Chapter 4
Harvey hates this merger, Mike has recently found out he is plotting against Jessica to take managing partnership from her, they're up to their necks with the Hessington trial... And still, despite all evidence to the contrary, Harvey seems to be in a particularly good mood.
That is something Mike only notices in brief off moments between one legal maneuver and another, but undeniably there. Something present in Harvey's more willing smirk at every lame joke Mike cracks – he has even started to overdo it, increasing the amount and decreasing the quality of his amusing comments, encouraged by Harvey's good mood, but also curious to see how much he can push the dude before he barks at him. So far, it hasn't happened yet. He's even determined to ask for a day off after they close this case, if for nothing else just because Harvey Specter being in such high spirits is not an opportunity one can simply let slide.
That afternoon Mike enters the men's restroom and finds Harvey there, casually leaning against the sink and talking on his cellphone.
"So the place is free on the 20th?" he says and then shoots Mike an annoyed glance at the interruption, straightening on his feet. "I'll only be coming at night. Great, man. Thank you!"
He hangs up and reinforces his gaze at his associate, who has decided to just stand there lurking at him in amusement.
"You take your calls in the bathroom now? Are you having such a hard time paying the bills that you're forced into this kind of overtime?"
"Did you come in here just to bother me or do you actually need to go?" Harvey deflects, nodding in the direction of the urinal.
"You know I always make time for you," Mike mocks and when Harvey says nothing else he adds, curiosity picked by what he had overheard. "Are you planning a trip?"
"Are you planning on minding your own business?" Harvey says raising his brows at him, but there's no bite. If anything there's humor in his tight lips. Then he decides to generously inform, "If you must know, yes. Just a little getaway, but it's not for a few weeks."
Mike mustn't know. He had already moved to the corner to empty his bladder thinking Harvey would just ignore him and leave. He's actually surprised Harvey volunteered the information. That good mood really must run deeper than he realized. "Where are you going?"
"Hamptons. A friend of mine has this great place I'm borrowing."
Mike's eyebrows shoot skyhigh as he turns over his shoulder to look at Harvey. Who will apparently be taking a weekend off. At the beach. He almost misses his aim.
He wants so bad to ask which Miss from which State or catalogue model Harvey is taking with him, but before he can swallow his shock and zip himself up, his boss is already moving out of the bathroom.
Harvey turns by the door, calling his attention. "Hey. Don't go babbling around about this to anyone," he says firmly and Mike gives him a nod.
Harvey walks away shaking his head in light annoyance. He can't talk in his office without his secretary overhearing, he can't talk in the bathroom without his nosy associate intruding… can't a guy have some privacy in his own goddamn firm?
Despite that, a lazy contentment settles in his features as he sits back in his office. Teddy's place at the Hamptons is great. He's sure Donna is gonna love it.
He's still not sure if she will consider this a breach in their agreement. He has a whole mental presentation with numerous bullet points to argue the case that this does not go against the rules, but the woman is stubborn.
Yes, his plan does entail spending the night there and although they had agreed that spending nights together was not a wise move, it is not really a specific provision of the agreement. They can stay if they want to.
And yes, he does plan on spending the next day together at the beach, but their agreement says they're only allowed one night a year, there's nothing that forbids them from enjoying each other's company during the following day.
Finally all that money Jessica had put into getting him through Harvard Law is amounting to something worth it, he thinks as he inwardly congratulates himself on his debating abilities.
It would be pretty awesome if they could stay the rest of the weekend too, but that is something he hasn't yet found a way to argue around because it would mean spending at least one more night together which would definitely be considered a breach in their agreement. He huffs thinking about Donna and all her goddamn rules she's so strict about. They would already be there, would it be so wrong to stay a little while longer together?
He misses her. She's currently seated fifteen feet away from him, he can see her lips move as she talks into the phone and makes a note on his calendar, but he misses her. It seems that the years are going by slower, like life's too fucking long, and everytime he leaves her bed it almost rips off a part of him knowing he won't be back there for another twelve excruciatingly long months.
