Disclaimer: I do not own Blindspot. More like it's the other way around… I've come to realize that THEY own ME. :)
What Jane wouldn't have given for a dryer. She could deal with damp clothing, though it felt cold and clammy, but now they were just waiting for her stupid socks to dry and they could keep moving. It had been about an hour since it had rained, and she felt like time was standing still.
Their water supply would be completely full as soon as they poured the last of what they had boiled into the bottles, but as long as they were still waiting for her socks to dry anyway, they let the water sit a little longer to cool. Jane was ready to say "That hell with it, they're fine," but Kurt had already reminded her multiples times that wet socks were what had started this nightmare to begin with. Well, the part of it that dealt with her feet, anyway.
And so there was nothing to do but wait. The dark clouds had blown away, leaving only a smattering of puffy white ones in their wake. Kurt had insisted that Jane should have her feet up, and he'd moved to sit behind her once again. He was leaning back, with his arms braced behind him, and Jane, in turn, was leaned against him at the same angle. However, unable to accept that both of his hands were busy with the mundane task of holding him up, he'd quickly managed to balance all of his weight on his left arm so that his right arm was free to wrap around her. Carefully, without putting either of them off balance, she had leaned into his arm.
They'd moved to the other end of the tarp, repositioning it so they could sit closer to the fire. The air was warm enough to be comfortable as they sat under the now-sunny sky, but also cool enough that the warmth of the fire felt nice on their skin. Between the two of them, they checked the dampness of her socks no less than every five minutes, inching them slowly closer and closer to the fire in an attempt to speed the dry process along. While they enjoyed the excuse to rest, now that they had restocked on water their main concern had become their dwindling food supply, and they knew that they needed to continue along the path.
Jane checked her socks again and sighed in frustration. They were so close, but just not quite there. Just like she swore they'd been the last 10 times she'd picked them up.
"You know, they don't dry faster if you pick them up more often to check," he observed with a smirk. He knew that she didn't actually think they would, but that she was simply frustrated and impatient. They'd now been sitting by the stream for a good chunk of the day, which wasn't getting them to the village any faster. Letting out an exasperated sigh, she turned them over again, replacing them by the fire and crossing her arms tightly across her chest.
Behind her, she felt his chest rumbling with gentle laughter once again. She knew that he wasn't actually laughing at her, that he was just amused by her, but she simply couldn't help feeling even more annoyed than she already had been. It was probably a combination of already being a little bit hungry along with frustrated and impatient – not a good combination for either of them.
He could see that she needed another distraction, and he'd just begun to try to think back and pluck out a good story from his past to tell her when, as if she had taken the words right out of his head, she suddenly murmured, "So what other story haven't I heard about young Kurt?"
The memory hit her suddenly, like a bolt of lightning, the same way the flashbacks of being Remi had done the first few times. This wasn't Remi's memory, however, but Janes, but it was from far enough back to be from the time that she wished she could forget.
Tell us a story, Taylor, the voice boomed in her head. Something happy.
Even from behind her, Kurt knew from the way that she froze that something had just changed. He hadn't even had time to answer her question, basically asking him to tell her a story…
The words echoed in the back of his mind for a second, like something that he should remember, but the connection wasn't quite there. He knew that it was important, though, so he repeated them over and over.
Any other story…?
Tell me a story…
Tell her a story…
Tell us a story…
He froze, suddenly remembering. She had been sitting rigidly for the past few seconds while he processed the words that he knew should be familiar, and then while he realized why. His father had said words similar enough to what she had just said herself to her one morning, when she had come to Kurt's apartment to visit. When they'd thought she was Taylor.
His father's words.
His father, who had killed Taylor.
His father, who had called Jane 'Taylor,' knowing very well the whole time that Jane wasn't Taylor...
And he'd left Jane alone with his father when he'd gone to meet Mayfair that morning. Never mind that his father had been in no position to hurt anyone, least of all Jane, who could hold her own against the strongest of assailants… That wasn't the point.
He needed to look into her eyes, then, to reassure both of them. "Jane," he said worriedly, scooting out from behind her slowly, so she didn't fall backwards. Keeping his left arm on her back, he moved around to the side of her so that he was facing her, but sitting beside her.
Jane was biting her lip, staring forward, breathing deliberately.
