Chapter Text
I
Gale
The raucous music bleated from the speakers, leaving his head throbbing dully along to its heated beat; each thrum reverberated inside his skull, like the bold beating of the drums.
Or perhaps that had been an after-effect of the drinks? Oh Christ. Gale wasn’t even sure how many he’d downed so far, but the edges of his vision were spiralling as though he’d been sucked in by a particularly vicious maelstrom. Under normal circumstances, he preferred to Savor the taste of a fine wine over sampling a coarse beer, a dry gin or God forbid a glass of whiskey or bourbon. But given his circumstances, those would serve adequately as a balm for his broken heart.
He’d spent his time nursing the first glass, a whiskey that had made his mouth feel dry and withered, like scraps of old papyrus preserved by dry climate and Egyptian sands. Gale had felt odd and out of his element ever since he entered the pub, his lonely figure sitting at the bar and sticking out like a sore thumb amongst the boisterous groups of people surrounding him.
He glanced about, trying to focus his vision on nothing in particular. But it seemed that everyone that moved left a brief, hazy, smudged trail behind them, as though he was gazing through a pair of dirty glasses.
The pub certainly wasn’t anything remotely like his usual haunts— he’d always possessed a somewhat reserved nature, preferring to curl up before a crackling hearth within the comforts of his own home, nose deeply buried in the pages of some ancient text. It had never occurred to him to mind his needle point sized social circle.
He enjoyed meeting others, certainly. The occasional brushing of minds with his fellow scholars was most invigorating, the steady flow of conversation always honing his mind and keeping it sharp.
But recent times had seen him all but alienated from his few friends and myriad of colleagues. Gale had been forced to move to another department to avoid the circulating rumours. He supposed he should feel fortunate that Florrick had gone on maternity leave, and he could fill in for her. It meant that he would not lose his job, that he could continue teaching. But it felt a hollow victory— much more had been lost than what he had been able to salvage.
The private confines of his home that had once seemed comforting had become a gnawing maw of loneliness and sorrow sinking its razor-sharp teeth into his flesh. It was just him and Tara now, and the place had never seemed as quiet. Not the pleasant quiet nights he’d one delighted in, but a hollow, empty quietness that seemed to taunt him in whatever room he tried to find peace in. The loneliness had burrowed deep into the pit of his stomach, festering like some internal wound to his liver, or curling around it tightly like a coiled serpent.
Even amidst this illusion of camaraderie he felt despondent and lonesome.
Everywhere around him people seemed to have it figured out, laughing and smiling amidst their friends. He’d hoped their joy would prove contagious, smiles and jovial laughter infecting his mood too. Or that the drinks would, at least. Instead, he was reminded of how he used to think he had it all figured out as well.
Even the bartender was too engrossed in boisterous conversations amongst friends to pay him much mind, aside from serving him several drinks. Her inky dark braid flitted about as she moved, thrumming against her back with every tilt of her head.
“Lae’zel, please, you’re being an idiot,” she retorted to some weaving together of words Gale hadn’t been paying attention enough to hear, flashing her companion a sardonic smile before going back to mixing her drink. She wore a plum button up beneath a black vest, and bold, dark makeup to match. A far cry from the crowd Gale usually surrounded himself with.
The woman she was talking to possessed a wiry, yet lean, frame. The sleeves of her leather jacket rolled up above her elbows to reveal tanned and toned muscles, freckles dotting her skin like a leopard. She bumped into him as she aggressively leaned over the counter, her grin all sharp teeth, as she thrust out a finger, quick and sharp as though they were fencing, to point at the bartender.
Gale tried to shrink away, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. She was close enough that he could see every little freckle that adorned her neck and face, the bold lines of her eyelines and the metal studs sticking out of her ears. He opened his mouth, planning on asking her to move, just a little. But before she could she swiftly retreated, as though she’d never leaned in, in the first place.
“Chk , the only idiot here is you,” came her flippant reply.
Their conversation continued on, Gale trying to focus on nursing his own drink rather than the conversation flitting on between the two. It was heated like an argument, though marked by a familiar and friendly tone between the two, like this was nothing out of the ordinary.
Gale was almost happy to be ignored, ill at ease trapped in the midst of their conversation, even with the loneliness festering within him.
Perhaps coming here had been a bad idea, he thought, but it was too late now. He knew no one here and few people had bothered to confer— he probably wore his discomfort overtly, like a very garish cravat, and thus, people avoided him.
