Author's Note: here it is. I'll leave the rest of what I want to say until the end.
Sands was in a bad mood.
For the last week he'd been happily ignoring the world, locked away in his tiny apartment, not caring if the windows and curtains were opened or closed because what was the point anyway? He could have gone on like that for quite a bit longer – it wasn't as if he'd been in any danger of starving, thanks to the bleeding-hearts who insisted on stopping by and stocking his fridge with more than just alcohol – but no, the boss-lady insisted on sticking her nose into his business too. And while he might ignore summons from a great number of people, Tymms was a tough old lady and would probably show up on his doorstep in combat boots if he didn't come when called.
But he didn't have to be happy about it. And he didn't have to bother with shaving or showering or any of the niceties that people who could see insisted on.
"Oh, this is just very professional," was her greeting when he was shown – Ha, ha – into her office. "Very mature. I'm glad to see that you're managing so well on your own, Agent Sands."
Screw you. "I aim to please."
There was a creak of leather as the woman made herself comfortable. She was disappointed that the agent in front of her had come to this. After all he'd been through, he was finally giving in to self-pity. She had no patience for it no matter what the Company shrinks said about how it was actually a good sign and how it meant he was coming to terms with his new life. He's not coming to terms with anything, much less a new life, she thought in disgust as she eyed his lank hair, rumpled clothes, and unshaved, hollowed cheeks. "You aim to please yourself. Otherwise you would have cleaned yourself up before coming in."
"I would have shaved, but the light was bad," he deadpanned. "Didn't want to slice my throat. Think about the mess it would have made."
"They make electric razors which, when used properly, greatly decrease the risk of cutting anything while shaving," she replied, in no mood to coddle him. "Tell me, Agent, what's brought on this peerless display of the consequences of attending too many pity parties."
Sands' jaw tightened. How dare she treat him as if there was nothing wrong with him? "What's wrong? Can't bring yourself to can me? Don't like kicking a man while he's down? Strange, I thought all the training got rid of those kinds of reservations."
"Oh, if it were up to me I'd fire you on the spot. But not because you're blind. I couldn't care less about that because you've proved that it's not much of a hindrance to you when you're on a mission. What makes me want to fire you is how you're a pain in the ass and you're wasting your life."
"What life?"
"Correct me if I'm wrong…" Tymms put on a pair of glasses and opened the file folder in front of her. "…but every department in the Company – save for support services, the typing pool, and the PR staff – have approached you with offers. You could have your pick of any assignment you want. There's not a department head that wouldn't kill to have you on their staff. And if that doesn't tickle your fancy, then there's always openings for instructors at Langley. Personally I'd think you'd jump at the chance to screw with the minds of recruits and men like you are the reason our intelligence agents rarely crack under pressure."
"What's your point?" Sands asked. She hadn't told him anything he didn't already know.
"I want to know why you're sitting around on your ass, twiddling your thumbs."
"You sound like my wife."
"Thank you. I admit I didn't meet her under the best of circumstances," Tymms relished the way that Sands seemed to freeze in surprise. "But she stuck me as a… woman to be reckoned with."
Damnit, Lizzie… "What'd she say?"
"She was very nearly eloquent, despite the surroundings. I'll never forget the look on everyone's faces when she informed me that the CIA is inconsiderate, incompetent, and as a whole couldn't stop a five-year-old with little more than an erector set from taking over the world, though she then had the nerve to faint. I'd almost written her off as a lost cause but then I had to take into account that she'd been married to you for nearly twenty years without losing her mind, and her showing at the hearings was commendable. She redeemed herself quite well."
"Yes well, that eloquent, fainting, commendable woman told me off," Sands muttered.
"Good." Once again Tymms took satisfaction into shocking the agent into silence. "From all accounts you were quite insufferable, Sands. Did you really expect her to grin and bear it?"
"She said she didn't need me!" Sands got up out of his chair and started pacing. His fingers rubbed together as he beat down the craving for a cigarette.
"You want a clingy, indecisive woman who can't stand on her own two feet? Or one who is looking for a fairy tale ending where the handsome prince slays dragons in her name while she spends all her time safely tucked away in a bower of roses?"
Sands hated that things had come to this. Tymms as a counselor left a lot to be desired, but as long as he was humiliating himself he might as wall spill it all. "She doesn't love me."
"Why should she? You've been an ass."
"She's my wife."
"That's why the term 'ex-wife' was created, I believe."
She's a real yuk-a-minute, Sands thought in disgust, missing the irony in their reversed positions. "She said she didn't want a divorce."
"Then what are you complaining about?" Tymms sighed and set her glasses aside. "You want advice? Here's my advice. Go home, take a shower, deliberate over the positions you've been offered and pick one. Once you start putting a life back together for yourself, everything else will fall into place. You're dismissed."
One hundred, thirty-six days. Liz stared at her calendar as she marked off several days at once. Force of habit had her counting off each day at the same time that her absence from home had her forgetting to do so for up to a week at a time. Real life had her too busy to mourn the passing of each individual sunset, yet she couldn't give up either. There was still a running tally that lurked at the back of her mind.
It's almost been five months. Five months since she'd last seen Sands. Five months since she'd laid everything she was willing to offer – and to accept in turn – on the line. There'd been no answer in those months. She had nothing but his absence and silence to judge how he'd taken things.
Not well. He'd never enjoyed being thwarted. From all Liz could tell, that hadn't changed. But she had. She was sick of sitting at home and voicing her complaints to people she didn't know and who could do nothing to resolve her frustrations. Speaking to Sands might not have done anything to save her marriage, but it may have saved her sanity. The ball was in his court now. The pressure was off her.
"Mom! We're out of computer paper!"
Well, almost all the pressure.
