Understanding
To fear love is to fear life, and those who fear life are already three parts dead.
Bertrand Russell
***
Interlude I
Four years, six months and thirteen days ago.
It's raining. I've always loved the rain.
It's cold rain. It strikes your skin, freezing. It's not quite an ice storm, but it's enough to make you feel alive. I don't mind. Alive is something I'm trying pretty hard to feel right now.
I don't want to go back inside. It's cold as hell, but I'd rather be standing out here than back in there. I need a cigarette, but my lighter's on the fritz. Fifteen years old, the Zippo is the product of youthful rebellion and, later on, an unhealthy fascination with graphic novels. The engraving feels rough under my fingertips.
That lighter has been through every hell I have. Every scratch, every dent, comes from one of my lifetime experiences. I guess time his taken its toll, because out here, in the rain, it won't ignite. It's broken. I'm broken.
All the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of a single candle.
A single flame. A light at the end of the tunnel.
I suck at the cigarette, relishing the deadly chemicals that fill my lungs.
'Thank-you.' I turn to my savior. Like me, she has braved the cold, wet conditions for a single cigarette. Hazel eyes smile in conjunction with pale pink lips. Her hair is darkened by the rain that soaks it.
'Men, huh?' She says in reply. Obviously she saw what went down inside. Four times he tried, and four times he wouldn't take no for an answer. I just wanted to be alone.
'He'll get out of hospital soon enough,' I say flatly. There's no enthusiasm in my voice.
I am broken.
It's cold – freezing – but I don't think I notice it.
There's something about her that wants me to open up, tell her of every single thing that's bothering me right now. But I don't.
'Makes you want to ignore them altogether. Men, that is.'
'No,' I say. 'I've tried that. I think I've lost faith in the human race altogether.'
'We're not all so bad,' she tells me. And I believe her. It's why, when she asks me if I want to go back inside, warm up, get a drink, I say yes.
Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.
***
Her name is Alyson – Lee – Stewart she's twenty-nine years old, and she's the editor of an obscure crime fiction magazine called Pulp. I tell her I'm with the FBI. I don't tell her that I'm supposed to be in the BAU, but some idiot forgot to give them the fucking transfer papers. I like to keep my work and my personal life separate.
She grins, asks if she can consult me on the novel she's trying to write. I give her my cell phone number. Normally I'd give her my card, but I don't really have one right now.
She asks me what I'm into. I reply with vague, but hopefully acceptable answers. Reading, movies, etc. I don't tell her that I can list a good majority of the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition. I don't tell her that I was once grounded for two months after being caught reading Great Expectations at one of my mother's numerous ambassadorial events. That I was almost arrested at thirteen for stealing a first edition copy of To the Lighthouse. That, at nine years old, I dressed up as Princess Leia for a midnight screening of The Empire Strikes Back.
I've got the strangest feeling that I don't want to jeopardize this yet.
***
'You don't have to work tomorrow?' she asks me. It's almost midnight.
'No,' I say, without a trace of bitterness. 'No, I've got tomorrow off.' My ear is to the ground. The BAU is still in St. Louis – for now. I might do a bit of calling around, try and figure out why my transfer papers didn't go through. But I can do that with a hangover.
She's kissing me. It's soft, gentle, passionate. It's unexpected, and yet it's almost as though I've been waiting for it all night. I want this.
Do I?
I'm enjoying it, there's no doubt about that. But I want to take this slowly. I don't want to screw it up.
Apparently, she senses my hesitation. She pulls back, leaving me breathless.
'Do you want me to stop?' she asks. Her eyebrows lift in concern.
'No.'
***
I'm sitting on his couch. I got the phone call three hours ago. They're flying back today. When he walks in, he looks like he's had a rough day. I guess they're all rough.
'Please tell me you haven't been there for the last four days.' He sounds exasperated, and I don't blame him. It's not his fault someone else fucked up.
And what have I been doing for the last four days?
I've been putting my life back together.
