TITLE: Through the Door (3/10)
AUTHOR: C. Midori
CATEGORY: JC/AL Angst
RATING: R for adult themes and language
SPOILERS: All of Season 8, except "Lockdown." (Crappy season finale? What crappy season finale?)
ARCHIVE: Please ask first for permission.
DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations owned by Not Me. These Other People may include, but are not limited to: NBC, Warner Bros., Michael Crichton, etc. No money is being made and no copyright infringement is intended.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: This chapter is dedicated to everyone who reviewed the Prologue and Chapter 1, making my virgin fanfic experience a wonderful one. ^_^ Colossal thanks and cotton candy to: Emma, Starfish (Kelsey), Hanna, Laura, Jane McCartney, Kate, and phoenix. It means a lot to me that each of you took the time to review, and I am tremendously humbled and flattered by your responses. Thank you, muchly! Thanks also to Neoxer and angelpixiedust for hosting. Visit The Lounge (er.neoxer.com) and Carter n' Abby (www.angelpixiedust.com)—they're both wonderful resources and well worth the visit. A cautionary note: this is where the R rating begins to kick in as I've sprinkled the chapter with Some Naughty Language. And, of course, reviews are always, always appreciated! You can review either on fanfiction.net under my pseudonym (C. Midori) or drop me an email at socksless@hotmail.com.
SUMMARY: Abby and Carter partake of the internal monologue and a good sulk. Also, some Carby fuzzies for those of you so inclined ^_-, and my first fanfic cliffhanger, ever! Whee!
CHAPTER TWO
Night Swimming
Nightswimming deserves a quiet night.
I'm not sure all these people understand.
It's not like years ago,
The fear of getting caught, of recklessness and water.
They cannot see me naked.
These things, they go away, replaced by everyday.
REM, "Nightswimming"
* * *
HEAD SPINNING, ABBY DAWDLED ALONG THE STREETS NEAR HER APARTMENT, consciousness slipping in and out of her fingers like fine grains of sand. The alcohol had hit her with a dizzying force, just like she knew it would, distancing her from her life while simultaneously giving it remarkable clarity. Crazy mom, aborted child, ex-husband, alcohol problem, med school drop out—Abby ticked off her sources of pain and self-pity and anger on her slim fingers, and laughed.
Rummaging through her pockets, a cigarette emerged and haphazardly brought to flame. Cloudy whirls of smoke spiraled in front of her as she took drag after long drag, finally flopping down onto the curbside. Sucking at the stub of a cigarette at her lips, stomach still very warm, the alcohol spread like quicksilver through her veins; meanwhile, the night was ridiculously humid and clung to her skin like dew on slicked blades of grass.
It was a beautiful night; a night that should not be wasted in her apartment. Alone. Again.
Snippets of her conversation with Susan drifted through her head. In love with Carter, Abby snorted. Right. Spent, the cigarette fell to the street, and she ground it out with a merciless heel. Blearily, then, eyes stared at wavering lines and acidic colors, and head ignored a sudden, swift kick of her heart as mouth puckered in thoughtful frown.
He's in love with you.
Impossible. Utterly, irrevocably impossible. He had made it clear that night on the bridge, when he rejected her point blank, he had made it even more abundantly clear afterwards, when he began dating Susan but never saw fit to mention it, and he had driven his point home with his friendly, but distanced, inquiry into her well-being after her beating. Never mind the long, loaded gazes, the briefest brushes of skin, the earnest, guardedly optimistic words; never her mind the thinly disguised jealousy of Luka; never mind that night outside the Lava Lounge, his glances suffused with heat, his hands warmly enclosing over hers, his looks alternately troubled and longing.
She shook her head ruefully, mouth set in a determined line, and attempted valiantly to suppress the queer, lancing ache whose reach began to spread slow and cruel through her ribcage like spilt blood blossoming against the snow. A queer, lancing ache; for those gazes, for those words, for that heat; for everything that meant nothing, certainly nothing, at all.
"Fuck," she breathed, squeezing her eyes shut. Need. A foreign tongue, in an unknown land, with all the trappings and discomfort of a narrow space. And she wasn't going to confine herself to that space again, to find herself caged by bars of her own making.
It's a bad idea, her mind slurred, it's a bad, bad idea, Abby.
