Archive of Our Own

October 5, 2016, New York City, New York

-

The embrace turns from warm and safe into a cage, trapping her, holding her captive, in the matter of an instant. 

Nothing changes about the embrace. Nothing changes about the way Roy holds her. The shift is purely internal, flooding Riza’s system with cold fear. Her body and her mind warn her, this touch is going to start hurting. Her body and her mind scream warnings, even though she knows it is irrational. Owen will see this, and both of us are going to suffer the consequences.

Riza steps away from Roy. “You need to go.” Talking makes her jaw throb. She bows her head, her hair falling forward to hide her face. (She has always been so observant, but she can barely manage to grasp onto any information today. One of those rare, fleeting catches was the horror on Breda’s face, and then Roy’s, when they saw hers.) “You need to get back to your schedule for the day. The debate is in two days.”

The debate is in two days. Their whole team has recited this countdown for the past month. 

Roy ignores her. He moves toward the kitchen table and pulls a chair out. He gestures to it, indicating that she should sit. This time, Riza ignores him. “The debate is in two days,” she repeats. 

Her tone is flat. It is all she can wrap her mind around right now. She can’t think of Owen, and what happened last night. She can’t think of the way she spent the rest of the night afterward, curled up under the covers and hugging a pillow and weeping until she hoped to die, just for a release from the pain. She can’t think of calling out of work this morning, and Breda showing up at the house unannounced, and his reaction when he saw her.

Riza can’t think of any of that. She can think of the campaign. She can think of the debate. She can think about the fourth of November.

“I will get back to my schedule for the day.” Roy speaks slowly, patiently. Normally there is an authoritative edge to his voice when he gives commands. That edge is gone now.  “But I need to talk to you first.”

Long years of experience have taught her that sometimes Roy gets set on things, ideas, and he clings to them as obsessively as a dog with a bone. Sometimes he can be persuaded to put his fixation aside for a short time. Riza can tell by the way he carries himself that today is not one of those times. 

The expression on his face is tense; tightly drawn. She could push him to get back to work, but then he might snap at her. A year and a half ago, that wouldn’t have given Riza pause. Now, the thought is terrifying.

She takes one step forward, and then another, and sinks down into the chair. Roy pulls one of the other chairs close and sits in front of her, so close their knees are almost touching. Riza can’t look him in the eye. She takes in fragments of him instead. Black suit pants and coat, matching shoes, silver-gray dress shirt and black tie. 

“Tell me what’s been going on.” 

Riza doesn’t know where to begin. She remains silent.

That isn’t true. She does know where to begin. With those three words that tore their lives asunder.

“The diagnosis.” Her throat aches. Riza reaches up to massage it. “The brain injury.”

Her speech is humiliatingly stilted. Her old stammer comes back. Roy listens with the utmost patience to every stiff and disjointed sentence until the floodgates break, and it all starts flowing out of her. Every incident that she hasn’t spoken of to anybody - not Owen’s doctors or therapists, not even Rebecca. The issues with emotional regulation, the jealousy, the accusations, the outbursts, the aggression. 

It started small. Backing her against a wall. Taking hold of her face to make her look up at him. Grabbing her wrist or her arm when she tried to walk away from him and give him a chance to cool down. Dragging her back to him. 

(Riza wore long-sleeved blouses throughout the summer. When Falman commented on it, she said it was because the air-conditioner was always set too low.)

It frightened her. She told herself it wouldn’t escalate. She told herself that right up until last night.

In spite of Roy’s well-publicized struggles with anger management over the years, he isn’t anything but quiet and calm now. The pity and the concern and the sorrow as he looks at her makes Riza feel all of an inch tall. She feels small and weak, pathetic and pitiable. How did she, of all people, ever get reduced to this? 

(During Roy’s tenure as the representative of NY-14, and then as New York’s junior senator, both of them visited crisis centers serving women who were survivors of domestic abuse. Roy co-sponsored House Bill 4471, Kara’s Law, for survivors of domestic violence. She had never thought - never in a million years - that one day, she would be--)

“I know you want to stay.” Roy still sounds so patient. So gentle. “But if you do, this will happen again. Or something worse.”

The argument that no, it won’t, no, this doesn’t have to happen again, no, we can change things, or even, no, I can deal with this, it isn’t that bad, dies in Riza’s throat. She listened to those presentations at the crisis centers. She knows the statistics about women and domestic violence. She knows how it escalates. It’s just a slap, and he’ll never do it again, giving way to more violent assaults, to choking, to cause of death: strangulation listed on the coroner’s report.  

“It’s my responsibility to look out for all of you. I can’t let you remain in this situation, Riza.”

Roy remains calm and quiet. Riza realizes he is making an effort, for her sake. They have been friends for sixteen years. She knows what his instincts are as well as she knows her own. By now, he would normally be on his feet, a muscle twitching in his jaw as he ordered Breda to escort her back to the house, and ordered her to pack her things and get out.

“I made vows,” Riza repeats, as she had earlier. Before she started weeping, before Roy held her in his arms. “In sickness and in health. And this - this is a sickness.”

Her face crumples again. It hurts so badly. She knows Roy is right. All women know this - should know it, at least. The first time he hits you, you leave. You don’t allow a second time. 

But this isn’t like other situations. Owen didn’t drink too much and lose his temper with her. This is just because of the injury. It isn’t his fault.

A muscle twitches in Roy’s jaw. “Yes, it is,” he says tersely. “But Owen’s sickness could hurt you. It could kill you. I can’t allow that.”

He leans forward, looking her in the eyes so intently that Riza can’t break his gaze. “You’ve been at my back for the past sixteen years. You’ve listened to every order I’ve given you. Think of this as an order, too. You are going to leave,” Roy stresses. “We are going to get your things out of the house as soon as we leave here. We are going to get you somewhere safe by this evening, and we are going to place a call to my divorce lawyer.”

Sixteen years ago, Roy carried her free of the explosion that claimed the lives of the rest of her sniper team in Afghanistan. Riza stares at him mutely now. The sensitive skin at the back of her neck prickles. She thinks, briefly, irrationally, he might have just saved her life again.

“I.” Riza’s reply is wooden. At least she doesn’t stutter. 

Roy frowns. “What?”

“I will do those things. You need to get back to work.” It is very important that Roy gets back to work. She will never, ever be able to forgive herself if this - episode - ends up distracting him and derailing his performance at the debate. “You said you would get back to work.”

Roy’s shoulders relax, ever so slightly. “I will. I’m going to call Rebecca. Is that all right?”

Riza’s stomach turns. Rebecca. The thought of explaining herself to Rebecca makes her insides roil. She has hidden so many things from her best friend over the past year. 

“I’m going to ask Falman to come too,” Roy adds quietly. 

Riza closes her eyes. She nods. Roy steps out of the kitchen to make the call. She wraps her arms around herself. It’s all she can do to just keep breathing, in and out. The succession of orders Roy gave her are nearly as frightening and impossible as the orders she was handed as a soldier. 

She is going to call a divorce lawyer. She remembers the afternoon she married Owen, in their simple backyard ceremony. It was the happiest day of her life. 

I want to die, Riza thinks, with sudden clarity. I wish I were dead.

There is a warm, heavy weight around her shoulders. She flinches back, and Roy steps away from her, stricken. “Sorry.”

He had dropped a blanket, a knit throw from the living room, around her shoulders. Riza draws it closer around herself. “Are you going to go back to work?” It is very important that Roy gets back to work. She never wanted to be a burden to him. Glancing at the clock on the wall shows her that it is almost three hours - almost three hours - since she arrived at Breda’s house this morning and he called Roy. 

“I will, once Rebecca and Falman arrive.” Roy fills the electric kettle on the counter with water. “There are things that are more important than work.”

Riza shakes her head mutely, rejecting that possibility. She is halfway through her mug of tea when the front door opens and closes, and she hears the low murmur of Breda and Falman’s voices. Breda has stayed in the front room the entire time, guarding the front door, making and taking phone calls in a hushed voice.

Falman enters, a nondescript army green duffel bag slung over his shoulder. The duffel appears like nothing more than a nondescript weekender bag. Only Roy’s staff is aware of the wealth of medical equipment and supplies inside. 

“Thank you for coming.” Roy pulls over another chair for Falman.

Falman is paler than usual. Riza can’t bring herself to greet him. “You are welcome. Rebecca should be here shortly. Her car was just a few behind mine in traffic.”

