"Goddammit, Donna, I've been calling you all day!"
Louis' distraught voice reaches her as if through glass, muffled and distant.
She's been in a state of numbness all day, struggling to stick to any task, worried sick but at the same time too afraid to pick up her phone or read any of the texts that have made the device buzz non-stop the whole afternoon. She almost didn't pick up again this time, but her nerves were gnawing at her and she decided to take Louis' call on impulse, before she could talk herself out of it. Now she just needs to hear the words.
"Just tell me," she murmurs, voice shaky.
Louis huffs, presumably swallowing his rant about her absence. Then he goes quiet and her stomach drops.
"We lost. Harvey got disbarred."
It's like gravity turns off and she's sent floating into space by those three words. Her ears start ringing, her mind going blank. Her limbs feel like lead and she's too weak to hold them up. She can hear Louis faintly elaborating, narrating the hearing or consoling her or chastising her - he could be listing US states, for all she knows - but she's no longer paying any attention, her arm dropping and her thumb absently pressing the button to end the call, cutting the other man off.
Panic rises within her, thick and dense, suffocating her from inside out. She feels like she's drowning in a swamp, the sludge swallowing her whole, pushing her down until no one else can hear her screams.
She gets light-headed, dizzy, nauseated. She stumbles over to her couch and drops down limply, her chest heaving as she tries desperately to gulp for air. This can't be happening. This can't be it. Harvey can't lose his license, not for this, not because of her.
Her phone starts buzzing again and she turns it off with shaky hands, not even checking who it is. The second she deposits it unceremoniously on the couch the dam breaks, sobs racking her frame. She buries her face in her hands and cries, anguish making her sobs loud and uncontrollable.
She cost Harvey his job, his entire career. He asked her to trust him and she didn't. She knew this could hurt him but she did it anyway, for no reason other than to distance herself from him, and she guesses she got what she wanted because not only will he not work with her anymore, she'll be lucky if he even wants to speak to her again. She told him if there's anyone in the world she has faith in, it's him, but what good does that do him when she chose not to hold on to that faith, but to throw it away and jeopardize him just to, what, make a point? Prove that she could, that she wasn't as pathetically linked to him as she is?
This line of thought brings about a fresh wave of despair and, with it, a fresh wave of tears. She lets her head hang, weak and defeated because she doesn't even have it in her to keep her head up right now. She'd give anything to turn back time, to undo what she did, to protect him like she once swore she would.
So many years, so many gray areas and bent rules and shady deals. Who would have thought it'd be Donna to finally cause Harvey Specter's downfall.
The realization that she went further than Anita Gibbs and Terrence Wolf and Daniel Hardman ever could fills her with a horror she'd never felt before. Her skin starts to crawl, a sense of almost palpable disgust coating every surface, the nausea coming back in full force. She almost worries she'll be sick, but it never comes, it's just the discomfort and the grime of betrayal.
The tears dry up eventually, her breath coming ragged as she slumps against the couch, no strength left to hold herself up. She wonders what she's gonna do, what Harvey's gonna do, the firm. It feels like the whole world changed in the last twenty minutes, even though she's pretty sure she'd find everything perfectly in order if she were to open her front door. Maybe it's just the things within her that came crashing down.
She needs to go to him, needs to understand if there is anything at all she can do to change this, if coming forward and confessing it was her can do him any good. She should have done it when she had the chance, should have owned up to her mistakes, accepted responsibility like she's always told him to do. Harvey didn't break privilege, she did. But he's the one paying for it.
She stands up on unsteady feet, wobbling as if she's drunk, a toddler who just learned how to walk. She grabs her purse, heads to her bedroom and slips on whatever shoes she can find and rushes down, hailing a cab and murmuring Harvey's address without even needing to think, so embedded are the words in her brain.
It's pitiful, really, how the second he opens the door her eyes well up and her lower lip starts quivering again.
He looks disheveled in a bad way, shirt all wrinkled, no shoes, bags under his eyes, defeated posture. It looks like he hasn't slept in days, which he probably hasn't, and like he's spent the entire day after the hearing sitting at the exact same spot drinking shot after shot of whiskey, which he probably has.
"I am so sorry," is all Donna manages to whisper before her tears start falling again and she presses her mouth shut to avoid any sobs escaping.
Harvey exhales heavily and she can feel it on her shoulders, the weight of that sigh pushing her down on her knees. She fears she'll be buried alive underneath it.
He swallows, and the effort it takes him to do just that shows her she was right to assume he's been drinking all day.
"S'okay, Donna, s'not your fault," he tells her, and he sounds so tired she wishes she could tuck him in and stand guard beside his bed for a full week until he slept off the exhaustion of these past few weeks.
