Living in the Past
Erin tossed and turned, unable to sleep worrying about Walter and his new obsession. Finally, in frustration, she gave up trying. Instead, she slipped out of her bed and opened the laptop that he had loaned her. Walter had found the only answer he was looking for, but now that they had discovered the object of Walter's affection on the Other Side, Erin had become curious to find out if Paige Dineen had ever existed in their world.
A cursory internet search turned up information that a young woman by the same name did exist in Los Angeles fifty years ago. She was a single mother of a young son named Ralph and had been a waitress at the same diner where Walter had been scheduled to upgrade the wifi on that awful day that the planes fell out of the sky. Unfortunately, she and her son had been seriously injured in a car accident on October 6, 2014, another fateful day for the city. All of the internet connectivity in the southwest United States, including L.A., had been compromised in a bombing of a downtown L.A. law office by a disgruntled former client. The inoperable city traffic lights had been the cause of the accident, but their injuries had proven fatal when no emergency services had been able to reach them in time due to chaos in the city.
Erin had been horrified at finding out the poor woman and her son's fate and hadn't slept all night. When the sun finally rose, she exited the Airstream, desperate for a cup of coffee. Her gaze immediately alighted on the object of her concern from the night before lying in his bed propped up on pillows watching his dream woman, rewatching the day that the other Walter and Paige met over and over. Not long after Walter's discovery of the dream woman and her identity, Noah had moved Walter's bed downstairs, when Erin forbade him from going up or down any longer unassisted. Erin wanted to scream in frustration. Walter wasn't even pretending to do anything else anymore. He refused to eat, all of his jobs were unfinished, new proposals and requests were ignored, and he still wouldn't sleep.
"Cousin Walter," Erin began, "it's such a lovely day. Sure some sunshine would be good for you. Leave The Window behind for even a few minutes."
"Why should I?" Walter challenged petulantly without a hint of the spark that used to be behind his eyes. "I can see her every minute of every day. It's all I've ever wanted since that first night."
"But she isn't your Paige. She's the woman from another universe. She belongs with a different version of you." Erin shook her head at the absurdity of this argument. It would make absolutely no sense to anyone else. She remembered a time when it wouldn't have made sense to her!
"I should have met her! I should have had that chance!" Walter's voice lost strength and he could no longer speak as a fit of coughing wracked his weakened body. Once he stopped, he lay on the bed, panting, trying to catch his breath. At long last, he took a shaky half breath, able to continue his thought. "If the team had gone to the diner that day, we would have met her. We could have saved all of the planes." Walter's eyes filled with tears as they always did when he talked like this. Erin felt tears prick in her own eyes. She felt Walter's pain at losing all of those lives as intensely as if it had just happened. "We could have saved them together."
Usually, when Walter talked like this, she just listened, but not today. She couldn't listen to him and his certainty about events from fifty years ago that might have been. "You don't know that, Cousin Walter. One of a million things could have happened differently! You might never have met her. Even if you did, you might still not have saved the planes." Erin wondered briefly if continuing this argument was wise, but she didn't care. She had kept these feelings bottled up for weeks, ever since Walter had started down the 'what if' rabbit hole.
"What if you had met her? What would have happened to me? Would I have ever come to California? Would you and I have ever met? What about Noah? What about my relationship?" Erin cried. "You just want to throw all of that away on some dream. You're the one who said that it's an alternate reality similar to our own but different in small but important ways. You don't know what ways would have been the same or different. I love you, Cousin Walter. I thought I meant something to you too, but now you're willing to throw it all away on what is still, at its heart, just a dream."
Walter considered Erin's words, but then movement on the display of The Window caught his attention once again. It was Paige, talking to the waitress' son. Walter was once again consumed with watching her and the entire world around him fell away. Erin watched him for a few moments longer before she did the only thing she could think of to do. She measured coffee into the machine and started to brew a pot.
Only days later, Erin arrived home from a quick visit to the market. There were no noises or bizarre flickers of light emanating from The Window that had been going nonstop for weeks. The power that awful thing required to look into the past and see the day Walter and Paige met was surely off the charts. She was grateful, not for the first time, that Cousin Walter had constructed his personal fusion reactor a few years ago. If not, they likely would have had the DEA and any other number of three-letter government agencies crawling around asking uncomfortable questions. Once inside the Garage, Erin looked hopefully over to Walter's bed to see if he had finally fallen asleep. Walter wasn't there, he wasn't anywhere that she could see and The Window was perched precariously on the edge of the mattress, sure to tumble off to the hard concrete floor at the slightest provocation.