It doesn't matter. It's fine, she told herself. She was vaguely conscious of Kurt shifting behind her, of him moving until he was beside her, but she didn't look at him, unable to bring herself to move except to sit up taller so that she didn't fall backwards.
He wanted to sit directly in front of her and look into her eyes, which he couldn't do when her legs were out in front of her, so he took her feet down off of his backpack one at a time. As he did, she pulled them in against her chest, refusing to meet his eyes.
"Jane," he said evenly, now shifting again, until he was sitting cross-legged directly in front of her. He gently laid his hands on her knees, and she looked up at him for the first time, her eyes suddenly haunted. "Don't," he whispered, unable to come up with anything better.
She shook her head slowly, looking down again. "It doesn't matter," she mumbled. "Besides, I did that to myself." Her breath came out as a choked sob, and when she looked back up, she almost looked afraid.
"No, Jane, you didn't," he told her evenly. She leaned forward, hugging her arms tightly around her knees, as his arms snaked around her slowly. Once he saw that she wasn't going to resist, he put his arms all the way around her, lifting her back up onto his lap where she'd woken up earlier.
"There are a lot of people who did a lot of things that led to what happened to you." He spoke slowly, evenly. "You made choices along the way, but unlike the people around you, your choices – Jane's – were never malicious." He saw the argument in her eyes before it reached her lips, and he shook his head. "No one is perfect, Jane, and I know that better than most," he continued. "But when it comes to anything that deals with my father… No. You did not do that."
What he'd said made sense, she was just so spooked by the connection that her brain had made to that one particular morning. No matter how she tried, it felt like she couldn't quite recover her footing.
She sat on his lap and breathed in and out slowly, appreciating him even more than she had five minutes before. Somehow, he knew when she needed him to give her a hard time about things, and when she needed him to remember how much she had been through, and treat her more gently… even when she didn't know those things herself. It was just one more thing about him that she loved.
"I know, I just…" Again, she exhaled loudly, leaning against him. "I'm s—" She stopped herself, and seemed to lose the will to try to form a sentence after that.
"You're not allowed to be sorry, and you're not allowed to feel bad, not about any of it," he told her soothingly, leaning his face against her forehead and kissing it gently. Aiming for a touch of levity, he added, "After all, we've both been through too much to expect not to be really, really messed up."
That wasn't what she'd been expecting to hear, and she laughed suddenly – though her laugh was more hollow than happy. "Well that much I have definitely accomplished," she said ruefully.
"You and me both, sweetheart... And you know what? I love that about you."
She leaned back just enough to give him a look that told him that he was completely insane. "You love that I'm… broken?"
"You are not broken," he told her emphatically. "Bruised, maybe… but not broken," he assured her with a smile. "Besides… it made you who you are. The most caring, empathetic, strongest person I've ever known. The most stubborn, too," he added as an afterthought, making her laugh. There was a pause, when he simply held onto her and listened to the stream water rushing by them.
"I wish I could make it all disappear for you," he told her sincerely, "All the bad parts."
"I know," she replied wearily. "But you do the next best thing." He raised his eyebrows curiously, and she couldn't help but smile. "You make me feel like all my flaws are strengths," she replied quietly.
"They are," he said with a smile. She shook her head, and he looked at her as if daring her to correct him, so she just laughed again. "Guess what?" he asked quietly, as if he had a secret to tell her.
"What?" she whispered.
"I'll bet those socks are dry by now."
Her face lit up then, and she forgot all about the memory of Bill Weller she'd had. She leaned in to kiss him quickly, then lifted herself off of his lap and reached across the tarp to where her socks had been drying for what felt like days. Sure enough, she now had two pairs of clean, dry socks. Her feet were raw and tender and she had nothing but her socks to cover the blisters with, but since they were now supposedly so close to the village, it felt like their lack of anything to wrap around her feet seemed like something that she could deal with.
"You know what this means?" he asked, holding out a hand for two of the four socks, which she handed to him without complaint.
"It means that we might actually make it off this damn mountain," she replied happily. Re-energized, she lifted her feet into his lap and smiled at him as he gently pulled a sock onto one foot, and then the other. Managing not to grimace as he lifted her right foot into the first of her boots, she felt her energy suddenly returning.
I can do this, she thought with determination.
He watched the change in her before his eyes. This was yet another thing he loved about her – her ability to rebound from adversity.
