A/N Thanks, once again, for all the reviews and thanks for reading. Erm... Not sure how this chapter is going to be received; LucidaBright mentioned a wringer of sorts...
Everything We Apprehend
Chapter Five
October 2008
Alex frowned to herself; finally out of hospital she was back home, the word as warm and comforting as it sounded, and the reality as she'd always known it would be - she'd just never factored in certain variables that were now threatening that ideal. She'd been content initially, returning to the house she shared with her daughter and, of course, she had Molly; the girl had done nothing but fuss around her since she had been released and Alex loved her all the more, if that was possible, for it. This was what she had wanted, what she had fought for. Trouser suits, hair straighteners, mobile phones, satellite television, congestion charges, the smoking ban and the more enlightened views towards women that 2008 offered her were all welcome sights (some more so than others) but they were really just a bonus in comparison with Molly.
As she wandered aimlessly into her kitchen she knew that she should be happy, fulfilled even; as she'd settled back into her old life the world around her had become more of a comfort too, like an old well worn cardigan she'd wrapped herself in, it was warm and familiar with maybe just a few small holes where there'd once been none. Unnoticeable to anyone else but prone to catch her attention as one of those holes lay right across her heart.
She opened the refrigerator, staring blankly at the endlessly familiar products that she'd missed so intently when she'd been stuck in that other life but she'd found that, in the flesh, they weren't quite so appealing. 'You only want what you can't have'; she closed the fridge sharply at that thought, its accuracy too close for comfort - if only she could close the (metaphorical) door on the 'past' so easily.
It had taken some wrangling, and perhaps a little deceit on her part, but she'd managed to get her hands on the police report into the death of her parents. Despite her determined resolution to find out if Gene had existed, if he was real or not, the file had sat in a drawer for days before she'd dared to read it. The urge to know the truth had been smothered by the thought that whatever lay inside the file would also hurt. The moment that she opened it everything would change; she would have her resolution, a logical ending to her story, but there would be no endless possibilities, no hope, no chance of... A chance. He would be real (and possibly now dead) or imagined (and most definitely out of reach). It was an apprehension that had proved founded when, with Molly safely at school for the day, she'd finally worked up the courage to open the file.
Part of her had wanted him to be real, to be some quantifiable piece of her past who had held her hand that day, had made her feel so safe in the midst of such a tragedy. Someone she had remembered, and perhaps even Sam had subconsciously recalled, from childhood that was real and solid. And who she could maybe track down, and meet, and thus turn the final page on the strangest chapter of her life.
Part of her had wanted him to be a construct, some imagined everyman (albeit in the form of a copper) who was therefore indestructible and who would live on in Sam Tyler's notes and her memories – because she could make him survive that way, she could even make herself believe his own assertion that he'd be fine. That this part had won through, that his name hadn't been on the file, had not been as comforting as she'd thought it would be – in fact, she'd felt like she'd lost. She felt as if she was lost. And she felt his loss. Nor did it make her departure any easier to justify; guilt was guilt and it still cut at her sharply.
But she didn't think the other outcome would have really satisfied her either because that man, if he had been real, wouldn't have been her Gene; if he'd existed he'd have been someone else, a man who'd never met Alex Drake, a man altered by the experiences and ravages of time, a man who would have been in his seventies - if he was even still alive. Opening that file had been akin to playing Russian roulette - only every chamber had been loaded and she could never have won.
With teary eyes and a lump in her throat she'd tucked the file back away in the drawer and, at that point, she had finally been able to acknowledge what she'd been trying to ignore since she'd woken: she wanted Gene. She wanted the man who had saved her countless times. She'd always believed that she'd get home to Molly - but whenever that belief had wavered he'd somehow been there to put her back on track with just a few simple words. She didn't doubt that without Gene she wouldn't be here now, she wouldn't have pulled through - Layton would have finished her off. If he hadn't taken that bullet instead of her, the action allowing her to get off a shot at Layton, it would have all been over for her. Gene might not have saved her as a child but he'd been there for her as an adult, he'd been there when she'd needed him the most. So why couldn't he be here now?
