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She never goes to that Knicks game.
It’s not as though she was ever genuinely interested. She’s never cared for sports, and her date was no more compelling. It was casual for a reason – she was only seeing him to fill the void in her heart, falling back into the compulsory habit she knows best. He was nothing more than an attempt to ignore the truth, a distraction – from Maggie.
It didn’t work, of course. It never works. Isobel can rarely maintain the facade of interest for more than a few months if not weeks before it starts to hurt too much, before all she can think about is Maggie in each man’s place. Yet still she keeps doing it, because she can’t stop how she feels, trying in vain to find someone – something – to override it, knowing Maggie would never look at her like that.
It hadn’t yet become completely intolerable this time, but today has quickly changed that. Now, the thought of going on that date only fills her with an overwhelming dread she can no longer ignore. She doesn't have the energy, nor inclination, to keep playing pretend for a man that knows nothing about her, least of all when she knows she will spend the entire game consumed by heartbreak and thoughts of Maggie, eating her alive.
Her decision, then, is so easy that it isn’t much of one at all.
She apologizes to him for not going, refunds the ticket price and then some, blocks his number and deletes the text log – like clockwork. She’s becoming far too good at doing that, but she's too preoccupied to feel even a little bit bad about it, when there’s far worse haunting her mind. After all, nothing can compare to the guilt and regret already bearing down on her tonight, and all she wants to do is try to forget the last twenty-four hours – at least for a little while.
She knows she can’t go to the usual bar where she drinks. It’s too high-end, they’ll cut her off to preserve their reputation, and the bartender will only recognize her. She has no choice but to opt for somewhere a little less lavish, where they won’t care how much alcohol she downs so long as she can pay for it. She doesn’t have to waste time trying to find somewhere, familiar enough with all the places in her general neighborhood, and settles on one within walking distance of her brownstone.
It's quiet and a little dingy, and she posts herself up at one end of the bar, in a dark corner far away from the few people already there. She’s served within moments of sitting down and orders her go-to brand of whiskey, knocking back the first two drinks without hesitation, only briefly waiting between them for the bartender to refill her glass. She grimaces slightly at the taste, and the faint burning at the back of her throat, but she can’t stand being completely sober for much longer.
She isn’t quite so desperate with her third glass, absently nursing it as she stares despondently at the bar’s surface. Even after twenty minutes, the alcohol isn’t working anywhere near as she’d hoped, but part of her had expected that. She doesn’t think anything could truly manage to numb the sheer extent of her heartbreak, and maybe she deserves to suffer the torture of it after today. Isobel downs what’s left of her drink and glumly accepts another.
She remembers being newly thirty – a bullet tearing through her midsection, like red-hot fire. An excruciating agony like nothing she’s ever felt, burning up on cold, hard concrete, pulse so loud she could taste it. Breathless, bleeding, barely conscious.
This is nothing like that.
This, somehow, is worse.
No, she and Maggie didn’t date. No, her long-suffering, insurmountable feelings weren’t mutual and wouldn’t ever be. Still, it kills her more than anything else ever has, and the harsh reality is that she never would’ve found the courage to try and make a move, but Maggie wouldn’t have stayed single forever – Isobel's unrequited love would have always led her to despair sooner or later.
It was inevitable.
She just wishes it hadn’t been like this, that there wasn't suddenly an irreparable rift between them, and all because of her. She wonders if there was anything she could’ve done differently, even if it’s already far too late. Was there another solution she just didn’t see? Did she try hard enough? Was there something else she could’ve done, even if only to spare Maggie from the guilt? Some obscure course of action that wouldn’t have come at the cost of losing her?
Isobel knows the what ifs will kill her, but after tonight, maybe that wouldn’t be so bad. She might be able to guide everyone to success on even the toughest cases, but it seems the only thing she’s truly good at is making them hate and distrust her, and now that includes the one person who’s always stood by her. Isobel stares down at what remains of her glass of whiskey, the amber liquid blurring slightly before she finishes it off.
She doesn't have to wait long for her next refill, when she can count the other customers on one hand, but after five drinks, the bartender simply leaves what’s left of the whiskey bottle with her. Isobel thinks she may very well empty it at this point, not that it's been any use in making her forget. She certainly feels drunk after more than an hour – detached and a little adrift – but the memory of her last conversation with Maggie persists, as suffocating as a pair of hands around her throat.
