Testament, Ch. 4-A Caskett AU set between seasons 3 and 4 (7 chapters)
Title: Testament, Ch. 4
Rating: T
Summary: "She moves as easily as he's seen her so far, here where there's less to lean on, but more open, level ground. More sun warming her skin. She's sweating again. Rivulets disappearing into her collar, but there's healthy color in her cheeks and the hard-won breath doesn't seem to hurt quite the same way."
A/N: Second-to-last chapter. Set during the time gap in Rise (4 x 01).
She doesn't need him at first. Or won't admit it, but he doesn't think so. He thinks she could have made it little farther without him, and he thinks she knows. He's sure she knows. Just as sure there's a story behind the caution that's so unlike her. His mind calls up scenarios by the dozen. Crises. Almost-tragedies. A fall. Some injury. Her stranded and in pain as the dark came on.
But he's alone in his imaginings. Alone in almost choking on impotent, ex post facto panic. She moves as easily as he's seen her so far, here where there's less to lean on, but more open, level ground. More sun warming her skin. She's sweating again. Rivulets disappearing into her collar, but there's healthy color in her cheeks and the hard-won breath doesn't seem to hurt quite the same way.
"This is . . . " She stops and turns. Catches him studying her and nods. Shrugs it off like she's answering a question they both know he was about to ask. "I always feel good this time of day."
She's smiling. It catches right in the center of him. It tugs at the tight knot of anticipation he'd forgotten about, even though it sounds a little like a warning.
"Coffee?" he says like it's any other day. Like they're joking. Flirting, but it hurts as soon as it's out. How not like any other day every thing is. How every other day is a thing long over for them.
"Coffee. And the meds. They balance or something." She struggles to get it out. Struggles to turn and look at him, and it's not because her body is a wreck. It's not just that. It's because this hurts her, too. The wreck that are, and more on top of that. The shame of bring broken. Of not being invincible. "The rest of the day I'm . . ." She shakes her head. Lets her arms go slack and her spine slump.
"Do you need to go back?" he asks as carefully as he can.
"Not yet." She gathers herself up like she's shaking off fear. She closes her eyes and her head turns just slightly. It tips up a little toward the music of water, closer now. "Hear that?"
He nods silently. The call of the water saying everything for both of them just then.
"I want that," she says and strikes out toward it.
It's a mess. Beautiful with little slivers of sun leaping on the surface of the water, but the ground is a mess here. A stream rushing and wider than it should be, judging from the low bushes clinging with exposed roots to the newborn muddy slope. They must've had more rain here than the city and he wonders what she did with her days then. If she paced the cabin's interior of sat in the chair by the window, helpless and without options as the strength she'd so carefully built up slipped away.
She's prying her feet out of her shoes before he can worry about it. She dips her knees, her whole body descending at once to work her socks off with effort that leaves her winded and red-faced.
"Cold!" she gasps as she drops to her butt on wide, gnarled root raised a few inches above the wet, muddy mess of the ground and her feet land in the swiftly traveling water. "God that's cold." But she's doesn't flinch from it. She grins like she's getting away with something. It's exquisite. Painful right down to the heart of him, but exquisite.
He doesn't drop down next to her. He'd like to. He likes the amicable picture it makes in his mind, but there's a recklessness to her now that troubles him. A pendulum swinging wildly the other way. The current drags at her. Toes, ankles, calves, soaking her jeans to the knees, even though she's made a clumsy effort to roll them up. He thinks about the cabin, infinitely far away and how they'll get there. How they can possibly make their way back with her exhausted and half soaked.
"This feels good." The quiet declaration pulls him out of himself. Out of another dark spiral. She's leaning back, the broad trunk of the tree more than up to the task of supporting her. Her palms are flat on either side of her. Sinking into the mud, her fingers curling in such pleasure that it's hard to worry. Hard not to be captivated with her mini-rebellion, however much the beauty of it hurts. "This feels so good."
She needs him on the way back. Badly.
They get her up on her feet, gracelessly, but without incident. Socks and shoes are a different matter, though. A project that leaves them both sour. Bad-tempered with each other and he mourns the quiet pleasure of the last little while, now that it's gone and they're left with the memory of that particular struggle. It shuts both their mouths and the going is slow. She won't ask for help, and he's not about to force the issue for a host of reasons, some good, some bad.
