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Annie gets shot – or does she? Jai can’t tell in the confusion but she’s falling and he wants to yell “agent down”, except what good would that do right now – and Jai is glad to let his training take over.
Auggie hears the gunshot ring in his ear, a grunt and then nothing more from Annie. He calls out her name but gets no answer. He thinks please, please, no.
There is only silence from Annie.
For Auggie, it comes with the job to assume the worst. The CIA isn’t exactly the place to stay optimistic, but Annie is one of the least disillusioned people he knows, himself included. He likes that about her.
Jai sacrificed a two hundred and thirty dollar jacket to stop the blood flow from Annie’s shoulder. He doesn’t mind at all.
Sometimes, Auggie is glad he can’t see Jai and Annie. Their low voices tell him more than he wants to know. He imagines them standing too close together; every time he hears the shifting of fabric, he imagines Jai’s hand on her shoulder, the uninjured one.
Joan tells Annie to translate this and that snippet of information that other agents got their hands on during field work, and Annie sighs. “I hate this.”
“Welcome to my world,” Auggie tells her and he’s had years of practice at keeping the longing out of his words so it comes across like he meant it: jokingly, lightening up the atmosphere. Annie stops tapping her fingers on her desk.
She laughs, but he knows she got the point.
Annie is excused from coffee runs, because she can’t carry more than two cups at a time. When she goes for a refill, though, she always brings Auggie a fresh cup as well.
Auggie is usually up to date on rumours, because people mention things in his presence. Everyone trusts the blind guy. There’s one that says Jai and Annie left together last night and one girl thinks they’d have the prettiest babies together.
Auggie doesn’t know if it’s true. He doesn’t want to ask and Annie doesn’t tell.
It makes Auggie wonder, would it destroy their friendship?
It’s not like Auggie’s in love, or even heartbroken.
Auggie can hold his liquor well, but even he has his limits – not that he is drunk, but he passed sober quite a while ago. Annie gives him a ride home and comes up, as she usually does. Auggie has beer in the fridge.
“I hate having to sit at that desk all day,” Annie sighs and then stops, backpedals. Auggie tries to give her credit for her immediate “I’m sorry, I—“. His skin feels too tight, itches.
I want, he thinks and stops himself. This, all of it, everything would be so much easier if he could see and he can’t stop himself from wishing for that. He puts his hand out, feels his way towards her until his fingers connect with her hair, her jaw, then the back of her head.
Annie’s breath catches in her throat.
He can’t tell who kissed whom first and he doesn’t care.
Annie’s hair makes a soft noise when Auggie runs his hands through it and the same noise, almost inaudible, when she’s wearing it down. It’s hard to hear in a room full of people, but it makes Auggie think of how it feels under his fingertips.
He thinks of the curve of her waist and adds the sighs she makes when kissed just right to his collection of kitten heels clicking on the ground and grapefruit-scent.
Jai and Annie are talking and laughing together and a small part of Auggie resents it, twists painfully. Auggie never thought of himself as the jealous type, so the feeling puzzles him.
“I know you don’t like Jai,” Annie says, “but he’s really not that bad. He’s a good agent and not as macho as you think.”
Auggie wants to disagree with her, argue Jai’s many flaws and finds he can’t.
She doesn’t call out Ben’s name, or Jai’s. Auggie wasn’t worried, but still, it gives him a certain satisfaction.
Eventually, Annie gets cleared for field duty. If Auggie thought he was worried about her before, the first time they lose contact now gives him a whole new perspective on the word ‘worry’.
He is glad for every time Jai is with her. Auggie trusts Jai to do his best to keep her safe – what he doesn’t quite trust yet are Jai’s reasons.
She goes home with him more often than not. He likes her breathless laughter and imagines that her smile could light up any room.
Sometimes, it feels like something is missing. He holds her a little closer, then, and wonders why this is not enough when it should be. Most of the time, it is.
If she notices it too, she doesn’t say.
“Jai kissed me.” Annie sounds confused.
Auggie wants to hug her, hit Jai, hit her, hug Jai and thoughts of why and how and what happened tumble through his head. He doesn’t know how to react.
Jai kissed her and Annie liked it. That, she thinks, could be a problem.
Annie and Jai are spending more and more time together.
Auggie minds; he should mind, he does mind, but not as much as he thinks he should.
“Something’s wrong,” Auggie says and Annie can’t help but agree. She likes him – more, maybe, than she cares to admit to herself, not after Ben – but doesn’t know if that’s enough. It seems like it isn’t.
They lie in his bed and cling to each other, as if everything would go away if they only held on tightly enough.
“You can—if, if you want, with Jai,” Auggie says and chokes on the words.
Annie shakes her head, at least he thinks that what she’s doing. “I don’t—“ she whispers, but it doesn’t sound like she believes herself.
Annie takes Auggie home and introduces him. Her sister is delighted.
Auggie doesn’t know what it means that he’s here, if it’s an apology, a last attempt, what Annie honestly wants or all of the above.
Annie thinks it must make her a terrible person, to have a gorgeous, sweet and all-around great boyfriend and to find that it’s not enough.
She wants Jai, but she would never give up Auggie. The mere thought makes her stomach churn.
“Happy birthday,” Auggie wishes Jai and is surprised to find that he means it. He’s even more surprised that by the time Annie walks into the bar, he and Jai have emptied more drinks than he is willing to count (plausible deniability, if you will), are sitting to close and he’s having a really good time. Auggie didn’t expect that at all.
When Annie sees them – sitting, touching and laughing – she doesn’t know whether to feel hopeful or abandoned.
“How are my two favourite guys doing?” she asks as she sits down and when she smiles with it, she finds she really means it.
Jai actually understands what Auggie is talking about when Annie is still grasping for enough technological knowledge to follow his words. They can make each other laugh and both of the men manage to cheer Annie up almost every time. She tries to do the same for them.
Auggie’s always been the one she trusted most of all her colleagues, but in the field, there’s no one she’d rather have by her side than Jai.
They can both make Annie blush, but she gives as good as she gets. A part of Auggie is still wary of Jai, but it’s making itself heard less and less often.
Jai is still trying to find his place in an agency that has a role assigned for him he is not sure he wants; Auggie, no matter how much he likes his work, is stuck at a desk because of blindness and protocol; and Annie doesn’t want to use the word love because it might get her burnt again.
It shouldn’t work, but somehow, it does.