Risk

Stella Bonasera had always dreamt of Mac Taylor. Since they had met eight years ago, she had seen in her dreams clearly what before had only been a blurry shadow of the most important man in her life.

The man for whom she had risked her own life just yesterday.

The same man who had obviously written and trashed those papers she just held in her hands, sitting behind his office desk like he must´ve last night.

The same man who left her alone in his apartment to buy some needed stuff to cook her some chicken soup.

A smile spread over her face as she recalled his sheepish look when he had tried to explain to her why the best thing to recover fast after getting shot was to eat some chicken soup. Mac could be so sweet sometimes. Especially when they both knew his arguments didn't make much sense like eating soup to heal a gunshot wound.

He had been so sweet to her yesterday. And demanding. Her smile brightened as she recalled how forcefully he had offered, no had insisted yesterday that she should either spend the night at the hospital or at his place because he would not allow her to stay alone that night. His voice had been stern and strong, leaving her no doubt that he would stick to his words and carry her to his apartment by himself. If she hadn´t still been so shocked from all the events of the day and weakened from her blood loss, she would´ve torn his head off for his bold orders. But his hands had been shaking and his eyes had looked so haunted, mirroring her own feelings so well and so she had accepted his offer to stay at his place.

Probably one of the best decisions she ever had made.

When else would she have had the opportunity to wear one of his old shirts, still smelling slightly of him, while she slept in his bed?

Besides, she would´ve missed that soft, caring side of him he had revealed yesterday.

Normally they weren´t exactly the type of people who needed much comfort. Yes, they relied on each other, they hugged if they knew that the other had a bad day, they talked but that was nothing compared to the proximity they had shared last night. They both were too strong, too stubborn, too independent to rely on somebody else, but yesterday...

He had made her tea. She didn´t really know why but he had. Nearly ten cups full of hot tea of which she had drunk barely two. Maybe he had used the same logic there as he had to justify the chicken soup.

And he had touched her nearly all the time before she had gone to bed. They had watched a movie which she couldn´t remember in his living room, sitting next to each other on his couch and he had taken her hand and had held it nearly a whole hour while he focused his gaze on the television. Then, when he had realized what he was doing, he had let go of her in a flash, jumped up and made her the eighth cup of tea.

Maybe one hour of holding hands didn´t seem that much proximity to normal people, but to her it had been important. It was not that much, sure, but it was a symbol of their connection, their psychic bond they had shared since they had met and which had grown even stronger today.

But she admitted, as she had wrapped her fingers around the warm mug, her hand still missed his warmth.

Truth was: She enjoyed their bond, but she had loved to hold his hand too. She had loved sleeping in his bed, surrounded by his scent and his presence. He had watched her sleep, she knew, she had felt his eyes on her. She had just loved to feel his arms around her too.

And today, still dressed in his old clothes, she had found those paper sheets in his trash, filled with his handwriting when she had collected the cups still filled with tea and shared everywhere in his apartment.

Yesterday´s events must have really gotten to him, if he even placed a cup filled with peppermint tea on his fax machine.

After she had picked this cup up, her gaze had fallen into his trash can, catching a glimpse of those papers which caught her attention immediately.

And now she sat here, a tablet with five cups of cold tea she had found at the craziest places right next to her standing on his desk.

With sentimental tears burning in her eyes, she read the lines a second time, whispering every word out loud as if hearing them would get her mind to understand them better.

"I´m used to see her die in my dreams," stood there in a white sheet of paper, written in Mac´s own unique hand. "I have these nightmares of seeing her die in my arms because someone shot her. They've haunted me ever since I hired her to work with me and I learned to live with them. I think I even did pretty well. I didn´t fuss over her, whenever we were on a crime scene, I could work next to her for more than half an hour without glancing at her to assure myself she was still alive. When we got into gunfire, I could suppress the urge to grab her and hide her away from all this craziness."

Nightmares...

An ironic chuckle escaped her throat like a gasp.

She had had nightmares about losing him ever since they met too. Nightmares of not seeing him return from one of those few cases they didn´t take together or nightmares about seeing him die.

As that stranger had tried to shoot him yesterday, she had hoped for a few tiny splits of a second that all that would be just one of these screwed up dreams which haunted her in her sleep. That it had been just another surreal situation her mind had created to deal with the everyday fear of losing him. Because, come on! One minute he had smiled at her while he had handed her one of her favorite cupcakes and she had thought how much she loved that half-sided smile of his, and the next moment she had thrown herself over the table to take a bullet for him. A surreal situation even Dali would´ve found impressive.

But it hadn´t been a dream, no it hadn´t been. The ache in her shoulder reminded her how close she had come to losing him. But the ache in her shoulder was so much better than the fear in her heart.

