This had to be the longest fucking day ever, Harvey thought to himself as he strode around the hospital. He needed to walk, to think, to breathe, but the stroll wasn't helping to subdue the steady hum of panic that vibrated just below his chest.
He wasn't gone for too long - maybe a half hour? If there was any news, he didn't want to miss it. But the fear of bad news is what kept him wandering about the halls. Every fiber of logic he possessed told him to prepare for the worst. That way, if the most terrible scenario played out, if Mike died, he could be ready.
But he couldn't…he couldn't even let his mind go there. A total breakdown loomed behind those thoughts. And even if he did run through that scenario in his mind, he doubted he would be any more prepared for the worst if it did happen. There existed no reality in which Harvey wouldn't crumble if Mike died.
Fluorescent light bathed his head and shoulders as he made his way back to the waiting room. His shoes sounded so loud against the speckled linoleum floor.
Turning the corner, he entered the familiar space and noticed that not much had changed. Everyone was sitting in the same spot they were in when he had left, with the same expressions of thinly veiled despair on their faces.
He resumed his seat and sat in silence with the rest of them. It was hard to ignore the tension that hung between he and Scottie, but he managed.
The sound of approaching footsteps caught his attention, but it wasn't a doctor. It was Trevor.
"Where is he? Is he okay?" the man asked breathlessly as he rushed into the room.
"Who the hell are you?" Louis asked incredulously. But his inquiry was met with Trevor's raised hand that clearly conveyed the "not now" message. "Is Mike alright?"
He was looking at Harvey, but it was Jessica who answered him. "We're not sure yet Trevor. He's in surgery, he is stable for now, and should be out in about three hours."
"What the hell happened?" Trevor demanded, fear and anger mingling in his facial features.
"He was shot," Harvey said simply.
"How the hell does a lawyer get shot in a downtown law office in the middle of the goddamn day?"
"Good question," Harvey muttered.
Trevor brought a hand down his face, that traveled to the back of his neck as his thoughts raced. He stood, barely inside the doorway, looking just as lost and shocked as everyone at Pearson Specter had earlier that day.
"He better have the best goddamn doctor in the city," he said, looking at Jessica.
"He does Trevor. We take care of our own."
The last sentence was sharp, and it needled at something precariously delicate inside of Trevor.
He glared back at Jessica, daring her with his eyes to say something more - to see what would happen if she did.
"Frankly, I'm surprised to see you here," she added.
"Now I really want to know who you are," Louis chipped in. "Clearly Jessica and Harvey aren't your biggest fans.."
Trevor turned to Louis, his hands on his hips, an exasperated look etched into his features. He was wearing an Armani suit - black - with a green tie. A gold watch glittered from beneath his cuffs. Any passerby would assume that he was with the rest of the legal team…but he wasn't.
"You want to know who I am?" Trevor said. "I'll tell you who I am."
It took him a moment to gather his thoughts, to push down the panic and sadness that threatened to ascend to his eyes.
"I'm Mike's oldest friend. I'm the one that stood beside him at his parent's funeral, I'm the one who spent every night with him for six months because all he could see when he shut his eyes at night were his dead parent's faces. I'm the one who beat the living shit out of anyone who even looked at him sideways in school. And he… he's the one who helped me study, helped me get through school when all I could think of was whether or not my Dad was going to toss me around when I got home."
Trevor halted. His words stung at his throat and pulled at the air in the room.
"There were times when all we had in life was each other," he turned his gaze to Jessica and then to Harvey. "And they," he pointed, "they witnessed the final moments of a dying friendship that lasted twenty-five years. All they know is that I betrayed Mike. But they don't know why. They don't know that it was because he broke my heart," his tone faltered.
Again, a hand came up to his face, rubbing the shock of vulnerability of what he had just said off his mouth.
"That's who I fucking am," he told Louis. "I am…a part of Mike. And he's a part of me, no matter what shit's gone down in the past. So you can all get over your disdain for me, because I'm staying," he finished, plopping down into an empty seat across from Louis, dropping his shoulder bag to the floor with a thud.
Once settled in the flimsy hospital chair he lent his head back against the wall with a smack and closed his eyes. If he had opened them, if he had looked at Jessica's face (or Harvey's), he would see a tinge of surprise. But it was too difficult to suppress the moisture pooling behind his heavy eyelids to keep them open.
Stable. Stable. Mike's stable, he kept repeating in his mind. How could this happen? What if Mike died? Died thinking that they…weren't friends…that he hated him?
Everything seemed so petty now. How could he have ever let Mike go? Let a woman get between them? What was he thinking betraying his best friend?
Mike couldn't die. Not because he wanted to say "goodbye." But because he wanted to say "I'm sorry."
"I love you."