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Frank tries not to go through the motions over the holidays.
It's hard as hell, and every small thought of his family just sharpens that knife in his chest, digs it deeper. But he's trying all the same, and so he doesn't say no when Curt insists on taking the vet group out for Frank's birthday, or when the Liebermans invite him to their place in the suburbs for Thanksgiving dinner.
He does spend Christmas alone, and even Curt doesn't press him on that one. Because some types of grief just need to be felt, with every breath in Frank's body, every bone, every heartbeat. Some griefs are like a living death; they can't be buried any more than he can. And God knows Frank's let the world take its shot.
A few days after Christmas, he picks himself up again, goes for a run. The fresh air is a nice change from the stilted feel of his apartment. It's unseasonably warm, too, and that is its own kind of welcoming.
He's worked up a sweat by the time he crosses the bridge. He can't pinpoint the exact moment his run turns into something else. But instead of circling back home, he keeps going, stopping only for flowers, and to refill his subway card before taking the train to her place.
He's about halfway down the hall to her apartment when her door swings open.
Karen comes out, brow furrowed as she searches her bag for her keys. She's dressed warmly, in a thick coat and scarf. There's a knit cap tugged snugly over her ears, and – he thinks those might be matching mittens peeking out from one of her coat pockets.
Something about the sight of her bundled like this makes him want to smile. He's known her to be a lot of things: headstrong, stubborn. Brave to the point of recklessness. Vulnerable too, yeah, but in a heart-on-her-sleeve kind of way. The fact that she's not immune to something as mundane as the cold is utterly disarming to him.
"Frank?"
She's stopped short, keys in her hand as she stares at him in genuine shock. It's not the first time he's shown up unannounced, but it might be the first time he's caught her truly off guard. Even when he'd come back from the dead, a part of her hadn't seemed all that surprised. Angry, maybe. But she's not even that at the moment, when she has every reason to be, and that's Frank's first clue that something is wrong.
He treads lightly, not wanting to press her. He raises a brow at her outfit instead and says, "You know it's like 50 out, right?"
She breathes out a small laugh. "It's cold where I'm going," she tells him, adjusting the strap on her shoulder. It's a weekender bag, he notices now.
"Home," she explains after a moment, reading the expression on his face. The question he wasn't sure he had a right to ask. "For the, um. Holiday."
Frank nods, because it's easier than admitting out loud he knows nothing about where home is, for her. Where she came from, how she grew up. Where her family is now. Clearly somewhere much colder than here, and Frank's pretty sure that's not all on account of the weather.
Karen seems to consider him. "Do you have plans?" she asks, carefully, after a moment.
It's his turn to laugh, the sound of it low and more than a little self-deprecating. "Hadn't, uh." He holds up the flowers. "Hadn't thought further than giving you these."
She takes in a breath. "Are you feeling up for a drive?"
…
It's a five hour trip to her backwater town in Vermont.
The first hour is a quiet one. It gives Frank time to read her in small glances – how she's got both hands tight on the wheel, how her smile doesn't fully reach her eyes before fading each time his gaze catches hers. She's preoccupied as hell, her thoughts already miles ahead of them.
Whatever's waiting for her at home – it's nothing she's looking forward to. Not by a long shot.
His chest fills with some nameless ache at the thought. A part of it is anger, he knows. Anger at whoever's responsible, anger at himself too for not knowing. But he gets the sense that she doesn't want to talk about it, and that is a feeling Frank knows all too well.
He clears his throat as they're nearing an exit. "Any chance you need to stop for gas soon?" He slants a sheepish grin at her. "Might've had too much coffee this morning."
"Too much coffee? You?" There's a lightness to her teasing that's gratifyingly familiar. "Didn't think that was possible."
"'M as surprised as you are."
Karen takes the next exit, the tight lines of her shoulders starting to loosen as soon as they're off the highway. "I could use some coffee myself, actually."
