Paige was standing in the cramped bathroom of her tiny studio apartment when her phone rang, she put down the brush she had been applying eyeshadow with and glanced over at her phone to see the Caller ID. Sammy, of course. Grinning she answered. "Go for Paige."
"Who talks like that?" Sammy's sonorous tenor voice echoed through her tiny bathroom.
"Me, I guess," Paige laughed. "I guess I'm feeling a little excited, with my reservation at MetroEpicure. It's only the hottest restaurant in Manhattan, and next to impossible to get a reservation for in this decade. I'm living the wild life."
Both Sammy and Paige laughed at the idea of Paige doing anything wild. "You are living on the edge, my friend. Going out on the town and past 7 pm no less."
"You know me so well," told him as she surveyed her makeup in the mirror.
"I should, I've been your next-door neighbor for the last year. But seriously, I am so glad you're coming to eat at MetroEpicure. It's my first night as head chef… well substitute head chef, since Leroy's on his honeymoon, but still, that counts. It's going to be such a confidence boost, knowing that I have a friendly face in the dining room."
"I wouldn't miss your big night for anything. But you have more important stuff to do than gab with me on the phone, get in that kitchen, and blow everyone's minds!"
"I love you, Paige, you're seriously the best neighbor I could have."
"I love you, too, Sammy! You are going to kill it tonight! We'll talk soon, now go!" Paige disconnected the call and finished her eye makeup.
She looked at herself in the mirror with a critical eye, noticing the slight crow's feet around her eyes that had deepened over the past few years. She fluffed her hair, deciding she looked as good as she was going to.
Her closet, such as it was, was a wardrobe from IKEA. She didn't even hesitate with her wardrobe choice for the evening. Paige pulled out a sparkling silver minidress and strappy midnight blue stilettos. Once dressed, she slipped diamond studs into her ears and wrapped the matching tennis bracelet on her wrist.
Both were gifts from a man she had hoped would be the one to sweep her off her feet, but he had ended up just being a cheater. I really can pick them, Paige thought. At least I got some nice jewelry out of this one. It's better than I've gotten from some of them.
But one of them did give me Ralph, so Paige guessed she couldn't complain about all of it.
Grabbing her clutch from the top shelf of the wardrobe, she shoved her phone, key, and credit card inside. Good thing she didn't need to carry anything else. Nothing else would fit.
Paige left her apartment and walked down to the street where she blended in with the Manhattan crowd as she walked half a block to the MetroEpicure restaurant with her reservation for one. Once arriving at the restaurant, she pulled the door open and slipped inside to be seated.
Walter despised coming to New York City.
The weather was bleak in the winter and oppressive in the summer. The sidewalks and streets teemed with humanity, and there was no efficient way to move through the city without touching anyone. But Richard Elia had a promising contract for Walter and Scorpion, and goodness only knew how much they needed the money.
Ever since that fateful night when Scorpion imploded, and Paige left for good, the team had been scrabbling for jobs. It was a minor miracle that he hadn't had to close Scorpion's doors for good years ago. The odds were never good for Scorpion to survive, but it seemed as if Walter had beaten the odds on every occasion, except for one…
Walter forced his mind not to go down that particular rabbit hole. He had gotten quite a bit of practice at that over the years. So when he stepped out of his hotel and onto the sidewalk, by the time he had seated himself in his waiting Uber, any thoughts of the one time he hadn't beaten the odds were long gone.
Fortunately for the driver, Uber had a setting in the app that informed the driver that the passenger was not interested in conversation. Once again, Walter felt vindicated in his belief in the superiority of technology over the arts. After a brief, and thankfully quiet ride, the Uber driver pulled up outside the restaurant where Walter was Meeting Elia for dinner.
"MetroEpicure, as requested." the driver informed him. "You are one lucky bastard, it's almost impossible to get a reservation here!"
Walter barely looked up at his driver as he exited the car, deciding to dock the driver's tip for the extraneous speech and shared opinion.
Navigating the crowded sidewalk, Walter ducked into the restaurant just as he received a message from Elia: Sorry, got stuck on a conference call with reps in China. We'll need to meet in the morning.
"Damn," Walter cursed softly as he bumped into a woman standing next to the hostesses podium.
"Excuse me!" an irritated voice sounded in his ear.
He looked up to see the woman he had bumped into at the moment that she moved her attention from the hostess to the rude man who had actually sworn at her when he was the one who had bumped into her!
"Paige!" "Walter?" the two spoke simultaneously.
