Author's Note: The inspiration for part of the scene in this story comes from LaylaBinx's "Alphabet Suits" (Chapter 2). Anyone who hasn't read that two-shot, I would totally suggest it. It makes me smile, and there are two parts - one for Gen and one for Slash. So a big THANK YOU goes out to LaylaBinx for giving me permission to use her idea in my story.
"It's nine o'clock on a Saturday. The regular crowd shuffles in. There's an old man sitting next to me, making love to his tonic and gin," Billy Joel began to sing gently in the background.
Mike, who had always loved this song, called out, "Mommy, turn it up! Turn it up!"
Mrs. Ross leaned forward and went to turn it up when Mr. Ross hit her hand away. "What do you think you're doing? You're encouraging him to be disrespectful to his elders," he responded harshly.
"Son, can you play me a memory? I'm not really sure how it goes!" Billy Joel continued to sing, completely obvious to the argument about to break out.
"Honestly, he doesn't always have to say 'please' when he asks something," Mrs. Ross countered. "Lord knows that our child is more respectful than most others."
Mr. Ross stated, "How other children act does not concern me in the least, but I cannot have our son embarrassing us at public events."
"Sing us a song! You're the piano man. Sing us a song tonight," Billy Joel continued to sing.
Sighing, Mrs. Ross turned around and inquired, "What's the magic word, Mikey?"
"Please?" Mike added, still hoping they would turn it up in time for his favorite part.
"The complete sentence, Michael," Mr. Ross stated in a disapproving voice.
Mike pouted and asked, "Please turn up the music?"
"That's still informal," Mr. Ross pointed out.
Now extremely frustrated, Mike snapped, "Would you please turn up the music?"
"I don't like that tone, little man!" Mr. Ross warned.
"Honestly, just let it go," Mrs. Ross stated. "He's just a child! He doesn't have to know what formality is yet."
Mr. Ross shook his head. "This dinner could make it or break it for my career," he responded. "We already left late because of him, so I sure as hell don't want him messing everything up even more."
"And he's quick with a joke or to light up your smoke, but there's some place he'd rather be," Billy Joel sang.
Bouncing up and down impatiently, Mike just wanted to be able to hear the song better. "Mommy, would you please, please turn the song up?" Mike asked again.
Mrs. Ross turned back to look at her son, smiled sweetly, and nodded. Just as she turned back around to turn the volume up, Mike saw a car in the opposing lane swerve into their lane. Cursing, Mr. Ross jerked the wheel in order to avoid having an accident. When he did that, though, the car went off the road. Before he could regain control of the car, they hit an embankment. Horror ran through Mike's blood as his world began to spin. Screams of pain and fear rang out through the air amid the sound of crunching metal and breaking glass. After what seemed to be forever, the car came to a stop. Mike's head was still swimming for a moment after he realized the car had stopped moving.
"…as the businessmen slowly get stoned. Yes, they're sharing a drink they call loneliness, but it's better than drinking alone!" Bill Joel sang out through the static.
Cautiously, Mike called out, "Mommy? Daddy?"
Only silence answered him. Heart pounding in his throat, Mike unsnapped his seatbelt and leaned forward. It looked like two pillows had popped out of the car, and Mike was bitter for a second that his parents hid those pillows from him even when he told them he was tired. When he called out again and got no answer, though, his anger changed to concern. He leaned forward and saw something red on the pillows that his parents' heads were on. Gently, he shook his mother's shoulders. Her head shifted on the pillow, revealing her face for him to see. Her nose was completely crooked, and there were burn marks where the seatbelt had been. Falling mainly from her nose, blood covered the lower half of her face. Her face was bruised here and there, but Mike noticed something wrong with her neck. It appeared to be bulging out awkwardly on one side.
"Shush, Mike," a familiar and calming voice drifted into the dream. "It's alright. You're okay. I'm right here."
"And you've got us feelin' alright!" Billy Joel sang out.
Frozen in terror, Mike felt tears streaming down his face as he realized that his mother was not okay. "Daddy?" he then cried out, turning around to face his father. "Daddy, wake up!"
"It's just a dream, Mike," the voice repeated. "You're perfectly safe. You just need to wake up."
Mike was torn. Part of him knew his father had to be okay. There was no way that his dad could die. Another part wasn't so sure of that, though. Hand outstretched, Mike remained frozen where he was. Inside, he was fighting himself. Wake his dad up or face the truth? As the song ended, Mike gently shook his father.
"Mike!" a baritone voice called out.
Waking up, Mike felt the tears on his face. As he focused on his surroundings, he found his arms pinned against his chest. Harvey had two strong arms wrapped around him, and Mike was pulled as close as he possibly could be. Shuddering, Mike burst into huge sobs as he felt the repressed memories come to life all over again. He unwrapped his arms and clung hard onto Harvey as sadness overwhelmed him.
"Kiddo, it's alright," Harvey whispered, holding Mike tighter.