He sits in front of her. “May I?” he asks, with his typical careful manner. He may no longer be practicing, but for as long as she has known him, Riza has wished that all doctors were as respectful in their demeanor. 

Riza inclines her head.

Falman tries to be gentle. His touch still sends agony lancing through her face. Riza rears back, a tiny hiss of pain escaping her clenched teeth. Beside her, Roy makes a small, strangled sound.

Falman apologizes, his mouth turning down in utter misery. “It’s all right,” Riza manages. “I’ll stay still. Try again.”

Falman examines the left side of her face with the utmost caution, and Riza tries not to whimper. “No facial fractures,” he declares at last, pulling away. 

Riza realizes, belatedly, that the fingers of her right hand curled around the sleeve of Roy’s suit coat, holding onto him like a child seeking comfort during a flu shot. He hadn’t dislodged her, and so she makes the effort to let go of him. “When will it heal?” The bruises on her arms were one thing, but this is much worse. Almost nightmarishly worse. She can’t go out in public like this, let alone to work in her public- and media-facing job. 

Falman hesitates. “It could take ten to fourteen days.”

The front door slams so loudly that they all jump. “That will be Rebecca,” Falman announces unnecessarily. 

Riza doesn’t wear much makeup ( who are you trying to look so good for? She closes her eyes tight.) But Rebecca does. Rebecca can cover up the bruises and she can go back to work. If not today, then tomorrow. 

Rebecca hurries into the kitchen in a cloud of her signature Dior perfume. Breda or Roy must have warned her on the phone. She still freezes in her path before continuing forward. She doesn’t say anything, for once. She just bends and hugs Riza very tenderly, and Riza leans into her. She bites the inside of her cheek to keep herself from crying. If she starts to cry now, she will never stop. 

Rebecca finally releases her, and looks at Roy. “Stuff, lawyer, apartment,” she recites. 

“That’s right. I can stay to make sure--”

“No,” Riza interrupts, more forcefully than she has all day. “I’ve kept you long enough.”

“Breda and I have this under control.” Rebecca gives him an encouraging nod. 

Roy doesn’t move. “Call me if you need anything. Anything,” he emphasizes. 

“We will,” Riza says. “Now go. Tell the team that I’m sorry.”

“I’m not going to do that. Don’t worry about work. Don’t think about work at all.” Roy stands and rests a hand on her shoulder. His purposeful stride is slowed as he leaves the kitchen, his shoulders a little slumped, like he carries the weight of the world on them. 

He stops at the threshold and looks back at her. Riza summons all of her strength and gives him a resolute nod. She doesn’t want him worrying about her. She doesn’t want to be a distraction. She will carry out his orders, as she always has. 

-

Roy makes it to the living room before he sags against the wall, bracing his back against it, and drops his head into his hands. 

His head throbs. His heart pounds. He wants to curl up in the corner like an injured animal. He wants to get into his car and search every inch of the city until he finds where Owen Shepherd is hiding. 

Roy hasn’t punched anyone in years. His hands almost spasm, almost tremble, with how badly he needs to slam his fists into Owen’s face. He needs to strike Owen over and over again, until his face is bruised black and blue, raw and bloody, until he’s just as much of a mess as Riza. 

He needs a drink.

No. Roy quells that last thought. He leans into the fantasy of beating Owen instead.

“Boss? Do you need anything?”

Breda doesn’t bother to ask if Roy is okay. He knows better than that. Roy lets his hands fall uselessly to his sides. “No. Just stick with Riza and Rebecca.” He falters. The statistic runs a merciless loop in his mind. The most dangerous time for a victim of domestic abuse is when she leaves the relationship. The most dangerous time for a victim of domestic abuse is when she leaves--

“If Owen shows up at the house... ”

“I know what to do,” Breda says flatly. 

Roy rests a hand on his shoulder. “Thank you.” 

Breda’s shoulder is stiff under his touch. “They’re safe with me.”

Falman emerges from the hallway. “I will return with you, sir. Riza was very insistent that there should be minimal disruption to our operations.”

“Of course.” Roy used to tease her about it. The world could be ending, and you would make sure that our operations kept running smoothly. Hawkeye would stare back at him in that unruffled way she had. That’s exactly right, sir. 

In a way, Riza’s world - the life, the reality that she constructed with Owen over the past eleven years - is ending now. 

“Falman, you drive Roy,” Breda orders.  

Roy scowls. “I’m fine to drive.”

Falman and Breda ignore him.

-

It has been three hours of sustained tension. It would be nice to take a moment to clear his head. To try to get some order out of the chaotic tangle of his thoughts. 

Roy had turned off his phone before walking into Breda’s house to meet with Riza. He switches it back on, and the home screen illuminates. Over a hundred notifications - email, calendar, news, Slack - flood the screen of his smartphone, each one demanding his attention. 

Hughes and Havoc clearly had their hands full with trying to clear and rearrange his schedule during the unexpected time away. Roy texts both of them. Falman and I are heading back to HQ now. Breda, Riza, and Rebecca are out for the rest of the day. Breda might be accessible by phone/email. He accepts his new calendar invites on autopilot. 

Falman finally pulls the car up in front of their campaign headquarters. Traffic in the city had been as oppressive as always. “Ready, sir?” 

Roy shoves his phone into the pocket of his overcoat. It’s time for him to pull it together. To get his head back in the game. He closes his eyes, marshaling his focus and composure. “Yeah.”

Headquarters is an absolute mess of activity, as it has been since Grumman tapped him for VP. His office perfectly accommodated his staff during his years as New York’s junior senator, and during his years as the representative for NY-14. That perfect ecosystem was disrupted after Grumman sent over ten new staff members from his own team when he picked Roy for VP. Roy was tempted to refuse them. Is he implying that my own staff isn’t up to par? he seethed to his Chief of Staff and Deputy Chief of Staff.   Both Hughes and Riza had to talk him down. Take the offer, Hughes ordered. You don’t want to alienate Grumman so soon, Riza added.

Riza keeps the chaos in perfect order when she is here, and Roy misses her as soon as he walks in. He proceeds quickly down the halls, murmuring automatic replies to the greetings that Fuery, Sheska, Maria, Alex, and Denny call out. He doesn’t make eye contact with them. He doesn’t stop to talk. They will ask about Riza, who hasn’t missed a single day of work since she went on her honeymoon eleven years ago. 

Roy finds Hughes in his office. His Deputy Chief of Staff has his office phone tucked between his ear and shoulder, as he types rapidly on his laptop. “Yeah, we can do all three events on the fifteenth. Phoenix, Tucson, and Albuquerque. That’s - what, a three-hour flight between Phoenix  and Albuquerque?”  In his pocket, Roy’s phone vibrates three times, undoubtedly with three new calendar invites. 

Havoc sits beside him, hunched over a thick report with a red pen in hand, elbows braced on the desk. His sleeves are rolled up to his elbows and his tie is undone, hair standing on end as if he has run a hand through it several times. It has clearly been a rough morning. His staff, as competent as they are, are used to having Riza around to call the shots. 

Hughes catches sight of Roy. Roy jerks his head in the direction of his own office. “I’ll call you back in fifteen.” Hughes hangs up the phone. Both of them rise, following Roy to his office. 

His desk is in a bad state, overflowing with speech drafts, other paperwork, and reports. Some of the overflow has landed on the two chairs in front of his desk. Roy clears some space for Hughes and Havoc to sit, and he collapses onto his own seat. “Thanks for covering for me this morning.”

“No problem.” Hughes’ face is tight with strain, the lines around his eyes more pronounced than usual. “What’s going on, Roy?”

He doesn’t know how to answer that question. Roy lowers his gaze to the paperwork on his desk. Yesterday’s responses to potential debate questions about climate change and the economy. Riza’s notes are written in red pen, in her neat, meticulous script. The sight sends a horrible twisting sensation through his chest. She wrote these notes at eight at night, and then went home. It was that late night that set Owen off. “There’s been a personal crisis.”

Havoc and Hughes exchange an uneasy look. “Is Riza all right?” 

She isn’t, but Roy can understand now that part of the terror and agitation rattling through him, gripping him like a child shaking a small toy, is the knowledge that it could have been so much worse. If Owen hadn’t stopped when he did-- 

“She will be,” Roy says quietly. 

“Is she taking a leave of absence?”

“Is she going to be back by the debate?”

