Author's Note: This fic contains SPOILERS for 10.10. So don't read if you're spoiler free. (if you need to know what in this fic is a real spoiler and what's not, then read the author's note at the end) Also, for the record, this is a STAND-ALONE. That means I won't be writing anymore, no matter how much I'm begged, because I think it's fine just as it is, and I'd probably take it too far if I continued.
Anyway, this is pretty much how I'd like the whole Kem storyline to go. :) One Can Only Hope, huh? Please let me know what you think, I thrive off feedback.
Jo xx
***
Susan reluctantly hauled herself off the couch as the phone rang. Who dared to ring her in the middle of Fear Factor? She grabbed the phone off the hook, and tried to make sure she didn't sound too annoyed, before answering. "Hello?"
"Hey Susan." Carter? She sighed angrily. What was he doing ringing her? How could he even have the nerve, after everything… "Susan?"
"Oh, hi."
"You okay?"
"Yup."
"Right. Well, I was wondering if we could go grab coffee sometime." The cheek of it! After everything he'd done to Abby, he still expected her to just go out for coffee with him like nothing had changed?
"I don't know Carter. I'm not sure I can be your friend anymore." She knew the words were harsh. She knew she shouldn't say them. She knew she normally tried to be rational and friendly, even when she didn't like people. But these were exceptional circumstances.
"Susan…" He sounded hurt, and she felt a sudden pang of guilt. Whatever he'd done, he was still once one of her best friends. She didn't know what to say now, how to rectify the situation. "I'm sorry Susan, I…I just really need a friend to talk to right now."
"Won't Kem do?" She closed her eyes and sighed. So much for feeling guilty about being rude to him.
"I know you probably don't want to hear from me right now, Susan. And I completely understand that. You have every reason to hate me." Now he sounded desperate, desperate for her just to listen. "And you can hate me however much you want, just…just have coffee, and hear me out."
"Okay," she agreed reluctantly. "When's good for you?"
"Err…now would be good." Now? Great, so much for a quiet evening in with only Joe Rogan for company!
"Okay. How about 15 minutes at the diner down my street?"
"Sure. And Susan?"
"Yeah?"
"Thank you."
***
Twenty minutes later, Susan rushed into the diner. How could she be late when it was only as the end of her street? She rolled her eyes at her own tardiness, before looking around and spotting him sitting at a booth. She approached him cautiously, not sure what she was going to say to him.
"Hi." He looked up at her, and smiled sadly.
"Hey. Take a seat." Returning the smile, she sat down opposite him. "Err, you want a coffee?"
"Yeah, please." He nodded, and called over a waitress, ordering two coffees.
"So…how have you been?" he ventured after a moment of awkward silence.
"Okay. Good, actually."
"I saw you with Chuck the other week, so…" She laughed, and was surprised to find it was a friendly laugh, and not awkward.
"Yeah, we're kind of an item."
"Ex husband, huh? Interesting one." They shared a grin, just they waitress brought them their coffees.
"What about you then?" Susan asked, deciding she would try to be friendly.
"Yeah, okay I guess." He shrugged, and she sensed there was something playing on his mind.
"Okay? You guess? Aren't you going to tell me all about Africa and what you got up to there?"
"There's not much to tell." Once again he shrugged. "There were people. Lots of sick people. Not many drugs, nothing that would do any good on half the diseases there. We just did the best we could. Vaccinated massive groups of kids. Probably saved a few hundred lives just through that. There's not really much else to tell, to be honest."
"There's not?" She raised an eyebrow. "What about…err…social interactions?"
"You know, you're running around all day saving lives, helping people who you can't really help in any way that you'd like to be able to, you don't really have much time for social interactions. Sometimes we had a drink together in the evening, but that was if we got anything to drink, and it didn't last long. The most efficient use of power was to go to bed once it got dark."
"Oh right." Should she mention Kem? There didn't seem to be any other way of getting him to tell her about it, but she wasn't sure she wanted to hear about his torrid love affair in the jungle. "You know Abby went back to med school?"
"Yup." He nodded, and Susan could have sworn he looked slightly proud.
"She's good, you know. She'll be a great doctor. Put a few of us in our place, I think." Susan grinned. "And she's coping really well, you know with the studying and everything else…"
"Okay Susan, stop it," he demanded, partly angry and partly something else she couldn't quite put her finger on. Maybe sadness?
"What?"
"Stop with the whole Abby routine. Just cut to the chase and ask what I know you're thinking."
"What am I thinking?"
"You want to ask about Kem. But you don't dare bring it up, because you're worried you'll get mad at me. In fact, you already are mad at me. Because not only did I hurt Abby by breaking up with her in that letter, I hurt her by bringing a pregnant girlfriend back. You're thinking I didn't wait a second after getting rid of Abby before jumping into bed with some African woman. You're thinking I'm some low life scum who you don't want to know, and wish you'd never even talked to."
"Carter…" She wasn't sure what to say. Truth was, he'd pretty much hit the nail on the head. And yet it was so hard to be mad at him. He looked like he was about to cry, and that was something that scared her. What was wrong?
"Don't try to apologise or deny it Susan, I know that's what you're thinking. It's what everyone's thinking." He put his head in his hands, and sighed angrily. After a moment he looked back up, tears in his eyes. "I've been stupid, Susan. So, so stupid."
What should she say to that? All she could do was reach across and place a comforting hand on his arm. "You want to talk about?" He nodded, breathing in deeply.
