He sits, still, on his sofa, naked and cold, hands loose at his sides and his head tipped back, eyes closed. Down the hall, his shower is running. It had taken less than a minute — a few precious moments all he had to hold her tight and pretend — for her to collect herself and wrench away from him as if he burned.
Standing in a jerky, disjointed movement, she'd looked at him with cool, empty eyes.
"I'm using your shower now," she'd said flatly. "You can wait." And she'd picked up her discarded clothes and stalked away.
And so he sits, seeing no point in moving now, even if he could summon the strength. He feels as empty as she had looked, as if, somehow, the essence of himself has been scooped messily out and discarded.
Is this how she feels, all the time? Hollow, scoured raw but not clean, left with nothing but a swell of hate and anger?
No wonder she wants me dead, he thinks lethargically, for if Solomon appeared before him now, the engineer of this madness, Red would tear him to shreds with his bare hands.
Images return, despite his efforts to shut off his mind, unbidden, unwelcome.
Of her ethereal loveliness forever damaged, marked and scarred, fucking monogrammed so that she could never forget that it was Red who was responsible for her ruin.
Of the cruelty on her pretty face as she stripped him bare.
Of the revulsion that ran through her entire being as she'd ripped herself from him with a fervent urgency and a hideous sound.
Nausea rises again and he lowers his head, breathing deep to dispel it. But now, now he's looking at himself, his cold cock curled against his thigh, sticky with sordid remains and what looks like blood, what must be her blood, and he loses the battle.
He staggers up and around the corner and throws himself at the kitchen sink, retching helplessly into it long after his stomach is empty.
She washes methodically, the water as hot as she can stand it, as is her habit now. She easily ignores the sting of the soap in her open cuts and abrasions, careful only to remove every trace of Reddington that she can.
Her mind is finally, finally, completely empty of the screaming chorus of memory and misgiving, as if her overt act of aggression has triggered a switch. She is nearly limp from the lack of tension in her body, coiled tight for so very long that she'd forgotten how a person was supposed to feel. She stretches and cracks her neck, satisfied with her success.
Her shower is quick — she no longer particularly savours these small pleasures — so she's already yanking her clothes on when she hears the unmistakable noises of sick misery coming down the hall. Somewhere deep inside, a small corner of her that is still sane, a little lonesome Lizzie that she wouldn't have guessed was there, suffers a hard pang of guilt, regret, sadness.
She quashes it ruthlessly — if he's miserable, good; if he now understands even the tiniest part of her suffering, good. Maybe now, he'll be prepared to answer to her. Because if the voices in her head get any louder, she will be completely lost to herself, and any slim chance she has at any kind of life will disappear.
She walks down the hall and sees him in the kitchen, curled over the sink, his head pressed to the stainless steel apron as if the cold metal provided some kind of relief. She catalogues with no particular interest the mass of scar tissue stretching across the upper left side of his back, over his shoulder. Notices absently that he is scratched and bleeding lightly in a few places, that shadows of bruising are just starting to emerge on his shoulders and hips.
"Your turn," she announces to his curved back, her inflection-free voice harsh in the quiet room. "And then we'll talk."
He coughs once, then straightens slowly, movements the stiff, pained ones of a much older man. He turns on the water in the sink and starts a disposal; after a minute, he flicks them both off again, then turns and walks out without looking at her.
She hears the bathroom door click shut quietly, then walks back into the living room to sit in the armchair and wait.
It's not until he's in the shower that he notices he is bleeding — from the scar on his neck, opened painfully; a bite mark on his chest; what the sting of the water tells him are at least two or three places on his back. He mentally shrugs it off as unimportant, the physical pain not really registering.
He washes slowly, gulping down water straight from the shower head, knowing none of it will make any difference to the hollow inside. He can accept it as his due, he really can — the crimes that are his too numerous to count, his failures on her behalf the worst of atrocities. Still, he hadn't imagined his punishment hurting quite this way.
With some effort, he gathers himself and puts it all away; rubs himself dry quickly, ignoring his seeping wounds; brushes his teeth twice to erase the taste of bile and blood. He does allow himself the small comfort of a soft tee and an ancient pair of sweats from his Navy days, with his thick hoodie to combat the chill that has settled in his bones.
Then he pads out to face her again, if he can.
Her eyes are closed when he reenters the room, her body curled limp and relaxed into his armchair, and he wonders if she has fallen asleep. But the floor creaks as he moves, and she stiffens and jerks, her eyes flying open, wary like a wild animal. He's almost accustomed now to the seething hate that flashes across her face before she shuts down — she didn't move or flinch this time, and he'll count that as progress.
She watches him as he pauses by the couch; he thinks he managed to hide his wince as he passes it and pulls out his desk chair instead.
"That doesn't look so comfortable," she comments, testing.
"It will suffice for the time being," he answers stiffly, not wanting to rise to her bait, to give anything away. "I believe you were looking for some clarity?"
She looks at him somberly. "Will you tell me the truth?"
"I will," he says, without hesitation, making her think she might believe it. "I don't lie to you, Elizabeth."
She nods slowly, but he can see the uncertainty in her eyes.
"Would you feel better if Dembe was here, to confirm what he can? He wasn't with me when you were small, but he was for much of your life with Sam."
She considers this, then nods. If Dembe confirms what Red has to say about her later life, perhaps she can accept what he says about her beginnings.
He has to fetch his phone from his slacks, still in a pile on the floor, and his voice when he speaks briefly to Dembe sounds strange even to himself.
"He'll be here shortly," he says as he flips the phone shut. "Shall we begin with the fire, while we wait?"
He'd already decided that there was no point keeping secrets any longer. Whatever there was in her past that might hurt or endanger her was far less damaging that what had already been done.
