Title: After All
Author: Lauren / Running Up Fawn
Rating: Mild PG-13
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, and I sto—ahem, borrowed, the title from Oasis's "Wonderwall."
Author's Note: Christmas Eve, just because. To Maple Street, hands down the best forum in existence. Thank you for everything.
*
When you can't breathe..
Samantha caught a quick glimpse of the blue sign on the side of a bus as it flew past her on the darkened, slush covered street, and she whipped her head over her shoulder to catch the final words.
When you can't breathe, nothing else matters.
It was an advertisement for a new form of asthma treatment, Samantha managed to make out, but as she turned back around into a sudden, strong gust of wind that robbed her of air for a few long seconds, she figured it was true for everyone, asthma or not.
Her cheeks were stinging with the cold when she entered the near silent lobby, still in the late evening hours, partly because of the time and partly because it was December twenty-fourth. Christmas Eve.
The guards didn't look twice when Samantha walked into the FBI building, though, because they'd come to expect her.
Instead of dinner with family or a party with friends, Samantha's eve of Christmas tradition found her right where she was, seated at her desk in the deserted unit, a year's worth of unsolved files spread out in front of her.
Oh, she knew she wasn't here to save them. Samantha had stopped believing in Christmas miracles before she'd even been ten years old, when her days had been spent in shadows and one night she saw the reflection from the lights on her family's scrawny tree flicker out for good in her mother's quiet eyes.
So her fingers weren't trailing over the names she'd managed to push aside for a time in hope of some divine revelation or even an absolution; she touched the names and remembered the faces just in case, on this night that for some was so full of warmth and spirit and a glow that was almost tangible in its brilliance, just in case no one else was touching and remembering those who hadn't come home.
It may have been silly, Samantha admitted quietly to herself, a silly, empty, meaningless gesture, but it was hers and somehow, she always allowed herself to put the names to rest afterward.
A few long minutes passed, and the stillness of the unit was shattered by the startling, shrill ring of her cell phone.
Fumbling for it, Samantha opened the phone, leaning back in her chair to answer.
"Hello?" Off duty, off the clock, she didn't feel the need to introduce herself as Agent Spade and she didn't bother masking the note of confusion in her voice. Phone calls had never been part of the tradition.
"Hey."
No introduction was necessary; she would know that voice and the feelings it carried along with it anywhere, but it was so out of place tonight that she had to make sure.
"Jack?"
"Sam." He sounded tired, resigned, and not at all like a man who was supposed to be spending Christmas Eve with his family.
Or maybe, she reflected, he sounded exactly like a man who was supposed to be spending Christmas Eve with his family.
"Are you okay? Where are you, Jack?" Samantha couldn't stop herself from asking.
"Right here. I'm right here," he answered, and she realized just how close he sounded.
A shifting of her position enabled her to glance over the top of her cubicle and into the dim yet occupied office of Jack Malone.
"Jack.." she didn't know whether to laugh or worry, and she wondered how she hadn't noticed his presence earlier. He sat behind his desk, phone in hand, gazing with a kind of dazed expression on his face in her general area.
"Are you okay?" Samantha asked again, unsure of what else there was to say. "Why..why are you calling me from twenty feet away?"
"I don't know," Jack answered honestly. "I just..I wanted to hear your voice, but I didn't want to disturb you."
Seeing that Jack was making no move to hang up the phone and continue the conversation face to face, Samantha settled back in her chair, her eyes landing on the files still spread in front of her, but she couldn't focus on them, not anymore. Words swam on the pages and all she could imagine was Jack, right here, right now, probably running a tired hand over his face as he wearily cradled the phone in his other hand and those dark eyes, usually so piercing, as unfocused and desperate as his raspy, tortured voice.
"Okay," was her eventual reply, though she wasn't sure if anything was okay at all.
"I didn't think you'd be here," Jack continued. "It's Christmas Eve," he informed her.
"I know," Samantha said. "That's why I'm here."
He didn't ask and she didn't elaborate, because the understanding between them was still there, and explanations were unnecessary.
"I didn't know hanging out at work was a part of your Christmas Eve plans," she commented, attempting to affect a casual tone.
"It's not," Jack replied, his voice low, hoarse. "At least, it wasn't supposed to be."
"So why are you here?" As long as they were being honest with each other, Samantha figured, she might as well find out why her tradition was being so drastically disrupted.
"This chair," he answered, and it was so nonsensical that for a moment Samantha thought she'd heard him wrong. "I wanted to sit in it because it's comfortable and mine and it's home and Sam, none of the chairs at home feel that way."