With a small sigh she laid her head against the fridge, the cool metal soothing and smooth against her skin. This was crazy; Gene was right - she was mad. How could she have such feelings for a man who drank like a fish, smoked like a chimney, and was prone to violent outbursts; a man who was homophobic, sexist, who always had to be in control, and who, to top it all off, didn't even exist? A wry smile tweaked at the corners of her mouth as she remembered her rebuttal on their one and only date; despite her denial it seemed she was one of 'those' women after all. The smile faded before it really had chance to set in as that sense of loss stabbed at her once again, accompanied by its good friend, regret - which had just as sharp an edge and had been slicing through her at every available opportunity of late.
She'd never acted upon those feelings when she was with him; there'd been times when she'd come close to doing so, times when all she'd wanted to do was take him up to her flat and completely unravel the Gene genie - an admission that made her wonder exactly when she had started to want him. But nothing had ever happened – and now all she had to hold onto were lingering looks, all she had to savour was one kiss. A kiss that had been stolen in the heat, or maybe the cold, of the moment; a kiss taken and given in equal measure and hurt all the more for that fact. And it would have to be enough as she would never have the chance to have more. Not now. Not ever. She removed her head from the fridge, unsure of which emotion hurt the most but determined to get over both of them.
Heading back to the living room, where two presenters she didn't recognise bantered easily enough from the television, she sat down on the couch, lifting her daughter's feet to do so and replacing them on her lap when she was settled. Molly didn't flinch throughout the motion, her eyes glued to the telly and engrossed in some cookery feature. Alex stared silently at her daughter, happy that the child seemed largely unaffected by the whole incident on the boat, and its aftermath, but worried by that fact too. Molly had seen her parents divorce, her family torn apart, leaving her with a father who only visited briefly, and sporadically, and a mother consumed with her work - and then she'd had to face up to the fact that her mother had almost lost her life because of that job.
If Alex had learnt anything tangible from her journey to 1981 it was that a child needed their mother; she was going to rectify that, make up for lost time with Molly, by doing the very thing her own mother had seemed intent on doing. She was going to take a sabbatical. Given what had happened to her, her employers were more than willing to cede to that demand - a doctor's note advising a lengthy recovery period pretty much sealed the deal. In truth, she expected a number of psychological tests would have to be endured before she'd even be allowed to touch her warrant card again.
"Are you okay, Mum?" Still laid in the same position but with her eyes now staring at her mother, Molly waited patiently for an answer though her concern was clearly written across her small face.
"Yes," Alex rushed to answer, rubbing the child's leg reassuringly, "I'm fine. I'm so glad I'm back."
"Back?" There was a spark of intelligence in her daughter's eyes that Alex didn't miss and she steeled herself for the inevitable questions. Molly may not have expressed an interest in following in her mother's footsteps but if her daughter ever wanted to join the force herself, Alex knew she'd make a great detective. Or maybe even a barrister. "Where have you been?"
It was almost as if she could hear the cogs whirring around Molly's head, a miracle given the deafening noise coming from the television; she couldn't bear to reprimand the child for having the volume so high, even if she had done so previously, as it was something she'd missed so very much - this humdrum, everyday domestic scene. But could she tell her the truth? Her daughter was bright, smart, wise beyond her years even (probably out of necessity and Alex blamed herself for that) and she had read about Sam Tyler's experiences the very day that Alex had been rendered unconscious - would a child's imagination make that link? But, though Molly had known all about the other world that a comatose Tyler had visited, she'd also doubted it, just as Alex herself had - would Molly believe her? Maybe the two worlds were incompatible and always would be - she had tried this conversation back in that other world and it was hard to convince someone else without sounding mad. Even now she wasn't sure if Gene had believed her; maybe he had, maybe at the end he had finally come around to the idea.
"I..." She started the sentence positively but then thought better of it; she didn't want Molly thinking her mother was certifiable. But she didn't want to lie to her daughter either and now that she had inadvertently ignited some kind of spark in the child's imagination it was going to be hard to douse it. In the end her daughter saved her from making that decision.
