We've finally reached the end. The last episode is tonight. (no, I was not talking about this story)
I am so excited but nervous for this episode! I've watched both promos and examined the pictures far too many times. I don't want it to be over, but I need to know what happens to Walter and Waige! There had better be some action between Walter and Paige... I'm depending on it.
Anyways, I'll let you get to the story
Disclaimer: I do not own Scorpion.
Chapter 20: Nonexistent
"Was it really necessary to send the police after me?" Walter asked Cabe dryly after two cops released his arms. Cabe had been waiting patiently outside of the hospital for him to be delivered.
"Was it really necessary to go running to a prison?" Cabe replied. Walter glowered at him. "Let's get you inside."
Toby, Happy and Sylvester pulled up in Cabe's car and joined them. "Where's Paige?" Sylvester asked.
"Drew came by while you guys were off being stupid. She's with him and Ralph now, I think, going over some sort of plan to get her back on track after the coma." Cabe told them. Walter stiffened when he heard Drew's name. Cabe glanced at him, then snatched his car keys out of his hand swiftly.
"Hey," Walter protested, holding his hand out.
"Nope. You're going to go running off again if you have the opportunity to. I know it." Walter retracted his hand and glared solidly at Cabe, unable to deny it. "You do realize the doctor said that she's going on medications and should be fine in a few weeks, right? The PTSD should go away."
Walter once again didn't reply to Cabe's words. "I'm going to the bathroom." He grumbled, and strode away, desperate to be alone. He felt... weird and uncomfortable all over. The gnawing feeling still burned within him on top of that, and all he could think about was how he had caused all of this. The rabbit hole, Paige being shot, her coma, and now her PTSD... he was to blame. Even Doctor Sayuri had said the likely cause for Paige's selective PTSD was because her subconscious had attached blame to him.
As he walked hastily to the bathroom, he paused by Paige's room. He couldn't help but peer through the small window on the door. Inside, Ralph was talking with his mother, and she beamed at him, clearly happy to be reunited with her son. Walter almost caught himself smiling at the sight of two of his favorite people, happy together. But then he noticed Paige's hand, and Drew's hand, perfectly connected with intertwined fingers.
Walter couldn't stop staring. That had been him for the past two weeks, by her bedside holding her hand. It should have been him now, too. He envied and loathed Drew with every part of his being. How dare he be able to hold Paige's hand, while Walter couldn't even touch her?
As much as Walter hated Drew, he hated himself more. I deserved this, he thought. I was to blame for this whole mess. He didn't deserve to be able to hold Paige's hand, because all he did was hurt her.
Walter didn't believe in a lot of things, but he did believe that when a person dreams, the dreams were a message from the subconscious. Getting sleep during challenging problems and paying attention to the details of his dreams was how Walter had solved many mathematical problems. It was the reason he enjoyed replaying his dreams over in his mind so much.
He thought back to the nightmare he had nights ago... When he looked into the mirror, his reflection had revealed that he was Mark Collins. Then he had shot Paige, even though he had tried not to... What if he actually was as bad as Collins, and that was what his subconscious was trying to tell him? Walter was just as much to blame as Collins, even though he had tried his best to keep Paige safe. He just couldn't help it.
"Hey." Walter turned to see Sylvester walking up to him. Sly glanced into the window, curious as to what had transfixed Walter.
"Hi." Walter replied stiffly. Sylvester frowned when he saw Drew holding Paige's hand. He said something to her and started to giggle. Walter turned away and started walking back towards the bathroom.
Sylvester jogged up to beside his friend. "You know, Paige went on a date with Drew while you were down the rabbit hole." Sylvester said hesitantly.
"I remember." Walter said curtly, still frustrated and annoyed with himself. He could remember the shattering plates and Paige's stunning figure in that tight, maroon dress.
"It went pretty badly." Sylvester said.
"I'm pretty sure that's because Toby pissed me off and Paige had to come deal with me. I can remember her yelling at me." Walter said plainly. He became more grumpy when he remembered that even before Collins shot Paige, Walter had made her life difficult through his rabbit hole.
"No, I overheard her talking to Toby afterwards. The date went badly. They didn't make a rain check or anything, which is customary in society's casual dating." Sylvester told Walter earnestly. Walter stopped walking at looked at the eager genius.
"It went bad?" Walter asked, allowing himself to be hopeful.
"Yep." Toby strode up to the two of them. "It wasn't even my fault, either. She told me it was going badly without my constant nagging. And you owe me, because you smashed my favorite mug."
"Your favorite mug?" Walter asked.
"Yeah, the one that said 'World's Best Doctor', but the 'Best' was crossed out." Toby said dryly.
"The one that Happy got you? I don't remember smashing that." Walter said.
"Well you did, but that's not the point. The point is that the 'World's Best Doctor' ended Paige's already crappy date with the 'World's Best Dad'.|" Toby curled his fingers in dramatic air quotes. "Not only do you owe me, Paige is most definitely not into him."
Walter thought about that for a second before his anger overtook him again. "What does it even matter?" He said stiffly. He had since then screwed everything up.
"What do you mean, what does it even matter?" Toby demanded. "This PTSD thing is a minor setback, but that doesn't mean you should withdraw yourself from Paige."
All Walter had done was hurt Paige, to a ridiculous point where he literally could not touch her without her experiencing physical pain. He didn't want to hurt her any further. "I'm lucky that this happened. I've avoided making the mistake of confessing feelings to her and compromising our work relationship."
"Lucky?" Sylvester sputtered.