"Can it wait, Chris?" Both of her children came into the kitchen where she was putting away dishes. They both carried projects that needed to be typed and or printed.
"This is worth half my grade. And it's due tomorrow."
Then you go buy the paper. Liz sighed; it'd been a long day. "Alright. Mandy, please finish putting away the dishes for me. Chris, I need you to move the laundry around and start dinner. The store is going to be full of crazy people."
Liz's prediction had been right. But then any store was bound to be full at five on a Friday night. When she got home, she parked under the carport then circled around the front to gather the mail and the paper. Absentmindedly flicking through the envelopes, Liz walked up her front stairs and reached for the doorknob.
"It's locked."
She let out a little yelp, spilling the mail to the ground as her hand went to her chest.
"Don't do that," she gasped once she'd recovered. "What are you doing here?" Keeping one eye on Sands, she bent down and gathered up her things, noticing that there were several cigarette butts on the pavement.
"That your way of informing me that you were just pissed the last time you visited me?"
"No." She watched as he somehow both tensed and relaxed at her reply. "I was just wondering why you're not inside. I didn't think a locked door would be enough to stop you."
"Ordinarily not, but I can't say I was looking forward to enduring the company of a snide teenager without you there to remind me not to shoot him."
Liz laughed silently until he pulled out another cigarette. "I hope you're not planning on taking that inside."
Sands paused. "I don't believe a ban on smoking was brought up during negotiations."
"I'm the one with the moody teenager."
"Too true." He put his lighter away.
Liz watched him for a moment. The falling twilight and the isolation was dusting a sense of sobriety over their situation. "How have you been, Sheldon?"
"It's been rough. First you chewed me out and then Tymms put her foot up my ass…"
"Poor baby."
"You would have meant that once."
"If you weren't so obviously fine, I might mean it now. But out of all the things you wanted from me, pity was never one of them." Liz tugged on his hand as she led the way over to two lawn chairs that'd seen better days. "Since there's no smoke and no one screaming bloody murder, I think this is a conversation we'd best have outside."
They sat in silence for several minutes, the neighborhood passing them by. All their immediate neighbors hadn't lived here long enough to know who Sands was, but their curious glances said they'd like to. Liz watched them pass, watched as the streetlights started to flicker on, watched as Chris pulled Mandy away from a window where she was watching them. The curtains were yanked shut with considerable temper. Uncertain of how much longer they had to say all they needed, Liz opened her mouth. "I –"
"– did all the talking last time." Sands ran a hand through his hair. Earlier, he'd propped one foot up on his knee; now it jiggled impatiently. "You're not the only one here that doesn't need this marriage. Tymms bullied me into taking another job, one inside the Company and the country. Living alone isn't new to me and living in the dark isn't as hard as looks." As frustrating, yes. But not as hard. "I don't need a concerned wife who's going to be asking what's wrong every time I'm a little off, and I really don't need a teenager who hates me and a daughter who has this fairy tale image of me."
He fell silent, and Liz was very glad that he couldn't see her. She'd always thought that if he came to her, then they'd be able to work things out. A personal – And gentle. He was being blunt but gentle, and somehow that made things ten times worse – send off was the last thing she'd been expecting.
"Oh."
"Since when do you give up so easily?" Sands demanded.
He almost sounds offended. "What do you mean?"
"What happened to the woman who told me that she liked being married and she'd prefer to keep the husband she had? The one who told me off? Because reacquainting myself with her was just getting interesting."
"What game are you playing now, Sheldon?"
"No game. You just have to get used to the fact that I turned into a manipulative bastard while I was gone and that on the best of days I'm going to be an ass–"
Liz reached over and pressed her fingers to his lips. "Do you mean that?"
"The part about being a bastard and an –"
"The part about me having to get used to it." Liz held her breath as she waited for an answer.
"Well I'm not giving up my apartment at Langley, but I figured I owed you something for kidnapping you. I make no promises, but if a chance is what you want –"
She interrupted him one last time, though this time with a kiss that had them both lingering.
"There'll be curious neighbors," she whispered when they parted. "I forgot to mention that alongside the rebellious teenager and the delicate ten-year-old."
"I'll make sure I'm armed."
"Just as long as no police get involved. I never want to see another bulletproof vest in my life."
"No police? Could be tricky."
Liz grinned as she leaned in for another kiss. "You'll find a way."
Author's Note II: well, that's it. Two years, eight months, eighteen days, 122 pages, and lots of angst on the part of the writer later, and here it is. I want to thank everyone who sent in a review. You guys really kept me going. You guys inspired the first chapter of what was supposed to be a single vignette about the family that Sands left behind. Special thanks go to Merrie and DB and SB who all provided a sounding board for me when I'd lost the plot and couldn't find another and who, in the case of SB, provided lots and lots of music to keep me going. (Eye of the Tiger, baby.)
I suppose it is time for "Neon Daisies" to take a short break. Don't despair. Neon Daisies has an alter ego named "rythmteck" who just happens to write Pirates of the Caribbean fanfic. (Long story. You can ask if you want, just be prepared.) Right now I'm reworking my very first ever fic, which was written under the "rythmteck" pseudonym, named "Inconvenient." The rewrite is called "A Different Story." You do not need to read the original to understand. As a rewrite, "ANS" is covering pretty much everything in "Inconvenient." Funny how that works, huh?
As for "Neon Daisies" me, I'm playing with a couple of different ideas. One is a PotC fic centered around post-DMC Norrington, and another is a second Secret Window fic that will be drastically different from "Fractured Secrets."
I hope to hear from you all. I have a LiveJournal, the link to which is in my profile, and of course you can always PM me. And I'm on Yahoo Instant Messenger.
Thanks for a great story!
Neon Daisies
