Bad day, anyone?

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Her tears were not just for show. In fact, her tears had run out before he even arrived, but still she sniffled and sobbed, cried and keened, heedless of anything but her pain. The beauty that surrounded her had no affect on her anguish, eased no manner of her suffering.

She looked terrible, her eyes swollen beyond merely puffy, sand stuck to the traces of saltwater on her cheeks. She lay on her back in the sand, arms clenching legs close to chest, head flung back and staring at the uncaring sky. She rocked back and forth with the pain of each sob that was torn from her body. Her voice was raw, the tenor of her sobbing edged with an ache that made him think that her heart had broken.

What had gone on in her apartment? It was almost frightening to see her like this. She was always so cool, so calm, so collected. She was never afraid, never angry, and certainly never so vocal with her feelings as she was being now. Mark stood near one of the spires and wondered what he was supposed to do. He had a feeling that she had no clue he was here, and wasn't sure that he was meant to intrude on her grief.

Grief. That was only one of the emotions that filled the air and made it hard for him to breathe. Loneliness. Self-doubt. Betrayal. Guilt. Depression. Hurt. Jealousy. The negative emotions battered at him, assaulted him, dragged him down to share the pain that she could not suppress.

Before he could think, before he could talk himself out of his reaction, he was moving across the last bit of distance that separated them. He sank to the sand next to her and reached out a gentle hand to stroke the hair out of her eyes. He could offer her little comfort, but to deny her even that small amount would surely be a torture that she didn't deserve. The last of his barriers that her revelation as a plant had erected were washed away with these tears. She was too raw, too human for him to pretend that she was anything so other as to be incomprehensible.

If he had expected something to change with that touch, for her to notice his presence, he would have been mistaken. But he had not; it was merely what little he could do on the outskirts of her agony. She still sobbed, even with his hand stroking her hair. All that changed was the angle of her head, turned ever so slightly away from him so that her eyes stared sightlessly towards the horizon, instead of towards the sky. Even heedless of his presence, she couldn't bear to share her tears.

What did happen was that the emotions that had assailed him increased tenfold. If they had seemed unbearable when he was one hundred feet away, being in this close of contact with her they nearly suffocated him. Tears trickled down his cheeks, substitute for the tears she had run out of.

Time passed surreally, unheeded. Pain bound them together, regardless of whose it might properly be. As the minutes passed, as the tears fell, they moved closer together, sharing the misery the only way they knew how, taking what solace they could in the touch of another. At some point Anne was crying with her head on Mark's lap, and in the end she was soaking his shoulder with tears that had welled up from some source deep inside her.

It was rather obvious when Anne realized that he was there. Without warning, without gradation, the feelings that had been assaulting him were gone. Not lessened, not abated, but disappeared as completely as if he had never felt them. The only clues left to him were the pains that sobbing had left in his body, but of the ones that had assailed his heart, there was nothing.

She pulled away from him at the same time, wiping at her cheeks with the edges of her sleeves, smearing the traces all over, rubbing the sand into her skin. Her head was turned slightly to one side, her eyes unable to even look at him.

"Sorry," she mouthed, her voice unable to supply the words. She rolled away and towards the pool of water, half-crawling until she was close enough to put her head in and drink.

"What was that?" he croaked, following her and following her example. "What happened? What is this place?"

She answered the easiest question. "This place is my home."

"You live here?"

"I would love to live here. It's my garden, my paradise. My refuge." She swallowed hard and didn't meet his eyes.

"But… how did you find it?"

"I didn't find it. I made it."

"From what?"

"Seeds. The pool of water was here in the beginning, but the rest of the place is my work. And the work of the plants that grew here. Life is a powerful force, and they wanted to live."

"It's… amazing."

"It's a hobby," she replied, shrugging dismissively before sighing and staring at the surface of the pool.

"What happened?" he asked again.

"I'm sorry," she said obliquely.

"Sorry for what?"

"I thought I was alone. That's why I came out here, so I could be alone and not make anyone else unhappy just because I was. That's one of the downsides to being an empath, you know? Always have to be careful to keep your emotions controlled, especially negative ones, or you'll affect others. And it's not fair to make other people feel bad because I'm not having a good day."

"That… that was more than not just having a bad day. What happened? Why did you leave work without me?"

"I had some questions I needed to ask, about Knives, and Ace, and… me." She swallowed hard. "I was told that there was no place for me." Her voice stayed carefully neutral, but even Mark could sense the pain that lay beneath them.