Beside him, Lae’zel unceremoniously accepted her drink, before trailing over to her table, surface shining like polished onyx and surrounded by laughing faces. She flopped into her seat with a snide remark and a smile, and both her friends and the bartender laughed.
For the briefest of moments, the dark eyes of the bartender lit up in amusement. In truth, they were light in colour; a soft green, like that of the unfurling leaves of an early spring. But she wore shadows over them, as though a pair of dark curtains had been drawn across.
Gale attempted a smile when he thanked her for his drink, but the interaction was nothing but a simple, cordial one.
The drink no longer burned as it went down. The drinks following the first one had gradually moved down with an increasing ease, now reaching the point where he probably wouldn’t even be able to tell the difference between a cup of whiskey and a glass of wine. He could probably have mistaken lukewarm tap water for vodka—he hardly tasted anything at all at this point. Not that it mattered.
He twirled the remaining contents of his glass about, trying to distract himself from the sorrow seeping back in, trying to settle itself in the very marrow of his bones.
It was futile. Of course it was.
He might as well have been a ship trying to ignore a great storm brewing upon the horizon, the distant strikes of thunder sending tremors through his soul.
He had been planning on proposing soon— he and Mystra’s anniversary had been coming up, after all, and it had seemed like the perfect time. The reservation had been made at their favourite restaurant, well in advance just to be safe, numerous ring shops had been perused through several times, he’d even prepared a speech.
Gale had loved her desperately; the type of deep devotion more akin to the worshiping prayers uttered in a lofty temple— adoring, revering, entirely and fully consuming. He’d wanted nothing more than to kneel at the altar of her and profess his most ardent love and veneration. To him she had seemed a Saint, or even a god, however blasphemous that might sound.
In her face, he had read a thousand stories. She was beauty, wisdom, elegance, power… she contained universes.
He’d let himself get lost in her, and now she’s left him stranded, with neither compass nor map to guide him.
Gale had given her everything he possibly could; his love; his endless, depthless devotion; every moment of his time she might have asked for. Yet it hadn’t been enough.
When she told she was ending things between them, he’d told her he was willing to do anything, everything to fix things. He’d begged her for another chance, pouted and pleaded, yet she had been adamant in her decision. The spark is gone, she had said, tender lips that had once dripped words like honey into his ears now twisting a bitter dagger into his heart.
Maybe the problem was just him himself. He rarely strayed from the straight and narrow, the closest brushes he’d had with chaos being some unconventional studies. Sure, he had ambition, he made plans and enjoyed her conversations. But here he was, a grown man with a double doctorate who could hardly make any conversation in a pub brimming with patrons.
Mystra had moved out of their house soon after their breakup, leaving him with only the remnants of her scent and Tara for company. He’d spent those first few nights weeping for long hours before sleep came— the sheets smelled like she was right there next to him, a part of her left behind, though her side of the bed remained empty. It seemed a wretched, thoughtless gift.
He’d wept again once the last traces of her smell had disappeared. The loss had weighed upon him. In a sense, it had made a cruel reality of her absence truly settle in. And, somehow, that had been far, far worse.
Oh, if only that had been the end of it.
He felt a sob build in his chest, not unlike a rumble of the earth foretelling a quake. What a goddamned couple of weeks he’d had, he thought.
Bottom lip aquiver, he raised the glass and gulped down the last of his drink, hoping to strangle the oncoming sob in its nascent stages. He didn’t wince when the probably too strong drink slid down his throat, at least not as much as he had when he’d quaffed all the previous drinks.
It proved ill aid for his tumultuous headache and swimming vision, in fact his entire body felt heavy and sluggish, as though he was moving his limbs through water. But he could feel the storm abating. The drinks could help nursing his wounded heart— for a precious while at least.
Gale moved a hand to his chest, slightly pained by a growing ache building within him. What he wouldn’t give for some respite from that constant pain, always leaving him feeling rotten and struggling. At least it was manageable now, he thought. He did not have to go to great lengths to hold it together, focusing on drawing in deep breaths, nor was he wracked by the pain.
He would have to take a pill, maybe even two, once he inevitably returned home, and then be forced to deal with the side effects of the medication. Alas, it was better than the biological deterioration: muscle spasms, disorientation, that ever present slight ringing in his ears.