She stood on the empty sidewalk and watched as the rain began to fall.
* * *
Carter shut his eyes and tried to lull himself to sleep, but the image of her body crumpling to the ground earlier that day smarted against the inside of his eyelids like a blood-red sunset long after it had sunk out of sight. In his head he saw the disbelief and fear in her round eyes, instead of her long, sloe-eyed glances; he read between the unhappy lines scarring her face. It had taken all his willpower to stop himself from gathering her close to him and smoothing those lines away.
He almost burst out laughing at the thought of giving in to those impulses.
Of course, they flirted. Often, and scandalously. But her words were cut on a sharp blade. Whetted on an element of finality. They warned him not to push his limits.
They were limits that appeared after that night by the river. A night in which he tired of waiting, and could not swallow his demand for something more than words—for grand, sweeping gestures. He had wanted more than the helpless shrug and the hopeful, tentative words that glimmered like dim lights strung on a line; he wanted what he knew, or thought, she could give.
I've been waiting for something to happen…with us.
And memory demanded entrance, rushing in like shafts of sunlight in the early morning.
…I'd rather settle for someone who isn't hung up over someone else.
You don't have to settle for anything, Carter.
Exhaling, he balled his hands into a fist, the scene ending as curtains drew shut around the memory. He stared at the ceiling painted in long blue shadows, and from outside his open window, cricket song beckoned him firmly, mercifully to sleep.
Sighing, he gave one last, drowsy look at the clock. The bright red numbers glared at him. 12:28 am. Thank god he didn't have a shift tomorrow morning, he thought, settling his head back into his pillow to sleep.
He had almost drifted off when the doorbell rang.
* * *
"Who is it?"
"It's me."
Instantly, Carter knew who it was. He knew it by the shape of her voice saying his name, the sweet and subtle nuances of her speech, the slight lilt indicating that she was…drunk. Again. He closed his eyes and touched his forehead to the door before swiftly unlocking the deadbolts and pulling at the doorknob.
"Abby," Carter said, swinging the door open. "I was just thinking about you."
"And here I am," Abby cocked her head, a slow smile spreading across her face. "Random chaos theory in action. Can I come in?"
He hesitated.
"Or will Gamma not approve?"
"She's not here," he replied, unsure as to how to proceed. Torn between the impulse to chastise her and the impulse to gather her close to him, he settled for stalling. "She's out. Visiting some friends."
"Then she won't mind if I come in," Abby laughed, hair falling in her face like rain. "Or you could come out here. It's nice out. Warm. Balmy. Showers, on again and off again.
"Kind of like us," he smiled, wearily.
Is there an "us"?
She looked away, nonchalant, and slid her hands into her pockets. "It's nice out," she repeated.
Carter stared at her, his t-shirt sticking uncomfortably to his back. "I can't." He fought the urge to be overwhelmed by her small, whirlwind figure.
Abby crossed her arms, looking mildly petulant. "Why the hell not?"
Like I said, it's complicated.
"I just don't feel up to it," he replied truthfully.
"Oh, come on," she rolled her eyes, interpreting his silence for surrender. She grabbed his hand, pulling him out of his thoughts. "Come on, Carter," she repeated.
Carter felt his resolve give way when she touched him, their hands entangled so tightly that he couldn't tell where he ended and she began. Light-headed, he let her drag him to the backyard where they plunked down on a dewy spot on the lawn. "We shouldn't be doing this," he protested half-heartedly, only marginally aware of what he was saying.
"What are we doing?" Abby said, in the hushed, sensual cadences of a dream-walker. Her words were slurred slightly as she collapsed against him, still holding on to his hand. She continued, "Oh wait, let me. We're resting because I still have to recover from hopping your fence."
"You hopped my fence?" he snickered, letting her head fall on his shoulder and forcing himself to take deep breaths. "You could've just rang the doorbell, you know."
"Too predictable."
He felt her breath warm on his neck, the smell of alcohol in her hair. Turning his gaze upward, he watched the stars twinkle in synch with the dull pounding in his head. Midnight stretched across the expanse of sky, a dark canvas upon which stars blossomed and a moon made no entrance. It impressed upon him a feeling of weightlessness, and he felt his body relax.
"You're drunk," he stated, matter-of-fact.
