"Son?" Cabe said as he moved into the small exam room where Walter lay.
"Cabe." Walter replied, his voice was flat and emotionless.
"How you feeling, son?" Cabe asked. He smiled at Walter as he stepped up next to the head of the bed.
"I'm fine, but they want to keep me overnight to ensure I won't exacerbate my ribs with more vomiting." Walter replied, almost robot-like. The whole time staring out the window.
Cabe nodded slowly for a few moments.
"Would you like to talk about it?" Cabe asked softly.
"What's to talk about?" Walter shrugged. "I was stupid, I allowed myself to be duped and used."
"Kid, you got to know that isn't true." Cabe told him as he reached into the bed and took Walter's hand in his. He knew Paige was right, Walter needed a human connection badly at this point.
"Of course it's true." Walter said as he continued to stare out of the window. His hand was slack in Cabe's hand. "I am only half-baked as you said. I had no business being in a relationship with a duplicitous woman. I allowed myself to be conned, used and humiliated. I was so stupid."
"Okay, stop that kind of talk, right now Walt." Cabe's face was turning red.
"She was duplicitous!" Walter glared. "While I was giving her one hundred percent from me, she never once talked to me about how she was feeling in our relationship." Walter jerked his thumb towards himself. "How am I supposed to adjust the habits she finds difficult if she isn't honest with me about them?"
"Damn it son, if you or Paige had just talked to me we could have gotten this straightened out long before it became a problem. Why didn't you talk to me?"
"Because I am only half-baked." The look Walter directed at Cabe…was cold, the dead look in his eyes was actually rather scary. "I was stupid, I was enamored in a lie of deceit…of experiencing emotions at a level I never had before. Of the joys of sexual expression with someone I loved, who I thought loved me, but didn't."
"I told you to stop that kind of talk." Cabe growled. "Of course Paige loves you…"
"No, she doesn't." Walter interrupted him. "She never did. She just loved some romanticized version of me she had. She just used me to get what she wanted and once my deficits outweighed whatever rewards she got from me, she berated and humiliated me before leaving."
"Son…" Cabe said softly knowing he needed to get Walter to calm back down. He kept hold of Walter's hand with one hand and reached back and brought a chair up and sat down on it. "You and I made a pact, right? No more lies between us."
Walter nodded.
"Do you believe me when I say I've been straight with you ever since that day?" Cabe asked softly.
"Yes…do you believe me when I say I've been straight with you since that day?" Walter replied.
"I do." Cabe smiled. "I want you to think about this for a moment. Which of us…has a better understanding of emotions? Of life and being in a relationship with someone else?"
"You of course." Walter replied almost instantly.
Cabe smiled as he saw Walter's eyes soften a bit at that.
"Okay, now I'm going to be straight with you over this." Cabe told him and he saw Walter slightly nod his head. "When Paige came back from seeing you yesterday, she told me what you did. And it pissed me off. I was going to come over and kick your ass. But Paige got on me. She told me in no uncertain terms, I was to be kind, I was to be supportive, she wanted you to have time to fully consider what she told you. And if she found out I was short, disgruntled or harsh then her and I were going to have a problem. Does that sound like someone who doesn't love you?"
Walter frowned as he considered his words for a few minutes and finally shook his head no.
"Your whole premise for what you said is built on one subjective statement that Paige made, correct?" Cabe continued.
"That she's exhausted trying to convince herself that I satisfied her." Walter said softly.
Cabe's heart broke for him again as he watched a tear run down Walter's face.
"I'm going to tell you what she really meant by that, What she was tired of, was sensing something was wrong in your actions. She was waiting on the other shoe to drop, just like when she was with Drew." Cabe told him seriously. "Now when couples have a fight, sometimes they use things they know about their partner to really hurt them, when they feel hurt by that partner." Cabe explained.
"But…" Walter started.
"No, listen to me." Cabe said as he squeezed Walter's hand. "You not telling Paige the truth about what happened, hurt her. So she hurt you back, with something she knew would hurt you, and she did it with a lie. This whole thing has been an emotional minefield for both of you. It's been twelve years and Paige still has pain and resentment over what Drew did to her. You swooped in out of nowhere and made her life better, not only that, but you helped her son. She now has a better relationship with her son than ever before. A much better relationship with Ralph than she ever dreamed possible. Hell, he's taking advanced college classes, she never dreamed he would be able to do that after his diagnosis."
