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They don’t keep secrets from each other.
Except as it turns out, they actually do.
He didn’t tell her about Alice. She didn’t tell him about Shin.
He doesn’t tell her how walking in on them kissing in her office was like a dagger to the heart, how watching them dance together made him feel so incredibly sad, even as she looked so happy.
He wants her to be happy but knows that she’s slipping through his fingers. He’s thrilled to pieces when he finds out she and Shin have broken up, but it is only the briefest respite. He knows all too well that if Shin didn’t stick, someone else will, sooner or later. That mad psychic will be right. He’ll lose her.
It’s not that he doesn’t know how he feels about her; nothing could be clearer. She’s the most beautiful, miraculous, inspiring thing. She’s pulled him back from the brink a dozen times over. He’s madly, stupidly in love with her.
She’s got him questioning what he believes about love and marriage. When he committed to Georgia to the exclusion of all others, he meant it. He never thought for a moment that there was anybody else in the world he could ever love so dearly.
And then he walked into New Amsterdam.
And there she was.
He accepts now that he probably fell for her the instant they met, even if he didn’t realize it. It took him a long time to be okay with that. There was a lot of guilt he had to work through, concerning Georgia (who he really did love too). But in the end there was no denying it.
Helen gets him. She excites him. She soothes him. She challenges him.
He’s crazy about her. If only he could get his shit together long enough to tell her so.
Max has addressed conferences, board meetings, members of government and the press. He thinks he’s pretty good at talking people into things, and he’s been told he’s an engaging and dynamic speaker. Of course, nobody who has ever told him that has witnessed the tongue-tied rambling mess he turns into around Helen. It always starts the same way, when there’s something important he wants to say, something he needs her to understand. And he’ll start, and it’ll be fine. And she’ll stand and wait, and she’s just so beautiful, and it’s a different kind of beautiful than Georgia was, but with the same ability to knock him on his ass.
It’s something in her eyes, something in her smile. It’s her effortless elegance and poise that seems to sap him of whatever eloquence he ever had, until he’s standing there gibbering away like a teenager trying to talk to the coolest girl in school. They’re not even complete sentences half the time, just jumbles of random words, and she looks at him like he’s some kind of lunatic (and well she might, as apparently he doesn’t possess the ability to string a sentence together when she’s around.)
He can talk about her with no problem at all.He’ll give her all the credit in the world for saving his life, tell anyone who’ll listen about what a fantastic doctor, friend and person she is. He’s defended her to the hilt when she ran afoul of the hospital board; he could talk about her all day if someone would let him, and if it wouldn’t make him seem as pathetic as he already knows he is. But when it comes to telling her how much she means to him, his brain lets him down.
One of the worst parts about not having her as his deputy anymore is that he now has far fewer legitimate reasons to see her during the day.
So, he has to rely on Fate’s intervention that they’ll both be roaming the halls at the same time and he’ll run into her. More often than not, one or both of them are in too much of a hurry to be able to stop, but it lifts his spirits anyway, when he sees her. Sometimes it’s just the clicking of her heels, or a flash of her long braids as she turns a corner, but it’s still comforting, knowing she’s around.
Of course, a normal person would simply send her a text and ask her if she wants to hang out one night after work, but he knows she’s got her hands full with her niece. And he understands that her priority is with her right now, just as his is with Luna.
But God, he misses her.
He misses having ironclad excuses to have her all to himself, the way she rolls her eyes in fond exasperation when he drops this week’s brainwave on her. He misses striding around the hospital with her at his side. He misses the way they can have conversations with just their eyes.
They could be together now. She as good as told him after Castro left how she felt about him, and it was thrilling. She didn’t actually say the words, but she said enough.
It was never a question of not loving her back, she had a hold on him the moment he set eyes on her, but he wasn’t ready then, and it’s been a year now. She’s dated someone else, taken in her niece, the pandemic happened. Her whole life has changed. She might not feel that way about him anymore. He acknowledges that it’s entirely possible that he may have missed his chance with her.
But Max Goodwin is nothing if not an optimist. Even if he’s right, and the ship has sailed, he knows he’ll never be able to rest unless he tries. He knows the onus is on him to break the stalemate they’ve fallen into. Somehow, he has to find the words.
It’s not a particularly special day when he finally decides that it’s time to fess up.
He wakes up alone in an empty bed, same as every day, feeds Luna alone, hands her over to his mother-in-law, walks to work alone.
He’s tired of being alone.
He sees her buying a coffee at Pan De Vie. She waves. Smiles at him. His heart skips a few beats. He can’t stop, he’s got a budget meeting this morning, which she’s no longer invited to because she’s not his deputy anymore.
It’s a wrench to walk away from her.
