Chapter 20: But you'll never fly with someone else's wings

A/N: This fic is still in hiatus. I'm not committing to any sort of update schedule. I just felt like getting this out there for some reason.

Reviews appreciated :)

Elizabeth held onto Henry's arm as he exited the SUV. She had wanted to take him back to her townhouse, but he had insisted on going to his own apartment. Walking with Henry up the steps, she could feel that he was still a little shaky. His muscles seemed weaker than normal, and even though he was sober, his coordination was not the best.

Opening the door for him, the stench of the apartment hit Elizabeth's nose and made her step back. Of course, no one had cleaned anything since they had left with the ambulance nearly two days ago. The barely 500 square foot apartment didn't leave a lot of place for the stale air to go. The hot light streaming in the window probably hadn't helped the smell.

Henry grimaced and kept moving forward into the apartment.

Elizabeth grabbed his arm. "Henry, stop. Come back to my house and stay for a few days. We can get someone to clean this up. You need to rest," she almost pleaded with him.

"No," Henry said firmly. "It's fine. I can clean it up. It's my mess anyway."

To Henry, it wasn't just the mess of dried vomit and spilled whiskey that he had to clean up. He had an intangible mess to clean, too. He was angry with himself. Alcohol had kept him from being a functioning human for the past two days. It wasn't even just alcohol. It was Elizabeth.

He had let Elizabeth's problems interfere with his work, with his personal life, and with his health. He loved her completely, but he felt like he should have been able to help her instead of getting bogged down in her issues. What good was he as a boyfriend if he couldn't help her? He felt like he had already failed her. Not only had he not kept her from cutting, he had made her go rescue him after the fact. She didn't need a boyfriend that was more trouble than he was worth, and Henry knew it.

Elizabeth bent to pick up an empty bottle of whiskey. "Well, at least let me help..." She gathered up the bottles in her arms.

"No," he said again, leaning against the couch for support. "Elizabeth, stop." His tone was harsh because of anger at himself for being so weak.

Seeing his face, she sighed, setting the bottles on the table. "I don't mind..." She trailed off.

"You can't pick up the pieces for me. I messed up, and I need to fix it."

She tried to soothe him. "Henry, you can't beat yourself up over it. You made a mistake, but you're not going to do it again."

"How do you know?" He raised his voice slightly. "How do you know I won't do it again? How do you know I won't freak out the next time you have a bad day and need me? I just can't... I can't guarantee... You need someone more stable than I am right now." His throat grew thick with emotion, his voice sounding pinched. He spoke to a point in the corner of the room, unable to look Elizabeth directly in the eye.

"Henry... please... Don't."

"You deserve someone better than me. You deserve someone who will be there for you no matter what."

"Don't you think you deserve the same thing?" Elizabeth was nearly shouting now. "Don't you think I'm mad at myself for not being there for YOU? Why was I so wrapped up in cutting that I didn't even notice you were upset? We could have avoided this whole fucking thing!" Angry tears seeped down her cheeks, and she had to turn away.

"You said it yourself." His gaze stayed on his feet, and his voice sounded flat. "We can't keep doing this. It's just not fair."

"So what do you want to do?" Elizabeth glanced at him briefly. She let her tears fall unchecked. She knew whatever Henry was about to say, she wasn't ready for it.

"I just need some time... Let me figure things out." Henry muttered.

She nodded. That was probably the best she could hope for, but it still felt like he had slapped her. She almost wished he would slap her so she could focus on the pain instead of the roiling mix of emotions currently churning inside her.

"Okay. I'll call you later..."

"Just... Give me some space, okay? I'm not ready... This is all just too much right now."

Henry still didn't look at her.

Elizabeth couldn't think of anything to say, and she probably couldn't have said it through her tears, anyway. Henry had just embarrassed her, and the only thing she could think to do at the moment was try to preserve what dignity she could. She quickly made her way out the door of the apartment and slammed the door behind her. Slamming the door was unintentional, but it felt good, anyway.