“I didn’t ask about either.” Roy rubs his temples. “I think it’ll be no to the first question, and yes to the second.” It probably isn’t a wise choice, but he has worked alongside Riza for long enough to know that nothing short of death itself would stop her from being at his side. 

That hits too close to home. He suppresses a shudder. 

“Thank God,” Havoc sighs. Hughes just studies him the way he sometimes does, like he can read everything that Roy isn’t saying as clearly as a book.

“Thank you for handling everything,” Roy repeats. “Really.” 

“Don’t make a habit of bailing in the middle of important meetings. I might have a heart attack.” Havoc stands up. “I’m going to get back to it.”

“I’ll be here, working on this.” Roy gestures to his debate answers. 

Hughes lingers in his office after Havoc leaves. “We’ll talk later,” his best friend says, before heading back to his own office. 

The door clicks shut behind him. Roy rubs his chest in a vain attempt to assuage the ache there. He really needs to make up for lost time. He pulls out his phone anyway and checks his messages. 

One from Rebecca, ten minutes ago. Riza and I called the contact you sent. She’s meeting with Riza tomorrow. On our way to Riza’s place now to get her stuff. She’s staying with me tonight.

Martina Lopez works with a surgeon’s precision. She made sure Roy’s divorce was handled quickly, cleanly, privately, just before he announced his presidential candidacy. Chris was the one who introduced him to Martina, and no matter how many plane tickets to Europe Roy buys his mother, it will never be enough. He scribbles a note in his planner to send Martina a thank-you for accommodating Riza so quickly. 

Roy opens up a new tab on his phone. A few minutes’ search provides him with three apartment buildings in Tribeca with solid security features. The statistic creeps back into his mind. The most dangerous time for a victim of domestic abuse is when she leaves the relationship. He sends the links to Rebecca. 

You need to focus. Roy hears Riza’s directive as clearly as if she were standing in the doorway of her office, which adjoins his. Her arms would be crossed, and she would regard him in that stern way she often does. She would give him an earful if he let his attention lapse in these two days leading up to the debate.

Roy sets his phone face down on the desk and massages the back of his neck, trying to loosen some of the knots of tension there. He opens his laptop and begins his work.

-

Hughes walks into Roy’s office at nine that night, a bag of Chinese takeout in hand. The order from Queens High Pearl is substantially reduced from its usual size, as the two of them are the only ones left in the office at this hour. Normally, Hughes would be at home with his family, and Riza would be here instead.

Hughes sets a white carton and a pair of chopsticks in front of Roy. The aroma of the beef chow fun hits him before he even opens the carton. His appetite, withered away to nothing since this morning, hits him like a truck. Roy mutters his thanks before grabbing his chopsticks and diving in. Some sauce lands on a first draft for his speech in Tucson, and he wipes it away with his thumb.  

 “Did you eat at all today?” Hughes asks, around a mouthful of his Szechuan shrimp with rice.

“I had a sandwich this morning.” More than twelve hours ago. Coffee and tea have been the only things keeping him going since then. 

They finish their meals in a matter of minutes, and Roy clears the empty cartons away. “Sorry to keep you here so late. I’m sure you’d rather be eating Gracia’s cooking.”

“It’s fine. She wanted me to ask you to come over for dinner sometime. It would do you some good to eat something besides takeout.” Hughes removes his glasses, cleans the lenses, and puts them back on. “Now, what’s going on?”

Roy makes a joke out of habit, even though his heart isn’t in it. “Straight to the point, as always.”  “Yeah. You look worse than you did in August.” 

It has been three months. Only three months since the worst defeat, the lowest moment, of his political career. It feels like three years. 

The mere mention of August used to make tension stiffen his back and tighten his jaw. After today, August feels more like a setback than a death blow. The pain and rage and fear that closed around him like a vice earlier clamps down on him, and Roy drops his face into his hands for a couple of moments before he can face Hughes. “Riza is filing for divorce.”

Hughes’ expression registers shock, and then confusion. “And you’re upset about this?”

He had a feeling Hughes knew. There isn’t anything about him that his best friend of almost two decades doesn’t know. Hell, Hughes probably realized it before August, before Roy himself did. 

“Owen hit her.” 

Hughes’ mouth opens, but speech fails him. “What?” he finally croaks. It was Hughes and Gracia who lent Riza their backyard for her small wedding with Owen. “He wouldn’t -- what?”

“She said that he’s been different since coming back. Since the - injury.” 

Hughes runs a hand through his hair, still apparently lost for words. “So this has been going on for that long? How did we not notice?” he demands. “She never seemed…” 

He trails off. Roy has been doing the same thing since the morning. Wracking his mind over every interaction he has had with Riza over the past several months. Looking for signs that something was amiss, and finding none at all. She kept her fear and her struggles flawlessly locked away, completely to herself, devoting herself to the campaign while her life crumbled around her. 

“I know.” Roy’s throat is tight, all of a sudden. He takes a sip of water in an attempt to alleviate it. “I would be lying to you if I said I didn’t want her single. But not like this. Never with her in pain like this.” Humiliatingly, his voice breaks. 

“I know,” Hughes says. “I get it, Roy.”

“I feel…” Roy pinches the bridge of his nose, willing the tears to retreat. It is frightening. He hasn’t cried in seventeen years. He forgot the sensation of utter helplessness that came with it. He shakes his head, unable to continue. If he keeps talking, he might weep in earnest at the memory of seeing Riza like that. 

He failed her. She has been one of his two closest friends for seventeen years, his right hand, and he failed her. Riza has been so devoted to him, and to their goals, for so long. When she suffered, Roy hadn’t even noticed. He should have seen something. He should have commented on the long-sleeved blouses in summer. You’ve seemed preoccupied lately, he remarked to her several times over the past year. Riza brushed it off. It’s the campaign, sir. 

He should have pressed her. He should have asked her if everything was really all right. He had been ignorant, and self-absorbed in his own political ambitions, all while the woman he loves was suffering. 

Hughes leans across the desk and grips his arm. The touch is warm and reassuring. “I get it,” he repeats. 

Roy still can’t talk, so Hughes continues. “This is a terrible thing, but Riza has survived terrible things before. She’s strong. She’ll get through this. She has all of us to help her through it.”

“I failed her,” Roy whispers. 

Hughes’ reply is gentle, and infinitely compassionate. “You didn’t know. If you had known, if you’d had any idea, you would have stepped in to help her as quickly as you did today.” 

“Thanks.” A few tears escaped his eyes. Roy wipes at them with the sleeve of his coat, a quick, embarrassed swipe. 

Hughes lets go of his arm. “I’m proud of you.” The comment takes Roy by surprise. “You didn’t go after Owen. You didn’t suggest we drink tonight.”

“I wanted to do both,” Roy confesses. 

“Yeah, but you didn’t. That means something.” 

-

“...Then, as the sun slipped over the horizon and the stars above began to fill the sky with twinkling brightness, Stanley and Marcie snuggled up to Stanley’s favorite rock. They both fell fast asleep.”

Riza tilts the illustration depicting the two starfish toward Ruby. Her goddaughter breathes a contented sigh and nestles against Riza’s side. “One more, please?”

Riza checks the bright red digital clock on Ruby’s nightstand. “It’s eight. You have to go to sleep.” 

Ruby peers up at her, unimpressed by the reminder of her bedtime. “Do I have to?”

Riza strokes Ruby’s dark curls. Her hair is identical to Rebecca’s. “You’ll feel rested for school tomorrow morning.”

Ruby’s sigh this time is mournful. She turns toward her array of stuffed animals and selects a plush purple Marcie starfish to sleep with. Then she takes hold of a stuffed dog and presses it into Riza’s arms. “You can have Candle.”

Riza can’t help but smile, even though it hurts. “Thank you.” She holds Candle the Golden Retriever’s paw and makes her wave goodnight at Ruby. Ruby giggles. “Good night, Ruby. Sweet dreams.”

Ruby holds her arms out. Riza hugs her, and Ruby presses a careful kiss to the uninjured side of her face. “Good night, Auntie Riza.”

Riza checks to make sure Ruby’s night light is on, before making her way to the guest bedroom down the hall. She closes the door behind her, leans against it, and sighs, hugging the stuffed dog close.

Twenty-four hours ago, she was leaving work, heading back home to Owen for the last time. She was uncharacteristically on edge at red lights, checking the clock in her car over and over. She knew that Owen would be upset over her working late with Roy. She’d braced herself for an argument. 

So much can change in a matter of twenty-four hours. 

