Breaking and Entering
________________
Will had been told he could have the next day off, so he slept in until 8:00. When he walked into Sydney's room a couple of minutes later, for a split second he was sure that his worst fear had come true. She wasn't in her bed.
Sydney was gone. Again.
However, after a moment the rational part of his brain kicked in and told him she was probably in the kitchen. She probably hadn't been able to sleep well and had left her bed early.
He found her at the table in front of a half-eaten bowl or Raisin Bran and a glass of water. Spread out on the table was that morning's L.A. Times.
"Catching up on the news?" he asked, as he walked into the kitchen. It had just occurred to him that she hadn't seen a newspaper for two years.
She looked up from the paper and grinned. "I've been up all night reading articles on the internet. In fact, I have a question for you. I just thought of it a few minutes ago."
"What?" he asked, while pouring his own bowl of Raisin Bran.
"What happened on the series finale of 'Friends'?"
Will couldn't help but laugh. Questions like this just reminded him how much Sydney had missed out on. She wouldn't just have to catch up on world events, politics, Sloane, Rambaldi, etc. She would also have to hear about all of the pop culture events from the last two years. It made sense that she was curious about a TV show that the rest of the world watched a year ago.
"I guess it was pretty good," he began. "I mean, I was never an avid 'Friends' watcher like you were, so-"
"But what happened?" she interrupted.
"Umm," he had to think about it for a second. It had been such a long time since it aired. "Ross and Rachel ended up together, that's all I-"
"Good!" she exclaimed. Will sat down at the table and in between bites of cereal they discussed 'Friends' and then moved on to other TV shows, celebrities, and sports. Sydney laughed and smiled the whole time. Will suspected that she was just putting on a mask of happiness - that she was using everything she had in her to not seem depressed. He knew that in a few hours she would most likely be miserable again. But for the time being, he didn't care. It was so wonderful just to be sitting and joking around with Sydney again. He could deal with the tears when they came.
After more than an hour she stood up. Will hadn't even noticed she was wearing an outfit to go run.
"Syd."
"Yeah," she replied as she turned around and used the wall to stretch her calves.
"Do you think you're ready to go running?" He kept thinking about what Dr. McCarthy had said: Sydney hadn't exercised in a long time.
"I have to get back in shape, Will," she answered, never taking her eyes off the wall.
"I'm just not sure it's a good idea." He wanted to talk her out of it - to have her stay there in the house where he knew she was safe. Before he had a chance to convince her not to go, though, she was at the door.
"Syd! Wait!" She turned around, obviously expecting to hear reasons she shouldn't leave. "You're not going to invite me?"
She grinned and rolled her eyes playfully. "Well go get ready then!"
Five minutes later they were jogging. Will went running several times a week and had no problems running long distances at quick speeds, but he tried to jog his slowest in order to set the pace where he knew Sydney could handle it. His efforts were futile, however; he kept having to speed up to stay next to Sydney on the sidewalk. He jogged helplessly next to her as he watched her push herself harder and harder. She kept running even as she clutched her side and gasped for oxygen. He wanted to tell her that this was far enough, that they could turn around now, but he had realized where she was leading him.
When Sydney finally doubled over and caught her breath, Will saw that he had been right. They stood in front of her old apartment.
The last time Will was there, he and Vaughn had been on a mission to retrieve Sydney's things. This time Will was on a mission with Sydney, and he was pretty sure he knew the objective. Sydney was looking for closure.
Will had heard that a married couple had moved in to the apartment once it had been cleaned out and repaired. As Will watched Sydney staring at the house, he tried to imagine how it would feel to wake up tomorrow and, among other things, find his house inhabited by complete strangers.
Sydney wiped her sweaty forehead with the back of her hand and walked to the front porch. She pushed her face against the window. "The lights are off," she declared.
Will was starting to get a bad feeling about this, "Sydney, what are you doing?"
She ignored him and walked to the garage. She jumped up and peered in one of the small windows. "They're not home," she said as she started walking around to the backyard.
"Sydney, you're not seriously thinking about going in there, are you?" Will asked, beginning to get nervous. He followed Sydney to the back of the house despite his doubts about what she was planning. "It's breaking and entering!" She was testing the windows, trying to push one open.
"It's not breaking and entering if you don't break anything. Plus, we're not going to get caught."
"And if we do?" Will already had an undeserved heroin conviction on his record. Did he really want to add to that?
"Just tell them I'm emotionally unstable. I snuck in and you followed to try and get me out." She smiled and Will relaxed a little bit.
"Ah - I got one!" She pushed the glass up. "Look," she said, as she pulled herself through the window, "you don't have to come if you really don't want to."
Will's heart was racing. No matter how innocent she looked, the fact was that Sydney was a spy. Plain and simple - she had been trained to sneak in and sneak out. Will might work with spies, but he sat behind a desk. Entering a stranger's house was not something for which he had been prepared.