"Ms. Dineen your table for…" the hostess noticed the way the two people standing in front of her looked at each other. "two?" Both of them looked at her blankly. "I saw that Sammy put you down tonight for a table for one, but I can seat both of you easily at the table. Sorry for the mix-up."
"Sure, why not?" "No!" they both spoke at the same time.
The hostess stood watching the two people in front of her who obviously knew each other. She could feel the tension running between the two of them, but there was something else, something almost hidden, that she couldn't quite name, but it made her hesitate, undecided about what to do next.
Paige had already agreed to be seated together and with the two women standing there, just watching him. What else could he do? Walter made a noise of irritation in the back of his throat. "Fine. I guess I need to eat dinner, it may as well be food I probably won't enjoy since I'm already here, than food I don't care for somewhere else." The hostess blinked and picked up two menus, unsure of what else to do. No one had ever talked about MetroEpicure in those terms before.
Paige wondered briefly if she had made a mistake consenting to sit and eat dinner with Walter. She had just been so surprised to see him after all these years. It was as if habit had taken over.
The hostess flagged down a passing server and whispered to make the table ready for a party of two. "Just a moment and it will be ready."
After only a few moments, the server signaled to her that the table was ready and the hostess showed the pair to the table.
Paige spoke as the trio walked toward their table. "Thank you, I'm sorry to be so much trouble on such a busy night."
"Aren't you Sammy's friend?" the hostess asked.
"Yes," Paige replied.
"Then it's no trouble at all, the entire wait staff just thinks the world of Sammy. We get such great tips when we serve food he had prepared. We are so excited that he is getting his chance to shine tonight as head chef." The server, who was waiting for them at the table, nodded his head in agreement before hurrying back to the kitchen.
The hostess hurried off to seat the next customer leaving the pair standing in awkward silence next to their table. Walter pulled out Paige's seat. "Thank you," she murmured as she sat and he pushed her chair in, then took his seat across from her.
"I hope you don't mind that I pushed for her to seat us together." Paige toyed with the napkin at her place setting, unwilling to meet his eyes.
"It's fine," Walter told her, "I was meeting with Richard for dinner to discuss a project he wanted Scorpion's help with, but he canceled just as I was walking into the restaurant."
"S-Scorpion?" Paige choked on the word and gratefully took a sip of water from the glass the server had just filled.
"Yes, Scorpion," Walter looked at Paige pointedly. "You know, me, Happy, Toby, Sly, Cabe, Scorpion."
Paige cleared her throat and looked to the side, leave it to Walter to get straight to the point. "When Centipede Partners folded, I wasn't sure what the others had done."
Walter made a noise of irritation. "Where else did you think they would go, Paige? When CP hit its first rough patch, you waved your availability in Richard Elia's face and high-tailed it out of California when he offered you a high-paying job in New York City, complete with your own office, assistant, and car service, or so I hear. Am I wrong?"
He took Paige's embarrassed silence as an agreement with his assessment of her actions.
"Within days of you shutting down your rival business, Toby, Happy, and Sly were all back at my door. And I welcomed them back with open arms. And together, with Cabe, we've made a real success of Scorpion, mostly." he admitted. "Even without a team liaison."
Paige wasn't surprised at the vitriol Walter was leveling at her. Even she knew that she deserved it for the hateful words she had spewed that night at the Garage. The night everything fell apart. "I had to think about what was good for me, what was good for Ralph." she defended herself.
"What was good for Ralph?" Walter sputtered. His face turned red with anger and he opened his mouth as if to speak, then, regaining control of his emotions, he closed it again.
"Poor choice of words." Walter knew some of the trouble that came with her move to New York City. That was back when Ralph was still in contact with him. But ever since the move East, Ralph had cut off all ties to his former life and made Paige's life a living hell as he chose her as the sole target of his sizeable anger.
Walter and Paige sat in uncomfortable silence for a few minutes, until the server came and offered them options for an appetizer.
Paige asked the server if there was a house special appetizer, he nodded. "Please bring an order of the special then. Thank you so much," The waiter disappeared into the kitchen to bring their order.
"I'm sorry," Walter apologized, "I didn't agree to this dinner with you to argue the past." His gaze swept her up and down, taking in every detail. "You look lovely. A special occasion?" Walter's eyebrow quirked up. Even he knew what a table for one meant. That combined with her silver dress and extremely high heels made no sense.
"It is, actually," Paige told him. "My friend and neighbor, Sammy, is making his debut as head chef tonight. I'm here to support him and cheer him on."
