"I spend days in bed debilitated by loss. I attempt to cry you back but the water is gone and still, you've not returned.
I pinch my belly till it bleeds, have lost count of the days; sun becomes moon, moon becomes sun. And I become a ghost.
A dozen different thoughts tear through me each second. You must be on your way.
Perhaps it's best if you're not."
-/-
Today was supposed to be the last day of her hold, she was supposed to go home today. Francis didn't come get her and now, now she has this stupid man looking at her like she's crazy. He leans back in his plastic chair and watches her pace like it's entertaining for him somehow. They're in a different room today, a recreation room, there are books and board games and a tennis table tucked in the corner and there are windows. Windows! Do you know how long it's been since Mary has seen a freaking window in this place?
They are the only two people in this room, she's beginning to think she's the only patient in this place. Gideon won't stop talking, he won't stop talking even as she's two seconds away from making a break for it. She wonders how hard she would have to throw one of these plastic chairs to break the glass of the window.
"You never really appreciate it until it's gone," Gideon tells her, he's telling her about the weather. The sunshine, how it's almost blinding against the snow on the ground. "Until it's all cloudy and grey-"
"Gideon."
"My daughter loved the snow, she used to play in it for hours."
"Gideon."
"Do you like snow? I find it irritating, especially when you're driving in it. Do you drive? Or do you have someone drive you places?" He pauses but she doesn't answer, "Are there secret passageways in the White House? I always wondered I've never met someone who used to work there. I know there's a bunker under it, but like is that-"
"Shut up!" She shrieks, slamming her hands down on the round table that he's seated at. He doesn't seem phased by it, if anything he seems calm; like he was expecting it. He just hums, tilts the cup of something warm to his lips, eyeing her curiously.
"What?" She snaps.
"All that anger in such a tiny frame, I wonder where you put it." He sighs, gestures for her to sit down and she doesn't, but then he starts talking about the weather again. And she sits in hopes that he'll. Stop. Talking.
She folds her arms over her chest and leans back in her chair, glaring at him.
"Why am I here?"
"Do you want the shortlist or the long one?" He asks as he flips open the folder resting on the tabletop and she rolls her eyes.
"No, why am I here. In this room?" She asks, "With you."
"I grow tired of my tiny office from time to time." He shrugs, "And I thought-"
"Thought what? We'd break open a game of monopoly and I'd tell you the inner workings of my mind?"
"Do you want to play monopoly?"
"No." She snaps, "I want to go home."
"If you don't start talking, this will become your home." He says that slowly and the physical restraint she has to not strangle him is astounding. "What will you do when you go home?"
"Sit in my bed and stare at the ceiling and think about all the beautiful, bloody, violent ways I can kill you." She's joking, it's a joke. He isn't laughing though and he just clicks his tongue against his teeth as he sets his cup down.
"Because that is going to make me want to release you."
"Gideon please." She begs softly, "Please." She's begging and it's pathetic, she remembers once that Catherine told her not to beg, never to beg. People lose respect for others who beg, especially if it's a woman. It invites pity.
And here she is doing it.
"I expected more from you," Gideon tells her with a shake of his head and she straightens, tilts her head at him.
"Pardon?"
"You are fierce." He tells her, "You are the thing that powerful men have nightmares about. You can make or break someone's entire livelihood with a flick of your wrist. You are cunning, clever. And here you are, yelling at someone who just wants to help you."
"Gideon."
"Where is the Mary Stuart in this file?" He asks it like he's offended, like his expectations of her were too high, that she's nothing like what he imagined. She swallows, runs her fingers through her hair, she glares at him.
He's insulting her to get something, a reaction, to get her to talk. He's playing with her head in hopes that she will give him the tools to pick her apart. No. Two can play at this game.
"It's sad." He adds with a shake of his head and a sip of his drink and she squints because there it is. Her ammunition. The band around his finger is gone, what used to be a gold wedding band is now just lines. The pale skin there contrasts against the rest of them.
Hallelujah.
"You're not wearing your wedding ring." She says softly, "What'd she do? Hm? Take everything and run?" She asks, "Is that why you do this? Are you just a sad little man who wants help other sad, sick, people because you can't help yourself?" He tilts his head, but he still seems unbothered, there's only a small glimmer of pain there, but it's not enough. She's tired of the one who is always being picked apart.
