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(x)
Harvey tried guilt tripping her, blaming her for his ulcers and talking about how he had to up his blood pressure medication after the stunt she pulled. Then he tried braying like a Neanderthal. In his last fit, he called her "Noseypants McFelon" and told her there was enough legitimate danger in this city without her "Veronica Marsing around". (Madeline deadpanned, "It like you're this giant jackass pinata, begging for someone to beat the candy out of you." It got no reaction. He either didn't catch the reference or was too committed to staying angry with her.)
Next came the empty threats. Fuming and growling about how when she got nicked he'd leave her ass on ice in a jail cell for a day or two if that's what it took to get her to stop putting herself in dumb as rocks, risky situations like these. Which of course, they both knew he'd never actually do.
Finally, Harvey tried reasoning with her, which was really his worst move yet. That opened the floor for her to use some of his own logic against him. ("Oh, so it's perfectly fine for you to break the rules, risk getting fired, and put your ass on the line. But not me. Could you remind me why that is again, please?") As of that morning, he'd gone back to guilt-tripping. It brought them full circle.
After all this time, Harvey still thought he knew her better than she knew him. It was like a puppy chewing through your favorite pair of pumps. It was infuriating and annoying… but she'd be damned if it wasn't at least a little cute.
She heard the echoing click of Wilson's boots, right before Jim Gordon walked into the dilapidated therapy room. He eyed her uncertainly.
Madeline said, "Hi."
After a long hesitation, he said, "Hi." Then he stepped forward and took a seat.
Well, there was an improvement.
This time Jim drank the coffee. It was an eventuality. Caffeine was the lifeblood of the GCPD detective, second only to doughnuts.
She sat across from him, sipping her own cup. This time she didn't start out with a question. Keeping silent at the start had become her preferred way to open most sessions. It made things a little awkward for the person sitting across from her, but it also let the client start off with whatever was foremost on their mind.
Jim seemed to be waiting for her to say something. She looked right back levelly with a diffident smile.
Finally, he cleared his throat. "I wanted to apologize." She must have looked at him oddly, because he then said, "I raised my voice at you. Last time we were…" He let it drift off.
So he didn't start off with his own thoughts, feelings, dread, or grief. All his needs took a back seat, and apologizing to her was his point of urgency. "The whole point of this thing is for you to be able to express whatever you're feeling. Even if it's anger. Even if it's anger at me."
Jim gave a short nod.
After a moment's thought, she said, "I'm sorry, too. Therapy isn't really… supposed to happen this way."
He looked like he had a thought about that, but he decided not to share it.
Madeline added, "Yes, you did hear me right. I am admitting that therapists should not typically break into prisons to see their clients."
What came across his face next might have been a smile, if it hadn't been so strained and tired.
She said, "Though I am happy to see you've come back."
Jim set down his coffee. "When you're led off by a guard, it's understood that you'll go without a fight."
"Do you feel you have to be in this room?"
"We don't get many choices in here."
"I thought about that after I left last time. I thought about how I was trapping you here. … But then I realized I wasn't."
Jim cast her a confused frown.
She gave a small shrug. "You're Jim Gordon." That regained his attention. "If you wanted to badly enough, you'd find a way out."
Jim sat up slightly and widened his eyes, as if that was the wildest thing he'd heard in awhile. He asked in his dry, gruff voice, "You really believe that?"
"Yes," she said. "In fact, I'd bet on you coming out of any situation over the alternative."
It slowly but surely brought them back to a teeming silence, which was fine. It was a dance she'd done many times before.
She took solace in the fact that for now he was choosing to stay.
(x)
When Jim stepped back inside the shambles of what used to be a therapy room, one thing became apparent. Either Harvey overestimated his grip on her reins or Madeline had new tricks up her sleeve that Harvey didn't know how to counter. Jim also knew too well how his partner could exert force. Harvey would have shut down the entire situation if he really thought it was a bad enough idea. Either way, Madeline didn't look like a woman who had expended much energy in coming back there.
In fact, she looked oddly at home in this room with its peeling walls, its armpit scent, and a torn-up, cold cement floor.