The last time she had felt this particular fear that intensely had been the third month after Claire had died. Yes, after she had died. Before Claire had died Stella hadn´t feared losing her. Her mind had never imagined that something like 9/11 could ever happen, so no, she never had feared losing Claire. She had just lost Claire without any warning. Without any foreboding, that was why losing Claire had nearly torn her apart and she had needed all her strength to put herself together. And after she had healed herself enough to see what was left for her to live for, that fear had overwhelmed her.

As that stranger had looked Mac in the eye five years ago, pointing a gun to his head, it had overwhelmed her, holding her heart tight and making it difficult for her to breathe. It hadn´t been the gun, the actual danger he had been in, it had been the look on Mac´s face that made her finger tremble in fear. That look on his face that told her that he had been totally aware of the fact that his life had been at risk and that he just didn´t care.

It had been that look that had told her, once again, that her fear had come too late, that she might have already lost him and that this time, she hadn´t just seen all the warnings, which had been there like she recognized now. That emptiness in his face had been there since Claire died.

Later that night, when he had cried in her arms, her own tears dropping on his shirt, the fear had gone but her heart had been aching...

Clearing her throat, Stella focused on the letter again.

"I controlled my urge to protect her so she was able to do her job."

Reading this line made her smile. A real one this time, a smile without any irony or sarcasm in it.

He controlled his urge to protect her... Yeah, that was why he always forced her behind him whenever they entered an unsecured room

Ok, maybe there was a little irony in her smile.

"She´s good at it. At her job. Detective Stella Bonasera is one of the best detectives I´ve ever known so far. She is capable of noticing every tiny detail in her surroundings and drawing her conclusions from them. A man tried to shoot me, but Detective Bonasera jumped into the line of fire, took the bullet for me and so saved my life. She was wounded, nearly bled to death. If the ambulance hadn´t been so fast I would´ve lost her. She would´ve died."

Tears were streaming down her face now. Stupid tears wiped away with an impatient hand.

She knew crying was ridiculous. She had no reason to. Her shoulder blade still hurt, yes, but physical pain failed to bring her to tears since she had been seven years old and her so-called elder "sister" had drowned her doll in the toilet, holding its head under water while flushing so the formerly blond but already dirty gray curls of her doll danced in circles the toilet bowl. She had told the younger girl, if Stella would ever talk to one of those nice people who came to the orphanage then she would find out if brown curls would twirl in the water just the same. A week later, after they had found out that brown curls did indeed twirl just the same, Stella had decided that the only water on her face would come from the outside.

And now, she sat here in Mac´s chair crying and felt better than she had for a very long time.

"She nearly died because of me. Every time I think about it, it hits me like a truck. She risked her life for me today. That sentence is so wrong I can´t even find a fitting metaphor for it."

More tears falling, soaking the sheets of paper she held tightly in her hands, blurring the ink.

Risking her life for him...

Yeah, that was what she had done yesterday.

When she had caught that reflection of that stranger pointing a gun at Mac, she hadn´t even noticed that she had jumped into the line of fire, she had just moved by instinct. Ironically she had felt relief as the bullet had hit her. No relief that she just had been shot in her shoulder, no relief that she herself would survive, only relief that Mac hadn't been hurt...

What did that tell her about herself?

"The shooter was the only son of a man I arrested for killing a woman here in NY five years ago. Last week his father had been executed in California for the murder of two other women there. I can only assume he wanted to take my life in revenge for the life of his father. Instead of killing me, he nearly killed the woman who makes my life worth living. The woman who brought me back to life after I lost Claire."

Claire.

Her best friend, her sister in mind, her first family.

Since she had been that lonely little girl growing up in that orphanage she had dreamed of having a family of her own one day, she had dreamed of that day she would build her family up with. When she had met him and Claire so many years ago she had caught the first glimpse of how a real family could be. After a year, this glimpse had already grown. And when Claire had died...

When Claire had died and Mac had cried in her arms three month later, filled with so much grief and her heart had ached, Stella had caught a glimpse of the love she already had felt for that man in her arms.

"And now she´s lying in my bed and I know for sure I won´t dream this night, because I won´t waste a minute with sleeping when I could also watch her breathe."

Oh, how much she loved that man who wrote that.

Love...

More tears were coming, welling up in her eyes.

Stupid silly tears.

She smiled under them.

Love.

She loved him. Not only as the true friend he had always been to her but also as the man she could picture herself growing old with, like sitting next to each other on a bench and holding hands old.

At least she could admit this to herself now. She, Stella Bonasera, loved Mac Taylor, for whatever it was worth.

She had never been a person who fell in love easily. Neither had she ever been the kind of person who trusted others easily. Loving always seemed too dangerous, too risky to her, because to love always held the risk of losing someone loved in it.

Maybe it was time to take a risk.

Maybe she should stop dreaming. Maybe she should finally go for the real thing.