Disclaimer: I do not own Blindspot. More like it's the other way around… I've come to realize that THEY own ME. :)
When Sarah walked into the living room a little while later, yawning from the effort of a long few days getting her family's old house ready for Christmas, she found Jane and Kurt snuggled on the couch together.
Finally, she thought as she smiled at them knowingly. She noticed that Jane blushed immediately, looking uncomfortable and, if Sarah wasn't mistaken, that she self-consciously tried to sit up a little bit. But Sarah also noticed that her brother didn't let Jane move away from him, holding her exactly where she was and grinning like a kid who'd gotten exactly what he'd wanted for Christmas. He had, she supposed.
Jane had turned to glance at him in surprise, and Kurt had just smiled at her, fighting to pull her even closer rather than let her go, amusement obvious on his face.
There two are really and truly the cutest thing, Sarah thought. Bordering on disgusting.
"Hey guys," Sarah said with a smile. She tried to think of something else to say, but for that moment, she was speechless. It was exactly like Sawyer had blurted out a little while ago – she hadn't seen Kurt so happy since he was ten years old, before Taylor had disappeared. She hated to be the one to give either of them a reason to get up, even for a few minutes, but she did it anyway, confident that it would only be temporary. "Kurt," she said, "Sawyer wants you to come in and say good night."
"Alright, no problem," Kurt replied, not moving a muscle. Sarah figured that it would probably take him a minute or so to convince himself to get up, judging from how comfortable he looked.
"Can you take over, the… uh… preparations?" Sarah asked him. "I'm about to crash."
"Absolutely," Kurt said with a grin.
"Thanks, you're a lifesaver," Sarah replied with relief. "The stuff's on the top shelf of the closet, in a blue bin. What didn't fit is in my room, but I'll go and get it now.
"Before he's even asleep? Risky…" Kurt replied jokingly.
Sarah rolled her eyes with a laugh. "Please," she said. "He hasn't believed in Santa in two years."
"Does that mean he's getting a stocking full of underwear?" he asked, his eyes lighting up with laughter. That was the long established, well known rule in their family, and it kept all talk of not believing in Santa to an absolute minimum.
Jane had absolutely no idea what the two siblings were talking about, but hoped that at some point one of them would fill her in. She looked from one of them to the other for some explanation.
"Ha! No, the kid's pretty smart. He doesn't actually tell me that he doesn't believe in Santa. He likes the whole toys and chocolates in his stocking thing too much… But you can just tell from comments here and there, or the things he casually mentions about other kids who still believe."
Kurt nodded, chuckling at the thought of Sawyer being sneaky enough to keep pretending to believe in Santa so that he could keep getting the good stuff – which was basically anything except underwear. Of course his nephew had brilliant powers of deduction and good investigative skills. He obviously took after him.
Sarah left the room then, going upstairs to get the other bag of Santa presents, and Jane looked at Kurt in utter confusion. Finally realizing how strange the conversation had probably sounded to her, he said, "Sorry… the rumor in our house was always that if you stopped believing in Santa, all he would bring you was underwear. We had a cute little plaque thing that my mom had bought when I was little that said it…" His voice tapered off then, for a second, at the mention of his mother.
Jane bit her lip and held her breath, watching him as he stared into the fire. She wasn't sure he'd ever mentioned his mother, except to say that she'd left when he and Sarah were really small. When she squeezed her hand over his, he seemed to realize that he'd gotten lost in thought and looked back at her.
"Anyway," he continued as if he'd never stopped talking, "that kept us pretending to believe in Santa for a very, very long time."
"It's nice that you guys had each other to pretend with," Jane said absently, "I wonder if that's been harder or easier for Sawyer, without any other kids his age… to tell him he should or shouldn't believe in Santa."
"I don't know," Kurt mused. "Sarah wanted to have more kids, I think, but…" He sighed, shaking his head slightly. "Well, her ex is her ex for many reasons. And she used to bug me all the time about Sawyer having a cousin. I think she gave up – I hope she did, anyway – at least for a while." Something occurred to him then, and he couldn't help but suddenly look scared. "I hope she's not going to start that again, now that…" He didn't finish that particular sentence, but it was perfectly clear as they looked into each other's eyes that they both understood. "She used to embarrass the hell out of me with that…" he added. It was the last thing he was going to say on the topic, he decided, because he was fairly sure that no good would come of expanding on it.