"Here goes my life as a law-abiding citizen," he said to himself as he entered the house.
Her eyes were closed when he saw her. She was breathing deeply - inhaling the scent of her home. They were in a room they both knew well. The furniture was all different - a desk with a computer covered the wall where Francie's bed had been, pictures of the happy homeowners in matching silver frames adorned the walls, an entertainment center holding an old TV set rested where her bureau had once been. Yet when he closed his eyes, he could feel Francie in the room.
Sydney walked to one of the photographs. Cautiously, as if the frame were on fire, she reached forward until her fingers touched the picture. She slid her fingers down the glass, leaving streaks of sweat which she promptly wiped away. She leaned against the wall and slid down it until she was sitting on the floor.
"I just had to see it," she whispered. She put her face in her hands.
Will ignored the voice in his head that was telling him to get out of the house as quickly as he possibly could and he sat down next to Sydney.
"Can I ask you another question?" she said.
"Of course." Will thought about Sydney's earlier question about Friends. He had been correct when he had guessed her happiness was a facade. Now he could see what was behind it as she slipped back into sadness.
"Do they know when .......when she ......." Sydney couldn't finish.
Will nodded. "Based on what Sark told us, it happened the same day as the takedown of SD-6."
"So that whole time after .......she was dead?" Sydney barely even whispered the final word of her question.
Again, Will nodded. He didn't know what to say, but Sydney filled the silence by stammering out another question.
"Will. What did they tell her parents?"
*****************
Before Will left the hospital to go to his house with his sister, he had been debriefed by Kendall, Vaughn, and Jack. They told him that they hadn't found the real Francie's body and didn't expect to. Will pleaded with them not to bury Allison in Francie's grave, not to honor Allison with Francie's memory, and Kendall acquiesced. So when Will attended Francie's funeral a week later, he knew that whatever was in the closed casket was not Francie's body.
It was just one more lie in the web of lies the CIA and FBI had created and fed to the Calfos. The story they had been told was gruesome in its own right, but Will knew that this lie was better than the truth - that their little girl was shot point-blank months ago and, for reasons the Calfos would never be able to understand, no one had noticed until now.
The Calfos were told that Francie, Will, and Sydney had been the victims of a random break-in for drug money. Things turned ugly, and the burglars ended up fighting with Francie and her friends. Will had been stabbed, but survived. Sydney was in critical condition at the hospital, and no, she wasn't allowed to have any visitors. Francie had died quickly, but her body was in such a condition that it would be inappropriate to have an open casket. When her parents asked to see the body so they could say goodbye, they were shown Allison, covered in a sheet from the chin down.
As for the men responsible, they had been cornered by the police. The men opened fire on the officers and the men were shot. They were both dead. Since there was no longer any danger to the public, the Calfos were told that this wouldn't be released to the press. Since they didn't want to deal with the media circus, they were fine with that.
Of course, the story was completely false, but how else could they explain Francie's death, Will's stabbing, and Sydney's disappearance?
Will had heard that a day or two after the night Sydney vanished, an item ran in the local paper describing a 'domestic disturbance' at the apartment. The neighbors should be aware that all sorts of people would be stopping by to investigate in case one side or the other pressed charges.
And that was that. The whole mess was covered in lies, wrapped up in a little box, and given to whoever asked any questions.
************
When he finished his story, there were tears in Sydney's eyes.
"We should probably go ." she said softly. He stood up and helped Sydney up, too. Once they were safely outside and the window was shut again, they walked around front.
Sydney stopped suddenly and looked back up at the house. She stood transfixed, staring at her home. She threw her hands over her mouth, and before Will could make it to her, she was breaking down. Right there, in the middle of the strangers' small front lawn. She cried in a way Will had never seen anyone cry before. She tried furiously to wipe away her tears, to control her breathing, to regain some composure, but it was useless. She collapsed into his arms, shaking and gasping for air through her sobs.
After a few minutes and more than a few stares from neighbors walking by, Sydney had calmed down enough to walk home. She cried the entire way back, right up until she fell down on her bed and pretended to be asleep so Will would leave the room.
Looking back, Will knew that that must have been the moment that she decided how she was going to cope with the disaster that had become her life.
It would be a very long time before Sydney cried like that again.
___________________________
First of all, I just want to apologize if there are any places where it seems like there should be three dots (.) but there is only one or two. I have been having a lot of problems trying to get ellipses to upload correctly, so sorry about that.
Secondly, thanks for reading and thanks for being patient with these chapters. Once again, it's going to be another few weeks before the next chapter is up, but I promise I will post it as soon as I get a chance. Please keep reading and reviewing!!! Thanks for all the reviews I've received so far!