"Do you want something to eat before we go?" he asked, knowing that there was barely anything left, but at the same time, not wanting her to be hungry. He'd gladly give up his share, if necessary.
"Nope, let's just go," she replied, just as he'd expected.
Standing up first, he helped her up and watched her reaction to standing on her own two feet for the first time in quite a few hours. It seemed that the rest had done her good this time, because she appeared to be in notably less pain than she had been before.
"How are you doing?" he asked her as he put away the two tarps and hoisted the bags onto his back.
"Better than last time," she acknowledged. "Beyond that… who knows?"
"I'll take it," he told her, reaching for her hand and then, once he had it in his, leaning down to kiss her again. "You need help?"
Watching her take a few tentative steps to determine the answer for herself, she looked a little wobbly, so he stepped closer to her hand released his hand from hers, sliding it around her waist.
"Better safe than sorry," he murmured.
"So let's go," Jane replied impatiently, bouncing slightly.
Kurt could only chuckle. "Easy," he cautioned her. "You're going to need to be gentle on those feet, or they're going to be screaming in pain again."
She seemed to be feeling more like herself again, that was for sure, and it was a relief. They set off at a slow but steady pace, despite Jane's impatience, quickly leaving the stream behind as it bent and twisted its way out of sight of the path. The day was wearing on quickly, and they knew that there were only a few hours of daylight left before they would be forced to stop. Still, there was a renewed optimism between them. They'd overcome a major hurdle – reaching the stream before they ran out of water – and now they moved on to the next one – arriving in the village before hunger became too overwhelming.
But once again, the afternoon was clear and not too hot, the sun already falling behind the other side of the mountain. They made far better time in those few hours than they had in the past few days, both of their spirits buoyed by the knowledge that they were finally close to the first real destination on their way back to civilization.
They walked until they could no longer reasonably pretend that night wasn't falling, but eventually they had to surrender to the fact that it was almost dark. When Kurt finally pointed this out, Jane sighed and agreed that it was time to stop.
"I'd expected you to say that a half hour ago," she admitted, looking around at the gathering darkness. "We'd better find something to use to build a fire before we lose the light completely."
"I wanted to make up as much distance as we could," he replied, setting down the backpacks as they quickly scouted the area. "And you did great."
"All I did was walk, same as you," she insisted, looking at him and making a face as they moved around looking for firewood. After that they focused on finding enough sticks to build a fire.
They didn't find quite as much in the way of usable kindling as they'd hoped, but they gathered everything they did find, bringing it back and quickly getting a small fire started. They set out one of the tarps nearby, close but not too close, and unrolled the sleeping bag.
As they sat down at the edge of the tarp to take off their boots, he looked over at her. "How are your feet?" he asked.
"Well, they hurt," she replied, "but just the normal amount that you'd expect for all the walking we've been doing. They don't feel like there's a mutiny happening inside my socks."
He chuckled at the image of tiny pirates stabbing her feet with swords smaller than toothpicks, nodding back at her. "That's good. Let's see how they look."
She pulled her right foot, then her left, out of her boots and looked at them in surprise. It felt like so long since she'd been able to do so without finding her socks to be a bloody mess, she was actually surprised when she saw only a few spots of slight discoloration against the white cotton.
"Hey, that's a big improvement," he observed, watching her smile.
"Yeah, I guess I'm going to make it after all," she joked.
"Oh, you were always going to make it," he informed her, rolling his eyes and shaking his head. "There was no way I was going to accept anything else."
Now it was her turn to chuckle at him. "So stubborn," she murmured, shaking her head.
"You know it," he agreed with a grin. He'd taken out the small bundle that remained of their food. There wasn't much to speak of, and he put half of it into the palm of his hand. The fact that half of what was left fit in the palm of his hand was concerning, but that was neither here nor there. "Let's share this," he told her, holding his hand over her lap as an excuse to move closer to her.
He saw the concern in her eyes at how little they had left, and he just nodded. "It's better than nothing," he told her. "Now don't argue with me. Eat. Something is better than nothing. And we'll have real food tomorrow."