The longer he looked at Jane, the more he felt himself turning pink. Surely his sister had more tact than to start that campaign even before he knew what was even going on with Jane… Hell, before anything was actually going on… Realizing a few seconds later that no, Sarah had very little tact when it came to situations in which she could embarrass him, in fact, a feeling of dread overtook him. She had bugged him about having kids for a long time, in various mortifying situations… why might this be any different?
Of course, the only person he'd been with even a little bit consistently was Allie, but that – them, or anything permanent resembling a 'them' – had just never seemed like a possibility, much less a likelihood. Hell, they hadn't even been a good idea. He hadn't actually wanted to end up with her – she was a good person, just not the right one for him. In the end, when they broke up the last time, it almost felt like a relief, as though he'd known it was only a matter of time. As if it had been inevitable.
Yes, she grilled me about having kids in front of Allie at least once, probably more… he recalled. Oh no, please don't let her go into that in front of Jane. There's already more than enough awkwardness…
Jane just raised her eyebrows and smiled slightly as she watched him. Interestingly enough, if he hadn't looked so completely freaked out at what he'd just said, it probably would have scared the hell out of her. But the fact that he did look so alarmed made her want to just laugh, somehow. Maybe it was because this man who so constantly ran toward danger without a second thought – when everyone else was running away from it – looked terrified about the prospect of his sister asking him, specifically in front of her, when he was going to have kids.
Personally, Jane was, of course, surprised at the direction of the conversation, as well as the fact that this topic of interrogation by the younger Weller sibling didn't scare her more. So far their relationship status was "whatever you want," and consisted of sitting close together, with a few hours' worth of time spent pressed against each other when their lives had depended on it – literally – and punctuated by the very occasional kiss. Even thinking about kids at that point seemed more than a little bit insane.
Not that she could claim that she'd never given any thought whatsoever to a hypothetical future with Kurt. In fact, for months her nightmares had alternated with dreams of domestic bliss in which the two of them were the stars. In a way, these dreams were almost worse than her nightmares, because after each of these dreams, she'd woken up to the crushing reality that he wanted nothing to do with her. That certainly hadn't helped their strained working relationship at the time. She figured that she would maybe tell him about those dreams eventually, assuming that things continued on as they were at that moment… but she wasn't ready for that kind of big admission.
Shaking her head slowly, she tried to see things from Sarah's perspective. "She just wants the best for you guys," she said slowly, gathering her thoughts as she went. "A sibling was out of her control, so she thought about the next best thing. She loves Sawyer, and she wants the same kind of happiness for you." Noting Kurt's look of discomfort, she decided to quit while she was ahead, or at least before she got any farther behind. This seemed like a no-win conversation, after all.
It made sense to Jane that Sarah would have pestered Kurt about having kids, even if the possibility of being Sarah's target was more than a little bit terrifying. Jane certainly couldn't relate to Sarah's specific situation, but she could sympathize with the other woman's desire for her son to have something that she couldn't provide him. Besides, Sarah obviously saw what Jane did about Kurt – that he would make a great dad…
Over the line, her mind informed her. Yes, you're just stating a fact, however… let's just back up. A lot.
Before either of them could say anything else, both of them just staring at each other in surprise, Sarah picked that moment to walk back into the room. Setting a very large plastic shopping bag down in front of him, she told Kurt. "Here's the rest of it. Thank you so much. I'll see you guys in the morning,"
Jane turned and smiled at her. "Good night, Sarah. Thanks for everything," she told her sincerely.
Sarah smiled back at Jane, stifling another yawn. "Good night, Jane," she said, then turned toward her brother. "Night, Kurt… I'm glad you guys made it here okay, no major mishaps." Kurt nodded at his sister with a smile, and Sarah just shook her head and rolled her eyes. Her brother's tendency to scare the hell out of her was usually confined to work injuries, but apparently he was now branching out.
"Good night, Sarah," he replied with a grin. She's so dramatic sometimes, he thought.
Sarah turned to leave, waving at them over her shoulder as she retreated back toward the stairs.
Alone once more, Kurt turned so that he could look into Jane's eyes, holding still for a minute and feeling the sudden weight of the look between them. He certainly didn't feel the need to return to the very awkward conversation they'd been having before Sarah had come in the last time, and yet, he was still thinking about it.
"I should go and…" he began, but his voice trailed off to nothing. Jane smiled, not a full watt smile, but the kind that didn't quite reach her eyes, and nodded. She didn't want him to go anywhere, but of course she couldn't tell him not to go and say good night to his nephew. Besides, it wasn't like he was leaving. He was going to come right back.
"To go say good night to Sawyer," she finished for him.
