You Weren't Mine to Lose
"Hey, can I talk to you for a minute?" Harvey asks as he walks into Donna's office. It's the first time they've spoken other than about work since that one night. The night it happened.
"I'm a little busy, Harvey," Donna says as she carries on with her work, her mind elsewhere. She won't let him see she's upset though. She never will again.
"Please. For just a minute," Harvey presses. She finally looks up at him and sees he is elsewhere too. His eyes scream that he is not okay and even after everything that's happened, she hates to see him like this.
"What could you possibly want to talk about?" She says coldly, keeping up an unbothered exterior. Despite her outward appearance, she's spiraling on the inside. It feels like someone is simultaneously punching her in the gut and pressing onto her temples.
As he walks to her side of the desk, Harvey moves dangerously close to her. She stands up in response, walking to the opposite side of the room. Harvey has never been good at expressing his emotions, but he just can't shake his longing for Donna.
"I miss you," he admits. She sighs in response. Partly in sadness and partly in anguish.
"You don't," she says. "You're just lonely right now." It's a bit harsher than she wanted it to come out, but what's said is said.
"No. I've been missing you since that night and you know it," Harvey replies.
"Bullshit," Donna says.
"Not bullshit. Please can we just be friends again. It's been a long year," Harvey pleads now, emphasizing how long it's been. Since summer of last year, the two of them have barely spent any time together. The bare minimum Harvey needs is a friend in Donna.
"We can't," she starts, "Harvey I can't be friends with you. I wanted you. That night, I wanted- I wanted you. I pursued you. Don't you remember?"
"Of course I remember. I'm sorry that I didn't… I'm sorry that I didn't want the same thing, but I do now," he says.
"You're sorry now, but you weren't sorry then," she counters. She can feel her heart beating faster and her face getting red. But it's not that she's blushing it's that she's pissed.
"It was just the safe decision," he says.
"I'm not sure how. Goddammit, you weren't even mine to lose and somehow I still lost you that summer!" Donna shouts. They are closer together now. Harvey reaches out and tries to touch the sides of her face lightly, but Donna moves further from him afraid that if he touches her that she will melt into his arms. Harvey's hands fall back to his sides.
"I'm so sorry. It wasn't right. I should've chosen to be with you. I should've. I'm so stupid for not choosing you," Harvey says.
"Don't do that," Donna says and shakes her head.
"Do what? Apologize?" he asks, confusion written all over his face.
"You're not apologizing, Harvey. You're manipulating me. You want me to feel bad for you that you made the decision you made. And yeah, I have to agree it was a stupid, shitty one but that doesn't change the fact that you did it. I asked you to stay and you didn't. You wanted things to go back to normal. And you left me," Donna says.
"It was one night with you," he says, changing the tone now. "It hardly counts as leaving you!"
"Well that's just great, Harvey. We're back at square one. Is this really what you came in here to do? Stand here and tell me you're sorry for not choosing to be with me and then immediately say you didn't leave me? I don't get it. I really don't," Donna says moving back to gather her things from her desk.
"Wait. Please. I didn't want it to be like this," Harvey says. "I need you."
"You don't, Harvey. You just... don't," she says, leaving him alone in her office to be lost in the memory of what could've been.