"Talk about predictable. Thank you, Captain Obvious," she snorted, lifting her head. He instantly missed her warmth. Hands slipped out of his to reach for a cigarette. "You don't mind, do you?" she asked archly, a cigarette dangling from her mouth.
"No, go ahead."
Abby gave him a small mock salute, lighting the cigarette and taking a long drag. "You're awfully quiet tonight. Are you okay?"
Carter shrugged, his eyes following the curve of her shoulder, where it disappeared into the shadows lighting her back. He tossed several answers back and forth in his mind, before settling on a very safe "I'm fine."
"Fine!" Abby chuckled. She flicked her cigarette, sprinkling ashes that were soon swallowed up by the shadows. "You've barely said three words to me the whole time."
He cleared his throat. "I didn't know we were counting."
"Well now you do. The more you know…"
"Ignorance is bliss, you know."
"Yeah, but knowledge is fundamental," Abby cheerfully retorted.
"I think that's reading, Abby." Carter smiled at her, and their knees brushed together.
"Knowledge is reading?"
"No, reading is fundamental."
"So what does that make knowledge?" Abby sucked on her cigarette, ribbons of smoke snaking around her wrist.
Abruptly, Carter changed the subject. "Why are you here?"
"Locked out of my apartment," she answered, her tone light.
"Locked out?" he echoed.
"And I thought, I've already imposed on Luka …"
"Luka?"
"What are you, my echo?"
"Wanna play shadow?" he grinned.
"I just might have to kill you," Abby laughed.
Carter shrugged, his shoulder brushing against hers. "So," he began carefully. "Locked out."
"That's my story, and I'm sticking to it," she declared.
"And you came to me?"
"Well, I wanted to see you."
"Even though—what did you say?" Startled, Carter stared at her intently. A slight breeze picked up, tickling the small hairs on the back of his neck, goose-pimpling his skin. "You did?"
Abby paused, and turned toward him, eyes half-lidded and drowsy, the soft corners of her mouth curving upwards in a delicious smile. Her cigarette lay forgotten on the grass, put out by the dew. "Yeah. Yeah, I guess I did."
"Oh."
"Is that a pleased 'oh' or a get-the-hell-off-my-property 'oh'?"
"It's, ah, it's a surprised 'oh'," he managed to say, blinking rapidly. He stared down at the grass, the heat rising in his cheeks.
Curious, Abby looked at him. In one purposive, fluid motion, she touched his face lightly, and Carter let her. The lines of her profile blurring, the colors of her pretty face churning, changing as the color of the ocean changes to reflect the sky, she was changing as the foggy pieces of his memory fell into place. To another time, another moment like this, in which he could feel her breath hot against his cheek, a breath steeped in naked honesty, in undeniable need, in alcohol.
"Are you okay?" She searched his gaze; her eyes were wide and very luminous, and very dark.
Carter blinked, a knot in his stomach twisting. Mouth dry, he almost laughed at the irony of the situation: how this acute feeling of rightness began to bleed and diffuse through the obvious wrongness of the situation. She's drunk, he reminded himself. She doesn't want you. Not like this. She's drunk. Be her friend. Just…be her friend.
"Hey," she said softly, interrupting his thoughts, her voice thick with emotion. Hesitantly, she rubbed small circles along his jaw with her thumb; slowly, sensuously, like lovers between the sheets, and almost sighed to feel the rough sandpapery feel of his cheek cupped in her hand. "What's wrong?"
Be her friend. Just be her friend. "Abby," he began, just as softly, his voice rimmed with silver, gleaming like a star yawning in the inky night sky, "I don't think this is a good idea. You here, and me…" he trailed off, and cleared his throat. "I mean, you're drunk."
Abby leaned into his warmth, the pressure of her hands on his face slackening and her lips parting. "Carter?" she whispered, her voice husky. Her breath rustled like silk against his face, hot and petal-soft.
"Yeah?" he whispered back. His heart thudded painfully in his chest.
"I'm not drunk anymore."
Their heads bowed together, as if in prayer, and Abby closed her eyes.
* * *
CREDITS: The title of the chapter is taken from REM's lovely song "Nightswimming," which can be found off their album Automatic for the People. Some lines of dialogue were lifted from Season Eight's "Supplies and Demands" and The Episode That Shall Remain Unnamed (at least until I can figure out where the lines came from!) in order to serve flashback purposes.