Saying nothing, she took a deep breath and nodded, trying not to look as uncertain as she felt. Her optimism from that afternoon was fading, but she was determined not to give up. After all, as Kurt had said, they'd make it this far. Besides, she told herself, humans could survive without food for three weeks, and it wasn't going to take anywhere near that long to reach the village. Feeling slightly better about their situation, she smiled up at him tiredly and then look some nuts from his palm.
"Agreed," she replied. It only took a few minutes before his hand was empty, and he put away the rest of the food.
"Bedtime," he declared, and she nodded, a yawn escaping from her. He took out their toothbrushes and toothpaste, handing her hers. "And maybe tomorrow we can sleep in a bed."
"That sounds nice," she agreed, "although I have to say, I'm not at all complaining about the sleeping bag situation."
"And it's a good thing you're not, considering that we somehow seem to keep ending up in places where we have to share," he observed with a smile, pulling off his shirt and standing up. "I'm certainly not complaining either." He winked at her, pulling the rest of his clothes off without hesitation and climbing into the sleeping bag as if it was the most normal thing in the world. "You joining me? Or just enjoying the show?" he asked when he saw that she was still sitting still, watching him.
"Uh, yes. I mean, both. Sorry, I got distracted just watching you," she murmured with a grin, slowly standing up and removing her clothes as well, feeling self-conscious about the fact that she had his full attention.
Don't be ridiculous, she told herself. It's nothing he hasn't seen before. That had always been strange… knowing that, even so very long ago when they barely knew each other, the entire team spent their days staring at pictures of her in which she was completely naked. At this point, it really shouldn't have been anything she thought twice about, of course. They were married, for goodness sake. Still, even after a few nights back together, she couldn't help but blush as he watched her get undressed and then move towards him.
"Come on, it's warm in here already," he told her with a smile.
"You are a furnace, after all," she agreed. He was lying on his side, with his back to the inside of the sleeping bag, and she crawled in next to him, her back facing the side with the zipper. He wasted no time in moving closer to her, supposedly to zip the sleeping bag, but he made no move away from her when that task was done.
"How are you? Okay?" he asked, their noses pressed together as he pushed a strand of hair behind her ears.
"Better now," she whispered, relaxing against him. The day had been yet another long and exhausting one, both physically and emotionally, and it was nice to be able to curl up with him, knowing that for that moment, there was nothing between them that they hadn't been able to talk about, nothing holding them back from each other, as there had been so many other times. They may not have understood all of each other's thoughts, but there were no secrets and no lies. That meant everything to her. After all, it hadn't always been that way. No, their difficult past made this moment even sweeter.
She was more awake this evening, having had a nap in the middle of the day, so she didn't fall asleep immediately. Instead, she took advantage of the chance to enjoy the company of the man she loved more than anything or anyone.
A little later, as they lay awake and listened to the fire crackling. The flames were already lower than they would have liked, especially considering that their supply of sticks had all already been thrown into it. There in the quiet darkness, they lay pressed together in the sleeping bag, just watching each other. Her left leg and left arm were draped partway over him, her head on his shoulder, as his left arm wound around her and his left hand sat on her back, moving gently against her skin.
They could just barely see each other's faces in the firelight, and the look on Jane's face was so intense that Kurt couldn't help but worry. "What's wrong?" he asked softly.
"That's the funny thing… nothing's wrong," she replied. "I'm not used to this feeling."
He chuckled softly, thinking that that was both very sad and yet wonderful at the same time. Sad that it wasn't something she had experienced enough to think that it was normal, and wonderful because she was feeling it now. In truth, of course, it was the same way for him, but he realized that only after thinking it about her. "Well, you're going to have to get used to it," he told her. When she looked at him in confusion, he added, "Because I don't intend for this to be the only time that happens. And yes, I understand that my powers are limited. There are a lot of things in our lives that we can't control…"
"That may be a significant understatement," she observed with a grimace.
"I know, I know," he said soothingly. "But as much as humanly possible, that's my goal. To make you as happy as I can."
Her head was shaking back and forth, but Kurt put his right hand up to her cheek to stop her head's movement. "And don't tell me that you don't know how to be happy, or something like that. There's nothing to know. Except that I love you. The rest of it… it doesn't matter."
She'd leaned her face against his hand as soon as it had touched her cheek, and warmth had spread from where their skin connected, out through her entire body. Her smile felt inadequate to express her emotions just then, the happiness inside her just too enormous and overwhelming to express.