She saw Matt raise an eyebrow in question. Realizing she probably looked hideous, she tried to wipe the tears from her face without drawing attention. "We're going home." She paused for a moment to breathe in the fresh air, seeing birds flying from tree to tree without a care in the world. With her back to Henry, she stepped towards her motorcade that would take her back to her house. Only this time, she knew Henry wouldn't be visiting her. He wouldn't be popping over with a bag of ingredients ready to cook for her.

Well, she had lived alone before, and she could live alone again.

Henry sat down heavily, wondering what he had just done. Had he just broken up with Elizabeth? He hadn't intended to, but having a door slammed in his face seemed pretty clear. And there was certainly no way he could call her now and try to explain. He had been the one to push for distance, after all. And now he might have pushed her away for good.

Resting his head back against the sofa, he tried to figure out what he should do next.

Clean up the bathroom, probably. The worst of it was in there. If he got that done, everything else would be easier.

At least, he hoped.

Sitting alone in front of her TV, Elizabeth tried to focus on the face of the woman on the screen trying to sell her a birdhouse. Today, though, it didn't seem funny. She didn't need a birdhouse. No one needed that particular birdhouse. It was hideously ugly.

And yet, as she listened to the woman on screen tell her about the pleasant mornings she could sit around sipping coffee and watching the peaceful birds, she found herself looking around her for her cell phone so she could order one of the gaudy bird houses.

"If you simply fill up the birdseed here, it will be automatically dispensed daily in the scale sized outdoor picnic table."

"Isn't that cute? The birds have their own little front garden and picnic table."

"This house is completely built to scale with a swimming pool in the back and bird sized doorways on the interior. The trim is done in a patriotic red, white, and blue. There's even a real working flagpole in the front yard you can raise and lower the flag with the remote."

Elizabeth knew the frankly stupid birdhouse was not going to make her feel any better, but she felt the need to do something.

She hadn't been able to keep Henry from drinking, and she hadn't been able to keep him from getting dragged into her own issues. She loved him, and she didn't want him having to put up with her cutting. Even if she wanted to cut, she didn't want to tell Henry about it because she preferred being able to be a normal couple. He shouldn't have to take time to soothe her through her urges to hurt herself. She should be able to handle that on her own.

Even when she did tell Henry about her urges to cut, it wasn't like he could do much, anyway. He could talk to her, but that only worked to the point she was willing to talk. He couldn't take away the urge or even the anxiety. Only so much physical comfort could be given, and she was still a little wary of letting him touch her, particularly when she was upset. Her body still remembered a trauma, even if her mind was ready to accept Henry's embrace. When she really wanted to hurt herself, there was nothing in the world that was going to stop her.

As much as she wished he could, Henry couldn't solve her problems or take away her urge to cut. And yet, hadn't that been what she was trying to do about his drinking? Had she not been trying to love away his urge to drink? They had both been trying to save each other, and it clearly hadn't worked. If anything, it had just made things worse. Strictly speaking, if Elizabeth had not upset Henry with her cutting, he wouldn't have given himself alcohol poisoning.

If she had never met Henry, she probably wouldn't have cut enough to require stitches.

The thought hurt her more than cutting ever could. She loved Henry, but their love couldn't overcome their problems. At least it clearly hadn't. They might be able to give it another go and try harder next time, but any way she thought about it, it all came back to the same thing. The only person who could stop her from cutting was herself. And short of removing all the alcohol in the world, the only person who could keep Henry from drinking was Henry.

What they had been doing, Elizabeth realized, would not actually empower them to make healthy decisions. If she ran to Henry every time she wanted to cut, that wasn't actually addressing the fact that she was her own problem. All it did was make it – her – Henry's problem. It was selfish, in a way, to expect Henry to take care of her in addition to himself. Although, he really hadn't been taking care of himself, she mused. They had been doing the same thing. At least she couldn't feel too bad about imposing herself on Henry when he had done just that to her. She hadn't really thought of it as an imposition, either. She genuinely loved Henry and wanted to help him. Elizabeth just hoped that Henry wouldn't be too mad at her.

Even if he were mad, at least now she'd be able to look at her new birdhouse to take her mind off of it.

