For several weeks Harm didn't have the chance or at least he didn't take it to talk about his feelings with Mac. A lot of other things happened though. Harm surprised Mac by selling his Corvette and instead buying a car that was more suitable for the kind of father he was now. He also said that he had now decided that he would like to move to an apartment closer to where Mac and Isabelle lived instead of his own at Union Station. Before starting to look for something, he asked Mac if she was OK with him living close to them or if she felt that she needed more space. Mac was more than OK with it, she was very glad that he'd be in the neighborhood.
Neither one of them was really looking forward to the day that Harm would move out from Mac's house. They got along very well and whenever there was a problem or they didn't like something the other one had done, they were able to talk about it calmly like the adults they were and figure out a solution that would work for both of them. Harm having to adjust not only to life as a free man again, but also to being a father, and Mac at the same time having to adjust to not being a single parent could have caused many conflicts, but things went very smoothly.
Harm had called the couple that were living in his apartment and they were very glad to find out they could stay in the apartment. Now there was just the problem of Harm trying to find an apartment close to where Mac and Isabelle lived, but also in the right size for his needs. He'd decided that he wanted two bedrooms so that Isabelle could stay with him overnight even if the plan still was for her to continue to live full-time with Mac. After a month of searching through ads in the newspapers and trying with all the contacts, they had found an apartment that was acceptable. Mac had found out that her colleague, the one that lived only ten minutes away, was being stationed abroad for over a year and therefore was going to cancel the contract on his apartment. With a bit of luck Harm was able to take over the lease on the two-bedroom apartment. He'd be moving in one week before he was scheduled to start working again.
Besides taking care of Isabelle he had also been working hard at getting back into physical shape and was well on his way. He had also taken Mac's advice to go and see someone to talk about his experiences in Afghanistan with and was now seeing a civilian psychiatrist, who was specialized in helping people who had been in hostage situations to cope, every Wednesday afternoon. Isabelle spent those afternoons with Jack. Something Harm hadn't done yet though was to start reading those law books Sturgis had given him and through that preparing to go back to work. After Isabelle had said that she thought it was easier to learn things together with her mom, Mac had again become the one in charge of her learning, even though Harm was of course still very interested in how things were going. This night when Mac sat down with Isabelle on the living room couch, Harm was as always sitting in the armchair although tonight he picked up one of those law books and started reading.
While Isabelle was rewriting her ten words for the second time, Mac looked up at Harm. She couldn't help bursting out in laughter. Harm had his arms stretched out as far as he could away from his eyes and his head was also bent back a bit to increase the distance between his eyes and the book. Still it didn't seem to be enough and Harm's face was in a grimace trying to make out the letters in the book. At the sound of Mac's laughter both Harm and Isabelle looked up at her.
"Harm, maybe you should go and have your eyes checked out," she got out.
"There's nothing wrong with my eyes," Harm muttered and picked up the book again and now held it at a normal distance from his eyes.
"He always reads the paper in the morning like that as well," Isabelle confided in Mac. Harm ignored them and just kept reading.
"Is it going well?" Mac asked him.
"Splendid," Harm muttered.
"Than read something aloud for us," Mac encouraged him.
Harm just pretended that he hadn't heard her.
"You know it really isn't that bad to have glasses, Harm," Mac said later the same night after she had put Isabelle to bed and was just going to start getting ready for bed as well. Harm was still sitting in the living room.
"No?" Harm looked up from the book.
"No, it's not," Mac said. She walked over to him. "Goodnight Harm," she leaned over and kissed his cheek.
"Goodnight Mac," he whispered back. He watched her leaving the room and decided to go to bed as well. Tomorrow he'd make an appointment with an optician.
A few weeks later Harm and Mac were sitting in the living room late in the evening. They often did that after Isabelle had gone to bed. Harm was reading through the law books, successfully now that he was wearing his new glasses, and Mac usually did some reading for her job. But it wouldn't always be just work, they also talked about a lot of things during these evenings. Sometimes a problem with Isabelle that they needed to handle together, sometimes it was a walk down memory lane and sometimes they were simply being friends listening when the other needed to be heard. Mac was truly surprised with the confidence and friendship that they had been able to build and rebuild in such a short amount of time. Harm was just as surprised and could hardly believe the kind of people they had both developed into.
This evening they were sitting in the living room on their usual spots, Mac on the couch and Harm in the armchair. It had been a warm day, but now the sun had set and it was beginning to get colder outside. Mac looked up from the report she was reading and looked over at Harm. It took a while before he noticed her watching him, but when he did he looked up to meet her eyes. He gave her a questioning look.
"You know Belle's birthday is coming up …" Mac started out.
"Yeah," Harm nodded. Considering he spent almost all of the time with Isabelle and it was pretty much all she had been talking about for the last week or so, it would have been hard for him not to know it.
"She's said that she wants a guitar and I'm thinking it might be a nice gift for us to give her. She's been working so hard this summer with her reading and writing and I think she deserves to get something she really wants."
"I agree and a guitar sounds great. We could play together, that would be nice," Harm said getting lost in thought. Most of the time they would pretend that the day that Harm would move out would never come, but they also knew that they needed to keep reminding both themselves and Isabelle that them living together wasn't going to last forever.
"She told me she wants to invite Sandra … and Jack over here for her birthday," Harm continued. Mac nodded, Isabelle had told her about that as well. It had been a tradition that Isabelle always got to invite two guests of her choice over for dinner on her birthday. "Are you going to be OK with that?" Harm asked concerned.
"Yeah," Mac said "You don't have to worry about me. I can behave," Mac tried a smile. Except for Mac picking Isabelle up at Jack's place every Wednesday , they hadn't really talked to each other ever since they had talked things out after the fight about Harm living in the house. They both felt that they needed to have a break away from each other. Mac shook herself out of her thoughts "Are you going to be OK with it?"
"Why wouldn't I be?" Harm answered back with a question rather defensively.
"No, I … Why wouldn't you be," Mac mumbled to herself. "I'm going to go off to bed now. Good night, Harm."
"Good night, Mac," Harm said. He regretted getting so defensive, but he also knew that to some part they needed to keep the distance between themselves.
TBC