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The buzz from her phone — the one not attached to Finch’s mesh network — nearly distracts Shaw enough to miss her lined up shot to the guy’s kneecap. Nearly, because she lands it perfectly anyway, but she still swears under her breath as she sets the rifle aside and digs into her pocket. A text greets her, from someone she’d immediately cast off as a one-night deal.
Hey! You still in the city?
She glares at the sender’s name and shakes her head. She still hasn’t managed the “father” conversation with Ris, after over twelve years now. How do you even start that talk? Hey, you know you have a bio-father and all? Well, he’s an international thief and might be back in town! Yeah, right.
"Is everything okay, Miss Shaw?" comes Finch’s voice over their network.
She grunts in the affirmative. “Perp’s down for the count,” she says while still staring down at her phone, then mutters under her breath, “Fucking Tomas…”
"Miss Shaw?" Finch asks again. "Did you just say Tomas? Is he there?"
"Did I hear Tomas?" Root’s voice cuts in, a slightly brittle edge to it that Shaw hasn’t heard in ages.
A sigh. “No,” she growls and shoves the phone back in her pocket, text unanswered. “We’ll talk about this later.” Probably too much to hope that everyone would just drop it without her having to explain. She could just delete the text, at least. Pretend it never happened. He won’t try again if she never replies, at least. Root and Finch would drop the subject pretty easily, probably.
She starts stripping her rifle apart to tuck it back in the case. No, she knows she can’t make that decision. She might not give a shit whether or not she ever sees Tomas again, but she’s not the one who stands to be the most impacted by his reappearance.
Her gut’s unhappy about it, but she knows what she has to do.
Root’s similarly unhappy about it, as it turns out. All that old jealousy from a long-forgotten ‘date’ comes screaming back to the forefront, and Shaw fights off an eyeroll at how obvious Root’s being right now. Like she’d everrun back to tap that again. Please.
"What are you going to do?" Root asks for the umpteenth time in the past hour alone, staring at her as they sit on Shaw’s couch.
Shaw takes a swig from her beer. “Don’t know,” she answers yet again, even though she really does. She just hasn’t psyched herself up enough yet to have that conversation with Ris.
Root looks down at her lap and plucks at some imaginary lint or something. “He’s not…” she trails off, glancing back up at Shaw through her lashes.
She looks more uncertain, fragile, than Shaw remembers seeing her in a long time. She knows what Root’s seeking — reassurance that their family dynamic that’s grown rock solid over the years won’t be thrown into disarray by the insertion of this one dude, that Shaw won’t bail on thewhatever they’ve managed to build between them. And Shaw could easily give her that reassurance, but she’s not the wild card here.
She shakes her head and finishes her beer. “I can’t decide that,” she finally says, peeling back some of the soggy label. “I won’t keep this from Ris.”
Root looks back down at her lap. “But—”
"She has to know the truth, Root," Shaw snaps, then eases off slightly. "She might not need a father, but she deserves to at least know that she has one.”
Root runs a hand shakily through her hair, then claps her hands against her legs and pulls herself off the couch. “I should go, then,” she murmurs, looking around for her jacket that she obviously knows she left draped over the bartop. “You’ll let me know how it goes?”
Shaw sets the empty bottle aside and moves to stand as well, fixing Root with a look. “It’s gonna be okay, you know that right?” she asks. “Whatever she decides, we’ll figure it out as a team.”
"Yeah…" Root whispers, sighs more like, then shuffles out the door.
With a sigh of her own, Shaw slowly makes her way down the hall to Ris’s room, and knocks gently on the partially open door. “You got a minute, kiddo?”
"Yeah, mom!" Ris calls back, and Shaw nudges the door open to find her diligently scribbling away in a notebook.
Now or never.
The door stands before her, a foreboding 5B gleaming under the bright hallway light. It’s stupid, really, that she’s been standing here for a good five minutes and hasn’t knocked. She’s faced down Samaritan operatives, an angry Control, and unrelenting gunfire, and this is what gives her the most pause. Still, something shifted tonight, and it isn’t something she could just discuss over the phone. Has to be in person. Has to be now. She forces her arm to lift and hand to rap against the door.
Maybe ten seconds pass, tops, before it swings open to reveal Root’s anxious face. “Hey,” she breathes, the corners of her lips twitching in something that Shaw’s not quite sure whether frown or smile.
"Hey," Shaw says in far more abrupt fashion, jamming her hands into her peacoat pockets. "Can I…?"
Those lips definitely curve slightly upward now, and Root inches aside to let Shaw squeeze past.
Shaw stands in the middle of Root’s tiny living room, fixing her gaze on a group photo of the entire team with Ris that Root’s gotten framed at some point. It grounds her in the moment somewhat, helps her breathe easier. “We talked, Ris and I,” she starts.
Shaw feels Root step up next to her, feels her eyes scanning everywhere, but Root doesn’t say anything in reply. Like she’s waiting for Shaw to suck it up and give her the worst news ever, and maybe not speaking might drag out the remaining time before the box opens on that decision.
"She understands," Shaw finally continues, breaking off to turn and face Root properly. "But she doesn’t want to meet him. Said she already has more than enough family for one girl."
A thousand emotions crawl over Root’s face all at once, and she heaves a shaky laugh. A few beats pass of them just looking at each other, soaking in that probably mutual relief. “Will you tell him?” Root eventually asks.
Shaw looks down at the floor and licks her dry lips as she considers. “I don’t know,” she murmurs. “Might be better to not tell him. It’s been years and she’s not interested anyway.” She nods to herself and glances back up to meet Root’s watery gaze.
Root looks for a half second like she’s about to lunge at Shaw, but then she blinks. “Wait…where is Parisa?” She glances back at her front door.
"She’s with Reese and Zoe tonight," Shaw says, a smirk forming. "I called him after our talk and said we’d probably need some alone time."
Reese’s gruff, "Say no more, please," anytime she says alone time will always make her snicker, even if this time she really did mean just having the night to hash everything out with Root and relax afterward.
Root matches her smirk and almost starts to say something that Shaw’s certain will contain the word zipties, but Shaw claps a hand over her mouth. “Can we just…watch a movie or something?” she asks, then removes the hand. “It’s kind of been a day.”
Their smirks ease into soft smiles, and Root gives her a slight nod of her head. “Absolutely, Sameen.”