***
In my experience, people who come out of the dark and get their shit together often go in one of two directions. One side is inclusion: protecting and healing the victims. The other side is enforcement: controlling and punishing the villains. The pendulum swings one way or the other, but it's the same force behind it. Both sides know damn well how ugly the world is, and feel motivated to have an impact on how other people experience it. Social workers and law enforcement are often cut from the same cloth, though they frequently can't stand each other.
June obviously has serious issues with control. She wants to master men and doesn't respect women at all. To me, that says her family life was crap—weak mother, mean father. She made herself as nasty and powerful as any of the men who bullied her. By contrast, Anne tries to save kids who are as lost and broken as she, at one point, must have felt.
Am I over thinking this? Why yes, yes I am.
-B.
***
For the next three days, Anne was subdued. She showed little but the ultimate poker-face when she regarded any member of the club but Half-Sack. It made Tig grit his teeth, but at least when Kip was sitting with her, sometimes the ghost of a smile crossed her face. If others were near, she would fade back behind the boy, silent and turned inwards. She didn't cower so much as switch off. Anne went away, far behind her empty green eyes.
Too wired and haunted by the memory of Donna to sleep, Tig entered the clubhouse in the small hours of the morning, expecting to find it deserted. Instead, he found Anne and Half-Sack asleep on the couch like a pair of puppies. Anne was curled sideways, knees touching Kip's leg and her head propped on his shoulder. Kip's head was tilted back, and he snored softly.
Tig watched them for a bit, then saw the glint of her eyes opening. Still and silent, she regarded him, and he remembered her feral and bloody in the Nord warehouse.
"You really don't sleep, do ya." He said.
Anne's head lifted. When the light fell across her face, she just looked weary. "Nope. You?"
Tig shrugged. He went to the bar and poured a shot of whiskey, slammed it, and poured another. He watched Half-Sack and Anne broodingly. She unfolded from the couch and stretched. An entirely innocent move, it was somehow sexier than any stripper. She was wearing track-pants and a SAMCRO t-shirt with one of Half-Sack's hoodies unzipped and hanging loosely around her. Silent and expressionless, she walked to the bar and perched on a stool across from Tig. He set a second shot-glass in front of her and filled it.
"Still angry?" He asked, voice pitched low. She accepted the offered shot, and downed it more slowly than he had, wincing. "You seem to be okay with Kipper."
"He never looked at me the way the rest of you do."
Tig nodded. "So you are still mad."
Her eyes assessed him coolly. "I'm not blind. You're not the boss here, but you're always right behind him. Tell me you couldn't just drop me at the nearest airport and let me walk."
"I can't. Won't." He shook his head. "The Nords are looking for you. We'd have sent you on your merry way by now if they weren't."
"What?" She straightened in her seat.
"We only killed a small part of that beast, kid. There are still Nords out there who know what Connor did to you. They want you dead and silent before you get to ATF or the media."
Anne closed her eyes. Tig pressed another shot into her hand. She drank it without looking at him. "I'm going to kill June. With my bare hands."
Tig laughed. "Not me?"
"Guess not if you're standing between me and them." She sighed. "God damn it."
"Juice says you're a counsellor."
Her eyes assessed his. "What else do you know?"
"Married?"
"I was." She shrugged. "I went chasing a career, and he went chasing other women. I'm not really the white-picket-fence kind of girl anyway."
"What kind of girl are you?" Tig let a bit of leer creep into his voice.
She raised an eyebrow at him dismissively and went back to staring at the shot glass in her hand. "The kind who gets into a whole lot of trouble, apparently."
"Most chicks would still be curled up in a ball, crying."
"I've done a bit of that." She pushed the empty glass away and rubbed absently at her shoulder, as if thinking about the tattoo. "But it doesn't help. So, hypothetically, what happens if I get my hands on a phone and call June?"
Tig eyed her, not sure how serious she was. "How much does she like you?"
Anne laughed. It was a derisive laugh, and she was definitely feeling the whiskey, but it was a laugh. "Have you met the woman? She doesn't like anyone."
"She's your family."
"How much does that mean? She left when I was seven and never looked back." Anne bit her lip. "I think she'd be more upset about her pride than about me getting hurt."
"Do you even want to call her?"
Anne's eyes narrowed, and a sly but sincere smile lit her face like he'd just asked the right question. "Funny how no one asked me that until now. As a matter of fact, no. I don't want to get martyred on the Chanel 6 news, either. I want it behind me."