Head buried in Harvey's chest, Mike merely kept crying as he fiercely grabbed Harvey's shirt like it was an anchor. Harvey never said a word throughout the entire time, just kept holding onto Mike. As time passed, Mike's sobbing became shudders, which turned into quivers after some more time passed. Lord knows how much time passed before the quivers turned into trembles every now and again. Finally, Mike let out a shuddering breath before the tension left his body. He was tired and just wanted to pass out and forget everything. Still, he didn't really feel like he could do that. Not after everything Harvey had just done for him… for the third night in a row.
"Did I hit you this time?" Mike asked, his voice still croaky and raw.
Shaking his head, Harvey responded, "I woke up before you could get me in the balls again."
"I've apologized for that twenty too many times," Mike noted, knowing Harvey was just trying to get him in a better mood.
Harvey chuckled. "Said the guy who didn't suddenly get nailed in the balls one night," he stated. "Every time you shift nowadays, I stir right awake as a precaution."
"Think of it as payback for every time I pulled an all-nighter because you didn't feel up to doing the work," Mike countered.
Shaking his head slightly, Harvey replied, "Then you better watch out. If you get me again then I'll be owing you all-nighters."
A silence fell over the room for a long couple of minutes. Mike was grateful that Harvey wasn't pressing him for answers. After all, he could remember the first night had the reoccurring nightmare. In a panic, Mike had wound up kneeing Harvey in the balls before waking up. The next night, Harvey figured out how to immobilize Mike the moment the nightmare started. Mike hated having the nightmares again. He never wanted to seem weak in front of Harvey, but it seemed like he could never really be strong in front of the older male.
"You already know how my parents died," Mike murmured, his face still buried in Harvey's chest. He didn't care if that caused his voice to be muffled. Honestly, he just didn't think that he would be able to look at the older male as he said this. "I was in the car with them when it happened, and I remember every little detail. But I just – I never had the strength to talk about it to anyone. Even my grandmother has to go off police reports. When I was younger, I thought that everything would eventually just go away, you know? I dealt with the nightmares for months afterwards, all with the hope that I would someday never dream about them again. When the police stopped pursuing the case, I began to dream about it less and less. People learned not to bring it up, and I managed to move on with my life."
Harvey half-heartedly jested, "Should we sue the detectives for emotional distress?"
"And give them the opportunity to have an entire trial about my parents' accident because that's what brought on the emotional stress?" Mike responded, not in the mood for joking. "No thank you."
Suddenly, Mike felt Harvey stroke his hair. "Try to get some sleep, alright? We don't have to work today, so we'll sleep in until we can't sleep any longer," Harvey murmured.
Mike tried to nestle closer only to find it impossible. "You know why we were traveling that night?" he asked rhetorically. Of course, Harvey didn't answer. "We were going out that night to a formal dinner. My father had this huge opportunity to impress some rich guys and earn some real money. Although he didn't want to take me, my mother insisted that bringing me there would help my father. If they rejected him with his kid standing next to him, they would feel like assholes for the rest of their lives." Out of nowhere, Mike felt a knot form in his throat. He had always come to the verge of saying this, but never had he actually verbally stated it. Honestly, he always felt like something would change in him if he did.
"We don't have to talk about this tonight," Harvey whispered.
Shaking his head, Mike responded, "If I don't talk about this right now, I never will."
"Take your time," Harvey told him gently.
Mike took in a deep breath. "I was young when this happened, and I didn't want to go. So I threw a fit, but they dragged me along anyway. Because I threw that fit, though, I made us late, which made my dad go well over the speed limit," he said. The knot grew tighter as guilt emerged from its hiding place. Gasping, Mike cried out, "I sometimes wonder if I hadn't been so selfish if we wouldn't have crashed!"
That was it. Waves of guilt washed over him as he once again tried to come to the terms of being his parents' murderer. Harshly, he jerked away from Harvey and sprung out of the bed. He wasn't sure what he was doing, but he had to do something. He had to be punished. When he was little, he was too scared to talk to the police. He thought they would put him in jail when they found out. Later on in life, he realized that wouldn't have happened. But he still felt like he deserved something – something to atone for his actions. If only… If only! Those words haunted him day after day. Letting out a guttural yell, Mike went to punch the wall next to him. Before his arm made it, though, a stronger force grabbed it.
"Let me go!" Mike screamed out, struggling to get away.
Harvey replied firmly, "Why? So you can damage my house?"
"Then let me at least hurt myself!" Mike yelled.
Harvey's grip tightened on Mike's arm as he heard this. "You have even less of a chance of me allowing you to do that than me allowing you to destroy my house," he stated matter-of-factly
Deflating, Mike let the tension out of his body. Harvey didn't release his arm, but he didn't force Mike to move either. Defeated, Mike turned and said, "I'm the one guilty of my parent's deaths. I'm a murderer."