His need for the bathroom had not been a pressing one, giving Frank time to stretch his legs while she's still inside. It's colder out here than in the city, the air fogging up with each breath. He gets back in the car and cranks the heat just a little, warming his hands over the vent.
Karen doesn't say anything when she finds him in the driver's seat this time, one arm on the wheel. But he hears her slow, shaky exhale as she alights on the passenger side, and the small smile she gives him says everything.
Eyes on the road now, he reaches out and takes her hand. It's a bit stiff from the cold, but he covers it up with his palm, feeling the life return to it slowly. She squeezes him back after a moment, and suddenly it's one of the easiest things he's done in a long time.
He finds himself filling the silence as the road beneath them winds and winds on. Not because it's an uncomfortable one, but because it gets another smile out of her, when he mentions Curt dragging him out for his birthday. How Zach and Leo Lieberman had said they were thankful to have their old Uncle Pete over for dinner; how they'd really missed him the year before.
Frank doesn't talk about Christmas, and Karen doesn't ask. Some things don't have to be said between them. Besides, she's going through her own thing, he can tell, and she's always been there for him when he needed it. In ways that go beyond just words.
He laces their fingers together, and drives.
…
The sun's already coming down as they near the sign for Fagan Corners. There's old snow packed against the side of the road, and Frank can feel the chill seeping into the truck cabin. Karen slips back into her coat, tugging it closed, but Franks suspects it's more than just about staying warm now.
He pulls onto a dirt road. The turn is narrow, and half-covered in trees; he might've missed it if Karen hadn't been on the lookout, putting a hand on his arm as they drew closer.
She directs him through several more turns. All of them are unmarked, each one even more nondescript than the last. She knows this place like the back of her hand. Frank finds himself wishing she didn't have to.
She has him park on an unpaved lot. There's a single footpath cutting into the trees, but otherwise there are no signs or guide maps, no houses or anything resembling any domiciled kind of life. The last car they'd seen had been thirty some-odd miles back.
Frank leaves the engine running, taking her hand and warming it over the vent this time. He keeps his other grip tight on the wheel, a part of him not trusting this place. Not when it has her looking so pale and so far away from him. Like he could reach for her one thousand times, and it wouldn't make a difference.
He doesn't know how to protect her like this, without something like a bullet or bomb to shield her from with all of his body. She's hurting, and he can't take that away from her, and this might be the one thing that can actually kill him. Some types of pain you can't see, or touch, or know in any real physical sense of the word, but they're felt all the same. Deeper than blood even goes. Things like longing. Homesickness. And grief.
Frank closes his eyes. He doesn't know how he didn't recognize it before.
"Someone meeting you here?" he asks finally, his throat full of gravel. He thinks he already knows her answer.
Karen exhales slowly. Then she says, voice soft, "No. Not exactly."
Frank nods. He reaches for the keys, then stops. If she'd rather go alone, that's at least one thing he can do for her. "I'm here however you need me, all right? If you want me to stay—"
She looks at him, her hand on the door. "Will you come with me?" she asks, like there could be any other answer but yes.
His thoughts flash back, unbidden. Back to the hospital, back to the last time she'd asked this of him. Back when a lie was the only answer he had to give.
Frank shuts off the engine. She slides out of the truck, retrieving the flowers he'd brought her as he makes his way around to her side. The wind has turned sharp, its bite almost staggering. It has pink blooming across Karen's cheeks, but she looks ready for it, hardly flinching when another gust blows apart a snowdrift at their feet.
"Fuck," says Frank with some surprise.
"What?"
"It's cold," he admits, and Karen lets out a small laugh.
"Hold these?" she says, and hands him the roses.
She starts unwinding her scarf, ignoring the sound of objection he makes. Her neck looks vulnerable without it, but she seems unbothered by the cold, like it's something she knows down to her bones. She steps in and wraps the scarf over his shoulders. He's close enough now that he can see the snow already trying to cling to her lashes, her hair. The scarf is soft, and thick, and she's careful to tuck it over his ears before securing the corners under his chin.