Sitting alone in his finally clean apartment, Henry nursed a plate of scrambled eggs and a fruit smoothie. Food didn't really sound appetizing in the slightest, but he knew he'd have to eat something if he wanted to feel any better. He tried to watch TV, but even the news didn't hold its normal appeal. He tried putting on music, but everything seemed to annoy him slightly.

At a loss for something to occupy him, but knowing it was too early to go to bed, he began thumbing through his bookshelf hoping he would find something to settle his mind. As he read the titles, he began to cast off the books as unsuitable for the occasion.

Summa Theologica. Much too much for tonight.

Feminist Biblical Interpretation. That'll just remind me of Elizabeth.

Postcolonial Commentary on the New Testament. That'll also remind me of Elizabeth.

Old Testament Exegesis. That was boring the first time I read it.

Rerum Novarum. Let's not get into that tonight…

Pacem in Terris. Too close to home…

Love and Responsibility. Huh…

He paused for a moment. If there were ever a time he needed to step up and be responsible when it came to love, it was now. Plucking the book off the shelf, he began thumbing through the well-worn pages. He had read this particular copy quite a bit when he was getting his PhD. The beautiful prose had filled his head and given him an alternative of what love could be like. His parents had loved each other, and for the most part, he had had a happy childhood. He certainly hadn't wanted for food or clothing like many of his friends had. But his parents had married for convenience. They needed to get married because that was what you did. That was the only foreseeable path forward. As the years had gone on, Henry had watched his parents drift further and further apart to the point that they were merely living together under one roof and barely interacting unless the children were home. They didn't have any animosity between them, but they certainly didn't have a spark of love, either.

In college, reading about ways to honor a partner had given him a much more hopeful outlook for himself. He wanted a marriage – a partnership that nourished him and helped him grow as a living person. He knew how much satisfaction could be gained from giving love, and he wanted to be able to love his potential wife in the most complete way possible.

The few women he had found who had a similar views of relationships were terrified of his military background. They couldn't understand what would make him want to sign up for a life of following orders and shooting guns.

As much as he had wanted to say that being a Marine was just a job – it hadn't been. He had never wavered in his decision to join. Sure, at the time, he had mostly been considering the scholarship he'd get to pay for school. It was his ticket out of a poor neighborhood in Pittsburgh. Even looking back as a 55 year old man, he would still consider becoming a Marine to be worth it had the only thing he had gotten been an escape from his family. Of course, he had gained so much more than that – friends, buddies, skills, a career, enough money to be perfectly comfortable. He knew he could afford to buy his own house if he wanted it, but he had spent so long living as a broke student in tiny apartments, he didn't really see the need for any more space.

Sitting down with his book, remembering the solace it used to bring him as an idealistic, naive college student, he hoped it would once again give him guidance. That was the thing about good writing – you could come back to it over and over and still get something new out of it.

Henry let the words of JPII wash over him, losing track of time. The beginning of the book was fundamental Catholic teaching, but the way it was presented was so eloquent and beautiful, he couldn't help but get caught up in it.

After reading for about half an hour, he came upon a quote he had highlighted at some point years ago. He had thought it was important then, and the weight of the words hit him with enough force to take his breath away.

"A person's rightful due is to be treated as an object of love, not as an object for use." - JPII Love and Responsibility

He leaned his head back, trying to sort out his thoughts. Had he been using Elizabeth? Had she been using him? Was that their problem? Of course they loved each other. That wasn't a question in his mind. But their treatment of each other? Was that really healthy? Was he truly honoring her as a person when he made her drag him to the hospital because he had poisoned himself with alcohol? Was he treating her equitably when he lied to her about how much he was drinking?

The questions burrowed into his mind, planting seeds of unease. The thought of losing Elizabeth stung like an open wound, but he knew she had been right when she spoke to him in the hospital. Their current pattern of supporting each other to their own detriment was unsustainable. That wasn't real love. Constantly making the other pick up the pieces... That wasn't respectful, and it certainly wasn't treating each other as receivers of love rather than objects for use.

