TRANSLATING THE WORLD

CHAPTER 2

AN: After all we've been through I think they OWE us a really hot Waige make out scene when they finally get together, just sayin'. I know things won't be resolved this quickly on the show, but I decided to go down this road anyway. I just wanted to make the battered, shipwrecked Waige fans feel a bit better.

Please take the time to review if you like a story. Not just mine. Everyone's. Writers need positive feedback.

OXOXOXOXOXO

Her apprehension only grew as she barreled down the painfully familiar streets on her way to the garage. What if Walter had done something stupid? Well, something else stupid.

Convinced he was hanging onto life by a thread, Paige was strangely let down when she burst through the door and found him calmly stacking items on the conference table. When she noticed whose belongings he was collecting into boxes and neat piles, her ire returned full force and her blood pressure soared. There was the geranium Ralph had potted for her Mother's Day gift two years before. Her sweater she kept for chilly mornings was casually thrown in a heap beside the silk flower-topped pens she always used to sign documents. Dishes, clothes, knick-knacks, all the tangible evidence she'd spent the better part of three years in the place was accumulated on that table, huddling forlornly like an unwanted child.

Hot tears stung her eyes. He didn't even have the courtesy to look up at her caustic, biting words, "Wow. I see you can't wait to get rid of any trace of me."

"What are you doing here?" was his only reply. He said it in a quiet monotone. Emotionless as an android, of course.

Sarcasm oozing thickly from every syllable, she answered, "I'm stupid and masochistic, I guess." When that got no response, she added, "My son. He was concerned about you. Hadn't heard from you. He's been trying to contact you for two days. He thought you might have driven off a cliff somewhere or something. He didn't realize you fired him too. I'll go. You can have a bonfire with all my stuff. I don't think I ever want to see any of it again."

At that, Walter's eyes finally met hers. They were anguished, red rimmed and lids swollen. He looked like he'd lost his best friend. But he put his chin up stubbornly and said, "It wasn't my intention to give Ralph that impression. I had to turn off all my devices. I was getting bombarded with irate… Well, you can imagine. Toby's been blowing up my phone with accusations since he and Happy took off. Sly is a little more subtle, but the censure is still there. I keep getting messages of all kinds from him. I found I wasn't… in the frame of mind to hear any of it, so I shut everything down before Cabe or Happy could chime in."

Paige would have felt some satisfaction in the responses of her friends if Walter didn't look so completely devastated. Instead her heart squeezed in frustrating sympathy. And after a few uncomfortable moments of staring at one another, he turned back toward the table even though his arms were crossed tightly against his chest and he wasn't rummaging around in her detritus anymore. "And I didn't fire anyone," he argued petulantly, "I don't see it. Why is everyone so mad? You don't… care about me like I... You're always complaining about being surrounded by geniuses. I-I thought you would welcome a different opportunity. I thought it was a good solution. For-for…both of us."

"Always complaining?! Where do you get that?" Paige sneered.

Spinning around to face her again, he recounted, "You called us black mold that creeps into your life. You begged Cabe not to leave you alone with us. You told Happy we make you feel stupid all the time and you said you didn't want Ralph raised by four lunatics. You even told Ava's father you feel inadequate multiple times a day. That's just what you've said recently. I don't understand. I may still be terrible at gauging emotions, so it's not just that you appear frustrated with us a lot. You said those things flat out. If we… if I drive you so crazy and you don't have… feelings for me, I don't get why you would want to stay here. Why would you be upset?"

The worst of her fury was abruptly doused by a sudden onslaught of guilt. She really had made those remarks and she hadn't given a thought about how they would sound to Walter or the others. It still didn't excuse what he did, but it made it slightly more understandable. His genuine confusion worked to extinguish what was left of her anger. It left intense grief in its place. It appeared they had both made such a mess of everything.

"Walter, let me try to help you understand one more time if I can. This was never just a job to me. I care a lot about all of you. You've all been like family to me and to Ralph. Like a home. A safe place. I've worked my heart and soul out here and shared some things with you guys no one else knows. I think I've done some good here too. And just because I express some negative emotions sometimes, doesn't mean I wasn't happy to be a part of this team. I thought you were simply being childish. It didn't seem like you were trying to help me find a better situation. It felt more like you wanted to be rid of me, because you were upset."

"I am upset. And I do want to be rid of you," Walter stated bluntly, causing Paige to gasp and stare at him open-mouthed, temperature rising again as he continued. "You betrayed me. You were deceptive. You kept the truth from me for months. The last few weeks, you let me believe… we-we could be… and all the time you knew. I can't. It's too much. You can't expect me to look at you every day knowing you know, and you d-don't… You never wanted…" His voice trailed off, he looked away scowling and clenching his jaw.

"Oh, no you don't! Don't you dare go there!" Paige laughed derisively. She paced toward him and jabbed him in the chest with an agitated finger, "For the record, Toby told me not to say anything! And who says I never wanted us to be together? I gave you chance after chance for over a year. You jerked me around. Kept making me think we were getting somewhere only to yank the rug out from under me. I finally gave up. Moved on. You're about a year too late! What did you want me to do?"

Glaring down at her, he shoved her offending hand away from him and ground out, "You know sorting through emotions is hard for me! You could have tried to understand that. It's obvious you didn't feel… this. You've never felt like this! This is huge and ugly and it doesn't leave you alone. You can't stop it that easily. If you felt anything toward me at all, it had to be a weak attraction of some sort. It's impossible. It-it couldn't have been… You never love-loved me."

"THE HELL I DON'T!" Paige yelled in his face.

One minute the two of them stood there stunned and seething and the next his lips were firmly on hers.