Chapter 5 - Talkin' in Your Sleep

Mary took in her surroundings with a dour eye, her head throbbing. All the anger and frustration was spent and she was left with a shell; skin and flesh holding the withered remnants of her soul. Really, what point did her life have, she wondered. Catching bad guys was a good thing. She was a valuable asset to the Marshals Service; she knew this. But her job could be performed by any number of others. Besides, didn't seem like she could capture the one person she had been after for so long. She sank down on the bed, staring vacantly at the blank TV screen.

What was the point of her specific life? There had to be more than searching for her mother from bar to bar and bailing her sister out of jail. She had no family of her own, no husband, no children. Not that she wanted those things. There wasn't even a boyfriend. No girlfriends either. No friends of any description. There was the occasional cowboy and a string of partners she chased off in a few months time. No one at work particularly wanted to be around her. She was gruff and prickly and rude. She carried 'fuck off' signs on her back. And no one knew. No one knew she yearned for some kind of human connection. No one knew that she had a deep well of compassion that was kept effectively hidden because she viewed it as a weakness. No one knew she viewed some of her fugitives with sympathy because she could easily envision members of her family in their shoes, given the right circumstances.

At the unwelcome prick of tears behind her eyes, Mary pressed the heels of her hands against her closed eyelids and tried to contain the salty drops before her shoulders started to quiver and the sobs came. That rotten little bag of fucknuts had eluded her again. She had him in her sights and he disappeared. This was becoming personal. A battle of wills and intelligence and street smarts between Willington and herself. How? How did he know when they were close to him? He was always just that one step ahead, with a meticulously planned escape route.

This time they found him in a Lexington coffee shop that he had been frequenting every morning between 7:15 and 7:45 am. They were waiting for him as he entered the shop. Marshals surrounded the outside of the shop. Mary and four other marshals were seated in the shop, coffee cups on the counter in front of them, eyes watchful. Willington entered at 7:18 am, purchased his double mocha latte and casually glanced around the room, sauntering towards a small table placed by the door into the kitchen. Mary stood up from her place in the corner and signaled to the other team members.

She flopped back on the bed and the memory played through her head. He smiled at her. A knowing, condescending, superior smile. Then the fucker ducked into the kitchen and was locked in the employee bathroom . Of course in the five seconds it took to kick the door open, their prey was out the window and gone. None of the outside agents had seen him. It was a complete mystery where he had gone. Much later, it was discovered he probably had hidden in a trash dumpster immediately after crawling out of the window, and somehow got away during the general confusion that ensued.

This was all starting to reflect poorly on her.

Mary pulled the covers down and crawled into bed fully clothed. Her weariness went beyond physical tiredness. It sunk into her very bones. She just wanted to close her eyes and not wake up.

They were flying down a lonely stretch of road through the desert. The tall man was throwing concerned looks at her.

"Normally, what I'd do now is call El Paso PD."

"What!" She glared at him incredulously.

He continued without missing a beat, "giving you the chance to vent with spectacular venom on the eager incompetence of the local constabulary, moving you into the state that I call post rant relief." He gave her a look she couldn't define.

"But I sense emotionally, you may be outside the bounds of normal play, so I'm gonna call a quick time out. Everything okay with you?" Again with the look.

"Beside a witness who.." Once again he cut her off. Eyes kept firmly straight ahead on the road.

"I mean, is everything okay. With you." The measured words. The tone. Another quick glance at her, searching

"Oh. Things with Raph are good. Really good." She looked at him obliquely. His stony gaze focused straight ahead as she spoke.

"So." A sigh escaped her.

"So." He mirrored her word.

"So, I should be happier about that."

"And what are you?"

"Scared, pissed, guilty. And happy. Happy's in there." She focused on her hands.

"Somewhere."

"Happy's under a bit of a pile." A grudging admittance.

"How come?"

"I think I want something that just doesn't exist. I want something that's just right, without argument or doubt, which is insane because there's always argument, there's always doubt. So I guess what I'm after here is the insane goal of an insane person." She stared out the window at the passing desert, unable to meet his eyes.

"I would say it's the ideal goal of someone who has somehow managed to protect the purest part of her heart, which does not seem insane to anyone who really knows you." Carefully chosen words accompanied by quick glances.

"Which would be you ...and you." She looked at him and gave a humorless smile.

Mary rolled over and stared up at the ceiling. He understood her. The tall man. Nobody in her life understood her. But he did. He understood the person she presented to the world and he understood the insecure girl hiding behind the facade. He got how important it was that she protect her heart. Is that what these dreams were about? Desperately wanting somebody who got her? And who the hell was Raph?

Marshall shut down his computer and cleared his desk, looking around the empty office. It was not unusual for him to work late, but it was unusual for him to feel sad, to feel empty. Loneliness was a faint accompaniment to his adult life, but something he was normally able to keep at bay. He had friends, he had many interests that he pursued, he had Beth, sort of. Sighing heavily, he faced the stark reality that he didn't have that one person who fit him, who complemented him. Adimpleate. His brain supplied the obscure word. To fill up. He needed that person who could adimpleate him. That person with whom he could make a life, with whom he could start a family. That person he could love.

