v. Smell

When she spotted him at the otherwise deserted bar shortly after ten, she wondered how he knew she would be here. And whether he had really kept out of her new life as much as she had thought until now. Nothing was for sure with him; not now, not ever.

She excused herself from her colleagues and went up to him. He had seen her, she was sure of that, but right now nothing suggested that he was aware of her presence. Nonchalantly and not quite dressed appropriately for this kind of posh restaurant he sat on a bar stool and stared at the glass in front of him.

For a moment she stopped behind him and inhaled the familiar scent of their shared past; his aftershave, the warm tingle on her skin, whenever she saw him. Then she sat down next to him, trying to push aside all the memories that welled up.

"What are you doing here?" she asked gently and searched for his eyes from her sideways angle.

He raised his head a little, turned to her and studied her with admiring eyes for longer that she would have liked. "Having a drink," he answered finally and let his eyes roam over her black dress. "And waiting for you."

"How did you know I would be here tonight?" she wanted to know in return and caught herself looking for clues on his face.

His lower lip moved forward just a little, as if it wasn't important, but immediately all his little quirks and mannerisms flooded her mind again. How he always shoved his hands in his pockets, wrinkled his nose when he was confused, how he completely owned the floors of the Lightman Group with his compact appearance and swagger.

"They have their Christmas party here every year," he replied shrugging his shoulders and taking a sip of his lager.

"And you just happen to know that." She observed the small wrinkles around his eyes and wasn't sure whether they had really gotten deeper or whether he simply looked tired. A moment later they became even more prominent when a slight smile began playing about his lips.

"A little research revealed the right location. You wouldn't believe what kind of mortifying pictures of Christmas parties people put up on the internet. Some well-placed twenty dollar notes made sure that I won't have to sit here through all of December. Would have been quite an expensive bill."

"You do still know where I live, don't you?"

"That would have been too easy, don't you think?"

A small smile tugged on her lips as well. "Maybe."

The conspiratorial smile drifted back and forth between the two of them and revealed a kind of intimacy that she had thought lost. But she should have known that her heart was still just as attached to him as her thoughts were in every spare minute.

He was the reason why she still tried to keep herself busy all the time, not allowing herself to stop, when all she actually wanted was to find peace and quiet. She was afraid of the moments of silence, because they were filled with him and opened up old wounds.

The smile slowly disappeared from their faces. "How are you?" she asked after some time when he went back to focusing on his glass.

"Emily's in Berkeley," he avoided her question and yet managed to tell her unmistakably that he had been better. "The house is awfully quiet without her."

She nodded gently. He dreaded the silence as well. "I can imagine, but that's a great chance for her. You can be proud."

"I am," he responded and there was no doubt.

She waited a moment before she went on to the next topic. "How's the Group doing?"

He waited a moment as well before he gave his answer. His eyes stared straight ahead to where the barkeeper rinsed a few last glasses. "Torres quit last week."

She drew her eyebrows together. "Why?"

"Enough of me and my moods," he returned with a shrug and had to grin a bit at the same time.

"She'll come back."

His head turned to her again and he gazed at her for a few seconds; let his eyes wander unabashed from the small scar next to her eyebrow down to the narrow line of her lips. "Why do you say that with such certainty?"

"Because she loves working with you. Gives her the same kick. She'll come to her senses and be back."

His eyes continued boring into her. "You didn't come back," he noticed without any accusation but a lot of melancholy in his voice.

She had to look away from him for a moment when it began to hurt too much. "Because I had to take care of a few things in my life. Things I hadn't taken care of for too long."

He nodded and kept silent, studying the almost empty glass in front of him again. She thought he might ask how she was, but he didn't and he had probably seen the answer on her face anyway.

Only after long seconds that felt like an eternity to her, he spoke again. "That's what I always loved most about you," he mused and a warm smile spread on his face again.

She didn't know what he was talking about. "What?"

"You always believe in the good in people. That Torres will think again and find back to her passion, that I will come round again and stop behaving like an idiot." His eyes searched for hers again, this time with borderline intensity. "You always saw the good in me."

She wasn't sure what exactly he wanted to say, but she understood enough to have her thoughts start spinning. "It's not always the best of traits. You believe in the good just to realize that the world doesn't honor it and that you'll get screwed by it. In the end it's just mostly naïve."

"It's a great trait," he assured her again and some admiration resonated in his voice.

She wasn't sure whether they were talking about the two of them, but they probably did. Somehow.

"I don't know whether Darwin would have agreed," she said with a timid smile. "Survival of the fittest and all that."

"Look where Darwin's theory left him: Just as dead as everybody else, even though he had thought to have outsmarted life and revealed its little secret."

Her smile spread and she saw how his eyes illuminated. For a moment they left it at that, but his unexpected appearance her at the restaurant kept bothering her.

"Why are you really here? Not for small talk, are you?"

He shook his head and confirmed her guess. "Wanted to give you something." His hand reached for an item on the bar stool next to him and a little later she realized what it was. He handed her the book and she ran her fingers over the cover immediately.

"You finally wrote it?"

"Dutifully. However, it was still too late. I will spend the rest of my life paying back publisher advances. And they hate it."