"I don't…" she started, blushing when she realized that once again, she was saying something that he was going to disagree with.
"Yes, you do deserve this happiness," he told her evenly, looking into her eyes intently as she looked away, and then back again. "Every bit of it."
Maybe she did deserve all this, deserved him, and maybe she didn't. That part didn't matter. What mattered was that she had him. Hadn't he said something like that at some point? In the end, that was the truth. After all, life wasn't all about what you deserved. Either way, she had no intention of letting the fact that she had him change – ever, if it was in her power to keep him.
Surrendering to his stubbornness on the subject, she just beamed at him. "I love you, too," she whispered, and then watched as his smile widened ever farther.
"Let's get some sleep," he suggested softly. "Okay?"
"One more thing," she said softly but insistently.
"And what's that?"
Without a word, she leaned up and closed the short distance between them, kissing his slowly, then leaning back less than a minute later to look into his eyes. She wasn't sure if he could understand how much she loved him, she only knew that she didn't have words to explain it. Somehow, however, she had a feeling that he knew, and the thought was comforting.
"Good night, Jane," he whispered.
"Good night," she replied, her eyes already closing, and her mind already shutting down for the night.
The next conscious thought he had, to his surprise, was waking up the next morning. Apparently he'd passed out just as quickly as she had, for once. Now, in the early morning, he awoke to find Jane's head tucked under his chin. The smile that lit up his face then was his only movement, not wanting to disturb her. He'd felt this delirious joy before, when he had woken up beside her other times, but somehow he was sure that the feeling was even stronger that day. Today there was the added happiness of knowing that, if nothing else went wrong, they would reach the village – and considering that they had next to no food left, it would be just in time.
Once again, he listened to the songs of birds that he couldn't see, tweeting happily from somewhere nearby. He was content to breathe in and out with his arms around Jane. The cool breeze on his cheeks was warm enough not to sting his skin, but cool enough to make him glad for the heat inside the sleeping bag.
He'd been staring at the sky and daydreaming when he felt Jane stirring against him, and he looked down to find her eyes just blinking open. "Hey, good morning," he said, his voice still raspy from sleep himself. The smile that lit up her face as soon as she saw him was, as far as he was concerned, yet another gift that he hadn't known that he would receive only a few days ago.
"Good morning," she replied sleepily. "How long have you been awake?"
"Don't know," he shrugged, "Not too long. Just laying here thinking."
"Oh yeah? About anything in particular?" Jane asked curiously.
"About you, of course," he told her, as if it should have been obvious.
Jane rolled her eyes and shook her head, but the smile on her face grew. "Not about getting to the village today? Finding some real food? Sleeping on an actual bed? Getting home?" she wanted to know.
"Well, those are things I'm looking forward to, of course. Especially the food… but I was still mostly thinking about you."
"Awww…" she murmured, snuggling against him. "I don't want to get out of this sleeping bag," she mused, "but I'm really looking forward to all of those things I just mentioned… Are you ready to get up? As much as I'd love to lie here with you…"
"I know, trust me," he nodded. "I'm ready if you are." As he had the day before, he moved closer to her and then slowly unzipped the sleeping bag behind her, kissing her neck in passing and sending a shiver down her spine.
"Such a tease," she muttered under her breath, not far from his ear, and she both heard and felt him chuckle. And then just like that, the cool air rushed in against her back as the zipper was released, and she stood up and moved as quickly as she could on sore feet to get to where she'd dropped her clothes the day before. Once she had clothes on, she picked up the socks that she'd put on the previous day after Kurt had washed them, which were still almost perfectly clean, amazed that they were clean enough that she could wear them again.
Kurt had already thrown his clothes on and was rolling up the sleeping bag to stow it back in its waterproof bag when she turned around, sitting down on the tarp to spare her feet unnecessary pressure and looking up at him. He knelt down beside her and took the tiny bundle that was all that was left of their food out of his backpack. It wasn't even enough for one person, but when he tried to hand the whole thing to her, she gave him a stern look that said, Don't even think about it.
"You're sharing that with me, you know that right?" she asked insistently. He looked like he was about to say something, but the look on her face was unrelenting until he gave in and agreed. Only then did she allow him to give her half of what was left of the fruit and nuts.
