A/N:
Hey :) Here's chapter 1, where it all really begins... It's short but pretty intense (or at least I think so, haha). I hope you enjoy it and join me on this journey! Many thanks to everyone who has read the prologue and taken a moment to share your thoughts with me—I really appreciate it
A few months later…
It's one of Donna's free nights, and it didn't go as she expected. In the past, she looked forward to the night when she and her husband could have their weekly date. The issue isn't that they missed it due to Harvey coming late from work; she can understand that. The problem is that he forgot their plan, and she spent over 40 minutes waiting for him at a restaurant, and she hasn't felt so humiliated in a long time. She tried calling him, but it was futile. So, after 45 minutes, she decided to leave, suppressing the urge to cry. After all, he could have at least sent a damn message.
They hadn't had one of their dates in weeks, and those weeks had been too turbulent for their marriage. So, she suggested this date as a chance to alleviate the tension between them and, perhaps, steer their marriage in the right direction again. But she doesn't feel like Harvey wants to do it, which makes her feel exhausted.
While sitting alone at the restaurant—at the same table where they had begun to plan their now frustrated trip to Verona—Donna hoped that this night might bring them closer again. She played scenarios in her mind, imagining a night filled with silly jokes, shared moments, and a passionate round—or maybe more—of make-up sex. But the truth turned out to be very different. The sharp contrast between her expectations and the lonely reality made her feel more and more frustrated as the minutes passed.
When Donna returned home, she took off the dress she had worn for the first time that night. Getting new clothes to go out with him had always been one of her favorite things; she loved getting herself ready to look even prettier for him, a sentiment that now made her feel even more foolish. She removed her makeup, her once neat hairstyle transformed into a messy braid... and what had earlier been an expression of love for him now felt like a futile attempt to salvage something slipping through her fingers. Already in her pajamas and looking at her reflection in the mirror, the sad confirmation that the emotional distance between her and Harvey had become an undeniable chasm became evident.
She didn't even have dinner; she just poured herself a glass of wine, which she drank in the backyard wrapped in her robe before going to bed. She wished she could be asleep when he returned, which she knew was unlikely because since she started working at the theater again, her schedule has changed, and her insomnia is so much worse right now. The chaos their marriage had become was not helping the situation either, plus Harvey had stopped holding her to sleep weeks ago.
She tried reading, scrolling through social media, and even watching a series, but nothing could distract her from the fact that Harvey had forgotten about her. It had never happened before. He had never forgotten to let her know if he couldn't make it, and that, combined with his attitude in recent weeks, made her heart ache in her chest.
She curses under her breath when she hears him open the door, taking advantage of the fact that the bedroom light is already off and she sleeps on the other side of the door, she turns away from it and closes her eyes, even though she knows Harvey will know she's not sleeping.
Harvey, on the other hand, feels a pang of regret wash over him as he glances at his phone screen, which displays seven missed calls and a barrage of messages from his wife. Hidden among the notifications is a photo of them together, of those moments that he almost no longer remembers, when they were stupidly happy.
From his wife's initial text, filled with concern: "Harvey, is everything ok? Where are you?"
To her final message, so far away from her usual tone of kindness: "Fuck you, Harvey. I'm tired of waiting for you. As you can see, I do have the decency to warn you about going home."
He knows he screws up.
His already faltering world crashes down on him. He immediately closes his laptop and rushes out of the office, panic and frustration coursing through his veins, each step echoing the weight of every single one of the mistakes he was making with his wife in the recent weeks.
Donna doesn't know it, but ever since she started working at the theater again, Harvey has reverted to working late once more. The solitude in their home becomes unbearable for him. Being there by himself just helps to highlight the fact that his marriage, which was once a heaven of happiness, is falling apart a bit more each day. In response, he reverts to his old mechanisms of denial: working until he feels exhausted and purposefully keeping his thoughts as distant as possible from his personal problems. And that's what he did tonight, completely forgetting that they made a date intended to work as the beginning of the path to reconciliation.