It would be so nice to not have to walk away from her. To maybe even arrive with her in the morning and leave with her at night. For people to see them together. A couple. He’d be the luckiest man on Earth to have that privilege, and for all he knows, the only thing that’s standing in his way is himself. It’s time to be brave.
The day passes. He finds her on their rooftop, her eyes closed, enjoying the last warmth of the afternoon sun. She doesn’t even bother to open her eyes; she knows it’s him. It’s their spot. The light sets a soft golden glow on the New York city skyline, but it’s not even half as radiant as she is.
“Long day?” he asks.
She sighs. “They all are.”
“Big plans tonight?”
She chuckles. “Yeah, sitting at home, watching the British soaps, while Mina’s off God-knows-where with God-knows-who.”
“I’ll see your wayward niece and raise you a toddler who refuses to eat her dinner, and only ever wants to hear the same bedtime story over and over again. If I ever come across The Very Hungry Caterpillar in real life, I can’t guarantee I won’t step on it out of spite.” He loves Luna more than anything, but he never counted on being a single parent, in a pandemic no less. He always assumed Georgia would be around, to share in the burdens and the triumphs. But at least he has Helen. It’s not quite the same, she’s raising a teenager, but at least he has someone to sound off to about the constant surprises of parenting, good and bad.
“Trust me, you’ll miss this when she’s out at all hours, not answering your texts and judging your every move.” Helen opens her eyes finally, and at all once he feels like he’s falling into their deep brown depths. He’s spent a lot more time gazing into those eyes than he probably should have, especially when he was still a married man.
If they’re together, he expects he’ll have license to look into her eyes all he wants. All he has to do is tell her how he feels and pray to every deity in existence that he isn’t too late.
“Helen?”
“Hmm?”
“I’ve got something to tell you.”
Okay, that was a good start. Clear. Direct. He sees her stiffen, and knows she’s bracing herself for bad news. Maybe she thinks he’s quitting, or his cancer’s back. “It’s not bad,” he hastens to reassure her. “At least, I hope you don’t think it is. I really hope so.” he adds as an afterthought.
One of the many qualities about her that he loves is how expressive she is. He can see the interplay on her face as she processes his words. The alarm that was there is starting to yield to confusion, apprehension, maybe even (though he could be projecting here) a little bit of hope?
“Okay,” she says, watching him closely. “Floor’s yours, Max.”
He takes a deep breath.
“Helen,” he begins, “I just-uh-I mean I want to-uh-I mean you are- “ It’s starting, the babbling. There’s so much he wants to say to her, and it’s like it’s all fighting to come out at the same time. He really should have taken some time to plan. Too late now.
She’s peering at him curiously. He swallows. Takes a breath. Tries again.
“We-we’re friends, right?” She raises her eyebrows at him, and he can’t really blame her. Of course they’re friends. He shouldn’t have to ask. He isn’t surprised when she elects not to dignify that piece of idiocy with a response. “Of course, right, that was stupid. I know we’re friends, I’m glad we’re friends. I mean I think we’ve always been friends-at least nobody else would put up with me like you do, well except Brantley I guess, but she only does it because it’s her job, you know sometimes I honestly think if she could get away with it she’d kill me and – “
“Max,” Helen’s gentle reproof cuts him off, and he glances guiltily at her.
“Sorry.” She shakes her head in a fond sort of way but doesn’t say anything else. He knows what she’s doing; giving him a chance to gather his thoughts, understanding, like she always does, exactly what he needs.
He does not deserve her.
“I-uh, I-uh, I mean, do you-uh…” He grunts in frustration. What is this drivel that is coming out of his mouth? And to think he was worried about putting a sentence together, right now he can barely get out a word. She’s looking up at him expectantly, and he’s looking down at her face and all he can think about is how it would feel to kiss those lips, caress her skin. He feels his fingers twitch a little as though they’re itching to try.
She waits, patiently. Somehow, that makes him feel even worse, because he feels like he’s always making her wait. Their relationship, it’s like it’s all about him. Waiting for him to beat the cancer. Waiting for him to grieve Georgia. Waiting for him to pluck up the courage to speak up.
“Did I ever tell you,” he begins again, determined to get this right, “you are the most important person in my life? Along with Luna,” he hastens to clarify.
This seems to surprise her, and now he thinks about it, that’s probably the most direct thing he’s ever said about how he feels about her.
“Not in so many words,” she answers him, gently, and he can see a hint of a smile, which warms his heart.
