okay so I'm breaking my own rules, cause I don't want to write anything else but my ongoing fics *but that doesn't mean* my mind doesn't create scenarios every other day and like an hour ago I saw Kristen's tweet ( /KristenMichele6/status/1380640054159282185 - 'm not picky, but i would've liked just ONCE for one of them to finish "but it doesn't mean-" with more than "i know.") and well this happened. So idk I guess here it is, enjoy and let me know what you thought.
x - M
"But that doesn't mean –"
The words hit her like a ton of bricks, and she sighs, lifts herself onto her feet and dashes to his office door. She can't believe they've been doing this little song and dance for thirteen fucking years, and every, every single time, it goes the same way. The words 'I know' so close on the tip of her tongue, her exit already hallway made when it truly dawns on her. They've been doing this for thirteen fucking years, and she'll be damned if she does it another time.
"Doesn't mean what?" Donna fires back, fire in her eyes; she strides towards him, and he simultaneously takes a step back. Already shaking his head as a way out, in an 'if we don't do this, we can just move on'- way.
Except they can't. They've never been able to move on. Not since the other time, not with Stephen there, coastal motors, liberty rail, Mike's freaking arrest and then a two-month exile of them being them. She thought they'd bounce back from it, that they had enough of a foundation left of what made him and her them. Were back to being them.
Maybe a little bit too much, because here they are. Drinks shared, glances exchanged, the tension palpable in the air. A date is waiting for her in the restaurant, and yet, here she is. With him, having the same old argument.
"Doesn't… Mean," Donna starts again, stalling in front of his desk.
"Donna," he says, shoulders hanging, and he turns somewhat away from her. Hand landing on the back of his chair in support, he makes the mistake of glancing at her. Her gaze piercing, anger visible in them, but what hits him the hardest are the held back tears.
"What?" Donna presses again.
"I .." he stammers, throws his hands in the air and shakes his head. "I don't know."
An exasperated sigh rolls off her tongue, and a tear rolls down her cheek then. She swallows thickly, glances at her feet and bites down the tears. "Of course," she mutters, more to herself than to him. "It doesn't mean anything," she adds, and she taps her fingers on his desk. Counting to ten – to calm herself down or to give him the time to respond - she doesn't know, but she turns after six seconds anyway.
He feels his throat drying up, and he pinches the bridge of his nose. He turns too, not to the door but to face the window. The entire city at the front of his feet, but his world just walked out of the door. "Fuck," he mutters, hand hitting the glass, and he hisses at the pain coursing through his body.
When he looks up again, he sees her in the reflection—still standing there, right behind him. Like always, and he considers it irony. Because he had been so close to telling her, to exploring this thing that had always been there between them, except he was too late. He learned of her dating a client three days ago, and that's where any sparkling hope had simmered down. "I just want –"
"Don't!" She argues, giving the glass door a push behind her, and she's next to his desk in three steps. "Don't you dare," she exclaims, still striding towards him. "Don't you dare say it."
He draws in a deep breath and turns on his heel. Facing the redhead now, the space between them is non-existent, but she feels further away than ever. "That I want you to be happy?" he fires back, closing in on her until he feels the warmth of her scoff on his cheek. He clenches his jaw, his fingers flexing by his side, and as much as he wants to be fierce, his eyes are glistening all the same. "Of course, I want you to be happy."
"Right," she whispers, but she shakes her head. Deep down, she knows it's the truth, but the truth is also that he is her happiness. Always has been and always will be, as much as she wishes it wasn't. "If that were true then –"
"Of course it's true," he reasons, but she shakes her head again. He watches her retreat, and he feels his chest tightening even further because there's nothing he's been more certain of since the day she stepped up to him in the bar.
If he wants to succeed, if he wants happiness, he needs her by his side to make it happen. But at some point over the years, that had transformed into the same thing. And while it took him years to come to terms with the fact that she is his happiness, it only took him a fraction to realise he isn't hers. That doesn't mean he doesn't want her to be happy.
"Why not?" he asks now, and he catches the halt in her step. "Why wouldn't that be true?"
"Because." It almost comes with a stomp of her feet, and she wipes a tear away from her cheek.
"Because what?"
She shrugs now, shoulders moving up and down, and she tilts her head to the side. A hint of a sympathetic smile painted on her lips. They both know the words that should follow, but neither says them.
"Donna," he presses.
"Because this," she signals back and forth between them, the space around them. "This, this fucking charade doesn't mean anything." She fires back the words he threw at her earlier in the evening. "Except if it really didn't mean anything, we wouldn't find ourselves having the same goddamn conversation every single time one of us tries to move on, wouldn't we."
His jaw clenches, and his shoulders tense.
"Because it doesn't mean anything that you get jealous every single time I get into something that resembles a relationship, doesn't it?" she adds, rocking back and forth on her spot. She takes a step back in his direction with every word she barks next. "Because you'd be happy for me, wouldn't you?"
The accusations she throws in his direction, worded in such a way that they focus on him. But they're true for her too. She gets jealous; she would be happy for him even if it would eat her up inside. She stops right in front of him again, eye to eye. She gazes into them, searching for an answer when a verbal one lacks. "Wouldn't you?"
He swallows audibly, and he adverts his gaze, unable to hide behind the lie he's told for so long it's almost become his truth.
"You would," she whispers then, fear overtaking her that he might actually -
"The hell I wouldn't." The words a whisper, barely there, but they're out in the open at last. "Fuck Donna," he breathes, lightly shaking his head as he catches the way her lips part. "I would want to be happy for you, even if it would kill me inside."
Donna gasps now, hand falling to her chest, and she stumbles over her feet. His hand automatically reaches for her elbow, holding her into place. "But …" she stammers, trying to piece it all together. Deep down, she's always known, especially since liberty rail, but knowing in the knowledge it would never be acknowledged by him is one thing. Hearing him say it another.
"But you… every time you, you said it didn't mean –"
"Everything," he cuts her off, his gaze locking with hers again. He stares in them for a second, telling her everything he has ever wanted with a glimpse; he nods when she does too.
"Because it means everything. You mean everything, Donna."