He was rambling and they both knew Jack wasn't here for his chair.
"I can't miss her at home, especially not tonight," Jack finally said quietly. "I can't sit in a chair and miss her because it doesn't feel right, it feels selfish and stupid and so I came here because I can miss her when I'm alone and it's okay."
Oh, Jack.
Samantha closed her eyes, trailed her fingers again over the files as if somehow, they held the answer to a world of pain and confusion.
"Your mom," she spoke gently after a moment, because he had called her and that alone was enough to let her know that even if he didn't think so, he needed to talk. "Do you miss her most at Christmas?"
The absolute silence that followed her question was stifling, and Samantha was seconds away from throwing the phone down and walking to Jack's office when she heard his voice crackle through the line.
"No," came his strained response. "No. I miss her when we bring a mother home to her kids, I miss her when I see those damn Nicorette commercials..she tried so hard to quit smoking, Sam, God, she tried..and I miss her when I see yellow cars. She always wanted a yellow car and I used to ask her why. 'Bright like you, Jack.' That's what she'd tell me."
His voice was so hollow..so hollow, it held a death grip on her heart and for a moment she couldn't breathe.
When you can't breathe..
"But most at Christmas?" Jack continued in the same defeated, empty tone, "No. It just feels that way because at Christmas she's not the only one I miss."
..nothing else matters.
Families. So many families they saw torn apart, so many they saw try to fit the broken pieces back together, so many with cracks too deep to fix and it was this time that was so warm for some that could be so bitterly cold for others.
Samantha knew this with perfect certainty because the names staring back at her haunted her in their quiet, hidden places, and she broke too when she remembered them and missed them and her heart felt as empty now as Jack sounded.
"I miss you at Christmas," came the whisper through the other line, Jack's voice hitching on a ragged, uneven breath, and her eyes slipped shut because there was nothing, not the brilliant lights in the city at Christmas or the serenity of the darkened unit, nothing she could see that would ever compare to the bitter sweetness of his honest tone and the words that filled the emptiness so completely she thought for sure she'd burst.
"God, Sam, it's beautiful..the lights and the peace and the happiness and then I wonder, I always wonder how it can possibly be so damn beautiful when you're not there, and it can't. It can't."
The room lit only by the sparkling lights woven around the tree (and he didn't know how they'd gotten there in the first place, because he hadn't put them up and one day they'd just appeared, so Jack figured Maria had gotten tired of waiting for him to find the time to decorate and had just done it herself), unwrapped presents and shining paper scattered all over the floor, but it wasn't messy, it looked comfortable and relaxed and for a moment Jack just stood, allowing himself to pretend everything was as normal and perfect as the scene in front of him.
But it wasn't, it couldn't be, because he found himself imagining her in the dim afterglow of Christmas, saw the quiet lights dancing across the angles and planes of her face and catching the blonde of her hair, and before he knew it his hand was on the receiver and all he wanted before Christmas ended was to hear the music of her voice.
He wouldn't call her and he knew it, not tonight, but he held the phone for a moment longer and even though he'd seen her the day before and would see her again in a few short hours, standing in the remains of his Christmas he missed her so deeply he couldn't breathe.
"I never saw you on Christmas," Jack continued. "So I miss her and I miss you, and here was the only place I could think of to miss you both."
It was several moments before Samantha could steady her voice enough to speak. "I can't give her back to you, Jack," she whispered, gripping the phone against her ear. "I can't give her to you and I'm so sorry. But you don't have to miss me," she promised. "You don't have to miss me because Jack, it's Christmas and I'm right here."
"I know. You're here saving me," he told her, with the innocence of a sixteen year old boy whose life hadn't yet been shattered, an innocence as delicate and precious as a glass Christmas ball, an innocence she wanted to cradle and protect with everything she had, because it had just been put back together and it was saving her too.
"It's not supposed to be this way, Sam, it's not. I miss you everyday, like you're some case I can't seem to solve and that's not fair to you or me or anyone, but it won't go away."
Samantha didn't want to hear the words, she wanted to pretend everything between them was as perfect as it could be and they weren't holding this bizarre phone conversation twenty feet away from each other, didn't want to face what Jack was saying and what she knew was true.
She wanted to be over him or with him, and she couldn't be either, not even on the night when wishes were supposed to come true.
"So where does that leave us? Where are we now, Jack?" and though each haunted, whispered word was a sharp twist in her gut, she said them anyway.
