Skyfall

Chapter Forty-Six

"And that is the whole place." Rebecca said as she made her way back to the entryway, which was the starting point of the tour. She then turned the camera on the phone back around so she could see Harvey. "What do you think?"

"It's ok." He shrugged.

She sighed. The whole point of Facetiming him was so he could see this place before she made a bid on it. Since he was still in Boston with the kids she was trying to include him on the house search.

She purposely searched for a townhome that was similar in style to his penthouse so he wouldn't feel too out of place. She knew that he loved the look of the modern style and had worked hard to find the perfect place. This was the closest to perfect she could find and she was excited about it.

The basement had the laundry room and a wine cellar. The street-level floor had the entry way leading into a hallway that could take you to the living room, the backyard or the garage. She actually managed to find a townhome that had a one car garage attached to the house. That was a rare find but she thought he would appreciate that since he loved cars so much. The second floor had the kitchen, dining room and a bedroom. She thought that bedroom could be Lily's work studio because it had wonderful light for her painting. The third floor had the master suite. The fourth floor had four bedrooms. And then the roof had a small garden and railed off area that they could put patio furniture on. The place even came with an elevator.

She loved the roof area and imagined going up there on warm summer nights with him to stare at the stars of make out. Or both.

She really thought that she had picked out a good house that they could fill to become a good home. But her excitement was dwindling over his lackluster attitude about it. It had been two days since she left him behind in Boston and she was getting even more worried about him than before. It felt like he was shutting her out even more and she still couldn't get him to talk to her. When she left she felt like they were in a good place. He was happy about the baby and they were talking about things—just not the things that were bothering him because he was still being quiet about that. But she thought things would be alright.

Now most of their conversations ended up in small arguments. A part of her hoped that if she could just get them a bigger place to live, he could come back, then things could fall into a new normal routine and everything would be alright again. But there was another part of her that felt like he was still hiding something from her and she didn't know how to approach him about it.

"It's just ok?" She prodded. "You don't have any other words for it?"

"I don't know. It's a place to live." He sighed. "It looks fine and seems to be big enough for what we need."

"Why don't you just say what you are thinking?" She sighed. "You couldn't care less about this. Were you even paying attention when I walked you through it?"

She knew it was kind of passive aggressive to bait him like that but she was getting tired of making all of the decisions by herself with very little input from him.

"Of course I was paying attention. But to me it's just another place to live. What do you want from me, Rebecca?" He sighed again, shaking his head.

"Apparently something you can't give me right now." She scoffed. "I'm really excited about this place and I thought you would like it. I worked really hard on this and all you can manage to say is 'it's ok.'"

He rolled his eyes. "The only things that matter to me is if we can afford it and if we can move in quickly."

"Fine." She rolled her eyes back at him. "We can afford it and right now the house is vacant so we could move in as soon as we clear escrow. And although you didn't ask, I love this place. It's not too far from the office or where we live right now. The schools around here are also excellent. So I'm going to buy it."

"Good."

"Yeah." She said. "Good."

"Fine."

She wasn't sure what to say anymore so she just stayed quiet for a moment, staring at his face on the phone. The last thing she wanted to do was fight with him again, but somehow almost every conversation had ended in one of these spats.

"Is there anything else? Because I have to go."

"No." She shook her head. Although there was a lot of stuff she wanted to say to him, she stayed quiet. "You can go now."

"We'll talk later." He told her before ending the call.

She put the phone in her back jeans pocket and sighed. That was another thing that had changed in the past couple of days…the whole saying I love you before they ended a call.

She thought that after she told him about the baby and they talked it out things would get better. Apparently she thought wrong though because ever since she left Boston, things rapidly deteriorated. Whatever was bothering him was having ripple effects throughout his attitude about everything.

He kept pulling farther and farther away from her and she wasn't sure how to stop it.

"Hi." She greeted as Lori came down the staircase.

"Hey, did you finish showing your husband the place?" Lori asked.

"Yes, and we want this place. I'm ready to make a bid right now."

"Wonderful!" Lori smiled. "Let's go into the kitchen and get the paperwork started."

Harvey threw his phone off to the side of the couch and sighed. He felt bad about his reaction to the place Rebecca showed him. But if he was honest, he didn't really care where they lived at this point. He trusted her to pick a good place and knew she was on top of things. From the looks of it, she did a good job choosing, though he realized he probably should have told her that on the phone.

He was just distracted. The kids went back to school yesterday and since then he had been going over to Marcus' house and packing it up while they were at school. He was trying to get the house ready to be sold and also trying to get the rest of the kids' stuff packed up so it would make the move to New York City easier. But it was not fun at all. In fact, it was slightly creepy to be going through the things of two people that were dead.

Everywhere he looked around that house he saw things that belonged to Marcus and Katie. He saw pictures that showed when the two of them were happier and he could imagine the two of them going around the house doing mundane things like laundry or dishes. He remembered the times that they all spent together in this house when he and Rebecca would come and visit. He remembered seeing Katie and Rebecca talking and giggling. He remembered watching sports with Marcus and giving each other a hard time about who was losing. But that wouldn't happen anymore now that they were both dead.

This house would soon belong to another family and they would be making their own memories here.

If he wanted to be completely honest with himself, he never fully dealt with Katie's death. He simply pushed it down and compartmentalized it until he found a way to go on. Now with Marcus also being dead, and the manner of his death, he found himself drowning in a sea of grief, guilt and sadness. While he wanted to reach out to Rebecca, pull her close to him and hold on for dear life, he couldn't bring himself to do it.