This restaurant alone, dressed in a dress that showed off her every asset finally made some kind of sense to him. Going all out for someone she cared about. That sounded more like the Paige he knew… used to know… something…
Paige gazed at Walter and he felt like she could read his mind, and he wanted to squirm with discomfort. "Thank you for agreeing to sit with me, have dinner with me. As much as I wanted to support Sammy I wasn't really looking forward to eating alone." she smiled shyly at him.
"No problem." Walter dismissed her gratitude with a wave of his hand. He shifted in his seat.
"What was the project Richard wanted to work with you on, maybe it's in my division."
Walter coughed on the water he had sipped. "I hope not." He stopped as he realized what he had just said. "Wait, that came out wrong."
Just at that moment, the server appeared to save Walter from further foot-in-mouth disease.
"Your appetizer and a bottle of the house wine." the waiter presented both with a flourish.
"Thank you." Walter wanted nothing more than to have the server disappear so he could speak to Paige. Unfortunately for Walter, that wasn't the way the evening was going to go. The server hesitated, "Aren't you Walter O'Brien, scheduled to dine with Mr. Elia?"
"Yes," Walter answered, "he canceled, I'm here with my fr-err, Paige instead."
"Yes, I received the message from my manager that Mr. Elia canceled but any companion of Mr. Elia is a VIP, so please let me know if there is anything, anything at all you need, Mr. O'Brien, Ms. Dineen." the server bowed and scraped, no doubt thinking of a large tip at the end of the night from Mr. Elia's companion.
"I don't think we need an entire bottle of wine," Walter informed the server. "Oh, it's on the house for Mr. Elia."
"If you're sure?" Walter asked and the server nodded. "Oh, all right, thank you."
"Would you like me to pour you and your lovely companion a glass?"
Walter looked at Paige and she subtly shook her head, "No-no thank you. We're fine."
As the server departed, Paige reached for an appetizer. "These look delicious."
Walter considered them with a critical eye. "I suppose they will be sufficient." he served himself one as well.
Paige shook her head with a smile at his remark, Walter O'Brien you never really change.
"How's Ralph?" "How's the team?" They asked at the same time.
"You go," Paige told him.
Walter demurred, "No, you first."
Paige nodded her assent. "Ralph is thriving in college life. He's finishing his bachelor's and master's simultaneously and plans to start his first Ph.D. in the spring."
"But what about between the two of you?" Walter asked her. "The last time I talked to him he was still very angry with you."
Paige felt the familiar tightness in her chest whenever the subject of her relationship with her son came up. "Yes, yes he was… he is… but I think... it's not as bad as it was." Paige wished she was anywhere but here in this moment, talking about anything but this. "I don't know what I'll do if he doesn't forgive me. He's turning 18 in a few months…" Paige trailed off. She could hardly believe she was giving Walter O'Brien, of all people, such a direct look into the mess her life had become. "I don't know what I'll do when legally he doesn't need me to be his guardian."
"I'm so sorry," Walter reached out a hand to touch Paige's where it played with her silverware, then stopped himself and placed his hand firmly in his lap.
Paige mentally shook herself and straightened her spine, no point in dwelling on things out of her control. She was here, now, with Walter. "What's new with Scorpion?"
"Scorpion is just as you'd expect. It's tricky keeping everyone together, Cabe and jobs from Homeland help, but he's retiring soon and I don't know that we'll get as lucky with a new Homeland liaison as we were with him." He rarely let him even think these thoughts, let alone voice his concerns about Scorpion, but Paige just always had that effect on him. Even after all these years, apparently. "I'm not optimistic about our chances, without Cabe…without… y-... Cabe."
Paige knew what Walter left unsaid, without you. They sat silently as Paige took a sip of her wine and both considered what the other had revealed.
Paige glanced around the restaurant for the first time since they had been seated and noticed a small dance floor along with a small instrumental combo playing. Paige hummed along with the music. Just then, the band started a new song.
Paige gasped and Walter stilled, blood draining out of his face as they both realized that the band was playing "Moonlight Magic", the song they had danced to at Lebeau's mansion trying to track down the Franz Bierman painting. What were the odds?
Paige smiled shyly at Walter, "I'd love to dance with you to this song, for old time's sake."
Walter hesitated, unsure if he wanted to get that close to Paige.
"Please?"
He never could resist her. "Yes," he told her as he stood and formally held his hand out to her as she pushed her chair back. She put her hand in his and they walked to the dance floor.
