lady_bols | [oom] Room 6620

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[oom] Room 6620

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Alex waits for the door to close behind Ace before turning back to face an utterly boneless Gene. He's laying half on his side, his jacket wrinkled, his hair mussed. One leg hangs over the edge of the bed.

She stands over him for a long moment, before picking up the one errant foot and slipping the boot off. The other soon follows and she tries not to let her hands linger, tries to keep her movements clinical and impersonal. She slips off his jacket and his tie, hanging them on the hook behind the door. His belt follows, and if she rests her head on his chest while her hands work it through the loops, then so be it.

She sits on the bed next to him, one leg folded beneath her. He's warm, and even through the booze and the cigarettes, she can smell his aftershave. She smooths his hair back from his face and makes sure his neck is supported by a pillow. Her hands do slow then, and she bends to brush a kiss against his cheek.

"Thought for a moment I'd lost you today." Her voice is the barest whisper, and the memory of that sickening moment when she didn't know if it was Mac or him that had taken the killing shot makes her throat tighten and her mouth go dry. "And not just when you asked that Glaswegian nutter to marry you," she laughs, biting back the tears that rise.

She rests her head against his shoulder, the strain making her lower back twinge, but she won't stretch out next to him. Ace's warning to not fall asleep across his chest still rings in her ears. (Oh but to wake up with his arms around her...)

The thought makes her sit up abruptly, scrubbing her hands over her face, dragging her fingers through her hair. She rises and toes off her boots, stepping into the bathroom. She fumbles the hot water on and grabs a cloth to remove her makeup. A few minutes later, she returns to the sound of his snoring.

Numb fingers pull the duvet up from the one side of the bed, gently covering him . She turns out the light and slips between the covers beside him, turning to lay with her back to him. Her eyes close and she listens to the sound of his breathing. Each breath, she urges another part of her body to relax. Her shoulders, her back, her legs, willing herself to let it go. Let that shot go. Let Jackie's little joke go. Let Summers go. Let it all go.

She focuses on her breathing, matching it to his, one breath at a time, until the heaviness takes over and her body slips into unconsciousness.

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He looks down, picking up crumbs from his shirt, rolling them in his fingers and flicking them on to the carpet.

'...I know, Bols. I know.'

Everything that happened to Mac was his own fault. But there's always going to be the odd doubt, when he's in a reflective mood - if he'd done it a bit differently, or said something at a different time, or something - then maybe they could have had Jarvis bang to rights and it wouldn't have come down to Mac killing him and then himself.

'I wouldn' have let him take you down.'

He looks up at her and maybe she can see how much he means it. But then he looks away again.

'I didn' wan' him t'die, tha's all. Bastard.'

She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath, chin dropping to her chest. That rage still simmers.

"He didn't have to." She wants to rail against the man, call him a filthy coward for abandoning his wife and child, but Gene knows.

And maybe Gene could have found a way to clear her name. Even now, she knows it's going to be a struggle, even if the charges are dropped. The damage has been done.

And it doesn't matter. She's not staying. (That thought crowds in the back of her throat, makes her eyes water. She's not staying and he's right here.)

She drinks her tea, imagining just standing up and taking his hand, taking him back to bed and explaining it to him, one kiss at a time.

'He was a weak man,' he says simply, and lapses into an exhausted silence.

There's one all-persuasive thought that's bothered him through all of this, has bothered him since Harry all those years ago. She knows, because he's already told her but that doesn't make it any less bothersome.

'Could've been me. Could've been any of us. Well, 'cept you, probably. Could still be Ray, one day, if I take my eye off 'im for too long.'

He stretches for his coat and one of the hipflasks inside it. If there was ever a need for hair of the dog, it's this morning.

'It's the second time it's happened an' I still don' know how t'stop it happenin' again.'

She watches him drink and thinks back to what Summers has hinted at. Operation Rose. Her exit route. But he has to know, she could never betray the Guv like that. She could never betray Gene.