The move on back through the clearing, wordless and avoiding each other's eyes until she stumbles hard, and that's the end of that. She cries out. Sharp and alarming. He's literally never heard anything like it from her, and he's catching her under the arms. She's sheet white and sweating and that didn't happen all at once. He's a mess of guilt and anger that won't stick to anything. To him or her, though it belongs to them both by rights.
"What do you need?" He steps back from her. A show of hands that says he won't go on like this.
She breathes hard. Half a minute or more before her eyes are clear enough-before the pain washes back enough-that she even processes the question. She turns her wrist up. Her left wrist, but it's bare, of course. It chastens her in some way he doesn't understand.
"It's late," she says. She's stalled there, her body giving out, however contrite she might be.
"Medication," he says, only just figuring it out as the word leaves his mouth.
She nods, ashamed. Grateful he's saved her the breath, and he's overwhelmed. Buried under everything he doesn't know about everything, and they're still so far from the cabin. He almost offers to get it. To leave her here and come back with it, but the very thought slams the breath right out of his body. It's a sudden, adamant truth that he is absolutely not leaving her alone, and he'd like someone to hate for that.
"Beckett. Tell me . . ."
His palms turn upward as he trails off. A helpless gesture, because he doesn't even know how to finish the plea. He doesn't even know what he needs to know right now. She looks back at him, just as helpless. Fully as ignorant of how they do this simple thing.
He moves toward her, extending a cautious arm as if to slide it around her waist, but she shakes her head. He jerks it back like she's bitten him, and he wonders how hard he might kick that particular adamant truth. How much work it would be to take it apart to its component atoms and free himself from her. From this.
"I can't . . ." She grits out the words, reaching to touch his arm, though it costs her. "It hurts too much to lift it like . . . to hold on like that."
"What then?" He steps closer to her. An apology of sorts. Weary acceptance that he can't go on taking every last thing as rejection. He literally can't if they're not going to both die right here, stranded in the mess they are.
"If you . . ." She looks ahead, a sigh slipping from her like the narrow path goes on forever. "If you go first, I can . . ." She holds a palm out a little above her own waist, her fingers fanning wide.
He doesn't get it. He doesn't see what she means or how it can help, but he turns. He takes a step and he feels the heel of her hand settle firm at the crest of his hip. Feels some of her weight transfer to him, and it's awkward at first. A little awkward, an then it's a dance they both already know somehow. Her fingers hooking into his belt loop when she needs him to go slower for a little while. A nudge to the left or right when he's unsure and she's suddenly close at his back. His palm out waiting for hers when there's something to step over.
Dance or not-easier or not-it feels like forever before the cabin's in sight. Before he can really breathe again, and he doesn't see how she'll make the stairs. But she steps past him. She lays a practiced hand on the worn wooden railing and takes it slow. Her legs are shaking and her eyes close when she makes it to the top. When she feels along the bottom of the metal mailbox for the key that has to be more about peace of mind than any real deterrent to anyone. Not that there's anyone around to deter.
He follows her inside, alarmed at how immediately she drops into the chair. How heavy and motionless she is. Her eyes are still closed, and for a moment, he thinks she's passed out. He hovers nearby and wishes-fervently wishes-that her eyes would snap open. That she'd slap at him and tell him not to, but her lips work at something. Her tongue wets her lips.
"Can you . . .?" Something claws at her. Some pain somewhere, and he remembers that it's late. That she went out without her meds and stayed out well past when she should've and made him an accomplice in the process.
"Bathroom?" he asks shortly without really waiting for an answer. There are only four interior doors in the whole place. He finds the tiny bathroom on the second try. An amber bottle on the bottom shelf of the mirrored medicine cabinet.
"One," she says without opening her eyes. Without lifting her hand or stirring at all.
The label says she can take up to the three at a time, and looking down at her like this, he's inclined to argue. To fall back into the the habit and cajole her like he does. To nudge his way in and bother her into actually taking care of herself. But he remembers suddenly how he came to be here. The watch looms large and he remembers that he doesn't do that anymore.
