We're getting close to the end of The Day the Papers Were Served (one chapter after this one, in fact) but until then . . . have a bit (well, a lot) more emotional introspection. And some protective Chris. And Jayne and Chris cuddling.
So, hopefully, a well-rounded chapter. I hope you enjoy it!
Acceleration
July 24, 2012
Neither Jayne nor Chris felt like talking after that last, exhausting round of extremely unpleasant revelations, so they had another wordless conference and decided that 'bad horror movie' was the way to go this time. It was an add affectation of theirs that had started about three weeks after their frustrating, so close they could taste it fourth-place finish at the 1980 Worlds Championships. They'd both been unhappy and rather depressed, but wrapping themselves together in a giant hug and then going on with practice didn't appeal to either of them. Or, rather, it didn't help like they expected, which left them floundering because they had no clue what would work, so they'd decided to take a two-day minibreak from skating and each other.
This had lasted maybe eighteen hours before the lengthening shadows of the approaching dusk had seen Jayne coming to Chris' door, feeling positively tetchy. They hadn't taken this much of a break since they'd been partnered and she was at completely loose ends as to what to do. It wasn't a weekend, so her small circle of friends wasn't available to go out and even if they had been, she didn't particularly want to, but being alone with her thoughts was utterly unappealing. It wasn't even helping. And her parents, as supportive as they were, understood neither her restlessness nor the underlying issue.
Thus, her arrival at her partner's home, because she figured it was a safe bet that he was feeling the same.
Betty Dean greeted her with a warm smile and a cup of tea, which she drank slowly, chatting with Chris' stepmum and feeling herself starting to unwind further as the familiarity of her surroundings worked their magic. It was a little odd, she admitted, that Chris' home was frequently more relaxing than hers, but it was something she took regular advantage of.
Once her tea and two very nice chocolate chip biscuits had been consumed, she was directed to the sitting room, where she found her partner engrossed in something on the telly that, even from the door, looked disgusting. And for the first time in more than a year, Jayne Torvill discovered something new about Christopher Dean: he was a closet horror movie buff.
She shuddered on realizing this because she was decidedly not a fan, but just seeing him had settled her completely, and given the relief that flashed across his face when he glanced up and saw her, he felt the same, so she sank down on the settee and cuddled into his side. Without a word, they had watched (well, he'd watched; she'd cringed at) Killer Fish.
And they had, during the course of that hideous monstrosity (her words, but he hadn't disagreed), discovered something interesting: her extreme distaste for scary and/or gory scenes had manifested itself into tiny screams as she buried her face in his shoulder or chest, getting a hug in the guise of seeking safety from the gross factor. He in turn got to feel manly and protective as he made sure she didn't see or hear anything 'too icky' while quietly laughing at her girly squeamishness and whispering when it was safe for her to look. For whatever reason, it created a sense of security for both of them that was different from anything else they'd experienced and it had quite quickly become their favorite — and most effective — form of relaxation on those odd occasions they needed a break from the ice but not each other.
So it was by mutual consent now that Chris gave her an anticipatory (and slightly evil) grin as he eased himself off the settee, went to the telly, and cued up Screams of a Winter Night, his personal favorite.
By the time it was over, Jayne had — for the 4,573 time — vowed that she would never watch another horror movie for the rest of her life, no matter how relaxed she felt after, while Chris was still laughing at her even as he debated the merits of Friday the 13thversus the Nightmare on Elm Street series. He was leaning toward the former simply because the bigger the number, the worse they got and the more he enjoyed it, although the crossover movie made that whole argument redundant. Jayne had gone to the bathroom and he was crouched by the pile of DVDs, looking for the first title that caught his eye (and why hadn't he alphabetized the damn things?), his attention wholly focused on his task.
So it knocked him for a bit of a loop when his partner asked, completely conversationally, "What happened with Karen, Chris?"
He was so startled by this that he rocked back on his heels, lost his balance, and flailed frantically in a doomed attempt to stay upright. Jayne's surprised cry at seeing him go arse over teakettle to the ground didn't help, because he could hear the laughter behind it, though she did try to keep it contained. Feeling very put-upon, he decided that sulking was the order of the day and just laid there for a few minutes, waving a hand so she'd know he was okay and then patiently waiting out the uncontrolled spate of giggles.