Both of their shares together were tiny, and split in two they were even smaller, so they finished them off quickly and drank some water from their replenished supply. By now they had the packing up and moving on thing down to a science, and after a few minutes to brush their teeth and fold up the tarp, they were on their way again.
Jane hadn't mentioned her feet so far that day, and though they weren't quite back to normal, they were feeling better than they had even the day before. Still, she'd noticed that Kurt had wrapped his arm around her waist when they'd started walking, even though she was now walking with him more than she was leaning on him.
It's probably more habit than anything else by now, she decided. Besides, it wasn't as though she minded being closer to him. Quite the opposite.
"So…" she said, approaching the subject carefully. They still hadn't talked about how Kurt had come to have that metal box with Jane's name on it, the one that needed the two of them to open. In truth, she hadn't really even thought about it since the night he'd arrived in her tent, when he'd shown it to her. To say that things had been tense that night would be an understatement, and since then, it had been all about figuring out how the two of them would move forward, both literally and emotionally. "Am I allowed to ask about that box you've been carrying? Like, where did you find it?"
"Of course," Kurt started, surprised by the question. He'd almost forgotten that that box was one of the things he was carrying. His initial thought was, Why would she think she couldn't ask about it?
Maybe because the box connects the two of you back to her having left, the voice in his head suggested. After all, it may or may not have appeared if you hadn't left. Of course that's going to be a sensitive subject.
"Patterson got a hit from the, uh, tattoo database," he began slowly.
Why do I feel guilty for saying that we used the tattoo database after she… left… when she was the one who left? he wondered. It almost felt as though using the database without Jane there had been wrong, somehow, even though that didn't make sense.
She watched as his face suddenly flushed, and she could feel him tense all over. The box was a tiny thread that connected the past few months with the present, and the connection between those times was still very sensitive for them, even after several long, emotional days together. It was something that they had to talk about eventually, of course, and this was as good a time as any. She just hoped that this wouldn't undo the progress they'd made so far.
You two are stronger than that, a voice whispered from the back of her mind. Hasn't he proven that yet?
He watched her for a reaction, but she just nodded, waiting for him to go on.
"We had a lead that led us to a street corner in Brooklyn," he continued slowly.
"Always Brooklyn," Jane added quietly, trying to diffuse the tension that she suddenly felt in the air. They'd headed to Brooklyn many times over the years to follow up on leads, but today her thoughts flew back to the day they'd casually strolled through Park Slope as part of an op that had allowed them, among other things, to keep hackers from releasing a wealth of classified documents to the public.
It wasn't the same without you. For a second he wasn't entirely sure he hadn't said the words out loud, and he watched her for a reaction until, a few seconds later when he still didn't see one, he let go of the breath that he'd suddenly been able to let out. He didn't want to make this even more difficult than it already was, after all, thankful that the words had only been inside his head after all. She certainly didn't need to feel any guiltier about leaving than she already did.
Kurt nodded, laughing nervously, then continued. "We were standing there, trying to figure out why we'd been sent to that particular corner, when Zapata noticed that the basement apartment on that particular corner had a brand new lock on the door. The rest of the alcove where the stairs went down looked ancient, like they'd never had any maintenance done whatsoever, but the outside part of the deadbolt system, the part where the keyhole was, that was shiny. The sun just happened to reflect right off of it while we were standing there, just for a second. So we went down and looked in the tiny little widows as best we could. It was a completely empty room, but in the center of it, we could see something sitting on the floor. No furniture whatsoever, just… that box."
Jane glanced at him, nodding, but didn't know what to say. She waited to see if there was more to the story.
"We got in there, obviously, and the apartment was clear. Not a single hair or fingerprint. Nothing. And as much dust as there was in that place… there wasn't any on the box. That lack of dust was the only clue we found in the entire place."
After a few seconds of silence, she asked, "What do you think it means?" She was fascinated by the story of how they'd found the box, and yet, it sounded like so many of their cases – 1 step forward, 3 steps back. They found an answer, only to have even more questions.
"The team threw around theories," he assured her. "But it was all conjecture. We had nothing to go on. Nowhere to even start. What happened back on the mountain, in your tent…" He stopped, glancing at her as if he didn't want to say it out loud.
"When my skin was glowing purple, you mean?" she added helpfully. Once again, she attempted to lighten the mood, even though thinking back to that moment when she had been about as frightened as she had been in a very long time made her skin crawl. She took several deep breaths in a row, hoping she seemed more together than she felt just then.