You're spoiled, she told herself. It's like the hours in the sleeping bag with him made it so that now you just can't get close enough to him, no matter what you do.
You could always go back in the sleeping bag, the voice in her head suggested playfully. She wanted to wring its neck, mainly because she liked the idea so much. Of course she wasn't going to do that.
"I'll be right back," he said, still staring into her eyes.
She just nodded at him with the same weak smile. Why did she suddenly feel so… what was it, anyway? There was no reason to feel like anything was wrong… and yet… something didn't feel right. That was the only way she could describe it.
Finally, after a long minute of staring at each other, during which he swore there was something different in her expression, he chuckled and forced himself to withdraw his arms from around her, to lean far enough away from her that he could stand up slowly. This – leaning away from her – was harder than it seemed like it should be, because they had molded themselves against each other as they'd sat there. When he was finally on his feet, he turned to walk toward the stairs, glancing back at her before walking through the archway that took him into the hall which led to the stairs at the front of the house. Once Jane was out of his line of sight, he took the stairs two at a time so that he could get upstairs to Sawyer and say good night, and then, more importantly at that moment, back downstairs to Jane.
As soon as Kurt went upstairs, Jane felt herself shiver, suddenly feeling colder than she had only a minute before. Don't be silly, she told herself when she wondered if she was feeling colder because Kurt had left the room. That doesn't even make sense. Maybe because he's not sitting next to you, but not because he left the room. But she swore that she hadn't noticed the difference until he'd turned around and left the room…
Deciding that it didn't matter which one it was, simply that she was cold, she stood up and stretched, walking across the room to the fireplace, where the fire was burning low but had not yet burned out. Finding the heat that the embers were still giving off a welcome feeling, she sat right up close to the hearth, her knees up in front of her and her arms wrapped around them tightly, staring into the dying flames. Not only was the warmth comforting, but watching the fire was mesmerizing, and she didn't hear Kurt come back into the room only a few minutes later.
The floors in the house, like the rest of it, were old and creaky, and Kurt was sure that she'd heard him come back into the room. However, when he had watched her from the doorway that was straight behind her for more than a minute without her showing any signs of having heard him, he realized that she really didn't know that he was there.
He walked slowly to where she sat in front of the fireplace, sitting down beside her so that his shoulder brushed against hers just slightly, and looked from her to the fire. She seemed to be mesmerized.
"Are you okay, Jane?" he asked
Jane nodded, but didn't look at him. "I can't get warm," she replied quietly. "I think I've been cold since the car…" Kurt just nodded. He knew the feeling. He didn't think that that was it, though, because she suddenly seemed a little… off. Standing up again, he walked back toward the couch, where there was a large, soft white wool blanket.
When he stood up, she felt as though the air had been sucked out of the space next to her. She didn't know why, but for some reason she felt the absence of him beside her more acutely than made logical sense.
He assumed that the blanket must belong to Sarah, because he'd never seen it before.
Then again, if someone bought it in the past twenty years, you probably wouldn't have noticed anyway, Kurt told himself accusingly.
Oh, so I was supposed to be reasonably expected to come back here? To see my father, the murderer, and do what? Make small talk? Of courseI didn't come back. And I was right, in the end, too, he thought, suddenly angry with the voice in his head as he walked slowly back toward the fireplace.
A few seconds later she felt him sit down next to her once again, even a little closer this time, noting the tension in his shoulder as it leaned against hers. She didn't object to the closeness, of course, simply looked at him in surprise, watching as he wrapped the large white blanket around them both.
"Maybe this will help," he told her softly, trying his best to once again simply push the thoughts of his father out of his head. The man was an unwelcome visitor there, after all. He knew that Borden would probably have told him that that wasn't the healthy way to deal with it all… but then again, Borden had lost his right to comment, trained professional or not. He'd been a Sandstorm mole.
Come to think of it, it seems like very few people in my life are who I originally thought they were, Kurt thought fleetingly, glancing at Jane. Mayfair. Carter. Keaton. My father. Borden. Jane. His heart ached the most as he added her to the list, of course. Thankfully, at least he and Jane finally seemed to be back on the right path. Yes, everything had been a mess, but they were wading through it and coming out the other side. This was the best way he could make sense of things, on all the rest of it that seemed so completely messed up – by simply focusing on Jane.
Who else isn't who I think they are? he wondered, hoping Jane hadn't noticed the shiver that ran down his spine. He pushed those thoughts from his mind for the time being then. After all, he'd much rather focus on her.
