Chapter Text
My life for both of us
A Kelster fic for misswritingobsessed
It had been a rainy and unpleasant day. Furthermore, Jamie had a bad day at the job she had at the restaurant which was helping her pay for her studies. Her boss must have been in a bad mood because she treated her very rudely all afternoon. Jamie just wanted to go home and curl up with a blanket on her couch. But, she promised her mother she would stop by to see June.
Her sister was not well. She hadn't left the house for weeks. Their mother and Jamie could see her depression was getting deeper every day. She had them worried sick.
The afternoon was already murky, but upon entering her mother's house shaking out her umbrella, Jamie found it was even darker.
It was the first thing that disturbed her: No lights on.
“June?”
The only response was an ominous silence.
Slowly, she walked down the darkened corridor. There was only light at the end, coming through the crack under the bathroom door. Her footsteps creaked on the old wood floor. It all felt very familiar, but in a dreadful way. She turned the doorknob.
No. She didn't want to go in. She knew what was behind this closed door. There was hopelessness. Tragedy. Pain.
She didn't want to. However, just as she had done it the other time, she did.
Jamie.
It was just a whisper in her ears, but it was deafening... and it was June's voice.
·~·~·
The startle made Jamie suddenly lift her head from the window of the train she was riding on. They were stopped for three hours on the track halfway to Vienna due to a breakdown. She didn't even remember falling asleep while waiting for the train to start up again. Her heart was pounding wildly in her chest. It was very cold in the carriage. It took a long time for the feeling of doom the dream left her with to disappear.
When the train finally arrived at Wien Hauptbahnhof, Vienna's Central Station, it was dead of night, and Jamie already missed her connecting flight to Washington, but decided to head to the airport anyway. Maybe she could catch another flight.
It was very windy coming out of the station. On the same sidewalk, a woman gave a little run to pass Jamie... and took the last cab from her at the stop.
Jamie hadn't even finished cursing when it started to rain.
She used her phone to find the closest hotel so she could spend the night, and set off.
The hotel was nearby, only a couple of hundred meters away, but the walk took forever.
It was raining cats and dogs now. The wind, inclement, turned the cold curtains of water into a constant scourge. Her jacket was getting drenched, soaking the clothes underneath. She should have stayed at the station to wait for a break in the rain. Too late. There was no point in going back now.
Jamie started running away from the rain. She could see the hotel illuminated sign from where she was, less than a hundred meters away.
Surely, if she hadn’t been running when she stepped into the puddle on the smooth sidewalk, her foot wouldn't have slipped. It was so sudden that, upon hitting the ground hard, she still didn't know she had fallen.
She found herself directly on the sidewalk. Pain immediately began to radiate from her knee and hip as soon as Jamie tried to get up, although she felt more humiliated by the clumsiness than anything else.
Until a stronger whiplash came from her left wrist. Jamie knew something was injured there.
She cursed under her breath. Could anything else go wrong tonight?
Suddenly, Jamie felt she was being watched. More than a sensation, it was a certainty. She turned her face slowly.
The reflection of June's haggard face stared back at her from the huge glass window of the building to her right. If she had stopped to think about it, she would have known it didn't make sense, but Jamie turned sharply, looking behind her for her sister.
But, of course, June wasn't there.
·~·~·
Thank Goodness, the hotel did have vacant accommodations. Jamie opened the door with the card and limped into the modern, clean but modest room. She closed the door behind her with a dejected sigh, then cursed inwardly. She was on her way home. Why did she feel as if she were heading for a strange and foreign place?
At least there, she could take off her soaked clothes and get warm.
As Jamie took off her coat, she was caught off guard by how much she missed Scott. To having him there with her, comforting her and in return making him smile.
It caused her a weird uneasiness. It had been months, no, years since she broke up with him. Why did she miss him so much now? Was it perhaps the effect of the distance she was putting between them?
Her heart shrank inside her chest and a strong shudder ran through her.
A hot shower. This would be helpful.
When she got out of the shower, Jamie felt a little better. Her body regained temperature, but her wrist was crying out for urgent attention. Wrapped in the hotel bathrobe, Jamie sat at the foot of the bed and examined the damage.
She had a scratch on the heel of her hand and her wrist was a little swollen, but this wasn't what cut her breath away. The rain, the scrape, and probably also the shower blurred June's name from the palm of her hand. Now it almost couldn't be distinguished anymore.
A sudden feeling of deep hopelessness swept over her. Swallowing hard her tears, Jamie shook her head and irritably pushed away what she interpreted as a weakness in her resolve.
Wrapping her wrist as best she could with a bandage from the small first-aid kit in her luggage, she took a painkiller, and went to bed.
She was tired, that's all. What she needed was sleep.
·~·~·
She was in the garden.
The garden of the old family home in Virginia. The house where she grew up. The house her mother inherited from her own mother. Jamie's peripheral vision recognized the bright magenta of the azaleas they both so lovingly cultivated there for decades.
But they no longer had this house. Her mother sold it after June's death...
The garden was still very beautiful, though. Even more so perhaps than Jamie remembered it, as if the light were more golden, the colors more vivid, the scents more intense, and the birdsong more joyful.
There in the back, in this corner where, since she was a little girl, she had always loved to hang out, sitting on the wide wooden swing, rocking, was June.
Jamie approached walking slowly, feeling the cool dew on her bare feet. Something told her all this wasn't real, but she was the one who felt out of place.
Welcoming her with a smile, June gestured for her to sit next to her. The two rocked gently on the swing in silence. Jamie felt a sense of peace surround her without filling her. She sighed.
Then, Jamie's eyes unwillingly fixed on June's countenance, on her pallor, bluish lips and blind eyes.