"I let the best thing that ever happened to me go. In fact, I forced it away. Forced her away. I don't even know why I did that. I knew when I was in Africa that I'd been stupid, that I wanted and needed her back. And then I came back, and…I just saw her coping and looking good and I didn't know how to explain to her. I didn't know what to say or do, so I just avoided the subject. And I knew everyone would want an explanation, so I avoided talking to anyone about anything. I'd come back, I had Kem, she was pregnant. That was all that mattered. I don't know what I thought people would think. I was pretty to naïve to think they wouldn't think what everyone has thought. Somehow I just thought that people would realise the baby wasn't mine."
"It's not yours?" Susan was shocked. All the horrible things she'd thought and said about Carter in the days since his return came flooding back to her. How had she jumped to conclusions so quickly about one of her best friends?
"No." He shook his head sadly. "See, everyone jumped to conclusions. I never even slept with her. But I…I couldn't bring myself to explain. I didn't know how to. I thought it would be easier just to leave it how it was, let everyone believe what they wanted to believe. But I was too caught up in making things easier for myself that I didn't even think about Abby, the most important person in all of this. I hurt her even more, didn't I?"
"Yeah." Susan wished she could say something to make him feel better, but it didn't seem like there was anything to say. "So…err, who's Kem then?"
"She's from the Congo, she was helping us out with aid work. I guess you could say she's the closest some of the remote areas had to a resident doctor, without Alliance d'Medicine Internationale. After we sent Luka on the plane back home, I went back to clinic in Kisangani, and I met Kem and her husband Henri. They were good people, we became friends. But then a few weeks ago Henri went with a few other people up to Kinshasa to get some supplies we needed. They got caught up in some fighting on the way back…"
***
"…And he was killed," Susan explained to Abby as they sat drinking coffee. "Kem was already a couple of months pregnant, and then she started to show signs of the early stages of malaria. Carter knew she and her baby wouldn't have a chance in the Congo, so he flew her back to America with him."
"But she was fine when I met her."
"They were in Atlanta for three weeks, while she was treated. Then they flew back to Chicago."
"Why didn't he call me from Atlanta?" Abby wasn't sure whether to be angry that he hadn't told her, or relieved that he wasn't having a kid with this Kem woman. "Why didn't he tell me who she really was? Why did he let everyone believe it was his kid?"
"Slow down, Abby." Susan held up a hand to emphasise her point. "He didn't mean any of this to be like it was. Why would he have a reason to call you from Atlanta if you guys were over? And, he never said it was his kid. Everyone just jumped to conclusions. He told me he didn't know how to explain the whole story. He couldn't exactly re-tell the story of Henri's death in front of the dead man's pregnant widow, could he?"
"No, but he could have told me when she wasn't around!" she demanded, deciding for the moment upon the 'being angry' option. "He could have told someone."
"He did. He told me last night." Abby rolled her eyes.
"That's not what I meant…"
"He sounded really sincere Abby. He was absolutely distraught, he told me he'd done something really stupid."
"What was that?"
"He told me he let you go. And not only that, but he pushed you away and hurt you. My goodness Abby, you should have seen the pained look on his face when he was trying to explain what he'd done to me. It was like he'd betrayed you, and himself, and everything that was meant to be in the world. Because you guys are meant to be." Abby stared down into her coffee mug, unsure what to say now. She certainly wasn't angry anymore. How could you be mad at someone who had said something like that?
"Did he really say it like that?" Susan nodded.
"He's still madly in love with you Abby."
***
Abby stood at the door, her hand hovering over the doorbell. To press, or not to press. She had to do this, if she turned around and walked away she would probably regret it forever more. Closing her eyes as if to stop herself seeing the deed being done, she reached out and pressed the doorbell firmly. She let out a long breath, before opening her eyes again and watching the dark wood of the door intently. After a few moments she heard the sound of footsteps, followed by the door opening in front of her to reveal Kem.
"Oh, hello Abby!" she greeted her warmly, with a smile. Abby returned the smile, sorry that she'd ever bitched about this woman.
"Hi, is Carter around?"
"Sure, I'll just get him, come in." She stepped aside and allowed Abby through the door, shutting it behind them. "Just a moment." She wandered off down a hallway into the depths of the mansion, in search of Carter. "John!" Abby could hear her calling in her slight French accent. "Abby's here."
Eventually Carter appeared in front of her, looking more nervous than she'd ever seen him. "Hi."
"Hey." She gave him a slight smile, hoping to reassure him, but it only seemed to make him look more worried.
"Abby, I can explain everything," he said hurriedly before she could speak. "Kem, the baby, everything, it's…"
"I know."
"What?"
"I talked to Susan. She told me all about your chat."
"And?" He still looked nervous, like he wasn't sure what her reaction to the revelations of the conversation had been.
"I can't believe you didn't tell me." She smiled, and shrugged. "But I'm so glad you didn't sleep with Kem that I can't be angry at you for not explaining."
"You're glad?" His eyes lit up.
"Yeah…I mean, shouldn't I be glad?"
"Of course you should. I just thought you'd hate me now, I completely screwed up."
"I thought I did for a while, but…well, I didn't like you but that couldn't stop me loving you."
***
Author's Note II: Okay, so regarding spoilers. Yes, it's a real spoiler that Carter comes back with a woman called Kem, who's pregnant. No, it's not a real spoiler that it's not his baby. We don't know. I personally believe it's not, but a lot of people (and they're the majority) think it is. So think what you will! ;) Thanks for reading, don't forget to hit that little review button. :) Jo xx