She knows the alcohol is only making it worse, but that doesn’t stop her from drinking, desperately searching for some semblance of relief. Her head aches with the constant echo of Maggie’s hurt voice, and every second they spent together replays tauntingly on a loop in her mind – up until Isobel staring regretfully after her retreating figure. She realizes, now, that this is what true heartbreak feels like – visceral, hopeless, agonizingly unbearable. The guilt and loss are inescapable, crawling under her skin. All of her breakups pale drastically in comparison.
And just like that, her glass is empty again. She has no idea what time it is now or how long she’s been sat there for – she doesn’t even remember when she arrived. She scowls faintly and reaches for the whiskey bottle, unscrewing the lid to pour herself a sixth glass. She's past caring about whether or not it’s a good idea, even if it’s more than she usually drinks, but she doesn’t get a chance to start on it.
“Isobel?”
She looks over, confused, at the sudden sound of her own name, unable to recognize the voice through her intoxication, and immediately freezes.
Oh.
Ah.
Mi sol. How ironic that her inner demons would take the form of an angel. What else did she expect? After today, there is no greater torture than staring into Maggie’s gentle eyes, studying Isobel with dismay. It’s the same expression she gave her at the office – the moment Isobel lost her. She knows now that she could never forget it, staring up at her in disbelief.
Isobel has never hallucinated when drunk before, and she’s certainly been more hammered than this, but perhaps it’s only fitting that this is the first vision she’s confronted with, no doubt born from grief just as much as alcohol. It doesn’t help that she has always been able to recall Maggie in such perfect detail – the beauty marks, the exact shade of brown in her eyes, the way the corners of them crinkle when she smiles, though Isobel doubts Maggie will ever genuinely smile at her again.
“Of course I can’t escape you...” she laments quietly, as if she could ever bring herself to look away from Maggie, watching as her eyes soften slightly with hurt – like she didn't look wistful enough.
“You don’t want to see me,” she murmurs – a statement, not a question – though she makes no move to leave. How can she, when Isobel’s tortured conscience is the reason she’s standing there at all? She’s managed to harm even a ghost.
“No, I do,” Isobel reassures her gently. “I always do.” Maggie’s assumption couldn’t be any further from the truth if it tried. There’s a reason Isobel's eyes always search for her in every room, why she’s the first person Isobel looks to. “That’s why I’m here.” The knowledge that she's ruined all of that is so crushing that the only thing she can do is try, unsuccessfully, to numb it with alcohol.
“What about your Knicks game?” Maggie asks, lowering herself onto the seat beside Isobel. Even in the bar’s crappy lighting, she's still mesmerizing, and there’s almost some relief in seeing her, even if she isn’t truly there, because Isobel knows the real Maggie will never regard her with such care again.
“I couldn’t go to that stupid game,” Isobel murmurs, scowling slightly at the thought. It was a lost cause in the first place, both the date and the relationship – not that she ever considered it one. “Not after tonight...” She might feel worse than she did when sober, but it’s still better than having to sit at a sports game hopelessly trying to pretend everything is fine when she’s dying inside. At least here, there’s no need to hide that and nobody to bother her.
“Because of the case?” Maggie says, though she’s wrong again. The case was a tough one, but Isobel has long learned to separate her emotions and her morals from her decisions on the job. Otherwise, she never would’ve made it this far. She’s lied to what must have been hundreds of people across her career and told far worse ones than today’s – not that it was even really a lie at first. It was deception and a necessary evil.
“No,” she admits, and if it was the real Maggie sitting beside her, she would have stopped there, but what does it matter if a ghost of the woman she loves finds her just as heartless and irredeemable as everyone else does? “Part of me felt bad, telling that man his wife is dead, but she might not be if he’d just cooperated with us. I don’t feel guilty for what we had to resort to because we saved thousands of people, and that’s a win.”
Ordering that deepfake had been her last option, and Leavins had given her no other choice. His information, useless as it largely turned out to be, was the main reason they found their suspect in time, and if he’d only been upfront about it, the same may have likely gone for his wife.
Isobel is apologetic for her death, when she was entirely innocent in all of this, but she has no remorse for taking the only course of action she was left with. Sometimes there are no good decisions, but someone – she – still has to decide, and making Leavins believe his wife was alive when they didn’t know for sure was always far better than letting him successfully facilitate mass fatalities. It had to be done.
“Then why?” Maggie questions, clearly confused, but for a long moment, Isobel doesn’t answer, staring at her in silence. She studies every little detail about her – Maggie's eyes, expression, clothes, the way she’s sat – but Isobel cannot find a single flaw in the illusion, resisting the urge to reach out and touch her for proof. She doesn’t want Maggie to disappear when this will be the very last time she gets to see her like this.
