"Confession"
Phil accepted a handkerchief from Simmons, and stemmed the bleeding.
"I deserved that," he admitted.
"You faked your own death!" Johnny said. Rage was pouring off him, and the area grew warmer. Phil stayed where he was, but the others backed away. "Why the fuck would you do that to me?"
"It wasn't to you," Phil said calmly. "And I didn't know I was going to survive. I really thought I was dying, and I told Nick to use my death to rally the Avengers. My… my last thoughts were of you. It was horrible. I kept trying to think of our happier times, but I kept remembering our argument, when you said you never wanted to see me again. I wanted to remember your smile," the tears in his eyes weren't from the pain in his nose, "but all I could remember was how much I'd hurt you. I was glad I was dying… Fury said it was hard to get me to stay awake when I didn't care. I just wanted you to be free of me… Johnny?"
"Don't say that," Johnny said. His face was white, and he was trembling. "Don't… don't you dare say any of that."
"It's true—"
"Well, it shouldn't be! None of it!"
"Johnny—"
"Damn it, Phil, how could you do that to me? I'm your husband!" The others – even Ward – gasped as one. "I should've been told, Phil."
"I wanted to tell you," Phil said. He didn't feel brave enough to move forward again, so he just stayed put. He could still taste his own blood, and knew that he should probably sit down with his head back, not just continue to saturate Simmons's handkerchief. "I made… I made a deal with the director."
Johnny laughed humourlessly. "Why am I not surprised?"
"Will you listen?" Phil snapped. Johnny pointedly 'zipped up' his lips. "I said that we could tell you if you went to the funeral. The others still had to believe that I was dead, but I wanted you to know. If you were there, Fury could make contact."
"…This all hinged on me being at your funeral?"
"Yes. It seemed logical."
"Log… logical."
"Well, of course you were going to go to your husband's funeral," Simmons said. "I mean, unless something happened to you… Oh my God. Did something happen to you?"
Johnny looked away, and then back to Phil. "Those last words I said to you… They haunted me, Phil. I had nightmares about them. Some nights I dreamed that I was the one in Loki's place, that I killed you. If I hadn't left, we could've been somewhere safer, away from demi-gods intent on ruining New York City. You wouldn't have been confronting them and getting stabbed through the chest."
"You don't know that," Phil said.
"But I dreamed about it. And it hurt so bad, Phil. I couldn't go to your funeral. I couldn't face what I'd done to you. I didn't even have my ring, and I couldn't find it when I went back to our place."
"I'd taken it with me," Phil said. "After I regained consciousness, Fury gave me my effects, and that was with them. I said that it hurt to keep it, and that if you didn't want it, just to get rid of it, and not to tell me."
Johnny reached down his blue suit, and fished out a necklace. On the end of it was his wedding ring.
"I asked about your ring, but he said it was with you, and I didn't want to dig up your grave just for a piece of metal," Johnny said. "I didn't want to see your… your corpse. If I had dug up your coffin and checked inside—"
"You would've known sooner," Phil said. "I believe the coffin's empty. When I die someday, I'll use it for real then. That'll save some money."
"Don't joke about this!" Johnny said.
"I'm not joking, Johnny. When the director told me you weren't at the funeral, I took that to mean that you didn't care. Since I died – technically – that meant you were free to move on in your own time."
"So were you," Johnny said.
"You were – you are – the love of my life, Johnny Storm. I could never move on from you."
"Those rumours about a cellist must have just been rumours," Fitz whispered. He wasn't very good at whispering quietly, because Johnny's head turned towards him.
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"Oh, well, uh," Fitz looked nervous, as well he might, "there were rumours that Agent Coulson was in love with a cellist."
Johnny's expression was closed off. "Well, he seems to have a type," he said. "I play the cello, too."
"There's no 'too', Johnny," Phil said. "I've only ever been in love with one cello-player, and I'll love him `til I die." He turned to Skye. "You, come with me. I need to sit down, and we need to talk."
They were nearly at the top of the stairs when Johnny looked up. "Hang on. If it's just the one cell… Oh."
Phil would have rolled his eyes, only he was feeling woozy enough as it was. In the end, he had to allow Skye to help him to his desk.
And they talked. Skye gave him the SD card, and Phil studied the SHIELD-redacted document on the screen. Eventually, he returned the information to her, before fetching the small black case.
"Trust is an important thing, possibly the most important after love," Phil said, and he opened the box. "You broke our trust, Skye."
"I know, and I'm sorry," she said.
"It's bad enough, what I did to my husband," Phil said. "Even before faking my death – which, for awhile, wasn't so fake – I destroyed everything. I had a chance to repair what I didn't even know was broken, and with a few words I ruined that chance, and my husband left me, leaving his wedding ring on the hall table and a hole in my heart that was nothing compared to what Loki did to me. And you know what's worse? The fact that those words, and everything I've done since, has ensured that my husband, the man I love more than life itself, will never trust me again. I don't deserve his trust, but I would do anything to regain it. Only, you see, you have a chance to make things right with this team, even though your betrayal could have cost lives. It's a long road ahead, and it won't always be pleasant. But it's possible that they might consider you a friend again. Me? I don't get that. I blew my chance with Johnny, and I don't expect any more miracles. It would have been better if I'd died."
"No way, sir," Skye said. "It's a good thing you're alive. I don't deserve this chance; a guy lost his life because of me."
"And I lost my marriage and the single most important person in my life." Phil pulled out the bracelet, and Skye slumped, but held out her wrist. Phil slid the metal over her hand and manoeuvred the band into place. A thought occurred to him. "You know, Skye, I'd trade the world to get him back, and that scares me. I know he thought that I was putting the world before him, and it might've seemed like that. But I only did it so that there'd be a world for him to live in. And I thought you held similar ideals."
"Why don't you tell him what you just told me?"
"Well, I—" Then the phone on his desk rang. It was the internal line. "You're dismissed."
Skye left as Phil answered the phone.
"Coulson," he said.
"Heard you got your nose smashed in," May said.
"It's not that bad. The bleeding's nearly stopped."
"It should have stopped already."
"I've been busy. Did you call just for this?"
"Do you have an ice pack in your office?"
"Yes."
"Then use it." And she hung up. Phil bent under his desk and opened the small freezer he kept under there specifically for backup icepacks. He had already changed to using one of his hankies, and had put Simmons's aside to wash it later. He took a couple of painkillers, and then applied the ice to his nose. The cold sting quickly became a relief, and Phil lowered the back rest until he was nearly lying down. He tilted his head back, still keeping pressure on the injury, and he finally allowed a couple of tears to fall. They'd take Johnny to an airport so that he could fly back to New York, or Portland, or wherever he lived now, and that would be the end of it.
Half an hour passed, and his nose felt much better. There'd be a bit of bruising, and it was already a bit swollen. But the blood had stopped flowing, and the worst of it had been staved off with the icepack. Phil mentally thanked Agent May; the state he was in, he doubted whether he would've thought of it. With a few tissues and some condensation from the freezer, he cleaned the blood off his face.
He looked up when he heard a knock at the door, and immediately straightened his chair.
I'm sure you can all guess who the guest is.
On the plus side, I spelt 'manoeuvred' right on the first go in this chapter. Hurrah!