He used to recover faster. He would lose control over his gazes and his thoughts for a few weeks after they'd had sex, but then he would go back to normal. Back to seeing her as his secretary and his partner, his compass and his friend who just happened to be too attractive for his own good. He didn't use to dwell all the time on the fact that he knows exactly what her mouth tastes like or the fact that she shivers every time he runs his tongue around the shell of her ear or the warmth that takes over the entire expanse of his skin when she delicately runs her fingernails on the back of his neck.
Now this kind of thought attacks him without any notice when it damn well pleases and the closer it gets to the set date of their agreement the worse it is.
"What's gotten into you?" her voice startles him. He didn't notice her going into the office.
"What?"
"You've been staring at that piece of paper for the past ten minutes."
"Just thinking," he brushes her off.
"Hm. If you don't need anything else, I'm packing up for the night."
He doesn't, but she usually doesn't leave until he does. His eyebrows shoot up with interest, in contrast with the something that drops in his stomach. "Do you have plans?" he asks in the most casual tone.
"I'm going to the Theater," she tells him. "MacBeth."
"Thought you'd seen that already."
He notices her eyes widen the tiniest bit, like she's startled and he doesn't get it. Was he not supposed to know that she's a big theater geek who would go see the same play twice in two weeks?
She quickly smiles. "What can I say. Daniel Day-Lewis in a kilt." She shrugs and he chuckles as she turns away and leaves.
.
.
A few days later he walks into his office to find Donna seated on his couch. Legs crossed, gentle smile on her face, a picture of casualty although something about her stiff posture, how she's leaning forward or how she propped her hair to drape over one shoulder hints that she's not that comfortable, but rather staged herself to look like she is. He knows her enough to notice that much.
"Make yourself at home," he says lightly as he comes in.
"I wanted to talk to you in here," Donna tells him and he moves to the armchair nearer to her.
"Is this about–" he boldly starts to ask because the date they spend the entire year waiting for is finally approaching and if she's here wanting to talk to him in private maybe she wants to talk about her plans for the day, maybe she's been looking forward to it as much as him.
"No, no…" she interrupts his question lightly, shaking her head.
"You don't even know what I was gonna say."
He's right in front of her now, looking down at her as she emphatically tilts her head to the side and looks him up, not needing to say a word to call him an idiot because of course she does.
It makes him smile. He loves it when she does that. He tilts his head too, mirroring her movement in a fond but unspoken communication before he takes a seat.
"How did it go with Gianopolous?" she says and that's really not what he was expecting this to be about.
"Well," he answers. "He's not a pushover, but I think we have a good plan."
"So it went well?"
"Yeah, it went well," he says. "And since when are you–"
"I'm sleeping with Stephen."
She says it quick and suddenly like a slap in the face, though it feels more like a kick to his chest because something crashes inside him. His body tenses and his linked fingers press so hard into one another they might pop out of their sockets. He looks away from her and nods his head, getting some air back into his shattered lungs and swallowing hard to keep his voice cool even though he wants to grab the coffee table right in front of him and toss it through a window. "I can see that."
"You can see that?" Donna sounds confused. "That's all you have to say?"
"Do you want me to say more?"
"Hm– I… It depends on what you would say."
He shakes his head slightly, feeling lost and unable to stop fidgeting. "I'd say, when?"
"Three days ago."
Three days ago. The day she told him she was going to the theater. "Why didn't you tell me before?"
"I was going to, but you got so upset when you thought I was working for him."
"Because you work for me."
He is very aware of how he deflects his eyes from her before each one of his answers all the while hers are boring into him, but he simply can't control himself. It's an involuntary response to the things she's telling him, his millisecond to take the hit and school his features before he looks back into her eyes and lies his heart out.
"Well, I'm not working for him," she says as if that solves everything.
"Good," he replies as if it really does.
She pauses and he notices as she takes a steadying breath.
"So you're not upset?"
"No," he says. "What you're doing with him is personal."
"And this isn't?"
He doesn't get what the fuck she wants him to say. "Donna, I don't wanna make this a thing."
"I don't either. I just wanna make sure that it doesn't become a thing," she quickly explains.
"It won't, as long as you don't let that affect this." He doesn't even know what he's saying anymore. Fucking hell. He's already more than affected.
"Okay." She nods affirmatively looking so intensely into his eyes he's scared she might be reading through his bullshit.
.
.
His hand hurts like hell. That last hit right into Huntley's jaw before he threw the son of a bitch into the mirror is really collecting its price, but he can move his fingers, so at least it's not broken.