"Better?" She smiles, and the sight of that alone is enough to make him want to say yes.
He reaches out, feeling her eyes flutter closed as he smooths the pads of his thumbs over her lashes. They come back wet, and her eyes are a brighter blue than usual when she opens them again.
She offers Frank her mittens, but he takes her hand instead, pocketing them in his hood. The trees are densely green around them, cutting out some of that wind as they walk.
The cemetery is a small one. The path to it is overgrown with roots and thick, gnarled bramble. Karen slips ahead of him where it's too narrow to walk side by side. Still, she doesn't let go of his hand.
There's a scattering of tombstones, some of them barely stumps in the ground. Other graves are marked only by a thinning in the dirt around them, worn down by foot treads over the years. Some flowers have been left around them, but not many; Frank sees more weeds than anything else, where anything's bothered to grow there at all.
Karen stops between two small plaques in the ground. PENELOPE PAGE on one side. KEVIN PAGE on the other. A cold realization sinks deep in Frank's gut as he looks over the dates, the engravings. She'd been so young when she lost her mother. And Kevin—
Beneath the date of his passing, two single words are etched there: BELOVED SON. No mention of being a brother to Karen. As if to erase that part of their family. As if to erase some part of herself.
Even this place would deny Karen her grief.
Frank feels the anger burn under his skin. He wants to let it overwhelm him, to spark him into action when he's been feeling so helpless to stop her from hurting like this.
But he looks over at her, the quiet way she's held together, the air clouding over with each soft but shaky exhale. She's always been so steady for him when he needs it. He's not about to self-destruct on her now.
Frank kneels, next to a small bundle of flowers. They don't look more than a few days old; someone had to have come around Christmas, if Frank had to guess. He tries not to dwell on the person who left them – someone who's clearly left Karen, too, in ways Frank suspects will never quite heal. Some wounds never do.
He sets the roses down, arranging them carefully between the two graves. When he doesn't make a move to get up, Karen folds herself down next to him. "Frank, we don't have to—" She touches his hand with a frown. "You're going to freeze."
"Nah." The corner of his mouth curves up, and he lifts her hand, brushing a kiss to her knuckles. "Not if I got you here."
She looks askance at him, but her features are soft, and she doesn't protest when he makes himself more comfortable, crossing his legs and knocking their knees gently together.
He thumbs a lock of her hair back. Her cheeks are still flushed, but the air feels full with an unspoken kind of warmth between them. "Take as long as you need," he murmurs. "We'll go home when you're ready."
There's something wistful in the smile she gives him. "Home sounds nice."
"Yeah," Frank agrees quietly. "It does." He never thought he'd go looking again. For a someplace, a someone, to belong to. He pulls Karen close, tucking her under his arm. He feels her curl into his side, all that shared heat between them, and he knows he's never had far to look.
"Thank you," he says. "For being here, Karen."
He can sense her surprise as she looks up at him. She shakes her head. "What do you mean?"
"This probably isn't how you used to envision spending your Christmas. At least, I hope it isn't. And I know for a fact it'll never be the homecoming you deserve." He jerks his head around them and says, "But whatever happened leading up to this place, whoever made you think otherwise—"
Karen's shifting away from him. Her mouth is turned downward, but Frank won't give her time to argue. He takes her chin into his hand. "You're always going to be somebody's home, all right?" He swallows, ducking his gaze. Letting the silence speak for a moment. Letting it get his true meaning across. "I – I need you to know that."
She puts her hand on his chest, waiting until he's looking back up at her. "You are too, Frank." Her words are firm, but there's a gentleness there underneath all the determination, and that will always break him the hardest. "Okay?"
He draws her back to him, pressing his lips against her forehead. "Okay," he whispers. "Okay."
He closes his eyes, and holds her until one of them has started to shiver; he can hardly tell, at that point, where one ends and the other begins.
It's utterly dark by the time they walk back, but they both know the way now, together.