The breakup felt like the end of an era. It was the changing of the guard in slow motion, resigning from being each other's most important person, handing the duty over to someone yet unnamed and unfound. Take care of her, Sam wanted to ask of her future partner, the man who wasn't him.
"I'm sorry," Sam said softly. Part of him wished he hadn't done this here, in the garage where she was so quintessentially herself. This was his Mikaela: her long hair pinned in a bun, her hands flecked with grease, a wrench in her back pocket, and he was leaving her. Sam had wished so many times to feel at home with her, gazed over at her and could only think why couldn't it be her? "You're amazing," he said, wished he had the words to explain to her how deeply he loved her despite leaving. "You're such an amazing person, Mikaela, and I, I just feel lucky that I even got to be with you and get to know you. I really…" The words were stuck back in his memory of saying them for the first time, of looking over at her under the stars and whispering them. "I really did love you."
"I know, Sam." Mikaela smiled, and her eyes were like sparkling water; Sam would always remember them clearly, he knew it, before and after they looked at him with sadness. "I loved you too. I just don't think we're meant for each other." She blew out a slow breath, faraway look in her eyes as she gazed down into the open hood of the car she leaned against, like maybe she was thinking about how things fit together, how they made incredible things happen by being together in the exact right way. "I know we were important to each other, and breaking up won't change who you were at that time in my life." She smiled a little, a lightness slowly returning to them. "That's also a fancy way of saying we should stay friends."
Sam had never had a breakup like this, where he left feeling free in this way – not of her, but of the misalignment, of now being in his proper place in her life. And if it wasn't her, if she wasn't the person waiting for him at the end of his long journey to find them, if someone as richly compelling and loving as Mikaela couldn't be the one waiting for Sam, Sam couldn't wait to see what his person was like.
Sam walked home slowly, kicking aimlessly at fallen leaves, hands in his jacket pockets. He wondered how long it would take, before he felt like she was missing whenever he looked over and didn't see her there. When he did look towards the street at the sound of tires, though, he did see someone who had been missing. The yellow Camaro sat in the street, one door open in invitation, as if Bee really had been gone for a month and not actually right beside Sam all along. Sam's lightened mood plummeted.
"I don't think so." He picked up his pace, shoving his hands deeper into his pockets. "I'm not talking to you."
An engine rev, almost like a whimper.
"I can't believe I didn't see right through it," Sam grumbled. He was talking to himself; maybe people would assume he had Bluetooth earphones in. "Random boy shows up, says he's Italian but never speaks a word of Italian, no accent, never even talks to me, can drive a car even though he's from a city with no cars, and you seriously couldn't come up with a better name? How about any name, at all?!"
The shouting earned him a confused look from a woman working in her garden, and she hid behind the picket fence as he walked by, ineffectually. Sam hurried past her, unable to think of any explanation to ease her fears. Maybe she'd think he was just a roving lunatic and didn't live around here.
"I can't believe you even got Ratchet in on it. That's who Randall was, wasn't it? You guys can all do it, the, the hologram thing? Or whatever that human form was? No one ever mentioned it to me, after all. You guys don't tell me anything. And seriously, Randall? That sounds the same as Ratchet! You guys are terrible with sneaky names! And it was you the whole time! You came with me when I went out with Mikaela, even!"
He was about to say it: you could have hurt her again, I shouldn't have let you close to her. But it stopped him, the nagging thought that he didn't understand everything yet, that maybe he just – wasn't ready to. He was just so angry, hated how Bee had forced the emotion onto him by his increasingly infuriating actions, how things just kept getting worse. Sam had wanted to talk to someone about it, had even planned to talk to Mikaela, but had been unable to heap more emotions on her than he already had.
"And you lied to me!" Sam's voice broke on the word. It was the worst part, the lies, and he hated remembering any of it, seeing himself as so thoroughly fooled. "Why'd you do it? Did you not – what, trust me? Wanted to spy on me?"
A loud rev from Bumblebee, probably in protest.
"Yeah, well, now I don't trust you either."
Sam stalked along in silence until he reached his house. Ratchet, car-form, was sitting in his driveway, engine humming quietly. The boxes with Sam's belongings were already packed into the ambulance that was Ratchet, and he was just waiting for Sam to finish up his goodbyes. He'd already said goodbye to his parents, and Mikaela was at the end of his goodbyes list. Sam hadn't wanted to face his parents after that, and the decision of whether or not to tell them about the breakup.
"You," Sam huffed, storming up to the ambulance. "Have so much explaining to do." It had been hard to reign in his fury in front of his parents and now that they were without an audience, he was ready to stop trying.
"Sam, we really must leave," Ratchet said, placating and factual, "the others are expecting us to be en route already. It is a long drive."
"It can wait two seconds."
Bumblebee stayed in the street, darting forward and then backwards, the auto equivalent of pacing. The engine revs were short, quick bursts, like the very sound of anxiety.