Could he even take the pills with all this liquor in his blood? Surely he hadn’t drank that many, though his recollection of events grew hazy after the fourth or fifth drink, he wasn’t certain. It seemed he would spend his weekend in the yoke of his chronic pains, meaning he’d be utterly useless and get nothing done for the upcoming week.
One bad thing on top of the other.
He’d need another drink soon, he decided, turning the last pitiful dregs around the glass. Without lifting his head, he opened his mouth and asked for another drink, his voice wholly unfamiliar to him— rough and slurred, his breath reeking of ethanol. It didn’t matter that the full pub proved lonely, as long as the drinks could dim that feeling— as long as they could dim any feeling.
“You sure that’s a good idea?” The voice that uttered the question had an unfamiliar, yet pleasant lilt to it, as though it swaggered along to the rhythm of the music.
Gale drew his gaze upwards to where a woman had materialized behind the sticky counter of the bar. Her white knuckled fingers wrapped around a rag as she rubbed it against the counter with an almost intense vigour, as if the surface had somehow earned her ire by being unclean.
However, those dark eyes fanned by a set of long, thick lashes never once left his own as she worked. He wasn’t sure he even deserved such attention,
Her hands were slim and elegant, like those of a harpist. They seemed like they’d been sculpted to delicately pluck at the strings of an exquisitely carved instrument, rather than wipe grime off the surface of a stuffy bar.
He wasn’t quite certain when she'd appeared and from whence. He couldn’t even recall the other bartender leaving.
He wondered, idly, where she had gone. This one was a few inches shorter than her colleague, and where the other had hair as dark as a night devoid of moon and stars— utter blackness swallowing a night sky— this one had hair like the finest silver.
“I’m sorry,” he blurted, scrambling to save face from his prolonged lack of answer. The words were more slurred than he’d intended and enough to make him wince in embarrassment. “What?” He must sound an utter fool, and an incompetent one at that.
He drank in the face before him.
The white of her hair shone like burnished silver whenever the dim lamplight of the bar caught onto it, trailing no further than the nape of her neck. It had been pulled behind her face and encased a pair of short braids that travelled in neat, careful lines down her scalp. Drawn back it revealed a set of high and delicate cheekbones, feather soft like the delicate brushstrokes of an oil painting— the finer edges of her features were seamlessly blending together.
The pre-Raphaelite masters would have loved her, he thought, with her lovely beauty and the dramatic contrast between the pale hair and those haunting eyes, framed by the smudged dark eyeshadow.
She was beautiful, yes. Only a fool would deny that. But Mystra was the one he loved still, his wounded heart still burning with the yearning he felt for her. To have her love him once more. This woman was naught but a lovely-faced stranger. A ship in the night he’d never pass again.
But even so, and in spite of himself, her presence made a flush seep into his skin. Though it was one of humiliation. It wasn’t many who got to see Gale Dekarios brought so low, certainly not by a folly of his own making.
He shouldn’t stare, he realized. His mother, the indomitable Morena Dekarios, had always told him it was awfully rude to stare. Yet, he found that he could not look away. How long had it been since anyone, aside from his mother, had voiced anything remotely like concern for him? He had not realized he was so hungry for it he could weep.
It was only when those ripe lips parted to utter another word he realized that she’d repeated her words and that he had not yet dignified her question with a response.
He must have looked a fool at best, he thought.
It struck him that the drinks had addled his mind far more thoroughly than he’d even realized. He’d been mulling over how to even respond— he was a grown man; he made his own choices. Surely, he didn’t need a stranger casting her judgment upon him, like some dark, heavy funerary shroud. Or was it her pity she cast upon him?
Gale wasn’t sure which was worse. Both would weigh heavier upon him than he could even bear to think of.
“You alright?” She asked, arching a fine, well-manicured brow. Her attention had half left him already, eyes trailing over to where the dark-haired bartender was serving more drinks to the lean woman from before. Her compatriots laughed at something that had been said and that of a tall, muscular woman sounded loudest of all, her merriment bouncing off the walls in her little corner and into the wide, open space. He half thought she was simply going to leave him here and join in on the merry making, but then she drew her gaze back to his, head tilted inquisitively.
But for a moment, Gale was dumbstruck; his brain had become a sloppy mess of a puddle; it was almost a surprise it had not begun to trickle out of his ears. How long ago had it been since anybody had deigned to ask him that? Someone who wasn't his mother, of course, or his cat.