Isobel takes a deep breath. This, too, is something she would never say to the real Maggie, but she feels far more drunk on love than whiskey. Confessing to a ghost can only be less painful than letting it consume her. “Because my only regret – what kills me – is that the cost of it all was losing you.”
There is no one else who has ever trusted her more, followed her so willingly, been so loyal to a fault. It has always meant more to her than Maggie would ever realize, and Isobel doesn’t know if she can live with the torment of having ruined it all with a single decision. It makes her feel sick, even though her hand was forced, to know that she hurt the only person she truly cares about.
And God, she thinks, the worst part is that she almost believes those thousands of saved lives weren’t worth losing Maggie over.
“You’re crying,” Maggie murmurs, features softening with concern as she leans closer to her. Isobel hadn’t noticed, touching a tentative hand to her face. For a long moment, she simply stares at her fingertips when they come away wet before laughing slightly at the absurdity of it all, a harsh and hollow sound.
She’s drunk as hell in some low-end bar pouring her broken heart out to thin air because she’s so helplessly, irrevocably in love with a woman that she’s imagined her into being here. Isobel has finally hit true rock bottom, falling quiet again as she stubbornly blinks back the rest of her tears and drinks from her untouched glass of whiskey.
“You haven’t lost me,” Maggie assures quietly when she receives no response, and Isobel winces faintly at her soft voice, heart aching almost too painfully to bear. Of course an illusion born from Isobel’s adoration, hope and yearning would say something like that, acting just as she longs for her to deep down.
“Haven’t I?” Isobel counters tiredly, looking across at her again, but it’s quickly getting harder to lay eyes on Maggie when she insists on something Isobel knows to be untrue, even if it’s what she wants to hear. “I made a decision that hurt you, and I pushed you to do something that you didn’t want to.” At the very least, she should’ve kept Maggie as far away from that interrogation room as possible when she wouldn’t voluntarily leave the case – or her. Instead, she abused her loyalty. “You’ll never trust me again. You’ll...”
Isobel’s voice catches in her throat. Maggie is staring at her too softly, too caringly, after everything that happened. It’s exactly how Isobel wants Maggie to look at her, but she knows it isn’t how she should be, and it makes her burn with shame. She doesn’t deserve to be looked at like that. “I...” Her head swims slightly. Facing the mirage of Maggie finally hurts too much to stand. She can’t do it anymore, nausea burning in her throat. “I need to get out of here.”
She struggles with her coat, so desperate to escape the situation that it isn’t even fully on her shoulders when she abruptly stands up, but in her drunken hurry to leave, she trips on the leg of the barstool and-
The hallucination of Maggie catches her.
Except, a hallucination wouldn’t be able to do that.
Maggie, it suddenly turns out, is very much real. She did come looking for Isobel after all, and Isobel just borderline admitted to being in love with her. She thinks she forgets how to breathe, her pulse so fast it physically hurts, bruising her chest from the inside out. The room spins, and her already unsteady legs give out, but she doesn’t move let alone hit the floor, held safe and upright by Maggie’s embrace.
“Easy, I’ve got you,” Maggie murmurs, holding tightly onto her. She winds her arm around Isobel’s waist to better support her, and despite her shock and horror, Isobel still instinctively sinks into her. There’s a part of her that almost refuses to believe it, that wonders if she’s laying passed out at the bar and this is just a dream and a nightmare tangled into one, but there’s no mistaking the warmth of Maggie’s body against hers or her gentle touch. “I’m taking you home, okay?”
Isobel is too stunned to give any indication that she heard her, but Maggie isn’t necessarily expecting one, preoccupied with closing Isobel’s tab and getting her card back. In her moment of panic, Isobel certainly would’ve just left it here without thinking, unresponsive when Maggie gently pulls her coat onto her shoulders properly.
Isobel still can’t process that she’s genuinely there, letting herself be guided towards the door and out into the parking lot. Everything is slightly out of focus, her footsteps uneven and unbalanced, as if the whiskey has just now hit her, all five glasses at once. The only thing keeping her grounded, perhaps ironically, is Maggie’s arm around her waist as she bears the majority of Isobel’s weight.
She leads them slowly to her car, glad that she parked near the entrance, and carefully helps Isobel into the passenger seat. She’s glassy-eyed, no doubt from crying just as much as the alcohol, and Maggie strokes a worried finger across Isobel’s cheek when she pulls back from buckling her in. She doesn’t react, staring blankly at the dashboard, and Maggie gazes at her in concern before reluctantly closing the door, unsure if she’ll hear her say anything else before the night is over.
