FIC: Heartbroken

[elliev]

Don’t own SGU but I do own the DVDs;
Nicholas Rush in glorious high definition

For Cat4444, who wanted the story of Rush’s trip back to Scotland …

Heartbroken
By EllieV


Patricia Blackall paced around her New York hotel room. She didn’t want to go out, though her husband had said to continue shopping and sightseeing. But the call they’d got put paid to any enjoyment of her holiday. When Tommy left, she’d holed up in their suite and waited.

They were on Ellis Island when Tommy’s phone had rung.

He’d answered it, looked puzzled, and said, “Hold on a minute.” He covered his other ear and walked away from the tour. She followed him.

“Father …” he said. “Father Andrew?”

He listened and said, “Where?” Then, “Did he say …?” And, “Fucking hell … sorry, Father.” He nodded absently. “Have you …?” He paused. “No, I’ll go right away.” Another pause as he pulled out a pen and wrote something on his hand. “No, I’ll call as soon as I see him.” He kicked at a wall. “Okay, okay, yes, bye now.”

“What’s wrong?” Patty asked. “Who was that?”

“Father Andrew,” Tommy said. He looked worried. “Nicky’s turned up.”

Nicky.

Nicky, who had vanished on the pretext of going away for work. Nicky, who had pushed everyone aside when Gloria died, who didn’t want to know or speak to anyone at all, who didn’t return calls or emails. No one had heard from Nicky, not his family, not his friends. He’d disappeared; he’d dropped out; he’d buried himself so far down in his work, it was a wonder he remembered who people were at all. But when Nicholas Rush said jump, his family asked how high. When Nicholas Rush clicked his fingers, his friends dropped everything.

“Where is he?” she asked. “Did Father Andrew say where he’s been all this time?”

“He said Nicky wouldn’t say,” Tommy said. “Nick just told Father Andrew he didn’t have access to his bank accounts or credit cards, could someone send him some money for the flight home. Andrew wants me to go to Washington and get him.”

“Nicky’s a grown man, Tommy,” Patty said, even though her instinct was like Tommy’s, to bolt to his side immediately. “If all he needs is money …”

But Tommy shook his head.

“I could hear Neil in the background,” Tommy said. “He sounded scared.”

“Scared,” she repeated.

Neil Rush was a hardened police officer. He wasn’t scared of anything.

“Fucking frantic, if you ask me, love,” said Tommy. “He was insisting that Andrew tell me to go get Nicky right now.” He folded his arms. “He kept saying that something was wrong with him.”

“If we leave this afternoon …” Patty said.

“You stay here,” Tommy said. “I’ll go.”

“Tommy …” she began.

“You know what he’s like,” Tommy said reasonably. “He’s going to be pissed that Neil and Andrew called me.”

That was true. Independent little Nicky, who never needed help from anyone. She supposed this was why his cousins were so worried. Nicky never asked for help even if it was just money. Tommy left and Patty walked aimlessly around her hotel room. She was in the bathroom washing her face when the phone rang. She ran to pick it up.

“It’s me,” said Tommy.

His voice was hushed.

“Is Nicky all right?” she asked. “Did he say where he’s been?”

“He told me he can’t say,” Tommy said. There was a silence at the other end of the phone then he said, “He’s … He’s not all right.”

“What?” Patty said. “What does that mean?”

“He looks like he hasn’t eaten properly for years,” Tommy said. “He looks like he’s been starved half to death.”

Nothing ever fazed Tommy Blackall. He was a man who took everything in his stride, even risks. He’d been such a chancer at school. He and Nicky together; Nicky had always said he had paid for half his education from scams he and Tommy had run in high school. Now, Tommy sounded almost frightened.

“Starved,” she repeated.

“And his hand, Christ almighty, his hand,” Tommy whispered into the phone. “His left hand’s fucked up. It’s like it was broken and never fixed.”

“Make him tell you,” Patty said, starting to feel frightened herself. “Make him.”

“I can’t,” Tommy said. He sounded like he was about to cry. “You need to see him, love. He’s wrong, he’s all wrong.”

Work was supposed to be the cure for Nicky Rush after his wife's death even though he'd worked through her illness, in denial. Work was supposed to fix everything. He had called them before he went away. He sounded like an excitable schoolboy about the job; it was everything he’d ever dreamed about. It was only later that she realized he hadn’t actually said what the job was or where he was going.

“I’ll make him presentable then we’ll get a flight,” Tommy said. “I’ll call you from the airport. Get our tickets changed, okay, and … and get Nicky a ticket. Upgrade everything to first class. You know how he hates being crowded. He’s got his passport; I think it’s the only thing he’s got with him.”