On Tuesday morning, Elizabeth stared at the wall in her office, not noticing what was in front of her at all. Thankfully, there were no major international crises for the time being. She wasn't sure what she would have done if there had been a situation that needed her full attention. It hadn't even been twenty-four hours since she had last seen Henry, and she had already managed to cut herself four separate times.

She kept bouncing back and forth between blaming herself for Henry's continued drinking and being mad at him that he couldn't control it. The anger scared her because being mad at Henry felt like betraying their relationship – betraying everything he had done to help her. And of course blaming herself for Henry's drinking didn't make her feel any better. She couldn't manage to stop cutting. She couldn't control her panic attacks... No matter what she did, she was a shitty girlfriend. No wonder Henry had wanted some time away from her.

Elizabeth knew the only way their relationship would ever work out was if they managed to each take care of themselves and not make the other guilty when one of them slipped up. They couldn't keep taking each other's failures so personally. The self-blame was misplaced and impossible to live with. They needed to find a way to separate their relationship from their personal struggles, at least a little.

But that didn't make her feel any better. What would that even look like? How could she keep from accidentally making Henry feel guilty when she cut? Would she just have to hide it from him? Would he have to hide his drinking from her? That didn't seem like much of a solution. That wasn't progress; that was going back to the way they had been when they first started dating.

Besides, thinking of trying to go back to fighting her own demons, alone, without Henry... That prospect was terrifying. Now that she had Henry, she knew if she woke up in the middle of the night, she had someone to call. If she panicked, she had someone who knew how to help. Henry gave her an oasis of calm when she felt like there was no oxygen left in the world.

It may not even matter, she huffed to herself. It may not matter how much she wanted to keep the status quo going. There was no status quo anymore. She had seen to that. If only she hadn't slammed the door, she thought. If only she had stayed and made Henry understand...

Not that she knew what she would have said to him. She still didn't know what to say to him.

Wednesday found Elizabeth sitting in her office, working as usual. Her second day back at work was going fine, if one ignored that she had already cut three times. It deadened the sinking feeling of despair that she felt whenever she thought about Henry. It deadened everything, really. In a way, that was nice. If she felt anything too strongly just then, she knew she would probably break down into tears, and no one needed that. But while it was nice that she could cut instead of feel sad about Henry, the cutting made her completely indifferent to Henry.

Without Henry around to keep her from cutting, she felt like she had been given a free pass to cut as much as she wanted. She wasn't going to do anything dangerous, but at least for a while, it felt great to immediately give in to the desire to cut. She was starting to run out of places she hadn't cut yet. After a day and a half of that, though, she was starting to realize that the cutting could only do so much. The endorphin high couldn't solve everything. If anything, it was starting to be more trouble than it was worth. While the cutting made her forget how upset she was over Henry, it also kept her from feeling much of anything for Henry, and that was almost more upsetting and painful.

"Ma'am, I need your okay to offer Pakistan humanitarian aid as an inducement to work with India." Nadine strode into the Secretary's office, still looking at the papers in her hands.

"Huh?" Elizabeth almost grunted, coming out of her endorphin reverie. She was having a perfectly enjoyable time just riding out her wave of numbness.

Nadine narrowed her eyes. This week, she had witnessed the Secretary like this countless times. She had seen her behave similarly before, but never this much all at once. It was like the problem – whatever it was – was getting worse.

"Madam Secretary, are you all right?" She asked carefully.

Shaking her head slightly to clear it, Elizabeth sat up at her desk, forcing herself to focus. "Yes. Yes, of course."

Again, Nadine regarded her boss with some skepticism, though she tried not to show it. She had a suspicion she knew what the Secretary had been up to. Watching her constantly fiddling with the edges of her sleeves, the fact that she wore long sleeves no matter how hot it was outside… Hell, Secretary Adams even wore long sleeved gowns to all the formal functions. Every other woman in the room could be wearing sleeveless dresses, and she would still be wearing long sleeves. Not just long sleeves, but the gowns were always ankle or floor length, too. Many women in DC were fond of skirt suits, but Secretary Adams never wore anything but long skirts. That struck Nadine as odd. She knew plenty of older women who wore long sleeves to cover up cellulite on their arms, but that was certainly not a problem the Secretary would have. She looked like she barely had an extra ounce of fat on her.