Walter nodded before he frowned. "She called us an experiment, Cabe." Walter whined.
"Why do you suppose she used that word?" Cabe asked.
"Mark…" Walter said softly.
"Exactly, she wasn't running an experiment with you over that. She's watched you from day one, being so concerned about the repercussions of your actions, about the repercussions of Scorpion's actions. She's never known a man who was as conscientious over his actions as you are. She's seen how much you really care even though you try to act like you don't. You leapt onto a speeding subway train to save her, to save Ralph. Hell, you swam in shark infested water to give her the chance to reach safety. You are very much like a real world superhero to her. And she risked her own life, risked leaving Ralph alone in the world without her. To her, living without you was worse than traumatizing Ralph and him having to live with Drew. Do you understand the love she had to feel for you to risk Ralph's well being?" Cabe asked him.
Walter slowly nodded as his brilliant mind considered that. Cabe could see his eyes softened even more.
"Son, that's love, true love, not some romanticized version." Cabe smiled. "You do have some quirks, some of them are out there…But they didn't put her off. You both need to find a balance between you."
"But…" Walter started.
"No!" Cabe said sharply but with a smile. "There are no "buts" in this. I know why you took Florence to that lecture."
Walter's eyes grew puzzled.
"It's because you had grown fond of having Paige with you at them. You couldn't stand the thought of going to it alone anymore." Cabe chuckled at the wide eyed expression Walter had. "I commend you for considering what you heard Paige tell Ralph, about how tired she was and that she really didn't want to go to that lecture. You chose to give her an out that spared her of thinking she let you down."
"Son, the old Walter, never would have considered that. You'd have become defensive and just told her you were going alone or worse, just left without her and without saying anything to her." Cabe patted Walter's hand he still held.
"I promise you, Paige does love you, the real you. You might think she has this romanticized version of you in her mind when you were being intimate, but she didn't. She has the real you, in her mind when you are in her arms. Now during the day, she might be thinking of the person you are becoming in her mind from time to time. And she probably always will, that's kind of normal for people. I get why you did, but you hurt her today, calling her a liar, denying her feelings for you." Cabe looked a bit peeved at him.
"Both of you screwed up, lying by omission…you've got to do better, Walter. I'd also recommend you both go see that doctor Paige made you and Toby go see…Dr. Rogaine?" Cabe frowned.
Walter frowned.
"Isn't Rogaine a hair loss treatment? Did you mean Dr. Rizzuto?" Walter asked.
"That's the one." Cabe smiled as he grew quiet.
Since Daniel's Mother was already at the school she called Paige and told her that she would bring him over to the office for her.
Paige was relieved and drove on over to CP's office.
Arriving just behind his Mom, Ralph frowned as he watched as she climbed the steps to CP's offices. Something was wrong, her walk, her body language. He got out of the car and he thanked Daniel's Mother before moving up the steps. He saw Toby and Happy moving down the front hall towards his Mom's office door. Ralph quickly ran around to Happy's side entrance.
"Where have you been?" Toby demanded brusquely as he arrived at the door to Paige's office.
It took Paige a few to respond.
"At the ER." Paige said softly after she walked around her desk.
"At the ER?!" Happy said as she came around the corner. "What happened?"
Paige sighed as she sat, unceremoniously, down into her chair at her desk. It took her several more moments to continue as she kept seeing Walter's angry face calling her a liar.
"Things got awful with Walter." Paige finally said before she sighed without looking up. "Walter got on that night we walked out and he began accusing me of lying to him during our time together."
"Well, you were." Toby interrupted her as he continued to stand there in the doorway.
"How do you figure that?" Happy asked as Paige gasped.
"Simple, did you ever once tell Walter what you told me that day at the faire?" Toby asked.
"No." Paige shook her head. "After we got home, after I had time to think about the day, I actually told him the opposite that evening." Paige sighed before she told them what she said.