He took her in his arms and she rested her cheek against his shoulder, feeling the sway of the music and the way his hand felt at the small of her back. It felt just like home.
Walter barely moved on the dance floor, what little motion he had was stiff and uncomfortable. "I still don't know how to do this," he whispered to her.
"You're doing just fine." Paige looked up at him, and their eyes met. The feeling of joy at being able to look into his deep brown eyes rushed over her. Paige bit her lower lip and closed her eyes.
With her eyes closed and not watching his every move, Walter felt free for the first time that evening to allow his gaze free rein to take in her features. She is a little older, but still the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
Paige sighed softly in his arms and opened her eyes. Walter lowered his lips and captured hers for just a moment before breaking away. He distanced himself from her and as he did, she made a small sound of disappointment.
Walter felt confused.
Was she trying to trap him?
She was the one who had been done with him.
What game was she playing?
Walter felt his temper rise.
Then Paige looked up at him again with that softness, that vulnerability, that desire, and it all felt so familiar. He pulled her closer again and they danced, slowly. He felt himself begin to relax as Paige moved sensuously in his arms.
He gazed into her eyes once again searching for clues, and saw no duplicity, just pain mixed with happiness. Her body felt amazing in his arms. He allowed himself not to think for a moment, to just feel, the intensity of her gaze stirring feelings in him that he had long ago abandoned. He bent down and kissed her again, capturing her lower lip as the kiss deepened. When he searched for her tongue he found it a willing partner as well.
The song ended and the couples on the dance floor around them began applauding for the band. The sound pulled Walter and Paige back from their own private world they had shared during the dance. They stepped apart a bit awkwardly and clapped as well.
"That was lovely, Walter, thank you for indulging my stroll down memory lane." Paige smiled shyly up at Walter.
Walter was unsure of the correct response to her comment after their dance, after those kisses. He wasn't sure what he felt… how he felt. So he turned to the mundane. "Shall we return to the table and order?"
Paige had hoped Walter say something more, but she wasn't surprised at the turn the conversation had taken. "Yes, let's order."
As Paige and Walter took their seats, the waiter hurried over to his VIP customers.
"Have you decided on your main courses?" the server inquired.
"I'll have the house special," Paige decided.
Walter considered the menu for a few moments, he hadn't planned to eat anything when he had agreed to this meeting with Richard. But now that he was here with Paige and she was supporting her friend, the chef, he felt it would be in poor taste not to order something. "I'll have the special as well." Walter closed his menu and handed it to the server.
"Very good," the server told them as he disappeared to put their order into the kitchen.
Paige convinced Walter to at least let her pour him a glass of wine. Throughout dinner, Walter drank a few sips and Paige had a glass or two as well. They finally relaxed and fell into the easy pattern that two old friends find when reconnecting after a long separation.
Paige caught Walter up on life as a single woman pushing middle age in New York City, told him how much she enjoyed the city, her new friends, working for Richard. "It's not Scorpion, nothing ever could be, but it's a good life. A really good life. I wish I had an answer on how to repair my relationship with Ralph but at a certain point, I learned I had to let go of wanting to control that and realize that he's going to do what he's going to do and I have to find a way to be okay with that."
"You are a good mom, you've always been," Walter reassured her. "I know you tried your best."
And they both knew he wasn't just talking about her relationship with Ralph.
"What about you?" Paige asked.
"You know Toby, Happy and Sly. They need me and I need to be needed by them. Helping people is what Scorpion is all about and we have helped people, thousands, millions, maybe billions." Walter paused. "But what's most important to me is the three of them, helping them reach their potential, live lives that matter not just skating by on luck and being a step ahead of the law. Toby and Happy never conceived a child and the adoption process just took so much out of them after all the failed fertility treatments. Unfortunately the Doc went back to his gambling habits and Happy couldn't stand for that. They divorced a couple of years ago. They're not together, but they're not not together. That's what they tell me, and I'm not quite sure I understand exactly what it means."
"Oh, Walter-" Paige started to explain, but then she stopped herself. That's not my job, not anymore. Instead, she says, "That's disappointing, I was really rooting for them." Paige asked the question she had been dying to find the answer to for years, "And, F-Flo… Florence, what about her?"
"She realized that she loved a quiet life in the lab more than out being a reluctant action hero putting her life on the line on a regular basis, and when her lease was up she got a new lab in University Park, far away from Scorpion. Sometimes I think about her and miss her…" Walter saw Paige's jaw clench at his words and he hurried through his next words to help her understand, "Not-not like that, just as a brilliant mind that maybe I could have helped."