She was also grieving and she had too much on her plate right now. She was spearheading the kids' move, handling everything at work, trying to make sure that his mom was doing well after her treatments, and now with the pregnancy…he didn't want to put any more stress on her.

Plus he was starting to feel like he didn't deserve her. She had her faults, like everyone does, but he knew how lucky he was to have her in her life. She didn't deserve the way he was shutting her out of his life. But he wasn't sure how to let her in.

He was able to sleep now, though it was a double-edged sword because he was having nightmares. Marcus visited him at least twice every night and every dream ended with Marcus killing himself in front of him. It was exhausting but he pushed on.

And ever since the dream where dream Marcus mentioned Specter men being doomed to end up alone, he started to wonder if there was any truth to that.

He felt bad about not being more excited about the house she found for them. But nothing really made him happy right now.

Rebecca pulled the phone from her back pocket a few hours later and smiled as she accepted the Facetime. "Hey Ethan."

"Aunt Becca, I got your email. Are we really moving in there?" He asked.

"Yeah." She nodded. "I just put in a bid for the place. We could be moving in within a week if everything moves as quickly as the real estate agent thinks. Why? Did you hate it?"

"No." He shook his head. "I don't hate it. I think it looks cool. It's just big."

"It just seems big because there are so many floors, but that is how they make townhomes in New York City. Everything is built up instead of out."

"It has an elevator." He laughed.

"I know." She smirked. "Pretty cool, right?"

"Yeah, it's pretty awesome." The smile on his face turned into a frown.

"You're going to miss Boston though, right?"

"Yeah." He nodded.

"I know and I'm sorry." She apologized. "If there was any way Harvey and I could move down there we would, but…"

"I understand." He interrupted. "I'm just going to miss this place and my friends."

"I know." She nodded again. "I think you are going to like the school I'm signing you up for though. And I'm really excited to show you the libraries up here. I think you'll like them."

"That would be cool." He smiled. "I'd like that."

"So how are you doing?"

"Ok I guess." He shrugged. "My teachers are being really weird around me—giving me smiles and telling me that my homework can be late if I need it to be. I don't want the special treatment though."

"They are just worried about you though and they want to try and make things easier for you." She explained.

"I know, but it's annoying in some ways." He shrugged. "They don't really know what I'm going through. I wanted to go to school to escape everything for a few hours, but when they mention it all the time it defeats the purpose."

"I can understand where you are coming from." She told him. "How is Olivia?"

"She's good. I don't think she fully understands what is happening."

"Can you show her the pictures of the house later? I'd like to get her opinion too."

"Sure." He nodded.

"How is Uncle Harvey?" She hated having to use Ethan as a spy on her husband. But she hoped that maybe Ethan could give her a little more insight into Harvey's behavior.

"He's very quiet." He pointed out. "I don't think he is very happy. He said he has been spending a lot of time at our old house, packing things up. I think that is making his mood worse."

"Yeah." She nodded. "I bet it is making things worse."

"Are you coming up this weekend?"

To be honest, she wasn't planning on it since she was there two days ago. It was Friday evening and by this time she was usually already in Boston or on her way. She looked at Ethan's face, seeing the hope. Harvey hadn't asked her to come up this weekend and she wondered if he even cared. Seeing that Ethan wanted her to visit, she gave him a small smile. She didn't feel like she could say no to him at this point without feeling guilty.

"I will be leaving first thing in the morning so I'll be there tomorrow sometime before noon." She was exhausted and didn't really want to go back to Boston so soon. But something told her that she needed to go up there. Maybe she could get Harvey to talk to her, though she doubted it.

"Really?" Ethan's face broke out into a smile.

"Really." She couldn't help but smile back.

"That's great news!"

Seeing his reaction was worth it. "I don't think Uncle Harvey knows I'm coming up though. Let's keep it between us so I can surprise him."

"Deal." He nodded.

"Ok. I need to get some work done tonight so I kind of need to get off the phone." She also now had to make a last minute flight reservation for Boston. The good news was that she had racked up a lot of frequent flier miles. At some point, she and Harvey could go on a trip for free…if they made it through this.

She hated thinking that way. But things between them were strained at best and she wasn't sure how to fix things.

"Ok." He nodded. "Goodnight Aunt Becca."

"Goodnight Ethan." She pushed the end button and sighed. Looking over, she saw Lily enter the living room. "I thought you were going to bed early tonight."

"I tried, but I couldn't sleep." Lily shook her head.

"Do you want to talk about it?" She asked.

"No, it's ok."

"So it looks like I'm going back up to Boston tomorrow morning."

"Why?" Lily asked. "Is something wrong?"

"No." She assured her. "I just got off the phone with Ethan. He asked if I was coming up for the weekend and I found it impossible to say no to him."

Lily laughed. "Just be careful not to let him know that he has you wrapped around his finger or he will exploit it."

"I'll do my best." She laughed.

"Are you sure you aren't overdoing things?" Lily asked. "You've been putting in long hours at work the last two days, as well as checking out half a dozen different places to live. Now you're flying off to Boston?"

"I'll be fine." She nodded. "Really."

"Ok."

She could tell that Lily wasn't convinced and she appreciated that she was concerned. Last night she had told her about her first pregnancy and how it ended in miscarriage. It felt good to tell Lily about it because she was incredibly supportive. Having this time with her had been great, though she felt guilty for having so much time with her while Harvey didn't get the same chance. But he would be back full-time soon and then he would have the same opportunity.

"I should make my reservation for tomorrow morning." She opened the app on her phone and started to type. By this point, she was able to book a flight on the app in less than a minute. God knows she had been doing it enough lately.