Riza’s steps are slow as she proceeds to the desk near the window. Roy, Rebecca, Jean, and Breda all practically ordered her not to work. She opens her laptop anyway and checks her email, staring at her inbox. Ninety messages. She keeps Ruby’s stuffed dog on her lap as she opens a message from Fuery and clicks on the attachment. 

This is easier. It is easier to catch up on all the work she has missed than it would be to sit alone on her bed in her best friends’ guest bedroom, and begin to process the ending of her marriage.

Riza works in the dark, the only illumination provided by the glow of her laptop screen, until she has caught up with half her emails. She presses her fingertips underneath her aching eyes, mindful of the injured side of her face. Nine-thirty at night.

She pulls her phone out of the pocket of her oversized cardigan. She hasn’t checked it in hours, not since she made the call to Martina Lopez and put their appointment in her calendar. The whole team has messaged her - not on Slack, but via personal text messages - to check in.

One contact is conspicuously absent. Block his number, Rebecca ordered, when Riza pulled out her phone this morning to call Roy’s lawyer. 

She wavered. If there’s an emergency--

No, Rebecca said sharply. If there’s an emergency, the police, or the EMTs, or the hospital, or whoever, can get in touch with you. You need to block his number right now so that he can’t call you to say he’s sorry and ask you to come home. 

Riza stared at her phone, unable to react or respond. She allowed Rebecca to remove the phone from her hand, block Owen with a few taps of her thumbs against the screen, and press the phone back into her grip.

So there are no texts from Owen. There are no missed calls.

Riza navigates to her recent texts and presses the call button. Roy’s cell rings just twice before he answers. “Hello?”

“It’s me. Am I interrupting anything?”

“No. I was just about to call you. Is everything alright at the Havocs’?”

Roy’s voice is roughened with stress. She hates that she has done this to him; that she has burdened him with these personal matters. “Everything is fine.” Riza shuts her laptop and sits there in the dark. “I’m sorry for missing work today, and for derailing your schedule.”

Roy stifles an impatient noise on the other end of the line. “Don’t apologize for that.”

The sharpness in his voice makes her eyes sting. Riza hugs Ruby’s stuffed dog with her free arm. “I’ll be back tomorrow. I’m coming in at nine, though, not seven. Martina said she could meet me first thing in the morning.” 

“Are you sure?” 

“Yes. Rebecca is going to cover up the--” Riza stammers. “My face. She has concealers that she’s going to teach me how to use. Don’t worry. No one should notice anything out of the ordinary.”

“It’s not that. Are you sure you want to come back to work? I don’t expect that of you, Riza. Hughes can cover for you while you’re dealing with all of this.”

“I need to come back to work. I can’t just…” Riza takes a deep breath, willing the tears to recede. “I can’t just sit here with this, Roy.” Like she did in her hospital bed after returning from Afghanistan, during the long weeks and months of rehabilitation on the burn unit. That will rob her of her sanity. That will kill her. “I need to work.” 

Roy is silent for several moments. “All right,” he allows, at last. “I thought you would want to come back by the debate.”

Riza wipes at her eyes. “I wouldn’t miss it.” 

“I know you wouldn’t. Our drills together have always been my good-luck charm before these things.” Roy clears his throat, as though embarrassed. 

“Thank you.” Riza rises from her desk and settles down in bed, still holding Ruby’s stuffed dog. “For everything today.”

The words are painfully inadequate. She can’t find anything better, not after the day she has had. She barely slept last night, and her thoughts are sluggish with exhaustion. 

“Of course,” Roy says immediately. “Tell me if there’s anything else I can do. If you need help with any of Martina’s legal fees, or with a deposit for an apartment, I can send--”

“No.” Riza’s palms grow warm at the mention of the legal fees. Roy confided more in Hughes than he had in her about his divorce, but even she knew how expensive it had been. “It’s fine. I have savings.” 

She and Owen have also had a frightening amount of medical bills since his brain injury, and those bills burned straight through both of their savings. But she can’t think of that now. She will find a way to deal with this.

“All right.” Roy’s skepticism is evident, but he doesn’t push her. 

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” Riza clutches that thought close. She can’t think of her consultation with Martina tomorrow. Rebecca will be accompanying her for moral support, but still. It is safer, easier, to think of everything that she needs to do in the office before they leave for Texas tomorrow afternoon. 

“Good night,” Roy says gently. “Try and get some sleep.”

“Good night.” Riza disconnects the call. She curls up in bed, staring at her home screen as it dims and switches off. Her phone’s lock screen image is her and Owen, hiking at the Kaaterskill Falls last autumn. She should change that. It hurts to look at him hugging her close; at her smile as she leaned against his side.

It is almost ten. She will meet Martina nine hours from now. She will have to tell her everything she told Roy today. She will have to go over it all again. Riza buries her face in the stuffed dog to hold back a whimper.

The worst thing is that she isn’t only concerned for herself, tonight. She isn’t only terrified of reliving last night through flashbacks.  

She had removed her wedding ring and left it on the dresser, along with a short letter to Owen. He would have seen it when he came home. Riza has the distinct feeling that Rebecca, Roy, Breda, and Jean are all afraid of what could happen if Owen reacted with anger. If he tried to come find her. What has haunted her more is the thought of him seeing her letter, and her ring, and being in pain. 

A knock on the door jolts her out of her reverie. Riza sits bolt upright at the noise, drawing her cardigan closer over her pajama top. “Come in.”

Rebecca enters, her hair in a loose braid over her shoulder, clad in a violet silk pajama set that matches Ruby’s. She carries a pillow under one arm, and kicks off her fluffy slippers as she approaches the bed. “Move over.” 

Riza does. “What’s going on?”

“Ruby conned Jean into another bedtime story when he went over to check to see if she was asleep. The two of them fell asleep together.” Rebecca settles in beside her. “Besides, I thought you might want some company,” she adds quietly. 

Riza offers Rebecca half of the covers. “Thank you.”

They lie in the dark, in silence, for a while. The weight of words unsaid presses down on them. Rebecca is the one to break the silence. “Riza?”

She knew this was coming. She is surprised and impressed that Rebecca managed to wait all day for it. Riza prepares herself for the question. “What is it?”

“You know how much you mean to us. To me.” 

She knows. She has known since Rebecca and Jean asked if they could name her Ruby’s legal guardian, in case anything ever happened to them. Rebecca has a sister. Jean has two sisters. Still, they chose her. Riza’s fingers tighten around the coverlet. “I do.”

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?” There is no judgment in Rebecca’s question. Only sorrow. 

“I couldn’t.” Riza turns onto her side, curling into herself. The explanation doesn’t seem sufficient, and she searches for a better way to explain herself. “There are things that hurt too much to talk about. I just couldn’t do it.”

(Like her mother. It has been more than twenty years since her mother died, and Riza can’t say more about her mother than she died from cancer. Four short words that don’t come close to capturing the horror of what Elizabeth Hawkeye suffered. Riza hadn’t even been able to talk about those years with Owen, and she confided everything, everything, else in him.) 

Rebecca hugs her, resting her forehead between Riza’s shoulder blades. Riza finds Rebecca’s arm, and rests her hand atop it. 

-

October 6, 2016, New York City, New York 

Riza reports to the office the following morning at exactly nine. She strides into the conference room and catches Roy in the middle of a debate prep session with Hughes, Breda, Falman, Fuery, and Havoc. “Good morning,” she says briskly. She holds a carrier of eight coffee drinks from Cafe Boulis, and she hands one to each member of their team. “Don’t stop on my account. Where are we?”

“We were just about to start on court packing,” Breda replies. “Thanks, Riza.” 

Rebecca’s work had been masterful. The left side of her face is virtually indistinguishable from the right. Riza is much paler than usual, but she has her typical expression of intense focus in place. She sits directly across from Roy, folding her arms on the conference table in front of her. His gaze drops to her bare left hand for just an instant. 

“Are you and Senator Grumman going to pack the court if Amelia Carter Bates is confirmed?” Riza’s inflection doesn’t change. It is still clear she has taken the role of Roy’s opponent, the current Vice President, Paul Raven. “Your party is openly advocating adding seats to the Supreme Court, which has had nine seats for the past one hundred and fifty-years.” 

“Of course you hit me with the hardest question we could get as soon as you come back.” Roy takes a sip of his coffee. He can’t conceal a small smile. It is a relief to have her here. 

“Your response, Senator,” Riza presses. 