“Well, you are,” he emphasizes, perhaps unnecessarily. “And you, you mean more to me than you could ever possibly know.” He doesn’t make a conscious decision to reach for her hand, but it happens anyway. She allows him to take it, and as his fingers entwine with hers, he knows he doesn’t ever want to let go. The last time he felt like this was on this very same rooftop, holding her close to him, marveling at how wonderful she’d felt in his arms. They’d nearly kissed, he could feel it in the air; and he’d wanted to so badly. Twice he’s been in a situation where he could have kissed her, and both times he shied away. He regretted it bitterly in both cases, but in the moment, he just hadn’t been able to bring himself to do it.
“You’re important to me too, Max,” she says. “You know that.”
“I know.” He does. She’s sacrificed a lot for him, over the years they’ve known each other. He owes her more than just his life. He owes her his job, his sanity, and his ability to be a semi-functional parent to Luna.
He squeezes her hand. She smiles at him, eyelashes aflutter. She can’t possibly know what it does to him when she bats her eyes at him like that, it’s like the bottom of his stomach drops out. And the worst part is, he’s fairly sure she doesn’t even realize she’s doing it.
He has to tell her. Now.
“Helen, I…” Her thumb is slowly traveling over the back of his hand, and he loses his train of thought, yet again.
“It’s just me, Max,” she says, quietly. “Whatever it is, you can tell me.”
They’ve done this dance before. This would normally be the point in the conversation where one of them loses their nerve, makes some offhand comment about being friends, and they both back off. Already he can feel every instinct in his body screaming at him to pull back, to stop before he goes over the cliff, but he recognizes it for what it is, fear. Fear that she might not be where he is anymore, or worse still, that she was never there to begin with. That he misread everything, right from the get-go. But he can’t put this off any longer.
“We’ve been through a lot together, you and I,” he says. “And I don’t know if you’ll ever truly appreciate how crucial you were to me being able to stand here today and have this conversation with you. You…you deserve to know…you have to know…. I’ve been trying for months to be able to tell you-“ Again, the words are failing him. How can he adequately express to her how he feels for her in just a few short sentences? She makes him feel everything more acutely, joy, anger, sadness, hope, passion, frustration and everything in between.
The hand not holding hers comes up to gently caress the side of her face. She makes no move to stop him, instead closes her eyes and leans into his touch. He takes that as an encouraging sign.
He can do this. He can.
“I…I…” He exhales, gathering all his courage, praying the right words will come. She must sense something, as her eyes snap open. He can feel her trembling, wonders if her heart is pounding like his is right now. She fixes her gaze on his, he feels himself start to unravel. If he doesn’t do it soon it’ll just be another wasted moment.
“I…I…I…” It’s like his brain has stalled on that one word, like it’s caught in some kind of frustrating loop. And now she’s starting to look concerned, like there’s something wrong with him, which to be frank, there probably is. Words clearly aren’t cutting it. He has to do something. Like so many times before, his gaze falls to her luscious-looking lips. He’s always wanted to kiss them.
Does he dare?
To his dying day, he’ll never know what finally compels him to lean in (slowly and deliberately so she’s got time to pull away if she wants to) and press his lips to hers for the first time.
It’s soft. Light. Barely there. A brush of his lips against hers that’s over almost as soon as it starts. He pulls away, searching her eyes frantically for her reaction.
She looks shellshocked. Not happy, not angry, just stunned and he immediately thinks that this is the end; he’s blown it. Seconds pass that feel like hours, and he’s torn between the urge to babble an apology to her, and the urge to run for the hills.
And then, in one sudden, swift motion, she steps forward, grabs him by the front of his shirt and drags him back towards her until his mouth is on hers again, and then she’s kissing him with so much passion it floors him. Encouraged by her enthusiasm, he starts to kiss her back, and it’s like a dam breaking. Three years of repressed longing and sorrow and heartbreak seem to be pouring out of him, as he kisses her and kisses her till he’s gasping for breath. She’s in his arms, he can smell her perfume, and she tastes so good he could kiss her forever. The need to breathe eventually outweighs the need to keep kissing her, and he reluctantly pulls away.
“Thank God,” he splutters, once he starts to get his breath back, and his mind clears enough to process what’s happened. He kissed her, she kissed him back. He wasn’t too late. “I thought maybe…you don’t have to, just because I do, but if you do, do you think we-could I- is it just me, or do you feel it too?”
Her eyes are slightly glazed, she’s gasping too, and her lipstick is just a tiny bit smudged. But she smiles at him and throws herself forward until she’s hugging him tightly, and he can feel her heart racing. “Yes. Always,” she whispers.
“Me too,” he confesses. “Right from the beginning.”
And it seems like that’s all that needs to be said, for now. All day he’s been grappling with the right words to say, while forgetting one vitally important thing. This is Helen, his best friend in the world, his confidante, his greatest support system, they don’t need something as pedestrian as words to know how much they mean to one another. It’s there when they laugh together, when they talk about their children, even when they’re arguing.
