Disclaimer: I don't own anyone, nor do I own the song "Take Me With You," by Morphine, parts of which appear here; I also don't own "The Wrong Girl" by Belle & Sebastian, which appears in the summary.
Author's Note: I missed a bunch of episodes this season, including, apparently, the one where Robbie left. Where did he go? I don't know. In another story I read, he went to Texas. I like Texas; I decided to go with that.

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Texas.

Flat, wide plains stretching out on either side of the road, as far as the eye is capable of seeing and beyond.

Today Eric received a letter folded neatly inside a blue envelope with no return address and a Texas postmark.

He tucked it in his pocket and kept his mouth shut.

(you want to begin again
pretend you're innocent
if you believe, you can convince yourself
I'm sure you can convince yourself)

* * *

Lucy is going to marry Kevin.

Lucy, the baby, the girl who loves to be in love with someone new every three days, is marrying a boy who is completely wrong for her.

Completely wrong for anyone, if you ask Eric, but no one does.

Look at Lucy, Annie prods later. Doesn't she look so happy now?

She does not say: Doesn't that make you want to be happy for her, too?

He finds it difficult to agree, but he has no other choice.

He writes this on a piece of stationery. Then he folds it into a thousand tiny triangles and hides it inside his desk drawer.

Along with three small blue envelopes.

(this town never gave you much back
just rumors and a whispering attack
this town is not your friend
never mind the loose ends)

* * *

Annie has noticed that something is different.

Not just his sudden crisis of faith, his abject apathy. Not just his lack of desire to interfere in anyone else's life, or tell anyone the best way to live is to invest everything they have in a concept that is probably just something someone made up thousands of years ago to keep the hedonistic peasants in line.

She has noticed that he is different in another way now.

Being Annie, she is Taking It Personally.

You don't think I'm as attractive as I used to be, do you, she pouts. Well, tough. I'm getting old. You're getting old. This is what you signed up for: you and me, getting old together. You're not allowed to back out now.

And she's teasing, but she isn't, and he's laughing, but he isn't.

(take me with you when you go now
don't leave me alone
I can't live without you
take me with you, take me with you when you go)

* * *

She is worried about other women.

She has always been worried about other women.

He usually deflects these concerns with compliments and reassurances. But he doesn't feel like soothing her insecurity anymore. So he says nothing when she "subtly" brings it up.

He has ten blue envelopes now from somewhere in Texas from someone too cowardly to sign his name.

He has opened none of them.

(and I don't care about the things
I leave at home
'cause things can't really keep you company
when you're alone now)

* * *

It has been a long time since he has had to wait for a broken heart to mend.

College, he supposes. Pre-Annie. High school, before that. Girls who left him for bigger boys, stronger boys, nicer boys. Only a few of them left a lasting impression; that is, he only thought about a few of them for more than a week after they declared it was over.

It was always them. He never broke up with anyone.

His record remains untarnished.

But he remembers now: the heart is resilient, and it will mend itself if given time, and soon you will forget what you loved about that person, and then you will simply forget that you ever loved that person at all.

When the 13th envelope arrives, he fingers the corners for a long time before filing it away with the others.

It doesn't hurt anymore, he reasons. Why not? Why not just see what the letter says? Perhaps it isn't a letter. Perhaps it's a bill. Perhaps it's a magazine subscription reminder. Perhaps it's a letter from someone he once counseled, who has since found his or her way and is writing to thank you for your services. It doesn't have to be what you think it is.

He unfolds the single piece of notebook paper, folded in quarters, apparently ripped from a spiral notebook. This is not a bill or a magazine subscription reminder.

It is an apology. It is a request for forgiveness. It says: I didn't mean to leave without looking back. I had to leave without looking back. If I had looked back I would have stayed. If I had stayed I would have wanted more. If I had wanted more it would have broken everything. It is better that only you and I are broken now. We are stronger than the others sometimes.

It says: Since you haven't answered the other letters, I've decided to keep writing until you write back. The return address is printed neatly across the bottom of the page.

He re-folds the letter and locks the drawer.