"It is," she counters. It is literally her fault, and she has no clue now why she did all that, why she didn't trust him, why she told Thomas and why she didn't come forward and say it was her. Everyone was so willing to protect her that she just let them, not fully thinking of the consequences. And, to be honest, she's starting to wonder if a part of her didn't know this was a real possibility, that Harvey getting disbarred would help force her to move on from him. She's starting to wonder if a part of her didn't want this.
"It's not, Donna, I screwed up. I shouldn't have let things get that far," he shakes his head, bringing her out of her reverie. She was expecting him to be angry but this beaten down, complacent version of him might be even worse, she thinks.
"There has to be something we can do. If I contact the committee...," she tries weakly, scrambling to hang on to any shred of hope she can find.
"They'll know I lied to them," he explains calmly and she feels stupid, even though she knows it's not how he meant it, "And I'm not letting you destroy what you fought so hard to achieve."
"And I should just sit back and watch as you destroy what you fought so hard to achieve?" she asks incredulously.
"I made peace with it, Donna," he counters and she thinks his patience is wearing thin but she can't stop, the desperate need to apologize to him and make up for her catastrophic mistake taking over.
"No, I don't believe you," she shakes her head, her throat clogging up again, vision starting to get blurred, "Just tell me how I can fix this."
"There's no way to fix it," he says quietly but she refuses to listen to him.
"Harvey, you didn't do this, it's my fault, you can't just give up like that," she begs.
"Donna-," he tries, but she interrupts him.
"I'm sorry. I never should have done that," she's blabbering at this point, "You were right, I did lose faith in you and I-"
"Donna," he repeats, a little louder this time, and she forces herself to shut up. "Look, I know you feel bad about what happened and I appreciate you coming over here but I've had a really long day and I just don't think I can have this conversation right now."
His words are like a bucket of cold water being dumped unceremoniously on her. It stings to be dismissed, and it's a little humiliating to think she came all the way over here and he doesn't even want to talk to her. But then she remembers she's the reason he got disbarred today. He's losing his licence, his firm, his entire career in a very public and shameful way, and all because she couldn't keep her damn mouth shut. No wonder he doesn't want to talk to her.
She doesn't really want to leave. She wants him to tell her everything is going to be okay, that he has a plan to undo this, but maybe nothing is going to be okay and there is no plan. Maybe there's just dealing with the consequences now. And if that's the case, the very least she can do is stop bothering him.
She swallows and takes a moment before nodding, acquiescing to his request. She doesn't say goodbye, just looks down and turns around, forcing her feet to carry her away from him like he asked her to. He doesn't say anything either, merely closing the door behind her, no "Good night" or "See you tomorrow".
She's already inside the elevator when she realizes Harvey never even invited her in.
The ride home is difficult, her stomach doing somersaults and her throat burning from the effort not to cry. She truly thinks she hates herself right now, which is a scary feeling she's not used to, but it's the only one that accurately describes the desire to scrub herself rid of her own skin, to scream at herself in the mirror, to make bad choices she knows will destroy her.
Every new minute away from him makes her feel worse. She walks into her condo and has no energy for anything, just drops herself down on her couch and stares at the ceiling.
It was stupid of her to go to him. What good does it do to want to fix things now? What are her good intentions worth if they came too late? Harvey was right, it's done now, there's nothing she can do. There was something, and she was well aware of it at the time but she decided not to do it, because she's selfish or pathetic or a bitch. She could have saved his career and she chose not to. Simple as that.
How could she do this to him?
He had always bent over backwards to protect her, to keep her out of the line of fire. Thomas himself told her just this morning that Harvey had laid himself down on the tracks for her yet again. How could she have been this awful?
Fuck her good intentions. Fuck her sass, her intuition, her ability to read people and anticipate their needs. None of that is worth shit now because when Harvey had truly needed her, possibly more than he's ever needed her before, she turned her back on him. And what kind of person does that to someone who's been their best friend for almost fifteen years? What kind of person holds in their hand the solution to all of someone else's problems, someone they care about, and just doesn't give a shit? What kind of person chooses their pride over someone else's entire career and honor?
She's awful. She truly is awful, and it's clear now why Harvey could barely stand to look at her. Because she failed him, and not because she couldn't fix things, but precisely because she could. She lost faith in him and she put herself first the only time she couldn't have done that. She stabbed him in the back, blindsided him, lied to him, made him believe he could trust her. He couldn't. Even she can't trust herself right now.
She thinks she almost wants him to hate her. She catches herself practically hoping he'll never speak to her again, that he won't look her in the eye or give her the time of day anymore. She hopes something happens because she doesn't know what she'll do if his whole life crumbles down and she walks away unscathed. It'll drive her insane.
He needed her. She cut his legs out from under him. And then she went running back begging him to tell her she's a good person so she can sleep at night. What the fuck.
Her eyes fill up again but she's too tired to cry, so she doesn't. In fact, she does nothing, just lets herself feel the shame and the regret until it consumes her, her breathing becoming slower and slower until she falls asleep.