"What were you guys thinking, sending Bee's hologram or whatever to follow me around? Seriously? You could have at least told me it was him! Or that you guys could even do that."
"No, Sam," Ratchet's voice was soothing, albeit ineffectually. "It was not security. You'll have to talk to Bumblebee about the reason."
"Yeah. Conveniently, he can't talk."
"I set him up with temporary cables this morning. He can get a couple days out of them. Now, may we leave?"
"Fine." Sam took one step towards the Camaro, and the door was flung open, desperately inviting. Sam sighed, climbed in.
It felt different than when he'd left for college, watching the house disappear from the rearview mirror. Sam watched his familiar street leave them, then his neighborhood, all in silence. He couldn't help but wonder where he would be going now if he hadn't ever met the Autobots, if his life had proceeded normally, if he was a recent college graduate who hadn't become entrenched in an alien war, if the threats to his safety weren't so significant and his involvement so pivotal that he didn't have to move to an Earthbound alien city.
He tried, in vain, to imagine never having met Bumblebee.
xxx
The first day of driving had passed in complete silence. Sam had tried a few times to ask Bee why he'd decided to play holo-exchange-student, not even touching upon the whole kissing thing – Sam definitely wasn't ready to hear about that – and all he'd gotten was a brief explanation of "security," even though Ratchet had sworn up and down that it was entirely Bee's doing and had zero relation to security.
The second day, though, during a stop at a deserted gas station, Sam had gotten out of the car to walk around, and had been surprised to see Bee's human hologram hesitantly following him up onto the porch of the shop. The Camaro stayed in place in the parking lot, no actual need for fuel. Sam frowned, giving Bee a quick glance. There was a brief wave of familiarity, a flash of feeling less alone in the wake of betrayal, until his mind caught up and reminded him that this was the person who had done it to him.
"Okay. You want to talk?" Sam asked. Bee nodded, leaning against the porch railing, still several paces away from Sam like he was afraid to get too close. The look of fear on his face made Sam's heart twist and pitch. "Don't look like that. I just want to know why."
Before Bee could answer, Sam's cell phone rang.
"Better get that," Bee offered weakly.
"Wasn't planning on it." Sam glowered. The fact that Bee looked even more picture-perfect than before wasn't helping Sam any. He had such a sweet face; Sam wondered briefly how the hologram image was even chosen.
"It's Mikaela." Bee recognized the ringtone, of course. Sam sighed and picked it up.
"Just checking in," Mikaela said when he answered, "you are, after all, my favorite ex-boyfriend."
"God, that's weird to hear. Not the favorite part, of course I'm your favorite, the other part."
"Yeah," Mikaela exhaled the word. "I miss you. Are you okay out there? You seemed kind of, y'know, upset after your friend left, and having to move away right after…"
"He… it's a long story. He didn't exactly leave on great terms."
"Oh, Sam." He knew the look that would be on her face; pitying, heart hurting for him.
"It's fine. It's not like I'll see him again, right?" he was maybe being a little too mean to Bee, he knew it, he just felt like his hurt had so much momentum it was hard to stop. "Anyways… we have to get driving again, but I'll tell you when we're there?"
"I'd love to see pictures of how the city turned out," she said. It had been a giant undertaking, starting years ago; it was weird, to think of a project started during their relationship and finishing after it, as well as all the unseen conclusions in her life. They'd stay in touch, but would he know the little things? How her pet frog would take to the companion she hadn't gotten him yet, whether she eventually lifted her ban on white leather seats in cars, if she'd ever stop nearly burning the handles of wooden spoons by leaving them in pots on the stove.
When Sam hung up, he turned to Bee; the look on Bee's face was so – so expressive, it made Sam wonder what he'd been missing all this time, when Bee stayed in car form because he had to, not even in Bot form. "Look, Bee, about Mikaela –"
"No!" Bee's sudden lash of anger made Sam fall speechless. "I'm sorry I hurt her, Sam, I really am – and I'm so, so sorry I hurt you by hurting her, and you're right, I was out of line, I know that, but you should have seen what it was doing to you!"
"What it was doing?"
"You were so sad, Sam! Like, like you were settling and you knew it. And you would never talk about it! Why wouldn't you just leave each other? Why keep making yourself feel like it was your fault for not being good together? You always blamed yourself!" His raised voice was clearly wearing on the temporary cables – or whatever the equivalent was, in his current form – as his voice went from grating to hoarse, so broken up that Sam was sure it was painful for Bee. Were there really that many times, for Bee to be so upset by this?
There were, though. Sam's relationship as viewed by a third party – had it hurt, to watch? Sam had certainly spent the beginning trying to form himself into someone who wouldn't fail out of the relationship, spent the middle beating himself up over his inability to do so. It was only now, at the sunset of their relationship, that Sam had accepted it: nothing he did would make things work.