At the very least, this bar isn’t far from Isobel’s brownstone. It’s the fourth place Maggie had tried when Isobel’s phone had continued going straight to voicemail, convinced she’d be searching for her all night. It’s just a relief to have finally found her, even if she's in a much worse state than Maggie had anticipated, unable to help feeling responsible.
Their last conversation had gone horribly wrong somewhere, both of them misunderstanding the other. Isobel had clearly thought she was there to blame her, and Maggie hadn’t done much of anything to disprove that assumption. She’d let Isobel place all the fault and guilt upon herself and said nothing to stop her, feeling unheard because she wasn’t getting the exact kind of reassurance she’d gone in there hoping for.
In her hurt, she’d missed the sorrow and regret in Isobel’s eyes until it was too late – until they were both already long gone from the office. She wonders just how different tonight would’ve been if she had only spoken up the moment Isobel first tried to burden herself with all the blame, if Maggie had reassured her that she'd followed her willingly – that they’d been in it together and it wasn’t Isobel’s fault.
Maggie glances across at her as they turn down Isobel’s street, only just able to make out her face in the dark. She’s no longer staring at the dashboard but rather out of the passenger side window, scowling faintly, which is at least a slight improvement from her earlier catatonia. Maggie parks as close to the building as she can get, pausing for a long moment after the car comes to a stop – waiting, almost – but Isobel doesn’t visibly react to their arrival. Still, Maggie had expected that, climbing out onto the pavement before walking around to help her do the same.
In the fraction of time it takes her to open the passenger door, Isobel has at least moved. She’s freed her seatbelt and sat up, turned towards the door slightly, but she has an almost nauseated look on her face and clearly can’t get much further on her own. “Come on,” Maggie murmurs softly, reaching in to help her and readily bearing the majority of Isobel’s weight as she eases her to her feet. She stumbles slightly trying to find her footing, but Maggie keeps her steady, kicking the car door shut with her heel.
She pulls Isobel into the curve of her body, guiding her slowly towards the gate of her brownstone. She manages to walk mostly level, only swaying once, but Maggie’s protective hold stops that from being an issue, and she uses her free hand to take Isobel’s for extra support when they reach the front steps, climbing them one foot at a time.
“Where’s your key?” Maggie asks when they make it to the top. Ironically, the first time she needs it, she doesn’t have the spare that Isobel gave her – a counter gesture to Maggie handing over a copy of her own in the wake of being hospitalized. She waits patiently as Isobel struggles slightly with unearthing her keys from a coat pocket, her hand wavering slightly as she goes to unlock the door, but she at least doesn’t drop them in the process, letting them inside.
Maggie closes it carefully behind them, keeping out the late-night chill, and maneuvers Isobel through the entryway, following her lead when she stops in front of the console table and turns towards it. She sets her keys gently in the bowl on its surface and slips out of her heels with more ease than expected, clearly following a routine even drunk, and Maggie does the same right beside her.
She only reluctantly lets go of Isobel so they can remove their coats, though Maggie’s worried eyes never leave her as she shrugs off and hangs up her own. It takes Isobel twice as long to manage the same, but she at least doesn’t so much as sway despite the motion. For a moment, Maggie thinks she’s going to turn and head into the lounge without help, but when Isobel moves her hand back, she hesitates for only a brief second before wordlessly reaching towards Maggie.
Whether or not she actually thinks she can’t manage it or just wants the safe familiarity of having her, Maggie doesn’t hesitate to take Isobel's hand, falling in beside her as they head towards the other room. She helps lower her onto the nearest end of the couch, watching as she unsuccessfully tries to brush her hair out of her flushed face and slumps back into the crook of the cushioning.
It would perhaps be an understatement to say that it breaks Maggie’s heart, seeing Isobel like this – and all because believing she'd lost her was so painful that she thought her only recourse was to get mind-numbingly drunk. Somehow, despite all the glaring signs, Maggie hadn’t realized she was quite that important to Isobel, apprehensively leaving her for the kitchen.
She takes a glass down from one of the cupboards, filling it halfway at the sink before swapping it for a clean cloth, wetting it under the same tap and wringing it out. She carries both back into the other room, unsurprised to find Isobel exactly as she left her. Only when Maggie sits down next to her does she move, half-heartedly pushing her hair back again as she struggles to sit up, angling herself in Maggie’s direction.