“Yes,” Roy says bluntly. “ We need to reform the Supreme Court in a way that will strengthen its independence and restore the American people’s trust in it as a check to the presidency and Congress. One promising idea is to restructure the court so that ten members are confirmed in the normal political fashion, with the other five promoted from the lower courts by unanimous agreement of the other ten. Others have proposed implementing term limits…”

-

Riza remains by Roy’s side for the rest of the day, through their flight to Texas, and their work and rounds of debate prep at the hotel that night. His presence is a comfort. A steady, reliable constant, in the face of everything else that is going on. Roy is thirty-nine now, poised on the verge of the greatest leap of his political career, but he is still the same bold progressive he was at twenty-four, when becoming a member of Congress was still just a dream. 

Riza brushes her teeth and takes a shower in the bathroom of her hotel room at one in the morning. She wraps herself in her pink bathrobe when she emerges from the shower, takes one look at her reflection in the mirror, and leaves the bathroom so quickly she bumps into the doorknob, the impact smarting against her skin.  

(With the makeup covering her skin, with work and the campaign dominating her every waking thought, distracting her from the throbbing in her face, she had, briefly, the luxury of forgetting.)

The makeup sits out on the dresser of the hotel room now. Concealer, foundation, powder. She can’t leave this room without making sure that it is all perfectly in place.

Riza stands in the middle of her hotel room, the only illumination provided by the small lamp on the bedside table. Reason tells her to climb into bed and go to sleep. Fear holds her rooted to the spot.

Nights have been grueling for the past two years. She never could rest easily when Owen was deployed, and nights became agony during the weeks when his unit was still MIA. She hasn’t slept well since he came home. Every night, she has passed hours in bed unmoving but wide awake, lost in spirals of worry and fear and pain. 

Normally, she would put off sleep and curl up on the sofa with MSNBC on. But tomorrow is an important day for their team; Roy is speaking at UT Austin in the morning, before the debate.

Move, Riza orders herself. She finally makes it to bed. She pulls the covers over herself and lies there, rigid, until she finally succumbs to an uneasy sleep.

-

October 7, 2016, Austin, Texas 

Roy wasn’t nervous leading up to the Democratic candidates’ debates. He isn’t nervous before any of his campaign rallies or other addresses to the public. In fact, it is the opposite. He paces the length of his dressing room, hands open, posture loose and relaxed, calmly reciting his talking points to himself. 

Tonight is a marked departure from the norm. His strain is compounded by the difficulty of pretending, for the benefit of his team, that nothing is amiss.

Hughes sees through it. He pulls Roy aside a few minutes before the candidates go on stage and places both hands on his shoulders, as calm and reassuring as if he were speaking to Elicia and Oliver. “Don’t get in your head,” he instructs. “You got this.”

Roy tries to smile. “Thanks.”

He graciously accepts his team’s claps on the back and wishes of good luck before he takes the stage. They aren’t nervous, because he never is. Their expressions are open, shining, eager. They are excited to see him share his vision, their vision, with the American people. The weight of their expectations nearly equals the weight of his own expectations for himself. 

Roy carries it all with grace. He tries his best, anyway. Sometimes being the (polarizing) face of the progressive movement, while keeping his own personal life and personal demons in check, is more difficult than he would like. 

Shut up, he snaps at himself. You can have a moment for self-pity later. It’s time to get your head in the game. 

“Thirty seconds,” the lady over the PA system announces. Roy brushes the lint from his shoulders and stands up straighter. 

Riza is the last person on the team to approach him. She doesn’t radiate the same energy as Havoc, Breda, Falman, Fuery, and Hughes. She looks even more serious than usual, which is saying something. 

But then she reaches out and straightens his tie - a quick, automatic gesture, but it still startles him. Vanessa used to do that for him. When Riza looks at him, Roy is struck momentarily speechless by the utter faith and trust in her eyes. He has to glance away in order to keep himself from getting flustered. “Are you going to wish me luck?”

“No. You don’t need it.”

He has never appreciated Riza’s steady demeanor more. Her calm is enough to calm him, to center him. Roy exhales, and his nerves begin to dissipate. They have done this dozens of times before, after all. They have done this for a long time, him and Riza and Hughes and the team.

“Thank you for being here with me tonight.” She didn’t have to do this. She could have remained in New York City with the rest of his staff; with Rebecca. Hell, she could be on leave, recuperating from her ordeal. 

“Always,” Riza says.

Roy holds that close, like a talisman, before he steps onto the stage.

-

The ninety-minute debate is every bit as contentious as they expected. But Roy doesn’t falter, not once. He performs even more brilliantly than he did in the debates between the Democratic candidates. He shines. It is beautiful, captivating, to watch. It is Roy at his very best. 

“He should have been our candidate.” Breda voices what they are all thinking. He keeps his voice low.

“This kind of energy and vision…” Fuery trails off, marveling. “ This is what’s going to inspire younger voters. No eighteen- to thirty-four-year-olds are going to turn out for Grumman.” 

“He might be our president.” Hughes’ reply is barely audible. “The old man is seventy-three, after all.” 

“He is in exceptionally good health,” Falman counters, though he doesn’t sound happy about it. 

Havoc scoffs. “He should be in a retirement home, not the White House.”

Riza shushes them. She isn’t a fan of Senator Grumman either, but the Senator from California has been a political ally of Roy’s for a long time. More importantly, he is Roy’s running mate. Nobody, nobody, in the media needs to pick up on the tensions between the two. 

They divide their attention between metrics and the debate as it unfolds. Falman pulls out a handkerchief and starts mopping his forehead in the final minutes of the debate as he watches the metrics. Riza hates to take even a moment away from the metrics, but she has to step into the bathroom to push her bangs away from her damp forehead and check her makeup to ensure that her coverage isn’t slipping. It has been a long, tense day. 

The debate finally comes to a close. Roy strides back to them immediately after, stopping only to unclip his mic and hand it to an assistant with a word of thanks. “Well? How did I do?”

“You did exactly what we hoped for,” Riza replies. “Your performance is exceptionally strong in the eighteen- to thirty-four age group - across all racial, religious, educational, and socioeconomic backgrounds.” 

“It’s looking promising with independent voters, too,” Hughes reports.

Roy laughs out loud with sheer relief. “Yes!” 

They have an impromptu team meeting in Roy’s dressing room to review the stats as they come in. Roy walks behind the privacy screen, sheds his suit coat, shirt, and tie, and emerges with the top half of his outfit replaced by one of his Columbia sweatshirts, without missing a beat. They linger, all of them packed into the room that is too small for them, for over an hour as they discuss the results. Hughes orders pizza for the whole staff. The mood is high, and Riza perches on one of the stools with Roy on one side of her and Falman on the other. She knows a sensation of intense, profound gratitude. At least I still have this. 

-

October 25, 2016, New York City, New York 

The debate marks a turning point for the campaign. Finally, for the first time, the needle begins to point in their direction. Sheska and Maria offer warnings about margins of error in the polls, but it doesn’t dampen anyone’s spirits. This is the first bit of good news that the Mustang campaign has had in months. 

Everyone’s schedules kick into overdrive, to an even more pronounced extent than previous election seasons. Their headquarters remain filled with frenetic activity late into the night. Roy and his senior staff travel four to five days a week and hold up to three rallies per day. 

Roy is getting by on five hours of sleep per night now. I don’t know how you do it, Breda and Hughes both remark. He has always thrived under pressure, excelled in high-stress situations, and he has never needed that much sleep anyway. He suspects that Riza is getting even less. She is in the office at seven in the morning every morning, so she gets in before he does, and she stays just as late. 

Most people wouldn’t guess that she must be operating on so little rest. Riza is the consummate professional, as she always has been. Perfectly prepared, composed, and on top of things at all times. The staffers Grumman lent him have all complimented the efficiency of his office. Roy has let them know that it is all thanks to his Chief of Staff’s leadership. 

It is a quarter past midnight now. Roy checks his itinerary for tomorrow, emailed by Riza earlier in the night. They have a nine-fifteen flight to Michigan from JFK. He shuts his laptop, packs up his things, and rubs his eyes.

Roy finds his Chief of Staff in her office, which is connected to his own. It is half the size of his, but it is impeccably neat and well-organized. Riza sits at her desk, typing away at her laptop, her gaze jumping from line to line. She doesn’t notice him until he clears his throat, and then she almost jumps in her seat.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“That’s all right.” Riza lowers the lid of her laptop, giving him her full attention. Roy notices the dark shadows under her eyes; the pale cast to her skin. “What can I help you with?”

