Her head relaxed on his chest, she didn't see Chloe walk in. But Harm did. "Nah, Chlo, you are not going on your phone right now. We're leaving," he said, watching her attempt to escape to the room she and Mac shared. Mac levered her head off his body and went to join them.
Chloe safely delivered to school, and advised to avoid telling her friends too much yet because they weren't sure what would be happening, they drove to the family court to drop off the paperwork – which, uncharacteristically, went without a hitch. For some reason, just opening the door to the hotel room he'd started to think of as "home" caused a lump to form in Harm's throat. He thought they'd got past the obfuscation and miscommunication stage, but he couldn't be sure Mac felt the same way about this as he did – and you had to admit they had a terrible track record with these kinds of conversations. A pessimistic part of him thought the ball discussion was just one massive fluke which wouldn't be repeated any time soon, and this conversation might be the proverbial straw which broke the camel's back. Well, he steeled himself, you never know until you try. "Mac?" he questioned quietly, realising he'd lost track of her whereabouts.
"Just making coffee," she said, and her voice sounded open – undeniably a good sign. "Missed out on it this morning."
"Make one for me too?" Harm asked. The hotel coffee was far worse quality than what he was used to, but if you could get past the taste the kick was the same.
"Already did," Mac said a moment later, walking through to the living area holding a steaming mug in either hand. She handed one over to him and he felt his skin tingle when their fingers touched. For a moment, lost in the pleasure of the sensation, he wondered whether he'd always feel this way when she touched him.
"Earth to Harm," Mac said, waving a hand in front of his face.
"Sorry, I'm here." Harm shook his head to dislodge the cobwebs.
She forced herself to take the first step. It had, after all, been her who initiated this conversation. "Sorry I told Chloe where I thought she'd live without asking you."
"Nah, don't worry," Harm said quickly, shaking his head. "You're the only one with a spare bedroom."
That was the easy part over with. Her voice came out much quieter than intended when she asked, "So where do you think you'll live?"
Harm hesitated, chest aching with confused anticipation. "I don't want to take this too fast, Mac," he said, and watched her face twist into an expression he couldn't identify. He put out a hand to steady her as he continued. "I don't want to rush you, or make you do anything you're uncomfortable with. And I want you to know that no matter how long this takes, I will wait." She heard the echo of a long-ago conversation and felt guilt drop heavily into her gut. He took a deep breath. "But here's the thing – if I had my way, I wouldn't be away from you again if either of us could help it."
Mac nodded slowly, his words taking a while to process. The pressure and heat of his hand on hers were a potent and distracting combination. "You'd like to live with us."
"Yes," his voice was earnest, "but…" he put his free hand up to touch her cheek. "You deserve to be wooed, if that's what you want." He traced his index finger down her temple. "So if you tell me to take this slow, I can do that. I'll live at my apartment for the time being, and we can go out like a normal couple until we're both ready to take the next step."
A smile spread across her face like sunshine after rain. "Crap, what are steps with us."
"We did do this a bit backwards." He matched her grin. "We're not even dating and we've officially got ourselves a kid."
"Maybe slow was never going to work for us," she mused. "We've been together, getting to know each other and fighting this," that familiar gesture between them, "for so long that we were bound to fall in head-first."
Harm raised an eyebrow. "There's no-one I'd rather be down the rabbit hole with."
She grinned, activating the dimpled lines at the corners of her mouth. "I love you, Harmon Rabb," she whispered. "When we get back to DC, will you move in with me?"
His smile was candy-shop sweet. It was sunshine reflecting off snow, the first flower of spring, and a thousand other clichés she normally hated but which would always come to mind when she thought of him. "Gladly," he said, and leant forward to meet her lips. She closed her eyes and scooted over to meet him, needing to feel the hard planes of his body against hers. He tasted like snowdrops and bluebells and sunlight, and she sighed into his mouth. Drawing back to place her forehead against his, she said honestly "This. This is where I belong."
Harm brought his hands around her back and nodded slowly. "I hope you always feel like that."
"Me too."
"Now," Harm said, lifting his head regretfully from Mac's shoulder, "as much as I'd like to stay here forever, we have to do something about schools."
Mac groaned but concurred, lifting her body up with all the strength of a frail 80-year-old and getting out her laptop. "Wishlist?" she asked quickly.
Harm nodded. "Close to you, close to me, good reputation, good sporting and co-curricular opportunities…public or private?"
"I think it'll have to be public."
"We can roll with that." He'd been pulling up schools' websites as he spoke, and now he paused on one which looked good. "What about this, Mac? It almost seems too good to be true."
Mac leant over his shoulder. "It does too. Excellent music, arts and sporting opportunities, great academic rep, limited mid-year spots available… shall I ring them?"
"Do it." Harm nodded slowly. "I don't think we're going to get much better than this."
It took some explaining, but Mac managed to convince the receptionist she reached that she was acting in Chloe's best interests rooting her up midyear. Once the story was told the lady was much more receptive to finding a spot for Chloe, and made multiple inquiries for Mac, promising to ring her back.