It gave him time to think, though there wasn't much to think about; he had nothing to hide, after all. He just hadn't said anything for the same reason he'd not asked Jayne until today about what had finally prompted her to end her marriage. Thankfully, this was the only thing he needed to tell her, at least in regards to his break-up. Because at the end of the day, the truth was that he wasn't in love with Karen and he wasn't going to fall in love with her. Anything else was extraneous to that and had no particular influence on his decision to end their relationship.
Other than Jayne being his first and highest priority, that is.
And now that he was free and Jayne was . . . well, getting there . . . they were finally able to discuss those 'off-limit' personal relationship matters, so he had no real problem with telling her what she wanted to know.
He did not, however, get up. For a reason he chose not to look at too closely, he found that he didn't want to meet her eyes as he explained why he had ended his relationship with Karen. It hadn't been a difficult choice for him to make, true, but his partner would be very aware of what he wasn't telling her. She wouldn't push, but she would know there was a great deal left unspoken. And he would tell her, he would, just . . . not today.
"I . . . nothing, really," he replied quietly, linking his fingers and resting his hands on his belly. "I just realized that I . . . I care about her so much, I do, but I don't — I'm not in love with her, and . . ."
Unable to find anything to add to this simple truth, he trailed off with a half shrug and stared at his ceiling while Jayne mulled over what he'd told her, both out loud and by implication.
"Okay," she said once she'd taken everything in. "So why now? I mean . . . it's been over a year."
This was the reason he still hadn't looked at her. It wasn't Jayne's fault that she was the most important person in his world and would be until he died. And it wasn't her responsibility that he hadn't realized this rather essential fact of life until That Night. But she would take it as such, and he refused to allow that.
Because truth be told, the only fault was his. He should have known his own mind much, much sooner, but he had been so skillfully manipulated while he had been extremely emotionally vulnerable that he honestly wasn't sure which way was 'up'. And yes, he knew that now, but at the time . . . yeah. So while he'd never stopped thinking that Jayne was the most important person in his world, he'd been tricked into believing otherwise and hadn't tried to break free of that even when the sheer wrongness of it grated against every nerve he possessed. Those efforts to change him into what Jill wanted had been so solid, so well done, that it had taken the trauma of thinking that Jayne was dead to shatter the illusion.
But how to tell her that?
Well, it was Jayne. Straight up and without a twist generally worked best.
So he took a deep breath — and sat up, finally meeting her eyes because he needed to make sure that she didn't take this on herself.
"Yeah, it has been," he started softly, biting his lip in embarrassment at how oblivious he'd been. "But I just . . . after that night . . ."
She nodded in instant understanding, to his great relief. Even after three months, it wasn't something he could talk about with much equanimity.
"Well, I just realized that she wasn't — that I — I . . ."
He trailed off again and looked down, because he was still ashamed of how badly he'd handled things. Even though he'd made the break as clean as possible for both of them, he felt guilty about how utterly blindsided Karen had been.
"It's okay, Chris," Jayne said gently, sliding off the couch so she could come to his side, picking his hand up and twining their fingers. As ever, her touch soothed and grounded him, and he blew out a deep sigh, deciding to just spit it out.
"I just realized that I didn't . . . well, I didn't feel as deeply for her as I should," he told her, meeting her eyes again with an intensity she wasn't expecting. "Even taking into account everything else I was dealing with —" he swallowed hard at the memory, grateful when she stayed silent and let him fumble his way through it "— I realized after about a week that I didn't . . . well, I didn't miss her. Not like I was supposed to," he said with more than a little self-deprecation, which Jayne promptly squashed by gently pressing a finger to his lips. He had to exert a great deal of effort to keep from licking it for some odd reason.
"Don't ever apologize for the way you feel," she said firmly, refusing to let him look away from her now. "You are not obligated to return someone's feelings or try to change your own to make someone else happy."