“Nothing, right now,” Roy replies, a little nonplussed. “It’s almost twelve-thirty. We should call it a night.”

“There are a few more things I need to take care of.” Riza opens her laptop again, making it clear that he is dismissed. “You go on without me.”

Roy doesn’t budge. “You know I’m not going to do that.” 

Riza’s fingers still on her keyboard. “You don’t have to worry,” she says quietly. “His brother emailed me. He’s back in Alaska with his family. His lawyer confirmed that as well.”

Roy has one of Chris’s investigators looking into the matter, to independently verify that Owen Shepherd is really in Ketchikan, but he hasn’t heard back. He doesn’t mention that to Riza, and just makes a noncommittal sound in response. “It’s still late, and I don’t want you walking to your car alone.”

Riza takes a deep breath. “Fine.” Her unhappiness is evident in her sharp movements as she shuts her laptop and begins to pack her things into her purse. 

“You’ll be back here in less than seven hours.” It is a weak attempt to cheer her up, but it is all that Roy can think of right now. 

“I just…” Riza sits down in her office chair again and buries her head in her hands. Her shoulders sag, her spine curving in, as she curls up into herself. 

Roy crosses the distance between the threshold of her office and her desk in a few quick strides. “Riza?” He reaches for her shoulder. 

“Sorry. I’m fine.” Riza sits up, returning to her usual ramrod-straight posture. She still carries herself like a soldier, even though she has been out of uniform for more than a decade. Her face is oddly blank.

Roy pulls out the chair in front of her desk and takes a seat there. “Talk to me,” he commands.

Riza is quiet for so long that he is about to prompt her again when she speaks. She folds her hands on her desk and stares down at them. “I wish I could stay here all night. It’s like home, after all of these years, isn’t it? It’s full of good memories.”

“Yeah.” Roy is taken aback by how perfectly she voiced the same sentiment that he carries. “It is.” He has spent more than a decade here, serving his constituents. Over the past year, he has contemplated the reality that if his ambitions become reality in this election cycle, he will leave this office in Queens for at least the next four, or eight, or more, years. 

“I hate going back to that apartment.” Riza’s voice is little more than a whisper now. 

“It won’t be for long. We’ll find you somewhere better in DC.” Roy knows, as soon as he says it, that his assurance misses the mark. It isn’t the little townhouse on the outskirts of Queens that she misses. It is the reality of having a shared home. A shared life.

He wants to take her hand, but that would be inappropriate. Roy rests his palm flat on Riza’s desk instead, feeling horribly useless. “The change of scenery - getting out of the city - will help you.”

Riza continues to study her hands. There is a pronounced tan line on her left hand where her wedding ring used to sit. She wore her diamond ring and wedding band together, as a set. It was a tiny diamond (a fraction of the enormous two-carat diamond ring that Roy gave to Vanessa), but she wore it so proudly. 

“How did you do it?” she asks suddenly. “You handled it so… well. So gracefully.” 

The question makes him ache. It takes him back to how blindsided he had been when he found out. It takes him back to the cleaving of one life into two, and starting over at almost thirty-nine. Moving his things out of his home with Vanessa, and into a one-bedroom apartment in Forest Hills.

“It was something I never expected.” It is awkward to talk about the ending of his marriage with Riza, of all people. “I was determined to move forward anyway. I let my ambition guide me. I knew what I had to do.”

“I’m trying to do that too.” 

There is something unusually raw and unsteady in that admission. Roy frowns. “I know. You’re running yourself into the ground trying to distract yourself, and I’ve let you get away with it because of the campaign.”

To his surprise, Riza manages a faint, fleeting smile. “You did the same thing.”

“You can’t compare us. My marriage to Vanessa was different than yours with Owen.” The way Riza softened when she regarded her husband, the way she practically glowed with adoration - he doesn’t know that he ever looked at Vanessa like that. It leaves the bitter taste of guilt in his mouth. “And the way things ended was different too.” 

“It worked for you,” Riza insists, in her stubborn way. 

“Sure. Until I almost had a nervous breakdown before the first debate, and you and Hughes had your little intervention.” 

Riza sighs. “That’s right.”

“We should do the same for you.” Roy rises, fishing his car keys out of the pocket of his overcoat. “First off, you need to get more sleep.”

“I sleep,” Riza maintains, unmoving from her chair.  

“I’ve seen the timestamps on your emails, Hawkeye. You’re going to go back to your apartment and be up until two in the morning working. You’re done with that as of tonight.”

Riza narrows her eyes at him, clearly on the verge of arguing. Roy changes tack. “You must be tired.”

“I am tired.” Riza pulls her car keys from her purse and finally stands up, coming to join him. Her steps are slow. “It’s just hard to be alone. That’s all. When I’m on my laptop, or my phone, it distracts me.”

It’s difficult for him to be alone too. In solitude, the memories come inching back, advancing on him like a predator on cornered prey. It has been seventeen years. The memories of Afghanistan, of the things he did there, that they did there, are as fresh as if all of it just occurred the previous month.

“I get it.” Roy locks the door of their campaign headquarters behind them. It’s a cold night. Riza draws her coat closer around her. Normally, he would make a joke about how the two of them should solve their problems with solitude by being roommates, but that would also be inappropriate. 

(The dynamic between the two of them was comfortably settled for so many years. Riza was with Owen, and then Roy met Vanessa. The two of them were best friends, happy with their respective spouses. But then Vanessa divorced him, and that comfortably settled dynamic fell apart.)

Roy walks Riza to her car. “Go home and go to bed. If I see any emails or Slack messages from you tonight, you’re fired.”

Roy has handed down similar threats for as long as Riza has worked for him. She gives him the unimpressed look she always does. “Good night, Roy.”

He keeps his hands in the pockets of his coat. He does not hug her goodnight. He does not hold her close and whisper words of comfort, that everything will be all right, that she is strong and brave and she will get through this. “Good night. Text me when you get home.”

Riza’s car beeps when she unlocks it. “I can’t. I don’t want to be fired.”

Roy hasn’t heard her make one of her dry little jokes in weeks. He blinks, astounded, and then laughs out loud for the first time in what feels like days.

-

Roy returns to his own apartment. He raises a hand in greeting to the doorman and the night security guard, and takes the elevator up to the tenth floor. 

Vanessa kept their home in Astoria impeccably decorated. She brought her expertise as a professional interior designer to bear and refreshed the decor every season, putting up lovely accents in every room for spring, summer, fall, and winter. Chris and his staff and friends used to marvel at it whenever they stepped through the front door. It’s right out of the pages of a magazine, Gracia remarked, as she admired the enormous autumn wreath Vanessa installed in the foyer. 

The apartment Roy moved into after the divorce is the opposite of his old home. Vanessa would shudder if she saw it. It is sparse and utilitarian, furnished solely with IKEA basics. The only personal touches come from his books and the photographs of his friends, taken on weekend trips and holiday parties over the years.

He should get to sleep, but he needs to unwind a little first. Roy makes himself a mug of tea - mulled plum cider, no caffeine - and settles on the sofa, his phone in hand. 

For once, he isn’t tempted to check the news, and the op-eds on the New York Times and the Washington Post. His mind drifts to personal matters instead.

It has frustrated him, how little he can do to help Riza with what she is going through. He is used to stepping in whenever he can to look out for his staff. He helped Fuery with his student loans, and Havoc with his rehabilitation after his spinal cord injury, and Maria with the ordeal she went through after her identity was stolen. It is the least he can do for them, after their tireless and unfailing support over the years.

Meanwhile, he can’t provide Riza with any of the support or comfort she needs, in her darkest hour. Roy exhales, making an effort to relax his shoulders. 

He sits in silence for a while, sipping his tea, lost in thought. It takes several minutes for something to finally occur to him. Roy finishes his tea in one large gulp and types a query into the search bar of his browser.

Service dogs for trauma. 

He clicks on the top search result, and begins to read. He loses himself in the website for the next half hour, before he checks the time and flinches. 

Roy texts the link to Riza. The text shows as delivered, but remains unread, which is promising. She must have gone to sleep. He should do the same. 

Roy finally, slowly, makes his way to bed.