Beneath the blanket, he pulled his left arm around her upper back, tugging her closer to him until she leaned her head against his shoulder. "Better?" he asked quietly, speaking into her ear once again. She nodded, but even from that angle he could see that something was wrong. For several minutes, he glanced back and forth between Jane and the fire.
"Still cold?" he asked quietly, and he was surprised when she nodded. How in the world can she still be cold? he wondered. He was determined to fix that, but he knew that at some point, he was going to have to stand up.
"Well, I'm happy to help you solve that problem. Though, I will have to get back up again. After all, Sarah did leave the Santa duties to me," he said seriously.
"Santa duties?" Jane asked quietly, lifting up her head to look at him in tired confusion. She had no plans to actually sleep, but she was beginning to feel the effects of the long day.
"Yep," he replied. "You know… fill the stockings, set out the presents…" He immediately regretted his choice of words. Didshe know? He wasn't sure how much she knew about common Christmas traditions, it being only her second Christmas.
Her face seemed to tighten, and he stopped talking, silently cursing himself. Whatever had been wrong before, he didn't seem to be making it better. On the contrary, he was pretty sure he'd just made it worse. Not wanting to risk putting his foot in his mouth again, he hesitated to speak. The concern in his eyes was clear, however. Talk to me, he begged her without speaking.
She exhaled slowly, deciding to start with the simpler of the two things that were currently on her mind. The guilt from the beginning of the trip had come flooding back to her as soon as he'd mentioned presents. "I don't have anything for anyone…" she sighed.
"Jane," Kurt said seriously, "no one expected you to have anything. I invited you at the last second. Besides, does it bother you that we don't have anything for you? With the exception of Sawyer's masterpiece, obviously." He looked at her expectantly, and a few seconds later, she shook her head.
"Of course not," she replied. "I'm just happy not to be in my safe house staring at the walls."
"Thank you for proving my point," he told her. "You don't need to give us anything. That's not what Christmas is supposed to be about." He turned around and look at the tree, then back at her sheepishly. "I'll admit, we tend to lose sight of that. I guess we've always tried to overcompensate for the way our family sort of… broke apart."
At that moment, Jane felt badly for even bringing up the subject. The look on his face made her heart ache for both him and Sarah. After all, she knew what it was like not to have family.
"But that's not what I wanted it to be about," he continued, his expression changing. "I wanted you to come along because…" He thought for a second. "…because all of a sudden, I couldn't imagine not spending Christmas with you."
He paused, sighing, and thinking about how confusing the sudden change must have seemed from her perspective. He wished he had a better answer for her about that. "And I know you probably have whiplash trying to understand how we went from one extreme to another since yesterday…" She smiled then, because the thought had crossed her mind. He sat there, trying to gather his thoughts, but they refused to be collected. Instead, they both stared into the fire for several minutes before he glanced at her once again. He couldn't help but notice how her face was lit by the flames. She looked more beautiful than ever. "The fact that you're here… I can't think of a better Christmas present. There's nothing else I want."
He tried to remember back to twenty-four hours before, to what they'd been doing… but he couldn't quite remember. It felt like things between them had always been like this.
No, the party ended at 9:00 last night, so at this time yesterday she was already with me. It seemed like another lifetime.
She really and truly didn't know what to think, much less what to say, just then. He was absolutely right, she did feel like she had gotten extremely mixed messages from him… although, strangely, it all almost made sense to her. In any case, she didn't doubt his sincerity, and she supposed that that had to count for something.
"I'd better go play Santa before it gets close enough to morning that Sawyer wakes up early to come down and peek at his presents… which he'll do, whether he believes in Santa or not," Kurt whispered to her. When he felt her sigh against him, he turned and kissed her forehead. "I'll show you what being Santa involves."
Smiling at him in spite of the fact that she didn't want him to get up, she then pulled the blanket tighter around herself when he did. Even though she knew that she was being silly, that he was right there in front of her and still focusing an intense look at her whenever he looked up, she couldn't help but feel like he was very far away. Then again, she'd been feeling that way since they'd climbed out of the sleeping bag, even when he was right beside her.
Watching as he went to the hall closet, just off the family room, and came back with the blue bin that Sarah had mentioned, Jane became more interested. Kurt moved back toward the stockings that were hanging in front of the fireplace, directly in front of her. There were three of them, with each of their names on them. The first two were significantly older looking, with a different but complimentary red and green pattern on them. One said 'Sarah,' and the other, 'Kurt.' The third one, which had a giant, smiling snowman on it, said 'Sawyer.' Jane smiled as she watched him take each one down, fill it with small items from the bag he was holding, and then lay it down on the hearth in front of her.