Probably before his ignominious fall from grace that followed, he and Mystra’s breakup; the spiralling rumours he’d only come as far as he had only achieved anything through Mystra; that he’d been using her position as dean to sleep his way to the top. Rumour, after all, was the swiftest of all evils.
Eventually the rumours had garnered enough strength that he’d been forced to quietly move to another department to save face, like steady waves wearing down the side of a cliff over time.
Gale tried, and failed, to keep down a sob, but like a bubbling cauldron about to boil over, it eventually rose to the surface and burst free of him. It was an ugly, half choked sound. But he found that once he’d started, he could not stop— tears flowing from him like water from a broken dam as he buried his face in his shaking hands, hoping to cover up his shame and embarrassment along with it. Where the alcohol earlier had served as a way to dull the throbbing pain in his chest, it now seemed to make it seize him tenfold.
With the stringing together of two simple words, his world unravelled, leaving him in a cesspit of emotions. How much easier it would have been if he’d simply been left alone to drink the fragmented pieces of his heart out.
But he had not wanted to be alone, at least not completely. Nor had he wanted for his feline friend to see him like this , as silly as the thought now seemed with the illumination of his drunken hindsight. So rather than stay walled in within the comforts of his too-quiet-house, he’d ventured out to find the most rowdy bar he could muster, hoping the thunderous noises and cheap beverages could keep him distracted.
It all seemed far too real, too sharp now. Rather than the rumble of a distant thunder, his woes had become a storm with him trapped in the midst of it. Alone and abandoned, pathetically weeping like a child for every stranger around him to see.
A hand came up to rest upon his shoulder, though he hardly noticed it until it offered a firm squeeze, a small, tentative attempt at comfort. He couldn’t even bring himself to look upon her.
Had he not been an object of pity before, he, without the shadow of a doubt, was now.
“Come on, love. Let’s get you some air,” she said, trying to offer him a reassuring smile he could only catch a glimpse of between the slender fingers of his hands and thick tears rolling off of his cheeks blurring his peripheral vision. Her hand slid off of his shoulder, taking its comforting warmth away with it.
Gale nearly collapsed when he got off the bar stool, ribs bumping into the sleek, sharp edge of the table. But the drinks had placated him enough that he didn’t feel it.
Objectively, he knew it ought to hurt, especially given how the woman winced in response to his tumble. A sharp pang of pain ought to course through him like a swift spreading fire and he could only feel relief that it didn’t. He’d already healed enough indignities upon himself.
The withdrawal of her touch had nearly made him cry even harder, but the hand’s gentle presence returned, settling between his shoulder blades, carefully guiding him towards the door with all the tenderness of teaching a toddler their first steps.
Although Gale was likely far more unsteady than one.
“Woah there,” she said as her touch returned, a touch firmer than the squeeze upon his shoulder had been. She probably thought he might fall again.
Sitting down he’d been unable to feel the full extent of the dizziness that had come with his excessive drinking. But now that his feet had to support the weight of his body, it cashed over him like a tidal wave.
He might as well have been aboard a ship caught in a storm, the boards beneath him rocking unsteadily as the roaring wind and vicious waves conspired to toss the ship from side to side, trying to overturn it. Except the ground beneath him was as steady as the drumming beat on the music blasting from the speakers. It was merely Gale who’d lost all footing, stumbling about like… well any common drunkard.
Without her hand, her steady touch, he feared he might fall, like a mighty oak felled by the swing of an axe.
Nausea has seized him as well, his body eager to expel the poison he’d guzzled with a newfound enthusiasm just moments before.
“Hey Jen,” he heard her call out, though blood was thrumming in his ears so thunderously it nearly choked out any other sound in the room that had previously been so, so loud. “Cover for me a bit, we have a uuhhhh…” she trailed off briefly, “a bit of a situation I need to take care of.”
Her choice of words even made herself wince, but Gale was too consumed with putting one foot before the other without tripping to take offense. He’d already made enough of an ass of himself, so he’d settle for showing her the courtesy of not falling. Saving himself any further embarrassment, too.
⚜︎
The door swung open with enough force the shock of it nearly made his teeth clatter and the stiff autumn air left ferocious bites on his soaked cheeks, the clamoring cold sinking its fangs into him and seeping beneath his skin.
