Two months later.
The Christmas lights lining the Drew house twinkled lazily and flickered as the thick snowflakes falling from the sky tried with all their might to extinguish their glow, to no avail. The lights were warm enough to withstand the assault for another couple of hours before the snow made any real headway towards burying them.
Nancy pulled into the driveway and lingered for a moment, watching for any movement in the windows to get an indication of who had actually arrived on time to her family's annual Christmas party. The Hardys, Marvins, Gruens, Faynes, Nickersons, and Drews had been doing this party annually for years. Nancy counted 4 cars already in the driveway but couldn't tell whose was whose. She noted a certain Buick was definitely not there but, then again, she had no idea if Frank was cleared to drive or not.
She had been dreading this party for a month. Somehow, she had never really found her footing after Frank woke up. She threw herself into work, only returning home to sleep, and had canceled most plans for the last two months. Somehow Joe had turned into the person she saw most, both of them working tirelessly around the clock to coordinate what was shaping to be an international and multi-agency anti-human trafficking operation spanning 8 countries and potentially saving over 300 victims at last estimated count. The D-day for their coordinated rescue was approaching and Nancy's friends could not blame her for her absentee-ism. As Joe had been right with her almost every step of the way (though admittedly, he took a weekly day off and she always opened and closed the office) her friends didn't question her dedication and chalked it up to the magnitude of their endeavor. Even Ned had accepted Nancy's limited schedule and she texted him at least once a day. He occasionally brought her lunch but largely stayed out of her way as she was constantly in "Drew-mode" as Frank used to call it. Single minded in her pursuit of Briggitta Belmont's network, now dubbed the Dark Railway, Nancy had apparently not noticed she had not kissed Ned in over a month and each meeting was getting shorter and shorter.
Despite her focus, Nan messaged Frank reliably once a week with encouraging or uplifting quotes but the replies had been mechanical and overly polite. She sorely missed their normal repartee but she hardly felt like herself anymore and couldn't imagine how Frank must be feeling. Especially because any inquiry would result in a reply of "Fine, thanks, and you?". From the little Joe had shared, she understood that physio had been going well and they had put Frank in an intensive therapy program that had just ended the week prior. Frank had finally been able to go home. Not to his apartment in the city, yet, but to his former childhood bedroom where his parents could make sure his progress continued. It seemed like Frank would be fully discharged to his old life in January if he kept it all up.
She thought about him almost hourly. She missed his mind at work as they tried navigating the complex web they had stumbled on, and was getting worried at the level of detail her imagination had developed to bring him into the work. Although they were barely texting, unbeknownst to Frank, Nancy talked to him every day, asking him his thoughts on the case and trying to imagine what his perspective would be.
Joe had agreed with her that it would be best not to give Frank too much info about what they were doing as he was in a precarious place mentally. She burned to ask more questions but felt bound and helpless. She had no right to his life. He hadn't initiated any conversations with her since he woke up and clearly was unhappy with her. She did not know how to cope with this realization and ignored it, choosing to focus with all intensity she could muster on the mystery of the Dark Railway.
The guilt and confused feelings swirled within her, still sitting in her car, as she opened her text messaging app. She was flirting with the idea of telling her dad she was too busy at work and would sleep on her office couch to get out of this. One text and she could turn around and pretend she was never here.
A sharp tap on her window caused her to squeal in a way she was not sure she ever had before. Ned, standing next to her window, looked bemused as he waited for Nan to get ahold of herself and roll down the window.
"Well if it isn't my own sweet girlfriend, returned from the dead" Ned chuckled. "Are you texting me back to tell me you're coming to the party?" he asked, looking at her open texts, clearly showing 3 unanswered texts from him.
Nancy guiltily closed the app and gulped "Ned, sorry I meant to reply, I just got caught up.."
"-Nan I get it. You don't need to explain." Ned looked steadily at her, her face just as pale as it had been two months ago when Hardy had woken up. Ned looked at the bottle of wine in his hand, at the house, and back at Nancy, all of a sudden with a firm and resolved set to his jaw Nancy hadn't seen in a while. "Nancy, can we go for a walk before going in?"
Nancy felt a calm foreboding wash over her. She thought she knew what was coming.
"Sure, would you like to put the wine in my car?" Ned nodded gratefully and she rolled her window up, exited the car, placed the wine inside and shut the door. They started off north, neither reaching for the hand of the other as they both steeled themselves to have a conversation that had been building between them all winter.
"This isn't working anymore," Ned began, after they had walked a block in the muffling snow in silence. "I thought I would get you back after Frank woke up but, Nan, I don't see any way out of this. We're not making any forward progress, we don't have a direction. I have barely heard from you in months and, when I do, it's just apologies or canceling plans or ignoring me when I come see you. It feels like you are avoiding me and there's nothing I can say or do to fix it. I've tried giving you space, I've tried pursuing you, and at each turn I'm left confused." they had happened upon a park and Ned reached for Nancy's hand to pull her into a gazebo and they finally faced each other.