"Not you, Gene. Never you. Not for a man like Jarvis."

Her voice is low, heavy with fatigue, but still threaded through with that same resolve.

How he can stop it happening again, well, she has no earthly idea. To some, those with feet of clay, the lure of an easy life proves too much to resist. Wasn't he the one that told her you never really knew anyone?

He's silent, inscrutable, for a long moment. When he speaks, he sounds just as tired as she does, but still firm.

'No. No' with someone like Jarvis.'

Never that.

He lights another cigarette and pulls a couple of sausage sandwiches out of the bag, pushing one over to her.

'You never been tempted, Bols?'

He knows the answer but it can't hurt to ask.

She takes the sandwich, no longer hungry, but knowing she should eat. She picks the paper open, carefully folding it back.

"Before I came here, I was never important enough to even be faced with the question. Fenchurch East -- is different from any place I've ever worked before. Everyone traffics in favours. It's the quickest way to get things done." She stares at the sandwich in her hand, and looks up at him.

"Have I been tempted? Honestly? Yes, when it seems like the only way to bridge the gap, I have been tempted. But always for the job, never for my own personal profit. And never when it might put someone's safety at risk."

He looks over at her, surprised by more than one of her comments.

'Not important enough? You're a DI, 'ow can you no' have been important enough?'

And he didn't know there was any other way of doing things than trafficking in favours.

She gives a little shrug. It's hard to put into words, and not just because she's from 2008. The details are fuzzy, and reaching for memories makes her head hurt.

"It's academic, at this point." In the end, she just gives a little shake of her head. "I know the line, and I've never crossed it. And I never will."

He wants to ask whether that means she's not leaving. If it's academic. But he doesn't because he's still pretty sure she'd say no, and he'd have to listen to it.

On the other hand, she could admit that she's staying and then he could take her to bed.

But all he does is stare at her, saying nothing at all. He could tell her (again) that she's not going anywhere without his say so but somehow, thats not what he wants her to remember. That he stopped her. If he is stopping her.

...and now his thoughts aren't even making semse to himself and he tells himself he's never touching that Atlantean shite again.

She feels the weight of his gaze and it makes her breath grow thick in her throat.

She looks up into his eyes, those amazing blue eyes, and she wants to tell him all of it. About Sam and the book, about the Prices, about Summers and the roses, about Molly. She wants to tell him who she is, really. She wants to share the burden with him.

She looks into his face, and the words won't come. The headache behind her eyes reasserts itself with a vengeance, the fine lines of tension wrinkling her brow, deepening the creases around her eyes.

He drops his face first, stubbing his fag out. He hates these moments. They tell him what he really needs to know but never get them anywhere. And it's never clearer, when they can't talk, that there's a reason they can't and it's coming from her. He'd love to ask what it is that's holding her back but he can't.

'I'm goin' t'get cleaned up,' he mutters, and gets up, walks to the wardrobe. If Bar can provide him a room, maybe...yeah. Clean clothes.

He doesn't look back at her as he heads to the bathroom. He's sort of hoping she'll be gone by the time he gets out but at the same time, wants her to be there to talk to. Her choice though.

It hurts to watch him go, wanting to touch him as much as she does. It hurts to know, all it would take is a few steps, and she could be in his arms.

But it doesn't hurt as much as the thought of giving up on getting back to Molly.

The door closes behind him, and her face crumples. She blinks back the tears, not making a sound. She's just tired. Tired and worn thin, and the last thing she needs to do is lose her grip here, in this place.

"Just breathe," she tells herself. "Just breathe."

By the time he gets out, she's tidied up and made them both another cup of hot tea. It might have been easier to leave while he was in the shower, but it never even occurred to her.

He comes out in jeans and a dark purple shirt, Bar having not seen fit to give him a clean suit. She did provide some Blue Stratos though, and a twenty first century razor which he would have immediately nicked if he didn't know it's disappear out of his pocket as he walked out of the front door.