This simple but profound truth hit Chris like a bolt of lightning and he actually gasped from the sudden cessation of the guilt he'd been feeling for so long. His partner gave him a tender, understanding smile as his worldview visibly upended itself and stroked his hair with her free hand as he let himself collapse into her, his head coming to rest in her lap and his arm wrapped around her waist.
They simply rested there in an easy silence, breathing in perfect sync, and let themselves take the time they needed to accept and adjust to not just this revelation, but everything it meant.
For both of them.
Because Jayne knew full well what had sparked Chris' understanding of his feelings for Karen . . . which explained why she hadn't heard from her friend for nearly three weeks after that day, not to mention her attitude toward Chris during the special they'd just done, though not why she had been so hostile to Jayne. She also knew why his change in perspective had come about, though she chose not to say it, because she'd come to the same realization about Phil. Her situation had been a lot more complicated due to her estranged husband's jackassery (on thinking the word, it occurred to her that she needed to cut down on the American telly she watched; their vocabulary was clearly starting to infect hers), but she hadn't let herself acknowledge the truth — that she didn't really miss him when she was gone and hadn't for some time — until after she had formally separated from him.
What she didn't know was that Chris had also realized and accepted the place that Jayne held in his life in terms of importance, which effectively ended any further attempts he might have made at romance. He would never tell her that because it would spark guilt and protest and arguments, which neither of them needed, and it wouldn't change anything. Jayne was Chris' top priority. The End. Everything and everyone would come after her, and now that he was finally allowing himself to see that it was okay to feel this way, there was a lot less guilt and shame in the thought.
When Jayne needed or wanted him, he was hers. No questions, no hesitation, no 'ifs' or 'ands' or 'buts' or 'maybes'. He belonged to Jayne first.
(he would remain oblivious to the underlying truth of this for an absurd amount of time)
He didn't yet know that Jayne felt the same way about him, that he came first for her, though she hadn't yet experienced the emotional upheaval he had or made the resulting correlation. She was honest enough to admit that had that been at the heart of Phil's issues with her relationship with Chris, she likely would have been more understanding. After all, what husband would be okay with his wife always prioritizing another man over him?
But no. No, he'd gotten tunnel vision about a nonexistent affair, which had forced Jayne to see that the underlying cause that had cemented the destruction of her marriage hadn't been a lack of trust, though that was a major factor. No, it had been a complete and total lack of respect. And from that, the entire foundation of their relationship had been twisted and deformed until it was unrecognizable.
But she wasn't ready to delve into that quite yet, so she sighed softly, stretched across her partner's body, and managed to get the record player going one-handed. In a not-quite-easy silence, they listened to the first two songs of Love over Gold again before Chris blew out a deep sigh and reluctantly sat up, raking both hands through his hair and leaving it adorably ruffled. Then he met her gaze and his eyes were so tender, so warm, that her heart actually skipped a beat.
"Will you tell me?" he asked quietly, demanding nothing . . . and not expecting anything, either. He understood all-too-well just how sensitive this was for Jayne and had no wish to hurt her. She'd feel better after talking about it, he knew, but he also knew that feeling better wasn't always worth the pain that came first.
And the pain she was suffering was too close to what he'd lived through for him to even contemplate pushing her.
It was nearly three minutes before she answered, and he actually had to bite his tongue to keep from retracting the question.
"Yes," she replied just as quietly, shifting until she was leaning against the settee and tugging on his hand until he took the hint and crawled to her, letting her pull and shift him until she had arranged them to her satisfaction, with him sitting between her knees, his back to her chest, his head settled against her left shoulder, and their clasped hands resting on his right thigh. She absently began to stroke his hair as she took a few more seconds to consider where she wanted to begin, and then decided to just start talking; any build-up would only serve to make things even more strained than they already were.
Which was why she'd chosen this position to tell him: it gave her the best chance of corralling him should he feel the need to go find Phil for the express purpose of killing him.
And God, how she wished she was joking.