Walking into his silent home, Marshall flipped on the lights and set his briefcase down on the kitchen table. Melancholia had its grip on him. He grabbed a beer from the fridge and sank down into his recliner. Unbidden, the early morning conversation with Beth replayed itself in his mind.

"So, who's Mary?" Beth had rolled over and looked at him, an expression he couldn't read on her face. She was watching him steadily, the sheet slipping down her lithe form, revealing satin smooth skin. Marshall looked at her in puzzlement "Mary? I don't know any Mary." He returned her gaze, eyes wandering down the curves of her body.

Beth shrugged. "You kept saying her name last night. Seemed pretty upset." Marshall closed his eyes. The dream the previous night had been intense, frightening. The woman – Mary?- had been badly injured, shot in the line of duty. Marshall had rushed to the hospital.

"Gunshot wound to the abdomen approximately eight minutes ago. Lost consciousness immediately. We lost her pulse roughly two minutes ago..." The hospital personnel were rushing her gurney down the corridor, Marshall running to catch up to them, heart pounding, fear almost overwhelming him.

"Oh, Jesus. Mary, listen to me. You need to hang around for a while. It's not time to go, yet. Okay? We're going to fix you up. But it might take some time." He bent down to place a kiss on her temple, wanting to pour out his love for her, but unable to get words past the constriction in his throat. This could not be happening.

"Hey, Bronstein? Clear Trauma Three. I'm sorry, sir. You have to wait outside." They took her inside the ER, Marshall firmly pushed outside by a nurse. Separated. This was wrong. He belonged with her. The enormity of the situation hit him and as sobs wracked his body, he sank to the floor as Stan came running around the corner.

"Marshall! Marshall." Panic clear in his voice.

"She wasn't breathing, Stan." Marshall completely broke down, his fear, love, grief, despair pouring out of him, Stan helplessly putting an arm around him.

Marshall looked at Beth and gently cupped her cheek. "I don't know anyone named Mary." Beth looked back at him steadily. Odd how much it hurt to think he may be thinking of another woman. She was under no delusions regarding their relationship, but she liked Marshall. She knew him well enough to know that even though they hadn't agreed to an exclusive relationship, he wouldn't see another woman while he was intimate with her. It was just the kind of man he was.

"I don't know any Marys," he reiterated. He rolled over onto his back, a frown crossing his face. "Have you ever had a recurring dream? Or more accurately had a recurring person run through your dreams?" He looked at her hopefully. Wanting her to tell him what he was experiencing was normal.

Beth thought a moment, before shaking her head. "Recurring dreams as a kid, you know, scary stuff, monsters and such. But not a recurring person. Are you having these dreams?" She propped her head up on her hand. Marshall hesitated a moment, but he wanted to share this with someone and he trusted Beth.

"I have been having dreams with the same woman in them. Maybe her name is Mary. I don't know. She's not anyone I've ever actually met. But it is always the same woman. The dreams are very real. I think she is, no she's definitely law enforcement. And she is tough as nails, fierce, but compassionate. I don't know why I'm dreaming about her. She's not real."

Beth covered his hand with hers, sadness in her eyes. "You must care for this dream woman very much. Tears were running down your face." She smiled tremulously. "We don't have a future together, Marshall. We are just helping each other cope with loneliness. I think it's time for both of us to move on. These dreams of yours are pointing out something that is missing from your life."

He had stared at her, startled. Her thoughts mirrored his own. He trailed gentle fingers down her face, whispering his regrets. Beth shook her head and kissed him, insisting no one was at fault. They had made love one last time, Marshall easily sliding in and out of her yielding body. Marshall felt her absence tonight, but didn't really miss her. Once again his restive mind returned to the mystery woman in his dreams.

He didn't know why certain things were so clear in his dreams while others were not, like the name of the woman. He was becoming increasingly curious to know who she was, even if just in the context of his dreams. He was still not clear on her relationship to himself, but was beginning to suspect she was his partner. And whether it was her name or not, he was thinking of her as Mary now. Strange, that he never seemed to address her by name.

Marshall tried to clear his head by working on a long term project. A massive jigsaw puzzle of the Crab Nebula. He had the pieces spread out on his dining room table. It helped him to concentrate on a task like this, looking for the shapes of the puzzle that would fit together. As his eyes searched for the similarities in shapes, the repeating patterns, he thought about the update he had read at the office on the search for a fugitive named Willington. He was leading the Marshals Service on a merry chase that started in New Jersey, moved to Philadelphia and ended in a clusterfuck in Lexington, Kentucky today. He felt a twinge of sympathy for the team chasing this guy. They must be frustrated as hell. Guy always seemed to pull an escape out of his hat.

Marshall stilled, puzzle piece in hand, as he wondered if the fugitive was being fed information from inside. To escape so many times from planned raids was highly unusual. The Service was extremely good at what it did. Making a mental note to look a little further into the case, he returned to his task, satisfied to see a curve of the Nebula now laid out before him.