Donna gently dabs a cotton ball into his bruised lips and he winces.
"Tell me he looks worse."
"He does."
"Are you hurt?" she asks. Concern clear in her voice.
"No, I'm fine."
He's not. He might not need a bandage so his answer is truthful enough to make her discard the pack of gauze into the table, but as he takes a swing of scotch the reality that he's anything but fine doesn't escape him.
They had a murderer among them in the firm and he fooled everybody. Stephen Huntley infiltrated himself into his case, watching someone else be prosecuted for a crime he committed, sabotaging the case to cover his tracks and he almost succeeded. And while all that had been going on, the criminal had been sleeping with Donna. That's what hits harder.
The look on her face when they found out... Her eyes wet and red and she apologized. She apologized as if she had any fault in what happened. It was the second he lost his shit, darted out of his office and beat the shit out of Stephen Huntley.
"Please tell me you didn't do this because of me," she says.
"It was a fight, Donna, not a duel," the answer was readily out of his mouth as he frowned, leaving her with no doubt that his dismissal was truthful.
He didn't beat Stephen because of her. He beat him because he had already promised he would if Stephen intruded in his case again. He did it because he lied to all of them. He did it because he was letting someone else take the blame for his crime. He did it because he is a murder…
He did it because he hurt Donna.
He could lie to her, but he couldn't lie to himself about this one thing, the sharp pain on his knuckles and the anger that commanded his fist into Huntley's face not allowing him to deflect reality.
"How could I not have..." she shakes her head and buries her face in her hand, voice barely there, clearly anguished.
"Listen to me," he promptly stops her train of thoughts, not wanting her to dwell on that. "Stephen betrayed us all."
"No, you don't understand, Harvey." She shakes her head and he notices a shiver run through her. "I was with him." For some reason the blunt statement digs at him as if he wasn't already aware of the fact. But it's clear it hurts her too, as she shivers once more and gets to her feet, unable to keep still, her tone getting aggravated. "And he was capable of something like that and I didn't even see it. You know, I'm supposed to–"
"Donna!" he stands and raises his voice, eager to make her stop. When she sighs heavily he simply tells her, "It's okay."
"Just tell me you're gonna make him pay."
"He'll pay," he promises.
He moves to his bar cart, pouring her a drink. She had poured him one when he came back to his office all beaten up, but up until now she is completely sober and he thinks she needs some alcohol to numb her thoughts.
He extends the drink to her from a distance and she hesitates by the door but eventually walks back in his direction, taking the glass from his hand and tasting the dryness of the liquid. Harvey sits back on the couch and she follows along, sinking herself in the nearest armchair.
They sit in silence, drinking together in the dark office. He chances the occasional glance in her direction, but she seems intent on quietly nursing her drink.
He knew Huntley had hurt her, of course, but he didn't really get how much until now. He should've known, though. Because with Donna being Donna, of course she would feel responsible and be completely blind to the fact that she was a victim.
This ability she has, to read people, to infiltrate herself in their thoughts, is such an integral part of who she is. The fact that she could be so wrong about someone must tear at her, he realizes, it defies her self worth, it defies the self knowledge of a woman who has spent her life priding herself on knowing people better than they knew themselves.
He gets that now, after watching her let out a bit of her inner turmoil in a way she so rarely does. But her suffering, or just this messed up situation, or the way she cried when Mike told them what he had found out… all of that makes Harvey wonder if she was taking the hit so hard because she was falling for Stephen.
They hadn't had much time together, not even two weeks, but it was possible. She had been so happy lately and he saw them together the other night in that restaurant, seated together on the piano bench as Stephen played for her. Harvey watched her naked back when she leaned forward and kissed Stephen. And lingered. He was torn between turning his back and leaving or attempting to throw the damn piano through the nearest window, Stephen along with it. But he just clenched his jaw, biting hard, swallowing his anger and going to talk to Stephen like he meant to.
He had been honest enough to tell Donna her being with Stephen bothered him and she was honest when she said she had to live her life so he made the monumental effort of letting her, no matter how much it killed him. No matter if he didn't understand why it did.