She had heard him, quickly understood that he was really just joking, but her thoughts were already circling fast around what might be written inside the book. She read the title again and again until the words didn't make any sense anymore. Life lies.

"It's the first copy," he explained and she looked at him with surprise. "I wanted you to have it."

"Thank you," she said quietly and tried to organize her thoughts, but everything did either make no sense at all or all too much. Her fingers continued tracing the cover, wandering over truths that could lie beneath. They scared her, but she was also looking for the relief they might offer.

While she contemplated and felt torn between the worlds of her old and her new life, he already got up. "I'll leave you alone with your colleagues again." He glanced at the small groups of people at the other end of the restaurant. "Was really nice seeing you."

She nodded and found it difficult to keep up with the pace of reality. Everything around her seemed to have stopped, but actually it all went on as usual.

"Nice seeing you too," she replied and wasn't sure how to react. He was so familiar and now he still seemed like a stranger.

He took the decision out of her hands by giving her a well-intentioned smile and leaving the restaurant scuffing his feet. She followed him with her eyes, but the connection with him in the form of the book in her hands remained.

When he was gone for good she slowly opened it, skimmed through the first empty page, was thrown off course again by the title on the next, and eventually got stuck on the dedication—her heart throbbing loudly, her breath taken away.

For my ever so loyal partner in crime. It hurts so much without you.

A tear formed in the corner of her eye and threatened to escape. But before this could happen she closed the book again, briefly bid farewell to her colleagues and climbed into a cab, where she held onto the book as if it were her life. Only when she closed the door of her house behind herself, the tear finally fell—hot and salty.

She let her coat remain somewhere in the hall, hastily took off her shoes and sat down on the couch, where the book was still in her shaking hands. It took some courage to open it again, go past the title, the dedication, a picture of him all dressed up, right to the first chapter. But she knew that she would find no sleep before she had read it all.

And so it happened. She didn't sleep until the last word was read; didn't even notice the hours that went by on the clock next to her.

She had read all of his books, had given useful input for the last two of them, but this was something completely different. It was personal, only somewhat scientific, warm and honest, not cool and distant. It wasn't a textbook, it was more of a memoir.

He described some of the cases they had been working on together in the past years. But instead of losing himself in details about micro expressions and deception he depicted how those cases had touched him personally, how they had changed him.

He told of mistakes he had made. Mistakes that were also caused by his ability to see more than other people and yet sometimes see nothing at all. He wrote about the people he was closest to and how he could decipher them the least; how he tended to hurt them, because he knew the lies and abysses of this world and wasn't able to protect them from those.

It was sincere and brutally honest.

And even though he didn't mention her name on any of the pages—maybe out of consideration, maybe out of respect—she sensed that the thoughts about her resonated on every single page.

It was something like a weird declaration of love and apology pressed between two book cases.

Shortly after four in the morning she finished the book and closed her eyes. The fatigue burned behind her eyelids, but she was still too restless, too agitated to simply go to sleep. There was only one destination and maybe for the first time in her life she didn't think twice.

When she rang his doorbell a little later and for agonizing seconds nothing happened, she regretted not having thought again. The sun was still far away from rising and it was crazy to get him out of bed at this time of the night. She didn't even know whether he was alone and if she had interpreted his words correctly.

But when she was already hoping and believing that he hadn't heard her, the lights went on inside and he finally opened the door; sleepy and heavily blinking against the bright light.

He examined her for a moment before he said anything. "You look awful," were the words he chose and some amusement in his voice was mixed with genuine concern.

"I didn't sleep," she said and only just realized how mad all of that must look to him. "I read the book."

He nodded and opened the door a little further. "Come in."

She followed him and studied his naked feet on the dark floorboards that abruptly stopped at one point. There wasn't much time for her to realize that and so she nearly bumped into him when he turned around and seemed to search for words.

"I had a lot of time to think. About you, about me, about us." His hand gestured between the two of them and she noticed how little space there was all of a sudden, and how much she missed being close to him.

"I think it was the right decision to leave," he continued. "I had to take care of some things as well. Had to realize my mistakes."

She nodded silently and tried to find comfort in his eyes.

"I don't want to ask you to come back to the company, but I wish you would come back into my life." The look on his face that accompanied this sentence was heartbreaking.

From there on every rational thought was eliminated. She closed the distance to him and let herself fall until his arms caught her. He enclosed her, held her tight and buried his face in her hair.

"I miss you so much," he whispered and every word was absorbed through her hair, so they only reached her vaguely. But she already knew what he wanted to say, because everything about him made it so obvious.

"I missed you too," she returned and a few tears rolled down her cheeks.

He whispered something again that she couldn't quite get and heard his breathing so close to her ear; reminding her of the fateful night a few months ago. It was impossible to simply forget.

They remained in this intertwined position for a while until she slowly broke away from him. With a shy laugh she wiped away most of the tears and remembered his greeting words. "Now I look even more awful."

He had to laugh as well and helped her dry the last tear. "I find you awfully breathtaking."

THE END


A/N: Thanks so very much to every single one of you taking this heart-wrenching ride with me and for all the awesome, encouraging reviews! Sorry this is the end already, but if you liked this one, please stay tuned for another little surprise chapter coming up.