Hope you liked the flashback chapter, more of that coming.
And here is a bit of a posting schedule to keep in mind: chapter today and tomorrow, then Friday and Saturday. Probably back on December 26.
He's not one for the long haul
Helen's words had been stuck in her head for hours, hiding under the guilt she felt for having failed to see what Cal had in Martin, and for all that had happened to him afterwards.
In that moment Gillian had thought it was an odd statement, completely unwarranted and unmotivated, an implication she had shut down quickly. But hours later, she wondered what had made her so eager to point that out, especially considering that it wasn't the first time that someone had assumed something other than friendship was going on between them.
She had tried to make up for it, for not seeing what he saw was no excuse not to be supportive and help him. Gillian had learned throughout the years that when Cal went off that kind of tangent the best thing to do was to stay close, not necessarily enable him no matter what but being around, keep an eye on him and show him that he wasn't alone. He could be far more deranged and a danger to himself if he felt he was on a lonely quest, feeling like he had to do things on his own because nobody believed him anyway.
So she had helped, small things like the fliers or being there as he questioned Martin's mother, but helped nonetheless. She had not been a fan of his plan to get himself caught, but after all she had put herself in quite the predicament: how could she claim she didn't see the threat Martin posed and then tell him that he shouldn't take that risk? And why had she waited in her office, torn apart by fear and tension, until Reynolds' call announcing that Cal was ok and they had Martin in custody?
Just keep your distance, or you could find yourself a very lonely woman
Was that what Helen meant? Lonely as in sitting alone in her office, waiting passively to find out if Cal would check in with her at the end of his unfortunate adventure? Lonely as in wondering why he did that sort of thing so frequently? As in wondering how did she fit in the live of a man who could willingly submit himself to torture? Lonely as in being mad at him and yet still dying to see him?
She still didn't know the answer to that when he walked into her office, properly dressed, cleaned and tidy…with every cell of his body betraying how he felt inside, an internal turmoil of residue adrenaline, fear, pain that was still boiling over a dead fire. Cal started off by announcing that they had found four more bodies in Martin's very own playground, a matter of fact statement that didn't mean to make her feel guilty or show resentment but still tugged at her that way. Gillian felt the need to rush, again, into explanation and apology, standing up and walking around the desk to get closer.
"I could have saved you some grief," she said, finding the pain of her own words not matching the casual way he dismissed them with a quick 'that's okay'.
He followed that with a joking quip about her wages and Gillian found herself smiling a bit but with clenched lips; that really was no laughing matter after all. That small note of regret wasn't what Cal saw; it was something else, something maybe only he could see, that made him jump to a new train of thoughts.
"Well, you thought I was obsessed on Helen, right?" He looked away briefly, as if he didn't want to see on her face what the answer was. "It's not beyond the realm of possibility."
"You loved her, didn't you?"
She asked then, surprising herself, wondering if the question was coming more from her previous conversation with Helen rather than her present interaction with Cal. Then again, he might have been the first one mentioning Helen but obviously he had done so because of something he had seen on her face, so that line of enquiry was on her. Which made it all the more strange and difficult to understand when Cal decided to look straight at her, not around or down or nowhere as he had done until that moment, when he simply said they've had their moments.
Then he went back to joking and deflecting, his way of indicating that he didn't want to talk about it anymore. Gillian was more than happy to oblige, she was feeling way too confused and uncertain of her words as it was, but then he went and asked something she wasn't ready for.
"Fancy a quick bite?" Cal asked, looking straight at aher again with an expression that was silently pleading for her to say yes.
And with that she was lost. Gillian opened her mouth but took way too long to respond, shaking her head slightly and averting her eyes even before the negative answer came out.
"Ah, thanks but I got work so…"
So she walked away, not even bothering finishing the sentence or clarifying what kind of work as she ran away from him, retreating behind her desk.
"Okay," he replied, trying to hide his clear disappointment. "Another time then."
"Yeah, another time."