Now he thinks it's possible that she had more feelings for Stephen than he had let himself believe before. After all, she had chosen to break her rule for him, when she never did for Harvey. She would be with him everyday when she would only give Harvey one night.
He clenches his fists at his sides, pushing that thought away. He can't ask that of her, he can't expect that from her, because he doesn't want to be with her. He wants her to be happy and of course he was bothered she was involved with Stephen, the guy is a criminal. He didn't know that at the time but…
His own thoughts trick him and he works on clearing his mind.
He wants her to be happy with someone who deserves her. She just hadn't found anyone who did yet and that's why all her boyfriends always bother him. That's all there is to it. It doesn't mean he–
"I just wish none of this had happened." Donna's voice interrupts his internal musing and for a second he thinks thank god for that because he was losing control of his thoughts, his mind driving him to places he didn't dare to go. "Well, the murders, obviously," she says with an unamused kind of laugh escaping her nostrils and he recognizes a bit of dark humor in the comment. "But also me being involved with him."
He fixes her with an intense gaze but doesn't say anything because the only words on the tip of his tongue are 'yeah, i wish you had never been involved with him too' and 'why were you'.
"I guess, I just…" She sighs and he really hopes she finishes her thoughts because hearing her say anything diminishing her involvement with Stephen is the only thing that could give him hope of getting some sleep tonight. "He charmed me and at first I said no but then I convinced myself it was okay to let myself get involved because he was only here for a few weeks and then he would be back to London, you know?"
"So you broke your rule." The words escape Harvey's mouth before he can stop himself and he can only hope it didn't sound like an accusation, even though it was, because she is already feeling pretty miserable and the last thing he would want is to make her feel worse.
He had already asked her about changing her rule the other day at the dinner so he doesn't really expect to hear further clarification from her. He's surprised when she says, "See, that's the thing. I didn't think that's what I was doing. The rule didn't really apply to him."
"Why not?" he asks, already indignant that Stephen Huntley could breeze through her goddamn rule.
"Because, like I said, we didn't really work together. He's in London, it's practically another firm."
"Except it's not," he firmly asserts, anger clear in his tone, and then immediately chastises himself, closing his eyes, readying himself to either apologize or to be met with her own anger, but when he opens it back, all he sees is Donna, deflated and miserable. He tries to mend it, "Look…"
"I guess you're right," she says, interrupting whatever excuse he was about to formulate. "But the thing is, Harvey…" she pauses and stares deeply into his eyes as if pondering if she should really say what she's thinking. He sits there, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, nursing his half empty glass of scotch and he realizes he's both physically and metaphorically on the edge of his seat waiting for her next words. "I had that rule for you, not for anyone else. And we act like our agreement doesn't go against it, but to be honest with you, I'm not so sure."
His eyes widen and he doesn't dare move a single muscle. "What do you mean you had that rule just for me?"
She shakes her head. "I let myself get involved with him and look at the mess I made and I didn't even think I was really going against my rule," she says in a weak voice and he wants to tell her she had no part in that mess but more than anything he wants her to keep talking and explain what did she mean she had that rule just for him?, but then she says, "Maybe I should be more strict about my own rules."
That startles Harvey enough to make him abandon his previous urgent questioning in favor of a hoarse, "What?"
Donna breathes in deeply and the way she looks at him, with her eyes glassy and sorrowful, he knows this can't be good. "Harvey, what are we doing? This once a year thing… this is destined to become a mess–"
"What–Donna. No." He says firmly, voice getting louder without him realizing, denying her words with everything in him. He wants to do anything to stop where this is going but he's paralyzed.
"Harvey, I don't think we should keep doing this." She says the words in such a quiet voice he thinks she can probably hear the crack inside his chest when they hit him.
"You think I'm gonna go around and kill a bunch of people and lie to you about it if we have sex?"
Her lips part soundlessly, taking the hit of his words, and he notices her eyes getting more watery. "No, I think, eventually, this can all blow up in our faces and what's happening just proves that getting in bed with someone you work with can stir a whole bunch of shit."
"So you can wave your rule to a murderer, but to me you reinforce it as if it was the goddamn First Amendment?!"
In the far back of his mind he knows his words must be hurting her, but his anger blinds him to her feelings, even when a tear runs down her face, one she wipes away with her fingers so quickly he could have imagined it.