"Nice observation." He says, "But I'm not divorced."
"Separated?" She questions, "That must be hard. How'd it start? Did she have an affair?" She gasps, "Did you have an affair? Get a little too close to your patients, huh doc?"
"No."
"Not separated but you've lost hope."
"Widower, actually." He says it casually, crosses a leg over the other as he leans back and she blinks.
Oh, great, she's crazy and she's a bitch.
She's not really sure what to say, so she doesn't say anything, she just stares at him.
"I can see by your face that isn't the answer you were expecting. But. That's okay, it's been years now. Died in childbirth." He sighs as he grabs his cup again, "I assume now you'll be scrambling for something else to throw at me in an attempt to shift the focus, go on then."
"I...I'm sorry…" She says softly, "I didn't mean-"
"I'm not angry." He tells her honestly. "My daughter is dead too." He supplies without her even asking for it, and maybe she should have known or realized it. He only ever referenced her in past tense. She just didn't put it together. "Cancer took her quickly, quietly, by the time it was caught it was too late." He shakes his head, she thinks for a second the composed and calm man who sits in front of her is gone and is replaced with a man who is wrapped in tragedy and she finds that she feels for him.
"That's awful."
"I don't do this because I'm a sad little man who has too much time on his hands, Mary, I do this because it's what I needed all those years ago."
-/-
It starts slow, she gives him a little information at a time and over the course of two days, she is open enough. He offers her perspectives she's never taken before, he tells her that maybe her attachment to Louis stemmed from her need to talk about what happened to her. Because she had never talked about it with anyone, not the whole thing, not in detail. That she needed to get it off her chest but to do so with someone she had no prior attachment to. Then when he knew, it was just that, he knew.
He tells her that she stabbed Louis because he was doing something he wasn't allowed to do and even though it doesn't make sense, she wasn't in her right mind. She hasn't been for a long time. He had the audacity to love her, to want her, even though she could never love him back.
"I shouldn't have done that to him." She says softly, she should honestly be in prison for it, but here she is.
"No." Gideon says, "And he shouldn't have begged for something he knew you couldn't give him."
The next day is different and his office feels smaller and there's a ringing in her ears that won't go away. She knew this would come up, that they would talk about it, because it is such an intricate part of who she is now. He makes her take him through it, everything before, and the hospital stay after. Why did she feel the need to stay with Francis for a month after, only to leave him?
"I thought it would...go away." She tells him with a hard swallow. He doesn't say anything, he just listens. "He offered to sleep...in another room or in the same room, just not the bed but I told him it was okay."
"You wanted him next to you."
"I thought if I pretended what happened didn't happen, then it couldn't have any effect on me." She had never been more wrong about anything in her life. "I used to set an alarm…"
"An alarm?"
"I would...we would go to bed, he was allowed to sleep close to me but not to touch me. I would stay awake until he fell asleep and then I would get up and I would move to the other room and I would set an alarm on my phone for one hour before I knew he would wake up." She shrugs, "And then I'd come back to bed."
"Did he ever notice?" She shakes her head, "Have you ever told him?" She shakes her head again. She thinks that maybe he figured it out, there's no way that he didn't. But maybe he never said anything about it because he was just happy that she was trying. Or she seemed to be trying. Gideon sighs as he shifts in his seat and then he's looking at her like she's a puzzle that needs to be solved.
"You keep referring to it as something other than what it was." He says it softly, slowly and she makes a face because she has no idea what the hell he means by that, "During the course of this session, you have called it an incident, the attack, the th-"
"What's your point?"
"I need you to say it." He says, "Part of the healing process is saying it out loud, have you ever done that before? Have you said it out loud?" Just the one time. When Francis asked at the hospital what happened to her. What they did. The doctors, nurses, they knew what it looked like. They knew, but they needed confirmation from her.
She remembers what happened after that, they sent in a sexual assault person, they took pelvic washings, they scraped under her fingernails, they took some of her hair, her clothes, she was poked and prodded. She never reported it, she refused, but she thinks it's still sitting in a lab somewhere.
Not that it matters, he's dead.
"I don't...I don't wan-"
"Tell me what they did to you." His voice is soft and sympathetic and she shakes her head but he doesn't move on, he just looks at her. She sighs heavily, swallows despite the dryness of her throat and she says it.