"I don't know. I know I'm supposed to be at home with my wife and children right now and instead I'm here with you. I know I wouldn't want to be anywhere else because after everything, Sam, after everything you're the one who's saving me."
Don't tell me that, Samantha wanted to scream, Jesus, Jack, don't say that, because if you do how am I supposed to ever let you go?
So she didn't utter a word, just clung to the phone and the bleeding pieces of her heart and his glass Christmas ball innocence and the fragmented hope she thought she'd long abandoned.
"Jack," she finally managed, and somehow, his name on her lips was a familiar comfort. "I don't know what to do."
"Neither do I," came his quiet admittance. "I don't know what to do about anything anymore."
Her watch chose that moment to beep, and, glancing at it, she couldn't help the wry grin that shaped her lips.
"It's Christmas," she told him.
Nothing, then a small chuckle. "I guess it is," he replied. "Merry Christmas, Sam."
In response, Samantha closed her phone, tossed it on the desk and stood all in one motion. He was just twenty feet away and yet the walk from her cubicle to his office was the longest she'd ever experienced, and his gaze never faltered, never left hers until she thought for sure she would drown in his pain, his passion, his hope.
He'smarriedhehastwolittlegirlshesaidit'soverit'soverit'sover..
But she was only three strides from him now, and she couldn't breathe and nothing else mattered except the firm feel of his body against hers and his breath on her face and finally, finally, his lips closed the distance and brushed hers for a second or a lifetime, and he was everywhere and nothing, nothing had ever mattered like this did.
It was Samantha who pulled back from the kiss, drew a deep, ragged breath and forced herself to look into his eyes, bracing her shattered heart for the impact of any sign of regret or guilt, but in the darkness she saw only light, the light that had been missing for so long.
Jack's warm hand covered her chilled cheek, and she allowed her eyes to flutter shut before reaching up and tangling her slender fingers with his.
For a long moment, they didn't speak, just breathed and reacquainted themselves with the feel and scent and nearness of each other, and even though they still didn't have any answers, neither had quite so many questions.
Jack's crooked grin broke through the overwhelming intensity, and he squeezed her hand gently.
"We should go," she inferred with a slight nod.
"I have to, uh.."
"Get home. I know," Samantha told him, offering a quiet smile. "I know."
They left the office and walked down the silent hallway together, their hands no longer intwined but still touching. Passing her cubicle, Samantha allowed herself a final glance at the names spread across her desk and maybe, she thought, maybe letting them go isn't the same as giving up hope. The thought warmed her as completely as Jack's presence at her side.
"I bet it's snowing," Samantha informed Jack after stepping into the elevator, and he raised an eyebrow in her direction.
"How do you know that?" He asked, question accented with a slight, playful quirk of the lips as he rested against the elevator wall and regarded her mildly.
"My leg hurts," she said, watching concern and alarm cross his face and fade to bemusement when he registered her teasing smile.
"I thought that only worked for broken bones," Jack commented off-handily.
"Or maybe I looked out the window before we left," Samantha admitted, the grin spreading to her eyes for the first time in too long, and Jack noted the dim lighting in the elevator was almost identical to the dim lights of his Christmas tree.
In it, she looked beautiful. Like she always did and like he always knew she would.
The doors opened, and Jack started to exit.
"Aren't you coming? I'll walk you to a cab," he told her, slight concern creasing his features.
"I forgot my phone," she said reluctantly. "Go on. I'll see you tomorrow."
The warm pressure he applied to her hand let her know leaving was the last thing he wanted to do, but he nodded.
"Okay. Be careful, Sam."
She wanted so much to touch his face, his lips, anything, but she settled for squeezing his hand in return.
"Merry Christmas, Jack."
As the doors began to slide shut he held up his fingers in a silent goodbye, and Samantha filed the image away in her mind as the elevator closed and took her back upstairs, back to her old tradition and the emptiness that wasn't quite so vacant anymore.
She picked up her phone and slipped it into her pocket, before making her way to the glass window of the unit.
It had indeed started to snow, gentle flurries that swirled around the cheerful lights of the city and the traffic and Jack, as he walked, shoulders hunched, hands in his pockets, down the abandoned sidewalk.
Samantha's hand trailed down the cold glass window and splayed across it, her own silent goodbye, and when he turned and found her eyes for the last time in the first hours of Christmas, nothing had changed.
She still couldn't breathe.
"Merry Christmas, Jack."
[end]