"See, we're already fighting over this!" she cries out. "And the longer we drag this out, the bigger mess we make."
"Donna!"
"I can't risk it, Harvey. I was stupid enough to agree to this and–"
"It was your idea! Are you trying to put it all on me now?"
"Harvey, no," she pleads, her eyes glistening wet and desperate to make him calm down and understand what she's saying because it's the hardest decision she's ever made and she probably doesn't have the strength to convince him if he fights her. "We both wanted it and we both agreed to it, but I just now realize that this really could ruin everything we have."
"How?!"
"I don't know how! But it also never crossed my mind that Stephen was a murderer and look how that turned out. Not only for me and him, but for me and you. Because you were bothered and it affected our relationship."
"I already apologized about that!" he huffs out, pissed that she would use that against him now.
"I know you did. But I can't risk it, Harvey. Can't you understand that?"
"No, Donna. Actually, I can't."
"Well, this just proves my point. Because if you're so mad about ending it now, if it's coming between us now, how do you think you would feel about it further along the way? Or did you think we could just keep this agreement going forever?"
He hadn't thought so far along in the future. He's not that type of person. He thinks about the present and presently the thought of ending his agreement with Donna, of never having her in his arms again, is fucking killing him.
He had it all planned out. A whole weekend just for them at the beach. They would swim past the waves, he would take her in his arms and she would wrap her legs around his waist and kiss him, letting him taste the salt of the sea directly from her lips. They would lie in the sun together, or more realistically, she would hide in the shade and he would laugh at her while he smeared sunscreen down her back, pulling on her bikini string just to tease her, and she would laugh and slap him off. And then he would take her inside and bury himself inside of her and feel everything he was so desperate to feel.
But now she wants to end it.
"You know what, Donna? If you wanna end this, then just end it."
Later he would beat himself up about his inability to fight for her. He accepted defeat and gave in to her terms exactly like he had done years ago when she first asked him to put her out of his mind. And between his fifth and sixth glass of scotch he would realize fighting for her would mean that she was his to fight for and he could never see Donna as his, not in that way, because if she was, he would eventually and inevitably lose her.
If she wasn't his he could never lose her, but he also could never fight for her.
She sounds so small and defeated when she says, "I'm just… trying to protect us, Harvey."
He feels her gaze on him, scorching his skin, but he can't look at her, tortured by the fact that she clearly doesn't feel for him the same way he feels about her because he would never give her up like she's giving him up, even if he only had her one night a year.
"I think I better go home," she says since Harvey apparently put an end to the conversation. He nods but still doesn't meet her gaze. "Are you sure your hand is okay?"
He glances at his red and swollen knuckles. "Fine," he says dismissively.
"Harvey." Donna's fingers gently wrap around his wrist and the contact of her warm skin on his forces his eyes into hers. "I'm sorry about all of this. And I'm sorry about… us. I just think… This made me realize I'm risking too much. Our agreement makes everything so much more complicated and I think we were fooling ourselves thinking we could keep this going and have no consequences. There are always consequences. Besides, we said we would do this to make it easier to be away when we stopped sleeping together and it isn't working. It's getting harder."
That much at least he can agree with. It's getting hard as hell to be away from her.
He feels differently about her now than he did when they first started their agreement. Before he was just thinking he was desperate to have her again. Now she has become such an intrinsic part of him he feels he can't ever be him without her. He's not sure that's any better.
He looks at her and although he thinks she can read on his face how unwilling he is to agree with her all he says is, "Goodnight, Donna." And for all her certainty in putting an end to their agreement it sure takes her a long time to get up from his couch and leave. Leave him.
He doesn't even look at her. Just listens to the echoes of her heels around his office as she walks away.
.
.
The next day she's at the courthouse asking him to put Stephen on the stand and he does, even though he knows he really shouldn't because this isn't his trial, it's Ava's, but he does because she asked and even after it blows up in his face he doesn't regret it because he can't have her thinking he would let what Stephen did slide through the cracks. That would break her even more.
.
.
He's in a shitty mood and the reality of the fact is that it's her fault. Stephen and the trial and none of that mess are her fault, but his sullen mood is, entirely, and that's something he's forced to admit after the trial is over. They cleared Ava Hessington, he managed to get the firm out of the merger with Darby International and Jessica has forgiven him for betraying her so, by all accounts, he's won in every aspect. He should be ecstatic. And yet, he's not.