"Nancy," he continued, lip quivering slightly, "can you tell me i'm wrong? You know I have loved you for eight years. If you gave me one sliver of hope, you know I would be there working at this with you every day. It just feels like I'm in this relationship alone. One word, Nancy, and I'm yours forever"
Nancy contemplated the man standing before her in silence. Ned's tone and gaze were plaintive. The two pairs of blue eyes stared steadily at each other as each felt the weight of the next words. Eight years of memories, triumphs, defeats, love and devotion spent together. Nancy felt the power of her words to either build a future or crumble their hopes and dreams together into ruin.
She looked down. Her cheeks flushing. When she finally looked back at Ned, her sad eyes were swimming under unshed tears and Ned didn't have to be told what was coming as she pulled her hand out of his.
"I've changed, Ned," she whispered. "I loved you too, with my whole heart… I'm just not the same girl anymore. I don't know if I ever will be…" Nancy looked up at him, searching the depths of the familiar blue eyes, praying something would spark and she could take it all back but her search was fruitless. She couldn't lie to this man, and she had nothing left to give.
"I'm sorry. I can't promise you something I don't have and if there were any other answer to give you I would give it. Ned…." words failed Nancy as she saw the heartbreak etched over Ned's face. "I'm so sorry.." her whisper hung in the air between them.
Ned exhaled and sat down with his head in his hands. Nancy sat next to him, perched on the edge of the bench in the gazebo, staring at her hands clasped in her lap, back perfectly straight.
They sat like that for a minute or two before Ned shook out of his reverie.
"Nan…." he finally ventured "... can you just tell me one thing?"
"Of course"
"...Is it Hardy?"
Nan's head snapped to attention "what do you mean?"
"I mean are you in love with Frank?" Ned looked directly at her. Nan's eyes widened in surprise as she considered the question and her answer.
"Ned…" Nancy began, completely flustered "I'm not breaking up with you because I'm in love with Frank…. I don't think it's helpful to have him in this conversation. Whether or not we should be together has nothing to do with him"
"It has everything to do with him" Ned was starting to speak more forcefully, realizing Nancy hadn't said 'no' and his fears were hearing validation in her lack of direct answer.
"From the first time you met him he's been part of our relationship! Like a freaking ghost haunting us, keeping us from moving forward"
"What?!" Now Nancy was starting to get heated in a way she hadn't for months. "Ned! Years? This is ridiculous! You've known Frank for years and you knew we were friends? Where is this coming from?"
"Oh come off it Nancy, if you'd ever had a normal friendship with Frank, I would eat my words but there's nothing normal about…" Ned closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. "You know what? You're right. This isn't helpful. Long story short, we are over, Frank's alive, you're alive, we are all alive and life moves on. There's nothing else to talk about" With that, Ned stood up and started walking back in the direction of the Drew house.
Nancy paused a half second in shock and then started after him, catching up but maintaining more distance between the two of them than there had been on the way to the park.
About half a block of silence later, Ned let out another deep breath and grabbed Nancy's hand again, closing the distance between the two. They were shrouded in the shimmering shadows of the snow reflected in the lamplight as Ned brought them to a standstill.
"I'm sorry. That's not how I want things to be left between the two of us." He shook off his negativity and looked her in the eye. "Nancy Drew, I have been lucky to be with you for so long. I would have loved you forever, but I understand. Who we are now is not who we were then, and..", there was a slight catch in his voice, "I wish you the best in your future."
Nancy's eyes brimmed over with tears as she looked up at her main man who had stood by her so faithfully.
"Oh Ned, I wish it were anything but this but I am so grateful for everything we have shared." She sniffed and Ned reached out to stop the tear running down her left cheek.
They embraced for a time under the lamplights until Nancy involuntarily shivered and Ned remembered where they were.
"Let's go," he muttered and Nan held his arm as they slowly walked the remaining block to her father's house.
A pair of Buick headlights illuminated them for a moment as Frank's old beater finally arrived at the party and swung into the driveway.
Nan and Ned could hear the doors open and slam shut, Joe's distinct laughter echoing back to them through the leafless trees, answered by a low rumble that sounded distinctly like Frank.
Ned sighed. "I don't think I'm in a party mood tonight. I'm going to go home. Please give the bottle of Wine to Hannah, I had her for secret Santa, and tell my parents I've gone home." Nan nodded.
He walked her to the door of her car, kissed her briefly on the cheek, and then climbed into his car and drove off.
Nancy looked after his fading tail lights for a moment. She then pulled the bottle out of her car, grabbed the box holding the necklace she had bought for Bess, and looked at the front door, exhausted.
Slowly she made her way across the yard, stepping in the distinctively large snowy steps of Frank's boots, and she climbed the stairs. Pausing one last time, she steeled herself and entered her father's house.