"You know, my job with Scorpion is to help you act more human so you can function better in the world, but I don't want you to pretend to be someone you're not to be my boyfriend. You know, like, earlier today, I saw a guy with a stupid crown, and he was pretending to be someone he's not. And then, when push came to shove, he ran away, and he showed his ugly true self."
"You are always your true self, Walter, and that person is brave and good, and I love that about you. So I just wanted you to know, I love a lot about you, whether you like silly festivals or not."" Paige finished.
"Then why did you teach him about white lies?" Happy demanded from her.
"Because he hurt my feelings over my waffles I made for him one morning." Paige said as tears slipped down her cheeks. "I wanted him to understand you could tell someone…"
"Tell someone what?" Toby asked in a bit of anger as he interrupted her. "A lie is a lie, white or not. What you should have taught him was about soft truths if you wanted him to be kind about something."
Happy backhanded his stomach as Paige pressed a tissue to her eyes.
"Anyway…now Walter thinks that I didn't love him, that every time we were…romantic, that I wasn't thinking of him as he was, but of some romanticized version of him and it made him violently throw up." Paige sobbed.
"For him, that'll do it." Toby nodded. "I'm going to guess in the middle of throwing up, he hurt himself? Hernia or maybe rib related?"
"He separated the lower three ribs from his sternum." Paige nodded as she tried to stop crying.
"Damn, that had to hurt." Happy winched.
"He ended up passing out over it." Paige nodded.
"So, what are you going to do about it?" Happy asked.
"What can I do?" Paige looked up at her. "Walter won't talk to me now. He told the hospital that I couldn't see him. So I left Cabe there and came back. How can I make him understand I never saw him like that when we were intimate? He's using my statement that I was exhausted from trying to convince myself that he satisfied me as proof that I'm a liar. As well as not telling him how I was feeling…How he was making me feel like I did with Drew."
"Whoa…that's a pretty big lie to hide." Happy's eyes were wide open.
"Were you lying when you said it?" Toby asked.
"Of course I was. But that doesn't make me a liar about everything else." Paige tried to glare at him. "I was hurting at what had finally come out in the open. So I tried to hurt him. I didn't mean it."
"Uh, yes, it does make you a liar. And lying by omission makes you a liar just the same." Toby told her and then grunted as Happy hit him in the gut again. "My point is, you got to tell him that was the only lie you told him." Toby held up his hand. "Uh, it was the only thing you said that you lied about, right? Not counting the omissions."
"Yes…" Paige sighed. "But to keep it totally honest…I would have to admit something else…That day you guys got trapped in that mine and your intellects were stunted…I really enjoyed Walter in a different way that day. Dopey Walter was so endearing, he had the same thirst so to speak, but he was so full of life, with an almost innocent-like quality. I'm not sure I'm explaining that right." Paige sighed.
"Did you fantasize about him being dopey again?" Toby asked.
"Well, not when we were intimate, but on a few dates after that…I wondered how dopey Walter would have responded. Because dopey Walter…was intrigued by music and I would love to be able to share my love of music with Walter." Paige sighed.
"But Walt gets irritated listening to music." Happy said.
Paige nodded and then frowned. "No, he doesn't get irritated, he gets bored."
"Well, you've really screwed this up, the both of you. If you are serious about getting back together with Walter, I would recommend you both go see a good relationship counselor." Toby told her.
"Like Rizzuto?" Happy asked.
"Well, he impressed me." Toby nodded.
"What's going on?" Ralph finally spoke up.
"Ralph?!" Paige freaked. "When did you get here?"
Toby turned sideways to see Ralph.
"I got dropped off as you came inside." Ralph told her.
"How much of this did you hear?" Paige demanded.
"Everything starting with, things got awful with Walter." Ralph told her.
"You shouldn't be eavesdropping." Paige scolded him.
"I was standing right here the whole time." Ralph told her.
"Behind Toby where none of us could see you." Paige said angrily just as her phone rang. Paige got it out of her purse and her eyes went wide.
"Who is it?" Happy asked.
"Walter!" Paige whispered loudly as she thrust the phone out to her.
"What do you want me to do?" Happy frowned.