________________
Will had been told he could have the next day off, so he slept in until 8:00. When he walked into Sydney's room a couple of minutes later, for a split second he was sure that his worst fear had come true. She wasn't in her bed.
Sydney was gone. Again.
However, after a moment the rational part of his brain kicked in and told him she was probably in the kitchen. She probably hadn't been able to sleep well and had left her bed early.
He found her at the table in front of a half-eaten bowl or Raisin Bran and a glass of water. Spread out on the table was that morning's L.A. Times.
"Catching up on the news?" he asked, as he walked into the kitchen. It had just occurred to him that she hadn't seen a newspaper for two years.
She looked up from the paper and grinned. "I've been up all night reading articles on the internet. In fact, I have a question for you. I just thought of it a few minutes ago."
"What?" he asked, while pouring his own bowl of Raisin Bran.
"What happened on the series finale of 'Friends'?"
Will couldn't help but laugh. Questions like this just reminded him how much Sydney had missed out on. She wouldn't just have to catch up on world events, politics, Sloane, Rambaldi, etc. She would also have to hear about all of the pop culture events from the last two years. It made sense that she was curious about a TV show that the rest of the world watched a year ago.
"I guess it was pretty good," he began. "I mean, I was never an avid 'Friends' watcher like you were, so-"
"But what happened?" she interrupted.
"Umm," he had to think about it for a second. It had been such a long time since it aired. "Ross and Rachel ended up together, that's all I-"
"Good!" she exclaimed. Will sat down at the table and in between bites of cereal they discussed 'Friends' and then moved on to other TV shows, celebrities, and sports. Sydney laughed and smiled the whole time. Will suspected that she was just putting on a mask of happiness - that she was using everything she had in her to not seem depressed. He knew that in a few hours she would most likely be miserable again. But for the time being, he didn't care. It was so wonderful just to be sitting and joking around with Sydney again. He could deal with the tears when they came.
After more than an hour she stood up. Will hadn't even noticed she was wearing an outfit to go run.
"Syd."
"Yeah," she replied as she turned around and used the wall to stretch her calves.
"Do you think you're ready to go running?" He kept thinking about what Dr. McCarthy had said: Sydney hadn't exercised in a long time.
"I have to get back in shape, Will," she answered, never taking her eyes off the wall.
"I'm just not sure it's a good idea." He wanted to talk her out of it - to have her stay there in the house where he knew she was safe. Before he had a chance to convince her not to go, though, she was at the door.
"Syd! Wait!" She turned around, obviously expecting to hear reasons she shouldn't leave. "You're not going to invite me?"
She grinned and rolled her eyes playfully. "Well go get ready then!"
Five minutes later they were jogging. Will went running several times a week and had no problems running long distances at quick speeds, but he tried to jog his slowest in order to set the pace where he knew Sydney could handle it. His efforts were futile, however; he kept having to speed up to stay next to Sydney on the sidewalk. He jogged helplessly next to her as he watched her push herself harder and harder. She kept running even as she clutched her side and gasped for oxygen. He wanted to tell her that this was far enough, that they could turn around now, but he had realized where she was leading him.
When Sydney finally doubled over and caught her breath, Will saw that he had been right. They stood in front of her old apartment.
The last time Will was there, he and Vaughn had been on a mission to retrieve Sydney's things. This time Will was on a mission with Sydney, and he was pretty sure he knew the objective. Sydney was looking for closure.
Will had heard that a married couple had moved in to the apartment once it had been cleaned out and repaired. As Will watched Sydney staring at the house, he tried to imagine how it would feel to wake up tomorrow and, among other things, find his house inhabited by complete strangers.
Sydney wiped her sweaty forehead with the back of her hand and walked to the front porch. She pushed her face against the window. "The lights are off," she declared.
Will was starting to get a bad feeling about this, "Sydney, what are you doing?"
She ignored him and walked to the garage. She jumped up and peered in one of the small windows. "They're not home," she said as she started walking around to the backyard.
"Sydney, you're not seriously thinking about going in there, are you?" Will asked, beginning to get nervous. He followed Sydney to the back of the house despite his doubts about what she was planning. "It's breaking and entering!" She was testing the windows, trying to push one open.
"It's not breaking and entering if you don't break anything. Plus, we're not going to get caught."
"And if we do?" Will already had an undeserved heroin conviction on his record. Did he really want to add to that?
"Just tell them I'm emotionally unstable. I snuck in and you followed to try and get me out." She smiled and Will relaxed a little bit.
"Ah - I got one!" She pushed the glass up. "Look," she said, as she pulled herself through the window, "you don't have to come if you really don't want to."
Will's heart was racing. No matter how innocent she looked, the fact was that Sydney was a spy. Plain and simple - she had been trained to sneak in and sneak out. Will might work with spies, but he sat behind a desk. Entering a stranger's house was not something for which he had been prepared.