“I'm so sorry,” June murmured, “But you're the one who sees me like this. You don't have to. You know it, don't you?” Jamie just looked at her, bewildered. “You just have to see me differently,” June added, taking her by the hand.
Jamie shook her head.
“Come on. Do it. For me,” June asked, gently squeezing Jamie’s hand. Her words felt like a kind nudge.
Closing her eyes, Jamie let her memory fly, back, back, to a bright and promising past. And she remembered June the way she really wanted to. Safe and sound, smiling and happy. When she opened them, June's haggard appearance was gone. With rosy cheeks and bright eyes filled with tears of emotion and joy, her sister hugged her. She gave off a pleasant warmth. Jamie marveled at how it managed to reach her chilled heart and warmed it.
“Why are you leaving?” June then asked.
Jamie pulled away and looked at her, taken aback.
“I'm not going anywhere,” she replied quizzically.
“You're leaving, Jamie. Literally thousands of miles away. Washington is nowhere precisely near Budapest.”
Jamie frowned at her and didn't answer. June looked at her tenderly. “I know what you promised at my funeral.”
Shaking her head, Jamie stood up. She didn't want to continue this conversation. “This decision has been made.”
She wanted to walk away, but her feet would not obey her. June looked into her eyes and held her there, still.
“I know you promised to live your life for both of us. But by leaving, you're not living your life, Jamie. Neither for me nor for you. You're running away from it.” Though June's voice was laden with affection, her words were a sure arrow. The tip of it, sharpened with The Truth itself, stuck in the center of her chest. “As I did.”
Yet, it didn't cause even a fraction of the damage Jamie was causing to herself.
I’ll take a bullet for you if I have to.
A long sensation of falling into the void woke Jamie up again, lying on the hotel bed, panting.
·~·~·
It took Scott several tries to get the key in the lock of his apartment. He was exhausted and not feeling well. An overwhelming sadness had enveloped him throughout the day.
He carefully touched his bruised ribs as he walked in.
He had tried to cope with Jamie's departure with serenity and maturity, but the truth is there was something broken inside him, and not just physically.
Despite his best efforts, he was distracted all day, his thoughts drifting endlessly toward Jamie, toward that last goodbye kiss burning on his cheek. In his line of work, it was the worst thing that could happen to him.
The suspect caught him off guard when he attacked Scott with a bat. Fortunately, his ribs paid the price and not any member of his team.
He had to find a way to pull himself together, before something really bad happened. But, to be honest, he had no idea how to do so.
It took him a minute, but at least he managed to find the strength to turn on the lights.
Something didn't add up. Tank didn't come out to meet him. A spark of worry assailed Scott.
“Tank?”
A short, determined bark answered him contentedly from the bedroom, dispelling his unease, but sowing more strangeness.
He opened the bedroom door fearing Tank had caused some destruction there, even if it was out of character for him.
He found Jamie in his bed, sitting up while rubbing one eye, with Tank lying next to her. She was dressed, only half covered with part of the quilt.
“Jamie,” Scott said with open bewilderment as he tried to control the elation in his heart at being able to see her at least one more time.
As an uninhibited reflection of Scott himself, Tank barked again, his tail wagging excitedly, as if telling Scott 'Look! She's back!', and tried to lick Jamie's face.
“I'm sorry,” she murmured, scratching Tank behind the ears and getting out of bed. “I was very tired and lay down for a while. I didn't mean to fall asleep.”
Scott held back from running to hug her. He had long since ceased to have the right to do it freely. He swallowed hard, trying to undo the lump tightening in his throat.
“What are you doing here?” Jamie's body language, her eyes elusive, told Scott she was nervous, uneasy even. “Are you all right?”
“I couldn’t...” Jamie approached, taking a deep breath, as if she was having a hard time breathing. “I couldn't leave.”
This was obvious. She still wouldn't look at him. Scott noticed her bandaged wrist and began to really worry. He took a step toward her, reaching for her hand.
“Jamie, what happened?”
She finally raised her mesmerizing navy blue eyes, taking Scott's breath away. Meanwhile, her lips drew a wry yet slightly overwhelmed half-smile.
“Nothing. Everything.”
This morning, Scott's words still echoing within her, Jamie awakened in tears, suffering his absence more than ever.
Wrapped in a suffocating sadness, she got up and dressed, determined to continue her journey anyway. She got into a cab which took her to Vienna airport. She had even waited in line at a counter to get a plane ticket.
But, when the polite young man helping the customers gently asked, “What is your destination?”... Jamie's heart took possession of her throat. She just could not answer: ‘Washington’.
Scott saw Jamie sigh again.
And suddenly she was in his arms. Scott's eyes closed at the longed-for sensation. He returned the embrace without even thinking about it.
“I can't leave,” she repeated.
She pulled away just enough to look him in the face. She seemed to be gathering courage to say something and Scott didn't know what to think.
“My life is here,” Jamie finally said. She paused briefly, reflective. “No. My life is with you, wherever you are.” Her determination was absolute.
However, Scott blinked at her in dismay, not knowing if he should believe it. She was the one who ended their relationship, not him. The one who decided to leave.
”I’ll take a bullet for you if I have to.”
”And I'm saying I’d never let you.”
At his silence, Jamie's eyes suddenly became unexpectedly unsure.
“Just- Just if you still want it too, of course...”
The senseless emotion rose through Scott's chest like an unstoppable tide. Who am I trying to fool? His fears and uncertainty escaped through his mouth in the form of a short, choked sigh, thrown into oblivion. He had no words to reply. ‘Of course I want” and ‘Do you even doubt it?’ fell far, far short.
Completely ignoring the pain in his ribs, Scott held Jamie tightly to him... and kissed her.
There was nothing in this world he would have wanted more than to have her back in his arms.
~.~.~.~