Psych 1
Shawn had envisioned a perfect night with Juliet. They would attend Lassiter and Marlowe's wedding, share some wine, share a dance, and then share a night together in their bed, with the subtle and pleasant idea of marriage still lingering.
Standing in the dark road now, his shirt still damp and his cheeks stiff from a few unashamed tears, that clearly hadn't worked out. Well, they did share some wine, although it kind of depends on your definition of "share".
After that, he had envisioned jumping out of the taxi as it slowed in front of their house, and running inside to make sure she was alright, because screw personal space, she could have as much of that as soon as he made sure she was okay. Because the pain on her face, the last thing he remembers seeing, was not okay.
His toes are in the driveway. His heels are in the street. Her car is at the front of the driveway, and he counts himself lucky she even came home. He might've expected her to be packing her things, and that car in the driveway could easily be just the thing that carries her away from him for good. But there are no lights on. He can see the bedroom and bathroom windows from the street, and all is dark.
His steps are cautious and painful. Guilt wracks his body, his hands shaking and his body shivering, despite it being a warm night, and he was sweating.
The door is unlocked. It doesn't cross his mind that someone else might be there. That someone else had gotten to her first.
His footsteps sound heavy on the stairs, despite his efforts to keep silent. He feels like Arbigast in Psycho, slowly ascending the stairs, waiting for someone to turn the corner and bludgeon him. He kind of wants her to take her anger out on him physically. Because it's when she's silent that always concerns him the most.
There is a shaft of moonlight stretching across the hall floor, coming from the bedroom window. The door is open just enough for it to shine through. He gently raps his knuckles against the door, but gets no answer. He nudges the door open with the side of his shoe.
"Jules?" His voice is quiet, hoarse.
She is not in the room. The bed is made, and his jacket lies open on it. The closet is closed, the window is shut but the curtains are pushed wide open. He turns towards their connecting bathroom. Also dark. The bathroom door is open, and almost certainly empty. He checks the shower stall just in case.
Also empty.
He turns slowly back into the bedroom, wondering if he had missed something downstairs. Halfway across the room, he sees her.
She stands in the corner, next to the window. The moonlight highlights the edges of her hair, which she has let down from the tight bun. Her face is obscured, but he can imagine her expression.
Before he can say anything, she steps out of the corner, revealing an expression of far more pain and knowledge than betrayal and anger. Like she expected him. No, like she expected this.
"Shawn." Her arms are folded across her chest. She's in a gray blouse and black jeans now. She looks… expectant.
"Jules, I didn't mean for you to find out like this, I know how you must feel-" The words spilled out before he could even think them over, even though he knew before they came out that he was saying everything wrong.
"Do you, Shawn? Do you know how I'm feeling?" Her voice is soft but stern. They stand closer now.
"No." He said in such a small voice, he wasn't sure if he had even said it.
"I knew you weren't psychic."
"…You-"
"Shawn, you're really not as subtle as you think. You may fool some people, but I've known since the day I met you. Don't flatter yourself." She stood tall, feet firmly planted, still looking up at him, yet he felt smaller.
He swallowed tightly.
"Do you remember what you "saw" of me the day we met? Your "psychic vision"? You told me about my two cats, about my parents and how they've been happily married for a long time. I laughed, and I played along, too. Mostly because I thought I was never going to see you again, but partly because I was just being friendly and I was on a stakeout."
She looked at him with a sadness in her eyes, a sadness he could not match to any other emotion he had seen before.
"See, Shawn, I would not have told a random stranger that I have no cats, but my brother does. I would not have told a random stranger, that my parents have been dead for many, many years. You sensed that I loved my family very much? My father has tried to kill me before, and my brother had to kill him just so that he wouldn't. You've said that you could "sense" my innocence, and that seeing things as a police officer was hard on me. Shawn, you wouldn't believe the things I've seen, and policework comes nowhere near that."
He felt like he had been slapped in the face, yet he seriously wished that she had actually slapped him instead. It would probably hurt less.
"My point is, you're nothing special, Shawn. You're just someone who turns observations into ridiculous "visions", and occasionally gets them right. You think I give a shit about some Michael Damien tickets? What hurts me, is that you waited this long. I've been waiting for you to come clean to me, but it really, really hurts that instead you waited for me to "figure it out."
And there was the knife. He was Arbigast and she had just stabbed him right through the heart.
The tears in her eyes were coming back, but only a little bit. "I gave you so many chances. You have had 7 years to come clean to me, and you couldn't even do it after all. Do you know how it feels to be that disrespected; taken advantage of?" The moonlight glinted off her eyes, which hadn't torn from his for a second. She said much quieter, "No matter what happens between the two of us now, I do still care about you Shawn. And I hope you never have to find out what that feels like."
She turned and walked slowly out the bedroom door, keeping her eyes locked with his until she had to turn her head.
He followed her out into the hall and stood in the doorway. "Where are you going? I mean, a-are you going to be safe?" His voice was tiny and rough.
She sighed quickly. "I'm going to my brother's house. I don't know for how long and don't ask me to come back. When I show up at work tomorrow, you will not be there, understand?"
He nodded.
She stopped on the top step, turned around, "My brothers are very protective of me, Shawn. Very. Consider yourself the lucky one that I won't mention what's going on."
She descended the stairs, and slipped out the front door quietly. And yet he was the one who was falling, stumbling backwards down the stairs, a knife in his chest.
Until he hits the bottom, lifeless, with a soft
thud.
~/~
A/N: It's sad that I feel I have to clarify this, which takes the mystery out of the story, but I'll probably get hate if I don't. He didn't kill himself, it's all a Psycho metaphor.