"The only thing you're guilty of is being an idiot," Harvey replied. "You're not at fault at all for what happened that day, Mike. First of all, you were just a child. You didn't understand how important everything was. Second of all, your dad didn't have to drive over the speed limit. He could have just been a couple minutes late to the meeting. Would it have made a bad impression? Probably. But rich men probably would have let it go once they saw you." He paused for a moment. "You were a cute kid, right?"
Mike let out a forced and bitter laugh. "Everyone sure said so," he responded. "But you know how that is. People feel obligated to say that kind of stuff."
"I sure as hell don't," Harvey informed him. "Everyone who said it about me was being honest. I was the cutest kid anyone had ever seen… until I opened my mouth."
Shaking his head, Mike asked, "Wow. You were a smartass even then?"
"I had to be," Harvey simply replied, shrugging a bit. "You wouldn't understand."
Mike suddenly inquired, "Why don't you talk to your family, Harvey? You don't seem to have any pictures of them, and you have never talked about them before."
"There are some things that I'm only willing to talk to you about, Mike," Harvey responded. "That is not one of them."
Mike understood and nodded his head in acknowledgement. Once more, a silence enveloped the two. Uncomfortable, Mike shifted his weight from one foot to another. Even Harvey wasn't taking the silence too well. The older man wasn't looking directly at Mike, one of the main indicators of his uneasiness. Slowly, Mike felt the memory pull at the back of his mind. He knew that he needed to get everything off his chest. If there was anyone in the world who would take him seriously, Harvey Specter was that man. Maybe he wouldn't understand, but he would be honest with Mike. Above all else, Mike needed that honesty.
"I'm about to tell you something that I could never tell anyone else," Mike stated. "Not the police, not my grandmother – no one."
Nodding slightly, Harvey responded, "You have my complete attention."
Feeling the raw grief return to the forefront of his mind, Mike fought with his emotions in order to get everything out. He knew he needed this; his gut told him that it was important that at least Harvey understood. If anyone would know how to react to the story, it would be Harvey. But the real question was: how did he complete the task? Slowly, his brain began to numb. It did it automatically, making it so that it was as if Mike was seeing the accident through someone else's eyes. As if the accident hadn't happened to him. Finally ready, he explained, "The car accident my parents died in was not a typical one in any way, shape, or form. Our car rolled down a hill, rotating from wheels to roof 21 times before finally coming to a stop. The police said that it was a miracle I survived, but they didn't understand why my dad would miss the curve like that. I mean, it wasn't like it was hard to miss. They thought that maybe he was drunk or high, but the tox screens came back negative."
"What did happen?" Harvey inquired softly.
Looking away, Mike shrugged. "A car swerved into our lane, and my father had to swerve to avoid it," he stated in a small voice.
"What kind of car?" Harvey abruptly asked, his tone becoming serious.
Mike blinked several times before trying to think back. "Uh," he started to say, dragging out the word as he thought. "Black Mercedes-Benz… with four doors. I think it was a sedan." As Harvey grew silent, Mike became worried. "Why? What's wrong?" he pressed, concern evident in his voice.
"The car that swerved to hit you the other day," Harvey said, pausing as he looked Mike in the eyes, "was a 2005 black, four door Mercedes-Benz C240 – a sedan."
Without saying a word, Mike headed towards the living room. Harvey somehow beat him to the door, though, and blocked it. "What are you doing, Harvey?" Mike snapped. "Let me through. This isn't funny."
"This doesn't have anything to do with your parents' accident," Harvey stated firmly. "You're forgetting that they broke into my office, Mike."
Mike shook his head. "But I work for you," he stated. "Think about it, Harvey! I'm the only connection between everything going on right now. They're coming after me, not you. I need to see a picture of this car now. I have to know for sure."
"Mike," Harvey began to say.
"Harvey," Mike replied, cutting him off, "I have gone through my whole life wondering why my parents were killed in an accident. I wondered why that car swerved into our lane, but those people did not come to help."
Quickly, Harvey responded, "Finding out that these people killed your parents will not bring them back."
Mike felt something inside him break as he heard that. "I know that, Harvey!" he exclaimed, tears coming to his eyes. "But if these people were the ones who killed them then that means their deaths aren't my fault."
"You shouldn't need a picture to tell you that," Harvey told him. Firmly, he grabbed Mike by the shoulders and looked him dead in the eyes. "The reason your parents died is because some idiot went over the line, and your father overreacted in order to not be any later to this dinner. Michael Ross, you did not kill your parents."
Suddenly, Mike felt a previously unknown pressure leave his chest. He had needed to hear that all his life, and he knew that Harvey would never lie to him about something so important. With this pressure now gone, Mike felt his knees buckle as pure relief washed over him. Harvey caught him before he went crashing to the ground, but Mike wouldn't have cared either way. It wasn't his fault. It wasn't his fault! Those words repeated themselves again and again in his mind. Trembling, Mike laughed and cried at the same time. His legs felt like jelly, and his mind felt like mush. Carefully, Harvey half-carried, half-dragged Mike to the bed and tossed him on. They curled up together underneath the blankets. And for the first time since Mike could remember, he truly slept.
