It had been a week since Erin had last seen the strange car near their driveway, and she didn't know if she should be relieved or even more unsettled by the fact that it was gone. Still, for the sake of her mental stability, she chose to go with relieved as she had other things to worry about. Like the fact that while things had stabilized between herself and Alex, there was still a small wall between them that she couldn't quite scale. She knew that patience had worked well for her up to that point, and that she needed to just keep that in mind as they moved forward, but a part of her heart wanted to just rush back into a deep friendship with the woman.
The current case that the team was away on also didn't help matters, since Erin was concerned about the toll that it would take on the team. Especially after David told her that it was dealing with gay conversion, and that they were all looking for a reason to shut the camp in question down, but had been unable to come up with a legal reason to do so quite yet. Eventually, she knew that Aaron would come up with a valid reason, and they would ensure that tortuous, evil, place was permanently shut down. She just hoped that it would be soon.
Glancing at her phone, she saw that she had a text from David, letting her know that he was on his way home, and would be there soon. That filled her heart with a lightness that had been long missing, since she knew that they had finally found a way to make certain no other young people would be destroyed by that awful, misguided, rhetoric that the camp had been spouting. Getting to her feet, Erin padded into the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water, knowing that she wanted to decompress with David once he was back.
Just as she was about to head back to the living room, she heard a car in the driveway, and she glanced out the window to see the familiar sight of David's car. So instead of leaving the kitchen, Erin took a seat on the island as she sipped at her water. "…still up. I saw her head in the window of the kitchen when I drove in."
That clued her in on the fact that her husband had brought someone home with him, and she had to guess that it was Aaron, since there wasn't anyone else that would be eager to see their home that late in the evening. To her shock, though, she saw Alex's dark head follow her husband into the house, and she let out a little gasp as their eyes met. There was such sorrow there, and she felt her heart break a little to look at her friend, yet she still held back, refraining from rushing over and hugging her tightly, since she didn't want to upset the woman by doing something rash. "Hello," she said quietly and sighed a little when David came over to her side and embraced her warmly, pressing his lips against her temple.
"Blake needed someone to talk to, since James is still on assignment, and I told her that your ear is always open, even if you don't talk about yourself all that much. I'll head up to bed. You remember where the guest room is, right, Blake?"
"I do, thank you." David nodded before kissing her temple once more and then leaving them alone in the kitchen. "So, I know that this is a shock for you. But…"
"You needed an ear to fill up, and mine is currently empty, since my children are asleep and my husband is headed that way, too. Would you like some water before we head into the living room to talk?"
"That would be nice, yes." Erin nodded as she slipped off the island, about to go over to the sink when Alex reached out and stopped her by taking gentle hold of her elbow. Erin looked up in time to see the mask that Alex was wearing crack wide open before she began to cry quietly. That was worse than sobs, since the quietness of her sorrow always broke Erin's heart. Again, though, she was hesitant to embrace her, knowing that it had to be Alex's choice, she couldn't force her to do something that she might not want. She did nod, though, and that seemed to be all Alex needed to step into her space before hesitantly slipping her arms around Erin's waist, her cheek coming to rest on her shoulder as she continued to quietly cry.
"Or maybe we could skip the water and just head into the living room to talk?" Alex nodded, and Erin rubbed her back gently as she carefully guided the woman into the living room and helped her to sit on the sofa. Alex seemed loathe to let go of her, which Erin didn't mind, since she knew the woman needed comfort in that moment. "All right, Lexie, do you want to tell me why this case hit you so hard?"
"Because of what we should have shared?"
Erin sucked in a short breath before nodding. "I was wondering if that would be on your mind, after David told me about the conversion camp angle. I know that your parents didn't listen to your grandmother about setting you straight, especially after you met James, but it still must have been agony for you."
Alex nodded as she moved closer into Erin's personal space, her head slightly slipping down from Erin's shoulder to her chest. A deep sigh escaped both their lips in unison, and Erin reached up to drag her fingers through Alex's hair, knowing that those touches would help to calm her down. "No one else on the team knows about that facet of me. I think that your husband might have guessed, based on how I reacted, but I don't want to tell anyone?"
"And why would you? You're happy with James, I'm happy with David, and we have our friendship back. We don't need to rehash those heady, glorious, months of us, not if you don't want to."
"I wish that I could forget it all, or at least, the bad parts. I never want to forget our happiness. And my heart just broke for those young men who were destroyed by religious ideology. I just don't know when we're going to move past this bullshit and allow people to be who they are, and not force them into ridiculously gendered stereotypes in an effort to make them heterosexual." Erin nodded before daring to drop a soft kiss to the top of Alex's head. That seemed to be the right move, since Alex drew in a deep, shaky, breath before relaxing a little against Erin's body.
"I think that was why I wanted to make amends with you so badly. What we shared, before the BSU, was special, and I wanted to let you know that while we've moved on to our current partners, that you still held this special place in my life. I, I kept up on your publishing, did I tell you that?"
"No. Even my more esoteric papers?"
"Yes, though I don't think that I understood a lot of the more in-depth ones. Still, it was a way to stay connected to you." Alex murmured something quietly happy, and Erin tightened her hold around the woman's waist, somehow knowing that though they might not talk much more that evening, the real healing would be found in these quiet moments together.