Everything she knew about lying, all the knowledge she possessed that could have helped her in that moment, disappeared from her mind in a short circuit of epic proportions. Her body was stiff, rigid, clearly uncomfortable with her words, her head bobbing slightly in a shy agreement while her overall physical language screamed 'leave me alone!', her lips closed and quivering with tension, her eyes on him but fixed as she tried to force eye contact knowing full well what that meant to him.
The 'I'm glad you're ok' she managed to let out in garbage time was of little to no help. Cal looked at her, studied her with a small frown and his mouth slightly open, easily catching on something being off and maybe, just maybe, too tired and still on the edge to be willing to find out what it was. Whether he liked it or now that was his cue, and before Gillian could scramble for something else to say and save the situation he put her out her misery, mumbling goodnight and leaving the room. He just walked away, a slow and thoughtful strut so unusual for someone used to storm in and out of rooms like he owned them all, his shoulders down and hands in his pockets, not turning around.
Gillian watched him go, unable to understand how that exit made her feel For a couple of seconds she tried to convince herself that it was nothing, that she had done nothing wrong, but she had seen the tension in him, the residue fear, the need, the openness…and she had decided to ignore it all.
She stood there behind her desk, her still tense body eventually letting go with a sigh and jerk of her head as she realised what she had done. Suddenly starting to wonder if that sense of dread and emptiness going through her was the loneliness Helen had talked about.
Days, weeks later, they would think about that moment, about the ill-fated case of Tracy and Stuart, and wonder if it hadn't been it, the beginning of the end. The first sign, the first crack, appearing so subtly to almost go undetected. After all, it happened slowly, so slowly that in the neverending whirlwind of their lives and work it was easy to lose sight of it.
Cal's deeply emotional reaction to what happened with Tracy and Stuart was yet another thing that tested them, not the last obstacle they overcame together and learned from. But it was the first that made them ask themselves a very uncomfortable question: was that all that their relationship was about? Going through the motions, mostly bad motions, and dealing with it?
They've been through a lot in the months they've been together. Granted, they've been through a lot since they've met each other years ago but of course it was different, as a couple. They had been learning so much, much more about each other, addressing so many of the things that in the past had created friction between them as friends and business partners.
Some of those things they had talked about in the beginning, during those two weeks they couldn't agree if they were part of their relationship or not; they had recognised and foresaw the issues, identified the possible areas of conflict and mutually decided they would be mindful of them. Some were still untouched, undiscovered still, possibly hiding somewhere and waiting for the right - or wrong - moment to jump out at them like predators.
But mostly they had gone through them coming out better, stronger, only.…could it be that they had done it all?
It might have seemed a silly concern, a convoluted way to look at things and perhaps an intentional sabotage of something too good to be true. But then again, when the normally steady flux of things happening to and around them stopped, that's when they started to pull apart.
Cal recovered from his turmoil and was able to see how it affected Gillian, and she was glad to know that he understood that they could - and should - share failures as much as successes. It was a big step, for both of them, one that after a while seemed to be taking them nowhere, again prompting the uneasy question. It became another thing they learned about the other, and yet a lesson they couldn't place the value of.
Had things gone so well because there had been too much to deal with? Cal's penchant for getting himself in trouble; coming clear about their relationship with Emily and Zoe and their staff; Gillian going behind his back with the Colombia mission; Cal's ability - or lack thereof - to share his emotional baggage; the other million small and big challenges they've overcome: they've done it all, sometimes more than once.
And once making it past that, what was left?
The first thing they stumbled on was boredom, the dangerous, ugly, b-side of routine. Not of each other, but at times of themselves together. Many things stemmed from that, one being lack of communication: they had been talking openly so much in the first months, that sometimes it felt like talking was unnecessary, superfluous even, not adding anything to their relationship as it used to. Worse still, they both didn't fail to notice how most of their conversations outside work were still mostly about business.
But neither said anything, not only to each other but to themselves. Maybe they were reading too much into it,reading in that way they had promised not to do to each other; maybe they were committing the everpresent mistake of doubting something too good to be true and felt silly about it.
Maybe they were just too afraid to see it.
Remember: new chapter tomorrow, then Friday and Saturday. Probably back on December 26.