But it would be impossible for him to get up without using force against her, which he would never do, so it was as safe as it was going to get to tell him the rest. They both wanted this conversation done and all of the ugly truths and revelations out in the open today. It was the only way either of them could finish healing, and it would also prevent the insidious danger of unspoken secrets. Their relationship was too strong for that to break them, but why give themselves the added — and unnecessary — stress?
"So you know how upset he was that I didn't talk to him for those two weeks," she said candidly, feeling him tense against her at both the complete lack of lead-up as well as the unpleasant memories evoked by her stark words. But he said nothing, though his fingers tightened on hers until it actually hurt. She accepted this without a qualm, knowing better than he did just how upset he was going to be by the time she was done.
"Well, when he came to meet me that night, I knew he was still mad, and while I really did need to avoid him until we got home from the tour, he deserved an explanation. And an apology," she added a little sadly, hit with another wave of grief at what he had taken from her. Chris took a deep breath through his nose but still didn't speak, and she blew out a soft sigh in return.
"He did," she insisted in answer to his unspoken disagreement. "If Jill or Karen or I had just vanished on you for days without so much as a word, would YOU have been okay with it?"
"Not really," he replied after a long, unhappy minute. "But I would have known there had to be a reason — a good reason — for it, and I wouldn't have . . . well, okay, I would have tried not to shout until I knew why."
Without meaning to, he'd just ruptured the fragile scab that had barely formed over the deep, aching wound that was the main reason her marriage was ending, and she was utterly unable to hold back a soft, pained cry. He cursed under his breath and tried to turn to face her, but she couldn't bear to see his eyes right then, so she wrapped both arms around his chest and held on for dear life while she buried her face between his shoulder blades and let his shirt absorb her tears.
"I'm sorry!" he gasped, clearly horrified that he'd hurt her, and she thought she'd never loved him more than in this moment.
"It's not you," she told him through her tears. "It's just . . . he refused to understand that. I'm not actually sure he even considered it. He . . . when I tried to explain, to apologize, he . . ."
Jayne trailed off here, suddenly acutely aware of the grenade she was about to set off but unable to prevent it now. He wouldn't let it go — well, yes, he would if she insisted, but that would only make things so much worse. So she wrapped herself around him as tightly as she could and closed her eyes.
"When I tried to explain," she began again, feeling him go rigid against her in an instinctive response to her tension, "he said . . . he said that he already knew, because I'd just gone off to screw you again."
The air in the room suddenly got so heavy, so intense, it felt like a tornado was about to fall out of the sky, and Jayne unconsciously held her breath as she waited for Chris to process that, praying that he wo—
He started to lunge to his feet and she frantically twisted herself around his body until she was on his lap, her hands gripping his wrists so tightly her fingers hurt, and her eyes anxiously seeking his. As tempting as it was to let him go, she refused to give Phil the honor of making her a widow. He didn't deserve that kind of remembrance.
"No!" she cried, tightening her knees around his thighs and pushing her face up until their foreheads were resting together. It was unbelievably uncomfortable, but it worked: he stopped trying to free himself from her tight, desperate hold, although each breath he took escaped as an actual growl¸ which simultaneously warmed her heart and worried her.
It was also the thing that so infuriated Phil; neither of them gave so much as a thought to how intimate this position was and wouldn't have cared if they had noticed.
She'd known her partner would be angry about this revelation, but this level of raw, unadulterated fury took even her by surprise. Still, he obeyed her heartfelt plea and didn't try to get up again. He was rigid against her, though, and all she could do was press herself tightly to him and keep her breathing calm and even until his heart found the rhythm of hers. After three or four very long minutes, when the worst of his rage had passed and his breathing had noticeably settled, she judged that it was safe enough to release his right wrist. Bringing her hand to his cheek, she tenderly stroked her fingers over the stubble he hadn't bothered shaving and held her breath until he closed his eyes and nuzzled into her palm, still clearly fighting for control.
Once he'd found it, he swallowed hard and leaned against the settee, shifting her back enough to see her face and staring intently into her eyes.
"Are you telling me that he didn't let you explain?" Chris said very, very gently, and Jayne went still, suddenly hoping with all her heart that Phil stayed the hell away from her until Chris had left the country. Because if he didn't, her partner would kill him in front of God and everyone, and then tell God it was an accident.
