Did someone say... darvey fluff? I thought it was only appropriate after I (accurately) predicted Donna getting Harvey's painting back years ago ;)
Harvey Specter has been with Donna Paulsen for one hundred and twenty two days, and of those, he's spent ninety-three consecutive days and nights by her side.
(They would've had a perfect record if Faye hadn't instilled that argument between them on their third day of dating, or if he hadn't offered to take Samantha on a road trip, but he digresses.)
And slowly but surely, Harvey keeps track of their milestones as the days accumulate.
He starts counting from one again once he returns from helping Samantha meet her birth father, and it's a great one because he comes back to the love of his life holding the paint that he thought he'd lost forever. He starts trying yoga with her on the seventh, and catches her watching behind-the-scenes Survivor videos on Youtube on the twelfth. They try cooking together on the fifteenth, and he ends up using his fire extinguisher for the first time. She says she loves him the next day, and he says it right back. Lilly passes away on the fortieth. He calls Mike to ask Rachel about the ring on the fifty-ninth, and marries Donna three days later without a doubt in his mind and spends that night professing declarations of love to her as husband and wife.
They move to Seattle on the seventy-third, with only minor alterations just so they can check things out. They spend the next fifteen days exploring the city and properly catching up with Mike and Rachel, while making full use of their private balcony once they're alone.
It becomes a game for him, of sorts. On one hand, he isn't surprised how easy it is to be with her once he realized they were always meant to be together. On the other, he can't believe how quickly the days are stacking up, and is giddy to see just how many days they can go. Seeing as they're going to spend the rest of their life together, he'd be lying if he said he wasn't even a little excited to see how far they would go.
He also doesn't tell Donna, because it's not a goal for them, per say. It's just fun to count, and a wonderful way for him to document their days together. He thinks he'll say something on their 1000th day, just to quantify how she's made him inexplicably happy for all of them.
His dreams of hitting even a hundred, however, are quickly dashed when Donna is asked to speak at a four-day conference in California. She's excited and honored, and he's so pleased for her, but a little bit of him breaks when they discover he can't go with her-they discuss it at lengths, but he's just starting out at the firm, and they don't want to abuse their relationship with their friends and take days off so early in the game.
So on the ninety-third day, Harvey drives her to the airport, and parks the car so that he can walk her to the gate and spend as much time with her as possible. They're a little early, so they grab a coffee while she recounts the last time she went to California. He tries to hang onto every word, but can't help being distracted by how adorable he finds her when she's excited and her face is lit up.
He's never dreaded being apart from her more.
Eventually, she has to go, so he hugs her tight for a good minute and she reciprocates with the same desperation until they remind each other it's only four days.
She jokes that surely they can survive this if they've spent twelve years without each other and his first thought is fuck, if I weren't so much of a dumbass i'd have already figured out how to be apart from her and still be with her.
His second thought is that she's wrong, anyway- even though they weren't together in that sense, the one part of his day he could always look forward to was seeing her and being with her.
Before he decides to buy a ticket for himself right then and there, he lets go of her and waves her off with reassurance that he'll be fine and that he'll call and they can FaceTime. She whispers they can get creative, and he doesn't know how to tell her he's not even thinking about sex because he's can't even remember how to go about the daily mundane activities of his life without her.
The drive home is silent, and he thinks Seattle looks a lot drowsier without her red hair in his periphery.
When he goes home, he does the usual things he used to do during his prolonged bachelor phase. He puts on Die Hard and orders a pizza, but quickly loses interest when Donna isn't here to ask him for his yellow tomatoes or when she's not lamenting the passing of Alan Rickman whenever Hans Gruber plans something particularly malevolent. He thinks he might be bored enough to go to sleep, except he wants to make sure she landed and is safely at her hotel before he turns in for the night.
And it's this turmoil that causes him to stare blankly at the television of their living room at ten at night on a Sunday evening.
It's so quiet.
Harvey lets out a heavy sigh and thinks maybe it's a little absurd, how he's acting. Had he been his old self from even a year ago, he probably would have absolutely roasted the current version of him by how whipped he was. But then he decides he doesn't give a shit what the old him would think, because Harvey from a year ago never had the balls to risk anything. Having been with her now, even for a short time, is everything he could've imagined and more, and he isn't ashamed for a second that he can't even remember what being a bachelor used to be like.
Harvey takes a short glance at his clock 10:23 and curses. Still probably another hour before she'll get back to him.