"I'll be right back," he said quietly, walking out of the room. Jane nodded, and returned her attention to the fire. She felt like she could stare into the dying embers all night. There was something beautiful and hypnotic about it all. He returned with three large, wrapped presents, setting them in front of the tree. Each was labeled with one of their names, and "from Santa."
Jane couldn't help but smile when he turned back to her. "All done," he proclaimed. "Now I think it's time for some sleep. What do you think?"
Nodding noncommittally, she tried to arrange her face into an expression of causal agreement as she nodded at him, though she had no intention whatsoever of sleeping. She thought back to the previous night, to the nightmare she'd had at Kurt's apartment. Feeling a shiver run down her spine, she did her best not to show it. No, it would be better if she didn't even try to sleep, she decided. Less risk of nightmares. However, that meant that it was going to be a long night… Not that it would be the first one. Besides, she'd been through far worse, after all.
"I'll take the couch," Jane said quickly. After all, she wasn't going to sleep anyway.
"No way," Kurt replied quickly. "You take the bed in my old room. I'll take the couch." He said it as if the matter was already decided.
The problem was, when it came down to it, she didn't want either of them on the couch. Well, unless it meant that they were both there. She already felt like he was too far away when he was sitting beside her, for goodness sake.
She wanted to tell him that, but… how? How could she tell him, with all of their history, this person who had been a complete stranger – no, worse than a stranger, who had actively despised her – for months, up until barely more than twenty four hours ago when he'd had some sort of epiphany, that he was too far away from her when there was any space between them at all. That was an easy question – she couldn't tell him that. That just wasn't the kind of thing you said to someone, and certainly not someone in a situation that was as complicated as this.
No, she was fine not sleeping, she decided.
It doesn't have to be this complicated, the voice in her head insisted. She'd noticed that the voice was sometimes right, but in this instance, she absolutely refused to consider its advice. She was not going to say that to him. Talk about a way to seriously embarrass yourself.
Seeing the stubborn look come over her face and knowing that she was about to argue with him, he decided to save her the trouble. He sat down beside her, but facing her and not the fireplace, and attempted to tug her so that she turned to face him and not the fire. "Would you like me to tell you why?"
He had successfully convinced her to turn and face him – she was willing to concede the direction she faced, at least. Everything else, however, was non-negotiable. She didn't want to go to sleep, didn't want to talk about going to sleep, didn't want to even admit that she was exhausted from the day they'd had, and she didn't want to look up at him, either. She did, however, want to know what his logic was behind insisting that she sleep in his childhood bed, because it sounded as though he had a specific reason, beyond just the fact that was a nice guy… Which he was, of course.
Unable to help it, she looked up at him slowly, hating the fact that she had conceded.
It's not a contest, she told herself. You didn't lose. Just listen to him. Do you really not think he has your best interests at heart? He's a lot more likely to be thinking of what's best for you than you are, she reminded herself.
I hate it when that you're right, she told the voice.
He was looking at her patiently when she looked into his eyes, and it annoyed her that just looking up at him made such a sense of relief wash over her.
"I assume that you remember last night," he began gently. "The part with your nightmare, that is." She just nodded, glancing down at the floor nervously, then back up at him.
As hard as she tried, she only wished that she could forget that nightmare – or any of the others, for that matter.
He watched her intently, waiting for a cue from her before he proceeded.
Now that she thought she saw where this was going, she reluctantly began to deflate. If his point was what she thought it was, he was going to win this argument easily.
After looking into her eyes for several long seconds, he started talking. "I just thought," he said quietly, reaching for her left hand with his right, holding it loosely and causing her stomach to do flips, "that you might prefer not to sleep out in the open if you were going to have another nightmare. That you might prefer to have a door that you could close."
Nodding slowly as his words sunk in, she grudgingly admitted to herself that what he'd said made sense.
"It won't be enough, though," she said quietly. He swore she sounded sad, which was confirmed when she added, "I should've just stayed home, where there's no one to disturb in the middle of the night. I don't want to wake up Sarah and Sawyer…" And then, in a very small voice, she added "I was just going to make myself stay up."
The look on his face told her that he thought that that idea was crazy. "And then what?" he asked her. "Not sleep until we get back to New York?" He'd been kidding, of course, because it sounded so ridiculous, but judging from the look on her face, that had been pretty close to her plan.
"It's only a few days. And we don't have to get all the way back. I can sleep in the car going home…" She trailed off, knowing that he wasn't going to react well even though she'd already looked away from him.
