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For once, Peggy was grateful for her duties of filing reports and spell checking Krezminski’s atrocious grammar. She could barely keep her head up, and her leaden eyelids kept drifting closed. She would have laid her head down on the desk and slept right there if she thought she could do it without anyone noticing. Her very bones felt hollow, no longer hers. God, it had been ages since she had been this sick, and somehow she hadn’t been able to shake it all weekend. For some misguided reason she had woken up this morning sure she was going to be fine, and by the time she had walked into the SSR she had felt ready to collapse. Her desk had been waiting for her, stacked high with reports, and she had started on them without complaint, which would have been enough to tip someone off that she wasn’t well… if anyone bothered to notice her. She shook her head both to clear it of the negative thoughts and to keep herself from drifting off, then turned the page in front of her. She was just wondering how anyone could possibly think that “necessary” was spelled “nessacerie” when the scraping of a chair across the floor drew her attention. She glanced up to see Thompson dragging Daniel’s chair over to her desk. He swung it around and sat down, arms draped lazily over the back, because of course he couldn’t sit on a chair the proper way. Why anyone felt the need to sit on chairs backwards was completely beyond her, but she suspected it was some sort of male assertion of territory.
“Carter,” he said.
“Thompson,” she replied, not trying to hide the weariness in her voice. Dealing with him was quite honestly the last thing she wanted to do today.
“You doing alright?” he asked, and she looked up at him in surprise. He hastily added “Only, you look awful.” Here was something she knew what to do with. Their bickering was second nature by now, she could fire insults at Thompson in her sleep (and, on one particularly embarrassing occasion, she had).
“Charming as ever,” she said. “Don’t you have something better to be doing instead of worrying about my health?”
He glanced around the bullpen. “Nope, not really. You really do look like you crawled from the depths of hell, Carter.”
She relented with a deep sigh. “I have a cold,” she admitted. “It’s been hanging around since Friday and I can’t seem to shake it. Happy now?”
“No.” Jack frowned. “You should go home.”
“You always want me to do that,” she muttered. “I’m fine here. What if something happens?”
“I think we’ll manage without you,” he said drily.
“I don’t.” Peggy made a note next to one of the most incoherent sentences she had ever read in her life. Honestly, was Krezminski half asleep when he wrote this? She could do better, even in her current state of extreme exhaustion.
“Go home,” Jack said. “You’re of no use when you’re sick. Get better.” The strange thing was, he sounded like he actually meant it. Like maybe he actually cared. Dear lord, was she hallucinating now too? Unfortunately, hallucination or not, he was right. The letters were starting to swim across the page in front of her. She sighed and stood, swaying a little and reaching out to catch herself on the desk. Jack was there in an instant, steadying her and then stepping quickly away. She tried not to think about the warmth of his hand on her shoulder as she dragged on her coat, but her voice softened as she said “If you’re quite sure you can do without me, I think I’ll go now.”
“Good,” Jack said, and she resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Get well soon, Carter.”
“Don’t burn the office down,” were her parting words as she hurried towards the comfort of home and the warmth of her own soft bed.
Much later in the afternoon, she woke to a knock on the door. She roused herself from a deep state of something that seemed to be a little to the left of sleep and dragged on her robe. When she pulled the door open it revealed a rather nervous Jack Thompson, shuffling his feet and holding a paper bag decorated with a logo she recognized from a nearby cafe.
“I brought you soup,” he said, holding up the bag for evidence. A little worried that he was going to drop it, Peggy reached for the bag and he allowed her to take it. The thin paper was no match for the heat from the container inside and it warmed her instantly. She cradled it in her hands and stepped aside.
“Do you want to come in?”
“Nah, that’s okay,” he muttered. “Don’t wanna get you in trouble.”
“How did you get up here anyway?” Peggy asked with genuine interest. “Mrs. Fry doesn’t allow men above the first floor no matter the circumstances.”
“What can I say?” Jack shrugged and offered a slightly more sheepish version of his usual cocky smile. “I just have a way with women.” Peggy raised an eyebrow, letting it climb higher and higher until he relented. “Okay, and a badge helps move most matters along.”
“That’s a much more likely story,” Peggy said, closing the door behind him as he stepped inside. He looked around the small flat with interest, and Peggy felt her cheeks heat up slightly, despite the fact that she had almost no personal effects decorating the space. In fact, it might have been unoccupied save for the small pile of cosmetics on the vanity and the rumpled sheets on the bed, and of course the hole in the wall, although it was empty now. Still, it was the place where she spent most of her time when she wasn’t at work, and it was strange to see Jack silhouetted against the floral wallpaper. He looked painfully out of place, but she already found herself adjusting to this strange crossing of worlds. Or maybe she was just too tired to care. She cast around and found that Angie had left a chair from her last visit. Usually they just sat on Peggy’s bed, but Angie had brought takeaway (actually, from the very same restaurant that Jack had gone to) and they’d sat with their knees pressed together, trying for a sort of makeshift table. Peggy grabbed that chair and the one from her vanity and arranged them, trying to quiet the voice in her head whispering how indecent this was. After all, it wasn’t as if Jack was in any way a romantic prospect. He was just her coworker… who for some reason had showed up with soup after she took a sick day.