He tries to think of alternatives to keep his mind occupied. He can't call Mike, because he would definitely know what was up and would tease him mercilessly for it. Marcus was three hours ahead and probably asleep, and while Louis is in the same time zone, Harvey is almost certain he'd be loyal enough to pick up the call just because, but he can't do that to the man just because he's feeling lonely when the other has a newborn to worry about.
A wave of sadness washes over him then, because he thinks about his parents and how he can't call them regardless of what time it is. If anything, they'd be the perfect people to talk to because they probably knew best how badly he had it for Donna since the very beginning. If anything, they'd know how to comfort his soul and provide wise words of advice but would also mix in the perfect balance of teasing that'd leave him open-mouthed and appalled but still happy.
So he opts for the next best thing and throws on one of his father's records. The melody is sad but soothing, perfect for his mood. He pours himself a little bit of Scotch to commemorate the both of them, and loses himself to the music.
He allows himself to stare at a spot in the living room with his vision blurred out until his phone vibrates a few minutes later. He audibly gasps before grabbing it, and can't help but smile when her name pops up as the caller. He's never picked up so quickly.
"Hey," he gushes, happy to hear from her after a few hours. Today he learned he doesn't understand how technology can be so advanced but you still can't make phone calls mid-flight.
"Hi," she says, with a chuckle. "I'm in my hotel room."
"That's good," he responds, feeling much more at ease just from hearing her voice. "Are the accomodations up to par for the keynote speaker, Ms. Donna Paulsen?"
She laughs at that. "I think the keynote speaker is taking it a little far, considering my seminars are going to be like one hundred people max."
"Those hundred people are about to be graced with the wisdom of Donna Paulsen. I don't think the keynote speaker is big enough for a title when they're about to find a new religion."
She chuckles and he can't see, but he knows she's shaking her head and calling him an idiot in her brain.
"How are you holding up?" she asks. "Miss me yet?"
"God, Donna, you have no idea," he freely groans as he pinches the area between his brows. "Nothing is the same without you here, I have no idea how you did it when I went on that road out of state with Samantha,"
She smiles. "You think that was easy for me? I started missing you the second I handed you your sack lunch."
His heart warms at the thought. It's not that he ever doubts how much Donna loves him, but it's always nice to hear words of affirmation coming from his gorgeous redhead. "Which was delicious, by the way," he adds. " So how'd you cope then? With me being gone?"
"My guess is that you're staring at it right now," she laughs lightly in.
God, as if he could forget about the painting. He had always known Donna was a force to be reckoned with, but sometimes he swears the thought of her is too good to be true, and that it's all a figment of his imagination gone awry. He still can't believe she hoodwinked Elliott Stemple so hard. It's insanely heartwarming and incredibly sexy.
"Put all of that energy into that and work and before I knew it, you were standing in the living room with your chin to the floor telling me I was perfect," she teases.
"Sometimes I can't believe you're real," he blurts out, as he leans back on the couch to stare at the ceiling. "It's like- you're so perfect, I can't believe you actually exist. And not only that, that you're my wife,"
He doesn't even know what he's saying at this point. He just misses her so fucking much.
"Harvey," she whines, "You can't say stuff like that when you physically can't do anything about it after,"
"Trust me, I'd be on the next flight out if I didn't have these obligations," he nearly growls. "Maybe I should just retire, and then we can just travel the world together and not worry about work,"
"Or maybe you can just tell me these nice things with the convenience of our bed in the next room next time,"
"I'll think about it," he counters.
"What? Are you already running out of nice things to say about me?" Donna asks.
"I could write a book, if that's what you're asking,"
"Alright, alright," she laughs. "I should get to bed, I have an early start tomorrow. If you're good, I'll reward you when I get back," she flirts.
"God, woman," he groans, suddenly smacked by the absence of her. "Is it wrong to hope your conference gets cancelled somehow so you're back sooner?"
She laughs again, and he's drunk off the sound. "You're an idiot. Goodnight, I love you."
He'll never get tired of hearing that. "Love you too, Donna."
He hates the resounding click, but at least he can go to sleep now.
Or not.
He should have known he had already gotten so accustomed to having her wrapped around him while they slept. It was three in the morning and after five hours of tossing and turning, he was about to try and recreate her presence with a body pillow for the fifth time that night.
He's only met with his own frustrated groan minutes later when the pseudo-Donna technique fails again, so he decides to just watch something mundane on TV to either get him through the night or lull him back to sleep. As he turns on the light, he comes face to face with his mother's painting, and an idea strikes him like lightning.