He realized belatedly he’d yet to even utter another word to her. Most ungentlemanly behavior, given their current situation. His shame and embarrassment, or perhaps simply the drinks, burned hot in his cheeks, whilst the rest of his body shook like a leaf at the bone gnawing cold.
“T-thank you,” he managed between sobs, it was weak and pathetic, but a show of his gratitude all the same. He pried his eyes off of the ground and craned his neck to get a look at her, rather than his own two feet. They were stumbling across the wet asphalt like a puppy learning to walk. However, as he did, he found himself slipping on the wet, rotting leaves that dappled the ground.
Normally, he found the crisp golds and burnt oranges of fallen leaves quite beautiful. The autumn foliage was always a testament to the fact that one could find great beauty, even as the summer sky dimmed, and the earth grew freezing hard and too unforgiving for anything to be sown. Merciless, yet lovely beyond words.
Rainwater and time, however, had rotted the beauty away, peeling it back to reveal only the merciless death and decay the autumn wrought as it gave way to winter and leaving only sopping, brown leaves robbed of that lovely earthen vibrancy they held whilst still clinging to the branches of trees and bushes.
The death and decay of the season, it seemed, left an awfully slippery surface in its wake.
The ground disappeared from beneath him in the fraction of an instant and his hands reached out to grab at the bartender with winter in her hair with an instinctual greediness. His weight nearly brought her down as well, though with a strength he wasn't sure where from she’d summoned, she hauled him back to his feet. They were still unsteady as those of a newborn fawn and Gale trembled with each step he took.
“Don’t worry about it,” she muttered, sounding almost sh though she was chastising him. “Just… focus on where you’re going. We don’t want you to fall and hurt yourself.”
He tried to muster any semblance of willpower to make his steps tentative, to ease the burden he was no doubt being on that poor bartender, yet each one was much less elegant than the last. His feet skidding on the pavement, occasionally slipping in the autumnal leaves decorating the ground.
“There,” she said smoothly, and it only occurred to him as to why, when he felt the cool wood of the bench press against his backside. In his drunken state it didn’t even register that the moisture condensed atop the surface bled into the tweed fabric of his trousers.
He’d left his wool coat inside, he realized belatedly, immediately trying to rise to his unsteady feet when the realization struck him, sudden as a bolt of lightning shooting across the sky.
“Hey, hey, where are you going,” the tone was soothing like a lullaby, with more eloquence in the sugared sweetness dripping from then than he’d ever heard anywhere. Likely a tongue well accustomed to diffusing drunken tensions with a practiced professionalism, but in Gale’s state he heard only the kindness and soaked it up like a sponge left in the sink to greedily lap up the excess water.
“I left my coat inside,” he slurred, the words coming out alongside a long, exhausted whine. His tongue felt thick and swollen in his mouth, as though it was too big to sit behind the fence of his teeth.
He tried to push himself up again, hardly realizing how her steady hand pushed him down again, keeping him anchored to the bench.
Freckles were dappled across her cheeks and over the bridge of her nose, he realized, her face clearer to him now that it was so close. The warmth of her breath danced across the cold night air in tiny clouds, much in a way that reminded Gale of stories of old— words written in an elegant cursive speaking of dragons and knights.
“Then wait here,” she muttered, a sliver of annoyance slipping from those otherwise sweet lips. “I’ll go and get it for you, okay? Just stay here and don’t go anywhere. I’ll be back in just a moment.”
“No!” He wailed, feeling a sudden urge to not let her presence slip through his fingers like sand trickling through an hourglass. “Please don’t leave me, ” he said, another sickly wet sob wrenching itself from his throat.
He threw his arms around her middle, drawing her closer and burying his face in the soft leather of her jacket. Nestled amongst the smell of leather, aged and worn, he detected faint traces of cigarette smoke— normally he detested the smell. Cigarettes were an unhealthy pastime, and the damned stink was so persistent. Gale had always had a delicate sense of smell, one where even the faintest traces of smoke and ash could assault his nostrils, continuing to trickle in them long after the smell had cleared off.
But on this woman, he found an odd comfort in it. She was there, real and in front of him, and the first real interaction he’d had since Mystra had ended things between them.
The realization drew another series of sobs from his throat, his wet face likely leaving a drenched spot on her jacket. Thinking of that only made him sob harder, gulping in breaths between them laced with her musky scent.