Nadine also knew people who had to cover up tattoos, but she could almost certainly rule out tattoos. There was no way a CIA operative would have had lots of distinguishing marks like tattoos. She couldn't be covering up track marks because, again, CIA operatives couldn't be drug addicts. If only Nadine had ever seen her wear an even slightly shorter sleeve. The State Department had a fairly conservative dress code, but even the most modest women wore thee-quarter length sleeves in the summer.

Except the Secretary. At least since Iran… Before Iran, sleeveless dresses and knee-length skirts were a normal part of the Secretary's wardrobe.

A few quick Google searches had given Nadine a few ideas. Psoriasis and eczema were possible. But with the emotional effect she had seen, she thought there might be a darker explanation. Before finding a website online, Nadine had never heard of self-injury. But the Secretary sure seemed to have all the warning signs – aside from having visible injuries. Nadine knew she had had panic attacks after Iran. She had read her bio; she knew she had a difficult childhood what with losing her parents when she was thirteen.

Nadine didn't think it was appropriate for her to ask. And there wasn't much to do, anyway. Secretary Adams was an adult. However she wanted to live her life was her own business.

Shaking herself back to the present, Nadine said, "I just need your signature on these before I talk to the Pakistanis." She held out the papers for her boss to sign, but she held them just far enough that she would have to reach. She wanted to see if Secretary Adams would let her sleeves ride up.

The answer was no.

Without thought, Elizabeth stood up and took the papers from Nadine. It was reflex. Reaching for things was something she had trained herself not to do. At least not since she started the cutting.

"Of course. Of course. Let me just double check that it's something Congress can live with." Elizabeth sat back down with the papers to read before she signed.

Nadine nodded and excused herself. She was confident in her suspicion that the Secretary injured herself in some way. But it wasn't her business. Secretary Adams had not reached out for help or even indicated that she wanted anything more than a strictly professional relationship with any of the office staff. And her work hadn't suffered, at least not that Nadine could tell. Secretary Adams was highly capable, if unorthodox in her methods.

No, Nadine knew she wouldn't say anything about it unless her work started suffering. But if it did – if she thought that Secretary Adams's personal issues were compromising the national interest – she wouldn't hesitate to speak to Russell Jackson. The State Department had a mission. Secretaries came and went, but the duty to the country stayed the same.

Over the past few months, Elizabeth had grown accustomed to walking through life with two secrets. She had the cutting, but now she had another source of calm – her relationship with Henry. When work got stressful, she could remind herself that at the end of it, she'd be able to see Henry. Just that thought was able to calm her down. It was so much easier to get up for work in the morning when she knew she'd be able to see Henry in only a few hours. She always had something to look forward to.

But the cutting made her apathetic about everything. Including Henry. The pain from the cuts made her panic less noticeable, but it also made her feelings for Henry less noticeable. That only made her feel worse. Without her feelings for Henry, she was without a part of herself. She had come to think of herself at least in part as someone who loved Henry, and without that love, she felt lost. She didn't have that secret source of joy, so she was just left with the cutting to make her feel better, but it couldn't fix everything. At some point, more cutting just became overkill. The endorphins couldn't actually solve anything in the real world. They could just put off the moment she would have to deal with her problems.

She was more attentive to her staff when she wasn't strung out on an endorphin high. She was better at her job as a whole when she hadn't been cutting. On a personal level, she was better able to encourage her staff when she could empathize with them. When she cut, though, she couldn't feel anything, even sympathy for others.

The only time she could feel how much she loved Henry was when she wasn't cutting. She was faced with a decision. If she wanted to feel the love they had for each other, she couldn't cut. But now it was so much more complicated. Would Henry ever want her back? Was that love still there? Or had she ruined it?