"I was raped." She tells him, "Is that what you want to hear?"
"You were." He nods, "But that's the beauty of past tense. You were, but you never will be again. Horrible things happen all the time, to good people and to bad people, but that's the thing. This is just something that happened to you, it doesn't become you."
-/-
She has a visitor today, she didn't even know that visitors were allowed here, but she has one and they're waiting. She's taken to a room, one with people, other patients being visited. The lights are brighter here and they hurt her eyes. It's all white floors and white walls and it's almost blinding, it feels like some different world, some other universe. She sees the dark blonde hair and she knows who it is. Though she was almost expecting Francis, this is fine too.
"Kenna?" She questions as she approaches the table, her friend standing with a smile and pulling her into a tight hug.
"Hey, you." She smiles when she pulls back. She looks different, no dark circles under her eyes, her hair is brushed out, the color has returned to her skin and they sit.
"How are you?" Mary asks as they sit at the table.
"I should be asking you that." She smiles a small smile, "I'm okay. Are you okay?"
"I...feel lighter." She says honestly but she doesn't know if that has more to do with the drugs than anything else. She finds herself wondering why Francis hasn't visited her, she thought it was because visitors weren't allowed but Kenna is here. Maybe he doesn't want to see her.
"I thought Francis was joking when he told me where you were." Kenna says, "I was ready to come break you out." She whispers that. "Greer and Aylee are working hard to get your firm back up and running. It's important I think, to get some normalcy back to your life. So that'll be there when you come home."
"Okay…"
"Oh, I work for you now." Kenna tells her, "Greer hired me, do you mind?"
"No." She was going to offer her job back to her anyways, now that she knows it wasn't entirely Kenna's fault. Henry wouldn't let her leave.
"Oh, and you didn't hear it from me, but Bash."
"Bash?"
"He works for you now too." She whispers it loudly, "Back from wherever the hell he went, he was very confused when he found out that you were...busy." She sighs, "But when he was told he understood."
"Bash is back?"
"Yes."
"Does...does Henry know?" She asks and Kenna shrugs.
"He might. I mean once someone with a camera catches him…" Kenna says it like it's already happened and Mary frowns because she thinks she missed it.
"He works for me now."
"Yup. Got yourself quite the team."
"Hm." She nods and then she runs her fingers through her hair. She's sure Francis is glad to have him back in his life. "How's...how is-"
"Francis is good. He's still under the assumption that this is good for you, I think he's hopeful." She smirks, "I think he's hopeful for a lot of things."
"I don't know-"
"Well, you aren't flat out saying no, so that's progress." She jokes, "He misses you like no other."
"Me too."
"Aw, I can't wait until you have his babies."
"Kenna-" She laughs softly, "That's...um-"
"I have a proposition." She says quickly as she straightens in her chair, "Okay when you get out of here, you need to do something."
"Um…"
"Try." She's serious now, "That's all you can do. No more running away from him. I've locked you two in a room once, I'll do it again." She's half-joking but there's part of her that is serious and Mary swallows as she scoots her chair closer. She isn't sure how to ask this, how to bring it up. It's a fear of hers. It has been for so long, part of the reason she left him.
"What if…" She drops her voice down to a low whisper, just for them, "What if I...can't be with him?"
"Sexually?" Kenna questions and Mary shushes her because she can't just say it that loudly, this is a personal conversation. "Okay. Hm." She tsks. What if it doesn't feel the same? What if she can never feel that way for him again? It was easy with Louis, she liked it, what if she can't...like it with Francis anymore?
"Oh, you mean-" Kenna's eyebrows shoot up, "Ooooohhhh, okay, yeah. Um. Well."
"Ew forget that I-"
"No." She says quickly, "You were right to ask. That's a perfectly logical thing to...wonder after what you went through." She thinks for a second, "First things first," She clears her throat, "Francis is...very, very well acquainted with...all of you." She pauses, "Second, baby steps."
"Baby steps."
"You don't have to jump right into bed with someone, Mary, it's not an obligation and if he makes you feel like it is. I'll kill him." She shrugs, "Take it slow. As slow as you want." She nods, she can do that.
"Do you know why Francis hasn't...visited me?" She asks, desperate now to change the subject because she isn't sure if her face can get any redder.