It drew a sharp gasp from her, a hiss of air escaping her at the way he’d suddenly drawn her near. One hand still planted on his shoulder, whereas the other had landed in his hair in an attempt to steady herself. It tugged loosely at the strands as she tried to untangle it from him, a sensation that would have been almost pleasant, if not for how sickly his body felt.
Nausea coiled in his stomach like a restless serpent, his throat and eyes ached from his endless cries and the drinks had left his usually sound mind a confused mess.
“Woah there,” she said, her voice thick, though still carrying the same gentle lilt as before.
The hand upon his head gently patted it. Though the motion was awkward and stilted, as though she wasn’t quite sure where to put her hands, the touch soothed him all the same.
“Why don’t I call you a taxi home?” She offered after the moment of silence following her delicate touch stretched out too thin. “I think some sleep could do you good, yeah?”
With only a low, pathetic whine leaving his lips, he shook his head, face still buried in her jacket.
“Oh, come on,” she said, offering the words to him as a kind of encouragement. “You can barely stand on your own two feet, yet alone get home on your own. Please, just let me call a taxi for you. It’ll let me rest easy knowing you won’t spend the night in some wet and cold ditch out there.”
“I don’t want to go home right now,” he said, voice breaking halfway through as another sob escaped him. “It’s… It’s too quiet.”
“Oh, come now, I’m sure it’s not that bad. You’ll feel better in the morning.” She started slowly peeling him off of her, the flush warmth of her no longer shielding him against the bitter bite of the night air.
Though her hands remained on his shoulders. A comforting presence where the only one that had been before had been when Tara sought him out, always demanding treats and scratches whenever he felt at his lowest, always offering a much-needed distraction from it all.
“No, I won’t,” he insisted, suddenly feeling stubborn and defensive, even if there was sense in her words. The only solace he’d found since his life fell apart lay in the bottom of a bottle, but perhaps one night of that had been enough.
Yet, just for a little while he had found a comfortable, numbing void where he could escape his own thoughts and find the only peace he’d known for weeks.
She stood there awkwardly for a moment, cheeks flush from the cool autumn air nibbing at them. A deep sigh escaped her, as though the two of them had been engrossed in a game of chess and the realization that she would lose this match seeped into her.
“Alright. Why don’t you come back inside then? I’ll get you a cup of water and you can sit out in the back to sober up.” She wiped the tears with the back of the sleeve, the worn and tender leather rubbing against his cheek in a similar manner as to how she’d rubbed down the counter before. “My shift will be over soon, so once that’s done and your head clears, I’ll help you find your way home. What do you say, chap, hm?”
Gale sniffled, his head still a pounding drum and his body as wilfully disobedient as Tara was whenever he attempted to bathe her, or bring her to a scheduled visit at the vet.
He managed a quick “you don’t understand,” before the tears began to spill again and he became a bubbling brook of verbiage, spilling out his woes on a nameless stranger. “I can’t go back right now; it’s not been the same. Too quiet since” He took a heaving breath, trying to force down the building nausea working its way up his throat, “since I lost…”
“I don’t understand. What is it that you’ve lost?”
“I’ve lost…”
“Listen, you’re clearly going through something, and you don’t have to tell me, right now it’s just important to ensure you can sleep this off somewhere safe,” she began, tapping the toe of her dark high-heeled boot into the pavement, growing impatient. Though it didn’t register to Gale.
“I’ve lost Mystra.” His entire body was wracked by the sobs. Flesh and sinews now trembling sickly around his bones. “And everything has just fallen apart since. I just wish things were the way they used to be, that I was who I used to be. You must know I loved her. She was my first great love, I thought it would last forever. But then I did something wrong. I must have, because she just left me and now she’s pretending like I don’t exist, because apparently that spark was just gone.”
He was babbling he realized, but there was something deeply cathartic about it he found, realizing he could no less stop himself than he could go without air. Wine was to wit as meat was to…. he couldn’t bloody remember, he realized. Simply proving the point he was carefully constructing in his head; that beer had the same effect.
“And then those bloody rumours started,” he babbled on, his words almost indistinguishable through his slurred speech and sobbing. Instinctively, he moved one of his hands to the spot over his heart, trying to rub away the growing discomfort building beneath.
