Author's note: I still continue to own nothing, my bank account can attest to that.
Chapter 3
It was in the middle of eating her salad for lunch when Dr. Holly Stewart heard her phone go off. She looked at the phone and almost dropped her fork. Gail had texted her.
Neeerrrrddd why. Your left no her whyyyyyy
Holly was confused, she had no idea what the gibberish on her screen meant. She looked at her watch and did the time conversion knowing it, usually, was too early for Gail to be drinking. She couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong with the cop. Holly then saw another message from Gail pop up on the screen.
Holly noanswrtg here injieweenyou dsaew
Now Holly knew for sure the blonde was drunk. Of course being across the continent wasn't very useful for helping drunk Gail. Holly fired off a text to Traci asking her to check on the blonde, as it was the only thing she could think to do.
Holly couldn't finish her lunch, not could she attempt to focus on work, not when her mind was racing about what was going on with Gail. She quickly cleaned up her desk and called her boss, she made some excuse about food positioning to leave the lab early. She drove to her apartment and paced just waiting for something. An hour after Gail's drunken texts she received an update from Traci.
Thanks for the heads up on Gail, found her at the penny. She's pretty out of it, gonna drag her home.
Holly breathed a sigh of relief. The woman that she loved, so immensely, would be ok. She hated feeling so absolutely powerless, and she felt that Gail's behaviour was her fault.
Taking a job in a different country, across the continent was probably the dumbest thing Holly had ever done. As soon as she was offered the position she had accepted it, she had no real reason to decline the offer, it was her dream job after and she had just been rejected by the person she loved, what was the point of sticking around and having to witness them continue to reject her. And then Gail came to the lab, came to her and gave a sliver of hope that just maybe she still loved the doctor as well. Holly remembered the rejection she'd felt for weeks and knew that Gail saying sorry wouldn't fix anything and so she used the stupid set up that Lisa had arranged the night before to subconsciously test Gail's resolve. She hadn't meant it, in fact it just kinda slipped out, since internally she was screaming thoughts of adoration. Holly couldn't help herself when she later brought the thumb to the station in hopes of seeing Gail and maybe getting more of an idea if she was clinging to a fantasy, or if Gail really did still feel the same for her. When those words emerged forms Gail's mouth that Holly was the most wonderful person she'd ever met, Holly wanted to collapse. She had to walk away, and that fact alone almost broke her right in front of Gail.
Holly had wrestled with her job decision since the encounter in the hallway, she had already committed to the position and resigned from her current job, but she also really needed to know if there was still a chance she and Gail could work it out, that maybe Gail felt the same way and Gail could come with her. She knew it was far fetched, but the romantic in Holly won out and she knew she had to try to have both this amazing career opportunity and the woman she loved. That's how she came to form her hair brained interrogation room ploy. She had known cornering Gail in a room wasn't the adult thing to do but it seemed like a brilliant plan that might just work. Then Gail said she had a 'thing'. Holly briefly hoped it didn't mean date, but she couldn't believe that after Gail's confession she would have moved on. Then Gail suggested the following night to have their much needed talk, her heart skipped a beat. It literally skipped a beat, and Holly felt like someone had spiked her tea she was so giddy. Of course that was short lived because once she left the station the reality of her recent decision hit her. Gail was a police officer, she couldn't just up and move to a different country, could she? Then came the next day when she picked up Gail for their planned evening which was derailed by the pair's confessions. In all the possible scenarios that Holly had played out in her mind never did she think that Gail would inform her of her intentions to become a mum. Her brain was working overtime and in a state of shock when the new job had slipped out. Her fantasy of going to San Francisco with Gail by her side came crashing down along with what she assumed was hopes for any reconciliation.
The next two weeks before Holly left Toronto had been almost too much for her. Gail had been perfect, she had been everything Holly needed, supportive and understanding, yet snarky and crass. She secretly hoped Gail would scream at her and beg her to stay, by she knew that wasn't Gail, and that would never happen. The growth Holly had seen in Gail since they had met several months before became glaringly obvious to the pathologist and it chipped away yet another piece of her heart that she was leaving. Holly hoped that perhaps they would continue their romantic relationship for the next few weeks, but the two had merely spent the two weeks as friends, no physical interaction and no emotional talks. The day that Holly left had been the hardest day of her life, harder than any of her school exams, harder than her residency, harder than all of them combined. She loved Gail and here she was abandoning her. Staring into the blue eyes before she headed towards the security queue made Holly's doubts come to the surface again. She couldn't voice them, however, not now, it was too little too late. So she hugged the blonde as tightly as possible, whilst willing her big brain to remember every dip and curve of Gail's body. When they finally pulled apart Holly couldn't help herself, her lips found Gail's and tried to remember every detail of them as well. The pair seemed to pour every emotion that had been bottled up for the past few weeks into that kiss and when they finally broke apart tears soaked both of their faces. Holly could barely speak she was so overcome with emotion, so when she finally stated she had to leave it came out in a squeak. She turned away from Gail and headed towards the checkpoint. Just before walking through the hall she turned to look back at the love of her life and the image she saw of Gail, tear streaked and abandoned, would become the nightmare that haunted her every single night.