Actually, no. He'd just straight up say that Phil had it coming.
It was unfathomable how tempted she was to let him, but while it would solve several problems, it would also end up with Chris in prison, and quite frankly, Phil wasn't worth it. Not to mention, that would make it rather difficult for them to skate and work together.
So she hugged him instead, knowing he would hear her silent plea for what it was. And he did; slowly, so agonizingly slowly, he came down from his aggressive, hyper-protective state of 'Me Tarzan, you Jayne' (she had to fight down a snort of hysterical amusement at this thought; it was so accurate it hurt, but he wasn't in any state to see the humor in it, and if she started laughing, she'd break down entirely, which would only set him off again).
When his frame finally softened against hers and his emotions had settled to the much less fraught state of 'Be Jayne's Rock of Gibraltar', she released a small sigh of utter relief, albeit one that was tinged with trepidation, because she wasn't done yet. But the worst of it was out now, and there really wasn't much left. Since he'd been through something similar with Jill — the accusations of cheating, anyway — she knew she wouldn't have to tell him the thought process that had ultimately led her to deciding that divorce was the best (the only) option . . . but she really, really didn't want to tell him what had been the final straw. She would, because he deserved to know, but also because if she didn't, it would fester inside both of them. But it was going to enrage him, and she wasn't sure that she could stop him again.
No, that wasn't right. She could stop him easily. She just wasn't sure that she would.
But they weren't there yet and hopefully, she'd be able to present it in a way that wouldn't set him off, especially since they still had to retrace the steps she'd taken to get to this point. And from the now-steady heartbeat pounding reassuringly against her cheek, she thought he might be calm enough to listen.
Best to check, though. Just in case.
"Okay?" she murmured into the silence before tilting her chin so she could see his face.
"No," he replied forthrightly, his voice hoarse and his eyes red with unshed tears. "But I'll live. Go on; let's just get it over with."
God, she loved him.
"Alright," she answered, and then smiled when he gently tugged on her wrist. She complied with his silent request and shifted until she was between his legs and leaning against his chest, his arms resting over her belly, once more cocooned by a solid wall of Christopher Dean.
She couldn't remember the last time she'd felt this safe.
Or this cherished.
"Well," she began, stroking her thumbs over the backs of his hands and smiling again when he hummed appreciatively at the feeling, "once I got over hearing that, I . . . well, you can imagine how shocked I was."
"Uh-huh," he grunted in reply, exerting considerable effort to stay relaxed against her.
"Yes," she agreed. "Then he told me, after some back and forth about how could he possibly think that, that he wasn't upset about us sleeping together. It was because we hadn't been discreet about it."
She stopped there, because the air had an ominous silence that did not bode well for Phil Christensen. But to his credit, her partner kept his cool this time.
Barely.
"Really?" was all he said, his voice deceptively even. But he wasn't as upset as she'd expected, and Jayne belatedly remembered that she'd already told him some of this, so he'd had the chance to process it.
Well. Thank heaven for that.
"Really," she said as dryly as she could, for both their sakes. If she let herself get upset, he'd go crazy again, and she wasn't about to let that happen. It would be a fine line to walk, keeping things serious without letting them get too heavy, and they were both exhausted and on-edge. But he was right; it was best now to just get it over with.
"I knew then that he wouldn't believe me when I told him what happened," she explained, her eyes un-focusing as she remembered everything that had happened that day. "But I tried anyway, because I had to. I just couldn't let him think that without trying t—"
She broke off here, shocked at how upset she still was about that, but she forced herself to stillness when Chris stiffened, though he didn't say anything. Soothingly, she ran her fingers down his forearm and he relaxed against her once again, nuzzling her ear and murmuring, "Go on. Tell me."
With a deep breath drawn through her nose, she did. They were so close now to getting it all out that she could almost taste it.