"Jane," he said, at a loss for what to say, finally settling for one word. "No." He shook his head sadly, looking at her, but she refused to meet his eyes again. "Can I tell you the rest of what I was thinking, besides you taking the bed in that room?" he asked quietly when he had recovered the power of speech. After all, maybe it would make a difference.
You're thinking that you'll share it with me? What is probably a twin bed? she thought, assuming that that was what he was going to say. It seemed awfully presumptuous of him, and yet after the way they'd finally fallen asleep last night and the way they'd spent the afternoon in the sleeping bag, it almost didn't seem like a big deal. Almost. What was more, she was fairly sure that having him that close would work against her nightmares. Still, she dreaded hearing the words.
The only thing that was worse than how much she dreaded hearing him say that was how very much she wanted him to say it.
When she looked back up at him again with a sigh of resignation, he couldn't quite read the look on her face, but he took it as encouragement to continue. "I was thinking that I would take the sleeping bag and put it on the floor in there. That way, if you need me I'm right there."
Finding that she was both relieved and simultaneously disappointed by this plan, she just nodded. It made sense. She still didn't think she would sleep, but it seemed like a compromise that she could live with, at least logically.
"But what about Sarah…?" Jane started to ask. She didn't really want to come out and say What about what Sarah will think? That we're sleeping together, after everything? But she didn't need to fill in all of the words for him to understand.
"What about her?" he asked, looking directly in her eyes. "Does it matter what she thinks or doesn't think? We're all adults."
She had to admit that he had a point. Of course it didn't matter.
He wondered if she was legitimately worried or just looking for reasons why his plan was a bad idea. "Jane, if you don't like the idea, I'll sleep on the couch. But you are not sleeping on the couch."
He said it with such finality that she accepted it as fact. After all, she knew how stubborn he was when he wanted to be, and she didn't have the energy to argue with him. He had this annoying habit of caring far more about her well-being than she seemed to.
Shaking her head slowly, she said, "I don't want you to sleep on the couch." She didn't want him to sleep on the floor, either, but that wasn't something that she was ready to say out loud.
Smiling for the first time since he'd played Santa, he felt as though he'd just made a breakthrough. However she actually did feel – because from the look in her eyes, he guessed that there was more that she didn't want to say – he'd at least gotten her to admit that much.
"Good," he said simply. Then, deciding why not? he added, "I didn't want to either. I'd rather not be that far away from you." A half second passed before he added, "Just in case." She couldn't tell if he meant that he didn't want to be that far from her at all, or if he wanted to be sure he was nearby if she had a nightmare.
It could always be both, she thought.
What he'd just said about not wanting to be that far away from her, of course, was more or less what she had been thinking about him, and she looked at him with surprise obvious on her face.
Did he read my mind? she wondered.
Or maybe, he just feels the same way. You know, the way you don't want to admit that you feel, the voice in her head reasoned. She tried stubbornly to push the feeling away, whatever it was that had overwhelmed her for a moment. It was soothing and terrifying at the same time.
Watching her carefully, he just smiled encouragingly, then lifted her left hand slowly in his right, bringing it up to press the back of her hand against the scruff on his cheek, just holding it there for a minute, watching her.
She felt as if her heart was doing belly flops, which was a very strange sensation indeed.
As he lowered her hand from his cheek, she was surprised to feel disappointment at the loss of contact. You really shouldn't be surprised, the voice in her head piped up. You've been disappointed every time you lost contact with him in the last twenty-four hours, maybe more. When she thought about it, she was startled to realize that it was correct. She couldn't think of a single instance where she hadn't wished that he hadn't let go.
The next example of this came immediately, when he suddenly let go of her hand so that he could push himself off the floor to stand up. "Come on," he said, extending his right hand to pull her up as well. She took it in her right hand, clutching the blanket around her awkwardly with her left, and managed to stand up without letting it go. He held onto her hand for a few seconds, letting it go only reluctantly, unsure of whether or not she wanted him to. He tried to read her, but at that moment it was impossible.
Walking behind him slowly, she followed him toward the stairs. On the way, he picked up her duffle bag as well as his in the front hallway, the stopped at the bottom of the stairs and looked over his shoulder, waiting as she caught up.
"The grand tour will have to wait until tomorrow," he told her in a whisper. She just nodded silently, and he wondered why her eyes suddenly looked so hollow. "Are you okay?" he asked her with concern.