"You can't think you deserve that, Sam! You can't stay with her, look what it's been doing to you! And you never understood what it did to me!" At his last words, his voice cracked in a sob, and he brought a hand to his throat. His eyes were sad and reluctant, and the sight of his pure misery tore Sam apart. Sam knew he had to find a reply, so he grabbed at the most prominent and hoped he wouldn't regret it.
"It didn't have anything to do with you," he said. Bee lifted his head to look at Sam, eyes welled with tears, and so betrayed – like Sam hadn't understood him at all, and it hurt Bee so deeply to realize that. Before Sam could say anything, Bee vanished. Sam blinked in the aftermath; he'd never seen Bee just disappear before.
The scream of tires against pavement came from the parking lot, and the Camaro roared off down the road, spinning up dust. Sam rubbed his hands over his face, swearing under his breath.
"I assume you need a ride?" Ratchet drove up in front of the shop and a door popped open. "I'm afraid the boxes take up the room in back, so you won't be able to pretend to be a patient."
"Very funny." Sam climbed in, the door closing behind him. With it shut, he couldn't even hear the distant howl of the Camaro engine. Ratchet let him sit in silence for a mile, as Sam watched the yellow car far ahead of them.
"May I ask what happened?" Ratchet asked, voice placid.
"Well…" Sam shifted, leaning against the stack of boxes between the driver's and passenger seat. "I'm not super sure, I guess. I… well, I definitely said something I shouldn't have."
"Very descriptive." Sam wasn't sure whether the Autobots had always used sarcasm, or if it was one of those things they'd just learned from the humans. At the very least, Ratchet's fondness for it had been on an incline since showing up on the planet.
"I mean… come on, in my defense, it was insane to find out that the guy I'd been hanging out with every day for a month was someone I already knew in disguise! I felt lied to – I was lied to! I suddenly find out I've been making out with my car and I'm supposed to – woah!" Ratchet had braked suddenly, and Sam flew forward before being all-but guillotined by his seatbelt. "Some warning would be nice!"
"I'm sorry, Sam." Ratchet picked up speed again, and Sam hoped the driving would stay smooth. Sam nudged aside boxes so he could see out the windshield better; the visibility would have been pretty unsafe if he'd been piloting the car himself, and he wondered how he would explain it if they were pulled over. Sorry, officer, I didn't think I needed to see out of the other half of the windshield. Sam looked ahead, and was just able to catch sight of sunlight glinting off the yellow car, far ahead. In the dead silence, he could just barely hear the screaming engine. "Okay, he's pissed."
"I would suggest," Ratchet finally offered, "That you talk to Bumblebee about his intentions some more. I think I misunderstood."
"You misunderstood him? What's not to understand?"
"That's a question for him, not me."
"Are you sure? He wouldn't tell me. I mean, maybe he was going to, but then Mikaela called, and then he flew off the handle."
"She called you? And what happened after that?"
"Bee started yelling at me about how my relationship had been bad for me all along." Sam could still see the hurt look, hear the pained voice. "He said it was hard for him, too." The image of Bee in tears refused to leave him. He hadn't known the Autobots could cry, but then again, Bee had been in human form. Maybe that had something to do with it. "And I said it had nothing to do with him. Which was probably not the best thing I could have said."
"You regret it?"
"Yeah. I mean… what if he really was just looking out for me?" Part of Sam was angry because he was the one who had rights to be upset. He'd been lied to and deceived, Bee had hurt his girlfriend. Ex-girlfriend. Sam was the one who had been wronged. But Bee – he looked so heartbroken. Like he was at the end of his rope, like there was a lot Sam had been missing.
"Sam," Ratchet interrupted softly. "Let me assure you, it was not a lack of trust that drove Bumblebee to come to you the way he did. Whatever it was, it was not mistrust. I can promise you that."
Sam drew in a breath, closing his eyes briefly. "Okay, well. I guess that makes everything else make sense too. Maybe he was trying to make her leave me, with all that stuff he did before? But when she didn't, he showed up as a guy to get me away from her? Do you think he could do that hormone reading thing that you guys can do?"
"Doubtlessly."
"Well maybe he could tell that if he showed up as a guy, I'd be, y'know. Susceptible." Sam had never told Bee, after all. Or much of anyone. It was a combination of taking the path of least resistance, and never seeking out a reason to do otherwise. He liked girls and he liked guys, and then Mikaela showed up, and Sam loved her. He'd never seen a reason to go around advertising that if someone like Cal had appeared first, things could have gone that way instead.
"Makes sense," Sam said, mostly to himself. "Doesn't really make it okay, but at least it makes sense. Y'know… mostly."
It didn't answer for the look on Bee's face. It didn't tell Sam why Bee was so hurt, watching his failing relationship from the outside. It didn't give Sam the Rosetta stone to Bee's hurt feelings. Maybe that meant it wasn't the answer at all.
The Camaro sped ahead of them until it was entirely out of sight, vanishing into the setting sun.