He tried to imagine her walking the halls, going toe to toe with the guards, the inmates, Warden Grey. Barely clearing 5'4" even in heels. … And he couldn't. It just didn't match with the level of brutality he'd seen.
Madeline stared back at him, politely. Waiting for...
He decided to keep conversation neutral. "You said you used to work here?"
She 'hmmed' through a sip of her coffee before setting down the cup. "For two years before they…" She raised her eyebrows. "Sent me on my way."
Jim shared a look of understanding with her. So this wasn't only about seeing him. This was also some more rebellion on her part. "Sounds like you didn't leave on the best of terms."
"That I had some animosity? A 'feeling' about it?" She nodded in agreement. "It wasn't the way I wanted to go. I was hurt and … angry." She finished with, "More than that. Furious. At times."
Jim found himself perfectly comfortable allowing the session to focus on her instead of him. "Something tells me you didn't leave without letting them hear about it."
She half-smiled. "How'd you guess?"
Just like that Jim thought of her court appearance, though he didn't want to. It stung like a barb. After a moment's consideration, he said, "You aren't exactly the type to hold back."
Madeline made a thoughtful noise. "Is that how you see me? Someone who puts it all out there, doesn't hide things?"
"Are you saying you're aren't?"
"No, it's just … interesting. The way other people see us." She paused and adjusted herself in her seat. "Do you see yourself as the opposite? Someone who holds back and keeps things … in control?"
Jim found himself unsurprised to hear the interpretation. "On the job you have to keep a poker face. If you show any hesitation, any weakness, if you crack, they'll take advantage. You might lose a confession or provoke an attack. Or worse."
"Is that the role you identify with most? That of a detective?"
Jim felt something heavy sink down inside him. He pressed his lips together before he said, "I'm not a detective any more."
She frowned. "Is that side of you gone, has it vanished, because you don't hold that title at the moment?"
In the midst of the gut feeling the topic brought up, Jim realized that she made a fair point. "I suppose some part of me will always be…" He breathed out a sigh against his closed lips. "Practical. Disciplined." Hard. ...Unrelenting.
"So some things can't be taken from you," she said. "No matter where you are."
It was a nice notion… almost sweet, really. Though Madeline was good for things like that, when she wasn't holding his feet to the fire.
But as nice a thought as it was, Jim didn't know how much of it was true in actuality. He'd seen the empty looks on some of the faces of the men around him. They'd lived their entire adult lives in a cell. They were old now. They'd be even older when they got out. So far as he could tell, there wasn't much that Blackgate hadn't taken from them.
She honed in on him. "How did you learn that being practical and disciplined was the best way to be?"
"Just life. I guess. If you can be direct, if you can be clear-headed, it benefits the people around you."
"That sounds … like the military in you talking."
Jim allowed for it with a nod.
She asked, "How did you make the decision to enter the military?"
There was an easy one. "I wanted … to be able to protect myself." He added, "And others, and I knew joining the army would teach me how to do that."
Madeline nodded, as if that explained everything. "Did being a soldier teach you anything you didn't want?"
He heard what she was fishing for. That made it easier to dodge it. "They taught me how to shovel snow."
She arched an eyebrow. Then she smiled. "I wasn't aware that was a core skill of being an army of one."
Jim gave a small smile. "When you break rules and challenge authority in the winter, you learn a lot about … shoveling snow."
Madeline hummed a short laugh. Then her smile disappeared as she had a thought. Jim felt a hint of unease sink down into his stomach. Or maybe she'd found a way to … "You were given a punishment. For …questioning those in power, I take it." She locked her eyes onto his. "It's not anything as extreme as what you're experiencing now, of course, but … How did you get through it?"
Jim had to think back. He wasn't sure… Then he came upon an answer. "I used the time."
"Used the time?"
"To think. Not about what I'd done … usually. Not like they wanted me to. If I focused on how cold it was, how I was losing feeling in my nose or fingertips…" He shrugged. "It just made it worse. So I thought about combat training. Enemy lines. How to use what I was being taught to escape, defend, attack…" Kill. In some instances.
"So they could control a lot, but they couldn't control what happened." She motioned vaguely to her temple. "Up here."