Walter sighed, "There's my god complex raising its head again as Toby would say."
He smiled again as he moved off the topic of Florence, "It's a good life, I've made a good life for myself, for them. I hope to continue to give them a good life but I'm concerned that our chances aren't great when Cabe retires. He deserves to be able to retire from a lifetime of service to his country without worrying about four geniuses." Walter frowned as he contemplated Scorpion's chances of survival without Cabe.
Before Paige had a chance to reply to anything Walter had just said, one of the band members approached the microphone stand on the size of the musicians' area. "The band is going to take a short break, but never fear, we won't leave you without entertainment! While we're gone, enjoy the musical stylings of Caleb and Sophia!"
A man and a woman stepped onto the stage as the band members filed off.
The man sat down at the piano and the woman stepped up to the mic, "As you just heard, I'm Sophia, and this is Caleb, my musical partner on piano." The audience clapped and Walter and Paige joined in. Paige was excited to hear what they would play. Once the sound of applause died down, Sophia continued her introduction, "We'd like to take things up a notch and really get the dance floor humming. Let's start with a classic, guaranteed to get you out of your seats and shaking your booty." Someone in the crowd hooted in appreciation. "Hit it, Caleb!"
Paige and Walter heard Caleb play the opening notes of "Don't Go Breaking My Heart". He listened for a few moments while she watched him, uncertain what he would do, what she should do.
"Don't go breaking my heart." Caleb sang. "I couldn't if I tried." Sophia joined in.
It felt as if he were moving in slow motion, Walter did the only thing he could think of, get out of there. He stood and tossed what Paige considered a surprisingly large stack of bills on the table, "I can't do this." He walked toward the door, breezing past the hostess.
"Mr. O'Brien is everything all right?"
Walter startled at her words, he hadn't even noticed her as he walked past. "Yes. I need to go."
"But sir-" the hostess began.
Walter refused to be stopped by anything, not as long as that… that song was playing. "Don't worry I left enough cash to pay for dinner and a generous tip."
"Mr. Elia's dinner is always on the house, don't worry." the hostess informed him.
Walter couldn't have been less worried about paying the bill. "Then the server will have an excellent tip. I'm leaving."
He brushed past her. Paige followed uncertainly behind him. She didn't know if he was leaving her or just the restaurant but she one hundred percent knew that she had zero interest in staying behind.
Thankfully, before the two singers got to the chorus, Walter was out on the sidewalk outside of the restaurant, no longer in earshot of the music, with Paige standing next to him.
"I-I just had to get out of there… that song… the memory of us dancing… that dress you're wearing… the way you look in it… you… It was all just too much." Walter finally took a breath, "I put that part of my life behind me. Or I thought I did."
"I understand," Paige told him, suppressing a desire to push an errant curl off of his forehead. "I thought I had too, until tonight…" Paige said too softly for him to hear, Walter didn't react to her words, he was already moving down the sidewalk. Not knowing what else to do, she followed him.
Walter stopped walking when he realized that Paige was trailing several feet behind him. He didn't particularly want to continue the evening with her, but he couldn't picture himself leaving her behind either. He realized why she was moving so slowly. He turned and called to her. "You can't walk in those heels, they are ridiculous!" As she took a few steps closer to him, he moved toward her. "We could go somewhere and just talk."
Paige knew her apartment was just half a block away, but inviting Walter back to her place was not the move here, plus her apartment was just so small, barely big enough for one, let alone two, plus all the emotional baggage between them.
Walter thought about offering to call them an Uber, but where would they go? Not his hotel room. Or her place. He's not familiar with the city by choice. So he waited to see what Paige suggests.
"There's a community garden with a few benches just down the block a bit on the other side of the street. It's such a lovely evening, and it's early, we could go there." Paige said. "We could sit and talk." She saw the look on his face. "Or not talk."
After considering all the variables, Walter nodded and Paige led the way. It was early May so it was still light as they made the short walk to the garden.
Paige breathed a sigh of relief that no one was in the garden at the moment and they had the space to themselves. As they settled companionably on a bench, Paige decided to turn the conversation toward less fraught topics.
"So what is this new project with Richard?" she asked.
Walter grabbed the conversational lifeline and started talking about specs and details for a new genome project lab that Richard was working on. One that needed as close as Scorpion could make it impenetrable cyber security. Walter was more than happy to take the job since Richard always paid very well and Scorpion's unfortunate track record with Elia and his holdings seemed to be a thing of the past.