He looked over at her as they walked, remembering the emotions that had overcome him at the first sight of her. "That was the biggest lead we've had on the box, and obviously, we don't know what it meant."
"How could it… what could possibly do that to me?" she asked, shivering slightly. "Just when I thought I knew everything that had been done to me… What I did to myself…" A chill ran through her body, and goosebumps appeared on her arms. His arm squeezed more tightly around her waist, causing her to look up at him.
"I'm not going to let anything happen to you," he told her sincerely.
"But what if it has already happened?" she asked him, her voice shaking slightly. "What if there's nothing even you can do?"
"I'm not going to let anything happen to you," he repeated firmly. "Okay?"
Smiling weakly at Kurt's attempt at reassurance, Jane just nodded. They both knew it wasn't that simple, but even just his stubborn words were somewhat reassuring.
It was her smile, or attempt at a smile, that killed him. Before these past few days, it had been a very long time since Jane had looked afraid of anything. On the contrary, she ran toward danger on a regular basis if even one person needed to be saved. That unwavering courage just made it that much more unnerving to see her face now. She hadn't said as much, but he could see that she was afraid, and if he was honest with himself, he knew that he was, too.
In the end, of course, he might very well have no say whatsoever in what happened to her, and he couldn't bear to admit how much that scared him. He already knew how it felt to lose her, and he already knew that he simply couldn't go through that again.
Try as she might to smile, the more she tried to form her face into that shape, the less it seemed to cooperate. Somehow, over the past few days she'd managed to forget the whole purple glow thing, but now, remembering it all again, she felt like she was back at the beginning, when she hadn't had a name or any idea what was happening to her. Yes, she knew who she was this time, and she did know a lot about her past – but what she knew was an ugly truth that was no consolation, and once again the magnitude of the unanswered questions threatened to overwhelm her.
"Jane," he said, tugging her to a stop and stepping in front of her, where she'd been focusing into the distance. Her eyes now looked in the direction of where he was standing, but without seeing him. Without waiting for a response, he wrapped his arms around her, feeling hers curl around his middle, even more tightly than he'd expected, in return.
"Hey… It's okay." There was surprise in his voice, because he hadn't expected her to give in to his attempt to comfort her quite that easily. "It's okay, Jane. Really."
She nodded quickly then, her face against his shoulder so that he wouldn't get the chance to read the fear in her eyes.
It was, of course, that same quick nod that told him not to believe her when she said she was fine. He kissed the top of her head and hugged her more tightly than he thought he ever had before, hoping that what he was trying to say would sink in somehow.
"None of that matters right now, okay? One thing at a time. Right now, we're just working on getting back to the village, and then we worry about getting back to New York. The rest of it will wait. It has to wait." Of course, there was no guarantee that it would work that way, but it felt like the right thing to say. It was the way that things would happen if there was any justice left in the world.
Like there was justice for Taylor? his mind whispered deviously.
Now it was his thoughts slamming to a halt instead of hers. No, along with hers. For a minute they just hung onto each other, taking deep breaths, somehow soothed by the other's slightly panicked breathing.
No, there had been no justice for Taylor, and now that his father was dead, there never would be. The only thing he could do was to remember her, and to continue to try to do as much good as possible. It didn't feel like enough, but then, he realized, there was nothing that ever would have. Even if his father had served a life sentence for his best friend's murder, it wouldn't have felt like enough.
Forget about justice that you can't have, he told himself. Focus on what you can have. What you do have.
"Come on," he whispered, releasing her slowly and stepping back to look into her eyes. She was focused on him now, the corners of her mouth turned up slightly and a spark of the determination in her eyes that made the Jane he knew so very special. Reassured by this, he stepped back and turned so that he could once again walk beside her, his arm around her waist. "We're okay. Let's keep moving." It wasn't clear whether this comment was intended more for her reassurance, for his, or for both, but he had decided that that was going to be what he believed for now. That they were okay. After all, he would accept no other outcome.
"Yeah," she agreed hesitantly. "After all, I'm not purple now…" She grimaced at him, and for a minute they exchanged the same pained look.
"Not much farther," he promised, trying to keep them focused on the present.
Not much farther, she repeated inside her head. We can do this… I hope.