"What about your EQ?" Toby said, clearly as shocked as Sylvester. They had all witnessed Walter's severe state when Paige's condition was degenerating. He had grown extremely depressed and guilty and apparent with his feelings for Paige. Now, to see him take everything he had ever felt back just when things had gotten better was astonishing to his friends. "You know you want to tell Paige how you feel."
"I don't have any EQ anymore. It supressed itself when Paige woke up." Walter lied.
"Are you telling me you're just giving up?" Toby pressed further.
"I'm thinking ahead and realizing I just saved myself from making a very harmful mistake." Walter defended himself.
"Two days ago, you were pretty much attached to her and desperate for her to wake up so you could tell her you were in love with her!" Toby was ecstatic.
"I'm not in love with her, though, Toby. Love doesn't exist." Walter's voice had shrunk to become robotic and dry, quite the opposite from Toby.
"You're shutting down because Paige's PTSD is putting blame on you for this. You can't do this, Walter. Days ago you would have cut off your right arm, or in your case your left arm, for Paige to open your eyes. She made a miraculous recovery - and yes, I do mean miraculous - and you're wasting how lucky you are by not taking this opportunity to grow a pair and tell her how you feel!"
"Well I don't anymore, ok? My EQ's gone. I'm back to normal. My emotions don't exist, miracles don't exist and love, love certainly does not exist." The more firmly Walter spoke, the more he believed in what he was saying. "My EQ just acted up and made me think they were real, but now it's gone and I can see that it was all just nonexistent."
"You're overreacting. So what if she has PTSD?" Sly gasped and Walter narrowed his eyes at Toby. "It's temporary! She's got meds to take care of it! You should be celebrating the fact that she just woke up from a god damn coma, not moping around and pretending that you don't feel anything anymore."
"Toby, my EQ is gone. I'm not pretending, my emotions really don't exist anymore." Walter said, faking exasperation.
Toby just gaped at Walter. "I can tell if you're lying, bozo. Cut the crap."
"I've had enough of this for one day, Toby. Please just let me be." Walter said with exhaustion before he marched away.
He went to the bathroom, pleased when he found that neither of them had followed him. He scrubbed his hands just for the sake of occupying himself. He needed a plan, something methodical and logical to follow through. He didn't want to hurt Paige any further, but he wanted to be able to tell her how he actually felt... he was torn.
Walter could do the safe, logical thing. He had proven he could only cause Paige harm by being near her, so he could retract himself from her. He could pretend his EQ had disappear, and with any luck it eventually would, taking the awful gnawing feeling away with it. Everything would go back to being normal. Paige would be safe, and Scorpion could continue on with it's successful career.
Or, he could do what he wanted to do. He could wait out the PTSD like Toby had suggested, tell Paige how he felt... and go from there. The thought of articulating any kind of emotion to Paige was terrifying. Even imagining living with EQ scared Walter, but it had won the attention of his curiosity, too. When he had seen Paige awake in the hospital bed, just an hour ago, he had felt alive and indescribably happy. He wanted to feel that again.
Walter was torn. Could he believe himself when he said that love was nonexistent, or could he risk hurting Paige again?
/WEAKNESSES\
Paige had received a ton of medication and lengthy instructions from both Doctor Harrison and Doctor Sayuri. Drew had taken the prescriptions for her, since she had no purse or anything to carry them with. Ralph and him had gone to grab the three of them some water while they wanted for her to be discharged from the hospital. Cabe had informed her that Homeland would be covering the costs for her under a personal favour to him. Paige was so overjoyed tears sprung from her eyes once again as she gratefully thanked him.
Paige was waiting quietly while sitting on the end of her bed when Walter came and stood in the doorway. She smiled at him, but his expression seemed dark, and cautious. "Hi," She said hesitantly.
He nodded, but he stayed silent, looming in the doorway. Something had changed; he had returned to the old, genius-like stoic Walter than Paige remembered from before the rabbit hole. Paige didn't like the change.
"You can come in, you know." She joked lightly.
"I don't want to trigger your PTSD." He said in a low voice.
"You just can't touch me, that's all." Paige said softly. She waited a moment, and Walter finally ventured into the room. He took a seat a few feet from her in a chair. Little did she know, but that was the chair that he had spent every possible hour in for the past two weeks.
"I'm sorry that all of this happened." He finally spoke. "This whole mess just keeps getting bigger and bigger."
"It's not your fault, Walter." Paige told him gently. "I don't blame you, and you shouldn't blame yourself either."
Walter just stared quietly at the ground. His face was tired, but lacked the emotion it had held previously. "Ok?" Paige asked. He nodded weakly, but refused to look at her still. Paige watched him sadly. She knew he didn't believe her, even though he nodded.
"So, you never told me how you got out of the rabbit hole." Paige tried to change the topic to something happier.
Walter looked up at her. Something had appeared in his eyes, something that Paige unsuccessfully tried to read. He watched her for a moment before he spoke. "The gunshot woke me up, from when Collins shot you."
"Oh." Paige said. She frowned as the life in his eyes dwindled away. "So... You don't remember anything from before that?" She asked tentatively. She focused on not blushing furiously as she thought of their kiss.
Walter watched Paige again for a few seconds. Paige thought maybe he was trying to remember, but really he was trying to decide. And when he finally did come to a decision, he spoke in a monotonous voice. "No." He shook his head. "My memory from before then is... nonexistent."
:( He chose to keep her safe... the noble and respectable move, which is very Walter of him, but it makes everything so sad... Don't worry though. I plan for this to be the last depressing chapter. This should also be the last chapter that takes place in the hospital, as well.
I hope you guys liked the chapter no matter how depressing it was for Waige.
As always, please review! Your comments improve the story, I promise.