"Do you want him to?" Kenna asks and before she can answer, she's pulling her purse to her lap and digging through it, "I wasn't supposed to take this." She whispers as she tucks something down her sleeve, "Hand, under the table." She instructs and when she does it, her friend passes something heavy to her palm and Mary tucks it in her sleeve, eyes narrowing to the orderly who's distracted by another patient.
"A flip phone?"
"Take it up with the White House sweetie." Kenna waves a hand dismissively. "Give him a call. He's saved under sex with legs." Because of course, he is.
"You're weird."
"Oh, the weirdest."
-/-
When she's taken back to her room, she stares at the phone in her hands. It's bedtime and they called lights out a few minutes ago, so she pulls the blanket over her head and mutes the phone so they don't hear the tone from pressing the buttons. She waits until she doesn't hear the footsteps in the hall anymore and then she's pressing the call button and pressing the phone to her ear.
It rings and rings and rings-
"Hello?" He sounds tired and she shifts in her cardboard bed.
"Francis?"
"Mary?" He questions, "How-"
"Kenna smuggled it in." She whispers, "Hi."
"Hi. Why are you whispering?" He asks in a whisper of his own.
"I don't want to get in trouble." If she's caught, they'll take it away.
"Oh."
"Um." She swallows, "Kenna has you saved under sex with legs." He's quiet for a second and then she hears him sigh heavily.
"She's strange…"
"I know."
"Are you angry?" He asks after another pause.
"I was but I'm not anymore." She isn't angry because she's starting to feel better.
"I thought you'd never forgive me." He says softly and she thinks he means for more than just putting her in here. "Are you okay? Is it helping?"
"Yeah." She says softly, "I miss you." She tells him, "Like a lot…"
"Oh? How much?" She hears the light turning of a page.
"More than usual."
"What's the usual amount?" He asks
"It used to be a dull ache." She tells him in a whisper, "Something I could turn off, but I can't do that now."
"Don't."
"Francis."
"I wanted to come see you." He says after a second. She went quiet because she heard someone walking, making their rounds, checking on people. "But it's risky."
"You don't want the press to see you walking into an asylum?"
"I don't want the press to know you're here." He says it softly and she hears another turning of a page as she sighs. "Mary-"
"Gideon said I might be able to come home soon."
"That's good."
"And Kenna told me that Bash came back." She whispers.
"He did, yeah." He says, "He figured enough time had passed and the press wouldn't be very interested in him anymore." He sighs after that, "Mary, it's late and I don't want you to get caught."
"What are you reading?" She asks as she turns over in bed and adjusts her blanket over her head, he doesn't say anything and she tries to still her movements when she hears someone walk by her room.
"A book."
"Oh wow, Sherlock Holmes." She says sarcastically and then bites at her lip when she realizes it was louder than she intended.
"Grief is the Thing With Feathers." He tells her with a light laugh.
"Dark."
"And beautiful."
"How do you have time to read?" She asks, he does a lot of charity work, and he's almost always traveling for something. Is he taking a break? Would he be an asshole for taking a break from his charitable attributions? Sometimes she thinks he's busier than her.
"Time management." He tells her, "You don't have to do everything all at once."
"Then how do you get to the other stuff quicker?"
"By not being an overachiever." He says it in a mocking tone that makes her giggle softly and she bites at her cheek.
"Francis." She gasps, "I have to stop talking." She says in a low tone, voice barely above a whisper because she thinks someone stopped in front of her door. She'll get caught if he keeps making her laugh and she tries to keep herself from moving.
"Oh. Okay-"
"Don't hang up."
"I-"
"Read." She whispers and he pauses, "I don't want them to take you away."
"Alright." He says softly and then she hears the flipping of pages before he takes a breath and then he starts in a soft voice, "I wanted to build a hundred-foot memorial to her with my bare hands. I wanted to see her sitting in a vast stone chair in Hyde Park, enjoying her view. Everybody passing could comprehend how much I miss her. How physical my missing is. I miss her so much it is a vast golden prince, a concert hall, a thousand trees, a lake, nine thousand buses, a million cars, twenty million birds and more. The whole city is my missing her…"
She thinks the passage he picked is as depressing as it is symbolic but she listens to him read. She listens to him read until her eyes feel heavy and then they flutter shut. She listens to him read until her breathing becomes steady and then she dreams of him and of feathers, and sunshine.
A/N: TWO MORE CHAPTERS GUYS