He toasts with Jessica and rolls his eyes at Mike's attempted high five then tells him to go celebrate with Rachel, but it doesn't really feel like a win.
He walks out of the building feeling a sting of melancholia, looking forward to getting home to his empty apartment when he finds Donna on the sidewalk, New York evening lights shining around her, night wind blowing her hair, pale arms exposed to the chill as she waits for him there beside the car.
"Harvey," she greets when he approaches.
"Donna. How did it go?" he asks about Stephen's arrest, which she had insisted on being present for. What he really wants to know is how she is.
"As well as it could." Which is her way of telling him she'll be okay.
He nods, relieved that she seems to be handling the situation, like she handles everything else. He, on the other hand, needs some distance because this is one thing she can't help him handle.
"Harvey," she calls again when he's about to enter the car. "Thank you," she says, something both sweet and solid to her tone and suddenly getting inside that car seems like the most claustrophobic thought that has ever crossed his mind.
"Why don't you take the car? Feel walking tonight." It's all he says, as he walks into the night.
So that was it. He has lost what little piece he had of her. He has no idea how he'll be able to get over the fact that he'll never be with her again and it occurs to him that the only reason why he's not completely losing his mind over this is the fact that she'll be there tomorrow, right outside his office, like she's been for the last several years. That kind of makes up for it.
Agreeing to not be with her again and putting her out of his mind; agreeing to her insane idea of being together once a year; agreeing to keep her at arm's length – it had all assured she would be there tomorrow and that has always been enough to keep him sane.
At the end of the day, he needs her there in any capacity he can have her. At the end of the day, he wants her there. And he can twist and turn in his bed all night long completely unable to understand this urge to keep her close and to protect her and to see her happy but it's very much real and very much there so when he wakes up the next morning he decides to give in to it, regardless of everything that's happened. So he takes her to breakfast just to see her smile.
.
.
A couple of days later, Mike shows up looking for Harvey, but he's not there, so Mike ends up telling her he had asked Rachel to move in with him, but of course Donna already knew that.
He sits on her chair, expelling a deep sigh. "Donna, you should've seen her face when I asked her. She was so happy."
"I'm sure she was, it was very romantic."
"How could she be so happy and then just not wanna do it?"
"Who says she doesn't wanna do it?"
He leans back, feeling a little defeated. "I told her to take her time, but I didn't think she'd need it."
"Why wouldn't she need it?" She sits on the desk near Mike. "Just because you made some romantic gestures doesn't mean that all reason goes out the window."
"I've had a pit in my stomach since last night. I need to do something."
"You need to look in the mirror," Donna tells him.
"What?"
She's gentle, but earnest, even if the subject feels uncomfortably personal given her current situation. "I just jumped into a relationship with a man who, it turns out, was pretending to be something he wasn't. Rachel already knows that you're pretending to be something you're not. All you need to do is just give her time to figure it all out."
"What if she says no?"
"Then she says no. But pushing her isn't gonna stop that from happening."
He takes it in, decides to follow her advice and give Rachel some space, because Donna's right. Given his secret, agreeing to take such a huge step in their relationship is a lot for Rachel to process. He breathes in, forcing himself to clear his mind and change the subject. "So. Any gossip on Harvey's weekend?"
"Hm?" Donna asks distractedly, moving to organize some folders in a drawer.
"His weekend at the Hamptons. I was afraid he wouldn't go anymore with that whole Stephen mess but since we put him behind bars… He's going, right?"
Donna freezes in place. It's the strangest feeling not knowing something about Harvey's life and she knows if she lets on to Mike that she has no idea what he's talking about he will shut up. He probably just assumed she knew about this because she knows about everything else, especially when it involves Harvey.
"Hm…" she hesitates, pretending to be focused on the files on her hand while she thinks of a way to extract information from Mike. "I'm not sure, Mike…"
Mike shakes his head. "He seemed so excited about it."
"What did he tell you, exactly?" she asks.
