Chapter Sixty Four – The Way Things Could Be

Tempers lingered through to the next day, though a small seed of doubt had formed in Olivia. She might have reacted a bit harshly. A bead of guilt formed but was quickly overpowered by the remnants of her anger. Even if she had been harsh, he hadn't been any better. If anything he'd been worse. After all he was the one that had started throwing around the insults in the first place. He'd questioned her courage, her personality, even her honesty. All she'd done was question his choice of fun, and maybe, how well he knew her. What was so exciting about being surrounded by a huge group of random strangers drinking away and partying like they were teenagers? They could be just as judgmental as teenagers too.

Even more pissed off now that their fight was back in the forefront of her mind she jabbed even harder at the keys on her laptop as she worked on her article. It was much harder than necessary and it wasn't helping at all, but she didn't care. She wasn't making much progress anyway with her mind as distracted as it was.

Ben wasn't having that problem. In fact, while the memories of the fight yesterday were distracting Olivia from work, he was using work as the actual distraction. He didn't want to think about last night. If he did it would make him seriously angry again and he would be just as useless with work as Olivia currently was. Best not to let the thought of it even begin to enter his mind. For the most part he did a good job, though his coworkers did notice he wasn't in the best of moods and tried to give him space so they wouldn't accidentally turn his ire onto them. Ben didn't notice, which was good since it could have easily reminded him of Olivia's own avoidance. His mind was already drifting to her whenever he had a second of down time.

He was forcing himself to focus so much on work that he didn't notice it was time to close up shop for the day until more people than normal began walking past his office. When he noticed what time it was he began packing his things up, but he didn't move even once he'd finished. Ben really didn't know what to do next. Either he could head straight home and leave apologizing and working this mess out up to Olivia or he could go over to her place and try to solve it himself. The buds of anger flickered through him again. She'd been the one being unreasonable, so it only made sense that she should be the one apologizing. He'd done nothing wrong unless trying to make her see the truth was wrong (which it wasn't, damn it!). Knowing Olivia though, she wouldn't come to him to fix the problem. At least not so soon after the fact. If he wanted the fighting to stop it would be up to him. Even if his anger was valid, he didn't think he could handle another day of it since he didn't particularly like being upset with her. Of course even if he did try to make things right there was a chance the argument could continue anyway or even get worse.

Ben sighed and ran a hand through his hair. He needed to talk to her even if it meant they'd end up fighting again. Time wasn't going to miraculously make it all better.

For the first time that day though Olivia wasn't thinking about Ben or their fight. She was too busy trying to get out the door on time. That, of course, was when Ben showed up at her door. She opened it for him and barely managed to not roll her eyes as she turned away.

"What are you doing here, Ben?"

She managed not so sound frustrated or annoyed, though it was obvious she wasn't happy. It didn't help that she wasn't pausing to actually face him and have a real conversation either. Instead she was busy wandering through her kitchen and living room gathering things to toss into her purse. She wasn't purposefully trying to ignore him (she simply had a limited amount of time before she had somewhere she needed to be), but her actions definitely came across as avoidance. It annoyed Ben. He'd been planning to speak to her like they hadn't been at each other's throats the day before, but if she wanted to mostly ignore him then fine.

"You figured anything out yet?"

Olivia shot him a furious glare and picked up her keys.

"There's nothing to figure out."

Of course there wasn't. She couldn't possibly be wrong, and if for some reason she might be there was no way she would admit it. Her mind was made up. Well, if she wasn't going to even try to be open to compromise then there was no point in him trying.

"Guess I should just go then," he replied bitterly.

"Guess you should."

"Right. Fine."

He turned to head back out the door when he spotted Olivia grabbing Suvi's vest and leash. That was a clearer sign than anything else that she was about to leave too.

"What, are you going to follow me out and make sure I actually leave?"

Normally he would have said that in a teasing voice, but he wasn't feeling the least bit humorous today. The heat of his anger came out loud and clear.

"No. I'm on my way to a doctor's appointment," Olivia retorted once she finished clipping Suvi's leash on. "Do I need to escort you out?"

The mention of a doctor was like throwing a bucket of ice water over Ben. His anger was immediately replaced by concern.

"Is everything okay?"

Olivia sighed softly, her own anger fading when she saw the worry etched across his face.

"I'm fine. It's just a normal check in. My doctor will ask a bunch of questions to make sure nothing has changed and he'll renew my prescriptions."