Erin dropped her bags on the nearest desk and walked toward Walter's bed, calling his name. When she reached the edge of the bed and pushed The Window more securely onto the middle, she heard a moan from the floor on the other side of the bed frame. "Cousin Walter!" Erin called as she hurried to his side.
Erin dropped to her knees next to him. "What happened?"
"I was so thirsty and I thought I could get a glass of water myself, but getting out of bed I tripped and I just didn't have the energy to get up. Thank you for coming to save me. Even though I don't deserve it. I've treated you, you and Noah so poorly."
Erin shrugged off Walter's apology. Gathering her strength, she pulled Walter to his feet, her shoulder propping him up until she could maneuver him into the bed where he so obviously belonged. As she helped him get under the blanket, Erin realized that he was shivering and burning up with fever, his breath coming in short wheezy bursts. Erin did her best to keep her expression neutral as she tucked him back under the covers. "Let me get you that water."
"Thank you," Walter whispered and his eyes fell closed at the effort of taking breath as Erin headed to the kitchen. When she returned with a plastic cup half full of water and a straw, Walter had already dozed off. Erin was loathe to wake him, even though he needed the water. He needed the rest as well.
Walter awoke with a start only a few minutes later. Erin offered him the water and he gratefully took a sip as Erin held the cup for him. Even the act of taking a drink of water had exhausted him and he lay limply against the pillows as he met Erin's eyes.
"Cousin Walter–" she began.
"No. The answer is no." Walter spoke with all of the effort he could muster as he shivered. Erin drew another blanket up over his emaciated body.
"Sure and you don't even know what I was going to say."
"I do. And the answer is still no."
"Let me take you to hospital."
"I told you, no. No hospitals."
"No." The extended exchange with Erin had taken a toll on Walter and he dozed off again for a few moments as she contemplated ignoring him and taking him to the hospital against his will, but she knew that she couldn't she couldn't let medical science get a hold of him. Who knows what they'll find in his blood… in his brain… Walter and Noah had worked too hard to bury the evidence of the Other Side and Walter's connection to it.
"At least let me call Dr. Friedman, see if I can convince him to make a house call."
Walter didn't have any more energy to argue with her. It didn't matter at this point to him, but if it made Erin feel better, what was the harm? Walter nodded and Erin pulled her phone out, quickly dialing the doctor's office number. It didn't take her as long as she had feared to convince the receptionist to let her speak directly to the doctor. He was also remarkably easy to convince to come and examine Walter that afternoon, but that was probably because she offered him a ridiculous amount of money to make the effort. As soon as Erin hung up, she texted Noah to let him know what had happened and to come to the Garage as soon as possible.
Walter drifted in and out of consciousness for the rest of the day. Whenever he was lucid enough to, Erin encouraged him to take sips of water. When he wasn't, she spent that time alternating between bathing his forehead with cold cloths in a vain attempt to bring down his fever and sitting next to the bed, holding Walter's hand just talking to him.
Dr. Friedman arrived at 1:30 exactly, and Erin ushered him in. When the doctor saw Walter's weakened frame in the bed, he visibly blanched.
"Mr. O'Brien," Dr. Friedman gently shook Walter awake. "Would it be all right if I examine you for a moment?"
Walter's eyes focused on the doctor's kind face for a moment before he waved his hand to agree to the examination but to also let him know that he didn't care one way or the other. The doctor checked Walter's temperature, then his eyes, heart, and lungs. He tsked at Walter's protruding ribs and sallow complexion. His examination complete, he turned to Erin. "Is there somewhere that you and I can speak?"
Erin had watched the doctor's examination closely. She was not a medical professional, but she saw what the doctor had seen and she could tell what it meant by the look on his face now. "Right here is fine. Anything you have to say, you can say in front of Walter. I seriously doubt that you will tell him anything he doesn't already know anyway."
The doctor sighed. "I don't know how long he has. His advanced age, in addition to being malnourished and dehydrated, has already weakened his body significantly. But now fluid is building up in his lungs. And that concerns me greatly. It appears to be an advanced case of pneumonia, but without further tests, I can't be sure. Mr. O'Brien still refuses to go to the hospital and legally my hands are tied. If you can, get him on oxygen. I will write you a prescription before I leave. And I can prescribe something for the pain as well. But without more testing and advanced medical equipment, I don't think he has long."
Erin clutched Walter's hand as she spoke. "Thank you, Doctor, but pain management is not necessary. He's not in pain."
"Are you sure?" Dr. Friedman asked sympathetically. "Mr. O'Brien? Walter?" he asked, "Would you like something for the pain?"
Walter opened his eyes and blinked as if surprised to see the doctor standing in his home. "Yes, the pain is unbearable." He turned to Erin. "I didn't want you to know. I didn't want you to have any excuse to stop me."