-

October 26, 2016, New York City to Detroit, Michigan 

Roy and his staff have made it a point to fly commercial for his entire political career. His colleagues in the House and Senate have teased him or mocked him for it, depending on which side of the aisle they sit on. Despite significant logistical challenges that have Denny Brosh close to tearing his hair out every day, Roy has kept this up for the duration of the campaign. Ever since Grumman got the nomination, the older Senator has offered to send Roy his private jet whenever he isn’t using it. Much to Denny’s frustration, Roy refused, citing the waste and climate impact of private jet travel. 

His one concession to comfort and privacy is approving the purchase of business class tickets for him and his staff. They are forty-five minutes into their flight to Detroit, both Roy and Riza working quietly on their laptops, when a new message pops up on his Slack app. 

Riza Hawkeye, 9:45 AM

I saw the link you sent me last night.

Roy Mustang, 9:45 AM

Did you get a chance to read through it? 

Riza Hawkeye, 9:46 AM

I did. It was interesting.

This is typical of Riza’s Slack and texting style. Roy’s entire staff has teased her for years about her extremely formal manner. She never uses abbreviations and always uses the most perfect punctuation, spelling, and grammar. The only thing that sets her apart from Falman is that, unlike Falman, Riza has never once used an emoji.

Roy glances at Riza. She does not look back at him. Her expression betrays nothing. She has switched out of the Slack tab and is typing suggested edits for his speech in Ohio on Thursday. Breda and Falman are in the document as well. 

Roy Mustang, 9:46 AM

I thought it might be helpful for you to have some company at home. :) 

Roy opens the document containing his draft for the Akron speech and begins to review his staff’s suggested changes. 

Riza Hawkeye, 9:50 AM. 

Thank you. 

-

October 28, 2016, Akron, Ohio 

Riza rubs her temple with her thumb as she reviews the transcript of President Bradley’s recent speech in Miami. Distaste swells in her chest with every sentence she reads. Havoc and Breda already sent over their suggestions on a rebuttal from Roy when he makes his speech tomorrow. She’ll add her own thoughts and then forward all of it to Roy. 

Their candidate, their Senator, their longtime friend, rises from his seat opposite her. Roy walks to the window of his room’s study and stares out over the city lights, resting his hands on the sill. He’s clearly in need of a break from their long hours of work. He fit in a quick session at the gym with Alex early this morning, before their flight to Akron, but that was the last time any of their staff had any downtime. Hughes is just out in the hallway now, taking his own break to FaceTime with Gracia and the kids. 

Roy’s position by the window makes her nervous. Riza approaches him, wiping her suddenly damp palms on her skirt. “You may want to consider standing somewhere else. You couldn’t make a better target if you tried.”

She has been a civilian for longer than she served as a sniper. She still can’t turn that part of her off. She still looks at people and automatically evaluates what kind of target they pose, and where she would need to stand to make the shot. It is exhausting. It is sickening. 

“Bradley may be evil, but I don’t think even he could get away with a political assassination.” Roy still moves, even if just to humor her. 

Riza breathes a little more easily. “Thank you.” 

(Something in the wiring of her brain changed irrevocably after Afghanistan. She became overly sensitized to threats and to danger, whether real or perceived. Something has shifted even more over the past month. Riza wakes up in the middle of the night every night, her cheeks wet with tears, whimpering aloud, wracked with terrible dreams of losing Rebecca or Ruby, of losing Roy, of losing Fuery, Falman, Breda, Havoc, Hughes, or any of her other friends. In losing Owen, she has already lost too much.)

“Do you have any good news for me?” Roy folds his arms behind his back, automatically falling into parade rest. He hasn’t done that in a while. He must be pretty far away, mentally. The other veterans on their staff all do the same thing every so often. He looks at her out of the corner of his eye, a shadow of a smile on his face. “Tell me that Raven’s been hospitalized due to a burst hemorrhoid, or something.”

Riza scoffs. “No such luck.” She hesitates, and then continues before she can second-guess herself for sharing an irrelevant update. “It’s more of a personal matter.” 

Roy regards her with interest. “What is it?”

“It’s about the link you sent me.” Riza can’t even remember the last time she felt so shy, so hopeful, so full of anticipation. Not nervous anticipation, but a sense of tentative excitement. She has felt almost dead inside, lost in a sea of fear and pain and anxiety, for so long. “There’s a dog I’m interested in. I sent the staff an inquiry and submitted an application.”

“I’m glad you did that.” Roy’s grin lights up his face. His genuine smile is a world apart from his practiced, polished politician charm. “Have they gotten back to you yet?” 

Riza nods. She can’t help but smile back. “He’ll be finished with his training and ready to be picked up in two months.” The staff asked for three testimonial letters to accompany her application. She knows Roy would have done it, but he has done so much for her already. Rebecca, Breda, and Fuery had sent her their completed letters of recommendation within mere hours of her request. 

“He sounds quite young, then.”

“He’s eighteen months old. I wanted a dog that could be with me for many years.” Riza has loved and lost a dog before - Lila, the Golden Retriever she grew up with. Lila died the year after her mother passed, and the loss broke her all over again. She doesn’t want to go through that again for a long time. 

Riza pulls out her phone in an attempt to distract herself. “Would you like to see a picture?”

“Yes,” Roy replies, at once. 

Riza pulls up the screenshot she took of the dog’s profile. “Here.”

“Black Hayate?” Roy peers at it over her shoulder. “Odd name. But he’s cute. What kind of dog is that?”

“A Shiba Inu.” Riza admires the picture. She had been immediately struck by Black Hayate’s face - by his good-natured dog smile, paired with the empathy and alertness in his eyes. “They’re known for being intelligent and loyal."

Roy smiles at her. “The perfect fit for you, then.” 

“I know that by December, you’ll be busy as the Vice President-elect.” Riza tucks her phone back in her pocket. “But I wanted to ask if you would be interested in coming with me to pick up Black Hayate. The training center is upstate, just outside of Rochester. You don’t have to,” she adds. “I could go alone, or I’m sure Rebecca and Ruby would enjoy coming.”

“I’ll be there.” Roy adopts a mock-serious expression. “I would like to meet and interview your new Deputy Chief of Staff, after all.”

“What?” Hughes asks, alarmed, as he re-enters the room. “Am I being replaced?”

“Not quite. Riza’s getting a dog.”

“Oh?” Hughes approaches, already pulling out his phone, undoubtedly to show them both photos of his family’s new dog. “We can have puppy playdates! And before we get back to work, you two have to see this video from Elicia’s violin recital…” 

-

November 5, 2016, Washington DC

It is two-thirty in the morning when the election is called for the Grumman-Mustang ticket.

It has been a torturously long night. A long month. An excruciatingly long campaign. 

Riza watches the room explode with shouts of joy and relief. She watches Alex Armstrong pick up Denny and Maria in an embrace and spin them around, all three of them laughing. She watches Fuery literally jump up and down with delight. She watches Chris actually dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief. She watches Hughes, Havoc, Breda, and Falman surround a dazed Roy, hugging him, clapping him on the back. 

Riza stands in the corner and takes it all in, basking in it. All of this joy, all of this happiness at a hard-won and narrow victory, is such a sweet relief, after all the tragedy she has witnessed. She rarely takes pictures on her phone, but she contemplates taking a few. This is the moment she wants to revisit late at night, when she is unable to find the sanctuary of a peaceful night’s sleep. 

Her chest grows tight, and her throat closes over. Her phone is buzzing, undoubtedly with texts from Rebecca and Gracia, and Maria and Havoc are waving her over. She manages to lift a hand in acknowledgement, and then she ducks out of the room through a back exit that won’t take her anywhere near the press. 

Riza finds the antechamber. The TV is on here as well, turned to CNN, reporting on the victory of the Grumman-Mustang ticket. 

She leans against the table, covered with extra snacks and pitchers of ice water, and gives in to her tears. She has wept so much, so much, over the past year and a half, since Owen’s unit went MIA. She has cried most days. This is the first time she has shed tears of happiness.

Roy would say that this is just one step closer; that his journey is far from complete. But it is a momentous step. He will gain valuable experience as the Vice President, and this will perfectly position him to run for President in 2020. He will get the Democratic Party’s nomination this time, and she and the rest of the team will get him the White House. For four years, and then four more, and Roy will finally move this country in the right direction. It is what he promised himself, what he promised her, when they both returned from the front lines. 

“Riza? What’s wrong?” 

Riza hastily wipes the tears from her cheeks and turns. Roy stands at the threshold to the antechamber, looking stricken. 

“Nothing,” she tries to assure him. “I’m just so happy.”  