By Wednesday evening, Henry felt pretty much back to normal. He had made it through two days at work without drawing any attention to himself. No one had any reason to suspect that he had spent the majority of his weekend in the hospital after giving himself alcohol poisoning. At first, he had had to catch up on the work he missed, but by the end of work on Wednesday, he was convinced that no one who didn't already know would find out about how he had spent his weekend.

With that settled, he had nothing to do but think of Elizabeth. He had really fucked up, and he knew it. She had been trying to help – hell, she had even given him an excuse for work that no one would question. And he had treated her terribly. Not that she had fought back. He had expected her to fight back. The Elizabeth he knew was a fighter. From the very beginning, she had not been afraid to tell him when he was embarrassing himself. Why hadn't she yelled at him like he deserved?

Maybe she had been looking for an excuse to leave, he reasoned. Maybe she realized she didn't want to put up with him. ...Elizabeth was smart, she could have gotten tired of cleaning up his messes for him.

Henry felt guilty that he had been wanting Elizabeth to pick up the pieces for him. She had covered for him and even offered to help him clean his apartment. He wished he could have walked into their relationship without any emotional baggage for her to deal with. At least not any baggage that manifested itself so dramatically. Particularly when Elizabeth had very real and very legitimate trauma, she didn't need to be worried that Henry would be on a bender when she needed him. His issues didn't have the clear-cut causes like Elizabeth's. Sure, Bolivia had been traumatic, but he had military training. His father may have died, but at some point, everybody had to deal with the loss of their parents. Henry couldn't compare their situations. In his mind, Elizabeth had every right to be traumatized, and he was making a mountain out of a molehill.

Picking up the bottle, he knew he would hate himself in the morning, but that didn't help him stop. He was upset that he had imposed on Elizabeth with his drinking, and his solution was to drink. That made a lot of sense.

After downing the first shot, he reasoned that if Elizabeth were mad at him and refusing to talk to him, at least his drinking couldn't hurt her.

Henry woke up and noticed there was soft gray light making the window glow. For a second, it could be a normal morning, and then his stomach lurched and he remembered what he had done the previous night as the evidence resurfaced. He could tell he was still at least a little intoxicated because vomiting didn't hurt. Vomiting while sober hurt, but vomiting while drunk didn't hurt. When he was done, he leaned back to take stock. He was on the sofa, sprawled out next to a puddle of vomit. A wave of pain hit him between the eyes and felt like a band constricting around his temples. It was blinding. His mouth was dry, and his throat felt like sandpaper. He knew he needed to get some water in his stomach before he threw up again. It might help settle things.

He tried to get up, but immediately stumbled back down. His equilibrium was gone, and he couldn't keep his balance. Hearing his stomach churn dangerously at the sudden movement, he knew he had to get some water or he'd regret it. The only thing left if he couldn't walk was to crawl.

On his hands and knees, he dragged himself the few feet to the sink and pulled himself up. Leaning heavily on the counter, he was able to fill a cup with water and bring it to his lips. He could only take a small sip before his stomach began to protest, but after a minute, he could tell it was already helping. He tried small sip after small sip, and gradually he felt better. After a few minutes, he thought he was ready to stand up. He knew the quicker he cleaned up the vomit, the easier it would be. As he stood and took a couple steps, the world pitched dangerously again, and he stumbled into the wall, bracing himself with a hand. He bent over as once again the contents of his stomach were expelled onto the floor. He could tell he was still vomiting alcohol that hadn't been absorbed into his system.

He sank down to the floor again, willing the world to stop spinning. His head was still pounding. He looked at the clock on the wall and realized it was already 7am. He'd have to hurry to make it to work on time. It took another few minutes for his stomach to settle again, but he managed to get up and get a rag to clean up his mess. When he vomited a third time while he was mopping up the floor, he decided there was nothing else for it. He'd be sick like this all day. It would be less embarrassing to take an unplanned sick day than it would be to go to work and have everyone know that he was hung over on a... what day was this?... Thursday? Yeah. Sometimes people came to work hung over on Fridays, but not on Thursdays. He'd just have to call in sick.

Feeling his stomach heave again, though, he figured that at least he wouldn't have to lie about being sick.