Molly muted the television and sat up, slowly removing her feet from her mother's lap and placing them on the carpet below, her eyes never leaving the woman at her side. "Mum," the child started slowly and deliberately. "That Taylor bloke... Did the same thing happen to you?"
Asked outright she was stunned, both that someone had made the connection and that that someone had been her daughter. She could try and deny it, say that she had just meant that she was glad to be back home but she had now hesitated too long in replying. It was a bit of a give away and she really didn't want to lie to Molly, even if it was probably in the child's best interests. She was caught between lies and truths and deception and honesty, and she hesitated for a moment longer, briefly wondering how Evan had seemed to find it so easy to make the decision and lie to her all those years ago. "Yes," she said softly, holding her daughter's gaze.
Not getting an immediate, obvious, response she continued on. "I think that because I was working on Tyler's case notes before I... Before all of this, I somehow found myself in the world he had created - though there were differences. Had to be really, given that it was my mind in control and not his." She wasn't entirely sure who she was trying to convince with that explanation; it was how she was attempting to cope with what had happened - it was the logical explanation that she needed to get over this and put it in the past. Only, cold logic, the very thing she had always relied upon, was failing her because it could never fully expunge human feelings - not hers anyway.
Molly frowned, her eyes falling to her own feet and Alex immediately regretted her decision; maybe Evan had been right to lie to her for all those years - maybe the truth wasn't worth all this. "Did it feel like a dream?"
Alex hesitated at the question; the answer so simple, the decision to voice it so hard. Molly returned her gaze and she found her daughter's eyes filled with only curiosity. "No," she answered softly, honestly, "Not like a dream at all. My parents - your grandparents - were there and..." She paused, her mind tumbling to thoughts of the others, to Chris and Ray, and to Shaz and Luigi and, of course, to Gene. "It all felt so very real."
"Is that why you look so sad sometimes?" Molly asked, after a moment of contemplation.
Alex frowned once again, both at the question and at her apparent failure to hide those feelings from her daughter. She felt guilty once more for missing Gene when she had Molly right here with her and it strengthened her resolve to let him go. But she knew the child had meant her Grandparents; she'd always spoken to Molly about Tim and Caroline Price, had made them seem alive even though they would never have the opportunity to meet. Alex had always kept them alive in her heart and passing those memories on to Molly had helped to keep that flame burning. In going back to 1981 her psyche had just chosen to take that a step further before taking great pleasure in blowing it all to smithereens.
"Because you left them behind?" Molly prompted further when nothing was said.
"Yes," she replied with a small smile and, in a way, it was true. She did miss her parents but she had also discovered the truth behind their deaths which, whilst both disturbing and horrifying, had brought some kind of closure that she had obviously needed. But she couldn't tell Molly what she'd discovered about her parents, nor could she quite bring herself to reveal the real reason behind her malaise. "That's why I'm finding it hard sometimes," Alex said quietly. "Can you understand?" Molly nodded her answer and Alex reached out for her daughter, pulling her into her side.
She was going to get over this, she'd promised herself that much - and she was as determined to reach that goal as she had been to get back home, to get back here. "This is real, you're real," she whispered reassuringly to her daughter and to herself. "And that's all that matters," she continued as Molly wrapped her arms around her; it was something she'd never been able to do back then - her daughter would always be a reflection, in a mirror or on a television screen, or glimpsed out of the corner of her eye, and would always disappear when Alex tried to focus upon her. The only time she'd been able to really see Molly, she thought as she kissed the top of her daughter's head, had been in the few moments before she had returned home. A thought struck her then, fighting through the boggy mire of memories of that time, through the pain and blood and choices made; a thought about Molly and about her return to this world but she let the idea fizzle out. It didn't mean anything, it couldn't mean anything, because it wasn't real. She was just desperately looking for any reason she could not to draw that line under it all and move on; she laid her head on top of her daughter's, determined to try and do just that.