She wakes up after 4 a.m. with mild disorientation and a sore neck she doesn't even resent. She drags herself to bed, not bothering to change, and instantly falls back asleep.
She skips breakfast the next morning, her stomach upset and no hunger in sight. She chooses the first dress she can find, barely bothering with her hair and makeup. She picks at her cuticles and bobs her leg the entire way to the office, anxiety making her feel like she's going to be sick. This feels like being called to the principal's office after you've done something very bad and you don't know if you'll get expelled from school or not. It feels like getting caught committing a crime, like forgetting your lines during a play and being laughed off the stage, like free falling from the top of the Empire State with no net to catch you.
She makes sure to take the route that makes it least likely for her to bump into Harvey, mostly because she's not ready to face him. She needs a few minutes of successful tasks first to ground her, calm her nerves. She powers through an hour of work despite being distracted, like she has a distant beating in the back of her mind she just can't shake.
She goes to the executive kitchen, makes herself a cup of coffee and comes back to her office, enjoying it quietly as she stares out her window. When she's done, she takes a deep breath, straightens her dress and her back and makes her way to Harvey's office, only to find it empty. His assistant isn't at his desk, so she just turns around and makes her way back to her office. She opens up his calendar and notices his day is filled with meetings - probably damage control, meeting up clients to appease them and start the transition to Louis, Alex or Samantha.
She has no clue how his leave is being handled by the firm, which strikes her as incredibly irresponsible on her part. She may have gotten away with throwing her little tantrum yesterday but she's still the COO, and it's her duty, not to mention her job, to be on top of things because this is another name partner getting disbarred in way too little time and they need to decide on a game plan.
She calls Louis, who is also out on a meeting, and sets about figuring out which clients can go to which partner, how they're going to announce Harvey's departure from the firm, how they're going to frame the entire situation.
Her phone buzzes shortly before lunch time - a text from Thomas. She completely forgot about him. Completely. She feels a pang of guilt, because even though their conversation must have given him a lot to think about, they were officially still together and she hadn't even thought of sending him a message to check in after the hearing.
The nausea comes back as she calls him, effectively ending things even if they were already half-ended, because ever since Louis told her Harvey lost his licence, her every waking second has been spent thinking about him, and she doesn't think that's fair to the man who is supposed to be her boyfriend. Thomas seems a little disappointed but hardly surprised. His parting gift is telling her Harvey held on to the end, making sure no questions were raised about him being the only one involved in this mess.
It makes her feel infinitely worse, of course. She works through lunch and by the time it's fully dark and Harvey remains nowhere to be seen, she just caves and goes home. This night is hardly easier than the last, even though she feels a little more in control of her emotions. She loses track of how many times she considers calling Harvey, or going to his place again.
Nothing has changed since yesterday. There's still nothing she can do to change his predicament. She's no less of a coward today than she was yesterday, no less of a horrible friend. So she puts on an old movie, stares blankly at her TV for two hours and goes to sleep, though she wakes up just as exhausted.
She's decided to talk to Harvey today. She needs to. She knows it's not fair because maybe he needs to not talk to her, but what's another selfish act added to the pile?
Except once again he's not at his office, and his assistant tells her he hasn't arrived yet. She has a meeting with Samantha and Alex, explaining the plan she came up with yesterday. She has a line of associates wanting to talk to her, eager to understand the future of the firm, and it's her job to take care of these things so she does, but every interval she gets is spent hurrying over to Harvey's office, and every time it's empty.
Every time she asks his assistant she gets the same answer: Harvey hasn't come in today, he doesn't know where he is and he isn't picking up his phone.
Donna caves and tries to call him, thinking maybe he's deliberately avoiding work-related stuff and maybe he'll pick up her call - though if he doesn't want to deal with work, she guesses he'd want even less to deal with her. Unsurprisingly but still disappointingly, he doesn't pick up, it doesn't even ring.
She supposes it's not entirely unthinkable that he'd be wallowing at home or something, ignoring the world, much like she did on the day of the hearing, but that doesn't sound like Harvey. He's never been one to run away from a problem, and even if this is a particularly big problem, he faced Mike going to prison head on, spent the whole night plotting with Jessica and Louis to figure out the next step. While it's not impossible that this time he could prefer to lay down his arms and surrender to circumstance, she just gets a feeling that's not what's happening.
But he's nowhere to be found and he keeps not picking up the phone and she doesn't have it in her to go to his place just to be turned down again, so she just lets it go, decides to give him the weekend to calm down, recollect. It's a quiet couple of days, but Monday seems to be bringing with it a new promise and she wants so bad to believe it. Harvey is strong, she knows he will find a way to work with this. She didn't have faith in him before but she's resolute to never make that mistake again, and she spends all of Saturday figuring out a way to tell him that as soon as they see each other again.
It's not until Sunday that she finds out Harvey is actually in Boston.