Harvey takes only 5 minutes to get home once he realizes what date it is, but it feels like an eternity. He knows he can't fix this with a simple phone call, so he decides that the least bad thing to do is to get home as soon as possible.
He takes a deep breath as he puts the keys in the lock and knows that this won't be easy. He finds the house in darkness and removes as much clothing as he can on his way to his bedroom. When he reaches the bedroom, he's only wearing his shirt, pants, and socks, and he puts on his pajamas. He does everything before making a sound, and Donna hates him even more for that, damn coward.
She curls up even more, feeling him sit on the mattress, and her tightly closed eyes threaten to overflow again.
"I'm so sorry, Donna," he murmurs, his voice husky yet gentle. That voice that Donna loves but to which she can't surrender right now. When she doesn't respond, he turns his body more towards her. "I got the date wrong; I'm sorry." He speaks again with that same tone of voice and tries to place his hand on her arm. She perceives the warmth of his hand wanting to get closer and moves before he reaches her, a simple gesture that deepens her husband's pain, but she doesn't care about that right now; the anger she feels is stronger than any other feeling.
"It's not that hard to know what day it is, Harvey. Or at least to answer your damn phone!" She shouts back, folding into herself even more as though hugging herself would make her current misery go away.
"I didn't do it on purpose," he replies, trying to hide the lump in his throat. "I just… I've been working late a lot of days, and I just forgot; I thought you were at the theater tonight."
"That's exactly the problem! You forgot about me! I suggested a weekly date after weeks of not doing so because I was trying to get close to you again, because damn it! I love you, Harvey, and this shit that's happening between us destroys me, and you forgot it!" She sobs, her voice breaking a little more with each word. "And you've never forgotten about me before!" she adds, breaking down into a cry full of anguish that she would like to avoid in front of him, but she simply can't do it anymore.
As he listens to her, Harvey struggles to breathe because he knows that he just screwed up too much with her, that he just pushed them deeper into the hole they were already in, and he really doesn't know what the hell to do to get them both out of there.
He wants to reach out to her, but she moves away again, not letting him near. "Donna..." he pleads, his eyes about to overflow with tears, just a small sign of the pain growing in his chest and not allowing him to breathe normally.
"No, Harvey. You can sleep here if you want, but don't even dare to touch me!" She responds with determination because she knows that if he touches her, she will give in, and she can't do it this time. Not anymore.
"Please," he sobs. "I'm so sorry."
"I want to sleep now."
"But you set the rule that we don't go to bed angry with each other!" He responds without thinking; his gentle and sad tone fades, becoming almost a scream full of rage.
She laughs ironically and turns to look at him for the first time. "And just now, you remember that?" She sits against the headboard of the bed, still keeping the distance between them, and hugs her legs, pulling them close to her torso. A bitter smile tugs at her lips, reflecting the irony of the situation. "I've gone to bed angry with you too many times in the last few weeks, and it didn't seem to matter to you." Her voice, though attempting strength, falters, a tremor revealing her vulnerability. "And you haven't noticed because, for weeks, you haven't even looked at me! Not for once! And you stopped hugging me for sleep, even if you promised to always do that!" Her voice breaks even more, becoming a total mess of anguish and anger.
Harvey, paralyzed in the face of her raw emotions, struggles to find the right words or actions. The bedroom feels suffocating, and he senses the ringing in his ears intensify, drowned out only by the erratic rhythm of his heartbeat echoing through his body. "Donna—"
She interrupts him because she hasn't done it yet. "For weeks, you haven't paid attention to me, Harvey," she continues, her words a plea layered with despair, "and it's really hard to keep alive a relationship, a marriage, with someone who isn't even capable of looking at you." Donna doesn't meet his gaze yet. With each sentence, the bedroom seems to shrink around them. "You don't even look at me now," she growls, frustration and pain evident in her eyes as they finally meet him.