They meet each other halfway, and Roy hugs her tight. “Thank you,” he whispers. “I couldn’t have come this far without you at my back. I couldn’t have done any of this without you.” 

The embrace doesn’t feel frightening this time. Riza wraps her arms around him. “Congratulations, Roy.”

Someone clears their throat. Riza backs away from Roy so quickly that she almost stumbles, her heart pounding in her chest. But it’s just Hughes, looking like he wishes he were anywhere else. “Sorry. You’re going to need to make your statement to the press soon, Roy.”

“I’ll be right there.” Roy straightens his tie. Riza follows him out. 

-

December 23, 2016, Rochester, New York 

Riza drives to the Center. Roy sits in the passenger seat, and his team of Secret Service agents follows behind them. 

Riza’s gaze flicks to the rearview mirror often. “I keep thinking that I’m being followed,” she murmurs. 

“Well, you are,” Roy points out. “It’s going to take some getting used to.” 

A small smile touches the corner of Riza’s mouth. The holidays, her first holiday without Owen, has strained her. Her smiles are rare things, emerging when she saw Elicia and Oliver Hughes, and Ruby Havoc, at the administration’s holiday party last night, and when Fuery and Gracia surprised her with a gift basket full of dog treats and toys for her new friend and partner. 

“Four years of this, for Grumman’s term, and eight for your two terms. By the time you leave office, you’ll have forgotten what it feels like to not be followed around by the Secret Service.”

“Former presidents get lifetime protection,” Roy reminds her. 

Riza looks at him briefly, surprised. “Your life really has changed forever.”

“Yeah. It has.”

The transition has been almost as busy as the campaign. Thankfully, Grumman has included him completely in the process. It is almost enough to keep Roy from getting bitter when he looks at his longtime friend and ally. It is almost enough to keep him from thinking, it should have been me. 

They chat as Riza drives, talking about their impending move to DC. “I’ll miss the city,” Riza says, once again voicing what he is thinking, as she so often does. 

“I will, too.” Riza grew up upstate. Roy has lived in Queens for his entire life, barring his deployment in the Middle East. He appreciates the history of DC - of every city in the United States, really - but New York City has his heart. “We’ll come back to visit whenever we can.”

“I would like that.” Riza bites her lower lip, visibly preoccupied. 

“What is it?” 

“What are we going to do about the bagels?” Riza asks.

The question takes him so utterly by surprise that Roy dissolves into laughter as he pulls out his phone. “You sound like Breda.”

Riza’s lips twitch again. “It’s a fair question,” she maintains. She does not take her eyes off the road, but she does narrow them. “Did you just text that to the group chat?”

“No,” Roy lies.

Denny and Maria have already begun putting together a shared document of the best restaurants (sorted by cuisine), bars, cafes, neighborhoods, gyms, child-care resources, physicians, pediatricians, and veterinarians in DC. Roy and his staff have spent quite a bit of time in DC since he was elected to the House and then the Senate, but that’s different from living there full-time. Roy reads out random recommendations to Riza and she offers her commentary until they arrive at the Center. 

The proximity to the Christmas holiday means that the Center has a bare-bones staff, and Roy is grateful for that. None of this should leak to the press. Riza is an intensely private person.

They go out to the expansive, snow-covered grounds for Riza’s first meeting with Black Hayate. Roy stands at a slight distance, not wanting to confuse the dog when he arrives with his handler. He adjusts his long wool scarf around his neck and then sticks his gloved hands in the pocket of his dark overcoat. It’s always much colder upstate than it is in the city. Riza looks elegant in her own camel-colored wool coat and red plaid scarf - a gift that Maria and Breda bought for her after their trip to Scotland last year. Her hair is down around her shoulders, occasionally getting whipped and tangled by the frigid wind. Her ears, which always used to be adorned with earrings that garnered compliments from Gracia and Rebecca, are bare. 

Black Hayate cuts a picture-perfect silhouette in his red service dog harness as he emerges from the kennel with his handler, an older woman with braided black hair and a kind smile. The dog proceeds straight to Riza, without even sparing a glance back at his handler or at Roy. Hayate sits right at Riza’s feet, looking up at her with that smiling expression that some dogs seem to have.

Riza sinks down to her knees, heedless of the snow. She pulls her gloves off and offers her hand to the dog, who sniffs them, and then licks her palm. She starts to stroke the dog’s head, and Roy sees how her hands tremble.

Black Hayate edges closer to her, as if trying to support her. Riza puts her arms around the dog and hugs him. 

-

“Love at first sight,” Roy comments to Riza, after Hayate’s handler, Mary, finishes giving Riza an orientation to her new service dog. Mary handed Hayate’s leash to Riza, and the dog fell into step with her with perfect ease. The three of them are going to go for a walk to tire Hayate out before the long car ride back to the city. 

Riza watches the dog prance in the snow, his tail wagging. She smiles. “I’ll have to get him little boots so that his paws don’t get cold.”

“Red, to match his harness.” Roy frowns. “Or perhaps you should change the harness to blue. It seems more appropriate for our party, right?”

“That would be cute,” Riza muses. Her expression quickly turns serious when she looks at him. “Thank you for coming with me today. And thank you for suggesting this. For - caring.”

“Don’t thank me,” Roy responds. “It’s enough to see you so happy.”

-

Black Hayate becomes Riza’s constant companion. He comes to work with her every day, and he sticks by her side at night, curling up beside her when she sits on the sofa and when she goes to sleep. Hayate wakes her when she has a nightmare. He snuggles up with her afterwards, and lets her weep into his fur. 

He senses when her anxiety and panic rise during her waking hours, too. When she is on the verge of a flashback. He nudges her insistently and then stands close to her legs, bracing himself against her. Often, that is enough to arrest the fear and prevent it from crippling her.  

Riza walks Hayate at dawn, before work, and after work, late at night. She plays with him every day. It brings her joy to see him running back to her with his ball in his mouth, ready for her to throw it again. 

She keeps one of her hands on him whenever she can. He anchors her to the present moment, and keeps her from slipping back into memories that only bring her pain. 

-

January 21, 2017, Washington DC 

The Inaugural Ball is absolutely spectacular. Roy ensures that Chris, his staff, and their families are enjoying themselves, before he immerses himself with networking (schmoozing, as his senior staff affectionately calls it). Most of the tickets for this event go to major campaign donors and supporters. As Hughes, Riza, and Breda all reminded him earlier in the evening, it’s never too early to start thinking about 2020. 

Roy allows himself to take a break from networking halfway through the night. He dances with Chris, Gracia, Rebecca, Maria, and Sheska in turn. He returns to the table and finds Hayate sitting with Fuery and Sheska. He follows the dog’s intent line of sight to Riza, dancing nearby with Alex. Riza is taller than the average woman, at five foot six, but she is still tiny beside Alex. He twirls her with the utmost care, and holds her hands gently in his own. 

Roy waits, talking with Fuery and Sheska, until Riza and Alex return. He offers her his arm. “May I have this dance? Unless you’d rather dance with Hayate.”

Riza smiles at the mental image. “I’ll give him the next one. Thank you for the dance, Alex.”

Alex bows to her gallantly. “The pleasure was all mine, my dear.”

Roy leads Riza to the periphery of the ballroom, the spot previously occupied by Alex and Riza. This will allow them to remain in clear view of Black Hayate, for the dog’s sake. Roy always seeks the spotlight, personally, but he knows that Riza will appreciate being far from the press and photographers. 

Riza places one hand on his shoulder, and the other hand in his. Roy rests his other hand on the small of her back. She is wearing a stunning evening gown of midnight blue silk shot through with glimmering silver threads, but she is always gorgeous, no matter what she wears. 

Roy is mindful, more mindful than ever, of keeping a respectful distance between them as they dance. There has never been an unmarried Vice President in office before, and the media has already commented on this - and on his divorce - at length. He doesn’t want to give them any more fuel for the fire. 

“Having fun?” he asks. 

Riza makes a quiet sound of assent, and meets his gaze. “I keep thinking about how this will be your inauguration, in four years.”

Roy spins her around. “I’m touched by your faith.” 

“It’s not faith,” Riza corrects. “It’s confidence.”

“Will you dance with me, then?” Roy asks, before he can stop himself. 

“Of course,” Riza replies. 

A lot can happen in four years. Roy wonders if Riza will still be his Chief of Staff, or whether there will be another position by his side that she is willing to step into. 

Roy shelves that thought for now.

For now, Riza is beginning to heal, and this is enough.