"Yeah," she replied quickly. Too quickly. She forced herself to smile, knowing full well that he wasn't going to believe it. So why bother? she asked herself. Honestly, she didn't know why she was trying, but for some reason it seemed important to at least put up the front. You're so stubborn, she thought to herself.
That was when exhaustion seemed to hit her, like a ton of bricks – all at once. He was suddenly halfway up the stairs in front of her when she looked up, and she had to force her legs to move by sheer willpower. He had stopped and looked over his shoulder at her, waiting for her to follow, and he didn't go any farther until she caught up. It took her a minute, but she did – very slowly.
When they reached the top of the stairs, she felt as though she'd climbed a mountain. Her body needed rest, she knew, but she was so anxious and hyper alert, she doubted that it would be possible. There were two doors to the left of the stairs, and two doors to the right, one on each side of the hall. He turned right, then pointed to the one at the end of the hall on the left, that was ajar, pushing it open slightly. "That's the bathroom," he told her, then turned toward the door on the right side of the hall. His hand was on the doorknob for several seconds before he finally turned it, as if he was psyching himself up to open it.
When he finally turned the doorknob, he did so very slowly. Watching him hesitate, she realized just how hard it must be for him to be there, and that that was exactly what he was doing – trying to prepare himself. After all, how many years had it been since he'd been here? What kinds of memories awaited him there? While she had been stuck in her own head about their sleeping arrangements, he was dealing with something far more traumatic, as far as she was concerned.
He pushed the door all the way open and stepped inside, looking around the room slowly. Against the far wall, there was a twin bed, one that looked like it was probably older than Kurt himself. As she stepped in slowly behind him and her eyes moved around the room, she also saw a wooden dresser that matched the bedframe, an old wooden desk and chair and a matching bookshelf. A closet door took up the far corner of the room, the only wall space in the small, crowded room without furniture, with the exception of the large window. She watched his eyes go to that window, and she had a guess about what it overlooked when the sky wasn't pitch dark. Her chest ached just thinking about what he must be feeling.
While there were small knickknacks, the layer of dust that had been on everything the last time he'd ventured inside this room – how many years ago had that been? – was conspicuously absent.
Sarah must have had something to do with that, he thought.
Though the room was small, she'd found just enough space to step up beside him. She was standing there silently, alternating between looking around at the room, basically a step back in time into Kurt's past, and at Kurt himself. It was unclear what he was thinking, but the pained look on his face made her wonder if it was a good idea for him to sleep in that room, after all.
Suddenly, she felt like she was the one who should be reaching out to him.
"Kurt, if you decide you'd rather sleep on the couch in the living room, that's fine," she said hesitantly. She didn't want him to, of course, but he was looking more and more uncomfortable. When he looked at her in confusion, she sighed and added sympathetically, "You don't exactly look like you're comfortable in here."
His face changed then, as he made a conscious effort to pull himself out of his thoughts. He set both of their duffle bags down on the floor by the bookshelf, noticing that the books on it were the same ones that had been there when he'd occupied the room. Pulling his eyes away from the books and back toward Jane, he took two steps and found himself across the small room, sitting down on the edge of the bed and looking around again.
Jane watched him carefully, trying to figure out what to do. She had no way to relate to what he was going through, after all – she couldn't even remember most of her past…
But you certainly are haunted by yours, the voice in her head pointed out. That much you understand better than anyone. Still, she didn't move yet, simply watched him as he looked around. Suddenly, he didn't even seem to see her.
In his head, he was ten years old again. He felt the walls closing in around him, as he had in the days after Taylor had disappeared. He felt a surge of anger, but mostly he felt a deep sense of loss. He remembered this feeling… like the bottom had dropped out of his stomach and he was falling, while simultaneously being crushed by the pressure in his head. The psychologist he'd been sent to briefly had tried to explain to him back then that it was all in his head, but it wasn't just his head. He felt the all-too-familiar feeling in his entire body, like a familiar nightmare from which he'd thought that he had long since woken up, only to discover, to his dismay, that he was right back where he'd started when he was ten years old. Suddenly feeling dizzy, he had to put his hands out on the bed to steady himself, breathing deeply.
It's not real, he told himself, but the conscious knowledge of this didn't seem to help.
Jane stood frozen in the center of the room, watching Kurt tense, a look of excruciating pain on his face. She didn't know what to do. And yet, without thinking about it, she moved towards him ever so slowly.