'Never seen a shower in a hotel room before,' he remarks, purposefully keeping it trivial and only glancing at her as he tosses yesterday's clothes over the back of a chair. Then the tea is spotted and he sits down again, rubs his hand over his face and reaches for his fags once more.

'Ta.'

She smiles, but doesn't look up. She doesn't want him to see her eyes all red-rimmed and puffy.

"My turn." She decided it's best to just keep it simple, and yes, a glance in the wardrobe does reveal a change of clothes for her as well. Including underthings.

She disappears into the bathroom, and the steam, and the scent of his aftershave.

He has a brief moment of oh shit when she goes for the shower too and then relaxes, lets his head drop back over the back of the chair. He knows he cleaned up, turned the water up almost hot enough to burn the evidence off his skin afterwards. She'll never know.

And now he's even more tired, sated in a dissatisfied kind of way, and is glad that it's still about midnight back home. When they walk back through the door, he can go home and sleep off the rest of this god-awful hangover.

...he wishes there were more in this room to take his mind off the thought of her there in the bathroom. He gets up and flicks the TV on. There's a program about those terrorist attacks Mills told him about and he almost switches it off, but doesn't in the end. It gets his mind off her for a few moments anyway, which can only be a good thing.

She emerges a half hour later, hair pulled back into a ponytail, wearing a long blue sweater and jeans. She's folded up her own clothes, and tucked them into a graciously provided hotel laundry bag.

She hears the voice on the television and turns, her eyes wide.

"Ninth anniversary," she whispers. "God has it been nine years?"

His eyes widen and his head snaps towards her immediately.

'Wha' did you say?'

Seasick. Again.

But at least this time it can easily be explained by the hangover, so he thinks nothing of it.

"Nothing. Turn it off."

She waves a hand at the television, and turns back to her now cold tea.

"I need a drink." If she's already half dead from a bullet to the head, what's a little liver damage in the long run?

He doesn't turn it off but he does mute it.

He knows what she said. He doesn't know why she said it but he's choosing not to go there because thinking about it makes him feel ill.

'Spare flask in me coat.'

He's got the other one in his hand and isn't giving it up any time soon.

She fishes it out, resolutely not looking at the flickering images, and takes a long swig. Flask still in hand, she returns to the bed, laying back and staring at the ceiling. She's a little more relaxed from the hot water, and the -- well, the other thing. She needed something to take the edge off.

Still, she feels like she could sleep for a week.

Looking up over her head, she sees the light from the window. It's a gorgeous day outside, from what she can see.

"You want to go for a walk? Around the lake?"

'No,' he says, from the chair.

'I wan' t'draw the curtains, stay in 'ere an' die. Or go home t'bed.'

He doesn't move. His eyelids are starting to droop and even dragging himself up to walk downstairs seems like an unbearable effort. Hell, his damp hair is making his collar wet which feels horrible but he doesn't have the energy to lift his head, let alone anything else.

No one said a hungover Gene was nice to be around.

She hums. Yes, well. It was an awful idea.

But so is staying here.

"Can we stay? Just a little while longer?"

'Good idea. Why didn' I thnk of tha'?'

He sighs and sits up. Now his neck hurts.

'Shove over.'

He has to lie down. Food hasn't helped, he's just starting to feel worse. Lying down is the only possible option and he feels bad enough that he can't even worry that she's on there as well.

She smiles, and does so, making room for him beside her on the bed. She stretches above her head to pull down a pillow for him, and then for herself.

She wants to rest her head against his shoulder, but the warm solid presence beside her is comforting enough. She does steal a glance at him.

"You look like shit," she says, her tone affectionate.

'Ta very much,' he says drily, eyes closed.

'You would too, if you drank what I did. At least, I assume it was a lot. All evidence is pointin' tha' way.'

She looks tired. But not like shit. Never like shit.

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lady_bols - 2010-09-13 01:49 (UTC) - Expand

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the_gene_genie - 2010-09-13 01:51 (UTC) - Expand

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