Maggie holds out the glass of water, but Isobel doesn’t take it, dark, sad eyes staring silently across at her. “Why are you here?” she asks after a long moment, voice hoarse. Through her shocked drunken haze, she’s finally managed to process that Maggie is very much there, but she still doesn’t know why. She was meant to be at a group dinner, that much Isobel distantly remembers.
“I was worried about you,” Maggie answers quietly. She'd thought that might be obvious, but considering the way she found Isobel, perhaps it’s not so unlikely that she simply can’t comprehend the possibility of Maggie worrying about her, let alone enough to do all of this – especially after today.
Isobel’s eyes soften slightly with what Maggie immediately recognizes as guilt further still, proving her suspicion right, as if concern for her could at all be a burden. “I’m sorry,” Isobel murmurs, clearly thinking so, casting her gaze downward before she reaches out to finally take the glass of water, her fingers brushing Maggie’s.
“I don’t want you to apologize to me,” Maggie tells her gently, settling her with a tender look. “Not for anything.” Let alone because Maggie instinctively worries about her. She only wishes Isobel wouldn’t feel ashamed about it, when she is more than worth worrying about. Maggie hates to think about how many people must have made her feel as though that isn’t true for her to believe it so deeply.
Isobel doesn’t say anything, her face still flushed, and Maggie decides to finally use the cool, damp cloth for its intended purpose, leaning forward to caress it gently across Isobel’s forehead and down along her jaw. She at least seems to find comfort in the gesture, melting into Maggie’s touch with closed eyes. “If you feel sick, the water will help,” Maggie advises when she moves her hand away. Isobel stares at her for a long moment, then down into the water, but she does at least slowly start to drink.
She almost manages to finish the entire half a glass before setting it on the end table, aggressively brushing her hair back in annoyance when it starts to fall into her face again. It’s clearly agitating her, that much had been obvious to Maggie from the first time she did it when sitting down – even when Isobel’s drunk, she can easily read her body language. “Do you want me to tie your hair back?” she asks, knowing it’ll only continue to aggravate her.
Isobel’s eyes immediately meet hers, imploring and a little desperate. “Please,” she murmurs, exhausted. Maggie instinctively reaches for her wrist, pushing back her sleeve, only to realize that her usual spare hair-tie is absent. She doesn’t know where Isobel keeps hers, but she quickly decides on a solution, taking out the one in her own hair, shaking it free. Isobel needs it more than she does right now, and Maggie moves closer to the back of the couch to better reach Isobel’s hair.
She gently gathers the upper half of her curls, brushing them behind her ears and back into a ponytail. Isobel is immediately soothed by the rhythm of Maggie’s fingers combing through her hair, wishing they could just stay this way even if it seems selfish. “You shouldn't have to see me like this,” she mutters, curling her hands inward against her lap.
She feels awful and has no doubt she looks the same, unable to help but be embarrassed. Vulnerability is an unpleasant feeling and one she hates, always dreading the judgement and rejection she’s usually dealt when she isn’t perfect. Worse still, she’s said things tonight that were never meant to be heard – let alone by the person they’re about.
“Like what?" Maggie asks, careful not to tie Isobel’s ponytail too tightly. She doesn’t want to give her a tension headache on top of everything else, moving to sit directly beside her again. Isobel avoids looking at her, keeping her head angled in the opposite direction, and doesn’t answer, but that only confirms what she means – pathetic, messy, a walking disaster. Maggie doesn’t think any of those things could be further from true.
“Hey,” she murmurs, stroking the back of her forefinger against Isobel’s cheek, immediately making her look over. “It doesn’t matter to me, okay?” Least of all when Isobel has seen her in a much worse state, confined to a hospital bed for weeks on end. She couldn't move, could barely communicate or breathe, and needed help for every little thing, yet Isobel had treated her just the same as always. Maggie would never think to judge her for tonight regardless, but certainly not after all those long months of unequivocal care and support.
She sighs, taking in Isobel’s tired eyes. It’s getting late, and she clearly needs to rest – she's drunk, struggling, and they’ve had a long, difficult day. “Do you want to sleep on the couch or go to bed?”
“Go to bed,” Isobel answers quietly, not needing to give it any thought. Her couch is comfortable, but her body is going to hate her enough in the morning without the inevitable aches caused by sleeping down here. She slowly tries to stand, grimacing at the toll it takes, and the room spins slightly, making her feel unsteady, but Maggie’s arm is around her in an instant.