"One."
He tips the pill out into his own hand, then remembers water. He doesn't bother hunting up a glass, just gives the same mug on the drainboard another rinse, then brings it back. He has to lift her hand. Has to rouse her, but she calls up the last of whatever it is that's gotten her this far. Energy, stubbornness, or embarrassment, she manages to take the mug from him. To do the seemingly impossible work of sipping and swallowing and handing it back. Catching his wrist with fingers that can hardly hold on.
They're frozen like that, the two of them, and his pulse is leaping. Pressing itself into her fingerprints and he feels defeated. Entirely defeated because he's in love with her. He's still in love with her after everything, and it's not a surprise. It's not a shock or a revelation. It's quiet, calling music, like water in the distance. It's been there all the while and the only thing new is the utter impossibility of pretending any longer that he doesn't hear it.
"You'll be gone." Her eyes are open. Just barely open. She's still holding his wrist. He's still holding the mug. It's an awkward tableau and she's not even looking at him. She's looking past him. Out the window and there's the barest glimpse of his car pulled up on the gravel patch in front of the house. "You'll be gone when I wake up."
She sounds forlorn. Sad and angry and afraid. For him, at him, of him. The same for herself. For. At. Of. She sounds forlorn.
He'd like to think it's wishful thinking. His own remnant delusions remaking her exhaustion into something else. But it's not that. Of all the tangled things he doesn't know-has no idea about-he knows she doesn't want him leave.
"No," he says, catching her fingers just as they drop from his wrist. Holding on just briefly. It's reassurance and resignation in equal parts. He's weary. Despondent and worn out with hope at the same time. Fixed to the spot, and he might be telling her all he knows. All he really knows. "I'll be here. I won't go."
A/N: Thanks for your continued patience and support. I posted on this on tumblr, but to repeat: I made the decision to remove the ff.net reviews that were nothing but abuse of me, personally and I'm moderating guest reviews. I really am not comfortable doing that, as I've never moderated reviews in any form before, and there are dozens of legitimate reasons why people review anonymously. But I just want to get to the end of this at this point, and I can't see any other way through.
Rating: T
Summary: "She moves as easily as he's seen her so far, here where there's less to lean on, but more open, level ground. More sun warming her skin. She's sweating again. Rivulets disappearing into her collar, but there's healthy color in her cheeks and the hard-won breath doesn't seem to hurt quite the same way."
A/N: Second-to-last chapter. Set during the time gap in Rise (4 x 01).
She doesn't need him at first. Or won't admit it, but he doesn't think so. He thinks she could have made it little farther without him, and he thinks she knows. He's sure she knows. Just as sure there's a story behind the caution that's so unlike her. His mind calls up scenarios by the dozen. Crises. Almost-tragedies. A fall. Some injury. Her stranded and in pain as the dark came on.
But he's alone in his imaginings. Alone in almost choking on impotent, ex post facto panic. She moves as easily as he's seen her so far, here where there's less to lean on, but more open, level ground. More sun warming her skin. She's sweating again. Rivulets disappearing into her collar, but there's healthy color in her cheeks and the hard-won breath doesn't seem to hurt quite the same way.
"This is . . . " She stops and turns. Catches him studying her and nods. Shrugs it off like she's answering a question they both know he was about to ask. "I always feel good this time of day."
She's smiling. It catches right in the center of him. It tugs at the tight knot of anticipation he'd forgotten about, even though it sounds a little like a warning.
"Coffee?" he says like it's any other day. Like they're joking. Flirting, but it hurts as soon as it's out. How not like any other day every thing is. How every other day is a thing long over for them.
"Coffee. And the meds. They balance or something." She struggles to get it out. Struggles to turn and look at him, and it's not because her body is a wreck. It's not just that. It's because this hurts her, too. The wreck that are, and more on top of that. The shame of bring broken. Of not being invincible. "The rest of the day I'm . . ." She shakes her head. Lets her arms go slack and her spine slump.
"Do you need to go back?" he asks as carefully as he can.
"Not yet." She gathers herself up like she's shaking off fear. She closes her eyes and her head turns just slightly. It tips up a little toward the music of water, closer now. "Hear that?"
