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Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters or the plot of Halt and Catch Fire. The only thing I own is my imagination and some extra words in here.
A/N: I hope you like this! I haven't been able to get this scene out of my head for a while. Cameron just broke my heart in the last episode. Comments are much appreciated :)
That Voice
Come on. Come on. The phone continued to ring until finally someone answered, but it definitely wasn’t Donna or Gordon.
“Hi. Can I speak to Donna?” Cameron asked in a rushed voice.
“She’s gone out for the evening,” said the voice on the other line.
“What? Where? It’s Cameron. Did she leave a number?”
“She did, but I don’t think I can give it to you…”
“Ahh! Listen to me! I need to speak to Donna right away!”
After a little more persuading, Joanie and Hailey’s babysitter finally cracked and gave her a number. She didn’t bother to mention who it belonged to, but Cameron didn’t care at the moment, she just needed to get a hold of Donna as soon as possible.
Cameron hurriedly dialed the number and started pacing around the room. Come on. Come on. After a couple rings, someone finally picked up.
“Hello?”
Cameron stopped dead in her tracks. That voice. Her stomach sank and ice flooded her veins. Her whole body went numb and she could hardly breathe.
“Hello?”
This was the last person she expected to hear again. She blinked. Her mind immediately flashed with past memories. Them kissing passionately on his bed. Them laughing late at night in the Cardiff engineering room. Him telling her how he got his scars. Her yelling at him about the Giant OS. She could practically feel his hands on her body and hear his voice whispering in her ear.
“Hello?”
There was a slight pause before the dial tone sounded. He was gone. She felt lightheaded and barely registered herself hanging up the phone.
She let out a shaky breath. “Shut it down,” she said to the room.
“The whole network?” Lev asked from across the table.
“Everything. Shut it all down.”
Cameron couldn’t shift her gaze from the wall. She couldn’t look at them and feel herself come apart even more. Once she heard Lev tell everyone to begin turning off the network, she walked slowly to her office.
Blindly sitting in her chair, she stared at the idle computer screen. Tears prickled the back of her eyes and anger bubbled up inside of her. How could Donna have dinner with Joe MacMillan? They weren’t exactly the closest of friends, but Donna knew how much Joe had hurt Cameron, even though she had never told Donna about it outright. There was a mutual respect between them, and Cameron felt like it had just been broken.
She felt a surge of hatred for the Clarks. What could they possibly be talking about? Was Donna’s sellout of a husband plotting new ways to steal ideas and rip off more people with Joe?
Joe. Thinking of that name again, she felt her anger replaced with an emotion she couldn’t place. Why did he still have this effect on her? She was almost positive she had never felt this desperateness when she was with him. But maybe that isn’t entirely true… She had always been more passionate and alive when he was near. Her creative senses were always heightened when he was pressuring her, and if she was being totally honest with herself, she had been lacking in that department recently.
She turned her gaze to the phone and stared at it. A part of her wanted to pick it up and call back. She needed to hear that voice again. It had always been like some sort of drug to her. Right now, she felt like an addict who had just relapsed. Her whole world was crashing down around her. Of its own accord, her hand started reaching for the phone.
She was called back to reality when Lev came in the room announcing that the network had been turned off and they needed instruction on what to do next. She quickly got out of her chair, shoved all thoughts of Joe MacMillan into the back of her mind, and headed out into the living room to deal with her collapsing company.