Half-Sack stirred in his sleep and muttered something incomprehensible. Anne and Tig exchanged a look. He closed his eyes for a moment, kicking himself for the decision he'd just made. "C'mon, babe, let's go up to the roof. Just promise not to throw me off, okay?"
At the top of the stairs, Anne hesitated for a moment. Tig offered her his hand, which she took. As the cool breeze ruffled her hair, she closed her eyes and sighed. Tig felt a disconcerting moment of inadequacy. This was a girl he'd never have had the chance to touch if she hadn't been dragged kicking and screaming into the MC world. In this moment, however, her face was serene. She swayed against him, then dropped his hand and stepped to the edge.
Looking down at the lights of Teller-Morrow, Tig lit up a cigarette. He offered one to Anne, which she declined, but she perched next to him on the vent. She zipped up Half-Sack's sweatshirt against the cool breeze, but left the hood down. The wind picked up locks of her hair, giving her the wild, wind-blown look of a girl out on a ride. "It feels strange to be outside, still."
"Really?" Tig sat beside her. There wasn't a lot of space, but she tolerated his arm touching hers.
"People seem to like keeping me locked up, for some reason." She said dryly.
"I'm sorry." Tig said, awkwardly. He rolled the cigarette between his thumb and forefinger. "When was the last time you saw your sister?"
"Mm... 2005? I was in Los Angeles for a conference. We got stupid drunk because it was easier than trying to have a conversation."
Tig tried to imagine Agent Stahl drunk off her ass. It was easier to imagine her drinking other cops under the table. "Not much sisterly love, then."
"She chases criminals; I try to keep kids from becoming criminals in the first place. Different ways of looking at the world. Plus, she's a bully."
"And how do you feel about people who are criminals and bullies?"
She looked up at him, amused. "I don't judge."
"No wonder you don't get along with your sister."
Anne had wrapped her arms tightly around herself. Tig wasn't sure if it was for warmth or for comfort. He slung an arm around her, the way Kip might have. Anne gradually relaxed against him, as if she was having a hard time remembering how to let her defenses down. He sensed that she was making her own decisions where he was concerned. When the wind blew cold, she drew even closer.
"You don't seem very mad at me anymore." Tig commented.
She thought about that for a moment, and replied, "I'm too tired to keep it up. You aren't acting like I'm poisoned for being June's sister tonight."
"You're not very much like her."
"Thank heaven for that, right?"
"A-fucking-men."
Anne asked him a few questions about how MCs worked. She didn't ask for details about Sam Crow or what her sister had done. She listened more than she spoke, and Tig found it easy to relax with her. In return, she dropped the stony mask of indifference. When silence descended, she was comfortable in it, tucked under his arm and watching the lights of cars out on the main road pass them by.
He knew he could probably lure her back down to bed and fuck her all over again, reasserting himself over Half-Sack's connection with her, but something held him back. He realized, to some surprise, that he liked her. She was clever and undramatic. Even under gunfire she'd kept her cool and gotten him free. Not many men could do that. Anne fought her own battles. He liked her the way he liked Tara and Gemma. She was real to him.
But unlike the doc or Clay's old lady, this woman was warm and quiet in his arms, no one else's. There hadn't been someone like that in his life for nearly a decade.
Tig's world was the Sons—there just wasn't room for anything else. A woman could make you soft, pull your attention away from the club, shift your priorities. They were a burden when you needed both hands free to protect your brothers. Tig didn't want that. He wanted his SAMCRO brethren beyond and above anything else. But here was Anne, an intoxicating mix of fierce and frail. She made him feel strong. She fucked like she loved him. She also quieted the loneliness he'd learned to tune out. Gemma and Tara were real because they respected the club and let their men do what needed to be done. Was that something Anne could do?
But really, how much of her wanting to be with him was just because he'd been an ally inside Connor's warehouse?
He rubbed at his temple, and looked down at Anne. She looked half asleep, her eyes only barely open. Soon, he thought, he'd rouse her enough to get back down the stairs and into bed. To sleep, not fuck. But for awhile, he would just enjoy the quiet companionship of another human being sharing his space. He knew it would hurt Anne when he inevitably pulled away, but the uncomplicated pleasure of her warm skin against his was something he just wasn't ready to let go.