"I can come with you."

"Ha, no. I'm fine on my own, thank you."

"Why not?"

"Because there's no point in you being there, Ben."

"Sure there is. I'll get to be a part of your life and have confirmation that everything is okay."

It sounded so simple, but tensions were already running high. Instead of hearing the sweetness behind Ben's offer all Olivia heard was the second part. He didn't trust her to tell him the truth. She'd heard the exact same thing last night. Ben hadn't expected to see anger spark back into her eyes, but when it happened he saw it clearly. Unfortunately he had no idea what had caused it and he was left blinking in surprise.

"You're not coming. End of story."

"What are you so mad about now?"

"Oh, I don't know. Maybe you not trusting me to know myself. Again."

She gave Suvi the command to heel and brushed past Ben out the door. Ben turned to follow her departure, his mouth wide open. He had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. Olivia didn't look back though.

"Go ahead and lock up behind you," she told him icily.

Ben stared after her dumbfounded for a moment before his face flared with fury. Fine. Whatever. If she wanted to just walk away again without any explanation or even a chance for him to explain then she could go ahead. He'd never said he didn't trust her. Let her think whatever she wanted. When she realized that she was being dumb she could come to him. That decided, he closed and locked the door and stormed off, purposefully taking the steps slowly so there would be no chance of running into her in the lobby.

Too worked up to head home, Ben took a detour to Brooklyn. He didn't bother letting his brother know he was coming; he simply showed up at his door. Cole just stood there staring at Ben after opening the door.

"Think you're going to actually let me in?" Ben asked sharply.

Cole barely managed to get out an, "Ah, yeah…" before Ben partway pushed him aside. Ben immediately started pacing around the room, clearly irritated. It wasn't common for Ben to be so visibly upset, so Cole stood by the door well out of the way. He had no idea what the hell was going on. He wasn't sure finding out would be worth the risk either. Ben could easily explode with Cole merely asking.

"Remind me why I deal with her again," Ben grumbled.

Ah. So this was about Olivia. Yeah, he probably should have guessed that. Olivia was undoubtedly the only one that could get his brother this worked up. They had to be arguing about something. Of course they'd gotten into minor fights before, but whatever this was it seemed to be much bigger. Ben was seriously pissed, and Cole had never before seen this level of anger directed (presumably) at Olivia.

"Because you love her. Because she makes you happier than you've ever been. Do I need to continue?"

"She's a pain!"

Cole snorted back a laugh.

"I did notice that. Warned you about it too. Now what's going on?"

"She's not listening to me. At all. I swear if my opinions don't agree with hers she won't even hear anything, let alone consider it."

"I'm not going to get involved in this, Ben."

Trying to offer advice could easily be suicide. Taking sides would be even worse. Cole seriously didn't want to be right in the middle of the nuclear reaction that would cause. No matter which of them he believed was right he'd become the target of the other one. It just wasn't worth it.

"Why not? You've gotten involved in everything else related to our relationship," Ben growled.

Cole could hear the acidity in Ben's voice and had to fight to control his own anger. Ben was already on edge. It wasn't surprising that he was being a bit sharper than usual. Of course there was a limit to how much Cole was willing to put up with.

"Don't get pissed off at me," Cole warned.

None of this was his fault, and he wasn't going to let Ben's full anger turn on him. Thankfully Ben seemed to realize his anger was being misdirected. He sighed heavily and dropped down onto the couch, putting his head in his hands.

"Sorry," Ben muttered.

Cole accepted his brother's apology without question. He moved into the room and leaned against the wall across from the couch so he could watch Ben.

"She's being unreasonably stubborn," Ben stated wearily.

Apparently Cole was going to get involved in this whether he wanted to or not. Protesting was not going to get him anywhere, and even if he tried Ben would continue on with the discussion anyway. There was no avoiding it. He would just have to try his best to smooth things out without getting burned too badly.

The long pause was enough for Ben to think Cole wasn't going to respond, so he continued.

"It's just a New Year's Eve party. Not a big deal. She has no reason to refuse so adamantly."

"It could be reasonable you know," Cole soothed. "You don't really know what it's like for her."

"I've been there too! It's not like we've never been out in public together."

"But you aren't the repeated target. Just collateral."

Ben scowled. He didn't particularly like being called collateral damage, but maybe Cole did have a point. When it came right down to it that was exactly what he was. Great. Maybe he really did need to reconsider. Of course she was going to need to also.