She had gone out to find the one thing he held closest to his heart and brought it back to him. So what if he did the same with her? It'd be tricky, sure, but he could already imagine the look of genuine surprise if he could really pull it off, and it'd be certain to leave her speechless. It was nearly impossible, but he had to try.
He can't believe he didn't think of it sooner.
And as if his wheel of misery had finally turned, the time difference was on his side now. He pulls out his phone to quickly shoot a text.
Hi, can you call me when you're awake? I want to do something nice for Donna, but I'm going to need your help.
His phone rings immediately, and he smiles. Showtime.
When Donna touches back down to Seattle, she's exhausted, maxed out, but incredibly proud of herself. The conference had been a whopping success- she received compliments from person after person about her mentoring skills and logistics acumen, and she had already been unofficially invited as next year's actual keynote speaker.
None of that mattered, however, once she was back in her state. She was dying to be in Harvey's arms again, especially after finding out just how attractive her husband's voice was even in the throes of phone sex the night before. She's never felt such desperation like that in herself.
Unfortunately for her, work had called and cock-blocked her again, because a case had run off its course and was taking longer than expected to finish off. He had called her in the afternoon to explain, and clearly she had understood but it left her feeling all the more aggravated and frustrated as she pulled out her app to call an uber.
She doesn't even care how she looks at the rate she bounces out of her car with a quick "thank you!", and she's jabbing her finger at the elevator button before she knows it. And while she's ready to fight anyone who's getting on the elevator for a floor below her, she's lucky to have the box to herself. The closer she gets, the more she feels herself vibrating with anticipation.
Harvey thinks it was hard for him to be apart for four days. She was in another state doing nerve-wracking things with a bunch of strangers around her.
When Donna arrives at her floor, she's already 3 doors down by the time the floors open. She's going to shower and change, and then surprise him at the office with the offer to get burgers or something.
When she flings the door open, ready to drop her stuff off and hop into the shower, she's interrupted mid-stride with Harvey standing there, with his hands holding a gorgeous bouquet of hydrangeas and wearing the widest smile he's ever seen.
"Welcome home," he breathes out.
She doesn't even think. Her purse thunks onto the floor until she covers the distance between him, wraps her arms around his neck, and plants her lips on his and when he kisses her back with the same enthusiasm, she swears she's never felt anything better.
It takes them a while to break apart, and they spend the following moments breathing each other in, foreheads touching.
"I missed you so much, you don't even understand" she says softly, as if only for their ears to hear.
He smiles with the same intensity. "I think I have some idea," he responds, before he pecks her lips softly again.
She just holds onto him after that.
"Hey," he whispers, trying to bring her out of the moment gently. "I got you something. Turn around,"
When she finally has the energy to untangle herself from his embrace, she does as she's told, and has to immediately grab himself to process the shock of her reaction.
"Oh- my god! Is this my-"
"Yep," he nods cheekily.
"The same exact one?"
"Tracked it down and everything, with the help of your Dad," he grins smugly. "It was sitting in a mansion all alone, so I bought it off the owner, and had it shipped here,"
She approaches the piano slowly, as if she's in a dream and she'll wake up if she moves too abruptly. But this is reality and he's not lying, the smooth dark wood and the keys- she doesn't know how, just knows that it's right.
Just in case though, she crouches down below the curve of the instrument and rubs on the bottom and surely, her initials, though worn down, and still here.
"Oh my god, please tell me you did not carve your initials into a grand piano."
"What? I was filled with a lot of angst at the time. Try being on the verge of losing the Paris trip of your dreams, on top of everything else. This was the only thing I loved, and I didn't even get to say a proper goodbye to it,"
He shakes her head, but can't help be extremely amused.
"At least now you know it's really yours. And I can't wait to hear you play," he encourages.
"Harvey," she moves in to hug him again. She's so touched, she's on the verge of crying. "This is perfect. How did you think of this?"
"Let's say I took a page out of your book," he says. "But most of all, I just really missed you," he explains, as if that answer alone were simple enough.
"We need to stop being apart from each other. I'm not sure our credit card bills can handle this, " she jokes.
"The next time you're leaving, I'm buying you the Taj Mahal," and they both laugh at that.
She pulls back from him to stare at him in admiration and awe, and she's never felt more loved.
He moves them to the piano where they sit side by side, and she plays all of Gordon's songs by memory, and he thinks there couldn't be a better way to restart the count of their days together.
But it doesn't matter anyway, because they never spend a day apart again.