Paige listened, just marveling at hearing the sound of Walter's voice after so long. She thought she'd stopped missing him…loving him long ago. Tonight she realized she was wrong.
As the sun dropped behind its horizon of buildings, the air began to chill and the frogs who called the tiny community garden home began letting their presence known to the two invaders sitting on the bench. Paige shivered. Walter noticed immediately and removed his suit jacket, draping it across her shoulders.
"Thank you," Paige told him reveling in the warmth of his body still held by the jacket. She inhaled. It smelled like him too. She had missed the scent of Walter: simple soap, aftershave, deodorant, no colognes to distract or hamper efficiency.
She had once thought she wanted someone different from Walter O'Brien. More like her, a normal human. She had realized over the years without him that she wasn't as normal as she thought. Maybe she never had been, but she had definitely been changed by the time she had spent with geniuses. But even more than that, she realized that she wasn't as interested in the normal human stuff anymore. She still loved music and dancing and game nights and girls' nights but she realized that that wasn't all there was to life.
She loved going to museums with Walter, and Super Fun Guy conventions with Sly, and even the junkyard with Happy to find a part for a 1977 Kawasaki Triple she was rebuilding. Even if she did get yelled at for her inappropriate wardrobe choice.
Her world was wider for knowing Scorpion, knowing Walter, not narrower.
She had just been too immature to see that all those years ago when she decided to throw a temper tantrum, testing him to see if he would come after her. Of course, he hadn't, he didn't know it was a test. He thought it was the way she saw him. He thought she was finally telling him the truth instead of telling him white lies like she had taught him to do.
And it had been the truth, in that moment she did feel that way, but it wasn't the whole truth.
The truth was she was scared that he would find a woman who suited him more and leave her first. She couldn't allow that to happen, again, so she decided to blow up the relationship first, see if he would follow.
But she was here now with him and she still felt all those old feelings. She thought there was a chance he felt them too.
In a lull in Walter's explanation of the new New York City lab Richard was building, Paige murmured his name and met Walter's eyes as he leaned in. She felt a shiver down her spine at the feeling of his gaze on her. She slowly let her eyes close as she kissed him.
He was surprised and didn't react for a moment, then he slowly, tenderly began to kiss her back.
Not wanting to make Walter feel ambushed, Paige broke the kiss, and Walter just looked at her. She couldn't decipher the look in his eyes. Taking a deep breath, she decided to just go for it. She took his hand in hers, feeling the comfortable weight and security of his jacket around her. "Walter, would you consider giving me… giving us another chance?
Author's Note:
Here comes the author's rant, so get ready.
I hate the way the show ended!
If the show had continued, however they decided to get Paige and Walter back together, I would have been there, cheering it on all the way. Even if they did it in some ridiculous way. Even if it wasn't until the end of another satisfying season or two of "will they or won't they".
Unfortunately, that's not how it worked out in real life.
For me personally, if I take their breakup/team breakdown at face value, that everyone just let their emotions get the better of them and Paige let all of her fears run rampant and Florence really thought that inserting herself into the conversation was a good idea, I just can't stand behind the idea of Paige and Walter apologizing, promising to do better, and getting back together.
If, however, there was something deeper at play like the team trying to draw out an old (or new, how exciting!) enemy or someone on the team was being manipulated, then "Sure, okay" Walter and Paige get back together and move forward from there.
There have been a plethora of fix-it fics dealing with the latter and I've enjoyed them. There have also been a number of fix-it fics dealing with the former and some of them do a really good job working on Walter and Paige's issues, which I've also enjoyed.
But that's not me, that's not how my mind works in this scenario.
I love me some good old-fashioned Waige fluff, romance, lifelong devotion, etc, and my favorite way to write it is as if the finale never happened. I don't ever let Walter and Paige break up. That's me.
But there's also this part of me that wants to explore Walter and Paige apart. That's what this fic does. I believe that I am in the minority here of readers/writers who are interested in Walter and Paige being broken up/broken. I hear you. When the people speak, I listen and I try to deliver as best as I can.
This fic deals with Paige and Walter reuniting by chance several years after the events in the Garage. They talk, they reconnect, and old feelings surface. Paige asks Walter to give her another chance: end of Chapter 1.
I wrote chapter 2 as Walter answers YES. I also wrote chapter 3 as Walter answers NO.
You get to choose which one or both that you read. Choose carefully!
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
~The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost
Clearly, I have issues I need to work on. But Walter grieving just calls to me. And I must write it.