The Charlie-Amita Equation
Fandom: Numb3rs
Pairing(s): dissolution of Charlie/Amita
Rating: PG
Word Count: 419
Notes: Another one for penguingirl84 who won the auction over here at Live Long and Marry.
Amita has to leave Charlie. There is one day where she wakes up and just knows it to be true. She’s done the math over and over in her head, and the Charlie + Amita equation just doesn’t equal anything anymore. Not love, not infinity, nothing but misery. Harvard hasn’t made her another offer, and CalTech is a good place to be at this point, career-wise. But she’s outgrown it like she’s outgrown Charlie.
She tries to leave quietly. She sets aside a week to get her affairs in order. She has to tell Millie, even though she wishes she didn’t. After an two days of steady pleading, Millie just looks at her in that hawkish way she has and says, ‘it’s Charlie isn’t it?’
Amita nods mournfully, trying to gather up the words to say everything that she feels. How Charlie is pressing in on her, making it too hard to breathe. Making everything too hard. That she is ready for something new, but can’t find any words to explain. Millie just pats her shoulder and walks away.
The day she is set to leave, Amita looks around her office, feeling something that closely resembles panic. She’s not a bad person, she knows that. She just can’t tell Charlie because he’ll look at her with those puppy dog eyes and ask, ‘why?’ and she can’t tell him, because all the reasons that she feels will just hurt him so that he’ll never recover.
As she starts to close the door to her (old, she’ll have to get used to that) office, Alan approaches. She freezes, caught in the act. He stares at her a while before either say anything. If she is honest, Amita knows that she is going over the Amita + Charlie equation one more time out of guilt, but the answer is the same as always.
‘I, I’m sorry. I can’t.’ she tells Alan.
He says nothing, just embraces her.
‘Millie told me,’ he says.
Amita feels like crying. ‘Do you think…?’ she trails off.
‘That this will kill him? Nah. His love life maybe,’ he says. ‘But Amita, you have got to take care of yourself first. If you know you can’t live with Charlie for the rest of your life, it’s better that you leave now. It will hurt both of you less in the end.’
Amita nods miserably, and leaves without once turning back.
-
Over the years when Charlie and Amita see each other at conferences, neither one acknowledges the other.
Pairing(s): dissolution of Charlie/Amita
Rating: PG
Word Count: 419
Notes: Another one for penguingirl84 who won the auction over here at Live Long and Marry.
Amita has to leave Charlie. There is one day where she wakes up and just knows it to be true. She’s done the math over and over in her head, and the Charlie + Amita equation just doesn’t equal anything anymore. Not love, not infinity, nothing but misery. Harvard hasn’t made her another offer, and CalTech is a good place to be at this point, career-wise. But she’s outgrown it like she’s outgrown Charlie.
She tries to leave quietly. She sets aside a week to get her affairs in order. She has to tell Millie, even though she wishes she didn’t. After an two days of steady pleading, Millie just looks at her in that hawkish way she has and says, ‘it’s Charlie isn’t it?’
Amita nods mournfully, trying to gather up the words to say everything that she feels. How Charlie is pressing in on her, making it too hard to breathe. Making everything too hard. That she is ready for something new, but can’t find any words to explain. Millie just pats her shoulder and walks away.
The day she is set to leave, Amita looks around her office, feeling something that closely resembles panic. She’s not a bad person, she knows that. She just can’t tell Charlie because he’ll look at her with those puppy dog eyes and ask, ‘why?’ and she can’t tell him, because all the reasons that she feels will just hurt him so that he’ll never recover.
As she starts to close the door to her (old, she’ll have to get used to that) office, Alan approaches. She freezes, caught in the act. He stares at her a while before either say anything. If she is honest, Amita knows that she is going over the Amita + Charlie equation one more time out of guilt, but the answer is the same as always.
‘I, I’m sorry. I can’t.’ she tells Alan.
He says nothing, just embraces her.
‘Millie told me,’ he says.
Amita feels like crying. ‘Do you think…?’ she trails off.
‘That this will kill him? Nah. His love life maybe,’ he says. ‘But Amita, you have got to take care of yourself first. If you know you can’t live with Charlie for the rest of your life, it’s better that you leave now. It will hurt both of you less in the end.’
Amita nods miserably, and leaves without once turning back.
-
Over the years when Charlie and Amita see each other at conferences, neither one acknowledges the other.