Work Text:
You signed the paperwork last week. Wednesday morning, scrawled black ink and a manila file tucked away to be dealt with later. You'd cited 'dynamic differences' and supposed it wasn't far from the truth. Another department would suit you better. Another place, another time, somewhere that the squeezing ache in your heart couldn't loom.
Your desk was mostly empty. In all your time sitting behind it, you'd only left slight traces of yourself behind. A pen with teeth marks in the plastic, a ring etched into the wood from a cup of coffee you forgot to sit on a scrap of A4 paper. The figurine Penelope had placed beside your keyboard was the last to be boxed up; an unidentifiable creature with green skin and large eyes. The cardboard box rattled when you knocked it, so near to empty that it shifted from the sleeve of your blazer catching the edge.
The bullpen was mostly empty, too. Mostly silent. A distant phone rang, the fluorescent lights hummed and your throat tightened. You took the seldom-used staircase to get to the roof, sitting on the ledge with your fingers grazing over the indent in the cement. The tip of your index finger sat in the groove as though you were the one who made it. As though it thought that it belonged there.
Your free hand rummaged in the inside pocket of your blazer, brushing against the silk to find the battered cardboard box of Marlboro Reds. You held one between your fingers, scraping your nail along the paper, just for something to occupy your hands. Peering down towards the lulled noise of the city, headlights reflected on rain-damp tarmac.
—
The first time it happened was after a tough case. The hotel bar was empty besides you and Emily; faint, generic hotel lobby music filtered through speakers latched to the walls and half-empty glasses sat between you.
She'd looked at you under the yellowed lights hanging above the bar; tired eyes, liquor-flushed cheeks and a longing to be held. The air had been charged with something willing you to close the distance and her lips had been chilled from the ice, her tongue holding remnants of bitter whiskey.
It was a way to push the stress aside. To let it out in hot breaths and lipstick marks. Four walls of a hotel room and trails of discarded clothes.
Once turned into twice. Twice into more until it became routine; a case that left you tired would give way to a silent acknowledgement. A look across the room that said, 'I'll keep my door unlocked.'
It was professional — perfect etiquette. But you'd glance too long. Emily would touch your arm in passing. Accidents that couldn't mean nothing.
You saw yourselves in one another; too emotionally guarded for your own good, much too comfortable with compartmentalisation — ducking away from the cost of vulnerability as though it'd kill you if you let it in. Neither of you have been bold enough to break the silence. The wall between you begging to be chipped away.
Growing up learning not to need someone can take its toll on anybody. Knowing the intricacies of human behaviour cannot shield you from the claws that pierce the skin. Neither of you 'do' feelings. Not willingly. You lash out when vulnerability comes too close; you do field reports and unsub profiles and sex in hotel rooms when it's convenient.
The lines between needing comfort and needing each other began to blur. The dark of late-night trysts seemed comforting enough — hidden enough to let you want. But as the light would start to seep back in, you'd go back to casual glances and nods of acknowledgement as though the night before never happened. Pretending there was nothing there, convincing yourselves it was nothing more than what it was.
But the lying of it all, the hiding — from yourselves and one another — began to gnaw. To infest. Seeping through the cracks like rot that you couldn't ignore.
At first, it was whispered shouts and slammed doors. Disagreements about petty things; a slip-up on a case, a reckless decision.
"You should've waited for back-up," she'd said, shirt half unbuttoned the following morning and eyes pleading.
"You weren't even there." Your voice had raised, fists bunched up in the sheets.
"Don't you get it? I can't lose you."
"Then stop pushing me away."
She'd left, you'd got dressed and she'd sat away from you on the jet ride back to Quantico.
—
You'd watched her talk to Penelope, listening in from the doorway. You heard her softened voice, the words of comfort she never seemed to think you deserved. Your stomach had twisted, knotting tightly as you swallowed the lump in your throat.
It was an easy way to chase the rising feelings away; the idea of her wanting you. Needing you. The way that you want her. Pleas and unheard cries for her to notice as you grasp for her with wanting hands.
She had noticed, of course, the way you backed away. The way you'd recoiled from her passing touch and the distant hollowing of your gaze when you'd looked back at her on the roof. She'd followed you there as usual, she took a cigarette from the packet you held out to her.
You let the silence sit. Smoke breathed out between you as you watched the buzz of the city below.
"You always know what to say to everyone," you'd murmured, flicking ash beside your shoe. "Why not me?"
Emily let the quiet sit, watching the side of your face with furrowed brows and a desperate prayer to find the right words. The ones that told you how she adored you, how she wanted to give you comfort, to see you smile because of her.
"Because with you, it matters."
"Then stop treating me like I'm temporary. Please."
She'd looked away, back down to the couple walking hand in hand along the street below, stubbing her half-finished cigarette out against the brick. She'd uttered an excuse of needing to get back to work with one last glance thrown your way and a silent promise to change. Neither of you did.
—
"Thought I'd find you here," Emily spoke as she approached from behind you, heels clicking against the rooftop with an echo to occupy the silence.
You craned your head over your shoulder to greet her and the aggravated arch to her brow.
"So you just weren't gonna tell me?" She stood beside the ledge you were perched on, crossing her arms over her chest.
"No, I was. I just-"
"Wanted me to walk into work and find a note on my desk?"
"Emily." You sighed and lit the cigarette you'd forced yourself to abstain from for the past twenty minutes. "I was going to tell you. I wanted to tell you. I can never find the right words with you."
"So you're just…leaving?"
"I don't fit here, Emily. This place - it doesn't work for me. None of this works." You breathed out smoke; smelled it blend with the jasmine of her perfume.
"You mean we don't work," she countered with a huff of an unamused laugh and an inability to meet your eyes.
"You've never needed me the way I need you, Em. We both know it."
"That's not true."
"So why do I always feel like I'm on my own?"
She sucked her lip between her teeth, struggling for words that weren't combative. As per usual. That's how it always is between you: a conversation that turns into an argument, a flippant comment taken as an insult. A desperation to communicate that can't find its way through defensive words with acrid flavour. Teeth too ready to bite, hearts too ready to push intrusions away.
"But I love you." Her voice was smaller than you'd ever heard it, her dark eyes glossy — reflecting the moonlight back at you like a doe caught in the headlights.
"And I love you," you breathed, flicking ash to the ground. "But there's a difference between loving someone and knowing how to love them."
"So that's it? No fight, no proper goodbye? You're just…done?"
"I-"
"You can't just decide that we're done. That I'm done. You can't just leave this behind — pack a box like this was nothing."
"It wasn't nothing, Emily. Not to me. But I-I'm not even sure what I'm leaving behind."
You want to tell her that you'll always love her, that maybe it just isn't your time. Not yet. But you don't willingly advocate false hope; you don't want to promise her — or yourself — that maybe, if time falls into place, you could try again.
You'd both made promises to change, and you'd both shied away from the daunting prospect. There was only so much back and forth you could take, only so long you could convince yourself that love could outweigh the toxicity that wouldn't leave.
"Then stay. We could try…" Emily's voice trailed off, lulling to silence and fidgeting hands. She couldn't promise either. "Please don't go," she whispered.
"Give me a reason - a real one." Your voice cracked despite your effort to steady it. "Something tangible."
You ached to be convinced, desperately, pathetically, seeking an excuse to carry on. But her mouth opened and closed with non-existent words. Pleas dying on her tongue before they could take shape.
You nodded, cleared your throat and flicked the cigarette butt to the ground.
She grabbed your arm as you walked past and you foolishly believed that, maybe, she'd found the right words. She hoped they'd come to her with one last proper look at your face.
But her grip loosened.
She nodded.
And you carried on.