"You're exaggerating a bit, Donna," he says with difficulty, trying to keep his hands still because he feels his whole body about to start shaking. Over the past several weeks, he has begun to feel intense anxiety once more, and it is proving to be very difficult to deal with.
"Seriously, your response is to tell me I'm exaggerating? Seriously, your plan is to minimize what I see and feel? Screw you, Harvey!" She yells, standing up and needing to get out of there. Her feet move as fast as they can to the kitchen, and with anger, she leans her hands on the counter and drops her head forward. Anguish corrodes her, and tears roll down her cheeks. He didn't come after her, and that hurts. The fact that Harvey is pulling away from her makes her feel like she's breaking in two. She feels at zero again. Like over 20 years ago, trying to slip into places Harvey won't let her in. And she doesn't know what the hell to do anymore.
Harvey remains seated on the bed, his gaze lost in the bedcovers, while, despite his seemingly calm appearance, his heart inside his chest goes crazy, pounding in his head, making his entire body sweat as if he had boxed for 45 minutes non-stop. He feels a burning in his chest that's unbearable. His fists grip the sheets tightly, his knuckles turning white, while everything around him is blurry and his breathing becomes more and more shallow and uneven.
His world is falling apart, and he has no idea how to stop it or the willpower to halt it. Something inside him reminds him that he's not enough for Donna, that everything will go wrong, and that he should never have dared to knock on her door six years ago. He's not being able to handle this change; he's not being able to support her in her new job. Instead, it's just making them drift further away from each other, and he knows that Donna deserves someone much better than him by his side. So, unconsciously, he keeps pushing her away and putting barriers between them until she gets tired and sees the reality that she can share life with someone who really deserves her.
Donna pours herself a glass of water in the kitchen, and the loud, dry sound it makes when she leaves it empty on the counter is the only thing that can snap Harvey out of his spiral of thoughts.
Harvey tries to calm himself with a few deep breaths, although he isn't sure if they're working. He opts to go into the bedroom's bathroom to try to calm himself down, and even from there, he can hear Donna crying, which makes his heart break into a million pieces, and all he can feel is even more stupid.
He compulsively wets his face and then dries it with a towel with some force. Not allowing his thoughts to win, he heads to the kitchen. Donna is leaning on the counter with her elbows resting there, her gaze lost in the darkness, and even though he knows she's right behind her, she doesn't turn to look at him.
"I didn't mean to minimize what you're feeling, Donna," he says, leaning against the counter next to her and crossing his arms. Each of them looks in a different direction, and both think it's a cruel and accurate representation of their marriage right now. "But things have changed too much, and I'm still adjusting to that."
"So, the problem is that I wanted to go back to acting?" She asks with a mix of anguish and anger in her voice.
"No, I didn't say that," Harvey murmurs. "You know I am a person who hates change; I'm just having trouble adjusting, but it is not your fault."
"You're making it seem like it is."
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..." And he doesn't know how to finish the sentence.
"I don't know what else to do to fix this." And when Donna says this, her voice trembles. "You've stopped doing so many things you used to do. You don't take care of me like before, in any aspect. And it was you who told me you wanted to do it, and maybe it was my bad, but I got used to it, Harvey, because you well know that nobody had ever taken care of me like that before. And right now, you won't let me take care of you either. You've created a wall between us that I don't know how the hell to break down!" She doesn't even try to stay calm anymore; the tears come faster than her words in the shape of screams. "For over 20 years, I've followed you; wherever the hell you wanted to go, I've gone with you! I made all the changes you needed; I stayed away until we could be close; and when everything was starting to go well, you asked me to move to the other damn side of the country. And what did I do? I said yes; I came with you because all I've done since I met you is take care of you, be there for you, and love you. I left a life behind there, with the illusion that we could make it here. And now that I'm asking for something, that I'm the one who needs a change, you treat me like you don't even know me? You're being damn cruel, Harvey!" She yells in the middle of violent breaths, trying to get all the shit she's been carrying inside her body out while he still can't look at her. "And I know I don't deserve this." She adds, and although she wants to sound strong, her voice breaks, and she sounds like a little girl who has just been left alone in the middle of a thunderstorm. "I don't deserve this." She sobs again, wiping her tears with her trembling fingers.
