#10 -- #10
Subterfuge
They tread carefully, peering around dim corners and slipping past windows, breath bated and all the hairs on their necks prickling up in anticipation. Door #10 looms at the end of the hall, and they rush the last few steps, feeling exposed as they step into the soft halo of light cast by a bulb overhead. She swiftly picks the lock, and he winces as the mechanic click reverberates back down the hallway.
But then they're inside, and the door's shut behind them and they can breathe again. Ned fumbles for a light-switch, and suddenly a yellow glow fills the tiny apartment.
"Isn't this exhilarating?" Chuck breathes, a grin flitting across her features. She glances at the room, taking in their surroundings.
"It's breaking and entering," he points out. Conscious of the cramped quarters, Ned shoves his hands deep in his pockets.
"You didn't have to come," she reminds him. He doesn't need to remind her that he wouldn't have let her go alone – and since it'd been impossible to dissuade her…well, here he was.
It's kind of futile to argue at this point, anyway, so Ned seals his lips and follows Chuck as she makes her way to the kitchen.
"Where do you think he put it?" Chuck wonders aloud, rummaging through a drawer. Ned opens a cupboard by the refrigerator and frowns.
"I don't know…he wasn't very clear, was he?"
Actually, the dearly departed Mr. Vance VanDerHall had barely been lucid, seeing as he possessed half a face at best. What he had managed to express, however, was that he'd once written a letter to his high school sweet-heart, but had never been brave enough to mail it. Now, he hoped that someone could complete the task for him, and send his one and only a post-mortem declaration of love.
As there was no sort of monetary profit to be gained from the venture, Emerson had dismissed the idea immediately. Chuck, on the other hand, had attacked it with gusto, and Ned had just tagged along.
"Well, it's not a very big apartment," Chuck says appraisingly, hands on her hips. "It can't be that hard to find."
An hour and a half passes before Chuck stumbles upon a tiny, white envelope, tucked neatly between the pages of Mr. VanDerHall's Bible. She bounds into the living room, where Ned has taken to checking behind picture frames, waving her discovery triumphantly.
"I found it," she proclaims, a slight blush in her cheeks and a grin tugging at her lips. Ned leans up against the entertainment center, a smile stealing across his own features as she flops down onto Mr. VanDerHall's ragtag sofa.
She spends a minute examining the hasty letters scrawled across the front of the envelope before glancing back up to look at Ned.
"It's really sad, you know," she says, running her finger along the edge of the paper. "I mean, it'd be awful, dying without ever telling the person that you loved how you felt." She pauses, reading over the address once more. "And what about her, she's going to find out that he loved her, but it's too late. He's gone."
Ned's quiet for a very long time, pondering his words before actually speaking them.
"I guess we're lucky then," he says finally, his voice low and solemn.
Chuck nods, her eyes locked on Ned's face. "I guess we are."
They stay that way for a long moment, Ned's fingers twitching in his pockets as he resists the urge to reach out and brush her cheek, or cup her soft chin in his palm and kiss her, slow and tender at first, until the fire that burned in his veins swelled up and consumed them both.
He can't, though, and he doesn't. But even that thought isn't enough to chase the desire away, and it hangs there, heavy in the air between them.
It's a good thing, then, that Mr. VanDerHall kept his pantry well stocked with plastic wrap.
Thanks for reading, and please review! Have a great Thanksgiving!
Cop