“Are you sure you’re not just a hallucination?” Peggy asked suspiciously as they sat down.
“One hundred percent,” Jack said with a chuckle. “Why would I be?”
“Because you’re being nice to me,” Peggy said. “And for once, I can’t think of another angle you could have, although that could just be because I’m too tired.”
“I don’t always have an angle,” he said in a quiet voice, “I was just worried.” In the soft light, he looked completely earnest, but half of his face was thrown into shadow and at this point Peggy wasn’t sure that this whole thing was not just a dream. She narrowed her eyes at him, but all she got was a headache, and she decided to just drop the subject.
“How did you fare without me there to hold the SSR together?”
“Terribly, actually,” Jack answered with a wry laugh. “I guess I didn’t know how much we needed you until you weren’t there.”
“Well, I’ll be back soon,” Peggy assured him.
“Not until you’re better, you won’t,” he was quick to say. “I’m the chief, I can handle my own office.”
“If you say so.” There her words seemed to run out, and for the life of her she could not think of a single thing to say. And yet she didn’t want him to go. She wanted him to linger, to discover what happened next when they ran out of the taunts and jabs that came so naturally to them. What would it be like, she wondered, if they could manage to cast aside the masks they wore for the rest of the world, even for just a moment? What would she see then? Something like what she saw in that plane on the way home from Russia, those old wounds still hurting like the day they were inflicted, a man who didn’t know what to do with all the guilt and shame he carried. But that was only part of what hid under his mask, because there was also a man who would notice when she was sick and bring her soup, and although it had been a surprise, she was not finding it hard to believe.
“I should probably go,” Jack said, standing. Peggy rose as well, trying to hide the wobble as she took a step. Jack noticed it, though, striding to her side and reaching out a hand without quite touching her. Perhaps he was worried that he had overstepped earlier, but she still couldn’t shake the memory of his hand on her shoulder. She wondered if they had ever touched before. She couldn’t remember. Now she reached out and placed her hand in his, holding tight, relishing the contact. When she was a girl, her mother would always be sure to hug her when she was sick, murmuring that love was the best medicine. Of course, those days had long passed, and she felt strangely empty, starved of touch. All she needed was a hug, someone to hold her while she slept. She glanced up, meeting Jack’s questioning gaze, the blue of his eyes deeper than she had ever seen it, approaching indigo, as soft as the night sky.
“Thank you for the soup,” she said softly.
“I was worried,” he repeated his words from before with a quick shrug.
“Jack Thompson? Worried about me? I didn’t know you cared.” Although she was teasing, the words couldn’t have been more true. She hadn’t known he cared, not like this. Not enough to show her.
“I care.” His voice was almost a whisper. “Peggy, I care about you.” He didn’t step away, but he shifted from one foot to the other, his apprehension written plainly across his face. Why should she care how he felt after everything he’d done to her? And yet, she did, the words washing over her like water after days in the desert.
“I would kiss you,” she murmured, “but I’m afraid I’d make you sick.”
The smile that stretched across his face was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen. He pulled her closer, gathering her into his arms, and she laid her head on his chest. He was warm, and she could hear the steady rhythm of his heartbeat.
The next morning she woke feeling better than she had in days, her head clear and her limbs light, no longer weighed down by illness. She could breathe, actually breathe through her nose, and as she stepped out into the clear morning she took a deep breath of chilly air and relished the way it burned her nose. It smelled like spring, fresh leaves and rain on pavement. The sun left a burning trail across soft pastels as it rose in the sky. Peggy smiled to herself-- she hadn’t been able to stop smiling since yesterday evening. A strange thought crossed her mind, more than a little silly, but now she couldn’t make it go away. She felt as though Jack had cured her with that one hug, which was of course completely impossible. Chiding herself for being such a foolish romantic, she went on her way.
“Morning, Carter,” Jack called as she walked in.
“Good morning, Agent Thompson,” she replied, not having to reach too hard for her usual cool,professional manner. After all, not much had changed. But she knew he cared now, and it was a nice thing to know. After a few moments, she heard a sneeze. She didn’t think much of it until she heard another one, and then another in quick succession. She glanced up to find Jack glaring at her, and couldn’t help laughing. On her way back from dropping off some files, she paused at his desk.
“Are you feeling alright?”
“You gave me your goddamn cold,” he accused. His nose was red but otherwise he looked much his normal self. Peggy was sure that would change throughout the day.
“You should rest,” she told him. “Maybe you can head it off before it really digs its claws into you.”
“Ah, I don’t mind,” Jack said with a half smile. “I’ll get through it.”
“If you’re sure…” She turned to go back to her desk, and he caught her wrist. She wondered if this was going to be normal now, the casual little touches. She didn’t suppose she’d mind if it was.
“It was worth it,” he said, only half teasing, and she sat back down to her reports with a smile on her face, scribbling a note to herself to pick up some soup along with the regular lunch orders.