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When they’re in space, in the future, it feels weird that Phil almost misses comms in his ear. He misses her voice, so close and constant, when he needs it most.
It’s not the future they envisioned, a broken world and a shattered group of people. It’s certainly not the future he thinks of now when it comes to May, after finding her again in the Framework, after falling back into the world with her. They shouldn’t be here; with her wound reopening every day and his chest aching as he moves through the dark, stale hallways of the station. He misses pie; an unopened bottle of Haig.
He sits in his bunk, staring out at the broken slabs of Earth that float past the windows. He remembers calm (or semi-calm) nights in the breakroom with the team, Mack and Daisy battling Fitz and Lance in whatever video game’s popular that month as they all watch and laugh and drink together. Even surrounded by all the people he loves, he only sits by her, their arms brushing as he watches her smile grow as the night goes on. She only smiles like this when it’s just them, their little family, gathered together in spite of the darkness that always seems to follow them.
He misses the even slower, quieter nights when it was only the two of them just talking in his quarters, May perched on the foot of his bed with a glass of wine in her hands, courtesy of Davis’ last mission in Europe. He remembers sitting at his desk with his feet propped up, laughing softly at something she’s said. Those nights always end with him wanting to reach out and squeeze her hand as she eventually walks out to get some shut-eye. Even his not-quite-real hand itches to touch her.
When Mace is promoted to director and they’re all but demoted, him on the Zephyr and her stuck shaping their strike teams into something formidable, he calls her from 30,000 feet. Time doesn’t really matter on the Zephyr, until they’ve got to touch down and hunt down a source or make contact with a potential asset. Most nights he ends up giving into the urge and calls her; realistically he knows it’s something like one in the afternoon for her, probably finding somewhere quiet and empty to eat her lunch, but the sun is setting outside the plane’s windows and his eyes are growing heavy.
She eases his mind with frustrated stories about whatever stupid thing Davis did that morning, or how Piper almost bested her while sparring. (Almost.) He settles into his bed, breathing deeply in the dark cabin, nothing but her voice in his ear.
He knows he falls asleep sometimes, laughing so quietly that she probably barely hears it before he eventually drifts off. His hand lies palm up on the bed, reaching for her. She never teases him for falling asleep, nor does she ask why he calls her to catch up if he’s just gonna fall asleep on her every time. She doesn’t ask, and he doesn’t bring it up.
After she wakes up from, well, dying at the hands of Simmons, she calls him, and it’s like nothing has changed.
“You punched me in the face. You remember that, right?”
She doesn’t say anything for a minute. “You probably deserved it.”
After she comes home from Radcliffe’s with Aida in tow, everything starts to feel stilted. He’s not sure what went wrong, and he sees her struggling with something, but then they have to collect the Koenigs and find the Darkhold again. There’s no time to pull her aside.
But then he kisses her, and it feels so perfect.
(She knows what she is now, and she knows that this hurts him, but she leans into the kiss anyway. It is wrong, wrong, wrong, but it does not feel wrong. It is only wrong to deceive him like this, but she knows there will be no second chance, not for her. Not for this version of her.)
But then she points her gun at him, and he knows.
“She means everything to me,” he says to a woman who looks like their enemy, but she is real.
He watches as their base is infiltrated, as they are betrayed at every angle. He watches their team fall apart, in the physical world and in a digital one. He is consumed by fire and rage and vengeance, but they survive it. They are together again, for one last meal atleast. He’ll buy another bottle of Haig.
But then the world goes still, and they are thrown into a time they do not understand. She is next to him, bleeding and aching, but he feels so far away. All he wants to do is gather her in his arms and kiss her, say screw you to all the things that have kept them apart, over and over. He doesn’t; instead he watches the rocks float by his window, rubbing at the center of his chest with his hand.