He wasn't sure how long he sat there, that way, but the next thing he knew, he was in the mindset of his fifteen year-old self. He looked around the room once again with the eyes of himself as a teenager, back at home on one of his very occasional visits. Usually, he just snuck back there and tried to coax Sarah to come outside to talk to him, to be sure that she was okay, or even just watched her through the window. But once in a while – mostly holidays, when all of the students were sent home – he was "officially" there. He couldn't win, after all – he'd hated military school, but he'd hated his father, arguably even more. He didn't want to be in either place, and yet, there was nowhere else to be. The frustration and anger in him had run so deep back them, it had invaded every part of him, and now he felt in once again.
Again, he didn't know how much time had elapsed since he'd descended into this particular memory. It isn't real, he told himself, just like he had before… but it didn't seem to be working any better than it had been before, to his dismay. It felt real, and it reminded him of why he hadn't come back to this place in about two decades. There was nothing here for him… nothing good, anyway. There was only… this.
Then, just as the pressure in his head – and in his whole body, really – was intensifying beyond what he was sure that he could take, something caught his attention. He didn't even know what it had been at first, he only knew that for a second, something dulled the pain of his past that had invaded his entire body. What was it?
A sound? A sensation? He couldn't even tell at first. His senses went on high alert, trying to figure it out, and the past – both his ten year old self and his fifteen year old one – began to fade ever so slowly as he struggled to regain consciousness in the present. Whatever it was that was distracting him, all he knew was that he far preferred it to what he had been feeling. For the present time, that was all he needed to know.
Kurt had been sitting on the edge of the bed, his hands out on either side of him, staring into space with a look on his face that was so heartbreaking, she knew that she had to do something. Of course, that brought up the question of what, and Jane was at a loss. Her experience included precious little for her to draw from, after all. As she stood there helplessly, she watched as the look on pain and confusion on his face changed to one that more closely resembled anger, at which time she became almost afraid to get closer to him. She'd never seen him look so furious before.
He's still Kurt, she reminded herself. Whatever feelings are overwhelming him, they're left over from his childhood. Chances are, he'd give anything to pull himself out of wherever he is just now, he just can't do it alone. Of all people, you should be able to understand that.
With renewed determination, despite a slight fear that he wouldn't recognize her in his current state and would react to her attempts to help as an attack (I probably would in his place, after all, she had thought), she moved toward him at a glacial pace. Standing beside him, looking at him for several seconds while she tried to figure out how best to begin, she asked herself what he would have done in her place. After all, they were so similar, chances were that that could work.
"Kurt," she said in her calmest voice. "It's Jane… Come back." She couldn't be sure if he had heard her, of course, but his breathing seemed to change ever so slightly. He seemed to take a deeper, steadier breath, though of course she could have been mistaken…
The next thing she did was to rest her hand on his shoulder, very slowly and tentatively. Again, there was no dramatic reaction on his part, but more of a slight shift in his posture and his breathing. Unsure of whether she was making progress so far, but encouraged by the fact that he hadn't reacted negatively, at least, she perched herself on the edge of the bed beside him, just past where his hands gripped the sides of the bed tightly. She kept her hand on his shoulder, squeezing it ever so slightly, becoming increasingly worried that what she was doing wasn't helping after all.
The problem was, she couldn't think of anything else to do. And so she sat there with her hand on his shoulder, occasionally murmuring his name soothingly, feeling increasingly helpless.
Whatever it was that he was hearing, the sound was distorted, as if he'd been underwater. At the same time, he felt a sense of calm come over him, as the frustration and anger slowly dissipated. Then he heard the sound again, and this time it sounded less distorted. It was a voice.
He focused again, listening hard, determined to identify it if he heard it again. It took a few minutes, but the voice did indeed come again. He knew that voice.
Jane.
He opened his eyes, which he hadn't even realized were closed, and his vision faded back in slowly. The room around him was familiar, unfortunately, and he felt his heart clench all over again.
No,not again.
Then suddenly, he heard the same voice again – the one that had pulled him out of his thoughts. It was closer this time.
"Hey." It was Jane, of course, there beside him.
He turned in surprise, only just then fully realizing where he was, and found himself looking into her eyes. Relief flooded his system all at once, and suddenly he could breathe normally again. Her hand left his shoulder, and settled instead on top of his left hand, which was still clutching the edge of the bed in between them.
When he smiled at her, albeit sadly, she let out a sigh. He wasn't the only one who was relieved that he had opened his eyes.
"Thanks," he said simply. No other explanation was necessary.
"Welcome back," she replied. "You okay?"
After looking into her eyes for a few seconds, he said slowly, "I am now." Worry faded from her face then, and she smiled. How could she not? After all, the rest of it didn't really matter, as long as they had each other.