(you want to burn your bridges?
I'll help you start the fire
you want to disappear?
I got the manual right here)

* * *

She asks what's weighing so heavily on his mind.

He almost says, "Nothing."

Then he figures, why not? And he tries again. "What do you do when you just can't forgive someone? When you can forget, but not forgive?"

Ruthie thinks for a long time. "Maybe you remember that it's not always all about you. Maybe they haven't forgiven you either."

She walks away without waiting for a response.

Sometimes he wonders if she knows his secret.

(you say you want my help?
I can't help myself
you want my help?
I can't help myself)

* * *

He wishes he could go outside one morning and drive to Texas, deliver his letter personally. He wishes he could pull the car off to one side of the highway, stop the engine, and stand in the middle of a field, listening to nothing.

He wishes it were easier to write this letter.

He wishes he didn't have to lie when he wrote: "I understand why you left. Don't worry. You don't have to be sorry. Good luck with your new life."

He wishes he had never started this whole stupid thing.

He wishes he had been the one to start it, so that he could have been the one to end it.

He wishes the one who did start it hadn't suddenly decided to end it and run away, driven by guilt and shame.

He wishes that secrets could stay secret forever.

He wishes it were easy to have the best of both worlds.

Or even just to have the best of one world.

* * *

He does not drive the car to Texas. He drives instead to the post office, deposits the letter in the proper slot, and returns home.

Somehow he had expected to feel better.

Later that evening he returns to his desk with the intention of depositing the unopened letters in the trash before he delivers the can to the curb for pickup.

Instead he finds Annie, sitting in his chair, peeling open one envelope after the other, discovering apology after apology, becoming increasingly bewildered.

She had never considered the possibility.

She pretends she still doesn't.

She says, "Why didn't you tell me he wrote us?" She does not say: Why didn't you tell me he wrote you?

He says, "I thought they were bills. I meant to throw them away."

She says, "Oh. They're not bills."

"What are they?"

"Letters. From Robbie. But you know that, don't you? I found the one you opened."

"It was the most recent one. I only opened it this morning. I meant to tell you." He is not even trying to sell this to her. This is the game they must play to get to the conclusion they both need.

She says, "Why... why would he be writing you letters? So many of them, I mean?"

He says, "I don't know. Maybe he felt guilty about leaving so quickly."

"Why not me? Why not Lucy, or even Ruthie? Or Simon? Or Kevin?" Her voice is uncharacteristically calm; she is letting him know: I will believe any answer you give me, please give me an answer I can believe.

"I don't know," he repeats mechanically.

"Okay," she agrees. She gathers the envelopes, opened and unopened, into her arms, and leaves him alone.

(you want to begin again
pretend you're innocent
if you believe, you can convince yourself,
I'm sure you can convince yourself)

* * *

The letters are gone.

He has forgiven and been forgiven.

His secret is safe.

He should feel better.

He doesn't.

Lucy says, "Please marry us."

He wants to bolt for the door, run as far as his legs and his heart will take him. He wants to find a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere, ask the pleasant couple who lives there to give him shelter for the evening. He wants to tell them his name is something that it isn't, that he has never married, that he has no children. He is a writer, he will claim, and he is taking this journey to learn. Unfortunately, his vehicle is unaware of its noble purpose, and has chosen this moment to die. The couple will welcome him warmly and ask about his project.

He will say, it is a love story set in the land of wide, flat plains and silence that rings in your ears on cold mornings and warm nights.

They will be impressed, and say: It sounds like you are telling our story.

He will smile and say: I am telling my own.

Lucy says, "Dad?"

He glances toward the door.

(take me with you when you go now
don't leave me alone)

* * *

At night he dreams restlessly of a land he has never visited and a love story he will never read again.

Annie does not curl into him when she sleeps now.

In this house, silence rings in your ears during cold mornings and colder nights. It would be so easy to leave. No one would notice until the sun rose, if then.

But he isn't wanted where he isn't and he isn't trusted where he is.

He is absolved. he is absolving. He is alone.