Erin couldn't speak, her shock and sorrow at Walter hiding this from her cut her to her very core.
Meanwhile, Noah had slipped in silently, not wanting to disturb the conversation, but he had heard most of it. He caught the doctor's eye and pulled him to one side so that he could make arrangements for the medical supplies to be delivered as soon as possible.
Erin didn't even notice the doctor leave. She hadn't let go of Walter's hand since she had learned the depth of his suffering. Noah placed a chair for her to sit in and gently guided her into it. Erin sat with Walter for hours, even as Noah came and went picking up the oxygen and medications.
At nearly midnight, Noah urged Erin, "Come on, Love, let's get you to bed. You need your rest too." As he kissed her he tried to loosen her grip on Walter's hand.
"No, I won't leave him." Erin insisted, holding Walter's hand more tightly. "I won't leave him alone, not for one minute. Can't you see he's already been through enough alone? Surely I can do this for him." Noah sighed, knowing he was beaten. He pulled up a chair as well and sat with Erin and Walter all night.
In the morning, Noah was reluctant to leave Erin to go to work. "You need to go." Erin insisted. "Your job at Kinetic Transformation is too important to neglect. We need to be sure that no traces of the Other Side remain. We need to make sure this is finished. We need to keep Cousin Walter's involvement a secret. It's the only way I can be sure that he's safe."
Noah hesitated. "I don't want to leave you."
"I'll be okay. I won't be alone. I'll be here with my best friend. I know he'd do the same for me now."
"All right," Noah reluctantly agreed.
The day passed with agonizing slowness as Erin watched Walter sleep, his breathing getting slower and shallower as the day wore on. Noah returned after night fell, Erin looked up as he opened the Garage door, her gaze catching his, her eyes questioning. Noah just nodded his head once and kissed her briefly as he passed. "How is Walter?"
"The same, no change."
"Are you planning to still stay by his bedside tonight?"
"Yes, you know I can't leave him."
"I do. Do you want anything to eat, Love?"
Erin sighed gratefully, "I would love one of your famous grilled cheese sandwiches, please."
Noah winked at her. "Coming right up." He returned swiftly with their sandwiches. They munched on their sandwiches in silence, each lost in their thoughts. Once the meal was finished, Noah returned the plates to the kitchen and then with one last look at Erin, he went upstairs to the loft, leaving her alone with Walter.
A part of Erin longed to follow Noah up the stairs, to spend the night in his arms, and to forget, just for a little while, about the Other Side and Walter's broken heart, but she couldn't. She couldn't leave Walter to suffer alone. Instead, she sat at his bedside, holding his hand and praying for another breath and then thanking God when she saw his chest rise once again. She had no idea how long she did that for until she realized it would drive her mad if she continued. Erin cast her mind about for something, anything else that could occupy her attention, and her eyes landed on The Window. Without leaving his side, she picked it up and turned it on, the thing she'd hated from the start, the thing that had taken Walter away from her. Erin turned the dials to watch that day, the day Walter refused to stop watching. She knew the settings by heart.
Erin watched, fascinated, as the other Walter and Paige saved the day. She watched as they kissed. Unlike Walter, she had no desire to watch that day over and over again. She couldn't stand it. Instead, she flipped quickly through the days of their lives: adventures and friends who were like family. She watched Scorpion saving the governor's daughter from a mysterious disease, stopping a hacker from crashing the Federal Reserve, even saving a Presidential election from being stolen, and many more as time passed.
Walter and Paige, together with Team Scorpion were unstoppable and their relationship grew and flourished. Walter and his genius fit more easily into the world with Paige at his side. It seemed as if they could do no wrong, they beat the odds every time. Walter developed a strong mentoring relationship with Paige's little brother Ralph. He even spent time with the waitress' genius son.
Walter's gentle heart was never broken the way her Cousin Walter's heart had been. The other Walter was never the bowed and broken man that Erin had come to know and to love. She even saw Walter with his beloved sister, Megan. The Megan who had been her Cousin Walter's sister had died of complications due to MS when she was a young woman, still in her teens, and it had broken his heart, shattered the family. The other Walter, with the help of his team, had made a breakthrough in the treatment of MS and that Megan had lived a much longer and healthier life.
Suddenly Erin hated the world she lived in as much as Cousin Walter did. It seemed as if she was merely a consolation prize that this universe offered him. His life here was a shadow of what it could have been, what it should have been. Erin continued to flip through moments of Walter and Paige's life, suddenly grateful that Cousin Walter had never looked through The Window to see his beloved Paige any further than that first day in the diner.
Erin was more than three years ahead of the day Walter and Paige met when the scene glimmering before her in The Window caught her eye.