"All right," she says slowly. "How do…should I just tell you what he told me, what he helped me remember?"
"That seems as good a start as any. But I wouldn't call it help, myself."
"I'm sure you wouldn't," she replies coldly. "But I might. Together, Solomon and Dr Orchard used drugs and some kind of hypnosis to take me into the past, into my memories. The night of the fire — my earliest memory — you were there. True?"
He nods cautiously. "True."
"You shot my parents and abducted me," she continues, her voice shaking and angry. "T-True?"
"No," he says emphatically, maintaining a calm façade with some effort. "Not true. I was there, yes. I had been working with your mother — she was a former KGB agent who defected to America shortly after you were born. She had some very legitimate concerns about your safety. Your father was…a dangerous man.
"That night, he finally caught up to her; I still don't know how he found her, after three years…" He shakes his head and shrugs. "I suppose it doesn't matter. He came for you both that night. I was already on my way there — we had a meet — but when I approached the house, the door was broken open and there was fighting everywhere. Your father's men against Katya's guards all over the house; the fire started in the kitchen when a stray bullet hit the gas line."
Her eyes were wide and frightened, she panted for breath, her face damp with sweat; listening to him put her right back into the dark places in her mind, as if they had just been waiting there for the chance to pounce. The scene he painted was vivid and flickering as if already in flames; she could see her parents arguing in front of her before he even said the words.
"Your parents were having a terrible argument in the front room — you were watching them, so frightened, crying. And you'd picked up your father's gun."
She shakes her head frantically. "No," she says, "that's not… No! How could you…"
But she can't throw his words back in his face now, not now, when she can see it happening in front of her, her head throbbing in vivid agony as her memory rights itself in her clouded vision, Solomon's deceptions melting away.
"It was me," she says quietly, resigned, eyes damp. "I shot my father. True or not true?"
"True," he says heavily, face creased in unhappy lines. "You were barely more than a baby; it wasn't your fault. You were trying to protect your mother."
"What about my mother?" she demands quickly. "If I killed my father and she was still alive…"
He's already shaking his head as she says the words, and now her tears run in earnest. "I'm so sorry, Elizabeth. She screamed at me to grab you and run and went into the house for something…Just as I approached the front door, something fell, a beam, something."
"No," she breathes again, the pain in her head and within her battling angrily.
He looks at her; takes a breath. "I know you saw my back in the kitchen earlier. That's what I carry, from that night, as well as memories."
She drops her head; wraps her arms around herself, holding herself together.
"I'm still not sure how I got out with you. You woke me, screaming…I think you saved us both," he continues bleakly. "Your mother was nowhere to be seen, and we couldn't stay there. Sam took us both in, and you never left.
"What I told you before about your mother was true — I learned later that she took her own life shortly after that night.
"This is what I know to be true."
When Dembe enters the apartment that night, it's dark in the room, no one having bothered to flick a light on once the last of the sun disappeared. He calls out, switching on a lamp by the door, but he cuts off abruptly as the pair comes into view.
Liz, her hair still shower-damp, silent tears running down her face as she stares out the window.
Red, pale and drawn, the shadow of a bruise on one cheek, blood congealing on his neck, a hollow resignation hanging around him in a miasma of unhappiness.
Dembe turns to Liz, his face as inscrutable as ever. "I'll take you home, Elizabeth."
'What?" she says, startled, looking up wildly, finding it difficult to focus on his face. "I'm not ready; we've only barely got started! I thought…I thought you were going to help."
"It looks to me like you've both had enough for one day," he returns firmly. "You need to come with me now."
"I–" she starts again, but shuts up when she finally gets a good look at Dembe's shuttered face.
She gets up and walks to the door without another word, without looking at Red, giving nothing.
"I'll be back in a bit," Dembe says to Red in a softer tone. "I'll make us dinner."
Red nods silently; watches them leave together.
When the door shuts, when their footsteps fade completely, when an empty silence wraps around him like a blanket.
Then, only then, does he allow his anguish to surface and take him under.
The trip back to her apartment is quiet, but this isn't unusual, and Liz is too relaxed to notice that it is much heavier than usual. Since the sharp pain of recall had left her head, she has been as limp as a kitten in the sun.
Dembe sees her to the door, as usual, but stops in the entry.
"I'm not staying tonight," he says quietly. "Raymond needs me more."
She shifts her gaze, faintly guilty again, and then resentful.
"That's fine," she says, a little sullenly, but still too unwound to summon much of a response. "I'll probably just go to sleep anyway."
He nods and turns away; hesitates briefly, and turns back, placing his warm hands gently on her shoulders.
"Think carefully, Elizabeth," he says gently. "Think carefully about about who it is that you want controlling your actions, before you have cause to act again."
He has collected himself by the time Dembe returns; has gathered all his brittle little pieces and tucked them away. He has neatened the living area, tossed his pile of clothing into the garbage chute in the hall, and is calmly brewing tea when Dembe arrives.
The younger man cleans his various wounds with his customary deft skill, saying nothing, but humming a little as he works, his easy expression unchanging. Red thinks that he has never appreciated this true friendship more.
Dembe makes grilled cheese sandwiches, which makes him laugh a little, and they eat in a companionable silence, truly at home in each other's company. Only when the meal is finished and the kitchen tidy, when they sit together with glasses of fine Scotch, does Dembe's face change.
"Raymond," he says, quietly intense, "why?"
Red looks into his drink, swirling it gently as if searching for answers in the depths of the amber liquid.
"Whatever she needs, he answers finally. "It's what I promised her; it's what I owe."
Dembe frowns, uneasy. "Do you really think allowing her to exercise Solomon's darkness will help her to heal?"
"Perhaps she can give the darkness to me to carry," Red murmurs, his eyes cloudy, "and walk free in the light again."