“Can I say hello?” she asked.

“He’s asleep,” Tommy said. “He looks completely shite, like he’s not slept properly for ages either.”

He rang off and Patty paced some more before calling to change the tickets. She hadn’t asked if Tommy had spoken to Andrew or Neil and he hadn’t mentioned it so when she got the flight details she rang Neil.

A deep voice said, “Strathclyde Police.”

“DCI Neil Rush, please,” she said.

“Just a moment, ma’am,” the voice said. The voice came back and said, “I’m sorry, ma’am, DCI Rush is out at the moment. Will I put you through to his voicemail?”

“No, I’ll call his cousin,” she said, almost relieved that she didn’t have to speak to Neil. “It’s a family matter.”

She rang Andrew instead. He was calmer than Neil who, like his brother Billy, had a hair-trigger temper. Neil was overprotective to the point of lunacy about his clever little cousin. He and Billy had raging rows about Nicky when they were growing up. Billy was forever getting Nicky into trouble-the tattoo, for instance. Neil had wanted Nicky to go to Glasgow University, close to home; Billy had researched all the expensive universities and had pushed Nicky into applying for a scholarship at Oxford-which he’d breezed into, of course. When Nicky’s dad died and he mentioned transferring back to Glasgow to be with his mum, Billy and Neil had actually come to blows about it. Only his mother’s insistence that Nicky return to Oxford had made Neil let go, probably because Andrew had intervened. Billy’s temper finally got the better of him; twenty years in prison, good old Billy. Neil’s career had stalled because of Billy; it had been very unfair but what she remembered most was how closed up Nicky had got when Neil had ranted furiously about his stupid brother. When they were growing up, Nicky had followed Billy around like a puppy despite Billy being a bullying little thug. It was only later that she’d realized how Nicky could wind Billy around his little finger. Manipulative little bastard.

A cheerful female voice answered the phone at Father Andrew Rush’s busy office.

“Father Rush, please,” Patty said. “Could you tell him it’s Patty Blackall calling from New York.”

She waited a minute before Andrew picked up the phone.

“Patty,” his voice said. “How are you? I’m sorry for spoiling your holiday.”

“Don’t be silly, Father,” she said. “You know we’d drop everything for Nicky.”

“Yes,” he said, his voice troubled. “He wouldn’t say where he’s been all this time.”

“Tommy said that Neil’s very worried,” she said.

“Ah well,” he said, a note of humor entering his voice. “You know what Neil’s like; he thinks Nicky should be locked up for his own safety.”

“He’s probably right,” Patty said. “Did Tommy call you?”

“Has he seen Nicky?” Andrew asked anxiously.

“Yes, he said Nicky didn’t seem very well,” she said, omitting the half-starved and smashed hand bits. “I asked to speak to him but Tommy said he was asleep.”

“He didn’t sound … he didn’t sound right,” Andrew said. “Maybe I’m just projecting.”

He was all wrong, Tommy had said. She didn’t say this to Andrew either.

“I just wanted to let you know what flight we’ll be on,” Patty said instead.

“I’m very grateful, Patty,” Andrew said after she passed on the details.

“Put in a good word for us with the man upstairs, Father,” she said cheerfully.

“Done,” he said.

Patty stopped smiling as she hung up the phone. She paced some more and eventually she sat and watched the city lights as they came on. She opened the balcony door, listening to the roar of the traffic and the sounds of the people as they moved about. She fell asleep in the chair and woke suddenly as the suite doorbell chimed.

Yawning, she hauled herself off the chair and went to the door, swearing as she bumped into the coffee table. She switched on the light and looked through the peephole. It was Tommy. She opened the door and he moved aside.

Patty stopped breathing and she felt her hand cover her mouth.

Nicky gave her a faint, twitchy smile.

“Patty,” he said in that soft voice.

He looked away as she continued to stare at him. Patty gulped in a breath and stepped forward pulling Nicky into her arms. She felt his arms go around her, holding her loosely.

“Oh, Nicky love,” she said, bursting into tears. “Oh, Nicky.”

“I’m fine, Patty, really,” he said. “Please, just … Will you stop crying?”

She pulled away to look at him. He was wearing Tommy’s coat and scarf, which, of course, were too big for him anyway, but he was so thin underneath them. Half-starved and all wrong. She couldn’t think of the right word to describe him.

“Let’s …” Tommy said, indicating the room.

