadn't really made sense for longer than she could remember. When she was with Peter before the glimmer, things been simpler, at least. Just him and her, things had been so clear… but with a sinking feeling she wondered if things would ever make sense again.
**********
Peter held onto Olivia and felt solid for the first time since he'd learned the truth an hour ago. After he'd left the lab in a daze, he'd immediately headed for the nearest bar, hoping to drown his shock and anger in the strongest thing he could order. It hadn't worked. He'd downed the first two drinks all right, but after nursing a third drink for over half an hour and entertaining thoughts of the best country to head to, he'd hadn't had the heart to swallow the rest. He couldn't get Olivia's horrified face out of his head. Suddenly, he'd needed to see her, feel her, be with her. Nothing else made sense anymore. His mind continued to hover and revolve around Walter's words, and he shook his head as he drank in her soothing presence.
"Why now?" Peter asked raggedly. "Why is he telling me this now?"
Olivia blanched. "He didn't tell you?"
"No…" Taking in her pale, guilt-stricken face and recalling her strange behavior over the past few days, everything suddenly solidified into two words. He leaned back and let out a breath. "I glimmer." Tears welled in her eyes, and she nodded mutely. He felt a lump forming in his own throat. It was all becoming clear. "The night we went out for drinks…?"
"The first time I saw the glimmer," she confirmed, then paused. He saw a tortured ghost flutter behind her eyes, and the chill was back.
He tried to swallow past the lump in his throat. "There's more."
She nodded again. A tear traced a path down her cheek.
He wasn't sure he could take any more. Not tonight. Not after all he'd already heard. At the same time, however, a part of him was resigned to knowing. And as he took in the agonized expression etched onto Olivia's face, he couldn't imagine asking her to try to keep back another tortured secret from him, even for a night. It was clearly tearing her apart as it was. They'd both had enough of secrets.
"Olivia…" He reached up an unsteady hand to brush away her tear and steeled himself. "It's ok. Just… tell me. I have to know."
But as she explained in a halting, tearful voice how he not only glimmered, but flickered and flared, that he wasn't… stable, a part of him regretted his words. And here he'd been, thinking it couldn't get any worse, he thought numbly. His breath felt frozen in his lungs. He and Olivia absently held onto one another's arms, forehead to forehead, gripping each other more closely to draw comfort as she continued her grim explanation.
At last, she stopped. Looking up at him nervously, her eyes filled with tears, and he distantly noted that her mouth was doing that thing it did when she was upset. Somehow 'upset' didn't really seem to cover this though. Even the floor beneath him felt somehow more distant. Detached.
"Peter, please…" she begged, dragging his stunned mind back to Earth. Her eyes were full of anguish as she watched him. "Say something…"
He gripped the fabric of her sleeve in an attempt to focus himself. God, he was so tired of this mess… He swallowed, voice hoarse. "Can Walter fix it?"
Her ragged breath brushed against his cheek as she hesitated. "He doesn't know."
He didn't know? The breath he'd been holding escaped. The buzzing in his ears, was returning, but he tried desperately to focus on Olivia's face where it hovered so close to his. Caressing her cheek in a desperate attempt to ground himself, he looked up into her tear-filled eyes and couldn't find his voice.
She brought her hands up to cradle his face and tried for a feeble smile. "He'll figure it out," she whispered in a wavering voice. "He'll fix it – he'll fix it, he has to. He always does, no matter what…" After a moment, however, her expression crumpled, and he felt his crumple too as she looked into his eyes. "Peter… I can't lose you."
He wanted to promise her that she wouldn't lose him. He wanted to assure her that he'd never leave her, that he was here for good, that he'd never hurt her, but it scared him to know that it quite possibly wasn't in his power to make those sorts of promises. His apparently glimmering skin itched, and felt oddly betrayed by it. He didn't know what would happen – and it terrified him. He half expected to be jerked away at any moment, to dissolve into nothingness…
No. No, he wouldn't let that happen. Not after everything they'd been through. He'd always been an active agent in his own fate, for better or worse, and that wasn't about to change now. He focused on the solid warmth of Olivia's touch, the soft feel of her hair. "I'm not going anywhere," he whispered roughly. He held her gaze, willing himself to believe it.
A part of him faltered in uncertainty, flooding with what ifs, but he leaned forward and gently caught her lips with his, drawing on her as his anchor. No way was he getting yanked back to wherever he'd come from. This was real, and he intended to keep it that way. The kiss escalated in desperation, and Olivia pressed her body flush against his, setting all his nerves on fire. He deepened the kiss further. As they came up for air, he breathed out words he never thought he'd hear himself say out loud. "I'm not going anywhere." He paused, the lump in his throat returning before he continued softly. "I love you, Olivia Dunham."
A choked sob escaped her lips. Eyes shining with tears, she held him more tightly. "I love you too." She hesitated only a moment before crashing her lips to his again, and Peter allowed himself to get lost in the feel of her as their bodies fervently found one another. If he had to chose his reality, then he chose this, he chose here – he chose her.
*********
Olivia kissed Peter as though their lives depended on it. He was the only thing keeping her sane, his solid presence, and she needed to be closer. Somehow she felt that if she could just get close enough, she couldn't possibly lose him. He couldn't fade away. Threading her hand beneath the fabric of his sweater to touch the warmth of his skin, she pressed herself against him – closer. She wouldn't let him fade.
"'Livia…"
She shook her head, silencing him with another desperate kiss, and she felt his fingers trace a fiery path along the bare skin of her back as he reciprocated. His ministrations matched her own desperation, and she could feel his body trembling with hers as his kisses strayed to her neck, to her shoulder, down her collar line. She gripped him tighter before recapturing his mouth with hers.
She loved him. She wasn't sure when exactly it had happened. Somewhere along this crazy road they were on, he'd become her foundation, and every fiber of her rebelled at the thought of that foundation crumbling. It was a part of her—he was part of her. Their love had come on so slowly, she almost hadn't noticed it, but she'd never felt such certainty, such a strong feeling of something being so absolutely right. To know he felt the same, but she could so easily lose him… The tears fell down her face, and he immediately kissed them away. Her breath hitched with longing. "Peter…"
Staggering back toward her room, he eased her unbuttoned blouse off her shoulders as she pulled his sweater over his head before they resumed their kiss, lost to the world. Somehow, she'd fix this, she'd do anything to. But for now she allowed herself to be vulnerable. She let herself melt into their mutual search for comfort from each other, for each other. For now, the fact that they loved each other was enough.
With a sudden burst of clarity, she smiled up at him softly. He seemed to understand, tenderly returning the smile, and suddenly she knew: somehow this would all be all right. She allowed herself a small tear-filled giggle as they fell back onto her bed, and he grinned in heart-breaking relief as he drew her into another deep kiss. As long as they had each other everything would be ok.
It had to be.
**********
A/N – Thanks for reading! The next update will be on Friday. : )