“I’ve got you, remember?” she reminds her gently, keeping her upright as they make their way down the hall. The stairs are a new obstacle, but Maggie is undeterred, pulling Isobel close to the point of half-carrying her as they gradually make their way up. It’s a long climb, and Maggie is shouldering Isobel’s entire weight by the time they reach her room, but she hardly minds, sitting her on the edge of the bed.
“I need to change,” Isobel murmurs, gesturing vaguely in the direction of her dresser. She can’t stand to be in her clothes for much longer, although she isn't cognizant enough to entirely determine why – knowing only that she wants to get out of them. They’re not comfortable to sleep in regardless, and she doesn’t need her bed smelling like a bar.
“I’ll grab you something,” Maggie says before Isobel can make any attempt to stand up again. She’s completely dead on her feet and Maggie would feel much better if she stayed sat where she is, only moving away from her when it’s clear she’s going to do exactly that.
“Second drawer,” Isobel directs quietly as Maggie approaches the dresser to her right, doing as instructed. It's cold out but the house is well-heated, and so she opts for the convenience of something loose and easy to slip on – a silk nightdress in powder blue. She drapes it over her arm, closing the drawer, and turns back to find Isobel struggling with the buttons of her shirt, still at the first one.
Maggie hesitates to intervene until she hears her start to mutter under her breath, frustrated, in Spanish, quickly returning to her. She sets the nightdress on the edge of the bed and steps in front of her. “Can I?” Maggie asks, gesturing to Isobel’s shirt, and she sighs, lowering her hands with a nod.
Maggie kneels down to take over, gently undoing each button, immediately reminded of when her hands shook too much as she recovered and Isobel would do the same for her. Although Maggie wishes it were under better circumstances, it’s still nice to be able to return that level of care – especially when Isobel is usually so stoic, always pretending to be infallible.
She's getting to her feet again just a few seconds later, and Isobel stares softly up at her for a long moment before motioning with a forefinger for her to face the other direction. Maggie turns in an instant, stepping away to give her some space, confident that if Isobel needs any further help, she’ll ask. It takes her several minutes to change, the room filled only with the faint rustle of fabric, but Maggie waits patiently until it’s no longer necessary.
“All done,” Isobel tells her, and Maggie turns back just as she stands up from the bed, her clothes in an already forgotten pile by her feet. She sways ever so slightly, and Maggie instinctively reaches out to fix the strap of her nightdress, gently pulling it back onto her shoulder before wordlessly moving to help her into bed.
She draws back the duvet, and Isobel slowly lays down on her side, sighing tiredly as her head sinks into the pillow. Maggie expects her to drift off in an instant, when her exhaustion is painfully clear, but Isobel’s eyes immediately flutter open again when Maggie gently tucks her in, settling her with a half-lidded stare.
“Get some rest,” Maggie says softly, leaning over to brush a stray curl out of Isobel’s face, already loose from her ponytail, but when she pulls her hand back, Isobel reaches out from under the covers to take it in her own.
“Can you stay?” she murmurs, transfixed by Maggie’s fingers intertwined with hers, too drunk and tired to care about whether or not the request is too much. If this entire night ends up having been a dream, Isobel wants to hold onto her for as long as she can. She almost dreads what might greet her after today when she closes her eyes, but at least if Maggie is here should she wake up, she’ll have proof that some of her potential nightmares aren’t true.
Maggie falters, immediately reminded of Isobel’s words from the bar – what kills me is that the cost of it all was losing you. Maggie knows that she could never leave her, but certainly not with that in mind. If she does, is she not just helping to reinforce that belief as true – that Isobel really has lost her. Her answer, then, doesn’t require much of any thought – she was always going to crash out in the guest room regardless. “Yeah,” she agrees quietly, gently untangling her hand from Isobel’s so she can walk around to the other side of the bed.
Maggie sits down in the space beside her and pulls the covers over her lap, deciding to wait until Isobel is comfortably asleep before she herself considers laying down. The moment she stills, however, Isobel shuffles over, resting her head against the dip of Maggie’s waist with closed eyes. “Thank you,” she mumbles, just loud enough for Maggie to hear, curling completely into her.
Maggie immediately softens. It’s the first time she’s seen Isobel fully relax in a long time, winding an arm around her frame, holding her closer still. She suspects that when they wake up tomorrow, Isobel will only remember the guilt and regret of how their shift ended and nothing of Maggie’s reassurance at the bar, but as she stares down at the top of her head, Maggie resolves to spend the entire morning repeating it to her – over and over again if she has to.