“I’m not sure when it started, nor who’s behind it. But people started saying I only had my position at the university because of her, that it was why I’d started dating her in the first place. Never mind the fact that I have a double doctorate or that we’d been together for years. What we had was truly love; I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her. I thought we were going to. In a few months I was going to propose, and it would have been perfect. On our anniversary, dining at our favourite restaurant…
“And the worst part is, she’s said nothing to defend me. It’s like I don’t even exist to her anymore. She’s not even said a single word to me since she moved out of the house, not even when I had to move departments and god…”
He started sobbing even harder, growing more sick and frantic by the moment. “I’m not even sure I’ll have my job by next year. I only get to teach the philosophy course this term and the next because Florrick is on maternity leave. But when she returns, what then? The university is always curbing the funding to the humanities departments and… and if they do that again and I don’t have a secure position…”
His next sob half came out as a strangled, broken laugh. His vision blurred with the slightest notion now, yet he continued. “I might as well start looking into other options. But where would I go? I’ve lived in this city my whole life. I’ll have to see my mother less, a thing she certainly won’t be pleased about, and I’ll have to find a new vet for Tara and she already struggles enough with her current one. I dread to think how she’ll react to starting over with someone new. I’ll have to find a new doctor for myself too, and it took long enough to get my current one to care enough to help with my illness and…”
He looked up at her through the blur of his vision and the fat tears sticking to his dark lashes, though her expression was impossible to read. Her hand still rested comfortably on his shoulder, offering occasional squeezes he assumed were meant to be reassuring.
“And I just don’t know what to—” his babbling was abruptly cut off when the climbing nausea reached its vile climax, and before he could stop it, he retched up a stinking bile on those pretty, black boots she wore.
“Oi, what the fuck!” She leapt backwards with the elegance of a gazelle, though he had undoubtedly ruined her shoes. That was the last coherent thought that crossed his drink-addled mind as he stared at her boots, unsure of how to react.
He was a mess of weeping apologies and impulsively trying to kneel down to wipe them clean with the soaked napkin he’d fished out of his pocket.
Her hands found his shoulders again, more harshly this time around. It only made him more frantic, his sobs louder and nearly choking him.
It was quite enough to have made a muck of his own life, but to have ruined the boots and earned the contempt of a stranger who’d tried to help him on top of that? Well, Gale couldn’t bear it.
“Hey now, sit still will you,” she huffed, shoving him back onto the bench with more force than he thought someone a head shorter than him could muster. “If you keep moving around like that you’ll just fall on your face—“
“But your boots,” he managed between sobs, though it hardly sounded like any words that he knew.
“What?”
“Your boots,” he whined, raking his fingers through his mussed-up hair. Though it hardly sounded any more coherent.
“My boots?” She asked, arching a brow. “Oh, forget about the bloody boots. Let’s get you inside and find you a cup of water, with all your crying you’re bound to be dehydrated.”
She hoisted an arm under his, grasping at one of his hands with her free one to guide it over her shoulder, steadying him as she dragged him back to his feet.
She did most of the walking for the both of them as they stumbled back to her bar. Like she’d promised, she seated him out in the back, away from the rest of the customers and placed a glass of water before him.
He’d gulped it down greedily, swallowing far too much air along with the cool, clear liquid, leaving him even more nauseous than he’d been before.
She’d left in the meantime he realized, suddenly feeling very small and tired. Though he still managed to stumble to the sink to fill another glass, half of which he spilled on the floor when he’d stumbled into a plant, before settling on the old leather couch again.
He gulped it down quickly too, instantly regretting how he’d left the sink so swiftly. His throat felt desert dry, and he desired another glass more than anything in that moment.
But his eyes had grown weary and by the time the woman returned, his woollen jacket folded with neat care over her arm, his head had lolled backwards and a deep, dreamless slumber taken over him.
He didn’t hear how she sighed defeatedly, nor see how she laid his coat over him like a blanket, before returning back to continue the rest of her shift.
⚜︎
He wasn’t sure how long passed, it could have been several hours or merely minutes, before the same hands that had tucked in on the couch helped him up again. He leaned into that touch like a particularly affectionate stray cat, relishing in her warmth and the tenderness of her touch.
By the time Gale finally fell asleep, snug and content in the warmth of the bedsheets, he hardly felt sick anymore. The sheets were silky and softer than his own, and it did not strike him to mind the unfamiliarity of them. He simply curled up on his side, almost snoring before his eyes had fully closed.