One day, he vows, she’ll know everything. She’ll know that he held back all these years mostly out of guilt, because he fell in love with her while still married to Georgia, and he thinks on some level, Georgia might have known that. She’ll know that the day he found out about her seeing Shin, he went home, fell face down on his bed and stayed there for an hour, bemoaning the fact that he’d lost her to another man. She’ll know that she draws his eye, wherever she is in his periphery, she’ll know his favorite perfume of hers is the one she wears on Thursdays, and that even though she must be uncomfortable, he really appreciates it when she wears high heels to work because they make her legs look amazing.
One day soon, he’ll get his act together enough to be able to tell her, outright, like a grownup, that he loves her. She deserves to hear him say it, and she will. But for right now, she knows, even if he can’t verbalize it. And miracle of miracles, she loves him too. He can feel it. For now, that’s enough.
And then they’re kissing again, and stumbling backwards until she’s got her back against the fence, clutching him to her, and she moans into his mouth, and it’s probably the most beautiful sound he’s ever heard in his life, because he made it happen. He gently sweeps her hair aside and kisses her neck, lets his lips trail over her jawline, her cheek, exploring every inch of her beautiful face. For her part, she’s running her hands all over him, nipping at his skin, her warm breath tickling his ear.
“We can’t stay here,” she manages to gasp, as he locates a sensitive spot on her neck and concentrates on kissing it. “Someone might see.”
To be frank, as long as he can keep kissing her, he doesn’t much care who sees, but knows that she will. She has a reputation to uphold, one that that could be damaged if they’re found in flagrante, and other people do come up here sometimes. And well, now that he thinks about it, the prospect of continuing this somewhere with no possible risk of interruption is enticing.
“Your place?” he suggests, fingers brushing against soft, warm skin where her blouse has ridden up slightly, and marveling at the fact that he’s allowed to touch her there. He imagines himself undoing each button, one by one, and peeling it away from her. He’s itching for more of her, to taste her, to feel her.
“Mina,” she sighs against his lips, pressing herself against him, and he understands immediately. He isn’t all that enthused about this happening with a teenager in the next room either. And Helen always says she doesn’t know where Mina might be at any given moment, so there’s a not insignificant chance she might walk in on them. “Your place?”
“Gwen.”
He can’t bring another woman home to where his dead wife’s mother is babysitting his child, he just can’t. Even if he tries to pass it off as just a friendly visit, Gwen will know. She’s always seen straight through him. And while he knows that they’ll have to cross paths eventually, if Helen’s going to be his girlfriend (and isn’t that an amazing thought?) it isn’t going to be tonight.
“Your office?” he suggests instead. It’s closer than his, and it has a couch. “We’ll just lock the door.”
She giggles. “That’s romantic. Way to sweep me off my feet, Max.” She’s right, in realizes, in shame. That makes him sound like some lout looking for nothing but a lay. Idiot. He opens his mouth to apologize, and she rolls her eyes fondly at him, and drowns whatever crap he was going to say with another kiss.
He can’t imagine ever getting enough of her kisses; they’re intoxicating.
“I’m kidding, you moron,” she says in a low voice. “I don’t care where we go. And I know this is a big step for you. So let me make something totally clear. I want to be alone with you. I want you to keep kissing me as long as you want.” She takes one of his hands and guides it under the hem of her skirt, so it sweeps its way up her smooth thigh. “And I want you to touch me, Max. Wherever you want.” She says it in an unbelievably breathy tone, that turns him on even more than he already is. And his name on her lips is pure sex. “And if that’s it for now, then that’s fine by me.”
Somehow she’s giving voice to a fear he hadn’t even realized he was having yet. This is moving fast, maybe too fast. They’ve waited so long for this, he doesn’t want their first time to be a quickie on her office couch, regardless of how badly he wants her, the evidence of which she must feel by now, pressed together as they are.
“It’s not that I don’t want to,” he hastens to assure her.
“Oh, I know.” Her eyes are alight with mischief and damn it if he doesn’t fall in love with her even more. “I got that.” Her eyes quickly flick downwards, and he instantly knows exactly what she means. “We’ll figure this out, just like we do everything else,” she reassures him. “And when we’re both ready, then we’ll see about taking it to the next level.”
He somehow gathers the presence of mind to nod. It’s a relief to let her take control, in fact it’s all manner of hot. And as if he could deny her anything she wanted right now, or ever. He’d tell her that she has his permission to have her wicked way with him however she sees fit, but once again, the words escape him. So, he settles for simplicity instead.
“I’m at your mercy, Helen Sharpe.”
“I’ll hold you to that.”
She kisses him hard one more time.