But the bitter tang of Phil's final humiliation of her that day coated her tongue and she lost some of the iron control that had gotten her through this endless day. Her voice trembled when she was finally able to obey that quiet but implacable command and she knew he heard it when a soft growl rose in his throat. But still, he said nothing; he simply gathered her that much closer and waited in a patient, albeit very tenuous, silence.
"He — when he told me he was waiting for my apology, I . . . that's when I really knew . . . it — it took a few days for that to really, truly sink in," she told her partner, unconsciously sinking against him for comfort that he gladly gave her, his arms tightening again in response to her silent plea. "But that was enough to make me realize that I wanted a separation. He actually wanted me to apologize for something I hadn't done, after accusing me of . . . of cheating and then refusing to let me even explain . . . well, anything."
There was a long minute while Chris digested this.
"Well," he finally said, his voice even. "I can see why that would upset you."
For whatever reason, that made her smile. It was tiny, but there, and she responded in kind.
"Just a little," she agreed. "So I threw him out and told him I wanted a separation and that he wasn't to contact me. I'd reach out when I was able to deal with him."
"Hmm," her partner murmured. "Which he ignored."
"Which he ignored," she agreed on a sigh. "And that's what finally made me realize that I couldn't stay with him. He showed up a week later, wanting to know why I hadn't come home to see him or the kids, and when I told him — after I'd gotten over the shock of his absolute audacity — that I'd spoken to Kieran and Jess and made plans to see them, he just . . ."
She trailed off, unable to articulate what had happened next. Phil hadn't flown into a rage, but he hadn't been calm, either.
"Let me guess," Chris said sardonically, his breath hot against her hair. "He got that constipated look and demanded to know how on earth you'd managed to do something without him telling you how to do it in words of one syllable."
The sheer accuracy of his assessment made Jayne choke. How on earth did he know that?!
"I've been watching him for twenty years," was her partner's unruffled reply to her slightly-indignant question. "He's always been a bit stuck-up and it got worse once we made him our business manager. We just didn't know any differently, so it was the only normal baseline that we had."
Jayne spluttered at this, but couldn't dispute it. And Chris, when he chose to pay that much attention to the people around him, was strikingly observant; he simply didn't choose to do it very often, because it was hard for him to shut off and that wreaked havoc on his emotional creativity. She wanted to demand why he'd never said anything to her, but in the next breath, acknowledged that he couldn't have, no matter how badly he wanted to. It was the same reason she couldn't tell him her suspicions that Jill's 'unplanned' pregnancy had been very deliberate.
That thought brought her sharply back to their conversation and she suddenly needed to stop. Just for a minute. She was utterly drained and even though there was only a little bit left to tell Chris, she needed a break. She needed to curl up with her best friend and eat M&Ms while watching something mindless and undemanding, and just not think for a little while.
As always, he fell into mental lockstep with her when her breathing changed and pulled her to her feet as he stood as well, immediately drawing her back into his arms and just holding her, shielding her from the world until she felt able to face it again, and then kissing her forehead so tenderly, tears began to spill down her cheeks.
He wisely ignored this and gently urged her to the bathroom, telling her that he'd order dinner while she took a nice, hot bath — yes, Jayne, with bubbles — and she went without a word of protest. Despite what was still to come, she was safe and protected here, with Chris. As she ran her bath, that feeling swirled through her thoughts again: here, with Chris, she was safe, she was cherished, and she was loved. Here, he would never ask for more than she could give him. Here, he was hers to command, and when she recognized that, something in her settled. He was her partner and he would never deliberately hurt her. And he would never do anything she asked him not to.
Still, knowing what was coming, she couldn't help but shiver a bit in anticipation of his anger. But there was sorrow as well, because she knew that their upcoming separation — on every level — was going to devastate him. Not that it would be easier for her, but she had a much more solid support system. And, truthfully, she was considerably more emotionally stable than he was, all things told.
But they wouldn't let this break them. Her divorce would be finalized, hopefully soon, and once she was free, she would reclaim her life. And when she did, Chris would be waiting for her, his hands outstretched, as always fitting hers perfectly. She could see that so clearly, but the path that would lead her to him was clouded and murky.
And it would take a turn she could never have imagined.
