A/N-this gets a big props to Garretelliot because well, she's the one that gave me the idea for it, and rather than write it while I'm in DC, I wrote it now. Before I left. So this is the last thing you're going to get out of Snarky until the 14th, when hopefully I'll be back with the rest of For Harry and an entire new fic! Oh, and all these characters don't belong to me, I'm just borrowing them. The only one that won't return in one piece is Woody.
The boy looked better, I had to give him that. He looked like he would be ready to get out of this place soon. I knocked on the door frame as I walked in, before standing near the window, looking out. I couldn't look at him, I'd probably knock one of his teeth out. Better to keep my temper in check, even though the best place to punch him would probably be here. At least they had plastic surgeons to fix anything that might happen to his perfect visage.
"Hey doc, what brings you here?" I smiled briefly to myself. He couldn't see it though. He should know why I was here, after what he had done. He had sent her away and she had wound up in my place, collapsing on my couch downing half a bottle of my scotch wondering what she had done wrong. Wondering if she would ever be good enough for him.
"Just stopped by." I lied. I could even hear how terse my voice was. But the boy wasn't the brightest in the bunch.
I didn't hate him. He was too likable to hate. Detest, maybe, but not hate. He was the congenial sort that everyone just kinda liked, that no matter what he did all he had to do was flash that grin of his and everything would be OK. But not this time, not after what he had done. "No, Doc, really, why are you here?" I turned around to face him.
I think I shocked him with the look of pure malice on my face. "What the hell did you do to Jordan?" It was a good thing the door was closed, I had a feeling my voice would be hitting the upper end of the decibel scale.
"I don't need to put up with that now." His blue eyes had a steely, icy edge to them.
"So you just kick her out, say you never want to see her again? Leave her wondering what the hell she did to make you hate her so much?" I had seen her go through bitter breakups before, always, I was there, the comforting soul that eased her pain.
"She knows what she did." I jammed my hands as far into my pockets as they would go. Flinging the boy across the room would not be something that would get me my job back any time soon.
"She has issues Woody, but that doesn't mean that she doesn't love you. You just come out of nowhere and give her a ring and say you don't want anything out of it, but yet you do, you know it and so does she. And then when she says no you act like a whiny little two year old." My voice was strangely calm, it had an angry edge, but I surprised myself that I wasn't screaming at him.
"I am not acting like a whiny two year old." I laughed bitterly. So like him to say that, to further prove my point.
"She loves you Woody, she didn't just say that out of pity. You know how scared she was that she was going to loose you? I've never seen her more afraid in all the years I've known her. I've seen her stare down the barrel of a gun and not care, and yet, the instant you get hurt, she's a nervous wreck. And then you add to the emotional hell she's going through by kicking her out?" I was pacing back and forth as I stared him down, angry energy stopping me from standing still.
Farm boy just stared back, no evidence that my words were even getting through that thick skull of his. I hadn't thought him to be too bad before. He wasn't my first choice for her, but he made her happy. At least he did until now. I was willing to concede that, I was willing to take the high road and back out, leaving her to him, but I couldn't do that now, not after what he had done to her.
"So you just come here to chew me out? In case you haven't noticed I was just shot." I glared at him, knowing that if looks could kill that his bullet wound would be the least of his worries at the moment.
"And you're using that excuse to ruin her life, and in effect, everyone else's. She showed up yesterday on the brink of tears, wondering if she would ever be good enough for you. If anything you should be wondering if you're good enough for her, and from the looks of it, I don't think you are." The blue-gray eyes looked back at me with the same amount of venom in them that mine had.
"Who are you to decide who's good enough for her?"
"Who are you to think you can just throw her out of here. You say you wanted something out of your relationship, and the second she's willing to give you something you throw it away. Make up your mind farm boy, and do it fast. Do you want her or not? Do you love her or are you going to just string her along for the rest of her life?"
I was glad he didn't have a roommate, but even if he did, I wouldn't care. "Is she just your attractive, successful arm candy? Have you ever wanted anything more than a good lay and someone to string along with you?"
"Get. Out." The words were low, almost a growl. I just laughed, staring him down.
"What are you going to do, throw me out? I came here to let you know that you made her absolutely miserable. You keep trying to help her with her problems, try to get her to forget about them, and just when she starts to you go and ruin everything that you had done for her. She just started becoming the devil-may-care person that she is, and you send her back to wondering if she'll ever be good enough. She's plenty good enough, it's you who needs the work."
"I'm warning you Dr. Macy-" I laughed again.
"There's not much you can do to me. Kick me out of here, yes, but it doesn't change the fact that you don't love her, do you? She's just a challenge to you, isn't she? Someone that's tantalizingly out of reach, what's going to happen once you get her, are youjust going to forget about her?"
"I told her to leave, so we'll never know. Why do you care so much? What does it matter to you?" He glared at the boy.
"What does it matter to me? I love her, probably more than you ever did or ever will. If she's happy, I'm happy, and seeing her come over and drink enough to pass out because of you makes me mad, so either flat out tell her you never loved her and you only wanted her cause she's out of reach or put your goddamn pride aside and just admit that you love her cause she loves you. You make her happy, and you can either admit that you love her or get your ass back to Wisconsin." The ice in the baby faced detective's eyes melted, but he still held my glare.
"You want me to leave, don't you, so you can have her?" I shrugged. That would be the ideal situation, but I knew that she loved him, as much as I didn't want to admit it, she did, he was the one that she wanted more than anyone else, and he truly made her happy.
"I'm not going to say I don't care, because I do. You make her happy, she loves you. You have to decide if you love her because if you drag her along in the dirt, I will kill you, and I could get away with it." I meant it too. There was no such thing as a perfect murder, but with my knowledge and Nigel and Bug, I could get away with murder. The two of them would like to see the detective just as much as I would if he kept hurting her.
"What if I do love her?" I could see the gears working in the boy's mind. Rusty as they were, he wasn't exactly the most keen person I had ever met.
"Then tell her that you do and stop stringing her along wondering what it takes to be loved by you. She thought you loved her when you bought her that ring and it took her nearly loosing you to realize just how much you mean to her. If you love her, you'd put your pride aside and stop being such a spoiled asshole and tell her that you do." He glared at me again before he finally melted. Fifty years of perfecting a death glare can make anyone melt.
"She really was upset?" He asked and I nodded.
"Would I be here if she wasn't?" I would have barely shown up to see if the boy was alive if I could avoid it. The less one has to deal with the man who the woman you love is in love with the better. He did seem a bit upset at the fact that he had hurt her. The boy did love her, there comes a point where as much as it hurts to acknowledge something, you know that it's true, and Woody's love for her was one of those things.
"I uh, I screwed up didn't I?" He ran a hand through his thick black hair, messing it up slightly, giving him the look of the cute young heartthrob that prepubescent girls dream over. I never did see what Jordan saw in him, he wasn't a bad guy, but he just seemed so much the typical All-American dream boy that she had shied away from so many times before.
"Yeah. You did." He flashed that sheepish grin he had, and if a nurse had walked in I swear she would have melted into a puddle right there, so many other women did. Maybe I was jealous, but then again, i had every right to be. "Tell her how you feel or stop playing her along. It's just as heartbreaking to those of us who love her to see her with her heart broken." I turned on my heel and walked out, not bothering to wait for a response.
The boy would come around, at least I hoped he would for her sake. She needed someone to love her who she could love back, and as much as I didn't want to admit it, that was Woody.