Jim shared a short look with her to show he agreed, but didn't build upon the point.
Another silence settled upon them. It wasn't dark, like ones they'd experienced before. Just … quiet. Apparently in therapy, you didn't always have to talk. He began looking off to the side. Just as he'd used the time in the military to consider his own thoughts, he found the same happening now.
She pointed at him. "You went somewhere." He didn't confirm it, but she held tight to the thread anyway. "Where'd you go just now?"
Jim scratched his head. "What we were talking about reminded me of something my father used to say. He said there's always enough time."
She asked, "What did he mean by that?"
"He meant even when we're rushed or busy, we can make time for anything if it's important enough. He always said that we have the same hours in the day as Michaelangelo, Mother Teresa, Albert Einstein…"
"That sounds like … a lot to live up to." She explained herself, "That you're wasting your time if you aren't as artistic as Michelangelo, as selfless as Mother Teresa, as brilliant as Einstein…"
He shrugged it off. "I guess I never heard it that way."
"We don't talk much about your father, but I've often wondered. How did you get through it? When he passed away?"
He hesitated, before saying, "My mother always told me we'd get through it the way anyone gets through anything. One bad day at a time."
Madeline studied him for a moment. "Did it work like she said it would?"
Jim felt himself frowning. He knew better than anyone that time could heal some wounds, but not all of them. That was the thing about therapy, or at least Madeline's brand of it. When you gave an inch, she really did take the whole field. But the worst part was that most the time she managed to do it without him even noticing. "She didn't … handle it well," he said, making his voice firm and … in control. "She worked hard, held down her job. It put food on the table. But she … got tired a lot. There was only so much she could do."
"Was she depressed?"
"I think she was grieving," he said, trying to be kind.
"For how long?"
His voice was like stone. "I don't know."
She sounded pretty certain when she said it. "Did you take care of her?"
He said shortly, "The best I could."
Madeline noticed the shift in the room. She asked softly, "What kind of feelings is this bringing up for you?"
Anger, sorrow, regret. … As if she couldn't see it.
Then again, she said, "Talk to me about what you're feeling in here."
But she wanted him to say it. … Why did he always have to say it?
Jim began to once again regard the room around him. This was supposed to be therapy, but it wasn't. She was trespassing. This was the opposite of sanity. She wasn't supposed to be here. She would be caught, and when she was, they would…
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Madeline setting her stare on him.
He glanced away from her, but something inside him did relent. He spoke just above a whisper, "It made me feel…" He swallowed before he found himself saying it. "Powerless."
The room went silent. After a long moment, she spoke in a voice that was soft but clear. "You did everything you could to take care of her, and you still got the message that it wasn't enough." She said, "And you learned that you weren't the one who needed protecting. She was."
Jim looked up to meet her eye. He didn't want those words to hurt, but they did, because they were true.
She said, "After your father died when he shouldn't have died. Living with your mother who was withdrawn and depressed. In the military, where you could be sent out in a snowstorm for hours, no matter how low the temperature dropped. … You didn't have any choice. You had to push away what you were feeling. Now, you're here in Blackgate, and you're doing the same thing. Once again, no matter how much you did, it wasn't enough. And you're not worth protecting."
Jim closed his eyes. He didn't know what to do when she did things like this, when she backed him into a corner. It made his head start to pound. It made it difficult to think, let alone to know what to say. And she would still be sitting there, expecting a response, putting together something in her head about what it meant if he didn't respond.
A fresh thought struck him. The muscles in his arms and legs grew stiff and began thrumming. He could leave right now. It wouldn't take anything. He could stand up, walk down the hall, and go back on his block. If he went fast enough, she wouldn't catch up to him. She didn't understand what she was up against, the risk she was taking. It would be better, the right choice. Better for her, for all of them to be...
He knew all those things and agreed with the logic, and still for some reason, he didn't budge. His heartbeat had sped up, and his chest ached.
"Stay with it," Madeline said softly. "Try to keep talking."
His eyes squeezed shut, and when he opened his mouth, words started coming out. "Sometimes… I feel like this is where I'm supposed to be."