Patty grabbed Nicky’s hand and pulled him into their suite. She looked down at his left hand, lifting it to take a look at the damage. He pulled away and tucked his hands under his arms, his shoulders going up as he stiffened in reaction.

“What happened to your hand?” she demanded.

“Accident,” he said shortly. “I broke my hand. That’s all.”

“And where the hell were you that you couldn’t go to a hospital?” she said angrily. “Why didn’t anyone take care of you?”

“Maybe that nice Lieutenant knows,” Tommy said in a horribly snide voice.

“Don’t, Tommy, please,” Nicky said. He sounded tired. “Just don’t, all right?”

“Lieutenant,” Patty said, grasping this bit of information. “What Lieutenant?”

“When we were at the airport, I met a nice young lady who said she’d worked with someone from Glasgow,” Tommy said. “And then she spotted our Nicky. Now, there’s a wee girl who has a big crush.”

Nicky snapped, instant temper, “Shut up, Tommy.”

“Pretty fucking obvious to me,” Tommy said. “She was practically in tears when she left you.”

Nicky looked furious but he stepped backwards, his face closing up as it always did. He just withdrew, mentally and physically, shutting himself off. She sighed and gave up for now.

“Have you eaten?” she asked. “Let’s get something to eat.”

“I’m really not hungry,” Nicky started to say but she interrupted with determined cheerfulness.

“Then you can keep us company,” she said. “Where’s your bag? Don’t you have any luggage?”

He said no. There was a small bag by the door, which seemed to contain his worldly goods. She glanced at Tommy helplessly. He shrugged, as if to say, see what I’ve been putting up with? She took Nicky’s hand, the damaged one, and pulled him in for a kiss.

“Want to go home?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said quietly.

“Dinner first,” she said giving him a little shake. “We’re flying out tomorrow morning.”

Dinner was short. The hotel restaurant-the award-winning hotel restaurant-was crowded. The place was known for being family friendly so they were surrounded by tables with children. That was generally okay, though Nicky was silent and winced every time a voice was raised. He said again that he wasn’t hungry so, impatiently, she took the menu out of his hand and ordered a steak for him, telling herself that he could use the iron.

When their meals arrived, he looked down at it and she cursed herself. His hand. He picked up the fork and he seemed to be able to hold it well enough but abruptly, he put it down again. He covered his nose and mouth with his right hand.

“Nicky?” she asked. He looked like he was about to throw up.

“You okay, Nick?” Tommy asked uneasily.

Nicky shook his head and got up, hurrying out of the restaurant. Both of them followed him, Tommy stopping to explain to the waiter that their friend wasn’t feeling well, that they’d be back shortly. Nicky was outside the hotel, leaning on a pillar. He was taking in slow, deep breaths. He straightened when he saw them.

“Sorry,” he said.

“What’s wrong with you?” Patty said harshly.

He blinked at her in surprise.

“You nearly threw up in there,” she said.

“I said I wasn’t hungry,” he muttered.

“So, you’re fine then,” she said. “Just your regular shithead self.”

“Yes,” he said with complete vitriol. “As regular as ever; ask anyone.”

“Nick,” Tommy said wearily.

“Look,” Nicky said. “I can’t tell you anything, okay?”

“It’s American military bullshit,” Tommy said. “What was that wee girl’s name? Tammy?”

“Tamara,” Nicky said, involuntarily.

He bit his lip and looked away. He looked so tired. He put his damaged hand up to his head.

“You want to go to bed?” Patty asked.

He said promptly, pretending cheer, “Can we ditch your husband first?”

She slipped her arms around him and he leaned into her side. It was frightening how thin he was.

“You bet,” she said.

Tommy smiled at the pair of them. He held out his room key and said, “I’m going to have my dinner.”

She waited until he’d gone inside before saying, “We’re just worried, Nicky.”

“I know,” he said taking off his glasses and rubbing his face.

"Are those glasses right?" she asked.

"They're just from a pharmacy," he said. "My other ones broke."

“So, who is this girl?” she asked. “Tamara? That’s pretty.”

“She’s just someone who worked in the same place,” he said. “She’s no one important.”

Patty didn’t think that was at all true but she just suggested he get some sleep. Second door on the left, she said, was the spare room. She didn’t wait; she went back to the restaurant.

Tommy said morosely, “See what I mean?”

“Did he say anything at all?” she asked. “Neil’s going to hit the roof when he sees him.”

“He said he’s been back from wherever he was for three weeks,” Tommy said. “He said something to this Tamara girl about getting debriefed but he’d only been at the hotel for a day so I don’t know where he was before that or why he didn’t call anyone.” He leaned forward and said very quietly, “She was a Lieutenant; she said she had resigned. She seemed pretty upset. It was about his hand, I think. I couldn’t hear everything. She kissed him goodbye. Just on his cheek. He wouldn’t tell me anything about her.”