"I don't deserve you," he says, his voice a mix of anger and hurt. Harvey puts his hand on her lower back, and she can't help but close her eyes at the sensation that invades her body—a warmth, a tenderness—that brings her a fleeting sense of calm. "I'm so sorry, Donna. I know this is falling apart because of me."
"The only thing that needs to fall apart here is that wall you put between us, Harvey!" She yells with frustration and turns her head to look at him for the first time. "All our lives, you looked at me, really looked at me, even though we couldn't say out loud what we felt. We always looked at each other, truly looked at each other, honestly, and it's the first time you've stopped looking at me." She sobs, and this time Harvey turns his head to look at her. Their pain-filled gazes meet, and that breaks them even more. "You have no idea how much it hurts not to be able to find my reflection in you." With every word that comes out of her mouth, Donna feels smaller and more vulnerable, while Harvey feels his heart breaking into even smaller pieces. She exhales sharply and covers her face with both hands. "You're drifting too far from me, Harvey, and I don't know how to stop it," she sobs.
Harvey positions himself at the same height as her, with his elbows also on the counter and his shoulder touching hers. "I know this won't change anything now, but I truly am sorry," he says, his eyes bloodshot and his soul trembling.
"It doesn't, but I appreciate it anyway," she whimpers, removing her hands from her face to look at him. "Just tell me what to do, please." Donna weeps, trying to find an answer in those eyes she thought she knew by heart. "I'm willing to fight for this, Harvey. To fight for you and for us. I always have, and I'm willing to do it again, but I just don't know how. I just know that I don't want to lose you." She speaks with honesty but also with pain, affectionately wrapping her fingers around his hand. It's not the first time she has to beg for this, and she doesn't mind looking pathetic; she will do whatever it takes to not lose him.
"Do you think we can do something, Donna?" He's genuinely not sure, and the insecurity he exudes shakes Donna.
"We've always been able to do something."
Harvey sighs and lowers his gaze, his heart pounding so hard against his chest that he can't think clearly. "I don't know if I can this time," he says, his voice almost imperceptible.
"Harvey..." Donna murmurs, afraid that the next words will come out of her mouth. "Do you want a divorce?" She whispers, and along with the words, she feels her soul leaving her body as well.
Harvey immediately looks at her and intertwines his fingers with hers. "No, I don't want to divorce you. That's not an option for me, and it never will be," he tells her, looking into her eyes, trying to sound as sincere as possible, and Donna lets out a sigh of relief that makes her slump against his side. "I'm just afraid of hurting you; I've done it for too long. And I don't think I'm everything you deserve."
"You're everything I need." Donna responds and hides her face on his shoulder. "Just fight for me, please, Harvey," she pleads amidst countless tears. "You've always done it; I'm just asking you to do it one more time."
Harvey breaks completely upon hearing her, and all he can do is wrap his arms around her and stand up, holding her against his chest. Donna clings to his waist, holding onto him with all her strength and crying like a child in his arms. Harvey's chin rests on her crown, and he can't help but cry as well, looking at a fixed point in the darkness.
"I promise I will, Donna," he whispers, kissing her head. "I love you, Donna. Never doubt that."
Donna clings even tighter to him, her fists clutching his clothes. "I love you, Harvey. Please don't let me go."
"I won't, Donna. I won't."
Both of them sigh, and although it seems impossible, they hold on tighter, as if trying to merge into one being, hoping that by holding each other close, they can somehow mend the fractures in their relationship. It's an embrace that almost hurts them, and they know it will leave marks on their bodies, but they need to remind each other that they're still here, clinging to each other amidst the storm.
She takes a pause to catch her breath and speaks again. "God, how the hell did we get here?"
Thanks for reading :)