It was nearly noon, after they'd made and remade a list of everything Chloe would need to check with her later, that they got the call. Mac brought the phone away from her face as she practically squealed at Harm, "she's got a spot!" Managing to calm herself down, she thanked the receptionist and was advised that Chloe could start the next Monday. They offered all the same subjects – with miraculously similar textbooks – to her old school, and she wouldn't lose any teaching time. Once she'd hung up, Harm grabbed Mac and pulled her close. "It's happening," he whispered into her shoulder.
"I know," she responded equally quietly. "And I couldn't be happier."
It was a very excited pair who greeted Chloe at the end of school that day. She looked from one to the other curiously, and then with barely-suppressed excitement. "I got a place, didn't I?" she asked.
Mac's infectious grin broke out. "Yep!"
Chloe put one arm around each of them and pulled them in tightly. "This is going to be great", she whispered like a promise to herself.
Only Harm heard the sadness behind the words. "Chloe, is everything ok? You know we want to hear whatever you're feeling."
Chloe nodded slightly against his chest. "It's just…" she sighed. "It wasn't so great when I started out here, but I turned it around. I'll miss this place."
Harm tipped his head in understanding. "You've been amazing about the whole thing so far, but we don't expect you to be universally happy all the time."
"Really?" Chloe mumbled with a hint of doubt, head still pressed into the fabric of his shirt.
"Really," Harm confirmed, noticing Mac beginning to catch his concern. Something clicked, just as it had for Mac the night before. "We're not going to back out on you because you're not perfectly happy, Chlo. No one is. All we want from you is a willingness to participate and make a go of this whole thing."
"OK." Chloe seemed to believe him, at least a little. "I'll miss this place, and I'll miss them." She waved in the general direction of her giggling group of friends. "At first, they were what made this place bearable. Now they make it somewhere I like to be."
Mac looked at her with motherly love. "Hey, those friendships don't have to end here, Chlo."
Chloe frowned in disbelief. "Look, Mac, I know that's something everyone says to make people feel better. But it kind of does end here."
Mac wasn't taking that. She traced Chloe's brow affectionately with a thumb, then tipped her head up so Chloe's eyes met hers. "Chloe, do he and I work?"
She didn't need to tell Chloe which 'he' she was referring to. "Aw, come on, Mac. You know you do." Chloe said with all the engagement of a teenager being lectured.
"No, I'm serious. Do you think we work? Do you believe we're good friends?"
"Mac," Chloe said with a knowing smile, "I don't think I could get anything past you if I tried. And the number of times you've saved each other from certain death, with or without the support of your superiors, is insane. You two are more than good friends."
"Good." Mac held Chloe's eyes intently. "We've been apart for months at a time, Chlo. At times we haven't spoken at all. We've hated each other and fought and decided it was over from halfway across the country." Each of those moments had left red-raw sores inside her, but the pain had dulled with time – and in the end it had made them stronger.
"You've always worked together," Chloe said, her brow furrowing dubiously. "You can't possibly have been apart that much."
Mac shook her head at how wrong Chloe was, mind tunnelling back to one experience in particular. "Oh, but we have, Chlo. Do you remember that time you were at my apartment and Harm came to say he was going back to flying?"
Chloe nodded, one side of her mouth quirking upwards. "How could I forget?"
Mac nodded. "He flew raptors on the Patrick Henry for six months." And at the time, it had broken her. She'd felt a thousand times betrayed when he whirled in to her apartment to tell her he'd had his night vision fixed. He'd expected her to be happy for him, when there were only two thoughts playing like a stuck record in her mind: he'd had a major operation without even telling her, and he hadn't changed. She had been hoping the adventurer had found his stop button, that maybe he'd be happy at JAG with her. She'd started to take comfort in his constant presence. And now he had come to her, arrogant and insensitive as the day they'd first met, to tell her he was going back. He'd found a new adventure, one that didn't include JAG – or her. And part of her thought she had lost him forever.
"No." Chloe was more than surprised. Harm thought he might even have seen protectiveness for her 'big sister' in the bitter set of her mouth.
"Yes. I didn't think we'd find our way to each other again, but we did. When we were thrown back together we made it work, and I realised that's what I wanted all along." She was paraphrasing a long and arduous journey to understanding – a journey which had included a million twists and turns not relevant to this story. But ultimately, her words were true. Eventually, they had found their way back together. She had found a way to forgive him for what he'd done, and he had found a way to apologise for putting flying before JAG – before her. Over noodles and late-night case prep, they'd become colleagues and then friends once more. And one part of their relationship had been just the same from the beginning – whatever hovered just below the surface, causing the tingle down to her toes whenever they touched, was ignored in their traditional holding pattern. Ignored, she corrected, only until the ball. They had worked it out. A smile touched her mouth at the thought.
"So you're telling me I can stay friends with them if I want?" Chloe asked, shooting a wistful look over at her soon-to-be former class-mates, who Mac could tell at one glance were an incongruous mix of lipglossed makeup addicts and grubby-kneed soccer players.
"Of course you can. If you like them and you want it to work, you can make it." She turned towards Harm, finding his eyes in a glance loaded with meaning. Somehow he caught her gist, taking a step closer in order to catch her hand and squeeze it. "There are never really endings, happy or otherwise."
Oddly in sync, both Harm and Mattie gave a quiet nod. "Okay," the teenager said with a contemplative expression. "Should I say goodbye before we go home?"