“You said she had a crush on him,” Patty said.

“She’s a lot younger than Nick, love,” he said. “Late twenties, maybe? A little taller than him. Blonde.”

She dismissed the age difference completely; men were so stupid about things like that.

“Is it only a crush, though?” she asked.

“No,” he sighed. “She glowed at him.”

“Did he glow back?” she asked.

“No,” Tommy said. “He looked all moody and tragic, like he always does.”

This was true. No one did moody and tragic better than Nicky.

“He said she wasn’t anyone important,” Patty said.

Tommy shook his head, disagreeing. They finished their meals quickly and returned to their suite. Nicky’s door was shut and the light was off. She wondered if she should see if he was all right. Tommy shook his head.

“Leave him,” he said. “He doesn’t want to talk.”

She packed their luggage and went to bed, lying awake most of the night. Nicky was already up in the morning. She could hear the shower in his room; it went for ages. He came out as she was making tea. She smiled at him, though she was dismayed to see that he seemed to have slept as little as she had.

“Tea?” Patty asked. “We brought our own; Americans are useless at tea.”

He nodded, sitting down at the counter.

“You sleep okay?” she said, not looking at him.

“Fine,” said Nicky.

“You were never a good liar, Nicky,” Patty observed. “Your face gives you away every time.”

He shrugged.

“It’s noisy,” he said. “All the cars.”

He’d been somewhere without cars?

“Are you going to stay in Glasgow for a while?” she asked. “Your house is still being rented out.”

“I’m sure there’s a spare park bench somewhere,” he said.

“Or you can stay with us until we evict your tenants,” she pointed out. “You can’t stay with Neil; he’ll drive you crazy.” Crazier, she added silently. “And Andrew’s place is usually filled with refugees.”

Nicky looked like a refugee so he’d fit right in.

“Or I can rent somewhere,” he said. “Hotel, caravan, tent.”

“So, you’re not going to keep working for whoever these people are,” she said.

“No,” he said. His face had that tick in his cheek that said he was getting upset. “They made that pretty clear.”

“Glasgow has a physics department,” she said hopefully. “Or you could go back to Oxford. And Harry Griffith would snaffle you in an instant.”

“I couldn’t live in London,” Nicky murmured. “And Harry likes students; I hate students.”

Harry Griffith, as a drunken eighteen-year-old on his first day at Balliol, had decided within the first five minutes of meeting him that adopting the also new-to-Oxford young Scottish boy in the rooms opposite would be his greatest ever achievement. He was a Professor at Imperial College now. The genial Irishman was a Victorian-era type of eccentric and was adored by his students, who took it in turns to puppy sit the lunatic terrier dog that went with him everywhere. He was probably the only person who actually understood Nicky’s work. They’d co-authored papers and when together had raging arguments about language and mathematics and physics and philosophy, sometimes all at once. Patty had tried to read one of Nicky’s papers and gave up when she couldn’t get past the first sentence in the abstract. She planned to get Harry Griffith onto Nicky’s case as soon as they got him home. If anyone could get Nicky to stop this horrible introverted twitching, Harry could. Harry was great.

“Did Harry know where you were?” she asked suddenly.

“Yes,” Nicky said.

She hoped Harry Griffith drowned in a bog, the Irish bastard.

“He won’t tell you anything either,” Nicky said reading her mind.

Tommy came out of the bedroom.

“Breakfast?” he asked hopefully.

Tommy ruffled Nicky’s hair and they both pretended that he didn’t flinch away from the touch. She poured him a tea and he sipped it. Somewhere without sugar, she thought. He’d always taken sugar but he didn’t put any into the cup. Somewhere without cigarettes. He hadn’t smoked at all. Somewhere without coffee. He had lived on coffee before.

The airport was crowded and Nicky started to walk behind Tommy who, as usual, ploughed his way through without problems. They handed over their tickets and luggage, the woman on the counter raising an eyebrow when Nicky said he didn’t have anything. Patty pushed him into a window seat in the luxurious first class compartment. He kept on Tommy’s coat and he turned toward the window, shutting his eyes. He didn’t open them again until they were well over the Atlantic.

“Can I take your coat, sir?” the flight attendant asked immediately spotting that her prey was awake. She’d watched him, hovering whenever it seemed like he was stirring, the only passenger in first class that she hadn’t ministered to.

Nicky shook his head and looked out the window.