"I can't talk to him, you talk to him." Paige pleaded.
Happy rolled her eyes but grabbed the phone.
"Walt?" Happy said cautiously. "Yeah, she's here…just a bit busy so I grabbed her phone." Happy frowned. "Can you talk to her?"
Paige was mouthing "No!" and waving her hands back and forth.
"I guess so." Happy said and thrust the phone back towards Paige.
Slowly, in resignation, Paige reached out and took the phone back. She put her hand over the mouthpiece and breathed for a few moments.
"Hello…Walter." Paige tried to say in a happier voice.
Happy and Toby watched Paige's eyes look around the room as she listened.
"Oh, well…sure, if you are sure you want me to. I could come back to the hospital." Paige said with a weak smile on her face. "Oh, but Ralph's here now." Paige said as she bit a lock of hair. "Umm, let me ask."
Paige looked to Ralph.
"Walter wants to talk to me for a bit, if it is okay with Happy, would you rather stay with them or Cabe until we get done talking?" Paige asked.
"That's fine with me as long as he doesn't mind going to Kovelsky's place for dinner." Happy grinned at Ralph.
"While I wouldn't mind going there for dinner, I'd like to see Walter too." Ralph frowned.
"Walter wants to see you too, but he'd like to try and talk with me first and, well, you heard what I said…we've got a lot to talk about." Paige said sadly.
"Yeah, that's true…But I want your solemn promise, no matter what, I get to spend all weekend with Walter." Ralph demanded.
"Did you hear that Walter?" Paige smiled and then nodded. "Walter said it's a deal and he loves you."
"I love you too Walter." Ralph grinned.
Greetings! I hope this finds you all well! Railman wanted me to let you know he's still in the hospital, he's hoping to get out tomorrow but will need a bit to start posting his story again.
LouBe - LOL Them actually talking and not leaping to the wrong conclusion in what the other was saying would be a novel approach! lol At least it looks like Paige is going to get a chance to talk with Walter again. LOL Yeah, Walter wasn't happy about that whirlpool either. He doesn't understand why we're all so horrible to him in these fics. LOL
Guest #1 - Thank you and you're welcome! Glad you are enjoying the story so much!
Guest #2 - So glad you loved it! I hope you can see now that Cabe isn't just upset at what Walter has felt/done but upset at them both. Cabe knows how happy Walter has been since they both admitted their feelings for each other and pursued their relationship. He also believes with the right help, they can work through this and be happy together again. I know it can seem like Cabe might be favoring Paige, but he's not. He knows Walter is making a bad assumption based on limited knowledge and experience.
DaToad - I'm not sure I feel that they chiseled away at his character as you say, but I can absolutely see and understand why you think that. For me, it seemed in S4, they let Walter go into coast mode almost immediately in their romantic relationship. It seemed almost every episode at the end, Paige went home and Walter stayed at the Garage. Would have been nice if there had been a time or two when Walter would stop her and either say something like, "If you don't have plans, how about if I go home with you tonight?" or "Why don't you and Ralph spend the night here?" Make it at least SEEM like he/they are happy and excited at their relationship. Well as you can see in this chapter and other stories I've written, right or wrong, I always felt like what she said was about causing him pain back.
Masikka - LOL While I'm glad it didn't send you over that type of edge, it would be a good pun. Yep, you remembered correctly, Paige was just so hyped at the possibility...it never dawned on her that Walter would just leap right into action on that, I don't know why, leaping is always Walter's first reaction. It did fall apart quickly, but it looks like Cabe might have made some ingress in getting Walter to look at things differently. Hopefully, maybe next chapter we'll have a better idea. Thank you! I'm glad you guys trust me...When I was writing "Consequences" I was really worried people would want blood. lol Hope this chapter gave you the strength to hold on for one more week!
Pearliegirl - It did indeed go south quickly! lol Poor Walter. I think he's better...but I'll leave it to you guys to decide.
Ms Natural - Lying is never a good thing! And usually when found out, makes it so much worse...especially if it is found out because the person lying has gotten tired of holding back and just let's it go. Their frustrations at not telling the truth amplifies the delivery which will cause even more pain for the receiver.
To the Adventure! -Tim