"Here goes my life as a law-abiding citizen," he said to himself as he entered the house.
Her eyes were closed when he saw her. She was breathing deeply - inhaling the scent of her home. They were in a room they both knew well. The furniture was all different - a desk with a computer covered the wall where Francie's bed had been, pictures of the happy homeowners in matching silver frames adorned the walls, an entertainment center holding an old TV set rested where her bureau had once been. Yet when he closed his eyes, he could feel Francie in the room.
Sydney walked to one of the photographs. Cautiously, as if the frame were on fire, she reached forward until her fingers touched the picture. She slid her fingers down the glass, leaving streaks of sweat which she promptly wiped away. She leaned against the wall and slid down it until she was sitting on the floor.
"I just had to see it," she whispered. She put her face in her hands.
Will ignored the voice in his head that was telling him to get out of the house as quickly as he possibly could and he sat down next to Sydney.
"Can I ask you another question?" she said.
"Of course." Will thought about Sydney's earlier question about Friends. He had been correct when he had guessed her happiness was a facade. Now he could see what was behind it as she slipped back into sadness.
"Do they know when .......when she ......." Sydney couldn't finish.
Will nodded. "Based on what Sark told us, it happened the same day as the takedown of SD-6."
"So that whole time after .......she was dead?" Sydney barely even whispered the final word of her question.
Again, Will nodded. He didn't know what to say, but Sydney filled the silence by stammering out another question.
"Will. What did they tell her parents?"
*****************
Before Will left the hospital to go to his house with his sister, he had been debriefed by Kendall, Vaughn, and Jack. They told him that they hadn't found the real Francie's body and didn't expect to. Will pleaded with them not to bury Allison in Francie's grave, not to honor Allison with Francie's memory, and Kendall acquiesced. So when Will attended Francie's funeral a week later, he knew that whatever was in the closed casket was not Francie's body.
It was just one more lie in the web of lies the CIA and FBI had created and fed to the Calfos. The story they had been told was gruesome in its own right, but Will knew that this lie was better than the truth - that their little girl was shot point-blank months ago and, for reasons the Calfos would never be able to understand, no one had noticed until now.
The Calfos were told that Francie, Will, and Sydney had been the victims of a random break-in for drug money. Things turned ugly, and the burglars ended up fighting with Francie and her friends. Will had been stabbed, but survived. Sydney was in critical condition at the hospital, and no, she wasn't allowed to have any visitors. Francie had died quickly, but her body was in such a condition that it would be inappropriate to have an open casket. When her parents asked to see the body so they could say goodbye, they were shown Allison, covered in a sheet from the chin down.
As for the men responsible, they had been cornered by the police. The men opened fire on the officers and the men were shot. They were both dead. Since there was no longer any danger to the public, the Calfos were told that this wouldn't be released to the press. Since they didn't want to deal with the media circus, they were fine with that.
Of course, the story was completely false, but how else could they explain Francie's death, Will's stabbing, and Sydney's disappearance?
Will had heard that a day or two after the night Sydney vanished, an item ran in the local paper describing a 'domestic disturbance' at the apartment. The neighbors should be aware that all sorts of people would be stopping by to investigate in case one side or the other pressed charges.
And that was that. The whole mess was covered in lies, wrapped up in a little box, and given to whoever asked any questions.
************
When he finished his story, there were tears in Sydney's eyes.
"We should probably go ." she said softly. He stood up and helped Sydney up, too. Once they were safely outside and the window was shut again, they walked around front.
Sydney stopped suddenly and looked back up at the house. She stood transfixed, staring at her home. She threw her hands over her mouth, and before Will could make it to her, she was breaking down. Right there, in the middle of the strangers' small front lawn. She cried in a way Will had never seen anyone cry before. She tried furiously to wipe away her tears, to control her breathing, to regain some composure, but it was useless. She collapsed into his arms, shaking and gasping for air through her sobs.
After a few minutes and more than a few stares from neighbors walking by, Sydney had calmed down enough to walk home. She cried the entire way back, right up until she fell down on her bed and pretended to be asleep so Will would leave the room.
Looking back, Will knew that that must have been the moment that she decided how she was going to cope with the disaster that had become her life.
It would be a very long time before Sydney cried like that again.
___________________________
First of all, I just want to apologize if there are any places where it seems like there should be three dots (.) but there is only one or two. I have been having a lot of problems trying to get ellipses to upload correctly, so sorry about that.
Secondly, thanks for reading and thanks for being patient with these chapters. Once again, it's going to be another few weeks before the next chapter is up, but I promise I will post it as soon as I get a chance. Please keep reading and reviewing!!! Thanks for all the reviews I've received so far!