“It isn’t cold in here, you know,” Patty said amused at the woman’s pout of disappointment.

“I’m fine,” he said.

“Don’t think for a moment that I’m going to put up with this nonsense from you, Nicholas,” Patty said severely. “I didn’t put up with it at school and I haven’t done so since.”

He turned to her, his dark eyes narrowing.

“Nonsense?” he said flatly.

“All this ‘I’m fine’ crap,” she said. “You want to push people away, that’s dandy but it won’t stop us from worrying about you.”

“I know,” he muttered.

“What was this debrief that Tommy mentioned?” she asked very quietly.

“Nothing,” he said in denial. “It was nothing.”

“Three weeks of nothing,” she said.

Nicky leaned forward to look around her at Tommy, snoring gently in his seat across the aisle, giving him the Rush glare.

“They just wanted to talk to me,” Nicky said. “That’s all.”

“They,” repeated Patty. “Who are they? Are they why you look like you’ve not been fed properly for years? Why your damned hand …” She stopped biting her lip. “Nicky, what happened to you? Why can’t you tell us? It was a military thing? That’s who you were working for? Were you in Iraq or Afghanistan?”

That didn’t make sense; they had military hospitals and could have flown him back. They had food so why did he look like he’d not eaten properly since they last saw him?

“It’s classified, Patty,” he said faintly impatient. “I can’t tell you anything.”

“Do you want to?” she asked.

“No,” he said.

“You were always a selfish bastard, Nicky,” she said.

“Yes,” he replied simply.

He sank down in the seat and shut his eyes again. Patty still couldn’t think of the right word to describe how he looked. She watched him for a little before lifting up the arm of the seat and folding it back. She leaned over and put her arms around him, pulling him forward. Nicky opened his eyes for a moment and put his head on her shoulder. He didn’t wake up until the announcement that they were descending into Glasgow.

She could see Father Andrew, the tallest of the Rush boys, waiting for them. The whirligig moving around him could only be Neil. She wondered why the entire Rush clan hadn’t arrived with them but Andrew had probably convinced Neil that all of them descending on Nicky wasn’t a good idea. Nicky, still trailing in Tommy’s wake to get through the crowd, paused as he spotted his cousins.

Andrew pulled him into his arms, Neil hovering anxiously before taking his turn. She’d once seen Neil at work just as she’d once seen Nicky in a lecture. Harsh and uncompromising, totally realistic, shutting down disagreements with complete authority. Andrew wasn’t much different, though it was leavened by his training as a priest. He was supposed to be kind to people. But Andrew was also a lawyer and she’d seen him in court advocating on behalf of refugees. All of the Rush boys had the same hardheaded pragmatism. All of the family was like that except when it came to their prized clever boy. Neil fussed at Nicky who, of old, knew if he allowed it now he’d get it less later on.

Andrew came over, holding out his hand.

“I see Neil was right to be worried,” he said, trying to joke and failing.

“Yeah,” Tommy said shaking Andrew’s hand. “He has to be right once in his life.”

They all looked at Neil pointing a finger in Nicky's face. Nicky pulled back and looked down at his feet. He said something and Neil shook his head. He stepped back and made a frustrated I-give-up gesture.

Patty put her hand on Andrew’s arm.

“I know he looks bad,” she said. “His hand …” All of them glanced back at Nicky. His hands were in the pockets of Tommy’s coat. “But he’s been back from wherever he was for three weeks and he didn’t call you right away. I think that whatever’s upsetting him happened when he got back.”

Tommy put in what he heard about the debrief, whatever the debrief was. Andrew frowned over that but surprisingly shallow, picked up on the other bit of information.

“There was a girl?” he asked.

“And he’s as unwilling to talk about her as he was about Gloria,” Patty stressed.

“Billy will get it out of him,” Andrew said.

This was true but Billy was in prison.

“Harry Griffith knows where he was,” she said. “He said so this morning.”

“Bloody bog Irishman,” Andrew said with priestly tranquility. “Right then, best get him home.”

“He can stay with us,” Tommy offered. “We have the studio.”

Nicky opted for Andrew’s place. Avoiding Patty’s questions and no doubt, relying on Andrew’s authority to stop Neil harassing him too much. Tommy gave him a hug and said he’d come over in a couple of days. Patty kissed him and he whispered a thank you. Neil put his arm around Nicky’s shoulders and pulled him away. Andrew said to call him in the morning. As they got to the door, Nicky looked back at them and gave that sad, twitchy smile.

Heartbroken, that’s the word she’d been looking for.

He looked heartbroken.

FINIS