"Oh, right." Mike chuckles. "He didn't want to advertise this, right?" Luckily he thinks Donna is just being careful to check what he knows before touching a subject Harvey apparently asked him to keep as a secret. Really, no one could blame Mike for thinking Donna knew all of Harvey's secrets. "I know he asked to borrow his friend Teddy's mansion at the Hamptons for next weekend… By the way, do you know who he was planning on taking with him? I never got to ask."
Donna swallows dryly. Her heart so tight it hurts. "He told you this?" she asks, struggling to sound casual.
Mike chuckles. "I caught him on the phone in the bathroom making arrangements for the house. I thought he would bite my head off, but he told me."
"When was this?"
"Like... three weeks ago? Why?" Mike frowns at her, confused, the uncanny thought that maybe Donna didn't know about this crossing his mind for the very first time.
"Nothing. And he really did tell you he was going next weekend?" She knows she sounds too eager, but she can't help it, swiping her clammy palms on her skirt and staring at Mike wide eyed.
"Yeah, on the twentieth, by night… You did know about this, right?"
Friday. The twentieth of May.
It breaks a piece of her heart. She couldn't fool herself into thinking this wasn't about them. She knew it was. Harvey had been planning this for them. He would take her away and according to Mike not just for the night, but for the whole weekend, which would clearly go against the rules of their agreement but he was still planning it.
She swipes her fingers on her forehead, pushing her hair back and trying to steady herself. "Of course I did." She rolls her eyes at Mike. "I'm just surprised he told you." Donna says it with so much confidence Mike doesn't dare challenge her. "But anyways, I'm not sure he's going anymore."
"Shit." Mike shakes his head, seeming genuinely sorry for his friend. "He seemed so happy about it. To be honest, I don't think I've ever seen him in such a good mood this whole time I've known him."
Way to rub the wound, Michael. Donna bites the inside of her cheeks and purses her lips, reigning her emotions.
"He'll live," she says dismissively. "Now. Off my chair. I've got more work to do besides being your relationship guru."
She shoos Mike away and sinks into her chair, allowing herself a moment to bury her face in her hands the second he turns around the corner, feeling a sting in her eyes as she tempers down the urge to cry.
Her mess of a relationship with Stephen scared her, made her realize she didn't know everything, she couldn't read everyone and she couldn't predict the catastrophic consequences of her every decision. And it was enough to scare her away from her agreement with Harvey because it reminded her exactly why she had that rule in the first place.
She had that rule because she didn't want to be that woman. The secretary sleeping with her womanizer of a boss. She never wanted people thinking she accomplished anything in her professional life that way. That was a generic rule and just good sense. But after she had slept with Harvey for the first time, after she allowed herself to give in to him and came to know what it felt like to be with him, she knew this was way more dangerous. Her good sense became a Harvey centric rule because she wanted to try and he clearly didn't so she couldn't run the risk of falling for him.
She was an idiot fooling herself into thinking they could make that agreement and make it uncomplicated. She thought she was keeping emotional distance while keeping him physically close, but she wasn't. Deep down, she's known this for a few years and was just never willing to admit it to herself. Harvey is now so woven into her heart she thinks if she tries to cut him out it would probably leave her heartless.
Being with Stephen and seeing how Harvey had reacted to that,like he was jealous, but still insisting it didn't mean anything, insisting on separating her personal life with Stephen from their professional relationship, made it pretty clear he wasn't ready. He didn't want a relationship. He wanted her, but he didn't want to be with her. So that's how she knew their agreement would eventually ruin their relationship because she wanted him and she wanted more and she wasn't sure how much longer she could keep that inside if she kept falling into his arms. And if she told him that, he just would've said he didn't feel the same.
Or that's what she thought.
But now, finding out about his plans of traveling together... It shakes her confidence. And she's had her confidence shaken so many times in the last week she's exhausted. She doesn't usually have to face self doubt but now she's scared maybe she made a huge mistake ending her agreement with Harvey. Maybe they had a shot.
She allows herself a glimmer of hope. Thinks about talking to him, going back on her decision, giving them a chance. But that same day Scottie's back to negotiate the firm's dissolution and right in the middle of that she gets back together with Harvey so whatever she thought might be there for the two of them feels pointless and hopeless.
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AN: Thank you everybody for all the love. Thank you to Blue for betaing. Really hope you enjoyed this one. Thoughts are very much appreciated.