Author's Note: This story isn't beta-read yet. And since English is my second language, there might be some mistakes in grammar and punctuation for which I like to apologize in advance. Please, feel free to point them all out to me in the feedback. Although, if anyone is interested in beta-reading this, please let me know.
I think that after the drama of the season 4 finale, I just had to get all of that out of my system.
Disclaimer: They do not belong to me.
xxx
while you were sleeping, you bet that i might
walk this empty northern hemisphere wide
and the kingdom it came, well it all fell down
it all fell to dust
Gregory Alan Isakov – This Empty Northern Hemisphere
xxx
He knows it's stupid. But it is actually Louis' ridiculous, yet honest Norma-was-a-battleaxe-eulogy that does it to him. But you see, the thing is, unlike Louis, he isn't an emotional and impulsive time bomb that likes to go off in regular intervals. And unlike Norma, Donna certainly isn't a battleaxe.
So this is going to need time. He's going to need time to figure out all the answers he knows he owes her. But for the first time, he thinks that he actually might be able to do just that because if he knows one thing, then it is that he wants her in his life.
So he actually decides there and then in that room that he can't have slipped another moment through his fingers. That he cannot let her walk by him without letting her know how he feels about her – and, yes, how he really feels about her, and, yes, that it is her face he sees before he falls asleep at night, and, yes, that he wants to be able to touch her whenever and wherever it suits him, and, yes, that all of this scares the shit out of him because it might as well be enough to ruin everything they already have.
Because as cliché as it all sounds, Louis is right and life slips by, and then it's over.
And he can't have that. He just can't have that-
So he decides to jump in, head first, because he cannot let another moment pass. And even so he knows that he will need time for this, he decides that, no matter what, he's actually going to try to stop acting like the selfish bastard that he is around her, because she is Donna and he actually loves her, and she deserves better than a man who keeps her around for his own emotional benefit without ever giving anything in return.
He wants her to be happy, even if he doesn't know if it actually is up to him to decide what that means.
So unlike the day before, when he told her that he said he loved her to make her feel better, he's actually prepared the next time she walks into his office.
"Hey."
"Hey-"
Well, that's a start.
Donna doesn't close the door to his office and he's grateful for the late hour and the darkness. His mouth feels dry and he pushes himself to speak before he loses his nerve and says all the wrong things again.
"Listen, I was thinking about what you said, about me pitying you. And I don't. Nothing could be further from the truth. I think you're one of the most amazing women I've ever met, and just because I don't –"
But Donna cuts him off once more and Harvey can feel the ground rush up to him despite his sitting position.
"I'm leaving you, Harvey."
Wait? What?
"What?"
Her voice is calm and even. It doesn't hold any resentment when she says,
"This isn't working for me anymore."
It sends Harvey's brain into overdrive. He can't let that happen. And he panics again – which seems to become a bad habit lately – because he knows already that he won't ever come up with a coherent answer to that. So there is little left do to for him but to push himself to his feet, despite the sudden dizziness that clouds the edges of his vision.
He rounds his desk to stand in front of her and while his locket down brain browses through everything he could possibly say to that, he already knows he's going to stumble before he even speaks.
"Donna, I know how you're feeling, but you just went through something huge, with being on trail, and, uh,", it is a lie, because right at this moment, he has no idea what she's feeling and he's never felt this shut out in his entire life. But the voice in his head is screaming at him now to make her stop while he still can.
So he hears his own voice crack when he says,
"-you need to give it time."
-Us- You need to give us time. You need to give me time. But the word wouldn't come out. He desperately hopes that she catches on to their meaning anyway.
"You can't just quit."
Something deep inside of him shatters as her voice sounds like steel cutting through glass.
"I'm not quitting. I'm going to work for Louis."
And he thinks that it is the wrong thing to say. That – this time – she has actually said the wrong thing – maybe even the worst thing – because that can't be right. And he's aware that he's actually close to tears now and pleading as her name sounds like a prayer on his lips,
"Donna,…Donna, please."
And Donna's voice, once again, is calm and clear, sincere even. It holds no resentment or pity, when she says,
"I love you, Harvey."