He nods silently. The call of the water saying everything for both of them just then.
"I want that," she says and strikes out toward it.
It's a mess. Beautiful with little slivers of sun leaping on the surface of the water, but the ground is a mess here. A stream rushing and wider than it should be, judging from the low bushes clinging with exposed roots to the newborn muddy slope. They must've had more rain here than the city and he wonders what she did with her days then. If she paced the cabin's interior of sat in the chair by the window, helpless and without options as the strength she'd so carefully built up slipped away.
She's prying her feet out of her shoes before he can worry about it. She dips her knees, her whole body descending at once to work her socks off with effort that leaves her winded and red-faced.
"Cold!" she gasps as she drops to her butt on wide, gnarled root raised a few inches above the wet, muddy mess of the ground and her feet land in the swiftly traveling water. "God that's cold." But she's doesn't flinch from it. She grins like she's getting away with something. It's exquisite. Painful right down to the heart of him, but exquisite.
He doesn't drop down next to her. He'd like to. He likes the amicable picture it makes in his mind, but there's a recklessness to her now that troubles him. A pendulum swinging wildly the other way. The current drags at her. Toes, ankles, calves, soaking her jeans to the knees, even though she's made a clumsy effort to roll them up. He thinks about the cabin, infinitely far away and how they'll get there. How they can possibly make their way back with her exhausted and half soaked.
"This feels good." The quiet declaration pulls him out of himself. Out of another dark spiral. She's leaning back, the broad trunk of the tree more than up to the task of supporting her. Her palms are flat on either side of her. Sinking into the mud, her fingers curling in such pleasure that it's hard to worry. Hard not to be captivated with her mini-rebellion, however much the beauty of it hurts. "This feels so good."
She needs him on the way back. Badly.
They get her up on her feet, gracelessly, but without incident. Socks and shoes are a different matter, though. A project that leaves them both sour. Bad-tempered with each other and he mourns the quiet pleasure of the last little while, now that it's gone and they're left with the memory of that particular struggle. It shuts both their mouths and the going is slow. She won't ask for help, and he's not about to force the issue for a host of reasons, some good, some bad.
The move on back through the clearing, wordless and avoiding each other's eyes until she stumbles hard, and that's the end of that. She cries out. Sharp and alarming. He's literally never heard anything like it from her, and he's catching her under the arms. She's sheet white and sweating and that didn't happen all at once. He's a mess of guilt and anger that won't stick to anything. To him or her, though it belongs to them both by rights.
"What do you need?" He steps back from her. A show of hands that says he won't go on like this.
She breathes hard. Half a minute or more before her eyes are clear enough-before the pain washes back enough-that she even processes the question. She turns her wrist up. Her left wrist, but it's bare, of course. It chastens her in some way he doesn't understand.
"It's late," she says. She's stalled there, her body giving out, however contrite she might be.
"Medication," he says, only just figuring it out as the word leaves his mouth.
She nods, ashamed. Grateful he's saved her the breath, and he's overwhelmed. Buried under everything he doesn't know about everything, and they're still so far from the cabin. He almost offers to get it. To leave her here and come back with it, but the very thought slams the breath right out of his body. It's a sudden, adamant truth that he is absolutely not leaving her alone, and he'd like someone to hate for that.
"Beckett. Tell me . . ."
His palms turn upward as he trails off. A helpless gesture, because he doesn't even know how to finish the plea. He doesn't even know what he needs to know right now. She looks back at him, just as helpless. Fully as ignorant of how they do this simple thing.
He moves toward her, extending a cautious arm as if to slide it around her waist, but she shakes her head. He jerks it back like she's bitten him, and he wonders how hard he might kick that particular adamant truth. How much work it would be to take it apart to its component atoms and free himself from her. From this.
"I can't . . ." She grits out the words, reaching to touch his arm, though it costs her. "It hurts too much to lift it like . . . to hold on like that."
"What then?" He steps closer to her. An apology of sorts. Weary acceptance that he can't go on taking every last thing as rejection. He literally can't if they're not going to both die right here, stranded in the mess they are.