She waited a moment and then asked, "Is it like you said last week? That you believe you put everyone in danger. So you need to be kept away."
He met her eye. "There are parts of what I said that were true."
"Which parts aren't true?"
It felt dangerous for him to go to that place. To let himself think about the ways he kept others safe. The ways he tried to keep others safe. And even knowing that, his mind went there anyway. "It's not that I want to be away from them. I'd do … anything," he breathed out, as if releasing the words. "If it meant, I could..."
Madeline seemed to grasp what he meant. "You'd do anything if it meant you could be with them. You're talking about what you need." He looked at her, though he didn't want to. "Your need to be a present husband and father. Your need to be a free man. Your need to be safe." She said, "Your needs weren't important when you were growing up. But right now you have people in your life who want your needs to matter."
Jim thought through what she said. "I know I have people in my life who … want to help me." He said in a stern but tired voice, "But it can't happen, not the way that they want. When they're out there, and I'm in here."
Her eyes shone. She looked away and took a moment to breathe deeply, before she looked back. "When I heard you were being sent here, I had that exact same thought."
He considered her for a long moment, before he nodded. He knew what it was to break rules for the safety of others … and he also knew where judgment calls like that had ultimately landed him. "Madeline, I know you're making a choice-"
"Maybe I think it's worth it."
The way she said it made him stop. After a long pause, he asked her quietly but openly, "Do you really think coming in here is the best way to protect yourself?"
She took some time before she said, "I think the fact that no one's coming in here and escorting me out means I'm not entirely unprotected."
He replied, "People in my life have warned me that sometimes being bold and breaking rules is really just ego."
He could tell that she was contemplating what he said. Then she countered, "Sometimes a little bit of ego is just good protection."
Jim listened to the sound of Wilson's footsteps echoing out in the hall and thought, Yeah, but a lot can get you killed.
As Wilson led him back into the general population, Jim had thought he'd worked his way through the pain that the session opened up, but he was wrong. Dread and grief gripped him in his chest and in his stomach. It had probably been there all along, but he'd never felt the entirety of it more than he did at that moment.
It shouldn't have hurt seeing Madeline, but it did. He returned back to his cell block, feeling everything he'd held back all at once.
(x)
Wilson Bishop led Jim Gordon back to his block, and Madeline waited outside the remnants of what used to be the therapy wing of Blackgate Penitentiary. She leaned her back against the wall and crossed her arms.
Her ethics told her to respect state laws, not to engage in therapy with people connected to those in your personal life, and to end therapy once it became personal to the therapist.
But her ethics also told her not to leave people behind when they were at their most vulnerable, and she didn't think anything could happen to make Jim Gordon more cut off and vulnerable than he already was.
Jim Gordon said he felt powerless. Powerless. He said it out loud.
On one hand, it was clear proof of progress. After being given the experience of acceptance after deep disclosure, it was possible for him to open up and speak his mind. And on the other hand, it meant things were even worse than she'd thought.
Madeline raised her head as she saw Wilson heading back toward her. He said, "I got him back to his cell." He glanced once over his shoulder. "So far, I think we're in the clear. I don't think anyone suspects anything."
She rolled her eyes a little to herself. With all the corruption inside Blackgate, Wilson would probably garner more attention if he wasn't involved in regular infractions. She sent him a muted smile. "Thank you for doing this."
"Well… he needs it. That's for sure."
"I'll see you next week?"
He frowned and shook his head. "I don't know, doc. We're pushing it as it is," he said, resting his hands on his hips. "They turn a blind eye around here to most things, but you keep goin' like this … They're gonna figure it out one way or the other."
She chewed on her lower lip. "What are you trying to say here, Wilson?"
"I say we push it back. Two or three weeks," Wilson said. "So far Gordon's stayed off Grey's radar. Between you and me, we need to keep it that way."
She sighed a little, but then she nodded. "Okay. Two weeks."
She turned to leave, and Wilson said, "You got your card?"
As she clip-clopped away, she held up her small, white key card in the air between her fingers.
He said after her, "Remember. Go out the back and to the right. There's a camera-"
"Ten feet down," she called back. "Got it."