"If you . . ." She looks ahead, a sigh slipping from her like the narrow path goes on forever. "If you go first, I can . . ." She holds a palm out a little above her own waist, her fingers fanning wide.
He doesn't get it. He doesn't see what she means or how it can help, but he turns. He takes a step and he feels the heel of her hand settle firm at the crest of his hip. Feels some of her weight transfer to him, and it's awkward at first. A little awkward, an then it's a dance they both already know somehow. Her fingers hooking into his belt loop when she needs him to go slower for a little while. A nudge to the left or right when he's unsure and she's suddenly close at his back. His palm out waiting for hers when there's something to step over.
Dance or not-easier or not-it feels like forever before the cabin's in sight. Before he can really breathe again, and he doesn't see how she'll make the stairs. But she steps past him. She lays a practiced hand on the worn wooden railing and takes it slow. Her legs are shaking and her eyes close when she makes it to the top. When she feels along the bottom of the metal mailbox for the key that has to be more about peace of mind than any real deterrent to anyone. Not that there's anyone around to deter.
He follows her inside, alarmed at how immediately she drops into the chair. How heavy and motionless she is. Her eyes are still closed, and for a moment, he thinks she's passed out. He hovers nearby and wishes-fervently wishes-that her eyes would snap open. That she'd slap at him and tell him not to, but her lips work at something. Her tongue wets her lips.
"Can you . . .?" Something claws at her. Some pain somewhere, and he remembers that it's late. That she went out without her meds and stayed out well past when she should've and made him an accomplice in the process.
"Bathroom?" he asks shortly without really waiting for an answer. There are only four interior doors in the whole place. He finds the tiny bathroom on the second try. An amber bottle on the bottom shelf of the mirrored medicine cabinet.
"One," she says without opening her eyes. Without lifting her hand or stirring at all.
The label says she can take up to the three at a time, and looking down at her like this, he's inclined to argue. To fall back into the the habit and cajole her like he does. To nudge his way in and bother her into actually taking care of herself. But he remembers suddenly how he came to be here. The watch looms large and he remembers that he doesn't do that anymore.
"One."
He tips the pill out into his own hand, then remembers water. He doesn't bother hunting up a glass, just gives the same mug on the drainboard another rinse, then brings it back. He has to lift her hand. Has to rouse her, but she calls up the last of whatever it is that's gotten her this far. Energy, stubbornness, or embarrassment, she manages to take the mug from him. To do the seemingly impossible work of sipping and swallowing and handing it back. Catching his wrist with fingers that can hardly hold on.
They're frozen like that, the two of them, and his pulse is leaping. Pressing itself into her fingerprints and he feels defeated. Entirely defeated because he's in love with her. He's still in love with her after everything, and it's not a surprise. It's not a shock or a revelation. It's quiet, calling music, like water in the distance. It's been there all the while and the only thing new is the utter impossibility of pretending any longer that he doesn't hear it.
"You'll be gone." Her eyes are open. Just barely open. She's still holding his wrist. He's still holding the mug. It's an awkward tableau and she's not even looking at him. She's looking past him. Out the window and there's the barest glimpse of his car pulled up on the gravel patch in front of the house. "You'll be gone when I wake up."
She sounds forlorn. Sad and angry and afraid. For him, at him, of him. The same for herself. For. At. Of. She sounds forlorn.
He'd like to think it's wishful thinking. His own remnant delusions remaking her exhaustion into something else. But it's not that. Of all the tangled things he doesn't know-has no idea about-he knows she doesn't want him leave.
"No," he says, catching her fingers just as they drop from his wrist. Holding on just briefly. It's reassurance and resignation in equal parts. He's weary. Despondent and worn out with hope at the same time. Fixed to the spot, and he might be telling her all he knows. All he really knows. "I'll be here. I won't go."
A/N: Thanks for your continued patience and support. I posted on this on tumblr, but to repeat: I made the decision to remove the ff.net reviews that were nothing but abuse of me, personally and I'm moderating guest reviews. I really am not comfortable doing that, as I've never moderated reviews in any form before, and there are dozens of legitimate reasons why people review anonymously. But I just want to get to the end of this at this point, and I can't see any other way through.